#had this idea ages ago and it sat unfinished until last week for months

[onlygenxhere]

I heard you calling

Julie dug her hands into the sand again and again as the light slowly faded from the sky.

It had been a shit day of an even crappier week and she just wanted to hide away from the world for a little while. It was why she’d told her dad she was studying at Flynn’s and then told Flynn she was tired and was going to call it an early night.

It’d taken her nearly an hour to ride her bike out to the beach but it had been worth it to let go of her thoughts in the sound of the waves and ground herself in the sand under her feet.

It’s not like she could hide in the studio.

That had been occupied by three ghost himbos for almost six months now.

Don’t get her wrong, she loved the guys and Flynn and her dad and even Carlos, for the most part, but sometimes a girl just needed to wallow in some self-pity by herself.

Her tears had dried a while ago and she was just staring out at the waves and the retreating sun when she heard the unmistakable sound of a ghost poofing in near her.

She didn’t even turn to look at him as he kicked off his vans and plopped down beside her scattering some sand on her own bare feet.

“Hey.”

Julie sighed and started digging in the sand again. “How’d you find me?” She looked down at the sand she was playing in, in case anyone was watching.

“You called me.”

She turned to Luke with a frown, the thought of anyone thinking she was crazy for talking to air flying right out of her head at his words.

“I did not!” She hissed. “I’ve only talked to my dad and Flynn. I certainly didn’t call the band phone. I was actually trying to be alone for a change.”

He shrank a little at her ire before shaking it off and leaning back on his hands. “I don’t know what to tell you Jules.” He shrugged. “I heard you call.”

She looked at him skeptically, “You heard me in your head, calling your name?” That would be new and weird and she wasn’t sure she wanted that ability, especially if she hadn’t meant to do it.

He leaned forward crossing his legs and bit his lip.

He ducked his head and was quiet for a moment before shaking it and looking back up at her through his lashes, “No, not in my head.”

The sun had nearly set and she could barely see his eyes in the fading light but he looked nervous all of a sudden like the answer was something she wouldn’t like.

As annoyed as she’d immediately been on his intrusion to her pity party she couldn’t help sliding her hand closer to his in the sand until their pinkies touched in a silent peace offering.

He wrapped his pinky around hers with a little tug.

The moment they touched Luke’s eyes cleared of their worry and she felt the tightness that had been pressing on her chest all day ease slightly. 

Julie pulled her knees up to her chest and laid her head on them before she whispered. “Explain, please?”

He sighed as he turned to face her a little more directly, careful not to move their hands still touching in the sand. “Ok, I guess heard is the wrong word…”

“Luke,” she sighed and squeezed his pinky. “Just spit it out. Why are you being weird?”

“Cause it is weird Jules.” He reached up to rub the back of his neck with his free hand. “I’ve had this feeling in my chest all day that something was wrong.” He dropped the hand on his neck to press against his chest like he was showing her where it hurt. “I asked the other guys if they felt it and they didn’t and…” He dropped the hand on his chest to lay on top of hers in the sand and fiddled with her rings. “I just knew you were sad or upset or something and I’ve wanted to check on you all day but you’ve told us not to come to the school anymore and then when you didn’t come out to the studio to see us this afternoon I…”

She flipped her hand over slowly and laced their fingers together keeping her head on her knees and her eyes on Luke. He looked up at her as a smile finally started to tug on his lips.

Julie and Luke had always been more in tune with each other than the other guys. She’d thought it had something to do with how they had shared pain about being disconnected from their moms or how they wrote music together like they shared a brain, but maybe it was more than that.

“Ok,” she nodded slightly. “Let’s disregard that you knew I was having a terrible day, we can analyze that later. That still doesn’t explain how you found me.”

He sighed, “I’m not sure explaining how I found you will be less weird. Honestly it was like some wizard shit.”

Julie giggled pressing her mouth to her knee trying to muffle the sound. Her giggles set his off and before long they were both shaking with laughter.

She unfolded herself and laid back on the sand keeping hold of Luke’s hand and he laid down beside her.

“Ok, I still need you to explain the wizard shit even if it is weird.”

“Ok, ok, I said that because you know in Harry Potter, in one of the last movies that part where Ron leaves and then finds his way back to them, back to Hermonie, with the little light in his chest telling him where to go?”

Julie frowned trying to follow his ramble. “You followed a light in your chest?”

“I mean kinda.” He groaned and rubbed his face. “I’d been feeling so off all day and when you didn’t come see us after school I started to get even more worried and then dinner time passed and we still hadn’t seen you. I needed to know you were ok.” He dropped the hand that had been on his head to his side and looked at her with so much concern. “I needed to find you so I just… did.”

He just did. It made a weird sort of sense. “So you just, what, closed your eyes and thought about me and here you are?”

He nodded, his eyes wide, “Yeah, exactly.”

They looked at each other a long time as they lay in the sand side by side holding hands. She briefly wondered what she looked like to anyone glancing in her direction.

“I’m sorry I worried you so much today. I’m ok, really.” She squeezed his hand. “I had no idea you knew how bad my day had gotten or I would have come to see you before I left.”

“Julie,” he rolled on his side to face her. “You didn’t know and really…” He dropped his eyes and stared hard at her shoulder. “It’s not your job to make sure I’m ok.”

She squeezed his hand again and he looked up at her with those sad puppy eyes and she melted like she always did. “Ditto.”

He grinned and shook his head. “I couldn’t help it.”

“You could have texted me.” She let go of his hand and rolled onto her side propping her head up on her hand. “You could have texted me.” She bit her lip. “What if I’d been in a bathroom or something when you came looking for me?”

He gaped at her. “I…I…” he started to laugh. “That would have been mortifying!”

“You think?” Julie giggled. “So text first…please.” She laid her hand on his in the sand. “I promise I’ll reply. Especially now that I know…”

Luke nodded, ducking his head. “Just so you know…” He started fiddling with her rings again. “Sometimes I know when you’re extra happy too.”

“Yeah?” She grinned at him and kicked his leg. “You don’t come find me then do you?”

He shook his head and looked up at her biting his lip. “We’re usually together.”

She laughed, of course they were. Luke wasn’t the only person that made her happy but ever since he fell into her life she couldn’t deny that she had more than friendly feelings for him.

Feelings that made her almost irrationally happy sometimes.

Luke smiled and pressed his hand against his chest. “You’re happy again now.”

“You seem to have that affect on me.” She bit her lip and ducked her head as she felt her cheeks heating up.

“Hey,” Luke tugged on her chin, gently forcing her to look at him. “You make me happy too Jules.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah…” Luke ducked his head and rubbed the back of his neck. It was too dark to know for sure but she thought he might be blushing like she had too. “I don’t know what I’d do without you boss.”

They looked at each other for a long time, neither wanting to say any more than they already had.

It was enough… for now.

Julie took a deep breath and blew it out hard. It was time to head back home, back to reality which luckily included three ghost boys that made amazing music with her and one that she…

“Alright, party’s over,” Julie said pulling herself up from the sand and dusting her jeans off. “It’s gonna take forever for me to bike home.”

Luke stood up with her, keeping her hand in his. It was fully dark now. Anyone would be hard pressed to notice how Julie’s hand might look like it was holding something invisible.

“Mind if I go with you?” He chewed on his lip. “I really don’t like the idea of you being alone in the dark like this all the way home.”

“I’ll have to walk.” She chuckled, “Unless you wanna run beside me?”

He laughed, “I’ll run for a bit and then you can sit on the handlebars and I’ll bike.”

Julie burst out laughing. “That would look crazy!”

“Exactly,” Luke grinned. “Anyone that saw you would think they were nuts.”

She bit her lip and shook her head at him as they headed off the sand toward her bike. There was a stretch of neighborhood they would need to go through where very few people were likely to see them.

“We’ll see.” She winked as she slipped her shoes on after unlocking her bike from the stand.

She glanced over at Luke as they left the beach area. Maybe she would let him bike for a bit. What did it matter if some stranger thought she was crazy, or they were?

She was already feeling pretty reckless… after all…

Julie looked over at Luke again to see him already looking back at her.

She was in love with a ghost.

[mountainashfae]

Word Search Game

Tagged by @outeremissary! This was a very funny way to spend my work day because we know I am Not a writer so I was digging deep to see what I could find. Dug up some very cool rambles and unfinished pieces from ages past.

The words I was given were TIME, HAND, and DARK.

TIME - This isn't really a WIP so much as an unpublished character backstory, written from the character's PoV. My Dragon Heist players will start to recognize him, but this is a specifically DnD5e version of Alec rather than the PF1e version they're acquainted with.

Take that gear. Grab that gold. Get a weapo–why are you picking up the bow? The voice continued to echo in his head to lead him to safety. Something about it filled him with dread. It was sophisticated, it was princely, it was like a whispering wind, and it was intense in its guidance to lead him out. It wasn’t until he was riding away on the back of a horse—did he always know how to do this?—that he began to wonder what was happening. He’d glanced at a mirror in his escape; at his dirt-caked hair, at his four horns whose count felt wrong, at his mismatched pair of eyes. What was he doing in that building? Why did it burn so suddenly? Who was he? Don’t think too hard. We aren’t safe yet. It’ll come back to you. The voice in his head wasn’t very comforting. But it was right, bits and pieces began to come back to him. His name, Alec, glimpses of his home, vague memories of loved ones. But whose voices were speaking to him? Whose gentle hands was he longing to hold him? He couldn’t remember, and it pained him. The pieces of memory came to him in the middle of the night as he tossed and turned for even a moment of sleep. It went on for hours, he would lay down in his stolen bedroll to sleep, but sleep never found him. After a week he finally accepted that he would never sleep. In fact, it appeared he didn’t need it anymore. That’s useful, more time to get work done if you never sleep. Alec found himself disagreeing with the voice more often than not.

HAND - This is from my current WotR WIP titled Accepting a Fey's Gift, which has been in limbo for months now as I try to figure out how to tie together all the disconnected sections.

"Forget the gift, let's talk. Just the two of us." Rotgut began to object from Aurien's shoulder before they gave him a stern look. Without missing a beat, the parrot nipped at their ear and flew off. "I don't know why you still keep that oglin around,” Ulbrig shook his head, checking on their now-bleeding ear. “I got lonely, especially after the shipwreck. He managed to survive it with me, so, it seemed a good idea at the time.” They reached to touch Ulbrig’s hand, but pulled back at the last second. The ice was too cold, he was making an effort to come this close as it was. “Still seem like a good idea?” “Well even if I’d known about a certain griffon sleeping in a statue in Kenabres, I doubt he would have woken up some 10 years ago…” Aurien stopped themself, catching the distraction in the conversation. “Let’s not change the subject. We need to talk about this.” Ulbrig sighed, gently pulling his hand away. “Then let’s talk.”

DARK - Okay. Okay so. It turns out in all these years I can only find one fic, wip or not, that uses this word??? Somehow?? Anyways my biggest regret in 2020 while I was in the Fate fandom was never finishing this fic. It's from the PoV of Perseus during the unwritten scene and fight against Caster. I came up with so much stuff for this. I had the entire fic planned out and it would've been the longest thing I've ever written. I made a whole fanservant for this. Mopsis my weird little guy.

He blinked. That’s how fast the change happened. One second, they were in fourth period. It was English. Sajyou-san sat two rows down from him, next to the window. She’d seemed distracted with something that day and wasn’t paying attention to the lecture. The next second, the familiar classroom was replaced with an alien landscape. All his classmates had disappeared. That left two options; either he was the only one in this space, or his classmates were all elsewhere. The landscape was alien in all sense of the word, but held a strange familiarity to it that he couldn’t place. There was no sun, only the dark expanse of space. Hundreds of glowing lights illuminated the ground as if they were stars. Everywhere he looked was gray. It was a desolate, barren land. As he walked down the path beneath his feet, he could get a better grasp on where he was. No typical laws of physics seemed to apply. Paths and rocks floated in the air as if in a three-dimensional maze, the “landscape” expanded for as far as he could see in all directions. No matter how far he looked, there was no sign of life. No plants, no people either. He seemed to be completely alone in the foreign remnants of a once prosperous society. That was fine, he could find his way out of this. He had faced plenty in his time, this was nothing more than one more adventure to his list. With a deep breath, the situation became clearer. The air was tinged with magic, like the Age of Gods. If this was the case, all he had to do was… “Isemi-kun!” A voice called out, disrupting his thoughts.

A shame some of my other older writing couldn't make it. The Cei fic or the Cay monologue could've been fun.

[pain-somnia]

tread over the contours of you and me

fandom: naruto pairing: sasusaku rating: M (here is your nsfr warning as it contains smut. the first part of this is safe but letting you all know now so that you may remain halal; i’m posting this during a time for me it would be but i know some people are not able to) Day’s notes: hello! this fic was written for a giveaway winner that is also a patron of mine. the giveaway was for non patrons to be able to win a chance to receive some exclusive PDFs or a patron to select a prompt. it’s been a really long time since i received the prompt but i wasn’t in the right health and only recently was able to give it proper attention. the winner has encouraged me to share this with everyone so here it is a couple of weeks after patrons received their early access to it. It falls into my blank period au series of fics. you can find some of them in this link. it contains one of the oneshots and also links to other one shots. another one-shot that fits with this one is my fic It Started With Rain which actually happened to be commissioned like a year ago by the winner and can be found in all of my fic sites. I hope you enjoy 😊

tread over the contours of you and me

Sakura sighed and rolled her neck. She cupped her shoulders at the base of her nape and pulsed a bit of healing chakra.

She was spending too many evenings at her desk looking over the data for the children in the institute. The caregivers were very thorough with their reports and while that relieved her it was also more work for her to get through every day.

It was only a year and a half since she had opened up the institute and while she was no longer in the experimental stage of the program, everything could still be hectic. The hardest part had been finding the caregivers and doctors for the children—people that understood that they weren’t treating soldiers.

The research and paperwork that she had poured over had been atrociously lacking, not only for children but adults as well. It was disgustingly obvious that the only insight to mental health that Konoha had was in the use of torture and interrogation. With Ino’s help, the two of them picked apart all of the data until they could find anything useful.

Luck was on Sakura’s side that the Yamanaka clan already had an understanding of how the mind operated. Due to the nature of their family jutsu and the young age of which their shinobi clansmen trained, there was a foundation she had to work with.

Speaking of the Yamanaka family jutsu, Ino was insistently sending her messages to go home. Her voice wheedled in Sakura’s mind and nagged at her.

A hot bath, warm food, and her bed sounded lovely. She knew that all she needed was to head home and her mom would have all three ready for her.

Locking the stacks of unfinished documents into a cabinet, Sakura began her nightly clean up routine. For the past year she used to stay holed up in her office until everything was completed but due to the person sleeping on her office’s couch at the moment, Sakura had stopped working overnight.

Stifling a giggle, Sakura crouched down on her toes and brushed Sasuke’s hair out of his face. He had grown out his forelocks into bangs that fell over his rinnegan and while the look suited him, sometimes she missed seeing his face in full.

Sasuke had taken to sleeping in her office, complaining that there was always some sort of disturbance at his apartment. She had teased him about it, stating that he just missed her. He hadn’t replied to her verbally, but chose to show her how much he missed her once they got back to his apartment.

Blinking his eyes, Sasuke woke up the second time Sakura ran her fingers through his hair. The corners of his mouth twitched upwards and he sat up, pulling his legs back from over the arm of the loveseat.

“Are you going to walk me home, Sasuke-kun?” Sakura asked, continuing to run her fingers along his hair, scratching lightly at his scalp.

Sitting up, Sasuke stretched his arm over his head. “You’re not coming over?”

Heat traveled up the back of her neck and she cleared her throat in discomfort. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. It’s late and I’m still in trouble with Mama from last time I accidentally slept over. You know how she is about premarital relations━don’t you laugh at me!”

Sasuke turned his head away from her but his shoulders slightly shook, giving himself away. He had walked her home and sat with her as her mother lectured her and Sakura insisted that she had fallen asleep while working on paperwork. Haruno Mebuki hadn’t bought the story.

“Come here,” Sasuke asked softly, patting the space between his legs. Sakura shrugged off her lab coat and let it fall to the floor before settling on the couch between his legs. She laid back so her back was against his chest and her legs laid across the cushions. Sasuke’s leg closest to the edge slipped off the couch to accommodate her.

“Kakashi sent a scroll for you,” Sakura told him as he settled his chin on her shoulder and wrapped his arm around her waist. “He figured out your hiding spot.”

“Not really a hiding spot. Where else would I be?”

“Right…” Her voice trailed softly as her cheeks bloomed with heat.

Sasuke had been back home for months and Sakura still wasn’t used to him speaking to her or of her in such a way. It was one thing for her to just know that he enjoyed her presence and took comfort in it by his actions, it was another when he voiced it out loud and confirmed it.

The words were never direct but her heart translated them into a different phrase.

Taking her right wrist, Sasuke rolled it in a circular fashion, stretching the joint and pressing his thumb along the inside, massaging the flesh there.

“You wrote a lot today.” His voice was low against her ear, his breath warm and causing her to shiver. Sakura hummed and nodded, not trusting her words, as he continued to trail his fingers up her arm.

Sasuke stroked at her skin until he reached the back of her nape and he cupped Sakura’s neck and massaged it with his strong fingers. He rolled the base of her neck in his hand and Sakura felt the warm sensation of chakra pulsing from his hand and soothing out the knots as he continued to add pressure with his thumb and fingers down her shoulders.

“You’re getting better at that,” Sakura moaned in relief. “You’ve been studying.”

“Just a bit.”

Sakura didn’t need to see his face to know there was a smirk on it; she could hear the smug undertones in his voice. It filled her with joy when pieces of the young Sasuke revealed themselves in this older version of him.

“Turn around.” The order was whispered but it beat loudly in Sakura’s chest right next to her heart.

Sex still felt new, despite the two of them getting into it whenever the opportunity presented itself. Sasuke’s voice, husky and desperate in her ear, caused her as much nerves as it thrilled her. They were still learning what made the other tick, what touches were more desired.

She decided that she liked the way she felt in Sasuke’s hand. His skin was deliciously warm and the friction from calluses and scars from the nicks from holding shuriken created a pleasant sensation when his hands roved over her soft skin.

He pushed into the flesh of her back, soothing her muscles with his thumb and kneading with his fingers.

“That would be easier if my shirt was off.” Sakura licked her lips and hoped Sasuke took the hint. “And much easier if I was lying on my stomach.”

“Since when have I ever done things the easy way?”

Sakura whimpered when he removed his hand from under her sleeveless top, missing the heat that radiated from his palm. Sasuke took hold of her chin with his thumb and index finger and tilted her face up so he could press an open mouthed kiss to her lips. When he tried to pull away Sakura pressed forward, straddling his lap and wrapping her arms around his neck.

Her skirt bunched up around her hips and Sasuke’s hand went to her left thigh and caressed the flesh there. Sakura hummed in delight as the soreness from standing all day for observations drifted away with his soothing touch.

She yelped when his hand slid between her legs and he began to massage a new ache. Her hands tightened their grip on his hair and she rocked her hips against his hand.

They had never done something like this anywhere outside of his apartment. Their intimate moments were limited to the walls of Sasuke’s new home and that had been just fine with them until an annoyance kept ringing at the door.

Naruto had been late in discovering their relationship. He had whined because he felt that they had owed it to him to let him know when they had finally gotten together because he was their best friend. He had not been happy to find out that Sai and Ino had known before him.

“I told you first about Hinata!” He had whined to Sakura and Sakura didn’t have the heart to tell him that it didn’t count because if he hadn’t shared his feelings with her then he probably wouldn’t have gotten a chance to be married.

It wasn’t the same for her and Sasuke. Naruto’s interference was likely to impede any progress in their relationship. He would have kept trying to get involved and would have interfered with their alone time.

“What are you doing?” Sasuke asked as she dipped her hands inside his waistband. He quirked an eyebrow up in amusement as she began to stroke him.

“Doing some massaging of my own.”

Sasuke groaned in distaste, sliding down the couch so that he was lying on his back. “That was really bad.”

“And yet you’re still hard,” Sakura snapped, tugging down his pants to free his member.

“Your cheesiness has no effect on what your hands are doing.” Sasuke’s lips curled upward as Sakura increased the tightness of her hold and the speed of her strokes. “You’re getting better at that. Have you been studying?”

“Shut up!” Sakura burst into a peal of laughter at his teasing. “Are we really doing this in my office?”

“Say the word, I’ll do just about anything to you on this couch.” Sasuke gritted his teeth, stopping a moan from escaping. “Especially if you keep that up.”

“Give you a handjob and you lose all sense of shame, huh?” Sasuke narrowed his eyes at her as he reached between her legs again and then pinched her clit. Sakura jumped a little, squeaking from the shock.

“I’m not the one getting wet from giving a handjob.”

“Oh, that has nothing to do with this.” Sakura dropped her hold on him and tugged her top over her head and off. Reaching behind her, she unhooked her bra. “You’re the one that was using a medical technique to try and seduce me.”

Sasuke shrugged but the smirk remained on his face as Sakura shimmied out of her panties. Without bothering to take off her skirt she straddled his hips again, settling his cock between her folds. She rolled her hips, sliding over him in just the right way that it hit her clit as she grinded against him.

Usually Sasuke was enough stimulation for her, but there was something about pressing him into the couch of her office that had her blood pumping faster. Perhaps it was the thought that he couldn’t wait to touch her and to be touched in return that he didn’t care that they were on a cramped sofa.

Leaning closer so that her chest was flush against his, Sakura licked up the line of Sasuke’s throat before sucking his lower lip into her mouth. She felt him shiver under her hands as her tongue stroked the space behind his teeth.

“I love you, Sasuke-kun,” Sakura murmured, smiling softly as Sasuke’s cheeks were dusted pink in his flustered state.

Sakura felt a pull around her navel and then found herself flat on her back, Sasuke looming over her. He had switched their places without warning.

“Sasuke-kun!” She scolded him for his use of his Rinnegan during foreplay, but he ignored her in favor of pressing kisses to her sternum and laving at her small, pert breasts as he slid off her skirt. Rolling her eyes, Sakura pulled at the hem of his shirt and tugged it off of his body.

Sasuke took her hand in his and pressed it flat over the breast he wasn’t attending to with his affections. He molded his hand over hers to stimulate her hand into moving, silently asking her to massage her own breast. Once Sakura got the hint, Sasuke dipped his hand between their bodies and slipped his fingers between her thighs once again.

That’s how it was with him. He barely spoke aloud the words that would express his feelings, but he spoke it with his actions and hid it in other statements.

Younger Sakura would have demanded a clear proclamation of his love, for him to declare it in a way the world would know of it. Nineteen year old Sakura though, had twenty year old Sasuke desperate and determined to have her climbing the highest peaks of pleasure he could give her, displaying a vulnerability she was the only person privy to.

“No.” Sakura shook her head, her voice trembling, and pulled Sasuke’s face away from the hip he was sucking on. “Not today. I want you closer. Now.”

Close. No matter how flush against each other they were, it never felt close enough. Unlike Sasuke, Sakura didn’t have Sharingan in order to always carry perfect memories of him with her.

She needed him to burn the memory of him on her skin with his hot fingers. Needed to feel him hot and slick against her, speaking a language only known to two of them. Needed to tattoo his love for her with every scorching touch of his.

As amazing as it was to watch him from above, all flustered and bothered and eyes pleading for her to relieve him of his want, Sakura prefered him like this. Sasuke would angle their hips, lifting her bottom to meet his thrusts and then loom over her, caging her head in between his forearm and the remainder of his left arm. Pushing her down, his body was a comforting and welcome weight.

Her fingers splayed against his shoulder blades, Sakura felt him move above her, thrusting and muscles flexing. Her finger pads felt the coarse lines of scars littered on his skin. She traced them as Sasuke pounded her into her office’s couch and she cried out incoherent words of gratitude that none of the old wounds kept them from having their current moment.

Sasuke exhaled a laugh against the crook of her neck as she came down from her high. “Did you just thank me for your orgasm?”

“No!” Sakura’s face grew even hotter and she slapped Sasuke against his chest. He just continued to laugh silently as his hips moved against hers.

“Just a bit more and I’ll be thanking you too,” he teased her, gripping her hip tightly as he grinded deep within her.

Sakura covered her face with her hands, trying to hide from the embarrassment. The action had Sasuke stilling his hips and moving her hands away from her face. He interlocked his fingers with her left hand and pressed his forehead to hers.

“Don’t hide from me,” he muttered, red eyes boring into hers. His tomo swirled as a particularly rough thrust in the new angle had Sakura tensing and crying out for more. Sakura wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him close for a kiss, swallowing his moan as he spilled inside of her.

Sasuke collapsed against her and Sakura’s left leg dropped so that it was dangling off of the couch. Sakura’s fingers sank into his thick hair and she massaged his scalp, her nails drawing curlicues.

“How did I end up being the only one that actually got fully naked again?” Sakura grumbled as Sasuke tucked himself back into his pants, barely moving his body away from her. “How do you keep doing that?”

Sasuke simply shrugged and nuzzled closer to her, crushing her chest to his. They lay like that, listening to the way the clock on the office wall clicked the seconds in tandem with their heartbeats. Sakura knew she had already pushed past the acceptable time to return home without her mother assuming she and Sasuke were playing house.

“I want to wake up with you again.” Sasuke’s voice was low but his breath fanned against Sakura’s neck and shoulder.

“Yeah?” Sakura breathed out the question, feeling the way Sasuke nodded his head against her shoulder. “I love you too, Sasuke-kun.”

He didn’t protest the way she had stated her love as if it was a response to his own. Sakura’s chest grew warm at the way Sasuke wrapped his arm around her and held her closer.

Someday, Sakura thought as she pressed a kiss to Sasuke’s temple. Someday I’ll have all the mornings with you.

[estamos-destinadas]

So, I recently--and by that I mean this past week--started working on a new story idea for Juliantina.

I’ve had a bad case of writer’s block these past couple of months--the ideas are there, I just couldn’t seem to put them into words. It was such a relief to me when, after I thought of this idea, the words just started flowing.

Since this story has me really excited, I thought I’d share the first half of the first chapter of the story. As always, I won’t post it on Ao3 until it’s done. And please, if you can, refrain from reblogging 😅-- I kinda feel guilty when I see my story ideas going around and they’re unfinished.

Anyway, story under the cut (please work because this is long.)

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On Earth Year 3010, the year Juliana turned ten, she and her mother, Lupé, left the slums of Santonio for the Palacio del Progreso.

The Progreso was in fact a sprawling estate, the “Palacio” in its name taken from the grand mansion at the heart of it. It was the residence of the Carvajals, whose patriarch, León Carvajal, was one of the Administrators of the Nor-Am Oligarchy. The thirteen Administrator families were descended from the billionaires of hundreds of years ago, their riches accumulating with each new generation, wealth unchecked becoming power unopposed until North America stopped pretending to be a democracy and became a nation ruled by its thirteen richest families.

Juliana did not know that particular history. In the slums, education was a fever dream, and there was no time to dream. She did know—she could observe—that the Progreso was as different from Santonio as it was possible to be.

Where Santonio had murky canals, the Progreso had crystal clear pools; where Santonio was blanketed with smog, the air within the Progreso’s perimeter was cleaned by powerful purifiers; where Santonio was all filthy and derelict buildings, the Progreso was true to its palatial name; where the ground of Santonio could barely grow weeds, the Progreso’s greenhouses and gardens boasted plants and flowers and trees that no longer occurred naturally in Earth’s poisoned soil.

Lupé had taken a job as one of the caretakers of the Progreso’s gardens. Lucía, an old friend, and now León Carvajal’s new wife, had gotten it for her. She and Lucía had used to work at one of the factories owned by the Carvajals, where they’d worked 12 hours a day, 6 days a week, all through the year for little pay. But then León had seen Lucía and had fallen in love, taking her to the Progreso. Lucía, who would not forget the life she’d led until then, had found jobs for her old friends within the estate’s walls.

In the Nor-Am Oligarchy, connection mattered.

That connection gave Lupé a job with gentler hours and better pay. The connection meant that she and her daughter could live in the staff’s compound within the Progreso, in an apartment that was much bigger than their old matchbox of a room in Santonio. It meant that Juliana could stop taking odd jobs to supplement their income, could stop worrying about her next meal. It meant that, finally, she could start getting her education.

⁂

Education was a completely new experience for Juliana and, at first, it felt like butting her head against a wall, or maybe trying to breathe underwater in one of Santonio’s canals.

It did help, however, that León Carvajal provided air-conditioned vehicles for his residential staff’s children, which daily took them outside of the Progreso, through affluent but smog-filled streets, and to a nearby school with air-conditioned buildings. It also helped that the Progreso’s main library was open to its residents, from the Carvajal family, to their guests, and even to the estate’s numerous staff and servants.

Every day, after school, when the other kids went to play in the rec area of the staff’s compound, Juliana went to the library, trying to catch up to classmates who had been going to school their whole lives.

That was where she met Valentina, almost a month after she and her mother arrived at the Palacio del Progreso.

Juliana, having taken a break from reviewing her lessons, was flipping through a book about 21st-century art—an actual paper book, that was how rich the Carvajals were—when she heard the sound of poorly-suppressed sobs. It was coming from a nearby row of kiosks, where one could download books and magazines and all sorts of digital media to their own personal devices.

Juliana decided to investigate. She passed by the kiosks, looking through the gaps between them, until she saw a girl sitting at a table near the windows. The girl, who was gazing downwards with her shoulders hunched, seemed to be her age. Juliana hesitated for a moment before approaching the girl.

“Estás bien?” Juliana asked.

The girl’s shoulders stiffened, her soft sobs cutting off, but she made no reply.

“Necesitas algo?”

“Estar sola, necesito… estar sola.”

“I’m sorry, it’s just that I heard you crying and I thought—” Juliana cut herself off. What was she thinking, bothering someone who clearly wanted to be alone. “You’re right,” she awkwardly scuffed the sole of her shoe against the marble floor. “I’ll let you be.”

With that, Juliana turned on her heel, but she had only taken one step away before the girl called out to her with a, “Hey, sorry, wait.” When Juliana turned back to her, the girl added, “I think—I think I’m fine, thank you.”

If the tears in her eyes did not tell Juliana that the girl was lying, the way her voice shook did. Her heart went out to the sad girl, who had the prettiest face Juliana had ever seen, though her brain filed that information away for later.

Juliana sat on the chair across from the girl. “So, what is it?” she asked, frank as any ten-year old. She didn’t know why, but she wanted to help solve the girl’s problem, even though she’d just met her, even if she didn’t know who she was.

The girl wiped her tears before launching into it. “My dad wants me to go to school! I don’t want to go to school. I want to stay here and read what I want to read, not what schools think I should read. And I want to go with him or my sister when they take trips to other nations, or to the moon, or to the other planets. If I go to school, I can only go with them during the holidays.”

Juliana had never met another kid who talked about travelling to other nations or other planets so casually, but she focused on what they did have in common. It seemed that the girl had also never been to school before.

“Oh, well, school’s not so bad, you know,” Juliana told the girl. “I started it for the first time last month too. Reading’s really hard—” Lupé had taught Juliana how to read when she was younger, but the slums of Santonio was not conducive to such an activity, “—but I’m learning a lot of really cool things. Like, did you know that North and South America used to be connected by land? I didn’t even know there was a South America!”

The girl gaped wordlessly at Juliana, her blue eyes wide and curious. When she found her voice, she began delicately, “I… I know. I’m learning with my tutors, but I don’t want to go to school. I want to do things at my own pace.”

“You can do that? Learn with tutors, I mean?” Juliana asked, borrowing the girl’s phrasing. It would be nice to learn at her own pace. It just seemed to Juliana that all her classmates were far ahead of her.

“Yes?” The girl cleared her throat. “I mean, yes.”

“Oh,” Juliana said, feeling like she was missing something. It began to dawn on her that the clothes the girl was wearing looked very expensive. On a hunch, she asked, “Do you live at the compound?”

“Huh?” the girl started, though she quickly added, “Oh, the staff’s compound! Uhm, no. I live here.”

“Like the guest houses?” Juliana almost begged. The guest houses were near the library after all.

The girl’s lips turned at the corners. “No, at the mansion.”

Which meant, Juliana realised, that the girl was a member of the Carvajal family, and that the dad she’d been talking about was León Carvajal himself. Juliana blushed, but before she could really process how embarrassing it was to tell the daughter of an Administrator of the North American Oligarchy that she had not known there was a South America, the girl’s smile broke out.

It was a kind smile. The girl’s gentle gaze told Juliana that she wasn’t being judged for her ignorance.

“You know,” the girl began, “I’m a really good reader. I got almost a hundred percent in my speed reading and reading comprehension tests.”

It was Juliana’s turn to gape at the girl. “Okay?”

“I could teach you!” the girl said excitedly, her previous complaints about school seemingly forgotten. “You said you found reading hard, I could help you get better at it. Only if you want to, of course,” she added quickly.

“I—really?” Juliana asked, not quite believing that the daughter of León Carvajal would want to help her get better at reading.

“Yes, really,” the girl said fervently. “Oh, but I don’t even know your name.” Before Juliana could reply, the girl extended her hand across the table. “I’m Valentina.”

As Juliana took the offered hand, she began to mirror the girl’s wide grin. “Juliana.”

⁂

A friendship was quickly formed.

True to her word, Valentina helped Juliana get better at reading, and even helped her with her lessons. School became easier for Juliana, and Valentina became more amenable to school, as long as she went to the same one as Juliana. Valentina was a year older than Juliana so they would not be in the same class, but at least they would be in the same place.

It spun another argument between Valentina and her father; the school Juliana and the other children of the residential staff went to did not have the prestige befitting a daughter of the Administrator. But Valentina was stubborn and used to getting her way, so Administrator León Carvajal had to compromise. Valentina was allowed to go to the same school as Juliana, as long as she continued to study with her tutors. Valentina was perfectly content with the arrangement.

Outside of school, where Valentina wanted to go, Juliana happily followed. Not that Valentina went where Juliana did not want to go, or could not follow. They spent all their time together, whether it was at the library, the gardens to visit Juliana’s mom, the sports and rec areas around the Progreso, particularly the poolhouse to go swimming, even the mansion itself. The last one took some getting used to for Juliana, but she eventually became comfortable enough to not feel like an intruder in the Carvajal family mansion.

They were inseparable.

One could say that Juliana and Valentina took to each other as a fish takes to the sea, or as a bird takes to the sky, but most birds had gone extinct, and what fish there was left lived in the depths of the ocean, or were cultivated in tanks or artificial bodies of water.

.

The older people had a different metaphor for it: linked by the guts.

One time, Lupé burst out in fond exasperation, “Why do you always have to go with the Administrator’s daughter everywhere? Are your guts linked together?”

Another time, León asked, “Are you really not going with me and Lucía to Venus because Juliana can’t come?” When Valentina answered in the affirmative, he observed in amusement, “You two are linked by the guts.” A few days after that, Juliana was preparing for her first interplanetary trip.

.

Guille, Valentina’s older brother, remarked that they were like the entangled particles of paired Qubes.

Qubes—or Quantumly-Entangled Communication Boxes—always came in pairs. The subatomic particles inside one Qube were quantumly-entangled with the particles of one other Qube. Whatever configuration the particles of one Qube were in, that was always reflected in its paired Qube.

Nothing can travel faster than light. The speed of light itself was a constant, limited, and as a communication medium light was prone to interference.

It meant that, in the past, off-world communication was slow and unreliable. When physicists and engineers unlocked the secrets of quantum entanglement almost a millennium ago, the exchange of messages became instantaneous with paired Qubes.

Nothing can travel faster than light, but there was a way to work around it.

Of course, Qubes were of the most use in interplanetary or interstellar communications. Within a planet’s atmosphere, radio waves and cables were still the more efficient form of communication, if only because they were much cheaper and faster to make.

So Valentina balked at her brother’s analogy. “That makes no sense, Guille,” she told him in no uncertain terms. “Entangled particles—paired Qubes—are useful when they are very far apart from each other, like light years apart. I don’t want to be light years apart from Juliana.”

They were at the mansion’s kitchen, watching Chivis, one the family’s personal servants, prepare an afternoon snack for Valentina and Juliana when Guille joined them and made his observation.

Glancing at her best friend, Valentina caught Juliana’s shy smile at her declaration. Valentina couldn’t help but mirror her smile. They’d known each other for a little over a year by then; Valentina understood the irrefutable truth of her statement. She did not want to be apart from Juliana. In fact, she wanted to be as close to her as possible, often longing to brush Juliana’s hair, to rub her cheeks against Juliana’s cheeks. With the kitchen counter between them, Valentina settled for grabbing Juliana’s hand. Juliana met her gaze; Valentina’s smile widened.

Guille waved a hand at the two of them, as if to demonstrate his point, but Valentina and Juliana were still gazing at each other and Chivis ignored him. “Well,” he said, clearing his throat to get their attention, “if you two lived light years apart, you two would still be—” he linked his hands through interlaced fingers, “—entangled.”

Juliana felt her face heat up, pleased and flattered. She thought it was nice, to hear Valentina’s brother make such remarks about their closeness.

Valentina thought differently. “Don’t even joke about that,” she said, slapping her brother’s arm, not appreciating the idea of living far away from Juliana.

Guille laughed as he moved away from Valentina, pretending to be hurt. Valentina laughed at his reaction. Juliana laughed at Valentina’s laughter, the way her eyes crinkled and her cheeks dimpled.

Chivis, much older and with much more experience of life, did not laugh at their banter.

���

Nothing can travel faster than light. The speed of light itself was a constant, a hard physical limit of the universe: 299,792.5 kilometres per second. In one Earth Year, light traveled a distance of 9.46 trillion kilometres: 1 light year.

The fastest interstellar ships were powered by warp drives, first built by physicists and engineers from over half a millennium ago. The warp ships were named after a fictional technology from millennia-old stories, but whereas the warp ships from the stories could overtake the speed of light by ever-increasing magnitudes, the real warp ships could not. Warp ships could travel nearly as fast as light, but not as fast as, and never faster.

Apart from an obscure reference to old fictional stories, warp ships were so called because of how it warped time for the ship’s passengers. At or near the speed of light, time dilated. To anyone and anything within a warp ship, trips take only a few hours, even a few minutes. To everyone and everything outside it, a ship that traveled a distance of a hundred light years would have taken a hundred Earth Years to get from its origin to its destination.

At the advent of warp ships, a group of astronauts travelled to Proxima Centauri—4 light years from Earth—then after a week at the system returned to Earth for a total distance travelled of 8 light years. To the astronauts, the round trip had taken a few minutes each way; to everyone outside the ship, the trip had taken over 8 years. One of the astronauts had been a mother. When she’d come back, her daughter—left on Earth—had aged 8 years in the absence that to the mother felt much less than that.

Because of the time dilation—the warp—it was impossible to interact with anyone and anything within a ship while it was traveling nearly as fast as light. Not even through Qubes, which were invented a couple of centuries before the warp ships. Even entangled particles could not sync when a second for one meant a lifetime for the other.

To travel in a warp ship at a distance of light years—5, 10, 100—meant to jump in time 5, 10, or 100 years to the future, putting not just space but also time between yourself and your loved ones.

Chivis, older and wiser, knew this. Interstellar travel was a special kind of heartbreak, it was no laughing matter.

.

Almost a year after that joking banter between the siblings, Valentina and Guille began to understand that heartbreak.

After warp ships were perfected, humanity began the Hundred Year Exodus. For a hundred years—and more—warp ships carrying thousands of people set off for far flung planets, hoping for a cleaner world, for better societies. Now, centuries later, the human diaspora was spread out over 500 light years from Earth in different directions, linked only by the paired Qubes the emigrants brought with them. But to travel to those colonies, hundreds of light years away, meant leaving the Earth as one knew it for good.

Chivis, who was retiring, had announced just that: she was going away to a colonised planet more than 200 light years’ distance from Earth.

.

“By the time she gets there, I’d be dead,” Valentina said lowly to Juliana.

They were lying side by side on Valentina’s bed, on the evening after Chivis’ departure. Valentina and Juliana often had sleepovers at the Carvajal family mansion. Usually they would be giggling over some vid or book or something that happened during the day, but when Juliana joined Valentina that evening, the latter had been crying into her pillows for most of the afternoon.

Valentina continued talking. “I know that she chose that planet because her children decided to move there, but she is—was—is,” Valentina huffed, even the tenses got confusing, “she’s like family to me too.” Valentina knew that she could not have hoped to compare against Chivis’ children and grandchildren when the woman had still been weighing her decision, but it had still hurt when Chivis had told her that she was leaving. “I’m going to miss her. I already miss her.”

“Val,” Juliana said gently, taking her best friend’s hand in hers and interlocking their fingers, “she’s going to miss you too. And it wasn’t an easy decision for her to make. She said so, right?”

“Yeah,” Valentina agreed in a whisper.

“She loved—she loves you Val, that doesn’t change.”

“It still sucks.”

“I know,” Juliana said gently, squeezing Valentina’s hand.

Valentina squeezed back before moving sideways and closing the distance between them so that her head was against Juliana’s shoulder, her hand wrapped around Juliana’s arms, her leg draped over Juliana’s legs.

“It helps that you’re here,” Valentina said. Suddenly overtaken with a certain fear, she gripped Juliana’s arm tightly, but it went away just as quickly and she loosened her hold. “I’m glad you’re here.”

⁂

That was not Valentina’s first experience with loss.

She had only been eight years old when her mother had passed away, and Valentina’s longing for her never quite went out.

“I still look around for her sometimes,” she’d once confessed to Juliana in a whisper, a few months after they’d met.

Even then, Valentina had found it easy to talk to Juliana about anything. She’d been the only person Valentina could really talk to about how it had felt to lose her mother at such a young age. It was the way Juliana had listened to her every word, and had seemed to understand exactly what Valentina had meant.

Valentina had tried to return the favour, tried to ask Juliana about her father, but Juliana had always clammed up when the subject was brought up.

.

It wasn’t until the day Juliana turned thirteen that she opened up about her father. He had not come to celebrate with her and Lupé, but he’d sent her some presents.

“I’m not really cut up that he didn’t come,” Juliana told Valentina matter-of-factly after her party, where she’d invited a few of her classmates. “I’m used to it,” she added with a shrug.

Macario Valdés had rarely ever been around back in Santonio; he had never come to visit once Lupé and Juliana moved to the Progreso.

“It was probably for the best anyway. He would have scared everyone off.”

He was a harsh man, not given to gentleness or affection.

“I’m surprised he even gave me anything.”

He was cold and distant.

“But maybe these actually came from Lupé, and she only pretended that it was from him.”

There was no doubt in Juliana’s mind that Lupé loved him dearly, that Lupé thought he was the most amazing man in the entire world. She could see it from the way Lupé talked about him, from the way Lupé preened on the rare occasion that he called.

To Juliana, he was just her mother’s absent husband. At least that was what she told herself.

Valentina did not understand how anyone could ever choose to be absent from Juliana’s life, but she did not say that out loud. Instead, she asked, “What did he get you?”

“Some books?” Juliana said doubtfully. Lupé had said that she’d downloaded them onto Juliana’s personal tablet, but Juliana hadn’t looked at it yet. “Which, I don’t know why, because there’s a library here.” She did not know what her father could have sent her that was not available in the Progreso’s huge library. “But I guess that means they really were from him.” Lupé would not have gotten her books.

Juliana huffed, waving away thoughts of absent fathers and thoughtless gifts. She looked at Valentina. “Thank you for your presents, by the way. Me encantan mucho.”

She’d already thanked her, but she felt like she could not express her gratitude enough. Valentina had gotten her a painting set, an actual physical painting set, with paper sketchbooks, a few canvases, and pencils and brushes and water colours. Juliana had done normal art—digital art—from the time she’d gotten her first tablet, but she’d always wanted to do art on paper and canvases.

“Of course,” Valentina said, “anything for you, Juls.”

Juliana smiled shyly, meeting Valentina’s eyes until, feeling overwhelmed by the depths of emotion in them, she gazed down at their joined hands and burrowed closer to Valentina, who tightened her hold around Juliana.

They were in Juliana’s bed, about to turn in for the night. Juliana’s other guests had left after the birthday party but Valentina had stayed for the rare sleepover at the Valdéses’ apartment. Juliana’s single bed was much smaller than Valentina’s so it was a tight squeeze, but Juliana didn’t mind. In fact, she liked it a lot.

Juliana liked being pressed close to Valentina. She liked holding Valentina’s hand. She liked it when Valentina hugged her tightly; she would always hug back and never want to let go. She liked it when Valentina kissed her cheeks; that was a new thing that Valentina did, and Juliana could not get enough of it. She liked it when Valentina would watch her for long moments, those pretty blue eyes seemingly glued on Juliana, even though it made her a little shy. And she liked gazing at Valentina in turn, never wanting to take her eyes off of her, because Valentina was the most beautiful person Juliana had ever seen, and she had the prettiest smile that made Juliana’s insides seem to fly.

.

.

.

This premise/idea is actually not a new one. I’ve been mulling it over in my head for years, but I’ve never been interested in putting one of my ships in this setting until Juliantina--not in writing or even in stories that are just in my head.

I’ve also wanted to write a certain kind of fic, a certain mood of fic, for Juliantina, but nothing seemed to fit their personalities--well, Val’s personality. I think this premise would achieve that mood without making them OOC. (I don’t know if I’m making any sense lol.)

Oh, and if you’ve reached this far, I wonder if you could guess where this story would be headed? 😊 

.

.

.

[artificialqueens]

hotel california. (gigi/jackie) — chapter one. - Roza

summary: jackie is a new immigrant to california in the late 70s after the explosion of the iranian revolution and meets gigi goode, a motorcyclist whose father owns the complex the persian is staying at for the next few months. what could possibly go wrong. [songfic based on hotel california]

author's note: thank you to all of jankie candle for being the best support and alex for being the best beta. ty guys for always loving this idea from the beginning, I hope you all enjoy and tumblr is @leljaaa as always xx

my tumblr: leljaaa / ao3 link / ( ꈍᴗꈍ)

— *.��

August 25th 1978.

Jackie's hands ceased to move as she stood completely stone-faced, looking towards the windows of the Yeşilköy Airport in Istanbul.

Her eyes glanced around the larger-than-life interior of the building as she was left to stare at the small view of the water from the terminal gate her ticket has assigned her to be present in.

Water.

That's all that managed to separate Jackie from her motherland.

All of her childhood and current life was to be completely thrown away and restarted.

The storm clouds concerning the collapse of the entire country had gathered for almost an entire year. It didn't help that everyone was simply butting heads over how to properly come together to try and overthrow the reigning government in power.

The Pro-Western, secret-police-filled lavish monarchy was now, apparently, wanting to be replaced with a Anti-Western theocracy. It had been largely nonviolent, thankfully, and simply was massed with civil protests as well as marches and chants from various citizens.

But the revolution finally erupted when only six days ago, 500 citizens were burned to their demise in an intentional fire that started at a local movie theatre.

Outcry, screams, rallying on the streets.

Constant.

Jackie left her family, called her mother one last time and promised to try to communicate as much as she could when she finally reached the West.

Storming out of University she groaned, running for Istanbul with her one suitcase after she hugged her roommate goodbye. She wiped the tears from her eyes as she passed by the warm and friendly neighborhood cats in Tehran one last time.

She adjusted her long blue and white floral dress as she pulled on the tassels near her neckline, making an attempt to tighten the top of the outfit as she gasped, hearing the announcement in Turkish and English about her flight finally boarding the next class in line.

Los Angeles was the only destination she was able to find a decent price for, her main sights were set on Canada where they had vacationed before to see cousins and distant family. However, most Iranians were fleeing to the states, so much so that the number in colleges jumped up almost 40,000 people.

Arrangements for her housing were made over in a telephone booth nearly an hour ago as Jackie detailed her situation to the man who apparently owned one of the cheaper complexes in California.

It wasn't her first choice but it was certainly her only choice at the moment, especially when she was about to board a plane to the destination.

Is this the American dream? Telling a stranger my life story as I sob over a payphone?

They exchanged information and she was booked through the system as she had just barely enough money to cover her basic expenses and the down payment he spoke of.

All that money saved from new year celebrations, her birthday, college and her job as a waitress would barely even cover a good two weeks of rent.

Basic math showed that seventy Iranian rial only equated to a single US Dollar.

Luckily, being an English and Linguistics major she knew the language like the back of her hand even if she still slipped heavily into her accent while conversing.

She could at least try to find work with the skills she had under her belt.

I know French fluently in any worst case. I'm sure there's some posh, Parisian strolling around the malls of America I've heard described in my magazines.

"Thank you," she whispered in English as she gripped her pastel blue suitcase close to her chest, stepping past the flight attendant as she entered the covered bridge.

My whole life is now on hold.

— *.✧

"Morning Miss Goode," a gentle voice spoke as the blonde flipped her long hair and shut the door in front of her. She smiled seeing one of their long time visitors, Clarissa, sitting near the lounge of the apartment complex with Earth, Wind & Fire blaring across the radio.

"Good morning," she grinned as she gave her a hug, gently crouching as she tried to keep a smile while hugging the older woman, who was reading her daily newspaper.

Her denim jumpsuit was covered in oil stains as she wiped her face dabbed in sweat.

"Riding again?"

The twenty year old laughed, confirming the woman's suggestion and shrugging with a small smile painted across her lips as she tied her hair back, explaining that she was trying to see if her motorcycle had an oil leak, that was all.

"Just trying to work on the bike while I can."

Owning the complex was always some kind of burden and weight on her shoulders, though it wasn't the Ritz or a five star resort, she grew up knowing it was a deep part of her family history and she was next to own it and take over the business.

Go to University and study business, paid for by her parents, come home and expand the housing and see a surge in profit.

If this plan was the stairwell to Heaven, Gigi had completely turned around and jumped off backwards after hitting that first step.

Gigi could care less about education in a society where no one cared unless you were rich or singing the number one hit song charting on the radios.

She had barely gotten her high school diploma before she decided to drop out of community college, despite getting to live with her best friend since middle school, Crystal.

The redhead had been extremely anxious about the sudden separation, until she realized that the starving poor artist wasn't a good look for her or her family, who barely had enough means as it was.

Now they both worked at the complex for decent money, Crystal great with design and helping out with various projects concerning architecture or the new paint jobs for the inside of some of the rooms.

Gigi was often stuck at the front desk, or trying to mingle with confused or returning guests who took every chance to complain to the daughter of the owner whenever they possibly could.

She entered the door to her childhood home as she was immediately met with an uncertain stare directed her way.  

"Dad—" her lips pursed together as she was immediately stopped by her father who sighed, not even needing an explanation of where she was or what she partook in instead of her job at the front desk of the small hotel.

"Gigi! We talked about this, you have to focus on your job here and make your money's worth and not just ride your bike!"

"I know…" she pouted as she took a deep breath, saddling in for another long rant from her father. But her mom seemed to hear her inner prayers, walking by and rubbing her shoulders, insisting that Gigi was allowed to have some fun during these hot dull summer months.

"Thank you," she whispered as she was bestowed with a loving kiss upon her forehead, her mom holding her hand as she stepped over to the kitchen, asking if Gigi would like anything to drink.

"I'm good."

Her father seemed to ignore the last two minutes as he sat on the couch, blissfully watching whatever channel was being broadcast as the mention of a new, month long rental had called in this morning.

"She's coming all the way from Iran. Only a bit older than Gigi."

Gigi's ears perked up as she changed in the bathroom out of the tight outfit into her short-cut t-shirt gifted from Crystal as a token of their friendship.

Her mind ran rampant with questions as she bit her lower lip and shook her head; she knew well enough from consistent pestering and close observation that right now wasn't a good time to be speaking about something still considered so taboo.

The only lesbian in all of Los Angeles who wasn't ancient or leading an uprise was Crystal and her other close friend from high school, Jan, who was as about as open as you could get with someone still fiercely in the closet.

"What about a new girl?" She asked curiously as she stepped out from the shadows.

Her father smiled, happy that Gigi was interested in anything pertaining to work, though the blonde knew exactly where her head laid with that question.

"She's a refugee, the revolution is apparently starting to build and she needs a place to stay," her mother recapped as Gigi slid by the fridge, listening impatiently to her father's blind knowledge of politics and foreign affairs as she stole a soda.

"Their royalty recently spoke to our own Jimmy Carter you know."

"Really?" Gigi replied with genuine shock, opening her bottle of Dr. Pepper, completely forgetting who her own country's president was for a solid two minutes.

I could give less of a shit.

It wasn't her fault she had failed Government and Economics in high school.

She had always been in favour of taking those 45 minutes to instead go on a ride or just hide behind the bleachers with one of the cigarettes she had managed to steal from Crystal.

"Name?"

"Jacqueline, she's scheduled to arrive around late afternoon so we should go down in a few to work on some unfinished papers and also to make sure she's comfortable."

Gigi groaned, sipping her drink as she kept moaning at the thought of having to do math at a table alone. The incredibly interesting job of paperwork, however, would end with her meeting a new and mysterious woman almost her age.

She could either be Gigi's next crush or turn into a decently close friend, and either way she considered it a win-win situation for the better.

— *.✧

"More to the left," the blonde spoke as Crystal lifted the piece of artwork towards the end of where she had placed her chair.

"Good!"

Nailing it in, the redhead jumped down from the chair as she and Gigi exchanged a round of high fives and hugs.

The time had rolled around to ten minutes to four in the afternoon as the two were attempting to keep on singing with the ABBA record that was playing as they finished up the final touches of the autumn decor near the lobby.

It wasn't the most interesting time, but the pair always managed to make it as lively and fun as can be.

"Good job," she admitted as both headed for the pool before Gigi gasped, stopping immediately in her tracks when noticing what must've been the new Persian girl her father was talking about.

"Crystal, that's her!" She whisper-shouted as her best friend nodded, looking up and down at her beautifully styled outfit.

Flowing curly black hair, her dress long with a slit almost up to her thigh as she wore her locks down with little makeup on.

She was more than beautiful.

She was completely ethereal.

A goddess, the kind of figure that would make anyone stop on the street just so they could take her in and bask in the pure, unfiltered grace and poise you would feel looking at such a textbook definition of stunning.

Crystal disappeared in broad daylight as Gigi was left staring, engulfed completely in fantasy and admiration for someone her age to travel all this way just to feel some stable security and safety.

"Your full name?"

The Persian tilted her head, confused before Gigi's father explained that it was just for check in purposes so they could find her room number and call number.

"Jacqueline but most will just call me Jackie, Cox."

"Very American last name," her dad spoke, curious, Gigi wanting to bash her head against the wall the moment the words left his lips.

"My dad was born in Canada," she explained sheepishly as she covered her cheeks with her fingertips, trying to disguise the blush that soon infiltrated her entire face.

They exchanged a couple of chuckles here and there before the Persian finally received the key to her hotel room, Gigi jumping out from behind her father to explain that she would show her the place she would be staying in.

Locking eyes, Jackie's expression brightened significantly as Gigi rapidly fluttered her lashes. Her tough girl exterior completely crumbled at the sight of someone so perfect and refined.

"Gigi Goode."

"Jackie Cox."

They shook hands firmly, the both of them walking towards the elevator as Jackie held her suitcase, completely indifferent to the idea of staying at this complex despite the cute girl next to her who made sure she would get to her room in an orderly fashion.

Jackie missed her apartment in Tehran, she missed the mountains and high-rises in the window of her student home, with the silver tabbies sometimes hopping on the window when they smelled something good being cooked.

"I don't wanna ask you if it's triggering but what drove you to Los Angeles specifically? Is there a lot of students here from your country?"

The Persian smiled, licking her lips as she tried to come up with a put together answer to the question without having to go through a textbook of back story concerning the revolution.

"There is a lot of fighting over my government and I just fled knowing it's going to get worse. Los Angeles does have some Persians here for sure but I only am here because it was the cheapest ticket option."

"Awesome," Gigi gasped, "I mean not awesome! I'm sorry you're here but I'm very glad you're here and are staying with us!"

Way to make a first impression Gigi.

Jackie laughed at how quickly the blonde seemed to trip over her own words as the elevator opened to the second floor, Gigi skipping out before holding out her hand for the taller woman.

"Ladies first."

"Thank you!"

Making her way to the door she slid her key into the room as she finally managed to unlock it before nodding at the space within the room.

"It's very nice!"

"You don't have to lie just because my father owns this building," Gigi admitted with a snicker as Jackie shook her head furiously.

"I mean it!"

Gigi couldn't help but stare at the brightly coloured walls, though she supposed anything was better than Jackie's current situation back in her home country.

She explained that her and her best friend were probably going to be redoing the rooms soon with new paint job finishes.

"It's very cute, I like the colours."

Jackie sets her suitcase down on the couch as she jumps on to it, wiggling around as she leaned back and sighed, remembering suddenly that she needed to find a way to speak with her mother.

"Do you possibly have some kind of phone around? I just need to contact my mother if that's okay."

Gigi frowned, the idea of being away from her mom during a damn revolution abroad completely would destroy her, though Jackie seemed fine, or was at least able to mask her true emotions extremely well.

"Yeah, there should be one in the kitchen. It has a guide in English and French if you know it," She jokes though the Persian claps, admitting she's fluent and better at it than English.

Oh so she's also a cunning linguist.

What a home run.

"It's a bit confusing but if you get stuck you can always ask me, I work at the front desk most of the time."

Jackie stands, their faces in proximity as she thanks Gigi for all the good service and help. The Persian admitted she definitely wanted to see her again considering she was the first connection she had made arriving in America.

"If you ever wanna see me you can catch me on my Kawasaki motorcycle, I'm almost always out somewhere riding."

"You drive a motorcycle?" She asks, genuinely intrigued at Gigi's few hobbies.

"I do and I would be happy to take you anywhere you need, we live near one of the best downtown areas so whenever you need food or just want to stroll, let me know."

Jackie tucked the loose strands of her black hair behind her ear as she blushed, admitting it might have to be soon since she had to go off and buy some food for herself.

"If it's any trouble, I absolutely do not mind walking…"

"You're not going to walk to a grocery store, what time do you want to go? I'll knock on your door."

The Persian stared at the clock before humming, admitting that somewhere around six or seven would be perfect.

"It's a date," Gigi flirted before making a move and kissing Jackie's hand, saying goodbye to her new-found friend as the refugee stared at her with a smirk.

"Bye Gigi," she whispered as the blonde turned and closed the door, Jackie locking it before trying not to let the thought of this girl completely hypnotize her.

She was beautiful and very sweet. She was trying to make Jackie feel as comforted as possible, even if her responses were sometimes just a bit floundered.

Content with what she had, she turned on the small television perked in her room as she quickly explored the remaining calibers of the place she would call home for the next few weeks or so.

Her body stopped at the sight of the phone as she gripped the wires, her fingers wrapping around them as she anxiously attempted to call her mother, though she knew it was a long shot, and if it wasn't it would still be expensive.

No answer.

She groaned, head in her heads as she attempted to not cry. She put aside some of her extra money she budgeted out for non-necessity items.

I will ask Gigi to find me a payphone so I can give a call.

However, I still have to work out these timezone conversions.

Her suitcase was filled to the brim with whatever she could bring: her best outfits, three pairs of shoes, all her basic first aid, the money, some tokens of her home country to keep her at ease, a small Iranian flag and some miscellaneous items to keep her entertained like a few vinyl records and lots of art and writing materials.

"This is the American dream they always speak about," she muttered under her breath as she pulled out a long white kaftan to wear for the rest of the day.

Welcome to the United States Jackie, everything is only uphill from here...

[accioharry]

if the world was ending | peter & mj |  ch 2

Perhaps she could finally call him a friend, maybe even on the way to being her best friend. She couldn’t ruin that now, but she couldn’t watch him ruin himself either. She found herself at a crossroads, wondering what mattered more.

ao3 | read from the beginning 

chapter word count: 1.8k

They agreed to meet at a coffee shop near Central Park, a place Michelle frequented often on the weekends with her family. While she was gone, parts of the park had been turned into a memorial for the fallen; a memorial that was currently in limbo of whether it would stay up or not. She took note of the amount of families in the park, as though they were cherishing every moment they had together. She never thought she’d feel that way at her age.

She found Peter outside the Starbucks with a hot coffee already in his hand. Even though she mentally prepared herself, Michelle felt the ground sway beneath her as soon as she saw Peter’s face. He had a scar on his cheek as though stitches were there a few months ago, but what shocked Michelle the most was how exhausted he looked. He looked so stricken with grief, as though something awful had completely shattered him into pieces. 

He still looked the same with the unruly curly hair and the chocolate brown eyes that she caught staring at her more than once in decathlon practice. Except when he lifted his head to acknowledge her and she saw his eyes, the little sparkle of mischief was gone. In a way, she barely recognized him. 

“Iced latte with almond milk?” He nodded to the iced coffee on the bench next to him. She took it graciously, shock evident on her face as she sat next to him on the bench. Her words caught in her throat for a moment, as though she had no idea what to say next.

“Peter,” she tapped his shoulder and he turned to her. He winced as she examined the scar. “That wasn’t there before.”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” he shrugged, sipping his coffee. Michelle wanted to argue with him so badly, wanted to push him to tell her everything he kept from her, but she just couldn’t. Not when he looked so destroyed. 

“I think after recent events, nothing would surprise me,” she smiled slightly. It took everything in her to not ask questions –– his battle scars were so prominent, she wasn’t prepared for it.  

“Challenge accepted and noted for the future,” Peter replied. “Did you sleep well?”

“I wouldn’t say I slept great, but it’s gotten better over time,” she leaned back against the bench, tucking her feet under her. “It’s getting easier to be in the dark, even if…it was instant for us,” she muttered before looking up at him. He was staring straight ahead, as though his focus was the only thing keeping him sane. “Are you sleeping?” She already knew the answer. 

He sighed, sipping the coffee again before leaning forward on his elbows. “Would you believe me if I said I was?”

“Not for a second,” she wanted to confide in him, to tell him that she wants to be there for everything. The death of Tony Stark hit him like a train—she could see it in his eyes. He was still sixteen, technically, but he acted so much older now, as though he aged the five years in a matter of five minutes. It would be so easy to grab his hand and tell him that she was here, and wanted to understand. So why couldn’t she?

“This is the first time I went out of the apartment,” he admitted. “I’ve wanted to, but I spent the first few weeks––“ he cut himself off before he slipped up, “upstate. I was upstate, but May found an apartment for us, so we came back finally.” 

“I haven’t gone out much either,” she said softly. “Only with my family, but never on my own. It’s different now, for all of us.”

“Yeah,” Peter sipped his coffee again, and Michelle could’ve sworn he was holding back tears. “It’s different.” 

The two of them sat in silence for a long time, watching the world move around them. It was hard to tell who had blipped and who didn’t because from the outside, it looked as though society was rebuilding itself just fine. Michelle knew better than that, and also knew how easy it was for Peter to get lost in his own thoughts. She glanced at him. 

“Do you want to take a walk?” _______________________________________________________________________ She missed hearing Peter’s rambles about pure nonsense. 

He was reluctant to take the walk, but Michelle pulled him up by the arm until he finally agreed. Getting back in the world was hard, but having Peter by her side made it a little easier, she was certain of that. 

“So basically, they still made the last Star Wars film, and it’s been out for YEARS,” Peter huffed. “I can’t believe it, I knew they filmed already before the blip, but they could have waited until we came back.”

“Okay in the defense of Hollywood, they didn’t know that we’d come back,” Michelle smiled. “You’re just mad you didn’t get to see it in theatres.”

“I’m not mad about that, I’m mad that I didn’t get to go to the premiere. The freaking premiere! I missed it and it will never happen again,” he grumbled. “It’s rude.”

“How is that rude?” she laughed. “You’re so grumpy about this!”

“If it was a good movie I’d understand, but it was so bad MJ, you don’t understand.” He kept rambling, and Michelle’s heart did a flip hearing him call her MJ again. It’s been quite a while since she heard that nickname. 

“I watched it with my brother,” she cut him off before he could continue. “It…had it’s good moments.” She rolled her eyes at the look of disgust on Peter’s face. “It did!”

“You’re defending the worst film in the saga, I hope you know that.”

“Says the boy whose favorite character was Jar Jar Binks in sixth grade.”

“I still can’t believe Ned told you that, I told him that in confidence.”

“and now it is a small fact about you that I will cherish forever,” she grinned, elbowing him in the side. It didn’t seem to bother him.

“You mean you’ll hold it over me for the rest of my life?” Peter scoffed, dumping his empty coffee cup in a trash can as they walked. 

“Same thing,” she smiled, and Peter’s face lit up. 

“So what, ten years from now you’ll send me an outdated Jar Jar Binks meme from a blocked number, taunting me once again?”

“I would never do such a thing,” Michelle faked offense. “I’d mail it to you, obviously.”

It surprised her to see Peter double over in laughter. She didn’t realize she was being funny, but it made him smile, so she went with it. For a brief moment in time, all of his suffering was gone, vanished as though it had been blipped permanently. She willed her mind to remember the moment for as long it would allow her, because a happy Peter Parker was officially her favorite Peter Parker.

_______________________________________________________________________ It was an hour later when Michelle decided she had enough. 

Even if Peter smiled with her, it lasted for a brief moment before his face fell again. She could tell Peter was in pain, he looked so lost. His eyes never focused on anything, his sentences went unfinished when he got deep in his thoughts, and call it instinct, but she just knew. 

“Okay,” she huffed, and Peter turned back to look at her, not realizing she had stopped walking. “Sit down.”

He looked around. They were still in the park, but not in an area where many empty benches were prominent. “Where?”

“On the ground, where else?”

He opened his mouth as though he wanted to argue, but thought different when he saw the look of determination on her face. He followed Michelle off the path and into the grass. She sat down, patting the space beside her. 

Even though it was still summer it was an overcast day, which to be honest, really reflected the mood Peter was in. He knew Michelle suspected something, but was he ready to tell her?

“Hey,” she muttered after a period of silence. “Talk to me.”

“What do you think we’ve been doing for two hours?” Peter’s eyes weren’t focused on her, but on the grass he was picking with his hands. He was caught, and he knew it. 

“You know that’s not what I meant.”

The silence was deafening and actually made her uncomfortable. For someone who spent most of her school years avoiding crowds and sitting in the library, she felt almost claustrophobic in the current silence.

 She wanted to shake him –– to yell in his face that she knows and she wants to help him. If she did that, she’d scare him off and he would never trust her again. They had gotten closer in the past twenty-four hours than they ever had been before the blip, before anything really. 

Perhaps she could finally call him a friend, maybe even on the way to being her best friend. She couldn’t ruin that now, but she couldn’t watch him ruin himself either. She found herself at a crossroads, wondering what mattered more. 

“Peter, please,” she tried again. “Talk to me, I’m here aren’t I? I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t want to help.” 

“You don’t understand,” he shrugged, his head lowered. “You wouldn’t understand. I can’t just tell you, it’s not that easy,” he winced, as though the words caused him physical pain. “I want to, I wish I could tell someone but—” He trailed off. 

She didn’t know what to say. Her limbs felt heavy, as though the weight of the world had fallen upon her. A weight of guilt, for thinking she could fix everything by being there, for thinking Peter would easily open up to her just because she was there. That’s not how it worked and she knew that. She just didn’t want to believe it. Life was never kind enough to give her what she wanted.

 Perhaps it was the blip itself, a force of the universe that created a bond between the fallen, the ones who were brought back. Maybe she just wanted a friend, someone who went through what she did. But that wasn’t Peter. He had gone through so much more, and Michelle hated watching him struggle with his demons on his own. 

“I won’t force you to tell me anything,” Michelle said finally. “If anything, I just want you to know that I would never, ever, do that.” 

“I know,” he shrugged, his voice quiet. “I want to, I really do because I know it would help, but I can’t put that on you. I can’t ask you to walk this with me.” 

“Then don’t,” the sincerity in her voice made Peter turn his head towards her. “Don’t ask me, because I’m offering, whenever you’re ready, I’m there.” She bumped his shoulder with hers. “Got it?”

“Yeah,” he nodded with a small smile, but Michelle could see it in his eyes, he didn’t believe her.

[justfor2am]

Snow in Venice

Words: 4610

Warnings: Character death, terminal illness, crying, alcohol mention

Ships: Logicality, implied Prinxiety, Logince

I technically wrote this a while back on a different site, but I figured I could bring this over here too! Hope y’all enjoy. Based around the cover of ‘Snow in Venice’ Thomas posted a couple years ago. I apologize if the Italian is wrong, I had to use google translate for some bits.

Abejita: little bee

Logan has the perfect life. A wonderful husband, a house, and a place in the world. But seasons change, and with it, Logan finds himself chasing old horizons and running into new ones.

   "Maybe my song isn't happy enough but I, I see it take flight with the snowflakes above me..." Patton's voice carried through the kitchen, over the light sizzle of eggs in a battered frying pan. Logan had been busying himself with setting the table, when a faint smile passed over his lips.

        "That song again? I'd thought by now you'd grow tired of it." His voice held no bite as he set down the last of the cutlery, and snaked his arms around the other's waist. Logan loved hearing Patton sing; sweet like the cardinals chirping outside their front porch. Light streamed through the open curtains of the window; the air was a fair and breezy reminder of the coming spring weather.

        Patton laughed under his breath, soft, golden brown curls falling into his eyes. He pushed his hair back, (Logan really must get him a haircut) and shrugged. "I don't know, it just makes me happy. Even though the singer is sad, they're still looking for their partner."

        He turned off the gas-lit stove with a click. "It's almost romantic." Patton smiled at his husband, and left a sweet kiss on his lips. Logan could never get enough of his kisses, and his ears turned pink in embarrassment. "I suppose that's one way of viewing it."

        "Come on, honeybee. Breakfast's ready!"

                                                        •••

        "My coffee gets cold, as I'm staring enthralled, at the snow, that keeps falling outside." The words were no longer belted out in a rich, warm tone. Patton's lungs had grown far too weak for such things in recent months, and Logan didn't want him straining himself anymore than necessary. Patton busied himself with another knitted scarf, humming under his breath; Logan prepped him another cup of tea and tried to ignore the fits of coughing that frequented his room.

        "You really should rest your voice, I don't want you to lose it again." Logan carried a small tray into the other's room, a cup of lavender tea with two spoonfuls of honey they way he liked. The tray was set down on the nightstand, and Logan picked up Patton's last, unfinished cup. He was having trouble keeping anything down, these days.

        Patton's fingers froze in their weaving, the yellow and green thread uneven and messy. He slowly turned to look at Logan, a thin, fragile smile gracing his face. "You're so sweet, but I promise, I'm nearly well. Can't I go outside for a little while?" He asked.

        Logan watched him carefully, those round, hazel eyes that didn't shine the way they used to. Logan saw how Patton's hand shook, how he could barely keep his knitting even. And he didn't want to remember the last time he'd let his husband get out of bed unattended; a nearly twisted ankle had given them both much more than a small fright.

        It pained him to shake his head, to look Patton in those gorgeous, hazel eyes and tell him "no," tell him "he couldn't risk getting any more ill."

        Patton said he wasn't sick, this was just a small flu, a cold, allergies. Every day, something new. Every day, the same request to leave bed rest just for a day, an hour, a minute. All he wanted to do was feel the sun again, or if it were raining, to splash in puddles and not care if his socks got wet. To be and feel alive.

        Eventually, he stopped asking. Mid summer, when Logan brought him his hourly tea, he asked a different question. "Honeybee," Patton said, "Could you bring me a map?"

        Confused, Logan set down the cup of tea. "A map? A map of what?"

        He paused, thinking. "Europe, I think. Yeah, Europe." He was almost cheery, a new, excited spark emitting from Patton. "And a pencil, if you don't mind."

        Logan brought him what he'd requested, and kissed him. "I don't know what you're planning, but don't strain yourself." He said. "The last thing I want is for you to fall asleep while working."

        The latter only smiled, and cupped his cheek. "You're one to talk, sweetheart."

                                                        •••

        Patton hadn't been this bubbly in ages. Through all of the coughing and feverish ranting, he kept his spirits high with what he was now calling, "The Fredricksen Project".

        "You know," he pushed another red pin into the now lightly battered-up map, connecting the blue thread to yet another city, "Like Carl and Ellie Fredricksen, from Up?"

        Logan chuckled, moving to sit on the bed next to Patton, "Last time I checked,  they only wanted to visit one place in South America, or did we not view the same movie?" He took a seat next to Patton on the bed, where he was now tying a light blue thread from one pin to another. There were quite a number of places marked, London, Paris, Berlin, Rome- "...I don't suppose you're also planning for modes of transportation?" He asked lightly. "London and Paris aren't exactly next-door-neighbors."

        His husband only shook his head and laughed. "That's part of the fun. We'll figure it out as we go." Patton pushed the map away from himself, taking a long look at it. "I think," he said, "we're still missing something." He pursed his lips, and clicked his tongue in a wondering key. "I just don't know what."

        Logan picked up the map, and smiled. "Perhaps a final stop in Venice wouldn't be a bad idea." He took a red pin, marking the city. "What do you think? I've heard it's lovely in the spring." 

        Patton nodded, and kissed his lips with a content hum. "Venice sounds perfect." He sat up slightly, stretching his back. "When would you want to go?"

        Tapping a pencil against the paper, Logan counted the points listed. "There's quite a lot of cities to visit, it would take us a while. We've only just finished paying off the house, and there's still my work at the university that needs to be taken into account-"

        He was interrupted by a heavy bout of coughing, and his eyes darted to Patton's frail figure, curling up into himself. Logan's hands went like clockwork, first to push away any loose pins or papers away from Patton, then to the glass of water that always sat on the nightstand. But he refused the water, instead taking a long, heavy breath. Patton leaned back against the pillows and sighed.

        Logan pushed his curls away from his eyes, and he could see what was left of that bright cheerfulness draining away. Patton was exhausted, or maybe more than that. Something like running on empty, Logan supposed.

        "Maybe we should wait a while, until your health impro-" "No." Logan blinked, his train of thought interrupted. Patton rubbed his eyes, and pulled his heavy black-framed glasses off. "I don't want to wait anymore."

        It was rare for his husband to sound so blank, even with the state of his illness. This was something new. "...What do you mean?" He asked.

        Patton stared down at his bedsheets, folding the fabric between his fingers. "I...I don't want to put this off anymore." He paused, adding hastily, "The trip, I don't want to wait on the trip anymore."

        "I think it's time we had ourselves another adventure, you know?" His hazel eyes met Logan's, and once again, Logan found it painful to tell him 'no'.  "Yes, I think it's time."

        He stood up, leaving the map with Patton. "But, not today. Soon, however. I promise."

        Patton nodded, looking back down at his hands. "Soon."

                                                        •••

        "I got you something!" Patton hid his phone screen from Logan, who in turn, playfully covered his eyes. "I suppose this is a 'no peeking' type situation?"

        Patton giggled, "Yup! You have to guess."

        "How many guesses do I get?"

        "Um, one."

        Logan uncovered his eyes slightly. "Well those don't sound like fair odds."

        "Hey, no peeking!" Patton chided, and Logan covered his eyes again. "Wait, can I just tell you? It's really, really special."

        "Do I get to uncover my eyes if you do?" Logan asked.

        "Sure, now come, come!" Patton reached for Logan's hand. Logan uncovered his eyes and threaded their fingers together. "What did you get me?"

        Patton turned his phone back on, "I know our anniversary is a few weeks away, but I wanted to go ahead and get this early." On his phone, there was a receipt for a connected-flight plane ticket. Logan scrolled through the page, and skimmed the cities listed. "London, Paris, Berlin... Patton, how did you afford this?"

        He shrugged, still smiling. "I went through my retirement fund. Was a penny and a half, but I'm glad I did." 

        Logan was dumbfounded. "I, this is a wonderful gift Patton, I love it." He hesitated. "But, I can't accept this. It's too much, you'll need something to fall back on financially in the future. Besides, there's only one ticket, and if you're implying that I take this trip without you, I could never."

        Patton squeezed his hand. "Honeybee, it's okay. This is just the first step, you know. We'll start saving, and I'll get a ticket for myself later. But this is yours, and I want you to have it."

        His breathing failed him for a moment, and Patton took a long pause. "From me to you, our adventure is finally starting."

                                                         •••

        "I don't want you here; please go home."

        "My home is right here; I'm not leaving."

        This was the types of talks Logan and Patton were having now, but instead of their cozy two-story home, and soft beds, and hot tea, there were sterilized hospital rooms, and hard beds, and beeping machines.

        Patton was counting his fifteenth day in this room, and fourth in his attempts to convince Logan to leave. "I don't want you to see me like this, I know it hurts you." His voice was faint and broken, and anything he said was more often than not, followed by a coughing spell. "It's time to go."

        "If you think I could leave you in a hospital all alone, of all places, and be able to live with myself, then you are sorely mistaken." Logan had his arms crossed in a defensive pose across his chest, pacing the room with an irregular foot step. "It's not time to go anywhere, Patton. I need to be with you, here."

        Logan could see Patton shaking his head out of the corner of his eye, and he sighed. "I'm not going to leave you, and that's final."

        "I've trapped you, I didn't mean to do that-"

         "You've done no such thing, rest your voice."

        "Lo, you need to go."

        "I can't. I won't. I'm not going to."

        Patton coughed, and fell back against his pillows harshly. "I think, maybe, we have different meanings to where you would go."

        He stopped pacing. "I'm talking about our house," Logan said. "What do you mean?"

        "Europe."

        He froze. "No. Absolutely not. I cannot go to Europe and simply leave you here."

        "You already have a ticket, remember?" Patton mumbled. He closed his eyes, and slowed his ragged breathing. "Everything's ready, and I really want you to go. Take pictures for me, if you'd like."

        Logan shook his head firmly, "I'm not going to Europe while you're so ill. When you get better, we can take the trip together. I promised you that, remember? I promised that we would go soon, the moment you were well enough to travel. Besides, there's almost enough saved up to buy you your ticket, it's just a matter of waiting a little while longer."

        Patton opened his eyes slowly, and stared up at the ceiling. "You know I can't wait anymore.

        "That's not true, you're getting better."

        "You know that's a lie honeybee, please don't lie to yourself."

        "Stop saying that, you're getting better I know it-" He wasn't sure at what point he'd walked to the window, or why he was leaning against it trying not to cry. Logan wasn't sure of anything anymore.

        "And traveling light.... is a curse, and a blessing. For someone like me, whose heart has gone missing..." Patton's voice was thin and worn out, but Logan needed to hear it.

        So get on that plane, as the snow turns to rain, and I'm writing your name, on the clouds..." 

                                                        •••

        Logan had always hated airports. The noisy bustling of business men in grey suits and black ties, maternal figures herding their children and partners to the correct gate with an exhausted expression, and those were only two types of people that frequented this place.

        It was something akin to purgatory for him, and Logan was filled with doubt from the baggage checks to the physical act of boarding the plane itself. There was very little he still carried with himself: a single suitcase with simple, practical garments, a wallet with as much money the bank allowed him to withdraw stuffed messily inside, and a few legal things here and there. Birth certificates, social security cards, passports, things he wanted to do away with.

        He found himself taking a window seat, waiting for the actual departure. Getting to this point had been incredibly difficult, and somehow the funeral was the least painful of the events leading up to this point. The event was an unsteady blur, from unknown guests leaving their best regards with him, to unwanted handshakes and teary looks as he sat silently by the casket staring unblinking at those who were mourning.

        He didn't want to mourn here, where people would judge and jeer, those who never approved of their marriage muttering under their breaths as to how deserved his husband's death was. 

        "Fuck them," Logan thought. Logan opted to mourn in private, when the viewing was over, and the body burned. Patton had always wanted to have his ashes turned into a tree. "Give back to the world!" he would have said. Patton was always giving too much. Giving was what killed him, handing out bits and pieces of his soul until there was nothing left of himself to keep ,and he was flat-lining at the hospital, and the room was so full, too many people, too many hands on his husband, where was his-

        Logan casually brushed away a stray tear that crawled its way down his face. No, not here. Not in an airport, of all places. He stared hard out of the window, his breath heavy, fogging up the glass.

        He wrote his name. It faded quickly, and Logan sniffed as quietly as possible. This was no place for crying. 

        This was no place for remembering.

                                                        •••

        The trip was fairly straight-forward. Logan found himself at what most would consider the most attractive tourist locations: London was the Buckingham Palace, a bus tour, the Tower of London, and a quick view from The Shard before departing for France. The sooner he got out of the UK, the better. Logan could remember all of the places Patton had longed to visit here, planned to a key. It hurt to stay.

        Before he left, Logan did make time to visit platform 9 3/4. He took a picture of the trolley stuck in the wall, and an attendant approached him. "You're allowed to take a picture on it too, if you'd like."

        He shook his head politely. "No, thank you. The pictures aren't for me." He walked away quickly, looking to avoid her follow-up questions. Yes, he should leave London promptly.

        France, unfortunately, was not any better for his emotions. Paris, the revered "City of Love": couples walking in happy, bubbly pairs and kissing by the Eiffel Tower ate away at Logan's heart, in pinching, little munches. He spent the least time in Paris, eager to see any place that wasn't so full of romance and well....love.

       Germany was a welcomed stop. Here, it wasn't so bad to drink beer at three in the afternoon by yourself in a park, so long as you didn't bother anyone walking by. Logan rummaged through his suitcase and pulled out Patton's map. There were still two more cities left, and he groaned to himself. There was very little will left in him to get off of this stupid bench, let alone finish the trip. Yes, Berlin was lovely.

        But it would be better with him here. 

                                                        •••

        The endeavor that was this trip wasn't to be completed in a matter of weeks, oh no. Logan had set out shortly after Patton's passing in late November. It was passing New Year's now, and he'd spent it drinking in Rome. In his defense, there was an extensive selection of wines to be had in Italy, and it would be a disservice to not enjoy a few glasses. Or at least, that's what the bartender had told him.

        Logan had left Berlin some days before the coming of the year, in a state of heated embarrassment. As it turns out, to make calls overseas via cell phone, you need an international calling card, which Logan did not own nor cared to purchase. He knew that family and friends back in the States were probably wondering where he was. In rather broken Italian, Logan made his way to a phone booth that hadn't seen a human in ages, and stuffed several euros into its slot.

        "Dove stai chiamando?" ("Where are you calling to?") the automatic voice system asked.

        "Um, gli stati Uniti?" (Um, the United States?") he replied.

        "Si prega di inserire il numero desiderato, ora." ("Please enter the desired number, now.")

        "...grazie." (Thank you.)

        He punched in the 0-0-1 for international calling, and froze. Logan didn't really want to call home, but felt that out of obligation, he should. He shook his head, and entered a familiar number.

        "Hello?" He spoke into the receiver. "Hello, greetings, um, it's...it's Logan. I know I haven't called in a while, I've just been...uncertain, of myself as of late. I wanted to check on how you were doing-"

        "Hey there!" A voice replied. "You've reached the voicemail of Patton Sanders!"

        Logan's shoulders sagged. The message played on, "oh, Logan's at the door, that's my husband. Logan, honeybee, come say hi! Oh whoops, that was the mail lady, sorry Mary Lee! Well anyway, this is his voicemail too, so just leave a message and we'll get back to you in a jiffy! Bye now!"

        A long beep played, and for a while Logan didn't say anything. He stared at the light flurry of snow that had started to pile up against the phone booth door. Months. It had been months since Logan had heard his husband speak. 

        He cleared his throat. "H-hello Patton, it's me. I know it seems odd to leave a voicemail, but many odd things have happened to me lately."

        "Uh, well, it's still snowing here. I'm in Berlin, by the way. On our trip? I'm sorry you couldn't make it, you couldn't imagine the views I've seen...um...I miss you. I miss you quite a lot, and I'll be home soon, okay? I promise. I love you."  Logan set the receiver back down on its hook, and rubbed his face pink, trying to fight away the tears. Not here, not now.

        "I love you. I love you a lot." 

        Now he was in Rome, trying to forget all of the emotions that had attacked him in that moment. Grief, joy, heartbreak, it just wasn't the right time for these things.

                                                        •••

        "Venice, the great city of.... Oh, who cares anymore." Logan thought, shuffling in from the heavy mid-January snow into a quaint café a few blocks from the airport. All of the time he's spent in Italy, Logan found himself enjoying the language as he ordered a small coffee in (albeit rather clumsy) Italian.

        The café carried a mellow atmosphere, with a guest tucked away in a far corner skillfully playing the piano. The lights were fairy-like and dim, and with plush pillows and chairs, it felt like home. Logan took his coffee to an empty table, and pulled out the battered map one more time. Venice was the last city Patton had planned for, and Logan was faced with the drudgery of home life staring him in the eyes blankly. 

        As much as he had wished for Patton's cheerful presence on this trip, Europe had become a healing experience for Logan, and he wasn't looking forward to leaving. Instead, Logan focused on the moment, and sipped his coffee slowly as the pianist started to shift songs.

        "Forse la mia canzone non è abbastanza felice ma io, lo vedo prendere il volo con i fiocchi di neve sopra di me." The voice was warm and rich, full of a vibrant tone that Logan could only call familiar.

        Half way into the first verse, Logan could hear the man shift into English. "And maybe I'll see you again when it's snowing in Venice. And I will be on my way home." Several heads had turned to catch a glimpse of the singer, but most simply nodded along, accustomed to these types of performances happening. 

        Logan stood, and made his way to the piano as the man sang on, "And see you in London or maybe in Paris. Berlin will be waiting, and so will be Rome," Logan knew this song. Had the words stitched into his heart and brain, knew the notes by memory. "And maybe I'll see you again when it's snowing in Venice. And I will be on my way home." The singer paid no attention to Logan, eyes closed in thought as he played. 

        "Oh la Venezia, mi fa cosi bene." Logan sang along quietly, sitting down nearby the piano. "Esco ogni sera, e vado a ballare." The pianist lowered his voice to raise Logan's, eyes still closed as he followed the tune. "Che ben atmosfera, che bellissima neve. Non ce proprio niente," the singer opened his eyes, and caught Logan's eye. He paused, hands floating atop the keys.

        Logan finished the phrase, "....Che mi posso mancare..." The two stared at each other a long time. There was something familiar about the other, but the two had never met before. The café had gone quiet, and whispered murmurs were floating around.

        Before Logan could even say a word, the stranger spoke. "...Virgil?"

                                                        •••

        The air was crisp and sharp, the heavy snow from before lightening into a gentle flurry. The two men sat together outside at the edge of a fountain, now frozen over and still.

        The pianist apologized for earlier, his suave, confident movements now awkward and nervous. "I hope I didn't startle you with what I said, you looked so much like someone I used to know." His voice was muffled from the heavy scarf around his neck.

        Logan waved him down, "It's alright, of all the things I've have to deal with on this excursion of mine so far, I would say this is the least unpleasant. Dare I even say, interesting. You speak two languages?"

        "Three," He mumbled. "I grew up in Spain and moved to Italy a few years ago. I've picked up what I can from the locals, and now it's my home."

        "Where did you learn English from?" Logan asked.

        The man sighed, and pulled down his scarf. "From him. Virgil." he clarified. "We met after I moved here, he was a college foreign exchange student from the United States. He spent two years here in Italy, and I found myself entertained with his language that I only knew bits and pieces of."

        "Eventually," he said, "I took an English class at a small college here, and the rest is history." His breath made small puffs of smoke rise up into the air, and his cheeks a rosy pink.

        "That's incredible." Logan said, watching his own breath lift into the breeze. "The only Italian I know is by ear, and even that is limited to a semester at best."

        They sat in silence for a while. "I never got your name."

        "I'm Roman. You?"

        "Logan. It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

                                                        •••

        The two chatted for some time, until the sun started to reach for the horizon with its orange hues. Logan learned several things about Roman in that time: he moved to Italy to become a performer, he dated Virgil during their second year together but separated when Virgil had to return to the U.S., the two no longer spoke, and Roman was always wondering how he was doing back home.

        Logan told Roman plenty about himself: how his husband had planned the trip, about Patton's terminal illness and passing, how much he enjoyed having someone to share his grief with. When the tears came, and after so long of holding them back you'd think this would have happened sooner, Roman simply pulled a crumpled tissue out of his pocket, and gave him a side hug.

        "I think you know where you're supposed to be," Roman said. "And it's not here."

        From there, it was a simple exchanging of numbers and a short cab to the airport.

        Upon returning to the States, Logan bought the first calling card he could find and dialed Roman's number with an unsteady hand. "Hello? This is Logan."

        "Missing me already?" The voice teased. Logan sighed with relief, and chuckled. "I bet you'd enjoy that, wouldn't you? I'm only testing my card." He hailed a cab from the airport parking lot. "When did you say you could visit?"

        "March uh....shoot, what's that number? After the twelve? I can't ever say it right."

        "Thirteenth?"

        "Yes, that one! March one-three." He quipped.

        Logan smiled, "I don't know if I'll have my house clean by then, it's been empty for some time now. I wouldn't be surprised to find it over run with dust bunnies by now."

        Roman laughed loudly into the receiver, and Logan found himself remembering Patton's laugh within it; rich and full of life. "Please, a few dust bunnies is nothing compared to a good duster and enough time."

        "I guess you'll just have to come and see for yourself." Logan opened the door to the cab and pulled out his suitcase, staring up at the empty house. The paint was cracked in a few places, and the mailbox was overflowing with letters.

        The inside was perfectly persevered under a heavy layer of dust, and each room had a vast empty feeling to them; a need to be filled.

        "We've got our work cut out for us here, Roman." Logan set down his suitcase on the kitchen tables, and he yanked the dusty curtains open, propping his phone under his ear.

        "Oh, we'll manage. I better I can dust faster than you can, Abejita." 

        Roman laughed again, and Logan watched the bits of dust fall to the floor and on the sink, pilling even further. But the mountain of dust was a more welcomed sight than Logan's own grief, which felt small next to Roman's voice.

        He looked out the window. Patton's ash tree was much more than a sprout now. It was tall and thin, with wispy branches and a few vibrant, green leaves.

        A bird was singing. The sun was out. Roman rambled in his ear, and Logan felt at ease.

        "I'm so excited to visit America, I've never been there before! Florida must be beautiful abejita, I've seen pictures of your palm trees and wide beaches, and of flowers and animals..."

        "Yes, yes." Logan replied, but he was barely paying attention anymore. He closed his eyes, and hummed to himself.

        "It's home."

[arcticmonkeysaf]

Translation of Alex Turner’s interview in ICON magazine 

Alex Turner, leader of Arctic Monkeys, the biggest rock band of the 21st century, and perhaps its last hope

"What the hell is this?"

We've just arrived at the location of our interview with Alex Turner, leader of Arctic Monkeys, who is absolutely awestruck. It's the first floor of the Bethnal Green Town Hall Hotel in London, an ancient Edwardian building with touches of art deco, converted, of course, into a hotel. In a room of the first floor, a photoshoot has just taken place.

"Well, I don't know, I think the people are getting married," says the press agent, attempting to explain some of the excitement it's provoked in Alex being in the space, without getting too carried away: we still have a job to do. Alex begins to run through the hall, the site of council meetings of the Bethnal Green since 1910, when the building was constructed. Nearly all civic government buildings in Spain are smaller, and certainly not as lovely as this place.

The writer of Fake Tales of San Francisco has already seated himself in the chair we suspect belongs to the mayor.

"What do you want? A fine or a wedding?" he jokes.

The press agent leaves, but the leader of the band formed in the era when teenagers no longer wanted to form rock bands can't keep still. He runs between the benches until he's standing in the spot meant for the speaker.

"A hundred pounds! Look here's £100!" He procures two rosy £50 notes. I suggest to him that we should keep them. He laughs. I decide not to insist. I say instead we should start the interview, after all we are here to talk about Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino, the sixth album by the band, not to get married or chat. He stops laughing. It's a shame that Alex Turner becomes such a timid person, careful and cautious, when the tape recorder starts. Before he assumes the role of frontman of the group that launched AM four years ago and made it the best selling vinyl record of the 21st century, he permits himself one last question.

"Would you get married here?" We look around - myself still thinking about those £100 - while we get cozy in two benches in the last row. I answer no, that's it's all very interesting, but not at all romantic.

"I agree. Motion denied," he decides.

Rising to fame in the middle of the last decade, Arctic Monkeys have become a phenomenon thanks to a handful of songs a friend converted into mp3 - they say that they, despite being part of the digital age, had problems even turning on a computer - which soon began to spread on the Internet. It was the raucous, intelligent, and British response to The Strokes. Seeing them on the stage in those early days, before the premiere of their debut album, Whatever People Say I Am That's What I'm Not, which would see the light of day in 2006 and would become the fastest selling debut album ever in Britain within in its first week of release, was a tremendously peculiar experience. Four kids at 3 a.m. making a spectacular noise in the Sala Razzmatazz in Barcelona, but who could barely reach the bar counter to order a drink.

More than a decade has passed and they've recorded four albums more. A brilliant sequel (Favourite Worst Nightmare), another risky, rapturous and rocking (Humbug, recorded en the California desert with Josh Homme), a delicate and underrated return to pop (Suck It and See) and a million-dollar beast, a sex-soundtrack record called AM. And then, they stopped.

"When we stopped touring in 2014, nearly everyone in the band was about to get married, or having kids, or another kid. The end of those concerts was much like the end of another chapter. We were all 28 or 29 and it felt like everything was about to change. During this neverending tour I thought that record would be with me forever. It was the longest tour we had ever done. Now I think we extended it because we knew that when it ended it would be the end of something bigger than just a series of concerts. I expected everything to change, well, I felt that even though the numbers said the opposite, in the end we had less than we started with," remembers Turner, about the final days we would see the band together in public.

Now all living in the U.S., each of the band members went on his own path. Alex returned to The Last Shadow Puppets, a band loved by Arctic Monkeys devotees. There Turner splits responsibilities with his friend Miles Kane, a guy with impeccable taste but with terrible ideas. In 2016 the pair played the mainstage at Primavera Sound, where they were the headliners. That performance was grotesque. The image of Turner, who looked like a mix between an actor in Rebeldes and a finalist in an Elvis impersonators competition, had only a semblance of Arctic Monkeys of AM. In that context he made a bit of a joke of himself. Compared to the boy who, as an adolescent, was rejected by a second-hand clothing shop in Sheffield because he was too shy, it had gotten out of hand.

"That was..." His words are halting, he speaks very slowly, he leaves sentences unfinished and even stops a joke short if he finds the punchline isn't as funny as he'd thought. "I think what I wanted to say with that image and that attitude have been said. It's over."

Now Turner sports long hair and a beard which has been the object of controversy among his fans, who even launched a Change.org campaign for him to shave it.

"There's a lot of scrutiny around our next step, I know. We've always tried to be discreet with what we do, where and with whom. It's normal, but I don't think we do it on purpose. In this age, it's hard to keep secrets. With this record we tried and even just getting to the studio, the sound engineer goes and posts a picture of us. Everyone is so crazy these days, they act like they're Columbo. 'I saw this, I spotted that guy...'" explains Turner when asked how it's possible that a band as big as his, who will be the headliners at Primavera Sound and at MadCool, has managed to make sure that, even with only a month left until the record's launch, no one knows absolutely anything about it.

"I don't know if not getting involved in social media is something we do on purpose to protect the band, but it helps," says Turner, introducing the topic of being offline. "Maybe it's not in our DNA to expose ourselves. I've put so much into the music that I don't know what more I can do with that. I can't open a Twitter account because I think everything's there, in the songs. I'd make a fool of myself if I started tweeting. See, social media doesn't bother me, truthfully, but when you become the version of yourself you've created in the virtual world there's something there that allows people to do their worst against you. And you can also do your worst against them. The consequences of that I can't even imagine, but I don't want them."

We've had to listen to Tranquility Base in a version that downloads and is scheduled for automatic deletion the next week. The band have asked us not to ask anything personal, days after an encounter Alex had with a journalist from The Times. There is no single before the release, but there is a new logo for the band's image. The only photograph of Turner is the one taken by a guard in an airport days before this meeting and which has reactivated the fierce debate with respect to the Sheffielder's beard. It's a record release like the ones before, but Turner hardly seems like a global superstar. I tell him that one time I interviewed Beyoncé and they sat me at one end of a massive table and told me that I shouldn't even think about touching her, and that, on another occasion interviewing Chris Cornell, I had to go into a hotel room that was completely dark and had to confirm that the voice answering my questions was actually the grunge singer's.

"Would you like some water?" Turner interrupts, and, before I can respond, fills my glass.

During the hours after our meeting, the first new photo of the band is made public (they look as though they're dressed for a wedding in December of 1972 in Iceland) and they publish the details and tracklisting of their latest record, which was recorded in Paris, London, and Los Angeles, where the band members now reside. But what most strikes me is the first line. "I just wanted to be one of The Strokes, now look at the mess you've made me make," sings Turner on “Star Treatment”, a gem of a song that marks the tone of an album destined to confound all those who expected something bombastic, expansive, and hormonal. The LP has songs with titles as fabulous as The Ultracheese, Batphone, or The World's First Ever Monster Truck Front Flip. Imagine Richard Hawley going on tour with comedian Andy Kaufman and performing only in Sheraton hotels located in state capitals, or Scott Walker in the pub, singing after a Sheffield United match. It's deliciously decadent and promises to polarize the opinions of millions of their fans. Is [Turner] nervous? And, more importantly, is he confident?

"Let's see, I think I remember feeling a bit like that with this last record. I wasn't sure if it was the right album. Are we going down the wrong path? It always happens. When I showed the first songs to my manager, to the people from the record label and my colleagues, a lot of the reactions were 'It's very unique.' I thought it was unique, but not that much. I doubted whether it was the right record for the Monkeys. So, Jamie came to my house and stayed with me for two weeks while we recorded. His enthusiasm for the songs confirmed to me that it was the right choice. If this is what comes out of me, that's what it is. I think we can do what we want to do, it's our band. So there's no reason to worry about whether it's a hit or not," he says about a record that, from time to time, evokes loneliness.

"Yes, a little bit," concedes Turner. "There's always been something in me that has made me isolated in life. But until now, I don't know why, I've avoided touching upon that on a creative level. The words passed through a very long process of refinement. It's been complicated getting here. For example, that first line about The Strokes. I fought hard against it, I wanted it but I didn't want it. I thought, "Hell, I'll leave it, because I know I'll change it because it's impossible that I'll end up saying this nonsense." And it got to a point that I thought, "If I feel like this, why not say it? I should be honest."

[winterromanov]

look at where we’ve been (through time) - bechloe fic

based on a prompt from @isthemusictoblame who wanted a bechloe first date (round about). i really hope u like it xx

“Is it possible to actually, like, shit yourself from nerves?”

Beca scrutinises her reflection in the bedroom mirror for about the millionth time in the last hour, checking and double checking that she’s put enough concealer on that giant fucking zit that’s magically appeared overnight, quelle surprise. Maybe she should burst it. Would bursting it make it better or worse?

“Yeah,” Amy replies from across the room, flicking another page in her copy of Extreme Fishing. Beca stares back at her in the mirror, horrified. “Wait—did I say yes? I meant no. I definitely meant no. That’s happened to nobody, ever.”

Beca doesn’t exactly feel reassured. “Jesus Christ. What if I shit myself?”

“Wear extra absorbent underwear.”

“Amy, I’m going on a date. I’m wearing my sexiest underwear.”

“By sexiest underwear, do you mean your boxer shorts with the little dog faces on them? Because I’ve rummaged through your stuff enough times by now to know that they’re literally the only kind you own, you turnip.”

Okay, so that’s another thing she needs to add to her list of inappropriate things Fat Amy does to Beca’s shit when she’s not paying attention. Beca opens her mouth, but no words seem to come out. This happens a lot around Amy. She’s actually run out of reactions. Her jaw swings open and closed like a door on a loose hinge, until Amy finally looks up from her weird magazine.

“What?” Amy shrugs, “If you do want actual sexy underwear, ask Stacie. She gave me some great catalogs. The stuff is really cheap and barely worn. Honestly. The elasticity in this thong I got was pretty—“

“Please be quiet,” Beca interjects quickly, deciding to terminate that line of enquiry immediately, because the elasticity of Amy’s dodgy thongs is not something she wants to hear about right now. Suddenly self-conscious, Beca looks under the waistband of her tights, wondering what underwear she’s actually thrown on. “And for your information, my pants actually have cat faces on them today, so…”

“Oh, even worse,” Amy says dramatically, faceplanting her bedspread. “Nobody likes cats, Beca.”

Beca sticks her tongue out to Amy in her reflection. “Nobody likes you.”

“That right? I’m sure if you talked to Philippe, aged twenty-four, from Illinois, because that dude really liked those photos I sent him—“

“Can you actually speak like, one sentence without grossing me out?” Beca says exasperatedly. She tugs at where her shirt tucks into her skirt, wondering if it looks better in or out, or whether it fucking matters at all what she’s wearing. She’s never cared all that much before. “Anyway—who the fuck from Illinois has a name like Philippe?”

“I think he had a fetish for French stuff,” Amy says, like that’s totally normal, “He kept trying to get me to do weird things with garlic and this one time he sent me this video of him eating a snail. Like, a wild, free-range snail he’d found in the street.”

“That’s insane!”

“I know, right?” Amy seems to agree, “I was like, dude, but some seasoning on it at least!”

There’s silence, because Beca’s lost enough of her sanity already, and she’d ideally like to keep some of it intact for the rest of the evening. She decides to leave the shirt loose and wanders back over to her side of the room, reaching out for her phone. At the top of her notifications tray there’s a snapchat from Chloe. With a half-smile, Beca swipes it open.

It’s a picture of Chloe. Specifically, Chloe’s newly-shaved legs in a pair of the sexiest, patent-leather stilettos she’s ever seen, and Beca almost has a gay heart attack right there and then. The caption reads just for you!!! with alternating heart and fire emojis—god, she’s so fucking whipped, and it’s just the first date. God knows what she’s going to be like when she actually sees Chloe in person.

“You’ve got that face on.”

Beca’s cheeks flush bright pink as she quickly shuts off her phone and throws it on the nightstand. She pats her hair, trying to make it look like everything’s totally normal and not like she almost had an orgasm looking at a freaking photograph. “What are you talking about?”

“That face I always pull whenever Philippe sends me a pic of his huge French dick. Sort of like…” Amy opens her mouth wide, her eyes inflating twice their normal size, a hand pressed on her heart for effect. “You’ve got that face on. Has ginger sent you a tit-pic?”

“What?” Beca squeaks, “No!”

“Oh my god, has she sent you a cli—“

Beca throws a pillow at Amy to silence her, who takes the shot like a champ, collapsing onto her bed a la being-shot-by-a-flying-burrito style. “Dude. If you say one more word, I’m hacking into your email and cancelling your Extreme Fishing subscription.”

“Feel free,” Amy shrugs. She rolls up her copy and expertly aims it into the trash, where it sits amongst tampon wrappers and unfinished classwork. “I was ripped off. That magazine has nothing in it about how to fool stupid old men into thinking you’re a part-time Victoria’s Secret model and trauma surgeon online and loads about how to entice carp using natural bait. What the fuck?”

Beca nervously pads back over to the mirror, where the aforementioned zit is currently throbbing painfully and looks way redder than it did a few minutes ago. She groans loudly. “Oh my god. I look a mess. This is the first date I’ve had in months in and my whole body is totally not co-operating.”

Amy sighs, finally moving her ass from her bed and walking up to behind where Beca stands. “For the record, I don’t think you have to worry about what you look like whatsoever.”

“Really?”

“I mean, yeah, that zit on your chin is about the size of Pluto,” she supplies unhelpfully, “But Chloe doesn’t care about that shit. She only cares about seeing you—she’s mushy like that. You could rock up in a garbage bag and she’d be like wow, that bitch is hot, I wanna bang her right now.”

Beca smiles a little. Sure, Amy’s not the most eloquent of speakers when it comes to relationships and emotions and all that, but it does make her feel a bit better about the whole thing. She does have stupid underwear on and a huge spot and a ladder in her tights but Chloe has seen her at four am, vomiting over the toilet after slamming too much tequila. She’s seen her sobbing into a milkshake in the middle of the day after breaking up with Jesse. She’s seen her during finals week when she didn’t wash her hair for a whole seven days. That girl has seen her at rock bottom, yet still wants to take her messy, uncoordinated ass on a date.

“But, Beca,” Amy suddenly says in a real solemn tone, tearing her away from her thoughts, “You have to let me pop that zit.”

Beca darts away from Amy’s vicinity like that superhero from one of those stupid comicbook films Jesse loved—you know, the one with the silver hair that runs really fucking fast, but she can’t remember the name because her head is full of way more important stuff than superheroes—and throws her hand up, grabbing a hockey stick (that belongs to neither her or Amy) and using it as a makeshift cattle prod as Amy follows her around the room like a serial killer.

“You,” Beca swipes at her with the hockey stick, “Are not going anywhere near my face.”

“Come on, Beca, I’ve watched so many YouTube videos on it, I can pop them like a pro—“

“I’m leaving in literally ten minutes. I’m not letting you and your huge monster hands anywhere near my tiny face.”

“What will hurt more—me popping that zit right now for no payment, or Chloe’s look of horror when she sees the start of a mountain range emerging across your chin?”

“You just said she wouldn’t care!”

“Let’s face it, you’d have to be blind not to care about a zit that size and Chloe happened to mention to me the other day that she has perfect twenty-twenty vision. On her driving test she read a sign from a whole mile away, unbelievable, right?”

“Amy, that’s bullshit, you—no! NO! GET AWAY FROM MY FACE! HOLY SHIT, AMY!”

-x-

The whole date thing actually was unintentional. As in Beca didn’t start the day thinking she’d end it securing a date with Chloe Beale. Even though that wasn’t, like, something she thought about pretty much all the time or anything.

They’re sat on the balcony that juts out of Chloe’s attic room, their legs dangling into the abyss, watching as the hazy orange sky blurs into black. Chloe’s just been on her eighth unsuccessful Tinder date of the new year and Beca wonders why she keeps going back to that fucking app, especially when there’s so many people she encounters in her day-to-day that are actually kind-of nice and not ugly or creepy that would be desperate to date her and treat her like she deserves. Because she does. Deserve better. Much better than weird thirty-year-old cashiers with BO and a penchant for rushed sex in uncomfortable places.

“And then he got his dick out,” Chloe says dramatically, complete with hand gesture to make sure Beca completely understands, “Like, right there, in the middle of the restaurant?”

Beca snorts, taking a sip of beer. She passes the bottle to Chloe, who takes a generous swig, wiping her top lip. “Men are weird.”

“They are,” Chloe agrees, nodding sagely, “They totally are. Maybe I should swear off them. Go on a man detox or something.”

“Not a bad idea,” Beca says, like her motives aren’t totally selfish, “It’s kind of what I’ve done. After, you know, Jesse. I just swore off everything.”

Chloe sighs softly. Her arm reaches out and wraps round Beca’s shoulder and she finds herself melting into her, warm and soft jarring with the cold night air. “Still hurting about that, huh?”

“Not really. It’s just—I don’t think I’ve ever been on a good date, and that really put me off? I don’t know what’s wrong with me half the time. Because Jess—he was really nice and considerate and actually liked me, but every time we went out there was this voice going we could just do all this at home.”

“There’s nothing wrong with you,” Chloe states plainly, resolutely. She takes another drink. “What floated his boat sank yours. You were stranded at the harbor while he sailed off. You’re the captain of your own ship, Becs. And maybe you didn’t have room for another sailor.”

Beca murmurs a laugh at the excessive nautical metaphors, but Chloe’s always like this when she’s a bit drunk, verbal diarrhoea all over the place. It’s adorable. “But I do want another sailor on my, uh, boat?”

(It’s really too bad that Chloe’s looking over the balcony and down onto the lawn, because then she would’ve seen the conviction Beca looks at her with, like she’s the only person in the whole wide world that Beca would even dream of being with right now and any time ever. They’re surrounded by stars and Beca’s fucking looking at her like she’s the brightest of them all, and Beca can’t believe what a sap she’s becoming.)

“Maybe you just need a good date,” Chloe says, “And I’m, like, the queen of dating.”

Beca suddenly sits up, narrowing her eyes a little. “Is this you asking me out?”

Chloe shrugs, trying to hide her smile and failing catastrophically, because maybe this is the point she’s always wanted to reach too. “Sure. And it’ll be the best date in the world, I can assure you.”

Beca laughs, a delirious and slightly drunken giggle in the back of her throat. She clamps a hand over her mouth. “Sorry. I just can’t believe that this is happening.”

Chloe grins, leaning across and pressing a sloppy kiss to Beca’s cheek. Warmth explodes in Beca’s chest and she fights the urge to kiss her back, while she’s in this happy drunken bubble, because she’ll so regret it a few hours later when the buzz has worn off and she’s lying in bed, mapping the cracks in the ceiling.

“You’re my favourite captain,” Chloe says, her words slightly slurred, “You’d be such a bad-ass pirate. I can totally imagine you with a hat and a parrot and those big puffy pants all pirates wear.”

“You’re my favourite captain too,” Beca murmurs, “Because, like, there can be more than one captain.”

(The conversation has kind of lost its way, but it’s nice, and Beca would’ve stayed out there all night drinking beer with Chloe Beale if it didn’t start freaking raining seconds later. Fucking bitch weather always out to kill her vibe. And she totally does not scream that at the sky or anything.)

-x-

Chloe picks her up at seven thirty. Which is weird, considering they live in the same house.

“You didn’t need to ring the bell,” Beca says incredulously, Chloe stood on the doorstep. She’s wearing an off-the-shoulder floral dress that cuts just above her knees, a denim jacket and the same shoes from the photograph she sent earlier. She’s a fucking goddess. “You literally live here. You have keys.”

“I know, but the thought of someone picking me up for a date always gets me really excited, you know?” Chloe says, “I mean the surprise is kind of spoiled because you already know which car I drive, but I do have a brand new playlist I created on Spotify in preparation, and that kind of thing gets you way more excited than cars do.”

Admittedly, Beca is curious, and the effort is really touching so she lets the initial weirdness slide. “As long as there isn’t any Taylor Swift, I’m totally yours, dude.”

Chloe lifts her head. “I can’t promise that. She does have some non-breakup songs that completely fit the occasion. You look beautiful, by the way.”

The compliment is so honest and pure that it knocks some of the air out of Beca’s lungs, because Chloe just called her beautiful, and it’s the first time in a long time that she’s heard that from someone who actually means it (and who she wants to mean it). Chloe just called her beautiful on their doorstep in the most normal day in March, with a giant red splodge on her chin where Amy admittedly popped her zit successfully, and Beca wonders if she might end up remembering this day for the rest of her goddamn life.

“You look great too,” Beca says, which is an understatement, but whatever. “Now, where are you taking me?”

It turns out Chloe has booked a table at a really posh restaurant in the city, which makes Beca feel a little uncomfortable because she’s the kind of girl who is happier with takeaway pizza and sweatpants, but she trusts Chloe and her instincts. They end up at the top of a really tall building surrounded by glass and from their table they can see across the whole of Atlanta, beautiful and illuminated by artificial light. Before she sits Beca presses a hand against the window, waving at the world below.

“You like it?” Chloe asks, standing next to her. Their reflections blur, merging into one another, like for a moment they’re the same person. “Someone I used to work with recommended it to me. Told me it was like you were on top of the world.”

Beca grins; she’s on top of the world, but it’s not all because of the view.

-x-

Surprisingly, Beca doesn’t actually hate the date. For brief, dark seconds she imagines Jesse is the one sat in the chair opposite and her stomach turns, tangled with nerves, scared she’s going to do the wrong thing or say something stupid or embarrass herself in front of her boyfriend. But she blinks and there’s Chloe, grinning and talking madly, and she’s not anxious at all.

(Fuck you, Amy. Shitting has been avoided, absorbent underwear aside.)

They do cute couple-y things like hold hands across the table and share dessert and make other diners uncomfortable. It doesn’t bother her. It’s not new knowledge to her that some people are yet to be dragged into the twenty-first century. She lets Chloe chat the evening away, because listening to Chloe talk is like her favourite song over and over and over again.

When the waiter drops the extortionate bill Beca doesn’t want the night to end. Luckily, Chloe has no plans to.

“Do you wanna see something awesome?” she says, lips curled into a mischievous smile, and Beca would be a grade A idiot to say no to something like that.

“Oh, absolutely.”

-x-

Apparently Chloe knows the security guard who watches over the Atlanta Aquarium. All she does is flutter her eyelashes at the guy stood at the front desk while she’s outside and the doors creak open, letting the two of them in. She grabs Beca’s hand and pulls her through corridors of eerie, dark tanks, illuminated by pale blue lights. She finally stops at a tank that takes over a whole back wall, fish of all shapes and sizes and colours drifting together right in front of them. It’s completely silent, other than the whirr of filters, bubbles rising to the surface.

“For the record,” Beca says, quiet and breathless, “This is the kind of shit that only ever happens in John Green novels.”

“I love John Green novels,” Chloe replies, and when Beca turns, she’s somehow fished a whole bottle of rose wine from somewhere in her jacket. Beca just shakes her head out of disbelief. “Want to get drunk in an aquarium with me?”

Beca untwists the cap, taking the first drink. “As if you even had to ask that question.”

They sit down on the floor a few meters away from the glass and pass the bottle between them, toes of their shoes touching the tank. Beca watches as a fish doused in bronze swims out in front of them, face touching the glass. She lazily points out in front of them. “That one looks like you.”

Chloe snorts. “What, because it’s red?”

“Yeah. It’s red. Like you.”

“In that case,” Chloe leans out, clumsy fingertip landing where a near-microscopic fish internally lit up by a flash of electric blue sits unmoving. “That one looks like you.”

“Well, it’s a good job I’m no longer sensitive about height jokes. You lose.”

Chloe brings the bottle to her lips, taking a sip before speaking. “You know… I meant what I said earlier.”

Beca brushes a strand of her hair away from her face. “About what?”

“That you look beautiful,” Chloe answers matter-of-factly. Beca’s heart stops. “I just think—like, sometimes you need telling. That you are. Beautiful, I mean. I don’t think you believe it.”

Beca half-remembers some line Jesse used on her in freshman year, something about being halfway to his standard of beautiful, and how it didn’t really bother her at the time but after the breakup it kind of gnawed at her, like she was the person she is now because of him and what she thought he wanted. But Chloe… she’s never expected her to be anything, to look like anything. She just wants her to be Beca, whether that’s with the earspike or not, and maybe it took her too long to realise that. Jesse was nice, sure. But there was always this extra layer of expectation with him. Like—she wasn’t quite perfect, to him, and he was trying his hardest to make her that way.

She doesn’t want to be the perfect girlfriend. She likes being messy and nervous and a bit out of control, sometimes. And Chloe gets that. Chloe has always got that.

Beca takes a long drink, refusing to meet Chloe’s eye. She watches the fish, a beautiful, messy rainbow of colours and movement, and how that’s a bit like the Bella’s, this crazy group of crazy girls that somehow all work. “You know, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about—what would’ve happened to me, if you’d never violated me in the showers that day. Like where would I be right now, without the Bella’s? And without… well, you.”

Chloe shrugs nonchalantly, but Beca feels her shoulders tighten. “I don’t know, Becs. I don’t tend to dwell on what ifs. I like the here and now.”

Beca smiles into the bottle. “Yeah, I mean, the here and now is pretty good.”

“Yeah?” Chloe smiles back. Her feet reach out, her toes tapping against Beca’s. “I think it’s pretty good too.”

-x-

“Can I tell you a secret?”

“Go for it, dude.”

“I was… really nervous about tonight. Like, really nervous.”

“What? Really?”

“Yeah. Totally skitzing it. I rang up Aubrey in a total panic. Luckily she knocked some sense into me. You know what she’s like.”

“…What did Aubrey say? If you don’t mind me asking.”

“She said get a grip Chloe, this is Beca Mitchell we’re talking about, she might think she’s God’s gift but she’s really not that special.”

“Geez. She doesn’t live and let die, does she?”

“No, no, but—she also said that out of everyone, she’d never seen anyone make me so happy, so you mustn’t be all bad. Mostly, but not all.”

“…I make you happy?”

“Of course you do, weirdo. Before you rolled into my life there was, like, a huge Beca-shaped hole in it. Only I didn’t realise it was Beca-shaped at the time, but if I had that would’ve been a really weird coincidence, right?”

“Huh. Yeah. Right.”

-x-

(It’s weird, because there’s always been a hole in Beca’s life too, and it’s the kind of hole that’s made her feel completely and utterly empty for so many years, and when Jesse didn’t fill it she thought there was something seriously wrong with her. But then Chloe—she slipped in so effortlessly Beca didn’t even realise, and it knocks her for six, because an actual person has made her feel actually complete for once in her turbulent life and it happened so naturally that it passed her by, passed her perfectly, and everything is suddenly right.)

-x-

They finish the night where it all started. On Chloe’s balcony.

The wine is long gone but Beca knows where Jessica hides her secret stash (in the gap behind the fridge, FYI, she’s really not that stupid, Jess) so she brings back two full bottles, drops one in Chloe’s lap. She has no idea where the rest of the girls are but there’s music, bassy and loud, coming from the Treble’s House—a party she’s missing out on, perhaps, not that she cares.

“I think I’ve realised something,” Beca says, plonking herself down next to Chloe, their knees touching. Chloe lifts her head up as if to say oh? “Yeah. I don’t think I actually hate dating.”

“Oh!” Chloe squeals excitedly, “Have I officially converted you?”

“Oh, no, not at all,” Beca says, killing Chloe’s high with a grin when she looks like a wounded puppy, “No, it was great, I loved it. But—I’m thinking, maybe it wasn’t the dating I hated? Maybe it was the… company, I wasn’t happy with.”

Chloe grins quietly, staring down at her knees, where Beca’s hand rests on her own. Her fingers reach across, cover them, and Beca clings on like a lifeline. “What about now?”

“This company,” Beca says, raising their intertwined hands, studying them carefully like she’s working them out. She nods resolutely. “I think this company is kind of alright.”

It would be just wrong for Chloe not to lean across and kiss her.

-x-

“By the way, that picture you sent me was, like, smoking hot.”

“Oh, you liked it?”

“Chlo, Amy thought I was looking at porn, that’s how much I liked it.”

“Well… there’s plenty more where that came from.”

“There better be. You know I’m only dating you for sexy photos, right?”

“Yeah. Totally. I knew that was a given the minute I asked you out.”

“Good. I’m glad we’re on the same page. It would be a bit embarrassing if we weren’t.”

“Good.”

“Awesome.”

“Cool.”

“…Should we kiss again?”

“That sounds like a great plan.”

“Awesome.”

[bellamyblake]

Please, don’t shut me out

54.”Please don’t shut me out” +Bellarke

Bellamy tries to help Clarke after her dad passes away/ Modern AU Bellarke

“Please don’t shut me out, okay?” she hears his voice from the other side of the closed door. Her breath hitches when she realizes he’s worried, way too worried for her. He shouldn’t be, it’s not really worth it.

“Just go away, Bellamy” she tries to steady her voice ”I don’t want to talk to anyone right now.”

“It’s been two weeks” she hears him slide down on the floor and she tries to imagine what he looks like.

Was he wearing that same blue plaid shirt that was a bit too big for him but he loved and wore around the house and the garden just because it was his dad’s?

Or was he in his coffee shop uniform-that dark t-shirt with the black jeans and the red line around the collar and the sleeves that couldn’t suit a guy like Bellamy just because they were too dark.

And it’s not like the man didn’t have darkness in his life, it’s not like he was supporting his addicted-to-the-alcohol mother and raising his sister but still...he looked better in any other color but that one.

”And I know that I just...I can’t imagine how hard it is for you” that’s a lie, he could.

He has lost his father too. Might not be at a conscious age, but Bellamy knows pain. Still, he would prefer to undermine his own for her sake

”But please,” he repeats ”Please, just let me in” she remains silent on her end, squeezing her eyes shut and letting her tears go before angrily brushing them away and looking up at her messed up room.

It was dark all around her, even though it was summer outside and the sun could be gently warming every corner of her room. She hated it, though, she has never been a day person. She preferred the night.

That’s how she met Bellamy after all. It was a bit after she moved in with her parents here. The neighbourhood wasn’t perfect but was still pretty decent for the small town of Arkadia and Bellamy’s family house was just on their right.

She had gotten herself up on the roof, just cause it gave her a better view and just enough space so she could breathe only to find out that the guy living next door-he obviously liked his rooftop very much too. They didn’t talk that night, just smiled from the opposite ends until she took out her notebook and began drawing.

That continued for about a week until one day when their parents were about to drive her to school he came out of his house and was casually swept up in a conversation by her dad. They got introduced and later that evening they both sat on her rooftop after he came home pretty late, much to her surprise until she found out later he was working two jobs and keeping his family together.

“Clarke?” he asks weakly again ”If you don’t want to let me in, just...open the door and let me take you out, okay?”

“I can’t face the world” the sentence escaped her lips before she could stop herself and she could only hope he didn’t hear that ”Not yet.”

“Okay, then please just open the door” he asked for the hundredth time and she sighed defeated.

He’s been coming here every day since the funeral, waiting outside her door. Sometimes he wouldn’t talk, just stay here and let her share a comfortable silence with him. Other times, he would talk about his day at work or Octavia and her new addiction to boxing training or about Raven’s new radio invention or Monty’s moonshine. And some days he would stay outside and let his heart break with hers as he listened to her rage inside and destroy her room in panic and anger. Her dad was gone and he couldn’t do anything about that but he still stayed and she owed it to him to eventually open that door.

When she did, he was obviously way too surprised that she’s done it because it took him a second to jump off  the floor and face her. She was right-he was in his blue plaid shirt with a white t-shirt hanging loosely underneath and his old ragged jeans on. He moved his glasses up his nose and she saw just how bloodshot and tired his eyes were-probably as much as hers.

Once again she hated herself for doing this to him.

“Bellamy-” she begins, her voice barely a whisper, belonging to a ghost of the girl she used to be.

“We don’t have to talk”  he reassures as he raises his hands in defence ”We don’t have to do anything, I’m not here to torture you” he states and she gives him a weak smile as she moves away from the door and lets him inside.

If he’s surprised by the way he finds her room to be, he doesn’t show it. Instead he closes the door behind and watches her head back to bed where she’s been spending most of the last two weeks. She hasn’t eaten much really and the soup her mom left for her last night was untouched. Abby would come and put the plate for her either on the floor outside or if the door was opened,  on her desk but eating was the last thing on her mind and he could see she’s lost weight. Way too much for his liking.

“Go ahead” her voice is colder than she would like it to be. But then again things lately aren’t the way she wanted them at all so ”Judge me” she has noticed his eyes tracing the things thrown all over the room, there was some broken glass from the lamp she pushed yesterday, near the window, clothes all over the place, her advanced Biology books and unfinished assignments tossed away in the corner. She only started the classes last month but she was ready to give it up.

Maybe being a doctor wasn’t for her after all.

“Never” his voice makes her breath hitch and she looks at him.

He seems like he’s pissed about something, but he certainly manages to swallow it down and get over it before he strolls over to her bed and carefully lays down next to her.

The scent of vanilla ice latte and grease-all a trace from his three workplaces, the coffee shop,  and the garage where he worked with Raven, hit her when he laid down.

For a moment she could almost imagine herself a few weeks ago when they were taking a walk in the park after lunch and she was complaining about the trivial things like having too many assignments or her feet hurting because of the heels.

“I miss him” she says after a while. She has no idea how long he’s been lying there his arms crossed behind his head, staring at the same ceiling as her-painted like a starry night with the help of her dad after they moved in.

“That’s fine” he states carefully and then she turns to look in his eyes.

“I don’t think I’ll ever stop feeling that way” she admits and she knows the tears are threatening to fall.

“Clarke” he takes her hand in his and rubs a few gentle circles with his thumb ”Of course you’ll always miss your father” she squeezes her eyes and wants to blink the tears away but instead they just roll down her cheek and she buries half her face in the pillow ”Hey, hey, no!” his hand moves to her cheek ”Don’t hide away from me.” he moves her head to the left so he could look at her ”Don’t hide your pain away. There’s nothing to be ashamed of.“

“I’m not ashamed, I’m scared” she mumbles quietly and for the first time in the past two weeks she’s having an honest conversation with someone about this.

“What of?” she takes her time before looking up to see his deep brown eyes that always comforted her.

“Everything” she admits and draws a shaky breath in before staring down at their intertwined hands ”That the pain will never go away. That I’ll be fucked up like this for the rest of my life” she tries to take a deeper breath now but it’s somewhat harder for her and she feels his hand tighten around hers ”That-that I-I won’t-”

“Hey, hey, stop it!” this time she feels his body move closer and his hand coming around her waist pulling her closer to him. ”Come here, take deep breaths” he orders when he feels her panic.

He could easily recognize panic attacks, Octavia used to have them often as a kid and you could say he was experienced in it. She digs her head in his chest and he moves his hands up her back in a soothing manner until her breathing goes back to normal and her tears start wetting his shirt. Her hand fists his t-shirt and he hugs her closer.

”I know it’s hell, Clarke” he whispers in her ear” And it will be hell for a while before it’s better, but-” he takes a deep breath himself as she shudders once more ”You will go through it, I promise” her sobs quiet for just a second and he knows she’s listening to him. He buries his hands in her hair and places a soft his on the top of her head.

”Just let me help, okay?” he feels her nod against his chest and lets himself relax for a minute.

It was a start.

[sleepy-sunlight]

"I miss you"

Thank you so much for sending the request!! Id’ be more than happy to do it!!

DIalogue Prompts

———————————————————————————————————–

It had felt like ages since you had left. The memory as you had prepared yourself mornings ago still somehow fresh in Cullen’s mind. 

“You don’t have to leave you know,” He had murmured as you slipped away from his arms, a sort of glow lining you through the dawn’s rays of sunlight. 

“You know very well that’s not an option,” You remarked, flashing him a small smile. 

Maker’s breath he adored that smile. 

“I won’t be gone that long anyhow,” You continued, changing from his heavy, overgrown shirt you always wore to your armor that hung almost proudly amongst the ‘proper’ garments. “a week at the most.” 

“I’ll write you letters before Sera burns Skyhold to the ground with her pranks,” He scoffed. “you should really consider leaving Dorian or Varric behind to look after her.” 

You snickered, fiddling clumsily with the metal clad to your shoulder blades and cuffs. “Dorian and Varric have started using this thing they call their ‘best friend pass’. It gets them out of everything! It’s awful!” Despite your words, your lips turned up, stretching from ear to ear. “Besides, they’d probably set Skyhold on fire themselves.” 

“I suppose you’ll just have to stay then to an eye on her.” He simpered, curls of messy blonde hair tangling about his eyes as he sat up. 

You cocked your head to the side, rounding about to meet him to place a fond kiss on his cheek, stifling your laughter as you felt his scruff brush against your own face. 

“You’d like that wouldn’t you?” 

“I would, that’s the entire point.” He chuckled, staring up at you as his arms nearly instinctively weaving around you. 

“I won’t be leaving for a long while when I come back,” You assured him, your expression softening. “We’re almost there. Just a bit longer.” 

“Just a bit longer…” He repeated the phrase back as you were forced to part, his hands falling away as you disappeared, the only sound remaining being the hinges of the old bedroom door.

He hated watching you leave. 

He had watched so many things leave in his life, from his childhood to the smallest bits of stability that had become desperately tethered to his fingertips. 

But when with you, he felt it all return, as though a blossom bursting to life in spring, he bloomed around you.

Yet when you were gone it became winter, the petals recoiling within itself, becoming frigid in the empty cold. 

The cold was never meant to last though. 

You were supposed to come as soon as you had left, that smile he had come to know so well sewn onto your expression to be there when you came back.

But it never came.

You never came. 

You exchanged only a few letters before they came to a sudden, abrupt stop, hardly a hint of anything wrong written within the words you sent his way.

“If Blackwall and Varric continue to place their bets on jousting, I may just enter the sport myself and beat everyone.” 

“Dorian decided it would a great idea to wake us all up with a new fireworks spell he had learned. Two sleeping troops were nearly set on fire in their tents.”

“I can’t wait to see you again. I love you.” 

It would send butterflies fluttering in his stomach or his heart aching like a boy suffering from his first horrid case of lovesickness. His soldiers always questioning him confusedly about the smile seemingly plastered to his face. 

 But when two days of nothing became three, and then four, and even five, he began to worry. 

And to fret. 

You said a week at the most. 

It had been almost a month.

He began to send out squads of troops to look over the area, his hands constantly fidgeting or shaking, the sound of his leg tapping against the weary floorboards becoming as common as breathing. 

But despite it all, the silence he was given in return and the sorrowful, worried gazes he’d be turned, he still wrote to you.

“Everyone is concerned about where you and the others are. You’ve never done this before. Please, come back. I’m not too prideful to admit I’m scared.” 

“Sera, Cassandra, and Bull have attempted to sneak away from Skyhold on more than one occasion now to search for you. Cassandra yelled out that we may as well begin to try searching for a body at this point. Please tell me we wouldn’t find that. Please.” 

He couldn’t help but cling onto to hope.

It was all he had.

The hope that you’d stagger through with the others one day, tears brimming at the edges of your eyes as you’d rush out to him, the familiar laughter he had never tired of echoing from you.

That was what kept him going.

But it was never met. 

Instead, he was left clinging to it, however weak or feeble his grip may be. 

For one day, the scouts had returned. 

 They had scrambled to his office, sweat beading down their foreheads and bodies shivering in a mixture of confusion and fear. 

“C-Commander!” They blurted out, unable to even meet his gaze, their grasps clasped over something hidden within their palms. “W-We found something. Something of the Inquisitor’s…” 

He nearly erupted from his seat, biting back a curse as his legs slammed against the desk in his hurry. “What? Are they here? Are they okay?” 

They were silent, unraveling their fingers to reveal a lucky charm.

His lucky coin.

But when he saw it, all he felt was his heart shattering into pieces.

He could still recall how he gave it to you in Fereldan, the light that had painted your expression warmer than any sunlight he had felt in his whole life.

You had always kept it with you since then.

But it was here now, dotted in dirt and grime.

And blood.

“Did… did you find them…?” He whispered, perhaps more so praying than questioning as he gawked at the gift, his vision blurring. 

“No sir… we didn’t.” 

But they hadn’t found everything. 

They hadn’t found the cave hidden in the trenches and swamps of the murky, foggy world you had explored, the twists and turns of mazes hidden within. 

They hadn’t recovered the body of the High Dragon that once stalked within, scales painted with dry patterns of crimson, no longer distinguishable from their own or others.

And they especially hadn’t seen the corpses littered nearby.

Because if they had, they would’ve found one to be yours. 

They would’ve discovered you shielded over your other companions, coated in gashes and wounds from the surprise of the beast. Your anchored hand would be revealed with faint wafts of the fade creeping from the tracings of your palm in one last desperate attempt to at least save the others. 

And just off to the side, just about shrouded by the torn and tattered remnants of your camp, they would’ve come across a letter, unfinished and doused in red.

Addressed to your commander. 

“We’re almost done, no longer than a week, just like I said! Once we’ve claimed the quarry I’ll be back in no time. 

I’m counting the seconds until I’m back, I don’t know if I can even properly put it into words how excited I am to see you.

Just know I love you. And I miss you.

I miss you so much.” 

[prodigalasshole]

Einmana & Ottisser

So this is a work in progress based off of this prompt that hopefully I’ll finish someday.

“Oh, yes, the place has been empty for years, decades actually, ever since the late seventies,” explained a woman with a bright, cheery voice and too-wide smile. “According to our files, the couple who previously lived here just up and left with no explanation and without selling. Never heard from them again, but they had bought it outright, husband had made quite a bit of money in the cassette industry according to the family. We just heard from their son, after the wife died, rest her soul, they found the deed to this house among her old belongings. Husband apparently passed years ago, so they came to us to sell the place. Said they had no interest in it, which is a shame really, you can see how lovely it is.”

The woman was rambling, but her companion, a thin, rather mousy man in his early thirties, didn’t seem to mind. He smiled gently as he took in the dimly lit interior of the house; she was right, it was quite a charming place.

“There are two bedrooms, as well as a converted attic room, so it should have enough space for your family Mr. Dowels. You said your mother might come to be living with you, correct?”

“Mother-in-law, technically speaking.”

“Oh, I thought you and your wife were separated?”

“We are. She’s dead.”

The woman’s smile immediately fell as she half raised a hand to her mouth. “Oh dear, I’m so sorry, I didn’t realize…”

“It’s alright, most people don’t,”  Mr. Dowels reassured her, his gentle smile tinged with sadness. Turning to look up the stairs he asked, “Might I see the attic room you mentioned?”

“Of course, right this way.”

Neither of them noticed the shape in the darkened corner of the kitchen that shuddered at the mention of the attic and fled to the basement once they were out of sight.

“Is there some sort of problem with the jamb?” he asked, looking at the dozens of holes surrounding the entrance to the attic room.

“Not at all, when we sent a contractor over for an inspection he found this door nailed shut, you can see the nails he removed just inside here.”

As promised, a pile of large wrought-iron nails sat in the corner near the entrance to the room. The nails, however, were not what caught Mr. Dowels’ eye. Instead he stared at, and slowly walked toward, the large, old, covered crib that made up the only furnishing in the spacious room. Reaching it, he peered inside; empty. A sigh filled with relief passed his lips and he turned to his companion.

Despite her too-wide smile, the look of discomfort was clear in her face. “We’re not exactly sure what the story behind all this is. We asked the son of the couple who owned the house, but he said he had no idea about any of it and asked rather insistently not to be bothered with anything more concerning the property until it was sold. There aren’t any public records of any infant deaths that would fit with the previous owners, so there wasn’t any need to push the issue.”

Mr. Dowels nodded slowly, and looked around the rest of the barren room. It was the size of the entire top of the house, with two windows at the ends. Something about the window nearest him caught his eye; it had the same sized hole in the frame as the door jamb. “So they nailed the windows shut along with the door,” he said quietly.

“What was that?”

“Oh, nothing, just thinking about how I would get Margaret’s things up here,” turning to face her, he again smiled and said, “Well I think you were right, this house does seem like it would suit us just fine. What can you tell me about the school district it’s in though?”

“It’s excellent, one of the best ranked in the state. In fact, the elementary school this property is zoned for was just recognized by a congressional panel as one of the top-performing in the nation.”

He seemed to contemplate this while gazing out of the window towards the only neighboring house. He then nodded decisively and said with a confident smile, “Ms. Andrews, I do believe I’ll take it.”

Down in the basement isn’t much better than up in the attic, Einmana thought, but at least I chose to be here. She sat next to the water heater, chewing at her nails absentmindedly. It had been four months since the smiling lady and thin man had first come into her house, and since then the man had decided to move in and bring a little girl and old woman with him. Since then she had hidden, remaining in the basement and scurrying through the walls with her lithe body.

Einmana had lived alone in this house her entire life, and no one had ever come in for this long before. Over the years it seemed that children made it a routine to come around in the yard wearing costumes in the fall, but that was only one night out of the year. But to suddenly have three people living in her house… it was almost more than she could handle.

She had been afraid of people, and the outside world, ever since the day he tied her up and left her in the attic. Papa, stop! Papa it hurts! Einmana had begged him. She didn’t know what was happening or why; it had been the middle of the night, and she had been asleep in her crib in the attic when he had done it.

Don’t call me that, you aren’t my daughter, you aren’t even human.

Mama! Mama help! Mama!

Stop that! Don’t you think you’ve caused her enough pain?

Mama! Mama help me! MAMA!

Stop!

He had hit her after that, and everything went black. When she woke up she was in her crib, and she thought it was just a dream until she tried to move and yelped with pain from the rough rope binding her arms behind her back and her ankles together. Then she cried. She cried until she fell asleep again, waking only to cry more. Weeks had passed as she lay there helpless, afraid, confused, and alone.

During that time her body changed. Einmana later hypothesized that this had occurred because whatever type of creature she in fact was, if she was not human, was designed to survive just about anything. She discovered, one day, after her sobbing had subsided into small sniffles as she drifted towards sleep, that her arms and fingers had become long enough that she could maneuver to pick at the ropes that bound her wrists. What was more, her nails were long and sharp, and able to cut the fibers. She had snapped awake at that, and for the first time since the night her father bound her she felt something besides despair as she worked to free herself. It took her a whole day, but when she finally escaped the knots binding her arms she cried again with the relief and pain of movement. She had then attacked the rope around her ankles, and making quick work of it rushed to stand.

She had fallen immediately, limbs atrophied from a month of confinement and body weak from hunger and thirst, both of which suddenly hit her now that she wasn’t consumed by her grief. Einmana had struggled to the door that led down the narrow stairs to the rest of the house, but although the door was unlocked it wouldn’t open. Panicked, she went as fast as her body would allow her to the window by the door. It too refused to open. Unlike the door, she could see why; a large, evil looking black nail kept it shut. She reached to the nail to try to pull it out, but as soon as her fingers touched the metal it felt as if her hand erupted in flame. She had screamed and fell to the floor, clutching her hand and sucking her fingers. When she pulled them from her mouth, she saw that they were blistered where she had touched the nail, and a cruel red rash spread out  from the blisters and nearly covered her entire hand.

Mama, she had wept, lying on the floor cradling her injured hand, Mama please help me. Mama… Mama please… Mama… Mama…

She had spent two years in that room, two years until she had managed to peel up the floor in the corner enough that her small body, which had continued its metamorphosis and become extremely thin and flexible, fit into that empty space. She had crawled like a spider, making her way into the wall and down, down, down until she reached the cool darkness and unfinished walls of the basement. She had tumbled out, and laughed until she cried with joy. She had run up the stairs and into her house, then stopped short.

It was empty. She had never believed that it would be empty, despite the gnawing silence that had existed beneath her attic prison. She had never fully accepted that the parents she loved with her whole being could reject her so completely. She had kept up hope despite it all. But now, as she forced herself to search, at first slowly, then with growing desperation, through her house, she had to face the reality of her situation. The furniture was all gone. Dust covered everything. Windows were closed up and curtains drawn. They were gone. And they had been gone for a long, long time. As this realization sunk in, Einmana did the only thing she could think of. She crawled back up to her attic room, folded her thin, elongated limbs into her crib, and cried.

I was only three years old when they left. Einmana thought as she bit through another claw-like nail. It had been been forty-one years since the last night she saw her father, yet her memories were clear as ever. She remembered everything, from the first night she had been brought to her parents. There had been another little baby who looked just like her in the crib, but the one who had carried her into the room took that child when they left Einmana. At first her parents hadn’t noticed; babies are mostly all the same, after all. She remembered how her mother used to look at her and hold her, as if she would never let her go. She remembered the surprised laugh that her father let out when she first started walking. She remembered when they had loved her.

But as she had aged, she had changed. Her skin became ashen, and her eyes faded from blue to dull grey. Her hair transformed from silken, golden waves to a coarse, dark mat. And her mother looked upon her less and less with adoration and more with horror and fear, while her father’s eyes contained hurt anger and hatred.

Still, she had loved them. She had loved them when they moved her crib into the attic from her pretty room down the hall from theirs, she had loved them as they argued more and more about her, she had loved them as her mother downed pills and bourbon and ignored her each day, and she loved them as her father yelled at her and smacked her for no reason. She had loved them because they were her parents, until the day they weren’t.

So she had hidden, alone, for four decades in her empty house. She changed her name in her head to what the one who had left her here had called her all those years ago, in place of the name her parents had called her. She left the windows covered, and she only ventured out when her hunger drove her to steal vegetables and fruits from the neighbors’ garden in the summer and fall.

She hid because of her reflection. When she looked at herself in the bathroom mirror, she did not look like her mother, or the women in the magazines that had been left in a box in the basement. Her eyes had become a darker grey, and her skin looked like the cement blocks  of the basement walls. Her arms and legs were extended, and the bones of her body were prominent. Her nose seemed to have disappeared, leaving only two nostrils above her cracked, thin lips. Behind her lips were teeth that were sharp and large, not flat, small pearls.

She did not look like humans, and when she remembered how her parents had left her, tied in her room and presumably for dead, when she had first started to change, she was filled with terror at how strangers would treat her now. They would kill me as soon as look at me.

Which is why the new residents of her house presented such a problem. She didn’t know why they were suddenly here after all this time, but it didn’t seem like they were going to leave any time soon. And when she heard the way the man and old woman treated the young girl as she crawled through the walls, it made her blood boil with jealousy and rage. They praised and doted on her constantly, and showered her with love and affection. What right do these people have to come into my home and torment me with what life denied me? Why are they allowed to force me into hiding from not just the outside, but inside of my home?

It was because of these feelings of jealousy and anger that Einmana hatched a plan to torment the people who had moved into her house, starting with the one she saw as the crux of her pain: the little girl.

“Daddy, there’s a monster under my bed.”

[paradisobound]

Forever the One

Summary: When Omega Dan is of age, he is told by his father that he will be sold off to find an Alpha mate. Cue, Alpha Phil. Alpha Phil is in desperate need for a mate, and although Phil is only a few years older than Dan, he holds a reasoning behind why he needs a mate so quickly. When secrets are revealed that give up why Phil needed a mate, this story may not have a happy ending. 

Chaptered Work: This is chapter 16 of 16. 

Warnings: None!

Word Count: 1,005

Authors Note: The ending is finally here everyone! I really wanted to think all of those that have stuck along the way and giving me the persistence to continue this story! So often I leave stories unfinished because I do not have the motivation but every one of you guys has made it so I finished this story! I thank you all and hope you continue to always support me! Much love -Lexi

***Popping in for a small poll: so, contrary to bunch of other people, I loved the book and show 13 Reason’s Why because what happened to Hannah is almost exactly what happened to my best friend and I don’t want people to see the show as ridiculous or a mess because it’s really not. My point being that I would like to write a fic as a 13 Reason’s Why AU but if I’m going to get tons of shit for it, I’m not going to put my time or effort into it. Because why would I write something just to get people to hate it? and potentially hate me for writing it? It’ll also be based more off from the book, but with the same tapes as the show. I just want to know your guys opinions on this subject. Thank you!***

*Masterlist*

Two Years Later The sound of yelling from outside in the lawn made me groan as I patted my hands dry on a towel in the kitchen and abandoned my cooking to see what Phil and Little Phil were up to. 

Little Phil has grown like a weed. He learned to walk fast and even know he's forming words that most two year olds just cannot form. He’s smart as hell and he makes Phil and I just so happy. 

Speaking of Phil, he’s doing amazingly well. He recovered completely and the doctor told us that if you didn’t know he had a lung transplant, you wouldn’t know it. Because he is doing that well. 

He exercises regularly like the doctor told him that he needs to. He keeps his body in shape and for a short while, I even did the same. That was until Little Phil became more and more of ours lives and keeping up a healthy life style was hard with a toddler. 

And right now, Phil is playing with the little guy outside on this beautiful summer day. Phil, having graduated from college the year before was now making his living as an editor for a newspaper in the center of town. I was just a stay at home dad but I was totally okay with that. 

Looking at how Phil was acting with our little boy made me the happiest person alive because I knew he was the perfect choice for a mate and for a father. Little Phil looked up to his dad so much already and you could tell. He was Phil’s little prodigy for sure. 

As for me, I haven't been doing much in these last two years besides try and keep our family to not be dysfunctional. That’s harder than it appears apparently when you have two kids living at home. 

But I loved them both with every fiber of my being. 

And I wouldn’t trade them for the world. 

We have Little Phil tested every six months for the disease and so far, he shows no signs of it and we’re hoping it stays that way considering that Phil told me he started experiencing issues with his lungs at the age of 18 months. 

So, we’re keeping our fingers crossed. 

Alpha and Omega Lester visit all the time to see our their little grandson. Every day they come I can see more and more love in their eyes for him. Mostly because he’s a spitting image of Phil. Everything he does and all of his features are just like Phil. It’s quite amazing. 

But I have another secret that I haven’t told Phil yet. 

Phil went off from his suppressants about two months ago and I went off mine the same time. Last week, I had my heat which also triggered his rut, and the small bump that was now forming under my shirt was showing how successful both of our bodies were. 

The next day, I took a trip to the same doctor that delivered Little Phil and he asked me if my mate knew yet. When I told him no, he gave me a completely friendly pill that masked the scent of my pregnancy for as long as I’d like. I stop taking them when I want to tell Phil, and I’ve already got a cute way to do so. 

You see, Phil has found a love of video games recently and Little Phil loves watching his papa play them. So I’m going to take the four controllers for Phil’s gaming system, label one Phil, one Dan, and One Little Phil, and then label the last one, Player four coming soon. I’m also going to include a photo of the ultrasound. 

Honestly, I didn’t come up with the idea. I looked up cute pregnancy announcements on line and this one came up and I thought it fit Phil. 

And this time around, I can tell it’s a little girl. Which makes me super excited. 

I stared into the backyard and saw the Phil as laying on his back on the grass, Little Phil climbing over him. He said something to Phil before Phil leaned up and kissed his head and hugged him tightly. Little Phil giggled. 

The whole sight made my heart melt and I couldn’t help but smile at the moment. 

I walked further into the grass and tugged my shirt further down my abdomen, “Are you guys having fun?” I asked and they both nodded with a smile, “Dinners almost ready so how about you both come inside and wash up,” I said looking at the first that was donning Little Phil’s hands. 

Little Phil got up and I bent down and picked him up, kissing the side of his before carrying him inside, Phil following behind us. I took Little Phil to the kitchen sink and washed his hands with soup as Phil watched over my shoulder. I could feel the love pouring from him over my shoulder. 

I turned and kissed Phil gently before turning the water off and letting Little Phil down on the floor. He waddled off into the living room where he sat down and played with some toys, “How loves the outdoors,” Phil said with a chuckle, “Almost makes me wonder if he’s even our child.” 

I smiled and laughed before turning the stove back on and continuing my cooking that was nearly done, “Yeah, but he’s definitely ours and I love him so much.” 

Phil wrapped his arms around me and I gasped before realizing into his touch, “Mmm, I love you so much too,” Phil said, kissing the back of my neck. 

“I love you too,” I said back. 

And just like this, everything in my life was going to be okay. I was happy and hopeful the future and I was excited to see everything that was going to happen between us. 

Even if it didn’t look like my story was gonna get a happy ending, it certainly turned into one.

Previous Chapter 

[sometimesiwearpants]

I'm Leaving Tumblr Today 👋

Hey everybody, I just wanted to let you know that this is my last day on Tumblr. I’ve had a lot of fun blogging but I’ve started to neglect what’s really important.

Anyway, as a parting gift, I wanted to give away all the art, fanfiction, and songs that I started but never finished. You can feel free to use ANY of this content or the ideas as you please. For example, it’s fine with me if you want to record my songs, steal lines from my fics, or use my art ideas. I’m not actually deactivating my account, so you’ll still be able to see content in this post and all my other posts even after I log out indefinitely. 

Thank-you so much for your follows and your friendship! I hope my blog brought you some enjoyment while it lasted. Love you guys ❤

SONGS:

(Lyrics are in the Sound Cloud descriptions.)

Never Feed a Stray - Click Here to listen in Sound Cloud

A song about Marinette reluctantly falling for Chat Noir. 

I Will Stay - Click Here to listen in Sound Cloud

A duet between the oblivious love birds, Adrien and Marinette.

ART:

(If you have ArtRage and want the .ptg file let me know!)

Mattress Surfing Comic

Basically the mattress surfing scene from Princess Diaries 2 but with Miraculous Ladybug characters. Unfortunately I never got around to drawing the third panel - Gabriel majestically gliding down the stairs on a mattress in his PJs (I added versions of the panels without words under the cut.)

Seven Eleven

So what if Seven from Mystic Messenger and Eleven from Stranger Things went to 7-Eleven? I feel like they’d talk about their crappy childhoods and bond over Slurpees and Honey Buddha Chips. Clearly I didn’t get very far with this one but I still like the idea. (Version with just Eleven under the cut.)

(Other versions of my art and unfinished fanfiction under the cut)

FANFICTION

Pursuit -  In this Miraculous AU, Adrien is the sole miraculous holder and Marinette is a civilian who becomes a self-imposed vigilante. The love square and their personalities are sort of flipped so Adrien is a socially awkward mess around Marinette and Ladybug is flirty with Chat Noir. 

(I didn’t even finish writing the first chapter…)

She should have stayed inside. The rain was falling harder now, bringing with it a frigid sensation that washed over Marinette’s paralyzed body. The glowing pause symbol hovered before her, a taunting reminder of the menacing evil that had overcome her best friend. But that had been hours ago. 

“It’s been too long,” Marinette kept thinking. “Something’s wrong.”

She was beginning to fear the worst when suddenly a familiar wave of green light shot through the sky, one of its rays swimming through the air in her direction. As it surrounded her, the pause symbol disappeared, releasing its death grip on her muscles. Marinette fell to her hands and knees on the wet pavement, her body shaking violently as it fought to regain heat.

“He did it.” She realized in relief. “Chat Noir did it.”

She trudged through the storm, each unavoidable puddle soaking through her shoes and biting at her toes. The only warmth provided her was a burning envy for those who passed by with umbrellas. She waited at a street corner, trying to avoid the waves of water that shot towards her as cars sped by. When the crosswalk signal finally turned green, Marinette stepped onto the slick street, distracted by thoughts of home. 

What she would give right now to be inside and safe and warm and dry and wrapped in her parents’ arms. Unfortunately, the latter would not be possible until tomorrow, as they were both in Strasbourg for the annual Festival de la Boulangerie. Maybe she could spend the night with Alya. She would probably appreciate the company after what happened today… Through her thoughts and the tumult of rain around her, Marinette suddenly heard a desperate screech of tires and a blaring car horn. Still in the street, she froze as her eyes caught sight of a black vehicle hydroplaning in her direction. 

There’s no time.

A powerful force slammed into the Parisian girl’s body, catapulting her through the air and onto the pavement. But it wasn’t the car. 

“Are you okay?” 

Marinette could feel a pair of arms releasing her. She looked up, relatively unharmed, to see a pair of glowing green eyes staring at her from beneath a black mask. She was speechless. Chat Noir gently pulled her to her feet as a small crowd gathered round. The people applauded and cheered, some shielding their phones from the rain as they recorded the moment, but the hero paid them no mind. His gaze was transfixed on Marinette in concern. Her face was pale with shock, her skin freezing cold, and her unsteady legs looked like they might give out at any second.“We need to get you home.” He placed an arm around her back and scooped her up, vaulting effortlessly from the ground to the roof of a car. Marinette gasped as they rebounded off an awning and landed on the roof, where the wind was strong and numbing. The hero looked around, then set her down beneath an eave which blocked the rain. 

“Where do you live?”

 Poor Marinette’s brain still hadn’t quite registered that Chat Noir, savior of Paris, was kneeling right there in front of her. Surely, she was hallucinating from hypothermia. He tentatively placed a hand on her shoulder and immediately the electricity jump-started her senses. “Oh! Uh, t-t-twelve Rue G-gotlib!” Marinette practically winced at how screwed up her speech was. A raspy voice and chattering teeth were hardly attractive. But Chat just smiled. 

“So you do talk after all.” A soft laugh escaped her lips. For some reason she had imagined Chat Noir would be dark and brooding, not… charming. “What’s your name?” he asked curiously. A flicker of warmth ignited in her chest. “Marinette.”

…

Chat Noir already knew Marinette’s name. He even knew where she lived. He visited her family’s bakery practically every week just on the off chance that he might see her outside of school. But that was without the mask, when he was just… Adrien. Despite the way he was pictured in most magazines and ad campaigns, the model was far from suave in everyday life. A practically friendless childhood left him with crippling social anxiety around those his age. 

As a result, his first few days at Collège Françoise Dupont, a little over a month ago, were a nightmare. He accidentally introduced himself as “Adrigen Areste" in front of the whole class and found himself tripping over things on a frequent basis. The excitement of having a “famous model” for a classmate quickly dissipated. His deskmate, Nino Lahiffe, seemed sympathetic but struggled to maintain conversation with the new student. Adrien was accustomed to a professional and practical form of dialogue so when the Moroccan said, “Dude, have you heard the new Jagged Stone album? It’s totally lit!” …he was lost for words.  

Then there was Marinette. On his second day, Adrien caught her hanging flyers all over the school hallways. They featured one of his more recent model shots, defaced with a uni-brow and captioned “Adrigen Areste”. There were hundreds of them. It wasn’t until after school that he found out they were really Chloe’s doing. 

“I was only trying to take them down.” Adrien looked past his locker door to see Marinette standing a little ways off, her face a mixture of guilt and compassion. “I know what it feels like to be the new kid and… well, I’m sorry we haven’t been very welcoming.” She reached into her pocket. “Here.” Marinette held out a colorful beaded bracelet. “This is my lucky charm. My mother gave it to me when I first came here and I thought… it might help you.” Adrien was shocked and completely overcome with gratitude. He accepted the gift and admired the bracelet in his hands as if it were a priceless treasure. He looked back at her sheepishly.

“Thank-you…uh-” he faltered.

“Marinette.” It was such a beautiful name. Almost as beautiful as Marinette, herself. Of course, Adrien didn’t have the courage to tell her that at the time. But now… on the roof and under the mask, he had a second chance. When she introduced herself to Chat Noir, he smiled affectionately. 

“That’s a pretty name.”

Cataclysm - Chat ends up confessing his feelings to Ladybug in this unfinished first chapter. I imagined him getting akumatized (into “Cataclysm”, not Chat Blanc lol) after being rejected by her and vowing to destroy the one who stole her heart. When he finds out it was actually his civilian self… well, I don’t know. I didn’t really plan out this plot, but I hope you enjoy!

It was a quiet night. Ladybug and Chat Noir strolled along the rooftops of Paris, planning in tandem as they patrolled the city.

“All the akumas have been striking within the same 5 kilometer radius,” Ladybug said. “If we can just figure out where they’re coming from, we can find Hawk Moth and stop him.”

“You know,” Chat added, “we might not be able to survey the whole city on our own, but-” he tossed his baton up between two adjacent chimneys. “-we do have quite the fan following. Maybe they could help?” He sprang up on the stick and began walking it back and forth like a tight rope. Ladybug paced beneath him.

“That’s not a bad idea. We should talk to Aly- uh that Ladyblog girl. If we can rally enough Parisians to report butterfly sightings on her website, we might be able to narrow down our search area.”

As Ladybug strategized, her nose scrunched up in a way Chat Noir couldn’t help but find adorable. He crouched down, smiling at his smart little bug as he gripped the pole with his claws. “Hawk Moth will be de-miracularized and behind bars in no time.”

Ladybug smiled back at Chat, but a thought caught at her mind. She swung her yoyo around the pole, fashioning it into a swing, and sat with her eyes fixed on the horizon.

Chat swung forward so that he hung upside down beside her and asked with concern, “What’s wrong?” He elbowed her playfully, hoping a joke might bring back that elusive smile. “Cat got your tongue?” But there was no smile, no laugh… not even an eye roll.

“No, I was just thinking…” Ladybug looked down at her yoyo. ”What will we do after he’s defeated?”

Chat dropped to the ground and stood up. “What do you mean?”

“When Hawk Moth is gone, there’ll be no more akumas to capture.” Her foot brushed back and forth against the ground anxiously. “Paris won’t really need us anymore.”

Chat had never considered this.

The thought of losing his newfound freedom was unnerving. The thought of losing Ladybug was even worse. Even if Paris didn’t need her, he did.

“Hey-” Chat lifted her chin gently, “Forget Paris. I happen to remember a certain set of hieroglyphics that prove the world has needed Ladybug for thousands of years.”

Ladybug raised an eyebrow curiously. “The world?”

“Yeah, doesn’t that sound great?” Chat squeezed himself next to Ladybug on the yoyo swing and wrapped an arm around her, much to her chagrin. “You and me: travelling the globe, defeating evil-” the corners of his mouth crept upward as if to warn Ladybug that he was about to say something cheeky, so she interrupted.

“You and me, huh?” She stood up and released her yoyo so that Chat fell on his tail. “And what if I decide to go solo, hmm?” She said with a hint of sass.

Chat was undeterred. “Then I’ll become a villain just so I can see you again.”

“Gag,” thought Ladybug, rolling her eyes. She could understand playful flirting, but Chat’s incessant romantic flattery was starting to bother her. Maybe she wouldn’t mind it as much if she thought it were genuine, but his coquettish behavior towards her civilian alter ego had proven otherwise. She took the banter a bit farther with a flair of dramatic indifference. “Eh, I think I’ll save my energy for bigger threats…”

Chat hopped up feistily and crossed his arms. “Okay, Spots, let’s go then! Right here, right now.”

Ladybug raised an eyebrow. “You’re joking right?”

“Not at all.” He held up his fists. “I’m one hundred purrr-cent serious.”

She considered the opportunity. “Alright then, but if I win, no more puns for the rest of the month.”

He pouted. “Harsh, but I’ll accept it. If I win, though, you have to laugh at my puns for the rest of the month.”

“Good thing I know I how to act,” Ladybug said. “Not that I’ll need to.”

“Because I’m hilarious?” Chat smiled.

She took her fighting stance, “Because I’m going to win!”

Ladybug charged forward, swinging her yoyo in Chat Noir’s direction. He dodged it by ducking swiftly, but then again, Ladybug hadn’t been aiming for him. As the yoyo wrapped around his silver baton, she tugged it forcefully, bringing both back in her direction. Chat swiped towards the gadget as it flew over his head but missed by a few inches. His partner waved it teasingly in the air. “You want the stick?” She tossed it off the roof behind her. “Go fetch!”

Chat squinted at her. “Uh…yeah, cat’s don’t do that.”

She shrugged “Suit yourself.”

“Just to be fair though-” Chat pounced towards her, a clawed hand reaching out to bat away the yoyo. Ladybug jolted backwards, leaving her leather-clad opponent once again swiping at nothing but air - and also falling into her. With a tumble she was down, the clumsy cat draped over her. Shoving against the ground, she flipped the two over and pinned Chat by his shoulders. “Give up yet, Kitty?” she smiled.

“Not a cha- ah- ah-”  Circumstantially, one of Ladybug’s pigtails had brushed his nose in the tumbling. “CHOO!” Ladybug reeled back to avoid the sneeze, and Chat - rebounding from the reaction - pulled his legs in and kicked her off. “Pardonne-moi, mademoiselle!“

Ladybug leapt to her feet, calculating her next move.

“You’re going to pay for that!”  

Chat Noir smirked, calculating his next pun.

“Oh darn, I don’t have any euros on me.”

For another half hour, they chased each other around the city, competitiveness ever growing as they tried to force one another to surrender without causing any significant pain. It was good training, they realized, considering the duo had to do the same with akumatized villains. But this battle seemed like it would never end. The two were so equally matched, so well-balanced, and so familiar that neither seemed able to hold the upper hand for long. That is, until Ladybug bent the rules a little.

“LUCKY CHARM!”

As Ladybug activated her power with a swing of her glowing yoyo, Chat Noir groaned and shouted, “Hey, c’mon! No powers!”

“Sorry, chaton!” she returned as a red and black fabric fell into her hands. “A sheet?” she muttered. “What can I do to him with this?”

Chat’s cheeks burned at the cheeky response that popped into his head. Behave yourself, Agreste! She is a lady!

Ladybug settled for waving the red sheet in a matador fashion “Here, Kitty, Kitty, Kitty! Come and get me!”

“You sure are terri-bull at understanding cats, milady.”

“And you’re terrible at understanding girls, Chat” she thought in response.

She disappeared down the side of the Eiffel Tower. Chat Noir paused before pursuing her, punching a fist into the air as he shouted,

“CATACLYSM!”

(I didn’t write this transition. Oops!)

He fell right into her cat-trap, the corners of the sheet wrapping around him and closing at the top as ladybug’s yoyo tightened around it. Chat kicked and clawed about inside but the material didn’t tear. “Game over, Chat!” Even from within the dark confines of the trap, Chat Noir could guarantee that Ladybug was just below him, hands on her hips and smiling smugly.  

“Be careful milady. You just might let the cat out of the bag.”

“Huh?”

(He extends his baton, breaking open the trap, and falls on top of Ladybug. He somehow manages to roll her up in the sheet and is kneeling over her)

“Well, aren’t you snug as a bug in a rug?”

“Fine, you won. Good for you.”

“With that charm, my lady, one day you just might get lucky.”

Ladybug blushed uncomfortably. “Ugh, Chat stop.”

“Why?” He grinned and leaned closer to her face. “Am I bugging you, beautiful?” Something snapped in Ladybug then. By then she had freed one hand and used it to push Chat out of her face. “Seriously, can you quit it?” She squirmed out of the sheet and brushed herself off. “The puns are one thing, but do you have to be so obnoxiously flirty?”

“Woah, woah!” Chat held up his hands defensively, trying to reassure her. “Calm down. I was only-”

“Only what, alley cat?” Once she got started, it was hard for her to stop.

“I…uh…” Chat’s face burned with embarrassment, beads of sweat forming on the back of his neck.

She jabbed a finger at his chest. “Look, Chat. If you want to be an egotistical flirt with other girls, that’s fine by me, but I’m your partner. I’m not some mouse for you to chase, so just stop!”

A wave of dejection fell over his face, and Ladybug realized she’d gone too far.

“Oh. Um… I’m sorry, my la- uh Ladybug.” He rubbed at his arm. “I’ll leave you alone.” He took a few steps back before turning and running off.

Ladybug reached out her arm. “Chat, wait!”

He bounded way without so much as a glance back at her. Ladybug bit her lip anxiously. She had only been trying to stand up for herself - just like Alya taught her - but maybe in the heat of the moment… she had misjudged him. Ladybug pulled out the tracker on her yoyo.

She found Chat sitting on a bench beneath the Eiffel Tower. He was arched forward with his elbows on his knees and head resting on the heel of one hand. When she landed a few yards away from him, his black ears twitched and he closed his eyes with a sigh. Ladybug crept forward, wringing her hands nervously. “Chat? I shouldn’t have spoken to you like that. I’m sorry.” He didn’t respond. Ladybug sat down beside him. “Really, uh- Eiffel Tower-bly about it.”

Chat opened his eyes in surprise and he finally looked over at Ladybug. She smiled apologetically at him and he gave in.

“I’m sorry too. I thought maybe…” he trailed off and shook his head. “Forget it.”

“Chat, please…” She placed a hand on his shoulder. “I misjudged you because… I don’t really know you. I need you to talk to me.”

Chat took a quick glance up at her eyes and seemed to find the reassurance he needed. He took a deep breath.

“Well, growing up, I was… pretty isolated. I was home-schooled for most of my life and I always felt this pressure to act and talk a certain way. I had no freedom… and no friends… until the day my miraculous showed up. All of a sudden, I had this freedom to be whoever I wanted to be, but I didn’t really know what to do with it. Like I said… I haven’t had much experience socializing – especially not with… girls – so I’ve been basing a lot of my behavior on… um, anime.”

“That actually explains a lot…”

“It seemed to work for Tamaki-

“Yeah, but Haruhi fell in love with Tamaki despite his flirty and over dramatic nature, not because of it! Was he even paying attention?”

“-so I thought I’d uh… try it on you.”

“Haha, well you clearly chose the wrong guinea pig!”

“What? No, Ladybug, you’re not a guinea pig. I… I love you.”

“Really?” “Chat, I had no idea you felt that way…”

“Well, now that the cat’s out of the bag… you don’t happen to have feelings for me too, do you?

“I uh-”

“And once again, curiosity killed the cat…”

“Chat, I just don’t think it would be a good idea to date when so much is on the line.” She pulled at one her pigtails nervously. “We have responsibilities and-”

“Ladybug, you don’t have to lie on my behalf.”

“I do like you, Chat. Really. I mean, maybe not when you’re imitating cartoon characters, but… beyond that, you’re smart, brave, selfless… you’ve sacrificed your safety for mine on more than one occasion! You’re the best partner I could ask for… but the thing is, I… I’m already in love with somebody else. And who knows if anything will come of it, but-” she bit her lip. “I can’t change the way I feel. I’m sorry, Chat.”

That’s it! Again, feel free to use ANY of this! And if you do, send me a message so I can check it out if I ever come back by Tumblr in the future :) BYE!!!

[justalittlebluetiefling]

Chapter 2: Sometimes I Can’t See Myself

Rating: T Fandom: The 100 Pairing: Bellamy x Clarke  Chapter: 2/? Word Count: 2321 Words 

Summary: (I suck at summaries) Modern AU set in college. This is the long journey through the lives of the Delinquents told almost entirely through Bellamy and Clarke’s POVs. This is a slow burn. And I mean really slow. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Also on AO3

As Bellamy hauled two suitcases full of Octavia’s dance clothes through the hall, he was incredibly grateful that he moved into an apartment this year. All the freshmen and their parents were loud and flustered and… he would do anything for his sister, so he pushed his annoyance out of his mind.

She did what she always did: trampled a path through the world and he silently followed her to make sure she stayed safe. Even when she managed to get a few people ahead of him, she was easy to spot in her bright pink shorts and white tank top, with her long brown hair in its ridiculously high ponytail. It was hard not to be proud of his little sister, even if her overconfidence kind of terrified him. They would at least be at the same school where he would be able to keep an eye on her.

He sighed when she dropped her laundry basket full of all her other things onto the floor down the hall and wiggled her keys at him with a silly grin. “Hurry up, Bell!” The people around her jumped as she managed to yell over the fervor. He wanted to roll his eyes, but her enthusiasm had always been so contagious, so he held it in and smiled back. She swung open the door as he approached and ran inside. “Took you long enough, slowpoke!”

“I’m helping you out of the goodness of my heart.” She snorted and he glared at her before putting her suitcases down by one of the closets and surveying the room. She'd been lucky to get into this building. The room had its own bathroom, one loft bed along the bathroom wall with a desk underneath, and a regular bed against the opposite wall with a desk next to it. There was a closet at the foot of the beds. Other than that, it was devoid of personal belongings, which meant…. “You should take the loft bed, O. You got here first. You get the better bed.”

“I don’t know. They both look the same to me. Does it really matter?”

“It does.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.” He crossed the room to open the blinds. “It just does.” He watched his sister as she continued to spin around in slow circles, taking everything in. It was almost as though she forgot he was there. “Earth to Octavia.”

“Sorry, Bell. It’s just a little overwhelming.” Octavia chewed on her lip and stared at him with wide eyes. “What if I hate my roommate?”

Bellamy chuckled. “File a complaint with your R.A. Or just let me know and I’ll kick Miller out so you can live with me and Harper.”

It was Octavia’s turn to laugh. She closed the short distance and hugged him tightly. “That’s sweet of you, big brother, but you need help paying the rent. I’d just be dead weight.”

“Never.” He squeezed her once before placing his hands on her shoulders and taking a step back to look down at her. “You’re going to be fine, O. Trust me.”

“Okay, fine. I’ll be fine. Go home.” She grinned and pushed him. “I’m going to wait for my roommate to get here, and I don’t want you to scare her away.”

Bellamy hesitated. He didn’t want to leave her all alone in a new place, but she was insistent that her roommate was going to walk in the room and think that Octavia was going to be constantly bringing guys back to their place unannounced. “You’ll just tell her I’m your brother.”

“Yeah, my overprotective big brother. Get out of here or I'll start unpacking my underwear.”

He held up his hands. “Fine. You win. Text me later and tell me what she’s like.”

Bellamy was halfway out the door when Octavia ran up and hugged him one more time. He kissed the top of her head before tearing himself away. He texted their mom on the way to his car to let her know that O was settling in and that they’d be home for dinner in a week and a half. If O decided she needed him after all, well, he only lived a few minutes away.

Clarke really had tried to get along with her mother all morning. She thought they were doing a good job until they reached the dorm. It took her an entire fifteen minutes to convince Abby, once again, that she would not, under any circumstances, be switching dorm halls. Clarke didn’t care that it was an older building. She didn’t care that it wasn’t an apartment. She was a freshman and freshmen lived in the dorms.

She told Abby the room number, 1220, for what she was sure was the millionth time and grabbed her art supply case and a suitcase and headed for the nearest elevator. The door to her room was open. A very skinny, very pretty girl who was sitting on the floor reading a book jumped up when Clarke entered. “Hi, are you Clarke Griffin? I’m Octavia Blake. It’s really nice to meet you.”

Clarke was taken aback by how fast she spoke and hoped she put on an adequate smile before shaking Octavia’s hand. “It’s nice to meet you, too.” Clarke glanced around the room, and noticed that her roommate’s small amount of stuff was still packed. She swallowed. She suddenly felt very overpacked and wanted to tell her mom to leave everything behind. It had been a very bad idea to let them stop at Target just to keep Abby quiet. “Have you been here long?”

“My brother dropped me off maybe ten minutes ago? I didn’t want to pick a spot without asking, even though he’s an ass and told me to take the loft bed. I figured we could just flip a coin for it or something.”

“Don’t you want it? You got here first, so you deserve it.” She walked over to the other bed and set her art supplies down on the mattress. “Besides, my mom is bringing up some of my stuff, and I guarantee you that if she sees me sitting on this bed, she’ll get another loft bed in here whether I want it or not.” Octavia opened her mouth to speak, but was interrupted by Abby calling her name from the hall. Clarke rolled her eyes. “Speak of the devil.”

Abby appeared from around the corner holding what had to be twenty shopping bags full of things that Clarke had tried to get her to not buy, followed by two moving men, like it was such an in depth moving process. Each of the men had one box, and one carried in her other suitcase. It took her mom all of thirty seconds to notice Clarke’s stuff on the “lesser” bed, politely introduce herself to Octavia, and then usher the moving men out so she could go find or purchase a loft bed frame. In her opinion, the room was "clearly unfinished".

Octavia watched the whole process with a partially dropped jaw, and Clarke was so angry about the impression she was making on her new roommate. Who she had to live with for nine months. So, it would be great that she would think that Clarke was a spoiled, privileged brat. Clarke sat down on the chair by her desk and frowned.

“No offense, but your mom is kind of intense.”

Clarke surprised Octavia and herself by bursting into laughter. “Oh, seriously. I wish I could say that you just witnessed her in prime ‘Abigail’ mode, but she gets worse than that.”

“She didn’t even say goodbye to you. She just… left.” Octavia plopped herself down next to Clarke’s art supplies and stared at her. “She’s always like that?”

“More or less.” Clarke shrugged. She didn’t want to talk about her mom anymore. “So, your brother dropped you off? Where is he?”

“I kicked him out.” A small smile formed on Octavia’s face. “He can be all broody and overwhelming. And he makes snap judgments and is kind of bad at hiding his opinion about anything, so it’s really better if he’s not around people.”

Clarke was unsure how to respond, even if Octavia looked like she might be joking, so she blurted out the first thing she could think of. “I’m an only child. No siblings. I mean, my next-door neighbor was kind of like my brother, but… we kind of had a falling out.”

Octavia seemed to notice Clarke’s discomfort and chewed on her lower lip. “Bell can be a huge pain, but I’m glad I have him. It took forever to get him to go to college, because he was too busy taking care of mom and me to worry about his own future.”

“Bell?”

“Bellamy.”

“Bellamy Blake. Nice alliteration.”

“I’ll tell him you said that.” Octavia giggled. “He’ll like it. Just don’t mention his age when you meet him. He gets really sensitive about the fact that he started school late. But he’s really smart and he may not be nice all the time, but he has a good heart.”

“Noted.” Clarke smiled, and it was a little easier.

They continued with the small talk as they unpacked their clothing. Clarke learned that Octavia was on the college dance team, was planning on majoring in dance, and that her older brother was a history major and there was nothing else Octavia could have imagined him picking. Their mom was a seamstress, and she couldn’t help Octavia move in because she had a huge bridal gig that morning. Clarke could call her O, because that’s what everyone called her. They had both chosen French for their language course. Clarke didn’t have time to tell Octavia much more than the fact that she was taking four classes before her mother was bursting back through the door, and ushering the two girls out of the room to wait in the hall.

After the second bed was set up, Abby hugged Clarke tightly and she could see Octavia looking a little wistfully in their direction. Clarke wasn’t sure why, but they finished unpacking in silence. Octavia changed for dance practice and then Clarke was left alone with her thoughts. It was kind of lonely.

Bellamy and Miller spent most of the afternoon helping Harper move her belongings into the third bedroom. She was the last to get settled after her parents drove her across three states to get her and her things back in time for classes. It took some doing on his part, but he was pretty sure that her parents were a little more comfortable with her choice in roommates than they had been when they first showed up.

The couch looked insanely inviting by the time everyone was gone. Harper had a ‘welcome back’ party to attend with a few friends and Miller had work, so Bellamy had the place to himself. He was more than ready to sit back with a couple of beers and aimlessly channel surf.

His phone buzzed halfway through his first beer with a text from Octavia.

Octavia 4:34 pm: my roommate’s mom is crazy. remind me to thank mom for having to work today.

Bellamy 4:34 pm: Examples?

Octavia 4:36 pm: she walked in here, saw Clarke’s stuff on the normal bed, and left to find the stuff for a second loft bed

Bellamy 4:37 pm: Isn’t Clarke a guy’s name? Clark? What’s with the extra e?

Octavia 4:38 pm: dunno. does it matter? it’s not like i snuck my way into the boys dorms

Bellamy 4:40 pm: So, I take it this means that you got some stuck up, princess-type for a roommate, then?

Octavia 4:41 pm: i don’t think so? i am reserving judgment, but don’t worry. i'm being nice. since i'm the blake that has trouble in social situations………. 4:47 pm: i'm kidding? please please text me. her mom is back and it’s so awkward

Bellamy 4:49 pm: Ha ha. So funny, O.

Octavia 4:51 pm: what? this is why i kicked you out

Bellamy 4:52 pm: You kicked me out?

Octavia 4:53 pm: so you wouldn’t scare away my hopefully awesome, new roommate with your lack of charm, remember?

Bellamy 4:55 pm: I’ll have you know I have plenty of charm.

Octavia 4:57 pm: that must be why i've met so so so many of your girlfriends so many STEADY girlfriends

Bellamy 4:58pm: Dangerous waters, O. Dangerous waters.

Octavia 5:01 pm: ugh whatever. you love me.

Bellamy 5:02 pm: Sure do. You’re lucky to have me.

Octavia 5:03 pm: barf

Bellamy 5:05 pm: What was Princess’s stuff doing on the other bed anyway? You sack up and take the loft before she deigned to grace you with her presence?

Octavia 5:07 pm: i’m not even going to tell you what she said about you if you keep that shit up

Bellamy 5:08 pm: Language, young lady.

Octavia 5:09 pm: ass. bitch. damn. fuck. i can continue in alphabetical order if you want. i left out the c word though in case you forward this to mom

Bellamy 5:10 pm: Did you learn all these words from her majesty? And what's she doing saying things about me when she hasn’t even met me?

Octavia 5:13 pm: is there not an e word? there should be…… paranoid much, weirdo? i was telling her about you.

Bellamy 5:13 pm: Tell her about you. Not me.

Octavia 5:14 pm: that's my charming big bro, ladies and gentlemen. her mom is finally gone. what are you up to?

Bellamy 5:16 pm: Trying to find something to watch and drinking.

Octavia 5:17 pm: if i pick up any bad habits, they’re from you, not her dance practice starts in a bit and i have to run across campus. love you big bro.

Bellamy 5:19 pm: Knock ‘em dead. Love you, too, by the way.

[artificialqueens]

Love Lingered On His Lips (Biadore) - Lemonade

AN: I’m sorry it’s been…close to a month since I last submitted something. My mental health and creative muse took a road trip to rock bottom and they didn’t come home until a few days ago lmao. Anyway I hope y’all enjoy this!! Italics = thoughts. (also i’m sorry my author notes are a mess this is the #realme) (also x2 to the anon who asked about my abc fic like two weeks ago i am planning on continuing it!!! i have some of it written (along w/ four other unfinished fics bc i am trash)  i don’t know when exactly i’ll get it out but i 100% want to finish it)

It had been months since the pair last saw each other in person. Danny moved to Seattle and Roy always kept busy with work. They FaceTimed on occasion and spoke in their long standing group chat. It worked, but it wasn’t enough. They both found themselves missing the days they were traveling the world together. Touring took a huge tole on Danny’s all around health; Roy was his silver lining. He looked after Danny when he was too drunk and out of control, he wiped away his tears when he was physically exhausted and emotionally drained, he made him laugh, he played with his hair and kissed his fingertips: Roy made Danny fall in love with him.

Danny so desperately wanted to kick his lyft drivers seat and tell him to burn fucking rubber, he had someone important waiting for him. Instead he huffed in frustration, asking how long until they would arrive at his apartment. Twenty minutes was the answer.

Danny: Sorry, my driver’s a slow ass bitch. I don’t know if I’ll get there before you.

Roy was getting antsy. He was more than sure a kid pulling him in a little red wagon would get him to Danny’s apartment faster than this uber driver. He rolled his eyes in frustration, asking how long until they would arrive at their destination. Twenty minutes was the answer.

Roy: I don’t think they could be any slower than this idiot driving me. I’m pretty sure we’re still in L.A.!

Danny quietly chuckled at Roy’s text.

—-

Roy ended up beating Danny to his apartment, only by a few seconds apparently. As Roy unloaded his suitcases he heard a familiar voice– his favorite voice call his name. The man barely had time to turn around before Danny’s entire body was wrapped around his in a koala hug. Roy nearly fell over at the sudden impact of Danny crashing into him, but regained his balance, not wanting to drop the precious human in his arms.

Danny nuzzled his face into the crook of Roy’s neck. Roy finally had enough composure to squeeze Danny back tightly. “I’ve missed you.” Danny’s words were mumbled against Roy’s neck. Roy heard them perfectly. “I’ve missed you too.” He pressed a kiss to Danny’s head. “Now get off,” Roy could only be sappy for so long. “I’m too old for you to be jumping on me like that. Next time you might break my hip.” Danny cackled, but obeyed. “Shut the fuck up, you’re not even that old.” He pecked Roy’s cheek before taking a few of his bags.

—

“I thought you were only staying for a week, what’s with all the luggage?” Danny asked as he threw the suitcases haphazardly onto his living room floor. Roy chose to sit the bags he was carrying against the wall instead. “I also have a gig. It takes a lot to make this old bitch look good.” He was planning on staying at a hotel, but the minute Danny heard he would be in Seattle he insisted Roy not only stay with him, but come a week early so they could catch up. There was no resistance on Roy’s part.

“Sorry about the mess.” Danny kicked an empty beer can across the room. “I’ve been writing so much lately, living in filth helps me get inspired.” Danny plopped down on his couch and Roy followed.

“What about?” You, is what Danny wanted to say. “A bunch of shit.” He shrugged his shoulders. Roy brushed a piece of hair away from Danny’s face as he spoke and pushed it behind his ear. He’d been growing his hair out, Roy thought he looked like a goddess. Danny acted as if the slight touch didn’t faze him, the tinge of pink coloring his cheeks betrayed that semblance. “Well don’t hold out on me.” Roy could listen to Danny talk about his music, or anything he was particularly excited about for hours, so he did. Danny went on about his writing process, showed Roy songs and poems he had written (conveniently leaving the ones about Roy in his folder), and explained the meaning behind each and every one of them. He told Roy about his YouTube channel, all the ideas he had for its revival. He shared stories from the set of his recent photoshoot and explained to Roy how he had finally discovered, and came to terms with his gender identity. Roy loved it. Danny seemed happier than he had ever personally seen him. His eyes lit up, his hands flew around in the air the more his excitement grew, his smile–fuck his smile was so wide, and bright, and genuine. Roy wanted to grab his face and smash their lips together about a hundred different times as they spoke.

No one ever listened to Danny ramble the way Roy did. Sure, people heard him, or let him speak into the void in their presence, but Roy truly listened to him. He seemed genuinely interested in everything Danny said, got excited about something when Danny got excited. He felt like he could tell him anything and Roy would never dismiss him, or judge him, or make him feel stupid like others had.

Time had completely slipped from their grasp. It was late, far too late to do anything other than go to a bar. Danny was a regular at this point. He liked to write in bars, observe people, karaoke had become one of his favorite activities, but not tonight. He wanted Roy to himself tonight (and every other night of his life too).

—-

Danny slowly inhaled smoke into his lungs before passing the shared blunt to Roy. He was the only person who could get Roy to smoke with them. He smiled to himself at the memory of Jinkx and himself betting on it; Of course Danny won. When Jinkx asked how he managed it, Danny left out the fact that he bribed Roy with a blowjob. “What are you smiling at?” Roy’s words were strangled as he tried not to cough like he had a severe case of bronchitis. Danny absentmindedly rubbed his back to sooth him.

“Remember the first time we smoked together?”

“You mean when you sucked my dick? Yeah.” They both laughed.

“Well that’s what I was thinking about.”

“If you want to suck my dick again all you have to do is ask. No need to cum in your pants over a memory.” Danny slapped his arm, taking the blunt back from him. Roy’s eyes followed the blunt to Danny’s lips. His soft, full lips that Roy couldn’t decide if he wanted to kiss, bite, or have them wrapped around his cock. His breath hitched at the possibility of any of those scenarios becoming a reality, quickly pushing the intrusive thoughts away. “That’s not what I meant.” Danny finally spoke after blowing smoke from his pull. “Jinkx and I had a bet: who could get you high first. They don’t know I won because of a blowjob.”

“I would have smoked with you regardless of whether you sucked me off or not.” I would do anything you asked me to without a second thought.

“I know.” I wanted to. I want to right now.

The blunt burned down to a roach, discarded on the balcony floor as Danny moved from his own seat to Roy’s lap. No protest was put up on Roy’s end. He snaked an arm around Danny’s waist and rested his head on his shoulder. They sat silently for a while, enjoying the stars, the cool night breeze, and most importantly each other. The moment felt so cozy Danny nearly blurted out an ‘I love you’. Love lingered on his lips so often around Roy it was a miracle he hadn’t confessed his undying devotion to this man a thousand times over.

Danny’s hair was tied up in a little bun, the lose pieces in front of his face blowing wildly with the direction of the wind made him look like some beautiful bad boy straight out of a shitty rom-com movie. Roy couldn’t stop staring. His heart felt so heavy with love for the person in his lap. Love, not lust. Roy had accepted the fact that he was in love with Danny ages ago. He did try to blame lust at first; Danny was sex personified, why wouldn’t he want to fuck him? It quickly became more than that. He wanted to take care of him, hold him, make him laugh every chance he had–love. If Roy could pour every ounce of affection he had into Danny he would.

Roy’s musing was interrupted by Danny’s lips softly, sweetly, and all too shortly pressing against his. It wasn’t abnormal for them to kiss each other’s lips swollen, but this, this was different. This felt delicate, and vulnerable, and innocent. Roy leaned up to meet Danny’s lips again in a kiss just as tender. He could feel Danny smile against him, which made him smile in return.

A look of complete serenity washed over Danny’s face as he pulled away from Roy’s lips. He tasted like weed and vanilla flavored Chapstick. Roy’s features softened at the sight of him. He reached his hand up to cup Danny’s face, the pad of his thumb caressing his cheek. “What was that for?” I love you. Danny just grinned down at him and shrugged, placing another kiss to his forehead.

He could blame it on the weed, or the exhaustion from traveling, or on Danny since he had initiated the first kiss…

Roy’s hand glided from Danny’s cheek to the back of his neck, pulling him in closer before catching Danny’s lips with his own. The chaste nature of their previous shared kisses was far gone. Roy wasted no time plunging his tongue into Danny’s mouth. From the outside, they looked like they were trying to swallow each other whole. On the inside, this was the only way to express their overwhelming feelings for one another. Every unsaid word, every unexpressed emotion, every ‘what if’ was poured into that kiss.

Roy’s hand moved again, from holding Danny in place by his neck to his hair. Carefully, he let Danny’s hair lose from its bun, tangling his fingers in the loose tresses. Roy knew from experience how much Danny adored having his hair played with.

While Roy massaged his scalp, Danny moved between the two of them, his hand finding Roy’s cock as he palmed him through his jeans. Roy moaned into the kiss, his hand tugging on Danny’s hair in response. “Hold on to me.” Roy instructed, muttering the words into Danny’s mouth. He did as he was told, wrapping his arms around Roy’s neck, then his legs around his waist when Roy stood with him in his arms. The walk back to the bedroom was bumpy. Roy stumbled over the step connecting the apartment to the balcony, knocked into furniture, and accidentally took them inside of the bathroom at first. All because he couldn’t tear his lips away from Danny’s for five seconds.

When they finally made it, Roy sat at the edge of the bed with Danny in his lap. Both hands rested on Danny’s ass, squeezing occasionally as they made out. He could spend the next week just kissing Danny, really. His plump lips working against his, their tongues gliding against each other, Danny’s quiet moans whenever Roy bit down on his bottom lip, and his fingers grazing against his jaw felt like a taste of heaven Roy would never be ready to let go of.

Danny reveled in their fervent kissing. It wasn’t the first time, definitely wouldn’t be the last time, but something about it felt special. He drank in the last few moments before reluctantly breaking his lips away from Roy’s. He caught a look of disappointment etched on Roy’s face before reconnecting his lips with Roy’s skin. Danny kissed Roy’s neck, letting his tongue roll over the sensitive flesh as he did so. Roy’s eyes fluttered shut, his head lulling back as he became lost in the sensation. Danny introduced teeth, roughly sucking the skin after biting into it, ending with a soothing pass of his tongue and small kiss. The sinful sounds coming from Roy were all the encouragement he needed to continue his ministrations.

Danny smirked as he felt Roy grow hard against his own erection. He gave him one last throbbing love bite before trailing his lips up his neck, pressing a kiss right behind his ear. “Lay down.” Danny whispered to him, his voice husky and drunk with lust. Danny dismounted him so Roy could position himself properly on the bed. The anticipation was killing him. He wanted nothing more than to take Danny right away, but he knew that everything leading up to it would be well worth the wait. Danny crawled over him, forcing Roy to spread his legs to make room for him. The blown out pupils of his eyes nearly made Roy’s mouth go dry. God, he was delectable. Danny rekindled their searing kiss from earlier, Roy’s hand found it’s way back into Danny’s hair. He began to grind down against Roy, their clothed cocks lined up perfectly. Roy hadn’t expected the moved, his hips involuntarily bucked up to meet Danny’s. He giggled against his lover lips. “Someone’s eager.” Danny teased. “Shut up.” Roy warned through gritted teeth, which earned him a harsh bite to his bottom lip.

Danny sat up purposefully, pulling Roy’s shirt slowly over his head. He took a few minutes to admire Roy’s body, letting his hands run over the smooth skin of his torso, making a mental note of every place he touched that made Roy’s muscles twitch under his fingertips. Every place that did so was where his lips connected to next. Roy’s breath hitched in his throat at the contact. Danny trailed down his body until he reached the waist band of Roy’s jeans. He rested his hand on the leather belt. “Can I?” Roy looked down at him and nodded earnestly. “I told you all you have to do is ask.” Danny chuckled at the reference to their conversation earlier.

Now, with consent, Danny hurriedly undid Roy’s belt, buttons, and zipper. He pulled Roy’s pants and boxers off all at once. He was already leaking a great deal. Wasting no time, Danny immediately began pumping him, using his wrist for added motion. Roy let out a shaky moan as his head fell against the pillows. His back arched slightly off of the bed as Danny quickened his pace. Having this control over Roy, knowing how much pleasure he could provide him, made Danny feel something he couldn’t describe. Whatever it was, it was good, and made his heart feel oddly full. Danny kissed up Roy’s inner thigh, stopping to suck at the skin as Roy whimpered. “I love you’ lingered on Danny’s lips, he had enough restraint to hold it in.

Danny stopped all at once without warning, not giving Roy too long to complain before taking all of him into his mouth. Roy gasped at the sudden warmth and wetness surrounding him. His had flew to Danny’s hair, the other grabbed at the sheets as Danny hollowed out his cheeks and began bobbing his head. He cupped Roy’s balls, gently toying with them as he continued to suck him off. Roy squirmed beneath him, Danny inching him closer to the edge. When Roy looked down, he was met with Danny’s eyes staring right back at him. Fuck, didn’t he know what that did to him? Didn’t he know that those big doe eyes were the most adorable, yet sexist thing he had ever seen?

Roy tugged on his hair. “Come here.” He demanded. Danny let him go with a pop, crawling back up his body until his face was hovering over his. “Yes, daddy?” Danny smirked. Roy gulped. He knew exactly what he was doing. Roy crashed his lips against Danny’s. Holding him close to his body as his tongue made a new home out of his mouth. As they kissed Roy became more aware of the unfortunate fact that Danny still had clothes on. He flipped them over so he was on top, pressing Danny into the mattress. He grabbed the hem of his shirt, quickly pulling it over his head. “You’re fucking beautiful.” He huffed out, his hands running over Danny’s chest and sides. Danny had a crooked rib, which Roy thought was precious and unique to him. He had never heard of, let alone seen anyone with a wonky rib before. It caused a dent in his side, and poked out oddly depending on how he moved his body. Danny always hated it. Roy could remember Danny telling him if there was one thing about his body he would change, that would be it. Roy took his time, letting his fingers trace over the bone before leaning down to kiss across it. “I mean that.” He reassured him. If Danny’s cheeks weren’t already flushed pink, they were now.

Once he acquired permission, Roy was quick to discard of Danny’s pants and little black thong (now wet with precum). He kissed across his waist band, and up his stomach, to his chest and collar bone where he left small love bites. He showered his face with sweet kisses that made Danny giggle. Roy’s heart swelled at the sound. “You’ve got condoms and lube, right?” He asked as he peppered kisses to Danny’s cheek and jaw. “Mhm.” Danny hummed, enjoying the affection he was being given too much to answer properly. “Where are they?” Roy’s lips were now on Danny’s neck, his only answer being a sultry moan. Roy couldn’t help but feel pleased with himself. He sucked at the delicate flesh, marking Danny’s neck with a purple bruise the size of his mouth.

Roy removed his lips from Danny’s skin so he could answer properly. “Seriously, babe. Where are they?” Danny pointed to the nightstand. “Second drawer.” Roy was quick to retrieve what he needed, noticing that neither box had been opened prior to that moment. “Dry spell?” Roy inquired as he climbed back on the bed. Danny shook his head. “Vow of celibacy.” Danny snickered. “Which is clearly out the fucking window now. I just– I don’t know, wasn’t comfortable with people touching me, I guess.” He admitted. “You know we don’t have to do this, right?” Roy was quick to reassure him of that. He never wanted Danny to feel like he was obligated to have sex with him just because they’ve hooked up before.

“I want to. It’s different with you.”

“How so?”

“You appreciate me. You aren’t just looking at me as some sort of human blowup doll for your own pleasure. I’m not letting guys treat my body like that anymore.”

Roy beamed down at him with all the pride in the world. I’m proud of you. Danny spoke as if he finally realized all of the worth in himself that everyone else had been seeing for years. He leaned down to peck his cheek, letting the subject go with that. Danny smiled sweetly as he did so. Thank you.

“Turn around.” Roy instructed. He grabbed the pillows from the head of Danny’s bed as he moved off of them, placing them under his stomach. “That should be more comfortable.” Roy’s hands started at Danny’s shoulders, massaging them. They drifted downwards, massaging his lower back next. Danny couldn’t lie and say he wasn’t enjoying all of this attention. He felt worshiped, and taken care of; He always did with Roy.

Roy’s hands were now on Danny’s ass, squeezing and massaging his cheeks. His right hand came up, instantly crashing against his skin, pulling a guttural moan from Danny. “Fuck!” He called out. “Do that again, Please.” So Roy did. Once, twice, three times. By the fourth spank the hand print on Danny’s skin had became so red and raw Roy refused to do it again, no matter how much he begged for it. He blew a stream of cool air against the burning flesh to sooth it. Roy rubbed the area for extra comfort before moving on to part Danny’s cheeks. Teasingly, he traced Danny’s hole with the tip of his tongue. Danny hissed at the contact, needing more than what he was getting, but loving it anyway. Roy switched between lapping at his entrance, adding slight suction to his ministrations, and dipping his tongue inside of him. He brought his arm up to hold Danny down by his lower back as he squirmed beneath him. No matter how times they had sex, Roy never failed to surprise Danny with just how good he was at it. He didn’t know why, but he never expected it from him. The sounds emitting from Danny made it almost painful for Roy to remove his mouth from him.

Danny adjusted his position while Roy reached for the lube he had tossed on the bed beforehand. Roy squeezed a small amount onto his hand, warming it up between his fingers. The bottle was thrown back behind him for when they would need it again. Roy pressed a single digit against Danny’s entrance. “Ready?” Danny nodded. “Yes.” He slid inside of him, muffled whimpers leaving Danny’s lips as Roy prepared him. He added a second finger, scissoring inside of him. Then a third at Danny’s request. Roy had been kissing Danny’s freckled shoulder when Danny thought he had enough. “Roy, I’m ready.” Danny whined breathlessly. He carefully pulled his fingers from him, the loss disappointed Danny, but excited him for Roy.

Roy ripped the condom open with his teeth, quickly rolling it onto himself. He wondered if Danny knew he was just as desperate to be inside of him as Danny was to receive him. He spread the excess lube on his fingers over Danny’s hole, squirting more on to his hand to warm it up then lathering it on his cock. Roy lined himself up with Danny, teasing him with the tip, but not fully pushing inside of him yet. Danny threw his head back. “Roy, please.” Danny fidgeted impatiently underneath him. “Alright, alright.” Was the only warning Danny got before Roy was completely inside of him. They moaned in unison as Roy entered him. Roy did his best to hold off from fucking Danny’s brains out so he’d have time to adjust, Danny was having none of that. He slammed his ass against Roy and Roy took the hint. Grabbing his hips, he began to thrust inside of Danny. The string of moans and curses spilling from Danny’s lips served as encouragement for Roy to pick up his pace and hit deeper inside of him. When his grunts heightened in pitch, Roy knew he hit his prostate.

The way he threw his head back, his wild moaning as if these walls weren’t paper thin, his straining muscles, and the beads of sweat rolling down his back were a feast for Roy’s eyes. Danny had to be, without a doubt, the most stunning person Roy ever had the pleasure of sleeping with; Even from behind. It was a rule of his: do not face anyone during sex, unless they’re your boyfriend. He tried to keep that rule while with Danny as well, but he was too fucking beautiful, and as Danny said earlier, it was different between them. Danny wasn’t just some random trade that he’d regret fucking the minute he came. Roy leaned down against him, pounding into him slower, but deeper. Roy moaned right into his ear, which sent a shiver up Danny’s spine.

He bit down on the same ear he moaned into before whispering to him. “Turn around. I need to see you.” Roy pulled out so Danny could lay on his back, kicking the pillows that were supporting him out of the way. Roy kneeled between his legs, propping both up on his shoulder for the best access to him. He pushed back inside of Danny, the room filled with a mixture of their moans and the sound of Roy’s hips beating against him. Danny had the fleeting thought that his neighbors were going to be pissed the next time he saw them. “Look at me.” Roy grabbed Danny’s face, turning his gaze in his own direction. He pressed their foreheads together, their eyes locked as Roy put every ounce of feeling he had for Danny into their love making–this couldn’t be called fucking anymore. A dizzying feeling came over the both of them as they breathed in each other’s air, their mouths agape as they could barely contain the sounds escaping them. Danny’s eyes rolled back and Roy nearly came at the sight. “I love you!” Danny cried out.

Wait. Wait. That wasn’t in his head. That was out loud. He heard it. Roy heard it, he had stop thrusting. Danny was almost too scared to open his eyes again, so he didn’t. Roy looked at him astonished, though he wouldn’t know that since his eyes were still squeezed shut. Did he mean that? Was it just heat of the moment? Roy knew things could slip, especially the word love, at such an intimate time. “Danny…Do you mean that?” Danny opened one eye, still too embarrassed to open both and face the situation his was in. “Yes.” His tone was defeated, as if he had already made up his mind that there was no chance Roy would feel the same. “I love you too.” That got him to open his eyes. He swallowed down the metaphorical block in his throat.

“You do?”

“I do.”

Roy connected their lips again, tongues swirling around each other. He continued his thrusts with more intensity than before. Danny had already been close when he blurted out his three year long pent up ‘I love you’. They had slept together more than enough times for Roy to know what Danny writhing beneath him the way he was meant. “You gonna cum for me, baby?” He rasped out against Danny’s lips. “You first.” Danny stammered, his hands moving down to squeeze Roy’s ass. Roy chuckled. “Cute, but I doubt it.” Roy bit his bottom lip, knowing how absolutely crazy that drove him. He reached down between them to stroke Danny’s neglected, profusely leaking cock. “Not fair–” Danny’s back arched off of the bed. “I’m gonna cum!” He spilled over on Roy’s hand and his own stomach. Roy only needed the sight of Danny orgasming to reach his own climax.

Roy rode the both of them through their orgasm, pulling out and trashing the condom when they both gained more composure. “So you love me?” Roy cheekily teased. “Shut up!” Danny blushed. “You love me too.” He spat back almost shyly. “I do.” Roy kissed his forehead, pulling him into his arms. “Hey, in my book, screaming 'I love you’ during sex is a lot better than screaming 'not today satan.” Danny cracked up, his neighbors were sure to complain about not only about the moaning, but the cackling too.

“I still don’t believe that story, bitch.”

“Trust me, I wish I were making it up.” Roy intertwined his fingers with Danny’s. “I think this is a better one.”