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redrobin-detective · 4 years ago

Text

handknit sweater, never worn

How did Valerie end up in these kinds of situations? Of course there had to be a large scale ghost attack at her school. Val had gotten rid of most of the ghosts, weak mindless things when part of the auditorium collapsed, trapping her inside. Normally she’d blast her way out but the old building was creaking ominously from who know how many fights. Her rockets might collapse the whole south side of the school, meaning she was stuck here while the Fentons cleaned up the rest of the small fry. And to make matters worse, Danny’s dad had had the brilliant idea to put up a portable ghost shield around parts of the school to contain the ghosts. Meaning Phantom and the spooky vampire ghost were stuck with her too.

“Ugh this sucks,” Phantom whined, leaning petulantly against the ghost shield. His arms were crossed and his eyes lidded with annoyance, he almost could have passed for a normal, annoyed high schooler if you ignored his unnatural glow. “They really increased the power on these shields, I hope they’re okay out there by themselves. I think most of the students were evacuated already.” He glanced subtlety over at her which only increased her irritation. It was so aggravating he knew everything about her while she knew nothing about him.

“Madeline’s handiwork no doubt,” The vampire guy, Plasmius, commented flippantly. “I don’t believe Jack could assemble a sandwich without her assistance.” Phantom bristled a bit at the comment but just turned to glare at empty air. While she’d once mistaken them for friends, it was clear there was serious bad blood between Plasmius and Phantom.

“What are you even doing here, Plasmius?” Phantom hissed, crossing his arms closer to his chest in aggravation. “I’ve told you a million times to stay out of Amity.”

“Or you’ll do what, dear boy?” Plasmius grinned, flashing his fangs, like Phantom had told a particularly funny joke. Val privately considered the ghost boy to be one of the strongest ghosts she’d ever fought so if this guy was treating him like an annoying fly... Valerie kept her weapons up just in case but otherwise stayed away from the two volatile ghosts. She could take them down if she had to but there might be collateral. Right, that’s what she was going to go with.

“Actually,” Plasmius said, his cruel red eyes twinkling with smug glee. “I popped into town to check in on some of my old college friends. See what they’d been up to while I’d been busy with my various projects.”

Phantom kept his casual posture but went rigid, he did a quick glance over at her before moving back over to the ghost. “Now? You’re doing this now?”

“It’s always a good time to hurt you and besides,” another throaty chuckle, “I thought Ms. Grey might be interested.” Ok, was there any ghost that didn’t know her identity?

“Anyway, the wife was out but I found my fat, stupid old friend,” another twitch from Phantom, “back at his old favorite past time of knitting. It looked like he was making a sweater.”

“You’re a real bastard, you know that?” Phantom hissed, his form looking more and more defensive by the minute. Valerie had no idea what they were talking about but it clearly was upsetting the Ghost Kid. Usually she’d be pleased but it was kind of uncomfortable to watch.

“Hmm,” the vampire ghost hummed, still radiating cruel satisfaction. “I’m sure you’ve seen it too considering how often you’re in that house. He was working so hard on it, so furiously. No doubt trying to get it done in time for Christmas. A beautiful, handmade sweater for his wayward son who’s never going to get the chance to wear it.”

Oh shit, Plasmius was talking about Phantom’s dad. She’d assumed the beef between them started once they’d become ghosts but clearly there was history that extended to when they’d both been alive. Imagining Phantom alive, with parents... it was too weird.

“Shut up, I’m going to wear the sweater,” Phantom muttered weakly, curling in on himself. He’d scooted as far away from Plasmius as he could get.

“Oh but he’s not making it for you, Danny Phantom,” Plasmius lilted with a smirk causing Phantom to wince. “He’s making it for his normal, human son who he doesn’t even have the brains to realize doesn’t exist anymore. Would he bother to spend so much time and energy on a sweater that could only be worn by a ghost? To see proof of his own failure as a father?”

“Hey, it was my fault,” Phantom defended, finally snapping out of his sad and guilty funk. He balled his fists and glared at Plasmius with all he had. “I don’t blame them for what happened, I love them and they love me and nothing you say will ever change that!”

“Then why don’t you tell them, Daniel,” Plasmius asked with a raised eyebrow. “If you’re so confident in their love, then tell them. Tell them the sweater is pointless because you thrive in the cold. Tell them that their mistakes and negligence led to you becoming an unnatural abomination not fit to exist in either world.”

“Only-” Phantom’s voice caught and he cleared his throat and tried again. “Only if you tell them first. You may have been their friend at one point a long time ago but all you’ve done since then is hurt people, hurt me. For all their flaws, I don’t think they’ll ever forgive you for that.”

“Touché, son,” Plasmius scoffed. “Now then, I’m afraid our discussion will have to continue another time. I believe the power on the ghosts shield should be fading right about...” a low whine and the green wall surrounding them disappeared. “Ta ta for now you petulant child. Ms. Grey, a pleasure as always. Be careful with this one, he’s an experienced cheat and a liar.” With those parting words, Plasmius disappeared in a swirl of pink.

Valerie thought Phantom would leave too but instead he let out a long breath and ran his gloved fingers through his hair. After a moment he straightened himself up and looked as cool and confident as he ever did.

“The Fentons have probably rounded up the rest of the ghost but we might as well check, you check by the cafeteria and I’ll go through the classrooms.”

“Why?” Valerie found herself asking, not sure what she meant. Why did Phantom die? Why was he so afraid to let his apparently still living parents know what happened? Why did he try so hard to help people when everyone, including her, was so against him?

“It’s the right thing I guess,” Phantom shrugged, rubbing at the back of his neck. “My uh my parents raised me that way and if it lost that after everything, well, then the person I was before really will be gone.” He floated over to her, gently phasing them both through the wreckage connecting them to the rest of the school and, for a second Valerie saw a scared, human kid in over his head. Then the illusion was gone and it was just Phantom, annoying as always.

“Check the classrooms and if there’s no ghosts then I’m gunning for you,” Val said instead, activating her hoverboard and speeding off before he could answer. She readied her weapons and didn’t think of childless parents living in ignorance of what they’d lost or lonely sons who were too afraid to ask if their parents would love them even as a monster.

She just wanted to get the ghost scum out of her school and move on with her life. But still, she couldn’t help but think that, come Christmas time, she’d find Phantom in a handknit sweater intended to ward off a chill he could not longer feel.

#danny phantom #this was last nights 10pm walk daydream #the situation itself is a little contrived #but just the idea of vlad dan and val being trapped #and plasmius being a total prick and talking about Phantom's 'death' in front of Val #neither him or danny ever quite lie but its not quite true either #jack seems like the type to handknit sweaters #just..... the idea of him making a sweater for danny who doesn't need protection from the cold #made me sad #p l u s Val thinking that Phantom is ghosting (haha) his parents and avoiding confronting his death #if I were to do a sequel (not) it would be about Val trying to offer an intervention to get Phantom to confess so he could move on #someone help me I can't stop writing dp ficlets

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chrisevansluv · 3 years ago

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Here is the 2012 Detail Magazine interview with chris evans:

The Avengers' Chris Evans: Just Your Average Beer-Swilling, Babe-Loving Buddhist

The 30-year-old Bud Light-chugging, Beantown-bred star of The Avengers is widely perceived as the ultimate guy's guy. But beneath the bro persona lies a serious student of Buddhism, an unrepentant song-and-dance man, and a guy who talks to his mom about sex. And farts.

By Adam Sachs,

Photographs by Norman Jean Roy

May 2012 Issue

"Should we just kill him and bury his body?" Chris Evans is stage whispering into the impassive blinking light of my digital recorder.

"Chris!" shouts his mother, her tone a familiar-to-anyone-with-a-mother mix of coddling and concern. "Don't say that! What if something happened?"

We're at Evans' apartment, an expansive but not overly tricked-out bachelor-pad-ish loft in a semi-industrial nowheresville part of Boston, hard by Chinatown, near an area sometimes called the Combat Zone. Evans has a fuzzy, floppy, slept-in-his-clothes aspect that'd be nearly unrecognizable if you knew him only by the upright, spit-polished bearing of the onscreen hero. His dog, East, a sweet and slobbery American bulldog, is spread out on a couch in front of the TV. The shelves of his fridge are neatly stacked with much of the world's supply of Bud Light in cans and little else.

On the counter sit a few buckets of muscle-making whey-protein powder that belong to Evans' roommate, Zach Jarvis, an old pal who sometimes tags along on set as a paid "assistant" and a personal trainer who bulked Evans up for his role as the super-ripped patriot in last summer's blockbuster Captain America: The First Avenger. A giant clock on the exposed-brick wall says it's early evening, but Evans operates on his own sense of time. Between gigs, his schedule's all his, which usually translates into long stretches of alone time during the day and longer social nights for the 30-year-old.

"I could just make this . . . disappear," says Josh Peck, another old pal and occasional on-set assistant, in a deadpan mumble, poking at the voice recorder I'd left on the table while I was in the bathroom.

Evans' mom, Lisa, now speaks directly into the microphone: "Don't listen to them—I'm trying to get them not to say these things!"

But not saying things isn't in the Evans DNA. They're an infectiously gregarious clan. Irish-Italians, proud Bostoners, close-knit, and innately theatrical. "We all act, we sing," Evans says. "It was like the fucking von Trapps." Mom was a dancer and now runs a children's theater. First-born Carly directed the family puppet shows and studied theater at NYU. Younger brother Scott has parts on One Life to Live and Law & Order under his belt and lives in Los Angeles full-time—something Evans stopped doing several years back. Rounding out the circle are baby sister Shanna and a pair of "strays" the family brought into their Sudbury, Massachusetts, home: Josh, who went from mowing the lawn to moving in when his folks relocated during his senior year in high school; and Demery, who was Evans' roommate until recently.

"Our house was like a hotel," Evans says. "It was a loony-tunes household. If you got arrested in high school, everyone knew: 'Call Mrs. Evans, she'll bail you out.'"

Growing up, they had a special floor put in the basement where all the kids practiced tap-dancing. The party-ready rec room also had a Ping-Pong table and a separate entrance. This was the house kids in the neighborhood wanted to hang at, and this was the kind of family you wanted to be adopted by. Spend an afternoon listening to them dish old dirt and talk over each other and it's easy to see why. Now they're worried they've said too much, laid bare the tender soul of the actor behind the star-spangled superhero outfit, so there's talk of offing the interviewer. I can hear all this from the bathroom, which, of course, is the point of a good stage whisper.

To be sure, no one's said too much, and the more you're brought into the embrace of this boisterous, funny, shit-slinging, demonstrably loving extended family, the more likable and enviable the whole dynamic is.

Sample exchange from today's lunch of baked ziti at a family-style Italian restaurant:

Mom: When he was a kid, he asked me, 'Mom, will I ever think farting isn't funny?'

Chris: You're throwing me under the bus, Ma! Thank you.

Mom: Well, if a dog farts you still find it funny.

Then, back at the apartment, where Mrs. Evans tries to give me good-natured dirt on her son without freaking him out:

Mom: You always tell me when you think a girl is attractive. You'll call me up so excited. Is that okay to say?

Chris: Nothing wrong with that.

Mom: And can I say all the girls you've brought to the house have been very sweet and wonderful? Of course, those are the ones that make it to the house. It's been a long time, hasn't it?

Chris: Looooong time.

Mom: The last one at our house? Was it six years ago?

Chris: No names, Ma!

Mom: But she knocked it out of the park.

Chris: She got drunk and puked at Auntie Pam's house! And she puked on the way home and she puked at our place.

Mom: And that's when I fell in love with her. Because she was real.

We're operating under a no-names rule, so I'm not asking if it's Jessica Biel who made this memorable first impression. She and Evans were serious for a couple of years. But I don't want to picture lovely Jessica Biel getting sick at Auntie Pam's or in the car or, really, anywhere.

East the bulldog ambles over to the table, begging for food.

"That dog is the love of his life," Mrs. Evans says. "Which tells me he'll be an unbelievable parent, but I don't want him to get married right now." She turns to Chris. "The way you are, I just don't think you're ready."

Some other things I learn about Evans from his mom: He hates going to the gym; he was so wound-up as a kid she'd let him stand during dinner, his legs shaking like caged greyhounds; he suffered weekly "Sunday-night meltdowns" over schoolwork and the angst of the sensitive middle-schooler; after she and his father split and he was making money from acting, he bought her the Sudbury family homestead rather than let her leave it.

Eventually his mom and Josh depart, and Evans and I go to work depleting his stash of Bud Light. It feels like we drink Bud Light and talk for days, because we basically do. I arrived early Friday evening; it's Saturday night now and it'll be sunup Sunday before I sleeplessly make my way to catch a train back to New York City. Somewhere in between we slip free of the gravitational pull of the bachelor pad and there's bottle service at a club and a long walk with entourage in tow back to Evans' apartment, where there is some earnest-yet-surreal group singing, piano playing, and chitchat. Evans is fun to talk to, partly because he's an open, self-mocking guy with an explosive laugh and no apparent need to sleep, and partly because when you cut just below the surface, it's clear he's not quite the dude's dude he sometimes plays onscreen and in TV appearances.

From a distance, Chris Evans the movie star seems a predictable, nearly inevitable piece of successful Hollywood packaging come to market. There's his major-release debut as the dorkily unaware jock Jake in the guilty pleasure Not Another Teen Movie (in one memorable scene, Evans has whipped cream on his chest and a banana up his ass). The female-friendly hunk appeal—his character in The Nanny Diaries is named simply Harvard Hottie—is balanced by a kind of casual-Friday, I'm-from-Boston regular-dudeness. Following the siren song of comic-book cash, he was the Human Torch in two Fantastic Four films. As with scrawny Steve Rogers, the Captain America suit beefed up his stature as a formidable screen presence, a bankable leading man, all of which leads us to The Avengers, this season's megabudget, megawatt ensemble in which he stars alongside Scarlett Johansson, Mark Ruffalo, Robert Downey Jr., and Chris Hemsworth.

It all feels inevitable—and yet it nearly didn't happen. Evans repeatedly turned down the Captain America role, fearing he'd be locked into what was originally a nine-picture deal. He was shooting Puncture, about a drug-addicted lawyer, at the time. Most actors doing small-budget legal dramas would jump at the chance to play the lead in a Marvel franchise, but Evans saw a decade of his life flash before his eyes.

What he remembers thinking is this: "What if the movie comes out and it's a success and I just reject all of this? What if I want to move to the fucking woods?"

By "the woods," he doesn't mean a quiet life away from the spotlight, some general metaphorical life escape route. He means the actual woods. "For a long time all I wanted for Christmas were books about outdoor survival," he says. "I was convinced that I was going to move to the woods. I camped a lot, I took classes. At 18, I told myself if I don't live in the woods by the time I'm 25, I have failed."

Evans has described his hesitation at signing on for Captain America. Usually he talks about the time commitment, the loss of what remained of his relative anonymity. On the junkets for the movie, he was open about needing therapy after the studio reduced the deal to six movies and he took the leap. What he doesn't usually mention is that he was racked with anxiety before the job came up.

"I get very nervous," Evans explains. "I shit the bed if I have to present something on stage or if I'm doing press. Because it's just you." He's been known to walk out of press conferences, to freeze up and go silent during the kind of relaxed-yet-high-stakes meetings an actor of his stature is expected to attend: "Do you know how badly I audition? Fifty percent of the time I have to walk out of the room. I'm naturally very pale, so I turn red and sweat. And I have to literally walk out. Sometimes mid-audition. You start having these conversations in your brain. 'Chris, don't do this. Chris, take it easy. You're just sitting in a room with a person saying some words, this isn't life. And you're letting this affect you? Shame on you.'"

Shades of "Sunday-night meltdowns." Luckily the nerves never follow him to the set. "You do your neuroses beforehand, so when they yell 'Action' you can be present," he says.

Okay, there was one on-set panic attack—while Evans was shooting Puncture. "We were getting ready to do a court scene in front of a bunch of people, and I don't know what happened," he says. "It's just your brain playing games with you. 'Hey, you know how we sometimes freak out? What if we did it right now?'"

One of the people who advised Evans to take the Captain America role was his eventual Avengers costar Robert Downey Jr. "I'd seen him around," Downey says. "We share an agent. I like to spend a lot of my free time talking to my agent about his other clients—I just had a feeling about him."

What he told Evans was: This puppy is going to be big, and when it is you're going to get to make the movies you want to make. "In the marathon obstacle course of a career," Downey says, "it's just good to have all the stats on paper for why you're not only a team player but also why it makes sense to support you in the projects you want to do—because you've made so much damned money for the studio."

There's also the fact that Evans had a chance to sign on for something likely to be a kind of watershed moment in the comic-book fascination of our time. "I do think The Avengers is the crescendo of this superhero phase in entertainment—except of course for Iron Man 3," Downey says. "It'll take a lot of innovation to keep it alive after this."

Captain America is the only person left who was truly close to Howard Stark, father of Tony Stark (a.k.a. Iron Man), which meant that Evans' and Downey's story lines are closely linked, and in the course of doing a lot of scenes together, they got to be pals. Downey diagnoses his friend with what he terms "low-grade red-carpet anxiety disorder."

"He just hates the game-show aspect of doing PR," Downey says. "Obviously there's pressure for anyone in this transition he's in. But he will easily triple that pressure to make sure he's not being lazy. That's why I respect the guy. I wouldn't necessarily want to be in his skin. But his motives are pure. He just needs to drink some red-carpet chamomile."

"The majority of the world is empty space," Chris Evans says, watching me as if my brain might explode on hearing this news—or like he might have to fight me if I try to contradict him. We're back at his apartment after a cigarette run through the Combat Zone.

"Empty space!" he says again, slapping the table and sort of yelling. Then, in a slow, breathy whisper, he repeats: "Empty space, empty space. All that we see in the world, the life, the animals, plants, people, it's all empty space. That's amazing!" He slaps the table again. "You want another beer? Gotta be Bud Light. Get dirty—you're in Boston. Okay, organize your thoughts. I gotta take a piss . . ."

My thoughts are this: That this guy who is hugging his dog and talking to me about space and mortality and the trouble with Boston girls who believe crazy gossip about him—this is not the guy I expected to meet. I figured he'd be a meatball. Though, truthfully, I'd never called anyone a meatball until Evans turned me on to the put-down. As in: "My sister Shanna dates meatballs." And, more to the point: "When I do interviews, I'd rather just be the beer-drinking dude from Boston and not get into the complex shit, because I don't want every meatball saying, 'So hey, whaddyathink about Buddhism?'"

At 17, Evans came across a copy of Hermann Hesse's Siddhartha and began his spiritual questing. It's a path of study and struggle that, he says, defines his true purpose in life. "I love acting. It's my playground, it lets me explore. But my happiness in this world, my level of peace, is never going to be dictated by acting," he says. "My goal in life is to detach from the egoic mind. Do you know anything about Eastern philosophy?"

I sip some Bud Light and shake my head sheepishly. "They talk about the egoic mind, the part of you that's self-aware, the watcher, the person you think is driving this machine," he says. "And that separation from self and mind is the root of suffering. There are ways of retraining the way you think. This isn't really supported in Western society, which is focused on 'Go get it, earn it, win it, marry it.'"

Scarlett Johansson says that one of the things she appreciates about Evans is how he steers clear of industry chat when they see each other. "Basically every actor," she says, "including myself, when we finish a job we're like, 'Well, that's it for me. Had a good run. Put me out to pasture.' But Chris doesn't strike me as someone who frets about the next job." The two met on the set of The Perfect Score when they were teenagers and have stayed close; The Avengers is their third movie together. "He has this obviously masculine presence—a dude's dude—and we're used to seeing him play heroic characters," Johansson says, "but he's also surprisingly sensitive. He has close female friends, and you can talk to him about anything. Plus there's that secret song-and-dance, jazz-hands side of Chris. I feel like he grew up with the Partridge Family. He'd be just as happy doing Guys and Dolls as he would Captain America 2."

East needs to do his business, so Evans and I take him up to the roof deck. Evans bought this apartment in 2010 when living in L.A. full-time no longer appealed to him. He came back to stay close to his extended family and the intimate circle of Boston pals he's maintained since high school. The move also seems like a pretty clear keep-it-real hedge against the manic ego-stroking distractions of Hollywood.

"I think my daytime person is different than my nighttime person," Evans says. "With my high-school buddies, we drink beer and talk sports and it's great. The kids in my Buddhism class in L.A., they're wildly intelligent, and I love being around them, but they're not talking about the Celtics. And that's part of me. It's a strange dichotomy. I don't mind being a certain way with some people and having this other piece of me that's just for me."

I asked Downey about Evans' outward regular-Joe persona. "It's complete horseshit," Downey says. "There's an inherent street-smart intelligence there. I don't think he tries to hide it. But he's much more evolved and much more culturally aware than he lets on."

Perhaps the meatball and the meditation can coexist. We argue about our egoic brains and the tao of Boston girls. "I love wet hair and sweatpants," he says in their defense. "I like sneakers and ponytails. I like girls who aren't so la-di-da. L.A. is so la-di-da. I like Boston girls who shit on me. Not literally. Girls who give me a hard time, bust my chops a little."

The chief buster of Evans' chops is, of course, Evans himself. "The problem is, the brain I'm using to dissect this world is a brain formed by it," he says. "We're born into confusion, and we get the blessing of letting go of it." Then he adds: "I think this shit by day. And then night comes and it's like, 'Fuck it, let's drink.'"

And so we do. It's getting late. Again. We should have eaten dinner, but Evans sometimes forgets to eat: "If I could just take a pill to make me full forever, I wouldn't think twice."

We talk about his dog and camping with his dog and why he loves being alone more than almost anything except maybe not being alone. "I swear to God, if you saw me when I am by myself in the woods, I'm a lunatic," he says. "I sing, I dance. I do crazy shit."

Evans' unflagging, all-encompassing enthusiasm is impressive, itself a kind of social intelligence. "If you want to have a good conversation with him, don't talk about the fact that he's famous" was the advice I got from Mark Kassen, who codirected Puncture. "He's a blast, a guy who can hang. For quite a long time. Many hours in a row."

I've stopped looking at the clock. We've stopped talking philosophy and moved into more emotional territory. He asks questions about my 9-month-old son, and then Captain America gets teary when I talk about the wonder of his birth. "I weep at everything," he says. "I emote. I love things so much—I just never want to dilute that."

He talks about how close he feels to his family, how open they all are with each other. About everything. All the time. "The first time I had sex," he says, "I raced home and was like, 'Mom, I just had sex! Where's the clit?'"

Wait, I ask—did she ever tell you?

"Still don't know where it is, man," he says, then breaks into a smile composed of equal parts shit-eating grin and inner peace. "I just don't know. Make some movies, you don't have to know…"

Here is the 2012 Detail Magazine interview with chris evans:

The Avengers' Chris Evans: Just Your Average Beer-Swilling, Babe-Loving Buddhist

By Adam Sachs,

Photographs by Norman Jean Roy

May 2012 Issue

"Should we just kill him and bury his body?" Chris Evans is stage whispering into the impassive blinking light of my digital recorder.

"Chris!" shouts his mother, her tone a familiar-to-anyone-with-a-mother mix of coddling and concern. "Don't say that! What if something happened?"

Evans' mom, Lisa, now speaks directly into the microphone: "Don't listen to them—I'm trying to get them not to say these things!"

"Our house was like a hotel," Evans says. "It was a loony-tunes household. If you got arrested in high school, everyone knew: 'Call Mrs. Evans, she'll bail you out.'"

Sample exchange from today's lunch of baked ziti at a family-style Italian restaurant:

Mom: When he was a kid, he asked me, 'Mom, will I ever think farting isn't funny?'

Chris: You're throwing me under the bus, Ma! Thank you.

Mom: Well, if a dog farts you still find it funny.

Then, back at the apartment, where Mrs. Evans tries to give me good-natured dirt on her son without freaking him out:

Mom: You always tell me when you think a girl is attractive. You'll call me up so excited. Is that okay to say?

Chris: Nothing wrong with that.

Mom: And can I say all the girls you've brought to the house have been very sweet and wonderful? Of course, those are the ones that make it to the house. It's been a long time, hasn't it?

Chris: Looooong time.

Mom: The last one at our house? Was it six years ago?

Chris: No names, Ma!

Mom: But she knocked it out of the park.

Chris: She got drunk and puked at Auntie Pam's house! And she puked on the way home and she puked at our place.

Mom: And that's when I fell in love with her. Because she was real.

East the bulldog ambles over to the table, begging for food.

What he remembers thinking is this: "What if the movie comes out and it's a success and I just reject all of this? What if I want to move to the fucking woods?"

Shades of "Sunday-night meltdowns." Luckily the nerves never follow him to the set. "You do your neuroses beforehand, so when they yell 'Action' you can be present," he says.

And so we do. It's getting late. Again. We should have eaten dinner, but Evans sometimes forgets to eat: "If I could just take a pill to make me full forever, I wouldn't think twice."

Wait, I ask—did she ever tell you?

"Still don't know where it is, man," he says, then breaks into a smile composed of equal parts shit-eating grin and inner peace. "I just don't know. Make some movies, you don't have to know…"

If someone doesn't want to check the link, the anon sent the full interview!

#chris evans #cevans #Details Magazine #2012 #interview

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tcsauaskblog · 6 years ago

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Any more headcanons on my baby boy fethry? Also pls dont hurt him

Fethry smiles like the sun and laughs the way stars shine, and is a tornado of love that you have absolutely no guard against. He’s finally asleep, curled up on the couch in the circle of Della’s arms, and is casually the most important thing in the world to you and completely unaware of the fact.

But it’s fine.

This is fine.

And you’ll continue to make it fine for as long as it takes for him to never have to experience that kind of world-bending fear ever again.

You had no way of preventing it from happening. How could you? None of you knew. Fethry didn’t let you know. And you can only wonder why he kept a secret like this from you. You of all people.

But, you guess you deserve it. After all, it’s you who let him down. If only you had been there sooner, turned the corner fast enough, hadn’t been too preoccupied with flirting with senior girls. Maybe you could have prevented it from happening. Maybe you could have been the brave older cousin for once, the one Donald and Della always are, the one Fethry’s always seen you as.

But you didn’t, so you aren’t, and you feel like just about the most useless guy in the world.

You had just finished with study hall, your last period of the day, and were on your way to where the Junior high halls connected with the high school ones. If anyone asks, you’ll always complain about it, but you’re kind of secretly happy that your school is small enough so that middle schoolers and high schoolers all share one building. You’ve always met by Donald and Della’s classes after school ended, and you aren’t really prepared to break from that tradition now that Don and Del are freshmen.

But they’re only a few hallways down from yours, and Fethry is probably already hanging off of Donnie’s arms with that teasing playfulness about him that only he can get away with, and you’re too far gone wondering if Del’s lockers are next to some pretty upperclassman’s to really notice anything until the slamming of a locker door pulls you back from your daydreams abruptly.

You don’t really know, or really care, why the hallway was crowded around a particular locker, but you try to sneak through the cracks and the gaps of the crowd because you’re on a mission and you have a hand that is criminally free of any cute seniors numbers in black sharpie.

But then you hear it.

The distant shouting and banging of metal that causes you to stop dead in your tracks and the fact that it seems all too familiar has your blood running cold. You strain your ears because it’s really all you can do among the sea of bodies you feel lost in, but you hear it. You hear him. And you can find his voice in a crowded room like it was a job, so you don’t feel an ounce of shame when you push your way through the mob until you’re front and center of the action.

Bullies exist everywhere, you’re not really surprised by that, but the school year just started, and you think it’s a little cruel for some Juniors to be pushing middle schoolers into lockers this early on. If you were Donald, you probably would have straight up started a fight, not caring who the kid was, but ready to throw down with bullies any time of the day just on the principle that jerks deserve to get their beaks punched in. If you were Della, you wouldn’t hesitate to try and break the kid-free, all while giving the offender a tongue lashing of the life time that they wouldn’t be getting over anytime soon.

But you’re not your cousins. You’re Gladstone Glander, and you don’t really know what to do other than try to grasp the situation for what it is.

In the short, few moments you spend standing there, you understand that one of the sixth graders accidentally popped one of the football player’s footballs. There was a bit of shoving, and it had looked like a few fists would have been thrown if one of the sixth grader’s friend’s hadn’t intervened. Said friend, was now stuck in the locker.

The sixth grader was still on the floor, and he was still yelling, begging for the upperclassman to let his friend out. But the upperclassman didn’t do more than throw harsh laughter and snide comments in his face before banging hard on the closed locker in mock aggravation, waving a piece of fabric (you really didn’t care enough to take stock of it) in the air like a trophy. The kid in the locker was banging back against the locker door frantically, despite the harassment of the Juniors, but you couldn’t afford to fret about them just yet.

No, at the moment, you were too busy trying to scan past the heads that were all tuned into the scene in front of you, because you were sure, could have sworn, that you heard his voice-

“Ok guys, this is really not funny, let me out! Let me out now! Please!”

And your head whipped around to the sound of Fethry’s voice coming from the closed locker so hard you should have broken something.

And you felt like your gut was filling with mud and something heavy and sickening.

“I don’t know what you mean, it’s plenty funny for us,” one of the Juniors with the crooked nose smiled cruelly, banging the solid metal again, each hit rattling your bones and echoing through your ribcage hollowly. ��If can’t take the heat, don’t jump into the frying pan kid. Mind your own fucking business next time.”

The Junior next to him laughed when the crooked nose teen hit the locker so hard, Fethry yelped from inside, a breathy and cracked ’please, stop’ breaking at the edge of his voice when he called out, and you only now realized the fabric they had been tossing to each other was Fethry’s stocking cap.

“Let him out. Now.” You heard yourself growl through sharp, clenched teeth, doing everything in your power to keep your hands from trembling at your sides and your vision from going red.

The Juniors all had turned to you, but they did little more than regard you with raised eyebrows and passively bored looks.

“Back off curls, it’s not your beef.” One of them snorted, a portly, stubbly teen that you could only assume was the ringleader. One of the other Juniors had tossed him Fethry’s cap and he was now twirling it around on one finger, his beady black eyes looking down on you like you were just another clover in a green field.

“My cousin, my beef,” you barked, swiping the cap from the fat teen in one effortless step. “Let him out. I’m not gonna ask again.”

“Gladdy? Is that you?” You heard Fethry call, his muffled voice shaking just on the short side of panic and your blood boiled with an anger you didn’t know what to do with.

The ringleader’s eyes narrowed dangerously as he stood up straight and towered over you. “Fuck off brat, and if you’re lucky, I won’t-”

Was all he got to say before you punched him square in the throat as hard as you could. It was the only thing you could think to do at the moment and was really the only thing you could reach with him hovering over you. You didn’t have the patience to try and get a better angle. The fat teen stumbled backwards, hands clenched at his throat as he coughed and sputtered and tried to catch his breath again.

“You won’t do squat because I’m always lucky.” And you were seething. You had the distant thought that that punch really hurt your hand, and that you really weren’t cut out for fighting like Don was, but it was pushed down by the more ringing thought that sounded like alarms bells in your head. The ’family, danger, family’ sirens that gave you tunnel vision were blaring numbly in your ears and only let you focus on the locker in front of you. “Fethry, just hang on buddy, I’m gonna get you out.”

“Hurry, Gladdy, I don’t… I want to get out of here. Like now.”

And you would have torn down the locker door then and there because it had sounded like Fethry had started crying, and if that were the case then there was little on this earth that could stop you from throwing open the doors and wrapping Fethry in a hug that he’d never outgrow no matter how old he got.

But someone had punched you square in the jaw, you didn’t take note of who, and you were thrown sideways into the lockers beside Fethry’s. The loud metal clang rang throughout the hallways like a silencing gong, and it was the only thing you could hear for a while even though you knew the hallway was alive with the buzz of shocked students.

Someone had grabbed you by your shirt color and was propping you up against the lockers now. You were a little dizzy, your vision not really catching up with the rest of you, but you were able to concentrate a glare at the crooked nose teen. Your jaw throbbed like it was on fire.

“You’re gonna really wish you hadn’t done that.” He hissed at you, and despite yourself, you smiled back at him.

“Not likely, I take my wishes very seriously.” You spat out, and it had earned you another slug to the stomach. It hurt, it hurt so bad, and you would have doubled over in pain if crooked nose didn’t have an iron grip on your shirt collar, so you coughed out a haggard wheeze instead because it was really all you could do.

You distantly heard Fethry calling out your name as he rapped against the inside of the locker, and the tone of his voice was the only thing keeping you focused.

He’s afraid. He’s afraid out of his wits. And he’s calling out for you and you can barely stand let alone help him and you’re pathetic. You wished you could be strong like Don. You wished you could be gutsy like Del. You wished you could be brave enough to stand up on your own and help the person who needs you most but you aren’t.

So you can’t.

So when crooked nose tightens his grip on your shirt and pulls back a clenched fist, you do little more than steal yourself, shut your eyes and hope to lady luck that he misses your beak.

Because you’re not good at standing up for others. You’re not good at fighting back. You’re not good at protecting your baby cousin. You’re not good at anything, period. All you have is your luck, and even that didn’t help you from getting decked or saving a panic Fethry.

So you clench your teeth and wait for the punch that you probably deserve. At least it’s you he’s punching and not someone else. At least you can do this much.

But that third punch never came. Instead, you feel something pull the bullies grasp from you roughly and in one fluid motion, tearing one of the buttons off your shirt.

The firm presence of his back in front of you, solidly placing itself between you and everyone else, was so warm and familiar that you didn’t even need to open your eyes to recognize it. But slowly, you do anyway.

And Donnie is the same height as you, but you can’t help but be in awe of how broad his shoulders are and how bold his back is as you hide behind it like the eight-year-old you used to do so many years ago. Back when you were smaller and the world was bigger and the bullies were still the same mean jerks they are now. And so many things are different now, but some things you suppose will never change. Like how you still get yourself into stupid situations, and how Don will always be there to get you out of them.

“Touch him again, and you’ll be breathing through a tube, Leopard. I suggest you let that one marinate.” And you can only assume what kind of glare Don was giving him when he said that, but you were glad you were on this side of your cousin and not on the receiving end of that kinda look.

Because Don loses his temper on the daily, and you know a lot of his tantrums are your fault (you can’t help it, you like messing with him) but you’ve only seen him really lose a couple of times. Those few times were never at you, you know better than to push him too far and not push a joke that only meant to tease instead of cut, but they were still terrifying and you felt your blood run cold all the same.

That practically crippling rage and undeniable hatred that turned his vision red and bloodied his palms from shaking nails digging too deep into taut fists. Don didn’t talk about his anger much, not to you anyway, and you can’t very well blame him from what he has disclosed to you.

Basically, it was just as terrifying to him as it was to you, and it feels like your drowning in your own hurt and wrath. And sometimes it feels like you’re sinking slowly, like you can control how far you go, and other times it feels like cement blocks are tied to your feet, pulling you down faster and faster with no bottom in sight.

’The scariest part is not knowing where the bottom is,’ he once told you on a November night, when one of your fights turned a little too physical, a little too real a little too fast, and both of you had to take a breather to cool your heads. It was you who went looking for him, because like all your fights, it was you who was the instigator so it was always you who apologized first, regardless of if you meant it or not.

You found him on the porch swing, looking at his hands like they were covered in some hidden filth you couldn’t see. You sat with him on that porch swing for a long time, not talking and not really noticing how cold it was, just mimicking each others breathing patterns and watching your breath circulate in the yellow porch light before dissolving into nothing.

’It’s blinding, and pitch dark, and you don’t know how far you’ll go until it’s too far, and then once you get there, it’s already too late, and you’re left with nothing else to grab on to pull you back up’.

You don’t really know what he meant then. You still don’t really know what he meant even now. And you don’t try to understand it, because it sounded painful, and so burdening and like it was tearing him apart in places you couldn’t see so you didn’t even have the slightest idea on how to help him.

Hearing his tone of voice was enough to send those spidey sense danger sirens through your skull again and tie knots in your stomach, so you grab onto the back of Don’s jacket and never wonder if you did it to steady yourself or to steady him.

“It’s ok Fethry, Don and I are right here. We’re right outside and we’re gonna get you out. Shhhh, it’ll be ok.”

You attention snapped back beside you, and Della has somehow materialized in front of the locker Fethry was in, speaking soft reassurances like it was her day job, and in that completely captivatingly kind way that had you calm in seconds.

Della always had a way with words, always knew the right things to say, like all it took was a smile off her lips and a kiss to the forehead to make the worst things in life good again. She was good at making the whole world make sense, like how some people were good at making pancakes, and it was evident in the way Fethry remained silent in still from behind the locked door. Probably leaning into Della’s heartened words like you’d learned into a hug, and soaking up all the warmth and love out of them.

“Is Gladdy ok?” You heard him hiccup after a few beats, almost a whisper compared to the blood pounding in your ears. And you felt yourself drop to your knees next to where Della was working on picking the lock with hairpins you didn’t care to wonder how she got.

“I’m right here Feth. I’m ok. Everything is going to be just fine. You’re safe. It’ll only take a few more seconds, just, hang on buddy.” And you ignored the aching bruise you could feel blooming across your jawline and the creased brow Della flashed at you in favor of lying to Fethry for just this moment. You would have told him just about anything he wanted to hear, to be honest, if it meant adding a little of your own warmth in helping make sure Fethry didn’t feel so alone and scared.

You couldn’t save him like you thought you could, but maybe, this could be enough for now.

You ignored the bullies that were now reforming at the edges of the cleared circle of the crowd, glaring at you with what you could only assume were daggers and whispering grudges you didn’t bother trying to hear. You didn’t have to worry about them now that Don was here, folding his arms in front of himself as he stood like a wall between the three of you and the rest of the school with a conviction that would take a tank to tear down.

So with Fethry’s cap tucked away safely in your hands, which at the back of your mind was somehow impressed you managed to hang on to, you focused on helping Della get the locker open. Saying just about everything under the sun that could pass the time and take Fethry’s mind off of things until you all let out a breath you didn’t know you’d been holding when the lock unhinged with a satisfying click of metal.

And like a bullet out of a gun, Fethry shot out of the locker with so much vigor that neither you or Della had enough time to guard yourselves as he plowed into you, like he couldn’t get out of the dark space fast enough.

And he was crying. Crying the way children did when they were convinced that the monster under their bed would get them, and you were unprepared for the way it broke your heart. He heaved into Della’s shoulder, clutching the folds of her shirt with shaking hands like it was the only lifeline in the world as giant, wild tears rolled down his cheeks. His breathing was hitched and ragged, like he hadn’t been breathing the whole time he was in there, and he gasped for air when he begged ’please don’t let me go back in there, please, I can’t go back in there.’

Della’s arms clung almost as tightly around Fethry as his hold on her, and she pierced you with eyes that glowed with a raw, electric intensity. Something determined setting behind those wide irisis that you could feel in the deepest parts of your soul. And a shared understanding passed between the two of you in the span of a second, one that would be imprinted on both of you for the rest of your lives. “Fethry, it’s ok. You’re safe. I’m here. And I’m never letting go of you again.”

It took what felt like a forever and half, but Donnie was able to scare off the bullies with almost little effort as you, with the help of the 6th grader whose name you learned was Woody, one of the millions of friends Fethry was able to make in his first few days of school, dispersed the crowd who shuffled away agreeably enough, until it was just the four of you standing in the hallway.

Finally, after some soft coaxing, Fethry eased his grasp on Della so that they could both stand up, only letting go of her once to put on his signature cap that you wordlessly offered to him. Della and him stood as far away from the lockers as possible, Fethry leaning into the window side of the hallway as far as he could while you and Don picked up all your backpacks that had been disregarded in the fuss, before you all headed out of the school and into the parking lot.

Gus was waiting for you, his hat laid comfortably over his eyes as he leaned back in the driver seat, stealing a quick nap in the time it took you all to get out of school and you had to bite down the disappointment that dropped in your stomach when you saw that he had decided to bring the old pickup today.

“Fethry and I will ride in the back. Get some air on your faces. It’s a gorgeous sunny afternoon,” Della had declared before anyone else had time to dwell on the fact that no one wanted to squeeze Fethry into the small seats up front. She smiled liked it was common sense and Donald nodded along like it was second nature and opened up the truck door to help them get in, while you piled into the middle seat up front next to Gus, shoving all of your backpacks in the small space behind the seat bench and elbowing Gus awake.

And just like that, you were off down the dusty dirt roads back to Granny’s farm, huddled between Gus and Donald while you kept your eyes squarely on the rearview mirror. Fethry was still glued to Della’s arm but he was smiling that smile that could melt glaciers, and despite the tints of pinks cornering his eyes, you could barely tell that only minutes before, he’d been sobbing like it was the end of the world. You could see his mouth moving, chatting in that amiable way that won him so many smiles from you, but with the windows down, you had no idea what he was saying. It didn’t matter though, because then he was making Della laugh, and holding out his arms under the sunny September sky like it was a blue he could feel.

“So,” you draw out, breaking the silence and tearing your eyes away from the rearview mirror. “He’s claustrophobic.”

“Hmmm? Who is?” Gus asked halfheartedly, but you ignored his question when Donald rested his chin on the back of his palm where his arm was propped on the open window frame.

“Did you know?” He asks, not taking his eyes off the green pastures that pass outside the window, and you know he’s not trying to pick a fight, but something in you shakes with an intense ferocity that makes you want to fight him.

“Of course I didn’t know! How on earth could I have known? He never told me!” You start to shout, but catch your tongue just in time to see Donald turn his attention on you, the blue in his eyes electric with something wild and fierce and protective and you realize that he didn’t know about it either. And it hurt him in a way that it wasn’t supposed to.

“Do you think… he’s always been like this?” Donald probs, and your mind races with the idea.

Because Fethry didn’t keep secrets. He was as open as a threadbare paperback book, with wrinkled pages and dog-eared corners and pressed flowers between the texts that is well worn with years of love and adoration. Fethry was the type of kid with the conscious of a golden retriever puppy and told on himself long before anyone even realized something was broken or missing. And if he did keep one or two secrets, he certainly didn’t keep them from you or Don or Del.

But if he did, you have to wonder why. Why keep this a secret? Fethry looked absolutely sick with fear, his whole body trembling like he was stuck in that locker for far longer than just a handful of minutes. And just seeing the pure panic on his face was enough to make you feel nauseated, like someone was squeezing the most tender parts of your heart with faint ghost fingers. This shouldn’t have been something he should ever have kept to himself. Not a fear like this. Not when it crippled him to the point of earth-shattering tears.

You felt pathetic, for a multitude of reasons, but you supposed that why’s Donnie fixed you with those electric eyes like headlights in the dark when he asked, “How’s your cheek doing? You got slugged pretty hard.”

You resist the urge to run a hand over your jaw just to test its sensitivity and shrug. “Not bad, don’t worry about it. It probably looks worse than it feels.” You lie because it’s easier than letting him worry about you too on top of Fethry’s newly discovered phobia.

You turn your attention back onto the rearview mirror, continually ignoring Gus’s ’Who’re y'all talking about?’s and Donnie’s ’We’ll tell you later’s and not answering back when Don lowly mentions a “We’ll ice it when we get home,” in favor of watching the wind ripple through Della’s hair and threaten to take a hold on Fethry’s cap.

And there was really no arguing further than that, because there were just some things not worth arguing about, and you know better than anyone that sometimes, when the moral is this low and tensions are high, you just need to suck it up and let someone take care and worry about you.

When they got back to the ranch, granny had already left to go to an overnight cattle show that was being held in the next few counties over, so they basically had a run of the night and most of the next day. Since it was a Friday, they didn’t bother with chores or homework and just opted to laze about for the rest of the evening and just piled their backpacks by the foot rack on their way to the kitchen.

It was pretty evident that Fethry was already on the mend, bouncing around and goofing off and cracking bad jokes like his usual 11-year-old self. With all the energy and warmth of the sun, like the incident from only an hour ago never happened, and you couldn’t help but breathe a little and laugh along when he pulled you along into the kitchen to bug Don about dinner plans.

Don caved after about 4 seconds, a new record, of Fethry’s puppy dog stare and let Del call for pizza. However, you didn’t have the same luck (weird, you know) when Don told you to plant your butt in one of the island swivel chairs so that he could take a look at your bruise and you vehemently refused. But you can’t win against Fethry either, when he looked at you with a whole world of worry and guilt, so you shake him off and do as your told, and only complain twice when Don hands you a cold bag of peas wrapped in a wet dish towel to hold against your jaw.

You don’t listen when Fethry tries to apologize, because ’it’s not your fault in the slightest,’ and ‘it’s not a big deal, I’m fine Feth,’ followed closely by ’you should have seen the porker when I clocked him in the throat. Would have tried to aim for his nose but the dude’s stupid tall,’ just to make Fethry laugh. Which he did, and it sounded like chimes and felt like a ray of sunshine that made basically everything bad that ever happened in your life worth it.

The rest of the night was spent binge watching a marathoned Duckwing Duck special and dogpiling on the couch. You were caught somewhere under the arms of Don with your legs resting on the rising and falling chest of a sleeping Gus. And you weren’t really watching the show as much as you were listening to the ramblings of Fethry explaining every poorly executed stunt or fight scene with a wonder and excitement you wished he’d never outgrow.

And you know that what happened today changed you all, left something daunting over your heads that you had to face at one point or another. But right now Gus was snoring soundly at your side, and Don was leaning on you with a comfortably annoying weight that you’d ignore just this once. And he said something that made Della giggle as she peppered the top of Fethry’s head in kisses and Fethry was dozing off with a dopey pizza stained grin on his face, and you thought, this is fine.

These little moments, these tender and raw parts of your hearts that you exposed to each other were something you’d treasure. These were the things you’d die protecting. You’d risk everything for. That you’d work harder to for. To be braver. Stronger. Everything they needed you to be so that it would always, undoubtedly and forever, be fine.

#ask #my fic #tcs #Teenage Cousin Shananigans #donald duck #della duck #Fethry Duck #Gladstone Gander #ok so #you said not to hurt him but #i couldn't resist #headcannon time #i spent way to much time with this #me:i'm only gonna write a small oneshot #also me: writes a 5k chapter that'll prologue the prologue of the abner fic #sorry if it's all over the place and the pacing is wierd #i hate writing in first person but it sorta just ended up that way woops #oh well #hope this was ok instead of drawing something #i don't have time in the day to draw this into a comic or fit all the emotions i want into it #i may draw a picture or two #just for the sake that i want to draw a crying fethry or an angry gladdy/don #but no promises #also #this is my writing style so you'll know what you're in for for the abner story #lots more cousin fluff #and LOTS more angst #hehe i'm excited

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slut4supersoldiers · 6 years ago

Text

Someday. Maybe. Chapter 8

Summary: Throw together a boy and a girl and another boy and 5 middle-schoolers, two adults, a little girl with telekinetic powers, and a monster from another dimension and you’ll get the perfectly strange story.

(AKA: I suck at writing summaries.)

Pairing: Steve Harrington X OC (fem reader) X Billy Hargrove

Words: 2K+

A/n: This is the second last chapter. And this one has my boi Stevie’s point of view. Please leave a feedback. xx

I do not own Strangers Things nor the GIF.

PART I

PART II

PART III

PART IV

PART V

PART VI

PART VII

MASTERLIST

REQUESTS ARE OPEN

I woke up the next day with a massive headache.

After spending two hours down at the station the night before, Flo decided to call it a day and the both of us returned home. Taking in my slouched appearance and lack of appetite Flo asked me if anything was bothering me. I gave her a half-hearted smile and shook my head. After kissing my forehead she retrieved to her room but not before assuring me that she would always be there if I need her. Her kind words somehow felt alien to me and suddenly my eyes welled up with tears. And the tears didn’t stop till the morning rays peeked through my curtains blinding me momentarily and worsening the head ache. Thankfully it was a Saturday so I didn’t have to come up with an excuse to skip school. Although with the way I was feeling now I wouldn’t have to come up with and excuse at all.

After fifteen minutes of lying in bed I willed myself to get up. Seeing as I was going to be staying home I quickly went through my routine, threw on a large sweater and some pants before heading downstairs.

As I entered the kitchen I saw Flo talking on the phone with a hand on her hip and an apron around her waist. She turned around probably on hearing me shuffle through the kitchen and pointed at a plate on the table. As she continued talking I devoured my breakfast. With all that happened in a period of two days I felt like I hadn’t eat at all and suddenly I wanted to eat till my stomach burst.

“Careful honey, you’re stuffing your mouth.” Flo who had now hung up approached the table and poured me a glass of orange juice. I nodded at her as I chugged down the juice. Flo just shook her head and grabbed the carton. After putting it away she turned to look at me and said, “I have to visit Lauren today. She fell from the stairs and broke her hip, poor thing.”

Lauren was Flo’s friend since high school and they frequented each other’s house from time to time. Lauren lived in the neighbouring town with her husband and their dog Humphry.

“I am taking your car and I’ll be back by Monday. Are you going to be okay by yourself?” Flo asked as she put on her coat.

I smiled and nodded at Flo when she grabbed the key hanging on the nail by the door. She gave a pat on my shoulder and kissed my cheek before bidding me farewell. I watched as she drove away and decided to get some homework done.

After three hours of making notes and solving math problems I decided to take a break. What better way to take a break than renting a movie! So I put on a pair of jeans, tucked my sweater in and grabbed my jacket.

The moment I stepped out of the house I cursed myself for being stupid enough to walk in this cold but with my car gone I had no other option. Luckily I managed to reach the store before I could freeze to death like Jack Nicholson in the Shinning. Huh! Maybe I could watch that movie.

After grabbing the VHS I walked over to aisle number 3 to grab some popcorn. As I was about to reach out and grab the box of (extra) butter popcorn my gaze fell on a ruckus in front of the meat section.

Dustin Henderson and Steve Harrington were engaged in an animated discussion over something. I would have never imagined Steve Harrington hanging out with anyone half his age let alone Dustin. Out of curiosity, I walked towards the two boys. The younger boy who was facing me suddenly stopped talking as he saw me approaching them.

“(y/n) what are you doing here?” He yelled and looked at Steve almost as if he was trying to stop Steve from saying anything. Following Dustin’s actions Steve tensed and turned around to look at me.

Without so much as glancing at Steve I asked Dustin, “Me? What are you doing here?” I pointed my finger at both the boys as if questioning the odd pair.

“Oh, yeah… huh… funny story. Steve do you wanna tell her?” Dustin suddenly looked towards the older boy.

Steve looked at Dustin with disbelief and then looked at the ground in an effort to conjure up some explanation.

“I got it. It’s for a project for science class. We have to study…uh… the behaviour of…uh… a semi-wild being in its habitat and how it reacts to its prey which in this case is raw beef.” Both Steve and I stared at Dustin who put his hands in his pockets and stared at us.

“Cut the crap Henderson and tell me the truth.” I deadpanned.

“I’ll tell you the truth. Dustin’s pet lizard ate his cat.” Steve spoke up.

“Okay. That’s funny Harrin- Wait are you serious?” I looked between the two boys. “How can a lizard eat a ca- Wait it ate Mews?”

“That’s the only cat I have (y/n) or had. And ‘it’ is not a lizard, he has a name.” Dustin pointed at Steve.

“Wait. So something which was not a lizard ate your cat and you gave it a name and are now feeding it. Does it sound completely stupid and irrational to you too or do you want me to say it out loud once more?” I looked at Dustin who looked at me with a scowl.

“(y/n) don’t you get it this thing is a creature from the upside down?” He whispered cautiously so as to not let anyone overhear us.

“Alright. That does it. You, Dustin Henderson are going home at this instant.” The moment Dustin mentioned that this filthy creature was linked to the creatures we encountered last year I realised the gravity of the issue.

“What? Why? Anyway mom is not home she is looking for Mews and I don’t have the key.” He shrugged.

“What? You haven’t told Mrs. Henderson that her cat is dead?” I whisper-yelled.

“(Y/n) you’re over-reacting.”

“I am over-reacting? Dustin some dangerous creature is on the loose and has killed your cat, why do you think it won’t kill you?”

“He is not some creature. He is Dart. He is my friend he won’t hurt me.”

“Oh, great! Just because you named it now it’s your-

“(Y/n) ‘it’ has a na-

“Hey, hey, hey, if you two are done arguing like 5 year olds we have something more important to do.” Steve interjected.

“Right.” Dustin Straightened up and backed away a little.

“Fine. Dustin I’ll keep your secret and not say anything to Mrs. Henderson if I can come with you two.” I crossed my arms in front of my chest.

“Why?” Dustin questioned mimicking my stance.

“Well firstly, I won’t be able to live with the fact that I let you walk in the arms of death without making any efforts of protecting you and also I have a shotgun at my house and I know how to use it.” I raised my brow as at Dustin, challenging him.

“Well you came in real strong with the emotional rant but just the shotgun part would have sufficed. Man! I should’ve just come to you instead of Steve.” Dustin smiled at me.

“You know I am standing right here?” Steve rolled his eyes at Dustin.

“Yeah, yeah. Let’s go guys.” Dustin said before he began piling his cart with packets of raw meat.

After buying two buckets worth meat and gaining a weird look by the cashier the three of us made our way to my house to grab my shotgun. Making sure I had enough bullets we finally began walking to the abandoned rail tracks that passed from the forest to the abandoned junkyard, since taking a car and then leaving it would have been unsafe.

The whole time Steve kept glancing towards me only to look ahead when I caught him. Annoyed with his behaviour I slung my shotgun on my back, grabbed one bucket out of Dustin’s hand and began walking ahead. With all that had happened two days ago and now this, I needed to free my mind even if it would last for a short while.

STEVE’S P.O.V:

If somebody told me few years ago I'd be teaming up with Dustin Henderson to track down some inter-dimensional creature who eats cats I would have laughed in their face. Then again I would have done the same thing if somebody said I'd be helping Jonathan Byers fight off a similar creature with my (ex) girlfriend. But then last year happened.

But the demo creature and teaming up with Dustin Henderson weren't the only strange things, (y/n)’s behaviour was strange too. She had made it clear that she was on board only for Dustin. I understood the reason why she was being distant and I was kicking myself for not apologizing to her but at the same time a small part of me (very selfish and confused part of me) wanted her to come along because she wanted to spend time with me. We never did that anymore. It was not her fault though.

Last year during the summer she confessed her attraction towards me. Did that catch me off guard? Yes. Not because I didn't like her. In fact I had liked her since we were friends but I never acted on it because she was...well (y/n). She was always the smartest, the hardest working, and the kindest person in school. The only thing I had going for me was my hair and my parents' money. Why would she go for me?

There were a few times in middle school when I wanted to tell her I liked her. Like after Becca Green's birthday party (where I dragged her against her will) when she tucked her hair behind her ears and told me she had a great time; or that time when we stayed up watching stars by the pool outside my house and decided to make it our little tradition or that time when she fell down her bike and in spite of a bleeding knee, glazed eyes and a wobbling lip she still managed to smile and say "I am okay."

I always wanted to tell her I liked her. But high school came along and we began drifting apart, again she wasn’t the one to be blamed. I know she hated the people I hung out with but I also liked the feeling of being popular. I liked the attention (that I was otherwise devoid of). I liked being the best, the king. That was the year I talked to Nancy Wheeler.

The closer we became the farther (y/n) went. She became even more distant from not just me but everyone around her. She began spending time at the AV club and down at the police station. But I was too busy ignoring her because I thought my life was perfect. I had many friends, I had a smart and beautiful girlfriend, I was partying, and I was at the apex of the social pyramid. Little did I know then that all this would cost me the one girl who cared about me the most (in spite of me being an asshole to her most of the times).

"Steve, let’s get moving." Dustin hollered, pulling me out of my thoughts.

Before I could go back to pondering over things I walked faster to keep up with Dustin.

"So let me get this straight, you hid a creature you knew was dangerous to impress a girl you barely knew?" I asked.

"Okay that's just grossly oversimplifying what happened." Dustin retorted.

"I mean why would a girl like a nasty slug?" I shrugged.

"An inter-dimensional slug? Because it's awesome." Dustin dramatically moved his hands.

"Well even if she thought it was cool, which she didn't, I just... Don't know, I just feel like you're trying to hard man." The boy needed some tough love.

"Well not everyone can have your perfect hair, alright?" Dustin walked a little faster like a child throwing a tantrum.

"It's not about the hair man. The key is to act like you don't care." I shrugged

"Even if you do?" Dustin slowed down a little.

"Yeah. Drives ‘em nuts." I said as I matched his pace.

"Is that why you behave like you don't care about (y/n) because you want to drive her nuts?" Dustin questioned softly looking to make sure (y/n) wasn't listening. Thankfully she was out of earshot.

“Whatever do you mean by that." I murmured.

“Going by what you said, you care for her but don't show her that because you want her to like you. So it means you like her too, right?" Dustin looked at me with furrowed brows.

"Of course I do like her Dustin I-

"Then why are you dating Nancy?"

"I am not... Nancy... I... She broke up with me." I said through gritted teeth.

"Oh brutal. So are you like gonna ask (y/n) out or something?" The younger boy asked.

"No...she... She wouldn't go out with me. She’s too special for someone as ordinary as me." After how I've treated her I doubt if she'd talk to me. I wanted to add.

"Yeah, she is special. Like max." Dustin softly murmured the last part.

"Hey, wait you're not in love with her, right?" Dustin frantically shook his head on hearing my question and repeatedly said no.

"Good, coz she will only break your heart." apparently that's what people you love do. That’s what Nancy did to me. And that's exactly what I did to (y/n).

TAG LIST:

@wefracturedmotivation @thoughstofaredhead @savannah-m-99 @spideyjoy @peanutlicker5000 @lovelydreamer-2000@mysticfluffyness

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impurelight · 5 years ago

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Spider-Man Far From Home - It Was The Best Of The MCU, It Was The Worst Of The MCU

All these overviews are filled with spoilers.

Far From Home can be cleanly divided into two parts. There is the first half which is full of comedy and I very much enjoyed. And then there's the second half which made me think the writers were like, "Oh, yeah, this has to be an action movie. Time to fix that." This second half ticks all the action movie boxes and is incredibly high octane while making absolutely no sense and will ultimately be unmemorable.

Still more memorable than the average Marvel movie though. Because now they're not faceless soldiers you're fighting, they're drones. Ooo... fancy!

And between the two parts there is the most WTF exposition sequence I have ever seen. I mean like people always call out games and movies with long exposition scenes but they're always well written and I don't have a problem with this. The exposition scene in this movie is just so bad. Whenever someone calls out a bad exposition scene now I'm going to be like, "Still better than Far From Home!"

When I first saw this movie I did not have very good expectations. I watched Homecoming and they should have just renamed it Marvel Movie: The Movie. It was just so generic. So watching Far From Home blew me away. It was just so funny and campy with Peter and MJ being so adorably socially awkward. I mean, like, totally fake but funny.

There is the one line in particular that I think was in the trailer with MJ going, "And therefore I have value?" I just can not imagine a high schooler saying this, less a high schooler with a crush on the person they're saying this to. It is just so bad and it was shoehorned in to make some dump political statement although I don't exactly know what that statement is. What is with these not funny lines popping up in movies? Detective Pickachu had the climate change one.

So anyways, there is also a secondary plot thread about Nick Fury trying to contact Peter. And you know how much I love secondary plot threads. And it works here too. There's this nice story of Peter doing high schooler stuff which is funny and interesting. And then there's the story of Spider-Man saving the world. I really like it. Sort of reminds me of the Agent Cody Banks movies. Those were some good movies.

But all good things have to come to an end. And here it ends in act 2. Of 2. Because this movie only has 2 acts. Deal with it. So of course as already mentioned the exposition scene.

Well, technically the exposition scene exists in a no-man's land between act 1 and 2.

So anyways before act 2 I already knew something was up. I mean, elemental monsters, pretty dumb. Obviously not the big bad. And then I was like, "So, who could the big bad be?" And then I was like, "Mysterio? That doesn't make any sense. What is his evil plan? Being nice to Peter? I mean maybe he's after that Edith tech but he never even mentioned it."

I mean, he even turned down the tech and had Peter force it onto him. I mean like they could have had an imaginary Nick Fury tell him to hand over the tech. But no. I guess he must also have mind control powers. Also why didn't Peter use Edith to like spy on Nick Fury or Mysterio or something? I mean, if I was a high schooler with that sort of tech I'd spy on everyone.

So after that we get that stupid exposition scene. And I could not roll my eyes harder. All these things that I knew you were doing despite not even setting up at all just came true. Sigh.

And then we have the villain's motivations. Which, I mean. Congratulations. You're the last in a long line of characters that got jealous of the hero and decided to be villains because YOLO. I guess it's good that they actually tried to give him backstory unlike all those other villains that are just evil. Why? Because they just are. But it does make this movie feel like it embodies the worst of the MCU.

So onto act 2. Now I have to say that illusion tech is probably the most amazing thing I've seen in the MCU. Like Iron Man armour is nice but we have things that are close. Nanite armour. I mean, yeah, it's far out there but it's not that unique of an idea. Also it's not exactly clear how it works.

But the idea you could use these illusions to create fake people, hide real people, and hide entire buildings? It is just wow, just wow. Especially as the illusions, in the fictional universe, were running in real time. I mean like we have real time raytracing now but it's not that good. And the idea is you could just create and direct these things on the fly is double wow. Then factor in the fact that they're holograms. Like holograms in real life are just so fake. They need an incredibly powerful light or you'll see right through them. And turn your head a fraction of a degree and everything breaks.

So enough fan boying. So I said that the writers woke up and said, "Oh, yeah, this has to be an action movie." And it really does feel like it. We go from 0 to 100 in like 2- 3 scenes. Personally I think they could have done it a little better with the whole, "Oops, forgot a projector." thing.

So the last scene in this short sequence is just so clever. It's here we see the true power of the holograms. I do like them but I had some problems. Mostly with how sometimes they can hit you and sometimes not. Just flesh out that a bit more. But I must say the "You're so dumb" part definitely look me by surprise.

There is something to say about Mysterio as a character. He says multiple times how people 'need to believe' which could be some sort of political remark but honestly I can't tell. I wish they took it further, though. Really flesh the theme of giving people something to believe in. Oh, well.

And then we have the final battle. And I must say the music in this battle was just incredible. There are a few tracks they swap between and apply various effects based on what the characters are doing. I mean, pretty standard stuff for an action movie, but I have never seen it done so aggressively in a movie. Every action is punctuated by it's own musical effect. The character's themes are ever present but the sound designer did not shy away from layering additional tracks to beef up the impact even more. It is the very best the MCU has to offer. It can even feel like the music is overpowering the movie. Although I don't mind. I'm not he biggest fan of action scenes.

Last but not least: spidey sense. I said before that I hate the whole 'chekhov's gun' thing. I think stories should feel organic. And not like a well-architected behemoth. So when something in the beginning of the movie is called out towards the end I can look past it if it naturally fits. But if it's not particularly well integrated I hate it. Like in Star Trek Into Darkness. It's just shoehorned into the story. Stop trying to shoehorn things into the story! So suffice it to say I hated the spidey sense thing here as well being foreshadowed in the beginning. They should have just left it out.

So I had a lot of problems with the second half of this movie. The first half was OK. But you know, I probably liked the second half more. Because it felt like an action movie which I liked. I enjoyed this movie and at the end of the day that's all that mattered. It's not my favourite Marvel Movie, but it's probably better than 90% of Marvel movies. It's might even be better than Ant-Man (I really liked Ant-Man) putting it in my top 3 Marvel movies of all time. One thing's for sure: it definitely beats the generic Marvel Movie: The Movie.

#spiderman far from home #spider-man far from home

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