#he starts dating a woman whose personality is almost exactly like yours. may as well be the female version of you

[ferretwhomst]

actually while i'm here. transmasc amber is also funny from house's pov because house's whole perception of amber is "she's like the girl version of me" so finding out amber isn't a girl anymore would be crazy for him, because that was the main difference between the two of them in house's mind??? and now amber is a guy and wilson is still dating him. so it's like the "oh my god, you're sleeping with me" scene but on another level this time. am i making sense even

[angel-kyo]

Okay, so it's probably just too late to get it out of my head now. I think I am obsessed with writing him obliviously obsessed.

Warnings: Mentions of obsessive/stalkerish behavior and invasion of privacy.

I guess this is a second part to this: Part I

^--------------------------------------------------------

ObsessedSatoru who randomly passes by your house on the days and the hours he knows you should be there. He tells himself he just cares about you and wants to make sure you made it home and the lights are on.

ObsessedSatoru who wonders if you are okay when you fail to attend the bakery one Friday. "I just wanted something sweet before starting the weekend", you had told him once, and he couldn't agree more. Seeing you was sweet for him too. Since that day, it had become some sort of tradition meeting you there on Fridays. Why would you not show up? This changes the script a bit, he thought.

ObsessedSatoru whose first thought is that you may be still at work but changes his mind after making a quick call to your workplace and having no one pick up. So they are closed already? Any other day he had wanted to check, he had called and spoken a few words to the receptionist. 'A nice woman', you had told him once, 'she won't leave until all of us have left the office.'

ObsessedSatoru who decides to check your home in case you had headed there earlier. Confusion, disappointment and worry, exactly in that order, bloomed in his head when he saw the lights off. A quick inspection inside confirmed you were indeed not there.

ObsessedSatoru who has memorized your weekly schedule as well as his own. He knew you were free that night and had planned for the two of you to not so casually meet after work. He would then have persuaded you into grabbing dinner with him and asked you to go out the following day on a 'friendly date' to try a new coffee shop, nothing out of the ordinary, although he was actually planning for something a bit more elaborate than just coffee this time.

ObsessedSatoru who calls you to ask if you are free for dinner right now. A direct call had not been part of his plan. He knew you were most likely to agree if spoken with in person, but he figured it was the fastest way to reach you.

ObsessedSatoru who frowns lightly at you not picking up. Were you busy? With what? Not at work, not at home and he was sure you had no plans for tonight. You had his number and would usually pick up quick enough. Had you ignored him? No, he didn't want to think like that. Maybe lost your phone? He wanted to call again, but wouldn't that be too pushy? No, he was your friend, so it should be okay, right?

ObsessedSatoru whose mood lightened when you call him instead. "Satoru? Sorry, for not picking up before." He could almost hear your apologetic smile. "Is everything okay?"

"Are you home yet?" Maybe he was being too forward, but wasn't he always? And his tone was as friendly as it had always been with you. Still, he felt funny asking such a question in the middle of your living room. He knew you were not home. "If you're free, do you want to grab dinner?"

You went silent for a bit, and he heard some voices in the background. Maybe you were busy after all.

He was going to ask you where you were, but you spoke sooner. "Sorry, we went out for dinner with some colleagues. Maybe..."

"What about tomorrow?", he interrupted. He could still save his plan.

You were hesitating. This is what he feared. "Sure, we can do something tomorrow."

Score. If you could only see the smile you put on his face.

ObsessedSatoru who ponders whether or not he should come back to your house later while eating his dinner alone. 'We went out for dinner with some colleagues.' He didn't know much about the people you worked with. Maybe he should fix that. Just for safety. You can never know these days, right?

ObsessedSatoru who decided to check on you and smiles when he sees you entering your home from afar. You are okay, so he can go to sleep soundly now.

ObsessedSatoru who plans one of the most exhausting 'dates' you have ever been on. 'What should we do next?', he kept saying, coming up with more things to do every hour just because he did not want your time together to end. Not that he would admit that though.

ObsessedSatoru who invites you to his place after the rain caught you at the festival where he had taken you. Contrary to what you may have thought, he keeps a neat apartment. "So neat that it is almost as if you didn't live here", you had said with a smile. He took it as a compliment.

ObsessedSatoru who laughs it off when you mention you buy the same shower gel as him after using his bathroom. What a coincidence that he also seems to like the same brand of coffee as you, no? "Great minds think alike", he grins as he pours your cup. If you looked through in his fridge and cabinets, you would probably find more 'coincidences'. Right, maybe his most recent grocery lists had been slightly inspired by his findings in your home. But he liked you, in the friendliest of ways, of course. What could be wrong with wanting to try the same things you seemed to like?

ObsessedSatoru who thinks there is only one thing in the whole apartment he doesn't want you to see: the bottle of perfume in the drawer of his nightstand. It was the same you wore almost every day. The same you were wearing when he met you and the same you had worn today. He had bought it on a whim a few weeks ago, when he passed by a store and suddenly thought he had smelled you. A silly buy, nothing more, but he knew that could make you raise an eyebrow.

ObsessedSatoru who keeps his eyes on you without realizing he is staring and blushes lightly when you put your cup of coffee down and speak in the most serious tone "You have been staring. Are you obsessed with me or something?" Your expression immediately changes when his eyes widen. You laugh at his reaction.

ObsessedSatoru who laughs too, but maybe he is being completely sincere when he replies "How could I not be?"

[my-soul-sings]

kiss the girl | ch 1

Fandom: Tears of Themis Characters: Artem x Reader 

Summary: Armed with a trusty book, Artem Wing attempts to win the woman of his dreams.

A/N: Artem’s personal story cracked me up so much that I had to write a fic about him with a less dense MC to troll him. :) 

***

It’s no secret that Artem is a genius. As the youngest person in Stellis to become a senior attorney, the firm has attracted hordes of clients seeking his services despite his higher-than-average hourly billing rates. Themis Law Firm may be a relatively new firm and much smaller compared to the bigger, reputable and more established ones in Stellis, but Artem’s presence has made it a force to be reckoned with in this industry. 

And yet, despite being perhaps one of the finest lawyers of his time, the Artem you know is quite something else altogether. You don’t really know how to explain it. Sure, he’s your boss and you admire his work ethic, intelligence, wit, charisma… the list could go on and on. But over the past few weeks it’s become evident that even geniuses like Artem lack in some ways. 

In Artem’s case, the area of lack is painfully obvious.

“So what kind of man are you into? We’ve all shared, it’s your turn now.” Celestine is sitting on the edge of your desk, a playful smirk on her lips as she sips her coffee. 

“Well… I don’t know…” Your words trail off as your eyes dart towards the pantry, where you spot the familiar back of your boss who’s trying very hard to blend into the side of the fridge at the moment. Needless to say, he’s not doing a very good job. He’s been stirring that cup of coffee for the past ten minutes now—yes, you’ve been keeping track ever since you noticed him come to the pantry for coffee despite having a coffee machine in his own office—and you’ve already spotted him glancing over in your direction at least twice when he thought you weren’t looking.

It’s been like this for the past few weeks. You didn’t really pick up on the signs at first: Artem leaving work almost always at the same time that you do, your conversations about work almost always ending with personal questions to get to know your likes and dislikes, and the unusual number of times he would walk out of his office a day to pay a visit to the pantry, only to leave empty-handed. 

But one incident became two, two became four, and it didn’t take much brainpower to figure out that he was oddly interested in matters involving you. It doesn’t matter if it’s about work or about your personal life, he seems to want to know everything, but especially about your love life and love interests. 

If the fact that he’s been not-so-subtly eavesdropping on your conversations with Kiki and Celestine in the office isn’t clear enough, then nothing will be.

You could just clear the air with him directly, although there’s that lingering fear of, “What if he isn’t actually interested?” It’s not like you can read his mind; maybe he’s just doing this shoddy spywork in an attempt to know his employees better. Something about employee welfare and morale building maybe—you wouldn’t put it past him. 

But then you think about it deeper and realise it can’t be, especially not when Celestine isn’t that subtle either with her pointed glances in your direction before staring straight at Artem with a smirk on her lips. She obviously knows what Artem is up to and is in on it somehow, which might be why lately she’s been asking you all sorts of questions relating to your love life whenever Artem happens to stroll into the pantry yet again. 

Just like that three weeks have passed, and you still haven’t gotten around to talking to Artem about it. It’s not for a lack of guts; really, it’s not. It’s just… it’s quite amusing to see Artem Wing, the youngest senior attorney in Stellis, a brilliant mind who usually has the answers to every legal problem, at a complete and utter loss. 

“The kind of guy I like… I think I’ll know when I meet him...” The answer is deliberately vague, which makes Kiki groan and Celestine click her tongue in dissatisfaction. Your attention, however, is focused on the back figure of your boss whose head is now drooping like a wilted flower. 

“...and I think I’ve found one.” 

In that instant, his head perks up, as do Kiki’s and Celestine’s. They begin to badger you for details, but your stubborn lips won’t budge. When you hear footsteps coming from the pantry, you allow your eyes to dart upwards only once, and you see Artem’s usual cool demeanour and straight face as he returns to his office. 

Your lips curl into a tiny smirk when you notice that the mug of cold coffee is still sitting on the pantry counter. 

***

She found one… 

The sentence she just said is playing over like a broken record in his head, much like when he’s mulling over a witness’ statement when preparing for a cross-examination. 

Does that mean she’s met someone who might be her type? Or is she already dating someone?

No wait, it can’t be the latter. She just told Celestine last week that she wasn’t seeing anyone because she’s “married to work”. 

A chuckle spills past his lips before he realises it—that’s the kind of thing he tells his relatives when they pester him about not having a girlfriend at his age. 

His smile quickly fades however, when he remembers the dilemma he’s in. Her answer left no room for him to guess what kind of guy she likes, let alone whether he fits into that box. And the fact that she’s found someone who’s her type… Does that mean he’s already lost the battle before he could even try? 

A knock on his office door jolts him out of his reverie, and he barely has time to clear his throat and fix his tie before Celestine enters the room. There’s only one reason she comes into his office when he doesn’t call her in, and it’s written all over her amused face. 

“I think she noticed you in the pantry this time. You stood there for way too long—even Kiki was starting to notice.” 

Artem groans, leaning back in his seat and turning away so Celestine won’t have to see him crumble internally and wallow in shame. First, she has a type, and now she’s noticed him needlessly hanging around the pantry, suspecting that he’s been eavesdropping on her conversations (which he has). She must think poorly of him now. 

“Don’t look so down, I think you still have a shot.” 

“What shot?” he asks with a sigh, fumbling with the knot of his tie to loosen it. “She’s already found someone who’s her type.”

“She never said she was dating him. She could just be, you know...” Celestine waves her hand in a gesture that Artem can’t understand, “...making a general statement of some sort. Point is, you can still try. Don’t give up.” 

“As a lawyer, shouldn’t you be advising your client to give up if there are better alternative modes of settlement?” 

His know-it-all response is not appreciated, and Celestine folds her arms across her chest, glowering at him. “Artem. She’s not a case that you need to solve. This is about love! Romance! The heart! Read a book about it, will you?” 

“I have, but nothing has worked so far. The advice in the book is at best ineffective, at worst a hoax.” He glares at the book on his desk, and Celestine follows his gaze to it before she recognises it as the book she’d given him a few weeks back. 

For the first time since coming in, her gaze turns into something more sympathetic. Artem isn’t sure he appreciates the sentiment. 

“Trust me on this, Artem. Don’t give up yet. I really think you still have a chance.”

“I do?” He perks up at that, raising a brow. “Did she say something about me?” 

“Not exactly…” Celestine grimaces when he starts sulking again. “But it’s a woman’s intuition. Trust me. I know her better than you do.” 

At his prolonged silence, she adds, “We both know my intuition is way more reliable than your gut feelings when it comes to relationship advice.”

The silence lingers on for a few more minutes, before Artem finally relents with a sigh. He doesn’t say anything however, merely fixing his tie and picking up the book from his desk to put in his drawer. 

“...You really should get back to work now.”

“Got it, boss.” Her tone is patronising as always, and she throws what’s probably meant to be an encouraging smile his way before she finally leaves him alone to his thoughts, although Artem can’t help but wonder if she’s still laughing at him internally.

In his now quiet office, his breathing is the only thing that can be heard. He picks up his pen and flips open the case file he was reading earlier before he left to visit the pantry. 

But then not even a minute passes before his office is filled with the repeated sound of a pen clicking, a dejected sigh... and then the sound of his drawer opening once more. 

[keijislove]

Happiness: Harry Potter X Muggle!Reader

Ding dong

The bell at Number Four, Privet Drive rang.

‘Boy, scurry off!’ Petunia growled at Harry; afraid he would do something to the person who was at the door.

Harry hid inside his old broom cupboard.

Even after spending two whole years at Hogwarts, and about to start his third, the Dursleys never let him come and see whoever was at their door.

It’s not like I’d stun them, Harry gloomily thought. I’ve got better things to do.

In truth, he really hadn’t.

Which is why he peeked through the small crack in the door to see who was there.

Petunia opened the door.

‘Er, yes?’ Harry heard her say.

‘Mrs. Dursley, good afternoon!’ a voice spoke.

The voice was gentle and sweet, a great variation from the Dursleys’ harsh, barking tones towards Harry.

It was the voice of a girl; one he did not know.

‘How may I help you dear?’ Petunia smiled.

‘Er, well, Dudley took my maths book yesterday, and I-I have a test coming up day after, so could you please ask him to lend it back?’ the voice asked.

‘Of course.’ Petunia smiled. ‘Come in, dear.’

That was when Harry finally saw the owner of the calming voice.

It was you.

Looking ever so beautiful and elegant with a halo of politeness surrounding you.

Petunia went upstairs to retrieve your book.

He did not know why exactly, but Harry felt like he had to talk to you.

He had to.

And if he didn’t, then the chance would be lost forever.

He walked out of the cupboard.

‘Oh!’ you exclaimed in surprise.

‘Er, sorry.’ He muttered, feeling foolish.

‘No, no... quite alright... I’m Y/N. Y/N L/N. you are?’ you asked, holding out your hand.

‘Harry. Harry Potter.’ He said, shaking your hand.

You frowned slightly. ‘Potter... I’ve heard that before... you’re Dudley’s cousin, aren’t you?’ you asked.

‘Er, yeah.’ Harry awkwardly said.

For a moment, a small flash of fear took over your face, but you tried your best to hide it.

Harry noticed it anyway.

He felt anger bubbling up inside him.

‘I don’t go to St. Brutus’ if that’s what’s scaring you.’ He said with more venom than intended.

You looked positively nonplussed. ‘Oh? Oh dear, I’m terribly sorry. It’s just that... Dudley says such awful things about you... I’d started thinking you were a mad hooligan!’

‘Dudley says a lot of things that aren’t true. For instance, he beat up a toddler and told me he’d won a boxing match.’ Harry shook his head.

You giggled slightly.

‘So... you’re his friend, then?’ Harry asked.

You looked down. ‘Uhm... well, no. I’m afraid he’s not very nice to me. I don’t think he likes me much.’

Harry felt yet another wish to strangle his cousin.

‘Why’d you lend him your book, then?’ he asked in confusion.

You sighed. ‘I didn’t. He took it from me when we were out during recess.’

‘Prat.’ Harry muttered.

When they heard Petunia’s footsteps, Harry jumped back inside the broom cupboard.

She was wiping fake tears, mumbling.

‘Diddykins, always such a gentleman. Asking for a girl’s book so politely.’ She mumbled.

You had to look away in order to roll your eyes.

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

Needless to say, you and Harry became friends since that day.

The Dursleys would always kick him out, and this used to annoy him, but now he had somewhere to go, so he used to leave without a word.

You two would meet up in the nearby playground and do one of the things Harry considered a big privilege.

You’d talk.

Nothing in particular, you’d sit on the swings and just talk.

Harry deeply wished he could tell you about Hogwarts, how Voldemort was a huge threat to his existence, but what would you think?

You’d call him mad.

You still followed the same routine.

You’d talk, everyday you’d talk and talk and one day he would leave, leave you behind, lonely.

Things however, changed quick after that.

He had just gotten home from third year, and was spending the summer there.

You had met up as usual, and he’d excitedly told you how his best friend, Ron Weasley, had invited him to stay over that Sunday for the rest of the vacation.

‘Oh... you’re leaving so soon?’ you had asked, and Harry thought he had heard the slightest bit of sadness in your voice, but that couldn’t be.

You wouldn’t be sad if he left, he wasn’t even on your priority list.

Which is what he thought.

To you, Harry was that cute boy whom you could consider one of your closest (and only) friends.

So, upon hearing that piece of news, you were jealous of this Weasley person.

No, that wouldn’t be right. You thought. He’s been at that school for three years; you’ve just met him. Why would he want to stay because of you?

You had been lonely that summer, and when Harry came back, it was unusual.

When he came back from his fourth year, he was a mess.

He’d jump at the slightest things, like a cat or a stray dog, and would hyperventilate a lot.

One day, he’d had a particularly bad panic attack.

You were on your swings, as usual, when Harry started rolling around on the floor, clutching his head.

You had gotten used to this, so you crouched next to him.

‘Ssh, Harry, breathe.’ You’d soothingly whisper. ‘Focus on your breathing, take deep breaths. Yes, that’s better, isn’t it?’

Harry was more grateful to you than he could have been.

Despite you not knowing the reason his scar hurt, you didn’t poke in further.

You left it at that and helped him whenever he needed help the most.

Your heart sank when Dudley’s gang came marching.

You hurriedly propped Harry up on the swing, before sitting down yourself.

‘Come on a date with a girlfriend, have you?’ Dudley sneered at Harry, his mates laughing loudly.

Yet another surge of anger passed through Harry’s body. ‘Beat up another ten year old, Dudley?’

‘This one deserved it.’ Dudley nonchalantly replied.

‘Five against one... that’s nice.’ Harry snapped.

Dudley’s lips curled over his teeth in a snarl. ‘At least I’m not afraid of my pillow! Don’t think I don’t hear you moaning in your sleep!’

A muscle was jumping in Harry’s jaw.

‘Leave it.’ You whispered.

‘Oh, don’t kill Cedric!’ Dudley mocked. ‘Who is Cedric, your boyfriend?’

More laughter issued as you held onto Harry tighter.

‘Mum, he’s gonna kill him!’ Dudley went on. ‘Where is your mum? Where is your mum, Potter? Is she dead? Is she dead?!’

You had released Harry; however, it was not him who went up to Dudley.

‘Pathetic!’ you snarled in his face. ‘What do you think you’re playing at, joking about his mother’s death? Absolutely pathetic!’

Dudley had given you a half smile, gesturing to his friend.

One of the boys held you and slammed you against the roundabout, making you hit your head as you groaned.

Harry jumped up and pointed his wand right at Dudley.

It was at that moment, that the skies darkened, as if a storm was ahead.

In mid-summer.

You and Harry walked home, Dudley following behind.

Suddenly, you felt cold.

Not because of the lack of warmth, but because it became really, really cold.

You heard a scream as your vision darkened.

Harry choked for air as a Dementor held him in place, desperately searching for his wand.

He saw you collapse to the floor, panting heavily.

With great effort, Harry grabbed his wand and managed to croak out.

‘EXPECTO PATRONUM!!!’

A silver stag rose out of Harry’s wand tip and fought off the Dementor holding him in place, before heading to you.

The Dementor instantly dropped you, almost scowling, which it would have done if it had no face, and glided out of the alleyway.

Dudley looked sick, but Harry didn’t care.

He rushed to your side immediately.

‘Oh my god, oh my god, cloaks.’ You whispered. ‘Cold air, c-cloaks, I saw my father die... all o-over a-again and i-it was so c-cold, all over...’

Harry shushed you, smiling understandingly at your rambling, disgusted at whoever sent those stupid Dementors to harm somebody as innocent as you.

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

‘So... he’s a wizard.’ You clarified, looking at the batty woman whose living room you were sprawled across.

‘And a ruddy good one at that, I mean, a corporeal Patronus at his age-’ she said.

‘Mrs. Figg.’ You interrupted. ‘He’s... he’s going to come back next summer, isn’t he?’

‘Of course, dear, whyever not?’ she looked at you as though you’d gone mad.

‘Those things... Dementors, as you said... were they trying to harm Harry?’ you tentatively asked.

‘Yes dear, sadly, yes.’ Mrs. Figg distractedly muttered. ‘Mundungus Fletcher, when I get my hands on that little squat again, I swear!’

You were trembling.

Something was after Harry, something terrible.

And you were in no power to help him.

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

‘Is something the matter?’ you asked, trying hard to keep a straight face.

‘Have you ever tried macaroons; I reckon they’re brilliant.’ Harry mumbled, ignoring you.

You rolled your eyes. ‘Harry.’

Sighing, Harry looked at you. ‘Hm?’

‘What’s wrong?’ you repeated.

‘Nothing.’

Lies.

‘Harry, something is very much wrong, and you know it.’ You disapprovingly said. ‘What is it?’

Harry sighed. ‘Its just... he’s growing stronger, you know. I... I fear there might be a day where I go to Hogwarts and never come back.’

Your heart sank into your stomach.

‘Its... cmon, Harry.’ You spoke. ‘We can’t... if you think like that, then, you’re not going to fight very well, are you? I’ll have you know, I am always here for you, and I have absolutely no intentions of letting whoever kills you live in peace.’

Harry chuckled at your scathing threats.

‘I’m gonna miss you, Y/N/N.’ Harry mumbled, intertwining your fingers with his.

You sighed. ‘I’ll miss you too Harry.’

More than you can imagine.

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

‘Harry Potter, open this door!’ you screamed, banging furiously, not caring it was raining and you were sopping wet.

‘Harry, I swear, I WILL BREAK THIS DOOR!’ you yelled, ripping your throat raw.

The door hesitantly opened, as a certain boy stood before you.

Choking an enormous sob, you pulled him into a bone-crushing hug.

Sobbing into his shoulder, you melted into his touch.

‘Ssh Y/N, ssh.’ He mumbled soothingly.

‘Harry Potter.’ You croaked. ‘You had best returned from this war ALIVE.’

‘I’ll try Y/N/N.’ Harry whispered. ‘I’ll try.’

Your sobs were growing uncontrollable, and Harry did the only thing he could think of to shut you up.

He kissed you.

Slowly and carefully, his lips took in your own, as you melted into the kiss.

Not caring about the salty tears you could taste, you gently stroked his cheek.

When you pulled apart, you sniffed. ‘Good luck, Harry.

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

The rain beat down on your house heavily, as you sat near your window.

Something was wrong, you could sense it.

He’s alive... God, no, he’s alive, please.

Each thought, each dream, showed you endless ways Harry would be dying.

You hated it.

After many days of crying, a knock on your door made you jump.

‘Y/N!’

That voice.

That amazing voice.

Trembling, you opened the door, seeing a messy haired Harry standing there, tears painting his face.

‘My God.’ You gasped. ‘You’re alive. Oh, Harry!’

After yet-another hug, Harry came inside.

‘I reckon I should’ve made this more special.’ He said seriously. ‘But I can not wait any longer.’

You watched, confused, as Harry took your hands.

‘Y/N L/N, the moment you came into my life, I have felt nothing but pure happiness. I love you with all my heart. Will you marry me?’

You gasped, hand flying to your mouth.

Sobbing harder, you hugged him.

‘Yes.’

[scapegrace74-blog]

Ginger Snap, Chapter 6

A/N  Well, here it is.  The last chapter of Ginger Snap.   As an unplanned fic inspired by a vanity license plate, I’m happy with how it turned out.   There will be a short epilogue posted in the next week or so.  In the meantime,  thank you so much for coming on this unexpected ride with me!   This chapter’s themed title is Fire in the Belly.

Previous chapters are best enjoyed on my AO3 page, because I have a bad habit of going back and editing them after they’ve been posted.

The next five months were some of the most difficult of my life.  

After our talk, Frank and I agreed that it would be best that we parted ways.  The Southside flat was close to the university, plus I’d never truly felt at home there, so it made sense for him to keep it.  Fortunately, we’d never combined our savings and I still had money tucked away from my time as a medical resident in Boston.

Geillis wanted me to move into her sprawling Murrayfield home, at least temporarily, but I knew that I needed a place of my own.  To stand on my own two feet, as it were.   Which was how I found myself moving my few belongings into a modest Morningside walk-up as the rest of Edinburgh celebrated Hogmanay with fireworks and drunken revelry.

I scheduled the written component of my medical licensing exam for February.  This was likely foolhardy, but I’d already wasted enough time.  As a result, almost every waking hour was dedicated to studying.  The flat remained an empty box whose naked beige walls bore witness to my rudimentary existence.

Geillis called regularly, reminding me to eat and to occasionally step outside for a breath of fresh air.  Returning up the high street from one of our weekly coffee dates, a bright flash in a shop window caught my eye.

I stopped and stared as the afternoon sun lit the vase like a shard of stained glass.  It was a profound shade of blue: the colour of a field of indigo, of the night sky in a Byzantine icon, of Jamie’s eyes when he laughed.  It sat on my windowsill, filled with the season’s first daffodils, as I pored over practice exams.

***

“Geillis, I passed!  I fucking passed!”  An elderly woman seated across from me on the bus muttered under her breath about vulgar Sassenachs, but I was too elated to care.

“Of course ye did, ye brilliant disaster.  Now I can brag tae the neighbours I have my own personal physician.”

“Not so fast, Duncan.  I still need to pass the clinical exam, and that’s no small thing.”  My gut twisted just thinking about it, but unlike the written exam, there was little I could do to prepare.  Either I knew how to perform as a doctor or I did not.  The long months since I’d last treated a patient loomed like a large shadow over that question.

“Och, yer bum’s oot the window Claire,” my friend dismissed blithely.  “Ye’re gonna do great.  When do ye head down tae yer homeland, then?”

“May first.”  The practical examination took place in Manchester and needed to be scheduled three months in advance.

“Sounds like ye’ve got some time on yer hands.  Whate’er are ye going tae do with yerself?” Geillis asked in a singsong voice.

Fortunately for me, spring was Edinburgh’s most pleasant season.  Its many gardens and laneways erupted in carpets of buds and blooms.  The air smelled fresh and green, like biting into a tart apple.  I took long walks and fell in love with the city I now called home.  There were secondhand bookstores to explore and a weekly craft market where I gradually amassed an assortment of items that made my flat feel like a home.  With each passing day, my existence felt more and more like a life; one I defined for myself.

I also started to explore my options for employment, hoping for a job offer from one of the city’s hospitals that was conditional upon my successful completion of the licensing process.  It was to that end that I found myself walking down the corridor of The Royal Edinburgh hospital after what I hoped had been a rather successful interview with the deputy director of surgery.

“Claire?”

I recognized her voice immediately.  Before turning around I closed my eyes and sent out a fervent appeal to the universe.

“Jenny, hi.  How are you?”

She looked just the same, her straight black hair such a contrast to her brother.  Next to her stood a man, but not the man I had conjured the moment I heard her voice.  I was unclear whether that meant my prayer had been answered or not.  Seeing my gaze stray, Jenny jumped to introductions.

“This is my husband, Ian.  We’re here fer treatment on his leg.”

“Nothing serious, I hope.”  

“Jes a fitting fer a new prosthetic.  Jenny keeps beatin’ me o’er the head with the old one, ye see.”  I laughed, instantly liking his easy-going manner, so in contrast with Jenny’s intensity.

“Ye must be the Claire I hear sae much about,” he went on, and I wondered what had been said about me in the Fraser household.

“Nothing bad, I hope.”

Ian smiled warmly.  “Only good things, I promise ye.”

“What brings ye tae the hospital, Claire?” Jenny interjected.

I explained how I was in the process of qualifying to practice medicine in Scotland, provided I could pass my exams.  Jenny and Ian were both delighted, congratulating me as though I’d already accomplished my goal.  As we spoke about Wee Jamie’s latest exploits and the ongoing growth of Ginger Snap, I couldn’t help notice that Jenny was staring at my hands.  At my left hand in particular.  Finally, I couldn’t resist temptation any longer.

“And, how is Jamie doing?”  I tried to sound casual, but I was certain my faltering voice betrayed me.

“Very well,” Jenny replied.  “Busy, as ye can imagine, but he thrives on chaos.”

I nodded, trying to be satisfied with the news that he was well.  It was the most I could hope for, really.  Jenny eyed me shrewdly before continuing.

“He’s a good man, my brother.  Any lass would be verra lucky tae have him.  I’d like tae see him settled, but he refuses tae be rushed.  Says the right woman is worth the wait.”  She paused before adding,  “I reckon ye ken wha’ he means.”

“Yes,” I breathed.  “I know exactly what he means.”

***

I took the overnight train from Edinburgh to Manchester.  It meant I was likely to arrive at the testing centre deprived of sleep, but I rationalized that most of my residency could be characterized as one long evaluation under similar conditions, and I hadn’t killed anyone yet.  Still, as the velvety darkness slipped by outside my window, studded by the lights of passing farms, my doubts got the better of me.

I texted Geillis, looking for moral support.  For once she didn’t reply immediately.  There was one other name on my laughably short list of contacts.  I deliberated for all of a minute, but the late hour and creeping panic made me impulsive.

Hello.

Best to start with something innocuous, rather than the slightly more revealing “I miss you.  I think about you every day.”  A reply bubble appeared immediately after I hit send.  At least I hadn’t woken him up.  A small tempest stirred in my gut.

Arsonist.  Hello.  How are you?

I tried to picture him.  Was he at home?  Working late?  Or, in a scenario that played out far too often in my mind, on a date?

I’m alright.  Well, to be honest, I feel like I’m going to puke and cry.  Not necessarily in that order.

Och, lass.  Do you need me to come over?

Damn it, this man.  I had done nothing to deserve his unswerving loyalty but mislead him and then disappear for months on end.  And yet here he was, willing to come to my aid on the flimsy pretext of a late night text.  Guilt and tenderness warred for possession of my heart.

That may prove a bit difficult, Jamie.  I’m on a train to England.

There was a long pause, and then a two letter reply.

Oh.

I realized at once that he’d leapt to the wrong conclusion: that I had left Edinburgh for good.  I rushed to correct the error.

I’m taking the second stage of my examination to practice as a NHS doctor tomorrow.   It’s all hands-on situations, and the licensing facility is in Manchester.

Arsonist, that’s wonderful news!  I’m so proud of you.

I blushed, then leaned my heated cheek against the chilled pane of glass.  It had been a rash impulse, but this conversation was exactly what I needed.  I wasn’t alone in this.  Geillis and Jamie were in my corner.

What has your stomach in a twist, then?

What if I’ve forgotten what to do?!  It’s been almost a year since I’ve so much as used a stethoscope, Jamie.  The exam is eighteen real-life situations and you’re given eight minutes to respond to each one.  Not a second longer.  I’m just...  what if I fail?

And there it was.  The kernel of fear that lived at the heart of everything I did.  What if I failed?   What if my best wasn’t good enough?

Claire, listen to me.  You’re a doctor, just as I am a chef.  It wouldn’t matter if I had not set foot in a kitchen in ten years, I would still remember how to cook, and I know that it’s the same for you.  I believe it with everything in me.

On some level, I knew that he was right.  But it still comforted me tremendously to hear it from someone I trusted.

Alright.  That helps.  I should let you get to bed.  Thank you for talking me off my ledge, Jamie.

Anytime, Arsonist.

As I got ready sign off, another text bubble appeared.

Oh, and Claire?  Don’t burn down their wee laboratory, okay? ;-)

I laughed out loud, muting my phone and reclining my seat.  Outside, the stars shone brightly, tiny fires in the firmament to guide me on my way.

***

It was a lovely late spring day, and the retractable doors to the fire station were open to the warm breeze.  I could hear Angus’ voice as he led a cooking demonstration for a group of young women; a bridal shower by the look of their ridiculous costumes.

“Mind the coriander, lass.  Tis a verra powerful aphrodisiac, ken?  I willna be held responsible if ye canna resist my considerable charms after ye eat yon soup.”

There was an outburst of giggles as I rounded the corner and entered the reception area.  Jenny was on the phone.  She halted mid-sentence when she saw me walk in.  I rubbed my hands down the front of my jeans, trying to stay calm.

“He’s in the storeroom, in the back,” Jenny prompted before I could even offer a greeting.  I smiled gratefully, relieved I didn’t have to make small talk.  I had only so much courage stored in reserve, and I didn’t want to use it all up before reaching my destination.

The storeroom was long and narrow, lit by a single naked bulb and girded with shelves.  Jamie stood with his broad back to the door, his curls absorbing the light like amber.  He had a clipboard in one hand, performing some kind of inventory.

“Jes how many lentils dae ye reckon we need, Janet?  There’s nine cans of them here already, and ye have us ordering ten more.”

I’d almost forgotten how much I loved his voice, the undulating grit and silk of it.  I had to remaster the art of speech before I could reply.

“It’s not Jenny.  It’s me.  Claire.”

He froze, and if it weren’t for the sudden rapid flow of his breath I would have assumed he hadn’t heard me.  My nerves got the better of me and I blurted out, “I like lentils.  You should listen to your sister.”

“Claire.”  More sigh than word.  He slowly turned.  It was when our eyes met that I knew nothing had changed for him.  It was still there, after all these months.  That look that told me I was the map to his journey, the focus to his vision, the reason to his why.  

Hopefully he could read that same certainty on my face.

“I passed my exams,” I began.  “I’m a doctor again.”

“Ye never stopped bein’ a doctor.  This jus’ makes it official.”

“I’m still a disaster in the kitchen,” I continued.  “Last week I ruined two saucepans.”

“Tha’s only a tragedy if ye dinna have someone willin’ tae cook fer ye,” he replied with a strange squinting motion I understood was meant to be a wink.

“I’m still learning who I am.  How to be true to the person on the inside,” I confessed.  This is what had kept me away for so long, worried that I would escape from Frank’s orbit just to be caught up in another.  Jamie never once expected my submission, but that didn’t mean I wouldn’t offer it out of habit.

“I’ll let ye in on a secret.  Sae is everyone else,” he replied.

Without realizing it, we’d both been moving until we were crowded together amongst the dried herbs and canned goods.  My hand rested against the solid metronome of his heart.  Just one more confession to go.

“I burn for you in a way I’ve never burned for anything before.”

There.  It was said.  A thousand wings of rapture beat against the cage of my ribs, clamoring to break free.  Jamie carefully pushed a loose curl behind my ear before cupping my jaw.

“Wee arsonist.  Come, set my life on fire.”

[got-svt]

it could’ve been you

summary: it’s jinyoung’s engagement party and you find yourself wondering what could’ve been if you had said yes to his proposal years ago.  pairing: park jinyoung x reader (+ some platonic!jackson x reader) genre: angst word count: 2076

part of my tales from the lakes series inspired by taylor swift’s champagne problems

__

Jackson had been kind enough to ask you to be his date for tonight. “As friends, obviously,” he quickly added once he noticed the panicked look in your eyes. He insisted, claiming that you needed a bit of extra support if you were to make it out of that party in one piece. Maybe he was exaggerating, but you knew he cared for you. So, as you rolled your eyes and lightly hit his chest at his antics, you agreed. Jackson clapped his hands together and gave you the biggest, most reassuring grin he could muster, “Great! I’ll pick you up at seven.”

You didn’t tell him, but you were grateful. 

Because as you stepped inside the lavish restaurant that Jinyoung had rented out for the occasion, you became vaguely aware that all eyes were on you. You smoothed out the non-existent creases on your most expensive outfit as you avoided their eyes. Jackson sensed your anxiousness and took your hand in his, leading you away from their judgemental gazes to a table where Yugyeom and Bambam greeted you with a smile.

“Yn!” Bambam engulfed you in a bone crushing hug, “I’ve missed you so much.”

You let out a breath as he released you from his grip, “I’ve missed you too.”

“We saw each other last week,” Yugyeom said, looking at you and Bambam in confusion, “what are you talking about?”

“A week is too long.” Bambam joked, gently bumping his hip into yours.

Yugyeom was about to open his mouth to retaliate when people started crowding around the large entryway, catching all of your attentions. All four of you make your way to where everyone else was, meeting up with Mark, Jaebeom, and Youngjae in the process.

“What’s everyone gathered around for?” You asked to no one in particular.

“The man of the hour has finally arrived.” Mark replied, but his eyes were elsewhere, and you couldn’t exactly blame him.

Jinyoung walked in, handsome as ever, hair swooped back and in a fitted black tux. All smiles, eyes crinkling as he looked around the room. Your heart skipped a beat at the sight before it clenched as memories of him dressing that way for you entered your memory. 

Beside him was the most beautiful woman you had ever laid eyes upon. You had never seen her in person before, only on a screen as she acted alongside Jinyoung in several of his dramas. You hated to admit it, but she looked more radiant in real life. The cameras did not do any justice to her already perfect skin, shiny dark hair, and adorable button nose.

You forced yourself to look away when everyone in the room called out for them to kiss.

That could’ve been you.

___

You had been there for him since day one. 

From the day his family moved into your neighborhood, into the house next to yours. He was the one to approach you first, to the shock of those you tell the story to. It wasn’t that Jinyoung was awfully shy or terribly picky, he just usually preferred his own company to that of others. But when ten year old him saw you at tumbling around in your front yard, something in him knew he had to talk to you.

You had been the one to encourage him to audition at JYP, recognizing his talent even before he did himself. You helped him practice in his bedroom, learning choreography and singing songs alongside him. And when you tackled him with a hug at the news that he passed the audition, warmth and happiness radiating from your body, he knew he loved you. 

You were the first person who was able to sneak into their dorms. It was almost midnight and you wore anything you thought helped conceal your identity: sunglasses, a mask, and a hat. He met you at the backdoor and immediately ushered you inside, introducing you to the people that would, alongside him, eventually be got7.  The members immediately loved you, which in turn only made him fall for you more. 

You were there at the front row during got7′s very first concert. A sign in your hand that declared your love for him. He spotted you in the crowd immediately, heart jumping as he read the sign, which caused him to stagger on some of the lyrics he was singing. You and him had been friends for years. What exactly gave you the courage to be the first one to confess, he never figured out. But he was grateful nonetheless when you met him at his dressing room with a kiss. 

You never would have thought that someday you’d have to watch him get married to someone else. 

___

Jinyoung never thought that you would actually come, especially given your history. Truth be told, the invite was more of a courtesy rather than an actual invitation. You were no longer lovers, now reluctant friends. If it had not been for the rest of the members, he would’ve lost contact with you altogether.

Still, his feet seemed to have a mind of their own when they lead themselves straight to you— skipping his family and friends. He tried to tell himself to turn back, maybe talk to his future mother-in-law instead. But it was too late, he now stood a few feet in front of you, hands in his pockets with a small smile on his features, “Hi.”

“Your bowtie is crooked.” 

“What?” He uttered out, eyes alight with confusion. 

You let out a small chuckle and pointed at the black fabric, “I would fix it for you, but you know—”

Jinyoung looked around the room to see some of the guests watching the both of you, quickly looking away once his gaze met theirs. His hands left his pockets to fix his bowtie, “Ah. I see. Thank you.”

You both looked down, as if the soles of your shoes had suddenly become a point of interest, completely unsure of what to say. The rest of the members always made it a point to no longer leave the two of you alone, for fear of tension and the unavoidable awkward silence. Yet here you two were, without Bambam, Jaebeom, or anyone else to save either of you. 

“What happened to us?” You asked once the silence became too deafening for you to bear.  It was never this hard for you two to hold a conversation, more often than not people would have had to physically restrain you from talking. Now, you couldn’t even look at each other in the eyes. “How— why did we end up like this?”

For a brief moment, quicker than a flash of lighting, his guard went crumbling down. For the first time in years, he let you see the effect you truly had on him. His tone was calm, but not devoid of emotion.  Jinyoung wanted you to hear the sincerity, the vulnerability in his voice, “You said no.”

____

Jinyoung had spent months preparing, but he always knew he wanted to propose. He rented out the restaurant you had your first date in, where you spent each and every one of your anniversaries. He brought a bouquet of your favorite flowers and bought a brand new suit. He asked help from his family, his members, even JYP himself. He spent several nights composing the perfect speech, sacrificing sleep for endless revising. 

But he should’ve known something was wrong when your hand slipped from his as he lead you through a slow dance. When you just picked at your favorite food instead of eating. When you could only give him curt replies to his stories and questions. His mother’s ring was in his pocket, but it started feeling unusually heavy. He assumed it was just his nerves getting the better of him. 

Jinyoung knew something was wrong when you stopped him from getting down on one knee. When you said no before he could even ask. 

____

“You never gave me a reason, you know?” 

It had been three years since he proposed to you, well, tried to. Yet he still couldn’t figure out what prompted you to say no. You had always been on the same page as him, in fact that was what he loved about your relationship the most. Were you just not ready? Or was it because you couldn’t handle being married to an idol? But he would’ve waited, and he was fine with keeping your relationship a secret. He may have even preferred it that way, and when you left him standing that faithful night, he began to question everything he thought he knew about the both of you. But that was years ago, all he wanted now was an answer. For you to give him one good reason.

“I still can’t.”

____

All the guests had gathered around the center of the room. Chairs and tables had been moved to the side for a makeshift dance floor. The string quartet began playing, the notes guiding Jinyoung as he lead his fiancee in the most elegant waltz. Their happiness undeniable as they glided across the room like they were always meant to dance with the other. Their eyes glued to each other, uncaring of the tens of people watching their every move. 

“That could’ve been you.” Yugyeom whispered, earning himself an elbow in the stomach from Jackson. He doubled over in pain before letting out in a strangled whisper, “Sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”

But he was right, it could’ve been you.

The one who wore his mom’s ring on her left ring finger. The one he twirled around the room, earning everyone’s quiet swoons of adoration. The one who gripped his hand tightly as they become illuminated by the soft glow of the chandelier. The one whose picture he carried in his wallet. The one he whispered ‘I love you’ to as he ended the dance with a dip, drowning out the room’s applause with a kiss. 

It should’ve been you.

But you said no, and you could give neither him nor yourself a reason. Maybe you couldn’t handle the life that came with being married to someone like him. You weren’t an idol, nor an actress. You were an outsider and no matter how hard you try, you’ll never be in. Maybe you just weren’t ready to get married. You were so young when he attempted to ask. Maybe you didn’t want to get married at all. The thought of marriage hadn’t even crossed your mind until he started getting down on one knee. Or maybe you were just afraid. Afraid that you weren’t deserving of his love. Afraid that someone else would come along and sweep him of his feet.

And someone else did come along because here she was in front of you, wrapped up in his arms, blissfully unaware of exactly how lucky she was to be with him. 

“I should go.” You muttered, though it was directed at no one in particular, unsure if anyone had even heard. But Jackson did. 

“You sure?” He asked,  “Let me give you a ride home at least.”

“No, please, stay.” You protest, shaking your head furiously, “Enjoy the party. I’m sure Jinyoung will be looking for you later.”

“Yn—” Jackson protested, gripping your wrist to stop you from leaving. His gaze was intense, almost challenging. But you had known him long enough to grown immune. 

You try to shake his hand off, offering him a smile to convince him you were fine with leaving alone, “It’s okay, I’ll just take the train. Or get a cab”

He stared you down, eyes scanning your face as he searched for any sign of reluctance or uncertainty, but he eventually let out a sigh when he realized there was no stopping you. “Text me when you get home, yeah?”

You nod, reaching up to hug him before whispering, “Thank you.”

The rest of the members said their goodbyes with a hug, promising to see you soon. You knew they meant it. 

As you went to the exit, something in you begged you to turn around, to give one last look around the room before you left. And so you did, only to find Jinyoung already looking back at you.

“I’m sorry.” You mouth, unsure if he could even see it.

But he smiled, giving you a small nod before he turned to face his fiancee; turning away from you.

[oldfritz]

I'm genuinely curious and don't want to start something! Just wanted to ask what you make of the 'Old Fritz might've been asexual' take, I don't know much about him and I feel you're one of the best people to ask esp since you lean towards 'he was probably queer in some way' too

Hey there! So, first off, don’t ever worry about me interpreting you asking me a question as starting something. As much as I love making dumb jokes about the guy, I love nothing more than doing this kind of stuff and defending or explaining my points. There’s two degrees I want to get over the next decade: first my JD and then my MA in Prussian history. I live for this stuff! Always have! Second off, I’m very sorry for not getting to this sooner. Things have been incredibly stressful for me for a variety of different reasons which have made answering your question, until now, rather difficult. Putting this under a cut because, holy shit, it got long!

My personal reasoning for why I think he’s bi (which, correct me if I’m wrong, I’m assuming is what you meant instead of ace and could be a different post entirely since some historians have tried to argue that) stems more to do with some of my lingering questions about the nature of his relationships with certain woman, rather than that of his relationships with men. To me and my modern, queer eye, Fritz’s relationships with men like Hans Hermann von Katte, Francisco Algarotti, Michael Gabriel Fredersdorf, and (much to my personal vexation) one Monsieur Voltaire are either outright homosexual/homoerotic in nature or very, very easily lend themselves to that interpretation rather than strictly romantic friendships (which Wikipedia does a fairly good overview of and, if you’re coming to me from AmRev perspective, uses Hamilton and Laurens’ relationship as a familiar example). While I’m avoiding those relationships in this ask, I’d be more than happy to elaborate upon one/all of them in a different one. 

Before I go into the big pauses that Fritz’s relationships with Madame von Wreech and Countess Orzelska give me, I want to deny the use of Fritz’s wife as an example of Fritz’s attraction to woman. While this, admittedly, may sound odd, we have ample evidence of how turned off and repulsed Fritz found Elisabeth Christine. Before he had even met her, Fritz was complaining about how she was ‘not very pretty, speaks but little, and acts like a blockhead’ (Asprey, 87) and, later, admitted to Grumbkow his plan to ‘keep my word,...get married, but afterwards it will be a case of that is that, and goodbye, Madame, and fare thee well’ (Jones, 52). For Christ’s sake, the man pitied her knowing how his treatment would leave her as ‘one more unhappy princess in the world’! Which is little consolation when you remember he also referred to her with such romantic terms as ‘this unpleasant creature,’ ‘the abominable object of my desires,’ ‘the person,’ and claimed to have preferred to marry ‘the biggest whore in Berlin’ (Asprey, 87). And while we (fortunately? unfortunately?) know quite a bit about their sex life, Fritz largely regarded it as just another duty - to quote him, ‘I will only have the duty to fuck’ (Ibid, 87). And while Seckendorf heard - first, presumably from Count von der Schulenburg and, later on, Count Friedrich von Wartensleben, a close and intimate friend of the then-crown prince - that Fritz would ‘fuck and refuck’ Elisabeth Christine and that said act occurred in the afternoon, it still was out of a sense of obligation (Bely, 481-2). When reminded that if he wanted more money for frivolities, he’d need to produce an heir, Fritz bemoaned that he ‘cannot sleep with my wife out of desire, and when I do sleep with her, I do it out of duty rather than inclination’ (Clark, 50). All this in accumulation, as well as the myriad of other quotes and incidents I’ve left out, makes one wonder why his relationship with Elisabeth Christine is sometimes used by historians to prove any sort of heterosexual impulse in the man when she’s the woman with the weakest supports for that argument.

That being said, now we get to the women with a more muddled places in his romantic escapades, if you will. What exactly happened between Orzelska and Fritz during his trip with his father to Dresden in 1728? The main source for everything that occurred during this trip is Wilhelmina, who didn’t attend and without anything about this specific incident coming from Fritz or Friedrich Wilhelm I, make it rather hard to use as concrete, irrefutable proof. Now, if her recollections were contemporaneous - like coming from a diary or journal she kept at the time - that would be one thing. But it comes from her memoirs which, while a delightful read 10/10 recommend, are written decades after this trip took place and, memory being a finicky thing, can’t be taken to the bank. All those disclaimers, here’s the story as told by her:

‘One evening...,the King of Poland [note: Augustus II] insensibly led the King of Prussia to a very richly decorated room...The King of Prussia, delighted with what he saw, stopped to contemplate all its beauties, when [all of] a sudden a tapestry was rolled up, which procured him a very novel sight. It was a lovely female in a state of nudity [note: Countess Orzelska, the Polish king’s daughter], carelessly reclined on a couch. Her beauty excelled that of the finest pictures of Venus and the Graces; her body seemed of ivory, whiter than snow, and better shaped than that of the Venus de Medicis at Florence.

...Scarcely had the King cast his eyes on the fair one, than he turned about with indignation; and seeing my brother behind him, he rudely pushed him out of the room, and left it immediately after in a violent irritation against the trickery they had attempted to practice on him. ...In spite of the King’s vigilance, [Frederick] had had time to contemplate the Venus of the closet, who did not cause him so much horror as she had done to his father. (Wilhelmina’s Memoirs, vol. 1, 107-6)

Wilhelmina then goes on to claim Fritz had fallen ‘passionately in love’ with Orzelska and that the illness Fritz experienced upon returning home was simply being lovesick. Pinning the accuracy of this story is incredibly difficult because, again, we have only one source relayed decades after the fact and from two volumes of memoirs known to have inaccuracies. While I, personally, would love if he had had a tryst with Orzelska (who is such a badass in her own right and deserves more recognition than as a footnote in this guy’s story), there’s no one way to say with more than 30% confidence. I am inclined to believe something along these lines happened because if someone told me a story like this, lord knows I wouldn’t forget it for the rest of my life. And, with Wilhelmina being so close with her brother, it lends a bit more credence but as to the actual emotional or physical response Fritz had to it, well, without my time machine, I can’t and don’t want to say.

With Madame Eleonore-Louise von Wreech, things are a little more concrete. For starters, Fritz actually talked about her! In written correspondence that survived! We even have seven letters between the two of them that survived, which is a bigger win! As Blanning says, they’re ‘ardent but light in tone, ironic, almost flippant, and highly stylized’ (Blanning, 58). Their relationship was known to those close with Fritz at the time that Schulenberg felt compelled to visit and warn the crown prince against devoting himself to women because ‘the slight pleasures gained cause a million displeasures.’  Fritz’s response? To tell the poor guy that he may have ‘the gift of continence, but I assure you that I do not’ (Asprey, 83-4). Firtz even went so far as to send a letter to her mother, waxing poetic about Louise’s ‘beauty, her majestic air, her bearing, and her entire department.’ It’s worth noting that Louise eventually broke off the affair due to being bored by how he ‘loved [her] too much and often annoyed [her] with his clumsy love’ (Ibid, 84). Contemporaries, including Friedrich Wilhelm, believed Fritz had impregnated her with a daughter who her ‘cuckolded husband would refuse to recognize’ (Blanning, 58). Blanning is the only source I’ve seen dispute this due to this news coming from Seckendorf, who didn’t reveal how he came about this information; that Fritz and Madame von Wreech’s correspondence doesn’t indicate a physical relationship; and on the fact that she was not pregnant. I haven’t been able to find the birth dates or any sort of records for Louise’s two daughters to figure out where their conception could’ve been in the timeline and if it matches with the likely dates for the affair, but I also don’t have the resources Cambridge would afford Blanning. Either way, while the physical nature of the affair is in dispute, the emotional aspect certainly was there. Especially when taking into consideration the fact that she’s the woman Fritz was likely referring to in the 16 August 1737 letter to Voltaire where he claimed she had taught him how to love (and also inspired him to write poetry, which we shouldn’t be thankful for). Specifically, all these years later, he stated how ‘this little miracle of nature possessed every possible charm, together with good taste and delicacy. She sought to transfer these qualities to me. I succeeded well in love but poorly in poetry. Since that time I have very often been in love and have always been a poet’ (Fritz’s Oeuvres, vol. 21, 96).

All this to say, there’s a bit too much evidence of some degree of opposite-gender attraction in Fritz to completely write off the possibility that he could’ve been bisexual. While it’s undeniable he held a preference for men and that’s whose company he typically enjoyed, I still do find it interesting the two exceptions (one potential and the other with a fair degree of certainty) to this. And, while I would never want his attraction to men be minimized in favor of that to women, it still remains important to note to get the most comprehensive picture of the man.

[shadowgeist-stars]

Kitagawa First: So Heavy the Crown

It should've been like any other Monday. Toru and Iwaizumi should've gone about their day off from practice as they usually did. He'd brought his nephew home and the two had intended to get something to eat together.

They should not have seen Tobio, of all people, standing in the cemetery.

It was already unlike him to be away from practice with the other crows this early in the afternoon. Especially wearing an oversized jacket vaguely similar to what they wore back in middle school. The strange hoodie he wore was familiar, but somehow not quite right; it even looked a little big for him.

“What in the world is he doing out here?” Iwaizumi wondered.

“Let’s go check it out,” Toru suggested with a smile. This could be a perfect opportunity to learn something about their former junior.

He was talking, they realized as they drew close. To himself, most likely, but Toru decided to take the stealthy route to hear exactly what Tobio was saying.

“I didn’t make it to Shiratorizawa like you did… but I think I still found a good team… At least, I hope you’d like them. Shiratorizawa might be too different from when you were there anyway… I still think about what you told me, back then… how if I got really good at volleyball, someone even better would come find me. I thought I found that person in middle school where you used to coach… But I guess it didn’t work out how I hoped…”

A small pang in Toru’s stomach told him that was probably about him. He was able to look at the name on the gravestone Tobio stood in front of, though, as well as the birth-to-death dates.

Kazuyo Kageyama… 1936-2010… sounds like a grandparent. And a volleyball coach, as well? Hmm... Volleyball must simply run in the family.

“But now, I think I found someone who is like what you were saying,” Tobio continued to the gravestone. “He may not look like much. He’s short, super annoying, and kind of a dumbass… but he’s the fastest and highest-jumping spiker I’ve ever seen… And sometimes, he’s the best friend someone like me could ask for.”

His head eventually lowered, his body starting to curl in on itself like he was going to fall to his knees. The third years almost thought they were starting to hear him sniffle.

“I just wish you could meet him, and everyone else… I think you’d like meeting them all. Sugawara and Asahi and Daichi… All the second years like Noya and Tanaka… maybe even Tadashi and Tsukishima and our managers and our coach and Mr. Takeda…” He crumbled to the ground with a sob. “I just… I miss you, Grandpa. More than Miwa or our parents. I have ever since…”

That was when the name finally clicked. Kazuyo Kageyama was the old coach of the infamous local ladies volleyball team, the Kitagawa Birds, who was forced into retirement due to illness. If both Tobio and this Miwa were related to him and he taught both of them volleyball from a really young age, it would’ve made sense that Kageyama would be such a good player so early on. And since the date said he died during Tobio’s second year in middle school… that had to have hit him hard.

Possibly… hard enough to make him into what Kunimi and Kindaichi called “the King of the Court.”

Iwaizumi took a small step closer, flinching when he stepped on the grass in just the right way that would make noise. Enough noise for Tobio to flinch away from the source and twist backward to see them both standing there. And more importantly, for them to see the tears starting to dribble down his face.

“Uh-um… what are you two doing here?” he asked, trying to clean his face with his sleeve (most likely to be his grandfather’s jacket).

“We’d ask you the same thing, but we heard enough to answer for us,” Toru replied. “Please, don’t let us stop you.”

Iwa slapped him on the back of the head. “Ignore him. We were just wondering what you were doing away from your team in a place like this.” His eyes scanned the gravestone once more, guiding Tobio into a position where the three could sit together. “You never really told any of us about your grandfather back in middle school, did you Kageyama?”

The first year shook his head.

“Didn’t think so… Well, if you’re feeling up for it with your old upperclassmen… care to share?”

Tobio drummed his fingers on top of one another for about a minute, before nodding slowly.

“Alright, let’s start small. Was your Grandpa the, uh… reason, why you got into volleyball?”

Tobio looked to his grandfather’s grave. “Sort of. He and my sister, Miwa, would always tell me about how I managed to get my hands on her volleyball when I was… a baby… and how I didn’t wanna let go of it. That might’ve been where it all started, but since Grandpa is the only one I really remember raising us, we’d both usually be with him when he was coaching the Kitagawa Birds, playing with some of the ladies, helping them practice, or just passing a ball to each other in a corner of the gym or practicing ourselves with the wall.”

The small story piqued Toru’s interest. Frankly, he found the mental image adorable, seeing a baby Tobio holding onto a volleyball and somehow keeping a grip on it with hands no bigger than the end of his thumb. His memory might be a little faded, but something similar could’ve happened with his nephew Takeru. And Tobio Kageyama, not actually being an only child… He couldn’t help wondering if that sister of his looked all that similar.

Iwaizumi seemed to like how it was going so far. “Okay. We remember you wanted to go to Shiratorizawa even back in middle school. Did your Grandpa have something to do with that?”

Tobio nodded. “He used to be a middle blocker for their team. Showed me his old yearbook and everything. Probably before the current coach showed up, though.”

“So it really does run in the family,” Toru commented. “Guess I shouldn’t be surprised though.”

The smaller boy shrugged. “Miwa wound up quitting volleyball after middle school. She was getting more into fashion and stuff anyways, and didn’t like how she was always being told to cut her hair. At least, I think that was the reason.”

Wow. That, Toru could get behind, no questions asked. Sure, he wouldn’t give up volleyball for the world, but he’d definitely take offense if he was always being told to do something like change his looks or cut his lovely hair. That said, it was good to hear Tobio’s sister found her own calling, even if it wasn’t sports-related.

“Kinda wish you were able to introduce your sister and grandfather to the team, Kageyama,” Iwaizumi remarked. “They sound like it’d be pretty interesting to meet them both. Wasn’t your grandfather still coaching in middle school?”

The dark heaviness returned to the young setter. “No… Grandpa was already in and out of the hospital for a long time by then; more one than the other, though. He was able to keep on a brave face for me… but in second year, after you left, he… he…” his voice started quivering, the tears starting to return with new fury. “He left us behind… left me behind… I couldn’t even cry at his damn funeral because it never really hit me! And then after he left… Miwa had to get ready to move away for university… Our parents were distant enough even before he died, and… and then my own team left me!” He wrapped himself tight in his grandfather’s jacket, hands even moving to tangle into his hair. “I was all alone… I didn’t even know what I did wrong… Why all of a sudden I didn’t have anyone anymore!… Why?... Why, why, why?!”

Iwaizumi was quick to hug Tobio from the side, glaring over at Toru until he mirrored the action. It had already been clear enough that Tobio had been holding this all in for a long time. How just losing one person -- closer to him than anyone else in the world -- made him go from a sweet and eager-to-please junior (who still reminded Toru of Ushijima in some ways) to the bad-tempered dictator whose team got so fed up with him that he was given the boot.

No wonder, Toru thought to himself, sadness and guilt pooling in his stomach again. No wonder Tobio became so self-reliant. No wonder he underwent such a change in temperament. What kind of void did middle school leave behind while no one else was able to see?

First, he lost the two of us.

Then he lost his grandfather.

Then he lost his sister.

…Then he lost his team.

He understood now, to some extent. Kazuyo Kageyama didn’t just introduce his grandson to volleyball; he was the reason why the boy loved it so much. But when he left, so did the better parts of Tobio. There was no family or friends to help him carry that weight; it was just him.

Him, and the weight that threatened to crush him, that so many were so willing to call a crown. A tarnished, broken, absurdly heavy crown that they were only beginning to realize here and now.

Until by some miracle, Karasuno and that little shrimp brought him back to some semblance of his old self. Before them, he was left with nothing and no one but himself to rely on. He carried all of that grief, guilt, and frustration on his head for the better part of two years, not knowing what to do with it or with himself.

So they let him cry. They let him drop those long years of forcing down his grief over who he loved most, in loud, chest-ripping wails. Iwaizumi ensured they both kept him wrapped up in their arms, maintaining that small reminder that he should’ve never had to endure that alone. The spite Toru felt for Tobio all that time seemed to melt as well, filling in all the blanks for why he was such a good player and so eager to please and so not deserving of such hatred. Every assumption he made was dissolved by the knowledge about a single person.

“Huh? Toby, what are you doing over there?” a new voice inquired after a time they didn’t give any thought to. “And who are your friends?”

Toru looked through blurred vision at an approaching woman. She was probably around their age, with black, meticulously-styled hair and -- once he blinked away the mist -- deep blue eyes very similar to the first year he and Iwaizumi were hugging.

“Mi -- Miwa…” Tobio managed to hiccup out. The woman held a hand out to him, something he looked at with an almost painful mix of confusion and disbelief before he took it and let her pull him up. And even then, he barely maintained his composure long enough to droop over her shoulder, gripping at her in a desperate hug.

“Shh… I know, Toby, I know…” she soothed, rubbing circles into his back. “I miss him, too… I’m so sorry, Toby…”

He stayed there a little longer before numbly stepping away, wiping his face with his sleeve again.

The Seijoh players were shattered by the look in his eyes. The way they looked so… dead, and tired.

How did no one realize he was becoming like this?

Tobio almost swayed another direction before Iwaizumi stepped in and grabbed him. “Easy there, kiddo. Just lean on me -- there we go.” He looked over to the woman with a dip of his head. “I’m Hajime Iwaizumi, and this jerk over here is Toru Oikawa. We knew Kageyama back in middle school.”

The woman seemed to scan the two of them, almost skeptical.

“We’d be happy to help you out with Tobio,” Toru offered, all too happy to take on the diplomatic duty he was so used to. “He was telling us about his grandfather, you see, and it’s clear how much has been on his shoulders since his passing. We were doing what we could as his old upperclassmen.”

“I see…” Miwa replied, turning on her heel. “Follow me. My car’s not far from here.”

Iwaizumi had decided to sit in the backseat with Tobio, keeping him steady as he all but dozed on his shoulder. Toru rode shotgun while the Karasuno player’s sister drove them to the Kageyama household.

“I can’t believe he’s held onto Grandpa’s old track hoodie this long,” Miwa commented. “Well, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.”

“Because he and his grandfather were that close?” Toru inquired.

The woman nodded. “Even closer than I was with either of ‘em. Grandpa was really all he had, ever since… well, there was always that one thing our parents didn’t like for some reason.”

...Secretly, Toru had a feeling he knew what exactly “that one thing” was. He had his suspicions of the way Tobio behaved, almost entirely fixated on volleyball. The way he subconsciously reminded him of Ushijima. Who knows? Perhaps even the famous Ushiwaka was introduced to volleyball that early on as well, and had the same sort of mind.

“I suppose that’s simply an unfortunate truth with some people,” he replied offhandedly. “I’ll admit, I and some of our current teammates weren’t exactly fond of him in middle school. But then again, none of us had a clue about his personal life, and I’d wager Tobio didn’t even give himself time to grieve.”

“I guess I can’t blame you there. Toby never consciously dwelled on things that he didn’t think he had to, for better or worse. He wanted to be just like Grandpa, but after graduating from middle school not being able to get into Shiratorizawa, he figured volleyball was the only thing he had left.”

“And even then, he was all on his own,” Iwaizumi finished from the backseat when they stopped at the house. He even helped carry Kageyama inside. “We all knew how Oikawa gave the poor kid a hard time when he was still an eager-to-please prodigy in his first year, and even heard how his sudden change in attitude in his second year left him ostracized by the team. Though we never saw the other side of the story until now.”

He didn't even need to say it was because they refused to hear it.

After the Aoba Johsai players put the younger boy to bed, they both went to the bathroom to wash their faces of tears. On the way back down, they discovered the pictures that littered the house. A happy family that comprised of parents, a grandfather, and a little girl. But when a baby boy appeared, there was only one of all five before the parents all but disappeared. The only ones after were the two children and their grandfather.

In all of them, the grandfather in question sported a wide, proud smile. Whether it be with a far younger Miwa trying to brush his hair, tossing a volleyball with the even younger Tobio, or all three of them together, he still had that smile. A sort of light that went missing when he passed away, leaving both of his grandchildren behind.

“Your grandfather must’ve been quite a splendid role model for the both of you,” Toru said softly. “A light that even Tobio didn’t deserve to lose.”

Miwa hummed thoughtfully, leaving some tea to steep in a pot. “I don’t think Toby even realized how badly he was hurting. Honestly, I kinda wish I didn’t have to leave him so soon. If I knew how badly he was affected by Grandpa’s death, I would’ve held off on school just to make sure he’d have at least someone to be there… Maybe I just put too much trust into his teammates supporting him.”

Because Kindaichi and Kunimi thought he was nothing but a dictator at the sport. They didn’t think for a second that he might’ve just been lonely or in pain.

…Then again, neither did we.

“I don’t think you have to worry much about him now, though,” Iwaizumi pointed out. “We know we failed the poor kid, as his former teammates and as his upperclassmen, and we’re far from the only ones who did so. But I plan to make sure we fix that.”

Toru smiled at the ace’s declaration, looking towards Tobio’s room. Even if the now-sleeping boy may never really trust Toru again, at least his beloved might be able to get through to the younger setter. If they find the chance, they might even get Kindaichi and Kunimi to understand as well, and enlist their help in making amends.

“Besides, ever since joining Karasuno, we can tell he’s doing a lot better,” Toru added. “He’s… finally found a place where he fits in. And I for one doubt those crows will leave him the way we did, especially not his new little go-to spiker. Whether he finds it in him to tell them about this or not, I can at least be confident that they’ll stand with him.”

Miwa smiled at them both, finally pouring the tea for all three of them. “I’m glad for that, you two. Toby needs a lot of friends to make up for not having anyone before. Whether they know about Grandpa or not, I just want him to find a family of his own, if only to make sure it’s not just the two of us looking out for each other.”

The two young men could only stick around for about another hour, conversing with Miwa and looking after their former underclassman. They told her about each of the crows to the best of their ability, the woman occasionally throwing in her two cents about whoever Tobio actually told her about. When the sun said they had to head home, they gave Tobio one last check before they left with a final goodbye and thank-you to Miwa.

As they left, though, Toru couldn't help but take a final look at the almost foreboding Kageyama household, holding onto his boyfriend's arm. "Iwa… do you think Tobio will tell his other teammates about his grandfather? Should he?"

Iwaizumi sighed. "It would probably be a good idea, but I doubt it. He'll probably tell the little sunspot and Karasuno's other setter, if no one else, but only time will tell."

…I guess that's true, Toru thought to himself dully. Only time will tell, and trust as well…

[ri-ahhh]

for the win

After dealing with a lifetime of insecurities, Winnie Walker finally gets the courage to pursue her dreams, with a few bumps along the way. But that confidence may not carry over when it comes to a certain hazel-eyed football player who’s had her attention for much too long.

A/N: this was a random inspo that hit me out of nowhere a while ago and I was gonna make it an epic oneshot, but I think I’ll just break it into parts instead. So, hence, this is part one. Hopefully you like it enough for it to be even worth posting more.

warnings: none yet, other than this is def gonna be as cheesy as you think it is

***

Winnie Walker has always considered herself an enigma. Not in that annoying, ‘I’m so cute and quirky’ type of way, but rather in the way that made her someone who never quite fit into one defined space. The kind perfected by years of self doubt, an emotionally distant mother, and the random ebb and flow of confidences and insecurities that always helps her remember that she is, in fact, perfectly un-extraordinary: her face is too round, but she’s always been called pretty; her personality is dry enough that she finds it challenging making female friends, but she fits in well with the boys; and she has a penchant for being the last one to talk about anything she might be feeling until she puts a pen to paper and speaks through the mouths of others.

Sports and writing were her main passions, but it still took until her senior year of high school to decide that she wanted to be a sports journalist. Not just a journalist, though -- more than anything, she dreamed of stepping out into the light as a broadcaster. Shy by nature but an athlete at heart, it once again put her in that enigmatic grey space where she wasn’t sure what the hell she was thinking.

But it’s what her heart was calling for her to do. For the first time in her life, Winnie Walker felt sure about something despite everyone’s doubts -- including her own. She grew up an athlete, and some of her fondest memories as a child were caught between either being in her dad’s man cave with all of his friends, cheering on their team of choice for whatever sport was on, discussing heatedly what plays should or shouldn’t have taken place. Or, on the volleyball court. 

The full ride offer from USC that was presented but never came to fruition because of a devastating knee injury in one of her last club tournaments haunted Winnie in the months leading up to her high school graduation. 

Her mother, Dahlia, was not-so-secretly thrilled. A stage mother through and through, she had always supported her daughter as she made headway in her sport as a star player, but it was an open point of contention that Winnie planned to follow her passion for it all the way to college. She wanted her middle daughter to attend the local university, get a nice marketing degree, and settle into a high rise in downtown Dallas, where she could point at during brunch with her friends and brag about the pretty penny her kid made with her perfectly nice degree she attained in her perfectly nice hometown. 

That’s not Winnie, though, and everyone except Dahlia knew it. No one was all too surprised that she still wanted to escape to California (again, except her mother), even if they were slightly shocked about her decision for a major. The reactions from her friends and sisters and dad had her even more excited as she scanned the email of her academic acceptance into USC. It finally gave her the courage to spill the beans to her mother as well.

Dahlia Walker very much scoffed in the face of her quiet, introverted, hopeful daughter sitting across the kitchen island while she scrubbed at the dishes from dinner.

“Winona, sweetie, you refused to even speak at your sister’s wedding as the maid of honor, and you want to be on TV? With all those... men?”

Winnie cringed a little bit and rolled her eyes at the slightly far-off look on her mother’s face as she no doubt started imagining the sweaty athletes the reporters would stand next to post-game.

“You don’t think I could do it?” she asked flatly, flicking a chip of her nail polish off her finger so it flew across the otherwise spotless granite — her mom hated when she did that. 

Dahlia’s hands picked up their pace again in the suds, slowed down by whatever middle-aged fantasy was going on in her mind. She shook her head, the highlights in her perfectly styled blonde bob shifting under the recessed lights.

“The girls who do that are just so bouncy. Friendly. They curl their hair.”

Winnie bit her lip. She didn’t know if she should laugh or cry. Her body felt deflated. “I knew I could count on you to be supportive.”

“Oh honey, I’m just trying to be realistic with you,” her mother said dismissively. Like she didn’t realize the pang her words caused to spread in Winnie’s chest; it should have been be all-too familiar by then, but the sting was never weakened with age or predictability. “And California? Are you really ready to be so far from home? You hardly ever even leave your room.”

It had taken everything in Winnie to hold back the open scoff she longed to throw at her mother; instead, she just stood up and left the kitchen, along with any childish hope that Dahlia might ever make an effort to really know her middle daughter.

Because anyone that knew Winona Elle Walker could predict just how much she would thrive in California. In the persistent sunshine that never quite reached the peak of being too hot for very long, unlike the nearly six months of 90 and 100-plus degree days of summer she knew so well in Texas. Within close proximity to a beach that didn’t have swamp-colored water washing ashore.

In a place well over a thousand miles away from Dahlia.

And that’s exactly how Winnie found herself in LA: thriving. She made friends easily, enjoyed life on the USC campus while she studied the exact major she had set out for the first day she sat down in her first class -- Navigating News in the Digital Age class -- and it was a relatively cheap flight home if she ever missed it too much. Winnie started feeling less like an enigma, and more like someone whose quirks were becoming more of a benefit to her success than she could have ever imagined.

Now, as a woman in her senior year, nearly 22 and set to graduate in only a few months time, she’s finally up for the most coveted position in her major: being the prime time student reporter at the biggest sporting events of the school’s entire athletic program — the Trojan football games. Reporting at football games was a job always reserved for seniors, and she had been driving her roommate — and best friend in California — Naomi crazy all summer prepping for the spot’s audition.

“Winnie, babe, you know the plays backwards and forwards. You’ve understood more about the rules of football since you were a kid than I’ll ever know as a grown woman. You have all the key players’ and coaches’ names and numbers memorized. You couldn’t be any more prepared,” she smiles, good-natured irritation clear in her eyes and behind the blinding smile that shone from her mocha-colored skin.

It softens some when Winnie stood from the couch, and Naomi reaches over and slaps her retreating ass just hard enough to make Winnie yelp and giggle. “Not to mention those squats are paying off big time, bitch. You’re gonna kill it.”

Winnie rolls her eyes and continues to make her way to the kitchen to refill her wine glass. “The camera won’t see my ass, but thanks.”

Naomi winks. “No. But Grayson Dolan might.”

Grayson Dolan — the walk-on that had stunned everyone when he was thrown into a game his freshman year after two of the starting tight ends had become injured on two consecutive plays. Now a senior himself, he’s led the team ever since in receiving yards, receptions, and TD’s, and is a clear prospect for the NFL in the coming months.

He also happens to be the player Winnie had drunkenly admitted she had a crush on during a girls night last year, and her friends have yet to let her live it down. She had felt ridiculous saying she had a crush as a 21 year-old, but that’s really all it was; he was hot, an extremely talented player, and she barely knew him beyond that one time he had spilled a drink on her at a frat party, and the rather interesting reputation that followed him around campus. There was nothing more to it.

Even if her attraction to him hasn’t died down in the passing time.

Winnie only blushes and pours herself a little extra, blaming the Maison No. 9 when Naomi throws her head back with a cackle and calls out the matching pink in her cheeks.

The morning of her audition, a mere two weeks into her fall semester, Winnie has butterflies fluttering madly in the pit of her belly. Her truer nature of being somewhat shy and timid in these situations has never left, always flaring up in moments of self-doubt and unpredictability. Undoubtedly, however, this audition deserves all the nerves; it’s a clear stepping stone into network broadcasting, and would almost guarantee her a spot as an intern at FOX Sports next semester.

She stares at herself in the mirror for a moment, silently urging herself to get her shit together, and takes a deep breath before eyeing Naomi’s curling iron plugged in by the sink adjacent to her own.

Winnie hasn’t curled her hair once in the nearly four years she’d been in LA. Not for nights out, or auditions, or even a date. A brief moment of madness overtakes her as she stands there staring at the metal device, her hand starting to reach out as words that should be long forgotten ring loud and clear in her head. For a second, the pale beige paint of her apartment bathroom turns the light blue and grey color scheme of her childhood one. Her mom had ‘surprised’ her with the the renovation one year when she decided to redecorate the house while Winnie was at volleyball camp, insisting she had chosen Winnie’s favorite colors, when in reality it simply matched the rest of the monotone suburban house that Winnie secretly couldn’t stand. It was boring, and typical, and...stuck, despite its relative newness.

With that, the fog clears as quickly as it had come, and she sets her jaw determinedly. She hasn’t let Dahlia psych her out for this long; she isn’t about to let now be the first time since she’s been out here on her own.

And maybe Naomi was right. Maybe she’d catch a certain tight end’s eye with a tight end of her own, after all.

The nausea suddenly returns as she shakes her head and reaches for her straightener instead, flicking it on before sectioning off her hair.

“No wonder you’re so fucking single, Win.”

[wisteriashouse]

aflame (ii).

pairing: firefighter!rengoku kyoujurou x cook!reader

genre: fluff, modern! au

word count: 2073

ii. chicken soup

Rengoku Kyoujurou and you have a rather strange relationship.

He’s what you would call your life benefactor — the man had saved you from a fire a couple of months ago when the gas pipe in your kitchen had exploded, leaving your eatery in flames and you choking on smoke, thankfully out of the blast range.

That’s when he’d appeared, charging through the flames fearlessly in full gear, looking like an angel descending from the heavens to rescue you. His eyes had met yours through the visor, a shining golden colour that you had never seen before, full of determination and courage, and you think it was that moment that you’d fallen in love.

In the middle of the roaring flames, his voice had been gentle and comforting, his arms strong and reliable as he carried you out of the fire like a prince from the pages of a fairytale.

That single encounter had left you completely starry eyed for a man whose name you hadn’t even known. After three weeks of fruitless agonizing over your mysterious savior’s identity while your eatery was being rebuilt, you had decided at the end of it to put the man firmly out of your mind — you had other things to focus on, such as filling the hungry bellies of your patrons.

As if fate would have it, however, the very day you had decided to reopen your eatery and forget about him, the very man you had been searching for this entire time walked right through your doors with the brightest smile on his face.

Rengoku Kyoujurou visiting your eatery that day had been a pure stroke of luck, you later learned. According to him, it’d been two months since the previous designated chef of the fire house had resigned, leaving him and the firefighting crew with no form of sustenance but cup noodles and microwavable meals. That had already sounded absolutely deplorable to you already, but the breaking point for them had come when the only microwave in the fire house had broken down right before lunch break, leaving all of the firefighting crew tired, stressed and downright angry.

Kyoujurou had then proceeded to lose at janken, the responsibility of finding an alternate food source before his co-workers went completely ballistic thrust upon his shoulders. Upon being tossed out onto the streets, he happened to remember about the eatery fire that he had attended to a few weeks ago, and hence decided to give it a shot.

That was how he had come to enter your eatery that day, very nearly giving you a heart attack and causing you to fall for him all over again. When he’d explained his plight to you with a rather sheepish smile on his face, you had insisted on treating him and all his co-workers to a hot lunch in return for saving your life. And that’s how things had gone from there.

Now, Kyoujurou drops by your eatery daily at twelve exactly when his break starts to collect lunch for the fire house crew. You hate to admit it, but his visits are easily what you look forward to the most every day; they never fail to brighten your mood with his presence and chatter.

So, you’re understandably put out when Kyoujurou doesn’t come by one day.

“Boss, is your Prince Charming still not here yet?”

You whirl around from where you were staring at the clock on the wall, mouth falling open in shock. “Stop calling him that!” You insist, fanning your cheeks wildly. The new part timer at your eatery, Kanzaki Aoi, only laughs in response as she rushes to fish the tempura from the deep fryer.

You smack your cheeks lightly, shaking your head in an attempt to clear your mind, it’s now lunch hour and the eatery is fully packed - you can even see a queue beginning for form outside. This isn’t time to be distracted!

“Aoi, take the tempura and chicken soup to Hakuji-san’s table, don’t forget to give them a cup of hot green tea on the house too–”

“Because his girlfriend catches a cold easily, I know.” Aoi calls back, already nimbly balancing three trays on her hands. You have to take a moment to admire your protégé, only two weeks of working here and she’s already so capable! Pleased, you turn back to the pan you’re tending to, but you find your eyes wandering back to the clock once more. The stack of bento boxes sit at the side, untouched.

It’s already fifteen minutes past twelve. Is he really not coming today?

“If you’re really that worried about him, just drop him a text.” Aoi’s voice interrupts your thoughts once more and you yelp at the sight of Aoi staring at you with her arms crossed, terribly embarrassed about having being caught distracted twice in a row. Is it really that obvious that you’re thinking about him?

“A text message?” You repeat dumbly. Aoi nods, gestures to your phone lying on the counter.

“Yes, a text message. With alphabets and words. Ask him why he hasn’t come yet, and tell him that you’re worried about him.” Aoi speaks slowly, as if she’s coaching a baby, and squints at you out of the corner of her eye. “You do have his number, right?

Sure, you have his number saved on your phone, but the only messages you’ve sent each other have been meal orders so far. To ask him why he hasn’t come yet... does that seem a little too awkward? Too personal?

“He should take responsibility for ordering food and not turning up to it. Imagine if he takes you out on a date and ends up blindsiding you... If he’s that sort of man, then you should just kick him to the curb. ” Aoi suddenly declares, folding her arms across her apron. You gasp.

“Don’t speak like that about Rengoku-san!”

“So just text him.” Aoi snorts, grabbing the stack of bento boxes and hefting them into the trolley your eatery uses for deliveries. “I’ll get this to the fire station and see if he’s there, so you just focus on finding out what happened to your prince charming, alright?”

“He’s not my prince charming!” You squeak, voice even more high pitched than earlier, but Aoi is already on her way out of the door, humming a merry tune to herself. Nervously, you heed her advice and pull out your phone, studying your most recent conversation with Kyoujurou.

The last message he’d sent you had been the evening prior.

Rengoku-san: I hope you’ve had a fantastic day at work! Your customers must be lucky to have your delicious food to strengthen their bodies and warm their hearts, as I am.

Rengoku-san: According to the weather forecast, it seems that it will rain tomorrow morning, so remember to take an umbrella with you. Although it may be cold and wet, I am sure that it will not dampen your spirits!

Rengoku-san: Uzui would like to request for extra onigiri. I’m looking forward to seeing you tomorrow! Thank you very much <3

See? Just a normal conversation between the owner of an eatery and their customer. Chewing on your lower lip, your fingers hover over the keypad, unsure of how you’re supposed to phrase your message.

How are you, Rengoku-san? No, too formal.

Are you alright, Rengoku-san? What if he isn’t sick? The message sounds like you’re assuming that he’s already sick. He might just be busy, and have forgotten about lunch.

Good afternoon, Rengoku-san, I was wondering if you were...

No, you wail internally, hitting the backspace again and again. All of it sounds awful! Absolutely awful! Come on, you can form one sentence right, can’t you?

Taking a deep breath, you stare at the screen of your phone with renewed concentration. “You didn’t come by today to pick up your lunch...” you mutter under your breath as you type out the message carefully. “I had Aoi send the food to the fire house instead. Are you alright?” You hit send before the scraps of courage you managed to gather earlier flee you again.

The message stays at two grey ticks.

You add a ‘:(’ for good measure and toss your phone to the side, too anxious to look at it any longer. Just as you do, there’s a light rap of knuckles on the counter top and you glance up to see on of your regulars, Hakuji, standing there with a big grin, holding out the money for lunch. “No luck with fire boy?”

“I’m not trying to do anything with him!” You exclaim frantically as you take the money from him. You wish your voice sounded believable, at the very least, because Hakuji only raises an eyebrow in amusement. “Oh, is that so?”

“Anyways! How is Koyuki-san doing?” You ask, desperate to change the subject as you root about in the cashier for his change. At the mention of his girlfriend’s name, Hakuji’s eyes soften almost immediately, head tilting back to glance at the slight young woman in the back sipping carefully at her cup of hot tea. His jacket rests around her shoulders.

“Better.” He says, unable to keep the happiness out of his voice. “She loves your chicken soup. It’s the only thing she wants to eat when she’s sick. I like to joke that it’s more effective than the medicine.”

You beam, joy welling up in your chest at the praise. “Well then, in repayment, remember to invite me to your wedding.” You joke, dropping the change into his hand. The man waves goodbye, flashing you a playful grin and a wink, before carefully escorting Koyuki out of the eatery.

Staring after the sweet couple as they leave with a smile, you’re startled when your phone suddenly buzzes, indicating a new message. You take a deep breath and pick up your phone.

Rengoku-san: My deepest apologies, I was feeling under the weather today. My younger brother turned off my alarm, so I ended up sleeping in until now. It’s my fault for forgetting to inform you.

Rengoku-san: I promise I’ll make it up to you the next time I see you. I’m really, really sorry about this.

Rengoku-san: Ahh, it’s only been a day, but I already find myself craving your cooking.

The last message makes you flush a little, but you snap yourself out of it, rereading his messages once again. Not a single exclamation mark? He must really be feeling awful, you think.

Chef-san: It’s no problem!

Chef-san: Rest properly and get well soon, Rengoku-san! I look forward to seeing you again.

Just as you hit send on your reply, a crumpled slip of paper is thrust into your field of vision. Bewildered, you look up to see Aoi standing there, one hand cocked on her hip. “Oh, you’re back from the fire house. What’s this?”

“Rengoku-san’s address.” Aoi says matter of factly, as if it’s perfectly normal for her to have people’s addresses scribbled on random slips of paper. “I got it from the angry white haired man at the fire house.”

You blink. “From Shinazugawa-san? Why?”

“So that you can deliver food to his house, of course.” Aoi nods at the phone in your hand. “Didn’t he say he wants to eat your cooking?”

What Aoi is trying to imply finally pieces itself together in your mind and your mouth falls open in horror at the thought. “You mean, me, deliver food to Rengoku-san’s place? Personally?”

“Exactly.” Your part timer waves the paper in your face even as you continue to gape at her like a goldfish out of water. “He’s sick and you have some chicken soup left over from earlier. You know, the one you made for Koyuki-san? Close shop early after the dinner crowd, go deliver it to him and voila! Affection stats raised instantly!”

You... visiting Kyoujurou’s place... bringing him dinner... “B-but, the washing up–” you stutter, trying to wrap your head around the idea of seeing him outside of your eatery and failing terribly.

Aoi clicks her tongue.

“I’ll take care of it. You, Boss, just need to focus on keeping the soup warm for him. Alright?”

The little slip of paper is pressed into your palm. The words on it stare back at you, as if encouraging you to go give that very special man a visit.

“Okay.” You whisper, clutching it tightly in your hand.

[backtothestart02]

Teacher’s Pet - 1/? | westallen fanfiction

A/N: Written for Mi on twitter. <3 Is there any new fic I won’t start and never update? *nervous laughter* Hopefully this will be updated soon. Hope you all enjoy. It’s the forbidden college teacher-student romance au you never knew you needed. Iris is much older than Barry and the rest of the chars (minus Scott). Just an fyi.

...

Synopsis:  AU - Fresh off a break-up, the last person Barry expects to fall for is his new English teacher.

...

Chapter 1 -

The university building loomed just ahead on the far side of the courtyard. It was menacing in its stature, for what it represented. A return to academics, sure, but that was something Barry had always enjoyed. No, this building was menacing because it thrust into his face the reality that he almost hadn’t passed any of his classes the previous semester. He had a long way to go to get back to the top of his class and to a place where his parents would be proud of him again. That was important to him.

He stepped out of his car and shut the door behind him, gulping as he looked up at the flag whipping in the wind in plain view of the building. It was cold outside. There was still snow on the ground. His boots crunched as he walked on the ground and around the car to pop open the trunk and grab the two duffel bags he’d taken home with him on winter break.

His phone started to buzz when he was halfway to the building. Reluctantly, he dropped his bags in the snow and answered it.

“Hey, Cisco.”

“Barry! Finally, you answered!”

Barry frowned.

“I just got back to school. You know I don’t pick up the phone when I’m driving.”

He could practically feel Cisco rolling his eyes on the other end.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Where are you at?”

Barry looked around.

“Right in front of our building,” he said. “Think you can come down and open the door for me? My hands are kinda full.”

“Oh, uh, yeah, sure thing.”

“Unless you’re too busy?”

“Mid-game actually.” Barry could hear video game noises in the background. They abruptly stopped. “But for you, I pause. I’ll be right there.”

“Great. Tha-”

But Cisco hung up before he could finish.

Barry shoved the phone back in his coat pocket and picked up his bags again. Then he trudged over to the building, stuffing the dread he’d felt on seeing the place again as far down as he could muster.

“There he is! Man of the hour!” Cisco declared, opening the door just as he arrived.

“Thanks, man.”

“It’s the least I could do. Personally, I was starting to wonder if you’d ever get here.”

Barry snorted.

“I don’t exactly live close by.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Here let me-”

But Barry held both bags out of reach.

“They’re heavy, Cisco. I put as much as I could into them before I left.”

“I remember. I was surprised the zipper didn’t break.”

“Ha, ha, very funny,” he drawled, shifting one bag over his shoulder. “Just lead the way.”

“Suit yourself. You may change your mind though.”

“What would make me do that?”

“The fact that the elevator is under construction for another month.”

Barry abruptly dropped one of the bags just shy of his foot.

“What, for real? I thought they were going to finish that over break.”

Cisco shrugged. “Guess not.”

Barry blew out a puff of air and reluctantly handed a bag over to his roommate.

“Shit, what do you got in here, bricks? Cement blocks? Oh, I know, pure gold.”

“Told you it was heavy.”

Barry moved past him towards the stairs.

“We still on the third floor?”

“Last time I checked.”

Barry nodded and took the stairs two at a time.

“Hey, Mr. Long Legs,” Cisco called out when he was only halfway up the stairs and Barry was turned the corner to the next staircase. “Slow up a bit, would ya?”

“Sorry.” Barry stopped. “But if I stop for too long, I’ll lose my energy and before you know it, I’ll be unpacking in the middle of the stairs.”

Heaving by the time he reached them, Cisco could only gesture for him to continue. Barry had to smile a bit to himself, but by the time they reached it to the final platform, he was due for some extra oxygen too.

“We should start working out.”

“On campus?” Cisco asked. “You know who’s always hogging the fitness center.”

Barry didn’t need a reminder.

“Wally West, yeah, I know.”

“He doesn’t exactly like you.”

“He stole my girlfriend.”

“To be fair, he’s been working out longer than you.”

“I don’t work out.”

“Case in point.”

“We could start walking.”

“In this weather?” Cisco visibly shivered. “Nah, I don’t think so.”

“So, what, we just stay skinny and pale for the rest of our lives?”

“I’ll just stay skinny, thank you very much. And after what you went through last semester, maybe the last thing you should be focused on is buffing up for the ladies.”

Barry rolled his eyes. He didn’t need the reminder. He hadn’t been in love with Linda, so her breaking up with him for cocky jock Wally West bruised his ego more than his heart, but it still hurt. He liked her, and he thought after a year of dating, they had something real. Guess he was wrong.

Spending the tail end of the semester trying to win her back instead of focusing on his finals was probably the reason he’d nearly flunked out of every class he’d been taking. He wouldn’t be doing that again.

Abruptly, he realized Cisco was still talking.

“You know the real reason Wally bothers you so much isn’t just because of Linda.”

“No? What is it then, oh, wise one?”

Cisco turned the key in the door to their room and stepped inside, dropping Barry’s bag on the floor for him to pick up and carry across the room.

“It’s because he skates by in his classes too. He rarely shows up, rarely puts in an effort, and yet, because his sister teaches, she has an in with his records and sweet talks the other teachers to let him slide by.”

Barry straightened after shrugging out of his coat and kicking his boots off.

“I didn’t know that.”

“Surprise!” Cisco said animatedly.

Barry was not amused.

“I have her as my English teacher this semester.”

Cisco winced. “Yikes.”

Barry scowled.

“I hear she’s pretty though. Like, drop-dead gorgeous.”

“I’m not gonna date my teacher.”

“Who said anything about dating her? She’s just something nice to look at. Maybe she’ll be sweet on you.”

“Oh, yeah, the woman who’s cheating the system so her brother graduates will give me – the ex to her brother’s girl whose gpa has seriously tanked over the last months – a fair chance.”

Cisco shrugged.

“It’s only one class?”

Barry sighed.

“Yeah, I guess.” He shook his head. “I need a distraction from all this.”

Cisco snapped his fingers.

“Video games!”

Barry considered it.

“Yeah, I guess that might do it.”

“It will do it.” He picked up a controller and handed it to him. “Here. I’ll even delete all my progress so we can both play.”

Barry snorted.

“Thanks, man. You’re one in a million.”

“Better than Linda and Wally combined.”

“And Ms. West.”

“Professor West she likes to be called.”

Of course she does.

Barry rolled his eyes and reached over to Cisco’s controller to start the game and shut him up.

“Hey, what did y-”

“Play!”

Cisco shook his head and started to play, eventually forgetting his minor irritation and focusing wholeheartedly on the game and having his best friend back in his space again.

It would be a good semester. Despite all odds, Barry would excel. He had no doubt.

…

 Iris draped the fuzzy blanket over her legs and sank into her couch. After a tasty dinner for one and an exhilarating bath, here she was ready to enjoy a few chapters of her current favorite book for the night. Tomorrow classes would start up again, and she would have to be up at the crack of dawn to be in teacher mode. It had been a solid month and a half of relaxation and freedom – minus the small inconvenience of having Wally crash with her and frequently invite his new girlfriend over. But aside from that, it had been nice.

She enjoyed teaching though, always had. Running the school newspaper helped channel her passions for something more. And when she wasn’t worrying about whether or not she would be the only one in her family graduating college, she could enjoy being a flirt to just about every man on staff. The other women envied her. She didn’t care. She didn’t sleep around. It was all in good fun. And it would all resume tomorrow morning, bright and early.

A sudden loud noise interrupted her thoughts. She looked toward the door and found to her great annoyance that it was her brother, whose lips were attached to the new girl she’d met only twice over the last month. Her eyes narrowed when she realized his hands were searching out the hem of her shirt and the zipper of her skirt.

“Uh, Wally?”

No response. Just more moans and groping.

“Hey, Wally!” She snapped – literally.

His eyes opened, and he distanced himself from his girl, though only slightly.

“Iris. Hey. What are y-”

“I live here, remember?”

“Yes, right. I know. I just thought…”

“It’s nine o’clock, and you’re crashing on my couch. Where were you expecting to go?”

He had the gall to have a straight face.

Meanwhile, the girl just inches from him blushed.

“Oh, my God, Wally,” she whispered under her breath. “I thought you said she wouldn’t be home.”

Iris got to her feet.

“You were going to fuck in my bed.”

“Well, I…”

“You were!”

“Maybe I should go…” the mortified girl muttered.

“Yeah, I think you’d better,” Iris barked.

“Hey! Don’t talk to her like that!” Wally ordered.

Iris’ eyes widened.

“Maybe you should leave too.”

“And go where?”

“I don’t know. Home?”

“I came here so I didn’t have to. You know they’d never take me. They can’t stand the sight of me.”

“Yeah, well, right now I can’t really stand the sight of you either.”

He fumed. She fumed right back.

“I’ll just go,” the girl piped up again. “I’m so sorry about this, Iris.” She swallowed hard.

“You’re not going anywhere.”

Both women gave him a deadly glare until finally Wally relented. He softened as he turned to his girlfriend.

“I mean, do you really want to go?”

“I…”

Iris was in disbelief. This was her apartment!

“I’m calling mom.”

He spun around to face his sister instead.

“You wouldn’t.”

“Leave.” She pointed toward the door. “Come back when you have your priorities straightened out.”

He scoffed but wrapped his arm around his girl and guided her to the door.

“Come on, Linda. We can go to your place.”

“I have a roommate,” she panicked.

“Guess you won’t be fucking then,” Iris said dryly.

Wally glared but left the apartment. Iris locked the door immediately. He had a key, so it wasn’t going to keep him out, but it would give her some peace of mind until she went to bed.

Heaving a sigh, she collapsed back on the couch and closed her eyes for a few minutes before grabbing her book and relaxing into it again.

It took a while, and she was just about into the zone of where the characters were headed when there was a knock on the door.

She sighed, aggravated, and deliberately set the book down on the coffee table. Then she got to her feet and headed toward the door.

“So help me, Wallace, if that is actually you… If you lost your key… If you’re coming back this soon, there better be an apology,” she muttered heatedly.

She was so focused on the possibility that it was her brother that she flung the door open without looking through the peephole and was fuming when she came face to face with a familiar yet completely unexpected face.

“Scott?”

“Did I…come at a bad time?”

She blinked, suddenly aware of just a teddy beneath her fluffy robe. She looked him over and debated her options. He looked dashing, as always, and the easy charm was there in his half-amused smile pulling at his lips. There’d been an easy flirtation between the two of them since they’d met five years ago, but they’d never acted on it. Now here he was the night before the spring semester started with red roses in one hand and an uncurling fist that was probably sweaty as the other.

Suddenly, she needed nothing more than to act out one of the steamy love scenes in her book. Damn it all to hell what the next day brought.

She grabbed him by the collar of his jacket and pulled him into her apartment, kissing him soundly on the lips. He made no attempt to push away, and in fact moved to undress her through the far less layers as she was undressing him.

The door was shut, and the flowers dropped in the flurry of it all, and before either of them realized the gravity of what had happened, they were in Iris’ bedroom fucking, and Iris was kind of smug about it because it should serve Wally right for trying to do it first.

That didn’t mean she’d let him spend the night however. If Wally saw him gossip would spread, no doubt to get back at her, and she didn’t need either of their teaching reputations ruined like that.

So, about ten minutes after they’d crested, and Scott was laying in bed beside her with a gigantic grin on his face, Iris propped herself up and made a gesture towards the door.

“Okay, time for you to go.”

His jaw dropped.

“Are you serious?”

“Dead serious.”

“Did I do something wrong?”

“No, honey.” She stroked his chest. “You were fantastic.”

“Then?”

“We’re not together. I was just feeling stressed out, and you alleviated my stress. Thank you.” She smiled serenely.

He blinked.

“Seriously, go. If Wally sees you here, gossip will spread before either of us gets a word in our classes tomorrow. That’s hardly the best way to start the semester.”

He blinked again, still trying to process. She didn’t like that.

“Go!” She pulled on her robe and yanked him out of her bedroom.

He seemed to figure out what was going on by that point and caught his clothes as she threw them at him.

“I…uh…”

“I’ll see you tomorrow in the hall.”

“You will?” he asked hopefully.

“In the hall,” she repeated.

He frowned, and she sighed, moving swiftly past him to open the door and usher him out.

“Did you like the flowers at least?” he asked pathetically.

“They’re lovely,” she assured. “Goodnight, Scott.”

Then she closed the door in his face and locked it, promptly turning and throwing out the flowers without even a single sniff. Wally couldn’t see she had flowers. He was annoyingly observant and picked up on shit like that.

She returned to her bedroom, changed the sheets, and took a quick shower to rinse off the sweat. Then she settled in to sleep with a smile on her face. Amazing what a one-night stand could do for a girl’s mood.

This semester was going to be great.

[chaoticpete]

Our lives is a movie?

Peter Parker x reader...I think, Avengers x reader, Tom Holland x Reader (if ya squint)

Warnings: none

What would it be like if the team found out they were just a movie series in our world?

A/n: This is just an idea I had like last year, will probably end up rewriting it, well at least the end, hope you guys still enjoy it though!

“Oh come on! I was so close to an almost perfect winning streak!” You yell at Bucky. Tossing the controller beside you, you cross your arms and start pouting as your Yoshi finally crosses over the finish line.

“Guess I’m just better.” He replies with a smug smirk. “Is that why I beat you the first three games.” It’s your turn to smirk when he glares at you. An alarm starts going off through the tower. A code red. Someone is inside the tower. You wave your hand and your suit appears on.

“FRIDAY! Where’s the intruder?” Tony asks, running into the room, Nat and Wanda following behind. “They’re trying to get into the plans vault, sir.”

“L/N would you mind pulling up a portal?” You make one leading to the vault. “Why of course Papa Stark!” Tony summons a suit and the rest of you jump through your portal seeing a blue man trying to get past the actual vault.

“Hey, Smurf! Who do you think you are?” You ask, throwing a mini explosive his way. He jumps out of way throwing back a disk towards you guys that set off a bright light.

Then he sent another one.

“Void! Look out!” Peter says pushing you out of the way the same time you made another portal causing it to mix with the blue guy’s device.

Before anyone else in the team could do anything the guy was gone, and so were you and Peter.

You land landing on your face. “Ow...I really don’t get paid enough for this.” You grumble as you get back up and brush off your clothes. You notice a golden disk by you. It’s the one the guy threw.

Picking it up and slipping it into your suit, you begin looking around you, you see lots of people walking around some talking other carrying items. “Where the hell am I?” You say starting to walk around.

When you spotted some familiar brown curls. “Peter!” You say running towards the boy and pulling him into a hug. “Ugh, I have absolutely no idea whe- when you change your clothes?” You ask actually getting a good look at him.

‘Peter’ looks at you confused. “When did I change my clothes? Darling, I think the real question is what are you wearing and who are you?” He says in a British accent.

Before either of you can say anything else ANOTHER Peter runs up to you. “Y/n!” “Peter?!” You say back pulling this one in a hug.

“Are you okay?” “Yeah. But when I came out of that portal this woman automatically started coming at me saying that “I needed to get ready for the next scene” and “I needed a touch up” THEN SHE TRIED TO UNDRESS ME! I ran so fast.”

Quickly remembering the other Peter you step back from that Peter and look between the two. Peter looks over at the next person, who he saw...was him. “Holy shit!” He says jumping closer to you.

“Y/n, what is happening?” “I don’t know but I don’t like it. Do you think this is Loki’s doing?” “No, no.” He's on that time mission, remember.” “She.” “Oh yeah.”

The fake Peter looked just as confused as the both of you. “I feel like I should be calling security, but it’s not every day you meet someone who looks, exactly like you.” He says staring at Peter.

“Whoa, you’re British?!” Peter askes shocked at the accident. “Would it help better if I talked like this?” He asked now in an American accent.

He sounded just like Peter.

Both your and Peter’s eyes open wide. “Noooo.” You both say. “You both already look very much alike. Don’t you guys talk alike also?”

A loud bell rings and you and Peter automatically jump into your fighting stances. “Shit! Break is just about done.” Fake Peter says panicking a bit.

“Uh, okay follow me. You guys can stay in my trailer till I’m done for the day then when you get to the hotel we can figure this out.” He says starting to walk towards the trailers.

He goes to one labeled “Peter Parker” and opens the door. “You guys can wait till I’m done. Please, don’t let anyone in. I have a key so I’ll just lock it. Um, there are some snacks in the cupboard, water in the fridge, and feel free to watch anything on the tele. Even got youtube!” He yelled before closing the door.

“...did you catch any of that?” “Nope.”

Turning on the tv, you see the date. “February 16, 2021. What the hell is Covid-19-“

You get cut off by someone trying to open the door. “Fucking div locked the door again. And left the tele on.” You hear a voice mumble on the other side before walking off.

“N/n look at this,” Peter says flipping through pages of paper.

“What is it?” “It’s a script. For a “Spider-Man: No Way Home.” He says looking at the first page. “It has everyone in here. Aunt May, Mj, Ned even that European trip we went on.” “Wait what?” You ask, looking over his shoulder.

“Dude...where the hell are we.”

Hours passed and before you know it you hear the trailer door unlocking. Sitting up in the bed you see the fake Peter (whose name you learned was Tom) walking in looking tired.

“Hey. Okay, so before I actually bring you guys back home. Who exactly are you?”

“Well, my name is Peter. Peter Parker. Spider-Man. Um, I’m pretty sure you know me.”

“Yeah kinda. I am...you? Technically...in this universe. Well, one of you. I’ll explain better at the hotel. Oh, I’m Tom by the way. Don’t think I’ve actually introduced myself.” He says chuckling. “And you?” He asks turning your attention to you.

“I’m the actual Y/n. Or Void as my hero name.”

“Y/n huh? Yeah, we don’t have you here.” “Wait what? Really? But I’m Peter’s partner in crime. We’re always getting blamed for everything with the team.” You say pouting.

“Is there at least an actor that looks like me?” “No, I don’t think so darling. Sorry.”

Before anything else can be said there’s another knock on the door. “Tom, are you in there mate? We’re going to go get some pizza.”

“Uh, no thanks I’ll just meet you back at the room. Be safe.” “Who was that?” “My brother, Harry.” “Aww, he has a brother.” “Three actually.” “Awww!”

“Okay it should be safe to get you two out of here but first. Here,” Tom says opening up a kit bag and giving Peter some clothes and you an oversized hoodie. “They might think you’re trying to steal the suit.”

“Oh, and you’ll need these.” He says grabbing a box and handing you each a mask after Peter was done changing.

“Yeah what’s with these?” “We’re in a pandemic?” “Like the plague?” “Ehh, sort of. Now let’s find a way to get you two back home.”

**************************************************************

“So here, we’re all just...comic book characters? There are no avengers? No flying robots? Nothing?”

“Nope. No alien villains. Just regular people who wanna bring harm.” “Huh.”

The three of you were now in Tom’s suite.

“So how did you guys even get here.” “Well, my theory is when the guy threw his little disk thingy, it merged with Y/n powers and made a new portal.”

“But how do you know that’s what it was meant to do?” “It’s the only explanation with how he got into the compound and the vault unnoticed.”

“You guys never thought about that?” “Blame Tony.” You say as Peter hisses and moves back from getting shocked.

“You okay?” You say grabbing his hand to inspect the slight burn. “Yeah, just a sting. It’ll heal in an hour or two.”

“Can you get us back home?” “Yeah, but I’ll need a few supplies.” “Well,” Tom speaks up. “I’m off tomorrow so we can go pick up what you need. You can stay here tonight if you like.”

“Thanks, dude,” Peter says and you nod with him.

“You guys hungry? I can ask Harry to bring back some pizza for us.” “Ohh yes please.” You say bouncing on your toes a bit. “I’m absolutely starving.”

“So Tom you’re an actor right?” “Mhmm.” “And you said you play me?” “Yep.” “And they have the rest of the team?” “Besides me apparently,” you say under your breath.

“Maybe they’ll bring you in soon. The company is starting a new phase so,” Tom says shrugging.

“Do you guys wanna see them?” “How many are there?” “23 movies and more coming out. There's also shows.”

“23 MOVIES ABOUT US?!”

Tom can’t help but laugh at your guy’s reaction. “Yeah, Marvel movies are some of the biggest ones these days. Going on for almost 13 years.”

“How much have you acted in?” “Like five, two solo films, and this one we’re currently filming will make it six. Three solos and three with the actual avengers.”

There was a knock on the door. “Must be Harry with the pizza,” Tom says going to the door. “Why didn’t you just use your key?”

“Cause my hands are full ya div. Why did you get so much food any-“ Harry stops when he sees you and Peter sitting on the couch.

Tom quickly grabs the food from his hands before he can even think about letting it go.

Looking between his brother and his duplicate you couldn’t help but start laughing at his expression.

All three turned to look at you like you completely lost his mind (which I’m sure is exactly how Harry was feeling). “I’m just gonna...nice meeting you guys I guess.” He says walking to what you think is his room before looking back at Tom and Peter causing him to almost walk up into a wall.

“Uh...sorry about that. That’s my little brother Harry, he came along as my assistant.” You and Peter nod. “Well guess we can dig in and watch the movies.”

“I- it was not that dramatic when Mr. Stark took the suit.” “Yes, it was. You could barely talk properly when you called me.”

“I can’t believe they included Flash but not me.”

“Okay, but why is the guy who plays Mysterio kinda hot though.” “Y/n I swear.” “Okay, but am I wrong?!” “...no.”

“Tony’s ego is gonna be ruined if he ever knows they killed him off.”

“Sucks we didn’t have enough time to watch all 23 films. I’m sure it would make more sense.”

And that’s how your night went. You just watched the Spider-Man stand-alone ones before everyone started to crash from the long eventful day. Harry even came out and joined you guys.

After figuring out what was needed and put together his own device, it was time for you guys to go home.

“You guys got everything?” Harry asks as Peter puts the finishing touches. “Yeah, thank you, guys. Really, I don’t know what I and Peter would’ve done if we didn’t end up here.”

“Oh! These are for you.” Tom says handing you a bag. “It’s the whole MCU collection. I saw how much you guys loved the Spider-Man ones and it was confusing since they all interact. Plus, I’m sure the others would wanna see them.”

“As if some of them need an ego boost. Especially Tony and Loki. I’m pretty sure if Loki ever found out he was actually worshipped here he would find a way to get here.”

You go and pull Tom into a hug. “Nice meeting you Peter’s British half. I’ve never really cared for them but eh, I guess I have a little soft spot for two of them now.” You say shooting Harry a wink before placing a kiss on Tom’s cheek and then going to give Harry a hug as Peter says his byes.

“Ready N/n?” “I guess. I just hope we actually end up in our world and not a different one.” You say grabbing Peter's hand as he gets ready to throw the disc.

You both look back at the two Holland brothers. “See you again one day boys.” You say as Peter throws the disc and a portal opens and the two of you jump through it.

The two of you crash to the floor. “Ugh, Peter get off me! You’re skinny but really heavy.”

“Kids!” You both look up to see the team rushing to you guys. “Where did you two go?!”

Getting up from the ground, both tackled with hugs.

“YOu'll never believe us. But we do have the next movie night!” “What are those?” “Movies about us. Avengers! To the theater room!”

Tags:: @tommyunderoos @spideyspeaches @frenchfrostpudding @holland-styles @gwenvrse @allegra-writes @petersgroupie @cherry-hyejin @kitkatd7 @buckys-other-punk

[valeriehervo]

Valérie Hervo runs Les Chandelles, the legendary Paris sex club where members of French high society, politicians, barristers and rock stars (and an increasing number of Brits) come to indulge their erotic fantasies. Can it survive the twin threats of the pandemic and a moral backlash?

Adam Sage

Saturday March 20 2021, 

Valérie Hervo is outraged. She has just been listening to a radio station where two male presenters, chatting about her forthcoming appearance on their show, kept referring to her as the owner of a “group sex club”.

“That really is low-class vocabulary,” she tells me. “It’s very macho as well. Only a man would say something like that.

“And it is not what this place is about. To me, it is a journey through the mystery of the senses to a land of sensuality and encounters.”

Hervo is particularly aggrieved at what she took to be the implication that she organised sexual games for the benefit of men.

Nothing could be further from the truth, she insists. “Here, everything revolves around women’s pleasure. This is a place where a woman can do what she wants, when she wants and with whom she wants – and if she wants to do nothing, she does nothing.”

Hervo opened Les Chandelles, her recreational club – as she would prefer it described – in 1993, and it has since become a part of French high-society folklore.

Any Parisian will tell you that this is the place where the country’s political, economic and cultural elites live out their sexual fantasies beyond the sight of ordinary mortals, where government ministers, television presenters, rock stars and chief executives engage in the ancient practice of libertinage.

But what exactly goes on behind the plain façade in a narrow street near the Louvre in central Paris? And what might this tell us about French values? Or indeed about British values, given the steady flow of clients rumoured to have crossed the channel in recent years in the hope of fulfilling their “erotic potential” under Hervo’s stewardship?

With telephones barred from the club (they have to be left at the entrance) and hardly anyone willing to talk openly about their evenings there – “It’s a matter of intimacy,” says Hervo. “You don’t start telling everyone about your sex life at dinner parties” – such questions have given rise to few answers and much speculation.

Now, with the club closed because of the pandemic, Hervo, 53, has written a book that explains what happens when the dancefloor empties, usually around 1.30am, and the salons around it fill with writhing, sighing bodies.

Les dessous des Chandelles, which could be translated either figuratively as The Secrets of the Chandelles or literally as Underneath the Candelabras, is the portrait of a quintessentially French establishment.

Where else would the lost property include designer thongs or customers eat Ladurée macarons off the back of a naked woman, a famous male barrister end up in an alcove with his female rival days after their clash in a criminal court, or Mick Jagger reportedly be turned away for wearing a pair of jeans?

Hervo explains that her club is a bastion of French “savoir vivre”, where a select group of beautiful, intelligent and well-educated people conduct themselves in a way befitting a nation that has given the world some of its greatest suggestive literature, from Molière’s Dom Juan to Laclos’ Les liaisons dangereuses.

Consider, for example, her account of one of the Eyes Wide Shut theme parties she holds from time to time. “A naked woman, her gaze hidden by a Venetian mask, lies on a table,” she writes. “A nymph in a transparent toga joins her. She kneels down and delicately pulls her legs apart.”

She has torrid encounters herself, for instance with a woman whose perfume she found bewitching and whose body she discovered behind a veil in an alcove.

Much of her time, however, is spent looking after her patrons, like the couple of regulars who realised to their horror that their adult son and his partner had also begun going to Les Chandelles. Hervo tells how they begged her to help them avoid what they said would be a “regrettable” meeting.

On another occasion, a male customer arrived with his mistress, explaining to Hervo that his wife was stuck at home because she was ill. An hour later, the wife arrived with a younger man, she writes. “Don’t say anything to my husband,” she told Hervo. “He thinks I’ve got the flu.”

Hervo promptly rushed downstairs where she found the husband, “naked and frolicking with his partner and a few other accomplices”. She advised him to leave through the emergency exit.

I am discussing these and more adventures with Hervo at a table in her club’s pink and white restaurant, which is to be found at the bottom of stairs that wind down from an ordinary-looking blue door on the street.

Opposite us is another staircase that leads to what could easily be mistaken for an 18th- century Parisian literary salon – were it not for the mattress in the alcove at the end of it.

A third staircase, encased in walls painted in gold leaf, descends to a dancefloor, a bar and more salons with their alcoves, benches and mattresses.

It is difficult to find an English word to describe Les Chandelles. Some have called it a swingers’ club, although that conveys none of the cerebral sophistication and cultural aspirations that go with elite sex in France.

Others have used the term wife-swapping (or échangisme, as the French call it), but Hervo is no more happier with that than with group sex.

“For me, échangisme is very reductive and sad,” Hervo explains. “It involves some kind of contract between four people and they all need to agree, which can’t happen very often.”

What prevails at her club, she says, is libertinage, a concept dating back to a 12th-century rebellion against the church by disaffected clerics who were determined to place physical love above the courtly version promoted by troubadours and their ilk.

The contemporary version of this philosophy involves making “everything possible and nothing obligatory”, Hervo says.

One couple might go for sex, either with each other or with someone else, she says. A second might go along to watch. A third could be happy with a turn on the dancefloor.

“For some, it is enough to have an imaginary journey. For others, they will want a little bit more. But what happens in the salons is the icing on the cake and it doesn’t matter if nothing happens, because we’ve had such fun with the preliminaries.

“Everyone goes at their own rhythm. You may be happy with a look, a caress or with voyeurism. But that is all very different to échangisme.”

Libertinage, which has come and gone in France over the centuries – the early 17th and the mid-18th being among the high points – enjoyed a return to fashion from the late Nineties with the emergence of hundreds of clubs amid a spirit of unrestrained freedom.

The number has since fallen, with adepts taking to organising their own house parties. At the last count there were 269 such clubs left, according to French state radio.

The health crisis looks likely to drive many more out of business, their activities scarcely being compatible with social distancing.

Les Chandelles, however, has a status apart, and this should offer it protection against the vicissitudes of fortune.

Hervo says her customers include “politicians from both the left and the right” and “celebrities from across the whole world” (she refuses to divulge their names).

Hervo says that as her club’s fame has grown, so has its allure to visitors from Europe, the US, Asia and “a lot from Britain”.

It is not enough just to cross the channel and knock on the door, though. In order to get in, you need erotic knowhow, Hervo says, along with familiarity with Parisian savoir-vivre.

“It is an alchemy. A way of being,” she says.

In his Histoire du libertinage, Didier Foucault, a history lecturer at Toulouse University who is a specialist on the subject, writes of how the practice became fashionable after 1600 among aristocrats driven “by a haughty refusal to bow either to common law or to any authority whatsoever, be it temporal or divine”.

There may be something similar about the French elite that frequents Les Chandelles. The entrance fee is €96 for two, or €310 with dinner and a bottle of Deutz champagne thrown in. If Deutz is too downmarket, there is Cristal Roederer for €490 or Dom Pérignon Rosé for €470.

But the selection policy is not based on money, Hervo insists. More important to her are “elegance, refinement, education and taste.

“I have a very tough door policy. I turn away a lot of people.”

The badly dressed, the ugly, the vulgar, have no hope of getting past her, she says, while the overweight may struggle as well, at least if they are male.

“I know I shouldn’t be saying this, but I am going to say it anyway. I think I would be more concerned by a fat man than a round woman. Round women can be very beautiful but, in general, men who are fat are… Well, someone who lets himself go physically is someone who does… not respect himself. And if he doesn’t respect himself, he is less likely to respect other people.”

Les dessous des Chandelles is a strange, almost dual work. On the one hand, it is a window onto this secretive world of privilege and exclusion created by Hervo beneath Rue Thérèse in the French capital.

On the other, it is a tale of the author’s personal voyage through libertinage and her claim that the sexual liberation she found along the way, first in other clubs and then in her own, helped to unshackle her from a traumatic childhood marked by incest, guilt and depression.

Our conversation reflects the same duality.

For much of the interview, Hervo comes across as the archetypal Parisian businesswoman, complete with carefully applied make-up, an elegant hairdo, an articulate discourse, a headstrong Yorkshire terrier and a well-trained fiancé – Tom, the maker of an excellent Sancerre white wine, who rushes off shortly after I arrive and returns later with an armful of her outfits for the photoshoot, including an all-white suit and a glittering jacket.

One minute she is talking with off-putting clarity about the female orgasm, telling me in a tone that brooks no argument that “a woman’s sexuality is so much richer than that of a man”. The next she is explaining, with equal equanimity, how she resisted underworld attempts to take over her club following her divorce in 2005.

Like all self-respecting Parisiennes, she knows how to throw a strategic fit of pique as well, announcing that the photographer is driving her mad and that Tom had better summon a friend for help, and be quick about it. The friend duly arrives with a bottle of sancerre to enable Hervo to get through the afternoon session.

Yet, from time to time, there are signs of the scars left by childhood, as when she concedes that she took refuge in libertinage in part because “at night-time, you can’t see the suffering so much… the glitter masks the pain”.

At one point, her eyes fill with tears as she discloses that her relatives have refused to speak to her since the publication of her book, which recounts her rape by her grandfather as a young girl, her parents’ refusal to believe her, her teenage struggles with depression, her toxic marriage to a man 20-odd years her senior, and her salvation in swingers’ clubs.

It was her former husband who introduced her to libertinage. She writes of her first experience in a club where “in a salon plunged into darkness… some couples are making love while others are observing them”.

She did not want to join in – at least not the first time – but says, “My emotion [was]great and my excitement real.”

“I was 24 and I instinctively knew it was right for me,” Hervo tells me. “What I liked in those places was a feeling of freedom and especially a feeling that I was meeting couples who seemed to get on well together.

“That was not the image of the couple I had received as a child because my parents argued all the time. It was like Disneyland as far as I was concerned.”

When her former husband suggested opening their own swingers’ club in Paris, she jumped at the chance. He put up some of the money, they borrowed the rest and she became the manager.

“It was a success straight away, because I think it was the first club to give so much importance to women,” she says. “At that time, in 1993, in other clubs, the women were just treated as objects and it was the men who took charge of the games and who brought along their wives.

“I think that they were probably men of little courage who were not able to cheat on their wives and who went to this sort of place instead. But that was not at all in the spirit of libertinage.”

Les Chandelles would be different, she decided. “Women who are objects are women without humanity. Here, I made sure that the women were subjects.

“In fact, I created here what I never had myself. I tried to encourage women to take their time, to dare to set the tempo, to ask men to be attentive and unhurried and to be gallant, because women adore gallantry.”

She says her door policy has always involved refusing entrance to couples if she suspects that the woman is being dragged along against her will or kept in the dark about the true nature of Les Chandelles. “Even now in 2021, there are boors who don’t tell their partners where they are taking them,” she says. “It’s increasingly rare but it still happens. But if I have the slightest doubt, I question them. You get a feeling for these things.”

Inside the club, no means no, she says, explaining that men can be expelled for repeating a request to a female customer if they are turned down the first time.

“I think women are much safer in this sort of place than in traditional nightclubs where they get hassled all the time,” she tells me.

She says that she herself came to see Les Chandelles – of which she has been the sole owner since extracting herself from her disastrous marriage 16 years ago and buying her former husband’s share – as a refuge from the wounds left by her troubled childhood.

“This has been my bunker and my incubator,” she says. “It was where I revitalised myself, and where I discovered myself too.”

Can her club really be as idyllic as she pretends?

For years, Les Chandelles has been described in the French press as a favourite haunt of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former head of the International Monetary Fund, who resigned following his arrest on suspicion of rape. Although the charge was ultimately dropped, reports of his attendance at Les Chandelles have done nothing for its image.

Recently, it has also been linked with Gérald Darminin, President Macron’s interior minister, who, it has emerged, went to Les Chandelles in 2009 with a woman who had asked him for help in overturning her criminal conviction – he was legal affairs adviser for an opposition political party at the time – and who has accused him of raping her later that evening.

He denies her claim, but the publicity has scarcely been an advertisement for Hervo’s establishment.

She says the coverage has been misleading and unfair. DSK, for instance, barely ever visited Les Chandelles, she insists.

“There are many other politicians who came more often than him and who were much more important than him,” she says.

As for Darmanin, she says that when he dropped into the club a little over a decade ago, he was a young bachelor, and that young bachelors sometimes visit “for an evening with – what’s that word they use now? – oh yes, les sex friends, that’s it.

“And there’s nothing wrong with that. If you find yourself on your own for a year or so, you might want a regular one of those. Why not?”

Until now, the interview has gone smoothly enough, interrupted only by the barking of Cerise, Hervo’s Yorkshire terrier, at the emergence of the photographer from below.

But then I make a big mistake. Noting the entrance policy favours single women – who are allowed in on evenings otherwise reserved for couples, when single men are banned – I ask Hervo whether she uses them as an enticement for male patrons seeking a threesome with their wives and another partner.

She looks daggers across the table. “That is really a stupid, male, Cro-Magnon thing to say,” she tells me. “It’s very maladroit of you.

“Single women come because they want to have fun, because they could meet a man who pleases them, or a woman, or perhaps neither. Sometimes, it’s just two women friends who come for a drink because they know that here they won’t be bothered and because they will be appreciated because they are pretty.

“When I began here, I didn’t receive single women in the evening, because society considered that a woman who came alone to an establishment like mine was either a whore or a bitch. I fought to make people understand that life does not work like that, and I am proud to say that today I have single women among my customers.”

I ask Hervo if she is a feminist. “I certainly am not a neo-feminist,” she says, explaining that she laughs off wolf whistles in the street, likes being complimented on her looks and wants to “seduce or to be seduced, freely. But I am feminist for some things. I am in favour of women being able to experience pleasure alone at first, to discover their bodies and to enjoy their bodies, and only afterwards to share all that with a partner if they so wish.

“That sort of thing has not always been possible in the past.”

Pointing out that Foucault’s history of libertinage shows how sexual freedoms have come and gone over the centuries in France, I wonder out loud whether the country is shifting back towards greater restraint.

“You’re right, it is,” she says. “The difference is that today, it is not religion that is trying to cover everything up, it’s our moralising society. There is a very prudish scent around these days.”

In a thinly veiled attack on #MeToo, she complains in her book that the social networks have been transformed into “popular tribunals”, that the law has come to treat women “as weak beings which have to be protected” and that the ancestral French game of seduction is being subjected to new codes and new rules.

It is difficult to determine whether the pandemic will brake or accelerate this trend. Some predict that when the crisis ends, we will see a repeat of les années folles (the mad years), as the Twenties were known in France, with a yearning for freedom, parties and libertinage.

Others forecast the continued spread of the Anglo-Saxon-style feminism that Hervo abhors and the curtailment of French love-making and seduction. She is not overly worried, though. On a personal level, she has emerged from years of therapy able to confront her past and look forward to the future, she says. She has become a part-time therapist herself, has a house in the country, where she has spent much of the past year, and is planning to “marry the man I love” this summer.

Even if the moral backlash gathers strength, she thinks that Les Chandelles will continue to triumph.

“There have always been currents and countercurrents, but if society goes one way, people will need a place of liberty where they can do what they want, where they will have the freedom to talk, to exchange.”

Indeed, she believes that her club may even come to play a role similar to that of literary salons in the 18th century, when they nurtured the ideas that helped to topple the ancien régime.

Only in France could there be dreams of Enlightenment amid the shadows of a basement sex club. Les dessous des Chandelles by Valérie Hervo is published by Cherche Midi

[redhoodssweetheart]

Hello Damian

Genre: Angst with happy ending

Relationship: Older!Damian x Gender Neutral!Reader

Requested: A follow up to a request I had (REQUESTS ARE CLOSED)

Word Count: 2.5K

Warnings: Angst with a happy ending

Description:  It’s been seven months since your supposed death Damian’s mother is captured and he learns that you are still alive and living not far from Gotham.

A/N:  Read the story that comes before this: Goodbye Damian

BEFORE

Damian sat in his room staring out the window as a robin flew by.  He snorted at the irony and slowly turned his gaze away from the cloud covered sky.  It seemed like more often than not his days without you seemed cloudy and deprived of sunshine.  It had been seven months since they had buried you, seven months since he thought he saw you standing on the hill in the cemetery.  

He had chased after you, hoping to see you again.  Hoping and praying that it was you watching him from the trees.  But when he reached the spot there was no sign of you.  Only tracks where two people had been standing.  He had frowned when he saw them, one set reminded him of his brother Jason’s favorite pair of combat boots while the others reminded Damian of shoes that you liked to wear.

He had gone back to the manor and back to Bruce saying that he thought it was you, that he was so sure it had been you watching him.  Bruce had merely pulled Damian in for a hug, not sure what to say.  He couldn’t tell Damian that it hadn’t been you because it very well could have been.  Jason said he was going to take you to the cemetery so you could see Damian one more time before starting over a few towns away.

There was a knock on Damian’s door alerting him to another presence.  Alfred poked his head in, “Master Damian, your father wishes to have a word with you.”

Damian nodded and rose to his feet and followed Alfred down the hall toward his father’s study.  He passed Selina on the way and they nodded tersely at each other.  Damian and Selina didn’t hate one another, but they weren’t exactly eager to be in the other’s presence.  They respected each other and understood that both of them cared for Bruce and they weren’t going to debase themselves to petty arguments and the like for Bruce’s sake.  

Alfred gently pushed the door open to Bruce’s study and allowed Damian to enter before closing the door behind him to give father and son some privacy.  “Alfred said you wished to speak with me,” Damian said, his hands folded behind his back.

Bruce was eyeing his son from behind his desk wondering how best to break the news.  “Your mother was captured by the Justice League earlier after trying to steal some information from a government office in Italy.”

Damian nodded his head, unsurprised to hear this, “I take it she’s currently in one of the League’s holding cells.”

“She is, but the Italian government is calling for us to release her into their custody so that they can deal with her accordingly.”

Damian scoffed, “An Italian prison won’t be able to hold my mother.”  Not like one of the League cells could at least.

“The League is aware of this and are currently negotiating terms with the Italian authorities.  I called you here to inform you of this and ask if you wanted to speak with her before anything has been decided any further?”

Damian considered his father’s offer, “I would.  It’s been sometime since I spoke to her.  I should probably see how she’s doing.”

“I’ll call Oliver and tell him, we can be on a plane there tonight if you wish.”  Damian gave a stiff nod and headed back to his room to back a few things before their trip.

The katana went swinging over your head so fast you almost didn’t dodge it in time.  You rolled to the side and quickly hopped back up and went after your assailant.  Jason blocked your attack and grinned at you, “You’re getting better.”

You smirked and shoved him away quickly trying to kick his feet out from under him, but he merely jumped up to avoid the attack.  “I think you’re just becoming too complacent,” you teased.

For the past seven months you had lived in a little cabin on the outskirts of some unknown town that Jason had found.  It wasn’t too far from Gotham, but far enough that you wouldn’t be noticed by anyone.  You worked in a little diner earning meager tips and getting hit on by some of the people there.  Jason stayed with you most of the time, but he would spend the nights at Wayne Manor so he wouldn’t raise suspicions on where he was going all the time.

Most of the time he lied and said that he had a date with some girl just to avoid Damian’s probing.  Jason always thought that Damian was too perceptive for his own good.  When he was with you though his sole focus was on training you to make sure that you could defend yourself whenever he wasn’t around.  The two of you had grown closer and were now more like siblings than the acquaintances that you had once been.

It was nice to have some attachment to your former life in Gotham around.  Jason often brought you news of Damian, though it wasn’t always good.  You knew he sugar coated most of it so you wouldn’t be tempted to go running back to Gotham.  There wasn’t a chance of you doing that though.  This was for your safety as well as Damian.  You couldn’t have him hating his mother if she managed to kill you.  They had a tentative relationship, but she was still his mother.

You managed to knock Jason’s katana away from him, a triumphant smile on your face and he chuckled.  “Okay, enough for today I gotta get ready for work.”

Jason understood and watched you hurry off to get ready for the evening shift at the diner.

Damian stood before his mother's cell.  She was alone on this block and sitting on the cot at the farthest wall staring at her son.  It had been five minutes since his arrival and neither of them had spoken a word to the other.  Finally Talia sighed, “Why so sad Damian?  Afraid of what may happen to your dear mother?”

Damian kept his stoic look, “No, I’m sure whatever punishment they can come up with will be adequate enough.”

Talia cocked her head to the side and studied her son, “You seem different.  Does this have to do with that person you were dating?”

Damian narrowed his eyes at his mother, the first time he had shown any emotion since arriving, “Do not speak their name.”

She grinned, “I had plans to kill them.  They were such a distraction, but then they died and I guess I didn’t have to worry about them anymore.”  Damian clenched his fists.  “Although I did hear something interesting.  A little birdie told me that they saw someone who looked suspiciously like Y/N and Jason in a little town not far from Gotham.  I wonder what they could be doing there.”

Damian stepped closer to his mother’s cell, “Talk.”

AFTER

The bell on the door to the diner where you worked dinged and you called over your shoulder, “Take a seat wherever you’d like, I’ll be with you in a moment.”  You hear retreating footsteps and continued working on the table that had been recently vacated.  When you stood and turned you dropped the tray.  Damian was sitting a few tables behind you just staring, his face unreadable.

One of your coworkers rushed over and started saying your name, but you were hearing her through a filter.  It was almost like you had been submerged in water and everything was muffled.  Damian was here.  Damian was here and he was staring at you.

He knew you were alive.

You wanted to bolt for the door and try to escape, tell Jason to play it off as if Damian had been seeing things, but you knew that would never work.  He was too smart to believe something as simple as that.

“Y/N,” your coworker shook you, her eyes going to the man at the table you were staring at.  The two of you were looking at each other so intensely, but you were shaking.  “Are you okay?  Should I call someone?”

“No Celia,” you finally found your voice.  “I need to clock out early.  Can you cover the last part of my shift?”

“Yeah, yeah go ahead, it’s dead in here anyway,” you winced at her word choice and quickly ducked into the back.

Celia walked over to the man whose eyes had followed your every move.  “Listen, I don’t know who you think you are,” her voice drew his attention away from the door that you disappeared through.  “But you better not hurt Y/N.”

Damian merely smiled at the woman, “Y/N is an old friend, they didn’t know I was coming, I just shocked them is all.”

Celia eyed him skeptically, but nodded and headed to the opposite side of the diner to take care of some more customers that had come in.  Meanwhile you were in the back on the phone with Jason.

“Damian’s here,” your voice shook and you glanced over your shoulder to make sure he hadn’t followed you here.  “How is he here?”

Jason was cursing, “I was just about to call you.  Bruce took him to see his mother, the League captured her and she’s in their custody for the moment.  She told him that you were still alive, how she knew I have no clue.  I was gonna move you, I’ve been getting our things together here, I thought we would have more time.  Y/N, I’m sorry.”

You let out a breath and squared your shoulders, “Well if she’s in custody then there’s no reason for me to be in hiding anymore, and especially if she knew I wasn’t dead.”

“Right, but still this was a big surprise for you.  Are you going to be okay?”  His concern made you smile, he really was like an older brother to you.

“I’ll be fine, I owe him an explanation,” you said.  “I just hope he isn’t too angry.”

“I’ll let you and Damian have some time alone so you can talk.  Just let me know if you need anything and I’ll come running,” he offered.

The two of you said your goodbyes and hung up.  You gathered your things from your locker in the back and waved goodbye to the cook and entered the main portion of the diner again.  Damian was still at the table with a cup of coffee before him.  He was watching the steam rising from the surface before lifting the cup to his lips and taking a drink.

You couldn’t quite believe that he was here and that he knew you were alive.  Sighing, you walked back over to him, “Hello Damian.”

He looked up, his expression unreadable, “Y/N.”

You flinched at the flatness to his voice, “Let’s go somewhere more private.  If we don’t our business will be all over town.”  He stood and followed you out to your car, he watched as you fiddled with your keys wondering what was going through your mind at that moment.

The two of you slipped into your car and took off toward the place you called home.  The first five minutes were quiet as the two of you just sat there not sure who should speak first.  Finally you couldn’t take it anymore and asked, “Are you mad?”

It took him a moment to answer and that had your heart beating wildly in your chest, “At you?  No.  At the others?  A little.”

“We didn’t want to have to do this, Damian,” you glanced at him, but in the darkness you couldn’t see his face well.  “Your dad wanted to protect the both of us.  He wanted to try and protect me and salvage what was left from your relationship with your mom.”

“He should have told me the truth,” Damian’s voice was low as he spoke as if he were trying to hold in his anger as best he could.  “I could have protected you.  You were my partner, and I should have known.  Instead, all of you let me believe that you were dead for seven months.”

“Your mother had to believe I was actually dead,” you argued.  “Would you have been able to do that?”  He was silent.  “Don’t just blame your dad, it was a joint decision, and not an easy one to make at that.”

You had pulled into your driveway now and the two of you just sat there in silence.  Damian was thinking things over, thinking over what he wanted to say to you next.  “Are you going to disappear again?”

“No, not again,” you told him.  “With your mother in custody I think I’m okay for now.”

“Then come home with me,” he said, his gaze turning to you at last.  He reached over and took your hand.  “Be with me again.”

You looked down at your entwined hands and then glanced back up at him wondering if this was a good idea.  “Damian--”

“Please,” his voice broke and he held onto you a little bit tighter.  “I can’t lose you again, not now when I know you’re alive.”

You pulled Damian into your arms and held him tightly, he squeezed you back, both of you relieved to be in each other’s arms again.  “Give me a few more months here.  Let me finish doing things here, I’m training with Jason and I want to complete that and to be honest I’m not ready to dive back into Gotham life again.”

He pulled back and cupped your face in his hands, “I understand, and take all the time you need.  But can I make a request?”

You tilted your head and said, “Depends on what the request is?”

He chuckled, “It’s nothing serious or bad.  I was just going to ask if I can come visit you and maybe help you train?”

You smiled, your heart feeling full, “Yes!  Did you really think I was going to turn you down?”

He shrugged, “I wasn’t sure if you would still want space to kinda come to terms with the fact that I know and that I want you to come back to Gotham with me.”

“I want to come back,” you assured him.  “And I’d love to train with you.  I’m kinda excited to show you my katana skills.  Jason says I’m pretty good.”

He grinned at you, “Yeah?”

“Mmhm,” you hummed and snuggled closer to him.  “Stay tonight?”  You asked, you weren’t ready to let him go just yet, not when you hadn’t held him for so long.

“Of course, don’t think for a second I’m going to leave you for the next couple of days.  I want to hear everything,” he said.  “I want to hear what the last seven months have been going.”

The two of you curled up in your bed together and you just talked.  You told him about the friends you had made and what your job was like.  You told him about your training with Jason and how frustrated you had been at first.  Damian listened while tracing patterns on your back.  And slowly you grew more tired and your words slurred, soon you were asleep and Damian smiled.

Kissing your forehead he whispered, “Goodnight, Y/N,” before closing his eyes and falling asleep himself.

[actuallylorelaigilmore]

TATMILB, CHAPTER 3

Penelope spent her life writing love letters, which didn’t seem like a terrible idea until the letters were mailed out and Schneider received one of them. Hoping to fool their exes, they agree to fake a relationship. But are they lying to everyone around them, or to themselves? aka my To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before-inspired AU.

Penelope x Schneider, ODAAT. available on ao3 with extra author’s notes.

Chapter 3: Penelope tries to bond with Alex during movie night; he and Lydia bring the family’s donations to Goodwill. Schneider returns from vacation and confronts Penelope. She panics.

While Schneider was away with Nikki over the weekend, Penelope splurged on a trip to the movies--luring Alex with the promise of food he didn’t have to sneak in.

She was trying to focus on silver linings instead of her anxieties about Elena, and the upsides included her new availability for Alex. Twice as much parent to go around could only lead to more bonding, right?

He had lobbied for an R-rated comedy, which she was definitely not willing to pay for. On her own, she would’ve headed right for the newest Bradley Cooper drama, but no amount of chocolate could convince Alex to sit through that.

So they compromised on an action movie--which would have the added benefit of covering up the sound of her soda later. Agreeing to buy concessions for Alex didn’t make her a different person. Her discount snacks were better than their overpriced junk, anyway.

He grinned at her over his bucket of popcorn while they waited for the lights to go down, and she considered her bribery a success. See, she could be the cool mom. Even if she had Raisinets in her cargo pants.

“Hey, Mom?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you still miss Max?”

Where did that come from? The question hurt, mostly because it was so unexpected. With Max exiting her life right before Lydia’s stroke, neither Alex or Elena had mentioned him much in the last year. They’d all had other things on their minds.

She let the pain pass by before she answered.

“Yes, Papito, I still do. It’s hard to let go of people you love. Sometimes, a part of you misses them even after you’ve moved on.”

He nodded, sipping his soda.

“Do you think you’ll start dating again anytime soon?”

That question was even more out of character for her son, whose world had been so often self-centered since he first came into it.

Penelope narrowed her eyes at him. “Why are you suddenly so interested in my dating life?”

“I was just wondering.”

”Well, I’m having fun the way things are. You and me, catching a movie on a Friday night, mother and son time with Elena away. Why would I want to date when I could be doing this?”

She grabbed a handful of popcorn and caught the way he cringed. Or flinched. Whatever it was, there was guilt there. Her mom radar went up.

“Alex, what is it? Is something going on?”

“It’s nothing!” He assured her in a rush. “It’s just...I kind of--did have a date.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. You wanted to go out together, so I rain checked it with Chloe for next weekend. But I mean, let’s be real, Mom. This can’t last forever. I’ll go off to college too, or modeling school, whatever, and then who will you hang out with?”

The trailers started playing, just in time, letting her wallow until the movie started.

Penelope couldn’t keep the sadness off her face as she watched Alex settle in with his snacks. He was growing up so fast on her. Too fast. And Elena was practically out of the house already.

She didn’t want to date just to avoid being alone, but hearing that concern from her teenage son? Ouch. So much for being the cool mom.

Now Penelope was glad that they’d picked an action flick. She was ready to watch some stuff blow up.

****

Alex emerged from his room the next morning waving his phone at her.

“Mom, that was the third text I’ve gotten from Elena since she left reminding us to take that stuff to Goodwill.”

“Good morning to you, too,” Penelope replied. 

She was almost out the door, but her son had the luxury of sleeping in on Saturdays until baseball season started. He was taking full advantage of it.

“Seriously, she woke me up--and I need my beauty rest. She’s not gonna stop bugging me until you drop it off.”

“Alex...” Penelope shrugged into her coat, kissing her Mami on the cheek in thanks for the quick cafecito she had substituted for breakfast. “It’s all boxed up, we finished it before she left; it’ll get there.”

“I’m just saying, she’s gonna start texting you next, and I don’t think you’ll enjoy the lectures any more than I do.”

“Well, I’ve got plans with Jill today--and I’m about to be late. Mami?” She raised hopeful eyebrows in Lydia’s direction.

“Hmm?”

“Can you go with Alex to the Goodwill donation dropoff? I won’t be back until dinner.”

“Si, Lupita. Go have fun with your friend, we will handle it.” 

“Great. Thanks. The things I’m getting rid of are in my room, next to the closet.”

“You know, this would be much easier if Schneider had not taken his girlfriend on a vacation.” Lydia frowned. “He could carry much bigger boxes than myself or Papito.”

“Hey, I can lift heavy stuff,” Alex protested. 

“Yes, but you should not have to! You should save your strength for wooing your future wife.” Lydia patted his face.

“Luckily for us--and Alex’s future wife--none of the boxes are all that heavy,” Penelope said. “And there aren’t too many of them. Now, I really have to go. I’ll see you both tonight.”

****

Absorbed in work and school, Penelope didn’t give their Goodwill donations another thought until Tuesday, on her way out of the hospital. The two boxes she’d packed in her room were gone, concluding that chore.

Or so she thought.

Penelope was  digging in her purse for her keys when she saw Schneider striding her way. “Oh, hey! I thought you were gonna be off the grid with Nikki for another couple of days.”

“No, that trip is kind of...over. That whole thing is kind of over.” 

“Again?”

Hurt crossed Schneider’s face before he buried it. He was really good at that, she’d learned--mostly from moments when she was the one hurting him. Way to go, Penelope. 

“I mean, I’m sorry. Are you okay?”

“Eh, I will be. Eventually. It’s not like we were engaged, right?”

Schneider shook his head. “That’s not why I’m here, though. Nikki may have dumped me for one of the jock dads at St. Bibiana’s, but that doesn’t mean I think you and I should blur the lines on the rebound.”

She stared at the creased blue paper he held up as he continued.

“Not that I’m not flattered, obviously. You’re the most badass woman I know, an amazing mom, anybody would be lucky to--”

Penelope’s field of vision narrowed to the letter in his hand, a letter that she definitely recognized. She didn’t hear the rest of his sentence. She could only hear her heart pounding in her ears, making her wonder if she was about to pass out there, next to her car.

How did Schneider get that? What was happening right now?

“I found it slipped under my door when I got home. And honestly, Pen, if you needed to tell me this stuff, you could have just done it in person--we’ve had enough late night chats that nothing’s really off limits at this point.”

She took a deep breath, trying to focus on a technique that worked for her during panic attacks and after nightmares. Since the moment felt like an actual waking nightmare, slowly counting backwards didn’t help much. He was still there. Waiting.

“Schneider, that letter--it’s not what it looks like, I swear. I don’t want to date you. At all. I wrote it because...”

She was still trying to find the words to explain something much too complicated for a parking lot when she saw motion past Schneider’s left shoulder.

Max was exiting the hospital and heading straight for them, holding a bright white envelope in one hand.

It didn’t take a genius to know what he was coming over to say.

Which was good, because Penelope’s mind was not exactly in top condition. It was already a five-alarm fire up in there, and every part of her was screaming I cannot deal with this.

In the fraction of a second she had to consider her options, Penelope acknowledged that the mature response would be to face it now--to explain the situation to her ex-boyfriend and her best friend at the same time.

Or, she decided, as she felt both men’s eyes on her and her palms started to sweat...she could do literally anything else.

Going with her first impulse, Penelope reached up and grabbed Schneider’s shirt with both hands, pulling him toward her. Before Max could get one step closer, she kissed Schneider like her life depended on it.

She couldn’t have explained to anybody why kissing Schneider seemed like a better idea than letting Max think she was still pining over him. Right then, she just needed Max to stay back. To leave them alone. 

Did it work? She wondered. She couldn’t check without breaking off the kiss, but the silence seemed promising.

Of course, the quiet only emphasized the situation she was now in. She was kissing Schneider. She was in a hospital parking lot, a few yards away from her ex-boyfriend, kissing Schneider. 

Pressed against her, Schneider didn’t react. Not after the initial moment, or several more. He let her kiss him, but he didn’t kiss back. And that was fine, Penelope told herself. That was better.

“Thank you,” she said when she let Schneider go. He stood there, flushed and baffled, looking at her like he had never seen her before. 

Though confusion was written all over his face, Schneider nodded. “You’re...welcome?”

Penelope wasn’t willing to push her luck any further. She couldn’t avoid the embarrassment forever, but at least she had managed to postpone it until she got home. She needed time to figure this out.

Without another word, and without glancing back to where Max was probably still holding his own letter, she got into her car and drove home.

****

Her reprieve was brief, not that she’d expected any different. She caught the aroma of dinner as soon as she walked through the door, and barely had time to praise her Mami’s cooking before Schneider arrived.

“Oh, good, Schneider, you are home from your vacación,” Lydia said. “I made enough for you to join us, just in case.”

“Hey,” Alex added from his spot at the table. “You’re back early, right?”

“Yeah, Nikki and I broke up.”

Schneider offered that explanation to Alex, but he was looking at Penelope. She shook her head in response, hoping the tiny movement would go unnoticed by the others. Hoping that Schneider would understand. Not now. Not in front of the family. Please.

His shoulders tensed where he stood, like her silent plea was a blow he had to absorb. But when he finally looked away from her, smiling at Lydia and taking his seat, Penelope knew he would let it go for now. “So you can see why I needed a nice, comforting family dinner this evening.”

“Oh, pobrecito Schneider,” Lydia said, patting his back before she sat down across from him. “You can do better.”

They were waiting for her to settle into her place at the table, but Penelope couldn’t join them until she knew for sure. She headed for her bedroom, straight to the spot where her army duffel would be. 

Or where it used to be.

“Mami?” She returned to the table and sat, trying to sound calm. “What happened to my duffel bag?”

“I don’t know,” Lydia said, pouring herself some rum as though her daughter’s world wasn’t spinning out of control in front of her. “Where did you see it last?”

“I keep it in my closet,” Penelope snapped back. “It’s been there for years. Where did I see it last,” she added in a mutter.

“You do not need to take that tone with me,” her Mami scolded her. “I did not touch your ratty old bag. I do not know where it is.”

“Well, I know I didn’t move it, and it’s gone. So can anybody explain to me how it up and disappeared?”

Lydia thought it over. “I suppose...if it was in your closet...it might be at the Goodwill.”

She clamped down even harder on her temper. “Why would it be at the Goodwill?” 

“As I said, Lupita, I have done nothing wrong. But your boxes were next to the closet. So if it is missing, that may be why.”

“It was just an old duffel bag, right, Mom?” Alex was halfway through his dinner, but he couldn’t ignore the tension in the room. “You can get a new one.”

“Not everything’s replaceable, Alex. That old bag had a lot of memories attached.” She picked up her fork and tried to focus on her food while her mind reeled. It also had five incredibly personal love letters tucked into the inside pocket. Letters she’d never wanted their subjects to read.

Now Max knew she never got over him, and wanted him back. God, after more than a year, how pathetic he must think she was. 

And that didn’t begin to address the other letters. How long until those came back to haunt her, too? What about the man currently watching her while he ate, pretending that he wasn’t? How could she possibly explain any of this to Schneider?

She stabbed at her salad, lost in thought until she was done eating. 

Worried she might snap at him next, even Schneider was quiet during the meal. The scraping of utensils against dishes filled the silence until Penelope cleared her plate and went to her bedroom.

Schneider swallowed loudly after Penelope left, but didn’t offer up his usual attempts to paper over the unease that lingered behind her. 

Instead it was Lydia who broke the silence. “Lupe hasn’t used any of her old bags in years. I do not understand why she is so upset about this one.”

“Maybe she’s going through menopause,” Alex offered up.

Schneider’s fork clattered loudly onto his plate. 

Lydia shook her head. “No, that can’t be the problem, Papito. She is far too young.”

“It can start between the ages of 40 and 50,” Alex argued, ignoring the way Schneider was gaping at him. “Mom’s just inside the window.”

“This is very inappropriate talk,” Lydia scolded him, standing up to clear the rest of the plates.

“Elena wouldn’t stop lecturing me about it, okay? She wanted me to be ready when it happened in case she was moved out already. You know how she never shuts up.”

Schneider left Alex sitting alone to go find Penelope--normally she would be back out with the family after dinner, but if she was going to try this hard to avoid him, she wasn’t giving him much choice. 

With Lydia at the sink and Alex’s face in his phone already, Schneider doubted the others would even notice him gone. 

He tapped lightly on her door. “Penelope?” 

The long silence wasn’t comforting, but eventually he heard a quiet “Come in” and let himself in. 

“Hey,” he said as he shut the door behind him. “You know, Max seemed just as confused as me, back at the hospital. He just sort of stared at me, once you drove off, for the longest five seconds in history, and then he left without saying anything.”

“Yeah?” Penelope was looking at the floor more than him, but he could tell she was listening.

“Yeah. I think he wanted to talk to you too. Which made me even more confused. What’s going on?”

A brisk rap on the door sounded before it opened--not giving either of them time to respond. 

“Mami.”

“It’s time for dessert,” Lydia told them. “What are you two doing in here?”

Penelope ignored the gossipy insinuation in her tone--she knew better than anyone that it was her Mami’s way of hoping something interesting was about to happen, whether it actually was or not. “We were talking about dessert, actually. I was asking Schneider if he wanted to go with me to get ice cream.”

She raised her eyebrows, hoping he would follow her lead. “What do you say? Dessert run?”

Whatever he was thinking, or feeling, Schneider kept it to himself. “Sure, Pen. Sounds good. My treat.”

“Oh, Schneider, you are such a generous man,” Lydia told him with a hand on his arm--laying it on a little thick even by her usual standards. 

“Mami, calm down. It’s ice cream, not new shoes.”

“Lydia, did you want new shoes?” Schneider perked up, and Penelope grabbed him by the arm to pull him past her mom before they could get any ideas. 

“She doesn’t need you to buy her shoes. Let’s go.”

Penelope rushed him to the door with one hand on his back, nudging him forward as she opened it.

She was in such a hurry, she almost shoved him directly into Ben--who was standing on the other side, hand raised to knock. 

“Oh, hey, Penelope. Is this a bad time?”

[onemuseleft]

Okay, okay, but. BUT. can we also get Zhao Yunlan/Shen Wei Blind Date AU?

Okay but: (this got way out of control, sorry)

So Shen Wei doesn’t exactly socialize with his coworkers, per se, but he does attend department meetings and he’s on a couple of committees and there are events meant to foster teamwork and comaraderie. Shen Wei attends exactly as many as he needs to in order to maintain his cover as an awkward but harmless introvert who has few interests outside his research. It’s more than he’d like. 

Anyway, there’s Professor Jiang Yue in the History Department. She’s brilliant, well-respected, and knows more about the history of Dragon City than anyone else in Haixing. She’s one of the few people who doesn’t think his research is entirely hypothetical and often likes to pop by and discuss something she’d recently translated that supports his theories that there may have been “mutants” in history. She’s also terrifyingly outgoing, finds Shen Wei’s deliberate stubborness and not-so-deliberate awkwardness endearing, and has decided he needs a wife. 

Or a husband. She’s open-minded.

Jiang Yue tries to hook him up with two grad students from her department (he declines for ethical reasons, even though they don’t work for him, which he suspects was a test), a young professor from the Literature department, her sister-in-law and a young woman she met at the market. 

This all occurs over a period of about ten days.

In semi-desperation Shen Wei tells her he’s not interested in women, which she takes to mean he is interested in men, but which Shen Wei had meant to mean he wasn’t interested in anyone.

Look, he’s never been good at this sort of conversation, all right? No one’s ever tried to fix him up before. 

Once she’s narrowed down the list of applicants to available young men, Jiang Yue appears to get a little more discerning. At the very least she spaces them out a little further.

(”Men are harder to come by,” she tells him much, much later. “You have to be more discerning. Also I had a bitch of a time pinning down your type.”)

She did, in fact, pin down his type, he just didn’t know it at the time.

Jiang Yue’s new husband is a police officer.

“I met someone at a fundraiser last night,” she says. “He’s very handsome, but the downside is that he knows it. Cleans up quite nice, but he mentioned he had a motorcycle so clearly he’s not afraid of a little excitement. And he had lips that I would have attached myself to were I not a happily married woman.” 

Shen Wei had ducked his head and smiled and agreed that sounded very nice, but he wasn’t interested.

Kunlun’s face had lingered in his mind’s eye; dark, knowing eyes and pink, plump lips that would press against Shen Wei’s own until he could lose himself in their kiss. He’d made up an excuse to leave early and spent the rest of the night unable to ground himself in the present. He’d given up, eventually, let himself fall into the memories in a way he usually won’t allow. He closes his eyes and remembers the way Kunlun would run his tongue over his lower lip when he was thinking about something, the way his lips would be pink and swollen from Shen Wei’s kisses, the way his mouth moved when he called Shen Wei baobei and Xiao Wei. (The way those lips looked wrapped around Shen Wei’s cock, eyes gazing up at him with a wicked glint in them as he made Shen Wei shudder and come apart beneath him). The way they felt in the dry mountain air, soft and just a little chapped as Kunlun brushed them over Shen Wei’s temple - the last kiss before the Hallows separated them for a hundred lifetimes.

He’s a little more brusque than he really needs to be the next time she mentions a potential date but he can’t bring himself to regret it.

There is a brief cooling-off period in which Shen Wei thinks he has communicated his lack of romantic interests quite clearly and she has decided to respect that and back off. 

He hasn’t communicated shit, it turns out she just thinks he’s not quite over an ex and is giving him some room to breathe. She’s right, of course.

“We’re having a little dinner party,” Jiang Yue says one day while they’re allegedly meeting for the efficiency committe, but really everyone is just gossiping about some rumors that the Chancellor is going to make them start submitting online lesson plans. Shen Wei wants to be outraged but he doesn’t even know how that would work. He makes a mental note to ask Li Qian. “We just bought our new house and we’re having some friends over. You should come!”

He’s flattered for half a second and then remembers who he’s dealing with. “Who are you trying to fix me up with?”

It’s the same cop. Apparently he’s friends with her husband even though they don’t work in the same department anymore. “He got promoted a couple years ago, but they still talk and hang out sometimes. He was at the wedding, apparently, but I was so nervous I don’t remember anything but staring into my husband’s eyes.” She smiled a little dreamily, then added, “That and my mother-in-law getting drunk and passing out in the photographer’s lap.”

He does not go to dinner.

She mentions a young man from the bookstore, and spends a few days dropping hints about Professor Chan in the archaeology department (he has a boyfriend, Shen Wei’s met him) before the cop comes up again.

She’s never been this persistent, usually taking his refusals as a challenge to do better next time. Shen Wei is wavering. If he says yes and it’s awful then maybe she’ll stop.

And it will be awful. Shen Wei feels faithless even contemplating it.

“He’s a department chief,” Jiang Yue says in a tempting voice one afternoon toward the end of the semester. “Apparently the youngest ever. He took down a bunch of Triad bosses a few years ago and saved a bunch of people’s lives and now he’s, like, the second most powerful person in the DCPD.”

That jiggles something at the back of Shen Wei’s mind. “What’s his name?” he asks. It’s been several years since he worked with the SID, and he never had any close associates with the main DCPD but something about what she’s saying rings a distant bell.

“His name is Zhao Yunlan,” she says, excited that he’s shown some sort of interest. “I told him about you and he said I could give you his number if you were interested-”

“Absolutely not,” Shen Wei says in a dull roar.

He spends five minutes apologizing and then pretends to have a headache that he can blame his rudeness on.

Jiang Yue lets the whole thing drop after that, not just her attempts to fix him up with Zhao Yunlan, but the match-making in general. 

He feels bad about not feeling bad about it.

Everything goes back to normal though, aside from the matchmaking, so he’s reasonable certain she isn’t upset with him.

And then a few months go by and she mentions her husband is coming to pick her up for dinner. It’s getting late and it’s fairly dark out, even with the streetlights, so he offers to walk with her. Jiang Li is waiting for them on the sidewalk and he gives his wife a quick kiss, and holds his hand out to Shen Wei. “Professor! It’s been a long time. How are you?”

Shen Wei’s not great at chit-chat, but he taks Jiang Li’s hand and says something.

He’ll never remember what, because at that moment he happened to look over Jiang Li’s shoulder, and saw Kunlun.

Kunlun.

He can’t move, he can’t think, he can barely breathe. His eyes are locked onto the man leaning against the Jiangs’ car and he can’t tear them away. He’s positive if he looks away, Kunlun will vanish like a soap bubble, or turn into another person entirely

It has to be someone else. A trick of the light, his mind playing games with him. A similarity, a distant descendant whose blood ran true, a coincidence.

He stares until his eyes burn, but Kunlun remains.

He’s as beautiful as Shen Wei remembers.

Kunlun is dressed in modern clothes: heavy black leather boots, tight fitting denim pants that do nothing to disguise his lean calves and muscular thighs. He’s wearing a grey shirt beneath a black leather motorcycle jacket. His hair is short, in the modern fashion, brushed forward so it almost falls over his eyes, and his beard is little more than scruff, a carefully groomed five o’clock shadow.

He’s sucking on a candy, the same kind he gave Shen Wei that first night. The same candy that belonged to the scrap of paper Shen Wei carried in the pendant over his heart.

He’s too far away for Shen Wei to see his eyes. 

And then Kunlun looks up at him.

And smiles politely, with no sign of recognition.

And looks back down at his phone.

The Jiangs leave but not before Jiang Yue leans in and whispers “I told you he was gorgeous, didn’t I?” and laughs in a friendly way at his stunned expression.

After they leave, Shen Wei stands there, watching the car vanish from sight, Kunlun, his Kunlun, vanishing with it, gone as soon as he was found again.

His Kunlun, who is, apparently, Zhao Yunlan, the son of a monster. Somehow. Reincarnation, or - the lollipops, the gun, baobei. Shen Wei has long entertained the idea that Kunlun had been familiar with the modern day, possibly a time traveler - the Hallows were near-infinite in their power, when used properly and combined. Perhaps Kunlan had always been Zhao Yunlan. Perhaps he looked at Shen Wei with eyes devoid of recognition because… Because this was the man who would become Kunlun, but wasn’t yet the man Shen Wei loved.

“Fuck,” Shen Wei said, softly but with great feeling, and went to send Jiang Yue an email asking her for that date after all.