#fit n fab world

[satorusugurugurl]

Buzzed

Summary: Your boyfriend doesn’t drink. He’s a lightweight, never saw the appeal, and, well, it makes him horny.

Pairing: Gojo Satoru x FAB!Reader

Warnings: Whiny super whiny Gojo, handjob, public play, Gojo is just buzzed, not drunk consent is key, there are several reasons he doesn't like alcohol

Word Count: 2,307

A/N: this popped into my head at work. The need for Gojo to whimper and whine is intense.

Gojo didn't drink. He had nothing against people who liked to drink; by all means, to each their own. He never liked the taste; he was a lightweight, and he'd rather spend his money on sweets. There, however, was another reason he didn't drink. One that was far too embarrassing to mention.

Whenever Satoru would drink, he'd get horny, like super horny.

So, it was safer for him to avoid alcohol altogether, which was pretty easy. That was until you both went to one of your co-workers' birthday party. You casually conversed with some friends while Gojo headed into the kitchen. He was in search of cake, but he found punch instead. He filled his glass, tentatively giving it a sip.

It didn't taste like there was alcohol in it, so he drank a full red solo cup. And he was working on his third in the living room when he felt like his blood was on fire. The room was hot, sweltering, and you, god, you looked even hotter. The tight-fitted shirt you wore emphasized the curves of your perfect body and breasts. Your ass looked amazing in your jeans, and your smile was to die for. God, why did you look like a goddess tonight?

There was a certain glow about you that drew him in like a moth to a light. He hummed, resting his chin on your shoulder, his body pressed firmly against your backside. Not only did you look good, but you smelt fucking delectable.

You turned your head, kissing his cheek before turning back to your friends, joining in with their conversation, leaning back into Satoru when you both felt it. The huge and very hard bulge in his pants had you choking on your words as Satoru straightened, glancing at you in sheer panic.

“Toru?” He grimaced at the tone of your voice. “Please tell me that's your phone.”

“It’s not,” he confirmed your fear.

“Can you get outside to the balcony?” A glance over his shoulder confirmed no one was remotely close to his sanctuary.

“Yeah.” His voice was so gravely as his cock twitched in his pants.

“Good, go on. I'll be out in a sec.”

The second Gojo stepped into the cool night air, he groaned, looking down at his pants. What the fuck? Why was he sporting the world's biggest boner of all time? Fuck, he was so hard it hurt. He slowly sank into the dark corner, resting his back against the window where the curtain was still drawn, waiting for you to join him.

A second later, the sliding glass door opened and shut. Gojo’s hands flew towards his crotch, shielding his erection from any prying eyes. When he saw you turn the corner, he released the breath he'd been holding, dropping his hands to his sides. Satoru shut his eyes tight, biting back a pained whine. All you could do was knit your eyebrows together as you watched.

“Satoru? Are you okay? What’s going on?”

“Nngh, fuck, I don't know.” His cock throbbed hard at the sound of your voice. “I'm so goddamn hard.”

“Aren't you always hard?” The teasing tone in your voice attempted to lighten the mood.

“Yes, but your point is irrelevant. Fuck, I don’t know what happened. I only get surprise boners like this when I drink!”

Satoru was panting as you tilted your head slightly to the side. “But you did. Mina’s punch has a fuck-ton of alcohol in it.” Your boyfriend's face was contorted in pained pleasure and confusion. “People can’t taste the alcohol because of the liter of Lemon-Lime soda and the whole ass pint of sherbet.”

“Fucking fantastic,” Glancing back down at his erection, he sighed in frustration. “I-It’s going to be awhile for this bitch to go down. I’ll stay out here; you go inside and enjoy the party.”

Right now, in this embarrassing moment, Satoru could barely look at you. During the entirety of your relations, Gojo never drank, leaving that up to you if you were in the mood. You understood he particularly wasn’t too keen on drinking; it was his personal preference. Seeing him now, sulking in a corner, chest heaving, cheeks flushed, cock throbbing. It made a little more sense.

Laughter and loud music blared inside the apartment, drawing your attention to the door. Mina’s special punch was getting to everyone, it seemed like. They were so immersed in their current conversations and food would they even notice your absence?

Satoru was in physical pain. His teeth were clenched as he hissed out in frustration. You took notice of his hands, how they twitched, drawing closer to his crotch before pulling away. The man was fighting against every instinct in his buzzed horny brain. You could tell by his expression that he wanted to do nothing more than stroke his fat cock until he came all over his fist. Satoru, however, was also one not to let his lust overtake him.

He wasn’t some horny freak that would pull his dick out and stroke it until he jizzed all over your friend's balcony railing. You, however, weren’t as collected as he was. Seeing your boyfriend's cock twitching in his pants, the tiny wet spot forming over his leaking tip, made you fucking feral.

“I don’t want to go back.” Closing the distance between you, Gojo watched with bated breath as your pretty hands unbuttoned his pants.

“Tsk!” Your boyfriend hissed, crystal blue eyes darting towards the door. “Y-Y/N, what if someone comes out?!”

“I guess you’ll need to stay quiet. That way, if someone does come.” You whispered, your fingers slowly tugging his zipped down. “Can you do that for me?”

Satoru didn’t have time to think of a response because his dick did all the talking for him. It throbbed hard in the confines of his boxers. He whined and watched more pre-cum seep through the fabric of his boxers.

You cooed, running the bed of your thumb over the growing wet spot. “I’ll take that as a yes?” A nod and a tiny whimper was all you needed.

Slowly, you slid your hand down the band of his boxers, immediately coming into contact with his hot cock. His velvety shaft twitched as you tugged his boxers down just enough to free his erection. The tip was a furiously red shade; his slit dribbled pre-cum. Seeing his fat cock this hard has your cunt clenching around nothing.

“Ahh, fuck, fuuuck,” Satoru whispered through a hiss as you wrapped your fingers around his shaft. You slowly stroked your hands up and down. Squeezing it, trying to mimic how your pussy would pulsate around him when he would fuck you. “Y-Y/N~”

Using his pre-cum as lube, you smeared it up and down his length. Watching the pretty tip twitch madly each time you collected your makeshift lubricant. Satoru groaned, eyes half-lidded, watching you, the way you shifted, pressing your thighs together, how you took your bottom lip between your teeth, biting down on it, as you jerked him off.

“I-I’m, haaa, I’m the one g-getting jerked off here. B-But you, holy fuck!” He clamped his hand over his mouth, stifling a moan. Your teasing jerks, changed, your wrist twisting with every move. “Nnngh, f-fuck but y-yo—ooooh shit, you're the one e-enjoying yourself.”

“Of course, I’m enjoying myself. Satoru, I love feeling your dick get hard in my hand. It's so fat, hot, god, it makes me wet.”

Satoru flushed, head tilting back, the veins in his neck straining as he clenched his jaw. He was the one that would normally talk to you like this. Having it turned the other way around, he had his head spinning. The dizziness was so intense your boyfriend tilted his head back before he began thrusting into your tight-fitted fist.

“Fuuck, Haa, ooh fuck sweetheart, feels so good.” you bit back a moan of your own, watching as he ducked your hands, stinks of pre-cum running over your fingers, as he slammed the palm of his Hans against the railing. “D-Dont stop baby~ fuck Y-Y/N don't fuckin’ stop.”

Watching him desperately fuck your hand was so fucking pretty. From the thin sheen of sweat on his beautiful face to the throbbing shaft in your hand, everything about Gojo had panties soaked. Right now, you wanted to drag him out of the cramped apartment and back to your place where you would fuck his brains out.

But getting him through the apartment right now was out of the question.to get what you wanted, you had to get him off first! The faster he came, the faster you'd get to have him inside of you.

“You're doing such a good job, Toru~” Your hand moved faster. “I love feeling your cock sliding into my hand. But I love it so much more when you’re sliding into me, stretching me with your cock.”

Satoru was a hundred present, certain you were responsible for his hot blood and the hazy gaze that lingered over his eyes. You were the source of his buzz, and it had him jerking like a virgin into your first. You tried matching his thrusts with your hand. The whines that left his mouth were all the confirmation you needed to know that it felt good.

“F-Feels so good.” Satoru cried out, head dipping down to watch you jerk him off. “Holy fuck, your hand feels so good.”

“Mmhm~ just think about how good my pussy will feel when I get you home.” A grunt sounded from him. “Yeah~ you like knowing that you’re going to fuck me when we get home~? You going to reward me for helping you~?”

“Y-Yes, p-please don’t stop Y/N, I can feel it coming. God, I’m going to cum so hard.”

Hearing the pleasure that paved his voice had you pressing your thighs together. “Yeah~ are you going to cum~? Do it; I want you to cum, baby~ I want you to feel so good~ Like the good you are.”

“Y/N?” Gojo jerked, his head searching for the source of your voice. “Hey, is Gojo okay?”

Without missing a beat, you pulled Satoru down with your free hand. Your hand pushed the back of his head into the crook of your neck. Gojo didn’t know what you were doing at first, but as your hand left to join the other stroking his throbbing cock, he picked up on what to do. He whimpered and moaned softly into the crook of your neck.

“Oh yeah, he’s just a bit buzzed right now.” You stroked him harder, squeezing his shaft. “He doesn’t like drinking and thought the punch was safe.”

Satoru’s arms wrapped around you, fingers digging into the fabric of your shirt. His breathing whines were hot against your skin as his balls started to clench. He was so close to cumming, his eyes shutting tight, losing himself in the cooling sensation in his abdomen. So close, he was so close.

“Aww, poor guy, did you need anything?”

Gojo needed whoever the fuck this was to get out of here. He whined out your name into your neck. Hot breath having you shifting.”Y//N c-close.” He whispered as softly as he could as you jerked him faster, both hands working in tandem.

“Nope! We’ll be back inside in a second; I gotta get him home.”

“Okay!”

You waited until the door shut when you moaned with him. “Good boy, good boy~” his fingers dug into your back. “Go on, Toru~ cum for me~ give me it all.”

Satoru cried out into your neck in a nearly silent cry. “Y-/N oooh~ god fuck~ holy fuckin’ shit! C-Cummin’ I-I’m cumming.” You suddenly understood why he loved you, scratching up his back when you came around his cock. It felt good, so good, as he spurted thick ropes of cum all over your hand. “Nnngh oh fuck~! Fuck! Fuck!” His whines were shaky and nearly breathless as his cock weakly twitched in your hand. “Y-Y/NN~”

Gently you let go of his softening cock, bring your cum coated hand to your mouth. Satoru watched you closely, his chest heaving as he slowly came down from his high. He had half expectantly thought you were going to wipe his cup off on the inside of his jacket. What he hadn’t been anticipating was for you to flatten your tongue and lick it off. His sensitive cock twitched back to life at the lewd sight.

“Mmm~” You hummed in delight as if you just finished a meal. “So sweet and salty, Satoru~ I wanna taste it first hand when we get home.”

A switch flipped in Satoru’s head, be it post-nut clarity. He grabbed you by the face, turning you so you were pressed against the sliding glass door. The sudden flip had your breath catching in your throat as your boyfriend bent down, pressing his forehead against yours.

“The only one who is doing any sort of tasting when we get home will be me. If you don’t get us out of here fast, I’ll be sampling that soaking cunt right here.”

You didn’t need to be told twice; you dragged Satoru out of the party, shouting out brash goodbyes. Satoru might be buzzed from the punch. But you were buzzed off of him, and you needed to turn that buzz into a love-drunken affair.

[imaginesig]

"I think he knows... he's gorgeous"

Paul Aron x singer!Reader

SMAU

I had such a hard time hunting down f2 wags so only Estelle is mentioned despite me wanting others-- sorry! Also the timeline doesn't fit reality but I do what I want and I made up a new gp for my own personal gain

Inspired by: Eras Tour Stockholm Night 1 Mashup

All songs mentioned are tagged at the very bottom

yourusername

liked by taylorswift, paularon_, user54, and 829,938 others

yourusername: I've taken my final bow on the eras tour stage today... I'm so upset it's over but so so happy to have had the experience. Taylor, you've been such a fantastic mentor and supporter! Thank you for bringing me along 🫶🫶🫶

tagged: taylorswift

taylorswift it ws an honor to have you!! Can't wait to work with you in the future 🫶🫶🫶

user1 omg collab????

paularon_ you were incredible! now hurry up and get to Melbourne

yourusername otw 🏃‍♀️‍➡️

taylorswift thank you for letting me borrow her on off season!!

user2 my fav opener!!!

user5 lmao Paul's comment 💀

user6 they're literally my fab couple on the grid

user7 same!! I need more songs about him

user3 im so glad I got you for my show!!!!

user4 ugh you put the rest of us swifties to shame

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Paularon_

liked by yourusername, kimi.antonelli, dinobeganovic, and 927,838 others

Paularon_: "I remember how we felt sitting by the water, and every time I look at you it's like the first time"

tagged: yourusername

yourusername you did not need to expose me playing mermaids

paularon_ you looked to cute, what's a man supposed to do 🤷‍♂️

oscarpiastri enjoying Melbourne then??

paularon_ you know it

hitechgp our fav couple 😍😍

user1 the rings 😭

user2 ok Paul with the Taylor caption

user3 he's every girls dream man

user4 I need to know where Y/n got her swimsuit-- I love that color

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yourusername

liked by lettiemng, olliebearman, taylorswift, and 783,939 others

yourusername: 🏄‍♀️🌺

tagged: lettiemng

paularon_ so nice to see you left me out of all the fun

olliebearman right

yourusername you guys had gp stuff

lettiemng plus being a surfing wag was way more entertaining and I got to work on my tan

lettiemng please teach me soon!!!

yourusername ofc ofc

user1 Aussie surfing is the best

user2 this post is to Pinterest

user3 you look gorgeous

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paularon_

liked by user5, user58, hitechgp, and 968,976 others

paularon_: thats P1 in Melbourne!! My good luck charm is back baby🍀❤️

tagged no one

yourusername THATS MY MAN

yourusername WHOOOP WHOOP

yourusername CELEBRATION TIME!!!!!!!

yourusername I LOVE YOU MY CHAMPIONSHIP LEADER

paularon_ I LOVE YOU TOO

user5 I love that they match each others energy

user1 Y/n is the gf we all need

hitechgp there's no way to beat Y/n, but congratulations anyway 👏

user2 yes sir 💪💪

user3 not him calling her his lucky charm 🥹

user4 ugh Pauls out here raising relationship standards one post at a time

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Time Skip: a few races later, about midseason

yourusername

liked by paularon_, danielseavey, user54, and 928,938 others

yourusername: I've spent these past few weeks traveling the world with the love of my life and the best group of friends I could've ever asked for!! I've enjoyed our endless lights of exploring, partying, and racing 🩵 To celebrate, my newest album, "Little Calm," will drop next Friday!!

tagged: no one

taylorswift so excited!!! I can't wait to hear the rest of what you cooked up, Enchanted is already so special 🫶

yourusername thank you for adding you special sparkle to the mix 🫶

danielseavey best writing season ever, thank you for reaching out

yourusername ofc!! It was magical to see how closely our experiences were and how they shaped into such a beautiful song

paularon_ so so proud!! I can't wait to hear it ❤️

yourusername I love you much ❤️ but you've def heard all of these to some degree

paularon_ but I can't wait to hear them all put together

lettiemng ugh the perfect soundtrack for our epic summer ☀️

lettiemng I say we have a windows down in the car listening session

yourusername yesssssss

user1 oh please have songs about Paul!!

user2 right I've listen to Gorgeous so much we NEED more

user3 and they weren't even together when she wrote it, imagine the stuff now!!!

user4 AHHHHH TAYLOR COLLAB

user5 yk its a good summer when Y/n covers One Direction and Billy Joel

user6 duality of man

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paularon_

liked by yourusername, hitechgp, user84, and 244,937 others

paularon_: wonderful album, kullakallis 🩵

tagged: yourusrname

yourusername ma armastan sind 🩵

dinobenganovic wonderful album, me and my gf love it!!

user1 Im not crying you are

user2 who's cutting onions in here 🥹

user3 "we can follow the sparks, ill drive"

user4 not Paul beating all of us (including Y/n) with the post

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yourusername

liked by user4, lettiemnd, user5, and 928,389 others

yourusername: "Little Calm" out now!!

tagged paularon_

user1 omg I NEED surfer Paul content

user2 this IS the summer of Y/n with this drop

paularon_ so so so amazed by you

yourusername so so so amazed by YOU

danielseavey on repeat 🔁

taylorswift adding to the pre-eras playlist now!!!

user3 this album is gonna own my sporty wrapped

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paularon_

liked by yourusername, user5, user9, and 893,039 others

paularon_: "Feels like I'm falling and I / I'm lost in your eyes / You make me crazier"

tagged: yourusername

lettiemng I just looked at my boyfriend and signed

olliebearman HEY

yourusername LMAO ESTELLE

username awww baby 🥹

paularon_ ❤️❤️

user1 God its me again

user2 yes marriage is scary, what if he doesn't treat me like Paul does Y/n

user3 live laugh love PaulY/n

user4 the paddock pic 😭 she's so us

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yourusername

liked by user3, taylorswift, lettiemng, and 829,093 others

yourusername: I'm going on tour!!! Dates/tickets on my website 🩵🩵

tagged: no one

user1 not the tour dates lining up so she can be at Paul's races

user2 we praise him for being the ultimate boyfriend, but Y/n is the ultimate girlfriend

lettiemng do I like that you'll be away from me, no, am I still so so happy, yes

yourusername 💋💋

paularon_ so proud!! You're gonna kill it

yourusername with your support?? Yes I am!!

taylorswift brb grabbing tickets now

user3 just got my tickets!!!

user4 im so excited

user5 wdym Y/n's going on her own tour?? Didn't she just drop her first album?? She's not popular enough for her own?? She's still out little secret??

user6 me fr fr

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Time Skip- a few more races

paularon_

liked by yourusername, hitehcgp, user54, and 839,928 others

paularon_ so blessed to win at my home race!! Thank you to my family for supporting me

tagged: no one

yourusername so so proud baby!!

paularon_ ❤️❤️

user1 this was enough to make me cry

user2 more points closer to the championship

user3 I love this!!!

user4 first I get to watch Paul win and tomorrow I get to see Y/n perform

user5 what a life!!

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paularon_

liked by user3, yourusername, aronralph, and 827,720 others

paularon_: ma armastan sind ❤️

tagged yourusername

yourusername ma armastan sind ❤️

user1 estonia won best show

user2 right im so jelous

user3 a Paul win and a love mashup?? I can't take it

user4 when will it be my turn

user5 looks like ill be sleeping in traffic tonight

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yourusername

liked by taylorswift, paularon_, olliebearman, and 823,929 others

yourusername: Estonia you've been my favorite show, but im a bit bias ;)

tagged paularon_

comments have been disabled

Bonus, sometime in the future

paularon_

liked by auroralf, dinobeganovic, lukebrownracing, and 983, 938 others

paularon_: "Home was a place, now home is a person and you're looking at rings 'cause you swear that you're certain"

tagged yourusername

yourusername ❤️

aronralf I've waited too long for this, congrats!!

lettiemng ahhhh im crying!!!

olliebearman congrats!

dinobeganovic so happy man!!

lukebrownracing party time!!

comments have been limited

~~~

Songs mentioned:

I Think He Knows by Taylor Swift

San Franciso by 5 Seconds of Summer

Fearless by Taylor Swift

You, Me, and the Beat from Liv and Maddie

Crazier from Hannah Montana

You're On Your Own, Kid by Taylor Swift

The Older You Get by Daniel Seavey

Enchanted by Taylor Swift

Live While We're Young by One Direction

Vienna by Billy Joel

Gorgeous by Taylor Swift

[velvetvexations]

But they still use the n-word, anon. They still use the n-word. Yet you think that years and years ago they were so worried about being "challenged" on grounds of transphobia ("transmisogyny" was not in widespread use at the time) that they felt the need to change their language? Even though they still, to this day, use the n-word.

You're an idiot.

And yes, actually, GNC boys who present in a feminine matter does affect things! You can't seriously pretend that every single depiction of an AMAB person wearing women's clothing could only ever possibly be a trans woman or based on trans women. That's not only ahistorical and erases real people right in front of you, but it also gets fucking racist as hell when you start imposing that view on other countries. Did you know, for instance, that "kathoey", the term "ladyboy" is a translation of, is generally used by people who self-identify as men? Because I'm guessing the answer is "no."

Femboys are and have always been a thing, stop fucking erasing them and appropriating their language just because you desperately want the world to revolve around you.

So many young trans girls are going to come out of this traumatized from the dooming, isolated and potentially trapped in abusive relationships because they'd been indoctrinated into the belief that only other trans women will ever love and support them.

The problem is that it has "fab" in there, so they can't do it like they're trying to do with femboy because it inherently points to "TMEs."

(2/2 ana mardoll) i really dont mind when trans women genuinely criticize specific terrible shit that a trans man has actually done, and mardoll has always been a fucking loser who does all the stereotypical negative shit that people tend to act like trans men do. i just wish people would not act like its standard behavior to be like that and judge us all on the basis of the worst of our community lmao. this is behavior that goes both ways tho, trans men judge trans women like this too. idk lol

The person I've seen most accused of being a ringleader was Neon Yang, who was definitely not that even though they contributed. The one I most remember was the trans woman who said something to the effect of "yeah well it didn't sound like the author was trans so I was completely justified actually" and that drives me up a wall because the transradfem girlies are going to lose their mind when I post the first chapter of Nursed with Kerosine.

I have to answer them mostly in batches, with a few exceptions, because I get so many.

@ratbastarddotfuck

Imagine if everyone just decided to start saying a PoC who votes Republican is white.

It's going to be difficult for them to ever actually make a callout post for me because they can screenshot my takes but there will never be a single piece of evidence that I've ever harassed anyone and they know it.

It's not just about taking it seriously, but it's extremely repellent just as content and can be severely triggering, which it would have been for me if I hadn't watched it when I was a teenager before The Deeplore Trauma settled into my bones. I don't think I can even get into the later stuff now because of the association.

But fuck me gently with a chainsaw, everything else about it should be immensely cool and it sucks it's not in something that isn't weighed down by that.

Explicitly using dysphoria as a plot point like that is interesting and does sound like good fuel for a transfem headcanon.

No, it isn't, the only thing being discussed is whether he fits the criteria for "TMA" or not, and he does.

Buffalo Bill is not a stereotype of trans women, and in fact I applaud and deeply appreciate the author for making that crystal clear and treating trans people with great respect and sympathy for the time in which it was written, but he became the model for a stereotype of trans women that transphobes have taken and ran with since the day the the movie came out.

[steveinscarlet]

I tried to scan the main ol' crazy eyes Joe picture but he was too big to properly fit in the scanner so this is the best I could do

Text below the cut

BRINGING UP BABY

Joe Elliott doesn't want children - he's got enough on his hands nursing a billion dollar baby called Def Leppard. Mat Snow hears why arguably the world's most successful rock 'n' roll band can still stroll down the street without being recognised. Pictures by Peter Anderson

BY THE time you read this, you'll know something that was on the cards a couple of weeks ago but by no means a dead cert.

That is whether the British Phonographic Institute, in all its majesty and wisdom, opened an envelope at the black tie, gala dinner and announced that the award for Rockin' Pneumonia, Boogie-Woogie Flu And All-Round Fabness goes not to Brother Beyond, Yazz, nor even Bros, but to a bunch of blokes who won't see 25 again and who play guitars, drums and stuff often quite loud.

Yes, you will know now what Def Leppard's Joe Elliott and I didn't know then whether there will be a BPI BRITS Award for Best British Band decorating his parents' mantelpiece.

"Def Leppard winning anything is hilarious," he chuckles. "It's nice to be nominated, but we're never going to win anything. We're a stick-in-the- mud heavy metal band - Long 'air and jeans: we can't vote for them, can we?"

JOE ELLIOTT is in mellow mood. After nearly three months off, following the highly lucrative but tiring 14-month Hysteria tour, he at last has time to chew the fat back home in a beautiful bay just outside Dublin, where he is spending his 'year out' of the UK for tax reasons.

Unlike the other four Leps, who get itchy after only three weeks off the road, Joe needs the time to lounge around, catch up with his listening and watch a few videos.

"I've been revelling in the fact that I've been able to get a sore throat and it doesn't matter!"

A week in the sun apart, Joe has not been neglecting his career as the mouthpiece of arguably the most commercially successful rock 'n' roll band in the world today.

There will be rehearsals for the new album. (Robert 'Mutt' Lange, the so-called 'sixth Lep', will not be producing). Hopes are high that it might be in the shops sooner than 1991, given that their two previous albums, 'Pyromania' and 'Hysteria', have been beaten only by Michael Jackson in terms of how long we've had to wait between releases - and how many copies we've gone out and bought. But, right now, Joe has the luxury of reflecting on his place in the scheme of things.

It seems that what he ultimately craves is to be recognised as one of the true rock greats, on a par with the people who turned him on in the first place, back when he was a soccer- crazy, only child growing up in Sheffield, when he was a bored youth maintaining stocks of grinding wheels and oil rags for Osborne Mushet Tools.

Back then, people like Alice Cooper, Jethro Tull, T Rex and, especially, Mott The Hoople kept him sane. Def Leppard's record company, Phonogram, have signed Ian Hunter and it's the best news Joe's had all year.

His list of heroes includes just about everybody who made a raucous noise in the '70s his years of yearning to escape the humdrum world of work and home. That need is still Joe's guiding force so he won't be taking a cue from his friend Jon Bon Jovi's 'New Jersey' and calling his next album 'South Yorkshire'. "Can you imagine it?" he guffaws.

"Ian Hunter summed it up brilliantly in his book Diary Of A Rock 'N' Roll Star - 'I left my heart in Watford?' How can you sing about Scunthorpe or Huddersfield?

"Let's face it, everybody would say, Fair play for doing it - but they'd laugh at it whether they were fans, journalists or friends. I remember when Saxon had this song called 'Northern Lady', and it just stank. Leave it out! Jesus Christ! Flat caps and Yorkshire pudding is the impression people get, even though we all know it's not like that. "They don't all keep pigeons, which is what a lot of people south of Nottingham seem to think. There's no romance, no beaches in Sheffield. A car chase in San Francisco is always going to look better than one through Hackney. But then they could never have Sherlock Holmes in America. It's a different world.

"I'd sooner go for the British approach, which is totally ambiguous: it doesn't say anything, it doesn't mean anything," Joe goes on. "I can't even describe what half the bloody songs are about; they just sound alright. You are what you listen to. You explain what T Rex's lyrics are about. If you can figure his out, then you can figure mine out. 'Hub-cap diamond star halo' means more to me than 'I went down to the river', I'm afraid. People can relate to that Springsteeny thing but, to me, T Rex made your imagination work harder.

"If I wrote from experience, I don't think it would sound very good me singing about the last five-a-side soccer game I had.

"Whenever I sing about women, it's always invented," says Joe, rebutting the charge of sexism which, in fact, I hadn't levelled at him.

"Who's to say that the honkytonk woman ever existed? It could have been a complete figment of Jagger's imagination. I used to write from personal experience don't think I never have.

"On the second album, we wrote about all sorts of stories; Steve (Clark) once hijacked a taxi in Paris and tried to write a song about it. But it just sounded like a piece of shit, so we scrapped it, rewrote the lyrics, made them up, and it was a lot better."

SO, IF not 'South Yorkshire', S perhaps 'Catatonia'? 'Schizophrenia' (a double- album)? Or (Bob Geldof's suggestion) 'Paranoia'? Another psychological disorder, surely?

"Probably," reckons Joe. "It was a complete coincidence, the last two. 'Hysteria' was an idea Rick (Allen) came up with. It was after all the stuff with his accident. The first time we ever seriously experienced it was on the '83 tour, and it got pretty close to it two days after his accident - the reception area of the hospital was teeming with newspaper reporters and kids. And, because we weren't all that popular in England at the time, it made it appear more massive. Rick was on the front page of the Daily Star - and there were all these journalists, like Rick was The Queen or lan Botham. We had to be snuck in through the f***in' laundry chute to go and see him! "I always imagine that Fish - and I'm not knocking the guy - has everything worked out in advance: This is the album title, here's the sleeve - now let's go write the music. The last thing we have is the album title; we panic so much. "Hysteria' was going to be called 'Animal Instincts' at one stage: then we thought that sounded really stupid. We had the sleeve ready, so that was four grand down the drain. It just wasn't right - so we used it for the book instead."

Having repeated, even exceeded, the success of the hard-to-match 'Pyromania' album with 'Hysteria', Joe has found that the way to cope with sky-high expectations is to ignore them.

"I have no doubts about the next album," he declares. "I'm not 100 per cent sure that it'll be as big as the last one, though it may be a better record. Much of it is down to timing. I don't believe success should be based on sales. But everywhere you look it's figures, figures, figures.

"Success should be judged on the sound of the bloody thing. I'm not worried about it. We'll make a record and put it out, and it'll do whatever it does."

What about the live act? "We've had a few approaches from the States to go back and do some shows this summer. Believe it or not, 'Hysteria"s gone back up in America the album's doing better now than when we were out there. It's been 'Top Five in three different years - '87, 88 and now '89.

"Anyway, I was talking to Adam Clayton about it the other day, and he said, You've got to be careful because where do you go from stadiums? What do you do go back to clubs? "That's why we have managers. We have opinions, but we don't have our finger on the pulse like they do. We're too busy trying to sing in tune, play the songs and look cool like a pop band is supposed to do and still keep an eye open so you don't get ripped off. But you can't be a master of all trades.

"When does a spectacle become untoppable? It doesn't. You do a gig on the moon and put the PA on Pluto... Satellite gigs? Hologram gigs? Put the audience in the middle and us outside!"

ON TOUR, the Aerosmith, Guns N' Roses and Love And Rockets albums never left cassette deck. Back home, the Irish magazine Fresh has asked Joe for a fan's-eye view of the new releases.

"I played the Lou Reed album ten times and, in my opinion, it ain't 'Transformer', it ain't 'Sally Can't Dance', it's not 'Coney Island Baby' and it's definitely not 'Berlin'. Every song's about f***ing New York! All about some guy with needles in his arms! "But I grew up with 'Transformer', which came out when I was 12. And 'Berlin' was really depressing but great to listen to in the bath. The new one sounds like demos, which has a sort of charm, but some of it's a bit weird. That song, 'Last Great American Whale' I can't make my mind up whether it's a piece of shit or it's genius. He just talks it he makes Mark Knopfler sound like the guy out of Foreigner. Very strange."

Fine Young Cannibals' "The Raw And The Cooked' gets short shrift from Joe: "I'll never forgive them for slaughtering the Buzzcocks". As for Blondie's remix album, 'Once More Into The Bleach', it's "awful".

The new Supremes compilation is another matter: "F***ing brilliant," Joe raves. "To hear 'Nathan Jones' the way I remember it, not the way f***ing Bananarama slaughtered it. I got my first snog to that song, under the stairs at the Top Rank in Sheffield in 1971, Saturday morning youth club."

Joe advises me to check out The Hooters and The Quireboys; I recommend The Replacements - right up his street. But Joe (29) is of an age to get his real kicks from the stars of yesteryear.

"I've met Jagger at the studio. He was great he kept stealing our f***ing newspapers! Have you got the Daily Mirror? I want to do the crossword.

"Robert Plant came to see us in Chicago. He was great. When we played in the round we used to go on in laundry baskets. His tour manager bet him ten dollars he wouldn't push one out. So he put a hat on, pair of shades, stuffed his tour jacket full of jumpers to make him look fat, and pushed it out to the middle of the stage, right through the audience! "It's funny because he's a Leo as well, and Jagger. All frontmen are Leos," Joe muses. "Those detailed analyses of your star sign tell you things you often don't like to hear. 'Capable of being childish' - I suppose I am. 'Always has to be the centre of attention' well, when it suits me. "Sometimes I just like to bury myself, but that's what my gig is, that's what everybody wants: a big, loud, bloody... you know. "But Jagger's the best; he's got the lips of an elephant on the body of a dwarf. Brilliant. The ultimate frontmen are those you can caricature in cartoons - Jagger, Steve Tyler, Rod Stewart, Bowie, Townshend, Meat Loaf, Alice Cooper... You couldn't really draw me but it doesn't seem to have hindered our success.

"To be honest, once you're as big as we are and you don't have those sort of features, it's nice. I don't have to send the maid out to buy the News Of The World. I can walk down Oxford Street."

So what is the secret of Def Leppard's success?

"Most people in bands have got families, and maybe that's the reason we have the success we have: nobody's married or got kids," reasons Joe.

"I can't see Phil (Collen) starting a family when he hasn't even got a home. And I definitely have no desire to be a father.

"The only times I've ever thought about it have been provoked by TV documentaries like World In Action. I seriously think I would rather adopt an eight-year-old Brazilian kid and give it a real good start in life.

"There's enough kids without me bringing another one into the world. And to be quite honest, after my mumps I don't know if I can!

"I can miss out the nappy stage, which I'd detest. And I don't like the idea of a nanny bringing the kid up because you might as well not bother; you might as well buy one. "I don't want a kid; the band's too much of a bloody baby!"

[castlebyersafterdark]

ok just so i just finished s3 of heartstopper which i know you dont watch but SPOILERS BELOW in case anyone does and ofc this relates to byler

so this season had heavy themes of losing your virginity. in the end the main gay male couple sleep together and its implied it was penetrative because they'd already been seen to do other things on screen, + had a conversation about said things on screen ("do you think it still counts as sex if its just touching?"), and then one of them buys condoms and lube, also on screen, and some of the positions we finally see them in are also implicit of anal sex. lots of visual and subtextual storytelling. the characters are 16, the age of consent in the uk.

and i havent seen any reviews yet but i have to say that after not feeling too connected to the season as a whole, compared to the previous ones, i was hit like a truck with emotion when the scene finally happened, mainly because it was about self-acceptance and body image as well as the underlayers of self discovery and identity, internalised homophobia etc. it was honestly so beautiful, i burst into tears. I feel like whatever happens with byler, it will be so emotional and moving for me, judging by how intensely i responded to Heartstopper with almost no prior emotional attachment.

it also cemented what i knew, which was that handled well, byler + sex seen on screen could be so moving and earned. the tone of HS is so much more wholesome than ST and ofc its audience is teens - its heartening to see a show aimed for teens address these important themes, but i must acknowledge that ST was made for adults who are going to be looking back on this era and their youth, and therefore will be expected to react to sexual content in a more accepting, mature and experienced way (i.e., not freaking out, even if it is gay sex).

but it also made me think of the ages of the actors and characters. i think HS actors are over 20 now, but the tone as i said is very light and somewhat idealistic - the sex scene was very much about love and acceptance, it was sweet, and even though characters called each other 'hot', I as an audience member did not find the scene titillating. storytelling is about provoking emotion in the audience that reflects the story, and if a scene is supposed to be received as sexy, and if that makes sense for the story, then fab. but unless i'm missing something because i'm not a teenager, HS was not supposed to be sexy.

and that makes me think that if the main audience of ST is people looking back to youth, then perhaps any byler sex scenes will not be designed to be titillating, either.

and it makes me think what the original trajectory of ST would have been if delays hadn't impeded filming. even though F + N can pass for teens in costume, something about their acting styles + the tone of the show makes me feel like they'd have a different energy than HS during sex scenes. i think this because even as young teen actors/characters, the scenes and tone of the show was very serious and mature. i genuinely wonder what a HS-style scene, that is very sweet and about only love and acceptance, with no titillation, between byler would play like. would it fit the tone of the show? will the focus perhaps be on the danger that byler are overcoming and the beauty of that, which contrasts the HS characters who are living in a very different world when it comes to queer acceptance?

in short, do you think that desire will be something the audience is allowed, or even invited, to feel vicariously through the visual storytelling with byler (as it often was in sex scenes in older films, which celebrated love AND desire), or will it play purely as innocent/loving as is more in vogue in storytelling today?

ofc this is all assuming there will be a sex scene culmination to their story. seeing as we are seeing so much church imagery trickle through, i can't help but think they'll really be leaning into the Us vs. Them themes, and they could really go very bold with this as relates to gay sex + traditional christian values. I mean, the symbolic connections of altars/worship/sex are manifold. if they do something as wild as byler having sex on an altar in an abandoned church/ achurch in the UD, it would be so incredibly clever that I don't think i'd care if it was titillating or not!

p.s. i tried to use titillating as much as poss for that one anon lmao

To use my favorite word on here - fascinating. It was very early on with this blog, that I started off approaching the topic of Heartstopper with a bit of a biased view based on assumptions and influence of different online circles and outside opinion. Now, while I'm still unsure that I'll ever personally watch it - everything I've learned and what some lovely people detailed about it, I understand it's impact and place in media and what it stands for so much better. I just wasn't exposed to it accurately.

That's so interesting with the themes of the latest season - really intriguing. I think it's really cool that conversations and storylines like that are being depicted with care on mainstream media aimed at teens and young adults as the intended audience? Because I think sex and coming of age have often been topics for TV, but there's a wide range of how it's been shown. So rare for queer storylines, too. Especially in this way. There are examples, but they are much more limited. So, that's kind of really awesome to hear.

Moving and earned. That's key! The show needs to tell its story as is and trust the audience it was intended for. I think as an adult (not that I'm super old, no, but I'm not a highschooler) I was judging HS too harshly because it wasn't relatable to me. But, I shouldn't have. It's tone can be relatable to a lot of types of people. Same with ST. The intentions are different depending on what's needed for the story. It's interesting because there have been different tones for the sex scenes/romance of the show.

I'm not sure if the Steve/Nancy scene was meant to be hot? I didn't think so, but it was perfect for the tone it was telling, what it meant for the characters. To me, it felt so typical of teenage coming of age and pressure and trying to be someone else and how desire and love can be confusing. I don't think their scene was meant to be titillating. Maybe someone else can weigh in - while in comparison, even if I'm gay and not personally attracted to the concept of straight sex - man, the Jopper kiss was hot! That was clearly the intention! They showcased a buildup over the course of 4 seasons to that. Moving and earned and hot. And it wasn't even sex - which is why some argue for/against them getting down and dirty in season 5 - would it serve the narrative or would it be fan service? Personally, I love a little fan-service and it would be a contender to show the adults having a love scene, but the show hasn't shied away from realistic teenage sex so when you think about it, we've got Jopper together and we'll now see what that means in this last season, but the more I think about it, sex in the show has always moved the plot along. Yet to be determined what plot would be moved along with Jopper - and at this point, the entire point might be because it's titillating.

Byler???? Plot and earned and moving and dare I say - hot? I feel like. They could be a candidate. Hot as a way to showcase desire. Drive home the impact of the relationship. It's a build-up and we have one season to get the payoff of the relationship and the depth of their feelings - where as a show like HS the show IS the relationships, so the more "wholesome" aspect is due to the fact that it's entirely a slice of life coming of age story. Stranger Things is coming of age but it's not slice of life. The pivotal moments need to be a bit more distilled and dramatic and hard hitting. That's why Nancy and Jonathan had their sudden night of passion. It made a point. Byler is our slow-burn, but I feel the burn will become a blaze. I think soft and subtle and sweet is a disservice to their point in the narrative.

I'm not sure they're honestly going to go at it on the alter on the church but ohhhhhhh you are serving a visionnnnnn, literal holy shit. That's hitting so many alarms bells for me in a very positive way, my mind is spinning now. That's so very horror-coming of age-titillating romance. Wowza.

And hey to the one anon who loves the word titillating - we love you!! You're an icon of this blog!!! 🫶🫶🫶

[facesbehindglass]

About

Casual doll collector. I barely know what I'm doing.

I want to collect at least 1 of each fashion doll brand. Especially early 2000's ones. There's plenty so I don't count knockoffs (unless they're really interesting....)

If you ever look for info like

-do X doll clothes fit Y doll

-measurements

-doll id (try google lens first tho!)

-size comparisons

then feel free to poke me after checking the list below (cause you'll know what dolls I got)

If there are any dolls you find interesting and aren't on the list, share, I wanna see :3

(Also, personal posts are tagged as #rustyspots)

✓ Owned

🔜Will arrive soon

👁️‍🗨️ Have my eyes on them

Checklist:

A

Arabian Friends

Art Squad

B

✓ Barbie (My First, Extra Mini, Extra Mini Mini)

✓ Barbie Dream Besties

✓ The Beatrix Girls

👁️‍🗨️Beauty Cuties

✓ BeKind Dolls

Be Fashion Academy

✓ BFF Crybabies

✓ Boxy Girls

👁️‍🗨️Bratz

✓ Bratz (but the tall ones lol)

✓ Bratzillaz

👁️‍🗨️Bratz Kidz

👁️‍🗨️ Bright Fairy Friends

C

👁️‍🗨️ Candyloks

Catalina

Catwalk Kitties

✓ Cave Club

Coleção Camilinhas

✓ Creatable World

Crush: Urban Energy

✓ Cutie Pops

✓ Cyborg Rocks

D

Dawn

👁️‍🗨️DC Super Hero Girls

✓ Decora Girlz

Defa Lucy

✓ Disney Descendants (Hasbro)

Disney Descendants (Mattel)

✓ Disney ily 4EVER

✓ Diva Starz

Dollikins

✓ Dream Ella Extra Iconic Mini

✓ Dream Seekers

E

✓ Enchantimals

👁️‍🗨️Ever After High

F

✓ FailFix

Fairy Tale High

✓ Famosa Club Hello Kitty

✓ Fidgie Friends

Flatsy

✓ Flavas

✓ Freckles & Friends

✓ The Fresh Dolls

✓ Fulla

G

👁️‍🗨️ Glossy Bossy

👁️‍🗨️ Glo-Up girls

✓ Gorjuss

Gorgeous Creatures

Groovy Catz

H

✓ Hairdorables

✓ Hairdorables Hairmazing

👁️‍🗨️ Hello Kitty and Friends

✓ Hi Glamm

I

iBesties (?)

J

Juku Couture

Just Grrls

K

👁️‍🗨️Kawaii Crush

👁️‍🗨️ Kindi Kids

Kiyaa

👁️‍🗨️ Kurhn

👁️‍🗨️ Kuu Kuu Harajuku

L

✓ Lalaloopsy

✓ Lammily

✓ La Dee Da

✓ Licca

👁️‍🗨️Little Bebops

👁️‍🗨️Liv

✓ Locksies

Lollipop Girls

✓ LOL OMG

✓ LOL OMG Fierce

✓ LOL Tweens

✓ Lottie

👁️‍🗨️LPS Blythe

LULUPOP

M

✓ Magic Mixies Pixlings

✓ Mermaid High

✓ Mermaze Mermaidz

👁️‍🗨️Mia by Hello Kitty

MimiWorld

Miss Scouby

Mixis

MomokoDOLL

✓ Monster High Frightfully Tall

✓ Monster High G1

✓ Monster High G2

✓ Monster High G3

👁️‍🗨️Moxie Girls

👁️‍🗨️Moxie Teenz

👁️‍🗨️Myscene (any...)

✓ Myscene Fab Faces

Mystikats

Mystixx

✓ My Little Pony Equestria Girls

N

✓ Na! Na! Na! Surprise

Na! Na! Na! Surprise Teens

Naija Princess

✓ Nebulous Stars

✓ Novi Stars

O

✓ Once Upon A Zombie

P

Passport Friends

Peppermint Rose

Peteena

✓ Pinkie Cooper

✓ Piny Doll (PinyPon)

Pippa

Pixie Doodles

✓ Power Puff Girls Z

Precure Bandai (?)

👁️‍🗨️Prettie Girls Tween Scene

✓ Project Mc²

Q

✓ Queens of Africa

R

Rainbow Brite

✓ Rainbow High

✓ Rainbow High Junior

✓ Rainbow High My Runway Friend

✓ Regal Academy

Rose Petal Place

Ruruko

S

Secret Jouju

✓ Shadow High

✓ Shibajuku Girls

👁️‍🗨️Shopkins Shoppies

✓ Sindy (Hasbro)

👁️‍🗨️Sindy (Pedigree)

✓ Snapstars

✓ Star Darlings

Starletz

✓ Steffi Love

👁️‍🗨️Strawberry Shortcake

Struts

Style Bae

Stylistaz

Sunny Day (?)

✓ Sweetyz

T

✓ Tattoo Divas

Trollz

Twilight Teens

U

✓ Unicorn Academy

👁️‍🗨️Unique Eyes

V

Vibe Girls

✓ VIP Hair Academy

Vi and Va

W

✓ We Teens

✓ What's Her Face

Wild Childz (?)

✓ Wild Hearts Crew

✓ WWE Superstars Wrestling

Y

Yue Sai Wa Wa

👁️‍🗨️Yummi-Land

Z

Zeenie Dollz

Zodiac Girlz

👁️‍🗨️Zombie Girls

Side quest- Mini dolls? Chibi or kid-shaped

👁️‍🗨️Best Furry Friends

Ddung

👁️‍🗨️Lady Lovely Locks

✓ Sparkle Girlz Little Sparkles

Dolls (or their remains) that are pretty much impossible to get but one can hope ;w;

-Country Kuttiez

-Driks

-LaTeenaz

-Trashion Alley

"Duplicates" I want anyway cause they're my grails:

-target exclusive Pinkie Pie EG

-failfix, the blondie one cuz shes smoler than the rest

-Novi Stars Doe A Deer

-Monster High Isi Dawndancer

[sunnydaleherald]

The Sunnydale Herald Newsletter, Sunday, January 21st

REAL-ESTATE MANAGER: And we'll be asking for first, last, security, and a small cleaning deposit.

~~The Replacement~~

[Drabbles & Short Fiction]

Stirring Trouble by veronyxk84 (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

Клин клином by B_E_S (Buffy/Angel, T, in Russian)

Inner Sanctum by MadeInGold (Willow/Giles/Angel, T)

The Bunny Issue by cmk418 (Xander/Anya, G)

Words by sparrow2000 (Oz, G)

A Hopeful World by Pinkperson (Buffy/Angel, T)

Stirring Trouble by VeroNyxK84 (Buffy/Spike, PG-13, anthology rated R)

[Chaptered Fiction]

The Fox's Cry Chapter 6 by madimpossibledreamer (Persona 4/Angel Crossover AU, Gunn, Cordelia, Teen)

Who are You in Twenty Years? - Chapter 8 (COMPLETE!) by StrangeBint (Sandman and American Gods crossover, Faith, M)

Marry Me on Monday - Chapter 2 (COMPLETE!) by Jess_Ann_Perreault (Giles/Jenny, G)

but I’m bending the light connecting you to me - Chapter 12 (COMPLETE!) by winterlovesong (Buffy/Spike, T)

Let me rest in peace - Chapter 9 (COMPLETE!) cauliflower666 (Spike/OC, Explicit)

The Master and her Court - Chapter 1 by TheClowniestLivInExistence (Buffy/Angel/Darla/Drusilla/Spike, Explicit)

The End of Destiny - Chapter 1 by ConstantCommentTea (Angel, Cordelia, Connor, brief Doctor Who crossover, T)

It's Easy Time, Until It's Not, Ch. 31 by hulettwyo (Buffy/Spike, Adult Only)

Wayward Girl, Ch. 3 by ClowniestLivEver (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

To Boldly Go, Ch. 3 by Lady Emma (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

Cherry On Top, Ch. 25 by Maxineeden (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Pack My Box with Five Dozen Liquor Jugs, Ch. 21 by honeygirl51885 (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Afterburn, Ch. 7 by Melme1325 (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Surviving Together, Ch. 13-14 by ionlylikebadboys (Buffy/Spike, Adult Only)

The Yellowstone: A Safe Harbor, Ch. 3 by Buffyworldbuilder (Yellowstone crossover, Buffy, FR7)

To Boldly Go, Ch. 3 by Lady Emma (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

Rules of Engagement, Ch. 7 by all choseny (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Pack My Box with Five Dozen Liquor Jugs, Ch. 21 by honeygirl51885 (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

A Waxy Gent Chuckled Over My Fab Jazzy Quips, Ch. 21 by violettathepiratequeen (Buffy/Spike, PG-13)

Ready for it? Ch. 2 by Lilacsandorangeblossoms (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

To All We Guard, Ch. 1 by simmony (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

I Do! Ch. 19 by Dusty (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Clean Slate, Ch. 6 by hulettwyo (Buffy/Spike, Adult Only)

Wayward Girl, Ch. 3 by ClowniestLivEver (Buffy/Spike, NC-17)

Coming Through, Ch. 2 by hulettwyo (Buffy/Spike, Adult Only)

[Images, Audio & Video]

Drawing: they're going to in n out by genericaces (Angel, Cordelia, Fred, Wesley, Lorne, Gunn, worksafe)

Playlist: Dean and Buffy's car radio by waywardfallenone (Supernatural crossover)

a few quick doodles of some of my favorite early-season willow fits by cheerio-fujisnacki (worksafe)

[Reviews & Recaps]

Season 7 was my least favorite, but I just started appreciating it by Usernamelesses

Grave S6 E22 (Buffy and the Art of Story Podcast) - Lisa Lilly

[Recs & In Search Of]

Spotlight Saturday: Sparla (Spike/Darla fic recs and vid recs) by februaryfangfest

"Weight of the World" Score? - question by Big-Restaurant-2766

OhHeckBois is selling a season 8 and 9 comic collection

DarshDarker is looking for a song from "Get it Done"

[Fandom Discussions]

What kind of shower do you think Spike really has in his crypt? by am-i-the-one

[this is how I think Buffy characters would feel about Taytos] by xandersrailcrash

The methods of dealing with the big bads in Buffy are so funny by aingeal98

One thing I love about Willow is how aware she is in a meta sense by aingeal98

S2 EP 5 - Bangel and Buffy's Depression by olliedollie1204

Would Angel and Cordelia have sided with Buffy in "Empty Places"? by Agent Z and others

Xander calling [Riley] "teutonic" in the Initiative? by NowMindYou

Amy's mom is hot (Name your hottest 1 off villain) by Jwyldeboomboom

You get Jeff Pruit and Sophia Crawford back for three episodes... by Brodes87

Confused about the whole Ben/Glory thing [not a joke post] by Suspicious-Thing5215

Was there a different plan originally for Angel's S2 finale? by Nostromo87

[Articles, Interviews, and Other News]

Buffy Revamped is back on tour in the UK in February

Submit a link to be included in the newsletter!

Join the editor team :)

[forbro]

Men's T-Shirts in Pop Culture: Iconic Moments in Film and Music

In the ever-evolving landscape of fashion, men's t-shirts have secured a permanent place not only in our closets but also in the annals of pop culture. From memorable movie scenes to iconic music performances, the humble t-shirt has played a pivotal role in shaping cultural narratives. Join us as we explore the fascinating intersection of men's t-shirts with some unforgettable moments in film and music.

The Rebel Without a Cause: James Dean's White Tee

One of the earliest and most enduring images of men's t-shirts in pop culture can be traced back to James Dean's rebellious persona in the 1955 classic "Rebel Without a Cause." Clad in a simple white tee, Dean's effortless coolness left an indelible mark on generations to come. The white t-shirt became a symbol of nonchalant rebellion and laid the foundation for its enduring popularity.

                                                     BUY NOW

Rock 'n' Roll Chic: The Beatles and Graphic Tees

As the 1960s ushered in the era of rock 'n' roll, The Beatles took the world by storm, not just with their music but also with their distinct fashion choices. The Fab Four's affinity for graphic tees, adorned with vibrant colors and bold designs, made a powerful statement. Fans eagerly embraced this trend, turning graphic tees into a staple for expressing individuality and fandom.

Taxi Driver and the Anti-Hero: De Niro's Army Green Tee

In Martin Scorsese's gritty masterpiece "Taxi Driver," Robert De Niro's portrayal of Travis Bickle became an emblem of the anti-hero. Decked in an army green surplus tee, Bickle's character exuded a raw, unfiltered masculinity that resonated with audiences. The army green tee, once associated with utility, became a symbol of urban angst and anti-establishment sentiments.

Dazed and Confused: The Grunge Movement and Band Tees

The 1990s witnessed the rise of grunge music and its unmistakable influence on fashion. Band tees, characterized by their oversized fit and often faded designs, became synonymous with the grunge movement. Films like "Dazed and Confused" captured the essence of this era, featuring characters sporting band tees that seamlessly blended music and fashion, solidifying their place in pop culture history.

Pulp Fiction and the Cult of the Black Tee

Quentin Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction" is a cinematic masterpiece known for its memorable characters and iconic scenes. John Travolta's character, Vincent Vega, donned a sleek black tee in one of the film's most recognizable moments—the dance sequence with Uma Thurman. This moment not only showcased the timeless allure of the black tee but also elevated it to a symbol of understated sophistication.

The Hip-Hop Connection: Eminem and White Tees in the 2000s

In the early 2000s, hip-hop culture heavily influenced fashion, and the white tee emerged as a wardrobe essential. Eminem, a rap icon of the era, often sported plain white tees in his music videos, contributing to the garment's widespread popularity. The simplicity of the white tee became a canvas for self-expression, reflecting the raw authenticity of hip-hop culture.

Forbro – Redefining Men's T-Shirt Culture

As we traverse the iconic moments in film and music where men's t-shirts took center stage, it's evident that these garments are more than just articles of clothing—they are cultural artifacts, weaving themselves into the fabric of our collective memory. At Forbro, we celebrate the rich history of men's t-shirts in pop culture, offering a curated collection that pays homage to these iconic moments.

Whether you're inspired by James Dean's rebel spirit, The Beatles' graphic exuberance, or Eminem's hip-hop flair, Forbro has a diverse range of men's t-shirts that capture the essence of these cultural touchstones. Our commitment to quality and style ensures that each tee is not just a piece of clothing but a statement—a reflection of your unique taste and the cultural influences that resonate with you.

In a world where fashion is a language, Forbro speaks the dialect of iconic moments, blending them seamlessly into every thread. Explore our collection today and be a part of the ongoing narrative of men's t-shirts in pop culture.

Forbro – Where Men's T-Shirts Meet Iconic Culture.

[thebanyantee]

Most Popular Band Merchandise of All Time

Some bands don't just create music; they create movements. Their merchandise becomes more than just clothing and accessories; it's a symbol of belonging to a tribe, a testament to their enduring legacy. 🎵👕  Here are some of the most popular bands whose merchandise has sold the most and the iconic items that made fans go wild. ⭐️

1. The Beatles 🇬🇧🎶

The Classic Tee: The famous Fab Four pose.

Yellow Submarine Everything: From tees to lunchboxes.

Album Art Prints: Iconic cover art on display.

2. Pink Floyd 🌈🔍

The Dark Side of the Moon Prism Tee: Instantly recognizable.

Wish You Were Here Vinyl: A collector's dream.

The Wall Hammers: Wearable art.

3. Led Zeppelin 🌄✈️

Stairway to Heaven Tee: A stairway to style.

Zoso Symbols Jewelry: Mystical and mesmerizing.

IV Vinyl: The soundtrack of a generation.

4. AC/DC ⚡🤘

High Voltage Logo Tee: Electrifying fashion.

Angus Young's Schoolboy Outfit: Halloween favorite.

Back in Black Vinyl: An album for the ages.

5. Metallica 🤟🔥

Metallica Ninja Star Tee: Bold and fearless.

Master of Puppets Vinyl: Thrash metal perfection.

Ride the Lightning Guitar Pick: Play like a rock god.

6. Nirvana 🤘🎸

Smiley Face Tee: A symbol of grunge.

In Utero Vinyl: The sound of the '90s.

Kurt Cobain's Iconic Sunglasses: A piece of rock history.

7. Grateful Dead 🌹🐻

Dancing Bears Tee: Colorful and iconic.

Live/Dead Vinyl: A journey through psychedelia.

Tie-Dye Everything: The essence of the Dead.

8. Queen 👑🎤

Freddie Mercury's Crown Tee: Fit for a legend.

A Night at the Opera Vinyl: Operatic rock brilliance.

Bohemian Rhapsody Scarf: Wrapped in rock history.

9. Rolling Stones 🎸👅

Tongue and Lips Tee: The most famous logo in rock.

Exile on Main St. Vinyl: Rock 'n' roll in a groove.

Keith Richards' Skull Ring: Legendary style.

10. U2 🌍🎶 - The Joshua Tree Tee: A desert dream. - War Vinyl: War-era anthems. - Bono's Iconic Sunglasses: For the ultimate cool factor.

A World of Rock and Roll Fashion 🌟🎵 These bands didn't just sell music; they sold a lifestyle, an attitude, and a piece of history. Their merchandise continues to be treasured by fans worldwide, a way to keep the spirit of rock and roll alive. From classic tees to vinyl records, these iconic items are more than just merchandise; they're symbols of the enduring power of music and the timeless appeal of rock legends. Rock on! 🤘🎸👕 Explore uber-cool merch from these legendary Bands ➡️ Band Merch

[winchestergirl2]

CJ!!

I think this is the first CJ fic I've found - thank you! ❤️

I thoroughly enjoyed this and how it fit into the Dawsons Creek 'world'.

He was so good with her on that initial call to the helpline, helping her calm down and then feel comfortable enough to talk to him about what prompted her to need the helpline.

That first phone call after it came out about him and Audrey...

“God, I wish I had your number outside of this so I could call you.”

“I really could’ve used a friend to talk to.”

Poor CJ... I did feel sorry for him here. I know he messed up, but I couldn't help but feel for him.

Uh-oh...

“CJ laughs it off but then Seth mentions how he has this girl calling him every Friday night, around the same time, and she talks his ear off for hours.”

Oh, this isn't going to do her panic attacks any good is it?! Hearing Jen tell this story.

“It’s true,” David confirmed. “I actually got her once when CJ was out sick. She sounded nice.” If you could have, you would have given him a smile, thankful for David’s attempt to defend CJ and the helpline and unknowingly you. But right then, you were trying not to hyperventilate. “And CJ appears to be helping her. He said she’s made a lot of progress since they started talking.”

Aww, David. I'm glad that he is sticking up for CJ here and her. The others should have listened to him.

She looked up from her cell phone and gave you a smile. “Of course. Rehab is bound to be drab so I’m going to make it fab.” She shot you a wink and opened the door for you. 

Hahaha, Audrey! She would definitely try and make it fab. I love how you've managed to capture her character.

Ooo... CJ is trying to track 'Jo' down (and he paid attention to the bits of information she gave him in their phone conversations).

Once they did and you started descending, CJ glanced over at you. “So, Jo, were you planning on ever calling me again?”

Smart guy!

That talk in her room was a bit intense. It's good that she expressed everything that she had heard about him and her, and how it had made her feel. Also, I'm pleased that CJ got the chance to explain how it all happened from his point of view, but also that he listened to her and understood where she was coming from.

I'm so happy that she decided to call back in and was even happier when they arranged to meet for coffee.

I loved this whole exchange...

One of the guys laughed. “Ah, so this is Y/N.” Your heart started hammering inside your chest. “CJ hasn’t shut up about you since you two started dating.” You nearly sighed in relief.

CJ shrugged, grinning down at you. "Seth's not wrong."

Your eyes widened before you turned back to the guy. “Oh, so you’re Seth.”

Seth beamed. “Aww, CJ, you told her about me? I just knew we had something special,” he joked.

You frowned. “Hey now. Go get your own CJ. This one’s mine.” You winked up at CJ who laughed. 

It's so good that she is able to interact like this with Seth. It shows how far she has come since that first phone call.

And to think, you almost hadn’t made that call. You laid your head against CJ’s and closed your eyes. You were so glad you did.

Thank goodness she did ❤️

CJ Braxton x Reader - Prompt Response - "I hate you." "You have a weird way of showing that."

Summary: You had only meant to call once, remaining anonymous while feeling out the whole helpline thing for yourself. Now, you talk to CJ every Friday night around the same time. When you don't call one Friday, CJ is worried and comes looking for you which presents its own host of problems.

Pairing: CJ Braxton x Female!Reader; CJ Braxton x College Student!Female!Reader

A/N: Prompt from @creativepromptsforwriting (#941). I initially wasn't going to write anything for CJ but this idea popped into my head for this prompt and I just had to write it. And I absolutely fell in love with the dynamic between CJ and the reader (and had so much fun with this). Please forgive any timeline tomfoolery or anything time wise that makes you go "huh?"; I was trying to make this work throughout the season from CJ's entry into the show (and his conversation with Jen about the helpline) to the end.

I wasn't much of a Dawson's Creek person back in the day (I still haven't seen seasons 2-5), so I hope this came out alright. I tried to keep it as 2000-ish as possible. I remember back in the day not everyone had a cell phone like Dawson, Audrey, and Pacey (though a lot of people were getting them moving into the beginning of the decade) so that rule kind of applied here so to speak.

This is meant to take place during s6 before Jen joins The Stand.

Warnings: implied sex; panic attacks; implied anxiety

Word Count: 15k+

"I hate you." "You have a weird way of showing that."

Soldier Boy version | Beau version | Dean version | Jenny version | Jason version | Tom version | Rachel version | Anael version | Alec version | SDV Leah version

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You glanced at the clock, seeing it was 6:59. One more minute and you’d pick up the phone as you did every Friday night and make the call you always did. Your nerves thrummed in anticipation as you stared down the clock, willing the numbers to turn.

Eventually, you got your wish and as soon as the 7 appeared on the clock face you picked up the phone, dialing the number you now knew by heart. After a few rings, the call finally connected. 

“Hello, Helpline. This is CJ.”

You couldn’t help but smile at the sound of his voice. “Hey.”

“There she is.” You could hear his own smile in his tone as he recognized you. “How are you, Jo?”

You winced at the fake name you had given him. At the time, you had quickly scrambled and chose the first name that came to mind. Granted, Joey Potter was in the same school as you so you weren’t too worried about him finding out about either of you seeing as he was from Boston Bay. But as you had talked with him more and more, you really wished you hadn’t given him any name but your own. Even if you were beyond terrified; you felt bad for lying to him.

Why should it matter, right? He was a volunteer counselor for a teen helpline at another college. Why would you care what this one person thought out of you?

Well, unbeknownst to him, you had seen him once and you knew who he was. Thanks to Joey and Audrey’s friendship with Jen, you had come to hear quite a bit about the cute tall guy whose voice made your heart rate speed up way too fast. Jen had even invited him out to a house party and that was when you saw him for the first time. Your nerves got to you and you bounced before one of your friends could make an introduction. Partly because you were afraid he would recognize you from your voice and immediately put a face to the name and possibly be disappointed or worse: he’d know you lied to him. So you avoided him at all costs — well, in person.

It wasn’t like you had planned for this to happen, where you would call a helpline weekly just to speak to a certain boy. That’s not how this started at all.

When you got to Worthington, you were homesick, overwhelmed, and overall terrified. While you eventually eased into the college student lifestyle and Boston was now home, you never really got past the overwhelmed feeling, and terrified had dialed down to being anxious all the time: anxious that you would mess up, anxious that you would fail, anxious that your future wouldn’t turn out the way you planned — all of it. There were days you felt like you were just scraping by, barely making a passing grade (though your final grade usually proved you wrong), and you felt like you were some sort of imposter who was soon to be found out and didn’t really belong. Meeting Joey and her roommate, Audrey Liddell, who lived down the hall from you, helped some, and their introducing you to their group of friends helped even more. But there were still times that you just felt…tightly wound and about to snap. As if you had too many balls in the air and you were about to trip, and all the balls would fall to the ground.

So when Jen mentioned to the group about some guy wanting her to join a teen helpline for the college, you quietly paid attention. She laughed it off — his approach, not the helpline — and she didn’t think she would be right for it so that was that. While everyone else began to talk and laugh about another topic, the wheels in your head slowly started to turn inside your head. A helpline where you could remain anonymous and talk to someone who would listen and could possibly even help. You knew your school most likely had one of those but you wouldn’t even dream of risking it. But a helpline elsewhere where you could talk to someone who maybe understood how you were feeling most of the time, maybe experienced similar things, and you were able to stay anonymous? That you could look into.

After much back and forth in your mind over it, you took the leap and made the call one Friday night after a particularly rough week. You really didn’t think anyone would pick up, it was close to 7:00 and most college kids were either out or getting ready to go out…right?

Before you could answer your own question to yourself, the line connected.

“Hello, Helpline. This is CJ.”

You did what any other person would do; you promptly hung up. You stared at your phone in terror. Someone had picked up. A guy. Just when you were convincing yourself that this was stupid and you needed to take a chill pill and deal.

You argued with yourself in your head for about another minute, hemming and hawing over it all. Wasn’t the whole point of you calling to try to do something about how you’d been feeling? You supposed you could always see a therapist here in town but that could be costly, even with insurance. You also had no desire to tell your parents because they would respond the same way they did the last time you tried to allude to how overwhelmed you were when you had returned home for the summer.

“You should be grateful you got into such a great school, Y/N. Most people would kill to be in your position, going after their degree. You don’t see your classmates moping about, do you? Just because they have classes and homework,” your mother had made sure to prick you with that pin of guilt. “Make the best of it.”

“You know what I think? I think you need to get yourself some friends and then you’ll stop focusing on this so much. If you have nothing to fill your time, of course your mind is going to obsess over what you’re viewing as negative. Try to join a club or a social group. They have keggers all the time. I remember back when I was in college. It was party city every weekend. Maybe let loose a little one of these Saturday nights and things will start to get better. And who knows? Maybe you’ll even make some friends.”

“Thanks, Dad,” you mumbled, tossing your overeasy egg onto its side with your fork, your eyes trained on your plate. You knew he was just trying to help — they both were — but their attitude seemed to imply that you could simply hit an off switch somewhere and you’d stop feeling so overwhelmed. If only.

It wasn’t like you hadn’t tried to take their advice. You had gone to some frat party and it had been one of the worst experiences of your life. You weren’t a big drinker and you weren’t really a party person in general. You didn’t really recognize anyone from your classes or your dorm and the music was so loud, it seemed like a ridiculous notion to try to approach someone and start a conversation. Not something you were very good at anyway. You had no idea how to play the drinking games you saw, other than what you’d seen on TV, and you didn’t want to do something to mess up anyone’s scores if you didn’t do it right. Then some hulk of a guy accidentally knocked into you, deluging you in beer, and he was so drunk, he didn’t even apologize, just kept on going. After about an hour (and the unintended beer bath), you decided to call it quits.  

That night, you had gone back to your dorm room which was blissfully empty, taken a hot shower, and then sobbed into your pillow. So much so that when a drunken Audrey accidentally stumbled into your room, she saw your tear-stained face when your head snapped up and immediately asked what was wrong and why you were crying in her room of all things. Despite the back and forth over whose room it actually was and her drunken state along with the slurring of her words, you two actually kind of hit it off. Before long she had you laughing, something you felt like you hadn’t done in some time. She passed out in your roommate’s bed, much to your roommate’s chagrin, but when Audrey’s boyfriend and roommate came to get her the next morning, you figured that had been it. Your one social interaction with someone who didn’t look at you as an unwanted intruder every single day (like your roommate) or like you were some loner weirdo (like most of your classmates). You knew that Audrey would probably either ignore you the next time she ran into you or she wouldn’t remember you at all. 

Boy, had you been wrong. The day after her hangover, she had been knocking on your door, smiling and telling you that you were going out with her for the night. Just like that. She introduced you to her roommate, Joey, and their group of friends. You had been inducted into their group of friends, just like that.

Eventually, Jen mentioned the helpline that one night and now here you were, staring at the phone as if it was about to come to life and do a dance or something. You waited a few more minutes, deciding you’d try again and hopefully get someone else. There couldn’t be only one person answering phones at a helpline, could there? That would make for some backed up phone traffic and not a good look for a helpline at all. Maybe you’d be lucky and the guy would have already had another caller he was speaking to so another counselor would have to pick up.

When the clock turned to 7:11, you slowly picked up the phone, took a deep breath, and dialed the number again. You began to jiggle your leg as you waited for the line to connect.

“Hello, Helpline. This is CJ.”

Oh crap. You froze.

“Hello?”

What did you do? You wanted to hang the phone up again but you were unable to. 

“Hello?” He asked again.

No. You were going to be a mature adult about this and answer him. Just as soon as you could breathe. You covered the mouthpiece with your hand and exhaled a breath.

“Look, if you’re in trouble or can’t talk, just hit a button. Any button will work.” A minute passed while you were trying to breathe, getting ready to talk. “If you don’t have a crisis and you’re not calling to speak to someone here, then I think you should hang up and let other people who need us call in. No use in tying up the phone lines.”

Another minute passed. You really were trying your hardest to get words out but your chest was tight and you felt like you couldn’t breathe. Your heart was racing yet you were frozen. This happened sometimes but usually you were by yourself, not with someone waiting for you to speak on the other end of the phone line. It also happened a couple of times while you were out with your friends, but usually you hid out in a bathroom stall until it passed and then you left to go back to your dorm with the excuse of a test the next day or a project due, whatever you could come up with on the fly. You didn’t understand why it was happening to you right now, though.

“Alright, I’m going to hang up now.”

You smashed a key on your phone so fast that you heard a loud annoying sound in your ear. Immediately, the guy’s tone changed. 

“Okay, I’m here. If you’re in trouble, hit the key again. If you’re not but can’t talk at the moment, don’t hit it.”

You didn’t hit any more keys and gasped for air that just wasn’t coming.

“Good. I’m glad you’re okay. Is someone in the room with you and that’s why you can’t talk? If so, hit the key again.” 

You moved over to your bed and laid down. That was the fastest way to get your body to relax when you had the option you’d found out.

“Okay, so you’re alone but you can’t talk but you’re not in trouble. Can you just try to say one word or make a sound so I know you’re really okay?” 

You removed your hand from the mouthpiece. “T-Trying,” you rasped out. Holy crap, this was a bad episode you were having. You were completely mortified. Perhaps you really should hang up. You were worried, though, that now he might notify someone or think you really were prank calling the helpline. Either way, you were bound to get in trouble and even more embarrassed, and that just made your chest tighter.

“Okay. That’s good. I’ll take that. Do you have asthma or something similar?” 

Great. That’s how bad you’d sounded; he thought you might actually have some sort of breathing issue. Well, technically, you were struggling to breathe right now so it made sense that he would think that but if he only knew the actual answer was something that was beyond ridiculous and couldn’t be explained away as something as serious as asthma. 

“No,” you whispered, rubbing at the spot in your chest where a mix of discomfort and a heavy-rock-feeling sat. 

“And you’re sure you don’t need to go to the hospital to get checked out?” He sounded concerned now. 

“No,” you repeated, staring up at your ceiling, your vision blurring with building tears. All you wanted to do was give this helpline thing a shot since nothing else seemed to be working, and here you had gone and made it so much worse. On top of that, you were frustrated that you couldn’t even do something as simple as answer a person when they said hello on a phone call that you made to them. What was wrong with you? 

“Okay. That’s good. Why don’t I talk for a minute so you can relax?” A tear slipped down your cheek when you realized he must have heard your heavy exhales over the phone. “Like I said before, my name is CJ. I’ve been with the helpline for a while now. I’m here four days a week. I try to schedule shifts around my classes and pick up a few extra when I’m able. Before you called, I was doing some reading for my Philosophy class. It’s not my major but I had to take another humanities course. It was that or religion so…philosophy it was.”

You closed your eyes and focused on his voice. It was actually very soothing and it was helping.

“Between you and me, I’m not the best student.” Your eyes opened and you stared at the ceiling, listening intently. “I mean, I do okay in terms of grades, but I’m not exactly a frequent flier on the Dean’s list.” He chuckled and after a moment, he asked, “How about you?”

You swallowed, feeling the slightest bit of easing up on your chest, almost if it was allowing the words through. “I do okay.” You didn’t sound as raspy as before but you still had a faint wheeze at the end. You were coming out of this, slowly but surely.

“That’s good. College sure isn’t easy, by any means. When midterms roll around, I always get a little more stressed. I usually have to blow off some steam to keep it all balanced, you know? Or else I get easily overwhelmed. I have to remind myself to take it one class at a time, one day at a time. But easier said than done sometimes, right?”

“Right.” You knew what he was doing but since it seemed to be helping, you played along. He was getting to the heart of the issue while also giving you time to come back down. You’d only been on the phone with him for close to ten minutes and already you felt much better than you had when the call started. 

“How are you feeling? Any better?”

“A little.” 

“Good.” He sounded genuinely pleased. “Is my being the one to talk helping any?”

“Actually…yeah,” you breathed out. 

“Does this happen a lot?”

You bit at your lip, not really wanting to admit it, but you had called for this very reason, hadn’t you? “Yeah.”

“Around midterms or anytime?”

“Anytime.”

“Even when you’re not in school?”

“Sometimes,” you whispered. “But mostly when I’m here.”

“So school related then?”

“Kind of.”

He was quiet for a moment and you wondered if you had said something wrong or if he was looking instructions up in a pamphlet or something for this sort of thing. 

“Hey, did you see Phantom Menace when it came out last year?”

That caught you off guard. You hadn’t expected to switch gears so quickly. “Um, no?”

“You’re not a Star Wars fan, I take it?”

He didn’t sound disappointed so you chalked that up to being a good thing. Most guys you’d met either were completely into Star Wars or weren’t into it at all. “I don’t know if I’d call myself a fan but I’ve seen the original movies.” 

“Uh oh, you’re not one of those prequel snobs, are you?” He teased.

“No? I just saw the trailer and I wasn’t interested.”

“Well, a buddy of mine and I went to see it when it came out. The theater was packed. I’m talking bursting at the seams.” A small smile started to creep onto your face at his energy. “And when the lights went down and the opening credits started rolling and the music started up, everyone was cheering and clapping. It was pretty awesome. My buddy ended up loving it. He’s the biggest Star Wars fan you’ve ever met.” A moment later he asked, “So besides anything in a galaxy, far far away, have you seen any other movies that came out?”

“I went to see The Green Mile. My, uh, my dad is a big Tom Hanks fan and a Stephen King fan so he really wanted to go.”

“And you?”

“I liked it. Though it was sad.” 

“I didn’t see it yet but I got the feeling that it was going to be a bit of a heavy one.”

“It was, but it was worth it.” You noticed then that you were talking to him normally, you were breathing normally, your chest was still a little tight but that was to be expected, and you were sitting up with your back to the wall. You had gotten through your latest episode and this CJ had helped. Perhaps there was something to this helpline thing after all.

“I’m definitely going to check it out then. Thanks.” 

“You’re welcome.”

Almost as if he had heard your thoughts, he then said, “You sound a lot better than earlier. Hopefully, you’re feeling better, too?”

“Um, yeah.” You anxiously tucked your hair behind your ear. “Thanks for earlier, by the way. You know, being patient…”

“Of course. That’s what I’m here for.”

“Right.”

“So, you feel up to telling me what’s going on and why you called tonight or did you want to talk about something else?”

You bit at your thumbnail, unsure. “I feel bad. I’ve taken up so much of your time already.” You glanced at the clock and saw that you had been on the phone with him now for almost half an hour. 

“Don’t worry about the time and I don’t want you feeling badly.” He sounded completely genuine when he said it and it made you feel a little bit better about monopolizing his time like this. “This is why I’m here. So, if you want to talk, I’m here to listen.”

You still weren’t certain you should take him up on his offer. “Are you sure? What if there’s someone else who needs to call in who is having an actual crisis and you’re stuck on the phone with me? I would feel bad if they didn’t get to talk to you when they needed to because of me.”

“I’m not the only one here so if someone else does call in, they’ll speak to one of the other counselors who can help them. While we’re on the subject, what you’re experiencing is just as valid as what anyone else might be experiencing. I’m not stuck on the phone with you, I want to be talking with you and try to help you in any way I can. And yes, I’m sure.”

You contemplated it, turning it over and over in your brain. This was why you called. This was why you decided to give the helpline a try, to speak to a stranger who would listen and possibly be able to help you and if not, at least maybe understand where you were coming from. If he was willing (and he had been helpful so far), then why not?

“Would it help if I promise not to make any more Star Wars references?”

You couldn’t help but smile. “Tremendously.” 

“Deal,” he laughed. You liked the sound of his laugh; it was warm, inviting, and put you instantly at ease. This CJ seemed to know what he was doing and you could now see why people called in to speak to him and other counselors like him. 

You nervously licked your lips and decided to take the plunge. You told him everything. You told him about how it started when you began college, how the classes and workload immediately overwhelmed you. How you struggled to keep from drowning in assignments and tests and projects and papers. How you started to develop these episodes and how badly you felt during them. How you had tried to talk to your parents but they just didn’t seem to hear you, dismissing it as an issue that would be resolved by you being more outgoing and feeling more grateful that you had such an educational opportunity when many didn’t. How you could be in a room full of a hundred people and still feel completely alone, especially when an episode kicked in. You’d even told him about your failed attempt at attending the frat party. He had rarely talked, giving you the floor, but he had interjected a couple of times to either support you or make some helpful suggestions. Other than that, he just listened. By the time you finished, you felt like you had told him your whole life story, but you had to admit that you felt a lot better once you got it all off your chest, which incidentally, was feeling lighter. And this time, someone listened and actually heard you. That made all the difference.

You glanced at the clock for the first time in a long time and noted it was 10:16. Your eyes widened and your jaw dropped, your cheeks immediately heating up. Had you really been talking nonstop for over three hours? “I’m so sorry, I didn’t realize it was so late. I should let you go so you can speak to other callers.”

“My shift ended fifteen minutes ago actually.”

Your heart stopped and however much better you’d been feeling, felt like it went right down the drain. How could you have been so self-absorbed and only concerned with your problems that you’d talked his ear off and used up his whole shift? Not one other person got to talk to him tonight and you didn’t even go to that school. Seriously, how selfish were you? “I-I’m so, so sorry. You should have stopped me or told me there was a time limit per call.” You were full on babbling now. “I didn’t mean to— I am so beyond sorry. I’m going to let you go. Thank you so much for your help and I hope you have a good rest of your night. Don’t worry. I promise I won’t call again. Good night.”

You went to hang up the phone when you heard loudly, “Please don’t hang up.”

You put it back to your ear, your brows drawing together in confusion. “But you said your shift was over.”

“Yeah,” he chuckled. “But that’s okay. If I wanted you to stop talking, I would have said something. And did I ask you to stop?”

“Well, no, but—”

“Then I didn’t want you to stop talking. It seems like there’s a lot on your plate at the moment or else you wouldn’t have called, right?”

“Okay, yeah. But—”

“So it’s good that you called and I’m glad I was able to help. And for the record, there’s no time limit on a call.” Someone said something to him in the background and he quietly responded though you couldn’t hear what he said. “I’m actually gonna get going because my replacement is here and they don’t have another place to sit.” 

“Right. Of course. Again, sorry.”

“But,” he continued. “I’m going to be here Monday afternoon around 2 so if you want to call back then we can talk again.”

“I have class then.” You truly did but even if you didn’t, you wouldn’t be calling him back. You had taken up enough of his time.

“I’m here until 6:00 that day.”

“I have a study session after that class.” Okay, maybe that was a lie. “But I appreciate the offer. Thank you and have a good—”

“I’m back on again next Friday. Same time. Why don’t you call me then if you’re free?”

“I appreciate it, CJ, but don’t worry. If I need the helpline again, I’ll call, but you helped me a lot tonight and I feel better so…I won’t need to call. Again, I’m sorry I monopolized your shift.”

“Do me a favor and call me again anyway, even if you are feeling better. I’d like to check in with you and the only way I can do that is if you call me back.”

“Right. Being anonymous and all,” you mumbled. Thank God for that. You didn’t think your embarrassment at talking his head off for over three hours while you complained about your life would ever go away.

“Yeah. So, please, if you can call me next week, same time, even if you just tell me you’re feeling better and hang up. That’s all I ask.”

You supposed you could do that, after he’d generously taken the time to hear you out, after he’d helped you through your episode. “Okay.”

“Friday, 7:00. Promise me.”

“I promise,” you whispered.

And so had begun the tradition of you calling him every Friday night at 7:00. You hadn’t intended for that to happen, honestly. But each time you would talk to him, ranging in times from twenty minutes to an hour and a half (you refused to ever get near that three hour mark again, no matter what he said), he would always ask you to call him back the following week, making you promise that you would. Over time, you noticed that your overwhelmed feeling had lessened considerably (though not completely gone) and instead of having an episode (or panic attack as CJ called them) twice weekly, they had now diminished to one every couple of weeks. And even then they weren’t as bad as they had been, thanks to the techniques CJ suggested you try using. Things had gotten better for you and you had to admit, the helpline definitely was a useful service for students, though for your own personal experience, you attributed a lot of that to CJ.

Speaking of which, that was how you two began to get to know one another, moving from strictly counselor and caller into a tentative friendship. When initially speaking to him, he began to feel like a friend you were just catching up with on how your past week had been, and then it actually sort of became that. He started to tell you more details about himself and now you knew what type of music he liked, what he was majoring in, where he had grown up, and why he had joined The Stand. He had even shared his backstory with you and why he didn’t drink when you told him how uncomfortable college parties made you in general. The conversation was no longer one-sided and you’d come to like it that way.

Until the day came when he asked your name. 

“My name?”

“Well, yeah, so I know what to call you. It feels weird calling you “you” all the time,” he laughed.

“Um…” You were practically crapping bricks. You didn’t expect this.

“Just your first name. You’ll still be anonymous,” he reassured. “It could be a nickname if you want. Or your middle name. Just something.”

You ran over it in your mind. What if he still somehow managed to find out who you were if you gave him only your first name? Sure, you weren’t going to the same schools, but what if somehow someway…? Plus, your friends weren’t exactly fans of CJ right now. Apparently, Jen had a major crush on him but her hopes were dashed when he told her he didn’t date (something he had told you long before you heard it via your friends) and then hooked up with Audrey the same night. You hadn’t been there that night, opting to stay in and study for a huge test you had coming up in your Lit class, and after hearing that not only had CJ been present but also what happened, you were glad you had made that decision. Audrey and Joey were on the outs thanks to the events of that night and now so were Jen and Audrey once it was revealed that CJ and Audrey had slept together, right before Pacey punched his face in. 

When that Friday rolled around, you almost didn’t call him. You were angry and hurt yourself. Angry because his careless actions had hurt more than one of your friends, and hurt because truth be told, you had started to crush on him yourself from afar. You trusted him with the details of your life, very personal details (without giving specifics obviously), and he’d helped you. How could he be this helpful, compassionate guy working at a helpline but turn out to be this scummy, advantage-taking, selfish player? You couldn’t reconcile in your head the CJ you were getting to know with the CJ your friends saw.

“That’s just the thing, Y/N,” Jen told you when you wondered aloud how a helpline counselor could do something like he had with your friends. “Most people who go into those positions to help other people are usually a thousand times more screwed up than the people they’re helping. Audrey’s been hurting, as you know, and she’s been acting out and he saw an opportunity. Case closed.” But it wasn’t case closed for you. Not by a mile. You wanted answers, but how could you get them while remaining anonymous?

So that following Friday at 7:00, as you angrily punched in the helpline number, you had no idea how you would do it but you were determined to get them. And if you didn’t like what you heard, then this would be your last call and you would close the book on CJ and your budding friendship for good.

It caught you off guard, though, when you heard a different voice this time.

“Hello, Helpline. This is David.”

You nearly hung up. You knew David; he was starting to hang out with your group more and more, especially Jack. What if he recognized your voice?

“Hello?”

You forced yourself to ask the burning question on the tip of your tongue, albeit with a slightly higher pitch of voice. “Hi, is CJ there?”

“No, I’m sorry.” You covered the mouthpiece with your hand and let out a sigh of relief. Whether it was because David didn’t recognize you or you didn’t have to confront CJ right this second, you couldn’t be sure. Probably a bit of both. “He called out sick and asked me to fill in for him. He should be back next week, though.”

“Oh, okay. I’ll call then. Thank you.” You quickly hung up before he could ask you anything else.

The next Friday you called, you got CJ.

“Hey,” he greeted, sounding relieved when he heard your voice. “How are you?”

“I’m okay.” You were standing in your dorm room, staring out the window and watching the rain, your arms crossed. You weren’t as angry as last week, the extra time allowing you to let a cooler head prevail, but you still wanted answers. “How are you?”

“Honestly? I’ve been better.”

“I’m sorry. I know you were sick last week. Has it not gotten any better?”

“Uh, yeah, I’m sorry about that. I was feeling lousy and just needed to take a day, you know?” And he didn’t need to be parading around a still-healing black eye that might prompt questions, you bet. 

“I get that.”

“God, I wish I had your number outside of this so I could call you.” Your jaw tightened. Perhaps your friends were right; there was a whole other side to him. A side you didn’t really want to get to know. “I really could’ve used a friend to talk to.”

You unclenched your jaw when you realized he wasn’t hitting on you and when you thought about it, he sounded genuinely miserable and he never had in any of your previous conversations, even when your friendship formed. It was unlike him, or at least the CJ you had gotten to know. Just like this behavior your friends had told you about sounded unlike him. “Well, I’m here now, if you want to talk.”

“Are you sure? I don’t want to make this about me. You called in to talk, not to hear about my problems,” he laughed, sounding nervous. That was a first.

“I’m sure. What are friends for?”

He told you everything while not naming anyone. He didn’t hold back anything and you realized that while he didn’t know who you were, he was giving you the side that had been missing from the story your friends told you: his side. Every side has a story after all. He admitted he had messed up big time. He had hurt Jen (or Blondie as he called her), he had been an ass to Pacey (or The Guy Who Punched My Face) when he had no right to be, and he should have never hooked up with Audrey (or The Girl That Came Out of Nowhere). Apparently, Jen had said to him the same thing she said to you and it got him thinking, along with some things Audrey had said. He felt like a huge jerk and all he wanted to do was keep his head down and move forward, get back on the right track that his life had been headed in. You stayed silent as he talked and before you knew it, the clock read 9:47. 

“Your shift is over soon,” you whispered once he was done.

“Yeah, but I still have a few minutes. So what do you think? Am I a complete jackass or what?” He let out another nervous chuckle.

You briefly pressed your lips together as you thought of how best to answer that. In the end, you were as honest as you could be without giving yourself away. “I think we all make mistakes sometimes. But as long as we recognize them, apologize to those we’ve hurt, and try to do better, then that’s all that matters. So no, not a complete jackass.” 

This time when he laughed, it sounded relieved. “Thanks.”

“Of course. That’s what I’m here for,” you repeated his words back to him, teasing him slightly.

A moment of silence passed between you before he asked, “Will you call again next week?”

That made you do a double take. He never asked you to call the following week like that. Usually he asked in the form of making you promise you would call or he’d tell you he’d talk to you the following week. But when he asked like this, he sounded uncertain, vulnerable. You knew then that more than just his face and ego had been hurt by recent events. Perhaps you were a fool but you believed his remorse to be genuine. 

“Yeah,” you assured him. “I’ll call next week.”

And when you did, he immediately hit you with the name question. 

“Earth to you…” He called, snapping you out of it and reclaiming your attention. “See? It doesn’t really work,” he laughed.

You had to be careful here. Not only because you didn’t want him to find out who you were but also because if your friends ever found out, especially Audrey…you were toast. 

You opened your mouth to give him the name of a classmate that couldn’t be traced back to you but “Jo” came tumbling out instead.

“Jo?”

Oh crap. You had Audrey and then Joey on your mind and it just slipped out. Crap, crap, crap. “Yeah,” you lied. “Jo.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Jo.” You could practically hear him smiling, happy to have gotten a name out of you.

You squeezed your eyes shut, angry with yourself. “Nice to meet you, too,” you mumbled before you dropped your head into your hands.  

So now here you were, him thinking you were Jo from the college he was attending, and you were calling him every single week at the same time like clock work. You had long ago stopped questioning the morality of what you were doing and it seemed that he didn’t appear to question it at all. He was always happy to hear from you and your conversations were more personal now. You couldn’t deny the way your heart rate spiked every time you heard his voice when he picked up the call or how whenever his name was mentioned in passing by David or Jen (though rare these days), you would specifically tune in, listening for anything that had to do with him. You had it bad and you knew it, but it was also a safe crush from a distance and would be staying that way.

You shook your head, snapping yourself out of your reverie and remembered CJ has asked you a question. “I’m good. Really good. How about you?”

“Really good, huh? I’m happy to hear it and happy to be hearing from you.”

You couldn’t help but smile. “Yeah, I got that paper back and you were so right, The Writing Center really helped. I can’t believe I never thought to try it before. Thank you so much for that idea.”

“I’m happy to be of service,” he chuckled. “I’m glad it helped. And the club thing? Did you give that a try as well?”

Your smile dropped. He had been trying to urge you to join a club or a group where you had shared interests with other students. His theory was that if you gave a small group of people a shot doing a social activity you might enjoy, that it might help decrease your nervousness in other social settings. Even though you told him you had a group of friends you regularly met up with, he didn’t think expanding your social circles would be a bad thing to consider. “No? I told you, CJ, that’s not really my thing.”

“I get that, I do. How about this? If you want, I could meet you at Student Activities and we could take a look around together, get some info. No pressure, of course, but you wouldn’t have to walk in there alone. I know it can be a bit much sometimes. I remember my first semester here and I didn’t know where to stick my head.”

You froze. That was the first time he’d ever mentioned the possibility of you meeting in person. Perhaps if you were really Jo from Boston Bay College, you could take him up on it or give him your number like he’d asked you for or call his room number like he’d offered up a few times now so you could talk outside of the helpline. But you weren’t and so you had to decline. “I appreciate the offer but it’s not my thing so I’m going to have to pass. Sorry, but thank you, though.” 

“If you’re sure.” He sounded slightly disappointed but maybe that was just you imagining it. 

“Yep, I’m sure. Uh, so listen, I can’t stay on long. My roommate and her boyfriend will be here in less than ten so I’m gonna go so I can get out of here before I get hit by the clothes hurricane that’s most likely to happen.” It was a complete lie. Your roommate, Stacey, had actually gone to visit her boyfriend for the weekend. You would have peace and quiet and the dorm to yourself for two whole days. 

He chuckled good-naturedly. “I don’t blame you. If you get bored later, I’m here at The Stand until 10:00, like you already know, and then I’ll be back in my room. You can call me then if you want to talk. I”ll be up for a while so don’t worry about calling too late.”

“Oh. Thanks. Maybe I’ll do that.” You weren’t going to and he knew you weren’t going to. You hadn’t the last two times he’d made the same offer and the last two times you’d given him the same response.

“Jo?”

“Yeah?”

“If I don’t hear from you… Call next week, okay?”

“Okay,” you agreed, smiling, like always. You said your quick goodbyes and you hung up, letting out a heavy breath. While he had been urging you to contact him personally, he had never mentioned meeting him before. That was different. And it worried you at the same time. Why the offer now? Granted, he was just trying to be helpful to you, given the context, but what if he began to find other ways to work it in like he already had about your phone numbers? What if he continued to push to meet Jo? 

You shook your head, telling yourself that you were doing it again, worrying over things that might not happen. You would cross that bridge when you came to it, something CJ had once said to you that you kept for yourself as your own personal mantra. You would wait to see how next week would go.

But unfortunately, the call never happened.

You had been out with Jack and David on Thursday night at Hell’s Kitchen, when Jen waltzed in, smiling and taking a seat. Joey and Emma were working and Pacey was supposed to join you later.

“You worked late today,” Jack commented. 

“Training took a little bit longer than expected. We were supposed to be done at 6:00 but then our relief called and said they were going to be late. Of course, since CJ was going to stay, I wasn’t going to just leave him there.” Your ears perked up at the mention of CJ. You knew Jen was training as a counselor and he was the one training her. Jen had begrudgingly forgiven CJ but it was also obvious to you all that she still had a crush on him. While you couldn’t blame her, you also felt for her. CJ told you that he had to make it clear once more to Blondie that he wasn’t looking to date though he was happy she had finally started training at the helpline. He really believed she would make a great counselor once she settled into it. 

Talk about complicated. Jen was your friend and you didn’t want to see her get hurt, but you could also understand if CJ didn’t see her that way, he just didn’t. They were both your friends now and you just wanted them both to be happy, whatever that looked like.

“But then, listen to this,” she continued. “Our relief, this guy named Seth, sees me there with CJ and starts teasing him about how he’s racking up all of these beautiful girls through the helpline, not leaving any for him.”

“Jen,” Jack warned. 

“No, listen. This is good. You’re going to like this.” 

Jack sighed but let her finish.

“CJ laughs it off but then Seth mentions how he has this girl calling him every Friday night, around the same time, and she talks his ear off for hours.”

You were about to take a bite of your french fry when you froze. Your heart dropped down to your feet. 

“And so I ask if this is true and CJ says that we’re there to help everybody, time limits aren’t a thing, and it doesn’t matter how many times a caller calls back or they speak to the same counselor. As long as they get the help they need.”

“He’s right,” David chimed in.

“But then Seth starts teasing him again and asks if CJ can give him tips on how to get dates using the helpline. CJ laughs and says sure. I mention how he said he wasn’t looking to date and Seth says he tells every girl that so he doesn’t have to commit but can still get what he wants.” You dropped your fry back into your basket, trying to ignore the rolling nausea in your stomach. 

“I don’t know about that,” David chuckled nervously.

“He didn’t deny it, David. He just laughed and walked away. Can you believe it? He’s using the helpline to get girls. Talk about abusing the system, not to mention the absolute lack of morality.” You definitely felt like you were going to be sick. “I quit. If that’s what guys like him and Seth are using that helpline for then I don’t want any part of it. And CJ? Audrey was right. He’s a skeevy player. I can’t believe I didn’t see it this whole time.” Jen shook her head. You were getting that all-too familiar falling feeling again. 

“Wait, seriously? Guys are using the helpline to pick up girls?” Jack turned to David.

“No. Jen, I’m sure Seth was just kidding and CJ was just playing along. Nobody is using the helpline to pick anyone up. Everyone that works there knows the rules and they’re there to help callers. How could they pick anyone up, anyway? It’s all anonymous.”

“Yeah, but if they pushed for a date or something… It could happen.” You immediately felt your stomach jolt and like someone had punched you in the gut at the same time.

“It could,” David agreed. “But I doubt it does.”

“He has the same girl calling him every single week at the same time. What would keep her calling like that?” Jen interjected. You glanced away from the table for a moment, not sure if you wanted to hear the answer David would give.

“Is that true? Every week?” Jack asked in disbelief.

“It’s true,” David confirmed. “I actually got her once when CJ was out sick. She sounded nice.” If you could have, you would have given him a smile, thankful for David’s attempt to defend CJ and the helpline and unknowingly you. But right then, you were trying not to hyperventilate. “And CJ appears to be helping her. He said she’s made a lot of progress since they started talking.”

“He talked to you about her?” Jen looked shocked. Oh God. Your chest started to feel tight.

“Only because he was going to be out sick that one day and in case she called and then decided to talk to me, he wanted me to be up to speed in case she needed something. That’s all.”

“I feel badly for this girl. She probably thinks CJ is some great guy and she can trust him but based on what Seth said, he’s simply playing the long game with her. A girl whose trust he’s taking advantage of. I’m telling you, Audrey was right about him and I should’ve seen it.” Jen rubbed at her forehead. It was beyond hot in here and even though it wasn’t crowded, the room started to feel smaller.

“I don’t think that’s true, Jen,” David defended. “I don’t think he’s looking to take advantage of this girl at all. I think he truly wants to help her.”

“Yeah, that’s how it started with Audrey and look at how that turned out.” David dropped his gaze to his food, continuing to poke at it with his fork. There wasn’t much he could say to that though he wished he still would. “And if that’s true, he only wants to help her, then why was he laughing along when Seth talked about her and how she keeps him on the phone for hours? How is that helping her?”

You felt like your feet were locked in cement but your legs were wobbling to and fro. And yet you also felt like a large boulder was now sitting on your chest, making it difficult to breathe. How could any of this conversation be happening right now?

Jack glanced from David to Jen. “Perhaps David’s right, Jen. Maybe he was just playing along. That’s what guys do sometimes. You know that.”

“I don’t think that’s what that was. Either way, I quit.”

Jack and David started to urge her not to quit, but at that point you’d had enough. Your hands were clammy and you felt that feeling on your forehead, too. You needed cold, and air. “Excuse me,” you nearly rasped out and beat a hasty retreat to the bathroom. You could feel your dinner coming back up. Joey stopped you in your trek.

“Hey, Y/N, are you okay? You don’t look so good.”

You shook your head and dodged past her, hurrying to the bathroom. Once you reached it, you locked the door and pushed into a stall just in time. You emptied the contents of your stomach and once you were finished, you made your way towards the sink, splashing cold water on your face. You could feel the panic attack you were having and you tried your best to ward it off but to no avail.

You slid down the wall and struggled to breathe, trying the techniques CJ had taught you. You didn’t want to think about him right now but you also didn’t want to be having this happen while your friends sat right outside. Not to mention, you knew Joey was going to come check on you. You gasped for air and rubbed at your chest. Once it passed, you unlocked the door, made excuses to Joey and your friends, went home, showered, and cried yourself to sleep. For the first time in a while, you’d had a particularly bad episode and ended the night in tears: two things you hadn’t done since you’d started talking to CJ regularly. You felt as if all the progress you’d made was like a house of cards that fell to the ground after one card was pulled out from under you. And all because you’d trusted the wrong person. 

So you stopped calling and instead, spent your Friday nights at the library, studying, so you wouldn’t be tempted to pick up the phone and call to confront the guy who’d betrayed your trust.

<-->

A few weeks later, you were sitting on Joey’s bed, watching Audrey unload her closet onto her mattress. Apparently, she was going to rehab, for real this time. She was ready to confront the fact that her drinking was out of control. Joey was helping her sort through everything and handed you things to fold and place in her suitcase. Eddie had already taken one heavy suitcase down to the car, along with a very high Bob. 

You all looked up when there was a polite knock on their dorm room door. Joey got up to answer it, most likely thinking it was Eddie, but when she opened the door, it revealed another guy altogether.

There stood CJ, in jeans and a long-sleeved shirt with a jacket covering his tall frame. Your heart skipped a beat before falling into your stomach but then leaping back into place and pounding faster than before for a whole other reason. You immediately grabbed a magazine from the nightstand and began sifting through it, your jaw clenched and you refusing to look in his direction.

Before anyone could say a word, Audrey groaned. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

Out of the corner of your eye, you saw CJ hold up a placating hand in her direction. “I’m not here for you, okay? I’m actually looking for someone.”

You froze.

“I bet you are,” Audrey grumbled.

Joey crossed her arms. “Who?”

“A girl by the name of Jo who lives in this building.”

You mentally cursed yourself. You knew you had let the name of your dorm building slip once by accident but he hadn’t appeared to have heard you so you thought you were in the clear; apparently, he had heard you. Crap.

Joey tensed. Uh oh. You had a feeling this was going to come back to haunt you at some point. Here it was. “Why are you looking for me?”

CJ’s brow drew together. “You’re Jo?”

Audrey was suddenly at Joey’s side. “Yeah, why are you looking for her?”

“Jo is a girl who called the helpline. I haven’t heard from her in a few weeks and I just wanted to check on her.”

Her distaste for CJ forgotten, Audrey turned in shock to her roommate. “Joey Potter, you called the helpline?”

“What? No. Don’t be ridiculous, Audrey.” Joey then looked at CJ. “I don’t know who this girl is but it’s not me. Good luck in your search.” She went to close the door but CJ stopped her.

“Wait, so you’ve never heard of a girl named Jo who lives in this building?”

“No,” Audrey snapped. “Now, go away.”

“Hold on a second. Because Joanna Martin who lives on the 2nd floor isn’t her and has never heard of her. Now you’re saying you’re not her and you’ve never heard of her either?”

Audrey gave him a nasty smirk. “Imagine that. A girl using a fake name calling an anonymous helpline. She probably knows what a sleazeball you are and didn’t want you stalking her. If she was calling the helpline, she’s probably got enough on her plate. Best of luck, Stalker Boy.”

Audrey went to shut the door in his face but again, he stopped it.

“I don’t really care what you think of me. You want to think I’m the bad guy in everything that happened with us? That’s fine. But I’m actually trying to find this girl to help her.”

“Help her into your bed, you mean.”

His jaw clenched. “It’s not like that.”

“Oh, I bet it is but whatever.” Audrey rolled her eyes and turned back to you. “Y/N, have you ever heard of this girl he’s looking for?”

Your eyes snapped up to them and all three of them were now staring at you, waiting for your answer. Crap. CJ was looking right at you. Double crap. You shook your head and went back to your magazine. 

“There you go. No one here has heard of her. Buh-bye now.” 

Audrey was closing the door when Joey’s phone started to ring. Joey, who had gone back into the whirlwind of clothes, looked over at you. “Hey, can you get that? Eddie might be calling from his cell phone.”

You nodded and picked up the line. “Hello?”

“Hey, Y/N. Can I talk to Joey? Audrey’s friend, Bob, is getting a little impatient down here.”

“Sure. One sec.” You handed the phone to Joey. “It’s Eddie.” She took it and began rolling her eyes when Eddie was most likely telling her the same thing he had just told you. She came over, zipped up the suitcase you had been working on after dumping more things into it. “Do you mind taking this to Eddie downstairs? He’ll meet you in the lobby.”

“Sure thing.” You tossed the magazine back onto the night stand and grabbed the suitcase handle, picking it up and placing it on its wheels. You slipped your worn paperback copy of your book into the back pocket of your jeans, intent on returning it to your room when you came back up. Now that you knew CJ was trying to track you down and he was in the building, you didn’t feel comfortable having any clues pointing to your identity out in the open like that. 

You grabbed the tail of the suitcase and began to pull it along. “Oh my God, Aud. Do you really need this many outfits?” 

She looked up from her cell phone and gave you a smile. “Of course. Rehab is bound to be drab so I’m going to make it fab.” She shot you a wink and opened the door for you. 

You laughed and shook your head, crossing over the threshold. You made your way to the elevator and pushed the button. While you were waiting, you heard behind you, “Need some help with that?”

You nearly jumped out of your skin. CJ was right there, behind you, talking directly to you. While a part of you wanted to tell him to take a hike, your desire for anonymity was greater. You turned and gave him a wan smile, shaking your head. His green eyes were intent on you and you didn’t care for that one bit. It was like he knew who you were without you even having to say it. Luckily, at that moment, the elevator dinged and the door opened. You went to roll the suitcase onto it when a hand picked it up out of nowhere.

“Let me give you a hand,” CJ offered, not waiting for you to reply and stepping into the elevator. You paused for a moment, considering not getting onto it with him but Eddie was expecting you and Joey and Audrey were waiting for you to come back. You let out a quiet sigh and stepped inside, hitting the button for the Lobby and waiting for the doors to close.

Once they did and you started descending, CJ glanced over at you. “So, Jo, were you planning on ever calling me again?”

Your heart started to pound but you forced yourself to remain cool as a cucumber, hoping he wouldn’t recognize your voice. You arched a questioning brow up at him. “I don’t know who you think I am but my name’s Y/N. Sorry to disappoint.” You turned back to the door.

“The Green Mile book in your back pocket says otherwise.”

Crap. You tried to think quickly. “That’s just a book I’m reading for class.” You decided to channel Audrey, the queen of mean when she wanted to be; perhaps that would get him to leave you alone. The doors were opening and you turned to give him a smirk. “NIce try, though, Sherlock. Better get back to Watson before he misses you.” You grabbed the tail of the suitcase and nearly stormed out of the elevator. 

CJ was suddenly at your side. “I know it’s you. Why are you trying so hard to act like it’s not?”

You shook your head, choosing to ignore him. Thankfully, Eddie came into sight, rushing to get the suitcase. 

“Thank you, thank you.” He picked it up and gave you a look. “About how many more of these are coming down, do you think?”

You shrugged. “I don’t know. She has a lot of outfits. Joey’s got her work cut out for her.”

Eddie groaned and then noticed CJ standing next to you. “Good to see you again, man.”

“Likewise.”

Eddie glanced between you and CJ before walking away. Great. He was bound to mention that to Joey who would most likely question you about it later thanks to CJ’s impromptu appearance earlier. You spun on your heel and headed back to the elevator, punching the button.  

CJ was suddenly next to you. “What happened? Why did you stop calling?” He quietly asked you. 

You didn’t answer him, just kept staring straight ahead, your jaw clenched.

He leaned in slightly, his voice even quieter. “Did I make you nervous by offering to meet you? I was only trying to help. Nothing funny, I promise.”

When the doors opened, you stepped inside and of course, he followed you. The doors closed and your ride up began. 

“Are you going to talk to me or just keep ignoring me?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I know your voice. It’s you.” After another quiet moment, he begged, “Would you please just talk to me? What happened?”

You shook your head.

“Something obviously happened to make you stop calling. So, talk to me. I want to make sure you’re okay.”

You glared over at him. “Again, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Now please stop bothering me.” CJ looked as if you’d slapped him for a moment and you felt guilty but then you immediately remembered what Jen had said that night at the bar. 

He gave you a curt nod and turned to face the door. Once it opened, you went to step out when he lifted the book out of your back pocket. 

“Hey! Give that back!” He held it out of your reach, opening it to find the note from your dad on the inside page that he’d written after he bought it for you. Why did you have to mention that in your phone conversations? That was a dead giveaway that yes, Jo was indeed you. How could you have been so stupid?

CJ gestured to the note. “Tell me again how it’s not you.”

You snatched the book out of his hands and hurried down the hall to your room. You would’ve gone back to Audrey’s and Joey’s room, but you were afraid he’d out you to them. Even if they didn’t believe him, you still remembered Audrey’s reaction when she thought it might be Joey for a moment and the latter’s response. 

“Y/N, wait,” CJ begged behind you. “Please, can we just talk for a minute?” You were unlocking your door when he was right next to you. “Just one minute. Please. That’s all I’m asking. Then, if you want, you’ll never see or hear from me again.”

You mulled it over for a moment. You could do one minute, you supposed, and get this over with. You glanced up at him and nodded, pretending not to see the relief that filled his expression. You opened the door and then held it open wider for him to follow.

You saw your roommate sitting on her bed, talking on the phone to her boyfriend. “Stace,” you interrupted. “Can you give us a minute?”

She frowned. “I’m kind of in the middle of—”

“I need the room.” Your tone brooked no argument. You surprised her; usually, you kept to yourself and never really stood up to her if she got mean or demanding. But you were not in the mood for any of her crap right then. You were at your limit.

Stacey scoffed but got to her feet. “One second, babe.” She glared at you, which you were more than happy to return, and then turned it onto CJ as well. “Boys aren’t allowed to stay up here so make it quick. You know the rules.”

You huffed out a snort. “The rule you break almost every other night? Got it, Stace, thanks for looking out.” You practically shut the door in her scowling face. You turned to find CJ’s eyes trained on you.

“So that’s the roommate, huh?” You shrugged. “Exactly how I pictured her, scowl and everything.”

You didn’t laugh at his joke and instead, crossed your arms. “You wanted to talk?”

He pressed his lips together and thrust his hands into his jacket pockets. “Why did you stop calling?”

You wanted to tell him the truth but it also seemed best to just get him out of there as soon as possible. He knew who you really were now and that was a problem. Especially if your friends found out you were the girl that had been calling him every week. Because sooner or later, they would want to know why and you weren’t ready to talk about that or have them look at you funny. You knew they’d be supportive, especially Joey and Audrey, but you also knew things would change. And you weren’t quite ready for that to happen. 

“I’ve been doing better so there was no need. You should know, you made me your pet project after all.” You didn’t mean to be harsh but you were still angry. 

His brows furrowed. “What does that mean?”

“You know. I’m the girl who calls you every week to talk your ear off and keeps you on the phone for hours. The girl you’ve supposedly been trying to pick up through the helpline, though apparently I’m not the only one.”

His eyes widened. “Y/N, that’s not true at all. I don’t use the helpline to pick up girls or try to get dates. I don’t date, you know I don’t. I don’t know who told you that but it’s not true.”

“But the other part is?”

“No. Not at all.”

“Because that’s how your buddy Seth put it, the way Jen tells it.”

CJ huffed out a mirthless laugh, rubbing at his forehead and giving a nod. “Jen. That’s who you heard this from.”

“Don’t even,” you snapped. “David also mentioned how you told him all about me and my issues.” You used quotation marks on the last word.

His hand dropped. “Okay, first off, you don’t have issues, no more than anybody else around here, myself included. Second, I only told David because I was going to be out that one night. I wanted to make sure if you called in that you were taken care of. That’s it. David is one of our better counselors, he’s a friend, and I trust him completely.”

Your jaw tightened. “That still doesn’t explain why Seth would even say anything like that. And you laughed! You stood there and laughed as this guy, who I don’t know by the way, is turning me calling you for help into a joke! Is that what I am? The joke at the office? Does everyone there know how I’ve been calling you every week and boring you to death with my problems?”

“What? No! You’re not a joke. And you’re not—”

“Really? Because it sure sounded like it to me based on what Jen said.”

“Okay, let’s get something straight. You’re not boring me to death when you call, you’re not talking my ear off, or keeping me stuck on the phone with you, or anything else that someone else might have said. I wanted to talk to you. I wanted to be there for you and try to help. Then when we started talking about more than that, I wanted to talk to you even more. If I didn’t want to talk to you at all, if you were such a nuisance, then why would I ask you to call back every week or give you my phone number even?”

“But you weren’t trying to pick me up.”

“No, I wasn’t. I wanted to be available to you if you needed to talk to me outside of the hours I had at The Stand.”

“Yeah, because I was your pet project.”

“No, you weren’t and why do you keep saying that?”

“It’s true, isn’t it?”

“No, it’s not.” 

“Isn’t that what you do, though? Isn’t that why you tracked me down? Isn’t that why you kept trying to get my number and even suggested we meet though the helpline’s supposed to be anonymous? You look for girls who are messed up and try to be their white knight. It gives you some sort of satisfaction, some twisted sense of purpose… That’s what happened with Audrey, right?” Again, he looked like you slapped him but this time, you didn’t feel guilty. You were only speaking the truth. He had told you how much he wanted to help Audrey and how somehow they ended up in bed together and before he knew it, he really liked her and wanted to see more of her. In the end, he’d admitted to you that it might have been him confusing his desire to help her with his interest in her. That maybe Audrey had been right in what she’d said.

You watched as his shoulders deflated slightly and he let out a heavy breath, hanging his head. You bit your lip and glanced away from him, not wanting to see him look so defeated. You had to be strong, you had to stand up for yourself and not let him or anyone else take advantage of you. That was the silent vow you’d made to yourself after you’d cried yourself to sleep that night you found out how you were being used and made a mockery of.

“I tracked you down because I was worried,” he spoke softly. You turned back to find him staring at you, remorse radiating from him. You felt slightly bad for hurting him but you had said nothing but the truth, from his own lips. “It wasn’t like you not to call so I thought maybe something happened or maybe I made you nervous with that last call. Like I said, I gave you my number because I wanted to be there for you anytime you needed me, even if I wasn’t working. So this way you always had a way to get a hold of me if you needed to. I only asked for yours because I did like talking to you and I thought we were becoming friends. I know that’s not the norm for the helpline and it’s never happened before, to me or to anyone else that I know of, but like I said, I enjoyed talking to you. I only offered to meet you at Student Activities that day because you seemed nervous to try it alone and I didn’t want you to feel like that. I would’ve made that offer to anyone that needed it.” He nervously licked his lips. “I do like you but it has nothing to do with my wanting to help you or make sure you’re okay. I made a mistake with Audrey but I learned from it. I told you that.” He sighed before continuing. “I like you, Y/N, because you’re funny and smart and kind. Even if we didn’t meet through the helpline, I still would have liked you once I got to talk to you, once I got to know you better. That’s the truth.”

He turned to leave when he stopped suddenly. “By the way, Seth is the guy who usually relieves me on Friday nights. That’s how he knew about you calling every week. He always liked to razz me about being on the phone with you since I made him fifteen minutes late for his shift that one time. I only laughed because it was obvious he was showing off for Jen, that he likes her, and I was trying not to embarrass him in front of her. I did end up talking to him later about it, though, and asked him not to mention it again in front of her or anyone else. He agreed; he’s not a bad guy.” He glanced back at you over his shoulder. “I’m sorry this happened. If you call the helpline again and want to talk to someone else, I understand. If you don’t want to call at all, I understand that, too. Just…take care of yourself, alright?”

You averted your eyes, not wanting him to see the tears building in them, and you gave him a curt nod. You only looked up again when the door snicked closed. You pretended a tear didn’t suddenly roll down your cheek and you told yourself that you had done the right thing. Though it certainly didn’t feel like it in the moment, deep within your chest. 

<-->

You stared at your phone, pacing back and forth as you chewed on your thumbnail. It had been almost a month since CJ walked out of your dorm room, leaving you more conflicted than you felt prior to his arrival. You had turned his explanation over and over in your mind so much that you had begun to dream about him every night. You had more panic attacks during that time, to the point where you’d finally taken the plunge and made an appointment to see a therapist. You’d told your parents everything you’d been experiencing, making sure they heard you this time, and told them you needed help. Your mother was still annoyed with you but your father was supportive, especially when you told him that you had a group of friends you met up with pretty regularly. He agreed to help with payments for your therapy. 

You were doing better, just like you had been while talking to CJ, and the therapist had even more techniques in her toolbox that she taught you how to use. You’d even opened up to her about CJ and everything that happened with him. She was the initial reason why you were considering making a call that you hadn’t made in quite a while. 

When you saw the clock hit 7:21, you made your decision. You huffed out a breath, picked up the phone, and dialed the all-too familiar number.

“Hello, Helpline. This is CJ.”

You resumed your pacing, nervous, unsure of how to say what you wanted to.

“Hello?”

You’ve got this.

“Hello?”

Just do it already. Talk to him.

“Listen, if you’re—”

“What are your plans for tomorrow afternoon?” You rushed out before you lost your nerve.

 “Jo?” You appreciated him using your fake name. “Is that you?”

“Well?” You asked.

“Uh, tomorrow? I’m free...”

“Would you…want to get some coffee? Maybe?”

“Coffee, huh?” You could hear the smile in his voice. “Jo, you’re not calling the helpline to ask me out on a coffee date, are you? Because that would be a serious misuse of this valuable resource the college provides,” he teased.       

“Oh. Okay. Well, I’ll just wait until Seth is on shift then and call him up to ask him instead. Thanks, though. Bye.”

“Don’t you dare,” he laughed. You lifted the phone back up to your ear. “What time and what coffee shop?”

You couldn’t help but smile. “Got a pen?”

<-->

You walked into the coffee shop ten minutes early, intent on getting a table and settling in before CJ arrived. To your surprise, he was already there, waving you over. You approached, feeling your heartbeat speed up with every step. “You’re early.”

“I wanted to make sure we got a good table.” You had a feeling that wasn’t the only reason. The worry shadowing his expression confirmed it. Did he really think you had called him up to ask him to meet you only for you not to show? Then again, you supposed you couldn’t blame him.

“Good thinking.” You gestured towards the line with your thumb. “I’m going to get some coffee. Do you want anything?”

He was immediately on his feet. “I’ll get it. You sit down. You still like lattes?”

You gave him a small smile and nodded; he remembered. 

He returned your smile. “Okay. Here, take a seat. I’ll be back in a minute.” You watched him walk over to the line as you did just that. 

You would be lying if you said you weren’t nervous, but you were taking your therapist’s advice. You were moving your friendship with CJ away from the helpline and out into the real world. You were giving him another chance while also allowing both of you to start over. If CJ agreed to, that is.

A few minutes later, he returned and placed your cup in front of you. You gave him a smile of thanks and waited for him to join you.

“So,” he started once he was settled. “You called in.”

“Only to ask you to meet me,” you pointed out.

The corner of his lips tipped up in a genuine smile. “I’m glad you did.”

“Me, too.” And you meant it. You were happy he’d said yes. “I actually asked you to meet me because I wanted to thank you.”

His brows drew together. “Thank me?”

You nodded and began to tell him about all of the recent developments in your life, including therapy. You also apologized for how harsh you’d been the last time you saw each other but he waved it off, saying you didn’t need to and he understood. He listened intently and his smile grew when you mentioned how the therapy was helping and your panic attacks were starting to lessen. 

“I’m really happy to hear it, Y/N, and I’m glad you’re doing better.”

You bit at your lip, feeling nervous about speaking this next part. “It wouldn’t have happened if you hadn’t helped me the way you did, especially that first night. So, thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” he murmured.

Your heart began to pound against your rib cage but you bravely surged forward and kissed his cheek. When you sat back in your chair, his eyes were wide and you felt your face get hot. “Sorry. I just really wanted to do that for a long time. I hope that was okay.”

He grinned. “More than okay.” You felt relief sweep through you. “I was just thinking—”

“I know. You’re not dating, and we’re friends. Don’t worry, I understand.”

He studied you for a moment before speaking again. “I was going to say ‘I was just thinking what a coincidence because there’s something I’ve wanted to do for a really long time, too.’” His hand gently covered yours and he slowly leaned in, giving you time to pull away or tell him to stop. You weren’t going to do either. 

His lips brushed gently against yours and you felt a thrill rush through you at the contact. You had imagined kissing him so many times but the fantasy did absolutely no justice to the real thing. When you broke apart but he didn’t lean back right away, he murmured, “Was that okay?”

“More than okay,” you whispered before pulling him back into you, both of you grinning like idiots before your lips connected again.

<-->

You stopped, seeing the front of the building you were about to go into. “Are you sure we should be doing this?” You asked nervously.

CJ turned back to you and gave you a reassuring smile before cupping your cheek and kissing you. “Yes. We should.”

“But—”

“Everything’s going to be fine,” he assured you. “Trust me. I’m right here with you, okay?” He pecked your lips one more time, tightened his hold on your hand, and began pulling you forward. 

“Okay.” You didn’t sound so sure about this and truthfully, you weren’t.

CJ chuckled and led you inside. The Stand office was decorated with balloons and streamers and there was even confetti on the floor. One of the counselors was leaving since she was soon to graduate and a party was being thrown for her last day. You tried not to get overwhelmed at the amount of people filling the small space. It was overly warm in here and you could barely hear yourself think over the din of multiple conversations going on at once. Somewhere music was playing at a decent level. You noted a room in the back where through the window you could see two people sitting, talking on the phone, a closed door in between them and the noise. 

CJ intertwined your fingers and moved you both towards a group of a few people that he was intent on talking to, people greeting him as he passed. You remembered the techniques you had been taught and tried to put them into action while reminding yourself that you were with CJ and he wasn’t going to abandon you. 

He stopped and greeted the group before he turned to you smiling. “This is Y/N, my girlfriend.”

One of the guys laughed. “Ah, so this is Y/N.” Your heart started hammering inside your chest. “CJ hasn’t shut up about you since you two started dating.” You nearly sighed in relief.

CJ shrugged, grinning down at you. “Seth’s not wrong.”

Your eyes widened before you turned back to the guy. “Oh, so you’re Seth.”

Seth beamed. “Aww, CJ, you told her about me? I just knew we had something special,” he joked.

You frowned. “Hey now. Go get your own CJ. This one’s mine.” You winked up at CJ who laughed. 

He let go of your hand to wrap an arm around your waist and pull you into him. “Definitely yours,” he whispered huskily. 

Seth pretended to gag. “Ugh. Young love. Gross. You can have him, Y/N.”

“Damn right I do,” you laughed as CJ wrapped himself around you from behind and leaned down to kiss your cheek.

From that moment on, it wasn’t so bad. CJ circulated around the room to different groups, introducing you each time. With him by your side, you began to feel more comfortable and you opened up bit by bit. At one point, CJ took your hand and led you away. “I want to show you something.”

“Again?” You teased. “Didn’t you already show me something back in my dorm earlier? Twice?”

“Ha ha. No, this is something different. Though there will definitely be a third time when I get you out of here and back to my place.”

“Ooo. You sure know how to sweet talk a girl, Mr. Braxton.”

He smirked, wiggling his eyebrows playfully, and pulled you into a kiss that left you breathless. “Just a small preview for later.”

“A small preview?” You panted. You just loved teasing him and couldn’t resist.  

He rolled his eyes in amusement. “Come on.”

CJ led you over to a desk and with his free hand, he swiped confetti off of the seat. “This is it. My station,” he told you.

Your eyes roamed over the computer, the keyboard, the notepad and pens, stopping on the corded phone. So this was it. This was where CJ had sat on those Friday nights during your conversations. You smiled to yourself at the memory.

You let out a squeal when CJ quickly sat down in the chair and pulled you into his lap. You wrapped your arms around his neck to keep from falling, glaring at his laugh. You softened though when you looked back over the desk. “So this is where you sat on those nights we talked?”

“Uh huh. Though I much prefer you here on this end with me.” He gripped your chin between his fingers and turned you to him, kissing you sweetly. You snuck your fingers into his hair and tilted your head to deepen it, not caring right then about anyone or anything else around you. 

You and CJ had been dating for a while now and it was starting to become serious. He had met your parents when they came to visit. Your dad had liked him right away. Your mom, on the other hand, had given him a bit of a hard time but underneath the harsh exterior she was presenting, you could tell she liked him, too. He had initially planned to transfer to a school in New York, which you more than supported (though you were secretly heartbroken). You reminded him that you had done the phone thing once upon a time and you could do it again, if he wanted. After contemplating it, he decided to stay in Boston. 

“Please don’t tell me you chose to stay because of me. I’m not going anywhere. If it’s a great opportunity for you, you should go. I don’t want you to regret not going.”

He’d simply smiled. “I have a great opportunity right here and I would regret leaving.” He’d kissed your nose. “Besides, Boston’s home.”

“CJ, you should go. I’m almost done and I can come visit you. It’s only a few hours’ drive. You could show me things like the Empire State Building or take me to a museum or a play or show me Times Square.” You’d tried to make it sound enticing but inside it was killing you. Everyone knew long distance relationships had their problems and who knew? Maybe he might meet someone new in the Big Apple. But you also wanted him to do what was right for him, just like you’d spoken with your therapist about. You didn’t want him to resent you later on if he didn’t take this opportunity now and you certainly didn’t want him to have any regrets. “We could even visit Jen and Jack, see how her Grams is doing.”

Jen and Jack had transferred to New York. You had been worried to tell her that you and CJ were dating but while she was a little miffed in the beginning, she was more focused on the developing situation with her grandmother who had been diagnosed with cancer. Eventually, she forgave you before she left and gave you her blessing. You had been relieved; Jen was a good person, a good friend, and you didn’t want to lose her friendship. Jack had been worried about Jen’s reaction but for the most part, he had been fine with it. David was happy for you both. Audrey was doing better these days and though she had wanted to know what the hell you were thinking by shacking up with The Sleaze (as she referred to him), she had eventually told you she loved you and just wanted you to be happy. Joey asked you if you were sure when you told her and when you assured her that you were, she pretty much said the same thing as her former roommate and gave you a hug. She gave you a look when you pulled away and you knew that she had connected the dots on who you really were to CJ, but to her credit, she mercifully never said anything. Pacey and Emma had shrugged (CJ had apologized to Pacey at some point after what happened with Audrey and they had resolved things), wishing you well. Dawson…well, you never really got to know Dawson all that well during his brief visits so no conversation needed to be had there really. All in all, your friends were supportive, even if still a little wary of how things were going to work out. You were happy, though. It was strange but shifting from friends into romance proved to be an easier transition then you thought it would be.

CJ laid his forehead against yours, staring into your eyes, as he stroked your cheek with his thumb. “I’m not going without you.” You went to speak, to remind him you weren’t going anywhere, when he cut you off. “I know what I want. I’m okay with my decision. I need you to be, too.”

You tenderly stroked his arm. “Are you sure?” You whispered, worried he was making a mistake.

“More than sure.” He then pulled you to him for a kiss.

“Okay,” you whispered to his lips before kissing him again.

And now you had met all of his co-workers at The Stand and had seen where he worked a few days out of the week. He had offered to bring you several times before, but you had been hesitant to take him up on it, still worried someone might figure out who you really were. It’s not that you were embarrassed that you had called the helpline for help, but your business was your business and you didn’t want to be seen as that girl CJ got himself through the service. You both obviously knew that wasn’t the case but people talked, people judged, and you just wanted to steer clear of both as long as you possibly could. You knew you shouldn’t care what anyone thought or said, just like CJ didn’t; it was something you were currently working on in therapy. 

“So,” you teased when he finally broke away for air. “Is there a switchboard somewhere that you have somebody directing all the girls to you when they call? Is that how I got you every single time I called?” 

He grinned. “Not exactly. I told everybody that any calls that came in on Fridays at 7:00 were mine.”

“You didn’t.”

“I did.”

“Well, how did you know I would call every single time?” You huffed out. “How do you know I might not have gotten held up? Or made plans at the last second? Or got fed up with you?”

He gave you a cocky smirk. “Because you liked talking to me. I could tell.”

You playfully swatted at his shoulder, making him laugh, and rolled your eyes. “It always amazes me that you’re able to make it through doorways with that massive ego of yours. That can’t be how you knew I would call you every time.”

His smirk grew and he nodded. 

“I hate you,” you mumbled. You didn’t really mean it and he knew you didn’t.

CJ pulled you closer up against him. “You have a weird way of showing that.” He inclined his head towards your embrace around his neck. 

“True,” you murmured and kissed him again.

“Plus,” CJ added when you pulled back. “You always said you would call back and I believed you.”

“Better,” you decided. “Though I will begrudgingly admit that I did like talking to you.”

“Like I said, I could—”

“Hush.” You covered his lips with yours and he chuckled into your mouth. When you pulled back this time, you laid your forehead against his, your eyes closed, smiling. “I love you,” you murmured.

“I love you, too” he whispered back to you, lifting up to press a kiss to your brow before you buried your head into his neck and he discreetly snuck his hands under your shirt to rub your back, just the way you liked. 

“Want to get out of here?” He asked you after a few minutes had passed.

“Mmm.” You lifted your head to look him in the eye. “No Fleetwood Mac this time, though.”

He laughed and helped you to your feet. “What have you got against one of the greatest bands of all time?”

“Nothing. It’s just weird to listen to that chorus when we’re about to…you know.” You could feel your cheeks starting to warm.

He grinned salaciously at you. “Oh, I know. Hey, at least it’s not the Star Wars theme.” He snickered at your glare and picked up your hand, kissing it. “No Fleetwood Mac tonight. Got it.” He intertwined your fingers and his grin softened into an affectionate smile before he led you out of there. You quickly made your goodbyes and hurried back to his place where he kept his promise of no rock group music track playing along to your own soundtrack. 

Later, as CJ slept, you repeatedly ran your fingers through his messy hair in soothing strokes as you studied him. Who knew calling the helpline that one Friday night would lead you here? Where you were happy, in love, and doing much better than you ever thought possible? You had gone from feeling overwhelmed by your education to feeling a different type of overwhelmed together. Overwhelming love and affection for the special person in your life; overwhelming gratitude for the progress you’d been able to make in managing your anxiety and panic attacks as best you could; and overwhelming contentment with every single moment, no matter the ups and downs that was best known as life. Regardless of whatever happened from here, you knew you’d be okay and you’d handle whatever was thrown your way. Like CJ had once said, one day at a time.

In his sleep, your boyfriend reached out for you and pulled you in closer to him, snuggling into your side and burrowing into your neck, making you smile.

And to think, you almost hadn’t made that call. You laid your head against CJ’s and closed your eyes. You were so glad you did.

[pedrito-friskito]

✨kay’s ultimate pedro ranking✨

ok ok ok ok @mandosmistress did this a while back (like a few days lmao what is time) and tagged me and I HAVE BEEN T H I N K I N G let me tell you.

so without further ado, under the cut is my (not so definitive) pedro pascal character ranking…..! (based mainly on attraction/how much I enjoy writing them)

FRANKIE MORALES. frankie. frankie frankie frankie. my man. sunshine of my life (haha see what I did there). there is just something about this character that really crawled into my chest, wrapped himself around my heart and said ”hi I live here now” and I’m cool with it. handsome in that rugged way, a little bit damaged, and good with his hands? done. hook, line, and sinker.

DIN DJARIN. oh the sweet soft-spoken tin can space man. in all honesty, him and Frankie fight for the top spot on a daily basis and sometimes the beskar-covered bounty hunter wins, and he truly was my pedro gateway drug so he’s gotta be high on my list.

JAVIER PEÑA. ohhhhhh mama I love me some Javi. (do I mainly blame my gargantuan crush on @the-ginger-hedge-witch and her brilliant Crush series YES AS A MATTER OF FACT I DO) something about those tight fuckin’ jeans and the stache and the aviators like yep honey take me I’m yours

JAVIER GUTIERREZ. sunshine baby angel too good for this world I just wanna give him a little kiss and carry him around in my pocket and make sure no harm every comes to him (no I haven’t written anything for him yet but I been thinkin’ thots okay)

DIETER BRAVO. ✨the trash man✨ another one I just wanna carry around in my pocket, also the hair does things for me (same with Javi G) like just let me run my fingers through it and I’ll die a happy gal. questionable life choices maybe, but we’ve all been there, right?

OBERYN MARTELL. oh my HEART. *cue adele* we could have had it AAAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLL. I would say spoilers but it was legitimately 8 years ago but he was so CLOSE and then so SQUISHED. tbh oberyn is the most intimidating to me to even think of writing but maybe someday….

MARCUS PIKE. I do really like Marcus. cheesy as hell? check. bit overboard sometimes? double check. BUT I really like the history of the character we got in limited scenes AND I have a fic idea for him I’ve been sitting on FOREVER and I def have to use it soon!

PERO TOVAR. okay I love me a grungy fantasy man okay like that’s my bread and butter. add in the grouchiness and the obvious way to his heart through his stomach? it’s go time, baby, I got plans for him too!

JACK DANIELS. oh darlin’, he hits the middle of my list for the sole reason that pedro and that whip awoken something in me that hasn’t shut up since I watched that movie and if you don’t think I’ve watched that clip where he pushes his jacket back and it’s a crystal-clear shot of his ass you are WRONG

EZRA PROSPECT. fits the grungy, violent thing pedro seems to work with half the time, and honestly, the linguistics of this man make my head spin (the main reason I haven’t written much for him because it’s a looooot of effort to try and think up dialogue for him!!!) BUT I do love that little moon-touched spot and the scar and the smile and just ugh yum

THE THIEF. full disclosure: I haven’t read a lot of fics about the thief (if anyone has recs let me at ‘em) buuuuuut I really like the whole vibe he has and the outfit? spectacular.

MARCUS MORENO. the glasses definitely do it for me but idk something about him I just…meh. have definitely read some fab fics about daddy moreno (maybe I’ll revisit him at some point). still hot, still delicious, just not my number one fav.

MAX PHILLIPS. maybe not the biggest asshole pedro’s played but definitely up there? I sat through the movie just for him, honestly the scene of him on the couch made it worth it and the smarminess is something else, but idk if I could ever write him! (kudos to all that do!)

DAVE YORK. ok ok ok ok OKAYYYYYYY. listen. he’s the baddie (and like a really bad baddie) so I gotta put him low on my list as far as attraction goes (plus I have mixed emotions about P without facial hair but I digress…) BUT I do have ideas. they are on the horizon. keep your eyes OPEN.

MAX LORD. I haven’t even watched wonder woman 1984 and I know he needs to be down here. maybe I’ll get some form of intoxicated this weekend and power through it, just for shits and giggles!

well KUDOS if you made it this far, this was actually so fun to do!

tagging a few pals just because, no pressure 😇

@prolix-yuy @pedropascalsx @mandoblowmybackout @mindidjarin @allfoolsinluv @iamskyereads and obvi anyone else who wants to play!!!

[auty-ren]

Tainted Heart: Chapter 2

The Agreement (Western AU)

Pairings: The Mandalorian x Reader. Din Djarin x Reader. Outlaw!Din x Reader. (Reader is female/fab)

Rating: Mature

Word count: 5k

Warnings: Mentions of blood/injury. Cursing. The kid being adorable. The reader is his babysitter. Pet names. Teasing. Soft-core Smut (kissing, heavy making out, groping, dry humping, mentions of virginity/inexperience, a few touches, unintentional edging.)

A/n: Thank you guys for being so patient, I hope it was worth the wait! We’re finally seeing a little action. Enjoy babes. (gif by @javier-pena​)

Tainted Heart Masterlist | My Masterlist

The wool was rough under your fingertips, a heavy dull gray that almost burned under the harsh tint of the midday sun. They were heavy, soaking with water and suds as you lifted them from the wash pan, squeezing what excess you could out of the fibers. A coo broke through the static that had filled your mind, numb with the monotonous action of wet, wash, rinse, repeat. The child stayed strapped in the high chair, peeking at you through white sheets you hung to dry, his inquisitive hands stretching out when the breeze blew white cotton out close, but just barely grazing the reach of his fingers. He babbled again at the sight of you, squealing when you threw the curtains of laundry away and broke the makeshift barrier between you. 

He repeated the snarl you had given him, playful and disappearing between fits of smiles and giggles.

“Are you a monster, little one?”

He was meant to scare you, giving a growl that was far cuter than it was fearsome in his pretend game of monster.

“You’re too sweet to be a monster.”

He kicked his feet in excitement, gnawing at the bread you tore into pieces on the plate attached to his chair. He offered you a piece of it, forming unrecognizable syllables as he prompted you to take it from him.

You wanted to be selfish, to hide away with your newfound companion and keep him perched on your hip permanently. None of it should be temporary.

It had been years since your home felt so warm; since the fogged windows were lit with a bright, new life that fumbled over every surface. It was sticky, the feeling you had laying on your chest when you were woken to the sound of shrill cries; the ache in your tired bones all but faded at the tear-soaked smile that greeted you in the dim mornings.

Maybe you were just lonely, growing tired of the same life you lived each day when it was just you and Papa. 

Maybe you had mistaken content for boredom.

And now it was unpredictable, a welcomed unpredictability.

You learned the hard way not to leave the little one unattended, even for a moment; not for a few measly seconds. The broken porcelain of an old vase had been enough of a warning, luckily it wouldn’t be missed and after you had cleaned up the mess, you could hardly notice any wrong had happened. 

At least, your father didn’t notice. 

But the child was just curious and his cries as he sat horrified at the pieces of glass surrounding his feet had been enough of punishment for the both of you. 

This arrangement took too much convincing on your father's part.

He only wanted to protect you, but at this point, you doubt he was thinking straight. Your father had sacrificed too much to keep you safe; to carve out a simple life for you on the edges of the real world, to keep it from crushing your spirit the way it did his.

You assumed your father’s anxiousness about the situation stemmed from something you didn't think you could understand; loved ones lost long ago to the evil that had spread to your quiet town.

But there were some things that only time could heal and it seemed for him there was never enough.

He wanted to send ‘Mando’ packing as soon as the wounds stopped bleeding, and the sun lit up the morning sky.

But you convinced him otherwise.

There was no way he would've made it twenty minutes without hurting himself, more so since he had to care for a child. A child who you found very difficult to say no to, especially since he became such good company.

Mando could stay until he was healed. But there was work to be done.

Mando’s right arm had been wrapped in a makeshift sling, leaving his less dominant hand available to carry out whatever your father asked of him. Although you argued he shouldn't be working at all, both of the men disagreed with you. Papa decided it was only fair for him to work, to repay the debt he owed you.

You wouldn't call it a debt, but you kept that to yourself and let your father negotiate the terms of Mando’s stay.

There wasn't much argument, Mando would work odd jobs around your homestead, things that Papa was unable to do anymore, and things he hated to ask you to do; in return, he and his child would be allowed to stay until Mando healed. But there were conditions, terms that your father had laid out and would be considered law as he saw fit.

Mando would not be allowed to sleep in your home.

Your father made sure to bolt the doors once Mando had left after dinner, checking each of them before he could settle enough to try and sleep. A place was made for him in the barn, blankets and an extra pillow for him to sleep with, the least you could do for someone about to work your entire harvest for practically nothing. 

The child would be allowed to stay inside.

Papa had gone into the attic in the early morning after he agreed to let Mando stay, and pulled down the old crib that had been yours once upon a time. You aired and cleaned all of the blankets and toys you had sorted inside of it, hoping that maybe they could get one final use before they crumbled from age. He slept in your room, just down the hall from where you and your father stayed.

You didn't like the idea of separating someone from their child, but your father insisted and Mando made no objection otherwise.

Your attention for the past week was wrapped completely around the fingers of a grinning child, smiling and keeping his curiosity at bay when he grabbed at anything within reach. He used unsteady legs, you being his shadow for the entire day; picking up the small toys that were left in his wake of discovery. 

He was a healthy little boy, just barely big enough to explore some on his own, and he had the energy to prove it. There were only a few times he slowed enough to nap, sleep that weighed heavy on his eyelids as he crawled into your arms, puffing small breaths into the crook of your neck while he rested.

He refused to fall asleep alone, if his fingers weren't gripping yours with an unusual force he didn't allow himself to sleep; he just cried, wailed until you picked him up again, and finally settled when the sound of your heartbeat was within reach.

You couldn't imagine what this child has been through.

There were a few things only you and Papa had spoken about, conversations and theories about your guests, the stranger who slept in the loft of your barn, and his precious companion. Papa wasn't very sentimental towards them, he was gentle with the child and polite to Mando; but the sooner both of them had left, the easier he would sleep at night. 

He repeated the same thing before bed, his voice shaking and eyes worrisome in ways you had never thought would come from him. You didn't protest, just nodding your head and trying to soothe the lines seemingly etched into his brow. You drifted off as he squeezed your fingers in his, tighter than he ever had before, and pressed a worried kiss to your hand.

“Do not trust him.”

You hadn't told Papa about what happened between you and Mando once he had gone to bed, and you'd keep it from him so long as you stay sane. He would never know about how much you thought about it, how part of you wanted something like that to happen again, how you wanted to feel that blossom of heat in your chest ten times over.

Papa was under the impression the two of you had never spoken and it was best it stayed that way. 

He couldn't be a good man.

He had the scars to prove he was a fighter, most of the wounds old and standing out sharply against his skin.

You remember how they looked, how tender and soft the damaged flesh felt when you ran your fingers over it.

That doesn't just happen.

He carried a gun, and two more sat on the saddle of his horse. One fell from the pockets of his rucksack when you lifted it off the horse's back, the other a long rifle that was heavy and awkward in your arms.

You didn't tell Papa about that, you just hid them in the haystack of the barn and hoped he wouldn't find them.

But he was kind.

He hadn't spoken much, not to you. Maybe to your father but, he hardly looked you in the eye; his face was mostly hidden behind the brow of his hat and sometimes by the cloth he wore over his face when he worked.

Or he was cunning.

Maybe Papa was right, maybe the sooner they left the better.

You didn't want them to leave.

Mando wasn't like other men, he had an attachment; something you doubt most low-lives ever considered having.

And you wanted to know why.

The baby was squealing for your attention again, and he giggled loudly when you shifted him in your arms. Papa looked in your direction, watching the two of you sitting on the porch. You gave him a small smile, one he returned in genuine, with promise that reached the crinkles in the corner of his eyes. You busied yourself with taming wisps of the baby’s hair, for the hundredth time that day, soft curls that gently framed his face sticking out in every direction. He giggled again, his hands reaching out in curiosity as he curled his fingers into his palm and babbling away as you sat him on the porch floor. He took a few unsure steps, then taking the lead as if he knew exactly where he was going and you kneeled behind him ready to reach out when he lost his balance.

He made his way to the railing, stopping above the steps that led down to where Papa sat working.

He had bushels of food sitting at his feet; vegetables that had been growing in the fields you kept behind the house. It wasn't too impressive, just enough to suffice with a little leftover that was sold at the end of the season; but it took far too long to pick any of it when the time came.

After years of practicing medicine, your father had fumbled his way through becoming a farmer. Papa had already been working for a few days, and at dinner last night he gave Mando the task of starting the harvesting of the far-garden in the morning while he’d work what had already been picked.

Mando wasn’t much of a talker; he was polite, sometimes even kind when he spoke to you, but it was few and far between. He did everything asked of him, sometimes even more.

You had mentioned at dinner last night you were planning to wash laundry in the morning, gathering clothes and sheets and rags Papa unintentionally littered about the house. It was tiresome and took most of the day, the clothesline filled with garments that took hours to dry even on a summer day. The chill in the air wasn’t the problem at all this time, the heat was.

It was tedious to fill and heat the washpans, sometimes you’d think it better to ignore that step, but the constant cold on your raw fingertips told a different story.

You hurried to eat this morning, making sure the baby was fed and occupied, so you could begin filling the tubs for laundry. 

But someone beat you to it.

You found both of the tubs were sitting out by the clothesline, filled to the brim with steaming water and the laundry stacked beside them.

Papa had been with you all morning, he couldn’t have done it.

You wanted to thank him, but it felt silly to do so, your cheeks getting warm with the thought like some smitten schoolgirl.

You had seen him one other time today, when he came in for some lunch, his boots kicking up dust that tracked from the back door into the kitchen. His pants were just as filthy from digging in the gardens all day, but his sleeves had been pushed up his arms, and his hands were still damp from when he had washed them.

At least he's not a slob.

You don't think he notices you, standing on the far side of the kitchen, quietly watching as he removes his hat, pulls down the covering on his face, and sits next to the kid. He checks on him with a ruffle of his hair, the baby babbling away with a grin on his face as he watches Mando stuff his mouth with some of the bread and meat you sat out for him on the kitchen table.

He ate in silence, quick and rushed as if someone would take it from him before he could get enough to be satisfied. You stood at the other end of the kitchen, watching him eat and interacting with his kid. He said something to him, something so quiet you barely heard it but you saw the way his hand brushed over the curls on his boy's head; just like you had been doing almost every day you watched him. He finished as he drank glass fulls of water, over and over until the pitcher was nearly empty. 

His eyes are like saucers when he turns around to see you standing there, and his mouth opens and closes as if he was thinking of some defense.

Definitely didn't see you standing there.

You try your best to smile at him and move to ask him if he'd like more to eat, but he's gone. He grabs his hat from the table and mutters a thank you before slamming the door closed behind him.

It couldn't be easy with just one arm, nothing your father had given him was gentle and no matter how much he dismissed it, you could tell he was still in pain. Even with the medication given to him regularly, he winced at the slightest movement and was slow compared to your father.

You could barely see his silhouette, still moving out in the gardens and shadowed by the sun setting behind him. He takes a moment, sitting on his ass and looking up at the painted colors of the sky. Delicate pink and orange hues fill a blue sky, mixing until there is a symphony dancing above your heads, dusk settling over the land as everyone prepares for sleep. He stretches his neck from side to side, wiping his face with his sleeve with a huff and pulling himself back to his feet.

“He's a very sweet kid.” 

Papa’s voice interrupted your watching, your eyes snapping over to him taking a seat in his chair, patting his lap, and asking for the child to join him. He waddled over, reaching up with grubby hands and squealing as he was lifted in your father’s lap.

“Why don't you take some time and wash up for dinner.” Papa insisted, nodding towards the door as he settled the child on his lap. “I’ll call for you when it's ready.”

“Nonsense,” you sigh, standing up with a smile and turning towards the door. “Someone has to help you.”

“And that someone has to be you?” He’s grinning, nothing evil or malicious; mostly playful, with just a hint of mischief sparkling in his eyes.

Your earlier intentions of dinner are forgotten as you lean against a wooden doorframe, the aged wood scratching at your arm when the sleeve of your dress is pushed up. You watch Papa coo at the child, patting his head with careful hands as the toddler yawned and laid against his chest. Your feet ache as you look down at the worn boots you wear, the leather cracked and crumbling from age at the soles of your feet; they throb as you roll your ankles, switching your weight from one foot to the next until some of the pain subsided.

 It’s just your breathing for a moment, the simple, rhythm rise and fall of your chest; occasionally dueted with the squeak of Papa’s old rocking chair.

“Looks like I'll need help taking this into town,” you gestured to the bushels sitting at the edge of your porch steps, cutting through the silence with a huff of your breath. “Kuill will be excited to see everything we've got for him.”

“Has he said anything to you?”

He took you by surprise, the change in subject hitting you with a force that had your chest seizing up. How pitiful you felt, your heart racing at the mention of a man who probably didn’t remember your name.

“No,” you offer meekly, hoping your father didn’t notice the change in your pitch. “Why?”

“He’s hardly spoken a word since he's been here.”

He rocks his seat back and forth in a steady motion, gentle as the baby in his arms drifts into slumber.

“Maybe he likes to keep to himself.” You shrug, moving to lean against the porch railing and face him.

Your father considered your reasoning, his brows knit with heavy thought and a frown set on his lips.

“Or he's guilty of something.”

There’s something you barely catch in Papa’s words, something like malice but with less bite as the words hit your ears.

“It's only for a few more days,” you pick at the splintered wood under your hand, the edges rough and pointed as they press deeper into your palm. “We'll manage.”

Papa nods his head, patting the baby’s back as he sleeps on his chest; his limbs stretching for just a moment before he settles back to sleep. You run your hands along the child’s back, soothing the tired grumbles that fell from his lips. Leaning forward, you pressed a kiss to your father’s temple, squeezing the free hand he had perched on the arm of his chair.

“You know they would've died if we hadn't helped.” You whisper it into his hairline with another kiss, turning to head back inside before anything else is said.

You keep quiet, somehow afraid of speaking nightmares into existence. They were safe for now, healing and resting what little they could on your farm. A stranger and his baby that dug tiny holes in your chest that you doubt were closing anytime soon. Part of you feared when the time came, you wouldn’t want to let your precious companion or his father go.

“I know.” 

-

An intake of breath is all he allows.

He says nothing, and his face is blank, staring in front of him with discipline as your father digs into his shoulder again. His wounds are still tender, pink, and fresh against his tan skin but he doesn’t even wince; there's barely a twitch in his eye, and the shaking push and pull of his breath is the only indication he felt any of it.

He does groan when your father pours alcohol over it, remnants of blood washing away from the openings in his shoulder, thrown away stitches sitting on the cloth with your father’s tools.

You didn’t ask how his stitches had broken, you could only assume it happened today while he was working, and it was almost dinner before you noticed the tint that had stained his shirt red.

You hold the child a little closer in your arms, turning his head and busying him when he reaches out for Mando. 

The painting hung mounted on the wall, just low enough it was about eye level with you and the child. You pointed to flowers caked in oil paints, their colors faded from years of the sun that breached the windowsill. He cooed as he followed your lead, tracing the petals with his fingers until he gave a big yawn.

You placed a kiss on the top of his head, the soap you used to wash him earlier still lingering on your lips as he laid on your chest. His blanket wrapped around him, the wool warm and green as you kept him snug in your arms.

“It’s time to say goodnight.”

You stayed at the threshold of the kitchen, Mando’s back turned to you as your father put new stitches into his shoulder. Papa paused for a moment, nodding his head in your direction until Mando turned his profile murmuring a ‘goodnight’ to the baby in your arms. He looked at you as he said it, something pulling deep in your belly as his eyes bore into yours; almost black in the darkness and twinkling from the light of your father’s lamp.

Papa cleared his throat, pulling your eyes towards him as you felt heat rush to your face. 

You hoped he couldn’t tell, that you didn’t look as flustered as you felt. When didn’t bring it up later, once the two of you were alone and everyone had gone to bed, you felt the pressure that built up in your chest dissipate. He went right to sleep, snoring loudly beside you while you laid wide-eyed and staring at the ceiling.

You're not sure what time it is, or how long you have been ‘asleep’ but everything blurs; your mind racing too fast for your drooping eyes to catch any sort of rest.

You laid warm beneath woolen covers as you watched the windows tint with fog, the barest hints of a cold breeze slipping between the cracks and leaving a chill in the air.

It must be very cold out in the barn.

You wouldn’t entertain the idea. Mando was a grown man, he didn’t need you to care for him or coddle him like he was a child.

Staying in bed was the right decision, but decision making was never your strong suit.

The doors to the barn looked wicked under the dim moonlight, tall and intimidating as you reached a shaking hand out to them. They groaned as you pulled open, the track they rested on squeaking and shrill in the quiet night.

You just hoped he was a heavy sleeper.

You carried the two blankets you had been washing just this morning, something Papa kept around for emergencies; thick, wooly blankets that were itchy and coarse on your skin.

They were better than nothing.

There was only one lamp lit, everything mostly covered in shadow save for the few feet of orange glow coming from the middle of the room. Hardly any sound in the air, nighttime completely dead save the occasional grunt and snort of the horses sleeping in their stalls. His belongings sat stacked in one corner, next to the makeshift bedding you had left in here just over a week ago. They were in a neat pile, a shirt and coat, his hat, the cloth he used on his face, and his holster.

He was nowhere to be found.

You put the blankets on his bedroll, hoping he would connect the dots whenever he came back. The hay crunch underneath your feet, even with your attempt at tiptoeing through the barn. You pulled the knitted shawl you wore tighter around you, shivering from the chill that seeped from cracked insulation in the walls.

You hadn’t even stood up before you jumped under the sudden baritone of his voice.

“Where are my guns?” 

The chill that ran down your spine wasn’t from the cold, but rather from accusation; deep, rich words that dripped from his words and held no real malice.

“I don't know what you're talking about.” You offered over your shoulder, slowly turning to face him head-on.

His arm was still in a sling, fresh bandaging that stood stark white against his worn clothes. He looked almost handsome in the orange hue of an oil lamp; his eyes bright even with the exhaustion pulling at his cheeks, his lips pouting and curls sticking out at his neck as if you had woken him in the embers of early morning.

“I know you didn't take them,”

He walked towards you, each step he took followed by your retreat until your back landed against the wall with a thud. Your eyes never leave him, never daring to break your stare even as your hand scrambled for purchase on the smooth wood at your back.

“So where are they?”

You counter him, thinking you're clever with a smile and a half-concocted comeback, batting your eyes when his lips quirk in response.

“How do you know I didn't keep them?”

He laughed, amusement hiding behind the rich color of his eyes and biting with the sparkle of his teeth.

“I doubt you've ever held a gun in your life, sweet girl.” His voice lowered at your pet name, sinful words that swirled at the base of your spine until you squirmed.

“I know you didn't take them.”

You take a deep breath, your cheeks burning when his hand comes to rest beside your head, his body coming just a hair closer until you feel pinned beneath him.

“I hid them.”

His eyebrow arches, questions stuck in the back of his throat that filter into one word.

“Why?”

You fiddled with the loose thread of your gown, wrapping the line excess around your finger until it pinched at the tip. Your ears thumped with the sound of your heartbeat, loud and racing as Mando drug his hand from your shoulder, across your neck. He cupped your jaw, squeezing your face in his hand for just a moment.

“You afraid of me, sweet girl?”

His voice rumbled, deep from his chest as he drags every word from smirking lips.

“Don't call me that.”

Any bite you had laced in your words was betrayed by the way you leaned into his touch, sighing when his fingers scratched at the hairs on the back of your neck.

“Yeah?” 

His lips were gentle, chapped, and sweet against yours with a tender kiss.

“What are you gonna do about it?”

You kissed him this time, testing the waters with a playful nip to his bottom lip; earning you a chuckle before he consumes you. Your lips slot lazily together in a clash of tongue as you taste one another, slow and sensual until your fingers thread his hair, tugging until he growls into your kiss.

“Thank you,” His breath puffed on your cheek, warm and wet on your skin as he trailed kisses over your face and neck. “For taking good care of my kid.”

“He's a sweetheart.” You huff out the words around a smile, your fingers tugging on Mando’s curls.

You almost moan when nips at your throat, his teeth leaving a mark on the juncture of your neck until he groans at the salty-sweet taste of soap on your skin.

“And you're beautiful.”

He steals the breath right from your lungs, gasping in between the short moments when his mouth wasn’t molded against yours. His hand on the back of your neck kept you pressed to his chest, your fingers ghosting over the stitches you could feel through the thin material of his shirt.

His leg was firmly pushed in between yours, his body supporting most of you as he hitched your leg to rest over his hip. The muscle of his thigh flexing when you barely rocked your hips against him. The cotton material of your nightgown did nothing to hide the feeling of rough denim on the softness of your thighs, scraping and molding red indents from the back and forth motion your hips made.

You nearly shout when he snakes his hand in between your bodies, cupping your mound while his fingers work against the bundle throbbing in between your legs; sparks of electricity shoot down to your toes and into the tips of your fingers with the slightest of touches. You ache against him, your body moving with him and seeking an unfamiliar end, a delicious coil in your belly that wound tighter and tighter with every swipe of his two fingers.

You’re panting, muffling pathetic whimpers against his ear while he mouths at the deliciously tender spot on your neck. You can hardly hold your head up, your mind swimming in a thick, intoxicating fog until the world blurred around the edges. You feel the build-up at the base of your spine boiling over, almost all-consuming to the point it tingles every nerve in your body with anticipation. 

You grip his forearm until your nails leave pale, pink marks in your wake, and push him away to finally breathe again.

He is about the only thing keeping you upright, slowly he dropped your leg until you stood alone; his touches stopped, leaving a dull, unsatisfied ache that seeped into your bones. The sweat gathered at your hairline was annoying, tickling you to the point of discomfort until you swiped it away with the back of your hand.

“I don’t want Papa...”

You can’t think, nothing on the forefront of your mind coherent enough; like you were hopelessly lagging while your thoughts raged and laid stuck on the tip of your tongue. You squeeze your eyes shut, rubbing your temple with your eyes opened, and find Mando looking right back at you.

If your father woke up to you gone, you’re not sure what he would do, other than assuming the worst.

And you certainly didn’t want him to catch you in the barn, not like this.

“I-I don’t…”

His eyes were almost gentle, sharp and consuming as always, but kind behind the harsh set of his brow.

He brushes pieces of your hair behind your ear, his touch still burning as it did before but with half the intensity felt a few moments ago.

“Go get some sleep.”

You collect yourself, pulling the shawl on your shoulders tight as you tuck your hands underneath your arms. He steps back once you regained composure and watches you even as you walk away.

You only make it a few steps before he calls after you.

“Tomorrow?”

There’s a hint of something in his voice.

Tease? Promise? Flirt?

Something that pulls harsh at your little heartstrings he had wrapped around his finger.

“How'd you like to go hunting?”

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[ravenvsfox]

I simply have to write down my thoughts for anything to have meaning, so here are my awtwb opinions in no particular order (spoilers ahead!!!):

- the break up absolutely needed to happen, and also frankly it was very tasty

- "you're crying from simon/baz?" "the 'we’re not made of pieces that come apart' got to me"

- the last ditch effort sentimentality on baz’s part and ill-conceived sacrifice on simon’s........ such a lovely lil piece of angst. hurt stokes honesty and vice versa

- why did they get back together literally the next day though. it was like watching someone tear down an old condemned building and then OVERNIGHT an identical building has been rebuilt in its place. the dust hadn’t even settled yet. can we sit in it for like a minute.

- it definitely IS in character for simon to look at the emotional mess he just made and be like wait. I hate this actually. I’m immediately going to fix it despite the fact that I haven’t thought it through and have no plan :)

- this sure is a horny book huh

- actually very tonally appropriate that simon sees intimacy as too much to possibly grapple with. sex is easy when it's prescribed, and he's not really invested in it, but when he wants things very very badly he knows he can never truly have them. he can only host power or love or acceptance for a while before it's taken away.

- (something something orphan something something instability/insatiability)

- he always used to have one clear path, and now he can’t tease apart all his options. he wants everything or nothing. no embarrassing in-betweens, no gentle half-touches, no one foot in and one foot out of the magickal world

- also he wants to be manhandled and told what to do and bitten and consumed. sub behaviour

- every minor character in this book rules. ent bartender, butch legend niamh, cake-maker ruth, tracksuit fox. demon bear lady please wife me.

- sapphics kissing over the birthing juices of a fresh goat? come ON

- I think it’s fitting that goatherder agatha found her own productive, unconventional niche just outside of the place where she felt so constricted and misunderstood. like she wandered out of her ivory tower and found all of these sprawling open pastures

- shepard is so supremely & unbelievably likeable. so delighted and delightful. a mover and a shaker and a monsterfucker. spin-off when

- penny & shepard were also such pleasing complementary colours, and I like that they were both highly self-assured (in contrast w baz/simon's insecurity) and highly impressed with one another

- there’s a lot of awkward pacing in this book, which does feel (possibly by accident) like a testament to the non-linear, unexpected way that people deal with trauma. like it’s realistic that emotional pitfalls and relationship turmoil will always clumsily insert themselves into your “narrative,” you know?

- the demon bride storyline felt like a (super fun) short story nested within the book rather than an important element of the overarching plot itself

- some of the interpersonal groundwork laid in wayward son definitely paid off, but there were also a lot of superfluous plot points, and not a lot of fall-out/consequences? no real stakes (pun intended)

- so much good relationship stuff though! the communication is bantery and productive and tender and sometimes uncomfortable. it all feels like growing pains

- it’s so clear that simon’s innate sense of self is completely hollow; he’s petrified of self-identifying (and thus committing to a label which might turn out to be false again), and he’s afraid of smothering people with how much he wants and relies on them so he ghosts them instead

- the way he self-sabotages just for the rush of fixing things afterwards…. baby let me study you

- he constantly kind of has to reassure himself that he’s normal and also that he’s a Normal (this is what regular people do. this is what healthy affection looks like. And also—I have to remember that I don’t have or deserve magic. I’m not the person I thought I was.)

- he was the chosen one, and it turned out to be fake. and now he’s another kind of chosen one—chosen by Baz, by his friends, and later by the Salisburys, but he doesn’t really trust the sensation of being important to people anymore. he thinks that everything good he has or will ever have has been stolen or coerced somehow, and too much feeling is always inevitably going to be followed by total devastation. doesn’t that make you insane

- the excalibur thing was such a neat little piece of world-building (ancestral magic swords? yes ma’am) although I definitely expected agatha to have a hand in that reveal

- wings y/n?????

- no real resolution for the magic immunity. okie dokie

- I wanted to linger with that mage paternity reveal a bit longer. the upgrade simon’s daddy issues just received…… astronomical

- I liked that penny and simon had a little bit of independence from one another actually, because simon had to think through his problems like a Normal, and penny had to fact check herself when no one was nodding benignly along with all of her ideas. growth!

- a society of chosen ones? cult-leader villain obsessed with empty symbolism? mages seduced not by the promise of power but of acceptance and healing? delicioso

- the climax of this book lasted about twelve seconds, but I enjoyed the continued chapel motif, and the fact that every villain ends up being a shade of simon snow

- the conclusion for daphne, prof. bunce, etc, wasn’t super fulfilling, I was half-expecting a reveal that they were all under some kind of thrall, but since they were just like.. insecure and ostracized by their community, I wanted a denouement where their respective spouses meet them where they’re at, and the world of mages pledges some kind of fundamental change in attitudes/policies towards differing magickal proficiency. maybe! idk!

- so much pop culture in this book. (the yeets…… the vibe checks…..) this one’s going to age like milk, ladies

- it’s cute though! I like a book that is a little parcel of the time that it was made, and I like how un-embarrassed it is of itself

- I love the way all three couples had a really clear, “oh this is what it’s supposed to feel like” moment—the transformative potential of being loved the way you want and deserve to be loved

- so many fab individual moments that I'll think about for the rest of my life, and overall so indulgent and fun to read, but a little messy and out of balance for the final book of a trilogy. the end ✌️

[ravenhealer5]

Yeah, I know JK will always only have breadcrumbs, never expected much esp from a series like this..but still, J&M deserved better than what they received, damn. Part of me is kind of glad Yams laid his hands off of JK, not sure if I trust his track record with m/f bonds haha. I also believe the hubba rlly is Jean now, it rlly was 1000% heavily implied. But no matter what, I'll always love the ship & the potential it had. N E way thx 4 ur posts about this chaos, helped me cope lol. Stay fab xoxo

Thank you for this message anon. Writing these posts has helped me stay sane in this chaos lol. 

I agree, given his history of handling ships I’m lowkey thankful Yams didn’t touch JK. And to be completely honest, I personally don’t mind as long as I can see a ship coming before it happens and I was able to see JK coming from around the beginning of rumbling arc. It’s the way Mikasa’s character arc is designed. Mikasa is not the girl in love whose lover goes rogue but then comes back and they get a happy ending. That trope is very common but there the girl recognises the darkness in her lover and confronts him. It’s like their payback. They stand for the greater good and oppose the person they love and as a reward is presented with a happy ending with them. But Mikasa was taking far too long to even acknowledge Eren’s darkness (also Marley arc pretty much established that Eren couldn’t be redeemed). And the reason it happens this way is unlike other girls in love, Mikasa’s love isn’t just love, her love is unbalanced, her character flaw lies in her love. She’s actually traumatised from her loss and has attached her sense of self to Eren to an extreme. She has this co-dependent relationship with him and all her dreams are tied to him and him only. She can’t picture a life outside him. This is not loyalty or devotion, this is literally her character flaw she has to overcome. And that happens throughout the story, her world gets bigger, she opens her eyes beyond Eren and forms other important bonds, starts finding her identity outside him. But she’s still very attached to Eren, and that’s why her arc has to complete by her letting go of him (by then I was staring to figure out Eren would die, wasn’t sure she will be the one to kill him). And then her perfect closure is her living the life she had always wanted, but thought she could only ever have with Eren, with someone else. And when you think of ‘someone else’ for Mikasa, the story has set up a certain character to fit that role. Since the very beginning. Jean and Mikasa the two characters are actually very compatible if you look at them, their life goals and dreams align too well, neither of them are fighting because they want to, they’re what you call reluctant heroes who’d rather live a peaceful life away from the conflict if they could. Jean is everything Mikasa wants except he’s not Eren. And ironically Eren is nothing Mikasa wants. He’s the type who will always be chasing after something, if he wasn’t doing the rumbling he’d be doing something else. He’s not the type to settle down and live a peaceful life like Mikasa wants. That’s the biggest tragedy of EreMika. For a character like Jean to exist in the story, and he also very conveniently has feelings for her and his character has been set as a contrast to Eren since the very beginning. He has a positive development while Eren has a negative development as the story goes on. Eren’s relationship with Mikasa (or Armin, or even EMA as a trio) deteriorates as the story progresses while Jean and Mikasa’s best moments are in the final arc, not romantic but you can see the comradeship they share. The way he has become someone Mikasa can trust at a time she can’t trust Eren anymore. It was NOT a coincidence that Jean was the one to suggest killing Eren to Mikasa for her to finally accept it. (I don’t know why it got translated as “we have to kill Eren”, Jean said 「殺そう」 “let’s kill Eren.” He presented it to her as a suggestion, not as a compulsion. And she accepted it). And like the king of twisted humor he is, Yams had him pose as Eren’s body double several times and made jokes about them looking similar, and I remember that dialogue from Jean during the sunset scene, where he offers to inherit Eren’s titan to save Mikasa and says something like, “It’s annoying getting a hand me down from Eren, but who better than me?” I remember reading that and thinking THAT’S SICK?! 

After chapter 127 came out, I did a rereading of the manga and that convinced me JeanMika was going to be endgame because the way it’d give a closure to both their character arcs (but it’s just in wrapping up their character arcs, like an afterthought, their main arc completion was for Mikasa in killing Eren, and for Jean in getting sacrificed in the process of saving the world). In fact I felt stupid for not seeing it before. I think a lot of readers look at characters as if they’re people with their own free will, but they’re not. They’re characters in a story put there by the writer to play some role. People saw Jean’s feelings and decided oh, he’s still in love and Mikasa still doesn’t care. While it was actually supposed to be seen as, oh, so Jean’s feelings for Mikasa is still relevant to the story even though it has achieved absolutely nothing so far? He has his feelings because Yams put it there and Yams must have a reason for putting it there. That’s why I wasn’t even worried he’d die or anything (even when he turned into a titan, I was 100% sure he was coming back). And back then I wasn’t even a shipper. Unlike most JK shippers who never expected it to be canon, I actually took interest in the ship because I fully believed it’ll be endgame. So, when I heard about Mikasa’s husband looking like Jean, it was just a smug “told ya” moment for me. Like to me, it’s Jean there isn’t any other option it’s him lol. 

This got way too long but I couldn’t help writing. Take care and I apologise for rambling so much ❤️

[dirkbaddisonfromdusk]

details in mbav that i like/noticed: a comphrehensive list

- sarah’s tank tops over a completely non-matching shirt (fashion queen)

- the photo of erica pre-vamp in sarah’s locker

- the little froggy in rory’s backpack pocket

- jane’s mini mole scout outfit

- benny & ethan’s painted nails :)

- the garbage can benny carries around as a halloween pail in halloweird

- rory’s mom being supportive of his interests :)))

- the numerous amounts of photos ethan has of him and benny in his locker in S1

- the teeth lamps at the restaurant in the date to end all dates

- the lil nose boop. u know the one

- the dazed and confused bit in flushed

- also their aprons in flushed when theyre in home ec

- the folders on ethans desktop labelled ‘nd websites’ and ‘MBV’

- rory’s keep calm and dont get bitten shirt

- in fanged and furious benny holds up a newspaper that reads ‘the fab four visit whitechapel’

- benny n ethans stupid clip-on ties in double negative/jilly putty😓😓❣

- when ethan says ‘wick’

- ericas hair + fit during the school dance episode <33333333

- benny’s powder blue suit & the floral bowtie HIII <3

- the double-stacked pizza with the gumballs in the middle

- the lil chick in welcome back dusker

- the banana hanging from sterns glasses by a string in welcome back dusker

- benny preordering $100 worth of the worlds first self-chewing gum

- the stuffed animals on ethans shelves

- the american license plates on ethans rooms walls even though theyre in canada

- museatronics (also when they say museatronics in unison)

- rory’s devil costume

- the one poster in the background that says RACISM IS NOT COOL.

- debbie dazzle and the disco beach. also dazzle dan

- erica holding a rainbow flag in mirror/rorrim

- THE 60S FITS IN MIRROR/RORRIM !!!!!!

- also the bit where ethan and his mom try a cake that sounds like its made of concrete

- the rabbit doodle that grandma weir brings to life in the movie

- benny accidentally hits ethans hand with a hammer during the montage in the movie lol

- the stray pizza slices strewn about the walls

- mr. kitty and vampire sasquatch

- the alien DNA detector goggles making a comeback in the last episode

- the lattice bridge in the movie

- benny getting holy water from the church

- rory’s hair in the movie!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

- jane warming up to benny’s grandma throughout the movie

- ross being a supportive dad

- benny wearing the towel over his head

- the fact that they just glossed over jesse being a cult leader lmao

[raindancer2004]

Unloved and Unwanted?

Word Count: 3,628 Felix x reader Part Three - Final Part Warnings: Fluff Angst

The following day Y/N goes to the carnival with Felix, Demetri and Heidi; the twins tagging along “We like a good Carnival and as it’s overcast outside so it’s perfect for us” Jane says smiling taking Y/N’s hand in hers as they all make their way out of the castle. “What do you like about Carnivals Y/N?” Alec asks falling in step with his sister and Y/N “The rides are cool especially the Haunted House. Another thing I like is Candy Floss, it’s really sweet but also really nice” She replies smiling, Felix listened paying attention to Y/N’s response. “What about you guys, what do you like about Carnivals?” “I like the Rollercoasters” Alec replied “I like the Waltzer ride and it’s funny to see the humans looking sick afterwards” Jane replies smiling.

Once at the Carnival Felix and Demetri headed straight for the ‘Shooting Gallery’ booth “This is where the competition begins Y/N” Heidi says as they follow them. Felix hits eight of the nine ‘targets’ whereas Demetri hits all nine ‘targets’ winning him a prize; Demetri chooses a ‘Minion’ toy dressed in a Maid’s outfit and hands it to Heidi “Another one for your collection cara” He says smiling “Thank you Demetri” She responds taking the toy. Next they head to the ‘Water Pistol’ booth and again Demetri knocks down more ‘targets’ than Felix “You’re making me look bad D” Felix says to Demetri as he chooses a stuffed Dog toy “Can’t help that Fe” Demetri replies handing the toy to Jane “The next prize is for you Y/N” Demetri points to her, giving her a playful smirk and a wink; Felix growls “Oh behave Fe” Demetri says tapping his friend’s chest. “Let’s go on some rides, you two can resume your competition later” Jane says as she gently pulls Y/N towards the Waltzer; Jane bursts into a fit of giggles when she notices the humans looking queasy once the ride is over “You’re mean” Y/N says smiling to Jane “I know” She smiles back. Felix smiles watching his mate get along with the Terror Twins.

They all go on a few more rides before Felix notices a ‘Test your strength’ booth “Watch me kick your ass at this one” Felix says to Demetri “We’ll see Mr I’m the World’s Strongest Vampire” Demetri says smirking; Y/N chokes back a laugh. Demetri goes first “I’ll show you how it’s done” He wins and true to his word he gives Y/N a stuffed Tiger “For you cara” He smiles at her and winks at Felix smirking “Thank you Demetri” “You’re such a wind-up” Heidi says shaking her head at Demetri.

Not to be outdone Felix steps up next and beats Demetri’s strength score winning a bigger toy, he picks out a white and grey bear “This is for you Y/N” He says softly handing her the toy “Th-Thank you Felix” Y/N gave him a smile “Show off” Demetri snorts “Just showing my strength can be used for other things than just my job” Felix says smiling at Y/N “You going to have a go Alec?” Heidi asked “Er no! Especially as Felix has just set a new high score” Alec replied “Wuss” Felix coughed out causing the others to laugh.

Next Felix decided he was going to the ‘Hit-The-Bell’ booth so he could show off his prowess further to Y/N. “Won’t he break it? You know because he’s…so strong?” Y/N asked “Not if he’s careful and reigns it in a bit” Heidi answers. Felix couldn’t help laughing at the human man in front of him when he took his go and the ball only made it half up to the bell “Alec would you like to go before me, surely you can do better than that” Felix said low to Alec, nodding in the human’s direction “Get fucked!” Alec said “Oi! Language. There are kids about” Heidi scolded lightly; Alec didn’t answer, he just glared at her. Felix took his go and of course hit the bell with ease winning another prize; he chose a Penguin in ski clothes and handed it to Y/N “For me?” She asked “Yes…Y/N” He replied softly “Thank you.” Demetri took his turn next and won a prize too; he selected a ‘Minion’ in a Hawaiian outfit “Another for your collection cara” He handed it to Heidi “Are you two together?” Y/N asked “Ha…no. We’re just friends. I have a mate, her name is Corin” Heidi replies and Y/N nods. “I don’t have a mate of my own to spoil so I tend to help Heidi with her Minion collection” Demetri added “That’s really nice of you Demetri” Y/N says smiling at him. “’Nice’ is my middle name Darling” He smiled and winked at Y/N “Sure it’s not ‘flirt’?” Alec asked “Oh shut it you” Demetri replied.

“Let’s go to the Haunted House next for Y/N” Alec says and they make their way over to the ride. On the way Alec notices the ‘Coconut Shy’ booth “Do you mind if we make a quick stop?” He asked Y/N “Not at all. Good luck” She replied as she and Jane followed Alec “Watch her D. I’ll be back in a minute” Felix said and then walked away before Demetri could respond. A few minutes later Felix returned and walked up beside Y/N “Here I bought you a bag of Candy Floss. I wasn’t sure what one you’d prefer so I got you a mixed bag of blue and pink” Y/N turned to Felix and gave him a small smile “Thank you Felix. You didn’t have to” “I know Y/N, but I wanted to” He replied smiling “Well done Fe” Demetri said to Felix too low for Y/N to hear. Alec knocked over all the coconuts and won a prize, he chose a Tamagotchi “Here you are sister. I know your last one broke” Alec said handing the retro toy to Jane “Thank you Alec” She hugged her brother.

They waited in line for the Haunted House and Y/N ate some Candy Floss “Did any of you want to try it?” She asked after she noticed them eyeing the bag “It smells weird” Jane said wrinkling her nose, but took a small handful anyway “Urgh! It’s so sweet but the texture…oh my god” Jane said clearly displeased “How can you eat that? It’s revolting” Alec added; Y/N laughed “It’s nice…but in small doses” “May I try some Y/N?” Felix asked “Oh yeah, course. You did buy it after all” Y/N could tell by his facial expression that Felix didn’t like it either. Demetri and Heidi both politely declined after seeing their friend’s reactions. When it was their turn to get seated; Demetri and Heidi quickly sat together knowing the twins would want to sit together, this left Felix to sit beside Y/N “Are you ok if I sit here or would you rather sit next to someone else?” Felix asked turning his head in his friend’s direction “I-it’s ok, you can sit there” She replied quietly “But you have to hold one of the toys for me” “Of course little one” Felix smiled and took the bear from her.

They arrived back at the castle to find Afton hanging around near reception, despite the fact Gianna had finished for the day. “Been on a group outing I see. Guess that means you still need Demetri and Co to babysit you when you’re around your mate?” Afton asks in a teasing tone; “Get lost” Felix growls and Demetri moves Y/N so she is standing behind him, safe just in case a fight breaks out. “I’m only asking because…well…you couldn’t be that stupid to think that a pathetic little human wouldn’t be scared of the big bad executioner?” Afton continued to tease “Don’t start something you can’t finish” Alec warned as Felix growled again “What’s he going to do about it?” Afton asked nodding in Felix’s direction “He can’t risk scaring her any further” Afton adds smirking and taking a step in Y/N’s direction; before Afton knew what was happening Felix flashed forward and pulled one of his arms off then used it to smack him round the back of the head causing him to fall flat on his face, Y/N couldn’t help laughing at the sight, the sound was music to Felix’s ears. Demetri looked over his shoulder at her “What?” She asked innocently “It was funny. Felix using the guy’s own arm against him” She continues to laugh; the guards watching her, a little surprised Felix’s actions hadn’t scared her. “Hey Felix” Y/N called stepping out from behind Demetri “What are you going to do with his arm now?” “I’m not sure. I’m open to ideas” He had a wicked grin on his face as he looked down at her “Oooh I have an idea, but I can’t say whilst he’s listening” Y/N replied looking over her shoulder at Afton. “Let’s all go back to my room and hear your idea and I’m pretty sure Jane has a few ideas too, judging by the look on her face” Felix says and Jane nods “I have many ideas for both arms” She says smiling and swiftly removed Afton’s other arm. They left Afton on the floor and made their way to Felix’s room.

“What is your idea little one?” Felix asks Y/N, she blushes a little at the nickname “Well I thought we could glue on some fake nails and paint them so they’re really girly…” Y/n gets cut off by Heidi “Fab idea Y/N, fake nails last for weeks” “I like her idea. It’s the gift that keeps on giving too” Demetri smirks, Y/N looks at him confused “We can tease him about the nails for ages afterwards” Demetri explains, Y/N nods in understanding “I think we should definitely go with Y/N’s idea” Felix says smiling at her “I’ll go get my nail polishes if you grab the fake nails Y/N” Jane says excitedly. By the time Y/N and Heidi are finished, Afton’s right hand is sporting fake nails; all of which are painted a different colour and there is a gold love heart sticker applied to his ring finger. “That looks…wow…that’s so…” “Girly” Y/N finishes for Felix; who just nods smiling at her “Bless them. They’re bonding over pranking Afton” Alec says low to Demetri “As long as they are bonding over something, that’s all that matters” He replies.  

Meanwhile, Jane had glued fake nails to Afton’s left hand and painted them ‘Barbie pink’ and painted a small picture of a dick onto the thumb, adding unicorn stickers to the index and ring fingers. “What do you think?” Jane asked smirking “Wow! That’s...different” Demetri said trying to hold back a laugh and failing “I think he’ll hate us more after this” Alec added. “You know what you should do when you return his arms…put the left one on the right side and vice versa” Y/N said with a mischievous glint in her eye “Now that sounds like a plan little one” Felix said grinning like a Cheshire cat.

Demetri volunteered to return Afton’s arms to him and Felix asked Alec to go with him and film Afton’s arms being reattached the wrong way round. Heidi and Jane left to do their own thing leaving Felix and Y/N alone together in his room “I’ll go too, you must have other things to do” Y/N said as she got up from the sofa “NO” His reply was louder than he planned “I mean…you don’t have to go. I have nothing else planned. I’d like it if you stayed...for a bit” He said softly “O-ok I’ll stay” She replied sitting back down. They spent some time getting to know one another; Felix finding out Y/N’s favourite colour, favourite animal, her hobbies, likes and dislikes. Y/N found out the same information about Felix. By the end of the evening Y/N was starting to feel at ease around him, although she wouldn’t admit it to anyone just yet.

The following afternoon Demetri, Alec and Jane left for a mission; they said their goodbyes to Y/N and Felix separately. That evening after dinner Y/N was on her way to Felix’s room when she heard voices “I take it Felix won’t be joining ‘boys’ night tonight, opting to spend time with Y/N” Santiago said to Josh “Actually Felix is joining ‘boys’ night, guess he had enough of the human yesterday; I mean they did spend the whole day together and most of the evening” Josh replied. Y/N felt her heart break a little hearing that and decided to spend the night alone; something she had gotten very used to. She cried her to sleep thinking ‘he’s changed his mind about wanting me…after spending just one day together. There must be something wrong with me…something that makes me...unlovable.’ Y/N stayed in her room the next few days only seeing Gianna when she bought her meals to her room. Felix was on guard duty and covering other duties for his friends whilst they were away.

Demetri, Jane and Alec returned to the castle; Jane going straight to see Y/N “Hi Y/N we’re back” She said entering Y/N’s room, noticing the stuffed toys Felix had won her were no longer on her bed “Hi Jane. Everything go ok?” Y/N replied “The mission went well, the problem was dealt with swiftly. How are you and Felix getting on?” Jane responded “Er…we’re not. I haven’t seen him since the Carnival. It would appear he has changed his mind about me….” “I’ll kill him” Jane growled cutting her off “No need for that Jane. He is allowed to change his mind. I’d like to be on my own...if you don’t mind” Y/N said not looking at Jane “Of course sweetie. I’ll see you later” Jane made her way to the door and unknown to Y/N Jane heard her mumble “It’s my own fault…I should never have thought someone like him would want someone like me” Y/N had her back to Jane so she didn’t see the tears that had started to fall.

“I’ll kill him!” Jane growled loudly as she slammed Demetri’s door shut behind her “Dare I ask who?” Demetri asked “That stupid idiot friend of yours. That’s who” She replied “Why? What’s he done now?” Demetri was curious “He has rejected Y/N whilst we’ve been away…” “WHAT?!” Demetri yelled “Are you serious? After everything she’s been through? After everything we did to help him?” Jane nods in response “I’m going to kill him!” Demetri growled, storming from his room to find Felix in the training room, Jane hot on his heels. He flashed up behind Felix catching him off guard and threw him into the wall; Jane used her gift to keep Felix subdued. Demetri flashed over to him grabbing him by the neck and squeezing so hard that cracks started to appear; he growled into his friend’s face “You don’t deserve her!” He shoved him away, Felix hitting the wall again “He’s all yours” He said to Jane as passed her on his way out of the room.

Demetri ran to Y/N’s room to check on her as he had become fond of her; he entered her room to find her lying on her bed crying, he closed the door behind him and made his way to her, pulling her gently into his arms “I’m so sorry cara” He said low in her ear “D-don’t be…I-it’s not y-your fault” She sobbed “It’s mine” “And how did you work that one out?” Demetri asked “T-there’s some-something wrong…with me. I-I’m unlovable” She was sobbing harder now and he held her closer “You are not unlovable Y/N. You just need to find the right person” He said softly “Ha…That’s a joke right? I mean I’m mated to a vampire…a vampire that doesn’t want me. Just bite me and lock me away” “Y/N I will do no such thing. If that idiot doesn’t want you…I’ll speak to the masters and ask if they’ll let you leave. Let you live out your life away from here” He replied “Thank you Dem…you’re a good friend”

Back in the training room “What’s going on? What’s he done now” Santiago asked “He’s rejected Y/N whilst we’ve been away…” “No he hasn’t or at least not that I’m aware of” Santiago cut her off “Then why does she think she’s been rejected? Why is she crying in her room?” Jane asked forgetting about Felix for moment “S-she th-thinks I d-don’t w-want her?” Felix asks, the cracks on his face and neck making it hard to talk “Yes. You idiot. You haven’t seen her since the carnival and that was five days ago” Jane replies glaring at him “You prat” Santiago says shaking his head “You better go set things straight” Felix nods and flashes to Y/N’s room.

He walks in to see Y/N lying in his best friend’s arms “What the hell’s going on?” Felix shouts “I’m comforting my friend after her stupid mate rejected her” Demetri shoots back “I haven’t rejected her” “Don’t lie Felix. I heard your friend say that you had had enough of the human after spending one day with her” She said low “That is not true...honestly little one. I have been working, covering Demetri and Alec’s shifts too in their absence” “B-But you’ve not come to see me” “I didn’t know if I’d be welcome or if you’d want to spend time with me without Heidi or Demetri around” He replied “If you’d bothered to come to my room and talk to me you’d know whether you’d be welcome. We spent time alone together after the Carnival did we not?” “Yes, but…” “But what Felix? I came to your room…well I was on my way there until I heard your friend and…” She trailed off “I’m going to leave you both to talk” Demetri said as he left the room “Fix this” He mouthed to Felix.

Felix made his way over to the bed and sat down “I’m sorry. This is new to me…” “It’s new for me too Felix” Y/N says “I know…it’ just after everything that happened I didn’t want to scare you away…but it seems I’ve pushed you away instead...which is rather unfortunate as I have planned something for you…for us…for tomorrow night, knowing that Demetri would cover for me” “You’ve planned a surprise…for me?” “Yes…little one. Don’t sound so surprised and I figured with Demetri being back in the castle you’d feel more comfortable being alone with me, knowing he was around if you needed him. I know you’re more comfortable with him than me” “There’s a reason for that Felix” “I know. So how about we put the misunderstanding aside and continue getting to know one another?” “O-ok, I’d like that” She replied quietly and he smiled at her “Wh-where are the stuffed animals I gave you? Did you throw them out? Felix sounded a little hurt “No. I-I shut them away in the closet” She replied quietly. “I’ll let you sleep, I have a few things to finish sorting out for tomorrow and I need to speak to Demetri. I’ll come by about six o’clock tomorrow evening, wear something nice but make sure you’ll be warm too” “Ok, I will. Goodnight Felix” “Goodnight little one”

Felix left Y/N’s room and went straight to Demetri’s and explained everything to him “You Felix are a bloody idiot, romantic but still...an idiot. For what it’s worth I’m sorry for how I reacted” “Don’t apologise D, you were just defending Y/N and I get that, you’re friends after all” Felix replied “I’ll always defend her and kick your ass if needed” Demetri replied smiling.

Felix had planned a sunset picnic on the castle roof for him and Y/N; he laid out two large blankets on the floor and placed the small hamper to one side. He then placed some cushions down and another two blankets folded neatly beside them. He then went to collect Y/N for their first date.

“Y/N you ready?” “Yes. I am” She replied “Wow...Y/N” Felix was left breathless at the sight of his mate; she was wearing black skinny jeans and a fitted blue jumper, the outfit hugging her curves in all the right places “Thank you” She blushed taking her bottom lip between her teeth as she watched him eye from head to toe and back again. He gently took her warm hand in his cold one and led up to the castle roof.

Looking around at the rooftop she spotted the blankets, cushions and the hamper “Y-you did all this for…for me?” She asked feeling tears build behind her eyes “Yes” He whispered into her ear “I thought we could have a picnic whilst watching the sunset” “Oh Fe, it’s perfect. Thank you” She replied smiling. He led to the blanket and reaching into the hamper he pulled out a single red rose “For you” He smiled handing it to her. He reached back inside the hamper and pulled out two glasses, a bottle of prosecco for Y/N and flask of blood for himself. They talked as they watched the sunset and as the evening went on Felix noticed Y/N had moved closer to him so he decided to take a leaf out of Demetri’s book and wrapped an arm around her gently and pulled her into his side; he felt her relax and snuggle into him as he covered them both with blankets. After a while he noticed Y/N’s breathing had evened out and that she had fallen asleep in his arms “Goodnight little one. I love you” Felix whispers and kisses her hair holding her a little closer finally happy to have his mate in his arms, where she belongs.