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anyarose011 · 20 days ago

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The Most "Wonderful" Time of the Year {Angus Tully x Reader}

Summary: Despite a nice trip to the art gallery and ice skating rink, sometimes, Andy Williams just gets it wrong.

Part 8 of ?? (Masterlist)

Warning(s): Swearing, description of nudity (on art), suggestive conversations, minor sexual harassment, a father has issues, fighting, Reader has a knife, and ANGST.

Heyyy guys (senior year, once again, has been kicking my ass and I also started a new mini-series that should be done soon). Again, I'm so sorry for how long it took me to upload and write this, and I know this chapter is short, but I swear it's got good shit in it. It's also fitting to have more chapters around Christmas time since, you know, this be a Christmas movie (yes, Alexander Payne, this can be a standalone movie, but you set it during Christmas so....) Anywho, I hope you like it (and that it breaks your heart :)

Word Count: 5.5k

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You hated to admit it, but you actually like history museums. Even though your father always dragged you to them from childhood to adulthood, you didn’t really mind them. Your father’s additional commentary only added to the experience as you walked through the Greek section. It didn’t really for Angus.

“Are we almost done?” He asked.

“Quit whining.” You reprimanded him.

“I’m not.”

Your father chuckled. “What’s your hurry? I thought you liked Antiquity?”

He sighed. “In class, maybe. But I never think about it unless I need to.”

Humming, your father pointed to a casing of ceramics behind you. “Here, what do you see?”

You and Angus turned. Of course, he said. “A bunch of pottery.”

“Look at that one.” He pointed.

You certainly weren’t expecting to see a man diving his dick into a woman as she bent over to pick something up on an ancient Grecian artifact, but there you were in the Boston Fine Arts Museum, jaw on the floor.

“Amy look, a Candy Cane!” Angus teased.

“I hate you.” Was all that managed to leave your lips.

Your father chuckled, shaking his head. “Children, there’s nothing new in human experience. Each generation thinks it invented debauchery or suffering or rebellion, but man’s every appetite and impulse, from the disgusting to the sublime, is on display right here, all around you.” He gestured around the room filled with art. “So, before you dismiss something as boring or irrelevant, remember that if you truly want to understand the present, or yourself, you must begin in the past. History is not merely the past; it’s an explanation of the present.”

Angus nodded. “See, when you say it that way, and throw in some pornography, it’s a lot easier to understand.”

Mr. Hunham glanced over at you, surprised at your lack of outburst. “You’re not going to comment on that?”

“No,” you shrugged. “porn helping men understanding things checks out.”

Angus snorted, turning back to the teacher. “You should try talking more and yelling less in class. You know, most of the kids pretty much hate you. Teachers, too. You know that, right?”

“Hey.” You glared at him as if to say, ‘Lay off’.

Your father nodded, obviously trying not to show the hurt that was apparent on his face. “Well, I appreciate your frequent candidness, Mr. Tully.”

“Sure…” He stuck his hands in his pockets and looked down.

It was then you realized another thing about Angus Tully that reminded you about yourself: You only noticed how horrible your words were as soon as you were done saying them.

The rest of your time at the art museum wasn’t as awkward as that entire scene, thankfully. The sun had completely set by the time you had exited, and the three of you made your way to the park. It almost made you laugh how quick Angus was to the booth to rent ice skates.

“Have you been ice skating before?” He asked as you both sat on the bench, tying up your skates.

“Once when I was eight, I think. You?”

“I played hockey until high school.” He finished tying his and stood. “And I go every chance I get when I’m in the city.”

“So, you should only fall if I push you, right?”

“Right.”

You smiled after double knotting your ice skates and approached the entrance to the rink. “My feet feel weird.”

“Yeah, you haven’t been skating for almost ten years.” He teased, walking past you and standing on the ice with ease.

Sighing, you took a step out and immediately started flailing. Still, the two of you laughed when you retreated back to solid ground. “Nope.”

Angus begged. “Come on.”

“Nuh uh, not going to do it.”

“Your dad paid a good two dollars for us to skate, and you’re going to waste it?” He joked.

“Two dollars doesn’t mean anything to my father if I’m dead!”

“You’re not going to die.”

“But-.”

He said your name with the right amount of sincerity and playfulness. “You can hold onto me. I’ll cushion you if you do fall.”

Grinning from ear to ear, you still held onto the side railing, but stepped out onto the ice. Taking a deep breath, you began walking.

“You don’t want to do that.” Angus skated by your side at your pace.

“I’m alright.” You struggled to say.

He scoffed, holding out his hand. “Yeah, I can tell. Come on.”

You stared down at it as if he had never touched you before. Still, you took it. You expected him to pull you out into the center and leave you there for dead (or try to figure out how to skate on your own), but instead, you stayed by the wall.

“Okay, you’re gonna want to lean forward, and just glide; don’t walk.” He explained, showing you.

“I’ll fall.”

“No, you won’t. Just trust me.”

Against what your nervous system was saying, you decided to. Leaning forward, you tried to copy him; and it worked for like a few seconds before you started tripping over your own feet. He caught you, of course.

“Hey, not bad!” He held you up so you could stand.

“I almost died.”

“You’re standing on your own though!” He backed away, and you still were. “That’s a good start.”

You wanted to fire a nasty retort at him, but you could only girlishly giggle. You don’t know how long you spent on that ice skating rink with him. Yes, there would be times when your feet would ache, or you’d be a mix of sweaty from the physical labor of skating and freezing from the cold, Massachusetts air. Yet, as you finally gathered your footing, you felt as if you could compete in the next Olympics.

You couldn’t, of course, but you sure had the confidence to do so.

And it was fun to laugh and talk with Angus. It always was, but it felt as if you were both on an actual date as you skated together. To everyone else on that ice rink, you were. When Angus had completely fallen onto the ice (you didn’t actually push him down, he fell on his own), pulling you down with him, you’d nearly forgotten that your father was chaperoning you two as you laughed.

After leaving the rink and taking your skates back, you walked up a set of stairs with your father and Angus, discussing where to go for dinner when-.

“Paul Hunham, is that you?!” A man and a woman approached the three of you with a gleeful look. “It’s Hugh. Hugh Cavanaugh.”

Your father’s face fell for just a moment before laughing. “Yes! Yes, of course. Wow, Hugh Cavanaugh. Oh, how are you, Hugh?”

“Oh God, what’s it been? Thirty years?” He turned to the woman beside him. “Oh, uh this is my wife, Karen. Honey, this is Paul Hunham; we went to Harvard together.”

She smiled, shaking his hand, then yours, then Angus’. “Hello.”

“Yes,” your dad nodded at Hugh’s comment. “yes we did. Uh, wow; what have you been up to, Hugh? Still in the area?”

“Oh, uh, yes-yes I’m still in Boston. Cambridge.”

“Harvard.” Karen said proudly. “He just got tenure, statistics. He won’t blow his own horn, I have to blow it for him.”

“Okay,” Hugh said to change the subject. “what about you, Paul?”

“Oh, still teaching, we have that in common.” He nodded. “History, ancient history.”

“That’s great, that’s great. Where?”

“Abroad mostly.” Your father lied through his teeth on each word. “On fellowships. Privately funded fellowships. Universities and private academies. Mostly fellowships, you know. I’m currently posted in Antwerp. Just back here for the holidays.”

“So, are these your kids?” He pointed to you and Angus.

“Well-.”

“-I’m his nephew, Laurie.” Angus cut in, then looked at you. “This is my cousin, Amy.”

Karen smiled. “It’s nice to meet you both.”

Hugh squinted his eyes as if to see you more clearly. Then, he chuckled. “Paul, do you know who she looks like?”

Your father hummed. “I would hope me.”

It was weird to hear your mother’s full name come out of a stranger’s mouth. He went on. “Do you see it? Same nose, same hair; you are the spitting image of beauty, young lady.”

Snickering, you didn’t even think of thanking him. “I’ve been told I have more of her temper than her looks. Although, our mouths are the same.”

“I have no doubt.” He laughed. “Paul, do you remember that one time freshman year?”

“Oh yes!” Your father pretended to. “When she-it was that one time during Roman history when Nolan-.”

“-Wouldn’t call on her when she was the only one to raise her hand,” Hugh looked back at you as if you didn’t know the story from the set up. “so she fed all the boys in the room the wrong answers for the rest of the class!”

“Yep,” Mr. Hunham nodded. “even I fell victim to it.”

Hugh was the only one who had relatively been amused by the fable. “Never put you and her together.”

“A lot of people didn’t.”

The group fell into a strange silence after that. Thank God for Angus Tully.

“He’s writing a book now.” He titled his head toward your father. “Tell them about your book, Uncle Paul.”

“My book.” Your father snickered, then immediately played it off. “It’s not a book, really. Just a monograph. Nothing special.”

You decided to jump in. “Don’t be so modest, dad. It’s about, uh, cameras, right? Ancient cameras?”

Hugh hummed, a quizzical look on his face.

“What she means, of course, is the camera obscura.” Your father explained. “You know, the optical and astronomical tool that dates back to, um, the time of Anaxagoras.

“Tell him the title, Uncle Paul.” Angus went back, and you masked your smile for one of curiosity and not at the misfortune of your father.

“He’s not interested, Laurie.”

Hugh smiled. “Sure, I am.”

Sighing, Paul Hunham said with the perfect amount of enthusiasm and disinterest. “Lights and Magic in the Ancient World.”

Hugh nodded before turning back to his wife, and then to your father, clasping his hand on his shoulder. “Well, Paul, I’m so glad you landed on your feet. You look swell.”

“You too. So, swell.”

“I’m sorry about your mother, Amy.” He said to you.

Thinning your lips in a tight smile, you said. “Thanks.”

Him and Karen walked away hand in hand, but he turned over his shoulder. “And we’ll keep an eye out for your book, Paul. Won’t we, honey?”

She nodded. Of course. Merry Christmas, Paul. Bye, Laurie and Amy.”

You all wished them ‘Merry Christmas’ as you three also left. Angus wasted no time turning to you.

“What the fuck just happened?!”

“You’re asking me?!” You matched him. “You sprung into ‘Tell them about your book, Uncle Paul!’, ‘What’s the title, Uncle Paul?’.”

“I had to think of something!”

Your father sighed. “I appreciated your efforts, but I would’ve been fine on my own.”

Rolling your eyes, you asked. “Can we get dinner now?”

“I need to pick something up from the liquor store first.”

Sighing overdramatically, you and Angus stumbled behind your father. That was when you looked at the boy beside you. “Also, Laurie and Amy? Really?”

“What? They’re like brother and sister. If I said you were Jo, then that would’ve been weird.”

Oh my god, he wasn’t even halfway through the book.

You wish you had a camera solely to capture the look on your father’s face as he turned over and stared at both of you. You wonder if that was when he found out about you and Angus.

Shaking your head, you didn’t know whether to laugh or scoff as you said. “Unbelievable.”

“What do you mean ‘unbelievable’?” Angus questioned. “Jo and Laurie get married in the end, right?”

“Unbelievable.” You repeated but smiled this time.

“Right?!”

Your father sighed as you finally made it to the store. “Look, the fact of the matter is, what happened, happened, and we should just pretend it didn’t.”

Angus furrowed his brow as you all walked in. “I thought Barton men don’t lie. Don’t get me wrong, that was fun, but you just lied through your teeth.”

He held up his hand, not having it. “What I say during a private conversation is none of your goddamn business. You’re not to judge me.”

“It wasn’t a private conversation; your daughter and I were there. Besides, he brought her into it.”

“I’m right here.” You announced yourself.

“Why’d he ask if you landed on your feet?”

Your father glanced up from searching through the shelves. “What is this, Nuremberg?”

“You’re the hardass constantly telling everybody not to lie and going on about the honor code!”

Looking up at both of you, Paul Hunham sighed. “There was an incident at Harvard with my roommate.”

You gave him a look. “I’ve never heard this story before.”

“He accused me of copying from his senior thesis. Plagiarizing.”

“Well, did you?” Angus asked.

“No! He stole from me.” Your father relented. “But that blue-blooded prick’s family had allies on the faculty. I mean, their last name is on a library, so he accused me in order to sanitize his treachery. And they threw me out.”

“Holy shit,” you breathed. “you got kicked out for cheating?”

“No, I got kicked out of Harvard for hitting him.”

Angus asked. “You hit him? Like punched him out?”

“No, I hit him with a car.”

“You got kicked out of Harvard for hitting a guy with a car?!”

“By accident,” he approached the counter, talking to the cashier. “Pint of Jim Beam, please.”

You piped up, still in astonishment. “Mom said you left because your grandma was dying.”

“She was, it was just perfect timing to go and help take care of her.” He shrugged. “But my roommate broke three ribs. Which was technically his fault, because he shouldn’t have been in the road.

“Two dollars, please.” The cashier said.

Your father took his wallet out, continuing his story. “Also, he shat himself; which was the greatest indignity.”

The cashier handed him the wrapped-up bottle. “Here you go, killer.”

You couldn’t help your laughter at the sudden statement. As the three of you left and walked down the darkened, cold roads, Angus said.

“So, Mr. Hunham never even graduated college? Holy shit, you didn’t even finish up somewhere else? Who else knows?”

“Did mom even know about you hitting the guy?” You asked.

Your father nodded. “Of course she knew! She gave me an earful on the phone the first time she called me after I left. It was only Dr. Greene who knew it after that. He’d always believed in me, so he gave me a job. Adjunct faculty: zero respect and even less pay, so nobody batted an eye, and I’ve been at the school ever since.”

“Are you ashamed at how things turned out?” Angus questioned.

“Not at all. I’m proud of my work, I love history, I married the smartest and kindest woman on the planet, I helped raise a spitfire of a girl, I love Barton. Barton is my life now. I don’t know what I’d do without it.”

“Then why did you lie to that guy?”

“Because I knew he’d relish the fact that I’m a washout and never left my own high school. And he’d probably repeat that story to everybody we used to know. So, I figured he’s not entitled to my story. I am. “

Angus nodded. “Yeah. Fuck that guy.”

“Exactly. Fuck that guy!”

“Fuck him, I hope his car slides on black ice and crashes into a lamp post.” You chimed in.

“Woah,” Angus gasped.

Your father said your name scoldingly.

“What?” You scoffed. “It was weird as hell when he talked to me about my mom like he knew me.”

“I’ll admit it was strange and unnecessary.” Your father tossed his arm around your shoulder. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.”

He looked at both you and Angus. “But you’ll keep this quiet, right? No one is to know.”

“Entre nous, sir.” Angus nodded. “Entre nous.”

Your father nodded then chuckled, poking you. “‘Ancient cameras’. Where’d the hell you come up with that?”

“I tried my best!” You whined. After the men ceased in their laughter, you then said. “Can we please get dinner now?”

“Alright, alright.” Your father snorted. “Where would you like to go for your absolutely atrocious food concoction?”

“South Street.”

“I figured.”

And that is where the three of you went. It shouldn’t have surprised you it was packed the day after Christmas, which was also a Saturday. It had to have been a miracle you managed to get in line only when it was starting to go out the door; a few minutes after you arrived, the line had started to curve around to the nearest streetlight.

The diner was filled with life once you got in; families pushing tables together, friends absolutely drunk off their asses laughing, even half of the staff seemed to be enjoying the sheer joy from others. Of course, a few were understandably stressed and annoyed from the number of customers and their behavior.

The three of you were soon sitting at a booth. When Angus sat close to the window, instead of sliding into the seat across from him, you took the one beside him. Leaving your father alone on the other side. To ordinary people, it perhaps didn’t mean anything; but you still felt as if it was a signal.

“I can’t believe they’re still playing Christmas music.” Your father grumbled as The Ronettes sang about a sleigh ride and he slipped off his jacket.

You giggled, copying him. “It was just yesterday.”

“I know, but still.”

“I like this song, thank you very much.”

He held up his menu as if to hide his disgust. You and the boy beside you chucked as Angus said. “I feel like I’ve been here before.”

“You don’t know if you have?” You asked.

“It feels familiar. Maybe when I was a kid?”

“We’d always come here when we’d visit Boston.” You looked at your father. “The owner gave me a free banana split when I turned twelve, he knew us so well, right?”

That managed to pull a laugh out of him. “That he did. If he’s here tonight maybe you could get a free dinner for us.”

You and Angus looked down at the menu before you, and soon enough, an exhausted waitress came by to take your drink orders and lay down silverware. Immediately, you asked for French fries and your favorite milkshake.

“There’s no way that’s going to be good.” Angus pointed out.

“Oh, ye of little faith.” You scoffed.

“That’s not faith, that’s fact.”

“What you’re speaking of is an opinion, not even a theory. If you ever want to make it in this world, I suggest you learn the different between those two before you can even begin to comprehend what an actual fact is.”

“And what is an actual fact?”

“You’re an idiot.”

He smirked despite the fact you insulted him. You also couldn’t hide your own smile. It was apparent from anyone in that room, it was not a smile of victory; it was one synonymous with the feeling inside of your chest as it felt like your own heart would burst forth like light.

Your father had felt this feeling before, so it was not lost on him.

“You seem awfully happy to have your entire statement dismantled, Mr. Tully.” He said to Angus.

The boy looked up, still with a smile but one not as euphoric. “I mean, I wasn’t that serious about it.”

“Oh, and I didn’t think you were. It just astounds me how close you two became in a matter of a few days.” He said. “Wasn’t it only yesterday you both were at each other’s throats?”

You stepped in. “No, that was the first few days, actually. I mean, we were the only kids at Barton after that, so it’s probably best we figured how to deal with each other. I guess we both liked some of the same things too, so that made it easier.”

“Yeah.” Angus nodded.

Your father straightened his gaze between the two of you, but then smiled, getting up from the booth. “I have to use the facilities; don’t go anywhere.”

“No papa,” you teased. “we’re going to go do a line of cocaine with the homeless man a few blocks away.”

“You know, I’m beginning to believe that you’re the bad influence on Mr. Tully and not the other way around.”

With that, he left the two of you by yourselves as he walked to the back of the diner. Once he was gone, you and Angus cackled to yourselves.

“Do you think he knows?” You asked, a hint of concern mixed in with delight.

“I don’t know, probably.” He shrugged, still chuckling. “Is that so bad?”

“I mean…I’ve never had a boyfriend before.” You admitted, smiling shyly.

Even though the rest of the diner was booming with Christmas music and leftover excitement from the holidays, it all fell silent between you two. The boy who was once radiated in the happiness you shared with him, now covered in a shroud of terror.

Well…in reality, he was alarmed, not terrified; yet, that is all you saw.

“Shit I-!” You realized what you had just said. “I didn’t mean-I mean, we don’t have to be together, I just meant that I’ve never had someone like me back when I’ve liked them, and even then, it didn’t happen very often-.”

“-Hey, hey.” He stopped you. “No, I’ve never had that happen either. I mean, I’ve been to all boys’ schools since I was fourteen. I think…yeah, I think I’d like to give it a try.”

“Really?” You felt the weight from your shoulders loosen as your face brightened.

He nodded, glowing with you. “Really.”

You glanced up at the bathroom door, and when there was no sight of your father, you took his face into your hands, pulling him into a kiss. It wasn’t as intense as your previous ones, but not as quick as the one you gave him outside the bookstore.

He pulled away first, and before you could say anything about it, you saw the waitress leave from the corner of your eye. She had brought the drinks, including your milkshake and fries. Turning back towards the table, you immediately picked up a fry and dipped it into the milkshake.

“Oh my god, you weren’t joking.” Angus said with no emotion behind it.

“I know I’m funny, but this I would not joke about.” You talked as you ate. “Try it.”

“No.”

“I’ll kiss you if you do.” You took another fry.

“You’ll kiss me anyway.”

“I’ll kiss you like how the French do.”

“You already do that.”

“I’ll do something different.”

His eyes grew, and he huffed out a surprised laugh. “‘Something different’?”

“Yeah.” You dipped a third fry. “I don’t know what, but I’ll do it.”

“Not that you have to, but fine I’ll try it.” Angus reached for a fry, then dipped it into your milkshake and ate it.

Angus’ face went through more arrays of emotions in a short time since you met him. You grinned from ear to ear. “Well?”

“Fuck off.” He tried to hide his smile as he took another fry.

“I’m sorry, what?” You taunted.

“It’s not the best-.”

“-I’m sorry, what?!” You repeated louder, and you both were talking over each other. “It sounds like-!”

“You don’t have to be so-!”

“It sounds like you actually like it!”

“You’re so loud.”

You finished with laughter, and then kissed his cheek. You returned to your milkshake and fries as Angus talked about something funny that happened back in the fall. You can’t remember what he said to this day, because a familiar voice entered your ears as it entered the diner.

Angus kept talking to you, but it was in one ear and out the other as you tried your best not to show your discomfort at the man who laughed a little louder than the rest of the people in the diner. When you thought Angus wasn’t paying attention, you glanced over your shoulder at the entrance.

There he stood; a man around the same age as your father with a woman perhaps ten or fifteen years younger than him, holding a baby on her hip, and clutching her seven-year-old daughter’s hand.

Despite what Andy Williams was singing from the jukebox, this was not the most wonderful time of the year.

Angus tapped your shoulder, and you drew your eyes away to look at him.

“Hey, I hate this song, I’m gonna go change it.” He said. You got out of the booth for him to stand, and once he did you sat back down. Only for him to then say. “Okay, scoot over.”

You frowned. “What?”

“Scoot over.”

“You didn’t even change the song.”

“I changed my mind, it’s not that bad.”

He was bullshitting you, but you scooted over anyway, and he sat beside you. “What’s going on?”

You scoffed. “You’re the one that got up and sat down again.”

“Is that guy Daniel?”

“Angus-.”

“-Tell me.”

“Is he bothering you?”

Both you and Angus looked and saw the man from the entrance stand before you with his hands in his pockets. You dropped your gaze.

“No, he’s not.”

You had no idea what you hated more that night: hearing a man you never met say your mother’s name, or hearing a man you knew too well say yours.

“If he is, just say the word and-.”

“-He’s not bothering me.” You hissed.

Angus slipped his hand into yours as you kept your eyes down, but he kept his trained on the man standing in front of him.

He sighed, shaking his head. “Look, I just didn’t expect you to actually show up.”

You didn’t say anything, so Angus did.

“Could you go? She doesn’t want to talk to you.”

“Yeah, yeah.” He ignored him, still angling on you. “Look, sweetie, you don’t have to, and I get it if you don’t want to, but I’d really like it if you came and meet them. They’re all right here now; Carol, Maria, and Frankie. He just turned one last week-.”

“-Can you just fuck off?” You finally looked at him.

He tilted his head and raised his brows before looking at Angus. “Young man, could you give her and I some privacy-?”

“-No.”

The man looked at you, scoffing. “Jesus Christ, what’d you do to make him so fucking head over heels for you? Was that the issue just now between you two? Under the counter action?”

Angus stood. “Fuck you, what’s your problem?”

You pulled on his sleeve, hissing his name and kneeling on top of your seat to try and get him to sit back down. The man continued to taunt him.

“My problem is that you don’t know what’s going on boy, and you’re being a little prick about all of this.”

“Get the fuck out of here or I’ll…”

“‘You’ll-you’ll what?’” He looked over at you. “I can’t tell if you picked the bravest or the stupidest kid to fool around with, Eurydice.”

You were always a strange child growing up. Perhaps it was that there are times in your life you picture music whenever a certain emotion arose within you.

As you heard him say that name, a name that you heard last when your mother was dying in her bed, a name that was only for her to use and her alone…You heard Danse Macabre by Camille Saint-Saëns.

You don’t even remember grabbing the stupid butter knife from your silverware, just raising it up above you and believing it would cause any harm. As Angus held you back, the man reached over you to grab your hair.

Chaos ensued for a moment in the diner as you cried out when he pulled the ribbon out of your hair, and both him and Angus engaged in a battle of expletives. Most of the diners held back and watched in shock, while only two of them came up. A man stood between him and Angus, and the wife of the yelling man pulled him away.

“Daniel, what the hell is going on?!” She hissed.

“Yes, Daniel,” all eyes fell onto Paul Hunham, who was behind Daniel. “what is the meaning of this?”

You shrunk back in the booth, Angus hugging you tightly against him as if to hide you from Daniel. Both of you stared at the scene before you.

“Paul…” Daniel nodded, standing taller and holding his wife’s hand.

Mr. Hunham nodded back. “Your Christmas went well I take it?”

“It was fine; yours?”

“Just peachy.” He gave a tight smile, looking around at everyone else. “Family matters everyone, I sincerely apologize.”

Hesitantly, the crowd went back to their own business; or they were at least good at pretending to as they eavesdropped. Mr. Hunham continued.

“Why’re you here exactly?”

“The same as you.” Daniel explained. “Dinner with my family.”

He hummed. “And you thought it wise to inform the child in the scenario but not me?”

“Now wait a minute-.”

“-I assume your wife also didn’t know about this or the letters and money you sent?”

At the mention of her, Daniel’s wife scowled. “Danny, what’s he talking about?”

He shook his head. “Hunham, you should just mind your own-.”

“-Well now you see, I can’t do that, because her mother trusted me to provide and care for her.”

It was only then did Angus Tully understand what exactly had been going on. As the adults fought, he looked down at you in his arms. It was as if it were the first time he had seen you, and it was the first time he noticed that he could not find a trace of Mr. Hunham.

The eyes he thought you had gotten from your mother stared up at him with dread, and when Angus looked back at the man seething with unspoken rage, he saw them there too.

“Look,” Paul sighed. “I don’t want to cause another scene, so let us handle this like men. You will not make contact with her again, and we can walk away.”

He took a heaving breath before responding. “Fine by me. Come on, Carrie.”

Daniel began to lead her away from your booth, but Paul stopped them. “I believe you have something of my daughter’s.”

His eyes trailed down to the ribbon in his hand. He let go of his wife to walk back to Paul who held his hand out. Instead of giving it to him, he turned to Angus, smiling. He handed it to him.

“Keep her on a short leash, boy. She’s got her mother’s mouth.”

With that, he and his wife and children left the South Street Diner. You only pulled away from Angus when he did from you. No tears had fallen onto your cheeks, but that didn’t mean they weren’t stinging your eyes as you tried to keep them at bay.

You took the ribbon from Angus only for it to hang loosely at your side. Paul softened his gaze as he began to put on his jacket.

“I think we should just settle on room service tonight.” He said gently. “I can get them to bag up the fries and let you take the milkshake glass?”

You could only nod, not wanting to look at either of the men with you. You all put on your coats in silence, and Angus, though not hugging you, hovered as Mr. Hunham spoke with the staff; both about not wanting to report the incident, and also on paying extra for you to take the glass.

It was so cold out, and everyone was so tired from not just the events of the night, but the entire day, that Paul splurged on a cab for the three of you back to the hotel.

Angus also didn’t feel shame in trying to hold you hand in front of your father; or…stepfather. You limply held his hand back, but you leaned against him as you sat in the cab, staring at the Boston Christmas lights as the city passed by you.

When the cab made it to the hotel, you led the way in a tired haze to the elevators. It wasn’t just the three of you in the elevator; there was a somewhat large family that piled in, all merry and jolly and reeking of chlorine from the pool they had just swum in.

It was as if God himself was rubbing salt into the wounds, tempting you to lick them.

When you made it onto your floor, you also led the way back to your connecting rooms. There was no ‘Goodnight’ or ‘Can we stay up just a little longer?’ to your companions; you simply opened your door and shut it in their faces.

Setting the milkshake down, you tossed off your jacket and pulled your shoes off. Collapsing on the bed, you looked down at the ribbon still in your hand…and you cried.

#angus tully x reader #angus tully #paul hunham #the holdovers #Youtube

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talesfromawannabejournalist · 8 months ago

Text

Adam apple high school AU PT 3

(this is a pretty long one so bear with me)

. On the very first day at his new school, Lucifer had felt as though his soul had been stripped away from his body, the reason being...Adam Mann

. You see everything was going fine he was given a schedule of his classic, and a basic tour of where his classes were, and everything seemed to go well during his introduction as the new student during first period

. sure, when he said his name, he got a weird look from this one girl in the middle row, but he just ignored it

. it wasn't until after class when he was waking to his next class, and he accidentally bumped into the one person he never thought he would see again that it's kind of all went to Hell

Lucifer: I'm so sorry! I didn't see where I was going, are you alright?

Adam: yeah, I'm fine no skin off...YOU!

Lucifer: A, Adam!?

. Lucifer would hardly believe it, the most beautiful person that he had ever known was right before his eyes, and as it couldn't be even more possible was even more beautiful than ever

. His face was more defined as he had a small stubble on his chin, he had gotten taller too, his soft brown eyes had a sort of golden shine to them, and his scent was even stronger than ever before his scent was of freshly peeled oranges with a hint of soft soil

. but the most prominent feature about him would be his body and his body, oh holy mercy it had curves not the normal amount of curves the usual omega had he had curves for days, right from the top of his perky chest to his soft tummy, all the way down to his big thighs, then to end it was his big juicy booty, though (of course, he didn't see it till after Adam left, but he was only looking respectfully he swears!)

. But before he could fully admire the angel before him he was suddenly pressed up against the lockers with the once lovely scent turned sour as Adam glared down at the person who was responsible for ruining his life back in middle school

. Lucifer gulped, both in horniness and fear(but mostly for being a horny little gremlin)

Lucifer: listen, I know we didn't leave on good terms, but

Adam: But nothing! you stay out of my way here and I'll stay out of your way, got that pipsqueak!?

Lucifer: Pipsqueak?! (before he could say anything else Adam turned around, skirt swishing as he did so, and stomped off. And all Lucifer could process were these cold facts, the one who got away is here, he’s even more hot than ever, and he hates his guts

. this was going to be the longest semester of his fucking life

. a month and a half had passed since the incident, and neither Lucifer nor Adam could barely even tolerate being in the same room together let alone speak to one another

. Lucifer has tried to talk to Adam during this time when he sees him outside of class or when they do have class together tries to sit next to or at least near him

. however it keeps failing for him because A. Adam doesn’t want anything to do with him, and B. His guard dog Lute won’t even let him look at Adam’s general direction let alone try and go near him

. it all comes to a head one day when out in the school football field sitting on the bleachers, waiting for Adam to finish lacrosse team practice, once he saw he was done he waved and called out to him to get his attention

. luckily Adam did acknowledge him with an eye roll and walked over to him

. Lucifer gave himself a mental fist bump as they finally were going to clear the table and maybe Lucifer would finally be able to tell Adam how he felt

. which is why it made so much sense that the plan went to shit

. see while rushing down the bleacher steps he slipped on the last few steps causing him to trip and fall of landing on top of Adam

. at first Lucifer thinks he must have landed right on his stomach because the body part he lands on is soft and squishy…with a space in between

. he slowly lifts himself away to see that he had landed right on Adam’s breasts, a fiery blush spreads all across his upper body as his eyes look into Adam’s shocked/disgusted filled ones

Lucifer: I’m sorry, I’m so so sorry it was a complete accident, I swear!

. he didn’t get a chance to say anything else as he was picked up by the scruff, thrown off of Adam, and was proceeded beaten by Lute

. Adam was in a daze for a minute as he tried to understand what the actual Hell happened

. his attention was then focused on the fight between Lucifer and Lute fighting on the ground

. that was really bad for two reasons, they were still on school grounds and if the coach came back those two would be on grounds for expulsion while he was more worried about Lute getting into trouble, he couldn't help but feel a ping of worry in his chest for Lucifer, damn omega instinct, reason number two was that two alphas fighting especially over an omega can more often than not turn bloody

. So, scrambling to his feet, he made his way over to the small crowd where the girls from the team were watching the fight, some even egging it on

. He pushed his way through them and saw Lucifer had Lute pinned under him with his fist raised up ready to strike her

. Adam ran towards them and tried to pull Lucifer off when he suddenly felt a hand hit right in the eye, he falls backwards and clutches his eye while whimpering in pain

. both alphas stop immediately and turn their attention to the omega in distress

. Lucifer gets off the female alpha and rushes towards Adam, while Lute stays frozen in place not believing that she hit Adam, on accident of course she didn't expect he'd be on the crossfire she just wanted to get Lucifer off

Lucifer: Holy shit, are you okay!? here let me take a look

. at first, Adam tried to just leave but Lucifer kept him still while giving a pleading look he sighed and allowed the alpha to look him over Adam's eye appeared to be swollen and starting to throb

Adam: is it bad?

Lucifer: It's not so bad that you'd need an eye patch just need to get something cold on it, come on let's get you home

. Despite his own injuries he helps Adam up and starts to lead him away as the crowd slowly starts to dissipate now that the fight was over

Lute: WAIT ADAM I'M SO SORRY IT WAS AN ACCIDENT!

. Adam turns his head slightly and says in a frustrated tone

Adam: Not now Lute, just, not now, I'll text you later ok?

. Lute doesn't say anything as she watches from the ground in complete shock as Adam allows himself to be taken away by that little demon

---

. after carefully maneuvering around the school so no one would see them in their current predicament they made it over to the student parking lot where a small white car resided

. Lucifer unlocked it with a push of his key's button, went to the passenger side to open the door for Adam, and went to his side to start the car, before turning to Adam

Lucifer: do you mind giving me your address?

Adam: No, please don't it's my aunt's day off and she'll freak the fuck out if she sees this.

. he says while referring to his damaged eye

Lucifer: ok I get it, um well, if your comfortable with it, are you okay with coming back to my house? I can get you the right medical aid you need

. Adam doesn't say anything as he silently nods

. The drive there is silent and tense as Adam's attention is solely focused on what is happening out the window, while Lucifer keeps checking on him every so often

. They soon made it to a high-class condo complex, they park in front of one and Lucifer quickly opens his door to open Adam's and helps him out

. They head inside and Lucifer calls out to Uriel, he breathes a sigh of relief when he gets no response

Lucifer: Ok were good, let me take you to the kitchen

. There he gets Adam a bag full of ice and he gently places it on his eye, wincing from the slight flinch from the cold

Lucifer: you need anything else? are you hungry or thirsty?

Adam: all I need now is how to tell my Aunt on how I got this, though shouldn't you be more concerned with your own injuries?

Lucifer: I think the worst I got was a bump on the head, I'm ok

. It was true that while he had some bruises he was mostly a-ok

Lucifer: but if you really need an excuse for her, just say you accidentally ran into a door while rushing to class

. suddenly Adam's phone starts to buzz he picks it up and sighs seeing the caller's ID

Adam: speak of the devil (answers it) hey Aunt Sera, no I uh stopped at Mcdonald's for an after practice snack with a friend, yeah I know they cause people to get fat but guess what that sentiment can't really be applied to me when I'm already fat, no that's not sarcasm that is stating facts, uh huh, yeah, yeah I'll be home soon ok, I don't know an hour soon ok? See you then, yeah love you too

. he ends the call and looks at Lucifer

Adam: ok, situation averted, for now at least, so

Lucifer: So?

Adam: (sighs and looks straight into Lucifer's eyes) you have exactly thirty minutes and explain why the Hell you've been trying to follow me around and won't just leave me alone? I mean if you're trying to apologize over what happened in Eden you're doing a pretty shitty job at it

Lucifer: I, I'm sorry but while I did want to talk to you about the whole Eden situation, I don't see why I have to apologize for anything

Adam: um ok how about you stealing my girlfriend then making me feel like complete shit by constantly following me around and trying to shove your tongue down her throat, oh! and let's not forget the rumors that destroyed my reputation, because I know you and Lilith were the ones that start them!

Lucifer: first of all, YOU broke up with Lilith first I think that made it perfectly ok for me to "Steal your girlfriend" second I didn't start those rumors I swear I didn't Lilith must've said something to her friends and those friends said something to their friends and it probably spiraled out of control from there, thirdly Lilith was the one to drag me to those places I swear it was a giant coincidence

Adam: Broke up with her, what the Hell are you talking about I didn't break up with her she broke up with me by being a slut!

Lucifer: what about Eve then?! the girl you left Lilith for!

Adam: You mean Eve my cousin?

Lucifer: what?

Adam: Eve is my cousin, and she was a new student there and I was just helping her settle in!

Lucifer: I, I, you're not lying to me, are you?

Adam: What the actual fuck would I earn by lying to you?! No, I'm not lying she was the one who fucking cheated on me why don't you get that?!

. Lucifer took a shaky breath and turned away eyes going wide in realization

Lucifer: she lied; she's been playing me this whole time

Adam: YES! finally you see the truth, she was a lying cheating alpha whore who only cared about her own wants and needs

Lucifer: A, Adam I, I am so, so fucking sorry I swear I didn't know I just I swear if I knew the truth I wouldn't have done that...if it makes you feel any better, she wasn't the best girlfriend to me either

Adam: Makes me feel a little better

Lucifer: I don't know how I'm going to make it up to you, actually I have an idea

Adam: what is it?

Lucifer: this Friday I don't know if your aware but there's a festival happening at school and if you're ok with it, why don't you let me take you? we could have fun and get to know each other better, get to know the real us, not the version's Lilith's lies had created; so what do you say wanna do it?

Adam: Uh I

. Adam didn't know what to say to an offer like that, he literally just spilled his guts to someone who he held onto a great amount of resent towards, or he at least he did once the realization that Lucifer was used just like he was, he supposed that maybe he could give him a second chance

Adam: sure, what's the harm

---

. Later when Lucifer drops Adam off in front of his house, he walks him to his door when Adam turns to address him

Adam: Well, I'll see you later, I I'm glad we had this chance to finally clear the air

Lucifer: me too

. Lucifer gives him a soft smile which caused Adam to blush then in a last-minute decision Adam places a soft kiss on his cheek, Lucifer's face turns to a deep Scarlett and before he had a chance to react Adam went inside closing the door

. Lucifer's lips split open into a goofy grin as he sways his way back to the car in a lovesick manner

. Inside Adam reels from realization from what he just did when he suddenly hears his aunt

Sera: Oh good your back hopefully you didn't ruin your appetite because dinner is, IS THAT A BLACK EYE?!

. Oh shit he forgot about that

(sorry it’s late, hope you liked it)

#hazbin hotel #adamsapple #high school au #omegaverse #Omega Adam #Alpha Lucifer #Lute

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maleyanderecafe · 24 days ago

Note

Have you seen “All The Boys Love Mandy Lane”? One of the characters, Emmet, definitely seems like a yandere

So I will preface this with the fact that I have no watched a lot of slasher or even horror movies before, so I'm pretty new to all of it. I do know the tropes from it though, which is sort of important for the twist in the story of All the Boys Love Mandy Lane. Though yes, I do think that Emmet is a yandere, he's just not very fleshed out within the movie/you need to make some connections to see it work.

The story starts out with Mandy walking through school with all guys eyeing her as she does. She is joined by her friend Emmet and invited to a pool party by a guy named Dylan. Mandy accepts but only if Emmet comes along and he agrees. During the party, a drunk Dylan comes up to Emmet who is sitting on the roof and starts talking about how he wants to bang Mandy. Emmet is able to convince him that jumping off the roof into the pool is a sure fire way to get her to like him and after some convincing, he does so. As he lands though, he ends up breaking his neck, dying in the pool. Nine months past and it seems that Emmet and Mandy are no longer as close as they were before. The three guys Red, Jake and Bird all talk about how they want to be the one to take Mandy's virginity. Chloe and Marlin convince Mandy to come on a road trip with them to Red's ranch while gossiping about how Emmet was the one who got Dylan killed, which is why he's shunned. They all head on the road trip to the cabin and eventually meet Garth, a guy who ends up protecting the group. Bird tries his hand at getting close to Mandy, managing to hold hands and kiss her on the cheek. Later that night, Merlin gives Jake a blowjob and upon leaving, the killer ends up sticking a gun in her mouth and breaking her jaw. As the night goes on, Jake who is drunk, ends up finding Merlin sitting next to a lake before he too is attacked by the killer. We find out that the killer is indeed Emmet, who has been obsessed with Mandy from the get go, having been shunned from the rest of his peers, he has a diary with obsessive scribbles about her. Eventually Bird runs out of the place, chasing after someone and finds himself face to face with Emmet. While he puts up a good fight, his face is eventually slashed by Emmet as he finishes him off. The remaining survivors realize that people have gone missing and start to barricading the house, though eventually, Garret tries to protect them and ends up getting shot. The other two, Red and Chloe attempt to run away, but find the body of Marlin and Jake near the fence. The two of them freak out before Red gets shot by Emmet. Chloe tries to hide next to some hay but finds the body of Bird there. She's able to run away and finds Mandy, however, Mandy ends up siding with Emmet and gets her killed with an axe. Mandy admits that he planned this all out and Emmet gives her pills to eat so they can have a suicide pact. Mandy changes her mind at the last moment and gets Garret to shoot Emmet. Emmet and Garret both get shot and Emmet chases Mandy inside a pit with decomposing dead cows. However, Mandy is able to take the upper hand and beats Emmet to death. She ends up driving away with an injured Garret.

So first of all, gotta say that this was a good movie for Halloween because boy was it a lot of killing. The general plot of it is that all the guys really want to sleep with Mandy because they want to claim her and relieve her of her virginity only to have Emmet end up killing everyone in the process. I don't actually know if this movie is good or not since the reviews seem pretty polarizing with some saying the movie is trash and some saying that it's really good, but I thought it was...okay? I think the twist at the end where the final girl (Mandy) was actually kind of masterminding everything and ends up killing Emmet, but unfortunately there's not a lot of explanation to it at all. Why did Mandy plan to get them all killed? I guess we can assume that it's because everyone kept on leering on her so this was a way to get them all killed or perhaps she developed a taste for it when Dylan jumped into the pool to kill himself. From what I can tell there's nothing that really indicates why she does it, so I can only speculate. What is interesting is that Mandy does actually end up saving Garret at the end even though she could have easily killed him (she nearly stabbed him). Emmet is pretty much the same, in where we do see that Emmet does like Mandy as shown by the notebook and possibly by seeing Emmet making Dylan jump off the roof. I think for him it was because he was shunned by everyone else (he states to Bird that he will be dead by the end of the day, seemingly not caring) and Mandy, his only friend shunned him as well. Still, we don't really know what it is because it's not necessarily clear why. Maybe he was mad that the other guys were leering at him, maybe he also found that killing Dylan was very fun for him, again this is something that's not explained. If this is the case, then he would be at least protective and jealous type of yandere, given he did kill off most of the cast. Once again though, we can only speculate on what he actually felt since it's not really explicitly said anywhere.

Overall, not a bad movie. I think it's a fun thing to watch, but it's not really anything that you'd want to watch for a yandere, unless you want to see the yandere just kill a bunch of people (and then getting killed by the love interest).

#All The Boys Love Mandy Lane #male yandere #yandere #yandere boy #recommendations #asks

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coopigeoncoo · 1 year ago

Text

Pairing: Todoroki Shouto x Gender Neutral Reader

Rating: Teen+

Tags: Reader-Insert, Stalking, Kidnapping, Attempted Kidnapping, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Psychological Torture (There is a plot for a character to get kidnapped and assaulted, but it doesn't actually happen), Sex Toys, Happy Ending

---

A late night meal delivery to Pro Hero Shouto goes terribly wrong, leaving you trapped in a room together with no obvious means of escape. You find yourself holding out hope not just for a rescue, but also for Shouto to somehow stay oblivious to the massive crush you've had on him for months now.

With the outlook for you future growing increasingly hazy, one thing becomes pointedly clear:

You can't keep things bottled up forever.

---

"It's true we don't know what might happen to us," Shouto admitted, his mismatched eyes locked onto yours; intense and mesmerizing. "But we'll face it together, okay?"

"Okay," you swallowed thickly. "But I think you definitely pulled the short straw as far as teammates go."

"Really?" Shouto asked, his eyes shining as he stared at you. "I don't think I could have chosen anyone better if I tried."

---

Continue reading below or follow the link to Ao3!

Society is built on a series of white lies, little untruths we tell ourselves to make life seem more bearable. Things like how good will always prevail over evil, that hard work equates to success, and that your Quirk didn't dictate the direction your life took.

You had some increasingly strong suspicions about those first two platitudes, but the fact that you had a teleportation Quirk and had only ever been hired for courier work left you feeling very certain that the last one was absolute bullshit.

Last month your boss had commemorated your third year of employment at Über Munch, a meal delivery service for Heroes, with a mesh bag half-full of dollar store candy and a keychain with the company logo on it in lieu of something you would actually appreciate.

Like a raise. Or a day off once and a while.

So you were feeling pretty unenthusiastic about work these days now that you knew how little your effort was actually valued by the suits down at the corporate office. You had never been this tempted to quit before and knew it would likely be a smart move to start sending out resumes and have something else lined up for when you eventually snapped, but it was hard to actually put forth the effort when you didn't totally hate your job most days.

Your Quirk, Revisit, allows you to instantaneously travel to anywhere you've walked before. It made some aspects of your job easier, like quickly delivering meals directly to Hero agencies in the major metropolitan area; but it didn't make it effortless. Some orders were just more difficult to fulfill than others.

A call from Fat Gum always requires multiple trips from a handful of different restaurants to fulfill, a task that left you winded and lightheaded from both the quantity of food you had to carry and overusing your Quirk. But he always tipped generously, which was more than you could say for other Heroes. Accepting an order from Vine would guarantee that you would end up dumped on the edge of some overgrown forest with a bag of vegetable samosas in one hand and a compass in the other, rewarded for all your trouble with an evangelical comic tract once you'd actually managed to track her down.

But then there were the clients you didn't mind getting calls from. Mt. Lady never ordered meals, she just wanted someone to drop off a bottle of her favorite bargain brand rosé on her days off so she could focus on relaxing. She'd answer the door in an old pair of sweatpants with a clay mask pasted thickly across her face, a rom-com blaring in the background as she accepted her delivery. It was a charmingly domestic view of a woman most often seen splashed across the covers of beauty magazines.

And then there was your favorite client of all, Todoroki Shouto. Every Tuesday and Thursday the same request would ping across the screen of your work phone: cold soba with extra ginger to be delivered to his agency precisely at eight thirty, which was when he took a break from his nightly paperwork. You'd started to become friendly over the course of your routine interactions, sharing courteous greetings and anecdotes from your respective work weeks. Shouto's stories were always more engaging than yours, but he was polite enough to laugh and offer commiseration at the appropriate points as he unpacked his dinner.

You tried to appreciate Shoto's companionship without interpreting his gentle smiles and welcoming demeanor as anything other than what they were; a show of kindness from a good man. But every time Shouto gifted you with a glimpse of his pearly whites you couldn't stop the sudden hitching of your breath, mind racing with snippets of impossible dreams you couldn't help but crave.

It was easy to let yourself imagine being with him; waking up in a tangle of limbs as early morning light streamed across your bedspread from between the too-wide gaps in your blinds. Knowing your breath was sour from sleeping but kissing him anyway, too needy for his attention to wait until after you'd brushed your teeth.

But you know life isn't like it is in the fairy tales. Princes don't marry peasants and pedigree Heroes don't end up with minimum wage service workers. You'd keep on delivering Shouto's noodles twice a week until inevitably, a year or two down the road, the tabloids would be saturated with news of his engagement to some super model or socialite. That was what was expected; what he deserved.

But you could, and would, fantasize about what could have been if things were just a little bit different. If you were richer or more successful. If you hadn't been too scared to take the entrance exams for placement at a Hero School. If you existed in the same social stratosphere as each other.

They were nice, those little flights of fancy you allowed yourself; the small sprinkles of sweetness that made the bitter taste of reality more palatable. You made time for one more brief daydream; a vision of gentle sighs and entwined fingers, before you dug your phone out of your pocket. Thumb swiping across the screen, you bring up your work app and see a new notification light up your screen: a request for cold soba with extra ginger.

With a weary sigh, you clutched your phone to your chest, screwed your eyes shut, and disappeared in a shower of sparks.

You'd become a regular feature around Shouto's agency, recognized on sight by the security guards and night cleaning crew. So the sudden appearance of a new receptionist next to the doors to Shouto's office was a jarring change in an otherwise predictable delivery routine. A sharp looking woman had replaced his usual assistant, the round-faced and rounder-bellied Mrs. Yamori; a devastatingly friendly and heavily pregnant woman with a heteromorphic gecko Quirk.

Customer service smile firmly in place, you approached the desk, checking the gleaming name plaque set in front of her.

"Hello, Ms. Yokubou!" You greeted cheerily, startling the receptionist who had been focused on sorting through a small pile of mail. "Did Mrs. Yamori go on maternity leave already?"

"How am I supposed to know?" The woman snapped, carefully placing a small box at the top of the stack. "I'm here to help Shouto, not spread office gossip."

"Right," you coughed nervously in the face of her hostility. "Well, I have his dinner. So I'll just go ahead and knock."

"Dinner?" She hissed, swiveling her chair to face the monitor on the left side of the desk. "There isn't any mention of dinner on his schedule and I certainly didn't call you."

"I don't know what to tell you. I deliver Mr. Todoroki's dinner every Tuesday and Thursday at this time," you sighed, pleasant demeanor slipping as this conversation eroded what little was left of your patience after a long day.

"Well, not today you don't," Yokubou sniffed, waving you away with a dismissive hand. "Shouto is simply too busy this evening. You may go."

"Listen, even if I wanted to go, Über Munch guarantees delivery to Heroes. That's sort of their entire business plan."

"I told you that your services won't be necessary!" Yokubou screeched, reaching her hand towards the receiver on her desk. "Don't make me call security!"

"Would you, actually? They know me down there and it seems like getting a third party involved might help speed things up a bit."

Yokubou's brow twisted as she pulled the desk phone up to her ear, but whatever sort of retort she had poised on the tip of her tongue evaporated the moment Shouto's office door opened and he stuck his head out curiously.

"Shouto!" She crooned, rolling her shoulders back to push her chest further out, the top buttons on her fitted blouse struggling under the added pressure. "I'm so sorry to have disturbed you! But I have everything under control and-"

"There you are," Shouto sighed in relief as his gaze landed on you, pointedly ignoring the antics of his receptionist. "I was starting to get worried."

"Sorry I'm late," you said, holding the bag out for him to take. "This is normally the part where I would apologize for your food getting cold, but it was already cold to start with, so I'm just going to skip that bit."

Shouto accepted his dinner with an amused huff, fingers brushing yours as the bag changed hands.

"Would you like to come in?" Shouto asked, pushing the door to his office open wider. "I need some help on today's crossword puzzle. There's a lot of pop culture questions that I don't know the answers to."

"You can't, Shouto! Not tonight! You're far too busy!" His receptionist said, shooting to a standing position and grabbing the pile of mail into her arms. "There's something important here that needs your immediate attention."

"Is there, now?" Shouto hummed thoughtfully, shifting the bag with his soba into the crook of his arm so he could accept the towering stack of mail.

"And I'm sure you need privacy to open classified mail," Yokubou insisted, squeezing herself into the space between you and Shouto.

"It'll be fine," Shouto assured her with a tight smile. "I'll just save all the top secret letters until I'm alone."

"But-!"

"That will be all for today, Ms. Yokubou," Shouto dismissed, reaching around her to place a palm between your shoulder blades and guide you into his office.

"No! You don't understand!" Yokubou wailed, clawing at the stack of mail Shouto held securely to his chest, trying to pry the missives away from him.

"I understand that it has been a very long day and you must be exhausted. Go home and rest and we'll talk about your lack of professionalism first thing in the morning," Shouto said sternly, shutting the door quickly behind him and engaging the lock with one swift motion. He ignored the pounding knocks that shook the door in its frame and the repeated frantic cries of 'Shouto!' as he made his way across the room, depositing the contents of his arms down onto his desk before collapsing into his office chair with a bone weary sigh.

"Well she sure is…something," you offer diplomatically.

"Fired is what she is," Shouto laughed dryly, scrubbing his hands furiously across his face. "That woman has been an absolute menace since day one. I tried to give her a chance to settle in, but it's beyond obvious that this job isn't a good fit for her."

"She only started on what? Friday?"

"Saturday," Shouto corrected, prying the lid off of his dinner and happily sniffing the ginger-covered noodles. "And since then she's thrown away all my fanmail, canceled a joint interview I had with Creati, and she keeps finding excuses to barge into my office. I've had to start locking my door."

"Yikes," you said, wincing in sympathy and a fair amount of second hand embarrassment. "How long is Mrs. Yamori supposed to be gone?"

"Too long," Shouto groaned, pulling out a set of disposable chopsticks and snapping them neatly in half. "Do you think I could convince her to come back to work early if I hire her baby too?"

"I'm fairly certain that's illegal. Child labor and all that," you laughed, pulling one of the guest chairs up to the front of Shouto's desk and spinning the abandoned crossword around to glance at the clue columns. "Plus, babies cry a lot. It would probably be pretty disruptive."

"It couldn't be worse than my current situation," Shouto grumbled, the faint sounds of Yokubou's wailing still audible in the background.

"I suppose the dental coverage for a baby would be pretty cheap," you muse, penciling in the answer for number thirty-two down. "They don't have any teeth."

"I wonder what's in that mail pile that had Ms. Yokubou so wound up," you pondered, tapping the pencil eraser against your cheek thoughtfully.

"Good question," Shouto said, using the cheap paper napkin to dab primly at his lips even though you were fairly certain he didn't get a single particle of food on his face with how carefully he ate. "I thought she had slipped a confession letter into the stack, but all that's here is official mail and a couple of packages."

"Maybe one of those then?"

"Maybe," Shouto mused, separating out the parcels in question. "But I am expecting some deliveries. My Mother's birthday is coming up and I'm having her gifts shipped here so she doesn't stumble upon them when she visits my apartment."

"I guess the only way to know for sure is to open them," you say, tossing your pencil down in defeat and refocusing your attention onto Shouto as he picked up an envelope mailer and ripped open the tab. Reaching into the envelope, Shouto pulled out a small paperback novel.

"It's the next volume in her favorite book series," he explained, setting the book aside with a smile. "I pulled some strings and got her an advanced copy."

"The ladies in her book club are going to be so jealous!"

"I know," Shouto grinned fiendishly in delight, the mischievous glint in his eye making your stomach muscles clench wickedly.

"And uh, what's in the last box?" You ask, trying to focus on anything other than your misplaced desire for the man in front of you.

"Let's see, shall we?" Shouto said, slicing open the packing tape with a large set of shears from his desk drawer. Carefully reaching in through the layers of tissue paper, Shouto pulls out a long glass bottle. It's overly ornate, with pink tinted glass and gilded edges, the sort of thing your grandmother would have proudly displayed on her vanity while smacking your small hand away for trying to touch it without permission.

"It's lovely," you say, only half-lying as you watched the golden tassel tied around the middle sway back and forth. "What's it for?"

"Perfume, I think?" Shouto guessed, face scrunched up as he examined the bottle closely. "I ordered the type Fuyumi told me to, but I don't remember it looking like this on the webpage?"

"Maybe it's a limited edition?" You suggest. "Or they noticed who was ordering and upgraded you to the deluxe version with like, extra ambergris or something?"

"I hope not. That would throw the fragrance completely off balance," Shouto winced, viscerally imagining the perfume you described. "Better check and make sure this isn't the deluxe edition."

And with those words, Shouto grasped the stopper on the bottle and pulled; a plume of thick yellow smoke billowing out from the mouth of the bottle. Gasping in surprise, you accidentally inhaled the spreading vapor; skin prickling painfully as you lost control of your limbs and tumbled to the floor. The last thing you saw before your vision blurred and unconsciousness claimed you was Shouto reaching out across the floor towards your prone body; shirt pulled over his nose and mouth in an effort to filter out the unknown gas.

Untold minutes passed before the smoke finally dissipated. And when it did, there was no trace of you or Shouto left. Just a shiny pink bottle with it's stopper wedged firmly in place, glimmering cheerily in the warm light of Shouto's office.

You woke up suddenly, contorted into an uncomfortable position on the floor with your clothes clinging to your clammy skin. Head pounding and stomach churning, you take in a deep breath and then promptly regret it as you inhale a lung-full of incredibly potent incense smoke.

"Ugh," you coughed, nose twitching as you got hit by another low-hanging cloud of patchouli. With one last sputter you shifted your focus to examine the room around you. The walls were an eye watering bright pink and every horizontal surface, from the tables to the numerous book shelves mounted to the walls, were stuffed full of flickering candles and arrangements of waxy-petaled lilies.

"Are you okay?" Shouto asked, voice calling out from behind the other side of the circular bed frame you were laying next to.

"I dunno'," you mumble, pausing to let out a tiny belch that seemed to help settle your stomach. "I think so?"

"Good," Shouto stated, voice still commanding despite its breathy quality. "Can you walk?"

"Let me try," you said as you went to roll over onto your side, only to discover that your body wasn't responding the way it should; your limbs dragging and heavy. Panic flooded your body, blood thrumming hotly in your ears as you once again tried, and failed, to roll. Exerting more concentrated effort than you ever had before in your life, you managed to slowly rock over onto your shoulder; body now facing towards the bed.

Whatever gratification you felt from your accomplishment was quickly forgotten as you realized that your heaving gasps of exhaustion were slowly pushing you off balance, sending you toppling face first into the shiny wooden bedframe. Your forehead landed with a dull thunk; the shock of the impact intensified by the headache throbbing sharply behind your eyes.

"Ouch," you hissed through your teeth, sucking up the pain as best you could. "Moving appears to be beyond me at the moment."

"That's okay," Shouto said, his voice dropping a decibel or two into a more comforting timbre. "Wait there. I'll come to you."

The one good thing about your fall was that it positioned your head closer to the foot of the bed, so you could watch as Shouto grasped handfuls of the carpet in his fists, pulling himself slowly into view with great heaving breaths. His strength finally gave out an arms length away from you, his fingers creeping along the floor until they collided with yours.

Tears prickled in the corners of your eyes, the embarrassing result of too many big feelings fighting against each other to be felt first- sadness and frustration and fear and utter relief when Shouto's fingers curled around your own.

"You don't need to cry," Shouto soothed, his thumb rubbing small circles into the back of your hand.

"I don't think I can stop," you sobbed, sucking in huge lungfuls of the incense-spiked air.

"That's okay, too."

"Yeah?"

"Mmhmm," Shouto hummed. "I'm told that crying can be very therapeutic. Do you feel any better?"

"No," you snorted, trying to downplay the telltale blubber of mucus collecting in the back of your throat.

"Do you need to cry some more then?"

You nodded as emphatically as you could with the feeble muscles in your neck, and then opened your mouth and let out a piercing wail; tears streaming down your face and soaking quickly into the plush carpet fibers.

"Can you use your Quirk?" You sniffed, tears dried and tacky on your skin. You'd tried to wipe them away but only managed to poke yourself in the eye instead. "Because mine isn't working."

"No," Shouto growled in frustration, eyes narrowed at his hands as though they had personally betrayed him. "I'm hoping we'll regain control of them once our bodies recover."

"If we recover," you mutter dismally, shifting your gaze reluctantly towards Shouto when you felt him squeeze your hand tightly to gain your attention.

"It's true we don't know what might happen to us," Shouto admitted, his mismatched eyes locked onto yours; intense and mesmerizing. "But we'll face it together, okay?"

"Okay," you swallowed thickly. "But I think you definitely pulled the short straw as far as teammates go."

"Really?" Shouto asked, his eyes shining as he stared at you. "I don't think I could have chosen anyone better if I tried."

At Shouto's insistence, you began doing little exercises in an attempt to kick start your muscles back into working order. You started small, with toe curls and rotating your arms in little circles. Everything was slightly numb and hard to control, a little like how your cheeks felt after you had a cavity filled at the dentist.

"I'm scared, Shouto," you whispered as you lifted your forearm a paltry couple inches off of the floor. Shouto had already graduated to doing floppy bicep curls, but that was the difference in athletic ability between a Pro Hero and someone who's preferred marathon experience involved popcorn and a handful of movies. "Where do you think we are?"

"I don't know," he grunted from exertion, sweat beading at his temples. "But I have a couple of theories about how we got here."

"What're you thinking?"

"It's obviously some sort of Quirk at work," he gasped. "You're a Teleporter, right? Could it be something like that, do you think?"

"No. It's not teleportation," you groaned, arms collapsing limply onto the floor as you burned through the last of your energy. "I'm in an online chat group with a bunch of other Teleporters and we all have the same basic experience. And this is not it."

"Really?" Shouto said, pausing in his exercises to join your brief respite. "That's fascinating."

"Yeah. I guess rearranging all your atoms is a complex enough process there's just one way it works correctly."

Shouto huffed, staring up at your reflections in the large mirror that covered the entire ceiling. "What's it like? Teleporting, I mean?"

"I- it's sort of hard to explain," you say, wrinkling up your nose in thought. "So, like, imagine if people were made entirely out of sand."

"That sounds awful," Shouto grimaced. "Can you imagine what it would feel like if your tongue was made out of sand? Everything would taste gritty."

"It isn't literal," you huff. "You can imagine anything small. Rocks, sugar-"

"Rice," Shouto interrupted, nodding resolutely.

"Yeah, sure. Rice. Imagine people are made out of rice. Teleporting is like, if every single one of those grains just scattered," you try to wave your hand around for emphasis but only succeed in making it flop on the ground like a dying fish. "But they aren't lost. I know where every single last one is, no matter how far away it wandered. And I can just pull them all back together again, wherever I choose."

"And it doesn't make you feel like all your muscles have atrophied?"

"No, not at all," you say, letting your head loll from side to side in an exaggerated shake. "I'm just- letting myself fall apart. I'm like ice when it starts to melt; shifting and warm."

"Oh," Shouto said, a sudden ring of clarity in his tone. "That's a nice feeling."

"Yeah, it is."

Eventually, you and Shouto progressed to being able to move around on the carpet. Shouto had worked himself up into a crawling position while you had adopted the much less elegant solution of wiggling around like a worm. You could tell by his puffed up cheeks and pointedly averted stare that he was barely holding back laughing at your expense.

"Don't you dare laugh at me," you warned him, butt stuck up in the air as you wiggled your shoulders from side to side to achieve forward momentum.

"I'm- I'm not," Shouto lied, wheezing with every inch he crawled towards a distant dresser.

"Please," you scoffed. "I went to middle school. I know what it looks like to be laughed at. You could at least have the decency to do it to my face."

"Right, sorry," Shouto apologized, turning his head to look at you and promptly losing all composure; crashing to the ground as his laughter wracked his body and threw him off balance. He landed hard on his shoulder, still too uncoordinated to break his fall well.

"Ow!" He snorted out between guffaws, body shaking as he rubbed at his shoulder with limp fingers. "That- that hurt."

"Serves you right," you mutter peevishly, pushing your derriere further into the air to power your next creep forward. "I'm going to beat you to the dresser. That'll teach you to laugh at me."

"No," Shouto gasped, stumbling back onto his hands and feet. "I'm gonna- gonna get there first."

"Oh yeah?" You countered, summoning up your go-to school yard taunt like the paragon of maturity you were.

"Yeah," he shot back, the call of competition doing a lot to sober his demeanor as he rocked on his hands and took a shaky shuffle forward.

"Hey, Shouto!" You called, waiting until he was looking at you before you wiggled your butt from side-to-side as much as you could without toppling over. Shouto, not anticipating your underhanded maneuver, collapsed face first into the shag rug, the long fibers muffling his delirious cackling.

"Cheater!" He cried out.

"Winner!" You laughed, sliding forward onto your belly and making a good headway towards the dresser, steadfastly ignoring Shouto's calls for a do-over.

Shouto had predictably rallied and beaten you to the dresser like the finely tuned muscle machine he was, but you were proud to say you had given him a run for his money. The two of you now sat propped up against the dresser, bodies slumped against each other for an additional layer of support. You'd passed a fair bit of time by guessing how many flowers were crammed into each vase and then counting to see who came the closest.

"Aaaaaand that's another round to me!" You proclaimed, nudging Shouto sharply. with your elbow when you heard him grumble discontentedly.

Todoroki Shouto, it turned out, was a very sore loser.

"One more time," he pouted, looking around the room for another cluster of lilies to tabulate. "Best fourteen out of twenty-seven."

"Yeah, I can agree to that. Because I've already won fourteen times," you reminded him smugly.

"This game is silly," Shouto grumbled, managing to cross his arms across his chest petulantly on the second try. "I don't want to play anymore."

"Fine by me," you yawned, only slapping yourself in the face a little as you tried to cover your mouth. "I'm getting tired anyway."

"Go ahead and sleep," Shouto said, nudging your shoulder with his own until your head slid down into the cradle of his neck. It was wildly uncomfortable and far too intimate for your level of acquaintance, but you'd sooner eat your shirt than complain about it. "I'll take first watch."

"Watch for what?" You grumble, already well on your way to being unconscious. "There aren't even any doors."

"Or windows," Shouto added with a frustrated sigh as he dropped his head down onto yours, smushing your cheek into the hard edge of his clavicle.

"Righ'," you mumble as your eyelids droop shut. "No win'ows."

"And I suppose if anyone was going to come in and kill us, they would have done that while we were lying defenseless on the floor."

Your eyes shoot open, all traces of exhaustion banished as you pry yourself away from Shouto and scramble into a more upright position.

"What's wrong?" He asked with genuine concern. "I thought you were tired?"

"I was, until someone started talking about us being killed," you laughed dryly, eyes darting around the room suspiciously, cataloging all the places a person could be laying in wait. There weren't a lot, but the privacy screen next to the chaise lounge was looking a little too sinister for your liking.

"No, I specifically said that we likely wouldn't be murdered."

"Yeah, but you still mentioned the killing part! And now I can't stop thinking about it!" You babbled anxiously, trying to calm your rabbit-fast heartbeat with a couple of deep breaths. "This is probably the closest I've ever been to being murdered before, so a little bit of panic feels justified!"

"There is a strong correlation between kidnapping and murder," Shouto nodded.

"Do you- do you think that's comforting?" You screech, hysteria ratcheting up another few notches.

"I- no?" Shouto said, voice pitching high in uncertainty. "But it is statistically significant!"

With a pitiful whine, you drop your head down into your mostly stable hands, doing your best to hold back another round of water works. Shouto, at a loss about what to say, drops his hand onto your back.

"There, there," he says, rubbing his palm slowly down your spine

"Now this- this is comforting," you sigh, arching your spine against his trailing hand.

"I'm glad," Shouto smiled. "This is how I pet stray cats, too. It's good to finally get some feedback on my technique."

"Now that we're back on our feet-," Shouto began, watching anxiously as you stumbled and were forced to grab onto a floor lamp for support. "-mostly, anyway. I think it would be a good idea for us to look around the room more thoroughly."

"Sounds good," you say, glancing at the lamp cord and wondering how far you explore while keeping your makeshift crutch plugged in. "Is there anything in particular we're looking for?"

"I'm not sure," Shouto said, setting his sights on the dresser drawers. "We know so little about our current situation that any information at all would be helpful."

"Right," you said, still unsure about what exactly to do, but not wanting to hinder Shouto's progress any further. You decided to inspect behind the privacy screen that had made you uneasy earlier. It was a tall thing that stretched far over your head, white wicker edges nearly scraping the mirrored ceiling.

"Finding anything interesting," you panted over your shoulder as you took another baby step towards the screen, dragging your support lamp along with you.

"No!" Shouto yelped, slamming the top drawer he'd been staring into shut. "I mean, yes. There are things. But they aren't important. They're uh-," he paused to cough uneasily into a loose fist. "They're- intimacy supplies."

"Ah, sex toys," you nod, turning back to face your destination and give Shouto what little privacy you could to work through his embarrassment. "Say no more."

"I- yes. Thank you."

"But that opens up an entirely new realm of possible explanations," you grunt, tired but excited by your continued progress across the room. "Like, did we get knocked out by the gas from that bottle and dropped into a love hotel or something? As a joke?"

"A love hotel?" Shouto screeched.

"Yeah. They're normally all schmaltzy and themed like this," you explain, gesturing vaguely to the abundance of bright pink decor. "Normally that theme isn't Barbie Escape Room, but I'm not here to kink shame."

"I think you maybe should have taken on the dresser inspection. I'm completely out of my element here," Shouto lamented, holding up a large paddle for you to see. "I can't even begin to imagine why there's a cutting board in here."

"Oh, that's not-"

"Actually," Shouto interrupted, holding up a hand to halt your explanation. "I don't think I want to know."

Shouto continues to rifle through the drawers, utterly befuddled and horrified in equal turns when you finally reach your destination.

"Alright," you said, mustering up the courage to peer behind the screen. "Let's see what's going on behind here."

You push the right side of the screen back slowly with your still weak arms, panels buckling at the hinges as it folded itself up like an accordion.

"Any murderers tucked away back there," Shouto teases, weighing a comically large steel buttplug in his hand.

"Not a murderer, no," your voice trembling with mounting horror as you step out of the way, allowing Shouto to see around you for the first time. The wall behind the screen was full of pictures of Shouto, hundreds of them pieced together into a collage of obsession. Magazine covers, promo pictures, and selfies from Shouto's official social media accounts were all present in the mashup; but far more distressing were the inclusions of what had to be candid shots of the Hero.

Blurry and over processed snapshots of Shouto shirtless that had been taken through his apartment window, spoon hanging from his mouth as he ate a cup of yogurt.

A far away street shot with him and a friend- you couldn't tell who it was exactly because they had been scribbled over with a pen so many times they had worn a hole in the paper; the bright pink of the walls visible through the missing space where a person should be.

Classified photographs detailing the injuries sustained in the line of duty that had been copied from official Commission files; terrible, gruesome things of Shouto bruised and bloodied and at his most vulnerable.

"You have a stalker, Shouto," you whispered.

"Oh," Shouto said numbly, the butt plug falling from between his fingers and hitting the top of the dresser with a loud thud. "Then this isn't a love hotel then," he paused and swallowed thickly, eyes glazed with an emotion you couldn't recognize as he stared at the wall behind you. "This is supposed to be my prison."

Things had only gotten worse from there. Now that you realized the purpose of the room, you were unable to unearth all sorts of hidden features that made your skin crawl. Hooks carved into the delicate filigree on the bed frame that were obviously made for handcuffs, a box of truffles with tiny syringe marks poked into the bottom, and a set of menacingly sharp sewing scissors tucked away in the bedside table drawer.

Your stomach was churning painfully, but you couldn't tell if it was from hunger or fear.

Not really knowing what else to do, you fumbled over towards the bed and collapsed onto it, nearly sliding off the slick satin duvet cover. A frantic scramble had kept you from dropping onto the floor, but it was a near thing. You watched as Shouto slid down onto the ground, a blank look on his face as he positioned his hands by his ears and began doing crunches.

"Are you- are you okay?" You ask from your sprawled out position on the bed. You'd tried to make eye contact with him through the mirror ceiling, but his gaze remained stubbornly averted to a blank spot on the wall you couldn't understand his interest in.

"I'm fine," he grunted through clenched teeth, forcing his shoulders up off the floor.

"You don't have to be."

"Yes I do!" Shouto bellowed, startling you as he threw himself down onto the floor, hands fisting in his hair in frustration. "You're trapped in here because of me! It's my responsibility to get you out safely and I can't do it if I'm like this!" He said, waving a hand down at his sluggish body.

"None of this is your fault," you assure Shouto, sliding to the edge of the bed and peering down towards him. "You're just as much a victim here as I am."

"You shouldn't even be a victim in the first place."

"Yeah, me being here obviously wasn't what your stalker had planned," you said, suppressing a shudder as you stared briefly at the collage of photos before reaching down and taking Shouto's hand into your own. "But I'm glad. I'm glad that it's me here with you, instead of- instead of them."

"I'm glad it's you, too," Shouto whispered, squeezing your hand tightly. "And not just because you don't have any plans to torture me."

"Being trapped in a room with me is torture enough," you joke, lazily swinging your interlocked hands back and forth in the air. "There's no need to overdo it."

There are faint memories of some long ago humanities class echoing in the back of your brain; something about needing to have your basic needs met before you're able to consider any other, arguably more important, matters. So while you understood that you were likely waist-deep in mortal peril and should be very worried about your long term health and wellbeing, you were far more concerned about the fact that you really had to pee.

Like, right now.

"Hey, Shouto?" You clear your throat nervously, not entirely sure how to broach the subject of bodily fluids with the top-ranked Hero laying on the bed next to you. "I, uh- have something I need to say. But it's sort of embarrassing?"

"Oh?" Shouto asked curiously, turning his head to face you, your noses nearly brushing. "What is it?"

"Well, I just- I know that a lot is happening right now, and I don't want to burden you anymore than I already am, but I just don't think I can hold it in any longer."

"Tell me," Shouto whispered breathlessly, his eyes wide as he watched you nibble on your lower lip nervously.

"I-"

"Yes?" He said imploringly, face inching closer to yours.

"I really need to pee!" You cry out loudly, sending Shouto reeling back from the force of your sudden screech.

"Oh- uh," he stammers. "That's, hmm."

"God," you whine, covering your face with your hands. "This is so embarrassing!"

"There's no need to be embarrassed," Shouto rushed to assure you, grasping your wrists gently to pull them away from your face. "I'm sorry, I should have reacted better."

"It's fine," you mutter sheepishly as you peer up at him from under your lashes. "It's gross and uncomfortable and I shouldn't have just blurted it out like that."

"No, it's not that- I was just caught a bit off guard. I thought you were going to say something different," Shouto admits with a wistful sigh.

"Like what? That I need to poop?"

"No," he snorts, pushing himself to the edge of the bed and standing with relative ease. "Don't worry about it right now. Let's just focus on finding a place for you to relieve yourself."

"I'd suggest just picking a corner like animals do, but that doesn't seem like a viable option in a round room."

"We'll just have to get creative then, won't we?" Shouto smiled, lifting up one of the largest vases of lilies and flipping it upside down; water and flowers spilling onto the floor at his feet in a soggy clump.

Shouto had originally set up your makeshift chamber pot behind the creepy stalker screen to give you some semblance of privacy, which was incredibly thoughtful of him. But the idea of peeing in front of one Shouto was hard enough, there was no way you could ever possibly bring yourself to pee in front of hundreds of little Shoutos pasted onto the wall. So the two of you combined your minimal strength together and managed to pull one side of the tall dresser away from the wall, creating a triangular little hidey-hole you hurriedly wedged yourself into.

"Don't look!" You called out over your shoulder, already pulling your zipper down before he could spin around fully.

"I won't," Shouto promised, staring dutifully across the room. With nothing more engaging to stare at, you join him in spectating the wall you were squeezed against. The pink paint had some sort of iridescent sparkles mixed into it that caught every flickering candle flame and created a hazy sort of glow that did nothing to help alleviate the headache you'd been nursing since you first woke up. The effect wasn't any less assaulting up close, so you were in the process of averting your eyes when the light behind you suddenly shifted; Shouto's dark shadow passing over you and catching on some strange divots on the otherwise smooth surface of the wall.

Hesitantly, you raise your hand and run your fingers across the wall, watching the route your fingertips take as they follow the nearly invisible grooves.

"Letters!" You gasp in excitement. "Shouto! There are letters on the wall!"

"Where?" Shouto demands, appearing over your shoulder in a flash, heedless of the fact that you were still mid-piss.

"Ahhh! No peeking! NO PEEKING!"

"Sorry! I'm so sorry!"

After you had emerged from your commode and dunked your hands into a bowl full of lily water to cleanse them, you and Shouto set about moving the dresser further from the wall to accommodate both your bodies as you squinted thoughtfully at the letters.

"They're really hard to make out through the shimmery paint," you grumble, waving a candle around to see if a different light position would make it any easier to read.

It didn't.

"I think that's the point," Shouto hummed thoughtfully. "They used paint and a dresser to hide the message, so they really didn't want us to discover what's written here."

You both stared at the shimmery wall for a moment longer before inspiration suddenly struck.

"I have an idea," you said, wobbling away to the other side of the room on stiff legs and returning moments later, the box of drugged chocolates tucked underneath your arm.

"Take one," you instructed Shouto as you pulled the lid off the box; selecting a dark chocolate truffle for yourself.

"I know things seem bad, but poisoning ourselves isn't the answer. Yet," Shouto added grimly, staring down into the box with a deep frown.

"I'm not gonna- ugh! Just watch!" You huff, placing your truffle onto the wall and smearing it over the letters with firm strokes. The chocolate transferred easily onto the wall, leaving brown streaks across the pink paint but skipping over the recessed grooves of the letters.

"Clever," Shouto smirked proudly, a sight that you stared at for longer than was strictly appropriate; permanently etching every last detail of this moment into your memory.

Chocolates in hand, you and Shouto began scribbling across the wall like two poorly supervised toddlers, the message slowly coming into focus as the number of truffles in the box quickly dwindled. The message was much larger than you had originally anticipated and you were a bit worried that you were going to run out of chocolates before the message was fully revealed. But in the end you were left with half a truffle and a bit of doggerel poetry outlined in cocoa:

A love confession you must tell,

If you wish to break the bottle's spell.

Sweet nothings alone just will not do,

You're trapped until your words are true.

"Well, I don't know what I was expecting but it certainly wasn't rhyming couplets," you admit, rubbing your sticky hands onto a nearby tufted throw pillow.

"The bottle," Shouto stated confidently, following your lead and wiping his hands on a decorative curtain. "The one I opened in my office earlier. The poem leads me to believe that we're inside of it."

"I- I suppose that makes sense," you admit, thinking back on the bottle you'd briefly seen. "You opening that bottle is the last thing I remember before waking up here."

"Removing the stopper must have been the trigger for the Quirk that trapped us to activate."

"That's why Ms. Yokubou was so insistent about getting into your office! She knew about the bottle!" You gasped, spinning to face Shouto. He didn't look too surprised by the revelation.

"She knew what the bottle did and likely intended to be here in your place," he nodded somberly. "Ms. Yokubou is definitely the most likely suspect."

"Really?" You scoff incredulously. "'The most likely suspect?' It's blatantly obvious that she's the one behind all of this."

"I took an oath to uphold the presumption of innocence. Ms. Yokubou isn't guilty unless she's proven so in a court of law," Shouto insisted with a sour look on his face, his morals at war with what he knew was true.

"Well, I didn't take an oath," you informed him proudly, puffing out your chest and resting your hands on your hips. "So I'm free to say that she's a creepy, rotten, low-down, guilty, bitch."

"Yes, you certainly can say that," Shouto grinned brilliantly. You tried to return a smile with similar intensity, but considering how rough you looked in the ceiling mirror after a full day of work and captivity you're positive it's no match for Shouto's natural radiance. But from the small sparkle you saw appear in the corner of his eye, it seemed that Shouto appreciated your efforts just the same.

"Are your hands starting to tingle?" You ask worriedly, staring down at the sharply prickling skin on your fingers.

"We need to wash the remaining chocolate off. Now," Shouto ordered, shoving the vase you had rinsed your hands off earlier into your lap; dunking his hands into the water after yours.

"I wonder what was in those truffles," you mutter in concern as Shouto's fingers worked defly over your skin, doing his best to scrub the chocolate residue off with firm strokes. You tried to return the favor, poking at the back of his hand with your clumsy digits, but it was growing increasingly difficult to will your fingers to bend.

"Likely just a tranquilizer," Shouto assured you, pulling one of your hands out of the water to check on how clean it was before lowering it back into the vase with a frown. "Whoever put me in here-"

"Ms. Yokubou," you filled in.

"-seems to have wanted me docile, not dead."

You tried to focus on the muted feeling of Shouto's hand on yours instead of the red hot anger roiling in your belly. It was a testament to the strength of your ire that you barely registered Shouto's gentle caresses.

Shouto had taken it upon himself to push the dresser out of the way so you could more clearly see the poem on the wall from a more comfortable position on the bed. The dresser had tipped in the process, drawers falling open and spilling their contents out across the ground; shiny new dental tools and lacy-edged corsets mixing together in a heap on the carpet. You had thought it had been an accident at first, Shouto simply underestimating his returning strength, but then you had seen the malicious glee spread thickly across his face and understood it had been a calculated act of wanton destruction. He dropped down onto the bed beside you, glaring at the mess he had made on the floor.

"Oops," he said unapologetically, kicking the pile of lingerie with a sneer. In a show of solidarity, you swept your arm across one of the bedside tables, sending an oil diffuser and a copy of the Kama Sutra crashing to the floor.

"Oh nooo," you said flatly, swiping at a teetering wine glass that escaped your first attack. "Clumsy me!"

Shouto's smile was a forced thing, too-fast and insincere compared to his normal grins. You watched as his shoulders slumped, head hanging down towards his chest as he ran his hands through his hair in frustration.

"I hate it here," he admits after a long moment of quiet. "I can't stop thinking about what could- what would have been happening to me. And I- I just-"

His foot jostled one of the hooked dental probes laying on the carpet, both your and Shouto's eyes locked onto it as it skittered across the floor and hit the baseboard with a tinny clang.

"We need to get out of here," you swallow thickly, hand blindly reaching out for Shouto's across the bed. He squeezed your fingers too tightly, your joints aching in protest; but you didn't tell him to stop.

"So, if we're interpreting this poem correctly then Ms. Yokubou-"

"The unconfirmed suspect," Shouto corrected.

"-the suspect intended keep you trapped in here and torture you until you were convinced you loved them."

"That seems to be the case, yes."

"That's so fucking awful, Shouto."

He didn't respond, staring thoughtfully at the words on the wall with a furrowed brow instead.

"Ms. Yoku- I mean, whoever did this obviously has some sort of feelings for you, but not really? They want you, but not the actual you," you ranted, the bubble of rage you had kept pushed down inside had finally built up enough pressure that it was spilling out against your will as you stomped around the room. You took a special sort of pleasure in grinding the discarded lilies down into mush with every lap you took.

"They don't care about what you think or- or feel, they just care that they get what they want, even if it destroys you. I just- I don't understand? How can they believe that they love you when they're so willing to hurt you?" you whispered brokenly, furious and devastated on Shouto's behalf.

"And I know that is an emotionally charged situation for you, but could you please say something?" You beg, sagging down onto the bed beside him, exhausted from your outburst. "If you don't, I'm pretty sure I'm just going to keep talking until I drive us both crazy. Which, admittedly, doesn't seem like it would be a very long trip at this point-"

"It can't be that simple," Shouto suddenly blurts out, putting an end to your rambling.

"What's not simple? Driving you crazy? Because I have some high school teachers with stories you wouldn't believe."

"No, not that," Shouto said, waving a hand dismissively. "I'm talking about the poem."

"What about it?" you asked, squinting at the rhyme inquisitively.

"It says that only a true love confession will break the bottle's spell and, presumably, set us free."

"Yeah, and that's sort of a huge issue? A forced love confession is just coercion," you explain. "You can't create genuine affection like that."

"Exactly," Shouto agreed, "And that would be a problem if the kidnapper was the one stuck in here with me. But instead, by some incredible stroke of luck or karma or kismet; I'm in here with you."

Between your persistent headache, bone-deep exhaustion, and the thick fog of panic blanketing your mind there was no possible way that you were interpreting Shouto's words correctly.

"What do you mean?" you said, swallowing thickly as you braced your heart for the let down you knew was coming; the walking back of his words, the incredulous laughter once he realized what he was mistakenly insinuating.

"I had a plan for this," Shouto sighed, a melancholy sort of sound. "There was supposed to be dinner. And music. And flowers. Not lilies, though," he rushed to assure you.

"Thank goodness. I don't think I ever want to see another lily again for as long as I live."

"Same here," he laughed dryly. "But we would have had a good evening together. Better than this one, at least. And at the end of the night I would take your hand in mine, just like this," Shouto said, cradling your hand between both of his. "And I'd finally tell you what I've been too scared to tell you for weeks now."

"Which is what?" you whisper breathlessly, precariously hanging on his every word by your fingertips; moments away from slipping and plummeting down into something- some feeling that couldn't possibly be real. You weren't that lucky. You weren't that anything, really.

"I'd tell you the truth," Shouto promised, his eyes shining with a soft sincerity that made your chest ache with longing. "That I am totally, irrevocably, head-over-heels in love with you."

You opened your mouth to respond- how exactly, you weren't entirely sure. Cheer, maybe? Cry? Ask him if he was serious? But the actual sound that came out was a prolonged scream as every muscle in your body twisted and burned.

And then, all you saw was darkness.

You woke up suddenly, contorted into an uncomfortable position on the floor again. But there was one immediately noticeable difference between waking up in the bottle and now, and that was the fact that your limbs were hopelessly tangled up with Shouto's; the two of you twisted together like a fleshy pretzel.

"We have to stop meeting like this," Shouto smiles down at where your head is pillowed on his chest, his heart thumping quickly beneath your ear.

"Nope, not allowed," you mumble in complaint, trying to push yourself off of his chest. You weren't able to make much protest with how loudly your muscles were protesting, so you just settled back down and tried to ignore how your heart skipped a beat when you felt his arm squeeze you tightly into his side. "I'm the funny one here. You're not allowed to have better one-liners than me."

"Apologies," Shouto said, your body rocking gently along with the quiet laughter that shook his chest. "I did have a bit of time to think of it though. It's taken you a little while to come around."

"You didn't move me?"

"No? Why would I?" Shouto asked, tilting his head to the side easily; obviously less inhibited by the soreness of his muscles than you were.

"Well, we're out of the bottle now so I thought…" you trailed off uneasily, unsure of what words you could put together to push this conversation along. It wasn't like you really wanted to talk about what happened; to pop the bubble of happiness that was filled to almost bursting inside of your chest. But you knew that the longer you drew it out the harder it would be to face reality; to acknowledge that Shouto discovered a loophole, a convenient lie he could believe just enough to free you both from that bottle.

Maybe he just loved you like a friend? Or worse, like a sister? Maybe that kind of affection was enough to have met the nebulous requirements for the Quirk to deactivate? The poem didn't have any footnotes that you could see, so maybe it wasn't quite as strict as you and Shouto had theorized. Maybe you could have gotten away with professing your love of Rock and Roll or sleeping in on the weekend?

You wish you would have experimented a bit more inside of the bottle and maybe saved yourself the devastating experience you were currently thrust into: staring literal heartbreak in the face as you gazed helplessly up at Todoroki Shouto.

"Thought what?" Shouto asked, the edges of his sweet grin slowly dipping down into the start of a frown.

"Well, we're out of the bottle now. So I don't expect- I won't hold you to anything you said. I know it was to just get us out. So, uh- thank you for that. But you don't have to keep pretending. It's okay," you assure him with a watery smile. You'd never been particularly skilled at lying and were even worse at it when you were emotional, and right now you were feeling very emotional.

But instead of looking relieved like you had expected him to be, Shouto looked positively exasperated; his face creased into a deep scowl.

"You don't believe that I have feelings for you?"

"Well, I mean, not like you said- not romantically," you explain, panicking internally as his expression grew even more displeased. "Just- like a friend?"

"I see," Shouto huffed. You could practically feel yourself withering under the intensity of his disappointed stare. "Is that how you see me? As just a friend?"

"I mean, we are friends, right?" You laugh nervously, growing increasingly concerned that this conversation might just torpedo your entire relationship into smithereens.

"Yes, of course. Very good ones I think," Shouto said, his hand coming up to cradle the side of your jaw gently to keep your attention firmly on him. "But is that all we are?"

"I wasn't aware there was any other option," you whisper honestly, your gaze jumping between each of his eyes, trying to see if one color was less intimidating than the other. But both gray and green burned with a deep intensity you couldn't fully comprehend.

"Really?" Shouto deadpanned. "I've been inviting you to stay with me in my office alone, after hours, for months now, and you didn't take that as a hint that I was interested in you?"

"I just thought you wanted some company while you ate," you admit quietly, still staring at Shouto much like a deer caught in a set of headlights. "And that you were like, really bad at crossword puzzles."

Shouto groaned miserably, closing his eyes and letting his head fall back onto the floor with a loud thunk.

"I didn't want just anyone's company," he sighed. "I wanted yours, specifically."

"Oh," you replied, stunned. "Then why didn't you, you know? Ask me out? Let me know that you were interested?"

"I thought about taking a more direct approach," Shouto says, staring up at the ceiling despondently. "But my friends told me it was inappropriate to ask someone out while they're working."

"That's true," you conceded. "So what was your plan then, exactly?"

"I was trying to make you relaxed enough in my presence where you would feel comfortable asking me out,"

Shouto said, shifting uncomfortably at your incredulous expression.

"You could have waited one thousand years and I still wouldn't have been able to muster up enough courage to ask you out," you laugh dryly. "But even if your plan had worked, I still signed an employee code of conduct when I started working at Über Munch. I'm not allowed to flirt with customers."

Shouto hummed thoughtfully, tightening his arm around you once more. "I guess maybe it's a good thing we got stuck in that bottle together then, huh?"

"Too soon," you chastised him immediately, eyes wide as you shook your head quickly from side-to-side.

"Right. Of course. Sorry."

Once you were able to move without crying in pain, you and Shouto had reluctantly pried your bodies apart and started acting like responsible adults. Shouto did his official Hero thing and reported your bungled kidnapping attempt to the police while you called in to work.

You'd ended up needing to use one of the Personal Victim Leave days you'd been accruing, which was fine. This was the exact sort of scenario you were supposed to use them for, but you still felt a little bitter because you had been hoping to cash all of them out at the end of the year to pay for holiday gifts for your family.

The next few hours were a blur of commotion as you were interrogated by so many detectives you were pretty sure they had to be bussing them in from the surrounding precincts just to have the opportunity to interview Shouto. But the attempted kidnapping of a high-profile hero was likely a large enough case to elevate someone's career into the big leagues, so you couldn't fault them for their efforts; as self serving as they likely were.

Eventually, you and Shouto had been escorted out of his office so they could start photographing the crime scene; officers delivering you down to a line of ambulances waiting to take you to the hospital for an After Quirk Exposure check-up. All you really wanted to do was go home and sleep for a week, but everyone had a story about some second cousin's friend who skipped the routine examinations and ended up turning inside out or something hours later.

Most of those stories were probably urban legends or some sort of Hero Commission propaganda, but either way they made you just wary enough to agree to climb onto the gurney and accept a juice box and pack of cookies from the paramedic without raising a fuss.

You and Shouto were separated at the hospital, the attending physicians swiveling your gurneys off into separate wings. Shouto was whisked away to the private Hero section of the hospital while you were shuffled into the ER with the rest of the civilians, shoved into a curtained off nook and left to your own devices with a small cup of ice water and a dwindling phone battery.

It was a testament to your exhaustion that you were able to fall asleep even with the cacophony of sounds from the ER filtering in behind your privacy curtain, waking only when the nurses arrived to wheel you around the hospital for one screening or another.

You were on your way back from your third exam, some sort of organ scanning thing you had never bothered to learn the name of, when you noticed that the nurse had pushed you past the corridor that led back to your shrouded nook in the emergency department and towards the elevators.

"Am I going for another test?" You asked in confusion, watching as she swiped her key card across a scanner mounted next to the elevator control panel, selecting one of the numerous unmarked buttons after the scanner accepted her ID with a high-pitched beep.

"No, you're all done for now. We're just waiting for final results to come in," the nurse explained, pushing you out of the elevator doors the moment they opened far enough. "It's been requested that you be moved into a room for security reasons."

"I don't understand. Am I in danger-," your query was cut off as you were pushed into your new hospital room where Shouto was awaiting your arrival, neatly tucked into his own hospital bed. You could tell from the overcrowded cluster of monitoring equipment that they had shoved his bed closer to the far wall to make room for your gurney to be positioned next to his.

"Ah, there you are," Shouto smiled in relief as the nurse engaged the locks on your bed wheels. "Thank you so much for your assistance, Nurse Yamamoto."

The nurse blushed tomato red under Shouto's direct attention, doing her best to hide her burning cheeks behind her clipboard.

"It- ah, it was nothing. Just um, ring the buzzer if you need anything and I'll be back to check on you in an hour?" She stammered nervously, the end of her sentence pitching up into a questioning tone.

"That sounds perfect. Thank you again," Shouto beamed, flashing his teeth in a wide grin that stunned the poor dear so severely she attempted to exit the room by pushing on a door that had to be pulled to open. You grimaced internally in sympathy for her, knowing full well that she would replay that fumbled exit over in her mind every night before she fell asleep.

Once the nurse was safely down the hallway, the squeak of her rubber soled shoes far enough away that you knew she wouldn't overhear, you spun to Shouto with a disbelieving look carved deeply into your face.

"Did you just charm a nurse into letting us be roomies?"

"Please. I didn't just charm a nurse," Shouto scoffed, crossing his arms defensively across his chest. "I also lied a little."

"I can't believe you're this big of a menace," you laugh, flopping back as far as the stiff hospital pillows would allow. "Your PR team must be incredible."

"They better be, for how much I pay them."

You hummed in acknowledgement, looking around his room with a critical eye, noting the immaculate condition of all of the decor and medical equipment, as well as the humongous TV mounted on the wall opposite you; a muted nature documentary flashing across the screen. A large bouquet of blue and yellow flowers were laid next to Shouto's bedside, as well as a carafe of some hot beverage; likely coffee based on the small mountain of tiny creamer tubs stacked up next to it.

"So there's no actual security risk then?" You mumble quietly, fiddling with the edge of your thin knit blanket, doing your best to swallow down the worried lump in your throat. "No sign of Ms. Yokubou or anything?"

"Nothing yet, I'm afraid," Shouto admitted, his face pinching tight with guilt as he examined your anxiously twisting hands. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to worry you unnecessarily."

"It's alright. I've just never been someone's potential target before. It's got me feeling sort of jumpy."

"Understandably," Shouto was quick to assure you. "I guess I'm so accustomed to this sort of thing I didn't really stop to think of how scary it might seem to someone less used to it."

Shouto averted his gaze to the TV for a few moments, flipping to the programming guide channel to allow you the illusion of privacy to collect yourself while you discreetly dabbed the tears pricking the corner of your eyes with the edge of your top sheet.

"So, uh- what was your motivation for moving me in with you then?" You ask, trying to set the conversation back on track after your emotional derailment. "Did you already miss being stuck in a room with me that much?"

"Not quite," Shouto huffed in amusement. "I came to the realization that this was the first time that you and I were both off the clock in the same building. I thought it would be a shame to not make the most of this opportunity to legally fraternize."

"I'm…not sure I'm entirely following your line of thought here," you say, brow furrowed. "You want to what, exactly? Have a date in the hospital?"

"That was my intention, yes," Shouto admitted, rubbing at the back of his neck bashfully. "But hearing you say it out loud makes me realize how silly it sounds."

"No!" You say quickly, shooting up stalk straight in bed, startling you both with the ferocity of your cry. "It's not silly at all! It's kind of sweet, actually. That you can't wait to spend time with me."

"It's just- things are going to get really busy for the both of us now that we're tangled up in a criminal investigation. And I'm not sure when we'll eventually get the chance to be together again,"

"You're right. We should make the best of the time we have together," you nod, rolling onto your side to face Shouto more directly. "And I can say with full confidence that this is the nicest place you've ever taken me. There's a bathroom here and everything!"

"There is!" Shouto laughed excitedly, reaching over to pull the flowers at his bedside into his arms. "And I got these for you, too."

"Really? They're beautiful, thank you," You beam, tugging the collection of blue blossoms into your arms, running a finger softly across a fuzzy green leaf. You notice a card tucked in amongst the blooms and pull it with a quick tug; snorting in amusement at the cartoon stork carrying a blue-bundled baby printed on the front.

"Ughhhhh," Shouto groaned when you showed him the card, scrubbing a hand down his face in frustration. "I asked the gift shop for any bouquet without pink flowers or lillies and this is what they sent. Give it to me and I'll throw it away."

"No!" You cry, pressing the card against your chest away from Shouto's wiggling fingers. "It's mine now, you gave it to me. I'm going to scrapbook it."

"Please don't," he begged, leaning over the rail of his bed to make a closer swipe at the card.

"Or maybe I'll laminate it. Keep it in my wallet for good luck," you muse with a hum. "Would you sign it for me? That would really increase its sentimental value."

"You want my autograph?" Shouto asked, arm paused mid-grab as he stared at you searchingly- for what, you weren't entirely sure.

"No. I want you to sign the card you gave me," you clarify, pulling the card away from your chest and sliding it into his hand. "That's just good manners."

Shouto pulled his hand back, eyes softer than they were just a moment ago as he opened up the side table drawer and pulled out a hospital issue pen.

"You're right. I apologize for my oversight," he said, quickly scrawling on the inside of the card with a speed born from years of practice. You snatched the card back from him as soon as he held it out, excited to see the message he wrote.

'Congratulations, it's a boy!

(The boy is me)

Love, Shouto'

"I'm definitely laminating this," you whisper to yourself, cheeks aching from the force of your smile as you tuck the card safely back into the bouquet and clutch it to your chest protectively.

"So, what else do you have planned for our date?"

Dinner was up next, not because you were necessarily very hungry with the swarm of nervous butterflies you had fluttering around in your stomach; but because a member of the kitchen staff had let themselves into your room to take your meal requests.

"You know, I sort of thought by how much fancier the Hero rooms are that you guys would get better food too," you say, spooning another mouthful of the thin vegetable broth into your mouth.

"All the hospital food comes from the same kitchen. The meals for Heroes aren't any better in quality, but we are permitted to have as much as we want," Shouto explained, prying the lid off of a pudding cup and giving it a tentative sniff. You decide to follow his lead and shift your focus to your dessert, a parfait that was mostly yogurt with a bit of granola sprinkled on top.

"This is actually turning out to be a pretty good date," you say when the TV starts showing a commercial for a local refrigerator repair service.

"You think so?"

"I do," you assure him. "We've even hit two of the major date features you mentioned before. We're having dinner together and you got me flowers. The only thing missing is the music."

"I can fix that," Shouto says as he reaches for the TV remote and punches in the code for a music channel. A music video starts playing; starring a man with bright green skin wearing sunglasses on the beach, flanked by a line of women in bikinis.

"Girl, I think your Quirk must be Twerkin', because your booty really knows how to work it-," The man sang, slapping the right buttcheek of the dancer closest to him.

"So romantic," you sigh, holding a hand to your chest dramatically.

"I'm changing the channel," Shouto grimaced as the camera panned away from the singer and zoomed in on the background dancer's wobbling butts.

"You can't! 'Twerkin' Quirk' is officially our song now, Shouto!" You laugh in delight, soaking in his misery like sunbeams on the first warm day of Spring.

"Everytime I think something else couldn't possibly go wrong, it does," Shouto lamented, a pained look on his face as they began spraying the bikini dancers with champagne while they gyrated next to a sports car with spinning neon rims.

"It sure does seem that way," you agree, fishing out the lone blueberry from the bottom of your parfait. "I'm probably going to have to reevaluate my opinion of this date now."

"Has it finally sunk low enough to earn the 'Worst Date Ever' award?" He sulked, flinging the remote down onto the end of his bed irritability.

"It's definitely cinched the nomination for 'Most Memorable'," you tell him with a smirk, putting your dessert cup down so you could reach across the space between your beds to offer him your hand. The feel of his hand in yours was already a familiar thing; your fingers at home twined together. "But I don't think any date could be bad, so long as you're with me."

"I think you're giving me too much credit, but I'll take it," Shouto grunts softly, deflating down into his pillows to watch the finale of the music video.

"I'll let you take as much credit as you want so long as you take me on another date."

"Agreed," Shouto replied instantly. "And I promise, it'll be better than this."

"I don't think you'll ever be able to top this," you laugh brightly, heart thumping happily as you bury your nose into your flowers and watch as the singer on screen smears oil across his chest while a confetti cannon fires behind him.

"But I can't wait to see you try."

#pigeoncoos #bnha x reader #bnha x y/n #bnha x you #mha x reader #mha x y/n #mha x you #bnha x self insert #mha x gender neutral reader #todoroki shouto x you #todoroki shoto x reader #shouto todoroki x reader #shouto x reader #todoroki shouto x reader #shouto x you #shouto x y/n

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blade-that-was-broken · 7 months ago

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John hardly said a word on the plane ride home.

He barely said anything for the entire time leading up to the plane ride either.

There had been quite the process to get his brother out of there and Bruce heard so many different things he could barely keep track of them all.

They explained about different resources for Bruce's brother, the medications he needed to take, the exercises that he needed to do. They told him to make sure he got involved in a group and a hospital and he should probably continue some physical therapy. They tried to tell him a bit about the adjustment that this could be and a bit on what he could possibly expect. They explained a bit about John's history, although not much, most of the file he was given was kind of blacked out.

He had been a lot of places.

There were commendations too, although Bruce wasn't entirely sure what each of them were. John didn't look at the file and Bruce didn't ask.

He had a smaller bag and a large duffle and that was it. That was the whole of his possessions. Ten years and that was pretty much all he had. Bruce was told that if John didn't stay on base for trips and leaves home, he was staying with one of his squad mates or disappeared. He always came back when he was supposed to so no one seemed to care where he went.

Bruce thought he'd have to contact some of his squad mates at some point. It would probably be good for them. He hoped that some of them were still alive, at least. He saw a few pictures. There was a retired sergeant, Pete. Maybe Bruce could find him. Bruce wasn't sure how close John was to any of these people. There was a young man in his squad that barely looked older than Branch.

Bruce didn't know how to feel about that.

Bruce was warned that he might not talk much, although it would come in bouts. Pretty much everything was up in the air. They also told him that it was likely he was very, very happy to see Bruce. Every one of the nurses and attendants pretty much knew how much John loved his brothers. Apparently, he had pictures of them as children. It made Bruce feel worse. They tried to assure him that it was mostly chalked up to the shock of everything that had happened, the sudden changes - in both his life and mood swings - and depression in general. Everything had changed for him.

John mostly slept during the flight but seemed to awaken the moment they started their descent. Or at least, that was what John told him. "We are landing," he muttered under his hat.

"What?"

"We are starting to land," John repeated, taking the hat off of his eyes and placing it in the pocket of his jacket.

He wasn't wrong.

Brandy was waiting at the airport for them to take them home. John didn't seem to realize who she was until they were standing right in front of her. Probably Bruce's fault; he hadn't really told him or showed him what she looked like. They had barely talked at all and he didn't really know how to talk to him anymore. Bruce kept telling himself that the nurses and therapist warned him about that. That for a bit, he was going to be pretty quiet and he wasn't going to want to talk about personal things.

"Hello, hello!" Brandy greeted, giving her hand for a shake but then hesitating. "I'm Brandy! You're John, right?"

"Yes, ma'am," he nodded, shaking Bruce's wife's hand with a surprising ease despite his unsteady balance.

Brandy flushed and chuckled. She glanced at her husband, almost proudly. "You hear that, Bruce? He called me ma'am."

Bruce tried not to roll his eyes but let out an amused smile.

"I won't be any bother," John promised, making Bruce's expression fall a little. He was worried about that, for some reason, although Bruce wasn't entirely sure why. It was like John felt he had to make sure that he wouldn't be considered a nuisance or was worth keeping around. "And I can pull my weight... so to speak. You can put me to work and I can be a help."

Brandy glanced at Bruce, a little confused. "Well I'm sure... we can find somethin," she replied slowly. She always seemed to understand what Bruce was trying to get across. "It's good to meet you, John. I am very glad you are here. Let's get you settled at home, alright? I hope you don't mind a little mess. Our kids are... they can be rambunctious."

John shrugged lightly before following the couple towards the doors, Bruce insisting on taking his bag. "I don't mind at all. I have a surprising amount of experience with kids... not including the buncha boys in my platoon that could barely get up at a decent hour."

Brandy laughed. "Our boys can get up at an hour... well, it might not be considered decent. Perhaps pre-decent."

"I can probably fix that."

Bruce coughed. "What?"

Brandy just looked over at John curious and amused as they headed to the car. "Oh? Do tell!"

#soldier on au #jd and brandy are gonna hit it off mkay?#bruce is just confused #idk maybe clay reunion next time?#What would ya'll wanna see #I'm probably just gonna do mostly random snippets #so prompts open i guess?#john dory #brandy #bruce trolls #jd just being out here like i will be of assistance #i will help you can't stop me

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genshin-scenarios · 1 year ago

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Reunion: Preparations for a Trip [Part 6]

Read the first series (Adopt a Wanderer) here! An AU where Scaramouche/Wanderer gets isekaied to your world - a found-family series.

Summary: You have an audience with the Dendro Archon, and make plans to travel to Liyue!

Warnings: contains spoilers of Wanderer’s story in the archon quest!

Wordcount: 1473

Part 1

Part 5 <-

After deciding that you’d like to travel to Liyue since you were already in Teyvat, Kuni was quick to find an excuse to leave Sumeru and accompany you. One condition he hadn’t foreseen though, was Nahida asking to be introduced to his ‘new friend’.

The dendro archon is not what one would call severe or intimidating. Despite her powers over dreams and reading people’s minds, she is known as a benevolent and kind god. You said the same when Kuni asked for your opinion on Nahida, which is how he finds himself in his current predicament - watching you and her hit it off in conversation. Namely conversation about him.

Nahida has the gall to ask you about what foods he likes, what he does in his free time, and other meaningless details that you for some reason are perfectly happy to divulge. Kuni thinks this is an invasion of privacy, while you think Nahida is just asking this for fun, seeing as anyone that observed him for long enough would know the answers to these questions.

“Are you done?” Kuni speaks up from the side of the room, where he’s been lounging in perfect distance to overhear everything. “When you said you wanted to meet Y/N, one would expect you to ask about them rather than me.”

“But they’re the only person that knows you so well! How could I pass off this chance?” Nahida chimes back with a smile. “I’m just glad that your relationship seems to be good. You hadn’t thought of anything particularly negative even though we were gossiping about you.”

“And tell me why were you reading my thoughts instead of theirs?”

“Because I can’t.”

The surprise in the room echoes with resounding silence. Nahida muses to herself, placing her teacup back onto its saucer.

“Lesser Lord— Nahida.” You try to suppress your confusion. “You can’t read my thoughts?”

“Nope. This is the first time I’ve encountered this, too.” She taps her chin. “Perhaps it simply has to do with your origins from another world. I’m a little disappointed, seeing as your dreams would’ve been very interesting to explore. With that said, this means my ability to help you find a way back home might be more limited than I thought.”

Kuni tries not to appear too relieved at that statement. You do the same, though both reactions don’t go unnoticed by Nahida, who takes another sip of tea to mask her amusement.

“Well, would you look at that?” Kuni says. “You’re not as un-extraordinary as we both thought.”

“It’s good to know you’re always my number one supporter at times like these.” You deadpan.

True to her prior agreement, Nahida doesn’t push about your mysterious source of information or attempt to seal you away. She can tell you don’t pose a threat to Teyvat in general, and seemed to be quite conscious about guarding your knowledge about the future.

All in all, a responsible person. Nahida arrives at her verdict. “Your condition seems healthy, so there should be no issues with you traveling around nations. So long as you don’t do anything that spreads the awareness of your knowledge to other parties, Kuni should be able to keep you safe. Just let me know if you ever need help with anything! I’m willing to write off the next few weeks as community service on his part.”

Nahida really does feel like Kuni’s guardian figure at times like these; their interactions are pretty wholesome.

“Thank you so much!” You bow your head in respect, before turning to Kuni. “See? That wasn’t so bad.”

“Speak for yourself.” He rolls his eyes before walking towards the exit. “If that’s all, I’ll just wait outside. I’m sure there’s stuff you want to ask the God of Wisdom.”

“We won’t be long!” You call out to Kuni, who waves his hand over his shoulder dismissively. Once he’s out of the room, you peer at Nahida - your previous confidence and bravado settling into something more nuanced. “I… I’m sorry if my presence here - in general, causes any complications.”

“I already said that you’re welcome to continue your stay, and I meant every word.” Nahida meets your gaze warmly. “Though I do not share the same burdens of knowledge as you do, my intuition tells me that you mean well. And if you could earn Kuni’s trust, that only furthers my judgment.” She trails off, refocusing the conversation. “...But that’s not what you wanted to ask me about.”

There are a hundred questions you’d like the answer to, such as the science of what allowed you and Kuni to meet all those years ago. But instead, you ask Nahida something that only you can decide for yourself. Such are the woes of human worries, to hope for an outside source to reassure or make grating decisions for you.

“Do you think I should distance myself from all this?” You purse your lips. “I’m sure you can tell that the Traveler will be an important part of this world’s future. Maybe I should just live a quiet life until I’m returned home, and avoid interacting with those who are a part of their story.”

“Would that involve leaving Kuni behind?”

Feeling a lump in your throat, you look down at your lap. “Technically speaking, none of us would remember anything once I go home, if things worked the same as before… It’ll conclude like none of this ever happened.” That would also mean we’re spending stolen time.

Nahida reaches across the table and places her hand over yours. It’s small, but comforting. Like a leaf offering shade to a tiny animal. “Is that what you want, or are you simply feeling guilty about gaining positives from this situation?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Think about it this way.” Nahida says. “In a world where so many things are out of our control, would it be so selfish to claim what we can as ours, and spend our time doing what makes us happiest?” Her voice falls quieter. “Sometimes it’s not about what’s wrong or correct, but what’s right for us. You would not be the worst person for living by that reasoning.”

What decision would make you happier, and what feels right to you?

Dropping Kuni all of a sudden without asking for his opinion beforehand… after all he’s done for you, would most certainly feel ‘wrong’. Treacherous, even.

It seems you’ve come to a decision after all.

“How was the talk?” Kuni asks as you pick out supplies from a shop. You seemed a little happier after leaving the room with Nahida, who bid the both of you a safe trip in advance.

The Dendro Archon also asked for a souvenir as part of his ‘assignment’, but that’s the least of his worries for now (he’s quite sure you’ll end up buying things for Nahida anyways, with how fond you seem of her).

“She really is wise - and kind.” You smile, a bit of cheek entering your tone. “It does feel a little like nepotism to have the chance to meet her, though. You’re quite connected, ‘Hat Guy’.”

“I’m not even going to ask how you know that nickname.” He sighs, but is otherwise satisfied with your answer. Looks like whatever question you had for Nahida has been aptly answered. “There’s still an entire day ahead of us. If we leave now, we can arrive at Liyue before dinnertime.”

“Sounds good! Just let me pack some items from home and I’ll be good to go.” Your chipper mood comes to a pause as reality hits you. “W-Wait… we’ll be walking, right?”

“The entire way. Running included for you if we run into any monsters.”

“Suddenly, I’m starting to feel like being a homebody isn’t so bad after all…”

“If you hurry we can hitch-hike on someone’s carriage.”

Giving Kuni a salute, you duck into the treehouse as soon as you reach the door. “Aye aye, captain! Ow!”

Kuni gives you the grace of ignoring how you ran into the table. “By hurry, I meant under fifteen minutes. I’d like to not lug an unconscious person to Liyue.”

“You should’ve said that before I mortally wounded myself!”

“If you can still talk, you’re fine.”

Shenanigans aside, Kuni realizes this would be your second time going on a trip together. There’s no train to take or websites to book last-minute accommodations, but the look in your eyes says you have a pretty solid idea of where to go and what to do.

Hah, it seems that even now, you were still the leader in some ways. It doesn’t feel too bad, though. Things are a little less boring when he’s around you - whether it be in the way you treat him, react to his comments, or your outlander origins. It feels a little bit like having a ‘home’.

-> Part 7 (finale)

#genshin scaramouche x reader #kunikuzushi x reader #wanderer x reader #genshin wanderer x you #genshin impact balladeer #genshin x reader #genshin writing #genshin reader insert #genshin impact imagines #genshin imagines #genshin x you #traveler wishes

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meguemii · 1 year ago

Text

Hardly Friends.

04. Girl Talk!

Pairings: Megumi x Reader, Nobara x Yuji (mostly platonic)

Synopsis- Megumi and Y/N used to be inseparable as children and just started drifting apart when they start high school they meet again in college. But you are roommates with each others best friends. Nobara drags Y/N to a party one night without knowing Yuji had asked Megumi too, they start their journey to regain their lost friendship on a two week trip.

Awkward silence was all there was for the first 15 minutes. God must have truly hated you and is making you pay for some mistake of the past you thought. It was almost physically paining you.

Trying to take your mind off of this awkward situation, you pulled out your laptop from your carry on bag and plugged headphones into it so you could watch a movie. It was starting to take your mind off of Megumi. About another 15 minutes had progressed and you felt a heavy weight hit your shoulder. Never had you ever tensed up so quickly.

Slowly moving your head you see Megumi had passed out on your shoulder. What do you even do when something like this happens. Wake him up? Just let him sleep and pretend he’s not there? His hair did smell really good, he smelled really good i’m general. He wore a summer-y cologne. Maybe you’d just go with the second option.

“Wake up sleepy heads, we landed!” Some jerk shouted jolting you awake. Not even phased by it, it’s not like this isn’t how you’re woken up every other day anyways. When did you even fall asleep? The movie had started replaying so it must have been about an hour ago.

The weight of Megumi’s fat head was lifted as he groaned and started to get up. Neither of you two said a word about it either, and you planned on keeping it that way for the rest of your life.

The four of you made it out of the airport and called a taxi to take you to the cabin you’d be staying in. No plans for the day, all you wanted to do was sleep. It was about 2pm when you had gotten to the cabin and now you guys had to discuss the living situation for the next two weeks.

“Okay, so it’s two bedrooms and two bathrooms. Obviously there is a kitchen as well as a living room. Also a built in theatre.” Megumi explained. “Don’t forget there’s a hot tub and pool!” Nobara shouted full of excitement. Yuji perked up hearing that and got excited as well, the two did a lil dancey dance. “I don’t care what room I have as long as I don’t have to room with Yuji. He snores AND sleep talks.” Glaring at him as he ignored you still sharing the hot tub excitement with Nobara. Nobara’s face dropped and quickly said “nose goes”. Megumi sighed at grabbed the bridge of his nose. “We’ll I was assuming it would be Y/N and Nobara, Yuji and myself anyways.”.

Yuji and Nobara ran to claim the better bedroom that would be yours for the next two weeks, leaving you and Megumi standing there.

That awkward tension was back now, both just looking at the other lost in thought but then Megumi opened his mouth to speak but you also did the same. In unison “I’m sorry for falling asleep on you” “your hair smells really nice”. What the fuck? Why did you say that? You meant to also apologize. Dumbfounded he gave you a puzzled look and thanked you. “Yeah, your perfume smells nice.” That wasn’t the reaction you thought it would be, you assumed he would have told you to fuck off and leave him alone. “I’m gonna go find Nobara.” quickly turning on your heel and speed walking away, face all rosy from the heat that resides in your cheeks.

Few hours had passed and it was about 10pm, Yuji and Megumi had left a little while ago to get dinner and explore. You and Nobara had opted out and wanted to relax for the day, it had been pretty long so far.

“Wanna use the hot tub? I’ve been dying to all day.” she asked. “Yeah sure” you said getting up off of the bed and grabbing your swim suit, then heading to the bathroom to change.

Meeting Nobara over at the cabana where the hot tub and pool were. “Aw! that’s the swim suit I got you for your birthday!” You gushed over Nobara, you had thought she wouldn’t like it because it wasn’t really her style. “Yes?! It’s my favourite, I just never really use it because I didn’t want to wear the elastics out! Also holy shit?? That bikini is so sexy!!” Ogling at you. A skimpy red bikini with black lace. “Haha yeah. I bought this the last time Yuta invited me over to Maki’s” you giggled sheepishly.

The two of you relaxed in the hot tub, sipping on a glass of red wine. Classy. It had been about a half hour and the both of you were a bit tipsy and having small talk. “So, you and Megumi??” That caught you by surprise resulting in you spitting out some of your drink. “What??!” You laughed uncomfortably, “Me and Megumi? absolutely nothing, just people who are in the same friend group.” Nothing was there between you and the raven haired boy.

“Don’t give me that! I’m not stupid! I see the way you look at him. I also hear the way he talks about you.. all the time.” The last part she said almost annoyed, he talked about you? All the time? You were so confused, you didn’t think you looked at him a certain way. “Okay first off, I do NOT look at Megumi ANY kind of way.” pausing for a moment to think of your next words. “Secondly, do not play with me! Did Yuji get you in on this?” You asked her as she cocked her head to the side like a confused puppy. “Yuji didn’t get me in on anything, what?” There’s no way he didn’t.

“Girl Megumi always talks about how he misses the way you guys used to be.” she paused to sip her glass. “He also always asks me about you, it was cute at first but then it just got annoying.” Your mouth hung open and your heart started beating quickly. You burried your face into your hands. “Y/N, I love you hunny but OPEN YOUR EYES GIRL! You’re oblivious clearly, but not dumb!” she shouted jokingly. The alcohol in your system was not helping the situation. “Do you think he thinks i’m hot?” You blurted out. “I should hit on him.” words you never thought you’d say starting falling from your mouth.

Nobara giggled out a “yes”. “You definitely should!! He wants you so bad!”. You giggled causing Nobara to giggle too which was followed by extreme laughter. “I love girl talk.” you said and she agreed.

Yuji and Megumi watched from behind the glass door confused on the sight before them. The two girls doubled over in laughter, clearly drunk. “Why don’t we do stuff like that?”

“Shut up Itadori.”

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Half proof read idk😓

I think I finally established Nobara and Y/N’s friendship, I had already done so with Megumi and Yuji but didn’t think there was much between Y/N and Nobara so girl talk!! I also tried to add more things to lead yours and Megumi’s “friendship” too a different kind of awkward, more sexual tension? Next chapter will have more of Y/N and Megumi I promise! I know there hasn’t been much of the two yet even though the story is literally about Y/N and Megumi. OKAY BYE BYE ❣️

#jujutsu kaisen #jjk #megumi fluff #jjk fluff #jjk x reader #jujutsu kaisen x reader #megumi fushiguro #megumi fushiguro x reader #megumi fushiguro x yn #megumi x reader #nobara kugisaki #nobara #yuji itadori #itadori #yuji

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weirdowithaquill · 5 months ago

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Do you have any headcanons for Duncan and Cody?

Thank you for asking, I do! (And to clarify, I'm going to guess this is a Duncody (Coduncan?) ask, though they will get separate headcanons too.)

Headcanon 1: Duncan doesn't get with either Gwen or Courtney post-canon. If we ignore Season 5 (more on All Stars later), then we end with him sort of with Gwen - only, I can't see that lasting. It's a rebound for both of them, and worse yet: Gwen regretted it. She regretted it during Season 3, and had they not been on a reality show, she'd have probably either cut and dumped, or tried to fix things with Courtney. Post-canon, both girls cut things off with Duncan for good over one thing or another.

Headcanon 2: Cody is a major flirt in Season 1 to cover his social anxiety. This is a teen who lives with family who are definitely well-off and also very neglectful. He is literally playing a part that he's seen on TV before, and trying his best to fit in. And had he not been mauled by a bear; he'd probably have done rather well! I mean, he had stopped pestering Gwen and promised to put in a good word for her!

But seriously dude, you were so out of your depth.

Headcanon 3: Duncan's parole officer is the person who Duncan first told about his sexuality. Chris claims that the parole officer is his best friend after the doctor challenge in Season 2, and that tells me that these two have a close friendship. Furthermore, Duncan actually seems excited. So these two are friends - which may be because said parole officer is the only person Duncan can actually talk to. His parents don't like his delinquency (his father specifically), so there is probably tension there, making the parole officer someone to talk to; someone for Duncan to share his secrets with.

Headcanon 4: Cody is a Total Drama equivalent of Tim Drake, minus the whole Batfam thing (and the stalking). We know that his parents are extremely neglectful - I mean, they forget their own son's birthday! - which sounds familiar. Secondly, both characters have wealthy parents who go on long trips without them. Both have trouble with socialising normally when first interacting with people outside their families (flirting uncontrollably and being the world's biggest awkward muffin and saying "hello, I know you're a superhero and I saw your parents die. Can you control your other parent who has gone off the rails after your adopted brother died"). That is not normal!

Oh, and both are bi icons.

Headcanon 5: Cody knew Trent and Courtney pre-Season 1. All three are noted as being on the wealthier end of the spectrum, and considering how his parents treat Cody, it's likely he shares the unfortunate fortune of also being wheeled out at every social event for networking purposes. He knows the two of them, but he knows Trent better. Trent is far more chill than Courtney, and was closer. It's why Cody is in a position where Gwen respects that he will 'put in a good word' with Trent.

Headcanon 6: Duncan and Cody like each other as friends in the early seasons. Remember, Duncan was ruthless back then, especially to those he saw as weak or nerdy (Noah, Harold) but he leaves Cody alone. Chalk that to being on different teams or whatever, but Duncan also (in one version) wins Season 2, and I'd put good money on Cody voting for him. And this goes without mentioning the fact that he is very perturbed by Sierra in Season 3. Which leads me to...

Headcanon 7: Sierra is the reason behind Cody swearing off women, as well as Duncan getting closer to Cody. This woman literally drugged Cody, not to mention kidnapped him, stalked him, violated him multiple times, and generally disturbed him. She also fueled Duncan, Courtney and Gwen's drama with glee - which is great for reality TV, sure - but it's also pretty shitty to wade into that explicitly to cause more issues. By the end of the series (in spite of Cody's punch), Duncan is on Team Cody. Whether or not it's cause he likes Cody or hates Heather and Alejandro is debatable, but he's still there.

Headcanon 8: Cody did legit punch Duncan (though he claimed he took a dive), but not cause he liked Gwen. Ever been so annoyed at how stupid someone is that you hit them? Yeah, it's that.

Headcanon 9: Duncan accepted this. Eventually. It took him getting booted and seeing just how stupid he was to realise, but he did. Yeah, Cody did have to do some groveling and apologising, but they managed to figure themselves out. And it was actually that punch that earnt Cody Duncan's respect!

Headcanon 10: without Season 5, they two get together a few years down the track, staying friends after TDWT, catching up and discovering they aren't too far from one another. Cody is there for when Duncan and Gwen break up, and helps them stay amicable. He's just there in general, and they just... fall in love. By this point, Gwen is friendly enough with the pair to give Duncan the shovel talk for Cody and all is happy!

But Season 5... Well, it gives us something interesting to work with, because it fully ends the Duncan drama, and isolates him from the others before dropping him in jail. But it does more than that: it puts Cody firmly back in Duncan's mind... again, thanks to Sierra. That woman is still coo coo for cocopuffs over Cody, and its shoved in his face constantly. It pushes Duncan to reach out to Cody afterwards, to check on him. And then... well, that's a thought for another day!

#weirdowithaquill #tdi duncan x cody #tdi duncan #tdi cody #tdi courtney #tdi gwen #td sierra #total drama #very long post #headcanons #Sierra needs so much therapy #tdwt #tdi #I randomly mention Tim Drake

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quietwingsinthesky · 1 year ago

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Do you agree w/ the fandom interpretation that john was so homophobic he’d have beaten up and abandoned his sons for being gay? Cause sure, he grew up in the 60s as a mechanic and then later became a marine during the vietnam war, but i also don’t think homophobia would’ve necessarily been a priority for him? Like obviously he’s not gonna be the full on supportive and politically correct loving dad, but i think that the fandom’s general opinion on that is pretty warped by people’s relationships w/ their own fathers

I do think this is one place where people tend to project. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that; working out our issues through fiction is healthy and good! I don’t think there’s any canon proof of it beyond, as you said, him being a marine from the sixties who would probably not be super knowledgeable about being queer, maybe a little apprehensive about it from what he’s absorbed through the culture he grew up in. I think we’d be correct to point out that if Sam or Dean were queer, he might be uncomfortable about it, he might try to avoid the topic, which is in of itself hurtful.

The thing about me is: I fully disagree that John was ever physically abusive towards his kids. At most, I will bend this interpretation to say he was probably too harsh on them while teaching them to fight and that maybe he and Sam have traded blows before when arguments got too loud (by blows, I mean, probably shoving with the yelling, you know, assertion of physical space. It seems realistic to me that two people who have been using violence for a long time to protect themselves, and for John, his family, down to the hierarchal power he’s put in place of him -> Dean -> Sam, would resort to it when things got too heated.)

(I also think that sometimes fandom’s insistence that John had to be physically abusive can sometimes get a little insulting because it perpetuates the idea that emotional abuse does less harm and can be overlooked and for flattening out John’s character in a way the show very literally pointed to and said He Did Not Do That. This is the entire point of Max’s episode in s1, for the show to point out that their experiences of abuse were different. How well it was handled is arguable, but I take it as clear evidence that when we talk about John’s relationship with his sons, the focus should be on the emotional abuse, the codependency he developed with Dean from a very young age, his neglect of them both, his attempts to suppress Sam, etc. And I appreciate this about the show, because you can’t talk about any of those things without also talking about why they’re happening, why John thinks this is necessary, how he loves his sons and isolates them to protect them and ends up doing more and more damage that will never leave them through their entire lives.

I’m sure there’s depictions of John being physically abusive that handle it with the same amount of nuance that the show handles him being emotionally abusive in canon. I have not seen them, unfortunately. I’ve seen John being physically abusive 90% of the time just being used as shorthand for him being Bad and Evil and A Terrible Father. Which does not interest me. So I will remain here as a staunch defender of He Would Not Fucking Hit His Kids.)

Sorry, okay, we got off topic there this is about gay shit.

The point of All Of That was for me to be able to say, John’s not going to react to his sons being queer by beating them. He’s definitely not going to abandon them. Hello? John Winchester? Abandon his kids? John Winchester, the guy who has been keeping them in warded up motel rooms their whole lives and moving them across the country out of paranoia the demon who killed his wife could find them if they say anywhere too long? John Winchester who only trusted one or two people to ever look after his sons when he went on a hunting trip too long? We think that John would ditch his kid because they’re queer???

Like I said, I think the most realistic reaction for John, (if not just flat out him going ‘that’s fine, now load this gun while I time you because that’s more important for me to know that you can do’, because. He kind of has bigger priorities to worry about here. Like werewolves.) would be discomfort and pushing it out of his view, ignoring it. Which would still fucking hurt! And would have horrible effects on Sam and Dean both, would encourage Dean to repress it if he thinks his dad is ashamed of him, would push Sam away if he trusts John with this fact about himself and can’t be accepted easily.

I just think this is truer to John’s character.

Anyway. If nothing else here persuades anyone reading that John Would Not Fucking Do That, well. He thought his kid was demonspawn, remember? He thought Sam was corrupted and might not be able to be saved. I don’t think you can get more clear queercoding than that, and you know what John’s very telling response was to that information, to finding out something a thousand times more terrifying than Sam being gay ever could be? To refuse to look at it. To insist to himself that whatever Hell wanted with Sam, he wouldn’t let it happen. To tell Dean to take care of it, because even when John is certain that his son might literally become a demon, he could never bring himself to pull the trigger on him. Because he loves Sam.

So like. He literally would not do anything for the much smaller realization that Sam is gay. His son has demon blood that might turn him super evil, and John still wouldn’t hurt him.

I guess what I’m trying to say here is, I try to keep the fact that John loved his sons at the forefront of my mind when I’m writing stuff about him, because I think if you let that slide out of your head, you can very easily make him much worse, much more flat than he was in canon. The real picture of him is just an extremely flawed man in a terrible situation who fucks up his kids as much as he protects them.

And also he wouldn’t care about them being gay because JohnAzazel real and true and they fucked sloppy in that hospital basement-

#this was so many words holy shit I did not need to ramble that much #but I did <3 #this is what u get when u send me an ask I have too many thoughts #john winchester #ask #spn #again reiterating that like. it is not a bad thing to work out ur issues through fiction.#hell knows I do. and hell knows I used to be a lot less kind to John BECAUSE daddy issues. so I get it. it’s literally fine. it’s fandom.#u are free to do whatever so long as you aren’t a dick to other people about the character they like that you dont #(…I am going to side eye you if you feel the need to insist john had to be physically abusive because he was just That Bad to his kids.#but that’s more like. ‘I think you might have some unexamined biases about the nuances of abuse.’ more than anything.)#tw abuse #re: John abandoning his kids:#I know Bad Boys(?) has John leaving dean at the boy’s home. uh. personally?#I think that’s just bad writing. I think they misunderstood John’s particular brand of weird relationship to dean.#I don’t tend to count that instance as canon or at least not in the way the show presented it.#but ur mileage obv may vary. it’s just my opinion that that was a later seasons fumble.

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hbosscreations · 2 months ago

Text

Fixing Hellblazer: Dead in America

Apparently I'm not doing being negative today, so I'm going to channel my bullshit into fixing things.

Let me tell you a bit about me. I love bad horror movies. I LOVE horror movies that aren't great, but you can see how they COULD be great under different circumstances. My favorite thing to do for years was take a movie that wasn't good and think about what needed to be done to fix it.

Dead in America actually has a pretty simple fix that would help with the rewrite. You'd have to rewrite the whole thing, this draft isn't salvagable, but if you really want to tell the story about American Racism, it's such an easy fix, I don't know why they didn't do it in the first place.

Make Noah Ikumelo the main character.

Seriously. That's the big change.

Maybe he's not the focal character for the entire 11 issue run, but have him be the perspective of at least one issue instead of the random racists that keep getting their stories told like we're supposed to care about them.

Issue 1: Flee

Tommy is dead, K-Mag is dead, they're on the run, and John says 'well, I've got friends in America who could help us out'.

Noah's scared, Nat's scared, John seems to have a plan. So, they're off to America with no money, no papers, nothing but the clothes on their backs.

It's okay at first, John's magic lets him manipulate people a bit, gets them through security checks and keeps them fed, but it's definitely not enough to keep them safe forever.

Noah has a bunch of exposition he gives about being black in the UK, about being disabled, about his feelings about his mother (being a cop, being in a coma, being weird about magic).

How he has always felt unheard until John came into the picture and saw him.

They're traveling, the fear starts to wear off, Noah realizes they've fled the country and his mother is alone.

Where's his gran? This is a point to show flashbacks. Maybe she's not mentally all there? Maybe Noah has been sleeping on John's couch. Maybe he's been learning magic during the months we don't see in the original run. Not a lot, John tells him that he likes that Noah's not really involved in this shit.

Until the murder dreams, when Noah starts getting a crash course in magic and hasn't had a chance to think about anything except John and his stupid plans.

The issue ends with them on the freight ship they stowed away on approaching the docks. They've arrived in port, and it's time to leave. John puts his hand on the double decker bus and reassures them both that he's got this. He's got a plan, and things are going to be okay.

He looks fondly at Noah, and Noah wonders if he can trust that face. Can he believe John?

He doesn't really have a choice, does he?

Issue 2: Where is everyone?

This issue is mostly from John's perspective and his narrating voice takes control again.

John reaches out to old contacts. They're gone. Dead or never existed in the first place. No capes and cowls in this universe. Just magic, divinity, and damnation.

They're fucked.

Meanwhile, Noah and Nat both realize that they're being treated differently than John is. Both have experienced different types of prejudice based on race, gender, disability, and now there's an extra layer of it. The American layer that the story really wants to talk about.

John gets a little, but it's pretty clear that people are generally cooler with a blond haired, blue eyed, white man with an accent than they are with Noah's lack of speaking and Nat's heavy Glaswegian accent.

There's a level of cruelty that makes being trapped in another country, unable to call anyone and tell them that you're alive, unable to know if your family is safe, unable to know if you were even a suspect in the crimes committed, extra fucky.

John's contacts he'd normally call are all of touch the easy way.

So, fine. If he can't call them, he'll go to their usual haunts and track them that way.

Hence, road trip.

This leads into the actual comic scene where John is in St. Augustine, Florida and talking to the statue.

You can still have the Girl Scout come and be cryptic and cruel, have John losing his shit over the fact that he's damned Noah to hell.

(Or we can include my favorite headcanon that Noah was supposed to be a tulpa designed to distract John. I don't know if it would work here, but a story about a kid literally designed to be a sponge for prejudice and cruelty might be a mirror this story about racism could play with. It would need a MUCH more competent writer than me and at least two sensitivity readers.)

Noah wants to pull over for a hitchhiker, they've got the space and he's kind, but John cautions him that America is VERY different from London. We learn that Noah has not traveled much outside of his home city if at all because of his mother's profession and then her coma, leaving him in the care of his gran, who lived on the estate and therefore didn't really have much in the ability or desire to go far.

The dream with Dream still happens, which gives us a nice connection to the previous story as well as John's whole...being dead thing. They're looking for the sand, they're looking for friendly faces, they're looking for magic in a world that John quickly realizes is GASPING and DYING.

Because the multiverse still got punched in the dick by Tim Hunter, and while this world hasn't been hit by him specifically, it's feeling some of the multiversal repercussions of an apocalypse that massive.

And John doesn't have the power to get them out of this while he's a corpse. The longer he rots, the weaker he gets.

Dream gives his orders. John agrees.

They wake up, Noah is being threatened by the cop because he's black and driving a bus. We don't make it about the cop being too stupid to know what a bus is this time, instead, we make it because the bus looks strange and 'why is a black boy driving a bus unless he stole it? obviously he's a thief and he's refusing to speak out of disrespect'.

That fucking sucks, but it also works more to the actual threat of racism in the US. The OTHERING. They're dangerous because they're OTHER. They're lesser because they're OTHER.

Nat keeps the cop's gun after he's frozen. She's freaked. Noah's freaked.

John calmly tells them the spell won't last forever and they need to drive. Nat goes to the wheel and we watch Noah sneak up to the upper level and cry.

John watches from the stairs until he's sure Noah is asleep. He doesn't know how to offer this particular kid comfort, how to offer to hold him without revealing his death or just being too attached.

We see him put his coat over the boy as a symbol of protection. He brushes a hand over Noah's head and asks Dream to look out for the kid.

"I know you're pissed at me and I don't really have the right to ask, but hasn't he had enough nightmares for now?"

Noah's dream about all the horrible things he's processing from the previous issue, the previous run, and that night melt into something more pleasant. Maybe the groundwork for him learning John is his father.

John is back with Nat as she's driving. She's angry. The conversation from the original issue can stay and be expanded on. John tries to comfort her, tries to ease the tension, and it eventually works.

She gets what he's doing, even if he's not doing a good job.

This is a Classic John Constantine who cares about other people but isn't necessarily good at showing it.

The sun starts to rise.

"Where the fuck are we going now? We're a target in this thing, John, and that cop's gonna call us in."

John reassures that they're fine and he's got a new plan.

Most of the hero types don't exist now, but that's fine. He's started to tap into the multiversal memories that he'd repressed in the 2019 issue, and he's pretty sure that he's got a friend who will exist in this universe, even if people like Zatanna and Superman don't.

After all, the Green is a multiversal constant.

This leads into the ending of the original issue 1, with the swamp being filled in and turned into a golf course.

And that ends issue 2.

I don't know if I want to invest energy into re-imagining the entire run, and I suspect that would require the run to be finished before I can properly fix anything except the opening. If you actually read this...sorry about the way it's written, this was all just thought to typing, so it has 0 polish.

I think this is a series that could have worked under different circumstances. I think there are elements here that are good, but this was clearly not written with any real oversight or a coherent story beforehand.

I would have loved for them to learn magic on the bus. Scenes of Nat and Noah picking up spells, Nat teaching Noah the proper way to throw a punch that won't fuck up his hands. Noah being REALLY good at making sure they all manage to eat properly (I am deeply invested in this child shoving oranges into people's hands because 'do you want scurvy?').

A scene of John teaching Nat sign language while Noah slept because he's already so isolated and they all need to take care of each other. Nat forcing John to drive, only for him to hit a car and immediately switch back to her driving. Nat reading a novel aloud to keep Noah awake while they drive at night.

Basically, we need to make them seem like they're actual people who actually spend all of their time trapped together.

Also, does John eat? How have they noticed that he doesn't eat? Does he sweat? If he showers, does that damage his skin and hair, since he's apparently molding at the start of the series?

#Lore is Writing Again #Hellblazer dead in america rewrite #John Constantine fanfiction #Noah Ikumelo #I'm not saying I could fix it #but I think I could make it something I hate less #and in the end isn't that what fanfiction is?

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kylesvariouslistsandstuff · 11 months ago

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Long post and hyperfixation/infodump session incoming:

It's reminiscence time again... A) Life hasn't been great as of now, and B) I saw something pretty cool the other day...

So, there's a free book online called DRAWING FOR NOTHING, which was compiled by an individual named Ziggy Cashmere. It is a book chronicling unmade animated movies, or animated movies that got - more or less - cooked into something else...

The book, so far, has a treasure trove of concept art and stories for ME AND MY SHADOW, FOODFIGHT!, B.O.O.: BUREAU OF OTHERWORLDLY OPERATIONS, THE INCREDIBLE MR. LIMPET, JOE JUMP, DREAMING MACHINE, DRAGON'S LAIR: THE LEGEND, JACK AND BEN, CAPTAIN FANTASTIC AND THE BROWN DIRT COWBOY, and HUCK'S LANDING...

All kinds of animated films from different eras, some that weren't made, some that were re-imagined as something else entirely...

And their work isn't over yet!

The Drawing For Nothing's twitter account is posting all kinds of cool, unearthed stuff...

And the other day, they found some conceptual work for an unmade Disney animated movie called AMERICAN DOG...

Actually, AMERICAN DOG kind of... Was... Made?

This film was to be directed by Chris Sanders for Walt Disney Feature Animation, his sophomore directorial outing following the success of LILO & STITCH. If all had gone according to the plan, this movie would've likely debuted around fall/Thanksgiving 2007-ish, maybe a little earlier. Things were a little more fluid back then, when it seemed like The Walt Disney Company were to lose Pixar after their contract was up. Either way, it was aiming for 2007.

Of course, a lot had changed at Disney Animation after Michael Eisner was essentially ousted as CEO of the wider company. After Bob Iger succeeded Eisner, one of his first big moves was acquiring Pixar for over $7b, in early 2006... And then that move lead to the studio's veterans and founding fathers John Lasseter and Ed Catmull becoming the heads of that studio, on the heels of critically lambasted films like HOME ON THE RANGE and CHICKEN LITTLE.

And they took their way of doing things at Pixar with them, infamously. Chris Sanders was given lots of notes on AMERICAN DOG throughout 2006, until Lasseter took him off the movie at the end of the year. Lasseter had "reasoned" that the movie was "too quirky for its own good", and that Sanders wasn't getting it to where it needed to be. This was a shocking blow to animation fans everywhere, that not only was Sanders removed from his next movie, but that he was also leaving Disney Animation for DreamWorks. (Where he currently is at the moment, in twenty-twenty three!) Yet some suggested, "They're from Pixar, maybe we should trust them?"

Lasseter then had AMERICAN DOG completely re-imagined, working only off of the core concept of a dog TV star going on a cross-country trip with some animal friends, into an entirely new movie called BOLT.

Directors Byron Howard and Chris Williams, both first-timers at the helm of something, brought the film to the finish line for Thanksgiving of 2008 to critical acclaim and even an Oscar nod, but a low final gross at the box office... While it was generally liked, there was a sort-of lingering feeling of what kind of movie AMERICAN DOG would've been. BOLT has often been compared to it, negatively, because visually it's just sort of... There? It looks nice, it's cute, the animal character design is pretty appealing, while WDAS was still working out CG human designs pre-TANGLED. Some of the extras in BOLT are little strange-looking to these eyes, to go off on a tangent.

Anyways, the short version: BOLT's fine, but what could've been... AMERICAN DOG...

There have been other pieces of concept art for AMERICAN DOG that have available to view for years, especially pieces from when the movie was still in development...

So, now... I want to talk about the days when I first came across this project... Around November/December 2004...

At the time, 12-year-old Kyle was beginning to look up upcoming movie slates and such on various movie news websites. Stuff like ComingSoon-dot-net and stuff like that. Box office was reported in many places, not just the usual suspects...

I had already seen THE INCREDIBLES maybe three times in theaters by this point (I saw it *five* times on a big screen total, during its one and only theatrical release), and that movie really rocked my world. It still does. I'm a huge fan of THE INCREDIBLES, and its sequel too. I was endlessly influenced by the movie, and it actually legit excited me at the possibilities of what CG animation could... Even though this was an era of hand-drawn animation being ushered out...

Still, I saw a lot of potential CGI before we got glomped with a ton of kiddie talking animal movies and such within a few years, that kinda cast CG in a more negative light online. It already got so much blame for ending 2D, for merely existing, so the kinds of movies that came out - like a dam burst - around late 2005-2007 certainly didn't help...

Anyways, I wanted to know... What was next???

For Pixar, since it seemed like they were splitting with the Disney Co. at the time, the future was a little less definite. A teaser for CARS was running before THE INCREDIBLES, and after that the plan was for RATATOUILLE to be next... Which it ultimately was. This was back when Jan Pinkava was still directing the movie, before he got taken off of it in early 2005 and replaced by INCREDIBLES director Brad Bird... And a lot of it was changed after that. Back in late 2004, it was simply a movie about a rat "living with" an eccentric famous chef.

Of course, per the original contract that Pixar signed with DizCo (to borrow from Steve Hulett, to save syllables), Pixar couldn't make any sequels to their hit movies. DizCo had those under lock and key if Pixar were to split with them, and they planned on taking advantage of that... DizCo opened up a CG animation studio called Circle 7 Animation, and tasked them to make TOY STORY 3, MONSTERS INC. 2, and FINDING NEMO 2... Quite different ones from the movies we ended up getting. At this stage, TOY STORY 3 might've still been about the whodunit story set at Andy's grandmother's house... Or, it had become the infamous "Buzz Lightyear recalled" story that got the green light.

Other studios had slates of sorts. DreamWorks, in addition to having MADAGASCAR and Aardman's WALLACE & GROMIT movie lined up for 2005, had OVER THE HEDGE and RATROPOLIS (changed to FLUSHED AWAY) on the horizon. They also had multiple SHREK movies lined up, up to five and a direct-to-video origin movie about Puss In Boots. KUNG FU PANDA was entering development at this time, but it wouldn't be announced officially until about a year later, ditto a few other pictures. Donkey made an appearance on the studio's CG animated primetime NBC sitcom FATHER OF THE PRIDE (a real trip of a show), in an episode that aired 9/21/2004, and remarked "But let your kid know that SHREK 3 is coming out in 2006!"

Other stuff was coming, too. Sony was getting OPEN SEASON fired up, I think Imagi was getting started on CAT TALE, there were a bunch of other random movies here and there... Most of them not made, I reckon...

Then there was Disney Animation's future stuff...

CHICKEN LITTLE already had a teaser that I first saw on the spring 2004 BROTHER BEAR DVD, and there was a much faster-paced trailer playing before THE INCREDIBLES (set to R.E.M.'s 'It's The End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)'). Next up were likes of A DAY WITH WILBUR ROBINSON, AMERICAN DOG, RAPUNZEL UNBRAIDED, and FRAIDY CAT I believe was announced as well.

I caught glimpses of AMERICAN DOG, and saw this particular action-packed image:

And I was draaaawn in. I was already hyped about how THE INCREDIBLES did such dynamic action, and this piece was reminding me of the scene where the Parr family use a news trailer to weave through Municiberg traffic to find the Omnidroid. I like a good car chase, so this was exciting.

At the time, I was already writing lots of stories about dogs, cats, stuff like that, dogs running away from dogcatchers and such. I was literally writing and picturing all these action sequences because THE INCREDIBLES really lit up my imagination on how action scenes could be done, especially in animation. All the wild angles and camera pans and swoops, it's like I was Incrediblizing everything I was writing at the time, my 12-year-old brain was just sooooo influenced by it. It was a formative film for me, m'kay?

Moving on... I was kind of in-and-out on what was happening with AMERICAN DOG once Chris Sanders was fired from the movie. I had found out that it become BOLT a little before the first trailer debuted, and I remember being down on it. Not to mention, I was going through a lot of other things at the time and I was kind of out of the loop on what was going on. There were some bad vibes going around in the circles too, that BOLT was sure to be bad because it wasn't AMERICAN DOG. It created a sense of "this is what we got instead", like we see a lot nowadays... And I saw the trailer before WALL-E in theaters, and just was not impressed.

The marketing for this movie was so weird. The posters, which pushed a lot of heavy reds, seemed to pass this picture off as "Dog INCREDIBLES". Anyone who has seen BOLT knows that the superhero stuff is literally a TV show he stars in, but the posters and covers really make it seem like it's a super-pets movie or something. And Disney had already done that live-action UNDERDOG movie a year prior. We were kind of at the tail-end of that weird period of Disney's movie output, the remains of the Eisner years and some very strange greenlights... I was starting to see movies in theaters again, following a depressive period where I didn't really go out in public much. And I was kinda softening on BOLT, but I missed it in theaters. I would later get the Blu-ray, as a blind present, around the end of 2009 I wanna say? And I finally gave it a watch, and I really dug it! I still do, actually, even if it is rather standard and workmanlike. Part of me assumes that Disney Animation, after years of critical and/or commercial bombs, were intentionally making something very familiar. Something cute and Disney-like and digestible, a fun little dog movie, as a way to ease back into the swing of things and get audiences to see their movies again.

After all, their last string of movies were... MEET THE ROBINSONS (lost money), CHICKEN LITTLE (made over $100m domestically but barely doubled its budget worldwide, got terrible reception), HOME ON THE RANGE (critical/commercial dud), BROTHER BEAR (critical flop but made its small budget back), and TREASURE PLANET (infamous massive bomb)... Maybe the rationale was, "Let's just make a classically Disney dog movie, but with some stuff that people like about the movies we make at Pixar!" It does feel a little assembled, it does feel like Lasseter using stuff from the movies he directed/oversaw at Pixar, mixing them with some "Disney" elements. The light satire of Hollywood and network television was an extra touch that gives it a little bit more flavor. In a way, I get it... Disney Animation hadn't had a genuine big hit in *years*, and maybe the thought process was "let's just make a straight-up family movie about a dog". Not something a little weirder or wilder, certainly not the utterly gonzo stuff Sanders was coming up with... But maybe, if they had taken a chance on it and kept the budget reasonable, they could've had a bigger hit on their hands? Who the heck knows...

BOLT ended up making around $309m worldwide against its $150m budget (I wonder how much of that came from the thrown-out AMERICAN DOG, since that got *very* far in pre-production), and managed to have spectacular legs in North America after such a blah opening weekend. I guess it's kind of a flop? Underperformer? The Hollywood math changes for each and every movie, it seems. But I think the positive critical reception and Oscar nod were taken into consideration, and so the movie was probably viewed as a stepping stone to the likes of THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG, TANGLED, WINNIE THE POOH, and WRECK-IT RALPH. The so-called "Revival"...

But I would loooooove to visit an alternate universe where AMERICAN DOG *did* happen. And that it was the unhinged Chris Sanders movie it was looking to be. Maybe not an alternate universe where David Stainton is running Disney Animation, by all means he really had to go. Lasseter was not exactly an exemplary replacement, as we'd learn in later years, but someone should've let the movie happen. I think a second Sanders WDAS movie could've not only been a major hit, but it could've down as one of Disney Animation's most interesting and experimental films... Much like his own LILO & STITCH was! And to think John Lasseter despised that movie... It's no wonder Sanders left the dog movie and left the studio, though he did negotiate with Lasseter to keep at least one of the characters from his concept and use it elsewhere... Namely the one-eyed cat who became the main character of his comic, KISKALOO.

Sanders made some really cool movies at DreamWorks. HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON is good stuff, and THE CROODS is a lot of fun. I even enjoyed that live-action CALL OF THE WILD movie he did for 20th Century Studios, with the CG'ed dog... And I'm excited as heck for THE WILD ROBOT, his third DreamWorks movie... But, part of me feels like AMERICAN DOG would've been Chris Sanders at his most Chris Sanders. Something totally uncorked and wild and unlike anything else... Whereas, two of his DreamWorks movies are based on books, and the other was someone else's movie first. He had expressed interest in turning KISKALOO into a feature, and if he gets to do that after WILD ROBOT... At DreamWorks... That would be pretty amazing, honestly. It'd probably be the closest thing we get to what AMERICAN DOG was shaping up to be...

Anyways, I wanted to talk about where I was at with upcoming animation in 2004 as a young, weirdo enthusiast... And just talk about an unmade movie and the director's stuff in general and such. Hope you're having a great holiday!

(And go read DRAWING FOR NOTHING!)

#american dog #bolt #disney #disney animation #random thoughts #rambling #long post #long post is long

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easypeasylindyvesey · 5 months ago

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I Think it’s Strange We Never Knew: Jimmy Vesey x fem!OC

Summary: After the unforeseen death of Abby’s boyfriend, one of the NHL’s star defenseman and her teammate, she severely struggles with managing her grief. She confides in Jimmy Vesey, who is not only another teammate of hers, but is one of the very few people she has a strong friendship with. That is until that night and the days that followed. Does this life-altering news change the trajectory of their personal perceptions of each other? Or does it entail a chance of crossing boundaries for the risk of moving on?

Word Count (excluding title and heading): 9,650

*(General) Warnings: (foul) language, mentions/discussion of death, suicide attempt (brief, closed door description), eventual confession of feelings, grief, panic attack(s), angst, eventual sexual implications but no smut, age gap

*Note: This story takes place in the future. Abby is 24-25 and Jimmy is 33-35.

JULY 2027 (Warnings: (foul) language, mentions/discussion of death)

“Okay, wait, hang on a sec,” he says in positive disbelief. “You’ve been here for over 2 years, and are just realizing this place exists?”

I roll my eyes. “I know it exists. Central Park’s just always been my go-to.”

“And yet, you hate the sight of more than 20 people in a 100 foot radius of you.”

“Yeah, well, today’s one of the rare times where it’s acceptable.”

It’s July 4th, and we’re spending our evening at the Hudson River park. I always knew how passionate New Yorkers are about pretty much anything, but they take lots of holidays to a whole new level. They’ve got the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade, outdoor ice skating during Christmas, the Times Square ball drop on New Year’s Eve, and loads of fireworks for Memorial Day and today. Last year, I spent it sitting on the porch of Ryan’s lake house in Minnesota with him, his family, and hometown friends. We shared the hammock while I wore his ratty crewneck and watched the different colors have their chance of stardom and illuminate the sky. They put on a great show, although for most of the time, he was watching me watch the fireworks, perhaps wondering if he could recreate the mesmerized yet engaged look on my face. We lied down in the hammock after the fireworks were gone and just listened to the sounds of the crickets and bustles of the wind and the chatter inside, with lots of laughing and passionate conversations. It was only until the lights were fully turned off in the house that we quietly made our way back in, tiptoeing on the wood floor and suppressing our laughter as we crept into our room and engaged in a sloppy yet intense make-out session, stifling any potential outbursts of excitement so that we didn’t wake anyone. Shortly after, when we both got startled by what we thought to be the sound of footsteps on the floor, only for it to be a group of squirrels chasing each other outside our window that we forgot was open, it seemed like sleep was the best option since it was the last day of the trip before I went back home to Long Island to be with family and friends for a few weeks. I wonder if his family’s still celebrating. They did invite me this year, but I declined, which they understood. I’m still not ready to leave my comfort zone just yet. At my session yesterday, Dr. Meadows and I talked about how we need to embrace the uncomfortable feelings until we become comfortable with them. It’s definitely a good lesson to learn. I just feel like it’s taking longer than it should. I wonder if he thinks so too.

We’re sitting under a tree, watching the sun peak through and give the leaves their chance to shine. We each brought our own towels and CAVA bowls, as we made a pitstop for dinner. The Statue of Liberty is within plain sight if you squint hard enough. So are the buildings. The water is moving calmly, and it comes as a mental shock when the depressed voice in my head isn’t telling me to jump over the guardrail. Here’s another thing I learned from Dr. Meadows: Depression does not primarily constitute of negative feelings. Some days will be good where you don’t even remember the reason why you’re sad, and other days will feel like the ones in the spring. There’s somewhat of an equal balance, and you just have to sit with those emotions for however long they last. It’s not supposed to last forever, but I can’t help but be afraid of the fact that it just might. I had that realization two months ago, but I was thinking illogically with my head and not my heart. There’s a chance I still am, and I just don’t know it yet.

Jimmy’s been on a CAVA kick recently, and he’s got me to thank for that. Whenever we don’t feel like cooking or putting in any effort, we just order on the app and drive down to pick it up. The bowls are filling and packed with flavor. It’s probably not the best idea to have it once a week, but first of all, it’s summer, and second of all, you only live once. I’d rather indulge too much than not often enough.

“See, it’s not too crowded,” he pipes up, acknowledging the surprisingly sparse crowd. Come to think of it, everyone’s probably off to watch the Macy’s fireworks show further down the waterfront. The park is its own entity. It surrounds the river, but doesn’t take up the entire 315 miles that it encompasses.

“Guess we got lucky,” I reply, biting into my pita.

“Do you wanna move to get a better view once it starts or do you just wanna stay here?”

I lean my head back against the tree. “Let’s just stay. The only time I’ll move is if the ice cream truck comes rolling down.”

He laughs. “Okay, deal.”

The park does their own fireworks show. The only difference is we get a water view, which I think is pretty convenient because you get to see them spread out across the whole sky. There’s never going to be a long period of time where the sky is dark, even though we have at least an hour until it turns into a different shade. It was kind of a last minute idea, but spontaneity never results in bad memories, at least that I know of.

It’s around 8:15, and the show begins at 9:00, so we cherish the last bit of daylight and watch the sun go down over the horizon with the hopes of it returning tomorrow. Unfortunately, the ice cream truck never showed (lame), but we did find a food truck serving churros and cotton candy. We both went with churros because they’re less heavy on the stomach and somewhat easier to eat, and we sat back down in our spot, where a whole new influx of city goers infiltrated their way to sit in front of us with their lawn chairs and dogs on their leashes and a large pack of Corona. I told Jimmy to go snag one for himself as a joke, but he suggested that I might need it more than him. I would hate to ruin the taste of delicious, cinnamon-dusted sticks with a dehydrating, disgusting beverage. I’ve sniffed an empty bottle before, and I will never forget the dull stench. It’s a no for me.

I watch him looking at this family looking out at the water from behind the guardrails. His hat is blocking any noticeable expression from his eyes, but I can’t help but feel bad about how he hasn’t gone to see his family yet. I know he’s called and FaceTimed and texted them, but it doesn’t radiate the same energy as being immersed in their presence. I haven’t seen my family since Christmas, which is heartbreaking. If I went forward with the plans of going to Montauk with Adam and Tate during Memorial Day weekend, maybe I could’ve stopped in for a day or two. Then again, we all know what happened that week. I can’t keep making it an excuse, and I swear that I’m not trying to, but that’s literally how everything has been sent into a downward spiral since his death. I’m not as organized and responsible, and it’s been harder to talk to them. I’ll just stick with daily harassing my roommate and see how it goes from there.

I nudge him in the arm. “You okay?” I ask. He’s obviously not. Should that even be a question?

I’m met with his eyes, which tend to look a lot bigger when he wears a hat. He’s been rocking them lately. I’m unsure of the reason, but I guess he wants to bring back his frat-boy era. Although he might be older and more mature, I doubt it’ll be something he’ll outgrow.

“Yeah,” he mutters quietly.

I want to bring up again how he’s allowed to leave his own place whenever he wants, but we already settled on why both of us haven’t attempted on doing such. I think the routine’s already become redundant to the point where we feel forced to repeat it, even though no one’s holding a gun to our heads. There’s so much of New York to explore, but it feels like we’ve adjusted to the city life where we don’t know if there’s anywhere else we should go.

“Have you talked to them recently?” I ask yet another question to continue the conversation. He considers family as one of his biggest values, and not being able to be surrounded by them on a holiday brings me more guilt than I expected.

“Yeah, I talked to my mom this morning. She said she hopes you’re doing alright, to which I said you are.”

I tilt my head. “You really think so?”

“It’s baby steps, but yeah. Guess the medication’s helping in a good way.”

Yeah. I guess it is.

“Did you get a refill at your last visit?”

“Yep. Just opened it yesterday.”

“Good. See? I told you it wouldn’t be so scary.”

“You think taking pills are scary?” I question uncertainly. “You had the front row seat to it all.”

“Actually, now that I think about it, yeah, I did,” he says with the tiniest grin on his face. It’s meant to be a tease, but I still can’t shake the idea of him viewing and judging me with this new perspective that thinks otherwise.

The sky is close to going fully dark, and the tiniest of stars appear. It would be such a good night for stargazing. I’ve always wanted to do that: lie down and stare at the sky while just talking about anything and everything with that one person. There’d be no range in what could be discussed; no room for worrying about what comes out of whose mouth and no effort required to maintain it. It’s an endless flow of random, reciprocated exchanges that don’t need to be explained. All that’s required is someone that’s going to be worth the time and attention. And for close to 22 months, I had that someone.

And I know damn well that time will never be substituted with another human.

“Thanks for suggesting this,” I tell Jimmy as I finish my churros. I’m so tempted to buy another selection, but I force myself to restrain.

“Yeah, you got it,” he replies, looking out toward the horizon. You can see the buildings lit up with some boats in the distance. Most people in the park have become quiet, as we’re all anticipating the show to begin any moment now. “Figured both of us would want something lowkey.”

“You figured right,” I confirm, readjusting my sitting position by bringing my knees curled up to my chest. He’s outstretched his entire body on his towel that his feet are the only body part of his touching the grass. I should’ve brought a longer one for him given how tall he is, but I’m sure he won’t mind the millions of mosquito bites he’ll feel tomorrow morning.

The sound of the first array of fireworks illuminates the sky, earning a lot of shocked gasps and “oohs” and “ahhs” from the crowd, with the polite action of clapping and whistling. It really is a beautiful sight. Here comes the second. Specks of yellow, orange, and purple dance across in the air. The same actions repeat. It goes on for several more instances until crackle and comet fireworks successfully intertwine and literally take everyone’s breath away. The planning into a proper execution of stuff like this is worth the extended preparation. It’s even more worth it this year. I wonder if he helped out from above.

I nudge his arm again. “How did you know this was going to be so amazing?” I whisper as a singular firework sounds off.

He leans toward my ear, his mouth almost touching it. “Heard about the turnout from last year. Better than standing on the side of the street and watching them. Thought it’d be more subdued.”

I return my attention to the display.

Now it’s his turn to nudge me. “You havin a good time?” It’s so hard to hear over everyone voicing their approval for what they’re seeing.

“Yeah,” I somewhat yell back, just so he can hear me. “Is that surprising for you to hear?”

He shakes his head, leaning his mouth to my ear again. “Not at all. You deserve it. We deserve it.”

Well, that’s certainly one thing I can agree with.

Quiet settles in as the show continues. This state really knows how to entertain. It’s rarely ever of a let-down and more of a feeling of rejuvenation. I know that I’ll be looking at every holiday differently now (well, mainly Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, and Valentine’s Day), but maybe it’ll be in a way that will benefit me and give me feelings of hope rather than despair.

I watch him watching the fireworks. He’s completely immersed, and he’s calm. That’s something I feel he hasn’t been in a long time. It feels more natural, more comfortable to talk to him, not really worrying about a potential fight. I think we subconsciously agreed that going at each other’s throats wouldn’t be the best answer. We still have our walls up, but have lowered them in the slightest of ways to make room for each other. It’s a start, and I know that I have not, under any circumstance, earned his trust back, and it’ll take longer than a month and a half (in estimation). He has no right to return it to me. I won’t be mad.

The only thing I will be mad about, however, is if we keep going through this pattern of tolerating each other one day and avoiding contact the next. I don’t want to blow it again. He’s taken up too much of a responsibility to be looking after me, and he’s doing all of it on his own. I don’t care that we’re adults. He should’ve never had to worry about me no longer being asleep in the next room and having more of an empty space he’d feel the need to fill.

And so for the next 20 minutes, we watch the epic conclusion of the fireworks that grace their way atop the river in silence. We don’t feel the need to speak. Instead, we enjoy each other’s company.

Once the show ends, we fold our towels and put them in the tote bag that I brought and discard our food containers in the trash can. Making our way through the crowd, walking briskly, we cut through the trees and benches and back to the side street where the Jeep has remained. Jimmy unlocks it and I throw the bag in the backseat before jumping into the front, shutting the door as he turns on the engine.

He fumbles through the radio stations before picking one that’s playing 80’s hits, specifically “Born in the USA” by Bruce Springsteen, which fits today perfectly. He turns on the headlights and looks in the rearview mirror, trying to detect if there’s enough room for him to pull out onto the street. “That was fun,” he speaks, shifting the car into drive once we’re safely strapped in and carefully moving around the car parked in front of us.

“It was,” I agree.

“We should do more of that,” he says. “Us making plans to hang out. I think it’d motivate us to keep going even when we don’t feel like it, you know?”

“Yeah, definitely.”

I tune out any exterior noise and focus on the tires gliding on the road, the music playing from the speakers, the occasional taps of the steering wheel to serve as either impatience or silently jamming out, perhaps both.

I break the silence. “I know that I can go to you if I need to talk, but I guess I should say that the same goes for you.”

“Yeah, I know,” he replies.

“So you’ve never slept on that couch if you couldn’t sleep?”

“No, I usually get out of bed and open up my curtains to let some light in, well, mainly from the outdoor streetlights, and stare out into it until my eyes hurt and then I shut them again and hope I doze off.”

“That’s kinda creepy,” I laugh.

“How in the world is that creepy?” he argues. “Sometimes, my brain won’t shut off either.”

“Then come wake me at 3am.” I feel proud throwing his words back in his face. I give a smirk in his direction, even though he doesn’t notice since he’s concentrating on driving.

“You’d really like that, wouldn’t you?” I can’t tell if he’s joking.

“Oh, you bet my ass I would.”

“Alright, then. Done deal.”

“Good.”

I still feel like he’s holding a lot inside. It might not eat at him now, but it’ll consume him before he even realizes, leaving me to deal with the brunt of it. I won’t nag him unless I have good reason. For now, he can deal with it in the way he likes it best. I’ll just be watching it slowly unfold, prepared to drown when the time comes.

We get home earlier than anticipated, as the traffic started to die down once we entered the suburban area of Manhattan. I’m surprised there’s not as many people out, unless they’re all partying it up at bars or to some equivalent. Both of us walk through the door, equally drained and reminiscent of the newly formed memories. He beat me to the shower, so I watched TV until he finished, and then I quickly took mine without hopefully falling asleep standing up. Even though I rushed myself, at least I didn’t slip on the floor and fall on my ass again. I had a reasonably good day today. I don’t want it to be ruined now. When I walk out of the bathroom, the TV is turned off, along with the lights. I walk to my room before my journey is cut short.

“Hey,” he hisses. The bed is unmade, the only light coming from the lamp on his nightstand.

I hesitantly stand in the doorway. “What?”

He walks over to stand in front of me. “I’m glad you had a good time tonight. I mean it.”

All I do is nod in agreement.

“Sleep well, yeah?” The tiredness is starting to form in his voice.

“You too,” I respond. “If you needa talk, I’m right next door.”

He gives me a cocky grin. “Got it. Night.”

“Good night.”

The door shuts behind me and I walk through my doorway and do the same, flopping onto my bed and discarding the pillows before crawling in. Since I’ve been awake for most of the day and am still on somewhat of a sugar rush, I focus on the tiniest appearance of light emerging from beneath the curtains and make it my gazing point. Hey, if it helps him, maybe it can help me.

Today was nothing close to a failure, I think to myself. I really hope that it can only go up from here.

And for right now, it is. We came to a mutual agreement to plan at least one social outing a week so both of us wouldn’t go crazy and climb up the walls. This past weekend, we took a day trip to Greenwich Village and acted like tourists: shopping, dining, sightseeing, the whole shebang. Luckily, it wasn’t too humid, so it was comfortable to be outside for the majority of the day. Today, we’re planning on going to an outdoor concert in Central Park.

So here I am in the kitchen, changed into my cute little blue skater dress and floral VANS, waiting for the big man to hurry up because he’s literally taking forever for no reason. “I’m literally gonna leave without you!” I yell from the short distance.

“Give me a minute!” He yells back from his room, the closed door barricading any further transmission of sound.

“I’ve run out of minutes, and fucks to give!” I retort back. “Please, can we just get moseying along?”

It’s like the universe heard me because the door opens as soon as I finish speaking. He’s got on a light blue polo and khaki shorts with his black Nikes that don’t really match. Carrying his phone and keys in one hand and his wallet in the other, he’s really looking like a true adult. It also looks like we’re matching. And no, we did not coordinate that.

“Ready to mosey,” he responds, trudging to the door, turning off the light and walking through it. I grab my purse off the counter and follow behind him, shutting the door and locking it before we wait for the elevator. The ride is quick and easygoing, and before we both know it, we’re in the parking lot. We also have another agreement: every week, we’ll alternate who drives. It’s just easier.

Those rules do not apply tonight, however, given the immensely short length of a walk between here and the park itself, so we stay put on the sidewalk, bags in tow (including the one we used at Hudson River), blending into the crowds. Luckily, he’s able to keep up with me, given that I’m a fast walker, and we get a break from people surrounding us on all sides before waiting to cross the street and immerse ourselves with the greenery.

We find a spot not too far from where the concert will take place and put down our towels, sitting down and waiting patiently for it to begin. We got here half an hour early, and honestly, I’m surprised we even got somewhere to sit. I thought it’d be crowded, but I guess there’s some perks living literally 5 minutes away. Both of us already had dinner, so no last minute planning for that either.

It’s been cloudy all day, but the mugginess doesn’t help. I spent some time actually styling my hair to look presentable for myself, and I feel like I could suffocate. I’ll try my best to not do it around him, though. I don’t wanna give him another life-threatening experience of a lifetime.

“Do you know whose performing tonight?” Jimmy asks me.

“I think it’s a mix of everything. There’s some cover bands, rock, indie, all that kinda stuff.”

“That sounds-” He’s interrupted by the blaring of the large speakers. “That sounds great,” he finishes once it ceases.

“Oh, it better be,” I hypothesize. “Anything you’re particularly excited for?”

He shrugs. “Let’s just see how it goes. You’ll be able to tell.”

A quizzical look appears across my face. “I will?” I can’t help but crack a little smile.

“Yeah. I’ll literally be like, ‘Oh, this is really good!’ No beating around the bush, straight to the point.”

“Alrighty, then.” I accept his answer.

“I’m sure you’ll be bopping your head along.”

“Actually, I’ll be tapping my feet if I’m sitting. Also, you won’t be seeing me concentrate on anything else. Maybe, I’ll close my eyes to make the moment last longer.”

“I support that.”

“I’m so glad.” I reach into the bag to retrieve my water.

“We don’t have to stay for the whole thing, so if there’s ever a time where you wanna leave, just let me know.”

I finish taking my sip. “K. Same rules apply the other way around.”

He motions a quick nod before putting his attention to the stage. It looks like the first act is ready to prepare for their performance. Instruments are being brought out and set up in certain positions. Lots of people have stopped from what they were doing and are slowly approaching to check it out. I’m really looking forward to this. It’s a good distraction, and it’s helping me adjust back to somewhat of a normal life. At least it’s starting to feel like it.

The voice of the public address announcer effortlessly flows through the speakers, welcoming us to what is supposed to be a night of “fun, fabulous music, and free memories.” He reads the crowd the lineup of performances and reviews the rules of conduct before introducing the crowd to the first performance, which is the group of individuals that were just previously on the stage. They greet themselves and quickly begin their first song, which is a combination of piano and guitar before it fully shifts to an electric guitar solo, earning positive praise from the concertgoers. They’re kind of an indie pop/rock band, which I found incredibly fascinating, as I’m sure Jimmy did, too. They performed five songs before the next act took over the stage, and the cycle repeated.

My surroundings keep changing by the minute. The sky fades to a full black, people are either joining or leaving, there’s constant sound flowing out of the speakers. It’s one of those rare moments where everyone is encapsulated by the talent they’re witnessing with their own eyes and ears. Distractions are nowhere to be found: no phones, no obnoxiously loud conversations, no negative feedback from the crowd. We’re all here to enjoy ourselves, and it has a different meaning in the summertime. Everyone is given the chance to be freed from their worries, even if it’s just for a couple hours. Music is always one good escape from the reality of any situation. It will forever be a valid choice.

A series of yawns start to take over and I try to force them out as quickly as I can. I might be tired, but I am definitely not bored. This has been an enjoyable experience, and I feel that I am definitely starting to come back to my old self and look for the joy in the small things. I guess not all hope is lost. Not yet.

I turn my head and catch a little glimpse at him again. He’s leaning back on the towel with his hands, feet lackadaisically pointed out to each side, totally concentrated on the melodies and the occasional incorporation of certain instruments. I don’t know if there’s ever been a time where I’ve seen him genuinely enjoy himself, and it might be hard to tell, given his resting face, but I don’t think he’s had to look over and check on me since we got here. That’s a good thing. His heart is (hopefully) returning to the right place.

After a total of eight acts, performing between 3-5 songs each, with an intermission in between, applause is the only thing you will hear in earshot. Heck, you could probably hear it from across town. Whistles and cheers captivate the park as the public address announcer’s voice reappears across the speakers and thanks everyone for coming out and to get home safe. It’s nice how strangers look out for each other. There’s reason to still have faith in humanity, even if some actions can consider otherwise.

The crowd starts to filter out as I sit criss-cross on my towel, looking all around. “Okay, I have to admit, that was literally so good,” I tell Jimmy, adjusting to fix my sandal strap.

“It was great,” he agrees. “I know they did something like this last year. Did you happen to go?”

“Probably not.”

“Well, anyway, if something like this pops up again, we’re going, you hear me?”

I nod enthusiastically. “Like hell we are.”

The air suddenly feels chilly, and I feel something wet touch the top of my head. “Yeah, Mother Nature really couldn’t have waited for the drizzle to start once we got home?” I say sarcastically.

Just as I say that, there’s a brief pause.

It starts to torrential downpour.

“Ah!” I yell, smiling as I grab my towel and throw it in the bag. “You’re fucking kidding me!”

“Jesus Christ, dude!” He lifts up his towel and instead of putting it in the bag, he shields it right above us. “Start runnin!” We moderately jog across the grass and out of the park and sprint down the sidewalk, approaching the crosswalk as he presses the button rapidly for us to cross.

We both take a minute to catch our breath. “That was a good idea with the towel!” I yell to make sure he can hear me over the steady rainfall. It’s literally so hard to see.

“Well, you know, I would’ve brought my umbrella, had I have known!” Jimmy shouts back. “Don’t really feel like taking a shower once we get back, though I’m sure will anyway. This couldn’t have held out, huh?”

“Mother Nature’s got no patience!” I emphasize.

“Damn straight!”

When the crosswalk changes to the red hand, and giving us 20 seconds to cross, we do a combination of skipping and walking to reduce our chances of getting soaked. I guess we’ve both run out of them.

By the time we’ve gotten to the opposite side of the sidewalk, we’re somewhat blindly running in the rain, the towel no longer providing much support. I’m starting to realize that I wore the wrong shoes. We do our best to avoid any puddles, but it’s difficult to follow each other’s movements when we’re directly next to each other.

The good news is that it’s no longer downpouring and it’s changed into consistent showers. We don’t let up the pace we’re keeping, though.

“Currently making this a core memory!” I shout.

“Yeah, definitely!” He responds. “What are the odds, right?”

What are the odds of everything that’s already happened?

What are the odds of everything that’s yet to come?

After what felt like hours, we finally reach the parking lot of the apartment, moving our way through the parked cars and up to the entrance, opening the door and wiping our shoes on the mat before walking past the front desk and placing ourselves in front of an elevator, me quickly pressing the button so that it can open.

Jimmy lowers the towel that was covering both of our heads and leaves it hanging on his elbow. It’s absolutely doused with Mother Nature’s selfish antics. His hair is sopping wet, with tiny curls peaking around the top. The same thing goes for his shirt. Maybe he was wrong about needing a shower.

I, on the other hand, am shivering as we walk into the elevator and it closes around us. You can hear my teeth chattering as my face is stained with rain droplets and my socks filled with the slightest of water. My hair is damp, which will make it harder for me to even get my hair tie out of it, but maybe I just won’t wash it tonight. I’m physically uncomfortable, although, the adrenaline has yet to exit my body.

“You can hit the shower first,” he says. “You’re literally freezing.”

“That should be impossible in July,” I scoff. “I guess I should be grateful that there was no lightning.”

“Yeah, you probably would’ve shut your eyes the entire time, and eventually run into a pole.”

“It’s better than getting struck by it, I’ll tell you that.”

Ever since I was a kid, I’ve always been afraid of thunderstorms. It’s not really the thunder; more of the lightning. Even at this somewhat grown age, I’ll still crawl underneath the covers and bury my head underneath my duvet and close my eyes super tight, facing away from the window so I don’t have to feel the lightning reflect through it. I know it can’t hurt me if I’m inside, but I have to keep telling myself that I’m fine, and I’m safe, and trick my brain into being occupied with something to calm me down. Usually, I imagine someone lying in my bed next to me, that someone being a man, just giving me reassuring touches and holding me from behind, letting me know that it’s okay. To replace that feeling, I take one of my stuffed animals and hold it for a little while, and then once I know the storm has passed, I set it free from my grasp. I didn’t bring any with me to Jimmy’s, so in the worst case scenario that I have to survive an late-night/early-morning thunderstorm in a place that doesn’t have my own bed, I don’t know what I’m going to hold to get through it.

Both of us are back inside now, and I take off my shoes and leave them in their own space on the bedroom rug, leaving them there to dry. I hope that I won’t have to get rid of them. I got them for my 18th birthday, and they’re one of my favorite pairs. Besides, they were expensive.

Grabbing my pajamas from the corner of my bed and a bath towel from the closet, I rush into the bathroom, shutting the door and immediately turning on the water so it can warm up. “I’ll be quick!” I yell, although I’m not sure in which direction because I don’t know where he went.

“Okay!” His voice is coming from his room. It’s weird how it quickly echoes through the wall. I thought they’d be thinner here. Guess I’m wrong again.

The showerhead expels warm water and I rid myself of my dress, bra, and underwear and jump in, feeling the goosebumps from the wet weather peel off my skin and wash down the drain. I focus on washing my face and body and decide to wash and condition my hair tomorrow. It’s close to 10:30 already, and all I can think about now is burying myself under the covers and listening to the rain fall outside the balcony and redirect to the window. It tends to make me feel more relaxed.

After perhaps one of my quickest showers ever, I moisturize and brush my teeth before gathering my outfit and walking back into my room, tossing it in my empty laundry basket. His footsteps emerge out of his room.

“It’s all yours,” I say without looking at him. I’m in the process of closing my curtains. “I’m going to bed. I’d wait till you’re done, but I just can’t do anymore of it today. Don’t fall and you’re fine.”

I hear him laugh in the bathroom. “I won’t. And if I do, don’t even come in. Just call 911. It’ll save me the embarrassment.”

“You’d rather have strangers look at you naked?” I jokingly question. “That explains a lot.”

“Hey, cut it out,” he teases, the door clicking shut behind him.

Once I hear the water running, I turn to face the windows (technically, the curtains), and try to focus on the rain bouncing off the glass. It sounds like it’s drizzling now, so I can relax, although, I’m sure my brain won’t let me until he’s out of the bathroom in one piece. I mean, is there a possibility that he could slip and fall and crack his head open? Yes. But will it happen 9 times out of 10? No. My brain has definitely been rewired. I’m not sure I like how it’s become.

I keep my eyes open, averting my gaze from the floor to the forbidden closet to the edge of the bed. I’m bored. I don’t have any energy to force myself to sleep. I guess the voices will win once again tonight.

I would’ve reached for my phone, but since I turned it off, I go for the remote instead and let the bright screen stimulate my brain. I flip through the channels before settling on “American Dad.” It’s definitely a raunchy cartoon, although you have to admit that it is funny. I keep the volume at an odd 7. That’s my magic number for TV’s. No, don’t ask why. I couldn’t tell you.

Readjusting myself in the bed, I choose to sit up and prop the pillow behind me. I keep my glasses off and consciously choose to get a headache in the late night hours. I’ll definitely feel the effects of it tomorrow morning.

“Hey, Abb, can you get out here?” Oh, please don’t tell me.

“You’re fuckin kidding me,” I whisper to myself loudly, as I leave the coziness of my bed and open the door. He’s standing outside the bathroom, freshly showered and changed.

“What?” I exhaustedly deadpan.

Jimmy motions me into the bathroom, pointing to the tile floor. “Did you know this was cracked?” He’s having me look at the uprooted tiles near the tub that are slightly dented.

“No?” It comes out as a question, but it’s honest. “What happened?”

“You seriously haven’t noticed?”

This is gonna become a huge thing, too, isn’t it?

“No, Jim, I haven’t. We can get it fixed, though.”

“I’m not sure I want to.”

“And why is that?”

“Because that’s the dent your head created when you fell over. You hit it hard enough to literally almost break the tiles.”

I grow quiet.

“It’s been here for the last month and a half in case you cared to notice.” He doesn’t sound angry, but it’s more of like he’s trying to explain something and that he just can’t get the right words out.

“I just want to let you know that everytime I come in here, I can’t help but look at that spot. I’m afraid to even step on it because these tiles are not that sturdy. If one goes, almost half of them will fall through the ceiling of the apartment below us. I don’t really feel like replacing them.”

I shake my head. “Is there a point to this or can I go back to bed?”

“Yes. Look over here.” He’s pointing to the tub now, at the very bottom. I see faint yet dark marks.

“And what’s that?”

“That’s the blood that somewhat stained when you hit your head. It’s gone for the most part, but I’ll try to get it off another day.”

I stare at it.

He motions his hand again. “And then these tiles surrounding the tub were filled with little droplets from your wrist. When you went to bed that night, I stayed up trying to clean it out, but since it was left there for so long, I doubt it’s ever going to fully fade.”

Why is he admitting all of this now?

“Are you trying to make me feel more guilty?” I lean against the doorframe.

He sighs. “I’m trying to make you understand that this impacted me, and I’m met with that reminder every single day. I know I don’t really talk about my feelings much, but I will never view this place the same way I ever used to.”

“Yeah, yeah, it’s because of me, I know,” already fed up with his antics as I turn around.

I feel a hand tightly grab my wrist and have me rotate in the opposite direction, the other hand remaining at its side. “Listen to me,” he says, his free hand touching my chin to force me to look at him.

I fight it off. “Do not touch me,” I say tiredly.

Another frustrated sigh escapes his mouth. I look at him with furrowed brows and a reasonable frown. My chin is lingering with his tough yet loose grip of his fingers. It tickles while feeling like I’m being choked.

“It’s not because of you. It was your mind not being in the right place.”

“I’m not sure I believe that.”

“You are not in the same place you were back then. You’re doing better. You’re trying. I see it, and I’m proud of you. I still have no idea what you were thinking, but this is one of the rare times I will be grateful that you were unsuccessful. In this case, I’m helping you move on from Ryan, and you’re helping me move on from the past version of yourself.”

“I haven’t moved on from him yet,” I find myself saying.

“I know you haven’t. It might not happen until a little while longer, but please, just please don’t rush it. Don’t listen to what I said. I was being a dick.”

“You sure were,” I confirm.

He playfully rolls his eyes. Taking his thumbs, he traces over the outlines of the blade on my wrists. Looking at me again, the sparkle in his eyes has significantly diminished.

“If you ever, ever feel like you’re going to do something like this again, you need to tell me.”

I look down at his light grip on both arms. “Won’t need to worry about that. It was a one-and-done thing. I’ll, uh, I’ll add it to the pinky promise.”

He laughs. “Okay.” It’s nice to see him crack a smile. I feel like he hasn’t done it in forever.

I don’t free myself from the wall right away. Instead, we just stand there, my gaze being directed toward the floor and his lower half where he can’t really catch me looking anywhere.

My voice quivers as I look up at him with glistening eyes. “I never meant to hurt you,” I croak out, my face becoming visibly upset, more wet than it was before.

“No, Abb, I know,” he says as he lets go of my wrists and pulls me into a hug, my face dampening his T-shirt again, only this time, we’re standing up, and I have full control of what to do next. His hand makes short, slow movements down my back, taking a loud breath. “I know. It’s okay. We’re okay.”

That just makes me cry even harder, but not in the way I did once I collapsed on his floor by the kitchen chairs. “Are you sure we are?”

“As of right now, yes,” he says soothingly, his hand continuing to move. “Unless you want to go full survivor mode on me again.”

I laugh through the tears. “No, I’m good. One time is enough.”

Pulling back from him, he assesses me head to toe, and then moves his thumbs to underneath my eyes, wiping the tears away so delicately, so easily without a change in facial expression. He then rests his hands beneath my shoulders, his warm touch sending me into an absolute oblivion. Luckily, I don’t have to tilt up to look at him because he levels his own face to mine, bending his knees in the process.

We just stare at each other. No words. I’m legit frozen. At the point, only he can unfreeze me.

The exhaling from his nose somehow finds its way to bounce on my own face, twitching both of my eyes. I feel like I’m here against my will. I have to leave. I have to go now.

I part my lips ever so slightly. “Jimmy, can you let go of me?” I meant for it to come out louder, but my voice is temporarily stuck in low power mode.

He quickly releases his hands. “Yeah, sorry.” It comes out flustered. My skin still burns.

He reaches his arm above me to turn off the light, but doesn’t back up. I guess he’s waiting for me to leave first.

“Y’know what?” He says, his arm still remaining in the air, fingers entangled with the light switch.

“God, Jim. What?” I’m unamused.

I can’t even see his eyes anymore, but his head has barely moved. “You can go back to bed now,” he announces snarkily.

I roll my eyes and turn around. “Finally.”

“I saw that, by the way.” His footsteps trail behind mine.

“I don’t care. You’ve held me hostage for the last 20 minutes, hell, probably longer.”

“Really? I thought time kinda stopped, didn’t you?”

“Well, it’s time I can’t get back now, so thanks for that,” I say with the slightest of attitude, shutting my door for the second and final time tonight.

“Anytime.” His door shuts now, too.

All I can do is stare at the TV and not even move to the bed. I’m left standing on the carpet like a statue.

What the hell was that?

I’m definitely overthinking it, and I’ll be devoted to figuring out its hidden meaning, if there is any, for the next few days. The simultaneous familiarity and unfamiliarity of his contact has me wondering if he’s changed how he views me. There’s the obvious answer, which is yes, and then there’s the not so obvious answer, which is actually posed as a question.

Have I changed the way I view him?

—---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

When the final full weekend of the month arrives, both Jimmy and I agree on an evening stroll through East Village, and ending it the way we did when we first were here four months ago: pizza.

Sitting in the stuffy, crowded, yet delicious smelling joint, we enjoy our slices while conversing about anything and everything. I remember back in March, this exact scenario occurred, only that time, there was barely any discussion. We were still processing what happened and how new it was. No playful banter could’ve saved us from the feelings of dread that scattered around like ashes.

That reminds me that he’s buried deep in the ground. Well, it’s only his body anyway. To me, his soul is still alive. I try to catch glimpses of it in everything I see or do. I don’t believe he’s come back reincarnated as an animal yet. I’ll be patient. It is a virtue, after all.

“My dad texted me today,” Jimmy says, breaking the crust of his slice.

I raise my eyebrows while sipping my water. “What’d he say?” I’m actually kinda curious.

“Well, he asked me when the hell I’m coming back home, to which I said ‘I don’t know,’ and then he got annoyed. I know I told you my family’s aware of what’s going on, but I’m sure they’re thinking if I’ll actually get to go visit them in person.”

And so the guilt resurfaces.

“But,” he says with a tinge of hope, “he did let me know that there was a couple who canceled their trip to Martha’s Vineyard in mid-August. Since we can’t fit the whole family in, and it’ll be too short notice, he suggested that maybe we could reserve it instead. Of course, that’s if you’re comfortable with leaving.”

Damn, that really does sound like a good time. It’s a mini vacation out of the city. It’d be a good escape for my mind, a great place to rejuvenate.

“How long is the trip?” I feel that’s a good first question to pose.

“A week” are the words that come out of his mouth.

An entire week?

“Specifically, the week before training camp starts.” he interjects. “We’d get there on Monday and leave Sunday.”

I click my tongue, showing my internal debacle that is obviously invisible. “I don’t know,” I say with defeat.

“Abby, c’mon,” he says sadly. “Vacation’s almost over. We need to make most of the time we have now, because once camp starts, all our schedule’s gonna consist of is practice, practice, practice. We’re not gonna have the luxury of taking a trip up there. It’d be too much, too stressful, and then we’d have to book it on our own time. You really wanna wait till next summer?”

“Everything could be different then,” I say with the tiniest bit of anxiety.

“That’s what I’m saying. I know you don’t like to be rushed, but I think this could be good for us. Just think about it. He’ll book the hotel and room, although he needs to know by at least August 8th, 14th the latest. Do you think that’s enough time?”

“It’s literally 2 full weeks,” I clarify. “Yeah, that’s plenty.”

“Okay,” he concludes. “Hey, guess what?”

I look at him stupidly, picking up my slice. “What?”

“A little birdie once told me that I can leave whenever I want and go anywhere.”

I roll my eyes.

“We’ve each got a car, plenty of space, and nowhere we need to be. Think of it as a spontaneous trip.” He gives me a convincing tight-lipped smile.

“I’ll think of it as a distraction,” I counterargue.

He shrugs. “Whatever helps you sleep at night.”

And now this decision will keep me up. Thanks for that!

“Are your parents asking you to go back to the Island for a bit?” Is he trying to subtly kick me out or something?

“No.” I get straight to the point. “As long as I’m taking care of myself, then they can’t really force me. Maybe I’ll stop by before preseason starts, but I just haven’t been in the mood. I know that sounds bad. I love them. I really do. I just don’t wanna drive 2 hours to see them and all they’ll wanna talk about is how he’s dead.”

“I’m sure they wouldn’t do that,” Jimmy reassures. “Do they know you’re seeing a therapist?”

I nod. “Well, when you called them saying I almost went to the afterlife, then yeah, they do. They’re happy I’m getting help.”

“Good.”

It’s quiet for a few moments before he asks me another question. “Anything you need to get off your chest?”

I slowly breathe out of my mouth. “I miss the team.” It’s hard when most of them went home and didn’t come back to visit. It’s only four more weeks until we all reunite, but I can’t help but think they kept their distance because of how screwed up I was.

“Yeah, I miss ‘em, too,” he admits. “But, hey. We can look forward to carpools for practice and dinners, getting back in the locker room. It’ll be here before we know it. This season is gonna mean a lot more than the previous ones ever did. We’ll make sure that point gets across.”

“I just hope we can perform to that standard. We’ve got a huge hole to not necessarily fill, but more of work our way around.”

“I completely agree. We’ll do it for him.”

“We sure will.”

It’s quiet again. I hate these tiny bits of silence. I always feel pressured to talk so that it’s not awkward, but it’s kinda ceased now. I wouldn’t say it’s become easy, but more natural to deal with. There’s a lot of times where you can’t explain what you’re feeling with words, and just need actions to explain for you.

“Ready to go?”

“Yeah.” I stand up and push in my chair, discarding my plate and cup in the trash. He does the same. Exiting out the door, we find ourselves back on the sidewalk and I unlock my car from a distance, but no one’s around, so there’s a low risk of someone actually breaking in and driving away with it. We open our respective doors and after we sit down, I press the Start Engine button, watching everything power on. It takes me a minute to compose myself.

I turn to face Jimmy. “I am going to think about it,” I tell him.

“Please do,” he encourages. “I think it’d be good for us.”

Us.

Not just me and not just you?

Together instead of separate?

Us?

That night in the bathroom was swept under the rug as well. Both of us woke the next morning pretending to not have any recollection of it. I’m guessing it didn’t mean anything. Not saying that it did, well, to me at least, but I couldn’t help but wonder. My brain has really done me no good.

“Yeah,” I come to conclude. “Me too.”

I pull out of the shoulder and assess the surrounding traffic, deciding to gun it and totally not almost cut someone off, but I had plenty of room before they approached me, so it’s fine. I am met with a rude honk from behind, though.

“You’re really just living life on the edge, aren’t you?” Jimmy says. “Dude looked pissed beyond belief.”

“He’s a grown man with a small dick that drives a huge truck,” I joke, sounding somewhat serious, because it’s true. “You don’t claim full ownership of the road. I don’t care how big your vehicle is.”

“What does that say about my Wrangler then?”

I roll my eyes. “You’re a grown man that doesn’t drive a truck.”

“Wanna elaborate any further?” My heart starts pounding out of my chest.

“I would, but then we’re reaching a weird and inappropriate discussion,” I say without a tinge of nerves, which is surprising.

“Not really,” he rebuts. “We’re both adults.”

“I know, but I just don’t wanna talk about that.” I concentrate on the road.

“Bad experience?” I can tell he’s doing this to gain a reaction. That fucking instigator.

“You’re such an asshole,” I start off, stopping at a red light. “Could I suspect the same for you?”

He scoffs. “Suspect whatever you want.”

“Fine by me.” I return my foot to the gas pedal, accelerating at a decent speed.

“Seriously, though, you’ve never…” His voice trails off, alluding to the obvious.

“Not till my wedding night,” I shoot at him with pure honesty. “My parents would kill me. They’d probably wonder where they failed.”

“Look at you sticking to it,” he jokes.

“I’m literally 24, Jim. There’s no reason for me to do it now, let alone jump in another relationship, experience all of that again, another potential failure, and then I’m back to the drawing board.”

“Hey, let’s not jump to conclusions.”

“I have been ever since.”

“Well, you don’t need to right now. It’s all gonna unfold when it needs to.”

“What are you, a spiritual guru?”

I get a good laugh to catch in his throat. “No, but maybe that should be my alter ego.”

“We’ll see how far that gets you.”

“Okay, twerp.” I can tell he’s grinning so hard right now. Why has he become such a menace recently?

“Can I ask you something now?” I take the exit ramp out of the village and into Midtown.

“Anything.”

I snicker under my breath, excited to return the favor. “Have you ever…?” Nothing else comes out.

“Oh, what, it’s my turn now?”

“Hey, whatever is said in here does not leave,” I propose.

He taps his fingers on the center console. “You gonna add it to the list?”

“It really should be a universal rule, but in case you didn’t know that prior to now, then I will. Continue.”

“Short answer, no. That probably sounds embarrassing.”

I feel the need to brake so bad, but I just lower my speed while hopefully not trying to collide with another vehicle or an object or even a person because I’m actually kinda surprised at this information. “Wait, actually? And for the record, it’s not embarrassing.”

“Well, thanks for making me feel validated,” he replies. “And no, I’m kinda in the same predicament. Obviously haven’t found the right girl yet.”

“What’s takin you so long, then? I’m kinda bummed no one’s willingly throwing themselves at you.”

“I’m just not really focusing on it,” he admits. “I’d hate to do somewhat of long distance since we’d be traveling for road games, barely any days off. Don’t get me wrong, of course I want to be in a relationship, but it’s just kinda difficult circumstances.”

“Yeah, you’ve had them, though.”

“Just one,” he once again surprises me, “for a few years. We agreed to end it because of the schedule conflicts and rarely seeing each other. Haven’t found the time for another.”

“Did it at least end on good terms?” I feel like I’m nagging, but I’m getting to know another side of him that I’ve never seen.

“It did,” he clarifies. “We text sometimes, catching up and everything. She reached out to me when she heard about Ryan, had a quick little exchange. Nothing too crazy. And you obviously dated before he came around, am I right?”

“Two relationships that both failed, but I don’t really care much about it anymore because one ended mutually and the other I got cheated on, so that explains itself.”

“Damn, Abb, I’m sorry.” He sounds concerned. “You didn’t deserve that.”

“I know I didn’t. That’s why I waited so long to get with Ryan. I was afraid it was gonna turn out like the others.”

“Well, aren’t you lucky?”

“No, I’m really not, because it didn’t have to end. Even if it did, by choice, I’d feel better knowing he was still out there and thriving than finding himself enclosed on all four sides, being lowered into the dirt without anyone being able to help. And I know you thought it was a blessing in disguise, but based on where it’s gotten me, I would say it was a curse, something the universe had to conspire because I had something too good.”

“You know I didn’t mean that, either, right?” His voice is a little bit on edge.

“I know that the only thing you have ever meant since all of this started was that we would get through this together, and we’re doing it, and it might not be how we both thought, but at least it’s something.”

We’ve finally made it back to the apartment, pulling into my spot and putting the car in park. This also signifies the end of this conversation.

“This stays in here,” I say as I gesture my finger around the entire car.

“You have my word.” Jimmy opens up the door and shuts it behind him, making his way to the entrance.

It’s my turn to get out, grabbing my purse, keys, and phone all in one hand, shutting the door and locking the car. I lean against the drivers side, watching him disappear. We were able to witness a different version of ourselves today. It was raw and non-judgmental. I’ll see how long it lasts.

#fictional jimmy vesey

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