#friends like we all have seperate challenges but I’m the only one still living off their parents (ha. parent. forgot for a second.) and the

[raibebe]

Simple Lessons

Genre: fluff Words: 3.200 Prompt: 90s grunge boy Jeno x female reader

Warnings: smoking, mentions of food

A/N: Literally no one asked for this but this just poured out of me the other day... EVERLONG JENO IS MY COMFORT CHARACTER OKAY??

Everlong masterlist

“Do you want to go out to grab lunch? You don’t have classes until later as well, right?” Your best friend asked as she dragged you out of the lecture hall. “Sure,” you smiled, basking in the rays of the sun for a while after being stuck inside an auditorium with barely any daylight for two hours straight. “There is this cute new diner a little off-campus and a little birdie told me there is this super hot guy working there,” she wiggled her eyebrows to which you could just groan loudly, making her giggle in return. Mimi had talked you up during orientation days and you two hadn’t seperated since. Sharing majors surely helped with that and soon you had found a small group of girls to call your friends. While she was very much the flirty, extrovert in your group, a crush on a different boy each day of the week, you couldn’t not be fond of her shenanigans when it made all of you laugh out loud whenever she told stories of yet another drastically failed date. “Not everyone can still be with their Highschool boyfriend like you,” she accused, slapping your arm before tugging you in the direction of the diner. “Are we really going to this diner just because someone told you that one of the waiters is hot?” “Listen. This was a very trustworthy source,” Mimi pouted, “I’ll pay for your meal, just come with me please.” “How can I say no to free food?” You laughed loudly, letting her pull you along while complaining about all the assignments your professors had given out.

You had to admit that the diner was really cute. It had this old-school look inside with the red, big sofas and a variety of license plates decorated the walls and the female servers even wore cute puffy skirts. “This is so pretty,” you said once Mimi had chosen a booth, the leather of the sofa squeaking while you sat down. “Yeah, yeah,” she waved it off, looking around the place, “Now where is this hot waiter?” “You’re hopeless,” you giggled, picking up the menu that was already laid out on the table to look at their food options instead of helping your friend. “Shut up,” she grumbled, copying your action, “You also still haven’t introduced us to your boyfriend.”

“Yeah,” you sighed, “He’s...” Well, what were you supposed to say now? If it were to go how you had wanted, your friends would have already met Jeno at the first party you were invited to but he had declined the offer, only sweetly kissing your head and promising to pick you up at 2 am from the adress you had given him. Which he had done but by that time everyone was so wasted that they couldn’t remember a thing. Which had become a reoccurring theme, no matter how much you’d bribe them to not drink to finally catch a glympse at him. “If you all would stop drinking yourself into a coma every time we go out, you’d have met him already.” “I am beginning to think you’ve made him up,” Mimi grinned, “He seems way too perfect. Letting you go out and party on your own and picking your drunk ass up after but then he never shows up to your classes to walk you to the next one.” Well just maybe you hadn’t gotten around to telling your friends that Jeno in fact wasn’t even studying but working different part-time jobs to help finance your apartment until he had figured out what he wanted to do in the first place. They had just assumed he was studying something way different than you hence why you wouldn’t meet up during your breaks. “Well he is real,” you sighed, “He’s just... Different?” “Oooooh, I get it,” your friend grinned, “He’s older than you. Oh my god. Do you have a sugar daddy?” At that you let out an embarrassed screech which made her double over with laughter. “Why would you say that?” You whined, “He’s the same age as us, for real.”

“Hi ladies, I see you’re already having a great time. I’ll be your waiter for today, have you already decided what to get?” A deep velvety voice interrupted. You didn’t need to look up to know who the waiter was or what he looked like because his voice was almost as familar to your ears as your own was and you knew his body inside and out. Smiling brightly, your eyes met Jeno’s who was also smiling, throwing you a little wink. You had known that he had been working in a diner for a little while now but not this specific one so it was a nice surprise to see him here clad in a neat button-down and pants that for once weren’t ripped to shreds. Meanwhile, Mimi was stunned in silence, her mouth parted in what must be awe. “Hi,” you kept smiling at Jeno, “Anything you can recommend?” “Our burgers are pretty good,” he shrugged, “But what’s really good are our milkshakes.” “Then we’ll take that, right?” You asked your friend, kicking her shin beneath the table to get her to snap out of it. “Y-yeah sure,” she stuttered, still blatantly gawking at Jeno. “Great, I’ll be right back with your drinks,” Jeno smiled before walking off again.

“Girl he’s so hot oh my god,” Mimi exclaimed as soon as he was out of earshot, dramatically flopping down onto the table. “He’s really good-looking,” you admitted, a big grin on your face. “Better than your boyfriend?” “I wouldn’t say that,” you laughed, awkwardly shuffling in your seat. Was this the right time to tell her that the waiter apparently a lot of girls were thirsting after was in fact your boyfriend and probably not at all like they thought him out to be? “God, I bet he looks so good out of his uniform as well,” she groaned, “Just the thought of him in light washed denim.” At that, you had to mask a burst of laughter with an awkward cough. You had tried times and times again to convince Jeno to swap out one of his dark jeans for light-washed ones but he wasn’t budging, only in turn challenging you to wear one of his many black baggy T-shirts instead of your brightly colored spaghetti tops. “Sure,” you giggled instead, kicking your friend’s shin again to alert her when Jeno came back with your drinks. “There you go, food will be out in a bit,” he smiled politely. Not the kind of smile that turned his eyes into beautiful crescents but a more reserved one.

“Hey, uhm,” Mimi suddenly spoke up when Jeno turned around to walk away again, making him halt in his steps. “Have you been working here for long?” Oh god. You had to physically keep yourself from cringing at her awkward try to rope him into a conversation. “Just a handful of weeks, so not that long,” Jeno shrugged, “Looking for a job as well?” “Oh no, we both work part-time at a clothing store downtown,” she waved it off, “I was just wondering because I had never seen you around before.” “Well yeah, makes sense I haven’t been here for long.” “So you recently moved here? I’m sure I would have remembered a handsome face like yours,” Mimi now blatantly flirted, twirling a dyed strand of hair around her finger and just slightly leaning forward on the table to give Jeno a better view of her cleavage in her white cropped top. “Yeah, I’m not from around here,” he shared, his eyes firmly staying on her face but the redness of his ears and how his fingers were fiddling with his little notepad betrayed his cool facade. Was this the time where you should end this to save Mimi and Jeno from further embarrassment? Or should you enjoy this for a little longer? “Are you also a student?” She asked next, “We both go to university here.” “Oh god no,” Jeno exclaimed and this time you couldn’t hold in the little giggle that slipped past your lips, noticing that your boyfriend’s lips twitched into a little grin as well. The more Jeno saw you struggle between classes, essays and study sessions, the more sure he had become about his whole decision to not do the whole university thing. Just when your friend wanted to ask the next question, a loud voice interrupted: “Jeno, I am not paying you for flirting with customers! Get back to work!” Rolling his eyes at his boss, Jeno shot the two of you an apologetic look before quickly walking to the register where his boss was waiting.

“God, even his name sounds good,” Mimi groaned, returning to her former position, sprawled out over the table. “You sound like you’re in love with him,” you giggled, “You don’t even know him.” “Listen. This is love at first sight. Do you not watch romance movies?” You did in fact. Even though Jeno would complain throughout the whole first 30 minutes of the movie until he’d either accept his fate in favor of cuddling and letting you pet his hair or actually get invested in the movie as well, cursing the characters for being so stupid and not talking out their problems. “I do, dummy,” you rolled your eyes, taking a sip from your milkshake that didn’t disappoint after Jeno had praised it so much, “But don’t you need to get to know a person before you can love them?”

“You’re the one with a boyfriend,” she mumbled, collecting herself from the table to take a sip of her drink as well, “Tell me about him.” “My boyfriend?” “Yeah, you never speak much about him and don’t let us meet him either. Convince me he’s not made up.” “Well we know each other since childhood,” you shared, feeling heat creep up your cheeks and neck, knowing how cliche your story sounded, “He lived in the house next to ours so we played a lot as children but then my family had to move away when I was in like elementary school or something because of my dad’s work but eventually we moved back for my last year of highschool.” “Oh wow, that must have sucked to leave all your friends behind twice.” Sighing, you ran your hands through your hair. “It wasn’t easy to just leave everything behind, but I managed. We moved back into our old house and he was also still living in the house next to us with his family. His mom made him take me to school every day and we shared a lot of classes and then it just went from there,” you smiled, blatantly leaving out the part where you had to basically force Jeno to speak and open up to you at nights on his rooftop beneath the moon and the stars. That was a private matter you didn’t want to share without his consent.

“That is so wholesome,” Mimi cheered, “What’s he like?” “Different?” You tried to explain, swirling your straw in your milkshake, “Like different than you’d expect him to be. When you see us together, you’d probably say we don’t match.” “Ooooh,” she nodded, her eyes wide, “So you’re like opposites?” “You could say that,” you smiled, “But when you get to know us, we’re not that different.” Before she could ask more questions, Jeno interrupted you again, hands full of your plates. “And that’s your food girls. Please enjoy,” he smiled, placing the plates down, “If you need anything else, I’ll be around.” “Actually,” Mimi began and you had to hold yourself back from interrupting her, “I was wondering when your shift is ending.” “My shift?” Jeno repeated, his eyes shortly drifting over to you. “Yeah,” she smiled, waiting for his answer. “I’m off in a bit,” he said slowly after checking the time on the neon clock hanging over the counter. “So you’re free after we’re done with our food?” She pressed on. “Probably?” “Would you like to hang out after? We still have some time until our next classes start. “Hang out. With you two,” he repeated, still dumbstruck by her boldness. “I mean you don’t have to if you really don’t want or have something to do,” she shrugged but you knew that look in her eyes. She was determined to have him hang out with you. “I was just going to go get groceries and go home,” Jeno shared, “Listen, I gotta go back to work or my boss will literally fire me because he already hates me.” With an apologetic smile, he quickly walked down to another table where a couple was seemingly done with their meal.

“You’re so shameless,” you accused your friend, finally digging into your meal. “Listen. I see a hot boy and need to talk to him, it’s as easy as that,” Mimi giggled, taking a bite from her burger. “Now tell me more about that boyfriend of yours.”

Once you were finished with your meal, Jeno already wasn’t there anymore to take your bill, instead, a cute girl with a big puffy skirt handed your friend the bill. “But half the stuff is missing,” Mimi asked, “I’m paying for both of us.” “Oh, my colleague took care of one of the meals,” the waiter smiled, “He must like one of you.” “I told you my flirting was worth it,” your friend smiled, handing over the money. You really didn’t have it in you to tell her that Jeno most likely covered for your half of the meal when she seemed so genuinely happy about it, so you swallowed the words back down even if it was going to come out sooner or later when you’d finally get Jeno to meet your friends.

Apparently, the universe wanted it to be sooner because as soon as you stepped back out of the diner and into the sun, a boy clad in all black caught your attention. He was leaning against the little railing around the diner, a cigarette between his lean fingers. “Hey,” you nudged your friend, nodding towards Jeno. “Huh?” “It’s the waiter,” you explained, looking over at him. By now it looked like he was trying his hardest to hold back his grin while taking another drag. Shocking people with his looks still was one of his favorite things to do if they only knew him from one of his jobs where he had to wear a uniform. “No way,” Mimi whispered, “He looks like a completely different guy.” “You’re not in love anymore now?” “He’s just so…” “Different?” You helped her out, rolling your eyes. Why could no one see past the dark clothes, chains and the cigarette and made the effort to actually get to know Jeno? “I don’t think he’s my type.” “You’re ridiculous,” you snorted, leaving her behind to walk over to Jeno.

“Hey bubblegum,” he smiled, curling an arm around your waist like it was second nature already, “Fancy seeing you here.” “You didn’t tell me that was the diner you applied to,” you pouted, scrunching your nose at the smell of smoke. “I didn’t know it was close to your campus,” he shrugged it off and stubbed out the remainder of his cigarette after taking a last drag, making an effort to blow the smoke away from you, “Your friend tried really hard to flirt with me.” “She’s an idiot,” you rolled your eyes, looping your arms around his torso to hug him close, “I missed you.” “I made you breakfast literally this morning,” he laughed but pulled you closer to him anyways. “If you work this close you could have come to visit.” “Bubblegum…” Jeno sighed, tucking a wild strand of hair back into place. “My friends think I’ve made up my boyfriend,” you pouted. “You want to show your friend back there how real I am? I think her eyes are already very close to falling out of her head.” “What’s going on in that head of yours Jeno Lee?” “Let me show you,” he grinned, cupping your face with one of his hands before pressing his lips to yours in a languid kiss, the taste of smoke on his breath familiar by now. “You really need to quit,” you grumbled against his lips. “I know,” he sighed but kissed you again anyways, “Wasn’t expecting to see you this soon.” “So you smoke in secret?” “Stop arguing when I’m trying to kiss you,” he grumbled, playfully biting your bottom lip. “Stop kissing me when I’m trying to safe your lungs,” you pouted, slapping his chest for emphasis but didn’t protest and insted kissed you again, languid and deep.

“Are you two done making out now?” Mimi suddenly interrupted you, making your face heat up as you took a step back from Jeno who was having nothing of that and pulled you back against his side by your waist. “Yeah, all done,” he grinned, holding one of his hands out for your friend to shake, “I’m Jeno.” “I figured from your boss screaming at you,” she mumbled but shook his hand anyways, giving him her name as well, “You made me look like a fool. Like you could have told me you were the infamous boyfriend refusing to meet us.” “It’s not like I was refusing.” “You totally were,” you butted in, pinching his side. “Listen it doesn’t sound as appealing to spend my evenings with a group of all girls as you think it does,” he defended himself, “And now you have a witness that I am in fact real.” “You’re not getting out of his now, Jeno Lee,” you grinned, lacing your fingers together. “And if I told you I had this really important thing to do?” He tried, throwing you his best puppy eyes. “We can go grocery shopping after my last class,” you rolled your eyes, “You’re walking back to campus with us now.” “Yes, ma’am,” he rolled his eyes, “Let me carry your bag.” “Oh god, you’ll make me feel so single,” Mimi groaned when you handed Jeno your backpack to carry. “You wanted this, I can leave any time,” your boyfriend shrugged, “Do you have like stones in your bag or something?” “It’s called books, you should try it,” you said, playfully sticking out your tongue. “Why am I even dating you?” Jeno just rolled his eyes. “Because you love me,” you smiled brightly. “Yeah, I kinda do,” he confessed, squeezing your hand.

“No need to make me feel even more single,” Mimi groaned again, “Do you have any hot friends to introduce me to, Jeno?” “I don’t think they’re your style,” he shrugged it off, motioning at his attire of ripped black jeans and dark shirt. “So you do have some hot friends that are also single?” “You almost fainted when you saw me, I don’t think you could handle them.” “Don’t judge a book by its cover, babe,” you smiled, leaning into his body. “Sure, bubblegum,” he gently smiled back.

Because if you had judged him by his cover, you’d never be as happy as you were right now.

[vintagedolan]

mixtape | track ten

| masterlist | faceclaims | playlist |

Indiana’s mental health class was in her first semester in the pre-med program. Abnormal Psychology, PSY 249, in a stuffy room in a building on the far side of campus. She’d hated it. College was supposed to be challenging, her program was supposed to be the most rigorous, and yet the class was a breeze. They went through condition after condition - depression, PTSD, anxiety, schizophrenia. The inner workings of the brain, the chemical imbalances, the medications that would help people come back to themselves. She passed the class with a 101%, stowed the knowledge in a seperate folder in her brain for safe keeping, and moved on at the end of the course. But she kept one piece of paper out, one piece of knowledge that didn’t make sense.

Voluntary Emotional Detachment. It was a relatively new idea in the world of psychology, seeing that many of its characteristics could fall under depression. That wasn’t what confused Indy. No, that came when her professor lectured on the voluntary portion. 

“Emotional Detachment is a useful tool sometimes, when it’s used purposefully. For example, if you have a toxic family member in your life, you may voluntarily emotionally detach yourself from them. It’s a defense mechanism, especially during times of trauma. You’ll find yourself numb, unable to feel even if you wanted to. It happens with loss sometimes as well, where you can’t feel the gravity of what you’re losing. Your mind knows what it can withstand, and sometimes, it pulls back. It shields you from the cruel world we live in. It protects.”

Indy had scoffed in her seat, so loud that her professor looked at her and frowned, which was enough to have her blushing red and keeping her head down as she scribbled notes for the rest of the class.

It was the one time she’d ever been reprimanded by an academic authority. Professor Upton pulled her aside before she could escape out of the lecture hall doors. 

“Ms. Cross. You seem like a bright girl, but I don’t appreciate the disrespect.”

“I’m very sorry professor, it won’t happen again.” Indiana had practically stumbled over the words to get them out, her palms sweaty on her backpack strap as she held it on her shoulder.

Indy had a million explanations, but she knew that her professor didn’t care to hear them. And they were lies anyway. The true reason she’d scoffed was something she didn’t want to share.

It was because her professor had made it seem so easy, to just turn it off. Emotionally pull the plug, to sever your ties to someone.

She’d scoffed because if her brain had the capability, and it hadn’t moved to protect her when her mother died, shielded her from the aftermath of unimaginable pain that she’d endured, she wasn’t so sure that she was at all intelligent after all. 

But she understood why now. 

It was because her mother dying had made sense.

Not in the grand scheme of things. Not in a karma driven universe - there was no justifying losing a light as bright as Nicole Cross in a world that had checks and balances, a world that cared. 

But physically, it had made sense. 

Nicole’s cancer started in her pancreas. Stage III when they found it. 13.3% survival rate. And it spread like wildfire. Indiana threw herself into her books, looked for anything, some medical breakthrough that someone had missed. She looked into drug trials, she looked into synthetic pancreas research. All the while, her mother’s cancer took over cell by cell, multiplied and multiplied the way cells are built to. And when it reached her brain, it took over her brainstem. 

When it got to that point, Indiana heard the four words that she would never forget.

“She’s done. We’re done.”

They had echoed out, bouncing off the bleached linoleum, making a cold room even colder. Her father’s voice had never sounded so unfamiliar, and she was glad that her mother was sedated when she broke down. There was no detachment, only raw, searing pain unlike anything she had ever experienced. She sunk to the floor, ragged sobs finally breaking free when she realized what she’d known was coming was finally happening.

The fight was over. It was time to let go. 

Charlie hadn’t cried. No, Charlie stood still as stone in the corner of the room, eyes unblinking as she stared at the shell of her mother in her hospital bed and willed it to be a dream, a nightmare that she would finally wake up from. 

And then, she remembered where she was. She remembered who she was. And she picked her little sister up off the floor and held her in her arms, like she always had when Indiana was hurting.

 Without the vital cues from that little piece of Nicole’s brain telling them to, her heart stopped beating and her lungs stopped asking for air, and she died. 

And it made sense.

This didn’t make sense. His words made no sense.

There was no one to hold Indiana Cross now, and she had a new set of four words that would haunt her.

“I can’t do this.”

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

Six days. Grayson’s thoughts ate him alive for six whole days. He lived through the odd limbo that the world seemed to find itself in on the days between Christmas and New Years. A pause in the spin on the axis, a time to reflect on everything the year had brought, and what the next one had to offer.

Even in his daze, Grayson could only remember one other December he’d tried to hold onto so hard. 

His father’s face was at the forefront of his mind, but not the images that he wanted to see. All he saw was a look of disappointment in his eyes with each hour that Grayson’s lips stayed pressed together while Indiana rested, oblivious in his arms. He towed the selfish line of wanting to enjoy the last days he had with her while his guilt threatened to drown him with every breath he dared to take. He hid it well, as he always did when he really needed to. They had their date nights, with movies and postmates since he still didn’t want her out in public with him. They stayed in the tiny house again to enjoy nature, snuck into Jet’s a few times. He smiled when he was supposed to, went through the motions that were expected of him. It had worked for him before, for videos, for time with friends when all he wanted to do was sit in his room and speak to no one. The only person he could never fool was Ethan, who kept his distance, but stayed close enough to keep his eyes on him. He thought he had everyone but his twin fooled.

But Indiana noticed. Indiana always noticed. 

Nicole had called it the curse of intelligence when she was younger. 

“Sometimes,” she’d said. “When you know too much about how the world works, how people work, you see things you aren’t supposed to. You understand things you aren’t supposed to.”

Indiana was 12 at the time, sitting on the other side of the kitchen table. 

“What do you mean mom? How can you know too much?”

“You’ll know one day. You’ll see.”

The way she’d said it made Indy sit her fork down, her stomach suddenly tight. 

And now she’d seen.

On New Years Eve, Indiana Cross leaned in to kiss her boyfriend as the clock struck midnight, on her couch in her apartment, with her picture frames on the shelf over their heads and the sound of fireworks outside her window.

Grayson didn’t lean in. 

He leaned back, and he spoke.

“I can’t do this.” 

Indiana took a breath. In. Out. Filled her lungs and emptied them again.

She’d noticed. But she hadn’t let herself believe it. She’d pushed every little nuance she’d seen, every time that Grayson’s eyes didn’t catch the smile he tried to put on his face the last few days- she’d pushed it to the back of her mind and justified it. He was just worried about leaving, he was just stressed about Bekah like she was, he was just tired. She’d seen every sign and she’d justified it. 

She swallowed air, her throat painfully dry.

“What?”

“I can’t do this, I’m sorry.”

Indiana did what she always did, what she’d always done her entire life when anything didn’t make sense, when anything went slightly off track. 

She tried to understand why. 

She racked her brain for everything that she’d done, every syllable she’d spoken, and every movement she’d made since that first day at Frazier outside, with him in his green pants on the bench, and her with two Jet’s coffee’s in her hands. 

Her fingers were cold as she pressed her hands together. There was a finality in his tone that had her chest tight, her ribs pressed together, muscles pushing on bones and squeezing everything until she felt like she was going to suffocate. She opened her mouth. 

“Oh.”

Grayson had his head in his hands, leaned over his knees on the couch. He shook in an unfamiliar way, like he was choking, and it took Indy a moment to realize that he was crying. 

She felt like she was in a dream, watching what was happening to her from the outside. It was like slow motion as she watched the girl on the couch curl in on herself, her walls reconstructing at ten times speed - he’d been so gentle with each brick that she didn’t even realize they’d been taken down. He spoke after a moment of heavy silence.

“I love you, but we can’t. I can’t do this to you.”

Her brain refused to process it, refused to even try to dissect it, and she spoke the only word she seemed to be able to find.

“Oh.”

“Indy I’m sorry, I’m so fucking sorry, I should have said something sooner, I wanted to, I’m an asshole for waiting this long.”

She swallowed and wrung her hands together.

“When is your flight?”

His tears streamed faster somehow as he blinked.

“Tomorrow afternoon. We have meetings on the 2nd.”

In. Out.

“What time?”

Grayson looked up. Indiana was sitting straight up, head up high. The only thing moving were her hands, which she kept squeezing together over and over. It scared him, to see his once bubbly girl so still while his tears continued to fall. He couldn’t read her. 

“I’m not sure, I’d have to check. Dee, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

She smiled her hospital smile, the one she used when she got bad news, and it was somehow worse than if she’d yelled at him.

“Indy.”

“It’s okay. C’mere, it’s okay.”

She opened up her arms for him, and she didn’t even seem to notice that they were shaking ever so slightly.

Grayson’s eyes were too blurry to see the quiver. He was fighting himself again, wagering whether sinking into her arms would only cause more damage in the long run. But he knew how it felt to be there, and he wagered that it would be worth whatever hellish guilt it was sure to bring later. So he leaned in, and just a single touch from her had him sobbing again. He pressed his face into her shoulder with so much force that she fell backwards a bit, and suddenly they were intertwined with him above her on the couch.

His pain was physical. She could feel it, in the way his body shook and paused when he tried to suck in a breath that his lungs desperately needed, the wet hot air soaking through her shirt with every exhale he choked out. His tears were warm, the salt already stiffening the fabric that soaked them up. Her hands found his back, and she lifted a finger to his skin before she paused. 

She didn’t know what to write anymore.

Instead, she moved her hand to his hair, scratching at his scalp, holding him steady. He was heavy against her and she closed her eyes, felt him there with her, took in the weight of him. 

“Shhhh. It’s okay.” We’re okay. “You’re okay.”

Her words only made Grayson cry harder when he realized what she was doing. He came back to himself for a moment when he realized that all the shaking wasn’t him. He could feel the way she held onto him and shook, so subtle that he could tell she was fighting it. His stomach churned at the thought of how bad her pain must be if it was causing a reaction in her body, and he moved to push himself up.

“Indy.”

She clung to him, panic breaking through the protective numbness that had taken hold so quickly. If it was the last time she was going to get to hold him, she’d hoped it would have lasted just a bit longer. 

But she took a deep breath and she let him go, forced her arms to release him.

It hurt worse to see his face again, see the pain in his puffy eyes. She reached back out for him, swiped her thumb across his cheek to catch a tear. Her fingers got distracted in the feeling of his scruff, and she scratched over it for a moment, indulging herself, willing herself to remember the way it felt on her fingertips.

“It’s okay.” It was a reflex to her, and she couldn’t stop herself from saying it.

“It’s not though. Indy, it’s not okay. I’m hurting you.”

She didn’t have a response to that. Her eyes fell to her lap, picking at her fingernails. 

“I’ll be okay.” It was a lie, but she would have said anything to bring some of the light back to his eyes. Her pain she could manage, but his was her breaking point.

“Please don’t do that. Please don’t pretend on this.” He brought in a shaky breath, blowing it out quickly.  

In. Out.

“What do you want me to do?” 

“I want you to scream. I want you to be pissed at me, I want you to be mad that I waited this long to tell you! You haven’t even asked why,” he cried. Indy wondered for a moment why it always hurt more to see boys cry. It seemed to be more painful for them somehow - heavier. 

“I think I know why.” 

He sat up a bit more at her words. Waiting.

“It was a chance thing, you being here. Us meeting. Your life is entirely different than mine, and you have your people in LA. There’s… I mean there’s plenty of girls there who don’t have the stuff I have. Class, work -” Her voice cracked at the end, Grayson’s outline blurring just a bit as she looked up.

“No. No no no, hey,” he stopped her, hands hovering over her for a moment before he gave in and rested them on her arms, holding her without fully pulling her in. “It’s not that. I promise you, it has nothing to do with anyone else. I want you, I don’t want anyone else. But I know you, and your dreams are here, and I’m not gonna take that away from you.”

Indiana’s confusion only grew. She’d only heard one thing he’d said.

“You want me?” Her voice sounded pitiful, even to own ears. 

“Of course I do.” He spoke it like it was the only possible truth, and a flicker of hope rose in her gut, fighting it’s way up. “Indy of course I do.” 

“Then… why?” 

“Remember when we went to LA?”

His words brought back a flood of memories. The two of them kissing in the ocean, the secret beach, sleeping in his bed with his green wall, piggyback rides around the house, the late night Cudi drives.

“Yeah.”

“You remember how much you hated it there? How bad you wanted to come back home? And what did I promise you?”

Indy couldn’t find her voice. Her brain was otherwise occupied, watching her memories being drug through dark ink, staining them. 

“I promised you I would never ask you to leave New York.” He finished it for her. “And I meant it. But I can’t stay here Indiana, no matter how bad I want to.”

“Your life is in LA.” She repeated her words from earlier, monotone and unattached. Her heart fought with her, begged her to tell him everything. Tell him that she was going to start working at Jets and start therapy so she could fly out to see him. Tell him that she was halfway through her UCLA application essay that she’d been working on on nights he fell asleep before her. Tell him that she’d drop everything and follow him anywhere. 

“You’re the most giving person I’ve ever met. You give so much to everyone but yourself. But I’m not letting you give up your life for anyone, especially not me.”

She wanted to be mad that he assumed that she would. But there was an understanding, a sadness in his eyes that reminded her that he knew her better than she had ever realized. 

“We could make it work.”

He looked like he wanted to believe her. 

“You deserve someone who is here for you.”

“You’re here for me.” Her mouth was starting to outrun her mind, a dangerous game that she usually couldn’t stop once it had begun.

“You deserve someone who is here to celebrate your accomplishments every day, not someone in a different time zone on the other side of the country.”

“We could make it work.” It was more of a plea that time, and she saw it register across his face, the pain it caused him. 

“Indy.” 

“People do long distance all the time, we could do it.”

“We aren’t long distance people,” he said, but Indy’s mind was already running.

“We could set up a facetime schedule, and you wouldn’t have to visit that much, I’ll be busy with school anyways. And if we hate it, then we can stop. We just have to try, we’re never gonna know unless we try it.” 

Grayson was silent for a minute, which was enough of an answer. He’d known this was coming. Ethan had warned him that it would happen, that Indiana would try to reason her way through it. He’d told his brother that he had to be confident in his choice or he’d get swayed off course.

Grayson wasn’t sure he’d even be confident in his choice to remove himself from the best person he’d ever known. But knowing that in the long run it would be better for her was the only thing that let him cling to the last bit of resolve he had. 

“Indy.”

Her lip quivered, and he felt his heart crack. 

“Please,” she said.

“C’mere. Just c’mere.”

It wasn’t a surrender, but an offering of comfort. Indy knew it would hurt her later, but she didn’t have the willpower to resist it. She crawled into his lap, and the last of the numbness that had started faded away. In his familiar arms, she lost her last semblance of control.

She crumpled into his shoulder, broken sobs shaking her frame as she clung to him, let him hold her as she wrapped herself around him, as if it would somehow make him stay. 

He rocked her as she sobbed, accidentally pressing a kiss to her shoulder before he realized what he was doing. It was torture in the rawest form, worse than he could have expected to be the cause of her pain. 

“I’m so sorry Indy, I’m so sorry,” he whispered to her over and over, hoping she believed him. She pressed her face against his neck to keep her eyes closed, pretending for a moment that everything was fine.

“I love you.” 

The tears returned to his eyes, and in a moment of weakness he turned and pressed a kiss to her hair, her temple. His lips had missed her. 

“I love you too Indiana Cross.”

She opened her mouth, then closed it again.

Her finger traced against his back. F-O-R-E-V-E-R. She wished she could erase it somehow when his breath caught in his throat again. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, and he shook his head.

“You have nothing to be sorry for.” His voice was muffled by her skin, seeing that he was unwilling to lean back from her.

“I know this is hurting you too,” she said, and was met with the feeling of more of his tears on her shoulder. “I’m sorry.”

“The only thing you did was make me love you too much. Don’t be sorry for that.”

The way her heart squeezed wasn’t natural, and though she knew the phenomenon wasn’t as everyone said, she was sure it skipped a beat in her chest. She squeezed him tighter to her, like she had so many times. She synced her breathing to his, laid her head on his shoulder, committed the sound of his heartbeat to memory. 

Their tears dried out over the next hour, the numbness of acceptance starting to blanket over them. Neither of them dared to move a muscle, Grayson especially. All he did was rub his hand over her back, up and down the same as he had been since she climbed into his lap. They both knew that moving would mean having to figure out what to do next. 

It could have been minutes, it could have been hours. Indy wasn’t sure, and she was scared to look at a clock, to see her fleeting time left with him wasting away.

“Did you pack your bag already?” Her voice was too loud even though it was barely above a whisper, pulling them back into the reality they wanted to avoid.

“Yeah. It’s at home.” 

Indy could see it in her head, his Jersey room, quiet and waiting for him with his orange duffle on the bed. But her stomach filled with a wave of nausea as she realized what it meant.

“So you have to go home.” 

Grayson’s hand paused on her back. She was holding her breath.

“I… I didn’t know if you would want me to stay.” It was the first time he could remember not knowing what to say to her. 

Her arms tightened around him, her breathing getting a little bit more ragged. He ran his hands over her back quickly, desperate to soothe her.

“Shh, shh hey, I’m staying. I’m not going anywhere.”

“Yet.” She whispered, and he squeezed his eyes shut as he flinched. “Sorry, that was harsh.”

“Not undeserved,” he said, turning and resting his cheek against her shoulder. “I don’t want to hurt you any more than I already have. So whatever you need, I’ll give it to you.”

Indy sat up. Her eyes had settled a bit, her tears washing the jellyfish blue into a shade of navy that Grayson didn’t recognize. It made his breath catch in his chest. 

“Whatever I need?”

“Whatever you need.” 

She looked at him, and her head tilted to the side just slightly. A small smile tried to make its way to her face, but her lips quivered. 

“Could you kiss me?” 

He paused, watching her fight off her tears with a deep breath. 

“Is that what you need?” 

“Just… just one. I didn’t know, you know. That the last one was gonna be the last one. And we’re here, and I just thought, that maybe - ” 

He kissed her. For the first time, he was hesitant. He kept his hands to his sides, not wanting to push anything too far, not wanting to make anything worse somehow. Indy barely reacted either, too nervous to do something wrong. 

They pulled back from each other, breathing shallow, nerves taking over as they tried to figure out what to do. 

“Thank you,” Indiana said. 

Grayson swallowed hard, watched her eyes as they flickered between his own. 

And then they were kissing. Really kissing, chasing the taste of each other like air at the end of a sprint. His hands went to her face, holding her to him as her hands went to his torso, bunched up his shirt and tried to pull him into her, closer somehow despite the fact that they were already touching everywhere that they could be. The desperation was palpable, in the way their hands roamed and fell back into their familiar patterns. Indy sucked in the first real breath she’d taken in since the clock had struck midnight, breathed him in as best she could, trying to lose herself in him like she always had. But her mind wouldn’t shut off, reminding her that it could really be the last time she had him like this. 

He felt her tears, first on his thumb that was holding her cheek, and then against his own skin. It took all his willpower to pull back from her lips. She let him, her breathing shaky as she tucked her face back down into his neck.

He picked her up effortlessly, standing up from the couch and moving them to her room. The Cudi vinyls seemed to mock him, especially when he laid down and stared up at them on their small shelves. Indy didn’t move an inch, staying wrapped around him, laying on top of him when he rested back against the pillows. 

Time moved quickly, and Indy still avoided the clocks, scared to see what had already passed. 

Grayson wanted to hear her voice. Wanted her to talk to him, wanted to commit every single thing she said to memory, but he wouldn’t ask. She had given him enough. 

He closed his eyes, focused on the feeling of her fingers over his shirt, tried to make out what shapes she was drawing like he always did. He felt her hands travel up higher, up his neck to his skin, scratching over his beard.

Her fingertips were gentle as they moved up, over his lips, around his cheek to his eyelids, down over his nose, then to the other side of his face. She traced the pattern a few times, and Grayson waited until she was on his nose to speak.

“What’re you drawing?”

“You,” she said. “Memorizing.”

He didn’t know how he still had more tears to make, but they started to fall anyways, down the side of his face over his temples. 

“I’m sorry,” was all he could say.

“I know. I wish you could stay just a little bit longer.” 

“Me too.”

He traced a heart on the back of her arm.

“I love you too.”

The truth of it was, she didn’t know how to not love him, and that was the scary part of it all. She couldn’t imagine a world where she didn’t love him with everything she had in her. 

She didn’t know who she was without it anymore.

“If you ever change your mind, I’ll be here you know,” she said. He took in a deep breath, pressing a kiss to her hair. 

“I’m not gonna do that.”

Her heart sank.

“That’s not fair,” he said. “I can’t ask you to do that, to wait for me. I’m not going to string you along, that’s cruel. Once I’m back in LA, I want you to move on.”

Indy shook her head against him, burying her face in his chest. 

“No.”

“Indy.”

“No.” Her brain refused to process it, to imagine a single scenario where she felt anything good without Grayson by her side. She knew it wasn’t healthy, and she vowed to never tell anyone but in that moment, she reserved herself to be miserable every minute that she wasn’t with him. 

“I know it’s not gonna be easy, but you deserve to be happy. And I’m sorry that I’m gonna make that harder, but you’ll find somebody who can love you better than I do.”

“Does that mean you’re going to just move on when you get back to LA? Just forget about me?�� There was a spite in her voice that she didn’t like hearing in her own voice. But Grayson didn’t flinch. It was almost reliving to him. He was getting what he deserved, what he’d earned for breaking her heart. 

Her anger meant she cared.

“Indiana I’m never going to forget you. If you think I could, I was an even worse boyfriend than I thought.”

“No, don’t do that.” She pushed off his chest and sat up. “You don’t get to do that. You don’t get to make me think that the last three months were bad. That’s the last thing I have to hold onto. Those were the best months of my life, you don’t get to take that.” 

Grayson didn’t have an answer. 

“Okay.”

“You made this decision for the both of us, I don’t get a say in it. So I’ll hold onto it as long as I fucking want to. You don’t get to tell me I have to move on.”

“Okay.” 

“Okay then,” Indy said, reaching up to wipe a tear away. She sucked in a breath and pushed it out through shaky lips, trying to hold herself together.

“Sorry.”

Grayson shook his head. “Indiana you can be mad at me. You should be mad at me.”

“I am mad at you.” 

She knew it wasn’t in the way that he meant. Because she wasn’t mad that he’d broken up with her. Because deep down, under all the pain and all the love and all the worry, she knew he was doing it for her. He was doing what she would never have the guts to do, even if it was the right thing.

No, she was mad at him for infiltrating every single part of her. Every thought, every muscle, every cell of her body contained him. Every hope she had for her future was molded around him. He was there in everything. His curls were in the dreams she had about her future children. His smile in the back of her mind every time she closed her eyes. His eyes, bright and green, always there.

“Do you want me to leave?” There was no malice in his tone, only genuine concern. 

She pondered it for a moment. Thought about what it would look like, for him to actually walk out the door and never come back through it.

“No.” 

“Okay. Then I’ll stay.”

“I can drive you to the airport. So Ethan doesn’t have to come into the city.”

“Okay. I’ll tell him.”

“Okay.” 

They stared at each other for a moment, staying very still, waiting for one of them to make a decision. 

“We should probably sleep.” Grayson checked his watch. “It’s 4am.”

“Okay.”

Another pause. Another moment of uncertainty that they’d never had to navigate.

“Do you want me to take the couch?”

She shook her head, and with a sigh, she gave in. Grayson could finally breathe again when she settled against him, pushing her hand up under his shirt, running her fingers over his ribs. He wrapped her up in his arms tightly, focused on the feeling of the weight of her on him.

And he closed his eyes. 

His alarm went off at 9:45. As soon as it sounded, Indy turned her face into his chest, a new wave of tears coming forward as the realization hit her

It was time to let go.

He just held her and kissed her head for as long as he could. She didn’t know if she’d slept. If she had, it was only for a few moments. She’d kept waking up, reminding herself that he was still there. 

They barely spoke. No one ate breakfast. He hadn’t brought a change of clothes, and parts of his shirt were stiff from the saltwater of both their tears. It took all the strength he had to keep it together when he closed the apartment door behind him for the last time. 

She took his hand in the elevator, and his tears fell, making his cheeks even colder when they walked outside. It felt odd, for him to climb into the passenger seat with her in the driver’s as they continued down the road. His mind was flooded with memories, with doubts. He couldn’t stop picturing the smile that would spread across her face if he told her that he’d changed his mind, that they could try. 

He fought it, kept his mouth shut, reminded himself that this was his decision and he had to deal with the repercussion of it. 

Indy was quiet too, evidence of her earlier decision to not hurt him anymore than she already had. She didn’t want to make it any harder on either of them. No matter what, she still loved him, and she didn’t like to see him hurting. She kept herself superficially distracted, focused on the colors of the cars that passed, and the number of the exits on the highway. 

The airport had never come quicker.

Grayson’s chest tightened when they pulled off. He couldn’t ignore it anymore, couldn’t push it down and stay strong like his dad had always told him to. An image of him hugging her goodbye over her console came to his mind, and he panicked.

“Would you want to come in? Like park and come in? I know you hate airports, and you can say no. But… I’d like to give you one last good hug before I go.” 

She merged into the lane that led to the parking as her tears began to fall. He ran his thumb over her hand until they got out. They found each other again behind the car, Indy linking her arm around his and holding on as tight as she could as they walked. She was ten times more anxious than the last time she had walked into an airport, her usual pertifying fear of Grayson being on a plane the least painful part. 

It was hard to keep her sobs quiet but she bit them back as best she could. Grayson heard them, shifted so he had his arms wrapped around her as they walked. Her eyes were blurry with tears but she noticed the bright yellow and orange bags before she spotted Ethan. He gave her a sad smile that she did her best to return. From the look of pity in his eyes, it was even worse than she thought. 

Her vision was obscured by Grayson, who moved in front of her. She clung to the front of his jacket with both hands, unable to look him in the eyes. She didn’t know if she could handle it. 

“I don’t want you to go,” she whispered, tears so full that they dripped off her chin and onto her shirt. 

“I’m so sorry.” His own eyes burned as he watched her. But her next words caused the worst pain he’d felt in a long time.

“Can we have a redo?” As her voice shook, his last barrier fell, and he was sobbing - the kind you try to choke back and keep quiet as he crushed her against him, burying his face in her hair.

“Not this time baby. Not this time.” 

They weren’t sure how they could cry harder, but they did. He swayed as he held her, tight and warm. Ethan wiped his own tears away with his jacket sleeve as he checked the boarding time on the tickets. 

“I love you. So much,” she said. 

“I love you too. I’m so sorry. If you ever need me... “ he trailed off, unsure if his offer would only hurt them both more down the road. She understood what he meant, and she took a deep breath. In. Out. 

“Right now, I need you to turn around, and I need you to walk away, or I’m never going to be able to let you go.” 

“Okay.” 

He didn’t move. She finally looked up at him and held herself together, determined to look at his face in person for the last time without the distortion of tears. 

“Take care of yourself, okay? Be safe. Be happy. I’m always gonna love you.” Her voice was as steady as she could make it, and that somehow hurt him worse. 

“Forever,” he whispered, and then he was kissing her. He wrapped her up in his arms as tightly as he could, held her to him until he forced himself away, only keeping a hold of her hand. 

Ethan, always in tune with his brother, seemed to recognize his cue. 

Indy nodded and squeezed his hand one more time, and then she let him go, their fingers tracing over one anothers until they fell away, the distance too much.

A numbness spread over her body as soon as he let her go, and she watched from her spot as he disappeared down the hallway and into the security line.

She didn’t remember getting back to her car. But somehow, she managed to crawl inside and lock the doors before she crumpled forward onto her steering wheel.

[tngrace]

Firey Situation

TK & Carlos's apartment complex catches on fire trapping Carlos inside.

Pt 3 of my Tarlos College AU Series. Thanks as always to @moviegeek03 & @justkillingtimewhileiwait for their constant support on my writing. It means the world. 

Tarlos/911 LS Masterlist; Read on A03

TK had been on shift for the last twenty-four hours. The calls hadn't been too terrible, but he was exhausted and missed his boyfriend. Carlos had sent him a couple of selfies in their texts throughout the last twenty-fours hours, but it wasn't the same as seeing him in person. He knew Carlos was at home asleep even though it was only eight pm. He'd had a long day of classes and he'd text TK that practice had been brutal. TK thought Carlos’s allergies were acting up and he just didn't want to admit it, so he was hoping his boyfriend was getting some much needed rest.

When B shift arrived, TK slung his bag on his shoulder and headed out. He was very much looking forward to crashing alongside Carlos once home. What he wasn't expecting was to pull into their complex to see fire and smoke. Adrenaline kicked in faster than he thought possible, and he was out of the car heading for the crowds of people searching for Carlos. He was single-minded in his desire to find him. When he couldn't, when he didn't see those curls and brown eyes he loved so much, he ran for their apartment.

It was a challenge getting through the crowds, but non-ems personnel didn't even try to stop him. When he saw the front door already engulfed, he did his best to bite back a sob. He looked around one more time to make sure he hadn't just missed Carlos, but he still didn't see him. He ran around the back of the building; they had a back door and a window, and when both were still closed, TK felt his heart sinking. "Carlos," he screamed, the smoke outside already starting to get to him without proper equipment. He screamed his boyfriend's name again, but was once again only met with the sounds of the fire eating the building, the smoke alarms, and the sirens.

He knew all the firefighters would be out front working on putting out the fire and making sure all the apartments were empty. He knew no one would notice him on the backside of the apartments. He did his best to look through the window, not able to get in the backdoor having left his keys in his car. He banged on the window screaming Carlos’s name but nothing. He had to stop a few times to cough, but then he saw it. Carlos was laying in the hallway floor not moving.

TK's heart kicked into overdrive; he couldn't lose him. He just couldn't. He finds the largest rock he can and throws it through the window. His heart is racing, and the little smoke he is breathing in is almost too much. He takes his hoodie off and wraps his hand clearing away as much glass as possible. He grips the edges heaving himself up into the window. He just barely fits but he makes it. The living area is totally engulfed and creeping closer to his unconscious boyfriend.

He screams Carlos’s name as he rights himself in the back hallway, but Carlos never moves. There's no telling how much smoke he's inhaled. He scrambles to Carlos’s side once he's on his feet; he checks for a pulse first thing, relieved to find one, even if it's faint. He maneuvers Carlos over his shoulder and then he's headed for the back door. He throws it open just as the fire reaches where they just were. He gets Carlos outside breathing in his own fresh air. He's not sure how he got from their back door to the front of the complex so quickly, but the next thing he knows he's yelling for a gurney.

The next little bit passes in a blur for TK. They’re both loaded into an ambulance and taken to the hospital. TK tries to stay with Carlos, but they get seperated when TK needs to be checked out himself. He has some minor cuts from the window on his arms, and they put him on a little oxygen to help clear up the smoke he inhaled. He tries to get updates on Carlos, but he’s not his boyfriend’s emergency contact. That would be Carlos’s parents, and TK doesn’t know them. They’d never thought to change their contacts, never thinking they would have a need for it. TK is released in a couple of hours, and he moves to the waiting room unable to leave. He needs to see Carlos, needs to know he’s ok. He's been sitting there about an hour when Judd and Grace appear in front of him. TK gives him a confused look before Grace is pulling him up into a hug. TK is still getting used to relying on his fire fam, but he loves Grace and Judd treats him just like a brother.

"How?" He manages to get out when Grace passes him off for a hug from Judd.

"I took the call earlier, and we've known the Reyes family a while," she says when they sit down with TK between them.

"Of course," he murmurs as he runs his hands up and down his thighs. "I don't…. I haven't… we…"

"It's ok. Just take a breath," Judd tells him as he rubs a hand up TK's back to calm him.

TK gulps in a big breath and slowly let's it out. "I haven't heard how he is. He was… he was unconscious when I got him out. We haven't, we never changed our contacts so I can't get any information on him." His voice is almost a wounded whimper making Judd and Grace share a look.

Grace pats TK's arm and then she's up and moving. "You got him out?" Judd questions softly.

TK nods. "Yea I got home from shift, and the whole place was in flames. I couldn't… I couldn't find him so I went in."

"Without gear?! TK have you been checked out?!"

"Yea. Yes.. I was released about an hour ago. They cleaned the cuts I got from climbing in the window and made me stay on oxygen for an hour."

"Why didn't you call one of us?!"

TK looks at him like he's grown a second head. "We just got off a twenty-four. I wasn't bothering any of you."

"TK," Judd groans, running a hand down his face.

TK huffs and turns his attention back to trying to find Grace.

"Family calls family no matter what. You haven't slept either. Next time call ok?"

TK just stares at Judd for the longest as the reality of finally having a real family sinks into his exhausted worried brain. "Ok," he whispers with a nod. Judd ruffles his hair and TK is too tired to stop him. They sit in silence til Grace returns. "Come on," she says motioning for them to follow.

"Where are we going?" TK asks nervously, but he jumps up to follow her.

"You are going to see your boy," she tells him in that nonsense way only Grace can perfect.

TK stops dead making Judd run into him with an oooff. "TK," he grunts managing to keep them both upright. Grace turns around giving them both an unimpressed look. "Is there a problem boys?"

"I don't think they know Carlos and I are together. I mean… I don't… we haven't talked in detail… but he just… I can't."

"You can and you are," Grace counters, grabbing his hand. She's careful with his injuries, but she tugs him on. "You're his roommate right? If nothing else roommates check on roommates."

She leads him to Carlos’s room. Carlos is on oxygen and ivs, luckily he escaped without any burns. His parents are on one side of the bed, his dad's arm around his mom's shoulders keeping her close. TK can tell she's been crying. "Gabriel, Andrea, this is TK. He's Carlos’s roommate, and the one who got him out," Grace says quietly as Judd props up in the doorway as Grace drags TK further into the room. He's staring at her like she's crazy that she offered up that little tidbit, but she just shrugs and pushes him closer to Carlos’s parents before stepping back by Judd's side.

Andrea pulls him into a tight hug and repeatedly thanks him. "No thanks needed," TK tells her quietly. "Your son is amazing and means a lot to me. He'd do it for me."

Before they can say anymore, Carlos makes a whining noise catching all their attention. TK goes to step towards him before remembering he's just a friend in this instance. He let's Gabriel and Andrea surround him, and he barely holds in a gasp when Carlos’s first wheezy breath is TK's name. TK freezes as all eyes turn to him. Carlos wheezes TK's name again; "Shhh hijo, él está aquí*," Andrea murmurs as she runs a hand through his hair. His eyes are searching for him as Andrea replaces his oxygen mask. "I'll get the doctor," Gabriel says as he heads out the door. Andrea holds out her hand to TK to come closer so Carlos can see him.

"I'm here," TK says softly coming up on the other side of the bed opposite Andrea. "You're ok Carlos." He gives him a watery smile and grabs his hand before Carlos can connect with his face. He gives it a pat and then lays it back on the bed as Carlos scrunches his forehead at him in confusion.

"You rest. I'm gonna…. I'll go see if anything was salvageable from the apartment and let you know."

Before Carlos can say anymore TK is out the door. He doubles over in the hallway panting for air as tears stream down his cheeks. "Ok. Come on you're going to get some sleep," Judd says as he rubs TK's back. He knows it's hard only being Carlos’s friend that moment, and they've both been through a lot. "We'll sort the apartment later." He doesn't give TK a chance to protest, just leads him out to their truck with Grace following. Judd stops by the apartment complex and gets TK's duffle and keys from the jeep. It's hard seeing their home in ruins, but at this point he's too exhausted. He dozes off in the truck and only wakes when Judd shakes him awake. He takes his bag with a thanks, and follows Grace to the spare bedroom. He kicks his shoes off and falls face first into the bed. He let's the tears fall until he falls asleep.

The doctor checks Carlos over after Gabriel informed them he was awake. His eyes kept straying towards the door hoping TK would come back. They want to leave him on oxygen for a while longer and tell him he needs to rest and let his body heal. Carlos is too tired to question his parents on where TK went, and he falls back into a fitful sleep. The next time he wakes his parents are murmuring quietly over food. He still doesn't see TK, and it's really stressing him out. He doesn't know if TK was injured as well. He doesn't know where he's staying. He needs TK. He does his best to push himself up, but his body still feels exhausted. "hijo fácil. Qué ocurre?" Gabriel asks, having seen Carlos trying to move.

"TK?" Where's TK?" He asks before Andrea is putting the oxygen mask back over his face. Gabriel and Andrea share a knowing look. They had gathered from the brief visit with TK that he was more than just a friend to their son. "He's at the Ryders. He's resting. Judd said he was exhausted."

Carlos keeps looking between them; he knows what they're saying is true, TK had worked a twenty-four, but he needs to see him. "I'll call Judd," Gabriel says reading his son so easily. Andrea continuously strokes her hand through his curls to help relax him. A nurse and doctor cycle through to check on him. They step him down to a cannula and are hopeful they'll be able to release him tomorrow.

Once the doctor and nurse are gone, Andrea sits on the edge of the bed and resumes her hand stroking through his hair. "Carlitos you know you can tell us anything right?" She asks so softly. The look of panic on her son's face breaks her heart. "Baby. We love you, so much."

"I… I know." He won't meet her eyes as he fiddles with the blanket. "What…" he clears his throat and she holds some water for him to sip. "Gracias, mamà."

She gives him a nod and squeezes his hand for him to continue. "What do you think I have to tell you?"

Andrea let's out a soft sigh and before she can answer Gabriel returns. "Judd says TK is sleeping. Says he hasn't moved since he hit the bed. He'll wake him if you want, or as soon as TK's awake they'll go get his jeep and he can come down."

"It's fine," Carlos says shaking his head and clearing his throat once more. He inhaled quite a bit of smoke and it's taking some getting used to the hoarseness and scratchiness of his voice. Andrea gets him to drink more water as she shares another look with Gabriel. Carlos is too tired to deal right now, so after thanking his mother once more, he drifts back off. He wakes a couple of hours later, and his parents are still there. Andrea checks to make sure he’s feeling ok, and he gives her a nod. He can still feel the tension from their previous conversation, and he knows they're going to have to discuss it before TK gets there. “Mama? What were you thinking I had to tell you earlier?”

Andrea and Gabriel move closer, one on each side of his bed. Andrea runs her hand through his hair; it’s always calmed him, and she hates seeing this tension her son is carrying. “TK’s more than a friend, si?” Gabriel says just as soft Andrea had been talking earlier.

Carlos stares at his dad wide eyed; his body unconsciously tensed, panic flowing through him. He should’ve known though that his dad would be the one to figure it out. “It’s ok Carlitos. It’s ok,” Andrea says trying to help him relax.

“Si,” he barely whispers. “He’s… he’s my b…. B.. boyfriend. We met at ACC. He’s a dual certified EMT and firefighter. He works at the 126 with Judd.” He won’t look at them the whole time he’s rambling. He knows they love him, that’s never changed, but after he came out, they never said another word about it. He’s never brought anyone home to meet them, not that there’s been many to bring home, but he can’t lie to them about TK. Not when he knows they figured it out.

“Are you happy? Does he make you happy?” Andrea asks, picking up on her son’s nerves.

“So very much,” he doesn’t hesitate.

“That’s all we’ve ever wanted hijo. We just want you happy,” this coming from Gabriel.

Carlos finally looks up at them, tears swimming in his eyes. “You… you never said anything,” he hiccups, his breath catching on a sob. Andrea gives him some more water and then she pulls him into a hug to try and calm him. His breathing still isn’t the best, but the oxygen helps; she just doesn’t want him to stress himself out too much.

“We thought you would want things to go on like normal. Nothing changed for us. We didn’t realize that by not talking about it, we were hurting you,” Andrea said softly wiping at her own eyes.

“I’m sorry,” Carlos whispers to which both his parents shush him. He hates seeing his mom upset though.

“You’ve nothing to be sorry for son. Nothing at all,” Gabriel reassures. “How do we make this better?” he asks Carlos as Andrea wipes her eyes.

“Just be here, talk to me, love me,” Carlos says with a soft smile.

“Done,” they say at the same time.

They let Carlos rest for a few more hours before TK shows up. Carlos properly introduces TK to his parents, and he manages to catch his boyfriend when TK falls into his arms in tears. The last forty-eight hours had been really stressful on him, and he’s so glad to be back in his arms. Andrea and Gabriel leave for the night with the promise to return with breakfast. They also offered to let the boys stay at the ranch until they decide what they’re going to do for housing. Carlos feels like he’s living in a dream, but he couldn’t be happier. He and TK talk about everything that happened after his parents leave. He kisses TK in thanks for saving him, before softly lecturing him about coming in without gear. “I couldn’t leave you. You mean too much to me. I can’t live without you Carlos.”

“I can’t live without you either TK.”

Carlos is discharged the next day with an inhaler just in case. The doctor is almost positive his lungs are clear enough not to need it, but he’d rather be safe than sorry. TK promises to keep an eye on him, and Carlos gives him an affection eye roll knowing TK will be hovering for a little bit. They take his parents up on their offer to stay at the ranch just until they figure out their next move. Things aren’t perfect with his parents but it's a start, and with TK by his side, he knows they can tackle anything that comes their way.

*shhh son he's here

**easy son. What's wrong

[addercharmer]

The mall was oddly empty for a Friday afternoon, Izumi was stupidly glad. 

Making her way to the center fountain, Izumi keeps her eyes searching for one of her friends' hair colors. 

Sky blue was the first she saw already standing by the fountain. Kayama had walked up to the blue haired boy at the same time as Izumi did. 

"Hiya!" She chirped once she was within hearing range. 

"Hey, thanks for the help. I have no idea what to get a six year old boy." Izumi greets and thanks them again. 

"Six?" Shirakumo asks, he looks deep in thought. 

"Un, six. He has wings so I figure he needs a full sized bed at least, and if he has any bird-like instincts a lot of blankets." Izumi explains a little more. 

"Yo, yo, yo." Yamada announces his arrival in his new favorite fashion, Izumi is just waiting for him to start calling everyone 'listeners'. 

Aizawa is right behind Yamada, his eyes zero in on Izumi's empty hands. "I thought I said bring coffee." He grumbles. 

"I figured you would want fresh hot coffee, we can get that first." Izumi plasates her hands raised in a sign of surrender. 

The glare she gets in return would have made her shrink in on herself if not for the uptick of the corner of Aizawa's mouth. 

With a sigh Izumi looks around quickly and starts making her was to the coffee house she sees just to the left of where they are. 

"So coffee, then a furniture store, a home store for the blankets and pillows, then maybe a toy store?" Izumi asks her friends. 

"No clothes?" Kayama asks. 

"I've never seen him so I will have to go out for those tomorrow, maybe you could come again?" Izumi half asks. "I have terrible fashion sense, like most of my clothes are bought by dad." She admits. 

Behind her Izumi can hear Shirakumo and Aizawa snort. 

"You aren't much better." Yamada tells the pair as he passes them to walk next to Izumi. 

"I can help tomorrow." He tells her as they cross into the coffee house. 

Izumi is the first to the counter, she orders herself a caramel frozen coffee and indicates to the barista that she was paying for the rest of the group. 

Drinks in hand the five teens make there way to a furniture store that advertised that they specialized in physical mutation needs. 

Izumi was a little awed at what she saw, there were nests, and wet beds, and beds made extra sturdy. 

She automatically made her way over to the beds that looked like giant shallow bowls. It took a few moments for a salesperson to make their way over. 

"Can I help you?" A woman who had large horns that curled at the side of her head much like a mountain goats' asked. 

"My dad is adopting a boy with wings. We need a bed." She tells the salesperson bluntly. "I just want to see what each mattress is made of before I choose." 

Izumi steps away from the woman and reaches for the information card of the first bowl like bed. She takes time to read the ten options as her friends lay in each of them to judge which feels better. 

It's the first one she had seen that she picked had an inside made of gel and memory foam, it would be best to offer support no matter Hawks preferred sleeping position. 

Aizawa and Kayama both agreed that it was the most comfortable, where Yamada and Shirakumo both argued that the one that was simply weaved fabric was the most comfortable. 

Taking the ordering card she stops by a dark cherry wood bed frame and matching desk, picking up the cards for those as well. Izumi makes her way to the check out. 

"Can I have these rush delivered before seven tonight?" Izumi asks as the three items are being rung up. 

"It will be an extra charge of one hundred dollars." The horned woman tells her. 

"Okay." Izumi agrees, Nezu hadn't given her a limit, he had just said not to go overboard. 

Izumi takes the delivery form and fills it out quickly, she then swipes Nezu's credit card with a pleased hum. 

As she's gathering with the others to leave she spots an ash wood dining table, quickly she grabs the information cards and runs back to the check out. 

The transaction complete without the rush delivery Izumi makes her way out of the store to where the others are waiting. 

"Sorry, we didn't have a dining room at the old house." She tells them. 

"Old house? Did you move?" Shirakumo asks and Izumi looks at him before she remembers that she hadn't told them yet. 

"Yeah, dad had our stuff moved during the festival. He bought this huge place on Sakura Ave." She shares the news. "Us getting the baby bird was riding on my being a medalist in the festival." 

The three boys' faces suddenly look horror stricken at the revelation, and Kayama looks extremely sad. 

"The commission is evil." Izumi deadpans, before she grabs Kayama's wrist to link their arms at the elbow. 

"So, are we close enough to use first names now that you know I'm getting a little brother?" She asks the group, using their last names asked he feel a little like they are her teachers still. 

"Izumi-chan!" Nemuri and Oboro both shout at the same time. 

"I was already using it, Izumi-chan." Hizashi points out. 

Shōta grumbles under his breath but his cheeks are pink and he nods. 

Izumi bounces as she walks into the home store, she's happy she's got friends. 

Looking around the entrance of the store Izumi spots signs hanging over their heads and pointing to where they should be able to find what they are looking for. 

Arm still linked with Nemuri she starts off towards the bedroom designated area. 

"I think we should split up." She suggests. "Nemuri and Oboro, would you guys look for some pillows, I think maybe two regular sized, one body sized, and maybe four smaller ones in fun shapes?" 

The two of them link their own arms and skip off towards where the pillows are. "Don't forget to grab sheets and pillow cases." Izumi shouts after them. 

Feeling bold, Izumi links arms with both Hizashi and Shōta Izumi all but drags them over to the blankets. 

The three of them spend half an hour testing each blanket for softness, and weight. By the end they had seven blankets picked out, two were weighted blankets that weren't supposed to hold heat but still give the needed weight, Izumi had selected one for herself as well. The other five blankets were a variety Of different fluffiness and thickness, Izumi's favorite was a pastel green that was the second softest thing she had ever held. 

Nemuri and Oboro still hadn't found them so Izumi was quick to text and ask where they were. 

The group of three found the two sitting in the middle of an isle debating the best fabrics for the sheets, Izumi laughed at them as Shōta joined in arguing for and against them both. 

Looking at what they had pulled off the shelves Izumi grabbed two that were a high thread count, one black and one gray, then she picked up a jersey knit set in a sky blue. 

Holding the packages tight to her chest she picked up one of the small pillows on the ground and tossed it at Shōta hitting him in the chest with a thump. 

"Come on guys, toy store next, you can each pick out two things for him." She tells them, trying not to feel like a parent negotiating with children. 

With Hizashi carrying one weighted blanket and five fluffy ones, Shōta carrying her weighted blanket and the body pillow, it left Nemuri and Oboro to gather up the six smaller pillows makes for a comical sight as they make their way to the registers. 

Choosing to buy reusable fabric bags for the purchase, Izumi let's the boys in their group carry everything to the last stop of the day, once there they grab two carts to give everyone free hands, and a place to put their choices. 

Each broke off in seperate directions at first, but then all of the gravitated to the area that held the stuffed animals. 

Izumi herself had chosen a pack of puzzles that would hopefully be fun but challenge Hawks mind before she went and selected a green bunny that's fur was surprisingly close to her hair, and a white bear that looked the closest she could find to Nezu. 

The others had all grabbed games that could be played with others, but the stuffed animal choices were what had Izumi grinning. Shōta had chosen a black cat, Nemuri had chosen a classic brown otter, Oboro and chosen a purple octopus, and Hizashi had chosen a bright eye searing yellow bird. 

After paying Izumi checked the time, it was only five-thirty.

Looking back at her friend she quickly asked. "Wanna come over for dinner? Maybe help me build the bed?"

Four agreements later of different levels of energy had Izumi grabbing three of the six bags of toys, leaving the others to sort the rest out themselves until they got outside and called a taxi. She made her way to the entrance of the mall that she had originally come from. 

Against Izumi's usual luck there is a taxi large enough for all of them already sitting curb side, knocking on the window with her free hand she catches the driver's attention. They open the back of the van once they catch sight of Izumi and unlocks the doors as the others load up the back.

"Thank you, we are going to seven-two-eight Sakura Ave South." Izumi says as she climbs into the front seat. 

The four teens in the back are all arguing loudly with each other on what they should order for dinner, Izumi figures that in the end they will order pizza. 

"Damn." Oboro says as they pull up to the house. 

Silently Izumi agrees, outwardly she says. "It's big because we have some people that are going to need a new place to live soon." 

Unloading everything from the back of the taxi goes just about as well as loading did, each of the boys fighting over who would take the heaviest things, Izumi just rolled her eyes as she paid the driver. 

Izumi is the first to make it to the door and opens it only to stop and carefully listen for any noise that would let her know if someone is home. 

It's all quiet, and Izumi is pretty happy that she still has a little time, she knows that the commission is in Tokyo, and it's about an hour and a half drive from UA where Nezu had to stop to get his specially designed car. 

That alone meant three hours of travel time, and Izumi thought that the commission was going to drag their feet as long as they possibly could. She would need to order enough food for Nezu and 'Keigo'. 

All four teens finally in the house Izumi led them to the second level and into the empty room. 

Earlier when she had noted the dimensions of the room she hadn't paid attention to the wall or carpet color, but she was happy to see that the carpet was a dark chocolate brown, and that three of the four walls were such a light brown they almost looked cream, the fourth wall was a dark green that without a light on Izumi guess it would look black. 

They all piled the bags in one corner of the room to keep it mostly out of the way to get the furniture set up. 

Half way down the stairs Izumi felt like hitting herself. 

"We forgot a desk chair and curtains." She said and brought her hand to slap her forehead. 

"Shit." Nemuri said and pouted. 

"Get them tomorrow." Shōta told her as he pinched his nose. "You promised food."

Getting everyone situated in the living room took some shuffling, Izumi had asked the boys to move the couches into Nezu's prefered position of ninety degrees of each other with the one that looked more used facing the window. Izumi then pushed the coffee table parallel to the window as well. 

"Sorry no T.V but we do have my laptop and a project." She told them preemptively, ash she dug around in the box labeled electronics. 

Making a squeak of triumph when she pulled out the box that they always kept the projector and all its cables in. 

She drops it carefully on the coffee table and then runs up the stairs again to grab her laptop out of the same lockbox that her phone was in. 

Back in the living room again she hears the same argument from in the taxi about food, with a sigh of resignation she sits herself infront of the coffee table, situates her laptop on its serface and opens it up to load. 

Once the password window opens she has Nemuri looking over her shoulder, she's greatful that it's a current hero's quirk that she needs to match the name with and not the name of someone from her original hero class. 

"What's that?" The other girl asks.

"Oh, dad had me write my own password program, it shows a picture related to a hero's quirk and then I have to put in the hero name for the password." Izumi explains simply. 

"Huh, can you do that on anything?" Shōta asks from where he is now leaning over Nemuri to see better.

"Yea, I have something similar to it on my phone, that one makes me put in the date and time according to the twenty-four hour clock." Izumi explains and shows them what she means. 

All of them look interested in the program on her phone and if they ask Izumi is willing to put the program on their devices. 

"Anyway, food. I want to make sure we have enough for dad and the baby bird. Dad likes cheese pizza when we order out, and I think the profile I saw said that Keigo likes fried chicken." Izumi says as she pulls up the webpage for Nezu's prefered pizza place. 

"Oh, I'll eat cheese pizza!" Nemuri says with a happy smile on her lips. 

"Pepperoni." Is Shōta input. 

"Cheese!" Hizashi almost slips into his quirk but Shōta quickly looks at the blond with his own active. 

"Pepperoni." Oboro yells, throwing his hands in the air. 

"So two large cheese, two large pepperoni, and sixty boneless wings sauce on the side." Izumi says as she clicks on their chosen meals adding sauces all in the mild range. "It will be here soon." 

"So what movie are we watching?" Hizashi asks the group. 

"Prequirk or post quirk?" Izumi asks them, she personally preferred prequirk, especially when it came to thrillers or animated movies. 

"Prequirk." Shōta demands when the others are silent. Izumi grins at the boy, she's going to put on a thriller. 

"Kiss the girls, it is!" She announces not giving them any choice. 

A few clicks later she has the movie ready to play, and she's connecting the projector and linking it up against the wall kiddy corner to the window. 

Looking over her shoulder she then skips over to the window to cover the half closest to the wall. 

Getting back to where she was originally sitting, Izumi started the movie. 

"You want to know all about me don't you?"  

The voice of a male actor filled the room. 

It didn't take long for the four others in the room to lose themselves in the movie, all of them silent.

It was eight when the others left, giving themselves enough time to reach their own homes before it was dark. 

And it was around nine when Nezu and Keigo got to the house, the bed and desk had been delivered and assembled by the delivery team at six-thirty leaving the small group of teens with nothing to assemble. 

"Izumi, we're home." Nezu calls as he opens the door. 

"Welcome home!" Izumi calls back from the living room where she is working on unpacking all their books after she did her best to set up Keigo's room, even using one of her own sheets as a makeshift curtain. 

When Nezu makes his way into the room he is trailed by the most adorable little boy she had ever seen. 

"Keigo, this is Izumi." Nezu says gently. 

Izumi dropped to her knees to be at eye level. "Hi Keigo, it's nice to meet you." She says slowly and carefully. 

"H-hi." The little blond whispers, she sounds scared but oh so hopeful. 

Izumi opens her arms slowly and carefully before asking. "Can I ha:?" 

Keigo doesn't wait for her to finish the question before he throws himself in her arms. Izumi rubs one hand in slow circles on his lower back as her other cards through his hair. 

"Welcome home Keigo." Izumi says again just to make the boy understand in some way that this is his home now. 

Keigo refuses to let go of her even as he eats the chicken she had ordered for him, his eyes light up with pure glee on the first bite and he inhales the rest one handed, the other tangled in Izumi's shirt with a healthy helping of hair as well. 

Izumi smiles at the boy as he falls asleep, she's careful when she lifts him and carries him up the stairs. The only problem was that he had a death grip on her shirt and hair, no matter how she tried he wouldn't let go. 

With a sigh Izumi gave up and picked the winged little boy back up and took him to her room. It was an awkward ten minutes as she balanced Keigo in one arm and wiggled out of her jeans and then into a pair of pajama pants. 

Izumi felt another flash or rage at the commission at the same time she was also grateful, the only clothes that Keigo had arrived with was two sets of child sized white scrubs. They would be comfortable to sleep in but they were not something she would ever put a child in daily.

With more careful maneuvering Izumi crawled into bed and the shifted Keigo so he was laying with his chest diagonally across her own, his wings spread out making a blanket of their own for Izumi, even as she pulled one over his back as well. 

"Sleep well my rosefinch." She whispered into the mess of blond fluff that was Keigo's hair. 

[songsofloretto]

Kieran gave me this earlier. I like writing for Kieran. He's a nasty bastard trying to turn his life around which makes him multi-faceted but as a character giving direction he's easy to 'feel'. Kieran never does third person perspective. His stories are always first person and written like a commentary.

Kieran, Nicky, Rory and Matthew

Sainsbury's, May 2021

"Uncle Kieran can I have these water pistols?"

It's been 30 years since I last took a child grocery shopping. It was bad enough in the 1980s with the kids wanting the sweets at the end of the checkout and all that. Fast forward to the 21st century and the problem has absolutely mushroomed, along with the size of supermarkets in general. Before I went to prison supermarkets only sold food. These days they sell everything from sun-dried tomatoes to fecking funeral plans. Nothing is sacred from these corporate giants. There are whole sections devoted to toys so there's no avoiding the inevitable pleas from children presented with their every wildest dream every time you call in for a pint of milk. Our Matthew's grandson is no different. The little lad is only four years old and to him this toy section is like every Christmas morning he's ever dreamed of all rolled in to one.

"Eh?" I say.

Rory lifts a box of four water pistols from the shelf and almost topples over under the weight of them. I grab it quick and steady him before he smacks his head off the corner of a shelf.

"Woah," I say to him, "steady on, our kid."

"I want these water pistols," Rory says emphatically, "there's four altogether. You, me, Uncle Nicky and Grandad can all play with them in the garden."

I look at the box. The pistols are nothing special. I've seen more power in a carrot. But the kid is right. It's a boiling hot day and perhaps an hour in the garden shooting each other up is exactly what this fecked up family needs to bond.

And who can say no to little Rory, who hasn't seen his daddy in over a year. Deaglan has been stuck in New York over this bloody pandemic, unable to get home to his son, missing out on all the drama we have going on here. The kid, innocently caught in the middle of it all, deserves a little joy in his life. I take a pistol out of the box and work my finger over the trigger, pretending to shoot, while Rory laughs and crouches down low.

"Aye you can have them," I tell him, and ruffle his hair with my fingers.

Right on cue the ever uptight Nicky slides up to us, almost falling over himself in his desperation to spoil any fun. He's swaggering about in his police uniform with a stick up his arse as usual. No tie or epaulettes but you can still tell he's an off-duty police officer. The cunt.

"I don't think so," he says rather efficiently as he plucks the box and the pistols out of my hands.

"What the f...Nicky!" I say, and pull the box back from him, "what's wrong with you?"

"I don't think it's appropriate for children to play with guns," Nicky says matter-of-factly.

"Aww!" Rory whines, "please, Uncle Nicky!"

His face creases and I can't bear to see him look sad. I know from experience that arguing with Nicky isn't easy. He's a jumped-up, self-important and arrogant little prick. In fact he's just like me when I was his age. It amuses me somewhat. I know that he'll get wound up like a clock if I challenge his decision - and I'm really trying to make friends with him, honest - but I've got to try and change his mind, for the little lad's sake.

"Well they're only water pistols," I say with a little shrug, "not gonna do much damage with them, eh, Nick auld fella?"

Nicky pulls a straight-laced expression and looks down his nose at me like a seasoned bloodhound would look at a yapping pup. He thinks I'm scum, I realise as we face each other off. He'll always look down on me like this, because in his bright, British eyes I'll always represent the dirty side of Ireland. I feel the vein on my temple flicker. I have to take a deep breath to keep my cool.

"It's not about any potential risk of damage," Nicky breaks the tension between us with a belittling little sniff, "it's about the psychology. Teaching children that guns are good fun and can't hurt anyone is a slippery slip. Before we know it he'll be twelve years old and shooting up his gym class."

"Fuck off Nicky, this is England, not America," I try to laugh off his point but he just keeps staring.

"And I don't think you, of all people, Kieran O'Driscoll, are in any position at all to be encouraging my nephew to take an interest in firearms," Nicky looks down his nose at me again.

I've been trying hard to handle his snooty arrogance for weeks. I really have. But something inside me snaps.

"Why?" I ask, squaring up to him, "because I was in the IRA? Is that it?"

I don't know what I'm doing. I'm 79 years old. Nicky is 45. I haven't got a chance against him in a fight, especially not with all his police training, but it's my pride that pushes me on. I have to stand up for myself, be a man about it. Teach this little arsehole a lesson.

"Yes," Nicky nods his head, "because you dealt firearms for terrorist organisation. And I don't want you playing with any sort of gun, imitation or otherwise, in front of my brother's son."

Deaglan is Nicky's own twin brother. They've never met. They were seperated at birth. Deaglan stayed in Ireland with Matthew, Nicky went to England with Kate. And now he fancies himself as the big Englishman, the creme de la creme of Britishness, superior above each and all other nationalities. And he spent his whole life loathing the Irish for putting his mother in a wheelchair. She was was a British soldier, victim of an IRA bomb, Newry police station, 1975. Sad story.

It was a terrible shock to poor Nicholas Jamie Hawley when he discovered that his father was not, as his mother always told him, a dead British soldier who died for his country in a halo of bullets. His father Matthew is in fact a proud Ulsterman who is very much alive and even did time for murder. Nicky's brain must have exploded inside his skull when it tried to digest this information. When he realised that half of him bled for Ireland it nearly knocked him sick.

But he had to get used to the idea because this pandemic threw us all together under the same roof, forcing us to learn to love and live with each other. And so here we are, factions of a long-estranged family trying to find common ground, and about to start fighting over water pistols in Sainsbury's.

"You'll never forgive me for being ex-IRA, will you?" I ask him.

"Never," Nicky lifts his chin, "once a terrorist, always a terrorist in my book."

"I did my time, Nicholas," I tell him, "27 years in a hell-hole of a prison. Oh Lord I suffered. And I'm deeply sorry for my transgressions as a younger man."

"Sorry will never be enough," Nicky whispers, "what your sort did to my mother..."

I close my eyes. I don't like think of it. And all over some water pistols to make the little lad happy!

The Voice of Reason enters stage left. Here is Matthew O'Driscoll, everyone's favourite peace-keeping fence-sitter. He spent an age parking the car and has only just joined us. He's as Irish as I am but everyone loves him, even Nicky, because...well because he's Matthew. Need I say more?

Matthew is astute. He studies the body language between me and his long-lost son and folds his arms, awaiting explanation.

"What's going on?" he asks.

"The wee bairn wanted a few water pistols to play with," I said, "and PC Gobshite over here has got an issue with it."

Matthew looks at Nicky who blushes a little as if he suddenly feels rather foolish.

"I didn't think it was ok," he says. His mouth is suddenly dry and he swallows, "to promote guns to a child. I'm in Loco Parentis for Rory. Deaglan has trusted me to look after him. I don't want to fuck it up and send the kid back to his dad thinking guns are ok. Because they're not. What would Deaglan think of me?"

He gives Matthew a slow look. Matthew nods his head. He is trying to understand Nicky's perspective. The man is nervous about all this family stuff. He's still reeling from the shock of discovering he has a family he never knew, that the family is Irish, that there is a man out there in the world who shares his face. Appearance and reputation is key right now. Nicky has never been a parent and suddenly, thanks to the pandemic, he's stepping in to care for his twin brother's son. He wants to do a good job. Of course he does.

It's interesting that Nicky never gives Matthew any stick about being Irish. Let's not forget that Matthew did prison time too. In 1994 he shot his own best mate in the head to stop the IRA from kidnapping and torturing him. We've never spoken about the fact it was me who ordered Brophy's kidnapping in the first place. If I'd have got my hands on Donnachadh Brophy all those years I'd have cut his balls off, fried them in Crisp N Dry oil, added little salt and pepper to taste and made the cunt eat them. But not now. I've mellowed out now. I'm not like that any more. I wouldn't hurt a hair on Brophy's head if he were alive today. And I don't deal in guns. Except water pistols because...well they're water pistols for feck's sake.

"You mean you've taken offence to Kieran handling a gun because he's Irish, is it that it?" Matthew asks.

"Not because he's Irish, per se," Nicky says, "but because of...it's because he has previous."

Matthew nods. The simple action brings calm to the situation. Nicky is feeling heard. He relaxes a little.

"I know you still suffer the fear of the IRA," Matthew says to him softly, "I know as a kid they haunted your dreams. You grew up thinking you had to protect your Mammy from them. But it's all in the past, Nicky. Wether we like it or not we're all together now and there are things we have to forgive each other for if we're going to survive this virus. And survive as a family. Because that's all any of us ever longed for, isn't it? It's time to let go, son."

Matthew takes the pistol from Nicky's grip. The police officer tightens but then releases his hold, surrendering control to the father he never knew he had, and letting go of the toy gun. It's very poignant, metaphorical moment. Makes the man in me uncomfortable so I try to inject some humour to make it bearable.

"Fecking hell," I scoff, "who do you think you are Matty eh? A walking example of the Good Friday Agreement?"

Matthew doesn't take his eyes from Nicky's face. A silent agreement is passing between them.

"Shut up, Ki," Matthew says without looking at me, "it's all right, Nicky. We're going to take these pistols home, fill them up with water and have a big old laugh together. Three generations shooting cold water at each other. And it will be safe, it will be ok. Because it's what families do together all the time."

"Ok," Nicky starts scratching at his arms in that way he has when needs to self-soothe with a wash, "we'll have a water fight. Together. But I'll need to get a shower first."

"If it makes you feel better," Matthew nodded.

He understands Nicky's need to be clean better than I do. I've never known a man so obsessed with washing his skin, changing his clothes, marinating in aftershave because unfamiliar smells upset him. As soon as you walk into the house we all share his first question is 'have you washed your hands?' He won't let you touch anything until you wash your own hands at the kitchen sink. Which by the way is a Belfast model. That little detail is lost on Nicky. It brings me a private sort of amusement.

Nicky's scratching intensifies. We'll have to hurry up with the shopping now because he has it in his head that he needs a wash and a preen. If he doesn't get to a shower soon he'll start getting all upset with himself. There's no time to argue now.

Matthew hands the pistol to the four-year-old whose innocence is responsible for bringing us all together. And then we all walk on, four abreast, to find the pint of milk we all came in looking for in the first place.

[tracle0]

WIP Bops Tag

So I got tagged for.... two music/listening related games in the span of two days so I will. Do both in one to save myself idk making another post lmao

First one: I think you just list things you’ve been listening to. Maybe the last ten things you listened to? I don’t know man. Tagged by the wonderful @kaatiba​ thank you boo 

I have been listening to...

Cloud Cult - I stand by the fact that Cloud Cult 500% have the best bops for apparently all my wips.��‘Time Machine Invention’ is peak Leon, don’t try and tell me otherwise. ‘It’s Your Decision’ gives me big Percival vibes. ‘Good Friend’ apparently works for every single WIP I have because I write about friends too much.

Night Vale - I missed Night Vale ok. I’ve listened to it all already, but I wanted to hear the Strexcorp arc again, and the liveshow and Carlos man. Carlos. 

I’ll Follow You Into The Dark - isolated song, but I have been listening to it over and over again, because it’s somehow playing my heart strings rather than a guitar. I am obsessed with this song. I learnt it on the ukuele as soon as I could. Major Mika vibes. Made me realise ‘ohhh he’s Catholic ain’t he’ and also made me figure out his friendship with Lynne more. Thanks, song.

Vienna Teng - someone else mentioned her recently, and I went ‘oh yeah I used to listen to her I should do that again’ the only memory I have of hearing her songs is. Not good. So I’m trying to get other memories down lmao.

I need to listen to...

Jake Parker Plagorised My Book which is a very cheerful subject. Quick run-down; Jake Parker is the creator of the yearly Inktober challenge. He plagorised the book of a black artist. I figured I should understand the Drama and then decide what I’ll do in October if not Inktober. 

Okay that’s like five, good enough. Next tag game;

Rules: Share some songs that have inspired your WIP or characters, then tag some people to play! - tagged by @albatris​ thanks homie and I’ve decided I’m going to jump around between WIPs becuase I want to. 

So first off I feel like the songs that first made me go ‘oh I could make a story out of this’ - DIAS spawned from ‘Hopeless Opus’ by Imagine Dragons. I got the idea for like. Two characters who were seperated for some reason, both regretting something, and went ‘okay! How.’ and my brain spat out Leon and Ant.

Whereas wip4 sort of spawned from both ‘On Melancholy Hill’ by Gorillaz, obviously, and also ‘Light a Roman Candle With Me’ by fun. And I cannot tell you at all why this story spawned from these songs. I think it was mostly... for Melancholy Hill, it gave me isolation vibes, and Roman Candle was more... a desperate reach for connection. wip4 has a focus on friendship. I guess that works? 

DIAS again - ‘The Cave’ by Mumford and Sons is. Peak DIAS, not gonna lie. I have officially storyboarded out an entire animatic that is just the entire plot of DIAS to this song. Every verse sort of follows each act of DIAS and uhh

So make - your sirens song and sing - all you want I will not hear what you have to say

I can’t say why because major spoilers, but that lyric. Fits. Very well. 

I mentioned ‘Time Machine Invention’ by Cloud Cult being a major Leon song, because it is, so I’ll talk about that here; Leon gets blown up at one point, and loses his leg. This, along with the fact he thinks Ant is dead, makes him Very Depressed. Vincent comes along like ‘hey dickhead stop being depressed’ except said in a slightly nicer way, and gives him a vote of confidence he needs to get up and try and fix one of the problems he has, that being the leg. 

If we give this moment our fullest attention, we’ll just keep moving forward, with no need for going back.

Which is honestly, just really good life advice, but is also kinda Leon finally starting to let go of the guilt he has over possibly killing Ant and starting to live life without any new regrets. 

wip4 again because this is getting long but I still have things to talk about; ‘Turn The Lights Off’ by Tally Hall is big It vibes, and I cannot tell you how but it does. I’m delighted to put ‘Holding Onto You’ by Twenty One Pilots as a major Keaton song, for the simple reason that Holding Onto You has tried to be a wip song for EVERY SINGLE wip, but it finally actually fits. Heck,

I’m taking over my body, back in control, no more shotty,  I bet a lot of me was lost,  t’s uncrossed and i’s undotted

is like. The first verse, and is also major Keaton being like ‘WOW WHAT THE HELL I WASLITERALLY DEAD UM WHAT’ and also the entire struggle against It. Fun times. 

‘Hello, My Old Heart’ by The Oh Hello’s is a Big Percival Mood, and I can’t really explain why - extreme protectiveness over himself and trying to save himself??? Maybe. Uhh. I’ll give you an Abby song and then done with wip4 - ‘Icicles’ by The Scary Jokes fits her freakishly well. I just found out the artist is nonbinary, which is cool, but I’ll talk about that another day. 

I can only be forgiven if I'm givin' myself up to you  On a silver serving tray  Must I bare myself to the stabbing of your knife and gnashing teeth  While our lovely company appears so entertained?

I think Abby recognises that she is in the wrong for a lot of the story, but also thinks that admitting this to Percival would sort of... reverse their roles? That he’d want revenge and would inflict the years of pain she’d put him through onto her. He wouldn’t but she doesn’t realise that. So ‘must I bear myself to the stabbing of your knife and gnashing teeth’ is just. What she assumes she’d have to deal with. 

Okay! Final song and it’s for DIAS and also for Simon cause we’re talking about villains okay. He’s got ‘The Greatest Show’ but specifically the cover by Panic! At The Disco. Simon is, to quote the lovely Summayah, ‘a dramatic fuck’ and this song is dramatic as fuck. 

Don't fight it, it's comin' for you, runnin' at ya It's only this moment, don't care what comes after Your fever dream, can't you see it gettin' closer? Just surrender 'cause you feel the feelin' takin' over 

Which is a pretty good way to explain Silvertongue commands and his general attitude to them, don’t you think? 

I’m done now. I have more songs and entire playlists but I’m done, I’ve rambled enough, this is long. I will tag: @joyful-soul-collector @druidx73 @petrolstationflowers @scmalarky @the-starlight-chills and you sir, over there, please, tell me about songs.

[unseelie-bitch]

Season 2 Episode 25: Storming Shadowhaunt

Oh I'm sure that'll end well

Dark!Bloom's design is genuinely SO GOOD though

Ammentia coming in strong on a guard worm

Ammentia WILL just straight up kill a bitch

OH SHIT ICY'S HERE AND SHE'S IMMEDIATELY JEALOUS OF DARK!BLOOM

The Trix are all pissed on Icy's behalf Darkar you did not think this through

Bloom's evil laugh over her shoulder LMAO

Fully planning on killing Bloom to prove a point the second she's opened the gate, excellent

Riven took Sky's murder count as a personal challenge

Trix I hate to break this to you but do you not think it's a little suspicious that Darkar wants you to use up all your power the second you opposed his new favourite?

Their "ominous" power bubble just looks like bubblegum

Okay right Trix analysis time: Icy was talking about how that "totally drained" her while slouching massively, fair enough. Darcy just agreed while doing the //exact same position// now, from what we've seen, Darcy is actually the most powerful but tends to hide it, so could it be that she's just immitating Icy's posture to simulate exhaustion? (I still think she's low on power, just not to the extent she's projecting). Then Stormy's at the back walking upright, still looking tired but no where near as much as the other two. Since there's no way Stormy's the most powerful this leaves us with two options (if we assume Darcy's faking): Icy's the weakest Trix OR Icy's Gloomix was designed to drain her of far more power than Darcy or Stormy due to her bravado tricking Darkar into believing she's the most powerful. I think the second seeing as Darcy's and Stormy's are functionally identical while Icy's is clearly very different. Anyway, theory over

Oh no the Trix are going to find Darkar while they're exhausted this isn't going to end well, is it?

Chatta is doing her best to lighten the mood and I support her

Sky fuck off this is a serious mission to rescue the girl you supposedly care about and you're using it as an oppurtunity to joke around and show off?

Darcy recognising it's important they confront him now proving he was deliberately using up their power

Oh no please don't try and confront him Trix he literally JUST said he doesn't care about you and you're out of power //he knows you can't defend yourselves//

Oh my god Icy's FEAR when he turned around and the way Darcy and Stormy look at her after Darkar blasted her? Again, these three are like 18 years old they are NOT mature and are barely adults - they want power but have been manipulated and shaped into monsters for what seems like their whole lives. For the whole show they've always attacked seperately so only one of them is weakened but now for the first time they're all powerless and their leader just got wiped out in one backhand hit. I'm so scared for them

WHAT THE FUCK HE JUST THREW THE TRIX THROUGH A PORTAL

Oh lovely, he's leaving his freaky bird behind

OH HE MADE IT BIG HE MADE IT BIG IT'S A HUMANOID NOW WHAT THE FUCK DARKAR

Sorry why the FUCK have you been sending these boys on missions and they "haven't got to emergency landings in fligt class yet"?? THEY'RE IN THIRD YEAR WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN TEACHING THEM??????? HOW TO NOT DIE IN A CRASH SHOULD BE ONE OF THE FIRST THINGS

YES HELIA

Okay Helia do NOT risk your life for Sky he's a little bitch anyway save yourself

Oh shit the portal is opening LADS HURRY

Meanwhile Ammentia is doing Her Best to fight off the monsters

Also why tf is her army made up of male Trog wasn't the whole point that they're a matriarchal society in which men stay at home and doing domestic tasks while the women do the big jobs? Faulty worldbuilding lads

And they all ran away and left her alone. Wow. A+ bodyguards

Flora's Charmix bag is diffinately the most impractical because like... all the other's are across their torso or hips but hers is just like a shoulder bag. Questionable, but it's cute so I'll give it a pass

C h a r m i x C o n v e r g e n c e

Ayyy Faragonda and Griffin mission!! The ex gfs back together again

Guys this is kind of a life and death situation do we really have time for long dramatic goodbyes

The fact they refused to actually show Flora or Helia's mouths during their kiss makes me question what exactly they were doing there like... they've shown all the other kisses on screen. Also no one in the other kisses blushed bright red or made certain sounds that Flora made. I know you're hormonal teens but like... right in front of all your friends? Yikes

AWW RIVEN ACTUALLY HUGGED MUSA AND TALKED ABOUT HIS FEELINGS

Why has dark!Bloom not had a single line she just laughs ominously every time someone says something to her it's getting weird

Lockette you literally INSISTED on coming you can't try and back out now

OH SHIT BIG BIRD MAN IS MASSIVE IT'S LIKE 30 FEET TALL WHAT

YEAH!! FARAGONDA AND GRIFFIN (and the Red Fountain coach) GOT HERE JUST IN TIME

Oh yikes bird man broke out and knocked out the teachers

[lovelyrocker]

Love Is Blind Ch.31

~ RPF

~ Characters: Jared Padalecki, Lexi Ackles(OFM), Jesse Spangler(OMC)

~ Pairings: None

~ Warnings: Angst, Jared being Protective/Defensive

~ Word Count: 2,773

~ Un Beta’d - All Mistakes Are My Own

Love Is Blind Masterlist

<Previous Chapter

Weeks went by after the break began. Eight weeks to be exact. Jared respected her decision for him and her to have a break, even though he didn’t really want a break. Jared thought back to him telling Jensen that he wished Lexi would tell him what she needed from him so he could give that to her. And she did just that. Now he had to put his words into action and respect her decision. 

Jared, although slightly hurt with Lexi’s need to be seperated, still checked in on her through Jensen, asking how she was doing. If he was visiting Jensen, he’d swing by the little lake house to see her, even if it was only for five minutes.

One thing that didn’t change was them texting everyday. Unlike the last time they were apart, Jared didn’t shut himself off from her. It was like he was her best friend again, aside from Ellie, of course.

Walking up to the small house one afternoon Jared paused when he heard more than one voice coming from inside… a man’s voice. The door swung open and Lexi stood in front of him surprised. “Hey!” Lexi smiled at Jared. “What are you doing here?” She wrapped her arms around his shoulders squeezing him tightly before stepping back. “You remember Jesse?” She motioned to the familiar young man standing next to her.

“Oh, yeah!” Jared extended a hand to the other man. “Wait,” Jared paused for a second. “You’re the guy-”

“The guy that always hits on her.” Jesse said shaking Jared’s hand knowing Jared knows about his flirtatious ways. 

Lexi had confided in Jared that Jesse has a hard time controlling his tongue and often says things that aren’t appropriate.

“I remember.” Lexi saw Jared clench his jaw in the way he did when attempted to control his anger or annoyance.

“Don’t worry, i’m not trying to activly fuck her. At least not at the moment.” Jesse said with arrogance.

“Ignore him!” Lexi spoke quickly seeing Jared’s expression go from annoyed to anger. “It’s not his fault. Jesse’s personality is asshole.” 

“At least I don't attract psychos.” Jesse nudged his head toward Lexi as she flipped him off.

“Jesse also has no filter. He was diagnosed with ICD.” 

“What the hell is ICD?” Jared lifted a single brow looking at the two of them. 

“Impulse control disorder. He can’t always control what comes out of his mouth. He will also say crap to piss you off just for fun. Because he really is an asshole.”

 “And you’re still a bitch.” Lexi laughed at his comeback. “I gotta go. I’ll talk to you later.” Jesse gave her a hug and looked at Jared. “Later pretty boy.” He gave a mock salute as he walked passed him and out the door.

After Jesse walked out Jared turned to Lexi. “I don’t like him.”

Lexi gave a chuckle. “I know you don’t. You haven’t liked him since I told you about his big mouth.”

“His ego seems to be just as big.”

“It can be.” Lexi gave a chuckle then noticed the discontent look on his face. A look she’d only seen during certain times with him. “Jared, are you jealous?” She crossed her arms over her chest as she stood in front of him.

“What?!” Jared gave an awkward huff. “No! I have no reason to be.”

Lexi took a step toward him looking intently at him. “Yes, you are! I know that look!” She pointed a finger in his face. “That’s the same look you would give your neighbor when he used to come over and I was there.”

“What look?! There is no look!” Jared defended, his voice giving a screech as it rose.

“Yes, there is!” She stepped closer. “Its that look of being nice but deep down wanting to punch the hell out of him!” Jared shook his head, letting it fall with a grin on his face. Lexi smiled slipping her hand under his chin, pulling his face to hers. His expression was bashful. “You have nothing to worry about.” His eyes were soft and reserved as they landed on hers. “You do not have to feel threatened. Especially by Jesse.”

Jared grabbed her hand and kissed the back of it before entwining their fingers. “Are you sure?”

Lexi stepped closer to him lifting her head to his. She felt the breath from his exhale brush against her lips. Jared was stunned when he felt Lexi’s lips brush against his for a brief moment before firmly taking a kiss. When the kiss broke it was much too soon for Jared’s liking. With a soft moan h took her face into his hands and pulled her back to him initiating another kiss. This time he didn’t let her pull away. He held her there, parting her lips with his, delving his tongue into her mouth, letting her familiar taste wash over him.

When they finally broke apart Lexi looked up at Jared with lust drunk eyes. “You have nothing to worry about.”

“I miss you.” Jared all but whimpered.

“I miss you, too.” Lexi pressed her forehead to his. “Just be patient with me a little longer.”

“As long as you need.” He whispered back.

Lexi missed Jared, she didn’t deny that. But she was trying to heal herself in he own way and he understood that, and she was thankful for that. Lexi was learning that she was able to lean on herself more. Although she sometimes called Jesse to help her through some days, she managed to make it through on her own. She was getting herself through panic attacks and going out into the city alone with little to no fear. Lexi felt strong, stronger than she’d felt in a long time. She’d even started working again. Albeit it was from Austin, but she was still getting a lot done. Lexi was proud of herself.

“So how long you’re gonna stay?” Jesse asked getting  comfortable on the couch.

“It’s only for a few days.” Lexi answered passing Jesse a beer hearing a knock on the screen door before in creaked open.

 “Lex?” Jared called walking in. 

He was greeted by Lexi running to the front door. “Guess what?!”

“Whoa!” Jared held up his hands surprised by her greeting. “What is going on?!” He gave a laugh. “What did you need to tell me right away and in person?” 

“Remember that store that Rush was talking about opening and how they wanted me to take the lead on it?”

“They gave it the green light?!” Jared asked with excitement. 

“I go to L.A. next week!” Lexi jumped into Jared’s arms.

“Baby girl, that’s amazing!” He spun her around with enthusiasm. “I’m so proud of you!” He sat her back onto her feet.

“I’ll be right back!. I’m gonna go run up to the house and tell Dee and Jay!” Lexi clapped her hands together rapidly. “Grab yourself a beer, I’ll be right back.” She told Jared and Jesse before running to the main house. 

Jared grabbed a beer from the fridge turning to see Jesse sitting on the couch. Jared took a deep breath and walked over sitting in the chair across the small living room.

“You don’t like me do ya?” Jesse chimed from across the room.  

"That's an understatement." Jared mumbled taking a long sip from his beer bottle. "But,” Jesse spoke again. “We should try or at least pretend to get along. Us both being in Lexi's life and all." He gave Jared an amused look. "Unless you're one of the guys that tell her who she can hang out with." "Lexi is a big girl. She can do whatever she wants." Jared looked over him noticing his smug grin.  "So," he ran a hand through his hair. "Tell me about this IC whatever. "

“ICD.” Jesse corrected. “It stands for Impulse control disorder. It’s a psychiatric disorder which basically means I fail to resist  an urge or an impulse. Or a temptation.” He gave a sly grin. “Or I speak on speak on a thought. Meaning it pops in my head and right out of my mouth.”

“I see.” Jared gave him an indecisive glare. “You playing’ me, aren’t you?”

“Not at all.”

“And Lexi is okay with you blurting out the stuff you do? About her?”

“At first she was a little taken aback by it by it took her less than a week to become immune to my big mouth.” Jess nodded. “That and she nearly broke my nose.”

“That’s my girl.” Jared smiled taking another swig of beer.

“Well, not anymore.” Jesse added smugly.

Jared looked over to Jesse with assertiveness. “I don’t see her running to anyone else. Do you?” 

“Yet.” Jesse challenged. “Matter of time if you ask me. After all, she is an extremely attractive woman. Won’t take long for a guy closer to her age to come by and woo her.” Jesse stood walking to the kitchen, tossing his empty beer into the trash.

“Sure.” Jared rolled his eyes with a bitter expression standing to look out the glass door.

”You know, Someone who is more on her level. Someone who can understand her emotionally, that gets her every need.”

“Fuck you.” Jared spat knowing what Jesse was insinuating.

“Ooh!” Jesse put his hands up. “Touchy touchy.” 

“I’ll go see what’s taking Lex?” Jared placed his bottle on the counter with a loud thud.

 “Yeah, you do that. Send her back down here to me.”

Jared turned and looked at him. “Do you ever get tired of hearing yourself talk?”

“Not really, no.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “But, I have a question. Have you ever gone down on her?”

“That’s none of your fucking business.” Jared spat taking another step toward Jesse.

“I bet she tastes good.” Jesse stood as if in thought, yapping his index finger on his chin. “Now, when she cums is it sweet or tangy?”

Jared shook his head. “Does she know you talk about her like this?”

“Yeah, she does actually.” Jesse grinned again.

“What do I do?” Lexi said as she walked back in with a laundry basket.

“I think I hurt your boy toys feelings.” Jesse said grabbing the basket and setting it on the table. “Apparently he doesn’t like the way I talk about you.”

“Oh, what is it this time?” She looked from Jared to Jesse. “My rack or my ass you talkin bout?”

“Actually I was wondering what you taste like.” Jesse said honestly.

She walked over to Jesse and put her hands on his shoulders, Jared stiffening seeing her touch him. “You wish you would be able to find out.” She gave his cheek a little smack before turning away with a grin.

“I asked Jared, but he wouldn’t tell me.” Jesse shrugged nonchalantly.

“And he didn’t punch you in the face?” Lexi looked at Jesse then to Jared.

“The day is young.” Jared mumbled.

“I’m warning you Jess, if he takes a swing at you I’ll let him.”.

“Oh, I’m a big boy. I can handle him.”

“I gotta get going.” Jared turned to Y/N. “I told Gen I would be there by four to pick up the kids.”

“Give them kisses from me.” She told him pulling him into a hug.

“I’ll call you later.” Jared told her before placing a kiss on her cheek and leaving.

“Hey.” Lexi grabbed Jared’s arm. “When the kids go back to Gen’s come over and hang out. I want to spend some time with you before I go to L.A.”

“Absolutely.” He told Lexi before looking back at Jesse with a complacent grin on his face.

When he walked out the house Lexi turned to Hesse and punched him hard in the arm. “Seriously?!”

“Owe!” He grabbed his arm. “What?!”

“You asked him what I taste like?!”

“It was just a question!” Jesse rubbed his arm. “You won’t let me find out so I asked him!” Lexi glared at him crossing her arms over her chest. “Oh, come on. You saying he’s never had his face between those pretty legs?” Jesse stepped towards her. 

Lexi dropped her arms meeting his stance. “Oh, he has. And he’s done things to me you’ve only fantasize about.” 

“I bet.” Jesse bit his lip.

 “And one day, you’ll piss him off enough. And he and I may be back together by then, and he will beat the living shit out of you.”  

“I’d be worth it.”

Lexi laughed. “How did you not get your ass kicked yet?”

“I’m lucky.” He grinned back at her and saw her serious expression. “I’ll attempt to control my mouth a little with Jared.”

“Please. Because Jared is one person that will forever be in my life. No. Matter. What.”  Lexi poked him in the chest with a finger. 

~

It had been several days since Lexi told Jared she was going to L.A. She was excited to get back to work, really get back to work. Not that online only, web conference crap she’d been doing. Now don’t think she didn’t love working from Austin, she did. But she missed being as hands on as she used to be. 

Lexi was excited to see Ellie. Not just a quick weekend thing but a week of hanging out between work. Not to mention they had a ton of girl talk to catch up on.

“Knock knock!” Jared said loudly from the front door as he ran in from the rain.

“Hey, get in here before you get soaked!” Lexi shut the door behind him as thunder cracked through the sky. 

“The wind is really picking up out there.” Jared slid his raincoat off.

“You should have waited to come over when it slacked off a bit.” Lexi handed him a towel.

“Supposed to rain like this till you leave for L.A. I’ll take my chances.” Jared smiled down at her. 

“I’m excited and nervous.” Lexi told him as they got comfortable in the small living room. “It’s been so long since I’ve been in the scene, I don’t want to make a fool of myself.”

“You won’t! You’ll do perfect.” Jared reached across the sofa and took her hand. “Did you find out how long you;re saying?”

“Four days.” She entwined their fingers before looking back to him. “I kind of have a weird favor to ask. 

“Anything.”

“Since Ellie’s place is full I decided to stay at a hotel while I’m there.” Lexis eyes focused back on his hand and hers. “Being back in L.A. after everything that happened, being in L.A. alone,” Lexi took a breath and looked up at Jared. “Can you come to L.A. with me? I’m terrified of being there alone, especially at night.” The words just fell out of her mouth like water down a fall. “I’m not saying follow me around and crap. I just want to know you’re there, close by. Just, just in case.”

“Of course.” Jared answered sweetly. “You don’t have to explain, I get it.” He kissed the back of her hand. 

“I know we’re still iffy, but just having you there would be like,” Her cheeks pinkened as she glanced down then back to his eyes. “You’re my security blanket.”

Jared could see the bashfulness on her face. “Hey,” He reached a hand to her cheek. “I’m glad i’m your security blanket.” A soft smile spread over his lips. “It’s good to know you still see me as someone who’ll protect you.” 

“Well, yeah!” Lexi let out an exhaled laugh. “Aside from Jay, you’re the person I feel safest with.”

“You don’t feel safe with Jesse?” Jared asked with a healthy dose of sarcasm in his voice.  

“I do.” Lexi smiled at Jared. “But it’s not the same. With you,”

“I know.” Jared chuckled. “I’m just picking.” He tucked her hair behind her ear. “When do we leave?”

Lexi squinted. “Day after tomorrow.” 

“Talk about springing it on me!” Jared laughed. 

“I know!” Lexi covered her face with her hands. “I’m sorry! I just didn’t know if I should ask you to do that or how to ask you.” Her cheeks pinkening as she fiddled with her hands not looking at Jared.

Jared gave another chuckle. “What hotel you want to stay at?” He wrapped a broad arm around her shoulders, pulling her against his side.

“You can pick.” She nestled close as Jared began flipping through his phone. 

A few clicks later and Jared had a hotel and flight blooked. This was a step forward.

Next Chapter>

TAGS: @onethirstyunicorn​ @xostephanie​ @saxxxyjared​ @dreaminemz​ @squirrelnotsam​ @thevelvetseries​

[supersoldiersruined-me]

Caelus

A/N: This is my entry (super late yet again) for @ruckystarnes Summer of AUs challenge! And for a lack of inspiration, the titlte is space in latin! loll I had an inital idea when I signed up but this honestly took me so long to grasp and then it just poured out! So here it is, thank you for being so patient love! 💖 Beta: babyboo @eyesfixedonthesun22 Warnings: language, smut, gay sex, mention of blood  Word count: 5714 Prompt: Space AU, Stucky

Main Masterlist  |  Challenges Masterlist

“Steve, you jackass! Come back!” There’s no point in yelling twice. Bucky knows. But his best friend is storming towards the recruiting line-up with a mighty will. When they had denied him to join the army, Steve jumped on every last occasion to prove himself.

Not two weeks ago, Stark Industries announced a new advanced project that would allow a select group of candidates to participate in a space camp tryout. They’d be secluded into experimental ships, given some basic training and then experts would monitor their behavior, their reactions to simulated situations. If they made it out alive - and sane - a month later, they’d be taken to Stark’s secret facility and given proper training and instructions. Every boy in New York reached out like little kids given the gift of their lives.

So Bucky is standing there in the busy streets of Brooklyn, arms up in disbelief. The sick boy was going to go against the odds once more. He was a foot shorter than the men around him. Arms frail, and thrown into an asthma attack once he reached the building. Security threatened to keep him out - much to his safety - but Steven Grant Rogers does not back down because of some disability.

“I swear to God,” Bucky mumbles under his breath as he begins to make his way towards the atroupment of testosterone. 

“There’s no reason for me to be doing less than these men!” Comes as a shout out of Steve’s mouth. He’s red and Bucky isn’t sure if it’s the rage or yet another one of his problems surfacing.

“Come on, buddy. Let’s go home,” he tries to reason with him.

“No Buck! Don’t you get it?” Steve turns back to the guard. “I’ll fucking die anyway! Might as well it be doing something important…” His face winces at the thought; he’d never mentioned his illness as something so weighing, so dark.

“Steve…” He brings his hand to his best pal’s shoulder as he tries to comfort him. “Your value isn’t measured with what you can do for the world. You take care of me and that’s plenty.” Steve sighs and accepts defeat.

“Fine,” he looks into Bucky’s eyes, tears of anger filling his own, “I guess we can go.”

They turn towards the street and start walking home. As he looks over his shoulder at the line of people still hoping to get a shot, he sees a strange man scribbling down a notepad, looking at the two of them leave with a smile. Round glasses frame his face, he hasn’t shaved in a week. From his outfit and his demeanor Bucky knows he’s German. He shrugs it off and turns his attention back to his friend, throwing his arm around his neck.

It’s a week later when a knock at the door startles the boys out of their sleep. It must be around three in the morning, as far as Steve can tell. He turns on the lamp on his nightstand and looks over at Bucky in annoyance.

“Jerks,” he whispers as he recalls the nights of torment the kids from the neighbourhood had him endure - it was the reason Bucky had moved in with him.

“Let me take care of it,” the dark haired man replies. 

“Bucky, stop. I can take care of myself.”

“See, the thing is, you don’t have to.” He shakes his shoulder before walking over to the door. There’s a paper taped to it, bright and clear texts surround a pointy, metal ship image. There’s the Stark logo on it, and it makes him shiver in excitement.

“Steve…” He trails. “Get your ass over here.”

He hands him the poster and gives him a minute to read. It begins to tremble in his hands when he reaches the last sentence: “We are glad to announce that you have been selected to participate in an experimental camp supervised by the Stark Industries.”

There’s a place and time for them to be the next day, and they spend the rest of the night getting their luggage ready, along with making up stories and tripping out over the opportunity.

*

The rustic walls of brick have transformed into sterile steel. The floors are made of a plastic-like material - something easy to clean, Steve notices. It would be impossible to reach the ceiling and he’s wondering how they even managed to build this facility anyway. It’s highly distinct from the level of ingenuity of the current construction standards. The white building stands out absurdly in its secluded forest location.

Robots roam around, tacking and bolting steel plates to one another. Prototypes of deadly weapons are hung on the walls as they walk behind a seductive lady to what they presume is the reception. Their stuff, along with themselves, go through metal detectors - something they had only heard of until now - before making their way to a large office.

“Good evening, boy.” There’s a thick accent to the greeting, one that both can easily distinguish. “I hope we haven’t given you too much trouble.”

“Not at all, um...” Bucky begins, words failing him as he’s still processing the amount of discoveries they are about to do. He sighs heavily, his shoulders slumping.

“I’m Dr. Erskine. Responsible of the Biological Enhancement department here at Stark Industries. This here is Lady Carter, she’ll be assisting you on your journey.” The voluptuous woman nods their way and it has them both swallowing hard. She has a confidence they had never witnessed, and it has them nearly humiliating themselves.

“Nice to meet you,” Steve manages to say as he struggles to gain composure. He hopes she doesn’t notice him drying his palms on the back of his pants.

“Likewise,” she says. Her British accent runs a shiver up Bucky’s spine.

“Now, we wouldn’t want to keep you up too late. If you please follow Miss Carter to your assigned pod. We’ll go through the logistics in the morning.” The German man hands them a pair of overalls; nothing flattering, Bucky thinks.

*

It takes only three weeks for the boys to be fully independent, allowing them to be part of the first team to launch the program. Their uniforms along with their tools and weapons get a significant upgrade. They’re already anticipating the look of their new quarters.

“Can’t believe we’re doing this,” Steve mentions.

“Really? After twenty-something attempts I would highly believe that you’d be given a chance,” Bucky answers with a hint of sarcasm. They both laugh until a voice requests them to be at the main quarter in the next ten minutes.

The spaceship is a hundred feet tall or so, its body is quite narrow and it feels pretty sturdy. They gulp nonetheless, this would be for real and they couldn’t just drop out with a snap of their fingers. The team of eight wait by the cabin door, ably putting on their masks and equipment.

“This is it!” Bucky shouts.

“We’ve been working so hard for this. Maybe a few years after this we’ll be able to finally see what Earth looks like from up there.” Doug, who’d been the fittest one of them until he took Bucky under his wing and made him an even bigger beast, contemplates the unimaginable. 

“Remember when just last year they presented the concept of flying cars and it failed. Seems like they were either lying to us or they made phenomenal progress since then…” Bucky remembers his astonishment after the Stark Expo; he was always a fan of progress and technology used for the good of the population. This journey would be an experiment of a life-time.

“Alright everyone settle in.” The German accent demands over the intercom. The small group walks into the ship and find their respective seats. With his wit and quick thinking, Steve was assigned board commander. Bucky was in charge of the combat tactics. It felt like, for once, their lives had meaning and it was an honour to be going through this together.

“‘Til the end of the line.” Steve captures his friend’s hand in his.

“‘Til the end of the line,” Bucky answers. They feel the ship ‘shake off the ground’, and the team howls in enthusiasm. 

Once the orbiting procedures are done, they find their way into their seperate quarters, each sharing rooms in teams of three, except for Bucky and Steve who have the room to just the two of them. They walk to the door as they chit chat. Their smiles fade when the door slides before them and they notice the size of the room.

A large window gives out to a realistic CGI galaxy. The moon roams by slowly and it’s enough to have them holding their breaths, eyes watering at the beauty. 

“Steve,” Bucky whispers. He turns to see his friend nodding at him, his lower lip bitten as he tries to hold in his emotions. “This wouldn’t have happened without your stubborn little head.” 

“You deserve this as much as I do Buck.” They turn around and freeze at the sight of the one king sized bed that sits right in the middle of the room. Around it is a flowy drape they can pull closed - something to keep the sun out as it never sets, they think. At the corner of his eyes, Steve can see Bucky blush. His body shivers, his numerous dreams coming to his mind again.

“Is, um. Is that okay with you?” He asks.

“Yeah. Yeah it’s fine Stevie.” He walks over and sets his bag on a small bench. They begin to set their things in the abundant storage space. Neither of them talk for the next couple of minutes, too shy, perhaps. Too caught in their own fantasies to acknowledge their separate peaks at the one bed as they eyeball the distance that will be left between them.

“I’m exhausted. I’ll hit the showers and be right back.” Bucky is first to say, a foot already out the door.

Steve sheds his clothes, leaving only his briefs on. The sheets are the softest thing he’s ever touched. Everything is plushy and so welcoming. There’s Bucky’s sweatshirt on the left side pillow; he’s tempted to take it and wear it, knowing he’s always cold at night. But he only pulls it close and brings it to his face, feeling the material on his heating cheeks, inhaling the masculinity of his best friend. It’s inevitable he’s growing hard at the thought of being able to smell it directly from his neck. To have his head on his chest. 

His free hand reaches under the band of his briefs, tentatively groping himself to try and relieve some tension. He loses himself in it though, and starts moving and twisting his hand faster. He’s staining his underwear but he doesn’t care. He knows Bucky’s hand would feel much better, much more unforgiving. There’s a pinch in his gut at the thought of teaching him all his sweet spots - or worse even, letting him discover them as he becomes a panting mess on this very bed. 

“Shit,” he whimpers into the balled up sweater. His hips find a slow rhythm to go along his hand movements. His dick is out of its hiding spot by now; he’s big for his frame and he needs the extra room to pump harder. The door opens but he’s too lost to notice. There’s another muffled moan before he hears someone clear their throat.

“Steve, I-”

“Fuck! I’m sorry.” No no no! he thinks. “Buck I didn’t mean-”

“It’s fine Rogers, just... Maybe finish in the bathroom?” He suggests with an uncomfortable smile. He’s scratching his scalp, looking anywhere around the room but the bed. When Steve doesn’t budge, he allows himself to look down. His friend had simply pulled the cover over his head, and he knows Steve is cursing himself for being careless.

“You can keep the hoodie, if you’re cold.” Steve nods no and doesn’t move. “Alright,” he adds before shuffling into his spot. He’s careful to stay along the edge of the bed, enough not to fall off but granting his friend personal space. He closes his eyes and tries to let his mind wander into sleep. It’s no use now that he’s seen his pal touching himself like that. Not that he’d never imagined it - he was much smaller in his mind though. He didn’t sound as heavenly either. Bucky had caught Steve jerking off already, their apartment being quite small for two people, but it was always discreet and he mostly had to spy on him to see anything.

The more he thinks about it, the more each scenario comes out clear. Steve had touched himself whenever they had been close, like when they got back home from the drive-in, or if Bucky walked around shirtless after a rather intense training. Steve had touched himself every time he felt bothered with Bucky’s presence, and fuck if that wasn’t something he’d dreamed about.

He inhales deeply before shifting to face Steve. His hand slowly lifts and comes to rest on his friend’s shoulder, which surprisingly relaxes under his touch rather than tense up. 

“Bucky, it’s late. I’m sorry, okay?” It’s a half plead, half demand as the physical effects of his actions still haven’t dissipated. Bucky knows from the speed of his heart when his Stevie is nervous of agitated. Or in this case aroused.

“No. I’m sorry Steve.” Without turning completely, Steve gives him more of his attention. His silence is enough to note his questioning. “I should’ve realised before.”

“Wh-what do you mean, Buck?”

He answers with his body rather than try to explain his thoughts out loud; Bucky could be the clumsiest person when his mind got hazy. His hand moves to Steve’s chest, and in a swift pull he brings him closer. Close enough to kiss along his shoulder, then up his neck, until his nose tickles the base of his scalp.

“Buck,” Steve shivers.

“Let me. Please Stevie,” he says, his breath warm on the poor boy’s frigid body. When he doesn’t feel a protest, he lowers his hand onto his stomach, takes extra time just under his navel before he ventures under the waistband of his briefs. He’s perfectly hard under his touch, it takes a longer stroke than he anticipated before his thumb can reach the soaked tip. Steve hums deep in his throat. Bucky’s hip jerks forward in response. He’s already a mess and he’s only been touching him for a few seconds.

“Yes,” Steve whimpers. It earns him a soft bite to the shoulder; tender action meant to stifle a moan. “Bucky, don’t hold back.”

“You don’t know how long I’ve wanted to hear this,” he answers.

He’s got Steve on his stomach as soon as he’s done answering, a low grunt escapes his lips when he kneels over Steve’s legs, admiring the boy’s slender body. He snakes his hands over his shoulders, over his arms. He feels every inch of his skin as if he’d seen it for the first time. It feels new, strange even, to be able to give his pal what he’d always dreamed of; but it’s the best sentiment he’s ever experienced. From the soft moans he can pull from Steve, Bucky knows he’s enjoying this as well. Once the muscles under his touch have gone slack, he proceeds lower, kissing the trail he makes in the valley of his back. Steve jerks his hips up slightly when Bucky’s thumbs come to rest over his back dimples. He’s longing for what’s next; for the frightening act of intimacy.

“Bucky, you don’t-” He’s cut short in his suggestion by the inevitable. He moans Bucky’s name over and over every time his tongue flattens over his puckered hole. Bucky’s at work like a hungry man who’s just discovered the sweetest fruit. He licks and sucks and pokes intently at the flustered mess of man underneath him; and /he’s/ already done for. He’s rock hard in his own boxers at the way he can get Steve to squirm. 

“Ja-james! Ah!” Steve’s got both hands fisting the sheet and his face flat into his pillow. He moves his hips along with the tactful intrusions. There’s a sticky mess already glueing his stomach to the mattress but he doesn’t care. If anything it allows for the lack of friction on his aching dick. “More. Please,” he pants.

He can hear Bucky spit but his rear is already too worn out from the previous actions to feel a thing. There’s a light poke, then a sting as Bucky’s slowly inching two fingers into him. 

“So fucking tight, Stevie. God… You’re going to ruin my cock, aren’t ya?” His words send shivers up their bodies. 

“All yours Buck,” Steve adds before choking on his words when he feels a third finger joining the others. “Always been yours.” With that said, Steve stretches back as best he can and brings a hand to the brunette’s hair. He plays with the curls, eyes fixed on the icy blues and his stomach tightens when Bucky leans into the touch. He moves his hand to his chin and pulls him up so their eyes are leveled.

“Will you let me take care of you now?” Bucky asks and regrets the way he phrased that.

“I can ta-”

“No, punk.” He sighs and closes his eyes. “It’s not about bullies anymore Stevie. I want you to feel wanted. Desired. It always pissed me off to see how the ladies treated you. They don’t know what they’re missing.” There’s a moment of silence while Steve turns around and sits straighter. His brows furrow but he doesn’t argue.

“Bucky, it’s fine. Those girls didn’t really have anything going for me, anyway.”

“So… Will you?” He’s still not looking at Steve. Afraid that maybe this was all he could allow himself to take. He ruined his chance, he thinks. But then Steve’s thumb comes to his chin and he’s forced to look up. The pretty blond is all smiles; the sweet pink on his cheeks warms Bucky’s heart. Steve dives in and crashes his lips to his friend’s. His boyfriend? Lover? He isn’t sure yet but that doesn’t matter for the night. 

“Would that include letting me come before the morning?” There’s a gasp coming from Bucky as the question comes out, but he smiles and nods stupidly at Steve’s confidence. He pounces on him, their lips meeting again in a heated kiss. 

“Only if it’s while I’m fucking that prefect little ass,” he taunts.

“Wouldn’t have it any other way,” Steve answers.

The following nights are spent identically. Several years of hidden feelings are finally being rewarded and the boys know exactly how to make up for lost time. Most of their breaks are spent in their room, in the sauna or in the private lounge each team gets to share alternatively. Between trainings and meals, before, during and after showers. It’s an insatiable feeling to be wanted and taken care of, which never came easily to Steve until the very moment Bucky had his face between his hands and seemed to dwell into his eyes. Everything went on so quickly. Too quickly, perhaps, for Bucky soon found himself feeling guilty. Dirty. To be filling his needs with his favourite boy, while he knows he’s building a really fragile castle around them. To be imagining a life of happiness that had no place to be. Amongst the group, none seem to have caught up on their shenanigans. They were safe. Safe in the confines of this ship until the mission was over and they’d have to go back to being best buddies; friends since playground. It’s a thought that has Bucky’s stomach churning. He’d been glued to bed with a pounding headache for two days, and a raging boner he kept denying Steve. This has to stop, he thinks.

The curtains rush open, startling him out of sleep. Through the bright, manipulated daylight he sees Steve’s silhouette standing in front of their window. 

“What’s up, Stevie?” His voice barely makes it out of him.

“I could ask you the same,” Steve accuses right away. He can hear Bucky fall back into his pillow and grunt.

“Care to explain…”

“You’re unbelievable.” He paces, his hands on his hips. “What’s so hard for you to accept? I thought you realised that we had been hiding these mutual feelings. I thought you were on my side, Buck. You haven’t touched me, haven’t even looked at me in the eyes for a week…”

The anguish in his voice has Bucky up on his feet in a second - he’s ready to lay down his point of view but Steve retorts faster.

“Look around! We’re in a fucking ship that’s meant to be in space, man.” His finger taps the glass behind him. “Everything around us is astonishing progress.”

“Yeah, simulated,” Bucky says.

“But progress nonetheless. Forget what people think. Gosh I wish this thing could take us to the future. Maybe things would have changed…” Bucky takes a step closer and he’s ready to fold. He wants Steve in his arms. Wants to keep his word and hold him tight. He reaches his arms out but quickly retracts when a sharp object flies over his upper arm.

“What the-”

There’s a rush of wind that sends a dozen more pieces their way. The back wall of their room is fractured, smoke coming in from the adjacent room, followed by a muffled scream. The strident screeching of metal makes it hard to focus. Alarms have gone off and an external team is running around, trying to find everyone.

It suddenly becomes hard to breathe but the medics have surged to rescue the guys who were stuck behind the flames. When Bucky turns around to grab onto Steve, he finds him lying on the ground, hands clenching his stomach and he swears that even through all the back-alley fights he’s never seen Steve’s face so contorted. A piece of steel bigger than his hand pokes out of a gash just under his left rib. Bucky knows not to pull it from him. He’d seen the consequences first hand on the field. 

“Don’t move, don’t move.” He’s got a hand on his shoulder and the other beneath his head. There’s a glance around his body before he’s sure he can lift him up. Luckily, Steve’s about half the size of the guys Bucky had to carry in boot camp. He makes sure to keep the wound close to himself, and he heads towards the nearest door, the floor plan of the ship something he knows like the back of his hand.

“I got you Stevie,” Bucky says when he hears him weep.

**

Bucky’s fidgeting on the chair around the corner of two narrow hallways. His arm still burns from the alcohol-drenched bandage someone put on him while he was passed out. He turns to the one on his right. It’s bright from all the fluorescents and much too lifeless to his liking. The same nurse keeps shuffling through the different doors with a pad in hands. His head is about to explode from all the beeping of the life support machines and the aftermath of inhaling so much smoke. Someone at the end of the hall in front of him keeps coughing and Bucky’s throat is suddenly tingling. He’s a moment away from bolting up from his seat when Peggy walks out of the room.

“Barnes.” She has an apologetic look, but she offers a sweet smile. “He’d like to see you.”

There’s a blink before he can react, before blood goes back into his legs and he can head towards her. She reaches for his arm and guides him over, stopping just before the curtain around the bed.

“Now,” she begins. “We’ve had to um… They did someth-”

“He’s fine?” He practically screams.

“Yes. Yes James he is fine.” She takes a step back and stretches her arm to direct him forward. He takes a deep breath, flattens his shirt over himself as a habit and nervously pulls onto the edge of the curtain.

His heart skips a beat when he lays eyes on him. He recognizes the flowy blond hair; he wants to run his hand through it. But he’s taken aback when he gets closer. The under shirt they put on him is about to burst from the width of his shoulders. His jaw, man, his jaw is square and strong, just like the rest of him. He scans him up. Once. Twice. He thinks it’s the illusion of Steve being laid down, but he knows he’s gotten taller. Before he can wonder further a hand comes to his shoulder.

“Stark. What happened?” He asks, not taking his eyes off his friend.

“The infection spread like wildfire. His frail disposition made it impossible for him to surpass this. He needed a little...boost...if I can say so.”

“Well, a boost he got!” Bucky answers a tad enthusiastically. He sees Peggy smirk and his cheeks heat up. “Sorry,” he mouths.

“Yes. Well. We had this experimental serum going around for a while. A project run by Dr. Erskine. It was meant to help soldiers heal faster. Make their ability to bulk up easier. Let’s say we might have dosed up a little on him.”

“Is it permanent?”

“So far.” Peggy joins in.

“Did it... hurt?” There’s a new concern in Bucky’s voice. The same gut wrenching feeling he had whenever he found Steve beat up to the ground. He closes his eyes to keep the imminent tears from spilling out. 

“Did it like a champ,” comes Steve’s voice next.

**

“Steve, listen,” Bucky begins as they walk into their apartment, bags of groceries in arms - the first one since they’ve been back from the mission. He’s walking behind him, still astounded by the two inches Steve has won. Their elbows bump as they walk around in the kitchen - they’ve yet to adjust to the two of them taking a lot of space; the conversation of them moving out into a new place was impending. 

“Bucky, stop. I know you didn’t want to hurt me.” He means it, but Steve continues to set the things away without looking at him.

“I got caught off guard, Stevie. The lady asked the question but the tone in her voice made me uncomfortable. I should have s-”

“Yes. You should have said we were together. But it’s fine,” he adds. Bucky steps up and grabs one of the blonde’s hands. He brings it to his chest, over his heart, and his eyes begin to water when they get lost in his. There’s a synched deep breath before Bucky composes himself.

“I’m sorry.” Steve’s shoulders loosen at the small admission - he watches as Bucky kisses his fingers one by one before leaning into him. His lips come to his neck and Steve can’t help but shiver. The serum surely had enhanced everything.

“Why is it still so hard for you to acknowledge this,” Steve says as he rubs Bucky’s back. “Every time you say ‘friend’ my stomach flinches.” 

“Strict family. It’s been coded into me when I was young. Every time I would hang out with you I’d get deathly stares at the dinner table.” Steve hugs him tighter. Bucky had never mentioned this before. Never said a word about being roughed around as a kid. He feels guilty. A feeling of remorse stikes through him as he recalls the numerous times he asked Bucky to pose for his sketches. Or when he needed a hand climbing somewhere and Bucky would hold onto him /just that way/. He didn’t know that his father was overlooking their every move from his office window. Didn’t know that his own mother was being lectured about their behavior.

“Plus, I still look at you and kind of freak out that I don’t have my little Stevie anymore. But you know… I’m really looking forward to what /this/ Steve can do.” He takes a step back to better look at him. His hands are on his hard chest, making their way onto his shoulders and he can feel Steve relax under his touch. One hand moves up to his nape before settling onto the side of his face; the other has made its way south, tracing every muscle on the way down. 

“How about you knock some sense into me?” Bucky taunts, eyes dark and glimmery. It takes Steve out of his thought - pulls him out quite harshly in fact - but he lets the brunette palm him through the thick fabric of his chinos. 

“But, Buck. We always-”

“I know. But I want to, baby. At least once…” There’s a soft whine along Bucky’s words and Steve melts into his embrace. Their lips stand close, waiting patiently for the right opportunity; though Bucky’s hand has made its way past Steve’s zipper by now. “For once, Stevie...please fuck me.”

It’s beastial. The way Steve picks his lover like he’s not heavier than a pillow. How he has him pinned to the wall by their room - they had finally started sleeping in the same bed, and eventually turned the spare room into a small art studio.

It takes a minute for Bucky’s hand to land onto the door handle, and another second for his mind to command it to turn it open. Steve’s grunt follows when it finally pries wide, allowing them to adventure further. Three steps later, Bucky finds himself thrown onto the stiff mattress, shirt gone missing while strong hands are already working at the button of his pants.

“Don’t break anything, Rogers.” He lifts himself onto his elbows to look down at the brusque man between his legs.

“The only thing I might be breaking is the bed,” he begins, his words muffled as he bites down on his tongue in concentration. He looks up at the headboard. Surely this was the first time they’d be intimate since ‘the change’. It most likely frightens Bucky more than it does Steve. A grin autographs his next words. “We need a new one anyway.” And with that he hooks his fingers into the waistband of both Bucky’s pants and underwear, and glides them off his thighs.

“Always so fucking hard for me,” Steve growls. “No wonder, you had /me/ on my back like that. I could get used to this view.”

“Don’t linger, Stevie.” Bucky’s words are low, but stern. His hips buck in agreement.

“Was I so whiny all the time?” They both chuckle before Bucky swats him on the chest.

“Only when I was balls deep in that fantastic ass,” he answers, both hands on the plump flesh he mentioned. The action causes Steve to grind into him - and he’d be lying if he said that wasn’t the plan all along. Bruises would appear on his shoulders the next day with how hard Steve’s biting down on them.

“I swear to God-" The enhanced man has his prey on his stomach in a flash, barely taking a breath of effort. He reaches forward to present two fingers to Bucky who gladly coats them in a generous amount of saliva. A hum rumbles into his chest when he feels them swipe over his hole, Steve taking his turn in exploring his man. The stretch is new, although Bucky had done this to himself in the past. The sweet tickling feeling of the intrusion is brain numbing. He's not sure he’s going to last. Surely Steve’s new physique could give more than he bargained for.

“Holy shit,” he cries when he feels the head of his dick press against him. They both moan when Steve inches into him with ease until his hips meet with Bucky’s ass and he stops, giving both of them a moment to adjust.

“Never thought it would be this good,” the blond grunts, eyes shut as he focuses on not painting the walls that so tightly envelop him. He pulls out just a tad, before pushing back in and establishing a smooth rhythm. Bucky contorts and mewls beneath him, his eyes go white as they roll to the back of his head.

“Like that, huh?” Steve asks. “I sure as hell fucking like it.”

Bucky can only make faint noises. Steves and ahs and what not escape his lips in the smoothest symphony Steve has ever heard. He’s fucking him relentless, unsure of how he can even get his hips to move this way as he never found himself in this exact position. But he’s going. And going. And he’s loving every moment, so much so that he’s not sure he can ever go back to the old ways. Inevitably him or Bucky would succumb. Both giving and receiving felt amazing, but he’d always be James’ little Stevie.

“You take me so well, fuck,” he adds.

“Ste-eve.”

“I know. Poor little face is all red and hot. You’re so close, love.” The praise comes naturally from Steve, but it seems to have Bucky blushing even more. He bends down and snakes an arm under Bucky so his hand can come around and hook onto his neck. His right knee spreads his legs even further, allowing him to bottom down into him; the head of his cock nudges that sweet spot and as if the words weren’t enough, it has Bucky pulsing and making a mess on the bed.

“Fuck fuck fuck!” He exclaims as he empties himself completely while Steve still pounds into him. He reaches back and grabs his lover by the head to bring him in for a heated kiss. A moment later it’s Steve’s turn to fall over the edge. He groans and shakes as he gives three more thrusts before pulling out and letting his seed splatter over the spent brunette’s back. Hot spurts reach up to his shoulders and onto his cheek. Steve is quick to lean forward and lick him clean.

“So good,” he says.

“Stevie, that’s your own cum,” Bucky replies with a shy smile. Who’d have thought Steven Rogers would be the kinky one.

“Mmm. And?”

“And… I want some.” They both chuckle before Bucky can grab onto the man’s broad shoulders and fetch what he wanted.

[jeoning]

dance partner / pjm

Pairing: pjm x reader

Genre: fluff

Length: 1.6k words

Summary: Being one of the best students in your group, your dance teacher decided to pair you up with one of his other best students from another group. Both you and Jimin have to master a choreography and later teach it to the students. 

⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

Dancing was the only thing you did whenever you were stressed, or whenever your mood was down. It has been in your life for so long and was one of your few rescue options when you weren’t well. You couldn’t live without it.

Changing into something more comfortable, you continued to dance freely. Your teacher was nice enough to let you stop by an hour before the lesson, meaning the room was all yours.

Your phone plugged to a speaker, you press on the shuffle button and let the music play. It was an upbeat song, hip hop genre — your favorite kind to start off your warm up. 

While you dance, completely lost in your own world, a boy was walking along the corridor, making his way to the men’s changing room.

Due to your loud music and the fact that you did not closed the door, he didn’t miss any of it. He puts his towel around his neck and stands near the doorway, leaning his body on it. 

You were so engrossed that you didn’t felt his presence. 

At times when you had to do provocative moves such as body rolling, lip biting and so on, he would widen his eyes or have a small smile on the corner of his lips.

“Ah, Jimin! You’re done?”

You quickly stop and went to turn off the music, hearing your teacher yelling something. You turn your head towards the direction of his voice and see him talking to someone, but you didn’t know who because he was hidden behind a wall. 

Unplugging your phone from the stereo, you brought your stuff into the corner where you sat there playing on your device. 

In no time, the room started to get louder and louder with people talking. Right, we’re mixed with the other group for a month or something...

After everyone did a five-minute stretch, it was time to learn new steps.

“Okay, Y/n will show us.” The teacher smiles at you as you stand up and make your way to the center, showing them what you’ve learned. 

Everyone in class knew that you were a quick learner, that is why it was no surprise that your teacher had picked you, plus you were going to help the others anyways.

“Please, get into pairs,” he later said.

You walk towards a girl that you have talked with a few times, but your teacher stops you. “You’re already paired. I’ll pair up with her, okay?”

You were confused but agreed.

"Jimin!" The teacher calls.

You look around the room and see a guy waving his hand before he jogs towards you.

“Yeah?”

"Didn't you hear?" The instructor had a hint of annoyance in his voice. "I said to get in teams of two, not three! Leave Hoseok and Yoongi alone."

Jimin takes a quick glance at you and smiles in which you return one back.

"Have fun, you know what to do, you two!" With that, he left and went to see your friend.

"Jimin?" You called him, making him hum in response. "Are you a good dancer? Can you do what he showed us earlier?"

It wasn’t mean to be rude. You just wanted to know if your teacher paired you up with a skilled partner. 

A smirk appears on his face as he takes a step forward. "Of course, I do. I may not be the best listener, but dancing is something else."

A grin forms on your lips at his confidence. 

The two of you danced and danced, skipping the teaching parts since both of you already learned and remembered more than half of the choreography.

Without you two knowing, the class had stop and was looking at you two dancing together. Both of you were smiling at each other whenever your eyes would meet, completely forgetting about your surroundings.

"That was great!" The teacher exclaimed, followed by cheers and handclaps from the others.

You two immediately stop and looked at each other, slowly regaining your breaths as your cheeks slowly redden.

"Jimin, Y/n! You two learn quickly! My place will be taken by the two of you soon," he said jokingly.

You and Jimin seperate ways and went to help others.

Every evening, you would go to the dance studio and dance to your heart's content. Sometimes you would bump into Jimin, and the two of you would start a small competition.

What you didn't know was that Jimin has always been there. On days when you didn't see him, he was not so far away, secretly looking at you dance while he copies. He was captivated by you. He couldn’t take his eyes off you. He was just mesmerized by you, your body, by your movements — everything, but what about you?

Sure, he was the flirtatious type, he would make jokes, make you smile and laugh by doing the smallest things, but you couldn't decide if it was that loving feeling yet. Something you admire in him was how he was so passionate about dancing. He doesn't seem like the serious type, but when it comes to dancing, he's a different person. You slowly were attracted and attached by him.

"Hey, Y/n!" The said man snaps his finger at you to get your attention. "Y/n!"

You come to your senses and see his face close to you, making you stagger backwards.

"Are you okay? You were in a daze."

"Yeah, just thinking..."

"About me?" He smirked and peered in your face.

You smack his arm and went to put on music. "Let's dance."

The two of you did the choreography that the teacher had worked on, adding and changing a few steps. The way your bodies were syncing together was unbelievable. He was checking you out through the mirror and you did the same as well, smiling a few times whenever you would make eye contact.

It was when you two had to come closer that you stumbled on your feet.

"I-I'm sorry," you apologized, heat rising to your face to the tip of your ear.

"It's fine," he said, oblivious to the situation. "Let's do it again."

He went to put the song back to the part that you messed up, while you slowly regain your composure. This time, it wasn't that bad, you were able to do it with your heart pounding loudly.

"Yeah! We nailed it!" He exclaimed. His eyes turned crescent shape as his lips were stretching upwards for a huge smile that made your heart melt. "Now. Let's do something even better."

You cocked your head to the side, not understanding what he meant until he put on that one song you had danced to when you were alone.

He gestures you to stand next to him before he starts to dance.

Your eyes grew wide as he was executing your moves. 

It didn't take long for you to join in with him; he couldn't stop but look at you with a challenging gaze, making you want to do nothing but show him what you can do.

It was different. You used to do it alone, but now that Jimin was dancing your choreography, it felt as if it was made to be danced by two people.

The song was almost coming to an end, you were all smiles, enjoying the experience. Jimin, on the other hand, was stupidly in love with you. Every time you would dance, he was always the first one to look at you.

If only you realize and felt the same. 

He improvises the last move: instead of facing the front, he takes the opportunity of you turning around to slowly take you by the waist, spinning you around, making both of you face each other, bodies pressed together.

"Isn't it better like this?" He said quietly, looking into your eyes.

You could feel his hot breath against your skin, making your face flush. It reddens more when you realize how close your bodies were. You try to get out of his grasp, but his arm was still around your waist, not wanting to let go

“J-Jimin... I-I need to go...”

“To where?” He asked softly.

Your heart was beating at an uncontrollable speed, it was impossible for him to not feel it.

"Y/n... Look at me."

You slowly look up and was welcomed by a warm smile. "I love you," he confessed to you, before loosening his hold.

Who knew that the simple three-word phrase would make you so speechless yet so shy and lost. At this point, it wasn't just butterflies in your stomachs, but a bunch of wild animals.

"I assume, you too?" He said, pointing to your face.

You were smiling without knowing.

You act cool and scoffed. "I didn't say a word." You turn your back on him and walk away to hide the immense smile you were wearing.

When you reached the door, you turn around, softly returning his words.

After you weren't in sight, Jimin stood there in the dance room, looking up at the ceiling with a content feeling.

✼ ✼ ✼

"Jimin and Y/n will show you the whole thing!" The teacher cheerfully says.

Everyone sits down on the sides while you and Jimin headed to the center of the room.

The music plays and you two were even better than the last time and the class couldn't agree more. You two looked like pros.

"I couldn't expect any less," the teacher praised both of you. "I could feel it, you two were communicating through it, the chemistry was so strong! I made the right decision to pair you two togeth—or did I also create a couple?"

You lower your gaze, making the teacher chuckle in amusement.

"Yes, you did," Jimin answered.

"I have high expectations from both of you!" The teacher left and went to see the others.

"You didn't have to say that..." you mumbled.

"I remember you saying "I do love you", yesterday?" He teased.

You roll your eyes and stretched your body, Jimin doing the same later on, both of you with smiles on your lips.

[just-castlevania-imagines]

More Traded Secrets ~ Alucard x Reader~

The girls are appalled by how the men talked about them but Alucard and Trevor Overhear them talking not so clean themselves...So they get back at them with a little surprise.

“I can’t believe that Trevor would talk about me like that.” Sypha said, crossing her arms and looking off to the ground. The group had stopped in a small town on their way back to the castle. You had no clue where Alucard and Trevor went but you and Sypha stayed with the wagons and the horses. “How are you not mad?” “Well, I don’t want to lose Trevor or Alucard as friends. Also, Alucard was very upfront with everything he said.” “Well, I still think it’s rude.” She said, hugging herself. “ I can’t even look at Trevor the same... Is that all he imagines when he looks at me?” “I don’t think it’s all he sees. I think it’s just something he’s thought about before.” You said, putting a hand on her shoulder and attempting to comfort her. “I’m sure you’ve looked at Trevor and thought a few things yourself.” You teased, making her blush a little. “Well, I do like looking at his biceps...They just..bulge so nicely....What about you?” “M-Me?” “Yeah, what have you thought? About Alucard?” “His Chest.” You said bluntly. “You see that deep v necked shirt he always wears. He could melt glaciers with that clevage.” “You’re so bad.” She said, giggling crazily. “But I have always wondered...” Sypha trailed off, giggling dying down a little. “Who do you think is bigger?” “WHoa, Sypha,” You panicked a little, looking around to make sure no one was listening to you. You started giggling too, now thinking a little too much about it. She just smiled, listening for your answer. “....Of course it’s Alucard.-” “You think so?” You both continued to talk out your little fantasies and make a case for which man was better endowed but you were unaware that someone was overhearing them.

You and Sypha stayed by the wagon until the men eventually returned. They seemed to be getting along a lot better than they were before. You and Sypha looked awkwardly at them and their fake looking smiles. “...Boys?” “We found something in this small town worth exploring.” Alucard started, sounding a bit too friendly. “There’s natural springs that a local Inn built walls around and are opening as baths.” “We thought that we could spend a night at the inn, enjoy the springs, salvage this trip and all that shit.” Trevor said, happily. You and Sypha looked at one another but you couldn’t deny the facts. They were getting along...even after that dreadful barfight in the last town. “..S-Sure,” Sypha started. “It’s good to see that you both have gotten along.” “Yeah, a hot bath sounds nice...”

You checked into the Inn just after sunset, the ower going on and on about the natural springs. It seemed to be the only thing the town had going for it. You walked down the hall that lead outside, seeing the wall that seperated the town from the springs. You looked at the steamy water and even Sypha marveled at the sight. “This is going to be so relaxing, Y/N-” “Well then, Hop in!” You and Sypha both squealed, turnign around to see Trevor and Alucard standing behind you in thin robes.  It then clicked to you that you walked down one hallway to get here and didn’t see a branching path. “What are you two doing here?!” Sypha scolded. “Oh, did we forget to mention that the bath isn’t seperated?” “Oh, My,” Alucard said, feigning innocence. “I think we forgot to tell them.” “You Assholes..” You started, shaking your head and folding your arms. “We are NOT getting in there with you guys.” “Fine,” Trevor shrugged, throwing his robe off his shoulders. You both flinched, immediately covering your eyes. “I’m getting in.” “I think I’ll join you.” Alucard said, tossing his robe to the side as well. You and Sypha were still covering your eyes but you felt both men walk past you both to get to the spring. “We’re the only ones here ladies.” Trevor said playfully. “It’s just a bath.” “Exactly,” Alucard started. “You girls are acting like children.” the heard the water being displaced slightly and upon hearing it settled you both uncovered your eyes, holding your robes closed tightly.  You look down at them, narrowing your eyes at their smirking faces. Sypha looks like she’s trying not to freeze the hot springs. “Well?” Trevor asked, “Are you girls ready to relax?” “Turn around.” Sypha demanded. “I’m not getting in.” You said, backing up a little. “I can’t do it.” “You both are so childish. This is completely innocuous.” Alucard defended. “Did your parents not bathe with you when you were a child?” “They did but they were my parents! It’s a little different! Also I wasn’t a full grown woman back then!” You complained, unable to hide your nervousness and embarrassment. Alucard was living for it. “Alright,” Trevor said, “They closed their eyes when we got in... let’s give them the curtousy.” “Fine, we can turn around. If it will put them at ease.” “We’d be more at ease if you leave.” Sypha mumbled. they didn’t respond, turning to face the wall and leaving you girls to look at one another. Sypha scrunched her face uncomfortably and bit her lip. “...Should we?” “...Let’s just get this over with.”

When you and Sypha were properly submerged and they were turned back around it was basically the men just talking while you both squirmed uncomfortably. They were so nonchalant about this. “That’s probably why I don’t like squirrels.” Trevor said, finishing his story. “I have to admit, I wouldn’t trust them either then,” Alucard started. “But, I’ve never been wronged by squirrels.” “Not yet-” “This is weird.” Sypha started, staring off to the side.” I want to leave.” “What’s weird about it?” Trevor asked, which pissed off the speaker. “What’s weird? How about that earlier today I learn that you stare at me like a piece of meat and then you bring us to an open hot spring!” “Oh please,” Alucard said, “We can admire the female form and respectfully disregard nudity at the same time.” “Unlike you girls.” Trevor said “All you’re doing is making a big deal out of being naked.” “because you were talking about our bodies earlier today-” “And you were talking about us.” Alucard said, cutting you off. “and yet we didn’t hesitate.” You and Sypha burst into different shades of pink. The boys just smirked finalyl revealing their true plan. “.. You heard us?” Sypha asked, turning to Trevor. he shook his head. “Alucard heard you both. Left his coin purse in the wagon adn had to go get it.” “What an imagination you ladies have.” the vampire teased. “And we offer you the oppurtunity to see if your guesses about us are correct and you immediately closed your eyes.” “To be fair, I’m sure I’m bigger than him.” Trevor defended, making Alucard raise a brow. “Oh you think so?” “...Why don’t we ask the girls to judge?” “We can’t put them in such an uncomfortable position.” Alucard said bluntly, “That’s going too far.” “...It’s cause it’s not much to look at isn’t it-” “You’re awfully eager to be humiliated in front of the women.” Alucard snapped. You and Sypha were a little in awe... You were about to probably see something you were very curious about earlier today. they continued to argue and Sypha leaned to whisper to you. “,,S-Should we judge?” “This is a moral dilemma I was not expecting to get invovled in today...” “I-It’s just.. I want to but... What if trevor loses?” She said nervously. You couldn’t help but crack up a little. “That’s all you’re worried about?” “Of course. That’s the only reason I’m hesitating.” She admitted, giddy and excited.  “Well why don’t we prove that, Belmont,” You tuned back in, hearing Alucard’s challenge. “On 3, we stand up and see.” “Fine by me.” Trevor said, gripping the side of the pool. “Alright. Sypha, count.” “O-Oh! um...1..” She started, seeing Alucard preparing to stand up too, “..2...” They looked at each other like they were mortal enemies, both of them sure of the results and ready to prove it. “...3!”

“So,” Trevor said, leading the walk back to the room you rented for the night, linking arms with Sypha. “Tonight was interesting.” He said happily. Alucard rolled his eyes, holding your hand for the walk back. “...You know size isn’t important-” “I know Alucard,” You said, rubbing his arm. “What difference does half an inch make-” “All the fucking difference.” Trevor said smugly. Alucard hissed, most liekly very pissed off. “Eat shit, Belmont.” “Please, don’t fight.” You pleaded. “I..am still very much impressed.” You whispered shyly, hoping that only he heard you. He smirked, putting his arm on your side. “Well..Once we get back to the room..and Sypha and Trevor fall asleep... why don’t you let me impress you further?” “We can hear you both!” Trevor complained loudly. Making both you and Alucard chuckle. “God, They’re going to fuck like we’re not here.” “... We might have to spend the night back at the wagon..”

[carlkrogen]

On the Edge of a Knife P1

Night time is made for deals like this. Parties meeting by lamp light on some shady part of town is the bread and butter of my work After all, who is going to ask a man to recover relics that might or might not have the power to end the world? The clue is, normally those who are wanting to hold the world at ransom. This time, no one has asked me to do this. I am going after something that could have danger written all over it. But there is a pay out if I can find a proper seller for it. That kind of money would mean I could be more picky of what relics I go and hunt down. This also means I could get an apartment in Stormwind or Silvermoon. Stability like that was hard to comeby, and the offer is almost too tempting to pass up.

As I make my way down the streets of Silvermoon, I know where I’m going. Murder’s Row is always a hive of the questionably moral and sane. I and the one with questionable morals, and I am looking for one with questionable sanity. Even as I enter the room I can smell the incense through my mask and hear the music of someone trying to chant. It is not like I need to know what they’re doing, but I am a curious little bean. So as I pass by a room with only a thin cloth seperating me from the ritual going on. I peek in and see a woman half naked as she is summoning something in a circle… I have been around enough cultists to know not to linger long for that one.

Places like this are havens for void users who don’t think constantly seeking out the void is a problem. There have been a number of elves exiled from the city for doing stuff like this, but, some people don’t know when to stop. I am hopeful to find the type of person I’m looking for though.

When I see a darkly dressed figure I reached into my pouch and pulled out a small item. It is a small slip of a bar with the symbol of the Twilight Cultists on it. The figure, that bit of a stereotype who wears a hood, but their pointed ears still poke out, because obviously this is a blood elf who wants to play with powers larger than itself. Seeing the slip they simply motion to me to follow them and into another room, this one with a proper door. The other side of the room is a simple office space, and a moment later a blond haired elf lowers his hood so he can look at me with a suspicious look. “Dr. Krogen, I thought you were dead.”

“I feel like I should be dead, after having to run when everything was destroyed in Uldum.” I said as I helped myself to a chair. “But, it’s hard to keep a good man down.”

“You ran off before that… hero came and destroyed our hard work.” The elf didn’t sit, instead he loomed over me with an irate look in his eyes. “Do you know how much it took to go into hiding since we lost.”

“Probably as much as it took me. Don’t forget Farendar. I was one of the researchers. I had a reason to be there.” But am I lying? My time in Uldum was a hot bed of intrigue and me trying to understand my bosses dreams. Finding out I was working for the Twilight Cultists, it was a shock I thought I took well. “But, we could either talk about the ‘good old days’,” I reached over and picked up the slip of gold and pocketed it. “Or we can talk about me bridging the gap between us.”

Farendar has very little reason to not trust me. When we worked together in Uldum he knew I was willing to do anything to have more power, more power that might give me the immortality I wanted. I know he craves power as well. But he wants power for another selfish endeavor, he wants to be seated next to an old god and preside over people. It’s an impossible dream, but no more impossible than my own.

“And how are you planning on doing that.”

Reaching into a pouch I pulled out the notes Olivia had translated for me. My last job had been an equal trade for a book, the book was a journal of a madman who was going after some, dagger. I don’t say where the dagger is located, but I do want him to see what the dagger could do. “As you can see. I remembered your love of the void. This dagger will let you open a rift through to the void, let you be a little closer to the thing you love most.”

Farendar looked down to the page, and I can see it. It is impossible to miss when someone becomes lustful for an object. “What do you want for it?” He asked, and again he knows me, he knows I want two things, funds to let me live comfortable, and my immortality.

“Well, I need someone to fund the expedition, I need to go to the Forgotten Kingdom, I was given instructions of where the dagger might be. I know something like this is… a hard to pass up object to anyone in your line of work.”

It was a calculated move, yes, and it was one I need when I am in situations like this. I have a need for a man like Farendar, and with him with me I know I’ll have no trouble in acquiring the dagger. It almost makes me wish though.

“I’ll pay for it, but I’m going with you. Relics like this normally look for an owner, and let's be honest Dr. Krogen, you are a secondary shadow user, unlike myself.” He grinned more and I could see his judgment is already clouded by his want to be more than he was born as.

This makes me wish one thing. I wish I wasn’t going to be alone in this mission. There is no way I can count Farendar as someone I would ‘enjoy’ having on a trip like this. He is going to be talking my ear off about what his massive plans are, about what he is going to do when he gets all the power he’s ever wanted. At the end of this… I am going to be very glad I will get to kill him in exchange for the dagger. Men like Farendar had long since lost his status of ‘could be a benefit for the world’ and he quickly fell into the group I don’t mind seeing get exactly what they want, just not in the way they want it.

Instead my mind for one moment wishes this mission wouldn’t have to be across the world from someone. From the person I was now considering my friend. For one moment before I left Farendar for the day, I thought I would use one of the shadow raven stones to tell her I had found a sacrifice, but I had to stop myself. I only have two of these, and I don’t want to waste it in case I end up in actual trouble. I’m not sure why that hurts though. A number of things have hurt over the past day and, not being able to speak to Olivia was one of the hurts. For someone I had just met, someone I was just now considering a friend with a challenge, I know there is something more going on in my head, but I just can’t figure it out just yet.

((Mentions: @olivia-lovecraft. Quest given by: @singing-over-bones))

[iturbide]

It isn't a crack ship if works of said ship exist and they do exist now ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) Anyway how about a little challenge? Number 22 in the Ylissean Grima universe with the current Robin and the original timeline Robin who's been seperated from Grima bc platonic love is valid and important (ﾉ≧∇≦)ﾉ ﾐ ┸━┸

You know a while ago I would have said that AO3 has no listing for them so I can’t say that it’s not a crack ship but

Now AO3 does have a listing for them because I’ve put these there I hope you’re happy the ship only has one work but it exists

Also 22 seems to be the one of the most popular prompts from this list I’m impressed

Listening to them while they vent.

Much to his surprise, having two Robins within Ylisstol Castle caused very little confusion among the Shepherds and their children from the future.  To be fair, though, despite the occasional shock he got from seeing what looked like himself turning a distant corner, the differences were quite striking: he carried himself differently, moved with greater care, and though he smiled often there was a weary weight to them that could not be hidden.  The fell dragon’s presence had lent an air of power to his vessel �� but with Grima’s soul now back in one piece within the dragon atop the palace, the signs of age had been laid bare for all to see, leaving his shoulders sloped from bearing too great a burden for too many years, and tired lines around his eyes that spoke volumes of the strain he had so long endured.  

Robin had no doubt that the man had lived a hard life, even before the fall of the world he and the children hailed from.  And he could not help but wonder (guiltily) whether he recalled any of it, or if his memories were as much a void as Robin’s own.  He hated the curiosity that sparked such a question, hated the mere thought of asking…

But for all that it made his stomach knot, he could not not help wanting to know.

But he kept that to himself as best he could.  The other Robin had been through enough.  No need to make it worse.  Instead, he turned into the library, hoping that perhaps a book might distract his mind from the queasy guilt and the question humming through his brain–

“Oh.  Hello.”

Robin stopped, staring at his doppelganger’s worn smile.  Only as the door creaked closed behind him did he think to return the gesture, feeling shy and more than a little awkward as he picked his way over to the shelves the man was browsing.  “I hope I’m not disturbing you,” he murmured. 

“Not at all,” the other Robin assured him.  “I was just looking for something new to read.  It’s…rather odd, to be honest – several of these series were complete in my time, and some were several books further along.  I’ll need to wait still longer to find out how they end…”

“Do you have any recommendations?” Robin ventured.

The man made a thoughtful sound, scanning the spines arranged before them…and finally pulled a thick text down, offering it to his younger self.  “Have you tried this one, yet?  I can’t recall when I first saw it, but I remember giving it to Sumia because it seemed like something she would like, and two days later having her give it back insisting I read it, too.  It’s quite good – the romance builds quite nicely over the first half of the book, and the tension manages to carry on through the next two…though you’ll apparently need to wait on those, since I don’t think they’ve been written yet.”

Robin grinned, taking the book and running his fingers over the cover.  “Hidden but Not Lost,” he murmured.  Glancing at the man beside him, he drew in a breath…and stopped, biting his lower lip and tucking the tome against his chest instead.  He didn’t mean anything by it, he couldn’t–

“Is something on your mind?”

He flinched, lifting a hand to rub the back of his neck.  “I-I was…I’ve been wondering.  About something.”  Glancing up, he saw the man watching him with quiet, earnest attention…and steeled his nerve as best he could.  “Do you remember your life?  Before Chrom?”

The other Robin blinked, his head canting slightly to one side.  “…why do you ask?”

“…I can’t remember it,” he mumbled.  “Any of it.  It’s…it’s all a blank.  Everything from before I woke up outside of Southtown is just…gone.  And…and some things that shouldn’t have been there – like Chrom’s death – were with me for so long, instead, but…I don’t know where I came from.  I don’t know who I was before.  Is the person I am now different than who I should have been?  I feel like…like something’s missing, like it’s been missing, and…and I don’t know how to get it back.”

“You don’t want it.”

The words startled Robin enough that he nearly dropped his book.  His older self set his own texts on the shelf beside him, running the tips of his fingers lightly over the mark hidden beneath his vambrace.  “Sometimes there are things we think we want, or tell ourselves we need, to be fulfilled and feel complete.  But…so often we’re wrong about what that is.”

He frowned, watching the slight tremor in the other Robin’s fingers.  “I’ve envied you, you know.  You had no memories when you met Chrom, aside from the ones you were given, and those were mostly buried.  You had all of the tactical prowess, all the latent understanding, and none of the hesitation.  You didn’t guard yourself against the Shepherds.  You didn’t think twice about becoming their tactician, their ally, comrade, confidante, friend.  It took me…it took me so long to let down my own guard to them, and watching you, I…I think you’re the better of us.”

The man’s voice shuddered, and Robin realized with a shock that he was crying.  And before he quite knew what he was doing, he moved to embrace his other self, wrapping his arms tight around his doppelganger’s shaking shoulders and feeling the man cling tight to the back of his coat.  “I’m sorry,” he whispered.  “I didn’t mean to stir up bad memories, I’m sorry…”

The older man shook his head against Robin’s shoulder.  “It’s nothing to apologize for,” he breathed.  “It’s natural to be curious.  But you don’t need them.  You’re not missing anything – you’ve always been whole.”

He smiled softly, hugging the man just a bit tighter.  “I’d still like to hear about what things were like before, sometime,” he murmured.  “Even if I don’t need them, there are things that I want to remember – or at least know.  …I want to know about my mother.  Our mother.”

“She was wonderful,” the other Robin laughed, pulling back slightly and wiping at his eyes.  “She was gentle, and kind, but wouldn’t hesitate to pick a fight with a Feroxi thrice her size if she had to – and usually she’d win, too.”

“No!” he gaped.  “How!?”

“She was not one to be underestimated,” the man grinned, gathering his books and gesturing toward the comfortable chairs set off to one side.  “And she was a small woman in Ferox.  They consistently underestimated her.”  Settling into one of the seats, Robin leaned eagerly forward as his other self made himself comfortable in the chair across from him – and though the stories did not bring anything rushing back, there was something familiar about them nonetheless, calming the burning desire and leaving him feeling well and truly satisfied. 

[americaswritings]

Fight you

Warnings: angst, a little dramtic lol, horrible writing tbh

Prompt: “I will fight you”

Summary: You’re on Caps team while Peter is on Team Iron Man. Will you really go as far hurting each other or can your friendship still be saved?

Words: 1.7k

Pairing: Peter Parker x reader

A/N: Takes place during Civil War. This is for @thedevilwearsvibranium writing challenge! Congrats!! 💓 

Add yourself to my taglist!

You made your way over to Peters apartment. Your backpack felt heavier on your shoulders with every step you took, mirroring your nervousness and the uneasy feeling in your stomach.

You had to tell Peter something, which could lead into not only an argument, but a fight.

The way to his apartment was too short for you liking. When you reached the front door of the building you hadn’t prepared your words at all.

But there was no way out of this so you sighed and pushed the door open.

May let you in with a big smile on her face, returning to the kitchen to continue baking what smelled like cookies.

You walked over to Peters room, taking a deep breath before knocking on his door.

“Come in”, you heared his voice and you opened the door, seeing Peter bent over his computer.

His face lit up when he saw that it was you and he stopped his work instantly.

“Hey, did I forget something?”, he wondered, but you shook your head.

“No, I just came to- you know- tell you something”, you stated, sitting down on Peters bed insecure.

He sensed that whatever you had to tell him was serious so he sat down next to you, patiently waiting for you to speak up.

“Clint called me”, you began and Peters face twisted in realization. He knew where this was going.

Since Peter had revealed to you that he was spiderman, you had helped him as much as possible, including accompanying him when he first met the avengers.

While Peter spend most of the time with Tony working on a new suit you waited in the living room.

The other avengers didn’t have much time, being busy with missions and other secret stuff, but Clint was always there for you, talking and helping you overcome the time Peter was gone.

You two had grown close so it was only logical that he was the first one you turned to when you discovered that something was different about you.

A wave of energy you had never felt before was flooding your body, giving you a sudden strength you didn’t know how to handle.

You didn’t tell Peter at first, since he had already many problems on his own, but after you pushed him a little too hard while tickling each other, you couldn’t hide the truth from him anymore.

You later found out that you were able to manipulate the constant vibrations of the universe, which allowed you to produce shockwaves and gave you the ability to affect objects by shaking and moving them.

“What did he say?”, Peter asked, although he already knew the answer to his question. 

“He wanted to recruit me on Caps team”, you stated, your eyes scanning Peters face for any hint on what he felt.

“But you said no, didn’t you?”, he concluded with an stiff laugh.

You stayed silent, knowing that this was the part you had feared the most.

“You said no, didn’t you?”, Peter repeated more forcefully this time and you adverted your gaze to the ground.

“I can’t let them down”, you mumbled instead and you heared Peter snort. “You can’t be serious”, he whispered, while getting up from the bed to pace the room.

“What else should I have done?”, you snapped, giving him a pleading look to understand your decision.

“Say no?”, Peter suggested with a huff.

“You know I can’t do that”, you reasoned and he stopped pacing. “You know what that means, do you?”, he asked and you slowly nodded.

“It means that we will be enemies (y/n)! We will have to fight each other in two days!”, Peter went on, the rage and desperation visible in his voice.

“I won’t fight you”, you whispered, turning your gaze back to his.

“But I will”, he declared and you felt your jaw clapping open.

“I will fight you.”

“Why?”, you murmured, starring up at Peter with big eyes. The shock must have been visible on your face, because he shifted uncomfortably.

“Mr. Stark- they are all counting on me”, Peter tried to argue, but you shook your head.

“So this is your decision?”, you asked, tears making their way into your eyes.

He put his chance to prove himself over your friendship?

“I don’t have a choice”, Peter hissed, but you shook your head again.

“You always have a choice”, you commented, grabbing your backpack, and left the room, not looking back at the heartbroken boy once again.

-

“Are you sure about this? You can always back out, you know that right?”

Clints voice woke you out of your thoughts, but you kept putting on your suit.

“I have to do this”, you cut him off and he knew that it was time to let it go.

You had just arrived in germany, everyone preparing for the plan.

In only a matter of time you had to face Peter, your best friend, your enemy.

Your only hope was that maybe you could fight somebody else and didn’t have to face him in a hand-to-hand combat.

But soon you found yourself standing in the group of your team, directly facing Tony and the others. 

You couldn’t discover Peter anywhere and for a split of a second you hoped that maybe he had changed his mind, but suddenly you saw a small figure jumping through the air, landing gracefully on the opposite side.

Peter was dressed in his new spiderman suit, Captain americas shield in his hands, which he had stolen during his arrival.

A few words were exchanged, but you didn’t really pay attention. All you could focus on was the boy in front of you.

It broke your heart to see him like this, not even paying attention to you. 

All he was focused on was proving himself to Tony and as much as you saw that he wanted to please the man, who was like a father figure to him, you couldn’t understand how easily he threw away your friendship.

Surely, you were the one agreeing on joying Caps team, but you had never imagined that you had to fight Peter. You would have refused, but here you were. 

He seemed to have made his decision, so why shouldn’t you do too?

The fight followed soon. Everyone began running towards their opponents and you did the same. You picked Natasha, who was trying to throw punches at Clint.

Within a second you had send a shockwave at her, sending her several meters through the air until she fell to the ground.

You wanted to go at her again, but a pain shot through your back and you were thrown to the ground.

Black panther was standing behind you, ready to attack you again.

You send a shockwave at him but he ducked away in time and began attacking you.

While his fists collided with your body you wondered why no one had thought about teaching you self defence.

You tried your best to escape his grip, but it was too firm. Helplessly you felt your panic increase, but in a last attempt to get rid of your oponent you kicked him.

The second he was distracted you used to free yourself from his grip, rolling to the side and standing up again quickly.

Before he could attack you, you send a shockwave at him, sending him through the air away from you.

The fight seemed to endure ages, but also went on too quickly.

You needed to be focused every second. Every little distraction could be determining how this would end.

Sweat was dripping down your forehead and your hair was flying wild around your shoulders, but the adrenaline kept you going.

Suddenly you saw a red-blue figure and not a second later you stood directly face to face with him.

Spiderman.

Peter Parker.

You were only a few inches apart, but it felt like something was seperating you. A barrier, a thin line turning you into enemies.

You had prepared for this to happen, considered his weaknesses and planned how you could overpower the spiderboy. 

But now, when you were directly facing him, you felt frozen.

You couldn’t attack him. It felt wrong, no, it was wrong. This was your best friend and you wouldn’t try to hurt him no matter what.

Even if that meant losing. Peter was worth it.

“I’m not gonna fight you”, you spoke up, your voice calm and steady.

Somehow you didn’t feel nervous nor afraid. You didn’t fear Peter attacking you and you didn’t fear giving up.

It didn’t make you weak, but strong.

No one could ever be able to make you turn against Peter, your best friend, the person you felt at home with.

Peters face twisted in confusion, but he seemed determined. “But I will”, he said and you nodded, waiting for him to get it over with.

Peter stepped a little closer, his hand ready to shoot a web at you, but you could see the determination on his face leaving him.

Deep inside he knew this was wrong.

“I have to do this”, Peter whispered, the inner conflict displaying on his features.

You nodded, relaxed and prepared for what would follow.

“Then do it”, you encouraged him with a small smile.

This somehow irriated Peter even more and you could see his hand shaking.

“C’mon it’s just a little web”, you chuckled, but you knew that this wasn’t about what impact it would have on you. It was about if he would do it. If he was willing to let this destroy your friendship. If a simple decision could make him attack his best friend.

“I can’t”, Peter confessed, his hand falling to his side again.

Tears had filled his vision and his face was twisted in confusion.

You carefully walked over to him, embracing the boy in your arms with a smile.

He was surprised at first, but then pulled you close to him.

“I knew you wouldn’t do it”, you muttered proudly, forgetting that you were in the midst of a battlefield.

Peter made you forget, about all the pain and hopelessness in the world.  When you were with him it didn’t matter.

You were at home.

Little did you know Tony had been watching the two of you, but instead of disappointment a proud smile was covering his face.

He had been right about Peter all along. He was better than him.

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[imhereforbvcky]

Make Me Believe - Part 1

Freshman Year: Making More Than Friends

Masterlist  -  Series Masterlist  -  Part 2

Summary: You keep meeting Bucky Barnes in unexpected places and he keeps acting like you know each other, like you’re dating. (tropes abound! college AND fake dating au. I’m a mess.)

Prompt(s): First day of college

Warnings: Drinking and silliness

Word Count: 2811

Author’s Note: This for @buckthegrump’s writing challenge because I love to push things to the very last minute. This will be a mini series.

Standing in line at the Starbucks at the center of campus was perhaps not your best laid plan. It was crowded and you were anxious to get moving. It was move-in day. You’d gotten your keys from Admissions and had left your car in a loading zone while you dashed in for what you hoped to be a quick coffee run. Now you could only hope you hadn’t been towed yet.

Finally, finally you were at the front of the line, about to place your order when a hand on your shoulder and a large, tall student slid to your side. He was cute, real cute. But if he thought you were going to give up your space in line for a handsome face, he was dead wrong.

“Hey sweetie, sorry I’m late.” He smiled warmly at you and winked at your confused stare. Your mouth had fallen slightly open, like a fish out of water, unsure what to say, not even sure you could breathe.

He turned to the girl behind the counter with an equally charming smile and began to place his order before adding a casual, “...and whatever my girl here wants.”

His smirk was so fluid, so infuriatingly natural as he nodded his head in your direction. It was all you could do to close your mouth as you glared at this precocious stranger and his antics for skipping the line.

“What do you want, gorgeous? We’re holding up the line.”

You glanced behind you at the impatient customers behind you. He was right. Damn it. What the hell could you do? He’d already ordered, it was either cause a scene and seperate yourself from his order or play along and get this over with.

“Um, sorry,” you smiled at the barista. “Vanilla latte please, with an extra shot.”

Before you could think your handsome intruder had handed over a 20 and stepped to the side, waiting for his drink.

“Thanks,” he murmured as he leaned close to your ear. Too close for strangers. “I’m running late and did not have time for that line.”

“Yeah, you’re a jerk,” you grumbled, folding your arms over your chest. “Everybody had to wait, I had to wait! I have somewhere to be too, you know.”

“You still got your coffee,” he argued, “You’re welcome, by the way.”

“Thanks,” you spat, with all the sarcasm you could muster.

He only laughed, smirking as your drinks were called out. With his drink in hand he backed out of the cafe. “What’s your name by the way?”

“Not interested!” you snapped. But you couldn’t help the small smile pulling across your face.

His laugh was a soft rumble that only made it worse. “See you ‘round, gorgeous.”

“Hey! Let me help you with that!” You turned to see a handsome smiling face, reaching for the small microwave in your arms. Temporarily frozen, you could only gape at him. He was so tall and broad with a tussle of soft blonde hair and shining blue eyes. They definitely didn’t make guys like this in your little hometown. Hell you didn’t know they made them like this outside of photoshop.

“Uhm thanks,” you finally managed, with a matching smile. “But that box of books is a lot heavier and you look more uh… equipped to handle that than I am.”

You offered a shy and slightly embarrassed smile that was met with a hearty laugh as he reached for the box you’d indicated. He stacked it on top of your last suitcase and turned to you with another bright smile. “Alright, where to?”

“Uh D Hall, 3150.”

As you waited for the elevator, he tried for small talk. You were never great at small talk; it always felt so tedious and pointless that it came awkward and stunted. The obligatory follow up questions never come naturally to you like they seemed to others and more often than not you wound up blurting out un-interesting facts about books or asking abrupt questions.

True to form, you set in on your unintentional interrogation. “So what is this? Are giant good-looking samaritans just a thing around here? If that’s the case I’m in trouble. I look like a sea urchin next to people like you.”

He laughed again, softer this time as he looked at his feet. You could tell he was used to this. He had the sort of confidence that comes easy to those who have never had to compensate for anything, but the grace to look slightly embarrassed by compliments, flattered, without ever really acknowledging it. Eventually he looked back up to you with a lopsided smile that seemed to make your stomach flip.

“You’re cute,” he said it like it was just a fact, a statement, no more no less. “No, it’s through the University.” The smile in his voice was nearly as warm as the one he turned on you in that tight space. “I volunteered to help new students move in, give ‘em a run down of the building and in return I got access to campus early and I get extra points on my meal plan until everyone’s moved in.”

“But moving sucks. That’s like being the buddy with the pick-up truck to 2,000 students. That sounds miserable.”

He laughed again, it seemed like the only reaction in his arsenal, but somehow it was still warm and sincere. “I’m never one to turn down free food.”

“Yeah, you look like it. What’re you, like, 8% body fat?” you rolled your eyes, the sarcasm thick before you both snorted in laughter.

“Soon! You’ll learn how valuable free food is to we poor college kids. Where are you from anyway?” he asked as you held your dorm room door open for him with your foot.

“Small town, you haven’t heard of it.”

“A small town huh? This your first time living away from home?” he asked as he set your things down.

“Mhmm. First time out of the state, if you can believe it.”

“I can,” he nodded with a poorly concealed smirk.

“Hey!” you shoved his shoulder playfully. “It’s not that obvious.”

“Little bit,” he nodded with a shrug. “You’re like an adorable little hillbilly lost in the big city campus.”

“What?! I’m not lost--”

“But we can fix that. What are you doing tonight?”

You stared at him for a moment, debating whether you should protest this unsolicited nickname or see where this line of questions lead. Finally you looked purposefully around the room full of boxes to be unpacked and shrugged. “You’re lookin’ at it.”

“No. It’s your first night as a free and independent adult, your first night at college, this needs to be memorable.” He reached for a pen from your roommate’s desk and scribbled an address onto the side of one of the cardboard boxes. It was somewhere on the south side of campus. “Come to this address later tonight. Ask for Cap or Bucky.”

“Bucky as in Buckwheat, the only girl allowed in the He-Man-Woman-Haters Club?” you asked with a judgemental snort.

“As in James Buchanan Barnes doesn’t like to be called Jimmy.”

“Got it, Bucky or Cap.”

“See you there.”

You giggled as he turned out of the room with an easy smile. Flutters had begun to kick off in your stomach as you flopped backwards onto your vinyl University-supplied mattress. You were far too caught up in replaying every second of the past 20 minutes to consider that you really should clean that mattress first.

The deeper you wound into the maze of streets south of campus, the thicker the parties grew. Every 5th house had brightly colored lights flashing through living room windows with thumping dance music to greet passersby in waves from within. You smiled as you walked to your destination, enjoying the last of the warm air in early fall and relishing in the newness and freedom of the world in which you now found yourself.

Your small town was far behind with its sleepy farmhouses and crumbling bungalows. Its nosy neighbors would gasp in a mix of horror and delight at the fodder for Sunday morning gossip to be found here. All the while the smile brimming to your lips was uncontainable as the freedom of anonymity took hold. No one knew you here, and no one cared. You could slip into any one of these parties and in minutes have a drink in hand and a new crowd.

The world lay at your feet and you needed only choose who to become.

When you finally approached your destination your excitement waned. It was an enormous stone house, absolutely crawling with people. You paused at the end of the lawn, taking in the scene. It was fresh out of a bad teen movie. Red solo cups seemed like permanent appendages, bawdy shouts clamored from a game of beer pong on the long open porch, clumsily wrapped white bed sheets barely managed to cling onto half of the attendees. Worst of all, there, in illuminated blocks over the door stood the unmistakable shape of the greek letters.

A frat. You’d been lured to a frat party on your very first day here.

With a determined sigh through gritted teeth you began the walk down the stone pathway toward the front door. As you approached the party a brick wall of a man stumbled backwards through the door nearly bowling you over.

In a moment he’d swung his arms around your back to steady you both, his long blonde hair falling in tangles and tickling your cheek as he leaned over you.

“‘M terribly sorry, m’lady!” he slurred followed by an excited smile that was so broad his eyes wrinkled to thin blue winks. You thought he might burst into laughter as he pulled back, setting you both to rights.

“May I offer you a cold beverage as recompense for nearly uh… running you over?”

You stared at him for a moment, wide-eyed and unsure before glancing behind him to his friend who shrugged and rolled her eyes. “This is Thor. He does accents when he’s drunk. I don’t know.” You laughed in relief. The pressure of pretending this was normal seemed too much and for someone else to acknowledge the insanity was a welcome sight. “I’m Valkyrie.” She offered you her hand and you took it. Before you could offer your own name Thor was bellowing again.

“That one was my father!” Thor volunteered with a deep hearty laugh. “It’s a good imitation. But you wouldn’t know, since you’ve never met him. He’s an Earl of Asguard or Ashworth or something...” He scowled in concentration.

Before he’d finished his speech he was trying to shove an icy can of beer into your hand. You held your hands up in what you hoped to be polite refusal.

“No, I’m… I’m not sure I’m in the right place. I’m looking for Bucky? Or Cap?” you recited the names you’d been given, hoping they’d act like some magic passcode into something less horrifying.

“Cap!!!” Thor shouted, throwing his arms into the air.

“Heeey!” came a laughing shout of a reply from a corner of the porch. The raised hand of yet another brick wall of a blonde man waved back. You could see his smile from your current position half way down the stairs, the soft crop of blonde hair.

“He’s right there,” Thor smiled down at you.

“Thanks,” you laughed, the sarcasm thick but unnoticed by the deliriously happy drunk.

You made your way through the throng of clumsy party-goers, shifting to shuffle sideways past narrow openings in the crowd until you reached ‘Cap’ in the corner of the porch, leaning against the old stone railing.

As you approached the table, Steve shouted in triumph as the white ping pong ball sunk into one of the cups on the opposite end of the table with a light thunk. You smiled and continued to shift closer. Right up until he turned to his beer pong partner and grabbed her face, two large hands cupping her cheeks.

“Okay, you can do this! You can end the game right now!”

You heard her giggle and nod. As she turned to the table he released her, his hand sliding down her back and hooking around her waist as she made the shot. The cacophony of cheers and squealing delight were simply infuriating. She leapt into his arms happily and he held her there, feet off the ground, arms around his neck.

You had no idea if they were together, or just a one-night event, but it didn’t matter either way. The sinking dread that you were a complete idiot for accepting this invitation crept over you, through the knot in your stomach and up your throat.

Refusing to waste another thought on it, you dove deeper into the party, seeking out the keg.

When you made it to the kitchen, however, an infuriatingly familiar face turned on yours. The most chilling grin catching your eye as he eased over toward you, all arrogance and mirth. Like the cat who got the cream. Like you were back in your home town again; like you hadn’t escaped at all.

You spun on your heel to make a quick escape from what was clearly the worst decision you’d made all day. But he called out loud and demanding and it had you frozen for a moment.

“Bonnie?! What a small world!”

You took in a deep breath, grinding your teeth against the urge to scream at him. The unbidden nickname struck you with greater force than ever. This was meant to be a fresh start, a new beginning.

“Not that small, Jack, there are forty thousand students here. Why don’t you pick someone else to torture?”

“Oh come on,” he simpered, stepping forward. “You like Bonnie. Found a Clyde yet?”

An irritated sigh rushed past your lips. Jack was the last person you wanted to see. Anyone from home fell pretty low on the list, but he made perpetually came in dead last.

“No. And I’d like to be called by my name, not some stupid nickname the argyle brigade bestowed on me in high school,” you snarled.

“It’s not really behind your back if you know about it,” he grinned. “C’mon I’m kidding!” he groaned as you turned to walk away. His fingers curled around your wrist, pulling you back.

All you could manage was to glare at his hand gripping you. If only a look could be actual daggers.

Before you’d calmed down enough to speak, an arm slid over your shoulder and a familiar voice called your attention.

“Hey gorgeous, I’ve been looking all over for you.”

Coffee shop guy.

You managed a tight smile as you turned to him. He was grinning down at you, just as comfortably as he had this morning. You wondered vaguely how often he’d pulled this move.

“Hi sweetie,” you grinned, narrowing your eyes only slightly.

“We can’t find the stereo remote, I thought you had it earlier…”

“Yeah! Yeah, let me help you find it,” you beamed up at him before turning to leave. He grinned back at you, his hand snaking into yours as you stepped out from under his arm.

With a glance over his shoulder he gave a short nod to Jack; the sort of nod that men offer to say ‘I see you, but we don’t need to talk.’ A smirk drew across his face as he turned back to you, as you wandered off to another corner of the party.

A laugh burst from your lips as you spun on your heel, leaning toward coffee shop guy.

“That was entirely too satisfying. Thank you.”

“Any time,” he grinned.

“Evidently!” you bawked. “So is this your thing? The fake boyfriend bit?”

“It’s 2 for 2 today.” He shrugged and took a sip of his beer. “So can I get your name now?”

With a rueful smile you offered your name and he nodded.

“Bucky,” he returned, gesturing toward himself with his drink. His gaze roved over you quickly. “This isn’t your thing, is it?”

It wasn’t a question.

“That obvious?” you laughed. “No, I uh… Some guy helped me move into my dorm and invited me. But I realized when I got here that he probably helped a lot of idiots like me move. Can I have some of that?” you asked, pointing to his drink.

He smiled and handed it to you. His gaze remained steadily on you as you took a long sip. He chewed on his lip for a moment.

“D’you want to get out of here?”

You sputtered into the cup and handed it back to him. “I’m not sleeping with you.”

A big laugh burst quickly from his lips. “I wasn’t offering.”

You rolled your eyes and frowned. Somehow it was both a relief and a disappointment.

“C’mon.”

Next Chapter >>

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[the-guardians-diary-blog]

Entry 1

“Ori, you know you don’t have to put on the Shattered Gear.” My ghost, Rain, told me. I just stared at the broken warlock armor that I was in during the Fall of the Tower when the Red legion first attacked. I sighed “I know, I need to though, Ikora specifically asked for us to do it, and well, you know how she gets when her Warlocks don’t follow orders.” For a split second, I saw my little ghost Shudder with terror. It was hard because my fireteam got separated, when the first attack happened. We were at the parade having a good time. That was when the tower first got hit with the volley of rockets. At that time we didn’t know if anyone survived that first wave, then the alarms started to sound and immediately every Guardian went to war to protect our hometown. I went immediately to get civilians to the evac point Zavala designated if something like this should ever happen. Nadir, our hunter, she slid into the shadows to figure out what was happening. Jordan went straight to the front lines to try and hold off any attackers. We were holding them off well, until the Traveler was taken away from us.

The light; just sapped from our bodies. Our ghosts falling, without a sound. “ You know, when you passed out; when we lost the light, I couldn’t save a entire family from a horde of Gladiators. They just…” I choked down dinner from last night. “I saw the children's eyes, pleading with me to help, but I couldn’t get up, I just laid there. But then I saw you Rain, you were just there, lifeless, unmoving. I knew I had to get the job done still. That’s what you would’ve wanted.” Rain turns towards me “Ori… I didn’t know. I came back and there were War hounds fighting over me. I could feel their teeth sinking into my shell. I don’t know who or what saved me, but they just died, by a sniper bullet to the head, I floated as best as I could to the bullet and saw it had the Iron Lord symbol engraved on it but I couldn’t see who it was. When we were seperated I knew the first thing I had to do was to find you. Where were you anyways?”

As he was talking, I got the Shattered gear on, I can still feel the energy being ripped out of the armor. “I got the remaining families to the Evac point. But then the comms came.” I balled my fist. “Zavala wanted all ships to head to Titan. He thought we could regroup there. Ships started leaving, families, orphaned children crying on battered guardians. Mothers grasping bloody blankets of their missing kids. Just gone, with an entire platoon firing at us. I got hit with a Slug bullet and went flying off the platform. That was when I lost you Rain. The last thing I heard before I went dark was the screaming. So much Screaming. I will never forget what Zavala did and I will never forgive him for what he commanded.”

    “Ori, he is commander. He had to make tough choices.” I spun around and started to scream “Well he still could have saved those civilians! We put our lives on the line for them and he abandoned us?! No!” Rain, floated back and hugged the wall. I felt the energy in the palm of my hand. A nova bomb, ready to go off. I took some deep breaths; “I’m sorry, little one. I’m not upset at you. And I understand the hard choices he had to make.But you don’t get it. You didn’t see what I saw. After taking out Gods and everything underneath that, you think I’d be used to death. But turns out, I wasn’t even close, those images will be forever seared into my brain. You know some guardians have turned to other means to cope. Some turn to the crucible, some turn toward weapon cleaning, mediation, some turn more towards darker methods, mostly warlocks.”

    The little ghost came back to me and nudged me on the cheek. “I know you didn’t mean it.” I let him sit there for a minute, he decided to break the silence thankfully before it got too much for me. “What happened to Nadir and Jordan?” I paused to think. “You know, I really don’t know. Nadir went to go find Info about them and Jordan went to the front lines with Zavala to help thin the herd for us. Rumor has it that when the light was taken away; Nadir put her ghost in the hood of her cloak, then when she was shot, she hugged the hood for dear life. She pulled some knife trick out of her ass and saved their life, albeit she broke her arm, but she held onto the ghost for dear life all the way to the farm. Jordan; he took off his mark and wrapped his ghost in it. He went toe to toe with everything that came at his way with one arm, Speaker only knows how he survived, because he took the Pilgrimage to the farm where some of the Cabal activity was at the highest.” I looked at the holo-clock on my wall.

    “Oh no! We’re running late come on little one!” I grabbed rain and made it to the new Tower just in time. Nadir and Jordan were standing out front, in their shattered armor as well. I never saw them in it, we reunited after we all got the Light back. I felt my heart shatter all over again. I slow my run to a walk and meet up with the Hunter and Titan. “Hey guys.” I quietly say to them. They both just nod and I couldn’t help but to hug them, I felt their embrace tighten around me as well. “I’m glad we all made it. I don’t know what I’d do without you guys. Do missions with Evan? God's, no.” They let out a chuckle at that. As we broke up the hug, I noticed Fireteams hugging when they saw each other, it hit me.

No one saw their friends like this, sure, we saw other Guardians, but not our friends, not our loved ones. And there was no noise, it was almost as if a hive spell was used to just make the entire area mute. Nadir cleared her throat, “well, I guess we better get to the courtyard. The Solstice of Heroes is about to begin.” And we that we all walked. We walked in silence for a bit then I had to break the silence. “I always want to be with you guys because I want to be there for you guys. We went through alot together and we need to protect each other.” “Hey, we just need to be there for each other not one person protecting the others. Everyone for everyone, Ori.” Jordan chimed in and I just nodded.

When we got to the courtyard, trumpets were blaring music, a piece I didn’t recognise. “Rain what’s this piece?” He paused and you can see the little eye blinking through database. I think when the Golden Age happened there was a verb you could use. People would say “You can just Shazam this.” Whatever that meant. “It’s called Guardians Sacrifice.” Rain broke my thoughts. The mood was somber up here, but it wasn’t sad, it was confidence.

Over the PA Ikora spoke, “This is a time for reflection, of the bravery of those who are standing with us, and the ones who have fallen. We do not have time to be sad, with many obstacles ahead of us, this is a time for celebrations. Please guardians, partake in the many challenges I have laid out. Go back and reflect on the moments of Triumph  you have earned. May the light always be with you.” I take a step and turn towards my two best friends. “Well what do you say? Lets kick these challenges out and get out of this god forsaken gear.”