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kuroopaisen · 4 years ago

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tiny love || iii

➵ as tooru’s younger sister, falling in love with iwaizumi hajime is easy. your feelings aren’t ignored, either. but is it worth the complications it could cause? iwaizumi made a decision for you. but, life goes on.

warnings: f!reader, Emotions

wc: 4.6k (i’m so sorry we had a lot of ground to cover)

m.list | ch. 2 ↞ ch. 3 ↠ ch. 4

last time...

“Look, I…” He sighed, running a hand through his hair. “I think it’s best if we pretend this never happened.”

The world shuttered to a stop. The mild afternoon sun was now searing your skin.

✧ ✧ ✧

“He disgusts me,” Amaya shivered, angrily shoving a spoonful of strawberry kakigori into her mouth. “Piece of—”

“It was ages ago,” you sighed, picking at the mountain of flavoured ice in front of you. “It’s not that important…”

“Yes, it is,” Amaya leant forward across the table. “It’s his fault, right? He kissed you.”

You bit your lip, giving your friend a pitiful look.

To say it was ages ago wasn’t quite a lie. It was finally the summer holidays, and it’d be a few months since that fateful afternoon.

You hadn’t wanted to spend your summer break thinking about this sort of thing. It felt like a waste of emotional energy.

But you just couldn’t get it out of your head.

You kept replaying the same few moments over and over in your mind – the kiss, the morning after it, the conversation…

“In my humble opinion,” Amaya sighed, preparing herself another scoop of kakigori, “I think he should answer for what he’s done.”

“Please don’t say anything,” you whined, reaching across the table and grabbing her wrist. “Don’t do anything, either. I don’t want to cause a mess.”

“He’s the one who caused a mess,” Amaya huffed, dropping her spoon into the kakigori bowl. “You have a right to be pissed.”

“I am pissed,” you sighed. “It’s just… I kind of get where he was coming from, you know?”

“No.”

“Well, like—” You squeezed your eyes shut for a moment, trying to clear your mind. “If we’d broken up, that’d make things really awkward.”

“Isn’t it already awkward?”

“I… yeah…”

“I just think he could’ve gone about it better,” she shrugged. “That’s all.”

You bit the inside of your cheek, twirling your spoon between your fingers. “You’re right about that, at least…”

Amaya watched you for a moment, pursing her lips together. You knew what she was thinking. That was reason enough to fear any potential advice.

“Date someone else,” she suggested. “Maybe that’ll help you get over him.”

You grimaced, cursing her for being able to read your mind. “No thanks.”

“Why not?” Amaya asked, raising an eyebrow at you. “Yahaba seems to be into you.”

You shook your head vehemently. “Ew, no! He’s on my brother’s team.”

“And?”

You shot your friend a dithering look. “That’s the problem, Maya,” you scoffed. “If Iwaizumi’s not ‘good enough’, then I doubt anyone else on the team is.”

“Did your brother say that?” Amaya gaped.

You shrugged. “I don’t know. But that’s what Iwaizumi implied.”

Amaya scoffed, screwing up her nose. “Men aren’t worth it.”

You laugh, shaking your head. “That’s true…”

“And men,” she said, pointing a finger directly at you, “don’t deserve you.”

“You know what?” You grinned, tilting your head at her. “You’re right.”

“I always am,” she replied, waving a hand at you.

You sighed, stretching your arms above your head. “Besides, if I end up going to America, I don’t want to deal with a long-distance relationship,” you grimaced. “Sounds tough.”

“What, you wouldn’t fight for love?” Amaya teased, fishing her phone out of her pocket.

You stuck your tongue out at her, screwing up your nose. “Shut up.”

Amaya giggled, looking down at her phone screen.

You took the opportunity to treat yourself to some of the kakogiri. The two of you had barely made a dent in it.

Amaya dropped her phone back into her pocket, tilting her head at you. “Hey, aren’t those qualifiers coming up soon or something?”

“Hm?”

“For your brother’s volleyball,” she shrugged. “You said something about going to nationals?”

“Oh, right!” You perked up, nodding. “If they win these preliminaries, they’ll finally get to go to nationals.”

“This is your brother’s last chance, right?”

Your stomach sank a little. “Yeah. He’s… he’s been working really hard.”

“Really hard?” She raised an eyebrow. “Or too hard?”

“What do you think?”

She sighed, placing her hands in her lap. “Right.”

You pressed your lips together, frowning.

“Hey, hey,” Amaya hummed, leaning over to flick your forehead. “Try not to think too much, okay? We’re supposed to be having fun.”

You smiled at her weakly.

“No more talk of boys,” she decreed, waving her spoon at you. “They’re a waste of time anyway.”

✧ ✧ ✧

There might be a thousand other places you’d rather be than outside Seijoh’s gym. But, you’d come to the conclusion that God hated you, and therefore would take any opportunity to submit you to some kind of punishment.

Tonight, it was this – standing outside a gym where a mass of sweaty teenage boys congregated, one of which was your brother, and another the Iwaizumi Hajime.

Tooru had always finished practice late, but this was just ridiculous.

Initially, you’d been content with walking yourself home after class, asserting that you were grown up enough to trawl the streets of Miyagi without a chaperone.

But recently, you’d signed up for the student council. You were surprised they let you in so late in the year,

Your parents had been chuffed with that, proclaiming that you were “finally showing some initiative” and that it was “a great way to teach you some responsibility.”

You hadn’t told them that the real reason you’d joined was because you were worried about Tooru.

You peeked inside the gym, eyes scanning the brightly lit hardwood for any sign of your brother.

You didn’t bother to check your watch. It was far too late in the evening for that anyway.

The boys were scrambling around on the court, jumping and spiking and all that volleyball stuff. You managed to catch sight of your brother, who, by your observation, was very much in the zone.

Perhaps maybe it would be okay for you to sit in on—

A flash of spikey hair was enough to make you recede, drawing yourself back into the dark.

You sighed, turning around and slumping yourself against the wall. Somehow, you felt even more exhausted than before.

Fuck this.

Fuck school and all it’s damn responsibilities.

Fuck your brother’s determination to overwork himself until he’s falling apart at the seams.

And fuck Iwaizumi Hajime.

Maybe you should just head home. Tooru would come home eventually, and…

No. That defeated the point.

You’d just have to wait it out, Iwaizumi Hajime be damned.

A few more minutes passed. You heard who you believed to be the coach call out an end to practice, followed by a resounding “Yes!”

You sighed, checking your watch. Seven o’clock. Even that would be considered a late practice.

Usually Tooru would usually wave the rest of the team out, spending the next hour on his own.

But not tonight.

You scampered through the gym doors, making a beeline for your disaster of a brother.

“Hey, Oika-chan!” A voice called out, making you stumble in your approach.

Ah, Matsukawa.

“Hey,” you waved absentmindedly, unsure of how exactly to process that nickname. It didn’t exactly roll off the tongue

“Stop calling her that!” Tooru yelled from the other side of the gym. “It doesn’t even sound cute!”

“You’re just jealous,” you shot back instinctively. “You just wish you were me.”

Tooru scoffed, ready to launch into a new tirade.

But you weren’t listening to him. Against your best efforts, your eyes sought out Iwaizumi. He wasn’t even looking at you.

Ouch.

Sure, you’d be avoiding him as best you could; finding excuses to be in your room or out with your friends whenever he was round at your house, always positioning Tooru between the two of you whenever you were forced to spend time with him... But, that didn’t stop it hurting.

You shook off the disappointment and continued your route to Tooru.

“Oi,” you barked, jabbing a finger at him. “Hurry up. I’m making dinner tonight and you’re going to enjoy it.”

Tooru screwed his nose up at you, grimacing. “But I still need to practice.”

You came to a stop in front of him, grabbing his elbow. “Too bad.”

“Aw, don’t complain,” Matsukawa grinned, suddenly appearing and looping his arm around Tooru’s shoulders. “We don’t all have a cute girl vying to cook us dinner.”

“Ew!” Tooru shrieked, shrugging off Matsukawa’s arm. “Don’t be gross that’s my sister!”

“I slave over the countertop for you and you don’t even have the decency to respect my efforts,” you scoffed, deciding to ignore Matsukawa’s half-compliment. You weren’t going to make the same mistake twice.

“Just stick it in the fridge,” Tooru sighed. “I’ll heat it up when I get home.”

Agitation brewed in your stomach, your mouth turning dry.

If he stayed here, he’d just overwork himself like he always did. And he’d come home sore and exhausted, bandages on his fingers and bags under his eyes.

But the prefecturals were so soon. If he wore himself out now, he wouldn’t be able to play to the best of his ability.

“Tooru, that’s not fair and you know it,” you whined. “Please.”

He tutted at you, shaking his head. “Now, now, as the older sibling, it’s natural law that I know be—”

“Hurry up, Shittykawa,” Iwaizumi grumbled, coming up behind Tooru and kneeing him in the back.

Tooru yelped, stumbling forward and out of your grasp. “Iwa!”

“We’ll clean up just fine without you,” Iwaizumi muttered, stepping away from your brother.

He caught your eye.

Your breath caught in your throat. Was he going to speak to you? Acknowledge you? Make you feel like things weren’t as weird as they were?

He just gave you an almost imperceptible nod.

You gave him a small smile in response despite the sinking feeling in your stomach.

Of course, Iwaizumi understood. He probably understood better than you did.

“Come on,” you whined, grabbing Tooru’s elbow and yanking him towards you. “Or I’ll kick your ass.”

“I’d like to see you try.”

You stuck your tongue out at him, dragging him towards the door. After a small scuffle he grabbed his bag, whining about how he was still in his sweaty gym clothes.

You waved off his concerns, telling him it was his own fault. Mustering all your strength you managed to push him outside, reprimanding him for wasting so much of your time.

You glanced over your shoulder one last time as you left. You weren’t quite sure why.

But Iwaizumi met your gaze for just a moment, his jaw tense.

That look stuck in your mind for the rest of the evening.

✧ ✧ ✧

The last thwack of a ball on the court.

Your brother, body half-twisted and arms outstretched, fighting to the very final second.

Everything the team had worked so hard for, gone. Crushed.

All those hours, all those late nights spent practicing, all the sweat and grief and band-aids.

All meaningless.

It was written on their faces. Regret, disappointment, shock.

And Iwaizumi. Poor steadfast, honourable Iwaizumi.

You’d never seen him cry. Never. But there he stood on the court, doing everything he could to hold back the tears.

You couldn’t even guess at what was going through his mind: probably some guilt about letting everyone down, for not being the best version of himself for the team.

You hoped, for his sake, that nobody else was paying attention to him.

Tooru patted him on the back. A firm, solid slap.

Even you could tell how much meaning was in that one gesture.

You gripped the barrier tightly, your knuckles beginning to ache. You watched with bitterness on your tongue, ready to cry the tears that Tooru refused to.

By the time you meet the team outside, you knew he didn’t want a hug. Even if you wanted desperately to give him one, he wouldn’t accept it.

He’s too angry for that.

You don’t know what to say; he’s worked so hard for this.

They all have.

And now they have to walk away from it all, no real victory to their name. Oikawa Tooru – destined for greatness, but yet unknown outside of Miyagi. He never did make it to nationals.

You bit your lip, regret and frustration and sympathy twisting in your stomach. There’s nothing you could’ve done, but by God you wished you’d done more.

Something. Anything.

But you’re just his little sister, a girl with nothing to offer. You hadn’t even stepped into the manager role when he’d asked you to in your first year. You’d been so distant from this world of his, a distance you’d only widened since that little hiccup with Iwaizumi.

You turned to the team, racking your brain for the appropriate thing to say.

You bowed. “Thank you for all your hard work.”

It felt empty, but you meant it. You knew that most of all, Tooru was proud of the team. Proud of what they’d built together.

It’d been three years of pain, but they’d done it together. And you knew, deep in your heart, that they’d given their all for him. That, at least, you were grateful.

You didn’t say goodbye.

Your fists are clenched at your sides as you exit the building, rushing home on aching thighs. You hadn’t even realised you’d been tensing so hard during the game.

Thoughts stumbled through your mind on the walk, trying to sort themselves out.

Should you have said something to Iwaizumi? Offered him some comfort?

He was obviously shaken by what’d happened. But perhaps that would’ve been stepping over a line. Maybe it would’ve made him uncomfortable.

And yet, you regretted not addressing him. He, more than anyone else, had given everything for Tooru.

His time, his sweat, his heart.

He couldn’t give anything to you because…

You swallowed, shaking your head. Now wasn’t the time to feel bitter.

Once you walked through the front door, you raced to the kitchen and rifled through your cupboards.

Bread flour, yeast, sugar…

A peek in the fridge.

Milk, butter, eggs.

You set everything on the counter, clattering around in your cupboards until you find a bowl, a whisk, a wooden spoon and a baking pan.

Your next few hours are a flurry of measuring ingredients, kneading dough with aching thumbs, checking oven temperatures and waiting.

You did all sorts of things to distract yourself during the waiting period: cleaning, reading, homework, laundry. But you could only do them in spurts, little five-to-ten-minute blocks until your anxiety returned.

You’d have to sleep this off.

By the time the oven finally pinged, letting you know you were finally free of your baking duties, you were exhausted.

But you rushed back over to the oven and took out your loaf, inspecting it once over. It looked okay – not as good at Kaori’s, but passable. Hopefully it tasted alright. You didn’t have the guts to check.

You let it cool as you grabbed a scrap of paper and scribbled out a little note.

“Good job today, you asswipe. You inspire me to work harder and go farther.

I’m so proud of you.”

You bit your lip, looking it over once. Is it sensitive enough? Is it too sensitive? Would it bring him comfort? Would it piss him off?

Hard to say.

You sighed, folding it over so it could prop up like a tent.

You cut off a third of the loaf, still hot, and plopped it on a plate. You wrapped the rest of the loaf up and placed it in the bread holder. Perhaps you’d have some tomorrow.

Tooru’s room, usually a place that was very out of bounds, was the next stop on your anxious little trip around the house. You placed the plate on his bedside table, propping the note up next to it. Hopefully this would make him smile, even if just by a little.

But you didn’t want to wait up to see.

The comfort of your own bed was calling you, coaxing you into an early night’s sleep.

You laid down with a sigh, unsure of whether or not you could be bothered to have a bath.

A little suggestion crawled through your mind, dragging itself along by it’s fingernails.

You tried to shoo it away. It was a terrible idea, really. One that was bound to end with you feeling quite shitty.

But tonight wasn’t about you. It wasn’t about your feelings.

You sighed, picking up your phone from the bedside table.

Hey, you typed.

[YOU] 7:31 PM: I hope you don’t mind me texting you like this, but thanks for looking after Tooru so well.

You bit the inside of your cheek as you stared at the name “Iwaizumi Hajime” at the top of your screen. Taking a deep breath, you tapped the blue arrow.

The message slipped into the grey space above, into the train of messages that hadn’t moved in months.

You stared at it a moment longer, fingers flitting anxiously around your screen.

Oh, fuck it.

[YOU] 7:33 PM: And thanks for being the best Ace he could’ve asked for.

It’s not what you wanted to say. It’s not what you feel like you should’ve said. There’s so much more, so much left unsaid.

But tonight isn’t about me, you reminded yourself. It’s about him. About them. About all they’ve been through together.

You waited a few minutes, heart hammering in your chest.

A response.

[Iwaizumi] 7:37 PM: Thank you.

[Iwaizumi] 7:37 PM: I’m sorry it wasn’t enough.

✧ ✧ ✧

“Argentina?” You hissed. “But that’s—”

“On the other side of the world,” Tooru shrugged. “What are you so mad for? You’re the one who wants to go to America.”

You had nothing to say to that. The two of you were sat at the breakfast table, your pieces of toast left untouched.

When Tooru had told you he wanted to talk to you this morning, you hadn’t expected this.

“When do you leave?” You asked, a lump forming in your throat.

“Soon,” he sighed. “I’m just trying to work out boarding and whatnot.”

“So… you’ll leave as soon as that’s sorted out?”

“That’s the plan.”

“It’s like you’re rushing out of here,” you mumbled, picking at your nails.

“Don’t be so dramatic,” he grinned. “I’ve just got to make sure I can get ahead. The sooner I start, the better.”

You looked up at him, frowning.

He wasn’t the little boy curled up in the bathtub anymore. He’s a young man with the tenacity to form his own destiny, circumstances be damned.

This day was bound to come.

But that didn’t make it any easier to swallow.

✧ ✧ ✧

A week passed. And then a month.

The year ended before you knew it. The festivities rolled on, but not without a hint of melancholy.

Each New Years celebration was tainted with the realisation that, after he left, chances were you wouldn’t see Tooru again until the same time next year.

You returned to school for the third semester and everything seemed like it was moving in fast forward.

It’s well and truly changing.

Student council swallowed you up, your family made a point of spending as much time with Tooru as they could, and life plodded on.

And before you knew it, you were standing at the airport at five in the morning, your parents to one side and Iwaizumi to the other. Your older sister, Kaori, was also there, hand-in-hand with your nephew.

For a farewell, it was quite the turn-out.

“Well,” Tooru took a deep breath, looking between the small crowd of faces in front of him. “You all better miss me.”

“Don’t push your luck, Tooru,” Kaori teased.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Tooru tutted. “Almost sounds like you’re glad to be rid of me.”

“I am,” your nephew piped up.

“Takeru!” Your mother chided. “Don’t say things like that.”

“It’s fine,” Tooru grinned. “He obviously just doesn’t know what else to say.”

Takeru simply stuck his tongue out at your brother, who just laughed as he stepped forward to ruffle his hair.

Tooru turned to you, grinning. “It’s now your job to take him to volleyball practice.”

You rolled your eyes at him. “Really, that’s all you’ve got to say to me?”

“Of course not!” He laughed, hopping towards you and wrapping his arms around your shoulders. “You be good, okay?”

“Always am,” you mumbled into his chest, wrapping your arms around his waist.

“Study hard,” he hummed. “And don’t talk to boys.”

“Tooru!”

“I’m serious!”

“Don’t worry about me,” you huffed. “Worry about yourself.”

“I’ll be fine,” he chuckled, pulling back. “Stop being such a worry-wort.”

You pouted at him. “Stay hydrated or I’ll kill you.”

“You know I will,” he tsked. “Which one of us is the athlete?”

“And don’t overwork yourself,” you continued, “or I’ll crawl out of the TV like Sadako and drag you back to Japan.”

“You know what?” Tooru grinned, letting you go. “I fully believe you’re capable of that.”

“Be afraid.”

He ruffled your hair; a sure signal that your conversation was over. You bit your lip as he moved over to talk to Iwaizumi. You tottered around to where your sister was, wrapping your arms around her waist – partly to give Tooru and Iwaizumi some privacy, partly to seek out some comfort.

She chuckled, standing on her tiptoes and propping her chin on the top of your head. “It’ll be okay.”

“Hm?” You blinked. “Oh, I’m not sad. Not at all.”

“You sure about that?” Kaori chuckled.

“Mhm,” you nodded. “Glad to be rid of him, actually. It’s my turn to get the biggest bedroom.”

“Sure,” she grinned. “If you need anything, don’t be afraid to text me, okay?”

“Thanks,” you smiled.

“And visit me more often!” Kaori chided. “I feel like I don’t see you enough.”

“I’m sorry,” you whined.

Kaori was right about that, at least. You’d spent the past few months focusing on Tooru, and before that, you’d been moping about Iwaizumi.

Some sister you were.

You peeked out the corner of your eye at the two boys you’d just fled from.

They were fist-bumping. Why they couldn’t just get over it and hug one another, you’d never know.

Especially seeing as this would likely be the last time they saw each other in a very long while.

Even if this was what Tooru wanted, even if this was a decision made on his own merit, something about it still felt off.

You want to be happy for him. You want to celebrate this new chance, this opportunity to make a name for himself outside of this tiny prefecture. But the melancholy wouldn’t budge; it’s like it’s rooted itself deep amongst the marrow of your ribcage.

You take a deep breath, trying to ground yourself.

You needed to be happy for him. And if you couldn’t, you needed to fake it.

“Alright,” Tooru sighed, addressing all of you as he stepped back and grabbed the handle of his suitcase. “I’m off!”

“Call us when you get there!” Your mother called after him, her eyes glassier than they were moments earlier.

“Will do,” Tooru called back, waving a hand over his head but not turning back.

“Make sure you eat well,” Kaori yelled. “Like I taught you!”

“I will, don’t worry!” Tooru called, ever more distant.

You wondered if there was anything you could shout out, anything you could implore him to do. But nothing came to mind that you hadn’t already said. But even that didn’t feel like enough.

Tooru passed through the gate, turning around to give you all one last wave.

He was so bright, so brilliant.

He always had been. But it was as if passing through that airport gate had freed him of the roots twisted around his ankles, finally allowing him to fly.

You frowned. What a stupid thought.

Once he was out of sight, your parents sighed.

“Alright, everyone,” your father yawned. “Time to go.”

You shuffled out of the airport in silence, your eyes cast to the ground. You lagged a few steps behind your family as you let your thoughts consume you.

How was this all going to work out?

It wasn’t like Tooru was just leaving for university. If it was just for education, there’d be a time frame. But he hadn’t given your family any of that.

He was just… going to Argentina. For how long, he couldn’t say. Would he be gone one year? Five? Ten?

Was that really for the best?

But he seemed optimistic. Maybe this would be the opportunity he needs. Maybe this would change everything.

“He’ll be fine.”

A voice over your shoulder made you jump. You turned to see Iwaizumi, a look of genuine concern on his face. You hadn’t even noticed him come up behind you.

“He always finds a way to land on his feet,” he said, digging his hands in his pockets.

“I know, I just…” You sighed, running a hand through your hair. “I’m worried about him.”

Worried about his safety, worried about his health, worried about his tendency to overwork, worried about the possibility he could be lonely, worried about his sense of self, worried—

“But, if he’d just stayed here, he’d never be satisfied.”

You paused, looking up at him. Iwaizumi was staring ahead at the early morning sky, something relaxed in his features.

“He’s got to keep pushing forward, no matter what,” he continued, looking at you. You caught your breath, but you didn’t look away. “If he didn’t, he wouldn’t be able to forgive himself for his losses.”

You stared at him for a long moment.

He was right. Iwaizumi was always right when it came to Tooru.

And you were grateful. Of course you were.

But a nugget of regret was buried deep in your heart.

Iwaizumi wasn’t worried about Tooru at all. He believed in him, trust him to go forward.

And yet you don’t feel the same. You can’t.

You can’t have the same faith in your brother because you don’t know him well enough.

Maybe you never would.

✧ ✧ ✧

More time passed.

Your holidays ebbed by in a haze, a flurry of friends, family, serious conversations about your future, and a little bit of snow.

You were trudging home in the waning afternoon after a day out with friends when you saw him. He was coming back from the opposite direction, bundled up in a jacket, with a scarf slung haphazardly around his neck and beanie pulled low over his hair.

You wondered if he’d bothered spiking it up this morning.

“Hey.” Iwaizumi raised a hand at you in some paltry greeting.

“Hi,” you nodded, slowing to a stop in front of your house.

He looked at you for a moment, something unreadable in his eyes. Admittedly, that was usually how he looked at you.

“How are you?” It was a simple question, but you were more curious about it than you’d like to admit. The two of you hadn’t spoken since Tooru left, your interactions limited to brief nods and hellos if you ever happened to bump into each other in public. Nothing deeper than that.

“Good,” he said, finally breaking eye contact as his gaze flitted to the ground. “I, uh… I leave for uni tomorrow.”

Your heart stopped in your chest.

Iwaizumi was leaving too, huh?

Not that there was much of a friendship for you to miss. But something about him leaving really solidified it all.

Tooru had left to pursue opportunities much bigger than those offered to him in Japan, and now Iwaizumi was off on his own journey.

Your stomach swelled, a quiet nausea rattling through your body.

“Oh,” was all you managed to say. “Well, good luck.” There was a long, painful pause.

He was looking at you again, something else in his eyes. Did he want you to say something else? Ask more questions?

“You’ll do great,” is all you managed to say, a tight smile stretched across your lips.

“Thanks,” he breathed, something between a sigh and a chuckle.

You hurried through your front door, a strange anxiety prickling over your skin.

Whenever you spoke to Iwaizumi, it never felt like enough. Like there was more to say, more to admit.

But regardless of what had happened, regardless of your regrets, you had to move on.

You should’ve done so months ago.

✧ ✧ ✧

a/n: this is SLOPPY but please forgive me! a lot of ground to cover,,, a lot of feelings to unpack,,,

#iwaizumi x reader #iwaizumi hajime x reader #iwaizumi x you #iwaizumi hajime x you #iwaizumi hajime #haikyuu x reader #tiny love

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doyelikehaggis · 3 years ago

Note

for the wip game: 2, 17, & 35?

Ahh, good choices!! So, “Sex Education Goes Camping” is... kind of exactly what it sounds like. The students of Moordale High are going on one last school trip before their school is closed down for good. Organized and supervised by Colin and Emily, of course. But there’s more than just the tension of the inevitable goodbye they’ll all have to say at the end of it; Adam and Eric haven’t talked since they broke up. Ruby is completely avoiding Otis, who feels terrible about hurting her. Maeve is leaving for America the moment they get back, and doesn’t want to make the goodbye any harder by letting Otis try and convince her to stay. Aimee and Steve have just broken up, but they’re working on being friends.

Jackson's eyebrows furrow. Maeve frowns. Otis and Eric share another confused look, as do a lot of others.

Spreading his arms, Mr Hendricks loudly says, "You are all utterly fucked! As am I, and so is Miss Sands! Well, I mean we can obviously find other teaching jobs, but it's not exactly easy, so, technically speaking, we are all very much fucked, you're right, Jackson."

Jackson just raises an eyebrow, then looks away. Miss Sands quickly joins Mr Hendricks on the stage as the students chattering gets louder around the room.

"What Mr Hendricks means to say--" Miss Sands shoots him a quick glare as she leans into the microphone, making him take a few steps back from it (and her) "--is that it doesn't have to be all bad!"

"No offence, Miss," Ruby interrupts, "but you're not the one about to have your entire future turned to shit without your consent."

Miss Sands nods, and says, "No, you're right. I'm only losing a job, but you are all losing the chance to finish your education comfortably -- or maybe at all. And I am... so incredibly sorry about that. I truly wish this wasn't happening to any of us. But it is. And we have to deal with that."

"We have to make the most of the time we have left together," Mr Hendricks chimes back in, taking a cautious step towards the podium. "Which is why us teachers and some of your parents/guardians have banded together to give you lot one last Moordale High experience!"

More murmuring. Eric and Maeve are already groaning, while Otis looks cautiously hopeful. Many more of them are apprehensive, including the likes of Adam and Ola, but they're sitting up a bit straighter in their seats, waiting to find out the rest.

They've all experienced many things at Moordale High, not all of them good, but not all of them awful, either. Some of them have been the best time of their lives, like the performance they put on just a few weeks ago to rid themselves of Hope. And some have an utter disaster like their trip to France.

Most of them are assuming it's going to be leaning more towards the latter. And it feels as though their fears are confirmed when Mr Hendricks excitedly, and dramatically, yells, "We're going camping!"

I completely forgot I hastily named it “Uncle Shawn the Icon” for this asjkdhajksh okay so. Auggie starts experimenting with feminine clothes, something that Cory, Topanga, and Riley are more than supportive of. But, unfortunately, people at his school aren’t as supportive. When he starts acting different (like Riley in that one episode where she was being bullied), they know something is up, and Cory happens to mention it to Shawn. Uncle Shawn who, after spending that week as “Veronica” realized he actually liked presenting as a girl sometimes, and came out as genderfluid. He comes over to have a proper talk with Auggie, and let him see that it doesn’t matter what other people say about them. Bonus: Riley mentions it to her friends because she’s worried about Auggie, and most of them jump to Auggie’s defence.

"Auggie's being bullied."

Maya blinks. Farkle sits back in his seat. Stunned into silence. Lucas is shaking his head, and Zay and Smackle share a confused glance at each other.

Then comes the eruption.

"Give me names and addresses," Maya demands, voice like sharp ice and scalding lava at the same time, retracting her hand from Riley's arm. Ready to storm out right now to track them down.

That's exactly why Riley doesn't answer her, but she does look at her like she's crazy, and she says, "Maya! They're kids!"

"I'm going to kill them, what do I care if they're twelve?"

Riley's about to tell her she should very much care, because when they were twelve, they benefited much more from being talked to rather than killed. At the same time, they never did anything even remotely like the kids bullying Auggie.

"Did he tell you why they're bullying him?" Lucas asks, sounding like he can't think of a reason why anyone would want to.

"We already had an idea, and Ava told us this morning. He wants to wear skirts. Not just that, but more feminine clothing in general." She drops her head back onto her arms. "He was so excited to wear one of my old skirts on the first day of school yesterday, and now he won't even come out of his room. I don't know how to help him because he won't talk to any of us."

"Those little b--"

"Language," Riley says flatly, not even having the heart to really care if she finishes her sentence or not. Honestly, she feels like doing it for her. "I know, Maya, I'm mad too. I just don't know what to do about it."

"Say something," Farkle says.

Riley lifts her head and turns in her seat to look at him curiously.

"Your parents could say something to the school," he suggests. "I can't guarantee it would stop them, but if we were vocal enough about it--"

"We?" Riley asks, eyebrows raising.

Farkle looks at her seriously, and says, "My dad could make the loudest noise, and I know he would do it if I asked him to. It's Auggie, Riley. Of course I'm not just going to stand by."

"Yeah, and besides, no one should be bullied for what they wear," Maya adds, throwing Farkle a small smile that he gratefully returns. Then she turns back to Riley. "Seriously, Riles, your parents should say something to the school."

Riley agrees with them. It had crossed her mind this morning, and she's sure her parents are already thinking the same thing. She looks to Lucas, Zay, and Smackle.

Without a question asked, Smackle is nodding immediately, and firmly, a look similar to Farkle's on her face.

"They're right," she says matter-of-factly. Then, with a softer note, adds, "It's unfair for them to get away with trying to stop him from expressing himself. People don't like different and it's..."

"It's wrong," Zay finishes for her. "Auggie doesn't deserve that. Going to the school about it might not help but at least it'll make some noise, right? That would do something good, make people aware that it's unfair the way he's getting treated."

Riley's heart is ready to burst from how apparant their support for Auggie is, and just how serious they are about wanting to help. She smiles at Zay, and he smiles back, reaching forward to pat her hand on the top of her chair.

Her eyes slide to Lucas. He hasn't said anything yet.

I really need to hurry up and finish “Clash of the European Boyfriends”, I feel like I’ve been writing it for years. I feel like I’ve summarised it before, but I’ll give another quick one just in case -- There’s a dinner party being hosted at the Salvatore household, set up by Stefan, Elijah, and Lexi. It was more a way of forcing Damon, Enzo, Klaus, and Stefan to get along, but also a good way to get Hope more familiar with the house for the longterm future. Some awkwardness and tension ensures because you just can’t have those four in a house together and not expect something to go wrong. I would love to be able to give a snippet for this but I’ve been rewriting it so much that I can’t decide on anything that might actually make it into the finished fic, so I’m going to skip this one if that’s okay. Hopefully I’ll actually decide where it’s going and what I’m doing with it soon.

Thank you for sending these, I’m really having so much fun with it!!

#donnas-troia #ask away earthlings!#fanfiction stuff #WIP nudge game #sex education #girl meets world

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twoidiotwriters1 · 4 years ago

Text

Starcrossed Losers 2.V (Josh Wheeler xF!Reader)

A/N: Now that I have more time on my hands expect a whole lot more of this baby coming your way :) -Danny

Words: 2,243

Series’ Masterlist

Previous Chapter // Next Chapter

Listen to me :)

Listen.

I'm not trying to defy my boyfriend's authority around here, can you really blame me for what I'm trying to do?

I don't get how the others aren't freaking out about this, like, those kids have eyes everywhere and now there's some freaky cult controlling them, right out of a dystopian story! Though I guess our whole situation may seem dystopian in general, I mean look at us, bunch of kids pretending to know what we're doing.

Either way, I'm just doing a quiet field trip, Nathan will come back with news of whether Sam will help or not, and we'll just look around the place... nothing more.

I don't have a death wish. I promise. Katie's death isn't weighing on me, I don't want to join her anytime soon, I'm actually quite happy, all things considered.

Then why am I here, the first hour in the morning, waiting for Nathan to come back?

Maybe I'm feeling like I have some adrenaline here that wasn't used and after going to one place and another now I can't stay still. And also because those AV kids might really need our help.

I find Nathan halfway to the school, he's not alone, Sam, Mona and Maya are with her. I groan a little at the sight of my former friend, and I can tell by her expression she wasn't expecting to see me either.

"Goodmorning, my queen," I smile at Sam, bowing a little just to make the ambience lighter.

"L/N," She bows back, her mocked solemnity making me grin in return. "Nathan has told us the issue, but only the basics. Care to tell us more?"

I tell them everything I know, I even play for them the last minutes of the newest episode, I see my worry reflected on Sam's eyes and I know I came to the right place.

"I knew Melissa," Sam said grimly. "She had the talent to see the positive things out of everything... You have the map?"

"I memorized it."

"Cool, then let's go."

"What?" I blink. "Hold on, Sam, we can't just show up."

Sam frowns. "Why not?"

"Didn't you hear the recording? I don't know what the fuck happened there but it sounded like they were heavily armed, or at least that they are very violent."

"Well, you have a sledgehammer, Nathan has his crossbow, Mona has..." She looked over her shoulder. "Mona has herself. Maya has a pocket knife..."

"What about you?"

She shows me a taser and winks. "Think we're good to go."

"I don't know..." I bite my lip.

"Okay, here's a suggestion," Nathan starts. "Let's not fight yet? I know for a fact that Alex would kill me if you die."

"And?"

Nathan looks at me with this truly confused glance.

"I don't want you to die, Y/N."

I beam at his comment, however, Maya makes sure to ruin it right away.

"Yeah well, you haven't been around her enough lately, have you?"

"Neither have you, Maya," Sam gives her a warning look. "Y/N, we won't force you to go with us if you feel it's too risky, just tell us where to go."

"I won't let you go alone! It was my idea!" I exclaim, then pinch the bridge of my nose with a little exasperation. "Fine, we go. But we have to be quiet and we won't attack unless we really have to."

Sam and Nathan agree right away, Mona and Maya grunt and scoff, but I guess that's a yes.

We start moving then, only to stop five minutes later.

"Do you guys hear that?" I lift my hand so everyone stays quiet.

"Hear what?" asks Maya.

I hush her again, and turn to my right, recognizing the bright backpack peering from a trashcan.

"An!" I hiss in annoyance.

I quickly skate to the trashcan and lift the lid, revealing the tiny figure of Angelica looking up to me with a guilty smile.

"Surprise?"

"What the hell are you doing here?"

"I could ask you the same," She frowns. "Josh told you to leave it alone."

"Since when do you listen to Josh?" I scoff.

"Since I realized a bunch of nerdy weirdos aren't worth risking my tribe!" She rolled her eyes. "They're probably dead already, Y/N! We should go back to the mall!"

She whines and pulls my arm as if to trying to drag me, I snatch my arm away and glare at her.

"I can't leave more people behind, not again."

Well, maybe this is about Katie a bit.

"You think those kids will thank you?" Angelica insisted. "They're losers! As soon as they find a better place they'll squirm away to the safest cave, there's a reason why rats survive longer than heroes, Y/N."

"I swear to god, sometimes what comes out of your mouth doesn't make any fucking sense," I reply. "Go back to the mall and stay there, if Josh asks, tell him I went to the school to finish my negotiations with Sam."

"I won't lie, he'll kick me out with you!"

"He won't kick me out!"

"Why not? You think he'll stop just because you make out a few times during the week? He could easily do the same with any other girl– No offence, but if he got over Sam Dean he can get over–"

"Stop!" I say, really not looking forward to hearing the end of that sentence. "You're already in trouble by knowing where I am, so you either come with me or you get lost but choose now because we don't have time for your temper tantrums!"

Angelica stares at me with that little frown she does before taking down her backpack and grabbing her taser.

"Fine," She growls. "But you better move your annoying ass faster, you're way easy to follow even while wearing those stupid roller skates."

"I was trying to be quiet," I argue.

"Wait, she's coming too?" Mona frowns. "We can't be babysitting while we search for a cult."

"I don't need a babysitter," Angelica rolls her eyes. "I could kill you in a heartbeat if I wanted to..."

"I'd like to see you try–"

"Okay!" Sam interrupted. "Let's just... keep going..."

As we keep going Nathan and I engage in a comfortable chat, it's weird to see him again, but not as weird as with Alex, I guess that by now I'm just used to find random people from my past. I'm not trying to avoid it, I don't mind being reminded of my past now that I have things to look forward to. I'm not sure exactly what, but I know I have a future, and maybe that future lies here or somewhere else, but as long as I stay alive I have one, and that's enough.

Nathan and I kinda have the much-needed talk about the elephant in the room, how we were an almost something, surprisingly enough, there are no hard feelings coming from either of us.

'Well the wind it brought my sails to you And my course was true We talked about the lovers we had How they never followed through Oh they never follow through'

"I still regret leaving you like that though," He tells me. "It's not that I was sick of you guys, I just... I don't know, felt like I was wasting my chance somehow?"

"Your chance?"

"Yeah, I mean during high school I was just the 'nice guy', you know? After the nuke I thought I would find something else to be but I'm still the nice guy, I let you escape when you stole half of our weapons, and now I keep Maya from doing fucked up things with the tribe when she thinks no one's paying attention..."

"That's a good thing to do," I try to cheer him up.

"I wish I could be more like you," He smiled fondly at me.

"What do you mean? The artsy girl?" I snort.

"You weren't the artsy girl– I don't know, you were just... you. I never felt like you had to belong anywhere to be worth something... I'm not like that."

"Maybe I never tried to belong, but I was lonely," I sigh. "I obsessed with reading of other worlds, imagining alternate lives that my actual real-life just felt... out of place. I always felt something was missing. The only time I had the feeling that my life was going somewhere for the first time was when... when you asked me out."

Nathan smiles at me, and even though I feel a little guilty about it, I can't help but feel glad that I can witness such a breathtaking smile from so close.

'You told me how the life you lead Is a made up thing How you wish you were as interesting As half the things you read Oh as half the things you read'

"Ah, I don't know," He sighs, looking away from me. "I guess I wasn't made to be part of a tribe, I really liked my time as a loner, you know?"

"Then why did you stop?"

He smiled again. "Because I also really liked you."

I blush at his statement, but I try to remain as neutral as possible.

"Well, if I'm allowed to say it, love is a really stupid reason to quit a good life," I admit.

"What?" He laughs. "Didn't you join your tribe because of Josh?"

"Not only because of Josh!" I defend myself. "I also joined because I had a purpose, I take care of them."

"Well, but most of them can take care of themselves now, don't they?" He teased. "C'mon, the only reason why you stayed is that Josh has you wrapped around his finger."

I frown a little at that.

Nathan kinda has a point, right? Alex already has my notebook filled with first-aid treatments and indications, most of the kids now know how to fix a broken bone. Do they really need me?

"Hey, not that it's bad," He adds, nudging my arm. "If I had what you have with Josh I would stay too, you guys seem happy."

Are we happy?

'I'm a wanderer I've always been undone And the shadows cast upon my soul Are clawing from the sun'

How much of this happiness will last once we get used to each other? And how much of that happiness is what it's keeping us together right now?

Are we really done with running away from places and being alone? I said I was, Josh said he wanted to stay with me. We said we'd be together. We are together.

Angelica's words come back to me in full force: 'If he could get over Sam, what makes you think he wouldn't be able to forget about you too?'

'I'm sure it's nice to think I'm something that you need But I promise when the sun ascends you'll see that's just a dream I'll never come around'

Do I really trust in love enough as to let it build the rest of my life? My future depends on whether Josh and I stay as a couple, and out of the two of us, I'm the one who'll lose the most if we break.

I obviously enjoy my time with Josh, and I really like him... but is liking him enough reason for him to stay? Or he'll leave as soon as I push the right button?

Just like with Sam...

'I must admit that the faith I had Is fleeting fast Cause you told me how you never let go And how that keeps you in the past'

No. I won't start this again. Josh already proved himself thousands of times. He chose me, he stayed with me. More yet, he came back for me when I left.

"It's here," I say abruptly, stopping dead in my tracks.

Everyone stops behind me. Ahead of us, there's a huge mansion, not too far from where Josh's old safe place is. It looks empty, but there's a security camera that luckily isn't pointing our way. I signal the group to give a few steps back and we hide around the corner.

"Okay, we need to get closer, we need to make sure they're–"

"Psst!"

I stop and straighten in my place.

"Did someone just 'pst' at us?"

"Psst!"

"Oh shit," Nathan looks up to the window above us and quickly prepares the crossbow. "Don't move!"

"Hey hey hey, it's fine!" The girl's voice says from the second floor. "You guys need to get out of the street right now, they're going to be here soon."

"What?"

"Come in!"

"Yeah, like we're going to listen to a stranger," Maya scoffs. "How do we know you're not with them."

"I know you," She says simply, then she turns to look at me and smiles. "I know your boyfriend. I talked to him once."

"What?" I tilt my head. "You mean after the nuke or..?"

"When you left the mall, he came to see me," She adds calmly. "Come in, I won't hurt you."

Her words make something inside my head click:

"Mavis?"

Taglist.

@letsbe-queer @slythermyg @loving-u-3000 @one-loud-mind

#twoidiots writing #netflix #daybreak fanfic #daybreak #josh wheeler #josh wheeler xreader #Starcrossed fic

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ayellowcurtain · 4 years ago

Text

could you maybe when you watched the final write an alternative ending?

could I maybe ask for some Alexia+Arthur I miss them terribly!

lola and baz hanging out, being friends, lola maybe mentioning maya

please tell us you have more ArthurxAlexia, spare some for the broken hearted that miss S5 with all their soul pls!

Arthur watches all his friends gathered around him, talking excitedly like this is not one of the last times they’ll all hang out together. Arthur would like to be more optimistic, but he’s struggles with that after this hell year.

Maybe he’s getting drunk, that’s it. When he gets drunk, he gets in the worst mood ever, remembering all the shit he did for the people he loves. And he shouldn’t be drinking this much tonight. Yann and Manon are moving across the country tomorrow, Emma is going away for her gap year and that feels like the start of the end.

Soon they’ll all leave, get their shit together and Arthur will still be stuck here, as lost as one can be.

“You okay, bro?” Baz squeezes his shoulder and Arthur looks at him, blinking a few times to be able to focus his hazy eyes and brain on his best friend right next to him, his hand still on Arthur’s shoulder.

“Fuck, yeah. Sorry, got distracted.” He smiles and hopes Baz buys it, lying his head against his best friend’s shoulder. From this new angle he can see under the long wood table, Alexia’s hands on her lap. Arthur looks around, nobody else is paying them much attention so he quietly holds her hand. Alexia looks down, at their hands now together and he looks at him.

Arthur misses her so much it’s almost disorienting.

“Stop being annoying! He’s just drunk and sad, he’s not dying.” Arthur hears Lola’s voice behind him and he looks at her direction, sitting next to Baz. He smiles at Arthur with that guilty and fond smile of his and Arthur pretends he’s too focused in other conversations to hear his with Lola.

“He’s too drunk, Lola! You’ll have to help me carry him home...”

“No way. I’m not doing that.”

“Lola!”

“No! He’s a grown ass man. If he can’t drink, I’m not the one that’ll carry him home.”

Arthur sighs, sitting up again, able to intertwine his fingers with Alexia’s now.

“I’m gonna get some water,” he thinks out loud, not sure if he’s telling that to Lola, Baz or Alexia.

This place that Eliott showed to them a few weeks back feels like a piece of them now. Le Gang, family size. The cooler with drinks is almost empty now, but Arthur manages to find a bottle of water, drinking half of it at once, hoping it’ll make him get sober quicker. It’s not how it works, but Arthur likes to pretend.

He walks around the abandoned building a little bit. It feels like the end of an era and Arthur doesn’t know how to feel about the future. Everything changed so quickly he’s still trying to make his brain stop spiraling. He loves his new place, loves being just him and his mom, redecorating his new bedroom.

If this is what he can have after everything, Arthur can also accept having Alexia just as a best friend, she’s a great (and free) interior designer. They’re still as close as they were when they were dating, they just don’t have sex or kiss. But he would be the luckiest man alive if she ever decided to give him a second chance.

“He’s here...” Lola’s voice makes him look back. She’s walking to his direction and Baz appears, smiling when he finds Arthur.

“I found you!” Baz rushes to him and hugs him from behind, resting his head against Arthur’s back. Lola walks slower and stops next to them, looking at the tall and broken building behind them.

“Alexia sent us here,” Lola says, looking at him from the corner of her eyes. Arthur feels stupid that even Daphné’s little sister can tell something is going on with him and Alexia.

“Yeah...”

“Hm...so! We’re leaving. Daphné is saying goodbye to Yann and Manon, are you coming with us?”

Arthur doesn’t want to go, he wants to hang out with everyone - and especially Alexia - a little more, but he knows he should go home. Baz probably thinks that too, his best friend wouldn’t worry if Arthur went with them. His raised eyebrows and expecting and weird smiles are there, staring at Arthur. So he nods his head and Baz laughs, clearly relieved. Lola rolls her eyes, texting someone.

“You’re going home? Is Maya going there? I need to know so I can make something special for us to eat and-”

“No, I’m going to her place. Don’t wanna be there with just you and Daphné.”

The sun starts overheating his body and slowly waking him up. Arthur moves to lie on his back and there’s someone on the bed. He opens his eyes and blinks a few times, finding Alexia sitting next to him, busy with her computer, looking at him and smiling.

She waits as he streches his body, getting his glasses and hearind aids, putting everything on.

“Shit, I’m sorry for last night. I got fucking shitfaced.” Arthur breathes slowly to calm his stomach as he pushes himself to sit, leaning against the headboard, remembering he went to Alexia’s place instead of his. He covers his face with both hands, his mouth so dry and bitter, still tasting like what he ate and drank yesterday. Alexia laughs and holds him by his wrist.

“It’s okay. You were funny.” She turns to the other side, grabbing something on her nightstand, turning back to him to offer a bottle of water.

“How did you sleep? Did I snore much?”

He looks at her, frowning, watching as she stops smiling suddenly. “So loud, Arthur. You’re worst than my grandpa.”

Alexia laughs and he exhales, a little more relaxed that this wast a joke. “Shut up, you liar...”

“I slept well. I feel like you steal the blankets less now that we’re...best friends.” Alexia tries to act normally, but she does sound like this is the most weird thing, which probably is. Them sharing a bed again, a small bed like Alexia’s.

Arthur looks at Alexia, his elbow on his naked thigh, noticing that he slept with just his underwear, no jeans, and he puts his face sideways against his palm, watching her.

“I wish I could steal your blankets then. I wish we were together. I miss you so much.”

“I’m right here...”

“You know what I mean, Alex.”

“I do.” She smiles fondly, resting against the headboard, looking relaxed, not really bothered by his presence, she looks down and back at him.“...And Noée?”

Whatever happened between him and Noée finished with that first and only kiss. There was never real romantic feelings from his side, he was just extremely dumb and confused and he noticed that when it was too late already, the damage was done. They still hang out every Saturday morning and sometimes they go out to eat or something, but they don’t talk about them. Because Arthur doesn’t think they have anything else to talk about.

“She’s just a friend. Whatever I thought I felt romantically for her wasn’t...real. She’s dating a girl now too. She seems very happy.”

Alexia raises her eyebrows, very surprised and Arthur was too when she told him over a month ago, but just because she never talked about the girl before, not because he was jealous. “Oh. I didn’t know.”

“Yeah...”

Arthur stares for another minute and Alex is looking back at him too. He moves to his knees and leans forward, kissing Alexia after what feels like a lifetime.

Her hands come to his cheeks, touching him so gently. Arthur tries to go slow, to keep his hands to himself. Alexia is the one to break the kiss, resting her forehead against his, sighing.

“Can we try again? I promise I’m better...I know I don’t deserve you, but please, let me try again.”

“I still like you...we can’t control with whom we fall in love with.”

He nods his head, letting himself get hopeful.

“No, we don’t.”

#skam france #alexia martineau #arthur broussard #alexia x arthur #skamfr

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ofadan · 5 years ago

Note

Final Destination AU let's go 💦

notes: sort of spoilers for final destination, but not really? it’s literally the plot of the movies. featuring @ircnxveils, @addictingvictories, @byacatalepsy, @ofjamra, @swtsvrndr.trigger warnings: death, graphic death, violence, suicide.

they’re on a cruise — courtesy of adan — on the hottest week of summer. they’re on route to croatia, departing from venice, but as their fourth day of the trip dawns on them, they spend it in mykonos, relishing the transparent blue waters under their feet. they have just finished navigating their way around the pearly white buildings, halting every ten minutes just to take polaroid pictures of each other.

there’s one of victoria sipping from a coconut through a swirly straw, then there’s maya trying on a strikingly white dress in the middle of a bazaar, clearly flirting with the seller. in one of them, adan has sunglasses perched on top of the bridge of his nose and his tanned face brings out the contrast of his smile as he’s laughing at jaime, who is slightly off the shot. for once, it isn’t eliza’s scowl that is captured — the girl is beaming during their late dinner and there’s haleema right next to her, beautifully illuminated by the dim glow of the candles.

they barely make it in time — they’re on board with only five minutes to spare, and all of them are sighing in relief. their laughter resonates in the halls as they disperse to their own cabins, but adan feels a cold sweat rolling off his back, even though the air is humid, and a terrible feeling begins churning in the pit of his stomach. he drowns it out with a cold shower and a numbing episode of a greek show that he doesn’t even understand before getting a message that they should all meet up in the front of the ship, right where the pool resides in. they all chime in with enthusiastic responses and adan laughs at maya's selfie of her already submerged in the pool, the crystal-clear water coming up to the bottom of her curls. she certainly never snoozes.

then, the lights flicker in a way that settles a chill upon his bones, ominous in its existence — like a warning that shouldn’t be ignored. not that it’d matter anyway because exactly five seconds later, the ground beneath him shakes and he’s thrown all the way forward, his body colliding with the oakwood wall, which makes him wince in pain. once he composes himself, adan throws the door open just to see eliza barging out of the room at the same time, both of them staring at each other in terrified bewilderment. the captain’s voice cracks in the system, but he manages to catch a word about a crash and explosion on the deck.

naturally, chaos erupts among the passengers. they’re all scurrying from one corner to another, demanding life jackets in case of sinking and safety boats, and adan can’t blame them. he tugs victoria inside a janitor’s closet just as another explosion sends shattered glass in their direction, missing them by a couple inches. he hears a voice booming through the air again, warning them about the abrasive explosions and blown-off pipes. great. if they’re lucky, the fire and water will cancel each other out, but adan doesn’t have to be a scientist to know that soon enough, they’ll suffocate in the rapidly leaking water if the ceilings don’t get to them first because of the blasts.

it all happens so quickly. the wooden planks crumble under the force and one of the chandeliers spring free from the screws, falling right on top of eliza as she tries to escape the first floor through the crowd of panicked tourists. it pierces right through her heart all the way to the ground and as the light evaporates from the crystal bulbs, her eyes dim too.

haleema and jaime come next. as soon as they make it out to the main hall, the glass sculpture in the middle of the room doesn’t manage to withstand the pressure and tips over, killing jaime almost instantly. with so many shards now engraved into his body, mutilating him, it’s hard to even recognize him. haleema makes the mistake of peering over the railing to check the ground floor and the swaying ship tips her over the edge, right above the fence of the little botanical garden. she lands right on top of it, with one of the sharp tips peeking out of her mouth. at least both of them welcomed an instant death.

adan makes it as far as he can, almost to the deck where the waterslides start. unfortunately, he’s too slow — had he been a few seconds faster, he would have avoided being crushed by one of the slides after they shake under the weight of rusty pillars and bolts. he splashes all over the walls and ground, like spilled milk, except it’s all in crimson. although it all happens in under a second, it feels like an eternity to him ; the moment he closes his eyes, he knows something else is going to happen, and when he opens them again …

he’s standing right at the entrance, with a boarding pass in his hand and maya urging him to go forward with a slight push. it feels like his heart is beating ten thousand times per minute as the staff tries to take the ticket from him to check it, but to no avail, due to adan gripping it tightly. he’s the first one in line, which means that all of his friends are still behind him and not on board yet, and he wastes no time to turn around and nudge them back down the stairs with wide-spread arms. of course, there’s a chorus of ‘ what the fuck, we’re going to be late ’ and collective curses, but he pays them no mind — right this moment, he trusts his gut feeling more than anything else. “ guys, we can’t go on board. this fucking ship is going down. i’ve seen it —— ” he sounds frantic as he begins explaining, making sure to push his friends as far as possible away from the cruise. “ for fuck’s sake, we’ve all seen final destination! ” it’s too late for them to change their mind anyway — the ship rings its final call and a few minutes later, the bridge closes, and it takes off to their next destination.

the destination being death, adan thinks. he books hotel rooms for them and he keeps checking his watch rather anxiously. any minute now, any minute and the ship will crash, and everything inside will explode, and everyone will meet their demise, and adan will be right. however, after another hour passes by, he begins thinking that maybe he overreacted for no reason ( thankfully, there are plenty of buses and smaller boats to take in order to get themselves back on the cruise if it survives ), but when he leaves the shower, drying his hair with a towel, he sees victoria on the edge of their bed, wrapped up in a robe and staring at the tv screen. this just in —— a cruise ship that was on the way to croatia crashed with another ship as it was leaving mykonos. dispatchers are on the scene already and trying to rescue people from the sinking ship. for now, the number of survivors is unknown, but from the looks of it, there have been a lot of fatal injuries.

adan tunes out the rest of it. there’s no need to listen ; he already knows what happened. everyone in his premonition just died … everyone except for them. so, that’s how it’s going to be? they’re going to go out one by one, according to some fucked up order — final destination style. still, adan is hopeful. it’s just a movie, there are no strange supernatural forces that would design their lives and deaths in such a twisted way. they will live.

“ okay, ” he starts once everyone is seated at their dinner table in the hotel’s restaurant, forks hanging off their plates. it’s pasta night, but apparently, no one is that hungry. except thirsty —— everyone has downed at least their second glass of wine. “ listen, guys. if this is actually what we think it is, we need to save ourselves some time before we figure out how to cheat this entirely. maybe if we keep intervening … i’ve read a reddit thread, i have some ideas. ” he’s aware that there’s no cheating death and they can’t avoid this like clear did because truth be told, he would rather die than suffer in a psychiatric ward with no social interaction, but something has to be tried. someone says something about killing tony todd if he shows up to solve this and it brightens up the mood a little. “ the order probably goes like this: eliza, jaime, haleema, maya, victoria, and me. according to the order of our cabins at least. ”

they decide that this won’t let them stop from enjoying their trip. if their days are truly numbered, they might as well have fun before going out with a bang. maya and eliza decide to go for a swim while victoria, adan, haleema and jaime are in their seats, sharing a two-liter cocktail among themselves. they quietly discuss the premonition after jaime asks him to start from the beginning.

“ wait, ” victoria interrupts him, seemingly lost in thought. “ you said the front of the ship crashed into the other, right? ” adan hums out a yes, turning his head to find the red-head, keeping an eye on her. if they’re right, at any possible moment she might get sucked into the depths of the sea by a massive spiral. “ and if the pool is there, it means that —— ”

shit. all of them shift their gazes immediately and a shriek follows. fuck, it wasn’t eliza’s turn — it was maya’s. they soon find out that she’s been stung by one of the most venomous jellyfish and the dose was so strong that it induced an immediate cardiac arrest. she dies before the ambulance arrives.

maya marceli, time of death: 3:49 pm. cause of death: cardiac arrest.

they don’t get enough time and rest to mourn her. even though they try to avoid obvious traps and scenarios, death is always one step ahead. it’s loud and crowded in the club — so many shades of purple neon are swirling in adan’s eyes and he’s too drunk to even walk. he hears shouts coming from the vip section and he recognizes eliza’s voice in the sea of distorted sounds, and he hurries to her before something terrible can happen. maybe this time, he will be able to intervene. except he’s not because a fight breaks out and as hard as they try to break it up, it ends only when a broken champagne bottle is twisted deep inside her, most likely mangling her organs. they keep the criminal hostage before the police gets there and they spend the entire night in interrogation. all adan can think about is the light leaving eliza’s eyes, just like in the premonition, and the fact that all of their deaths are inevitable.

eliza cerrato, time of death: 4:07 am. cause of death: bleeding out.

death skips jaime for the time being.

a bus full of tourists comes out of nowhere when they’re hiking and haleema manages to get jaime out of the way before it can get to him ( it’s not her time to die — they know she’ll be fine when she surges forward to push him ). the driver steers the vehicle away, but it dives off the cliff anyway, resulting in death of at least twenty people. as adan begins losing count of zipped up bodies getting inside the ambulances, he realizes something: is this considered murder? maybe by saving jaime, they took away innocent people’s lives, thus they were crossed off the death’s list? they wait with baited breath. two days pass by with no casualties … the calm before the storm.

it’s two in the morning when he smells smoke. the hotel is on fire. adan doesn’t think as he jumps from his bed, almost naked, and peels the door open. he gets a flashback — crashing noises and screaming people, feeling like he’s tilting — but instead of eliza staring back at him, it’s jaime. there’s no room for spoken communication as they both sprint to haleema’s room only to find two bodies burnt to a crisp. he doesn’t recognize the other person, but by the looks of their … very naked bodies, he puts two and two together. at least they went out with an actual bang, just like all of them had wanted. they’re told there will be an investigation. looks like the bus crashing was all according to death’s design anyway.

haleema kanaan, time of death: 2:16 am. cause of death: burnt alive.

it’s victoria’s turn and adan goes more mad each day. he’s frantically trying to look for ways to save them, but all of the answers keep slipping from his fingers — deep down, he knows that there really is no cheating death, but he needs a faux sense of security to give him peace. he keeps researching and there it is ; a glimmer of hope. maybe he won’t live, but it will save them.

“ adan, what are you doing? get down. ” he ignores it. on the contrary, it prompts him to take another step closer to the ledge. will this work? he’s not certain, but at least all of this will be over for him. call him selfish, but he would rather not watch any more of his friends die right in front of his eyes.

“ i’m the last one on the list, right? so — ” he turns around to face victoria and adan, wincing at the wind tousling his hair and neglecting to acknowledge the terrified faces of strangers behind them. he vaguely hears them whispering to their phones, but everything in his head is buzzing and there’s blood rushing to his head, and he’s going absolutely crazy, and he just wants to die. “ if i kill myself right now, the order will be messed up. ” the breeze hits him a little harder this time and he sways, to which his friends respond by attempting to reach out for him. “ it makes sense! if i die out of my turn, we beat death! you guys get to survive! ” he takes another step. “ if not, maybe it will give you some more time. hey, you can make a baby together. new life defeats death, right? ” he laughs, almost maniacally. then, he stills, going quiet.

“ we should have stayed, ” he speaks up again, “ on the cruise. we would have all died at the same time, we wouldn’t suffer. it’s my fault — ” he looks up, his eyes boring into jaime and victoria’s. he takes a final step. “ — and i’m going to fix it. ”

adan garza, time of death: 12:20 pm. cause of death: suicide.

except … he isn’t the last one. victoria is. in the premonition, they part ways somewhere in between jaime and haleema’s deaths, therefore, there’s no knowing when victoria dies as the cabin numbers don’t entirely indicate their order. in reality, she would have been impaled by another ship’s pole while trying to jump out of the cruise to save herself from sinking, a few minutes after adan’s death. which brings to the conclusion that there’s also no way of knowing whether his theory is true —— after all, the man dies following the death’s list.

death takes away the rest too. their fate is inevitable. somewhere, far far away, zain and al are shaking their heads at them.

victoria villalobos, time of death: 9:14 pm. cause of death: plane crash.

james kaplan, time of death: 9:16 pm. cause of death: plane crash.

#‘ answered / 𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐜. ”#‘ victoria / 𝐟𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠. ”#‘ jaime / 𝐟𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠. ”#‘ eliza / 𝐟𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠. ”#‘ haleema / 𝐟𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠. ”#‘ maya / 𝐟𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠. ”#i didnt read this bc fuck that #there are probably things that dont make sense because im tired and continuity is not my strongest suit

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somerandomwriter1234 · 5 years ago

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Riley and Maya: Complicated Parenthood - Chapter 8 (New Good Days)

Summary: As the final three chapters of the series begin, Riley and Maya who are completely back together again finally have to now fully move forward with their lives now after the loss of their daughter. However the two learn through helping others that they are indeed allowed to have “new good days”.

Scene 1:

-In the before and after care auditorium, Maya and Grace sat in front of each other at a table while working on an art project together.

Grace: That is so awesome that your wife is getting better Miss Maya. Is she gonna get out of the hospital and come home today?

Maya: Well, not today. When people come out of a coma they don't just get up and start walking around. But with that being said… the doctors have told me that Riley's condition has improved faster than anything they've seen before… and she may be up and about pretty soon. It's all one amazing miracle really.

Grace: That is so nice. I'm so happy for you Miss Maya.

Maya: Well let's not make everything about me right now. How was your weekend Grace?

Grace: It was nice. I read stories to the little kids at the orphanage for six hours straight.

Maya: Six hours? Wow. That's pretty impressive. I bet all of those leaders where you live really appreciate your help.

Grace: Well I know Ms. Wilson does. I don't really know any of the other people that work there.

Maya: How could you not know any of the other people that work where you live?

Grace: It's just a bunch of different volunteers every day. Ms. Wilson is the only person that's there all of the time. Most days she only has one or two helper adults.

Maya: One or two helpers? For all of those kids!?

Scene 2:

-In a hospital room, Riley was sitting up in her bed while Maya was taping a picture to the wall near the bed. As Riley watched Maya tape the picture to the wall, she made a small smile.

Riley: You know Maya, you don't have to decorate every square inch of the walls in here with these amazing drawings. I should be getting out soon.

-Maya then finished taping the picture to the wall and then sat in a chair facing Riley.

Maya: But my students had heard about how you were doing and just really wanted your room to look nice.

Riley: When you say students, are you sure you're not referring to just one particular student who I know has done every single drawing in here?

Maya: Uh… what makes you say that Riley?

Riley: The art style in every picture is similar, the way the coloring strokes match up… the fact that I see the name Grace in the corner of every picture.

Maya: Oh. I guess that would give it away.

Riley: She's a really nice girl to give me these pictures. But she can't be giving me all of these pictures just from what she's heard about me. She must've done this because she adores you a great deal. Why don't you talk more about her?

Maya: Oh… because, I… didn't want you to feel uncomfortable. I didn't want you to feel weird with me talking on and on about some other woman and…

-Riley began to laugh and then spoke.

Riley: You are too cute. Yet another reason why I'm glad I married you. Maya, I am not jealous about you spending so much of your time to make the life of a little girl a little better. During the entire time I was in that coma, it was the kind of thing I wanted you to do. And… it's what I know Erika would've wanted you to do.

-Riley looked downwards with a sad face for a moment as Maya noticed.

Maya: Are you going to be okay Riley?

-Riley then lifted her head up and looked right at Maya.

Riley: I'm never going to be completely okay ever again Maya. But that doesn't mean I won't stop loving those around me. Just like you haven't stopped with those amazing kids you've come to know. And if it's ever possible, I'd like to meet this amazing Grace and the other children you've gotten to know, and if I can: do something nice for them too.

Maya: Well… there is. You remember how before and after care now takes care of a bunch of kids from the local orphanage?

Riley: Yeah, I remember setting that arrangement up. I'm glad it's worked out.

Maya: Well Grace is one of those kids. And she was just telling me recently how there's barely any adult help there. I checked with the woman in charge: Ms. Wilson and she confirmed that. Their funding is incredibly low and with barely any help to take care of the children, they've had no way to let more people in the community at large know about these many kids who need help and need families. And to help them out with their needs, they require your help Riley.

Riley: And what kind of help can I give?

Maya: You were able to set up a grant from the county to get those kids into the before and after care program. So use your connections and skills to get some kind of bigger grant to help out the orphanage as a whole. Get them more workers, and more connections to people that can find those kids some parents or at least some kind of good foster care arrangements.

Riley: Maya, I can't just start bossing around government leaders and tell them where to send their money.

Maya: Come on Riley… who can say no to a woman who just came out of a coma with a dream to improve the world?

Riley: I… I… I think you're starting to turn into one of the most influential people I know Maya. Okay… I'll do what I can. But if I make this happen, we don't just give these children more money and resources. I want us to give those children a chance to feel like children.

Maya: Sounds good to me.

Scene 3:

-In a large room at the orphanage, many children of different ages were sitting together as Ms. Wilson stood in front of them.

Ms. Wilson: I have some wonderful news children. We have two new volunteers that promise that they'll be here to help us every weekend from now on. Let me introduce you to them now.

-From a doorway, Maya then walked into the room with Riley. From the crowd of children, Grace jumped up.

Grace: Miss Maya!

-Grace then ran over to Maya and gave her a hug. Maya hugged Grace back.

Maya: Hey Grace. Good to see you.

Grace: I usually never see you on the weekend. This is so awesome!

-Maya smiled as she then looked at all of the other children.

Maya: And hello to all of my other friends here I recognize from before and after care. For those that don't know me, yes: my name is Miss Maya. And this is my wife Riley.

Riley: Nice to meet you all. We'll be here every Saturday and Sunday afternoon from now on. And today, we actually brought you all some nice presents.

Maya: We were able to get our hands on a bunch of new sports equipment, and overnight we were able to install a brand new basketball hoop in your yard. It's all outside right now if you're ready to play some games.

Riley: And for those that aren't the biggest sport players, we also have a ton of new books for you all to read.

Maya: All right. If you're ready and wanna play outside, follow me!

-Maya then began to head outside as many of the children began to follow her. Riley meanwhile took out a bag full of many books and put them on the ground. Many of the other children began to crowd around the books as Grace stood near Riley. Riley then looked at Grace and motioned to her to come closer.

Riley: Hi Grace. Maya has told me a lot of good things about you. Thank you for all of those pictures you made for me while I was in the hospital.

Grace: Oh. You're welcome.

Riley: By the way, there's some new art supplies in the back pack behind me. You can grab whatever you want. Just make you share some of them, okay?

-Grace then looked in the backpack hanging on the floor and her eyes lit up with excitement as she saw the art supplies in the bag. Out of excitement Grace immediately hugged Riley.

Grace: Thank you Miss Riley! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

-Riley smiled as she hugged Grace back.

Riley: You're welcome Grace.

Scene 4:

-Maya was standing in the kitchen of her home as she hung a drawing on the refrigerator. The drawing was a picture of herself and Grace standing together near a basketball hoop. From nearby, Riley walked into the room and sat down near Maya.

Riley: How was your day?

-Maya turned to look right at Riley as she smiled.

Maya: Good.

Riley: So I see we have yet another picture for our refrigerator. Or should I now call it the Grace Givens Movable Wall of Art?

Maya: Oh? Well at least I didn't take all of the socks out of the drawer and turn that into an art collection depository.

Riley: Well I had to after you re-purposed my filing cabinet.

-Maya and Riley both began to laugh but after a moment of laughter they immediately stopped. Maya suddenly sat in a chair facing Riley as Riley began to speak.

Riley: Was that the first time we've laughed together since…

Maya: Yeah. It was.

Riley: Are… are we allowed to enjoy life like that again?

Maya: Well… yeah. I… I think she would want us to.

Riley: Maya, I… I don't ever want to forget the good days we had with Erika but… as much as I wish she could've had more with us… I don't want to let that stop us from having new good days with each other.

Maya: Riley… no matter what kind of day we have, I'm glad I get to still share more with you.

-Tears began to come out of Maya and Riley's eyes as they hugged each other, while the day came to a close.

END OF CHAPTER 8

Upcoming Chapters For the Series:

-Chapter 9: Happy Mother's Day (Coming 5/11)

-Chapter 10: Finally Home (Coming 5/13)

#girl meets world #gmw fanfic #girl meets world fanfiction #rilaya #riley and maya #riley x maya

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ventingblacklist · 6 years ago

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4x4 Gaia “I thought I could make it better, that I could protect my baby. I mean, that’s my one job…to protect my child.”

Gaia is sick. Living in the woods. Calls his wife and kid and tells them to leave town, cuz he has a new target.

He takes out a mechanic so he can take his place and steal a helicopter later.

Liz is going through some of the papers on Kirk when her laptop chirps. Kirk is calling. Kirk: Hello, Masha. I know it’s late, but I wanted to speak to you alone. Liz: Where is she?

Kirk: I never wanted you to be apart from her. Liz: Where’s my daughter?! Kirk: Right here, safe.

“If you so much as… If you hurt her…”

“I know the truth. The only reason you came for me… you think we can cure you, that our blood can…”

Kirk: Yes, the blood is what I need, but it’s not what I want. What I want is for us to be together, but that can’t happen until Reddington’s out of your life. Only you can make that happen.

“I see you’re wearing your mother’s bracelet. I’m glad.”

“I want you to know that your baby is safe. This link is open day or night any time you want to see Agnes.” Tom later discusses the link with Liz. He wants to trace it to get Agnes back. Liz is like, it wouldn’t work, he’s anticipated that.

“If he hurts her, he loses me....What does Kirk want more than anything in the world? For me to trust him… to care for him. And because it’s what he desires most, it’s the easiest way to deceive him.

“He’ll see what he wants to see… my affection. He won’t see what’s real… my deception. This link is an opportunity for me to get close to Kirk. And I can’t do anything to jeopardize that.”

Tom: Liz, I think you’re being naive. Liz: I know you think that. And I’m asking you to trust me.

I kind of agree with Liz on this one. Not just about the link tracing, but the being able to see her thing. Red called it unbelievably cruel. Keeping the kid away, but having that link open. Which, I guess.

I don't have kids so there are some things I'm not going to get, but if I was worried for my kid's well-being, I'd rather be able to see them than not. If I can't get to them at the moment, at least I know they're okay. Drive me nuts, otherwise. Especially in the wake of blood talk. Liz is hoping to use this to get to Kirk. Not in the tracing way, but in the gaining his trust way. She wants to use it.

Kirk isn’t happy about keeping Liz and Agnes apart, but he doesn't want Red near Agnes any more than Red wants Kirk near Agnes.

I think of parallels a lot, and Agnes might be a replay not just for Kaplan, but for Kirk. Red is not going to get his hooks in another one. He took Kirk’s daughter; he will not have his granddaughter.

Agnes is motivation for Kaplan as well. It's too late, she's already failed Liz, but she could still save Agnes.

Kirk here, and Kaplan later, want Reddington out of the picture.

Kirk wants Liz to reject Reddington, later tries to kill Reddington. Talks on his death bed of Liz taking his fortune and getting away from Reddington.

Kirk lets it go after the whisper; lets her go when it’s confirmed beyond doubt that Liz is not his child.

Kaplan never lets it go. To the end, she's trying to get Liz to walk away.

Liz might see this same motivation going forward into season six. Her life is a giant mess, but maybe she can clean it up for Agnes. Agnes’ father is already gone. And she’s away from her mother for a long time. But maybe Liz can stop things from deteriorating further.

Liz meets with Red. He tells her about Gaia.

After Liz briefs the task force, Aram grabs Samar and says sorry for not being able to talk, but they can grab lunch, and Samar is like, it's okay, I figured it out. I’m transferring.

Samar is going to be a bit snippy today as she's all hurt in general. First Liz, now Aram. Ressler grabs her after another Gaia briefing. Ressler: Aram told me you put in for a transfer. Navabi, trust me, I understand how angry you are with Keen for doing what she did…

Samar: Yes, and that is part of why I’m leaving, but it’s not just that. It… It’s this place. You never know where you stand with anyone… whether they’ll be there for you when you need them.

Ressler: If there’s anything I can do to get you to reconsider, you let me know. I’ll do it. You’re a good partner.

Samar: I wish there was. I really do.

Aw, look at them all friends now.

Gaia takes out an energy company guy so he can take his place and sabotage a pipeline. Or something. Kaplan wakes up in hunter guy's cabin.

Kirk gets a transfusion and some bad news from his doc. His body is starting to reject the transfusions. Six months to live, maybe less. Odette: There is a solution. Kirk: We’ve already discussed this. Reifler: It’s unacceptable. Odette: Easy for you to say. You’re not the one that’s gonna die. Kirk: No, I am, and I agree with Sebastian.

Kirk: We’re exploring other cures. Odette: We were. Before we lost the Ribowski virus, before the U.S. government froze your assets.

Reifler: If the girl is a genetic match, and there’s no guarantee that she is, extracting stem cells from such a young child is extremely dangerous and could prove fatal.

Odette: ....We are out of time, and we are out of resources. The only way to save your life is if we put that child’s in jeopardy. Odette is clearly jealous of Kirk's fun new obsession. Doesn't give a crap about Liz or the kid. What a fun new stepmom Liz has acquired.

She also seems to actually care about Kirk. Even though he’s clearly still in love with his dead spy wife.

Ressler and Samar run after Gaia. He gets away. But they nab a fake id he used to get into the faciliity.

Red takes the id to Glen at a bowling alley to find out who made it.

Glen calls in a guy. The guy gives them Gaia’s address.

Red and Liz go out to Gaia's school bus.

"Photo of a pregnant woman. But no child. Maybe the child was taken or… or died....”

“We’re going to get her back, Lizzy.”

Gaia bursts into his ex-wife's house to tell her to get out of the state. We see that his kid is disfigured.

Tom meets with an old colleague to trace the signal and get Agnes back. Aram informs the task force that Gaia's strike on a pipeline will include a nuclear facility in its blast radius. It's gonna be bad.

Night falls. Tom and his little troop prepare to raid the house.

Liz is sitting in the post office working. She opens the video feed and calls Tom.

Liz: I’m looking at our little girl. It’s almost like a baby monitor, like she’s in the next room. Tom: Only she’s not. Kirk has her. Liz: I know. I asked you this morning to trust me, not to trace the link. I want you to know it means everything to me that you are okay with that. Thank you. Tom: Everything’s gonna be all right, Liz. Blow her a kiss for me.

Liz sings Agnes a lullaby while Tom and company raid the place where the servers are, but not where Kirk is.

It’s a setup. A place full of cameras so Kirk can see if she violates his trust. And she did. Or, he thinks she did.

Kirk: I thought we had an understanding. Liz: About what? What are you talking about? Kirk: You traced this feed.

“No. No, I didn’t. There must be some mistake.”

Liz: ...Wait. That had nothing to do with me. Kirk: I’m sorry, Masha. Liz: No, I told Tom. I specifically said…

"No! Please bring her back! I’m begging you! Bring her back!”

Liz has spent like five minutes with her kid since she was born. She's frantic. Desperate to at least see her. Can't do that anymore.

Tom and Liz both trying to get the kid back in their own way. Tom not telling her things. Liz blows up at him at the end of the episode. Perfectly natural fight, I just hate that they patch it up in like two seconds.

Liz all forgiving him, saying that if his family was the reason they were in danger... um. Actually, his family is involved too. Scottie, you may have heard of her, hired Solomon who sent you on a car chase that almost killed Agnes in utero. But Tom hasn't told you that.

Super happy couple. They never talk about anything apparently, but they really like getting married.

Red goes to see Glen. Shows him the picture of the pregnant woman they found in Gaia's bus. Glen screws with him before agreeing to help.

Hunter helps Kate sit up and feeds her. Asks if the people who did this to her are coming back. She says no and thanks him.

The task force finds out who Gaia is. Ressler and Samar go to the helicopter place and just miss him. "I’m a dead man walking thanks to Fukushima. It poisoned my innocent unborn son into someone people look at as if he’s a monster! Now, whoever dies from this, they’ve got it coming." Fun fact: from what I can find, nobody actually died from radiation poisoning following Fukushima. People died from evacuation, displacement. The earthquake and tsunami. I'm not entirely sure how this was supposed to poison his unborn son? Apparently his helicopter was flown into an unscheduled radiation venting. How does that...? Did his wife fly into it too? Does radiation poisoning get passed on? Like, genetically? Seems unlikely. Whatever.

Anyway, they can't scramble fighters or shut down the pipeline fast enough. But Aram hacks into the helicopter and can shut the rotor down. But he freezes.

“If I click on this, he’ll die. I’ve killed somebody once. I can’t take another life again.” Cooper hits the key like it's no big thing. Glad they were in the office instead of Aram alone in the back of a van or something.

Thank goodness all this happened or Gaia would have killed millions of people, probably. One good thing came out of the running/kidnapping.

Red meets with Maya (Gaia’s wife) in a diner. Needs her to contact her kid's doctor, who, incidentally, is also Kirk's doctor.

“My name is Raymond. I’ve been looking forward to meeting you, Skyler.”

Aw.

“They live in a delightful space somewhere between dreams and reality. They taste color, hear shapes, see sounds. We should all have such special needs.”

"There is a child. Her life hangs in the balance. I believe Skyler’s doctor could save her.”

It's interesting that they go with a special needs child's doctor, when they could have gone with an adult's doctor, to save the child, Agnes. As there's talk of doing a risky stem cell procedure on her. I think perhaps the writers left the door open to have something happen to Agnes and didn't walk through it. Aram comes in all chipper. Samar shuts that right down. “You made the wrong call today.”

She’s not wrong.

Liz: We talked about this! We agreed!

Tom: Yeah, on how you felt. I told you I disagreed.

Liz: What you didn’t tell me was that you were gonna do something about it. Instead, you went behind my back and did exactly what I told you not to do.

Tom: ...I’m not gonna fight with you about this, Liz! I did what I thought was best! And nobody is sorrier than me that it didn’t work!

Liz: Oh, no. I know someone who’s sorrier. Our daughter… who now, because of you, is God knows where. ...She's probably in the same spot, actually. You just can't see her now. And I doubt she even notices this is happening.

Reifler is taken at the end of this ep, after his house call. He’ll tell Liz that Kirk moves Agnes around anyway to keep Reddington from finding her.

There’s a deleted scene that fits in somewhere of Liz staring at her cellphone, willing the video link to reappear.

Meanwhile, the evil stepmother encourages Kirk to take the risk.

"I know you don’t want to. But you need to use the child.”

They really play up Kirk using her. And then never tell us for sure whether or not he used her. Lovely high stakes to nowhere.

At this point, I don’t think he did. He’s still got six months or so at this juncture. Well, maybe less. But he’s fine at the moment. I don’t think he’d use Agnes until it got super desperate. And she wouldn’t be a match to him anyway, apparently.

Red meets with Liz in his car. Tells her what it was all about, getting Skylar's doctor. “Owen Ayers and his son Skyler share a rare blood disorder. But Dr. Sebastian Reifler is one with a particularly relevant distinction. He treats both Skyler Ayers and Alexander Kirk. If we can get to his doctor, we can get to Kirk. We’re getting close, Lizzy.”

"I lied to you. You asked if Kirk had reached out, and I told you he hadn’t. That wasn’t true. He set up a link… a video feed so I could see Agnes.”

“How incredibly cruel.”

“Tom tried to trace the link, tried to find Agnes, but Kirk found out, and now, uh…”

“She’s gone.”

“I thought I could make it better, that I could protect my baby. I mean, that’s my one job… to protect my child. Make her feel safe at any cost.”

“To hold her. To tell her everything’s gonna be okay. But now because of me, because of what I’ve done, I can’t even do that.”

♪ How does this happen to us all? ♪

I include those lyrics cuz yeah. I haven't seen such a glaring parallel since Red and Liz sitting over the harbormaster's daughter.

Red is angry at Liz at the start of Miles McGrath. He's still stand offish in Gaia, though not as much after spilling the blood news to Liz at the end of McGrath. There's still distance between them, but he can't sit there and see that pain without having a reaction. Red snatches the doc.

Kaplan wakes up with a chain around her ankle.

#Gaia #rewatch 2017

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fairskyabove · 7 years ago

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What's wrong with the edmonton version of hadestown?

i have a Lot to say so i’m putting a full list of all the changes under the cut but tl;dr: a lot of the most important moments of the show are different and it’s really unclear what the messages of the show even are now, and it’s honestly hard to imagine this version going anywhere near broadway

first a note about the cast. this is of course subject to opinion (and i’m only going on audio, i have no idea if the staging and visual acting would change my opinion at all), but i thought this cast was overall weaker than the nytw cast. tv and reeve didn’t seem to have much chemistry, and both were weaker than nabiyah and damon vocally. kingsley as hermes is very different, his voice doesn’t have the same raspy quality and doesn’t seem to carry the same weight as the narrator, it doesn’t feel like he has the same knowledge of the direction of the story. i like the expanded chorus and hades’s workers, and i like the new fates. amber and patrick seem like they’re pretty much carrying the show, they have amazing chemistry and both are really strong vocally. it’s definitely possible that the cast got more comfortable after this audio, since all i’ve heard is the second preview, but from what i did hear the nytw cast was much stronger.

this list is really long but i’m sure i missed some stuff, so this isn’t like Officially all the changes. also if you don’t read the whole thing i understand bc it’s a lot but the most important part is the part about promises so i would look at that if i were you! also a lot of this discussion came from conversation with maya @davey-jacobsofficial so this is not all my own thoughts! ok here’s a (mostly) comprehensive list of things that were changed:

a shortened and slightly changed version any way the wind blows was moved to after road to hell, which is a little jarring in the flow of the story. i liked any way the wind blows as a sort of prologue, setting the mood before we get into the story. it established the fates as having knowledge and control, and it felt a little dream-like before we got thrown into meeting the characters. it doesn’t make a ton of sense to me to move it after but anyways

road to hell:

some minor lyric changes in the beginning

hermes introduces orpheus and eurydice differently (orpheus is described as singing to himself on the tracks waiting for someone like eurydice)

any way the wind blows:

there’s a man singing with the fates on some lines, i’m not sure who it is or what the point is (might be orpheus, and the intent might be more clear with visuals)

sister’s gone/brother’s gone verse is changed to “wind comes up, ooh do you hear that sound? wind comes up, move to another town”

hermes comes in after this verse and narrates, he explains eurydice’s character a little and there’s a new part where she asks if anyone has a match and then grabs something from someone, probably meant to show us that she can fend for herself and add a litttle context for all i’ve ever known

come home with me:

initial dialogue is different, eurydice seems more aggressive/closed off, orpheus asks her to make a home right there, she says it’s in the middle of nowhere. he claims spring is coming any day, she says it’s late, they go into “a singer, is that what you are?” and then into the song normally

lyrics from there on are almost the same, a few words changed every once in a while

epic i is completely cut, which i don’t understand at all because it’s kind of important for people who don’t know persephone’s story, and makes the epics less of a recurring thing through the whole story, and it ruins the element of orpheus singing about persephone and hades each separately and then finally together in epic iii

livin’ it up on top:

nothing is changed except the last line of orpheus’s toast, which is changed to “to the world we dream about, and the one we live in now,” which kind of changes his whole world view. in the old version, he showed his idealism, believing they could live in a perfect world that they dream of, which fits with his act 1 characterization. in this version he’s just stating that they don’t live in the world they want to, there’s no optimism and it takes away the whole significance of his toast

all i’ve ever known

no changes

way down hadestown

no changes

wind theme

some new dialogue where eurydice sees everyone else leaving and wants to do the same, orpheus doesn’t want to leave his home, and says it’s her home too. short reprise of the “wind comes up” section from any way the wind blows

epic ii

no changes

chant

added line for eurydice before “all the pretty songs you sing ain’t gonna shelter us” where she is getting caught in the storm, singing about the wind surrounding her and how orpheus promised the wind would never change which would be great build up for promises if they hadn’t ruined it

small lyric change in between verses, orpheus sings “a mighty king, a mighty queen” and hermes sings “this year their fighting made/the mightiest storm you’ve ever seen”

after the next verse eurydice sings “love, can you hear me now/answer if you can somehow/orpheus in all my years/never seen a storm like this” and then back into the normal “now i see/all the pretty songs you sing ain’t gonna harbor me…”

right after that hermes sings “eurydice was a hungry young girl/she was no stranger to the wind/but she had not seen nothing/like the mighty storm she got caught in. only took a minute/but the wrath of the gods was in it”

persephone’s verse after this has some lyric changes, mostly talking about how she doesn’t recognize hades anymore as the man she married

hey, little songbird

a couple words changed here and there, hades’s last part is changed to “hey, little songbird, look all around you/see how the vipers and vultures surround you/they’ll take you down/they’ll pick you clean/if you stick around such a desperate scene/see, people get mean/when the chips are down”

when the chips are down

no changes

gone, i’m gone

no changes

wait for me

no changes

why we build the wall

tempo is slightly faster, not sure why

the larger chorus sounds good, it’s more powerful

no lyric changes

our lady of the underground

no changes. thank god for amber gray

way down hadestown ii

no changes

flowers

no changes and honestly i’m surprised they didn’t screw this up too

come home with me ii

they cut “are you always this confident?/when i look at you i am” which was significant wrt doubt comes in and the fact that orpheus loses his confidence because he can’t see eurydice (creds to maya on this one)

papers

no changes

nothing changes

no changes

if it’s true

added a section where hades’s workers repeat orpheus’s message, then orpheus directly addresses the workers like a rebel leader with some added lyrics (i actually like this part, it shows the workers taking an interest and makes hades’s dilemna clearer)

how long

no changes, amber and patrick are trying their best to save the show

chant ii

added section for the workers before hades enters, after hermes’s introduction, wondering what will happen to orpheus, workers sing small parts throughout the song

there are no other changes on the audio i have, but apparently a section was deleted for later performances

epic iii

no changes

lover’s desire

no changes

alright some big structural changes here. right after lover’s desire there’s a new section of dialogue where eurydice tells orpheus to take her home, and says everything he said in act 1 was true (about spring coming etc), pretty much the opposite of what she says at nytw. orpheus says not everything he said was true, he said the wind would never change, etc, he basically takes eurydice’s lines from the first verse of promises and they’re spoken instead of sung. orpheus says he can’t promise the wind won’t change, eurydice says “don’t [promise], just take me home.” orpheus launches into the second half of promises, starting with “i have no ring for your finger.” orpheus sings his verse, eurydice sings hers, then they have another new section of dialogue. they agree to leave, eurydice asks how, orpheus suggests that they walk. eurydice asks about hades, orpheus says hades won’t be able to tell them no, and he isn’t going back alone. they sing their duet verse.

this change is the one i have the biggest issue with. by changing the order of the songs, we lose the moment where hermes tells them they have to trust each other completely and they realize they don’t. we lose a really important part of eurydice’s character, that she was able to speak up and tell orpheus what’s wrong. in this version she has no complaints, he has to tell her that he he isn’t perfect and he couldn’t keep his promises while she acts like he has no flaws. it takes away her agency in the relationship and makes it seem like she got lost and ended up in hadestown and had to wait patiently for orpheus to come save her, when there is So Much More to it than that. we also lose the entire part where they discuss all the ways they’ve let each other down and how they promise to move forward and do better. we lose the resolution of the issues that have been haunting in their relationship since chant, where they both grow up and they both realize that they can’t have the perfect relationship they talked about in wedding song, but they love each other enough that they’re ok with a realistic relationship (maya’s point). we’ve lost the feeling of hopelessness they had at nytw, from the fact that eurydice had literally sold her soul and believed she would be stuck in hell forever. in this version they act like all of the sudden they can just walk out. ultimately what we have in this version is an empty resolution with no build up. all the tension is gone, they never acknowledge anything that’s wrong in their relationship. instead they make empty promises to be together forever despite the fact that they made those promises before, and in this version nothing has changed since then. in the old version, promises added to the heartbreak of doubt comes in, because there’s a moment of clarity between them and they trust each other, they’re ready to move forward just in time to lose each other forever. taking promises away changes the flow of the whole show and makes orpheus and eurydice’s relationship a lot emptier and less mature, taking away from the tragedy of their story. thanks for coming to my TED talk.

word to the wise

no changes

his kiss the riot

no changes

wait for me ii

still starts with hermes giving the good and bad news (same basic meaning, just with slightly different words)

eurydice asks why orpheus can’t look at her, hermes tells her it’s the gods testing them, connecting the “divide and conquer” method to the wall. hermes asks them if they trust each other and themselves. they say they do without any reflection on their relationship or honestly any proof that they even love each other but it’s fine

orpheus asks if it’s a trick, hermes says it’s a test. the song continues like normal from there and we all pretend this part of the show carries the same weight as it did before even though everything’s wrong

doubt comes in

some lyric changes for the fates. now instead of orpheus and the fates singing “where are you, where are you now” it’s just the fates singing “where is she, where is she now” which is cool when you think about it as them planting doubt in orpheus’s head

orpheus sings an added section about how he can see his future with eurydice, one of the fates responds that his story sounds the same as the day eurydice left him for hadestown, there’s some more back and forth along these lines

eurydice’s comfort has some lyric changes but it’s mostly along the same lines

it’s hard to hear what they say when orpheus turns around, but they 100% took out “you’re early/i missed you” which i don’t even see the point of. it took like 5 seconds of the show and fit so well with the situation, it contrasted the relationships between orpheus and eurydice and hades and persephone, and it showed so perfectly their relationship dynamic! going back to maya’s point from earlier, it was so perfect in showing how much orpheus relies on eurydice for his confidence and how he can’t succeed without her! but i guess we’re taking out all the development of their relationship so we can focus on other things

road to hell

this now starts with hermes saying “alright…” and then taking a deep breath and saying it again as if he needs a minute or he’s trying to calm the audience or something? which i feel like is kind of out of character for him. at nytw, he definitely showed emotion when things weren’t going well for orpheus and eurydice, but i felt like his vibe was more “it sucks but this is how the world is” which is one of the big discussions in the show (does the song “nothing changes” ring a bell?) and it makes more sense for a god who’s been around since the beginning of time and seen all the other greek myths and how they end. i don’t think he would be shocked or panicked or whatever kingsley is doing here. especially considering that he obviously knows the end of the story way the whole time, so he always knows where we’re headed (that’s the whole point of “it’s an old song/it’s a tragedy/we’re gonna sing it again/it’s a sad song but we sing it anyway”), so i don’t know what this choice is supposed to tell us.

there are some lyric changes beyond that, mostly saying “that’s how it goes/that’s how it is” which contradicts his opening but it’s mostly along the same lines. he literally sings “we know how it ends, but still we sing it again” so what was he doing??

there’s an added line at the end where eurydice sings between hermes’s lines “orpheus was a poor boy but he had a gift to give,” asking if anyone has a match and grabbing something from someone exactly like in road to hell which maya thought might be like a flashback? which seems like the most likely thing but i don’t really understand why they added it there, it doesn’t seem like it fits, if anything it should be a flashback to orpheus at the beginning. unless that’s when orpheus and eurydice first see each other or something that’s only visual and we can’t hear it

i raise my cup

no changes, but apparently they moved this song to after the curtain call after this audio was recorded, which is honestly just stupid

if you made it through this i’m very impressed. in conclusion the edmonton version is trash and i have no idea what the creative team is thinking.

#this is. much longer than i planned but here you go #also tell me what you think it you've listened to it #hadestown #hadestown edmonton #Anonymous #ask box #this one's mine

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yuniesan · 7 years ago

Text

Girl Meets Season 5 -Episode 15 – Girl Meets a Single Moment [Part One]

Synopsis: What can you expect when you’re finishing high school? For Riley her entire world will turn upside down and picking up the pieces will bring her and her friends closer together.

[Previous Episodes]

A/N: So don’t kill me for the end of this.

Episode 15 – Girl Meets a Single Moment Part One

Riley couldn’t figure out how she got there, it was supposed to be a normal trip with friends and family. Except she was at the bottom of a ditch and her head hurt, and she’s pretty sure she broke her leg.

“Now I understand why dad hates skiing,” she said to no one in particular.

It had started snowing again and she was afraid that no one would find her. All she wanted to do was go for a walk while everyone else skied, she was walking down one of the paths and sat down to watch the snow fall. She tripped on the way back lodge and fell down a hill, only to find herself hurt and her phone broken.

------ Ten Hours Earlier ------

“Come on kids’ time to get up,” she heard her mother said and Maya rolled onto her.

Maya started throwing her hands in the air making Riley giggle before she rolled off and climbed off the bed. The girls all stood in the bathroom getting ready one by one, at six in the morning it was a lot of work when they were all half asleep. The guys were already dressed when they made their way downstairs. Since there were so many of them going on the trip Farkle’s father had chartered a bus for them all to ride up to the lodge. His parents were coming along but they had to go to a function the night before so they were going to meet them on the bus.

“Why are we awake so early,” Maya said before she sat down on the couch next to Smackle who was reading a book. “How are you not tired?”

“I wake up at this time every day,” Smackle answered.

Maya groaned before Lucas walked into the apartment carrying cups of coffee, with his dad and Zay behind him with bags of food and drinks.

“Breakfast is here,” her father said as he closed the door.

“Give me coffee,” Maya said glaring at Lucas.

They sat in silence as they ate, Riley ignored the coffee just so she could nap on the way to the resort. Everyone walked outside once they were done and waited until the bus pulled up. Riley yawned and Lucas just smiled at her like he knew that she wanted to fall asleep next to him.

“So Riley is sitting next to me,” her father said before Riley turned to him giving him the death glare. “Uh fine, you can sit next to him.”

“Come on Cory,” her mother said pulling him away. “We’re going to sit together… towards the front of the bus, away from a rowdy group of teenagers.”

“We’re not rowdy,” Maya said looking at them.

“Maya you just drank three cups of coffee, you’re going to be rowdy,” Shawn said walking over to them. “Now on the bus you all go.”

Lucas walked them to the farthest seats at the back of the bus, everyone else sat towards the middle or the front excited for the trip.

“I know you didn’t drink the coffee just so we could cuddle and sleep,” he said smiling at her.

“Well it reminds me of how we spent the trip back from the ski lodge the first time,” she said smiling.

“Riley that’s because you had been awake for two days straight and needed to get some sleep.”

“Yeah well it was still sweet.”

“Yes it was,” he said pulling a blanket over them. “Get some sleep, I’ll wake you up when we get there.”

“Okay,” she said snuggling herself up next to him. Lucas gave her a kiss on her forehead and rubbed her arm until it lulled her to sleep.

The trip to the ski lodge was four hours upstate, it wasn’t the Mount Sun Lodge, it was somewhere new without all of the memories that her parents had from years before. This was somewhere new where they could all make memories. Riley dreamt of long walks in the snow with Lucas, and building snowmen with Auggie and Ava, she dreamed of a night under the stars and hot cocoa with her friends. Most of all she wanted to find something that would commemorate the moment just like the last time.

They hadn’t known that she had left, she just wanted to go for a walk, Lucas said that he was going to surprise her with something. It sounded like something out of a movie, and she was excited about it, but he wanted to ski first and she hadn’t wanted to chance it because she was afraid of getting hurt. So she went for a walk, but the world wanted to torture her.

“Somebody help me,” she screamed out.

It was lunch time by the time they had reached the resort, they all had lunch before they got to their rooms, Riley was given her own room on the other side of the resort. Her father didn’t want her anywhere near Lucas, so her parents’ room was next to Lucas’s room. While Riley’s room was next to Josh, Farkle and his parents, Maya shared the suite along with Smackle and Cassie.

“My dad is crazy,” Riley said sitting on the couch in the sitting room.

“That he is,” Cassie said sitting next to her. “It’s almost as if he thinks you and Lucas are going to do something crazy.”

“He thinks they’re going to have sex,” Smackle said.

“She’s not wrong about that,” Maya said looking at her. “Not that Riley would do something like that before marriage.”

“Maya,” Riley yelled out.

“Yeah well we’re all thinking it, so it doesn’t matter, we’re all in relationships Riles, eventually it’s going to happen,” Maya said to her smiling.

“Can we not talk about this,” Riley said before getting up and going to her room her face flushing from the conversation they were having.

She wasn’t sure about sex, she knew that she wanted to wait, and yes maybe it won’t happen until she got married but it shouldn’t matter what they thought. She sighed as she walked through the door only to hear her phone beeping, to the sound of a cowboy, it was Lucas, she had put different ringtones for all of her friends, but his was something they had picked together.

Dinner, you and me tonight?

She smiled at the message, how are we going to have dinner if my dad is keeping us apart?

Her phone beeped, don’t worry it’s out in the open they’ll see where we are.

Her phone went off again before she could reply, Plus I have someone on my side.

Who’s that? she replied.

Your mom, your brother and Ava.

Riley laughed at the message, her father could try to keep them apart but in the end she had allies, and her mother thought her father was being too overprotective especially now that she was graduating from high school.

Okay, she replied smiling. She dialed Lucas’s number on her phone and waited for him to pick up.

“Hello,” he said she could hear the smile on his voice.

“Hi,” she said before laying down on the bed. “So does it feel like we’re some weird version of Romeo and Juliet?”

“Somedays, your dad has Maya’s parents near me, I’m bunking with Zay but it’s still kind of weird,” he said.

“So you want to have dinner?”

“Yes, but how?”

“The hotel has this sunroom, where you can see the stars, we’re having dinner there.”

“Sounds romantic.”

“The rest of the details are a secret, a surprise.”

“As long as it’s under the stars, like the first day we became a couple it will be perfect.”

“Okay, I’m going to ski for a while do you want to come with me?”

“Nope,” she said. “I’m going to go to the spa and maybe take a walk in the snow.”

“Okay, just be back by six for dinner.”

“Under the stars,” she said smiling.

They hung up, leaving Riley to her thoughts, when she walked back outside there was a note on table. The girls had gone skiing as well, she was the only one who wasn’t going to take the chance and go skiing. She didn’t really care, as long as everyone was having fun it was going to be alright.

Riley spent sometime in the spa getting her nails done, and a facial just for fun before going out on a walk. The flurries were lightly coming down around her, she walked towards the path that led towards the lake, it should be iced over but Riley just wanted to see how the snow looked on the trees. It looked almost magical, unlike in the city where the snow melted too fast, or turned black because there were so many cars. She stood there and looked out at the wonderland in front of her.

That was the reason why she hadn’t seen the root of the tree on the ground, it was the reason why she tripped over it. Her foot hit the root, making her tumble forward down the nearby hill and into the bank of snow at the bottom. Somewhere down the hill she cut her head, her leg twisted in an odd angle and hurt like the dickens.

And she was alone.

“That was a lot of fun,” Maya said smiling at them as they walked through the doors.

Lucas looked at his friend but felt like that there was one thing missing from it all, and that was Riley. He needed to get ready for their dinner, he had asked Farkle for help when the trip had been proposed because he knew that there was no way that he would be able to find a room like that anywhere.

The sun room was actually a part of a green house filled with flowers so he thought that it would be perfect for dinner, even if it was just a plain picnic but him and Riley never really cared about going to big fancy restaurants, their dates were always something that they would both enjoy.

“Hey have you guys seen Riley?” Mr. Matthews said walking towards them.

“No not since we left to go skiing,” Maya answered. “We left her in the room, and she wouldn’t go skiing anyway because you scared her for life.”

“She’s not in her room,” he said looking around at the teenagers. “The front desk told me she went out over an hour ago.”

“She told me that she was going to go to the spa, and then for a walk,” Lucas said looking at his girlfriend’s father.

“It’s started snowing again a while ago and they’re talking about it being a really bad storm,” Farkle said looking at them.

“We’ll have the front desk call the patrol unit to see if they can find her, but it’s getting dark out there,” Mr. Matthews said but Lucas’s ears felt as though they were being filled with water.

Everyone around him kept talking but he couldn’t hear a thing all he could think about was the fact that Riley was out there alone in the dark. He didn’t know what to do, every instinct told him to run out there and look for her. Zay’s hand was on him before he could move forward, everyone was looking at him worried because of Riley but also because they knew how he would react. They pulled him towards a couch and sat him down so they could talk, her parents, her brother, their friends, it was a second family to him and without Riley his heart wouldn’t be the same.

#girl meets season 5 #rucas fanfic #rucas fanfiction #riley matthews #RileyxLucas #lucas friar #don't hurt me for what I've done #ski lodge returns #i love them so much #i miss them so much #but it's a story and things happen

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kitsutoshi · 7 years ago

Text

When you know better...do better.

With the new year about to start, I’m thinking about resolutions. Things to change. To quote Maya Angelou “I did then what I knew how to do. Now that I know better, I do better.”

But I’m having trouble with that. A lot of the time I don’t do better.

Of course I want to “be the change I want to see in the world.” But I also don’t want to introduce myself with my pronouns, because it feels weird, and the phrase “I am too old for this” plays in my head. I understand that there’s some kind of thing about plastic straws being awful, but I’ve not read the articles and haven’t turned down a straw yet. I’m still struggling to understand cultural appropriation (at least grayer aspects of it) and while I’m not buying any “Hot Buddhist Monk” Halloween costumes, I find myself thinking “how much does this really matter?” when YES it matters. I think most people would agree it’s worse to knowingly do bad things than to accidentally or unknowingly do them. I like to think I’m a good person…but this is some bullshit.

And not just me, I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one who knows better but screws up anyway. If that wasn’t true then there would be no Doritos.

Right now we’re watching the long-overdue tipping point with sexual harassment, thanks largely to the #MeToo movement. We’re tossing flawed men out of positions of responsibility as if it’s going out of style. And we’re vilifying them. In some cases, for mistakes made back when those actions were the norm. In other cases it’s dick pics. Men fighting the tide of history. Men who knew better, or had no excuse not to, but who propositioned those teenaged girls, those women at work. Men who knew better, but grabbed women’s butts anyway.

And when I look at history, it’s filled with people who seriously had to know better (slavery? really?) but who just kept doing wrong. Even people “on the wrong side of history” who definitely knew better.

I think we can all relate to knowing better but doing worse. So how do we weigh that? How do we handle all of this?

I’ve engaged in discussions this year about how to honor historical heroes who were also deeply flawed people “by modern standards.” If we judge historical people by what we now generally agree is wrong (slave owners are a great example) then we lose the good with the bad. Thomas Jefferson, American hero…and terrible person who surely knew it was wrong to own people.

We’re also losing the good they’ve done (anyone feel like binging the Cosby Show?). We have to figure out what to do with the artistic works, awards, philanthropy, invention…everything.

So should we toss the baby with the bathwater? And how do we think about those folks, past and present? How do we think about ourselves? What wrongs are enough to write a person off completely?

So here we are, headed inexorably into the next New Year. I’m considering resolutions, I want to “do better.” I have a list of things I now know (or maybe haver for a long while) and I want to behave better. But what if I don’t? This issue is personal. I can’t think “yeah, that Thomas Jefferson guy…” or “Dammit Al Franken!” without also thinking “and you.” I’m no different than any people who didn’t “do better.”

We know that some social ills will only be fixed by waiting for a generation or two to die. Young people who are “woke” waiting for older racist/sexist/homophobe/etc bigots to just die off and take their crufty views and behaviors with them. Because change is hard. People know better all day long, and don’t do better.

So it’s hard. But is that an excuse? (spoiler: no, no it isn’t).

So what are some of the things people debate “overlooking?” because of “the times they lived in?” Owning slaves. Harassing behavior that might have been the norm but was never ok. There’s this idea that if something was common that we should just understand and give people a bye. I’m not so sure.

When I use a microscope, what I can see is a whole lot of people who knew clearly, long before the Civil War, that slavery was wrong. Otherwise the Underground Railroad would have been to nowhere. I see a lot of HR seminars on harassment and hostile work environment, laughed off by guys who didn’t want to change.

When recycling became a thing, young people were all over it. There are plenty of Baby Boomers who throw away water bottles every day. There are young people who would carry an empty plastic bottle across the earth to recycle it. And there are people in between, who recycle if it’s convenient. Do we give a pass to the individual boomers who can’t find a blue bin with both hands and a map, because it’s a “function of the times?”

Where am I going with this?

My dearest hope is that humanity will continue to advance. That the future will bring more social evolution. More cooperation, less competition. More selfless behavior, less profiteering. More live-and-let-live and less authoritarianism. I’d like to think that humanity will eventually produce the Federation of Planets.

The best example I can think of where a sea-change is coming but we’re not yet at a tipping point is eating meat. It seems likely that in the future, people won’t eat meat from real animals anymore. Lab-grown real meat may be a thing, or good sense will have prevailed and folks will eat vegan, or just flat-out overpopulation will make meat a thing of the past. I eat meat. I know better. I have the means to eat well without meat, and I don’t. I try to source my meat from local farms with high ethical standards. But not always. But someday there will be whole generations of people who wouldn’t even contemplate killing an animal to make a meal. How will they look at us?

If you speak to any not-deranged human being and say “is torturing an animal ok?” The answer is unequivocally no. Absolutely no. But we rationalize. We do it for medical science. We definitely do it for food. We wear leather but not fur. We eat pigs but not dogs. Ugly animals don’t count.

But those people will look back at us in bafflement and disgust. If we did awesome things, maybe won a Nobel Prize, or twelve Olympic medals…they will still look at us as “meat eaters.”

What I’m looking for is a litmus test. I’m no pinnacle of human perfection, there’s a lot going on that needs fixing here. And our ancestors were the same. People who knew damned well and good that women should be able to vote, but who went along with the social order of abuse and oppression. Nazis. Slave owners. War profiteers. Pussy grabbers. Casting-couch sleaze.

But many of those people (not the Nazis) did great things. Art, literature, war heroism, writing Constitutions. We want to know those things right?

What would I want for future folk to think of me? Not that I’m likely to be remembered in a hundred years, but if some future schoolchild does look back at my life, what do I want for them to think? What would Thomas Jefferson want for me (and us) to think of him?

These are some answers I would give (TJ will have to speak for himself):

1. If I’m making mistakes (and history suggests that we all do that) then I’d like to be forgiven those. If I really think I’m doing a good thing, but later hindsight says “nope,” future people please give me a pass. I offer the same to people in my rear-view mirror.

2. When I already know better…How would I like to be viewed for that? When I refuse a major change with measurable benefit to the world, in favor of personal convenience or preference. I’m the modern equivalent of the “nice” slave owner who knows it’s wrong so he makes sure that his slaves have good housing and food. I’m a “product of my time” where most people who can afford to will eat meat every day. So even though vegans exist and ethics matter, I eat meat. When I look forward and think of those future great-great-great-great grandchildren looking back at me, I can’t meet their eyes. If they need to dismiss whatever good I’ve done out of disgust for the things I do knowingly wrongly, I can’t blame them for that. I know better, but I don’t do better. My hope is that the problem (be it meat or something else) solved itself when a few generations died off, maybe including me and mine.

3. But what if I didn’t know, but I reallllly should have? What if I’d never watched any PETA videos, never read Temple Grandin’s book. What if I grew up without knowing how food comes to fork? Some forms of Christianity differentiate between a sin committed knowingly, and one committed without knowledge. Purgatory was invented because it wasn’t fair to think of all of those non-Christian souls burning in hell just because they never even had the opportunity to be forgiven. Modern criminal law differentiates some types of offenses based on intent. But I don’t know how I feel about those historical people who thought they were “protecting” women by treating them as voteless property. I know that I’ve been confronted with ideas that I just haven’t had time or inclination or energy to deal with. For example, the concept of “implicit bias” didn’t really land in my consciousness until this year, even though I had heard of it years ago. It didn’t hit me with enough impact to motivate any effort on my part until recently. But I could have learned it at any time. The information was available to me. I guess I’m not that forgiving. Willful ignorance isn’t an excuse to me. Your mileage may differ. I hold myself accountable for things I chose not to know, at least things it would have been easy to know. There’s a scale. I’m ok with future people thinking “she used STRAWS?! But didn’t she see those headlines on Facebook?” I hope they’ll cut a little slack for a primitive progenitor if the information wasn’t readily available, but if it was looking me in the face, that’s on me.

I don’t know how Thomas Jefferson would feel about this. Or Winston Churchill. My best guess is that they would feel as I do. A Golden Rule situation. If I would want for my progeny to forgive me for something, maybe I should forgive the same things.

Applying those rules of thumb: Sexual harassment and abuse in the workplace. It’s never been ok. Women have taken men to HR or court over this crap since women have worked. No one younger than 90 should be able to plead ignorance that work isn’t the place to get handsy or to talk about sex or to try to get a date with your subordinate. But men who knew better sure haven’t done better. Many have, but many have not. No one is getting a pass.

We fought a war in this country in which slavery was the primary or a collateral issue (depends on who you ask). Plenty of people knew perfectly well that it was wrong…but many people who knew better did worse. I vote no passes.

There are a lot of vegetarians and vegans around. And people still make fun of them. I think most of us know that’s really right-action and that our meat-eating isn’t. I’ve also seen a lot of humor to the effect that vegans and vegetarians are on a high horse (riding, not eating) and shouldn’t look down at the rest of us. But I see two things there:

When you’ve seen better and done better, maybe it’s ok to express that there’s something others should wake up to. Why would we NOT want that? Lots of people go to church specifically to be reminded to do better.

Maybe when you’ve walked a lot of miles being made fun of for ethical uprightness, reminders come out less like “hey, there’s something to consider” and more like “wtf is wrong with you?”

We should want that reminder. We should want to wake up to what we’re doing wrong. But when you’re around someone who you know is doing better, it feels like being judged. Which all of us hate. We think of ourselves as good people, but we know we’re doing bad things, and people doing better just remind us of that. We judge ourselves. Then we thrash, to avoid those feelings.

It’s galling, isn’t it. When you know you’re choosing worse, and someone else has chosen better? We want to keep doing the thing we do, but we don’t like to think of ourselves as bad. So we weasel and manage our cognitive dissonance. From inventing religions that give us “absolution” so we can keep on sinning, to making fun of vegans to avoid the idea that they’re right. We compound our wrongs with more wrongs.

Right now we have a society where people who do better are actively mocked by people who do worse. “Social justice warrior” is somehow an insult (!!?). It sounds like something that should be the highest possible praise. Its as if the bullies all won, and decent people are getting shoved into lockers. Only we’re all the bullies too, on one subject or another.

So “know better…do better” right? There’s no pass for failure. Of course it’s easier to do things when everyone else is doing them too. But sometimes we’re the first generation to know better. We still have to do it. We may someday figure out how to handle the artistic, scientific, philosophical, and other goods created by slave-owners, harassers, abusers, profiteers, and others. I hope we do. I’m going to use the “what would future progeny think?” litmus test. And if “they’d think I was scum of the earth,” that seems fair. If I knowingly do something wrong, just because everyone else is doing it too, I shouldn’t get a pass.

Here’s the main step I plan to take this year. I’d like to confront my irritation. My blind spots. Find my cognitive dissonance. I may not manage to do better in some respects (burgers) but I’m going to face that head one. No pats on the back. Conscience turned up to 11. No passes given to myself if that future society wouldn’t give me one. When I know better, I will own it when I don’t do better. The world needs that.

#knowbetterdobetter #progress #blindspot #resolutions

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drawingsanddrabbles · 8 years ago

Text

Joke’s On You

I DIDNT MISS AN UPDATE WHAAAAAAAAT

betaed of course by @ilovebeingintroverted

guuys my fav scene the SCENE(TM) that i worte the fic for is in this chappie

Chapter ... whichever one this is (Seven I think...): I’m Not Batman, I Have Friends

links

Titans Tower stood on a small island off of the shore of San Francisco. It was a large T, built with silver steel; its windows were shaded and seemed tinged blue although they were clear from the inside. It was fortified, had some of the best security on the planet but still got destroyed every fifth Tuesday and is home to some of the world’s most annoying teenaged superheroes in Damian’s opinion. Of course, though, most of them are no longer teens.

Damian hadn’t been here in over eight years.

Colin put a hand on his shoulder. He didn’t need to say anything, he knew that the hand is comfort to Damian enough, but he spoke anyway, leading his friend towards the door. “C’mon. They’re waiting.”

Every step Damian wanted to turn back. The first ten years of his life he grew up in a world of ‘kill or be killed’ and every now and then his survival instincts of ‘fight or flight’ would spring back up—like now. Right now. Right now when they were screaming for him to run, run as far as possible because he shouldn’t be here. He lost all right to be here when Tim became Robin and he started acting like an asshole, even if he didn’t own up to it at the time.

They sat at the top of the T in the middle. The room there was the large common room which is also used as a debriefing room and lounge. The couches were facing away from the door, which was good as everyone is sitting down and therefore sitting with their backs to where Damian and Colin entered. If they’d seen him coming well… Damian could take a Kryptonian-Human hybrid and an Amazonian but Speedsters he always had some trouble with, especially when he had to deal with the other two. Traya, Maya, and Jon stood opposite the couch, Jon’s eyes lit up when Damian walked in which confused some of his younger teammates.

“Jon, what-“ Cassandra Sandsmark said, her voice was a little deeper than it had been so many years before. Damian could see her blonde hair and red shirt as she leaned against the couch. Bartholomew Allen and Conner Kent sat on either side of her. The speedster seemed to be shorter than his friends and he wasn’t constantly vibrating anymore which Damian assumed was a credit to his age.

“We told you that you were here because of something important,” Traya began, as gently as she could.

“But since it’s of a…” Jon continued.

“Bat nature,” Traya supplied.

“We have decided that it would be best if Nightwing was here to tell you.” Damian had just about reached the couch about then. At his moniker the three Teen Titans jumped up, fists balled, and anger rising.

Jon, Traya, and Maya, put hands on their teammates’ shoulders. “You all need to hear this.” Colin insisted.

The clone half-brother of Jon growled. Damian could feel his tactile telekinesis vibrating in the air near his body. “We should beat you to a pulp.”

“Believe me, Clone Boy-“

“Don’t-call me that!”

“-I would not have come, but this is important and… you may want to be sitting down for this.” Damian walked to the other side of the couch, back facing the window as his friends’ were.

The three of them looked between themselves before warily sitting. There were some chairs set up and the five older Titans sat opposite their youngers.

Damian wasn’t quite sure where to begin. “Something has… happened.”

“Just spill it ‘Wing, then you can be on your way and we can all go back to our lives.” Cassie snapped, arms crossed.

“I’m afraid, Sandsmark, that there will be no ‘going back to our lives’ after this.” Damian stated just as crossly as Cassie had. He took a deep breath.

“Then stop screwin’ around and tell us already!” Bart imput.

“Timothy Drake is alive.” Damian said.

There was a silence. At first it seemed proper, as it did take some time to process that a once dead family member and friend was now living, but then the silence continued. And continued. And continued.

When one of the three of them finally spoke it was the Amazonian. She let out a sob, tears trickling down her cheeks. “Do-do you think this is a joke?”

Damian exchanged a confused look with his friends. “I don’t understand.”

“Do you think we’re a joke?” She let out a scream and flew at Damian sending the two of them flying into the bulletproof-but-not-shatter-resistant window that served as a wall. A loud crack resounded as Damian’s head hit the glass. She held him up with one hand and pulled back the other and punched him across the face, which resulted in another crack this one sounding harder than the first had. “How dare you! How dare you come in here and terrify us and then lie to us! And about Tim!” She hit him again. Jon stood and grabbed her by the collar of her red shirt, yanking her back so hard that she flew into the ground, sprawling. Jon caught Damian (he’d been held some feet above the floor) and drifted him to the ground. Both Bart and Conner were standing now, furious. “HOW DARE YOU!” Cassie roared.

“It’s not a lie!” Colin said. “I saw him myself! He’s real. He’s alive.”

“How?”

“Gr-Ra’s Al Ghul revived him and hid him for years. It was only recently that we even knew he was alive.”

“How recently?” Conner demanded.

Damian didn’t meet their eyes. “A day or two.”

“A day or two.” Cassie repeated. “You’ve known that Tim was alive for a day or two and you didn’t tell us?”

“We wanted Damian to tell you and he and Colin needed to return to Gotham-“ Traya explained, but Wonder Girl was having none of it. She scrambled to her feet and stormed out of the room, Bart and Conner zipped after her.

“Well, that was less of a disaster than it could have been.” Maya said optimistically.

“Jon and I should go talk to them.” Colin said. “They like us best.”

Jon nodded in agreement. “Maybe we can calm them down.” He added.

Traya nodded, rubbing her eyes wearily. “I’ll go get the jet ready for take off, no doubt they’ll want to see Tim as soon as possible.

“Are you alright, Damian?” Maya asked. Damian was sure that he had a bump on the back of his head and he had definitely heard something crack in his jaw, which probably wasn’t good, but with adrenaline still running through his system he felt fine. He told Maya so. She nodded and she offered that she and Damian could help with prepping the jet. So the five set off on their missions, it was time to bring Tim’s friends to him.

“You don’t deserve to be Robin! You never have!”

“Damian-“ Jon tried to calm his friend, laying a hand gently on the older man’s shoulder before Damian shrugged it off violently.

“Robin was my title! You haven’t the training! You haven’t the intellect! And you haven’t the blood!” Damain roared.

“Oh, right! I forgot!” Tim yelled back, throwing his arms out in anger. “I’m not a Wayne. You telling me that over and over for the past year hadn’t made it sink in yet! I’m so sorry that I stole your vacated mantle! You aren’t Robin anymore and that was the reason I became Robin in the first place! I became Robin ‘cuz after you left Batman went off the rails! He needed a Robin and I just happened to come along. I’m sorry that I wasn’t born a Wayne, I’m sorry that my blood isn’t blue, but, you know what Damian? Me being Robin? It’s all your fault! If you hadn’t left I never would have become him so if you want someone to blame, blame your fucking self! And yeah, I may not have the smarts you consider necessary of Robin, but I found out who you and your Dad were pretty quickly so suck on that!” Tim stormed out the door and slammed it to the sound of Damian bellowing back his response.

Useless, I’m fucking useless! Tim pushed past his friends (the ones who weren’t still in the infirmary from the last mission. The ones Tim had failed) who had been eavesdropping on the fight. Bart called out to him but he ignored the speedster and marched off to his room. Slamming the door, because it seemed to be one of the only helpful ways to get out his anger, he threw himself onto the bed. Useless. Useless. The words swam around in his brain. Each of them said in a different tone of voice but the voice itself was clearly Damian’s. Tim squeezed his welling eyes shut, hoping that the sob climbing in his throat wouldn’t escape.

It did.

Tim shuddered with the sob, hands clenched into his pillow with such force that they began to shake.

Useless. Useless. Useless.

Tim was useless. It was his fault. All of it was his fault. It was his fault that Kon was in the infirmary. It was his fault that Maya might never be able to walk again. It was his fault that the bad guy got away. Damian was right, he didn’t deserve to be Robin. He never deserved to be Robin.

Tim hadn’t heard the knocking, but he did hear the door open. Tim sprang up and quickly wiped his face, hoping whoever it was didn’t see the streaks that marred his face, or the wet spot on his pillow case.

“Robin?” Oh. Traya. Tim ignored her, he heard her walk forward softly. “You left your mask…” She didn’t finish her sentence. This wasn’t the first time that Damian and Tim had fought like this, and it certainly wasn’t the last. This fight in particular had hit a soft spot for Tim, and he’d thrown his mask down before Damian had tried to attack him the first time (Colin and Jon had held him back). “Robin?” Maybe if Tim ignored her she’d go away.

It wasn’t that he had anything against Traya. In fact, he liked her a lot. She and Jon were great. That was when they weren’t siding with Damian in a fight. Granted many times they abstained from joining the arguments and just moderated and did damage control but… oh. That was what this was. Traya was doing damage control.

“Tim?” All of the older heroes in the Titans knew Tim’s real name, it came with the whole being friends (or at least allies) of the family for a long time.

“I’m fine, Traya. Go away.”

But Traya sat down next to him on his bed, and held out the dark green mask for Tim to take. “Want to talk?”

“No.”

“Tim…” He hated when she used that tone of voice on him. Like he was her little brother, like he was her responsibility.

“I said I’m fine.”

“Damian was wrong.”

That was… unexpected.

“Damian was wrong, and you were right to argue with him.”

Then why didn’t you back me up?

“… say something?” She asked softly when he remained silent.

“Why didn’t you back me up?”

“Because I’ve learned the hard way that arguing with Damian will almost never get you anywhere.”

Tim took the mask but didn’t look at her.

“But that’s not an excuse. I should have backed you up. I’m sorry.”

“Why would you anyway? You’re one of them.” Tim spat.

“Them?”

He shouldn’t have said that. “Never mind.”

“No, Tim, obviously this is really important to you. What do you mean ‘them’?” She asked kindly.

“You know… a blue blood.” The second half was muttered, but he knew that Traya had heard him.

“Blue blood? You mean…” There was a pause, and then a gasp. “Tim, oh Timmy. Look at me.” Tim wouldn’t. “I said look at me.” Tim glanced up at her. At her big blue eyes, and her tilted lids, and her long dark lashes. She looked… sad. Tim didn’t like that expression so he looked away.

Traya got down on her knees, and bent so that she was right in front of Tim’s face. She wiped a hand across his cheek, running her fingers over the tracks his tears had made on his face. “Feel my face.”

“What?”

“Feel it. Feel my hands, my arms, my legs.” Tim hesitantly touched her face. “Tim, what do you feel?”

“Skin?” What on Earth could Traya be getting at?

“Exactly. Feel that again, Tim. Do you feel the muscles? Feel my lips, my hair. Those are cells. Living, breathing, human cells.”

Oh.

“Tim, blood has nothing to do with being a superhero. I’m not an android. I was not created by my father, but I love him. I still work with him as a hero. I helped create and sustain a team. I was trained with Damian and Jon and Colin. I created my own wind manipulators and I taught Maya and Damian everything they know about hacking. Tim, I am a hero. And not because I am the daughter of Red Tornado. Not because I have his blood, or lack thereof, running through my veins. I’m a hero because it’s who I am, and it’s who you are too. Tim, blood has nothing to do with it. Sure, maybe Maya and Jon and Damian and Bart are related to their superhero mentors-“

“And Kon, and Cassie.”

“How are Kon and Cassie related?”

“Kon is the son of Superman, Traya. And Cassie is a friggin’ demigod.”

“Okay. I’ll give you them. But the point is Tim, it doesn’t matter who your parents are. Colin’s parents weren’t superheroes. My original ones weren’t either. Tim, it doesn’t matter who your parents are because blood does not a hero make. Tim, you are Robin. You are a good Robin. You’re kind, something Damian had to work for, you’re smart, something I think Damian still has trouble with.” she said lightly. Tim didn’t laugh so she continued. “You’re a good fighter, and a good leader.”

“But I’m not. Kon is hurt and Maya-“

“Even good leaders have bad days, Tim. You can’t save everyone. But no one is dead, and that’s always a plus in my book.” Tim couldn’t hold her eye contact so he looked away, a blush crawling up his neck. “Tim, you are the perfect Robin for this team. And I’ll stick by that until I die. Even in front of Damian.” Then she hugged him.

“Ew! Traya! Get off!”

“Not until you value your own worth.”

“Okay! Okay! I value my own worth! Now get off me!” Traya giggled and released him.

“Ready to go see your friends? They saw how upset you were. They’re worried about their Robin.”

“Yeah, okay.” Tim stood and put his mask back on his face.

“Tim, you know you can always talk to me, right?”

“Yeah, I know. Thanks Trays.”

“Anytime.”

New rule, Tim thought to himself as he blinked awake blearily, no more being blown up. The pain in his back had dulled some but he was still sleeping a lot as he had no distractions and the pain went away when he was unconscious.

Bruce had switched out his morphine drip at some point with a new one, but Tim barely used it. He disliked the painkillers. He slowly moved into a sitting position, having a back where any type of pressure put on it hurt was very tedious.

In his current state he couldn’t get out of the cell much less fight and kill the Joker. Staying to heal wasn’t an option either, they were almost ready and no one would listen to Tim which meant that Bruce would still patrol one night soon, and then he wouldn’t come home.

Jason Todd had come to see him multiple times; apparently he’d been grounded and was very bored over the weekend. He was rash, impulsive, but a very good fighter. He wasn’t the detective Bruce was, nor was he the assassin that Damian was, but he was determined to be a good Robin and determination went a long way. One time he and Cass had sparred in the hallway on the other side of Tim’s glass cell wall. Jason hadn’t beaten Cass, but he was good, Tim had to admit. He fought like he seemed to live, with a sense of spite towards the world and with a resolve to win.

Tim was glad that Jason had been in replacement, he was glad that Cass had been Steph’s too. They both fit the part. Bruce needed them.

Alfred knocked on the glass politely, and Tim raised an eyebrow before standing, walking over to greet the butler. “Yes?” He asked.

“Sir, some visitors have come. I have been told to take you to them. I ask that you do not struggle, I wish you no harm Master Timothy.”

“I understand, Alfred.” Tim said with a nod.

Alfred unlocked the door and Tim raised his hands in surrender as he stepped out. “Sir, I am sorry about the conditions we have kept you in-“

“No, it’s understandable Alfred. I’m not… how I used to be and I’m healing. It’s smart that you keep me there, I can’t escape.”

“Sir, I have to ask you to walk in front of me.”

“I understand.” Tim repeated. And he truly did. Treating him like an enemy made sense, it really did. They didn’t want him to escape and kill the Joker. It was annoying, but Tim would have done the same thing if he was in Bruce’s position.

He walked slowly at first, gauging how much pain he took with each step, slowly he walked faster and faster until he was moving at a normal speed his face masking his pain. They walked through the Cave and into one of the training rooms; acrobatic equipment, mats, Tim knew that the blank wall on his left was really retractable and covered an arsenal of weapons. Tim wondered if his bo staff was still in its place…

Damian stood in the room, he sat on a balance beam, long lean legs reaching the ground. His back bent in a very un-Damian way, it almost looked like he was slouching. He was wearing his Nightwing costume. “Really? What, you’re going to fight me?” Tim stuck his lower lip out, in a mock-pout. “But Damian, I’m in pain.”

Damian said nothing.

“Really? Are you just going to stand there? You know, I do the whole staring-not-talking thing better than you.”

He still said nothing. Instead the door behind Tim opened. He turned. Huh, when did Alfred leave? The three people who had entered were friends of Damian’s, old Titans. Jonathan Kent, Flamebird, he wore his costume too, in fact all three of them did. Tim felt a little under-dressed. Colin, Abuse, stood behind Jon. Maya, NoBody, walked over to Damian and sat next to him on the beam. She took off her mask, holding it under her arm.

“Really? What is this? An intervention?”

No one still said anything, they all just continued to stare.

Tim crossed his arms over his chest, ignoring the buzz of pain from the healing skin he was stretching. “Interventions work better when you talk.”

Jon and Colin sat with their backs to one of the walls, eyes continuing to look at Tim. Tim frowned, what were they trying to do? Get him to talk? Annoy him? And where was Traya? She wasn’t here, was she staying with the Titans?

“Is there a point to this? Is the point that you’re not allowed to talk?” He asked. Damian gave a small nod. Why wouldn’t they be allowed to talk? Well, they could apparently answer him through nods, or did Damian just slip up?

The door opened again and Traya walked in, she glanced at Tim her eyes lighting up slightly. She gave him a small smile, then she held open the door.

They walked in, each glaring at the elder Titans. Cassie walked in first; she froze when she saw him. Conner was next; he let out a small gasp. Finally Bart walked through; he looked around the room in that hyper way of his before his eyes finally settled on Tim. In a blink of an eye he had tackled Tim, slamming his back against the floor to which Tim wanted to cry out, but he was too busy hugging the speedster. His other friends soon were on him too.

They were all crying and talking at once, Tim’s head was slowly feeling the pain from his back more and more, it dug into his mind and distracted him from what they were saying. He pushed Bart off of him and sat up, back relieved of pressure he could give his full attention to him.

Cassie was bawling, her arms around him. Conner was crying too but given that both Cassie and Bart were holding Tim he didn’t really have space to join. He just held Tim’s face in his hands, staring into his eyes. They were all talking and it was mainly babble about how much they loved him, how much they never thought they would see him again, how glad they were he was alive.

Oh god, his friends were here. Conner didn’t look that much older than he did at sixteen, but his voice was deeper. His eyes were so blue and filled with tears. Then there was Cassie who was kissing his face, and whispering how much she’d missed him and how she was so glad he was back, her face was streaked from crying and her blonde hair was wild. Then Bart, tiny Bart had gotten so much taller and wider, his shoulders and chest had filled out and his hair had been tamed—cut to a normal length as opposed to the mop he’d had for so long, and he was just hanging onto Tim so tightly that Tim didn’t think he would ever let go. God his friends, they were all alive and they were okay. Tim didn’t even know he was crying.

Eventually his friends ran out of things to say and the four of them just sat in a pile on the floor. The tears never really dried, every time they looked at one another a new flood would roll down their faces. They held one another as if that was the only thing that mattered, because it was, Tim was back. That was all any of them could process for a long time.

Finally a conversation rose again. “How-how did you…?” Cassie tried to ask.

“Ra’s. He brought me back.”

Conner let out a laugh, “You know, I might ask Ma to make a pie for him as a thank you.” He joked.

Bart was holding Tim’s hand, he wouldn’t let go, as if he stopped touching Tim he would disappear. Tim didn’t mind that much though. “Areyoulivingokay? YouknowwealwayshavemoreroomattheToweryoucouldcomebackandlivewithusifyouwantedtoImean-“

Tim laughed. He hadn’t heard Bart speak that fast in so long, it was good to be back. “I’m good, Bart. But I’d love to come visit maybe.”

“You can always come. Always.” Cassie promised.

“How have you guys been? Save the world much?”

Conner shook his head. “We want to hear about you. How long have you been back? Why are you here? How-?”

“What’s on your back?” Bart interrupted. “And why aren’t you wearing a shirt?” Tim looked down at his clothes; he had forgotten that his chest was bare. He didn’t wear a shirt because Alfred wanted to make sure that he was healing well, and because of the frequency that his bandages had to be changed. While they had been talking he had almost forgotten about his pain, but now that he was once again aware of it it had gotten worse. He subtly took as deep of a breath as possible; he didn’t want them to know how much pain he was masking right now.

Bart let go of his hand for less than a second so he could move to get a better look at Tim’s back using his super speed. “What happened to you?” He cried. He instantly began checking Tim for other injuries. Conner and Cassie both moved so that they could see his back before having similar reactions.

“So, I may have been blow up a little.” Tim explained meekly.

“You were what?” Cassie stood and stomped over to where Damian sat (Tim had almost forgotten that he was there). “You said he was safe here! You said that he was fine! What did you do?”

“Cassie, they didn’t do anything to me!” Tim said. Damian wouldn’t look her in the eye. She scowled but didn’t attack instead, she went back to sit down next to Tim. “It was the Riddler’s fault, really, I’m fine. Just a little banged up.” Tim promised. Cassie still didn’t look happy.

“You look so much older.” Kon mumbled. “Your voice is lower, your hair is longer-“

“Idon’tlikeit.” Bart input.

Tim rolled his eyes. “Do you remember your old hairstyle?”

“I shaved it!”

Tim laughed remembering the fiasco where his friend, in a bout of impulsiveness (what else was new), had indeed shaved his wild hair, and the rest of his head. To make is not seem suspicious that both Kid Flash and Bart Allen had shaved their heads he was required to wear a wig while he was Bart until it grew back to an inconspicuous length.

No one spoke for a minute and Tim glanced at the silent Titans around them. “So… why aren’t they speaking?” He asked.

Conner glared at the elder heroes. “They aren’t allowed to talk.” He said.

“… Why?”

“They decided to keep your living a secret from us, they also wanted to observe us, make sure we didn’t… I don’t know, hurt you or something, we said that they weren’t allowed to talk.” Cassie explained.

Oh, no. Tim didn’t respond, but he looked at Damian. He saw how Damian glanced at the three Titans then at him, warily. They weren’t here to protect Tim from them, they were here to protect them from Tim. He was worried that Tim would, what? Bring them to the dark side? Was he worried that Tim was a sleeper agent of Ra’s? No, then he wouldn’t be trying to protect Tim from the League of Assassins.

“Tim? You okay?” Conner asked, nudging Tim.

Tim blinked. “Sorry, what?” He saw his friends’ worried faces and put on a smile. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just zoned out for a second.”

Cassie began telling him a story about something that had happened with her friend Cissie (one of the Green Arrow’s old co-workers who had retired to become an Olympic Archer). Afterwards Conner mentioned an off-world mission he’d had with Superman and soon Tim’s friends were telling him about everything he’d missed in the past six years, some of which Tim knew (be it from searching the internet after he escaped the League or from newspapers that Talia and Ra’s so graciously supplied him while under their care), some of which he didn’t.

Tim laughed when he was supposed to, gasped when appropriate, was sympathetic. He watched as his friends’ eyes lit up, appreciating his reactions to their stories and continued talking. Tim liked when they talked, he liked when he didn’t have to hear himself. Plus, he didn’t really want to tell them what he’d been doing the past few years. He didn’t want them to worry. He didn’t want them to know.

“Why don’t you come back with us?” Cassie asked at one point.

Tim shook his head, ducking it to hide his flush. “I have things to do here.”

“It’ll just be for a little while- just until you’re healed.” Tim glanced at Damian whose mouth had formed a firm line.

“Nah, it’s okay. But I promise, as soon as I’m free I’ll come visit.” Tim lied. The truth was he’d probably never get that far, either he’d die trying (or succeeding) to kill the Joker, or he’d be put in jail.

And his friends wouldn’t want anything to do with him.

There was a gentle knock on the door which interrupted Bart who zipped over to open it. Alfred stood at the other side. “Apologies Masters, but Doctor Thompkins is here. Shall I ask her to wait?”

Tim looked at Damian who stood, staring at his adoptive brother. Tim didn’t want to go, he really didn’t. But he knew that look on Damian’s face, Damian wanted him to swiftly exit the conversation and kick his friends out.

“Who’s Doctor Thompkins?” Bart asked.

“Just someone here to help Timothy.” Alfred responded. So they didn’t want his friends to know… they were asking him in their subtle way to comply.

“Um, I better go.”

“We’ll wait.” Cassie insisted.

“No, it’ll take a while.” Tim said quickly. “But you can always come back to visit.” Tim looked at Alfred who nodded in confirmation.

“Absolutely, Miss Sandsmark.”

Cassie gave Tim a pleading look but he wouldn’t meet her eyes. He didn’t want them here for this. “It’ll be fine. I’ll see you guys another day, okay?”

Bart ran back to Tim, hugging him tightly, putting pressure on his wounds but Tim ignored the pain. “Imgonnamissyousomuch.”

“Bart, you can see me tomorrow.”

“But that’s so far from now!”

Cassie pushed Bart out of the way and hugged Tim as well, pressing a kiss to his hair. “I’ll see you later.”

Next was Conner’s turn. The man brushed Tim’s hair out of his face before hugging him as well. “Later.” The clone promised.

“Master Timothy, if you’d come with me.” Tim nodded, sparing his friends one last glance he walked out of the room.

“Hello Tim.” Leslie Thompkins greeted. Tim had been led from the training room his friends had been in to the living room upstairs in the Manor. Tim was actually surprised that Bruce had let them meet up here. Between Leslie and the chair that had been set up for Tim was a small coffee table with a pot of water and two tea cups. Huh, so they trusted him with a potential weapon (or they knew he wouldn’t dare break Alfred’s good china).

Tim sat down. Leslie Thompkins crossed her legs. “Hello Doctor.”

Lee waited until Alfred had left and then she began speaking. “Would you like to tell me why you think you’re here?” She asked.

“Bruce thinks I can change. He thinks I can see error in my ways.” Lee stayed silent, waiting for Tim to elaborate. “He thinks that I can join him again, that if the right people talk to me I’ll eventually not want to kill the Joker.”

“What do you think will happen when he believes that?” She asked.

“He’ll let me go.”

“Then why haven’t you lied to him so he’ll let you go?”

“I hadn’t thought of it.” Tim lied.

“You. Tim Drake, the world’s second greatest detective didn’t think of lying?” Tim didn’t respond. “I get it. You don’t want to be here, you want to be somewhere else fulfilling this… desire. Killing the Joker. But you didn’t lie to get to your goal. You don’t think that maybe this is your subconscious telling you something? You could have let Jason die. You didn’t have to save him, didn’t have to be stuck here, didn’t have to save those people.”

“You’re saying you… want me to be a bad guy?” Tim asked incredulously. “You want me to kill people? You want me to let innocent people suffer?”

“Well why should they be saved? You weren’t.”

Tim swallowed, eyes narrowing. “They aren’t to blame for me dying.”

“The Joker is.”

“Yes.”

“And therefore he must die.”

“No.”

Leslie cocked her head to the side. “I’m confused. Then why do you want to kill the Joker?”

“I want to kill the Joker so he can never do this again. The rest of Bruce’s rogues gallery—they can reform. They won’t but they can. They don’t deserve to die, not like the Joker does. The Joker and Bruce play this… game. This game that either ends where Bruce gets hurt and the Joker gets away, the Joker gets sent back to Arkham only to break out again, or someone Bruce cares about gets hurt. I don’t want anyone else to get hurt. And I understand why Bruce won’t do it. And that’s fine. But we aren’t all like Bruce, for some of us we don’t open a one way door. Some of us can come back over the line.”

“By ‘some of us’ you’re referring to yourself?”

“Who else?”

“Tim, why didn’t you come to Bruce? Why didn’t you go to your friends? To Stephanie? You know you’re not alone.”

“They wouldn’t help. They’re like Bruce. They can’t help.”

“Or maybe you just don’t want them to. Because if they do they’ve become just like criminals. Maybe because you will become one, too.”

“This is my fight, and after this… Bruce can do whatever he wants with me. Send me to Arkham. Throw me in Blackgate. I don’t care. But I won’t drag them down with me. That doesn’t mean I’m going to just start killing everyone I don’t like… just him. I just—I can’t let him live.” Leslie just looked at him. “Look, I know none of you understand and-that’s-that’s okay. That’s fine. I don’t expect you to.” Tim rubbed his face. “I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

“Alright. What do you want to talk about?”

Tim shook his head.

“That’s okay,” Leslie said gently. “We can wait until you know.” She offered. The rest of the session was silence.

Tim woke up when heard the footsteps, funny this being-held-captive-in-a-cage-so-he-didn’t-kill-the-Joker had resulted in the most sleep he’d gotten since he’d been dead. He didn’t move. By the sound of it it was two people, Alfred was probably one of them. Alfred came by to see Tim a lot. It felt like his friends yesterday had been a dream, must have been a dream. They hadn’t called since—not that Tim expected them to put their lives on hold for him.

“He’s asleep.” Kon whispered. “Maybe-maybe I should go.”

“He is not asleep, Young Mister Kent. He is, as you young ones say, faking it. Master Tim, please open your eyes, your friend is here.”

Sometimes Tim disliked Alfred. Tim opened his eyes, slowly rising. Conner’s face lit up, a smile flickered over his face. He stood on the other side of the glass in civvies, a tin in his hands. That wasn’t… Ma’s pie, was it? “Hi.” Conner breathed.

“Hi. What’re you…?” Tim’s eyes never left the tin in his hands.

“Stand back, Master Timothy.” Alfred warned. Tim nodded and stood back as he unlocked the door. Conner looked confused, glancing between the two of them, before he ran into the room. Alfred locked the door behind him. Conner immediately hugged his friend.

“Hey! How are you?”

“I’m, um, I’m fine. Is… is that what I think it is?” Tim asked, pointing to the tin.

Kon snorted. “Should have known that you would care more about Ma’s pie than me.”

“So… it is one of Ma’s pies?”

Kon laughed and took a fork from his jeans pocket and handed it to Tim. “I told Ma. About you. And she wasn’t that surprised. Weirdly. Said it happened to someone Clark knew like, at least once a month.”

Tim was too busy stuffing his face with pie to respond. “Mmmshruf.” He said in agreement. He and Conner sat on the floor of his cell and while Tim ate, Kon talked. Tim had a sudden blast of déjà vu, this scene, this place, him and Kon, sitting on the floor while Kon talked.

They’d done similar things like this before, Tim remembered, every other week or so. Tim would be working, whether it was at the Tower, at the Manor, in the Cave or (for a short time when his parents were alive) in his old room. Conner would come, he would bring pie and play video games with a play-by-play commentary on whatever he wanted to talk about. Sometimes it was school, or missions, or “hey did you see how frickin’ dope it was when Cassie punched Despero? Like damn.”

“So?” Conner asked. “Why are you in a zoo cage?”

Tim stopped eating for a second. “A… zoo cage?”

“Yeah. Like the lions or the water animals? You go to a zoo and they have this glass wall between you and them that has real walls on other sides. Like this place.”

“It was supposed to be a cell. Originally, Damian and Bruce… they didn’t know who I was. So when I was recovering from the bomb, in the beginning, they wanted me in here. I guess, they keep it that way now because they just find me… dangerous.”

“Dangerous? What the fuck, man? What is wrong with your family?”

“I dunno, man. I don’t know.”

“I’m going to speak with them-“

“No!” Tim interrupted.

Conner shot him a confused look. “They locked you up in here! With like, a passcode and everything! And you’re… okay with that?”

“No, but that’s not the point.”

“Then what is?”

“They need to feel safe. And, I don’t know if I can help him in my current condition.”

“Help? Help who?” Tim ate a piece of pie instead of answering. “Tim. Don’t shut me out. Who are you trying to help?”

“Bruce is in trouble, and no one believes me. They think I’m just… I don’t know. Making an excuse.”

“For what?”

Tim couldn’t tell him. He’d never believe him. He’d never help him. He’d think he was crazy. “Doesn’t matter.”

“Tim.”

“I want… the Joker gone.”

“Just gone? I want him dead.”

“You… what?” Now Tim was confused.

“I want him dead. He, he killed you Tim. He doesn’t deserve—he’s hurt so many people.”

“Heroes don’t kill.” Tim echoed Bruce.

Conner glanced downward. “Clark says the same thing.”

“I bet Diana and Barry do too.”

Kon leaned back on his hands. “You’re really going to town on that pie, aren’t you?”

Tim looked up innocently at his friend. “It’s yummy.”

Kon burst out laughing and Tim grinned at his friend. “So how’s Ma?” Tim asked.

“She’s good. She and Pa need more help on the farm though, so Jon’s thinking about coming back home for a while.”

“No way! I can’t imagine Ma and Pa asking for help around the farm!”

“Oh, they didn’t ask. They specifically called Jon and told him not to come, but you know Jon.”

“Yeah.”

“You know, they’ve really gotten the hang of the wifi you set up for them. Pa’s getting into Netflix.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I mean, Ma still uses that grainy black and white to watch the news while she cooks, but Pa sometimes watches a few documentaries after being in the field. He falls asleep halfway through usually, but he still watches them.”

“And I was worried it would be of no use to them.”

“Well, it wasn’t. For a long time, but…” Kon took a shaky breath. Tim hated that he’d caused that pain on Kon’s face. No, a small part of his mind argued, you didn’t cause anything. And you know that. And you know what you have to do because of it. “Anyway, Pa remembered how excited you’d been when you set it up for them, and how he promised to use it but never did and… he wanted it to be a reminder, you know?”

“Tell Pa that what he did means a lot to me.”

“I will.” Kon promised. While Tim ate every last morsel in the bottom of that pie tin Kon watched him.

“What?” Tim asked when he was finished, licking the last molecules of pie off of the fork in his hand.

“I’ve missed you a lot.” Kon said with a softness that wasn’t at all sad, but happy, with maybe a hint of reverence. The thought that Kon could ever see him in reverence made Tim want to laugh. But the way that Kon smiled lightly, the way his eyes crinkled at the corners, the way his cheeks puffed out a little when he really smiled, that was true happiness, without a doubt.

Tim grinned at him.

Tim was being woken up again, but this time is was by something different. Was-was that a tapping sound? It was annoyingly persistent. Why would someone be tapping without stop? Just to wake him up? Oooh this reeked of Damian.

That little-

Wait.

That was morse code.

Tim pressed his ear to the wall at the back of his cell which held up his cot. That was weird. If he remembered the blueprints of the Batcave correctly, the area where his cell was had been carved out of the mountain which Wayne Manor sat on… there shouldn’t have been anything but rock on the other side of here.

The message was being repeated over and over. shhshh-thump-thump-thump seven unit pause thump-thump-thump-thump-shhshh seven unit pause thump-shhshh-thump pause thump-thump-thump one unit pause shhshh-thump-thump-thump Crap he got that wrong. The first word was thump-thump-thump and shhshh-thump-thump-thump not shhshh-thump-thump-thump.

Now what were those letters again? Tim strained to remember, the last time he had used morse code had been when he was bored and had been teaching it to the Titans for in case of emergency.

Thump-thump-thump was supposed to be dot-dot-dot, which was… S!

Next letter: shhshh-thump-thump-thump, dash-dot-dot-dot—B!

Wait. SB?

Kon.

The other two letters were easier to remember once he figured out it was Kon who was trying to communicate with him. He’d taught the team certain initials which would be their name signals, and then he taught them how to contact a specific person. The number four and then the other person’s name signal.

So Tim rubbed back against the wall as hard as he could: thump-thump-shhshh-shhshh-thump-thump and awaited Kon’s answer.

U T-A-L-K

“Kon?” Tim whispered against the wall. “What are you doing here? How did you get to the other side of the wall? Did you tunnel into the mountain? Isn’t this a little much? You could have just calle-“

Kon was tapping something back out on the wall.

S-T-A-N-D B-A-C-K

Stand back?

There was a rumbling sound and Tim’s eyes widened as he jumped off of his bed, scrambling to the other side of the cell. He covered his head, curling up into a ball.

The wall burst as a hand punched through it, then ripped the wall apart. Soon Tim was huddled, protected from some of the dust and grime by his position, in a room with a very large new door. Tim slowly straightened watching as not just Kon but Bart and Cassie walked into his cell from the very opposite of where the door was supposed to be.

“What are you guys doing here? Alfred’s going to be so pissed when he sees that you broke open my cell. Did you tunnel all the way through the mountain? Why are you guys even here? Shouldn’t you be, like, I don’t know, asleep? How did you bypass the Manor’s security?”

Cassie hugged her friend tightly while Bart grinned and held out a handmade banner, CONGRATS ON YOUR NEWFOUND FREEDOM!

“Jesus, Tim. Shut up for once.” Kon said lightly.

Huh?

“What’s going on?” Tim asked warily, pulling away from Cassie. He looked at his friends’ grinning faces, the banner that Bart had apparently made, and the new gaping hole in his wall.

“Isn’t it obvious, Silly?” Bart asked, rolling his eyes. “We’re breaking you out!”

#diana writes #diana writes batman #robin!reversal #joke's on you #I'm Not Batman I Have Friends

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grizbehr · 8 years ago

Text

Second Chances - Part Two

Future AU: The reunion over, Lucas and Lily return to Texas and Riley returns to her job overseas. Will the difficulties of distance and their own lives cause problems for their reemerging relationship

Part One Chapter List

Chapter Thirteen - Birthdays

"Go ahead," Riley said as she cuddled in Lucas' arms on the couch. "Tell me you told me so."

"I wouldn't do that," Lucas told her. He had gotten back from the hospital to find that Riley and Maya had returned. Riley had been curled up on the sofa and Lucas pulled her into his arms.

"I understand her loss, but how can someone take it out on a child like that?"

"Had it been her father you met, you may have been able to bring him around. But Hannah has been like that for as long as I've known her. She never warmed up to me. Anna told me there were times when she saw her mother brighten, but it was only for a second. Then she would revert back to her stern and rigid behavior. She loved her mother, but I think she was glad when she moved away for college."

Riley sat there, comfortable in Lucas' arms. With everything else that was going on, here she felt safe.

"You did a good job with the ramp," she said after a moment. "I take it it was Zay who replanted the flowers?"

"Yeah," Lucas laughed. "It was actually Thomas and the hands who did the work. After we got the truck unloaded, I went to the hospital."

"How's she doing?"

"I'm not sure. Physically she's the same, but I think being there is getting to her. Tomorrow is her birthday and I'm going to talk to the doctor and see if we can bring her home early."

"Just don't push too hard. If bringing her home would do more harm than good…"

"I know. I'm just going to talk to him about it. I won't bring her home until she's ready." The two sat there in silence.

"Where is everyone," Riley asked, noticing that neither Maya or Zay had come in. Lucas looked out the window at the evening sky.

"I'm not sure. They were out front when I came in."

"Maybe we should go find them," Riley said, starting to rise. Lucas held on and pulled her closer.

"Or maybe we should just let them find themselves. I'm actually pretty comfortable as I am." Riley relented and snuggled in closer.

"So," Lucas said hesitantly. "Have you thought any more about what you are going to do?"

"Not really." Riley let out a sigh. "But I don't think I'm headed back to London. I thought about it a lot on the ride back here. Between Anna's mom cutting herself of from Lily and you and your father made me realize even more how much I've cut myself off from my parents. When we were younger, I was so close to them. Even when it sometimes felt that mom was closer to Maya than me, I always knew she was there for me. And dad was always around, even when we didn't want him there. Since I moved…actually before that…we're not as close. I'd like to change that before it's too late."

"I don't think that's something you need to worry about. My dad and I have never really gotten along. He always thought he knew what was best for me, without taking what I want into consideration."

"He was right about moving to New York though," Riley interrupted. "Wasn't he?"

"Yeah, he was. But he never made me feel that I could come to him. It was always his way or the highway. As for Hannah, she grew up in an orphanage and was reared by nuns. So I don't think she ever knew how a mother was supposed to act, but she did her best. I think, maybe, she had to close herself off to protect herself. I hope that she'll come around, but I don't expect it. Someday, maybe Lily will reach out and they'll change their minds."

"Are you sure you want to come here," Zay asked as they walked through the trees. "It kind of messed everything up last time,"

"I'm sure," Maya said as they came across the campfire burn. She walked around it before sitting down on one of the logs. Zay sat down across from her.

"Do you ever think 'What if?'" Zay asked her. "What if we had never come here for the rodeo? What if Riley hadn't backed away? What if…"

"What if Lucas and I had kissed here?" Zay nodded at her and Maya gazed into the black spot in the middle of the clearing. "Yeah, I thought about it. Especially when we first got back. I sometimes wished that we had. Then we would have known if there was something there. Like the song says, 'If you want to know if he loves you so, it's in his kiss.' Based on what we know now, there wouldn't have been and we could have moved on that much faster."

"Or you might have thought there was something and it would have made it so much worse."

"You're probably right," Maya admitted. "That was the only time I was worried about Riley and me. That's part of why it dragged on as long as it did. I thought that if one of us got with Lucas, the other would pull away."

"Riley did," Zay said. "Remember before Farkle made his announcement on the roof. If it was you and Riley, everything was good. But once Lucas came in, Riley excused herself. She really thought that the two of you liked each other and the sight of you together hurt her so much."

"And I was oblivious to it," Maya agreed. "I've gotten better since then. I've known for a few years that Riley hasn't been happy in London. But that's something she needed to figure out on her own."

"I think we've all known. When she left for London, I thought that was going to be the end of us. It felt just like when her mom was possibly getting transferred there, except it was worse. Lucas was down here and I was scared that without him as an anchor, I'd lose my friends. I knew that Riley would never let me go, but if she was gone..."

"Hey," Maya got up and went over to him. "You're stuck with us," she wrapped her arms around Zay's shoulders.

"Boy, do I know that now. We've all grown a lot since High School. We've become stronger, both together and separately. All of us have learned something from the people in our lives."

"People change people." Maya laid her head on Zay's shoulder and the two friends sat there in silence.

Lily's eyes opened and she looked at the clock. "Two-twenty-three," she said sadly. "Happy birthday, Lily." She looked around the room, wishing she was in her own bed in her own home. Her dad would be coming in right about now to wish her a happy birthday and they'd sit and talk.

"Happy birthday, baby girl," Lucas said from the doorway. Lily looked up and smiled.

"Daddy," she said, reaching her arms out. Lucas sat on the bed next to her and hugged her softly. "I'm glad you're here. I was afraid we wouldn't be able to do this this year."

"I sneaked in. No way was I going to miss being the first to wish you a happy birthday." He kissed Lily before letting her fall back on her pillow. "So how does it feel to be fifteen?"

"It sucks," Lily said. "I'm tired of being here. I'm tired of this pain in my side. I'm tired of my foot not working. I want to go home."

"I know, and as soon as the doctors say you can, you will. We're all coming back later to have a mini-birthday and I plan on talking to them then. I just don't want to do anything that will hurt your recovery."

"Ya'll don't have to do that. I'm not really up to a party."

"Tough. Maya and Zay need to get back and they want you to know how much you mean to them. We won't stay long."

"Fine. What about Riley? Is she going too?"

"Not just yet." Lucas paused for a moment, not sure if he should tell his daughter this. "She quit her job and is moving back to New York, so doesn't have anything pressing right now. She said she'd stay with us for a while."

"You know," Lily said. "If you wanted to, you could ask her to move down here with us instead of going back to New York. I think it would be good for you to have her around. And I'd kind of like for her to be around also."

"I agree," Lucas told her. "But she needs to do what's right for her. We can't be selfish. She wants to reconnect with her family and I think that's important. Maybe, someday."

"I'll look forward to someday, then. You could make sure she, you know, knows that she's welcome to, though."

"She knows," Lucas said.

"Just don't assume she does, daddy. Make sure."

"I will," Lucas assured her. "Trust me, I learned a long time ago not to just assume things." Lily looked at him curiously. He laughed softly. "Okay, one story then you get back to sleep and I'll head home. It was after we went on our disastrous second date and we had decided to just be friends because we weren't ready yet. The semi-formal was coming up and I assumed we would be going together, so I didn't ask her. I mean, we had gone to the last dance together. What I didn't realize at the time was that Riley wanted to be asked. They showed this old filmstrip from the fifties and I still didn't get it. After class, a friend, of sorts, did this big ask. Flowers, balloons, Yogi on roller-skates. Riley said yes, thinking it was from me. But it wasn't. I was hurt at first, then upset with myself. I let her down."

"When we finally did get together, we promised that we'd go to dances together without even asking. But I made sure to ask anyway."

"Do you think that if you had asked her, maybe the two of you would have gotten together earlier?"

"Maybe," Lucas said. "Riley and I had a lot of missed opportunities. It always seemed as if something was getting in the way. Usually our own insecurities. Okay, you get to sleep and let me get out of here before security comes and drags me off." Lily laughed as Lucas leaned down and kissed her on her forehead. "Happy birthday, baby."

"Thanks, daddy." Lily closed her eyes and Lucas went home.

"Happy birthday to you," they sang as they came into the room. Lily sat up in her bed and put a smile on her face. Maya was in front, holding the cake. Riley and Zay came in behind her, wrapped presents in their arms. Pulling up the rear was her father, balloons in his hands. They finished the song and then put down their burdens.

"Happy birthday," Maya said, kissing Lily on the cheek. She brushed her hand lightly through the young girl's hair.

"Happy birthday, magpie." Zay pulled a hard candy out of his pocket and put it in Lily's mouth.

"Happy birthday, Lily," Riley said, hugging her. Lily took her by the hand and didn't let go as her father gave her a hug.

"Maria will be by later," Lucas said. "She didn't want to crowd the room. Maggie said she'd call you. Her mom isn't letting her out too much."

"Thank you, everybody," she said, still holding Riley's hand. Riley noticed and climbed onto the bed and wrapped her arm around the girl. "But you didn't need to do this."

"Of course we did," Maya said. "It's not every day a girl turns fifteen."

"Besides," Zay added. "I'll never turn down a party." He moved his arms in a cheesy dancing motion, causing everyone to laugh.

As the others moved around the room, decorating and setting up, Riley stayed with Lily. "Are you doing okay," she asked quietly.

"I'm fine," Lily said. She relented quickly under Riley's gaze. "Okay, not fine. I'm bored and tired and ready to get out of here."

"I know, I know," Riley squeezed her. "When I got my tonsils out when I was little I was stuck in the hospital. Not as long as you have, by any means, but it was depressing being there. But I had my friends and family and that made it bearable."

"I guess," Lily admitted. "But I don't like being fussed over. I can stand on my own two feet." Riley looked at her as Lily's eyes moved to the bottom of her bed. "At least I used to," Lily said under her breath. Riley heard her and squeezed her again.

"You'll get there," Riley said. "I have faith. If you are half as stubborn as your father, nothing is going to stop you." She looked up to make sure everyone was occupied and pulled an envelope out of her pocket. "This is for you," she said, handing it over. "It's the address for your mother's parents."

Lily took it and stared at the sealed envelope. As often as she thought of her mother, she rarely gave a thought to her grandparents.

"I thought you could write them," Riley explained. "Maybe if you reached out, they'd be willing to do the same. They are family."

"Thank you, Riley," Lily breathed. Riley smiled and began to get up, but Lily stopped her. "I like you being here," Lily told her and Riley relaxed back next to her.

"Okay," Maya said, finishing up. The balloons were floating against the ceiling and the cake was on the table. There were no candles as they couldn't light a fire in the hospital. A banner, decorated by Maya with flowers and horses, was hung across the window reading "Happy Birthday Lily!"

"It's presents time," Maya continued. She brought a flat package over and deposited it on Lily's lap. "Mine first."

Lily tore the paper open. She pulled out a drawing pad and colored pencils. "Thank you, Auntie Maya. I love it, but I'm not a really good artist."

"You don't have to be good," Maya said. "Just have fun. And if something wonderful happens, draw me a picture." She leaned down and hugged the girl.

"Me next," Zay said, pushing a small box into her hands. Lily opened it, revealing a pendant of a bird. "It's a magpie," he explained.

"Thank you, Uncle Zay." Zay smiled and blushed as she put it around her neck with Riley's help. She put her hand on it and smiled.

"Riley," Lucas asked her. He handed her the box she had brought and Riley passed it over to Lily. She opened it to find a flash drive. Lily picked it up and saw the name "Lucas" hand written on it. She looked over at Riley confused.

"I know your father didn't tell you a lot about his time up north," Riley said. "I gathered up all the photos I could find of him, both mine and from the others who know him, and put them on this flash drive. If you play them in order, it sort of tells his story. I, uhm, also included pictures of him and your mom and the three of you together. I hope it's okay."

"It's perfect," Lily said. She held it in her hand and spun it around. She leaned her head on Riley's shoulder, wishing she had her computer here so she could look at them. Lucas smiled down at his daughter laying there next to Riley.

"There's someone else who wants to give you a birthday present, of sorts," Lucas said, pulling out his tablet. He opened up the video chat app and then turned it to face Lily.

"Happy birthday," Farkle said from the screen.

"Hi, Uncle Farkle," Lily said. She could see he was still at the hospital.

"Okay, this isn’t exactly your birthday present," Farkle said. "That's a flight on a private jet whenever you want to come up here and visit. But this arrived late last night and thought you'd like to see." He turned the tablet around to reveal Isadora holding a baby boy in her arms.

"May I introduce you to Stuart Cornelius Minkus." Lily could hear the pride in his voice.

"Aawwwwwwww," Lily, Riley, and Maya all said at the same time. "He's so cute," Lily said.

"And he had the foresight not to be born on your birthday," Farkle said, sitting next to his wife and son. "He was born at eleven-fifty-eight last night."

"My dad will be so proud you gave him the name Cornelius," Riley said.

"He and your mom were here this morning and I told him. He started tearing up. But how could I not name my son after someone who meant so much to my life. He helped make me the man I am."

"He's adorable, guys," Lucas said. "Don't you think, Izzy?"

"I do," Isadora said. "I was worried about connecting with him, but as soon as he was in my arms I knew that wouldn't be a problem."

"I'm glad."

"Riley, Maya," Farkle stated. "Even though neither of us are really religious, we'd like for you to be his godmothers."

"You can't have two godmothers," Zay said.

"Who says," Farkle replied. "I've never been able to choose between those two, so it only makes sense that they both hold that position."

Riley looked over at Maya who nodded. "We'd love to, Farkle," Riley said for both of them.

"Good. And since he'll have two godmothers, it's only fair that he have two godfathers. Lucas, Zay? Would you do us the honor."

"Of course," Lucas said quickly, smiling.

"Try and stop us," Zay said, forgetting his earlier objection.

"We're going to let you go now," Farkle said. "Isadora and Stuart need their rest."

"Bye, Farkle," everyone said. "Bye Izzy. Bye Stuart." The screen went dark and everyone started talking about the baby. Everyone except Lily.

"What's wrong," Riley said, noticing. Lily realized that very little got past Riley, even if she didn't let on that she knew.

"I don't know," Lily admitted. "I'm happy everyone is here and I got to see Farkle and the baby. Maybe I'm just getting tired out." She glanced over at the door.

"Or maybe you wish someone else was here? Where is Dave? I haven't seen him for a while."

"We had a fight. He was just always doing things for me. Things I should be able to do myself. I just don't want to see him right now. But at the same time, I do."

"I think it's more that you don't want him to see you right now," Riley explained. "You feel broken and his trying to help makes you feel more broken and you don't want him to see you broken so you pushed him away. It's understandable, it really is. But don't let it go on too long. I don't know him that well, but sometimes when you push someone away, they go."

Lily put her head back on Riley's shoulder. Riley smiled at the girl. Though they didn't say it out loud, they both thought that this felt right.

Chapter Fourteen - Home Again

#Girl Meets World #fan fiction #fanfic #GB:Fiction #Lily Friar #riley matthews #lucas friar #Maya hart #zay babineaux #Farkle Minkus #isadora smackle #happy birthday #ruca #liley

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