#eloquence about music is something i’ve got none of

[bandsanitizer]

congrats on 4K alison!! 🥳💛 also making playlists?? amazing. I love the idea so much!! so playlist idea, I’ve been really digging muke lately so maybe a muke inspired playlist? as far as music inspo goes i def think of kill my time as a muke song because of writing credits, also some classic pop punk like all time low and also songs from sounds good feels good, castaway for example is a song I associate with muke! I don’t really have a quote but I hope that’s enough for you to work with!!:)

hi!!!! thank you 💖 and thank you for sending in an ask!!! ahdjdjwkd muke. gotta love them. this one was fun to make! I really hope you like it!!!!

some background on the song choices if you care to know!

Check Yes, Juliet - so! this is definitely cos their cover of the song. and cos it has a sound that fits! and it’s feels like “let’s take on the world together and never look back” to me which is very 5sos and !!! muke !!! especially because I think the band really pushed them out of their comfort zones?

Kill My Time - because you specified it! and it feels very “now” muke... can’t really explain other than it feels like a very solid blend of CALM & YB with SGFG & self-titled. like sonically it has their various influences and tHE LYRICS?!?! anyways—it was written by muke and it definitely sounds/feels like that too!

Stella - I honestly CANNOT explain why but this is a muke song for me. idk if they’ve both mentioned it before or what but I’ve associated this song with michael and luke for SO LONG!!! I think part of it is that it sounds like a michael song and the name “Stella” means like “star” and luke reminds me of the word “star” so yeah... !!! and it carries “night out” vibes from Kill My Time

Where Did The Party Go - part 3 of the party vibes LOL lyrically it feels like observers of a party (rather than hardcore participants) and that’s the kind of people at the party muke are. in different ways, granted, but if they’re at a party where they don’t know people? I feel like they’re hiding in the kitchen or sitting on a couch or sitting on the porch. both part of the party and sorta just watching and then they meet each other and get lost in their little moment and it’s like “woah! where did the party go?”

Catch Fire - muke just reminds me of bright things: stars, suns, lights at a party or concert, etc etc. catch fire has that with the sort of ��get out of this town” vibe. which is both muke and 5sos—this feeling of being bigger than the town you’re in or just wanting more than the monotony you’ve got? and particular muke with this because it’s kind of about finding that spark which is something the band really gave them

Kids In Love - it feels vaguely like a sequel to Wrapped Around Your Finger (which is the muke song for me) with the summer love in the lyrics and just mayday parade seemed fitting for the playlist. also it reminds me of Castaway

If It Means A Lot To You - cos they covered it and it fits and I needed a ballad and like Kids In Love it reminds me of Castaway (thematically) ((and a little bit sonically))

Castaway - !!!! because you mentioned it and honestly I didn’t get it but now I do and just— ugh GUITAR BATTLES!!!!

Flights - okay so like I told myself I wouldn’t add songs just cos I like them but this one... it’s kinda twinkly? to me or it’s like seeing streetlights through the window as you’re driving at night. (sorry very specific and a bit obscure) but basically it’s reminiscent in the best way which kinda wraps up the previous songs on the places and spins a slightly hopeful note. sonically, I think it fits michael and luke

Drive - this one I’m not too confident about. sometimes it feels more cashton than muke but like... idk there’s something about muke sitting in a car, driving on a highway somewhere (Cali, I guess if we stick with the song) and just... vibing. I can’t explain it more than this feeling of realizing you’ve found a person to be quiet with. which is a twist to a lot of the earlier part of the playlist and I think for muke, it’s capturing michael and luke on a level above the antics they get into? like they wrote Wrapped together!!! their capacity for emotions that pour into music is just !!!

Backseat Serenade - back to the upbeat songs because we love atl in this house. also it’s a bit of a pun? or connection? cos Drive -> you drive cars -> cars have backseats -> Backseat Serenade! also the “dizzy hurricane” reminds me of The Only Reason and JBH which are michael songs and the lyrics also vaguely tie to the previous songs as a sort of reconnection/wanting one

Tear In My Heart - there’s stuff about driving in the bridge (yeah i’m very literal) and it’s one of the the few non-5sos songs that muke’s spotify playlists have in common. idk I just like the sentiment of the lyrics and this sort of agression to it? kinda firey? I guess? this one I really can’t explain but it’s here

Last Young Renegade - again with the atl cos why not? 🤷🏻‍♀️ a very nice closing lyrically (and sonically I think) and just... well there’s a lyric about “road” in there and just this sense of letting go and coming back and thE CHORUS!!! (also, while we’re here, alex gaskarth singing “darling”????) ((mICHAEL CALLING LUKE DARLING??? ok sorry)) basically this feels very summary-ish of the playlist and so it’s a good finale, I think

[soulprompts]

"𝐒𝐈𝐍𝐂𝐄𝐑𝐄𝐋𝐘 𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑𝐒" 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐌𝐏𝐓𝐒.

so i started listening to music, and reading poems, and my vibes were very shippy for a while, and then my sims got married so obviously that didn’t help??? anyway, none of these are written by me, aside from the third one. i saw them on insta or i read them in lyrics or smth, they’re incredibly romantic, very eloquent and passionate and sincere, so i hope you shippy angels like them!! as always, please DO NOT ADD ANY MORE PROMPTS TO THIS LIST!!! i will make more!! i am a simp!! 

“ you are half my soul. “

“ i wish i could tell you what you are to me. “

“ you say you’re dangerous. that you destroy everything you touch. so destroy me. ruin me. tear me apart, and let me love you all the same. “

“ our “almost” will always haunt me. “

“ only love can hurt like this. “

“ i just want you to be happy. if that’s with me or with someone else or with nobody... i just want you to be happy. “

“ i love you. i feel as though we were never strangers, you and i, not even for a moment. “

“ if anyone else were to kiss me, all they would taste is your name. “

“ the stars will go out before i forget you. “

“ i will love you if i never see you again, and i will love you if i see you every day. “

“ if i loved you less, i might be able to talk about it more. “

“ there’s nothing i wouldn’t do for you. “

“ i just realized i don’t care if they’re the most perfect person in the world. they’re not you. “

“ you know how i feel about you... you’ve always known. “

“ i forget every beauty in the universe, the moment you smile. “

“ i say it all the time, i just say it very very quietly. i tell you when you’re in another room, or right after we hang up the phone. i say it after you shut the door behind you. i say it in my head every time you look at me. i love you. of course i love you. i never stopped. “

“ i feel like a part of my soul has loved you since the beginning of everything. maybe we’re from the same star. “

“ my only hope is that one day i can love myself as much as i love you. “

“ in the space, the pause, between this breath and the one that follows, you have made a home in me. “ 

“ i loved the way you touched me with your eyes and felt me with mine. “

“ you’ve always seen me. and i think that’s all that anyone wants. seeing someone. really seeing someone. that’s love. “

“ you kissed my cheek. and then i knew, that you could be homesick for people, too. “

“ all i’ve known are temporary people, the leaving and the hoping, the begging someone to stay... so forgive me if i break apart when you say the word “forever”. “

“ sometimes i wonder if love is worth fighting for. and then i look at you and i’m ready for war. “

“ my darling, you will never be unloved by me. you are too well entangled in my soul. “

“ i climb into my bathtub the same way i’ll keep loving you; until my skin is wrinkled. “

“ and if i could ever ask for one more blessing in this life of mine, i’d pray for a thousand years to see you one more time. “

“ when i am near you, i finally know how it feels to breathe without worry, without caution. i just feel safe with you... “

“ you kissed me goodbye, but you never left. i’ve been seeing you every time i close my eyes. “

“ what cloud did you fall from? because you taste like stardust and eternity. “

“ all i know is, when i think of you, i feel like singing. and i feel like i could run miles to find you. all i’m sure of is, i love you, entirely as you are. “

“ i will never regret us, because you taught me i could love and be loved without the fear of loss. “

“ i wanna spend the rest of my sunsets with you. “

“ let’s do something crazy. like grow old together. let’s show everyone how to do forever. “

“ and i’m not afraid to love you. only afraid my love won’t be enough. “

“ the universe has existed for billions of years, and by chance, we ended up living at the same time. that counts for something. “

“ the sky exploded into a thousand moonbeams dazzling with stars, and as you stared quietly above, i couldn’t help but stare at you, falling in love. “

“ there is a little bit of you in all the words i write. maybe you’re the language of love my heart speaks. “

“ you deserve someone who isn’t okay with losing you. “

“ they named a black hole after you, and i’d be lying if i said you weren’t pulling me in. “

“ i thought i knew what love was, until i felt your arms around me, and realized what it truly was. “

“ i wish you were here. or... or i was there, or something... i don’t know. i just wish i was with you. “

[widgenstain]

I remembered this photoshoot/interview from 2015 (TIME FLIES) the other week, but couldn’t find a full version on my blog and since it’s behind a paywall, I’m posting the full article here under the Read More. 

It’s as I remembered, James Eloquent Bastard McAvoy gets to talk a lot and make great points about the art, while Andrew is a bit more in the background (with comments about his “skinny legs”, oh boy) but the video on the original article is lovely, it shows that they’re really all in the pic together and that my Celtic faves were actually talking to each other yusssss (also the description of Rory Kinnear cracked me up).

The drama kings

Theatrical tantrums or male bonding – what happened when Britain’s leading men got together for our photoshoot?

Ben Machell

Saturday April 04 2015, 6.58pm BST, The Times

What’s the collective noun for a roomful of actors? “A whinge,” says Russell Tovey.“A babble,” offers Tim Pigott-Smith. “A resting,” says Mark Gatiss, who then immediately changes his mind. “An ambition. No, a thrust! A thrust of actors!” he eventually decides, laughing. 

Keeping one eye on his peers, he leans in conspiratorially. “Can you smell the testosterone?” We’re in a photographer’s studio in north London and the actors – suited, booted, ready for their close-ups – sit around a long table, chatting, drinking coffee and cooing over Tovey’s French bulldog, Rocky.There really is no testosterone to smell. The atmosphere is relaxed and convivial, as if I’ve accidentally walked in on a poker night arranged for some of the best leading men of the British stage. It’s friendly. It’s fun. “Actors tend to be quite good at getting on with people,” says Bertie Carvel, who is tall, dark and thoughtful. “If you’re an arsehole, people don’t want to work with you. You won’t get hired.”Wait, hang on … actors can’t be arseholes? “Well, there are a few arseholes,” he concedes, but insists that none of them is here today. 

New faces wander into the studio and warm greetings are dispensed. Andrew Scott – an Olivier award winner in 2005 for his performance in the Royal Court’s A Girl in a Car with a Man – bear-hugs Carvel, himself a 2012 winner (Best Actor in a Musical) for his Miss Trunchbull in Matilda.

James McAvoy – three Olivier nominations and counting – arrives with his motorcycle helmet under one arm and gives out high-fives, while Rory Kinnear (two Oliviers, including Best Actor last year for his Iago) is more subdued, smiling and nodding at people in polite recognition, like a man at his wife’s office party.

A few moments later Michael Sheen walks in and mimes surprise at seeing Gatiss across the room. It transpires the two had arranged to meet for dinner tonight and then take in a show, but that neither had known the other was going to be here today. From a punter’s perspective, I say, there’s something quite nice about learning that.“Well, Mark and I have known each other for a long time,” says Sheen, explaining that, often as not, actors genuinely do end up being mates. “If you’ve spent six months doing the same theatre production night after night, and trying not to go insane, then that does bond you.��It’s been a bumper year for juicy male roles on the British stage, and those performances will be celebrated at next weekend’s Olivier Awards. Looking at these leading men, it begs the question: why, in 2015, do we have such a glut of theatrical talent?

To answer this, we first need to understand how the theatre has changed. Pigott-Smith, up for an Olivier for his lead role in King Charles III, has been working on stage for almost 50 years. “The profession is radically different today. All those old-fashioned images of the old actor laddie in a fedora with a trace of eye make-up have gone. When I started, it was much more hierarchical. Older actors were afforded a great deal more respect. But since then there’s been a democratisation that is very healthy.”

In other words, there is now less dead wood taking up space that could otherwise be filled by talented younger actors. This is in part because British theatre has been forced to become leaner, less complacent. “There’s not as much theatre around now,” says Pigott-Smith. “Which means there’s much more competition for less and less work.” This competition, in turn, raises everybody’s game. The result?A virtuous cycle of effort and ability.

Mark Strong talks about the undercurrent of competition that exists between actors. “It’s a complicated dynamic, a really odd balance,” he says. “Because you form these very, very tight relationships with people. They’re your pals, but then you’re also competing with them for work. There are a lot of us chasing a few jobs.”Strong – up for a 2015 Best Actor Olivier for Arthur Miller’s A View From the Bridge – suspects this competitive streak informs every performance he gives. “To be honest, I think I perform for my peers first and foremost. I don’t mean to belittle the audience, but it’s the other actors’ evaluation of my performance that I’m most interested in. We’re doing it for each other. We’re always trying to outdo each other, always trying to impress each other.”

I stand in the corner of the dressing room while some of them try on suits and have their hair and make-up done. Andrew Scott pulls a pair of trousers over his skinny legs and then frets about their length in the mirror. Gatiss charms the girls who are looking after the wardrobe and briefly flashes broad, hairy shoulders while changing shirts. Sheen sidles in carrying a slight paunch. He looks at the suits. “Anything that fits, I’m happy with.”

The hair and make-up people set about Sheen, McAvoy and Kinnear, who sit in a row, like three men at the barber’s. Sheen and McAvoy recently played on the same celebrity Soccer Aid football team, a team that happened to be coached by José Mourinho. It’s pretty obvious both men share a major man crush on the Chelsea manager. “I love him,” says McAvoy. “He texted me on Christmas Day,” says Sheen. Kinnear chips in: “What was he saying? ‘Stop texting me’?”

I grab McAvoy. For some reason, I can imagine him being a nightmare to play football against, niggly and ruthless. In person, he is confident and intense, especially when talking about the theatre. “I think it’s your job as a leading man to be first in, last out,” he says. “To work as hard as you possibly can. To identify the actor who is working hardest, and then work harder than them. Just to set the tone.”McAvoy – Olivier-nominated for his role as paranoid schizophrenic the 14th Earl of Gurney in The Ruling Class– has a theory about the enduring appeal of the stage.“The source of theatre is human sacrifice,” he says, looking me in the eye. “The first time we killed someone in front of a crowd to make the gods like us better, that’s where we got our theatre. And I think there’s still an element of that, when it’s frightening and electric, and you’re watching actors who are giving themselves in such a committed way that they are almost sweating blood. And that’s what I always try to do.”That sounds a bit extreme, I say. But then, he flashes, that’s his point. “I’d rather people went out twice a year to see a really good, dangerous piece of theatre in which they were genuinely concerned for the actor on stage, rather than just going to see loads of dead-easy bourgeois f***ing pieces of s***, the dead-easy stuff that gets put on just to sell out quickly.”

Bad theatre seems to physically upset McAvoy. “If you watch a bad film, you kind of just forget about it. It’s not such a headache. But a bad play? When I watch bad theatre, I feel like I’ve been hurt. I feel like someone has really annoyed me. Badly.” If this strikes you as a bit much, it’s nothing if not heartfelt. And it only reflects something that everyone I speak to emphasises, which is that actors – or these actors, anyway – genuinely love doing theatre work. It sounds like a luvvie thing to say, but then they are, in the nicest possible way, a bunch of luvvies. And besides, they all have their reasons. Matthew Macfadyen, for example, talks about appearing in Jeeves & Wooster in Perfect Nonsense last year. “I felt like I was doing a proper job.“I know that sounds ridiculous,” he says gently. “But I sort of felt nicely anonymous. You go in, you do your job, then go home. You’re not babied as much as you are in the TV business. You run into lots of people you’ve done jobs with in the past.” I say that makes it sound a bit like working on a building site. “It really is, yeah!” he says. “It’s lovely. I adore it.”

Nicholas Pinnock loves theatre work because of how close actors and audiences can get to one another, particularly given the present popularity of studio productions and theatre in the round. He’s currently starring in The Royale at the Bush, based on the story of early 20th-century African-American boxer Jack Johnson. “The other night there were two women on the front row crying,” he says. “Just because of the stuff we were doing on stage. It’s nice to be able to actually see those kinds of reactions. It gives you a different energy.”Does he ever worry about sounding a bit, well … thespy? He grins. “I got to a certain stage in my life when I stopped giving a f*** about what people thought. I can talk about acting all day long. I love it. It’s my job. Sometimes we fall into that cliché. But so what?”

One man who can’t talk all day about acting is Ralph Fiennes. He is the last actor to arrive at the studio, and his minder says that he has two minutes to answer questions. Everyone else hangs around, waiting for the final group shot, while Fiennes stands apart, looking out of the window.

So, I ask, what is it like when a load of actors all get together like this? He frowns. “I think it’s just like any group situation. You know you’re in the same business. But with a sense of recognition and common purpose,” he says in a voice that sounds a bit like the Prince of Wales. “Some of these people …” he starts, and then looks over at them. “I know Mark [Strong] a bit and I know Tim [Pigott-Smith] a little bit. But usually it’s a sense of easy camaraderie.”I ask him: what does looking at these people make you think about the present quality of British acting? “I think if you’re in a profession, you’re in it. It’s not often you’re taking a step back to think about it. That’s your job. A job for the critics and the journalists,” he says, and gives a tight laugh. Does he have any views on these other guys at all? “They are all actors I really admire,” he says, before being led across the studio to take centre stage in the shoot. 

After that I speak to Russell Tovey, who’s been in a few Olivier award-winning plays, notably The History Boys. He is lovely, with all the offhand openness of an Essex hairdresser. So, I ask, what it’s like when a load of actors get together like this? “We like to sit around and have a bitch and a whine about things.”Really?“ Yeah! Actors like to sit down and have a good moan. But that’s because we’re dramatic. Obviously, that’s not happening today,” he adds quickly. “We’re all happy. We’ve all got these lovely suits on. We’re all over the moon!”

He says that, at the end of the day, every actor here knows that he is very fortunate. “We’re in that rare percentage of guys who can turn down work and feel secure that something else will come along. I still s*** myself whenever I turn down a job because I’ve got so many actor mates who aren’t working at all. But I’m so lucky. I’ve bought a place. I’m paying a mortgage. I can go out and buy a pair of shoes and not worry about it.”But it’s not really about the shoes, he continues. It’s just that he’s completely in love with his job. And I think that, deep down, the same is true of everyone else in the room. They may be a bunch of luvvies but, lucky for us, they’re bloody good ones, too.“At the end of the day I love pretending to be someone else,” says Tovey. “I mean, in what other job can you scream and cry and then, at the end, have someone pat you on the back and say, ‘Well done’? I do it because I need it. I think we all do,” he says. “Psychoanalyse that.”

The 2015 Olivier Awards, presented by Lenny Henry, will take place at the Royal Opera House, London, on April 12 (olivierawards.com)

The line-up: who’s who

Standing, from left:

Mark Gatiss, 48.

About to star in new Donmar show The Vote with Dame Judi Dench and Catherine Tate, from April 24.

Tim Pigott-Smith, 68.

Nominated for Best Actor in 2015 for King Charles III at the Almeida and Wyndham’s theatres.

Julian Ovenden, 38.

Currently starring in Olivier Best Revival-nominated show, My Night With Reg at the Apollo until April 11.

Bertie Carvel, 37.

Won Best Actor in a Musical in 2012 as Miss Trunchbull in Matilda; about to star in Bakkai at the Almeida, with Ben Whishaw, from May 29.

Matthew Macfadyen, 40.

Starred in 2014’s Olivier Best New Comedy Jeeves & Wooster in Perfect Nonsense

Nicholas Pinnock, 41.

Playing a heavyweight boxer in The Royale, at the Bush Theatre until April 18.

Iwan Rheon, 29.

Won Best Supporting Actor in a Musical in 2010 for Spring Awakening.

Rolan Bell, 31.

Nominated for 2015 Olivier Best Actor in a Supporting Role in a Musical for his role in Memphis the Musical at the Shaftesbury Theatre.

Seated, from left:

Rory Kinnear, 37.

Won Best Actor Olivier in 2014 for Othello at the National. Stars in The Trial at the Young Vic from June 19.

Mark Strong, 51.

2015 Olivier Best Actor nominee for A View from the Bridge at the Young Vic. Run ends April 11.

Ralph Fiennes, 52.

Starring in Man and Superman at the National Theatre until May 17.

Russell Tovey, 33.

Starred in Olivier-winning play The History Boys, and The Pass at the Royal Court in 2014.

Andrew Scott, 38.

Won Outstanding Achievement Olivier for A Girl in a Car with a Man at the Royal Court in 2005.

James McAvoy, 35.

Nominated for Best Actor at the 2015 Olivier Awards for The Ruling Class which closes on April 11.

Michael Sheen, 46.

Has been nominated for a total of four Olivier Awards – for Amadeus, 

Look Back in Anger, Caligula and the Donmar Warehouse’s 2006 production of

Frost/Nixon. Played Hamlet at the Young Vic in 2011-12.

Jamie Campbell Bower, 26.

About to star in Bend It Like Beckham, playing the coach, Joe, at the Phoenix Theatre from May 15.

THE SHOOT

Styling

Jane Taylor-Hayhurst.

Grooming

Nicky Weir at Sarah Laird using MAC.

Hair

Craig Taylor at One Represents for Hari’s Salon SW3 using Kiehl’s.

Ralph Fiennes

Nathalie Eleni using MAC and Braun.

James McAvoy

Jennie Roberts at Stella Creative Artists using Paul Mitchell.

[haztory]

OK BUT THAT'S ME BEING AN IDIOT HAHAHHAHAHAHAHA drabble/sfw JAHAHHAHAHAHAH DAMN

““You better catch that fucking bouquet, babe. Our relationship is on the line!” + “You wanna go toe to toe with me, pretty boy?” with Bokuto for the loveliest Clara! from my writing event that is now closed!

warnings: adult langauge and that’s it!

a/n: i answered her previous ask for the quotes so i’m just posting the drabble here! thank you for your patience my love!!! i hope you like it <33333

bokuto koutarou x f!reader; (fluff, all the fluff and wedding shenanigans)

Bokuto loves weddings. They’re truly his weak spot. Ask him to attend and he’s there an hour early, regardless of whether you’re his best friend or his cousin twice removed. The man lives for a wedding.

He loves the sentimentality of the ceremony that never fails to make him teary-eyed and oppositely, he loves the liveliness of the reception, half tempted every time to push the DJ aside and take over the mixing of music with a drink in his hand and a sloppy yell. He’s a vivacious mess of mixed moods and energy, but truthfully, he’s the best date anyone could ever ask for.

The best attendee too, considering almost everyone wants him to be a groomsman. He usually can never say no, but this time, it wasn’t even a question; Especially not for Hinata.

But above all, he loves that every wedding he attends grants him ample opportunity to enter into the sanctity of his fantasies and imagine his own.

“Did ya see him up there?!” Atsumu barks with a hard laugh, one hand clutching his whiskey and another his suit-clad chest, “He was cryin’ more than the groom!”

Met with the boastful laughs of his fellow team members, all gathered in a scattered circle by the bar, Bokuto jokingly pushes the blond on his left with a loud scoff and a faux-defense tone.

“I held it in!”

 “I heard you sniffling when Sho finally entered the venue,” Sakusa says, pointing a finger at Bokuto with the same hand that held his own alcoholic drink, “Don’t lie.”

 The group erupts into even more scattered laughter, that of which Bokuto finally joins in. His suit jacket has long since been abandoned, and his sleeves are rolled up to his elbows as he holds his hands up in surrender, “What can I say? I love weddings!”

Throwing an arm around his shoulders, Meian joyfully says from beside him, “At least we’ll know now how you’ll be at your own.” His eyes waggle in accompaniment and Bokuto feels his cheeks start to ache from the intensity of his smile. 

“We’ll bring extra tissues!”

Flustered to the core, Bokuto dips his head in abnormal shyness— the likes of which have the entirety of his friend group leaning forward in curiosity, their own interested smiles painted on their faces.

Fascinating as it may be to see the loud and boisterous wing spiker reduced to flushed cheeks at the mention of marriage, it doesn’t take much to figure out why; Even if they didn’t know him as well as they did, it was more than clear as to the reason when Bokuto’s own gaze tries to covertly dart to the side. That of which they all notice and blatantly follow. 

Stood beside the table of the bride, there you stood in all of your sheer elegance laughing with a number of the bridesmaids, blissfully unaware of a loving gaze that was drawn much too heavily to your turned figure. Focused on the way your dress shimmers in the dim lighting and the way you speak amongst the other guests, Bokuto feels locked in the trace of your magnanimous presence. Shyness dissipating quickly and replaced with the overwhelming flutter in his stomach.

And, not for the first time this night, he wonders briefly what it would be like if it were you walking down the aisle; If instead of the sheer, shimmery dress that adorned you beautifully, you were wearing a white one.

As he watched with exuberant joy as one of his closest friends married the one he loved, he couldn’t help but imagine what it would be like if this were his wedding. If it were you walking down the aisle to the ethereal orchestra with your closest friends and family in attendance, all watching with eager rapture at your astounding beauty as he surely would be. But none of them, not a single one of them could ever compare to the intensity of his own stupefied gaze.

He’s imagined the scenario too often, felt tears prick the corner of his eyes every time, and he grows more excited each time he’s fantasized. But nothing gives him more butterflies than the thought of interlocking his hand with yours, placing his ring of eternal promise on your third finger, and avidly vow forever with you.

It’s not like he needs a wedding to promise that; He sees his future every time he looks at you—even if you have your back turned to him and are chatting away unsuspectingly with the fellow attendees.

 But a wedding would be nice, he thinks.

“That’s if he can get married,” Atsumu mutters into his glass cup and takes a long drink of his whiskey.

Bokuto, interrupted from his loving stare at the back of your head, snaps his own head to the blond with the speed to break necks. Eyebrows furrowed, fantasy ruined, and full offense coating his syllables, he exclaims, “Hey! What’s that supposed to mean?”

Shrugging his shoulder nonchalantly, Atsumu leans one elbow on the surface of the bar counter and swirls his drink around, “Ya keep sayin’ yer gonna do it, but how long’s it been? Seven, eight months? If you haven’t done it yet, yer not ever gonna.”

A quick flash of sternness settles into the eyes of their captain, his arm still wrapped around the shoulders of the slowly deflating wing spiker. “He’ll do it when he’s ready, Atsumu. There’s no need to rush something like that.”

Rolling his eyes, Sakusa chimes in from across the three men. Pointing his stare at Koutarou, who resembles a kicked puppy at this point, he sighs. Not one to expel too much effort in emotional comfort, he decides this one is worthy of some kind of attempt. Albeit a minimal one. 

 “Don’t listen to this idiot, Koutarou.”

“‘m jus’ sayin’. She won’t wait for long, man,” Atsumu shrugs his shoulders again, eyes flitting to his right. Out of the corner, Koutarou deflates even more— shoulders slumped and the corners of his mouth downturned noticeably. He huffs out a quiet laugh through his nose.

Step one, complete.

“Since when were you such an expert in what women want?” Sakusa snorts.

“I have experience, thank you very much!” 

“That’s hard to believe.”

Sticking his tongue out at Sakusa, he pointedly ignores the insult to his knowledge of the feminine desires and turns his attention to the subject matter at hand.

Atsumu knows what women, having dated quite a few in his years. More specifically, he knew what you want, considering one drunk evening you had wondered aloud— quite heartachingly in your alcoholic daze, he might add— if the boisterous wing spiker even wanted to marry you. Bokuto, in your words verbatim—

“He just always gets fidgety when I bring it up and I jus’ dunno if he even likes me anymore cause yesterday, he said that my dinner was just ‘okay’ when he always says that he really loves it. Do you know how that made me feel? How could he even want to marry me when I make just ‘okay’ food? Do you know how much he eats? How can he survive!”

And as the ever so loyal friend that Atsumu considers himself to be, who is never one to ever meddle in the business of others, decided it was only right of him to solve this slight problem himself.

By taunting Bokuto, of course. 

If only to make him take matters into his own hands and finally do what everyone has been waiting for. What he knew the poor man has been dying to do forever, considering he never shuts up about you.

And also, to finally have you stop drunk texting him, no matter how endearing he may find them to be.

“So,” Atsumu sings once more, ignoring the look of exasperation on Meian’s face and instead, zoning in on the face of despair before him, “what are ya waiting for?”

In his stupefied stare at the blond beside him, Bokuto finds his gaze once more being drawn back to your turned figure that stands right in his line of sight. Wearing that pretty dress that you face timed him to get his opinion on, smelling of sweet lavender and jasmine— his favorite perfume of yours— and the lip gloss that you begged him not to mess up. He didn’t listen, and truthfully, you hardly minded all that much.

What is he waiting for? He knows what he wants, so why hasn’t he done it yet?

What if you’re growing tired of how long he’s been waiting? What if you’re unhappy that your relationship hasn’t progressed to the next stage? Oh god, what if--

His mouth opens then closes, then opens once again, bottom lip jutting out in a pout. “I… I don’t know.”

“Do ya want to marry her?”

Bokuto nods eagerly, as though through the action alone he could dispel of any lingering doubt that ever had the audacity to pervade his thoughts, “Of course! I don’t want to be with anyone else.”

“Ya think she’s gonna say ‘no’?”

Looking at his two other teammates, who each have their own curiosities piqued at the line of questioning, he shakes his head with finality.

“No. At least, I don’t think so.”

“Then ya just need a push!” Placing his drink on the counter, Atsumu slaps his hand on the man’s shoulder, “How about this: If yer girl catches the bouquet, ya rip the band-aid and ya ask her—”

Stepping in once more, Meian chimes, “Don’t push him to do something he’s not ready for—”

“I ain’t pushin’! He’s got the ring already, right?”

“You do?” All eyes fall onto Bokuto, who stares with widened innocent stare at each of them. He quickly shoves his hand into his pocket, pulling out his fist to reveal a velvet box in his hand. 

“I’ve been carrying it with me every day for the past six months. I just didn’t know if I should do it.”

Three pairs of eyes stare blankly at the man before them. Sharing a quick look at one another, the message is translated seamlessly between each of them and voiced eloquently by Meian himself. Ever the efficient captain.

“Holy shit.”

“My friend,” Atsumu laughs, squeezing his hand on the broad shoulder of his closest friend. His smile, innocent enough to the passing gaze, holds that twinge of mischief that Bokuto has come to know rather intimately; A taunting smile that has been directed his way one too many times that usually never ends well.

“I dare ya to propose to yer girl if she catches that bouquet. If yer really a man, that is.”

Bokuto’s eye twitches, his features narrowed at the utterance of the dare, and that’s how Atsumu knows he’s got him in the bag. It has his own smile widening even further, as Bokuto’s face scrunches in suspicion, knowing full well that he could never resist a dare.

With the single word alone, long gone is the hesitancy and doubt that plagued the man just a moment before, and instead stands a man tall in his ushering of competition. A man who thrives off the challenge, especially wherever his teammate presented one. It’s almost startling how quickly he sheds his mopey behavior and embraces his natural presence, which overwhelms and overpowers everyone around them. 

Step two, done.

“And if she doesn’t?” Bokuto asks, smugness filtering his words as he entertains the notion— silently accepts the provocation laid before him and drastically alters himself in order to successfully combat it. 

In order to win.

Spotting the glint of devilry that grows in strength in the narrowing of Bokuto’s eyes, Atsumu smirks and meets it with one of his own. He’s got him, hook, line, and sinker.

“Ya break up.”

Bokuto reels backward physically, shaken from the competitive trance and staring at the man in grotesque shock. The kind that almost borders anger and offense. Huffing a breath through his nose, he takes a step forward, away from the present comfort of Meian and almost in accusation.

“Are you trying to ruin my life, blondie? You trying to go toe to toe with me, pretty boy?”

Atsumu laughs, holding his hands up in defense, “I’m tryna get ya married, big guy!” Shoving his hands into his pockets, hardly phased by the proximity in which the large man has entrenched onto his space, he shrugs once more, “That is… if yer man enough to take it.”

“Deal,” Bokuto says without hesitation, both incredibly and not at all to the surprise of the other two men who have been silently watching from the sidelines. Like a sudden reset, the tension that resided stiffly in the shoulders of Bokuto rescinds, and replaced is the confident, joyous man. 

A man who looks as though he’s won easy money and then some. 

Smiling widely, Bokuto turns in his place and begins a bold strut away from his friends. In the direction of his beloved, “Excuuuse me, gentlemen. I’m going to go teach my lady how to catch a bouquet.”

Meian and Kiyoomi step to the side, allowing enough space for Bokuto to walk through with the hint of laughter in their small smiles. 

Spinning on his heel and pointing his thumb at his chest, Bokuto exclaims proudly, “This time tomorrow, I will be a married man!”

“One wedding at a time, Kou.” Meian laughs at the retreating man, who is beaming from head to toe.

“Better train ‘er good, big guy! Or else I might be the next one to propose to her!” Atsumu calls out as Bokuto gets closer and closer towards your turned figure.

“I’ll kill you!” He calls back, hearing the echoing laughter diminish as he finally steps beside you.

Turning from the conversation with one of the bridesmaids to the new presence, you shine beautifully upon recognizing who it is, and Bokuto feels his resolve grow almost stronger.

“Hi baby,” You coo, instinctually placing your hand into his and leaning up to place a kiss on his cheek when he quickly presents it to you, “Did you have fun with the boys?”

Wrapping his arm around your waist and pulling you closer, he places his own kiss on your cheek, humming against the surface of the skin yet making no move to part from you. “Mhmm. Just missed you.”

You laugh, rubbing your hand on his arm, “You were only gone for a couple minutes, Kou.”

Trailing his lips downward, he nuzzles himself into your neck, inhaling deeply. Lavender and jasmine. His favorite scent.

The one he wants to smell for the rest of his life.

“Ten minutes is too long.”

If possible, he manages to pull you even tighter against him. Two strong arms wrapping around you, pulling your chest into his and squeezing you tightly. Lovingly and entirely too comforting. Home.

You return the embrace eagerly, holding him to you equally as tight, “You’re right. It was starting to get boring without you.”

His hand, warm and large against the small of your back, rubs the surface up and down before he pulls back slightly, if only to look at your face in its entirety and the lip gloss you have unfortunately reapplied.

“You’re gonna do the bouquet toss, right?”

You raise an eyebrow, “I usually do. Why?”

He glances to the side, avoiding your inquiring stare. He raises a hand from your waist, rubbing the back of his neck with an embarrassed smile, “Maybe we should go outside, and I can throw a couple of rocks at you. Just to practice your catching skills.”

“Kou— “

“Can’t have anyone disrespecting you on the floor, can we? We gotta let everyone know you’re a winner! Cause you’re my girl, and whoever disrespects you, disrespects me! You know? So, you better catch that fucking bouquet. I mean, our relationship is on the line, here!”

“Koutarou—” From the tone in which you say his name, he knows he’s not making any sense. You’re confused, incredibly so, and he can’t blame you. Truthfully, he doesn’t even know what he’s saying, only that he has a goal, and he has to make you see it without revealing himself entirely.

 “I mean, only if you want to. It just… means a lot to me, and I want you to say yes, because I love you. And if you win, I win in a lot of ways. And I want to win with you, for the rest of our lives.”

Realizing almost entirely too late that he was talking with duplicity that you have most certainly caught on towards, he decides there is a good place to stop talking entirely. Oh god, he’s such an idiot. What was he thinking? He can never hide anything from you!

If you couldn’t tell from the way he was talking in metaphors, you could most definitely see it from the way in which sweat beads at the top of his forehead.

Your eyes flicker from each of his, your warm palms cupping the sides of his face as you watch him with concern.

“Baby,” You breathe out, voice steady and calm as you watch his resolve slowly crack under your watchful stare, “Did you want to talk to me about something?”

He tried desperately to remind himself that he has a mission to accomplish, that there was a dare that Atsumu had challenged him to that he must complete—but it’s you. You’re the trump card, the weakness in his defense, his priority above all else. He could never hide anything from you because you would catch him in a quick minute. And truthfully, he doesn’t want to hide anything from you.

It was easy to hide the ring under the guise of waiting for the perfect time, a mental barrier that he could excuse as a good cause behind his hesitancy, but now that he’s accepted a dare that is forcing him to put his desires to immediate use, he can hardly wait for the bouquet toss to arrive.

He’s got to do it now. The time is right, it will never be more perfect. You look beautiful, you’re held tightly in his arms, and he’s never been more convinced of the fact that he loves you. Why has he even waited this long?

He has to do it—Atsumu be damned.

“Marry me.” 

**

Extra:

“You really think she’s going to catch it?” Meian asks Atsumu, as they both watch from afar the way Bokuto wraps himself around your body, nuzzling unabashedly into you.

Atsumu scoffs, “Hell no. Girl can’t catch fer shit.”

Furrowing his brows, Meian stares at the blond with intense confusion, “Then why did you—”

“Just had to plant the idea in his head. He’ll do it soon, jus’ give it a minute.”

The two watch you both silently, noticing the way in which Bokuto pulls away from you and starts to speak rapidly. Neither of them can hear what he’s saying, but they can see his lips moving. More importantly, can see the way in which you stare in perplexion.

Then finally, his lips stop moving and your hands cup his face. The setter and captain feel their breaths hitch and they both lean forward if only to see if they can read the wing spiker’s lips from where they stand.

They can. And from the way you respond with a laugh and an eager kiss, they know it worked.

Looking to Meian, Atsumu raises his brow with a smile, “Told ya!”

end note: to everyone who sent a request, it is on it’s way! i just don’t know the definition of a drabble and instead make 3k long fics, so that’s fun. 

[kindness-ricochets]

I’ve been seeing a lot of thoughts and hc of autistic wylan lately and you seem to also be a fan of the concept. May I ask why? Exactly? I could definitely kinda see it but wanna hear you thoughts you’re always so eloquent

Hey there anon! Sorry for the delay—I’m guessing you already found an answer to this elsewhere while I was off Tumblr for a bit, but just in case, here are my thoughts. This will be heavily personal, but… well, you can’t very well ask an autistic person about autism and expect neutrality!

Autism is different for everyone and can be difficult to pin down, so while Wylan is arguably autistic, he misses several beats that for me would have made him definitively and undeniably autistic. For example, when the bells start to ring, triggering black protocol—I work in a place with a lot of bells and am frequently caught too close to one and normally press my hands over my ears until it’s over because that sound is like shrapnel raking across my insides. All of them. Not just the ear and brain parts. Wylan doesn’t have that sort of visceral reaction, but that may just mean he doesn’t have the same sensitivities that I do, or to the same level. He also never, that I recall, eats meat—as weird as that might sound, eating meat is incredibly complicated with heightened sensitivities to taste and texture. I’m not sure how old I was when I realized it was strange to get up from the table to spit out my food because it viscerally repulsed me. So it might be that Wylan is autistic and has different experiences than I do. Those are things I would include in a story as major indicators of a character being autistic. This might also mean that his father’s way of raising him taught him to hide unusual reactions and stimming behaviors. It’s not that much of a reach to assume a man who tried to abuse the dyslexia out of his son would take the same approach to autism. (More on autism and abuse later.)

So while I’m going to lay out why I read Wylan as autistic, that’s why I think it’s valid to read him as not being autistic as well. Both are valid.

A final caveat, I am well overdue for a reread of the books, so I likely left something out or could have found better examples. Take this as a few of my reasons for a personal headcanon. Anyone who feels differently, that's fine! We can each read things our own way :)

1 - Hyperfixation: The way Wylan loves music

Most of the Crows’ backgrounds color how they see the world: Kaz’s shrewdness, Matthias’s tactical thinking and superstition, Inej’s faith and Suli wisdom, etc. That’s a sign of good character writing. But very little of Wylan’s upbringing seems to have influenced how he sees the world. It comes closest when he thinks about how his father would scorn his new friends, but we never see that scorn from Wylan.

The way a hyperfixation feels, it’s like you’ve always lived in a close parallel world, never fully been a part of the other one where it seems like everyone else lives, but suddenly there’s this bright shining piece of your soul laced through the other world. It lets you connect, it lets you exist in their realm, and you can’t help but filter everything new through that lens because it’s the brightest, most wonderful thing. (I had been between hyperfixations for a while when I started a new job; six months into that work, I read Crooked Kingdom. One of my coworkers thought I had fallen in love, it was that marked a difference.)

So, combining these: Wylan never really acts like he was part of his father’s world, and indeed is in some ways separate from the other Crows, but he parses everything through music, his hyperfixation. He sets words to music to remember them, like he does with the contract. Even his own anxiety is made sense of through music, when in his first narrated chapter, he sets it to music: what am I doing here what am I doing here…. When he’s overwhelmed, his thoughts are “a jangle of misplayed chords”. The Crows have backgrounds that influence how they react to the world, but Wylan’s hyperfixation is his means of experiencing and understanding the world.

2 - Literal thinking: Wylan responds to exact words

In this post, I went into detail on the line where Wylan suggested waking up men to kill them. Wylan is generally unsupportive of killing people—Oomen, Smeet’s clerk, his father… he advocates not-murder in each of these situations. Accepting his aversion to murder, his suggestion to wake men up and kill them seems like a genuine reaction to Jesper saying he doesn’t want to kill unconscious men. Wylan takes things literally.

This happens the most with Jesper, probably because Jesper talks to Wylan the most. Nina and Matthias don’t really register him past how he might be useful, Inej is usually quite direct, and Kaz is very deliberate when he speaks with Wylan. This really interests me because Kaz tends to vary his speech more than the others do, he adapts more to being around other people. He jokes a little with Jesper, spars with Nina, speaks more openly and more sharply with Inej, and he’s precise with Wylan. Kaz may not know what autism is, but he recognizes what’s effective with Wylan.

Another example is when Wylan is sketching the Ice Court plans and Jesper says it looks like a cake. There are plenty of valid responses here: pointing out that concentric circles look like lots of things, that it’s just a sketch, telling Jesper to stop looking over his shoulder. Instead, Wylan says that the Ice Court is sort of like a cake. That… doesn’t sound like something Wylan would normally say. He’s not addressing the whole situation, he’s addressing the specific words Jesper said.

One of the most heartbreaking examples of this (to me, anyway) is with Marya. Wylan does the same thing with his mother, when she asks if he’s there for her money and says she hasn’t got any, and his response is, “I don’t either.” We understand as readers that what Marya is communicating here is that she is so accustomed to being utterly ignored unless she is being used, and if she told Wylan that no one visited but to take advantage and she assumed he was here for the same reason, he would say it wasn’t the case. But he just responds to the immediate statement.

There are a lot of examples of this.

3 — 0% perception, 100% creativity

Wylan can identify things that don’t make sense or that he doesn’t understand, but at the beginning of the series he can’t make leaps, only ask questions. On the Ferolind, he wonders about the source of water at the Ice Court; though Kaz doesn’t say as much, he was clearly wondering, too, because he eventually figured out the underground river. There’s an interesting parallel here where, in the beginning of Crooked Kingdom, Wylan asks a question about how they’ll break into Smeet’s and Kaz tells him to use his eyes instead of running his mouth—at which point Wylan is able to figure it out. I don’t think this is because he never tried before, though, but because no one ever bothered to teach him. Kaz can be harsh but he gives harsh corrections rather than harsh rejections and Wylan learns from him.

It’s hard to understand the world for people with autism. The world is designed and run by and for people whose minds are fundamentally different from ours, whose thoughts and experiences are unlike ours. Imagine trying to learn English or Spanish or Mandarin or any other spoken language if your first language was olfactory. That’s sort of what it’s like for someone with autism to just get dropped into the world and expected to figure this out.

This can be attributed to Wylan’s upbringing, but I disagree with that because none of the others were brought up in the Barrel, either, and Wylan doesn’t understand trade or politics with any special skill. Kaz wasn’t born in the Barrel, but he managed to go from “stealing is wrong” to “wrong isn’t my concern” real quick; Colm Fahey didn’t raise his son on gambling and firefights; the Ghafas never expected their daughter to be away from the family. Only Nina has relevant training—and even that’s precious little, she left school way too early. The others figured it out; Wylan needed a bit more help. He also seems surprised by the way his father conducts business. Wylan takes things on face value—like the time he’s surprised someone would do something, simply because it’s unlawful. This is something he expresses to a group of gangsters. He’s never been taught the way of any world and these things are not intuitive to him.

But Wylan isn’t stupid.

He doesn’t know how to understand the world, but he does understand how things go together. Given a pointy diamond, a handle, and a screw, he cut through Grisha glass. He carries flashbangs and magic napalm, he recreates military hardware—Wylan understands how to make things interact for a specific result. But to me the most telling thing isn’t just that he puts together chemical pieces, it’s that he figured out Jesper controlled bullets. He saw the pieces and put them together.

Wylan can understand when things don’t make sense, but he can’t make sense of them—yet when he understands things at their basic level, he understands them without preconception, for what they are. This is a very autistic way of thinking about things, it goes back to the literalism. He can’t make the leaps of logic other people can, but he also doesn’t make the assumptions they do—“I’ve never heard of a bullet Grisha, so that’s not a thing” vs “Well Jesper’s an almost impossibly good shot and he controls metal and bullets are metal, so why not?”

4 - Broken brain/body connection

Wylan’s great at chemistry and drawing and playing flute or piano—but he’s something of a disaster other times. This is in particular contrast to the other characters, all of whom are physically adept. Meanwhile it’s a challenge for Wylan to climb a rope ladder and he spends a full paragraph trying to figure out what to do with his hands. It’s easy to say, well, he’s used to a sedentary lifestyle, but at this point he’s not. He’s worked in the tannery for months. He’s just physically awkward.

I have less to say on this point only because it’s about something I don’t fully understand myself. I don’t really understand what it would be like to have a body that just… does things? Like normal stuff? Without tics and stims. No idea. Only that Wylan’s discomfort in and seeming lack of mastery of his own body feels very relatable to me.

5 - Abuse

One of the most familiar things about Wylan is how he has been so thoroughly abused and broken down that he’s afraid to do or say much of anything. Again, this is a place his background can be an obscuring factor. Of course Wylan didn’t think to blow up the walls when the first met the parem-juiced jurda and got trapped, he’s a spoiled rich kid! Except, he also startled when Jesper said his name later. Wylan didn’t hesitate because he was spoiled, he hesitated because he had no confidence.

He also thinks Kaz would laugh at him for playing music at his mother’s grave. Now, personally, I can’t see Kaz laughing at Wylan—being indifferent, thinking it’s pointless sentimentality, shaking his head, maybe commenting sharply that they need to go if they don’t have the time. But not laughing. Kaz is a snarky, sharp-edged jerk sometimes, but he doesn’t go out of his way to criticize, he just lets people know when they inconvenience him.

Wylan has been trained to identify attention as negative by an overbearing abusive father who literally saw him as less favorable than a demon. Now, that may have been hyperbole, but Jan criticized everything he could about Wylan—art, music, emotion—and made clear that he was worthless and competent to nothing. (Jan Van Eck can suck a rotten donkey dick but that’s neither here nor there.)

A lot of people with autism experience levels of bullying that have similar impacts. Or as the kids these days are calling it: we go to school. We go to school where we are weird. Where we look weird and move weird and talk about weird things and there’s a whole little bevy of asswipes to makes sure we know it. I got teased more for playing Pokemon and sitting alone reading than the kid who pissed himself onstage at assembly. (This was before Pokemon was cool. I’m old.) And that is not unusual for autistic kids. It’s also not unusual for this to be compounded by relatives or even parents who may be trying to help but don’t understand and can make things even harder.

So we can’t read social cues and we’re taught at a vicious age that everything that comes naturally to us is wrong. Imagine trying to interact in society with that background. There is no guide and most advice from neurotypical people isn’t actually what they mean. It breaks you down.

Wylan’s anxiety isn’t definitive of autism, but isn’t something that was incredibly familiar as someone whose neurodivergent experiences created a strong level of anxiety.

6 — High Compassion, Low Social Competence

Wylan isn’t very good at making friends. In fact, none of the Crows likes him much in the beginning, and only some of them soften toward him by the end. (Matthias and Nina come to respect his skills as a chemist but neither seems to particularly like him.) But you can see throughout the books that Wylan wants to connect with them and be one of them, he just… isn’t. He’s off-beat. He’s weird. He asks questions and mimics behaviors (trying to be cool and tough like Jesper, saying “mission” like Matthias does, imitating Kaz’s scheming face) but he doesn’t quite get how to adapt.

But he still cares about people. Not just them. Everyone. He cares about the people they leave in the ditch outside the prison wagon, he cares about Hanna Smeet, he cares about Alys. He cares about the people who’ll take a hit from Kaz’s sugar caper.

Wylan’s awkward social skills have undeniable big autism energy. I posit his compassion does as well. This is simply who Wylan is, and that means being someone who cares about everyone. I have nothing to back up that this is related to autism. I can say that it’s like me. (Not to brag.) I can’t turn off the part of my brain that says everyone matters. Individuals can opt out of that compassion, but they have it by default. There’s a certain agony in feeling a pull toward and love for just about everyone and yet an inability to develop meaningful connections with them, and that keen loneliness… it just burns.

Again, it’s not definitive of autism, but it’s very similar to an autistic experience.

I said in the beginning that I didn’t think Wylan certainly had autism and I stand by that, but he is a powerfully honest reflection of many people who do. So he can be understood to have autism, and that’s part of the reason some people have that headcanon.

[creativeashproductions]

Curiosity // Luke Patterson

Summary: After filling up another journal designed his songbook Luke is left empty handed. With the offer to a shelf of blanket journals is given he’s immediately choosing. But Luke’s curiosity leads him to a discovery. In other words Luke finds Perfect Harmony in Reader’s bedroom.

Requested: Yes by @averyharrypotterlife​ 

Warnings: None.

Words: 1.7 (including lyrics)

A/N: Thank you from the bottom of my heart for the 5000+ followers whether it was years ago and you didn’t unfollow or in the future. Thank you for enjoying and interacting in something I’ve always loved: writing.

TO BE TAGGED SEND AN INBOX PLEASE!

Masterlist

Luke’s always been a curious person going as far back as his early childhood. The most consistent evidence being during the Christmas holidays. Until he was ten, yes, he’s aware that his friends stopped believing in Santa way earlier. The young lad would stay up hidden in the living room waiting to catch Santa. Without fail, Luke would wake up in his outer space planet sheets having fallen asleep in his mission.

When he was twelve years old, he was left at his aunt and uncle’s house for the weekend due to a work-related thing. His older cousin was eighteen at the time and at college, so Luke stayed in his bedroom. Luke couldn’t help but snoop through Bryan’s personal items, and in a drawer with a false bottom, he discovered magazines.

Luke had a lot of fun that weekend diligently going through the magazines his mother would skin his hide even knowing about them. He may have had to use the excuse of having a cold for the entire box of Kleenex missing. No one was the wiser on that weekend.

Now when Luke was fourteen years old, he had snuck into the Rated R film Candyman with Alex and Reggie. Luke’s parents had been strict in their rules and definitely had shot down the question of seeing the film. The three didn’t sleep with the lights out for a month after that, and the truth came out when no lie was sufficient to their concerned parents.

Luke Patterson didn’t care about boundaries. Why ask for permission when you can just ask for forgiveness? It worked with going through Julie’s dream box, but all personal items got hidden from the ghostly guitarist.

“No!” Luke exclaimed flipping through his song journal once more in hopes of a blank page. The frustration in his body snapping the pencil he had been using.

“You good?” You questioned glancing up from the essay you graded as a teacher’s assistant for an AP course. Luke’s frustrated brown met yours with a cute pout on his lips.

“I’ve filled my journal up. I hate using loose-leaf, but no money means no buying things.” Luke roughly scrubbed one hand on his face.

“You could always just forever borrow one from the- “Luke quickly shot that down with a look of absolute horror, “Okay…so stealing a no.”

“I did listen to my parents on certain aspects. I would never steal anything, other than the food when we didn’t have enough cash.” Luke’s brown hue had softened back into the hazel that caused flutters in your heart, “I have no respect for thieves.”

You nodded before scribbling a suggestion on the paper in dark red, “I have a shelf in my room dedicated solely to blank journals. If you want to, you can take one free of charge.”

With a quick smile, Luke disappeared from the room to your personal domain he sometimes hung out with you in. You had no misgivings on the teen finding solace in your room and gave him free rein; your prized possessions hidden very well.

Luke appeared in the soft blue and lilac bedroom with the queen white iron wrought style bed in the middle. A white desk in the corner with a multitude of bookcases and shelves in the room. The desk chair neatly pushed into the desk as well he went straight to the shelf.

Journals of all colours and styles with a label on the shelf noting them as empty. It was packed with dozens, but it was the midnight blue one that called to the boy. In his reach, he bumped an emerald green one off the edge. It opened having hit the edge of the desk.

As he leaned down, he noticed notations in the margins, now remember how Luke is a curious guy? He only hesitated a second before he was reading the pages of words in your signature script.

The guilt flared for a second before he justified it as being on the shelf you declared free game. So Luke settled sitting criss-cross against the side of your bed reading the words so eloquently written. Even notes allowed Luke to hear the melody in his mind.

Assignment: Write a piece of literature from two points of views. Genre doesn’t matter as long as it is a minimum of one page and not exceed eight.

Step into my world

Bittersweet love story ’bout a girl

Shook me to the core

Voice like an angel

I’ve never heard before

The words took his breath away, recalling a moment he gushed to Alex on how he had caught you singing. He had described your voice as being angelic, and it took him by complete surprise. He remembered Julie, and you entered the room shortly after with a nervous feeling if you had heard. Now Luke had his answer. His phantom heart pounded in anticipation for the reply to this first point of view.

Here in front of me

They’re shining so much brighter

Than I have ever seen

Life can be so mean

But when he goes, I know he doesn’t leave

The smile threatened to split his face with the elation as he continued reading with a subconscious hum. His fingers tapping the sides of the paper as his hazel irises tinged green ate up the words.

The truth is finally breaking through

Two worlds collide when I’m with you

Our voices rise and soar so high

We come to life when we’re

In perfect harmony

Whoa-oa-oa, whoa-oa-oa

Perfect harmony

Whoa-oa-oa, whoa-oa-oa

Perfect harmony

The world faded as Luke distinctly heard your angelic voice singing the parts he could easily recognize as perfect for you. There was something so powerful in this incredibly personal song only intended for your eyes and your teachers.

The next handful of lines left him breathless and astonished as he visualized not sitting across from each other. But engaging in another art form that can be so incredibly intimate for people; he imagined singing this while holding you in his arms.

You set me free

You and me together is more than chemistry

Love me as I am

I’ll hold your music here inside my hands

We say we’re friends, we play pretend

You’re more to me, we’re everything

Our voices rise and soar so high

 We come to life when we’re

 In perfect harmony

 Whoa-oa-oa, whoa-oa-oa

 Perfect harmony

 Whoa-oa-oa, whoa-oa-oa

 Perfect harmony

Luke went from humming to softly singing to the heartfelt tune with a flutter of butterflies deep in his stomach. When Julie saw Unsaid Emily, he had denied it as an experiment, and it was the truth. Luke wrote rock anthems and rock-pop with his living friend. He never dabbled into romantic ones.

He’d never read something so poetically beautiful it felt him weeping at the sheer amount of feelings.

I feel your rhythm in my heart

Yeah yeah yeah

You are my brightest burning star

Whoah whoah oh

I never knew a love so real (so real)

We’re heaven on earth

Melody and words

When we’re together we’re

In perfect harmony

Whoa-oa-oa, whoa-oa-oa

Perfect harmony

Whoa-oa-oa, whoa-oa-oa

We say we’re friends (we play pretend)

You’re more to me (we create)

Perfect harmony

His eyes found the last line of the song setting him back in a dead silence returning to the start to reread it. On his third read, he found the notes from your teacher on a separate page.

Y/N, in my years of teaching, I’ve never read something with such meaning behind it. The longing, passion, respect and love you artfully encapsulated is rare. To have written, this means you’ve felt this. No corrects needed, and I felt compelled to not mark on the piece. Thank you for being vulnerable with me, for letting me step inside your mind and please never let this emotion fade.

Your grade is A+.

Luke’s lips pulled apart at the genuine words your teacher had written because it indeed was a word of art. Carefully Luke returned the notebook back to the shelf to retrieve the blue one that caught his attention. AS he turned, he found you leaning against the door frame with a soft smile.

“I am so sor-“

“No.” You replied, walking into the room, “You’ve got nothing to be sorry for. I told you any notebook on that shelf. I can’t get mad, and I’ve seen you can’t leave something half-read.”

“Probably why my book reports were insanely well done in school.” Luke joked as you stepped in his personal space. The tension faded from his shoulders as he took in your features, “You got a perfect grade.”

“I did.” You simply spoke, staring up into his eyes, “You helped me with it.”

“How?”

“You told Alex what you felt about my voice. You looked nervous when I walked in, so I let it go. It wasn’t the time to bring it up. It’s called Perfect Harmony.” You told the ghost gently grazing your fingertips on his hand. The feeling sends shudders down his spine.

“I guess it just wasn’t the right time. With the band and-“

“-the whole soul owning thing. Too much but now that you’ve read that…what do you feel?” You hesitantly asked because reading it and discovering how someone feels is another to if the feelings are reciprocated back.

“That I was always meant to live in 2020. That I was meant to love you with every atom in my very being.” Luke murmured before he crashed his lips onto your own in a searing kiss that had your toe-curling.

The midnight blue journal dropped to the floor as his large calloused hands cupped your face to feel the warmth. The very journal would be filled with songs all about this person, Luke adored not matter his state as a ghost. Two worlds collided just as two souls came together in perfect harmony.

So, wrapped up in each other Luke didn’t notice something magical encased in the warm love. In the bedroom, the two teens were kissing in had two distinct heartbeats with a glow emanating from Luke Patterson.

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[the-purity-pen]

All My Life

Pairing: Marcus Moreno x Fem!Reader

Rating: G (for now) Warning: None. Just a lot of pining. Word Count: 2,144 A/N: I threw this idea out like over a month ago to you all after watching the movie and you all loved it! I’ve finally finished the first part of this story! I hope you all enjoy!

“Marcus and Missy Moreno Save the World Again”

The headline dashed across the bottom of your television screen as clips of the Heroics defeating an invading robotic alien flashed on the screen. The news reporters were rambling on about the details of the attack and how the Morenos and the others had stopped the invaders.

The smile on your face as you packed your suitcase was undeniable. It was wonderful to see the next generation of Heroics take over. Especially after your own departure from the original gang. You hadn’t kept in straight contact with many of them aside from Jasmine and Alana.

They both had been texting you for the last week to ensure you were actually going to attend the reunion. You didn’t know why they were so insistent on you going but you’d absolutely be lying to say you weren’t excited to get back together and have something other than work to focus on.

Becoming a consultant for recruiting new Heroics wasn’t always a glamorous job and your deadlines for meeting quotas were constantly breathing down your neck. But knowing that you were still making an impact even if your powers were mostly underwraps and not used in a big way, was enough to make your job and your move all those years ago worth it.

Your phone buzzed as you attempted to zip the suitcase, pushing down with your entire body weight to try to slide the metal zipper. You grunted and puffed air up out of your mouth and shook your head. You should know better than to overpack but you were trying to make sure you were prepared for anything for the weekend that you’d be back home.

You took a sharp breath in and reached for your phone where it sat on your nightstand. Seeing the messages flying in from Jasmine and Alana made you laugh. They were both gushing about how Marcus looked on the newsreel and Jasmine in particular was mentioning that he was looking better with age and that if you didn’t try to snag him at the reunion that she would seize her opportunity.

“Seriously? He just uses those arms like that?”

“I swear if he comes to the reunion in that vest…”

“Can you imagine what he looks like now that he’s so stacked?”

Your fingers flew across the screen telling them both to calm down and that Marcus, the last thing you knew, was married. Alana was quick to jump in and inform you that Marcus’s wife had passed away just a few years ago. Your heart immediately sank upon reading that message. Despite the years and the way life had separated you, your heart still cared for Marcus.

You had lost your husband to infidelity but losing a significant other in the way Marcus did? Your heart panged as you texted the girls that there was absolutely no way you'd be able to "jump on that" as Jasmine had to eloquently put it. It wouldn't be right. You were just excited to see him and everyone else and catch up on life.

You finally won the fight against the zipper of your suitcase and pulled it onto the floor. You ran through your checklist one last time before deciding you were ready. You placed your carry-on on top of the suitcase and with your phone and keys in hand, you left the house and made your way to the airport.

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

“Daaaad, seriously,” Missy groaned with a grin attached to her face. The young girl got up from the edge of her father’s bed and stood in front of him by the mirror. Her small hands came up to cover her father’s larger ones as she stopped him from fidgeting with the tie.

“You look fine,” she reassured him, again. She tugged on the tie to straighten as Marcus looked down at her and sighed. For a teenage girl, Missy seemed to have her life more together than Marcus at times.

“If you say so. Doesn’t make me feel fine,” Marcus admitted to his daughter. Ever since his wife had died, Missy had become his focus and when he had to rejoin the Heroics, he did it to protect her. Everything was for her. So having a night out for just him was odd.

“What are you nervous about? That everyone is going to know that we saved the world again?” Missy laughed and Marcus cracked a grin, shaking his head softly.

“That I’ll bump into people I haven’t seen in years and they’ll think differently of me,” Marcus admitted with a sigh. Missy’s brows furrowed up at her father before her face softened. She knew what it was like to have people look at you like an outcast but there was no way her father would be looked at that way. He was a literal hero and she told him such which made him smile down and press a kiss to the top of her head.

“Love you kiddo,” Marcus sighed before finally leaving the house to make his way to the gymnasium of a building he hadn’t stepped foot in in almost two decades. The walls seemed shorter now and the hallways narrower but his feet carried him through as if he were back to being a teenager.

His eyes scanned as he saw the locker that he had called home for all four years. And a few steps later, he saw your corner locker and his heart stopped for a second. He wondered if you were going to make it to the reunion. He hadn’t thought too deeply about you in a few years because he was still grieving his wife but now that he was here, you were consuming his thoughts.

As he walked into the decorated and rainbow-lit gymnasium, all conversations started to fade away as everyone looked to him with bright smiles. Jasmine looked over your shoulder towards the entrance and her eyes widened. She tapped your arm and nudged her chin in his direction, making you turn.

Your heart nearly leaped out of your chest seeing him. A black suit with a black tie and his black frames all pulled the look together nicely. You guessed Missy probably had a hand in helping him pick out his outfits. The girl was notorious for helping her father with simple things and it didn’t surprise you.

You watched as Steven, better known as Miracle Guy, came over to clap Marcus on the shoulder while shaking his hand with the other. Last you knew Steven didn’t like Marcus but perhaps he was putting on a show since there were phones and cameras everywhere. You scoffed quietly to yourself as a reminder that some people really don’t change.

Some minutes later, Alana nudged her elbow into your side. “Marcus is alone at the drink table. Go say hi,” she punctuated the last word with another nudge and you made a pout at her. “But I have a full-” you started but Alana quickly swiped your cup and downed the rest of your punch. You narrowed your eyes at her and she just gave a giddy, toothy smile, holding your now empty cup out to you before mouthing the word Go.

You rolled your eyes and sighed heavily as you took the cup from her and turned around but not before sticking your tongue out at her. You walked a bit slowly, nervous to even strike up a conversation with your ex-high school boyfriend turned superhero of the world.

You stepped up the punchbowl just as Marcus was about to reach for it and bumped his arm. “Oh! Sorry!” you exclaimed with a light chuckle and he turned to see who had bumped him and felt a huge lump form in his throat.

Your name came from him like a soft whisper and you felt your face soften looking at him. “Hi Marcus,” you said softly, almost in a soft whisper that echoed the way he had said your name. “Or should I say Mr. Superhero of the World?” you gave a soft chuckle and he echoed it with a soft guffaw of his own. The two of you stood there for a minute, just studying each other’s faces with goofy grins attached to your lips.

Suddenly the music dimmed and a tap of a live microphone came over the speakers. “Attention everyone! Okay, okay! Come closer okay?” the class president, Rachelle Hawkins, spoke into the microphone. You and Marcus turned your attention to the stage at the same time. Most of the crowd started moving closer to the stage but you stayed back with Marcus by the food table.

“First of all I just want to say thank you to everyone who could make it tonight,” she said in her overly fake happy tone that she used to use as a cheerleader. You rolled your eyes slightly and Marcus looked over and chuckled at your response. He remembered how much you and Rachelle didn’t get along. You weren’t exactly enemies but her power during school years seemed to have just been racking up the count on how many boys would lose their virginity to her.

Marcus leaned over to speak into your ear with both of your heads still facing the stage. “Good to see she hasn’t changed huh?” he whispered which made you snicker. You both were already falling back into comfort after so many years apart. It only made sense since you had dated for all four years of high school and were friends first.

“Let’s start the night off with a dance from our senior year prom king and queen!” Rachelle exclaimed and held her hand out to point in your and Marcus’s direction. Everyone turned to face you both as Rachelle called out both your names and a bright light then shown on you. You tried to shield your eyes from the blinding spotlight as you looked to Marcus.

In the distance you heard Jasmine and Alana whooping and hollering in celebration which prompted everyone else to start clapping and cheering the two of you on. Marcus looked at you and placed his plate down on the long table. You followed suit to place your still empty cup down next to his plate. You swallowed a large lump that had formed in your throat before Marcus was holding out his arm for you to loop yours through.

You did so and he led you out to the middle of the floor. The light finally faded and you could clearly see Marcus’ face. His eyes were scanning the crowd before jumping back to you. You took a deep breath and reached up to put your left hand onto his shoulder. He placed his right arm on your hip and reached with his left hand to grab your right and hold it. He intertwined your fingers and you felt your heart nearly leap from your chest.

He pulled you closer slowly so your bodies were right next to each other as the song started playing. “All My Life” by KC and Jojo came over the speakers and you couldn’t help but burst out laughing as Marcus swayed you to the beat. He was smiling too knowing why this song was picked. It was the same song that was played during your dance after being chosen as king and queen.

Your laughter caused you to lean into Marcus’s chest for a minute to catch your breath and his heart started to race a mile a minute. Your heart was starting to match his rhythm and when you stood up straight up again, you found yourself just looking into his eyes. The feel of his body pressed against you, the heat of his arm that was now wrapped around your lower back all accumulated to you immediately feeling smitten by him once more.

Your eyes flickered around his face slowly, landing on his lips before looking back into his eyes. But before you knew it, Rachelle’s voice was coming back through the speakers, loud and clear over the music. “Aw look at them folks! It’s like nothing has changed! How sweet!” she cooed and the entire crowd followed suit. You rolled your eyes and Marcus gave a tight lipped grin in response.

He finally pulled back from you when Rachelle started to list off the night’s events and the song faded into the night. Your heart was beating so hard you were starting to breathe heavier. Marcus walked back over to the food table to gather up his plate and you followed him just a step behind. You picked up your cup and without a word to Marcus, started to refill it with punch.

“I’ll um, I’ll see you later?” Marcus asked rather than said and you looked up at him with a wry smile and slow nod.

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[theyreonlynoodlesmike]

How would the guys handle a “girly girl” S/O? Either poly or individual is fine with me. Thanks!

"How would the boys act with a S/O who is a girly girl? Could they handle that?" -anon

I've said this once and I'll say it again!!! I don't think the boys have a type!! So if you're a girly girl?? Totally won't care. Here you go!! (Made this poly btw)

Poly!Lost Boys x Girly Girl S/O

The boys had spotted you on the boardwalk. Pastels, teased hair, manicured nails, and expertly done makeup to match. You were a prim little girly girl, and their complete opposite. For some reason, that only drew them to you

At first, they just wanted to mess with you. "Piss off the princess" as David had some eloquently put. And it was fun. So fun, actually. They flirted with you, of course, but David made sure to play with your hair, putting a strand out of place. He stroked your cheek, his gaze making you flustered as you tried your best to keep up with them. You could've sworn a second ago you had been surrounded by your friends, but they were nowhere to be found now. Marko had leaned in close, a wide smile on his face as he asked what perfume you used and blatantly took a whiff. You had squirmed at his closeness, and tried to give him a reply. He'd hummed, telling you that he liked it with a grin that made the compliment seem far too suggestive (even if it wasn't). Paul took your distraction as an opportunity to play with the edge of your skirt. You yelped and bat his hands away, but he was already leaning down. He whispered in your ear, "Nice heels. Though, I'm surprised your feet don't hurt. Maybe you wanna spend some time off them?" He flirted. Dwayne was the only one that didn't tease you as ruthlessly as the others, and he caught you before the blonde terror twins could make you trip backwards. You had pressed your back right up against his chest, and quickly looked up to see the handsome brunette. It was all a little much for you, the onslaught of teasing and flirting, and you had flushed bright red. Dwayne rubbed his knuckle against your cheek, quietly asking, "What's wrong, princess?" And that had been the final straw. You had broken away from the four, stomping off as you cursed the boys and their antics. They had jeered, calling for you and asking you to come back

They bothered you every night after that, and eventually they weren't such an unwelcome sight. Really...they could be quite charming when they wanted to be. Despite the warnings you'd recieved about "boys like them", you ended up dating them. All four of them.

Marko low-key likes that you're extremely girly. It makes him look more tough whenever you stand besides him, and he's definitely willing to fight anyone who bothers you. Marko would interlock his arm with yours, and ask you questions about the things you liked (even if they were things he had no interest in). He would even talk to you about makeup and fashion, and just saw your style as your own personal self-expression. He liked to hang out in your room and play with all the stuff you had on your walls. He's not big on wearing makeup himself, but he likes to watch you put it on. He'll hover just a little bit out of the sight of the mirror, tilting his head to the side as you focus on applying your eyeshadow and eyeliner. He likes to watch you make yourself "look pretty" and will argue that, "You're always pretty". He always smiles when you ask him what color you should use, and he grins a little bit more at the boardwalk that night. Will watch "girly" movies and shows with you, and actually likes some of them. Will even listen to some "girly" music with you. Likes to listen to gossip, and totally knows all the names of your friends. Is one of the only boys that can tolerate your friends. Will still tease you from time to time about how girly you are, but he never means it in a bad way. Was totally ko-ed that one time you were chewing bubblegum and blew a bubble while talking to him. Won't explain why, but he just thinks it was really hot. The two of you went into an alleyway, and he was the one chewing gum when you left.

Paul had been completely devastated when he heard that your favorite singers were Cyndi Lauper and Madonna, and had tried to convince you to come back to the cave with them just so he could show you some "real music". You had denied, as you were hesitant about getting on one of their death machines. Especially Paul's. The first time he had you listen to metal, you had just said, "this sounds very angry" and you swore that Paul looked like he was about to cry. Literally conditions you to like it, but will mostly put on soft rock/ballads as a "compromise". He listens to some of your music as well, and one time you caught him humming "Physical" by Olivia Newton John afterwards. He's the most willing to let you put some make-up on him, but only something that "rockstars" would wear. You end up finding out that Paul looks really good with some eyeliner. Let's you paint his nails, but the boy can barely sit still long enough for you to do one coat. And trying to wait for it to dry? Forget it. He even likes the painted nails, but, again, he cannot sit still. Paul loves the fact that you mostly wear skirts. Whistles every time he sees you, and is definitely the type to try to sneak his hands under your skirt to try to cop a feel. If you sit on his lap, his hand is going straight to your legs. You gotta hold them so he won't try anything. Likes to pick out your outfits, even if he usually aims to make it as skimpy as possible and most of his choices get vetoed.

Dwayne is the nicest to you, and he treats you like a little princess. He always tells you that you look pretty, and would let you talk about whatever you wanted. He just likes hearing you talk, even if he has no idea what you're saying. Listens to you talk so much that he starts to pick up some of your slang. In his deep voice, he just says, "That was totally bogus". Type to hold open doors for you and treat you like a lady, even if the others make fun of him for it. He's your giant bodyguard, and he basically makes sure no one tries to take advantage of you based on how non-intimidating you look. The type to buy steal you whatever you want, and may spoil you a bit. If you like a certain piece of jewelry, he's giving you it the next night. He was the one that helped you pick out your earrings when you and them decided to become more official. Let's you braid and brush his hair, but he never wears it out of the cave. If you wear sneakers one night, he'll tie your shoelaces for you so you don't have to bend down in your skirt. Low-key has a kink for when you put on lip-gloss. He just likes watching you apply it, and will pull you into a kiss as soon as your done. It's one of the rare instances where he'll do PDA, so you let it slide that when he pulls back and half of your lip gloss is on his lips instead. He just comments, "Bubblegum." And acts like nothing happened. You mostly want to ride with him because he's the safest, and he always helps you on/off of his bike

David could be a perfect gentleman at times, when he wasn't being an ass. He teases you the most out of all the boys. He likes how feminine you are, mainly because it makes him feel more manly and tough. His all black coat and punk/metal look really constrasts with your feminine style, and he loves watching how beach go-ers immediately back down when you tell them that he's your boyfriend. Yeah, they weren't expecting that. He enjoys pushing your boundaries and testing your knowledge on things outside the mainstream. He will even suggest books and movies to you, but it wasn't until you started dating that he actually got you to listen to him. This was mainly by literally giving you his copies or watching them with you at the cave. You two mainly have conversations about those things, or about the things going on in your life. He's really not the type to be interested in girly things, so rip- Loves and almost insists on having you ride with him, mainly because he loves the way you have to hike up your skirt and how tightly you grip onto him. Definitely teases you by calling you "little girl" along with his usual "kitten" and "sweetheart". Likes that you're a girly girl a little bit too much, especially the fact that you get your nails done. You scratched your nails down his back one (1) time in bed, and he had to keep himself from vamping out and biting you in retaliation. Likes to joke about how he and the boys are "corrupting" you, but secretly thinks it's kind of hot

The boys all call you "barbie" and it's a running joke in your relationship. If you ever start to annoy them, they'll say, "Okay, Barbie"

One of the boys favorite things is picking you up from the mall or the boardwalk when you're with all your friends. They live for the looks your friends give them, whether they're judging your choices or giggling at how cute they are. One of your friends comments about you not possibly being able to date all of them long term, and the boys roll their eyes. David just replies, "Long term is exactly what we had in mind", and ends up telling you about their vampirism soon after. It was a bit of a shock, but after some time to adjust they were able to convince you it wasn't as bad as you thought. But they knew convincing you to change would be a whole other battle...

Overall, none of the boys really mind that you're girly, but they'll definitely tease you for it

[k-and-the-arts]

Lover - Willex

Pairing: Alex Mercer/Willie Word Count: 2412 Based on Taylor Swift’s song “Lover.” Read on AO3

We could leave the Christmas lights up 'til January

And this is our place, we make the rules

And there's a dazzling haze, a mysterious way about you dear

Have I known you 20 seconds or 20 years?

 It all happened so fast. One minute, Alex was walking down Sunset Boulevard, clearing his head, and the next minute he was getting run over by a gorgeous boy on a skateboard. He wanted to be mad, he really did, but when the boy started talking, all anger dissolved. The skater was charming and dorky and was able to convince Alex to follow him after exchanging only a few words. 

Willie guided Alex to his favorite spot on Sunset Boulevard -- a simple bench that was “the best place to people-watch” as the skater had said. People in weird furry costumes and outfits of dead celebrities walked by, but Alex only had eyes for Willie. The brunette talked about everything that popped into his head, and none of it seemed to have a coherent flow. He mentioned his favorite places to skate, random facts about the ocean, and weird ways different famous people died. The blonde talked about his friends, the band, and the one time they ate street dogs that were so bad, they had food poisoning for three days.

“Reggie was convinced we were going to die,” Alex had told Willie, causing the other boy to burst into a fit of giggles that sounded like music to Alex’s ears. 

The drummer didn’t say much after that; he was content with listening to Willie’s voice and all of the stories that fell from his lips. He loved watching the way Willie’s eyes sparkled when something he was talking about reminded him of another topic, and it amazed Alex that the boy knew so much about everything.  

There was a lull in the conversation as the sun started to set, painting the sky in beautiful shades of purples and pinks and oranges. Willie was watching the sky but Alex was watching Willie. There was a dazzling glow around the boy that made him look ethereal. A small gust of wind blew through the street, causing Willie’s long hair to float gracefully around him. Alex’s breath caught in his throat and he tried to take it all in. He wanted to replay this moment in his mind over and over again for as long as he could remember it. 

There was suddenly a small, sharp pain in his chest; a sign of his anxiety taking over. He tried to push it down, push it away. His instincts told him to run, this is happening too fast, but his heart told him to keep his feet planted firmly to the ground. He had never felt so smitten about someone so quickly before and it was the most exciting yet terrifying thing he had ever felt. 

Even though they had been talking for only a few hours, Alex felt like he had known the skater his entire life. It felt like they were childhood friends, talking about everything and nothing at the same time. But Alex knew there was still so much to learn, and his heart ached for so much more. 

As the sky grew dark, Willie’s gaze floated back to him. Alex quickly looked away, focusing his attention on the fairylights on building awnings and edging that had created an intimate glow around them. If Willie had caught him staring, he didn’t say anything, and Alex appreciated that. 

“I love leaving the Christmas lights up until January,” Willie said suddenly, causing Alex’s eyes to snap back to the boy that was beautifully sculpted under the soft light.

“Hmm?” Alex hummed, hoping Willie would continue.

Willie gestured to the fairylights above them. “I didn’t get to experience a lot of proper Christmases growing up,” Willie said quietly, as if talking too loudly would shatter the tension that had grown around them. “I want to experience Christmas for as long as possible. So I try to leave the lights and decorations up for as long as Caleb will let me, which is usually in January.” 

The question was on the tip of Alex’s tongue -- Who’s this mysterious Caleb? 

But he stayed silent, nodding to acknowledge Willie’s words. He knew Willie would tell him if he asked, but he needed something to look forward to when they talked again. If they talked again.

Willie opened his mouth to speak again but the sound of smooth jazz interrupted him. The brunette pulled his phone out of his pocket and sighed. He ignored the call but stood up from the bench, slipping the phone back into his pocket and placing the helmet back on his head. 

“It was really nice to meet you, but unfortunately I have to go. I’ll catch ya later, Hotdog,” Willie smirked, letting his board drop to the ground.

 Can I go where you go?

Can we always be this close forever and ever?

And ah, take me out, and take me home

You're my, my, my, my

Lover

  Alex wanted to run after him, wanted to follow him home. He immediately missed Willie’s warmth and light and yearned to be by his side again. He rewatched the entire afternoon in his mind like a movie, and by the time he made it back to the studio, his cheeks hurt from smiling so much. Julie and Flynn begged him to tell them everything, while Luke, Reggie, and Bobby teased him mercilessly. But he didn’t tell him any details and ignored the overdramatic swooning and kissy faces, refusing to let them ruin one of the best days of his life.

 We could let our friends crash in the living room

This is our place, we make the call

And I'm highly suspicious that everyone who sees you wants you

I've loved you three summers now, honey, but I want 'em all

 The next three years were the most difficult and exhilarating years in Alex’s life. While his relationship with Willie grew wonderfully, along with the band’s success, his relationship with his parents fell apart. As soon as he graduated, he packed his bags and found the cheapest apartment he could. He took the first job that would hire him and tried to support himself as best he could. The Molinas offered to take him in but he didn’t want to burden them. The band suffered as they tried to find a way to rehearse around everyone’s work schedule. Alex could feel his life crumbling around him and he found it harder and harder to wake up every day.

But then there was Willie. He was the light in the darkness and the glue that kept him together. 

And when Willie suggested they move in together, Alex felt his heart stop. 

“I’ve been wanting to move out for awhile now and I already found a place that I can afford and it’s decent and I know this is like, a crazy huge step but --”

“Yes.”

The word flew from his lips before he allowed his brain to catch up, over think, and lose his nerve. The large smile that grew on Willie’s face was all the confirmation he needed that he made the right decision. 

Willie convinced Alex to quit his shitty job and convinced Caleb to let the band play at the Hollywood Ghost Club whenever they weren’t playing at other gigs. They were finally living the dream. Rehearsing and writing during the day and playing to large crowds almost every night. 

After their sets at the club, they would just linger around the building, mingling and making connections with the Hollywood elite that could afford to be there. Alex would watch Willie work, flitting from table to table and chatting up anyone who would look in his direction. It was amazing to watch him go from a dorky skater boy that couldn’t even finish a complete story without switching to a new topic, to a super charming and eloquent figure that never failed to convince a guest to give a very generous donation to the club. 

Alex was also pretty sure that half of the crowd was just as besotted with Willie as he was. But he knew he didn’t have to be jealous of anyone in the room. He knew he had Willie’s entire heart, just as Willie had his. And at the end of the night, he would be the one that would be holding Willie’s hand, and kissing Willie’s lips, and laying next to him in bed.

And if their friends got a little too drunk to drive home, he would be the one to help Willie carry them back to their apartment. He would be the one helping Willie rearrange the living room so that their friends had a place to sleep. He would be the one thanking him for being the best boyfriend anyone could ever ask for. 

 Can I go where you go?

Can we always be this close forever and ever?

And ah, take me out, and take me home (forever and ever)

You're my, my, my, my

Lover

 Ladies and gentlemen, will you please stand?

With every guitar string scar on my hand

I take this magnetic force of a man to be my lover

My heart's been borrowed and yours has been blue

All's well that ends well to end up with you

Swear to be overdramatic and true to my lover

And you'll save all your dirtiest jokes for me

And at every table, I'll save you a seat, lover

  That same night, Alex was lying against Willie on the couch, playing with the skater’s rough, yet surprisingly soft fingers. Their friends were asleep, sprawled out everywhere on the living room floor, and Alex wished he could just freeze time and just stay in this moment forever. He was surrounded by his love and support and he couldn’t imagine anything better than this. Not until Willie whispered those words.

“Have you ever thought about marriage?” 

Alex sucked in a breath and his fingers were still against Willie’s. Had Alex thought about marriage? 

All the time.

Ever since they moved in together two years prior. But he always thought that it was too big of a thought; too obsessive. He didn’t want to scare Willie by moving too fast, even if they were just flashing ideas in his mind. He didn’t want Willie to leave him because he was too dependent, too attached to their relationship, too--

Alex realized how silent he had been and tried to scrounge up words so that Willie didn’t think he was freaked out, even if he kinda was.

But Willie didn’t seem to be bothered by Alex’s silence. Because Willie knew Alex so well. He knew exactly how Alex would react if he were to ask that kind of question. Willie continued, “I’ve thought about it a lot, recently. I’ve thought about us and this thing we’re doing. I don’t know all the details or anything, but I do know one thing for sure,” Willie paused and Alex looked up at him, waiting for the deep sentiment the boy was about to share. “Luke would definitely be the flower girl.”

This threw Alex into a fit of giggles and Willie’s smile was radiant. “I think Ruby would fight Luke for that position,” Alex said through his laughter.

At the mention of his sister, he sobered up. He had no doubt Ruby would absolutely want to be a part of his wedding; she would probably want to plan everything herself. He just hoped his parents would want to be there as well. Even if they didn’t agree with it, he’d hope they would at least care enough to see him happy. Thinking about how he would tell his parents and how they would react, his thoughts started to spiral once again.

It was as if Willie could sense his anxiety rising. He laced his fingers with Alex’s and squeezed reassuringly. 

Alex could feel Willie’s chest rumble as he spoke again. “We’re not gonna have a traditional wedding though. Those are too boring. Maybe we’ll do something crazy like have all the girls be groomsman and all the guys be bridesmaids. Or however it’ll work for us.” Alex didn’t really know either, but nodded in agreement. “And no traditional vows. We gotta get creative. Like, I dunno.  ‘I, Wilhelm Covington the Third,’”

“Willie, your first name isn’t Wilhem and you’re definitely not a ‘third,’” Alex chuckled, grinning up at his boyfriend.

“Shush, that’s what makes it creative. Now where was I? Oh yeah,

‘I, Wilhelm Covington the Third, with all the skateboard scars on my hand, take this magnetic force of a man,’” Willie paused, and Alex could practically see the smoke coming out of his ears as he tried to think of something funny. When that famous smirk crossed his features, Alex was ready to cringe. “‘I take this magnetic force of a man, Hotdog, to be my husband. Through cracked helmets and bad street dogs, and even when we’re ghosts.’”

Alex rolled his eyes but his smile only grew wider. He decided to play along, “and I promise to be super over-dramatic and constantly swooning over you.” 

“And you’ll save all your worst jokes for me. I want your lamest and dirtiest and cringiest jokes,” Willie added.

Alex nodded in agreement, trying to think of other funny vows. But the more he thought about it, the more everything was sinking in. Willie continued to ramble about silly vows and untraditional wedding things they could do. But all Alex could think about was the fact that Willie wanted to marry him. 

Willie wanted to marry him. 

He wanted to be Alex’s husband. He wanted to be Alex’s forever. No matter what life threw their way, Willie wanted to be by Alex’s side. He wanted to go everywhere and do everything with Alex. Through sickness, health, and everything in between. 

Alex looked back up at Willie and pushed himself up to interrupt his boyfriend with a gentle kiss to the lips. 

“Yes,” Alex whispered, his heart pounding and anxiety -- no, excitement -- filling his chest.

“Yes?”

“Yes, I’ll marry you.”

 Can I go where you go?

Can we always be this close forever and ever?

And ah, take me out, and take me home (forever and ever)

You're my, my, my, my

Oh, you're my, my, my, my

Darling, you're my, my, my, my

Lover

[frogsmulder]

Maybe There’s Hope: chpt 5 Under the Midnight Moon

Starting from the final events of 09x20 The Truth,  Mulder and Scully tackle their new reality as fugitives. When they  finally settle into things, Scully finds out she is pregnant again. A canon divergent AU where I thought, what if Scully got pregnant whilst on the run instead of at the end of season 11?

3.7k words; rated t; tagging @today-in-fic; read on ao3

The night was mild but the coastal breeze had its biting edge. Nipping at Mulder's toes, it reminded him that he really was in Mazatlán, Mexico, and the beauty of the sky and the sea softly roaring wasn't just a lyrical dream. The music from the clubs on the promenade pulsed through the air; a low hum by the time it reached the beach. He sat on one of the blankets from the car laid out over the soft dips and mounds of the sand, guarding Scully's socks and shoes and Moby as he watched her. Scully, ever his lyrical dream, paddled at the shore, not caring for the power of the elements, but liberated by the tug of the tide. In the candescence of the moon, her blonde hair was illuminated an ethereal silver like a halo, gently billowing in the breeze. Her pants were turned up, the waves cresting and crashing at her feet, the sand no doubt sifting through her bare toes as whisps of seaweed floated at her ankles. There was a lightness to her step that made everyone she took look like a dance of her spirit. Beside her, Emily was jumping over the waves as they rolled in. Her little feet made no splashes in the water but she was giggling and skipping all the same. His heart ached with contentment to see them both enjoy a moment of happiness. Gazing up at the black night sky littered with the warmth of orange light pollution, he thanked the far-off, scattered stars, knowing whoever was up there had smiled on him with mercy.

 Man, you're properly screwed.

The three musketeers appeared behind him with the dulcet tones of Frohike carrying on the wind.

Yeah, dude, you can't keep living like this, Langley added.

"Like what?" Mulder asked defensively.

Byers sat down in front of Mulder and clasped his hands. What the others were trying so eloquently say is that you need to tell her about us.

Mulder rubbed his face in his hands. With his sight darkened, he couldn't tell that the trio was there like they had simply blinked out of existence– no presence, no warmth, no sound of breath greeted him. He was chasing visions in his own head again. He took a deep breath. "I don't know if I can do that to her."

Frohike sympathetically tried to pat his shoulder. Mulder, we had a deal: if you don't treat the lady right, I get to make a pass.

Mulder scrunched his nose. "I don't ever remember making that deal."

 He's right, Frohike, that never happened.

Shut up, Langley, he warned. I might be dead, but I'm no less of a catch.

Because you looked like a wet fish while you were still alive, Langley jibed.

Mulder chuckled, "I didn't even have to say it."

He looked up to see Scully walking back up the beach towards him, a peaceful smile playing on her lips. The reflection of the ocean still twinkled beyond the infinite blue of her eyes. He felt as though he had taken a lungful of seawater, something like an intoxicating potion swirling around his insides, polishing unbridled emotion.

"Talking to yourself again?" she asked cheerfully, pulling a stray strand of hair from her curling lips, blissfully unaware of the company he held.

Beaming up at her, he joked, "One day, they'll lock me up for it."

Come on, man! Frohike exclaimed accompanied by a reprimanding, Mulder... from Byers.

Scully's face fell, a flash of pain darting behind those endless oceans, suddenly turning the air sombre. All at once, the imaginary taste of salt on his tongue spoilt and dried his mouth.

"Please don't say that," she said calmly, her voice a mask free of malice or vulnerability.

"Sorry, I forget," he muttered.

The trio moved out the way as Scully unknowingly walked between them and sat beside Mulder. "It's okay," she murmured, eyes drawn to the water.

Frohike, Byers, and Langley all looked at him expectantly. He ignored them indignantly and laid down with his head in Scully's lap, shuffling on the scratchy blanket to get comfortable. She idly stroked her fingers through his hair, fingertips cool against his side-burns. He shivered from the chill of her touch, but leaned into her affection, letting the tingles shoot down his spine.

Frohike groaned exasperatedly. Let's leave the two lovebirds to it, he said, frowning at Mulder and gesturing for the others to follow. I'm sure he'll tell her eventually.

Mulder chuckled at him and the disgruntled expression on his face as he walked out of sight.

"Are you okay?" Scully asked, a purring lilt to her voice.

"Yeah," he sighed, then nestled further into the cradle of her lap.

She hummed contentedly, continuing to draw waves through his hair. Her stare was fixed not on him, but following the line of the horizon where cargo ships were dotted like tiny toys. She was more peaceful, her spirit soothed for a few hours by the lullaby of the waves. Yet she still kept that part of her private. Her silhouette was stoic, not letting on what undercurrents pained her. He just felt like a sponge, absorbing all her hardship and mirroring it back to her. Her pain was his hurt; her wounds why he wept.

Mulder placed his hand on top of hers by his head, nuzzling his cheek warmly into her palm. "I like it when you're like this," he mused.

She cocked her head with curiosity. "Like what?"

"Carefree," he said simply.

"What do you mean?"

"I can feel you and you're the most relaxed I've ever seen you these last couple of months–" Turning, he sat up and cupped her cheek, holding her as if she were a delicate and intricate work of art, constantly shifting and changing, swirling and charming him with her mystery. He watched the puzzle pieces in her eyes and her jaw shift and tighten. He smoothed her porcelain skin over with his thumb, her cheeks rosy from the chill, no longer thawed by her constant smile. "–But you're still putting on a strong face."

"What do you mean?" she asked again below her breath.

He brought their foreheads together, noses kissing like Eskimos', daring to say what had been on his mind since they had first driven out of New Mexico. "I know you're coping, but it's killing me watching you close off from the world. I don't know how long I can wait for you while I'm in the dark, not knowing what monsters you're fighting. Seeing you then, it was like I got the old, happy Scully back for a moment."

Carefully, she spoke, "It's never been my intention to hurt you. I'm sorry if I've made you feel that way. I, uh, don't think I need to tell you how hard I have found this."

"I know, I'm sorry." Sorry for everything. Sorry that she needed to put up her ten-foot fences. He realised that it was his fault. "I'm selfish for wanting more from you," he mumbled and clenched his eyes closed, willing away the hot sting that tormented him. The air shifted around him: the compress to his forehead vanished, the warmth of a small hand appeared against his other cheek, tending to a tear with a delicate swipe.

"I haven't been entirely honest with you either..." he whispered and waited. Waited for her exclamation of anger; her disappointment; her harsh words telling him that they were nothing if they couldn't trust each other. Yet none of it came. He stumbled over how to order his thoughts. "There are so many things in my head, Scully..."

He slowly opened his eyes to see her piercing ones mere inches from his face. The faint creases that defined them, like fine brushstrokes on the pale canvas of her skin, suddenly became crisp with clarity. Behind her, the rest of the world remained a dark blur, obscured and fading into oblivion. It looked a lot like the inside of his mind: a dark swimming void that only focused to a sharp point when he could see his touchstone.

"I can see people I shouldn't..." he started, his voice strangely calm and docile. Finally saying the words, he felt the ache in his chest alleviate. Keeping her face in focus, he grounded himself in the detail of her laugh lines, having watched them grow deeper over the years. He recalled a time not too long ago when the sole reason he had been placed on this planet seemed to be to make them appear. But that was before he had been abducted; before he'd died; before he'd brought back souls with him from the other side.

"They come to me, talk to me, and I can't tell if it's real or a sick and twisted projection of my subconscious. The Smoking Man, Langley, Frohike, Byers... Emily... I want to believe they are real... but I– I–" he shook his head desperately– "I don't know what to believe."

Scully nodded, unsurprised that the trauma he had seen had manifested into monsters of his own, yet she was surprised that she hadn't thought of the possibility. In the last couple of months, it had been him catching her when she fell, him holding her together when she broke apart. He had been her silent buttress supporting her, for which she was eternally grateful. She knew he suffered too, but he had taken their whole situation in his stride. Yet she had been stupid to think that he was doing okay. In her own world of survival, she had been so disconnected from reality, so ignorant. She should have picked up on the signs: the far off look he'd get like he was watching something else; mumbling to himself like he was with somebody else. Tiny, minuscule things, that she had shrugged off one at a time, all came tumbling together like a tonne of bricks. She bit her lip but she wanted to kick herself.

Brushing back Mulder's shaggy fringe out of his grey-hazel eyes, she glimpsed his soul beneath, entirely trusting, entirely innocent. A pang of guilt hit her deep down that she could have possibly failed him. She sat up, her hands falling into her lap, and sighed.

"I could tell you that stimulating different areas of the brain can provoke auditory and visual hallucinations, that extreme conditions have been known to create the sensation of a 'third person'. But I think the answer is a lot simpler than that: I think it's stress." She gaged his reaction, knowing it was probably not what he wanted to hear, but he continued to listen intently, head softly bobbing with everything she said. She took a deep breath. "The last few years have been hard– to put it lightly. There were days where I couldn't stop wondering what I was going to do without you–"

He smiled at that and she felt a similar one quietly creep into the corners of her mouth, mirroring him.

"–You know, when you weren't there, I used to pretend you were and talk to you as if you were in the room with me. Maybe the ghosts you see are just a comfort and a way to rationalise things."

"Is that your diagnosis, Doc?" he smirked. "Stress?"

Scully could see he was trying to laugh it off and she wished the answer was that simple, but stress didn't cause as sophisticated hallucinations as he was describing– exacerbate the symptoms maybe, but not cause. But she couldn't tell him that and cause undue worry without any chance of finding a real answer. She couldn't put him in more pain. It was better that she alone worried for him rather than them both be uselessly anxious.

"Have you been sleeping properly?" She lifted his fringe back again, checking for signs of tiredness in his eyes. There were dark circles under them, but no more so than usual and they weren't bloodshot.

"Do I ever?" he said as light-heartedly as possible.

She couldn't help but smile a little, letting his hair flop back into place once satisfied. Sighing, she asked more quietly, "You've seen Emily?"

She was aware that she was indulging in a foolish fantasy, but the possibility made her heart race. Rationally, the hallucinations Mulder had would be meaningless. Perhaps it was only curiosity driving her, but the clenching in her chest told her it was more than that. It had been so long since she'd seen Emily's sweet smiling face, that she needed to know, and more than a small part of her wanted to believe.

"Yeah..." Wanting to give Scully some sort of meaning, he added, "She's always looking out for you."

"I miss them both," she whispered.

"Yeah, me too."

The silence between them was filled with the chorus of waves crashing. Like their unspoken words, they tumbled with taut energy until they finally broke on the sand. Mulder wrapped his arms around her and brought them both gently down to lay on the blanket. He could see her mother's guilt plain as day and wished he could wash those fears away for her as effortlessly as she could put his mind at ease. Just looking at her, his troubles seemed to dissipate. Everything else could blur at the seams, fray and untangle, darken into that oblivion, and it would all be okay because Scully would be there.

"I don't know if I've ever told you this, Scully, but I always sleep better when you're near me."

"No, you haven't." She pursed her lips simperingly... "But I know."

He traced his thumb along the blush of her cheek and followed the line of her jaw like brushstrokes on a canvas. He soothed her worry with the repeated motion, watching the wrinkles of her forehead soften. He followed the ups and downs of her nose and cheekbones sculpted from the finest clay. He fell into the endless oceans in the depths of her eyes. She was like a journey in which he always got lost. An epic he would never tire of exploring. Like the old days back on the Vineyard, climbing and cycling and adventuring until the sun kissed the horizon and he was late home for dinner.

He chuckled: he was gazing again.

"Do you remember the last time we were by the sea?" he asked abruptly, tucking a strand of blonde hair behind her ear. "Because I do-- fondly."

Scully hummed, rolling onto her back to look up at the heavens. "The City of Angels. I seem to remember something about strawberries, champagne, and phone calls from bubble baths."

"I seem to remember a bit more than that..."

"There was also the minibar we raided," she offered with a quirk of her eyebrow.

"Before that, do you remember we took our shoes off and walked along the beach?" He sat up on one elbow, facing her. "The stars were out that night like tonight, and I remember thinking, loving you was the best thing I ever decided upon."

Scully turned to meet his gaze with a soft smile of wonderment.

"There was something I regret not doing last time and I want to make it right," he said and stood up, dusting himself off. He held out his hand for her, and she sat up, tilting her head, bemused.

He took a deep breath. "Would you do the honour of letting me have this dance?"

"Always," she smiled, stretching up to grasp his fingers just out of reach. He grabbed her hands and hoisted her up. Wrapping one arm around her waist, Mulder smiled as his hand found that familiar place to rest. Gently entwining his other hand with hers, he pulled her flush against his chest, the heat of her body a comforting blanket against the chill of the night.

Scully winced, hissing through clenched teeth at the press upon her own chest. He immediately relaxed his hold, sensing something was wrong.

"Sorry, my breasts have been a bit tender lately," she explained.

He nodded, allowing a gap between them. "Okay, stand on my feet," he instructed.

She gave him a questioning look.

"Trust me," he chuckled, and she stepped tentatively on top of his own bare feet. "Okay?"

"Yeah, I got it," she laughed, wobbling slightly to keep her balance. Mulder started stepping to an imaginary 3|4 beat, wiggling his toes as their dance took them across the sand. Scully hung closer to him as they waltzed, despite the ache, resting her ear to the soothing metronome of his heart beneath his chest. The da-dum that conducted them pulsed with a vibrancy of life that she had forgotten was possible. For the first time in a long time, Scully felt alive and truly living. She took in a deep breath of seaside air, tasting the tang of salt in the back of her throat. Burying her nose to where his sternum lay clothed beneath his t-shirt, she inhaled again, a deep breath in exchange for a giggle that slipped past her lips. Everything felt surreal and very real all at once.

"Forward, side, close. Back, side, close," he muttered under his breath repeatedly. It wasn't as graceful as he had envisioned it all those years ago, the weight Scully on his feet rendering it more of a charming clomp than the moonlit gentle sway he had hoped.

Her nose peaked upward followed by two bright eyes that held him in regard. "When did you learn to dance?" she asked.

"My mother used to bring us along to her ballroom classes. It wasn't the same as baseball, the thrill of standing in the batter's box, waiting to strike the ball. But I liked it."

His eyes shone with the far-off light of that precious time Before. Memories of walking down to the local village hall with his mother when he was younger danced with nostalgia like the flickering of a film reel in his mind's eye. He fondly remembered having to drag Samantha along, who'd rather stay at home and play Stratego; except their father was always away on business so they had to go.

Scully smiled up at him. "Do all your teaching stunts involve being pressed so close together?"

He gave an honest laugh. "Only when I'm teaching you. You think you got this now?"

"Back, side, close. Forward, side, close," she narrated, and he stopped to let her get off his feet.

"Now put your feet between mine, with one foot on the outside... No, the other one." A little grin worked its way into the corner of his mouth and he asked, "Ready?"

She nodded, following his lead as he slowly started to dance again. He took his time gently easing her into the lilting rhythm, allowing her to catch up with him and bracing her when she stumbled. Despite herself, Scully let out another light laugh, flowing with a newfound grace in his arms. Sighing, aware of herself, Scully laid her head against his chest again. "I bet all the girls must have loved you at Oxford."

She felt a low chuckle rumble through him.

"No?" She looked up in surprise.

"Not once they got to know me," he answered with an innocent shrug. "I was good at scaring them away... One way or another."

"I'm sure that isn't true. And anyway, wasn't Phoebe Green your girlfriend?"

He shook his head: of course she would remember. "Were you seriously jealous of her?"

She sucked in a telling breath. "No... I just didn't like how she sauntered in thinking she could use you," she said honestly, but in hindsight, it would be futile to refuse that seeing them dance more intimately yet than their waltz made her gut clench for other reasons.

Mulder squeezed her hand. "Scully, she couldn't even lift a finger to hold a candle to you."

"I didn't like seeing you hurt."

"Hey, it doesn't matter now. I'm here. You're here. I'm dancing with my beautiful wife," he smirked.

"You wish," she quipped with mirth, but the idea was a thrilling impossibility that made butterflies out of her belly.

"She is beautiful," he insisted and spun her out of hold.

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder."

She folded back into his arms.

"I'm a lucky man to be gifted with such a sight."

She gazed upwards.

"Love is blind."

"The heart knows best," he whispered, leaning down, a hair's breadth from her face, hesitant and seeking permission.

Scully wasn't sure when they had stopped but she was aware that her toes were curling through the sand, grounding her whilst Mulder's lips beckoned her to fly. He was gentle, but with them, he persuaded her to dive a little deeper, fall a little harder, fly a little higher. When met with his pleading tongue, she took a leap of indulgence until the will for oxygen became too strong. Breaking from the kiss and her consuming haze, she smiled shyly. "Mulder... If you kiss me like that..."

"What?" he husked, forehead resting against hers.

"We'll have sand in places we don't particularly want."

"We have a blanket," he helpfully reminded her.

"Mulder!" she giggled.

He shook his head, rubbing his forehead against hers as he thought. Suddenly, he straightened with an idea; a mischievous grin taking over his countenance. "I want to get strawberries first."

A look of surprise lit her features. "Really?"

"Yeah, we can afford to splurge a little for strawberries."

Scully hummed in agreement; the thought of big, red, fresh, juicy strawberries whetting her appetite. She was suddenly met with the craving for cream as well and licked her lips. "I always knew you'd get me into trouble, Agent Mulder."

"As if you weren't capable of that yourself, Doctor Scully," he teased, and she rolled her eyes in good humour.

"I love you," she whispered for only him to hear, the weight of the words hanging in her voice. The ears of the sea and the stars were not privy to her words, not even God; they were the only two in their own world. Slowly, they swayed together in an embrace that was everything; warming each other from the darkness of the night; shielding each other from the darkness that followed them. Yet Scully allowed herself to worry about Mulder and, for the countless time that night, held him just a little closer.

[corpsentry]

allahrakhii (dot) tumblr (dot) com/post/148596180152/honestly-the-depths-of-ignorance-of-white-people

this is a really good post for those who want to learn more about the harmful portrayal of brown women in the legend of zelda series. theres a bunch of helpful links that direct to articles throughout the post as well. if you scroll through a bit youll find the section that covers why the gerudo outfit is racist.

i would appreciate if you post this and not simply brush it aside! this message isnt intended to be hostile or offensive, but rather it is an opportunity for learning and discussion. thank you.

i find the insinuation that i might brush this aside rather ominous anon! first of all, thank you for sharing this post. as someone vaguely from southeast asia i uncovered another facet of the fuckcluster of internalized racism in my system while reading it and will be thinking about it for a while to come. the post is well-written and thoughtfully phrased, plus op provides links to several other resources that i’ll be checking out in my free time too so i’d recommend anyone passing by here give it a read. i also want to apologize for responding to the earlier ask (now deleted) where op was like ‘how is the gerudo outfit racist’ and i was like ‘fuck all if i know’. i was talking out of my ass and failed to consider alternate perspectives. i retract that statement and replace it with this much longer and much more eloquent one.

now everything from here on is frankly quite unrelated to this ask so to the person who sent it please feel free to stop reading right here right now from high school musical as i want to talk about the previous anon message i received and some general stuff regarding fandom and none of that has anything to do with you (you are lovely and the rest of the world is a shithole).

i don’t know if the original anon who sent the ‘i like your art but the gerudo outfit racist :(’ is gonna see this but let’s take a moment to unpack it. i’m not quite sure what anon was going for with this ask. what did they want from me? did they want me to apologize for drawing and posting it? did they want me to delete the post? did they expect me to say oh thank you so much!!! sorry about the racism xd or did they want me to call up shigeru miyamoto and be like ‘hey dude your shit’s racist’ and then take down the entire nintendo corporation in one fell swoop like i was somehow implicated in either the development process or the game by pure merit of drawing fanart of it(????). this was the shit running through my head when i woke up at 6 am this morning because jetlag and opened tumblr and there was this Person sitting there trying to :( me. what’s up with the :(. why are you :(. what do you want from me.

this is where the second anon above comes in. relative to this ask, if the first anon had so much as dropped one (1) link to one (1) post explaining how the outfit might be racist (and taken out the :(, which is lame) then instead of being like ‘which reaction image should i use for this’ i would’ve been like ‘oh here’s something i didn’t know about the world and here’s how i can learn more’. ‘your art great but this racist u___u’ reads like someone trying to guilt-trip someone for shits and giggles. a B grade on a paper is useless unless your prof tells you where you went wrong and before anyone Calls Me Out i’m going to acknowledge that there is a broader issue with marginalized groups having to bear the burden of ‘explaining themselves’ to privileged people who aren’t willing to go and seek information on their own, but let’s just look at this ask for a moment.

what the fuck is this??? what am i even supposed to do with a statement that not only tells me nothing but also seems to have no clear purpose? i am sitting here drawing video game fanart in a college dorm in pennsylvania and i know like 3 things about western media because i don’t like live-action film. if you want to have a conversation please give me something to work with instead of trying to sound sad in my askbox. i can’t turn your :( into a :) because i have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about because i am not god (yet) (although i am trying to).

but let’s talk bigger. racist stereotypes are a huge fucking problem in everything the ideological west gets its hands on. i promise you i know this because i grew up in singapore where the racism was directed towards everyone including ourselves because sir dickbag raffles stuck a flag in the ground and then ruined everything. i can see how nintendo has replicated those racist stereotypes, especially given that east asian countries generally have a long history of racism towards black and brown people. singapore fucks with it too because we’re majority chinese-singaporean and majority lighter-skinned (relatively speaking). op makes a lot of excellent points. perpetuating stereotypes in popular media serves to reinforce racist ideas and further entrench discriminatory beliefs. it’s a chicken egg chicken egg thing. people are socialized into racist beliefs. they create media with racist depictions. young people consume said media and are socialized into racist beliefs. and so on. egg chicken egg chicken.

so, question: where does fanwork figure into all of this? is that 5k ganlink (is this the ship name lol idk if it’s wrong feel free to take me out with a bazooka) e-rated smutfic the egg or the chicken? who is it socializing? who’s writing it? what kind of audience is it reaching? and, more broadly speaking, what is fandom here for, and what does fandom want to achieve?

here we’re going to take a huge detour into another very popular disco horse (at least on twitter i have fuckall clue what’s going on on tumblr at all times) of the present times: the wmulti level wmarketing (wlw) discussion. it is statistically true that there are far less f/f fics on ao3 than m/m fics and f/m fics. this clearly reflects something about fandom’s habits, but the floor is divided. in fact, the floor is on fucking fire all the time. several arguments have been made over the years, of which 1) media creates less-nuanced female characters which makes them harder to connect to (mass media’s fault) and 2) everyone is a gay fetishizer (the individual’s fault) are, arguably, the most popular.

as a head ass philosophy student i’m going to pick the option no one likes and say that i think it’s a combination of all of these factors. and i’m going to step out further and say that people are so inseparable from our communities and societies that it’s impossible to tell where external influence ends and personal preference begins. what this means, more simply, is i think that both individual arguments are insufficient. media is fucking complicated and so are people so imagine when you put all of this shit together on one webpage and then you light a match. tell me, bethany, can you truly say that you like twinkies because You Like Twinkies or was it that advertisement you saw at the bus stop every day for eight years that finally got to you? are you trying to rebel against society’s fear of fatness? are you depressed? do you just like sweet things, and anyway, can anyone “just like” something?

now let’s transplant this issue of societal/self influence (a fandom friendly version of the nature/nurture argument, if you will) onto fandom. so okay, there aren’t a lot of f/f fics. what do?

some popular options i’ve seen are: 1) make angry posts/tweets about how everyone sleeps on f/f relationships in fandom and we’re all secretly lesbophobic 2) call everyone a gay fetishizer 3) write f/f fic

and so here is the other (other? i don’t remember how many problems i’ve listed lol i’m trying here guys) problem: fandom doesn’t have a single cohesive goal. like people don’t come to fandom and then sign a 5 page contract at the end of which is the company vision. everyone comes here to do their own shit. some people use fandom as a means of escape. some people are trying to spread a message (like the evangelists) or educate the youth. some people fuck around and find out.

concept: if the goal of fandom was social activism, then the argument could be made that We Should Write More f/f fics. that make sense to you? because there’s something we’re all striving towards, we can agree that we have an obligation to our community to do something. but the goal of fandom isn’t social activism, is it? maybe it is for you. but it isn’t for everyone here including the 14 year old kid in chinese orchestra and the 56 year old who just wants to read some good werewolf smut. and because we’re all different people who do different things and fandom is not and cannot be your entire life, we can’t make these prescriptive statements. we can’t tell people what to do. ‘people should write more f/f fics because there are very few right now’ that is a valid statement and observation. now will you write those fics? because you’re the only person whose fandom life you can control. because the point of fandom is we’re away from the rules and regulations of Society. because when people are told they can do what they want they will do what they want and if you tell them to do something else, it’s hard to fault them for not taking kindly to it. i’ve written 5k character studies. it’s work. not everyone wants to do that work. that’s why i do it.

detour end and now we return to the chicken egg problem. in my opinion, the shit we create in fandom isn’t the chicken or the egg. it’s the onsen egg that’s been placed on top of your ramen. it’s a product of several complex societal processes, but now it’s here you and maybe the dude sitting across from you are the only ones, by and large, that it’s going to affect. this onsen egg isn’t for the children of the world (broadcast via disney+). this onsen egg isn’t for the politicians who’ll decide on the policy of your country for the next hundred years. they’re not even going to see it because it’s a fucking onsen egg now and no one has taste anymore these days except for yourself, which is why this onsen egg is just for you. put in clearer terms, i agree with op that people in fandom often replicate societal bias in their work (people are copy machines, bethany), but i don’t think most fanfiction has the power to influence society the way that popular media can (see: marvel movies, i dunno, fucking, like, austin powers?), and to critique it with the same mindset we use to critique tony stark is to say that we earnestly think every 15k smutfic is going to be read by millions of people of all ages from across the world. which is not the case. ao3 has a thing you have to click if you’re not logged in you know where you have to agree that you’re 18 or older o read adult stuff. if you lie about that that’s your own goddamn problem. they asked.

and now, part 2, we come around to several interesting points made in the post. op mentioned that ganon is often portrayed as hypersexual (which is fascinating to me i don’t read e rated fic I See What Zelda Fandom Is Doing) or just fucks a lot in general. since i don’t go here i will take op’s word and roll with it, but i have my own word to add: so ganon fucks- what do we do? do we tell people to stop writing fics where ganon fucks? do we force them? do we tell people to write more gen rated character studies (please join me i sit here alone and i (pensive homo stare))?

we could. but we can’t make them. and we also can’t tell them where their ideas are coming from. i don’t, like, read a lot of smutfic but i sure know that shit exists because half my friends are horny as shit and can we all agree that fandom as a whole is just super fucking horny. like yes if ganon as a whole is portrayed more often in sexual situations than the other characters in the franchise, it’s a good and fair observation that Something’s Up Here. but can we really point to individual authors? the premises mentioned in the post by op are premises i’ve seen for haikyuu fanfiction. multiple times. tens of hundreds of times. what if someone’s just really fucking horny? what if they’re replicating racist ideas taught to them by mass media? can we tell? can THEY tell?

the answer is no because humans are black boxes that can’t be opened up even if we drop into the pacific ocean and instead screech helplessly at walls all our lives. the answer is these are complex issues and i don’t think prescriptive ‘Never Write Sexy Ganon’ statements or pointing fingers at random 30 year old smutfic authors will improve the situation. the answer, or at least my answer, is that we should consume media with a critical eye and be aware of potential biases perpetuated by the authors/creators, but striving towards ideological purity is impossible on principle (i promise you everyone on this planet is problematic in some way or another because this purity thing from christianity is fucking lame and also completely fake) and so we should all give that up. my personal answer is i’ve learned a lot about stereotypes about middle eastern and south asian people and i’ll take all this info with me moving forward, but i honestly and earnestly do not think me drawing link and zelda in dumbass princess jasmine outfits is going to directly correlate with an increase in racism as observed in the island city-state of singapore. i am aware now. that’s a good thing. but just like how the h*rry potter fandom has completely detached itself from its horrible creator and now fucks around in its own space doing its own thing, i think it’s fully possible to engage with flawed media because, surprise surprise, all the media in the world is flawed.

[lacetulle]

How do you reconcile the fact that some designers are/were terrible people? Like Coco Channel changed the fashion world... but she was also a Nazi. I know separating art from the artist is a thing, but how far does that extend in fashion?

First off, I know you asked this weeks ago. And it’s an important question, so I wanted to make sure I was slightly eloquent in my answer. But when I was ready to submit this, I decided to flip my answer. So be forewarned, this is going to be long  Initially, I thought “yeah, of course there’s separation between the art and the artist.” But now I think that can only be the case if you’re paying attention.

Going from idolizing Coco Chanel to finding out she was a Nazi, was a dramatic shift for me. But I didn’t have any problems looking at her designs and acknowledging how she changed the fashion world. I always enjoy seeing her pieces in museum exhibits…they’re beautiful and it’s always nice to see something in person. Finding out about Chanel’s past was probably my easiest compartmentalization of artists and their work. But the Chanel brand has always swept the bad press under the rug, allowing the average consumer to go along knowing nothing bad about Coco Chanel.

Much like Coco Chanel, I adored John Galliano. But I couldn’t separate his designs from his remarks for a long time. John Galliano’s anti-Semitic rant in 2011 was harder for me to compartmentalize.  By that time, I had been getting into Dior for a year, maybe two if I stretch it. So to find a designer I loved only to be slapped in the face with his “true thoughts” shortly thereafter was tough. And for a long time I refused to really study his collections. I didn’t hold anything against Dior, since they fired him immediately, but I remember feeling bad because for as talented as Raf Simons is, his tenue at Dior didn’t hold my interest the way Galliano’s had. It’s been nine years. He got sober. He’s spoken out about the scandal and expressed his remorse. He’s acknowledged how ignorant he was and that he’s grown to become a better person. Because of all his strides, it was only a couple of years ago when I finally felt comfortable diving back into Galliano’s tenure at Dior. I can now say that his time at Dior is one my absolute favorites and I hope he’s in a good place in his life. He’s not on that pedestal I had him on ten years ago, but there’s no denying he’s insanely talented. The fact that Dior fired him immediately was their way of ensuring no one had to separate the art from the artist. 

Then we can look at Dolce & Gabbana. I’ve always liked seeing their campy Italian shows along with Moschino and other Milan fashion week designers. I know D&G have had some beautiful collections (like their 2019 Alta Moda and Fall 2013 Byzantine shows just to name a couple). I’ve even seen other critics who are don’t like to give them any press, admit when D&G puts out a good collection – which is the prime example of separating art from the artist. It’s what I’ve strived to do with D&G because it’s another brand I grew up knowing at a young age. But Stefano Gabbana is consistently racist and just all-around problematic. And he’s never once apologized for it. At this point, I just assume he thrives on it because it brings the brand into the spotlight for a while. The fact that he continually makes racist/misogynistic/ignorant remarks with no remorse tells me all I need to know about him. He’s a terrible person. D&G is one of the more extremes for me…I tried to really separate the two and just appreciate a collection for what it was. But Gabbana’s reputation has seeped into the brand for me.

I know I’ve semi-recently posted D&G collections, and they’ve been in the queue for months. I received a couple messages asking me to stop posting them. So I went through my queue and pulled all the remaining ones down. I knew the big stories about Gabbana, but it wasn’t until I had the requests to stop D&G posts where I did more research and found a laundry list of receipts that Gabbana is just an ugly person.

There was an article about D&G and how the brand always bounces back and they attributed it to the fact that the average buyer just isn’t paying attention to who’s running the brand. Fashion almost has a safety net for problematic designers because they’re not the face of the brand. The clothes are. So if they stay out of the media, people will be none the wiser.

It’s easy for me to compartmentalize two of the three designers nowadays. What’s done is done at Chanel. I appreciate everything she did for fashion. Time will tell if John Galliano winds up with a nice legacy, but it seems like his life is on the right path now and I hope it continues. I love his work and knowing he has made strides to educate himself on his mistakes has helped me to fully embrace his body of work. But at this point, D&G shouldn’t be compartmentalized. Stefano Gabbana is who he is and will never apologize. So any time someone looks at a D&G collection, they should always remember just who designed it. And don’t give him a cent.

Long story short, I can only speak about my personal ability to separate the art from the artist, so it’s obviously not a one-size-fits-all answer. There are also a lot of people out there who are willing to turn a blind eye to someone simply because they like what they give to the world (a la Michael Jackson or Chris Brown). So I think the extension of separating art from the artist is much like it is in music or movies. It’s probably easy to turn a blind eye to an artist if they had an impact on you. Music and fashion are two ways we express ourselves on a daily basis and it can be really hard to work through the idea that an artist who inspired you can be a horrible person.

Diet Prada on instagram is a great page and they’re basically an industry watchdog. They’ve called out D&G countless times and yet the brand still comes out the other side. So it’s a good indication that even if someone in a position of power calls out Gabbana, the average customer for D&G doesn’t pay attention. Or even worse, they don’t care.

Everyone is going to have a different threshold for when they decide to dump a brand all together because of its designer. If someone is consistently messy, it’s probably a good time to stop caring about their art. Also a big lesson that I’ve had to continue to learn throughout my life…don’t idolize people. We don’t know who anyone truly is, and it’ll save a lot of heartache if something bad comes out.

If you made it to the end and can’t believe I wrote all that with no definitive answer, I think that’s pretty indicative that the lines are murky in fashion. I think it truly depends on the individual looking at a collection and whether they can support/appreciate it while knowing the designer has a dark past.

[simply-trash5]

Running

Okay not even going to lie this was my favorite chapter to write and I REALLY hope you guys like it. 

<3 Chapter Five

The week seemed to drag by. You wanted nothing more than for it to be Saturday so that you could see Lee again. You both were going to have a very busy week so you both decided that you wouldn’t hang out again until the date on Saturday. Just because you couldn’t see each other though didn’t mean that you couldn’t stay up till obscene hours playing dumb games or sending each other memes. You spent the week with your phone in your hand constantly and you kept finding yourself waiting to hear from Lee. He surprisingly texted you a lot, and seemed to be a huge fan of emojis. 

He always sent you a good morning text, which usually had a meme accompanying it. These of course always made you smile. One night when you fell asleep while texting him you woke up at 3:00 A.M. to find your phone gripped in your hand. Just before you put it on the charger you saw that you had an unopened text from none other than Lee. The text read: “Good night Y/N. I really hope that you sleep well. I am really excited for our date on Saturday! :)” Even in your sleepy stupor you found yourself smiling and feeling the butterflies in your tummy flutter. 

On Saturday morning you woke up bright and cheery at 8:00 A.M. as if you hadn’t been up till 3:00 doing homework. Despite only getting a few hours of good sleep you felt so rested and so excited. Today was the big date and you had absolutely no idea what Lee had decided on. You decided to text Lee first this time, telling him Good morning, and asking him what to wear on your date that night. He simply replied “Dress for fun. I’ll be there to get you at 6:00.”

For fun? What did that even mean? The day seemed to fly by and you questioned what you should wear for ‘fun’.  You rummaged through your closet and finally decided on a deep purple bodysuit under ripped black skinny jeans. You added a denim jacket for warmth and a pair of black combat boots. The body suit hugged your curves and gave a nice amount of cleavage without being too revealing for your liking. You decided to wear your hair naturally with a black knit beanie because you had no idea what Lee had up his sleeve. 

You didn’t hear much from Lee after the morning but that was okay with you. You were so nervous that you weren’t sure you would even be able to form responses to whatever he may say. By 5:15 you were completely ready and nervously scrolling through social media to pass the time. You checked on a few friends pages and even found yourself checking Lee’s feed to see if he had mentioned anything. At 3:00 that afternoon he posted a single smiley face and his dad liked it. You rolled your eyes thinking of how he must have looked crafting such an eloquent post. 

At 6:00 you decided to head down to the front of the building to see if Lee had shown up. Right on time he was there scrolling through his phone in one hand and had the other placed strategically behind his back. When he heard you approach he beamed and put his phone in his pocket. Just from his smile alone you could feel your cheeks heat up.

“Y/N, you look so pretty. Oh, erm, I’m sorry. That was probably really weird and forward. Uh, I got you this.” He outstretched his arm and in his hand was a single pink daisy. The joy on your face told him everything he needed to know. He gave you a thumbs up, which he seemed to do often when he was happy. 

You took the flower from Lee’s hand and gave him a huge hug. You both stood there for a minute in the embrace, this hug definitely felt different than your one from a week ago. There was something exciting and warm in this hug. You both stood back from each other, both blushing slightly. “So, Lee, what do you have planned for us?” you said excitedly.

“Ah, yes.” Lee began, “Well I have such a fun plan for us. Our first stop is a ramen shop downtown. Now here is my question for you, would you like to walk there or take the bus?” You thought for a minute and carefully weighed your options. He took your silence as a sign that you wanted to walk. “Lets go Y/N! I can’t wait for you to try this place!”

You and Lee walked the few blocks into downtown chatting and talking about your week. Lee talked about all of the tests he had this week and you talked about how you were completely over writing papers. Before long you both had made it to the shop. Lee held the door open for you as you both entered the small hole-in-the wall restaurant. You walked to the counter to order and you quietly whispered to Lee, “I’ve never had Ramen, what should I order?”

Lee looked at you in complete shock and then a look of determination washed over his face. “We will have two orders of the spicy ramen!” The gentleman behind the counter began to ring in your order. He talked with Lee as if he had known him forever. Lee introduced you to the man with a smile. The gentleman asked if you were Lee’s girlfriend which caused Lee to sputter and stammer. You told the man that you were on a date but you were friends. You would have never known it but Lee’s heart dropped a little at the mention of you being friends. Lee led you to a small table by the window where he continued to tell you about himself. You both laughed, ate, and talked for about an hour when Lee finally spoke up. “Well Y/N, we have a few more stops on our night of fun. Ready to go to our next location?” You laughed at how formally Lee was speaking and he gave you a bright smile in return.

Outside the restaurant you looked at Lee inquisitively. Lee looked down at you and gave you a wink. “So, Y/N, I thought you may want something sweet after dinner so I have just the place. Did you know that every saturday this month there is a town bonfire down by the river?” You gave Lee a surprised look with a smile. “I was thinking that maybe we could go make smores before our last stop. You know, just something sweet for the sweetest person I know.”

You blushed and giggled just a little. Once you realized how silly you must have looked you rolled your eyes with a smirk and punched Lee lightly on the arm. You weren’t fooling him though, he saw the way you turned pink at his little compliment and he thought it was one of the cutest things he had ever seen. His heart was beating just a little harder as you guys walked toward the river than ran through town. Once there you both had a blast making smores and sitting around the fire. You wondered how Lee had heard about this spot but instead of asking you just told him more about yourself. Lee checked his watch, the time read 8:00 and he began to stand from his spot. “Okay Y/N, I have one last stop for us. This may be the coolest one in my opinion.” He held out his hand to help you stand from the log where you were sitting. Lee’s hand was so warm and felt so nice wrapped around yours, you almost hated to let it go. Reluctantly you let go of Lee’s hand, not wanting to make your need for affection awkward for him. 

Lee led you to a small bar in town, which made you question why you would be coming there. You never thought Lee was a drinker. Lee cleared his throat, “So you’re probably wondering why I brought you here. Well, one of my favorite local bands is playing here tonight and I think you would like them. We can obviously leave if you want, but I thought it would be fun!” You gave Lee a smile and a nod reassuring him that you wanted to go inside. 

Once inside the bar you both walked toward the stage where the band was playing. There set had already began but you could tell that you really liked them already. You and Lee exchanged some glances and smiles throughout the first few songs until the band took a quick break. Lee went off to the bar and grabbed you both a beer. You both drank your beer and listened to the music. Lee was singing and dancing a little when it was a song he knew and before long you found yourself swaying along too. The band announced that they were going to be playing a stripped down version of one of their songs and encouraged the crowd to dance with a “special someone.” Lee’s cheeks began to turn a light shade of pink. He began to walk to a table to sit when you reached out your hand and grabbed his arm. Lee looked at you a little confused. You weren’t sure if it was liquid courage or your need to feel his arms around you but you asked him shyly if he would dance with you. Lee shook his head so violently that you thought it may fly off. You began to giggle at his goofy grin but stopped as soon as his large hands found your waist. 

The next 3 minutes were the best part of the date so far. You two definitely danced like no one was watching. Neither one of you were sure how to dance with another person, but you gave your best shot at it. You two were still in each other’s arms long after the band had finished. Neither of you would have moved if the band hadn’t announced it was the last song of the evening. Lee leaned down and asked if you wanted to head back to campus and you gave him a nod. 

Outside the wind was blowing lightly. The lights in the city seemed to glow even more with the cloudy sky. It was quiet in town as most of the nightlife was coming to a close. You two began your walk back to campus. You pulled your jacket a little tighter remarking about how chilly it was. Lee immediately reached his hand out for yours. You stared at his hand in shock for a few seconds before taking it. The feeling of Lee’s hand wrapped around yours made you feel so warm inside you would have thought it was summer. You were pulled out of your quiet thoughts by Lee. “Earlier I gave you a daisy. Do you know anything about flowers and their meaning?” You shook your head and said that you didn't. Lee cleared his throat and began to speak in a thoughtful tone, “The daisy is a symbol of new beginnings, specifically a pink daisy is sometimes seen as a symbol for new romantic feelings.” 

Your mouth made a small o and you looked up at Lee with a sparkle in your eye. You two didn’t speak again till you got back to your building. You looked at Lee standing in front of you. He was so handsome and sweet; you were sure you had never met a better guy in your life. “Lee, I had a really great time tonight. Thank you for such a fun and thoughtful date. The flower was very thoughtful too.” Lee looked down at you with a small grin.

“Y/N I gave you that daisy because I wanted you to know how much I like you. Everyday I wake up and you’re the first thing on my mind. At night, before I go to sleep, you are the last thing I think of. I don’t mean to be forward, but I just wanted you to know how I feel.” Your eyes grew wide. Immediately Lee thought he had said the wrong thing. The corners of your mouth turned upward into a bright smile.

“Lee, I like you too, so much more than just a friend. You make me so happy. You’re an amazing man.” Lee’s cheeks turned a bright shade of pink. Lee closed his eyes and breathed in deeply.

“Y/N, can I kiss you?”, Lee asked bravely.

“Lee,” you began, “I’ve been waiting on this since the day you carried me up to my room. I would want nothing more.” Lee’s hands travelled to your cheeks and held your face tenderly. He leaned down to you and gave you a soft sweet kiss. Time stood still for just a minute and just like that it was over. When you both pulled away you both stared at each other with small grins on your face. 

“Y/N, thank you for being you. I can’t wait to see you again,” Lee whispered in your ear as he gave you a tight hug. “Can I come see you tomorrow?”

You gave Lee a small peck on the lips in reassurance. 

 “It’s a date lover-boy.”

[knuffled]

discipline & punish - chapter four

here it is and it is literally a wall of very explicit smut so please don’t read if that’s not your thing. thank you for reading, and i hope you enjoy it! 

chapter four - virginal delights

Annabeth looked up from her blueprints when she heard the sound of the bell tolling, signalling it was time for dinner. It was dark outside her office window now, even though it had been early in the afternoon when she’d initially sat down to work. With a sigh, she made some final notes on a scrap piece of paper before standing up and leaving her office.

The wound in her abdomen throbbed with pain as she did, just like it had for the past two weeks since she’d been discharged from the hospital. It wasn’t as excruciating as it once was, but she still hissed and gingerly ran her fingers along the top of the gauze pad taped over her stitches in a vain attempt to soothe the pain.

Annabeth had had her fair share of injuries over the years – it came with the territory of being a demigod, after all – but it was still frustrating to live in constant pain from the moment she woke in the morning till she mercifully fell asleep at night. The only moments of reprieve during her day came as she worked when her sheer focus kept the pain at bay.

Her boots clacked against the cobblestone road as she made her towards the dining pavilion. The path took her through the plaza at the heart of New Athens, and she took a moment to stop and appreciate the fountain, now that it was fully functional. It was made from marble, depicting three dryads standing in the center as water poured out of the vases they carried. The rush of falling water was music to her ears, and she felt a swell of pride course through her.

There was a familiar face sitting on a bench, looking at the fountain. Annabeth made her way over with a big grin on her face.

“Dominick!” she called.

The son of Hephaestus looked up and smiled when he saw Annabeth approaching. “Look who’s back from the dead,” he said.

Annabeth rolled her eyes. “You’re being awfully dramatic. It was only a flesh wound.”

“A damn foolish thing is what it was,” Dominick said, snorting. “I’m glad you’re recovering.”

“Just because I’m injured doesn’t mean I’m not working on new blue prints to terrorize you with,” Annabeth teased, sitting beside him.

Dominick rubbed his beard, a disgruntled expression on his face, and grumbled, “You should be resting.”

“But that would be boring.”

He huffed a laugh and said, “Well, it’s good to know that near death experiences haven’t changed you.”

Annabeth shrugged. “I’ve been through worse.”

The look in Dominick’s eyes softened. “I know you have.”

Annabeth cleared her throat and shot him a small smile of gratitude. “Thanks for taking over while I was out with the fountain and everything. I appreciate it.”

Dominick waved his hand dismissively.

“It was nothing. If anything, I’m hoping this experience shows you the value of delegating. It’s foolish to try and build Rome on your own,” he said. “You should rely on us more. We all want New Athens to succeed as much as you do.”

Annabeth laughed and said, “You’ve gotten far more eloquent than I remember. What ever happened to being the strong and silent type?”

He shrugged and said, “This isn’t the time to be silent.”

There was a pause before Annabeth said, “Thank you for what you said. I’ll try to make a more conscious effort to not micromanage everything from now on.”

The bench squeaked once Dominick stood up with a grin on his face. “That’s all I ask for,” he said. “I know you have to head to the dining pavilion, so I don’t want to keep you any longer. Keep me posted on how you’re doing and if there’s anything I can do to help.”

Annabeth nodded and waited a few minutes after Dominick’s departure before continuing on her way, but the warm glow in her stomach faded rapidly the closer she got to the pavilion. She found herself clenching and unclenching her fists, dread welling up inside her, and by the time she arrived at the pavilion her heart was almost jack-hammering in her chest. Immediately, her eyes scanned all the tables in search of him without her consent until she spotted Percy sitting alone, like always, at one of the tables at the edges of the pavilion, much to her dismay.

Not for the first time, she cursed herself for taking on the mantle of Camp Director. Her position made her presence at the pavilion necessary during lunch and dinner times. Honestly, Annabeth wanted nothing more than to retreat to the confines of her apartment so she could whip up a salad, maybe pour herself a glass of bourbon, and plop down on her favorite armchair, swaddled in blankets, so she could watch something mindless on Netflix.

Although she would never admit it aloud, Annabeth had done her damndest to stay the fuck away from Percy after her discharge from the hospital. The night he had snuck into her hospital room had only cemented the truth that she could not be around him if she didn’t want to do something stupid, something she would regret.

In fact, since her discharge, Annabeth had only spoken to him once directly to discuss his living arrangements. She briefly toyed with the idea of letting him stay in the Hermes cabin until he was claimed before realizing that was a recipe for disaster, so she had instead instructed him to stay at the Big House until then.

However, because of her position as director she was forced to see Percy twice a day for lunch and dinner, and of course that meant that obscene scent of his would unerringly find a way to waft over to her like the world’s slowest heat seeking missile. Every single day was a battle as her willpower wrestled her growing urges, and each day her willpower grew closer to losing. It had gotten to the point where Annabeth could no longer recall what she had had for lunch, let alone what it tasted like, even earlier that same day because every ounce of her focus was on repressing her growing obsession with Percy.

There was something about him that she found irresistible, something that eroded her self-control. On more than one occasion, she found herself staring out her office window, observing him as he sat at the beach and watched the waves lick the shore for hours at a time. He rarely spent time around other campers, but, once or twice, she had seen Percy coaxing the Naiads in the canoe lake into conversing with him.

Every time she caught herself staring, frustration and shame would bubble in the pit of her stomach, and it just got worse with each passing day. Percy, on the other hand, seemed blissfully unaware of Annabeth’s growing anguish. He would just sit alone and finish his meal quickly before disappearing again while Annabeth was forced to give herself mental pep talks to keep from fucking his brains out in front of everyone in the dining pavilion.

Tonight was no different unfortunately. After Annabeth took her seat, she had to push all thoughts of him out of her mind so she could nod politely when the other campers spoke to her, a terse smile on her face. A son of Ares asked her about organizing a game of capture the flag for that weekend after a daughter of Demeter inquired about the logistics of opening a city garden.

Somehow, in the midst of that bombardment, Annabeth noticed a daughter of Hermes walking towards Percy’s table with a determined expression on her face. Annabeth ground her teeth together and fought the urge to intercept her and turn her away. Recently, she had begun to notice the wayward glances and hushed conversations the female campers had amongst themselves as they stared at Percy, like wolves looking at a piece of meat.

It was the scent, Annabeth assumed. If it was strong enough to threaten her self-control, none of the other girls in camp stood a chance.

Annabeth tuned out whoever was talking to her and watched Percy turn to the girl after she tapped his shoulder, a look of mild bemusement on his face. She couldn’t hear what they said to each other, not this far away, but Annabeth found herself digging her nails into her palm as she watched them.

Percy was hers. No one else was allowed to have him.

Eventually, the girl bowed her head before returning to her table with a somewhat dejected look on her face, much to Annabeth’s satisfaction, but the feeling faded when Annabeth noticed Percy staring at her. When their eyes met, Percy raised his eyebrows, the ghost of a smirk tugging at his lips, which made Annabeth’s skin heat up and prickle, knowing she’d been caught red-handed.

The rest of dinner passed by in a blur. Percy vanished at some indeterminate point in the night, but Annabeth wasn’t sure whether or not to be grateful for that. On her way back to her apartment, Annabeth wracked her brain for solutions to neutralize that ridiculous scent of his – it was what threatened her most of all. Without it, she stood a much better chance of maintaining her self-control.

With a sigh, Annabeth checked her mailbox before taking the elevator up to her floor. Perhaps a child of Hecate could cast a spell on her to make her immune to the scent or maybe a child of Hephaestus could build a contraption that dispelled it. The method was irrelevant as long as it achieved its intended effect.

Once she arrived at her floor, Annabeth was about to make her way down the hallway to her room when she froze at the sight of Percy leaning against her front door. How did he know where she lived? One hand immediately curled around the hilt of her dagger as she stared at him, heart racing in her chest. At the very least, with this much distance between them she would have enough time to react if he chose to attack.

“What’re you doing here, Percy?” she asked carefully.

Percy pushed off the door and stepped towards her. Annabeth had to quell her instinct to step away from him and forced herself to hold her ground instead.

“I think you know exactly why I’m here, Annabeth,” Percy said softly.

Annabeth licked her lips and tried frantically to formulate a response, but nothing was coming to mind. At this proximity, she was exposed to the full brunt of that maddening scent of his, and it was rapidly eroding what little was left of her self-control.

“Do you want to explain why you’re trying so hard to avoid me? You’re doing a very bad job of it though by the way. Don’t think I haven’t noticed all those times you’ve stolen glances at me during dinner,” Percy said.

“You know why. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be here.”

Percy smirked and said, “I still want to hear you say it.”

Annabeth narrowed her eyes. “There’s no point – nothing can happen between us.”

Percy raised an eyebrow. “And what exactly is stopping you?”

“Common fucking sense for one thing,” Annabeth snorted. “Also, I don’t fucking trust you. In case you don’t remember, you nearly killed me, for Christ’s sake!”

“I gave you my word-”

“And I’m just supposed to believe you?” Annabeth hissed. “All because you gave your word?”

“Yes, that’s the whole point of making a promise,” Percy said slowly, like she had said something incredibly stupid.

Annabeth resisted the urge to scream. “Look, I’m twenty four years old – to me, you’re practically a child, so there’s nothing to discuss here. You need to leave. Now.”

Percy met her gaze for a few seconds before shrugging. “If that’s what you want.”

For a few seconds, Percy stood unmoving and matched her gaze. He wasn’t backing down. The harsh fluorescent light in the hall hummed like a droning bee, adding to the tension between them. Annabeth desperately hoped he wouldn’t continue to argue with her – she wasn’t sure she had the willpower to refuse him again, a realization that only served to inspire more self-disgust.

He’s only 18. He’s the same age as Bobby and Matthew. Send him away. Why the fuck are you still considering this? What the fuck is wrong with you?

It was hard to say how long they both stood there, holding their ground, but eventually Percy shrugged and turned to leave. In the next instant, Annabeth’s body moved faster than her brain could think. There was thud as she pressed Percy against her front door and she surged up to kiss him. His lips were softer than she would have expected, his inexperience showing in the awkward way he kissed her back, but that only served to inflame Annabeth’s lust.

She would be his first and she was going to ruin him.

The thought sent a wave of heat rushing through her. Annabeth pressed her knee in between his legs and tangled her fingers in his hair possessively. She jerked his head to the side, harder than she should have, and sucked bruises along the column of his neck, coaxing a strangled groan out of him.

“Shhh,” Annabeth murmured, voice slurring as she covered his mouth with her hand.

Percy’s hand scrabbled for purchase against the door but found none, making Annabeth grin. Served him right, flaunting that intolerable scent of his at every opportunity, tormenting her for weeks.

Annabeth slid a hand beneath the hem of his jeans and palmed his cock roughly, which was already straining against his boxers, and delighted in the way his legs trembled from the effort of keeping him upright.

Jesus, she was already so wet, and they’d barely even started.

They both stumbled into her dark apartment when she somehow managed to prize the door open, kicking it shut behind her. Her fumbling fingers scrambled to find the light switch just in time for her to crowd Percy against the door and claim his lips again. Annabeth tangled her fingers in his hair and cradled to the back of his head, pulling him down to deepen the kiss.

She was fortunate that Percy was such a quick learner. Within minutes, he found the sensitive spot behind her left ear that always made her go crazy as well as how much her body responded when he softly traced the curve of her spine with his fingers. Annabeth had armed herself with a better idea of Percy’s preferences as well, noting how he liked having his hair pulled and when she clawed at his upper back, between his shoulder blades.

It’s hard to say how long they stayed there, exploring with their lips and tongue, trying to coax reactions out of the other like they were sparring again. Percy was already beginning to resist the control Annabeth had initially claimed, but she’d expected as much. She’d known from the moment they’d traded blows in the hospital that Percy would not be tamed so easily, but that was exactly what Annabeth craved. To her, there was nothing better than forcing a strong will to submit.

They stepped away from each other for a moment in an effort to steady their heavy breathing. A grin split across Annabeth’s face once she saw how debauched Percy looked. He was gorgeous like this: hair mussed, pupils blown wide with desire, lips swollen, neck littered with red bites. His body was so responsive, more so than anyone Annabeth had ever been with.

Annabeth pulled him by the hand towards the living room, knowing they wouldn’t make it to the bedroom, and watched hungrily as Percy desperately shucked his shirt. She got rid of hers as well, leaving her in a bra and jeans, while Percy threw his jeans into some dark corner of her living room. Annabeth pushed him onto the sofa and climbed atop his lap, her hands slowly smoothing down his chest. The hunger in Percy’s gaze as he looked up at her while pressing a kiss to the valley of her breasts, his pupils completely dilated, sent a shiver down her spine.

“This is your last chance,” Annabeth said, breathing heavily. “If you want to stop, now is the time.”

Annabeth could feel the low rumble of Percy’s laughter through his chest. “What in the world makes you think I want to stop?” he asked, lips brushing against her breasts.

Annabeth framed his face in her hands and stared into his eyes. “I have to hear you say it. Tell me you want this.”

Instead of answering, Percy teased one of her breasts out from under her bra and sucked, making Annabeth bite her lip in an effort to keep from crying out.

“Percy,” she groaned, unable to mask her exasperation.

“Fine, I want this,” he said, a challenge glinting in his eyes. “Happy?”

Annabeth narrowed her eyes. She would get rid of that arrogant attitude in due time.

She rutted against him and smirked when she felt him harden under her. Percy stared at her, slack-jawed, as she continued mercilessly rolling her hips against him. As desperate as she was to get rid of her pants, she wanted to make Percy suffer more.

His hands reached for her hips in an attempt to stop her, but Annabeth swatted his hands away. If she wasn’t so drunk with lust, she might’ve punished him for even trying to stop her, but tonight she was too far gone to bother with dominance. That could wait for next time.

Annabeth bit and tugged at Percy’s earlobe, eliciting a broken moan that went straight to her cunt. The little noises and whimpers he made stoked her lust for him to a feverish degree.

She stood up and desperately stripped out of her pants, unable to delay it any longer. Her bra and underwear were next to go. Percy discarded his own boxers, and Annabeth took the chance to study him, now that he was fully naked, visually tracing the beautiful lines of his body and the lean muscle he’d formed.

Annabeth pushed him down onto the sofa and climbed over his face, smirking when Percy’s hands instantly went to support her hips.

She tangled her fingers in his hair again. “Lick,” she commanded.

A broken moan escaped her lips as Percy dragged the flat of his tongue along the outside of her cunt. Fuck, that felt good. He repeated the motion a few more times, stoking the fire inside her higher and higher, but it still wasn’t enough.

“Use your tongue inside too,” Annabeth instructed.

When Percy obeyed, Annabeth’s eyelids fluttered shut, and her grip on his hair tightened. It was probably hurting him, but she was too far gone to care. For his first time eating someone out, Percy was doing better than she’d expected. It didn’t take her long to settle on a rhythm and start riding his face. As she grew closer to the edge, Annabeth removed a hand from his hair and rubbed her clit to provide the final boost she needed to cum.

“Fuck, I’m cumming,” Annabeth moaned.

Percy’s hands wrapped around her ass and pulled her closer down onto his mouth as her thighs clamped down on either side of his face. Annabeth jerked hard on Percy’s hair, arching her back, a long moan escaping her as she came. She held onto the sofa’s frame to maintain her balance while her hips spasmed as she rode out the aftershocks of her orgasm.

Once they were done, she moved and sat back atop Percy’s stomach and tried to steady her heavy breathing. Annabeth could feel Percy’s cock straining against the curve of her ass and relished in how dark Percy’s eyes were.

“Not bad for your first time,” Annabeth said, panting.

Percy rolled his eyes and sat up, pressing their chests together. She could feel the outline of his scars against her skin, and she was sure that he could feel her own as well. Neither of them were conscious about – if anything it was a testament to how strong they were as individuals. Percy’s fingers ghosted over the gauze pad taped to her abdomen.

“You sure you’re not hurting yourself?” Percy asked, smirking. “This might be too hard on your elderly body.”

Annabeth narrowed her eyes and shoved him half-heartedly. “I’m not that old, you asshole,” she grumbled.

When Percy laughed, Annabeth could feel it through her skin. “Then does that mean you have enough stamina to keep going?”

Annabeth opened her purse and fished out a condom and tore it with her teeth. “Men shouldn’t talk about stamina.”

She reached behind her and rolled the condom onto his cock before wrapping her hand around it, smirking when Percy’s eyes fluttered shut.

“They never do last very long – most of them are only good for one round.”

Annabeth slowly jerked him off and leaned in to whisper in his ear. “I doubt you’ll even last five minutes inside me.”

Percy glowered at her. “Is that a challenge?”

“Challenge implies you stand a chance of winning, which you clearly don’t.”

A growl rumbled through Percy’s chest, making Annabeth’s smile widen. Good, he was getting worked up. Annabeth found that she often got the best sex out of men once she provoked them.

Percy squeezed her ass hard before he lifted her above his cock and thrust into her. They both groaned in unison and desperately pressed up against each other.

God, it felt so good to be filled.

Annabeth brushed his hair out of his eyes and pressed a messy kiss to his lips. They kissed languidly, their tongues dancing around one another, as she got adjusted to his size. Then, without warning, Annabeth raised herself up and sank back down onto him.

“Fuck,” she muttered.

Percy’s grip on her hips tightened when she circled her hips on her way down. He dropped a kiss to one of her breasts before reaching up to knead the other one, making Annabeth groan. She scratched at his upper back, etching red lines into his skin, and slowly began to ride him.

He managed to work a particularly broken moan out of her when he tugged on a nipple with his teeth. She could feel him smirking against her skin as he sucked it again to soothe the sting.

Annabeth pushed him onto the couch so that she could accelerate her pace, partially to prove he couldn’t last five minutes but mostly because she needed more. Percy tried to sit up again, but she stayed low on him and held him down by the shoulders, sucking a bruise under his chin and making him grunt.

She could feel heat pooling inside her already, the promise of another orgasm on the horizon, and chased after it with reckless abandon, setting a punishing rhythm atop him. The maddening scent of his was stronger now than it had ever been before and seemed to egg her on to go faster and faster. The lewd sounds of them fucking filled her half-dark living room, and the sofa squeaked beneath them, keeping time with her pace.

Percy’s body stiffened a few minutes later, which spurred Annabeth on faster. “Aah, I-I’m gonna,” he stammered.

Annabeth bit his earlobe, pulling with her teeth, before whispering into his ear, “Do it. Show me how you cum.”

Percy wrapped a hand behind Annabeth’s head to anchor himself, his fingers knotting in her hair, as he released a strangled groan.

“Annabeth,” he moaned.

Annabeth felt his cock grow inside her before Percy froze, his eyes screwing shut as his back arched up off the sofa. He was almost completely silent as he came, but Annabeth could feel his entire body quivering beneath her. She’d never seen anything as beautiful as Percy’s face contorted by pleasure, completely slaw-jawed, weaving his fingers into her hair like she was the only thing keeping him tethered to Earth.

The sight itself was enough to send Annabeth over the edge as well. She bit down on his shoulder to keep from crying out, which made his hips jerked upward involuntarily. Her fingernails cut into his upper back, leaving red crescent shaped marks in his skin, while her cunt clenched around his cock desperately.

When she finally came, Annabeth’s entire body felt completely drained, leaving her panting atop Percy’s chest. Annabeth deeply breathed in the smell of sweat, sex, and Percy’s troublesome odor scent that hung in the air. She felt Percy’s hand brush aside the strands of hair that lay matted against her forehead, almost tenderly, and felt her face flush.

Annabeth looked up at him, her head still flat against his chest, and smiled softly when he met her eyes.

“I think that was more than five minutes,” she said coyly. “Well done.”

“Strangely enough, I didn’t really have enough time to check my watch in the middle of all that. Funny, huh?” Percy said.

Annabeth pressed a kiss to his chest and said, “Given how hard I just fucked your brains out, I’m a little insulted that you can still mouth off to me.”

Percy’s ensuing laughter brought a smile to Annabeth’s lips. “Are you always this arrogant?”

“It’s not arrogance if it’s true,” Annabeth said, shrugging. “I fucked you well, and you know it.”

Percy blinked. “That’s fair.”

They lay there in silence for a while. It had been a long time since Annabeth had had such a good fuck. Alyssa and her other partners were fun, sure, but there was just something about Percy. Already her mind raced with all sorts of possibilities.

They hadn’t gotten into any of the good stuff tonight, which fine considering it was Percy’s first time and all, but going forward, Annabeth wasn’t going to be this easy on him. Images flooded into her mind of him bound and blindfolded, sobbing as she edged him for hours, begging her to let him cum. Images of him with his hands tied behind his back, that cute ass of his pointing straight up in the air, red and ready for her, littered with welts from her riding crop, as she fastened her strap-on.

Fuck.

Annabeth bit her lip and rubbed her thighs together discreetly, already feeling heat pool in her stomach. She looked up and noticed Percy’s eyelids were drooping as he resisted the urge to fall asleep. Annabeth traced his scars with her fingers as a small bit of disappointment arose in her – she really would’ve liked to go for a second round, but it was understandable given that it was his first time.

“Not tonight. Next time,” she promised herself. “Next time, I’ll get to have some real fun with him.”

[orbitariums]

happy together | ransom drysdale

anon asked: Hey! I was wondering if you write for Ransom Drysdale? If you do could you write something where he’s married but bc of his relationship with his family, none of them know &when the questioning takes place he unwilling tells everyone about it and how he couldn’t have done it bc he was with the reader the whole time yet they don’t believe him so the reader shows up and backs him up by showing the detective a video of their activities that took place that night and he’s super cute with the reader?      

note: so i saw knives out when it came out and i had to freshen up a bit!! ransom is not a fav of mine for obvious reasons BUT i can appreciate a good ransom imagine, and i think this is one. i wasn’t quite sure how to write it at the beginning but it became so fun throughout. a short and sweet read. thanks anon!

word count: 1.8k

     "He doesn't even have an alibi!" screeched Joni.

She wasn't the only one screeching - everyone's voices overlapped one another's in the living room where the family questioning was taking place. Ransom was the target of the hour and he was slouched uncomfortably in a classic grandfather chair, trying to maintain his stoic calm as his family griped at each other and specifically him.

He really didn't want to have to come to this point - but it was either that, or getting accused for murder. So, he would have to go to that point.

     "I couldn't have been there," Ransom muttered, first quietly because he was trying to keep calm under the pressure.

    Meg rolled her eyes,

   "What was that? Speak up Ransom, you always seem to have so much to say!"

A raucous chorus of agreement ensued, and Ransom took in a deep breath, this time speaking louder, but calmly, effectively hushing the crowd,

     "I couldn't have been there, because I was at home with my wife."

He locked eyes with the detective, who simply glanced at him, eyebrows quirked just slightly. Meanwhile, his entire family went beserk, bewildered by his statement. But of course he wouldn't have told them of his marriage, and they wouldn't have known to begin with. No one was invited to the wedding. It was private, just the two of them and a wedding clerk. And that was just how Ransom wanted it - no crazy family drama to interrupt, no noses in his business. Just him, and you, his lovely wife. Much sweeter than him, but still a perfect match for his demeanor. So, while everyone took in the sudden news, Ransom tuned them out, although his face grew hot and his jaw grew taut. No one was supposed to know, at least for as long as he could keep it a secret. He wasn't planning on telling anyone, and he wasn't willing to. But again, the circumstances were dire.

    "Hm," Detective Blanc nodded slowly, taking in the situation.

    "Well- you're not just gonna believe him, are you detective?" stuttered Walt.

Detective Benoit Blanc seemed to be thumbing over Ransom's options in his mind, to prove his own statement true. Finally he spoke, silencing the room in that magnetic way of his,

    "Bring your wife. Tell her to bring evidence that you were there that night, and evidence that you're married of course. Now, let's break, shall we?"

| | |

    You instantly knew what you had to do, the moment Ransom called. You had insisted that you join him to support him during the questionings, but he refused, wanting to keep this a secret until he simply was unable to. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate you greatly, or want to show you off - just not to his family, for reasons he'd explained in depth ever since you started dating. But now that he called you, you were ready immediately. What better way to reveal yourself to the family than with great triumph, as you proved your husband innocent?  

    A hush went over the room as you entered. No one had ever seen you before, and your beauty and grace as you stood tall and resilient despite the hectic circumstances encapsulated everyone. And there was no doubting that you were Ransom's wife - the way your eyes glowed cold and belittling, shooting daggers at everyone in the room without even looking at one person in particular. Not unlike Ransom, you weren't too fond of his family either, from what he'd told you.

     Though you'd always imagined that maybe one day you would meet under better circumstances, when Ransom had perhaps patched things up with his family, and you could put on a very wide smile and network your way through one of their famous dinner parties, cold hand in another cold hand as you introduced yourself: "Hi, I'm YN, Ransom's wife." But that wasn't the way you would be meeting, and thank god you got to skip past the sickly sweet drama of it all. What better way to meet the family than in this way?

    You turned immediately on your ankle boot heel to face the detective, Ransom gazing at you with pleading eyes. You wore a trench coat length leather jacket over your shoulders, and a cable knit turtle neck top that matched Ransom's.  In your manicured, unbattered hands you held a crisp manila file folder tight to your chest, which contained legal documents officiating your marriage with Ransom, and video evidence that proved his alibi. It was all down to you.  You were his saving grace.

    You spoke steadily and calmly, just like Ransom would, except you spoke in a poised, eloquent way, truly unbothered by the glares and stares of confusion that you were getting from his so-called "family."  Their stares burned hot like knives in your back, and yet you persisted. Your husband was innocent.  You would be the one to prove it, fully and completely, within thrall.

    "Detective," you finally spoke, your voice smooth and just the right amount of husky. "I'm Y/N Drysdale, wife of Ransom Drysdale. I understand I've been called here to vouch for the innocence of my husband, who I can assure you, has no business being here among such - well, if I may be honest - insipid bastards."

    You turned to face the family on that last part, turning them to stone just with the undeniable spite in your eyes, even earning a gasp from Joni. You turned back immediately as if nothing had happened, and on Ransom's face creeped a victorious smirk. Attagirl, he thought.

     "But I digress," your heels clacked against the wooden floor as you walked directly in front of the detective, and passed him the folder full of evidence. "I understand you'll be wanting this."

    The detective, amused by your film noir act, took the folder with grateful hands, and nodded. He sifted through the documents, you sitting down next to Ransom and holding his hand all throughout, giving it a squeeze. The detective made pleased humming noises as he sifted through the documents - so the marriage was legit. Now all that was left was a video tape, showing the time stamp in which Ransom had been at home with you, the thing that would prove him innocent.

     "A movie," Detective Blanc joked, only gaining laughter from himself. "Let's see, then."

He put the tape in, and the activities of that night unfolded - in embarrassing, unfittingly cute time.

    "Ransom, really, I can't be bothered!" despite your pleas, you were laughing giddily as Ransom hugged and tugged at you from behind, distracting you from your tax of stirring up homemade chocolate cake mix.

    "Really, because you seem to like this," Ransom laughed, so carefree and happy - unlike him. He was teasing you, as always, something his family would never even expect to see. But it was happening so clearly on video, him holding you and caressing you, biting joyfully at your neck.

    "You're going to make me waste this unborn chocolate cake, is that what you want?" you squealed as he picked you up, nevermind the fact that you were carrying a bowl of creamy chocolate cake mix.

      "I can think of better things to eat," he cooed.

Skip.

    "Ha! That's three games in a row I've won, pay up!" you exclaimed, throwing your hands up in the air in victory.

    Earlier, you and Ransom had agreed that if you won three games of Uno with him, he'd give you a foot massage. He didn't need a bet to agree to that, but he thought it was cute how you were up to the challenge.

    "Sure. But I would've done it anyway," Ransom reassured you, standing up to get the stuff he needed.

     "Mhm, I know. You adore me, of course you would!" you exclaimed, laying back on the couch and propping your feet up in a very Hollywood actress fashion, flipping your hair as a smile took over your features. "But I like beating you."

    "Game of luck," Ransom retorted, coming back into the room with a full massage kit.

    "Game of strategy. Which I see you have none of," you teased him, and Ransom let you, a full lipped smile on his face.

    "You know I'm letting you bask in this, right?"

    "Oh, believe me, I know."

Skip.

    It was just before your bedtime, but you and Ransom were sharing a glass of evening wine, sitting across from each other on your couches. You were dressed in a darling, expensive silk robe, and Ransom had on his best loungewear. Being rich had its small perks like that.

    You sighed into your wine glass, then taking a big gulp.  

    "Must be hard not being around your family, huh?" you asked, easing into the conversation, the deep blues and oranges of the sky outside setting the tone.

    "Not really," Ransom shrugged. "It's better without them, honest. It's not hard to not see them. It's great not to, in fact."

    You chuckled bitterly,

    "I hear that. I love my family, but they can be-"

    "A pain in the ass," both you and Ransom said at once, and you ended up shaking your heads with knowing smiles.

    "Cheers to that," Ransom offered, leaning across to clink his glass with yours. You obliged, and then you both took big sips.

    "Hm... I'm going to tune out soon. Care to join me?"

    "It's all I ever want to do."

Skip.

    It appeared that you were in the bathtub, Ransom kneeling on the floor next to you, your entire body covered with soap and bubbles while he reached a bath cloth in, gently rubbing the cloth against your soapy body, while faint music played in the background.

    "Uh- this won't be necessary, will it?" Linda's voice cut into the video.

She was definitely more concerned than you were - as you were watching the tape with a mischievous smirk, knowing exactly where this was heading.

    "Who has security cameras in their bathroom?" Meg snorted, making a snide comment. 

Barely turning your head to face her, you responded,

    "Hmm, you would think that you would. To get video evidence of all the shit that comes out of your mouth."

    "Well, I must agree. That is enough. And judging by the time stamps-" Detective started, and you simply sighed, rolling your eyes - what a waste of precious time, proving your obviously innocent husband innocent.

    "He was there. With me. Enjoying lovely time with his lovely wife, his hand in marriage, his eternal partner. And obviously, he's innocent. Now, may we please be dismissed? It reeks of simple minds in here."

    And in that moment, Ransom had never smiled so genuinely in front of his own family. All thanks to you.

[noona-clock]

The Demon 👿 Day and Night

Genre: College!AU (with flashbacks of High School!AU)

Pairing: Sungjin x You

Warnings: Slight Angst

Words: 1,750

Day and Night  👿 Zombie  👿 Tick Tock  👿 Love me or Leave me  👿 STOP  👿 1 to 10  👿 Afraid

Like the day and night It’s going back differently The middle is always waiting It’s just a moment. It’s being biased.  Only on one side we’ve been wanting each other

Sungjin was tired of the back and forth.

The two of you had known each other since high school. He’d had a crush on you since high school, and he knew you felt the same way -- but for one reason or another, it had just never worked out.

And, like I said, he was tired of it. He was tired of getting his hopes up, he was tired of waiting in limbo, and he was tired of constantly feeling like all he did was wait for you.

I mean, the two of you were about to graduate from university. Don’t you think this has been going on long enough?

So, tonight -- tonight -- Sungjin was going to resolve this once and for all. He was going to seek you out and talk to you like he’d never talked to you before. And, hopefully, he would never have to talk to you like that again.

Good lord, he hoped so.

Sad sad sad sad sad What can I do? Always Bad bad bad bad bad Timing all the time When someone’s hot, Someone else is cold. I’m going crazy.

Back then, Sungjin had waited a long time before confessing to you. His crush on you had developed during his freshman year, but he hadn’t said anything to you until junior year, and even then it was only after months of working up his nerve.

You had been flirting with him -- he had been pretty sure, at least. He had never been the best at interpreting stuff like that, but you’d been pretty obvious about it. The two of you had spent a lot of time together, and you’d seemed to perk up whenever Sungjin had talked about Junior Prom.

So, he had finally decided to ask you to be his date.

He hadn’t come up with anything fancy -- none of that promposal nonsense he’d seen on social media. He was simply going to go to your house, ring your doorbell, and ask you. Plain and simple, just like him.

But when he’d arrived, he had been faced with an incredibly disappointing scene -- for him, at least.

Another guy (presumably someone from the baseball team) had been laying out a bunch of baseballs in your yard, shaping out the letters P-R-O-M with a question mark at the end. Sungjin had been able to see a sheet of poster board laying in your driveway, too, which read ‘Being your date to prom would be better than a home run.’

...How was he supposed to compete with that?

Besides, the other guy had gotten there first.

Sungjin had watched from down the road as Baseball Guy rang your doorbell, ran back into your yard next to his display of baseballs, and held his sign up as soon as you’d opened the door.

He had held out the tiniest bit of hope that you would say ‘no.’ 

But, of course, you hadn’t.

The next day, Sungjin had decided to just be honest with you.

...Kind of.

He had brought up the pictures he’d seen on social media of the whole thing, and you had confirmed it.

“Yeah, it super unexpected,” you’d grinned. And then your grin had fallen slightly, and you’d added, “I... was actually kind of hoping you would ask me, but you probably don’t even want to go. You don’t really seem like the prom type.”

And his heart had broken.

No, he hadn’t been the prom type. He hadn’t wanted to go.

But he would’ve gone with you.

If he had just been ten minutes earlier. Or if he had just confessed his feelings to you weeks ago -- months ago!

Ah, well. At least Sungjin had learned a valuable lesson: it really was all about timing. 

Unfortunately, his timing had just been spectacularly bad.

If you try to get closer and closer, You’re going to disappear in a while and in my sight, oh We’re gonna have to go through this I go up And you go down It’s always the same

On the night of prom, Sungjin had decided he would move on.

You would most likely start dating that dumb baseball player, and Sungjin really didn’t want to spend Senior year pining over you when he knew he had no chance.

So, he had taken out his phone and called up his grandfather.

A couple of years ago, Sungjin had spent the summer with him and had been a counselor at a music camp close to his grandfather’s house. Even if the camp didn’t have any open counselor spots, he could still stay there for the summer and not risk running into you with your new boyfriend.

And, thankfully, that’s just what he’d done. 

He’d spent two whole months living with his grandfather and working at the nearby arts center as a music camp counselor. Most importantly, he’d spent two whole months not seeing or talking to you.

In fact, there was another counselor he’d connected with, and he’d spent two whole months seeing and talking to her. The two of them had a lot of common interests -- including the same sense of humor -- and by the time Sungjin had returned to school for Senior Year, he had officially taken himself off the market.

And, of course, that’s when you’d approached him.

The first day of school.

“Hey,” you’d grinned, hugging your astronomy textbook to your chest. “How was your summer? I didn’t see you at all.”

“Oh... yeah,” Sungjin had replied with an awkward chuckle. “I was staying with my grandfather.”

He had closed his locker, but instead of saying ‘goodbye’ and leaving, you had followed him.

“I... actually was hoping we could talk?” you’d asked softly, your brow furrowed gently.

Oh, boy. 

“...Talk about what?”

“About... us.”

Us?!

Sungjin had paused, turning to face you as he’d clutched one strap of his backpack. “I... I actually met someone. We were counselors together at a music camp, and she only lives an hour away, so...”

Your expression had fallen, and Sungjin had known exactly how you’d felt in that moment. Because he had just felt it a couple of months ago.

“...Oh,” you’d murmured.

Sungjin’s timing had been bad right before prom, and the tables had turned on him. You had been with someone before summer when Sungjin had been ready to ask you out. He had been with someone after summer when you had been ready to ask him out.

Would your timing ever match up?

I don’t wanna give it up Don’t give it up Won’t give it up I hope so, too. I hope so. with that in mind Come a little closer Me, too. I’ll take a step And then one day, Maybe we’ll meet.

Apparently, the answer to that question is ‘no.’

After Sungjin had broken up with his summer girlfriend about halfway through Senior year, you had started dating someone.

Then the two of you went off to different universities and only saw each other during school breaks.

But then you had transferred to Sungjin’s school, though he had gotten busy with a band he’d joined.

It continued on like this for the next two years or so. If Sungjin wasn’t busy with school or band practice, you were busy with school and the on-campus job you’d gotten. You studied abroad for an entire semester, and when you came back, you had decided to swear off dating for at least a year (you never told him specifically, but he had a feeling a foreign guy or two had something to do with this).

And now here the two of you were. Getting ready to graduate, and after all these years, you had still never dated. And Sungjin wasn’t sure whether or not he still had hope that you would.

Maybe that was the most frustrating thing about this whole situation. Sungjin wanted to want to just give up and move on. But he didn’t. He didn’t want to give up hope that things would never work out.

So... maybe tonight would be it. Maybe tonight would be the night when the timing was actually right.

If you try to get closer and closer, You’re going to disappear in a while and in my sight, oh We’re gonna have to go through this I go up And you go down It’s always the same

Actually, if you try to approach me little by little, in the meantime, chilled by a slight difference We’re all so mixed up. You go up And I go down It’s always the same, like the sun and the moon.

Sungjin’s heart thudded in his chest as he knocked on your door. It leaped up into his throat when the doorknob turned. And it stopped altogether when you opened it, standing in front of him with a curious look on your face.

“Hey,” you greeted with a soft, confused grin. “What’s up?”

Oh, god. Now that he was here, he wasn’t sure if he could do it.

But he had to. You were both at a turning point in your lives, and if he didn’t do this now... he never would.

So, he took a deep breath and just came out with it.

“I’ve liked you for years. I think you’ve liked me, too, but our timing has just been... bad.”

Well, he wished he could’ve been a bit more eloquent, but there you go.

You opened your mouth to reply but then paused. After a few moments of silence, you simply opened your door wider and let him come inside.

Sungjin stepped into your entryway, turning to keep his eyes on you as you closed the door behind him.

His heart skipped a couple of beats as you stood facing the door, letting out a soft sigh. And without turning around, you murmured, “I have. You’re right.”

Even though he knew he shouldn’t, Sungjin began to think this really was the night. Tonight was the night when everything would come together.

But then you turned around, and Sungjin saw the incredibly distressed look on your face.

“I just got offered a job by the company where I interned during my study abroad,” you told him. “And... I already accepted.”

See -- he knew he shouldn’t have thought that. He knew he shouldn’t have gotten his hopes up.

“Ah,” he replied, nodding slowly. “That -- that’s great, though. Congratulations.”

You quickly stepped up to him, wringing your hands together nervously. “I wouldn’t have accepted if I had known -- I thought you had moved on already. I’ve liked you -- a lot. I figured taking a job in another country would be a fresh start. A really fresh start. A way to... get over you.”

Okay, Sungjin would really appreciate it if you just stopped talking.

“I -- I’m sorry,” you said softly.

“No,” Sungjin shook his head. “No, don’t be sorry.”

“I can call them back -- see if I can tell them --”

But Sungjin interrupted you. “Please don’t. I think... I think this is best.”

Before he could stop himself, he reached up and circled his arms around you, pulling you into his chest.

“I’m happy for you,” he murmured, bringing one hand up to cradle the back of your head as you returned his hug. “Really.”

And... to be honest. He was happy for some closure.

Once and for all.

“You never know,” you said with a soft chuckle, causing Sungjin’s heart to skip another beat. “Maybe I’ll come back sooner rather than later.”

...Oh, boy. 

Well.

There went that closure he’d just found.