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evergone · 7 months ago

Text

Rumours

Theodore Nott x Reader

Warnings: swearing.

Description: Theo and the reader aren't particularly close friends until a storm terrifies the reader, and Theo has to take her to her room. Scandal ensues.

Night began to ride in on the back of a storm and through the large windows looking out into the lake you could see schools of fish swimming further down to hide amongst the weeds and mud below the dungeon. Wrapped in a large cream coloured goat’s wool blanket, and layered in both a brown cotton jumper and your green-lined robe, you found warmth by the crackling fireplace as you sped through your Potions homework, well aware that you would never get it completely finished by Monday when it was due. Vanilla and chamomile candles lit themselves around the long common room and their scent wafted through the space, mixing with the smell of the burning wood and adding to the all-encompassing sense of home.

Lightning struck the lake, the first of what would be many times that night, and you waited anxiously for the oncoming thunder. It broke out from a whimper to a roar, so loud it shook the common room, and the two green glass bottles sat atop the elaborate stone mantelpiece of the fireplace swayed into each other with a quiet ‘clink!’ as if making a toast. Stress seized your mind, and while you contemplated moving away from the windows, you couldn’t find it in yourself to get up. Just about frozen from phonophobia, as well as from your complete mortification at the thought that someone unkind could discover this fear, you scribbled over your homework parchment absentmindedly.

As another bolt of lightning met with the lake, the entrance to the common room swung open and the ever-familiar voice of your dearest friend, Pansy Parkinson, and some of your other housemates disturbed the mostly silent space. Gaze transfixed on your homework, you didn’t notice them make their way across the deep green and shining silver mosaic floors until Theodore Nott overly fondly pushed you further to the edge of the lounge you were on and stole half of the blanket from you as he sat down. Thunder raged again in the gloomy, storm-charged atmosphere, twice as loud as the groups’ conversation and your body tightened to a tense.

As Theo made himself more comfortable, he threw you an awkward smile as a swift apology for invading your personal bubble.

The two of you were hardly friends, just friends-of-friends, and it was for no reason other than the convenience of the group that you were ever in each other’s company. Occasionally, there would be a free period that you’d both spend in the library and whoever had gotten there first would wave the other over and you’d sit together, but you’d only ever do your homework quietly across from each other. No chatting, no socialising, not even a ‘how are you liking the weather?’ You were fine with this, though, as both Theo and yourself were private people. Or, at least, you pretended to be fine with the unspoken arrangement.

“You okay?” he asked, interrupting your train of thought when his hand met the section of blanket covering your knee, and the earthly wonders he had for eyes met yours.

He must have felt you when you tensed.

Simplicity was an attribute of Theo’s that you truly admired and adored. He never said a word more than he needed to. You shook your head meekly like a shy child on her first day in kindergarten. Mascara seemed the only barrier stopping you from turning your lashes into a lawn covered in morning dew — you wouldn’t be seen having it run down your face, how would you possibly hide that from the judgemental eyes of the Slytherin population? Seeming to disregard your nonverbal response as a lie, Theo waved his wand and the snake-patterned blackout curtains fell over the windows, putting a distance between the common room and the outside world.

“Is it the noise?” he guessed in a hushed tone, careful not to draw the attention of any of the others.

“Mhm,” you hummed as your cheeks reddened (Merlin be damned for letting him of all people figure you out), “Could you get Pansy to walk me to my room?”

Over on the other lounge, Pansy sat preoccupied in Draco’s lap, twiddling her short black hair between her pointer and her thumb, and laughing in an obnoxious manner at a story Blaise had started to tell almost twenty minutes earlier in the courtyard. It was some long reach piece of gossip about one of those Weasley kids — Fred? George? One of the other ones whose names Theo couldn’t remember for the life of him? He hadn’t really been paying much attention. Rested in the back pocket of Pansy’s jeans was Draco’s hand, holding her firmly on top of him. Safe to say, Theo wouldn’t be pulling those two apart inconspicuously.

“I’ll take you,” he told you.

Softly, he abandoned the blanket that once sheltered you from the nibbling chill of the late-Spring air and stood up. Both Blaise and Draco noticed this and each raised a pitch black or platinum blonde brow respectively as a questioning gesture of Theo’s motives as he held his hand out to help you up. With Theo as your guide and support, you made your way up to your room, stopping halfway up the stairs when another bang of thunder made you jump and he had to grab your forearms to make sure you didn’t fall over. You apologised awkwardly, and avoided his gaze as best you could while cherishing every moment in which his hands were on you.

At your door, you made sure to thank him profusely and honoured him with an I-owe-you which he refused to acknowledge. After ensuring you would be okay, he returned to the common room and sat in the seat he had left. Blaise had made himself comfortable where you’d once been, and the entire group stopped their conversation in favour of silence.

“The fuck was that?” Draco asked loudly.

Thunder continued to rumble overhead in the grey of the storm, adding to the grandeur of the Slytherin common room that Draco’s obscenity disregarded. Unbothered and unwilling to explain your personal troubles to the king of being the opposite of understanding, Theo just shrugged in response, and focused in on the black-furred cat that had made its way into their area as he listened to the storm as if it were music.

“Oh, shit…” Pansy said, the realisation that you had been scared by the storm finally hitting her, “I gotta go.”

Leaving Draco with an affectionate peck on the cheek, Pansy retreated upstairs, likely to go take care of you, Theo presumed. In her wake, Draco and Blaise erupted into questions. A muddle of ‘are you guys dating?’s and ‘actually what the fuck’s and ‘I didn’t even know you liked her’s were thrown at Theo who had no ulterior motives behind taking you upstairs, he had just done so out of the simple kindness of his heart. Slytherins being Slytherins, however, couldn’t fathom that he would do anything purely out of kindness. Kindness didn’t come naturally in a house dedicated to ambition and self-preservation.

“You like her, Theo, admit it.”

“Shove off, Draco,” Theo spat, pulling the blanket back over himself, “You don’t know anything.”

“Defensive!” Blaise laughed and poked his friend’s shoulder, “You are the closest to her out of all of us guys.”

Truthfully, you and Theo did spend an awful lot of time together. But that was only out of consequence, the fact that you both thoroughly enjoyed reading meant you were both always in the library looking through the hundreds or possibly thousands of leather-bound books, and you seemed to frequently happen upon each other. Outside of the library, your time was limited only to group activities because you sat next to Pansy or Daphne Greengrass in almost every class you shared with Theo and never spoke to him. He didn’t think anything of your time together. Surely, there wasn’t much to think. Right? The pair of you — no, there wasn’t any “pair” to begin with, say, the individuals of you, yes, that’s right, the individuals. The individuals of you were just happy acquaintances, nothing more.

The fire was hardly big enough to keep Theo warm against the backdrop of a fiercely windy night that had turned even the secluded dungeons cold. Even under all its fur, the cat who had made itself comfortable right up next to the flames looked still to be shivering in the crisp air. It jumped up off the floor, where the stone mosaics weren’t warming up at all, and squished itself between Blaise and Theo.

“You know, she barely even talks to us,” Draco started, “We’re her friends, of course, but when Pansy or Daphne or you aren’t there she goes all quiet.”

“And she clearly trusts you, whatever that whole thing was—” Blaise made circular motions with his arms to refer to Theo taking her to her room— “She didn’t trust any of us with it.”

Theo huffed, “She wanted Pansy, but she was busy with his hand on her ass, I had an…” He searched for the right word, “Obligation to help.”

“Because Theodore Nott is renowned for helping people,” Draco scoffed, his tongue dripping with sarcasm.

By the time you were crouched over a table in the library the next morning, making a desperate last-ditch effort to complete that Potions homework before third period, the storm had subsided. Unfortunately for you, your most outspoken friend, Daphne, had brought with her a storm of her own.

“I heard a rumour,” Daphne began as she pinned her blonde side fringe back behind her ear.

“Oh, here we go!” Pansy sighed.

Numerous scrolls of parchment were littered over the desk in the library that the three of you had made your own and Pansy was sorting frantically through them looking for all the ones with her handwriting on them — she couldn’t even remember the amount she had written on. Stacks of books on the fundamentals of potions, charms and transfiguration threaded themselves between the scrolls and threatened to fall as her inattentive sorting had her reaching over and around them sloppily. With a creak, you leaned back in your chair taking a blind gander under the desk to find another three scrolls forgotten on the elephant print, medieval-style rug that covered the wooden floors and handed them to her.

“According to hearsay, you and Theo are having some kind of fling,” Daphne continued, “Care to comment, Y/n, my dear friend?” She held a fist out towards to mimic a reporter holding a microphone.

“Who told you that?” You asked, furrowed brows adorning your face like a weighted crown as you slapped her hand away.

She shrugged then took her own scrolls which were contained in a pile on a separate but close-by desk, and put them into the spacey grey-black satchel slung over her shoulder. Clock striking the hour, your two companions bid you adieu as they headed for Ghoul Studies. Unsure whether she had found all her scrolls, Pansy took one last glance at the desk before giving up altogether, stating that if she didn’t have it then it surely wasn’t important.

Left alone to drown in your inability to finish this Merlin-darned homework, your mind wandered to the somewhat unsavoury rumour concerning yourself and Theo that was supposedly making the rounds. Details of the night prior came back in sections, split up by bursts of terror ignited by the loud storm. Most of your memories were from the latter half of the night, curled up in Pansy’s arms singing to the wizarding hits of the last five or so decades. However, the earlier moments lingered on your side and your hand — the everlasting effects of Theo’s touch. By Salazar, what you wouldn’t give to feel him again.

As if your thoughts were summons, the very boy with whom you were engaged in the beginnings of a tumultuous scandal entered your space in the library. Drawing back the chair Pansy had once claimed beside you, Theo sat down, and set some parchment and ink on the desk alongside your books and half-finished assignments. He ran a hand through his tawny brown curls, breaking his near-perfect side part as his chest rose and fell with every heavy breath.

“You look exhausted,” you smiled, taking notice of his sweat slicked forehead.

You’d never started a conversation with him before.

“I spent the morning playing quidditch with Draco,” he said with a hint of anger.

You laughed gently and missed as the sound lit a spark in Theo’s eyes, convincing him to move his seat closer to yours. Surrounding the two of you was an air as warm as a campfire at school camp, or the fireplace under stockings on Christmas Day, or the oven after baking a fresh loaf of bread. Burdened by your workload, you dug straight back into your tasks, but Theo had other ideas. Parchment was less hardy than paper, and so your homework scroll was starting to fray, piquing his interest as he took a lose thread between his fingers and toyed with it. Eyes slimmed, brow raised, you sent him a look of confusion.

“Let’s not do our work today,” he announced.

“And do what instead?” You questioned, already having disregarded your quill in the inkpot, turned wild by the promise of adventure.

Easily, Theo stood up and raised his arms to stretch out his tall spine letting a set of cracks run down it from his shoulders to his hips. The black band of his underwear exposed itself as his white button-up school shirt lifted above his belly button, and you caught yourself mid-stare at his happy trail. He made a place for himself behind your chair, his upper body leant over your head like a tree you were using for shade as he inspected the shelves full of ancient books before you. If you had died right there, you would certainly have died happy.

He was looking for something to impress you (though he couldn’t exactly justify why he’d become suddenly inclined to do such a thing), something that would gain your attention, something he could recommend so you could go back to him to talk about it. For him to find that, you would have to leave the education section in favour of the leisure section. He held his hand out to assist you in standing for the second time in less than twenty-four hours, and you took it again; his high body temperature, and calm but bored aura encompassed you at the touch of your palms. When he let go, he waved the very same hand over your belongings to cast a spell that would pack everything into your brown leather shoulder bag that was leaning idly on the leg of your chair.

“Give me a sec,” he whispered, cautious of Madam Pince’s omni-audient ear.

There wasn’t a single book he could think of that he didn’t know you had already read. Always the avid reader, you were, from the moment you learnt the alphabet it seemed you couldn’t live without a book in one hand and a pencil for annotating in the other. When he finally came across something he thought you’d like, a compilation of poetry by some witch named Winters, he hurried back to lead you elsewhere.

You followed him like a stray puppy would follow the scent of food, and he took you outside to sit below two wych elms whose branches were tangled like lovers. Blooming expanses of creeping thyme coloured the soles of your shoes a pale pink-purple as you crushed them under your feet; you would be ever grateful for the house elves when they cleaned it off for you. Pollen tickled your nose and pricked your eyes, the sun’s rays created a sheen of light across the Black Lake, and the skies had cleared completely, leaving a blue vastness to watch over the castle.

Theo laid down and passed you the poetry book, “For you.”

Taking it from him and flipping through the pages, you nodded your thanks and rested your head on the ground next to him. Human silence overcame the little space you two had made for yourselves and the sounds of nature, birds chirping, bees buzzing, leaves rustling, were the only things left to be heard anywhere near. In the distance, there was a faint echo of classes being taught, but so far away that it you wouldn’t be able to hear it unless you strained yourself immensely.

“Did you finish that potions homework?” Theo asked.

Another laugh escaped your mouth, “When have I ever finished potions homework on time?” You said with a newfound confidence, “Snape takes five house points from me in every class.”

An amused close-lipped smile spread across his face, “And here I’ve taken you away from your studying.”

“I wouldn’t have done it anyway,” you sighed, content with your predicament.

Frost-speckled grass kissed your cheek as you turned to look at him, the remnants of Winter still lasted so far into Spring. Theo turned as well, taking in every scar, freckle and acne bump that was blessed by belonging to you.

“Let’s read this together,” you said, and opened to the first page of the book he had found for you.

“No!” He rushed out, stealing it back, and placing it on the other side of him.

Confusion danced a ballet over your soft features while a blush spun savagely over his strong, sharp traits. One of your arms, your right that was furthest away from him, reached across his body in blind hope to find the gift he had so abruptly rescinded. The mole above his mouth slinked forward as he bit his bottom lip, and slid the book under the curve of his back so you’d never be able to grab it. Nevertheless, you flipped onto your stomach and shot your hand underneath him, crumbling as you got stuck under his weight.

“What are you doing?” You giggled, “Why can’t I read it?”

“I want to get it right,” explained Theo, “I picked this out on a whim, give me some time to choose something better suited for you, yeah?” You frowned so he quickly added, “Please?”

Under long lashes that appeared almost naked without the layers of mascara you usually covered them with, your enthralling e/c irises stared at him, teleporting him into the mazes of your mind where he intended to get lost. Retracting your frown and wriggling your arm out from underneath him, you lazed the side of your forehead against his shoulder which, to both yours and Theo’s surprise, struck up an affectionate sensation in your chests. From your position you could feel the way his heart pushed and pulled the blood through his veins and arteries, the tender ‘dun-dun’ of his heartbeat causing his whole body to pulse to an organised rhythm.

Five years you had known Theo and while one wouldn’t be wrong to call you associates, I must reiterate that you were never really friends. Seeing him in the library during your corresponding free periods was nice, you supposed, but you suddenly realised that you hated how far you drifted outside of the library’s book-covered walls. The previous night had been the first time in what was likely forever that you had spoken exclusively to one another without the guidance of a third party. Really, you just wanted to get to know him better, see the sides of him that didn’t show during a dead-silent hour alone in the library.

“Well, since you asked so politely,” you said with a sincere smile.

Theo opened his mouth to respond but was cut off before he was given the chance by Daphne’s high-pitched, intrusive voice screaming at you from across the field of creeping thyme, “You whores are never beating these allegations!”

Her volume gave you half a heart attack and you jolted upright, deserting Theo’s shoulder, and glancing over your own to see Daphne approaching the two of you with Blaise, Pansy, Draco, Tweedledum and Tweedle-dee on her heel. Clearly, the bell had rung for break, but between your great library escape and book shenanigan, neither of you had cared to check the time. How the others had found you was beyond your capacity to think as you waited for your heart to settle and your forehead to cease sweating following Daphne’s ear-piercing entrance.

“What allegations?” He asked her, thick eyebrows glaring, not at her, but at the content of her conversation.

“Y/n didn’t tell you?” She said, “You’ve been swept up in a scandal. Everyone thinks you guys are getting it on.”

Vulgar motions were made with her hands, sending Crabbe and Goyle into a bout of immature laughter. Flushed red with embarrassment, you avoided the look Theo was more-than-likely throwing your way by connecting your own line of vision with Pansy’s. She bit her tongue, widened her eyes, and nodded harshly in Theo’s direction, urging you to look at him. But you were so terribly embarrassed that you took to your feet, and ran away from your friends, ignoring them as they called out for you to come back.

You found the first broom closet that would open at the utterance of ‘Alohomora,’ and found solace in the cramped, yet perfectly concealed hiding spot. As your hands came up to cover your eyes, the humiliation of, not only the rumour, or the fact that you were caught in such a compromising position with Theo, but of the fact that you had fooled yourself into starting to think that you and Theo were building something, overcame you. Once you decided the coast would be clear, and your friends would have all returned to their classes, you opened the broom closet door, your eyes stinging with the remains of tears.

Standing before you with a look of knowing and understanding that was so much beyond friendliness, was Theo. His hands were in his pockets, and he had slung both your bag and his own over his wide shoulders.

“How did you find me?” You said quietly, and wiped your eyes, hoping you could hide their inevitable redness.

“The others were headed to Potions, but I heard you sobbing, and thought I should wait until you were ready to come out,” he responded just as softly.

“Why would you do that? You know Snape doesn’t take late homework submissions! You’re coming third-in-class!” You exclaimed.

Worry flashed behind your eyes, and he quickly leant down, and reached out to cup your face in his large, calloused hands, “Hey, hey, it’s alright! I took you away from your study first, Y/n, it’s only fair that we both fail.”

That classic frown of yours graced your beautiful features, and Theo had to withhold the urge to sigh with infatuation. It was a blessing to behold you, even when your cheeks and eyes were so puffy and irritated, and your nose was beginning to run a little. However gross it was was eclipsed by how perfect you were.

“Why are you so upset, huh?” He asked you in a gentle tone.

A small sniffle preceded your reply, “There’s this tasteless rumour about us, and I was just starting to realise how much I like being around you, and now it’s all ruined!”

Theo laughed his mellifluous, musical laugh which frustrated you into an even deeper frown, then he said, “A stupid rumour couldn’t ruin us.”

Glancing up at him, you allowed your frown to soften. He had said ‘us.’ What in the world did that mean? What, or who, was ‘us?’ Did he mean the two of you? Your thoughts ran as rampant and crazy as they had earlier when he first proposed the idea of skipping out on your study period. Quickly, you began to hypothesise all sorts of meanings and justifications for his choice of words.

“And, for the record, I love being around you, too,” he said.

Without warning, your body became charged with that uncharacteristic confidence that had only started to appear the night before, and you leant in to place your forehead on Theo’s. He looked downright idiotic from that angle, but you saw firsthand how his line of vision flickered down to your lips, and back up to your eyes. And you thought, if people must think you’re messing around with someone, you wouldn’t want it to be anyone else.

“Would you like to — Do you want to…?” You had read hundreds of books on romance, but still you couldn’t think of the words.

“Can I…?” Neither, it seems, could he.

You placed your hand on the back of his neck, and pulled him in. His lips were were raging fires, yours were wax, melting at the touch of heat. Notes of nutmeg and cypress hit your nose — his cologne. His hands gripped your waist, just lower than could be written off as friendly, and he kissed you so passionately that any onlooker would think the rumours so obviously confirmed.

Eventually, he pulled away, and you just stared at each other in total wonder. There was no way you could possibly discredit those rumours now.

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bunni-v1 · 1 year ago

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Aommgg

Could I request the nrc staff + grim finding out you‘re a girl (plantonic)?

Or do they all know straight from the start?

TW: None

Info: Crowley, Grim, Sam, Cruel, Trien x Reader (Platonic)

🍓Hello lovely! I didn't want to make a whole long post about this, but I do want to talk about it. I'm so glad you asked! So the staff is... made aware of the situation, obviously. But, I think I'll go a little into depth on how each member deals with this information.

Crowley knows because... well... he sees you out of the ceremonial robes before anyone else does. He handles it as well as he does every other issue he comes across. "Just cover it up!" Famously said by Crowley. He's not unkind though, he does ensure that you get the help you need and he makes sure you keep what you need hidden, well, hidden. But... he won't do more than the bare minimum unless his hand is forced. Like... with Scarabia, he pretty much threatened the whole dorm with expulsion if they so much as uttered a word to anyone but amongst themselves. He is, unsurprisingly, not a father figure to you. He's more like... you're weird quirky uncle that you like, but only in small doses.

Grim, our little guy, finds out at the same time as Crowley... and he's a little harder to convince to keep his mouth shut to start. He doesn't like you, okay, you stole his position at NRC (like he had a chance at all). With a few well-placed cans of tuna from both you and Crowley, he keeps his little rat mouth shut. However, when you're actually granted studentship as NRC? His tune changes. It changes because Crowley holds his position as a student over his head, but it changes. Not a SINGLE person will ever hear you're a woman from Grim. He can't lose this position, not after so much work to get where he's gotten to. Besides, he grows to really love you! You're family to him, and no one out family. Seriously, he's so protective of it, once Ace and Deuce figure it out they're too scared to talk because of Grim's looming presence.

Sam is the first member of Staff to find out, other than Crowley. How? Crowley's sudden interest in pads, tampons, birth control, and all the fun stuff that comes with being a woman. Sam usually would just shrug his shoulders and excuse Crowley's quirky behavior, but then you come in looking like a lost deer and he gets it. He is genuinely so nice to you though! If you ever feel unsafe on campus, you talk to Sam and he'll handle it for you, okay? Sure, he jacks up the prices on your feminine products, but it's considerably less than his normal prices. Hell, if you're short, he'll "suddenly" remember he's got a discount on those items. He's like a cool older brother, honestly. He lets you hang out in the back of the shop and do homework when you ask, and he gives you snacks at a discount when you're there!

Crewel doesn't really treat you any differently than anyone else. Admittedly though, he's fond of you, even if you're a troublemaker. When you come into his class on your first day in a uniform six times too big for you, he feels pity for you. You didn't ask to be here, and now you have to wear that atrocious old uniform? You poor little pup. He's not exactly easy on you, but he's more understanding of your mistakes. Eventually, after you get to know him better, he offers to get you a nicer uniform and also privately tutor you. This is his excuse for keeping you busy so that you don't have as many chances to get found out, and it's also because you are horrifically failing his class and it looks bad on him.

Trien treats you the most differently out of everyone on staff. The SECOND he found out you were a girl and were being forced to hide that fact for Crowley's sake? Oh my god, grandpa was PISSED. Crowley got an EARFUL after that meeting. This man makes it his mission to make your stay as comfortable as he possibly can make it because sevens know Crowley won't be doing SHIT. After he meets you? Oh my god, you remind him of his own girls when they were little. He absolutely adores you, and everyone can tell. It's so odd to the other students because he clearly favors you, and when they ask you about it you've got no clue. He is your dad here at NRC, as out of character as that might be. You are a young woman lost in a world that is not kind to you going through so much more than you need to. He doesn't want to add more to your plate. You can come to him for anything and he will provide as best as he can.

Vargas (I'm sorry for forgetting about him lol) is a lot like Crewel in the fact that he doesn't treat you too differently from his other students. You're still made to push yourself to your upper limits for gym, still expected to keep up with your peers, and still expected to meet his general expectations. However, if it's way too much for you to do, out of fear of Crowley and Trien breathing down his neck, he'll lessen your load. Otherwise, he doesn't really have much chance to be around you outside of class. He finds you amusing and knows you've got a good head on your shoulders, but that's about it from him.

#bunni babbles 🍓#twst #twisted wonderland #twst x reader #twisted wonderland x reader #bunni's treats 🧁#x reader #crowley x reader #sam x reader #trein x reader #mozus trein #twst crewel #crewel x reader #twst crowley #twst sam #twst grim #vargas x reader #twst vargas

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sarahpetersonruiz · 2 years ago

Text

SARAH RUIZ

BIRTH NAME : Sarah Sofía Ruíz

ALIAS / NICKNAME : Mariposa (Butterfly in Spanish). Used by her mom when she was little.

AGE : 36

DATE OF BIRTH : 4th October 1987

PLACE OF BIRTH : East Haven, VT

HOMETOWN : East Haven, VT

TIME IN EAST HAVEN : 36 years. Born and raised, baby.

RESIDENCE : Sutherland Park

TW : teen pregnancy, alcohol

EDUCATION : BA (Hons) in American Literature & Creative Writing

OCCUPATION : Manager at Book Haven

GENDER : Female

PRONOUNS : She/Her

SEXUALITY : Questioning

FACECLAIM : Aubrey Plaza

HAIR COLOR : Brunette

EYE COLOR : Brown

HEIGHT : 5'7

LANGUAGES : English, Spanish

TATTOOS : A quote from her favourite poet, Dorothy Parker, inside her wrist - "To hell, my love, with you"

PIERCINGS : Ears

POSITIVE TRAITS : Intelligent, fiercely loyal, honest

NEGATIVE TRAITS : Reclusive, intimidating, sarcastic

PHOBIAS : Water, spiders

FEARS : Losing her siblings, dying in East Haven

HOBBIES : Reading, writing poetry, drinking

HABITS : Drumming her fingers, smoking, rolling her eyes

FATHER : Mateo Ruiz

MOTHER : Lucía Lopez

SIBLINGS : Three (two sisters and a brother - all younger)

PARTNERS : None

CHILDREN : None

PETS : A ginger cat called Simon

BIOGRAPHY

Early Life

When Sarah was a child, her teachers used to call her Matilda. She wasn't magical, and she didn't have a principal who would throw her around by her pigtails, but she had a love for education that even the adults thought was peculiar. Instead of grazing her knees playing tag like the rest of the kids her age, Sarah sat at the side with a book in her hand, creating a new world for herself.

Her home life could, at times, be compared to Matilda's. Her father left when Sarah was four. She remembered it vividly, because he had taken her to the park and hesitated to make conversation over a melting ice cream cone. It was the first time they had properly spent time together - she just didn't realise it would be the last. Sarah's mother, Lucía, didn't deal with it well. She drank, cried, and drank some more. At first, Sarah tried to help her, but she knew when she wasn't wanted. Instead, she just fell back into the books. At least the words would never leave her.

Sarah's mom eventually got over her father the way most women do - by getting under another man. And another. And another. It was like a revolving door of men with loose ties, reddening cheeks and tousled hair leaving their small apartment. Occasionally, Sarah would end up eating breakfast with one, staring blankly at them across a plate of eggs.

It wasn't a complete loss, however. Sarah eventually gained three siblings. They all had different fathers, but it didn't matter to her. Sarah was fiercely protective over her siblings, and she felt it was her duty to protect them from harm.

Teenage Years

It was strange how someone could go from being a Matilda in elementary school to being "uncooperative and unkind" in high school, according to her teachers. As Sarah got older, she became more and more disillusioned with the world of East Haven. The people were fake, and her high school was filled with people who would either be waitresses or bank tellers in ten years. But her? She knew she was bigger than East Haven. She imagined writing beautiful books of poetry which would sell millions of copies and make her well-known around the world. She didn't care much about fame, but the idea of making enough money so her family could live comfortably was exciting to her. The cracks were beginning to show in her home. Her mother went on benders which sometimes lasted up to a week or longer. When she did return, she was so hungover she wasn't seen for another couple of days. This left looking after her younger siblings to Sarah. She bathed them, fed them, did their homework with them and dropped them off at school. When her mother was there, she and Sarah often got into explosive fights which usually ended up with one of them leaving with only a slammed door behind them.

It didn't help that Sarah was known as a freak in school. It turned out that being naturally quiet and keeping your nose in a book wasn't as normal as she once thought. Kids would pick on her, often tripping her up in the corridor or stealing her books and ripping pages out. She didn't let it bother her - she just went back to her fantasies about finally getting out of East Haven and leaving the shit-for-brains in high school.

Him.

Despite trying her best not to care about the people around her, Sarah fell hard for one of the people she should hate the most - the captain of the football team. It was like a sad teen movie from the early-2000s. He was called Caleb, and Sarah was head over heels from the moment she laid eyes on him. Maybe it was because he was the only one who didn't pick on her. Maybe it was because he smiled at her in the hallway when everyone else looked through her. Maybe it was because they had been secretly hooking up ever since she had been paired to tutor him. Who knows? He dominated all of her thoughts, and she couldn't wait for the day that he told his friends and they could finally be open about their relationship. Only, of course, that day never came. Instead, he got with Samantha, a cheerleader who Sarah was almost certain was the first human being to possess no human thought. Caleb never smiled at her in the hallway again.

College Days

Sarah had been accepted at a variety of colleges which included Brown and NYU. She had been anxiously debating which to go with, when she got the news. Her youngest sister, who was only sixteen, had gotten pregnant. Instead of fulfilling her wishes of moving to a different state and finally becoming the person she knew she was supposed to become, Sarah stayed in East Haven and went to the local college so she could help her sister. What was three more years, anyway?

Present Day

Sarah never ended up leaving East Haven. She helped her sister raise her nephew with no help from their AWOL mother. She worked her way up to manager at Book Haven despite graduating summa cum laude. Inside, she is itching to get out of East Haven and truly start her life, but at 36 years old and a crippling college debt, the dream seems to be getting further and further away.

#about #biography #tw: alcohol #tw: teen pregnancy

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toomanyrobins2 · 3 years ago

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not my real mom - a little birdie told me

Summary: Set in the Three Families story, Jamie had started to get older and with that come some growing pains for the Rogers Family.

Notes: I’ve played around with the idea of doing like a “behind the scenes” from the different stories. Let me know if you have any ideas! I can’t promise I’ll write them, but you never know 💛

series masterlist

Jamie had known from a young age that his mom hadn’t given birth to him. They celebrated his adoption anniversary every year since he could remember. It didn’t matter to him and it was like Y/N said to him: he hadn’t come from her tummy, but he was always in her heart. He didn’t remember the woman who gave birth to him and it was easy to forget that he was any different from his litter sister, Sarah.

Today was a bad day. It was Monday and he’d woken up late and couldn’t find his favorite shoes. Then he’d gotten in trouble at school for forgetting his homework and had to miss recess. The snacks in his lunch weren’t his usual ones and all of that culminated in him being in a foul mood. When Y/N came to pick him up, he saw on her face that she had gotten an email from the teacher. She didn’t say anything in front of his friends but he knew it was coming. In the car, Sarah was waiting and he saw that she was snacking one of his usual granola bars. As soon as everyone was buckled, she started to lecture him, “I told you to put your homework in your bag last night, Jamie.” He stared out the window sullenly. Y/N sighed and shook her head, “No video games until the weekend.”

“But—“

“No buts, Jamie. You know the rules. As long as you do good in school, you’re allowed video games.”

He scoffed and folded his arms, “I don’t know why I should have to listen to you. You’re not even my real mom.”

As soon as the words left his mouth, Jamie felt sick to his stomach. He saw his mom’s face go blank and her shoulders tense. Y/N just nodded, “That may be how you feel, but your very real dad will agree with me.” That was the last thing that was said on the car ride home. As soon as they were inside, she fixed them both a snack and then went to do laundry. Jamie was used to having her ask about his day and spending the afternoon together, but he saw how hurt she was. He decided to go to his room and as soon as the door was shut, tears started to well in his eyes.

Steve walked into the house and immediately felt the tense air. As soon as the door shut, his little girl came flying around the corner. Sarah was speaking so fast that he could barely catch a word she was saying. He picked her up and shushed her, “You got to say that all again, but slower. I can’t understand a thing you said, Sare-Bear.”

“Jamie told mommy she isn’t his real mom and now they’re both really upset. He’s been up in his room all day and she’s baking.”

Steve groaned and took a deep breath, “Why don’t you go back and play. Dad’s gonna try and fix this.”

“Please do it fast, Daddy. Mommy’s cookies are gross.”

He could help but chuckle as he walked up the stairs to Jamie’s room. Birdie may have mastered cooking years ago, but her baking was notoriously bad. Once he reached the landing, he knocked on the door and when he opened it, his heart broke. His son’s face was tear-streaked and he looked so distraught. Steve sat down on the bed and pulled him into a hug. Jamie immediately burst into tears, babbling about how he didn’t mean it. Steve didn’t say anything, he just rubbed his son’s back until he calmed down.

Jamie rubbed his nose and whispered, “Mom hates me.”

“Oh, your mom doesn’t hate you. That’s completely impossible,” he had Jamie look him in the eyes, “She’s just hurt. What you said was very unkind.”

“I didn’t mean. I wanted to take it back as soon as I said it.”

Steve kept rubbing his hand on Jamie’s back, “I know you didn’t mean it and she does too. She’s loved you since the moment she set eyes on you and that will never change. You’re the first Rogers she fell in love with.”

Jamie’s brow furrowed, “Even before you?”

“Especially before me. If your mom can forgive me for all the stupid things I do, then she’ll forgive you in a heartbeat.”

Jamie looked down at his hands, “I don’t know what to say.”

“I find that I’m sorry is the best place to start.

It took a few minutes for Jamie to work up the courage. He walked into the kitchen, his little shoulders slouched and his eyes red from crying. Y/N took one look at him and crouched down, holding her arms open. He flew across the room and nearly tackled her with how hard he hugged her. She didn’t say a thing, just ran her hand through his hair and let him hold her tight. Eventually, Jamie pulled away and looked down at his socks. “I’m sorry, Mom.”

“I know, baby.”

“I didn’t mean it! You are my mom and I love you 100!”

Y/N pressed a kiss to Jamie’s nose, “I love you 3000. I know you were just angry.”

“You’re the best mom ever and dad says I was the first Rogers you loved and we are lucky that you love us even when we are stupid.”

Y/N looked at Steve, looking less than impressed. He stood in the doorway and just shrugged. “Don’t worry, Jaime. You’ll never be as stupid as your father. He’s a special case.” She stood up and looked over the mess she’d made in the kitchen and her failed creations on the cooking rack, “I guess I should throw all this out.”

“No, mom, I want one of your cookies!” Jamie looked like he’d rather do anything else but he still felt guilty.

“Are you sure?” Jamie nodded furiously. When he was presented with the cookie, he looked down, his nose wrinkled with disgust. He took a bite and tried to smile at his mom, but it came out more like a grimace. Steve had to hide his laughter in Y/N's shoulder at the situation. She shook her head and held out her hand, “Oh god, spit it out before you make yourself sick.”

Jamie left the nasty lump roll out of his mouth, “Can I have some water?”

Y/N pulled him into a hug and kissed his head as Steve poured him a glass. He guzzled it down before turning back to his mom, “I’m really sorry, Mom. I love you so much and you are my real mom.”

“It’s forgotten and the sad truth you’re stuck with me whether you want me or not. I adopted you kiddo and you’re stuck with me and my bad baking until you’re at least 18.”

Sarah was in Steve’s arms and tilted her head, “If Jamie tells you you’re his mom everyday, can you not bake anymore?” Steve barked out a laugh at how innocently Sarah asked the question.

Y/N smacked her husband on his chest and hugged her children, You got yourself a deal, kids. No baking for mom.”

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unpleasantsimms · 2 years ago

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Nightshade Academy

Welcome to Nightshade Academy, a boarding school for spellcasters and supernatural types to learn and engage with their burgeoning powers in a safe and controlled environment. This year’s class is a little unusual, but it has some of the most promising minds this academy has ever seen. For today’s lesson, love is in the air, and the bright minds of Nightshade Academy must navigate their strong emotions while also having access to strange and untamed magics. They will question who is beauty, and who is the beast, and what perfection truly means.

Rating: T for Teen Word Count: 9760

A long form fanfic of my magic high series, in which several characters across the Sims canon attend school together. It is mostly silliness, and the wonky nature of the Sims timeline means things can be a little weird, but just go with it. As a Halloween treat, I’m putting up the first episode in what will hopefully become a series, if I get off my behind and write it. Sit back, relax, and enjoy

I. Eye of the Beholder

Bella brushed her hair in the full length mirror in her room, admiring herself from multiple angles. She’d tucked the shirt of her uniform into her skirt, accentuating her curves, and she extended her neck this way and that to give herself the most length. Satisfied, she picked up a tub of her signature lipstick, a dark and luscious red, and she applied it to her curved lips. There. Perfection achieved.

“You really had to move that thing in here?” Lilith said from her bed, where she was pulling on tennis shoes.

Bella flipped her hair so she couldn’t see her roommate. “I didn’t think it’d bother you that much. You know how the bathrooms are in the morning.”

“I don’t,” she drawled and grabbed her books from the nightstand.

“Well it’s important.” Bella picked at the green pendant she wore around her neck and tucked it beneath her collar. “Today’s the day. I need to look perfect.”

“Oh,” Lilith said with a roll of her red eyes. “So that’s happening.”

Lilith stood from the bed, and as she passed behind Bella, no reflection appeared in the mirror. Bella suppressed a shiver. Rooming with a vampire hadn’t been her first choice, but she was new to this whole magic thing. She wasn’t going to be the first to blink. If Bella were unkind, she might compare her roommate to a stick bug, long limbed and almost blended in enough with normal people to avoid sticking out, if it weren’t for her glowing eyes and the sharp teeth that protruded from her gums. But the worst thing about Lilith, the actual worst thing, was how all knowing she seemed to be. She had the answer to every test, she dressed people down with just a glance, and all the gossip made its way back to her. If she were stupid, Bella might have liked her. No one wants to spend time with a smart predator.

“You know.” Lilith paused as she placed her hand on the doorknob. Even though she didn’t reflect in the mirror, Bella could feel her eyes on her. “I thought you were really clever when I first met you.”

Bella glanced back over her shoulder. A compliment from Lilith was rare. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” she sighed. “But seeing you gussy yourself up to bag the likes of Mortimer Goth makes me realize you’re just another vapid girl.”

“And here I was thinking you had some human left in you,” Bella snapped back. “Guess we’re both wrong.”

Lilith stared at her, red eyes wide. Her mouth drew open, extending her long fangs, and then she shook her head.

“If you can bear to stop looking at yourself for one second,” she said, “you might actually be on time to class.”

Bella’s lip curled. “You don’t have to wait for me.”

“I won’t,” she said and threw open the door, before letting it slam behind her. Bella breathed out.

Well, she’d already faced down a vampire today. How much scarier could asking out a boy be?

The morning halls of the school were busy as people ran through the dorm hallways to the communal bath, or hurriedly worked on last minute homework in the rounded commons. Bella glided through the usual panic and stood in front of the door down the hall from hers. Adjusting her hair one more time, she stood a little straighter, and gave a gentle knock. She smiled as the door pulled back, and let it drop when she realized who’d answered it.

“He’s not here,” Michael said. “You’re gonna have to try your luck some other time.”

Bella stuck out her tongue at him. “I was just saying good morning. Can’t a sister ensure her brother is making it to class on time?”

He huffed out a laugh and walked back to his own mirror. He’d been applying pomade to his hair, and he worked to slick it back. Bella leaned against the threshold and let out a long breath.

“You’re not really subtle, Bebe,” Michael said.

“Good, I’m not trying to be.” She glanced around the room. Her brother’s spot was on the far side, piled with magazines and cologne bottles, but the bed by the door was completely unmade, with papers and pens left out in a last minute attempt to finish their weekend assignments. A crocheted Grim plush stuck out from under the bed, kicked aside by loafers. A bottle of hair gel had tipped over on the dresser and was currently making a mess in the to drawer, unable to close thanks to the haphazardly folded shirts that were forced in. The whole room stank of boy.

“Today’s the day, Michael,” Bella announced as he gathered his books. “Today Mortimer is mine.”

“You say that like it’s such a struggle,” he said. “I’ve never seen another girl even look at him. He’ll be thankful if you ask him out.”

“The how is important,” she said. “I can’t just throw myself at him wantonly. I wanted him to want me, and not just because I’m a pretty girl.”

“Okay, well.” He shut the door behind him, and they started towards the main foyer of the school. “He’s a dumb boy without a girlfriend. It’s not really going to matter if you prove your worth to him or not.”

The pair headed down the hallways, past the student room, full of chess tables and tall bookshelves, and into the main hall. Teachers directed students up the stairs and reminded them of when class was starting.

“I don’t want a boy to go out with me just because I’m a nice pair of legs,” Bella muttered.

Michael laughed and pointed to her stockings. “Then why are you wearing those?”

“Not every boy is like you, Caramellino!” she laughed. “You’re speedrunning the entire female population of the school.”

“Aren’t we supposed to be making connections?” he asked with a grin.

“Connections, dummy.” She jumped past him on the stairs and so she could knock his forehead. “Not ex-girlfriends.”

“Can’t I do both?”

The clock struck the top of the hours, eight rings resounding through the stone halls. Students rushed to their classrooms, and Bella hurried to the top of the stairs. Sage Dyers waited there, her long green locks falling behind her like silken snakes. Scales touched the white skin of her eyes, leaving an odd sheen of green. She smirked as she saw the Bachelor siblings trailing behind.

“No, now,” she said in a low voice that made Bella’s spine shiver. “We wouldn’t want to be late for our potions lesson.”

“I was just corralling my brother,” Bella promised.

“Good,” she said. “Sage Hughes won’t tolerate tardiness.”

Bella grabbed her brother’s arm and dragged him down the halls of the school. For all its majesty, the school was a cozy place, with classrooms nestled into their own corners. They passed the open doorway of the debate classroom, and saw the final students hurry into the herbalism class, which boasted a wide metal cauldron and a room overflowing with plants, and from the staircase up to the music room, an unsteady melody of piano notes clunked down. Bella took a hard left, pulling her brother into the potions classroom with her, and she hurried to her seat.

It was another day at Nightshade Academy.

⬨⬧⬨

The Realm of Magic had never truly been separate from simkind. For generations, magical families have lived with one foot in the world, finding passages and pathways to lead them to a place of pure fantasy. Magic was not just relegated to bloodlines either. Any sim wanting to gain that knowledge could do so. It was in recent years that the thought of formal education and recruitment of occult types brought about the prestigious institution of the Nightshade Academy. The sages took a direct approach to the thought, choosing to take a direct hand in the tutelage of future generations. Their guidance ensured every graduating class experienced prestige and good fortune. This year was no different. This year’s class was so full of promise. The magical and unmagical world might be changed forever.

L had read the brochure. She’d been given the spiel. She’d nodded along as Sage Dyer explained to her all these things. But L was from the old ways, the very old ways, and she’d never set foot outside the Magic Realm before. She’d never wanted to. What was out there for her?

It was in talking with her sisters that L had considered the man variables and decided there was something she wanted. Knowledge? That could be found anywhere. Prowess? Could be learned from her family, from the other spellcasters. But power? Getting close to the sages, being taught alongside prestigious names, earning her place, that was everything.

It was supposed to be an adventure. The young girl steps through the portal to a new realm. She just wished it wasn’t so boring. Glimmerbrook, nestled in the mountains and secluded among the trees, was a crossroads of all kinds, attracting magical and non-magical sims alike. It should be a nexus of weird! L expected to wake up every day face to face with occult types of new breeds, and instead she sat in the same boring classroom, with the same boring students, learning the same boring lessons, taught by the same boring adults who were only teaching them to be more boring. L’s fingers itched to do more.

The potions classroom, at least, was without desks. Chairs arranged around a large cauldron fired by magical crystals. The students sat as they usually did. Lilith Vatore and Bella Bachelor sat directly up front, spines straights, hands in their laps, as they watched their professor work with rapt attention. L usually liked to sit near them for the show, and today she took the row behind them, draped lazily on her chair as her boot tapped against the floor. Simeon Silversweater took up residence beside her. He hunched forward, notebook on his knee, as he carefully took dictation of everything the teacher said. Michael Bachelor and Mortimer Goth were the other constant residents of the back row, watching with bored expressions. L’s eyes slid to Morgyn Ember, her roomie and possibly the most interesting person at school. They were smart, scary smart, but not the teacher’s pet the ladies were. They fiddled with the edge of their skirt, but their shining eyes were focused on the cauldron ahead. They didn’t miss anything. The only other person in Class 3 was Caleb Vatore, who sat beside his sister. He shared the disinterest of the other lads, but wasn’t quite as laissez-faire about it. He reminded L too often of a frightened bird, or maybe a small shaking dog tucked behind the rottweiler that was his sister.

Keisha Hughes stood in front of them, hands outstretched as the ladle turned the cauldron’s waters. She was entirely in white, from her hair to her face to her pointy boots. Like the other professors, she wore something of a uniform as well, a long robe cinched with a crescent moon. Her eyes sparkled as the water heated, reflecting the colors of the crystals below.

“Potion making is really quite simple,” she said. “It’s the right ingredients, at the right temperature, in the right formation. But what it really needs is a dash of magic.”

She flicked her fingers, and sparkles rained down in the water. The bubbling cauldron shifted to a bright green.

“Who can tell me the most important aspect of potion making?” she asked.

Both Lilith and Bella’s hands shot straight up. L would’ve laughed if it wasn’t so terribly predictable.

“Miss Bachelor,” Sage Hughes said. “Enlighten us.”

Bella lifted up her chin. “They require the correct components.”

Sage Hughes tsked. “I’m afraid not. Miss Vatore?”

“You’ve already said it’s the magic itself,” Lilith said. “It takes an apple from a mere snack to something that fills you up entirely.”

“Wrong again,” she said. “The most important part of potion making, of all magic, is experimentation. Magic is a living thing. We’ve managed to harvest it, to wield it, but we only have so much control. It reacts, understands, and changes things. Even we sages don’t know everything about magic. It’s possible we never will. But what separates good spellcasters from great ones is the drive to see something new.”

L sat up. Finally, someone was speaking her language. Anyone could read a book, go through the motions, memorize the words and the ingredients. What she wanted to know was what happened next.

“Now,” Sage Hughes continued. “I’ll need a volunteer.”

Two hands went up again, and L sighed. Without a word, she stood from her seat and marched to the front of the class. Sage Hughes smiled and stretched out a hand to her side.

“Welcome to the front, Miss Faba,” the sage said. “Are you familiar with potion making?”

L nodded. “I’ve made a few before.”

“Good, good.” She snapped her fingers again. From the bookshelves behind her, a tome lifted up and drifted into her hand. “There are easy basics to understand. Miss Vatore already mentioned the Potion of Plentiful Needs, everyone’s favorite. The potion of Nimble Mind is very useful to me. Do you have a favorite?”

“I use a nausea potion on my sisters all the time,” L boasted. “It’s easy enough to slip into a drink.”

Sage Hughes threw her head back and laughed. “A girl after my own heart! I’m sure your sisters loved that.”

“It solved a few arguments,” L said.

She shook her herald and held out the tome. The leather cover was burned with symbols, and engraved with the words “Good Fortune”. The edges of the pages shone with gold.

“I believe you all have a quiz today in Ethren’s class,” she said. “Do you feel prepared for it?”

Honestly, L hadn’t bothered to study. Sage Reyes was exacting, and his classes were dull and focused on the practicalities of magic. She fell asleep reading about it.

“Well,” Sage Hughes said. “Maybe this will help. Mister Goth, what are the two ingredients of a Potion of Good Fortune?”

Mortimer sat straighter in his seat, and he rubbed his right eye. His uniform had a slovenly appearance that shrugged down his shoulders, and the mess of hair he stuck straight up probably hadn’t been washed in days. Dark circles hung under his eyes permanently. He carried the distinguished features of his family in a way that made his young face look like a jigsaw, but one day he might grow into them.

“Uh,” he said, and nothing more.

L watched Bella pass a look over her shoulder. Realizing he didn’t have the answer, she whipped her head around and said, “It’s valerian root and turquoise.”

“Good, Miss Bachelor,” Sage Hughes said. “But you’re not the person I asked. What aspect of valerian do you think help in Good Fortune?”

It was Silversweater who raised his hand this time. Sage Hughes gestured to him.

“Valerian’s used in herbal remedies to help with sleep,” he said in a low, lazy voice. It was accented softly. L hadn’t quite gotten a read on him yet, not since he kept his head down and focused on his work. But he certainly knew a lot. “It’s a sedative.”

“Very good,” Sage Hughes said. “Combined with turquoise, which is used in protection, this brew will calm your anxiety, and allow you to get through the day unscathed. Now, Miss Faba, why not make a batch for the class?”

In the end, it wasn’t just L making the thing. Sage Hughes got everyone involved, even the sleeping Mortimer, handing her ingredients, reading pages from the tome, and offering feedback. L mixed it herself, watching the staff roll through the golden waves of the boiling pot. L focused all her mind and magic on the staff, infusing it as it rolled through. It should be easy, she told herself. It’s a simple spell. And then they can get through Sage Reyes’ dull class, onto the next dull class, tracking moon patterns and learning the taxonomy of plants, and this was all so boring! This should be magic! It should be thrilling, and exciting, and it should burn from her fingertips and fill her chest with light, and if you don’t have the exact right ingredients under the exact phase of the moon, then who cares? That was the joy! This would be another by-the-book potion with nothing exciting about it, and it would–

L jumped back as the cauldron began to shake, and the bubbling overflowed. The liquid turned into a dull gray-green. It threatened to boil over, smoke rising in black plums. L dropped the staff, and it clattered to the floor. All at once, it erupted. Like a pan of hot oil it spat out, causing everyone to duck for cover. The classroom was filled with smoke. No one waited around. The door flew open, and they staggered into the hall, coughing and covering their faces. Sage Hughes clenched her hand, and the fire beneath the cauldron went out. L jumped when she placed a hand on her shoulder.

“Another important lesson,” the sage said. “You can do everything right, and it’ll still go wrong. That’s not a bad thing.”

“It seems pretty bad!” Lilith snapped.

Sage Hughes shook her head with a smile. “Perfect is the enemy of good. Remember that. Now, that gives you all fifteen extra minutes to study for Ethren’s class. Why don’t you head downstairs while I sort out this mess.”

Begrudgingly, the students stumbled away from the class. L remained a moment longer as Sage Hughes waved a hand. The windows in the room shuddered open, and the new breeze sucked the smoke outside.

“You’ve got to keep a handle on your own mind,” the Sage said. “You’ll influence your own powers, and not in the best of ways.”

L puffed up her chest. “I wanted to see something new.”

“Not a bad instinct.” Sage Hughes glanced at her over her shoulder. “You’ll let me know what you find, will you?”

L blinked, and then she nodded her head. Without another word, she snatched up the tome from where it’d fallen to the ground and hurried to the staircase. All the while she grinned.

Finally, it was time to get into some mischief.

⬨⬧⬨

Bella adjusted her hair for the fourth time. She’d taken up the upstairs bathroom while the rest of the school had gone to lunch. Lipstick reapplied, uniform adjusted, she looked as fresh as she had that morning. Good. The majority of students would be in the dining hall or spread out by the fountain outside. Mortimer usually spent his lunch hour in the commons room. She intended to descend the stairs like one of her romance novels, and then she’d ask him to walk with her, where she’d admit to the butterflies that fluttered in her stomach every time she looked at him. It’d mostly be true, too.

Michael had been partially right. Mortimer Goth didn’t spire the sort of swooning poetic pining of some of the other boys in school. Even Caleb, who like his sister was stick thin and gawky, at least had the benefit of being a vampire and therefore mysterious. In society, the Goth name went far, but in Glimmerbrook they were barely among the top magical families. She’d spent her time in the library going down the family trees and bloodlines. The Goths were an uneven stretch of odd branches and disconnected family members, of which one thing was sure. They were sitting on a pile of riches and enough clout to open nearly any door. It was the exact kind of family Bella dreamed of marrying into since she was a young girl reading Jane Eyre. Curled up in her family’s trailer, listening to the rain patter against the metal roof, and imagining instead that she was in some gothic castle reading by candlelight as a storm crashed around her, possibly haunted by some dark spirit or mad woman.

When Bella and Michael’s parents had enrolled them in Nightshade Academy, there’d been a lot of talk of opportunity. They would meet new people, powerful people. They would learn how to make dreams come true. Any chance they had to better their family and their name, they should take it. Bella’s mom had extolled to her the virtues of her beauty since she was eight years old. It was a constant reminder in the back of her mind, especially when she was talking to Mortimer. Eventually, the other girls would realize how rich Mortimer was. Better to stake her claim now, before anyone else could take this opportunity away.

Bella pushed open the door to the bathroom and started towards the stairs, until she heard what sounded like glass breaking in one of the classrooms. She paused. There was definitely someone in the potions room. Maybe one of the professors, but they were usually downstairs keeping an eye on the students. Bella crept forward and peeked through the door before shoving it open.

“What’re you doing?” she shouted.

L dropped the bottle she’d been holding, and it smashed against the floor. The cauldron in the center of the room billowed with smoke and bubbled with the aroma of a bright and earthy tea. A tome was floating in front of her, and she snatched the ladle out of the air, pointing threateningly at Bella.

“Why aren’t you at lunch?” she asked.

“Why aren’t you?” Bella entered the room, and the door swung shut behind her. “You’re going to be in so much trouble. We’re not supposed to be in the classrooms alone.”

“Mind your own business,” L snapped.

“What are you even working on?” Bella walked towards the cauldron. “Is it the good luck potion again?”

“Maybe.” L huffed out a breath and rolled her eyes. “Okay, well, I was thinking about how you could probably tailor the potion to work for specific things. Like our test today, if we could focus it on academic success, or money making, or–”

“Or love.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Yeah, I guess.”

“What ingredients would you need for that?” Bella wondered aloud. “If you wanted to make it more specific.”

“My eldest sister used to make love potions.” L let the ladle go and walked to the display case. “They share some ingredients with the good luck potion. Maybe it’d be the simplest one to work out. Let’s see, amethyst, dragon fruit, salmon eyes–oh, here we go! Frog hearts!”

Bella grimaced at the jar overstuffed with small purple mounds of muscle. “That’s what goes into a love potion?”

“A thing of beauty, isn’t it?” L opened the jar. “What do you need luck in love for anyway? You look like that.”

Bella brushed back her hair. “Boys who think you’re just something pretty aren’t the same boys that love you. I don’t want Mortimer to just think I’m pretty.”

“Oh, Mortimer.” She glanced back over the tome. “He isn’t the brightest bloom in the garden.”

“He doesn’t have to be,” Bella said. “But you know how he writes poetry? He never lets anyone read it. And sometimes when he’s staring off into space, I just want to go with him, you know?”

L shrugged. “I guess, if you’re into that. Come over here.”

Bella cautiously stepped forward. “Why?”

“Two witches are better than one.” Holding the jar above her in one hand, she held onto Bella with the other. “Sage Hughes seems to think magic has everything to do with intent. Think about the positive outcome. Imagine what’ll happen if this works.”

Bella glanced at her sideways, and then she took a breath and closed her eyes. She and Mortimer would take a walk through the forest along the river, and next to the sparkling waters she would tell him what she meant to say all along. He’d like her, he had to like her. Mortimer couldn’t be the kind of person that just cared about looks. He wanted something deeper than that. Bella wanted something deeper than that.

She opened her eyes just in time to see L dump the entire jar of frog hearts into the brew. Bella shouted, and she yanked her arm away, spilling half of them onto the floor. Oh, watcher, oh no, it was so gross!

“What did you do that for?” she and L shouted at the same time.

“You can’t just dump the whole jar!” Bella snapped.

“We want it to work!” L shouted back. “And look!”

Both of their eyes drew to the cauldron, which had turned a fluorescent shade of magenta. It bubbled brighter and taller. Bella staggered back from the boiling brew. Steam poured off it, filling the classroom, and L fumbled towards the windows to try to yank them open, but the room was so full of fog that the sunlight was barely making its way through the glass panes. Bella’s heels staggered on a frog heart, and she slipped backwards. In a desperate attempt to stay upright, she grappled wildly and grabbed onto the edge of the cauldron as she rolled back. The contents rolled forward, and she braced herself for the pain of boiling hot liquid, but she was washed in something else. Like steam from a hot pot, it poured over her, breathing into her nose, into her mouth, into her skin. Her whole body felt tight and stiff, and she couldn’t see as she felt L’s hand against her back. They staggered towards the door and burst through it. L didn’t stop outside the hallway. She dragged Bella back into the bathroom and dropped her on the tiled floor. Bella coughed and wheezed and hugged her knees as the spell passed. She was finally able to open her eyes, tears streaming down her cheek. L was staring at her, a hand covering her mouth.

“What?” Bella croaked out. “What happened?”

L didn’t say anything at all, and Bella gripped the edge of the sink to lift herself to her feet. She brushed her hands through her hair and stopped. Black stringy tendrils sat limply over her fingers. Raising her hands up, she stared at the gnarled, pockmarked skin and ugly unkempt nails. Her eyes went to the mirror, and an ugly green hag stared back with crooked teeth and unnatural cheeks. Bella opened her mouth, hands rising to her face, and in the mirror the hag did the same. It was her. The creature was her.

Bella screamed.

Instantly L slapped a hand over her mouth. Bella bit down on her palm, causing her to shout, and she whirled on her, green finger pointing in accusation.

“You did this!” she shouted. “You did this to me!”

“No I didn’t!” Le shouted defensively. “At least I didn’t mean to! I was trying to make the potion work!”

“You thought it’d be funny!” Bella turned back to the mirror, gripping her dark hair in her hands. “You thought it’d be so cute and mean if you turned me into some kind of monster! You and Lilith could laugh about it all day!”

“Why would Lilith and I laugh about anything together?” L sucked in a breath and tried to put on a calming smile. “You did say you didn’t want Mortimer to like you just for your looks.”

“I didn’t mean I wanted this!” Bella howled. “I can’t see him now! I can’t see anybody! He’ll never like me if all he thinks about is this.”

L raised a hand to pat her, and then thought better of it. “Well, Bella, that may not be the worst thing.”

Her head shot up, sending a death glare her way. L took a step back.

“Get Sage Hughes,” she said. “Get the school nurse. Get me a veil so I can escape into the woods!”

“No, no, no!” L said. “I’ve already made one mess today, Bella, and now this? Look, physical spells never last long. They’re not made to. This should be so simple to reverse!”

“L!”

“Bella!” She squeezed her hands together. “At least let me try! If I can fix you up before the end of the lunch period–”

“And what am I supposed to do?” Bella shouted.

“Just stay here,” L said. “Just for a little while. I’m going to take care of this.”

Bella breathed heavy through her nose, hands pressed against the side of her face. Okay. Okay. “Okay. Do that. And if you can’t, find Sage Hughes, but I’m not leaving this bathroom, okay? I can’t be seen like this. I can’t let Mortimer see me. Okay?”

“Okay,” L said. “Stay put. I’m going to fix this, Bella.”

Her eyes narrowed, heat building under her skin. “You better.”

L pressed a finger to her lips and poked her head out of the bathroom. The coast was clear, and she slipped away. Bella stood in the center of the tiled floor, hugging her arms to her chest. She glanced at the mirror again and quickly turned away. It was too horrible to look at. Mortimer was probably still in the commons, so close and so far. If he saw her, that was the end of it. No boy could love her like this.

And all she could do was wait.

⬨⬧⬨

L hurried down the front hall stairs and stopped outside the commons to quickly adjust her uniform. Sage Reyes was in the doorway, keeping an eye on the students. A tall, well dressed man, and swooned over by half the population of the school, he was the most intimidating of their professors. Perfection and precision were required by him. L wasn’t doing well in his classes.

“Not getting into trouble, Miss Faba,” he said in his low tone.

She grinned up at him. “I was just looking for a book.”

He waved her past, and she hurried to the bookshelves that lined the walls. At lunch, students splayed out in chairs, and the chess table was occupied by Simeon and Morgyn. She brushed past them to scan the shelves and groaned when they came up empty.

“What’s got you in a fuss?” Morgyn said as they moved their queen.

“Go stuff your mushrooms,” L said. “I need a book.”

Simeon blocked their move with a bishop. “Is it that Materials for Spells and Their Uses book?”

L glanced at him. “Yes. How did you know?”

“You were reading it last time you were in here.” His pawn struck, taking out Morgyn’s knight. “I thought it was clever, breaking things down into their components. It’s any wonder you get top marks in our potions class.”

“I don’t have time to be flattered,” she said. “Do you know where it’s at?”

Morgyn leaned back in their chair. “I saw the handsome Master Reyes taking some materials. They’re probably in his office.”

“Fiddlesticks,” she murmured, glancing behind her. Quickly she turned back around, like the sage could sense her guilt.

“Oh, L,” Morgyn said with a pout. “What trouble have you gotten into today?”

She shot them a scowl. Since their first day rooming together, L and Morgyn had gotten along fantastically. They’d been destined to become best friends. Morgyn spent their days pushing the limits of magic just as L fantasized about doing, and they both had discarded the pants of their uniforms and opted for the skirt. Morgyn wanted to transcend, they’d explained in quiet tones. They were the first person to speak in a way L wanted to hear. It was an instant connection, a bond unlike any other, which made them really very annoying.

“It’s no trouble,” L said quickly. “I just wanted to take a second shot at that potion.”

“And you failed,” Simeone said.

She pressed a hand to her chest. “Wow, no. Thank you for the confidence boost. I would say it worked a little too well.”

“It’s not raining gold or test grades.” Morgyn put their chin in their hand. “What have you done?”

She looked back again to where Sage Reyes stood and dropped her voice. “I wanted to help out Miss Bachelor with her boy troubles. Really, I was being nice.”

Morgyn narrowed their eyes. “What did you do?”

“See,” she said, “Bella insisted that she didn’t want to be known for her beauty. Now, I doubt she will.”

They both stared at her. L tried not to look guilty.

“You made her ugly,” Simeon said.

“No,” she said and pressed her hands to her face. “I made her hideous! And I told her I’d fix it but I don’t know how! I thought the book would give me a clue as to how I broke it in the first place.”

Morgyn put a hand over their mouth to cover up their laughter, not that it was doing much good. They bent forward, shoulders shaking.

“You turned,” they gasped, “the beauty queen into a beast! Oh, this is delicious. I need to see.”

“She’ll die,” L said. “Or kill me, or worse, one of the professors will find out. We’re not supposed to be mixing potions in our off hours.”

“It will cause some trouble for you,” Simeon said.

“We should see the patient,” Morgyn insisted. “To help her. How else can we reverse the effect?”

“We?” She shook her head. “I don’t need co-conspirators.”

“But you do need help.” Simeon shrugged his shoulders. “We may as well try.”

L chewed on her bottom lip. It was true. Simeon had a head for potions knowledge, and Morgyn was twice as crazy as she was. If anyone could figure out how to undo this without getting a teacher involved, she may as well start there.

“We’d have to sneak into the potions room to do anything,” she said, “and I’ve already blown up the class twice today.”

“We’re spellcasters,” Morgyn said. “There’s cauldrons tucked away everywhere. I bet Reyes has one in his office, along with that book.”

“Okay,” L said. “Easy.”

Simeon picked up his knight and let it swing between his fingers. “Easy to break into the office of the Sage of Practical Magic?”

“It’s a reference book,” Morgyn drawled. “It’s not as if he’s locked it away in some vault. We go right now, he won’t even know.”

“See.” L held out a hand. “Easy. Let’s go, right now.”

They stood from their seat. “Thank goodness. I thought things were going to stay boring around here.”

“I don’t mind boring,” Simeon sighed as he followed behind. “Though I am curious to see what components you used.”

“I’m sure Miss Bachelor doesn’t mind being a guinea pig.” L put a finger to her lips as they walked to the archway. “And not a word to anyone.”

“I swear.” Morgan crossed their finger over their chest. “No one is going to know.”

“You know us,” Simeon said. “The epitome of subtlety.”

“Easy,” L repeated. “This whole thing is going to be easy.”

⬨⬧⬨

Bella sat on the seat of the toilet, rocking back and forth. Oh, this was no good. L wasn’t back yet! And all she could do was hide in the upstairs toilets and pray she’d come back for her. She ran her fingers through her hair and grimaced as she saw the gnarled bony green limbs. Ugh, ugh, ugh! How was she too dry and too moist at the same time? Her skin felt slick, like it didn’t fit her right, and then in some places it was too tight to the bone. Her hair came down in stringy clumps. Well, she wanted to be a witch. All she needed now was a cape and a black cat and she’d be adorning everyone’s porches come Halloween.

The door to the bathroom swung open, and Bella sat straight up until she heard the second pair of shoes. Oh no, oh no, oh no. Her stall was closed, but people didn’t need to know she was in here at all. Too many questions. She picked up her feet and hugged her knees to her chest. Great. Come to school to rub elbows with the most powerful witches in the land, end up in the toilet. Michael was going to have a laugh at her.

“I really don’t want to spend any more time in the dining hall,” the sharp clear voice of Lilith Vatore rang out against the porcelain. “It’s so disgusting.”

“It’s really not that bad.” The second voice was softer, clearly that of her brother Caleb. “I think you just don’t like people.”

“What gave it away?” Lilith droned.

Bella sucked in a breath. Fantastic. The only thing worse than Mortimer seeing her like this was Lilith of all people. She’d never live it down.

“It’d be alright if they weren’t so stupid,” Lilith continued. “I told you about Bella this morning.”

“Yeah.” She could hear Caleb roll his eyes. “You told me.”

Bella pressed her face to the stall and tried to peer through the crack. Lilith brushed her straight shiny hair back as Caleb stood against the sink, arms crossed. His own soft brown hair was messily styled without real indication he knew what he was doing. If either Vatore siblings had any style to speak of, Bella had never seen it firsthand.

“I just don’t get it,” Lilith said. “Aren’t we in a new generation of women? Why do they waste their life on men?”

“Maybe some men are worth it.” Caleb examined his nails, painted pink, purple, and blue.

“You would say that,” she cooed. “I just didn’t expect Bella to get so dizzy for a lad. If she wants to marry rich that badly, she won’t have a problem.”

Bella sucked in a breath and swallowed it down. Not that it was any surprise what Lilith thought of her. Her best and worst quality was her bluntness. But honestly! Like Bella was some gold digger with nothing to offer the world.

“You’re so cynical of love, Lilith,” Caleb sighed.

“You could stand to be that way.”

Lilith finished adjusting her hair and turned. Bella swore her dark eyes flashed through the crack in the stall, and she slapped a hand over her mouth, sitting back. Ugh, her skin smelled disgusting! She swallowed down the urge to gag.

“If you’re going to spy,” Lilith said loudly, “you could at least be quiet about it.”

Her sneakers approached the stall, and Bella bust out, “Don’t come in here!”

Lilith paused. One foot turned back towards her brother, and then three gentle knocks sounded on the stall door.

“Bella?” she called sweetly. “Is that you?”

“Yes!” she snapped. “And it’s very rude to talk to me right now!”

“Your feet aren’t on the ground.” Lilith pulled on the stall, which thankfully didn’t open. “Is Mortimer really that intimidating for you?”

“Lilith, leave her alone,” Caleb said.

“Oh, no.” Her voice filled with glee. “Did he reject you? You must be devastated. Are you crying?”

“He didn’t reject me,” Bella said. “I want some privacy in the bathroom please!”

“Lilith.” Her brother’s footsteps got closer. “Now you’re just being cruel.”

“As a good roommate, I need to check on you.” Lilith’s fingers reached over top the stall. “I just want to see if you’re crying–ah!”

Lilith pulled herself up, and as soon as her eyes met Bella’s, she let out a shout and dropped to the floor. Bella covered her face in embarrassment. Caleb tried to help his sister, who crawled away from the door.

“What happened to you!” Lilith shouted.

Bella squeezed her eyes shut. “I told you! I want to be alone!”

“You look like a monster!”

“I know!”

“What did you do?!”

Anger overtook Bella, and she pushed open the stall door, standing in front of both Vatore siblings. Lilith was prone back on the ground with Caleb kneeling over her, and they both stared up at her with wide eyes.

“I didn’t do anything!” Bella shouted. “Everything would be going perfect if it weren’t for people like you and L! All I wanted to do was talk to a boy, but noooo. I have to be punished for showing an interest in Mortimer. Go ahead and laugh, Lilith! I’m sorry I dared to have a crush on someone!”

Bella caught sight of herself in the mirror, shoulders raised, chin low, looking like an old rotted witch. She screamed and dropped to the floor, shielding her face with her arms. This was not how today was supposed to go.

A hand pressed against her shoulder, and she peeked up to see Caleb standing over her. The soft look on his face was almost enough to send her over the edge. Now she was getting pity. What else could go wrong?”

“Did you say L did this to you?” he asked.

“It was an accident,” she sighed. “I think. She’s supposed to be finding a cure hopefully before–”

A dull chime rang out through the school. First bell. Ten minutes to get to next classes.

“Lunch is over,” Bella said, defeated. “At this point, I should just go face the firing squad.”

“Looking like that?” Lilith said. “You’ll just drip your way to class then.”

“It’s not like I have a choice! Everyone’s going to see how hideous I am.”

Lilith sat up and smoothed out her skirt. “You’re not hideous, Bella.”

Bella glared up at her. “Really.”

“I mean you are, currently.” She waved a hand in her direction. “And teenage boys are notoriously stupid, so I wouldn’t go swinging your bat in Mortimer’s direction right now–”

Caleb rolled his eyes. “Point, Lilith.”

“Right, right.” She held up her hands. “All I’m saying is, at most, this will be a funny anecdote in a few weeks. People might remember the time you looked like this as a lark, but when they think of you, they’re going to think of how smart and funny you are first.”

Bella held her breath, and when nothing else came, she said, “Usually your compliments come with a scathing critique at the end.”

Lilith shrugged. “I’m done.’

“Wow,” she said. “That was surprisingly sincere.”

“She’ll get there, given the chance.” Caleb patted her shoulder. “You know, one of us could go get one of the professors without you having to do a shame walk.”

Bella hung her head. “I didn’t want anyone to see me like this.”

“Too late for that now,” Lilith said. “I saw Sage Hughes out in the hall.”

“Yeah,” she said. “That’s probably smart.”

Lilith stood. “Let me go. You’ll be back to your usual beautiful self in a tick.”

“Thank you,” Bella said.

“Yeah, yeah. Don’t get too–”

They all froze as the door started to open. Lilith moved first. In a blink, she slammed herself against the door and slapped the lock, shouting out, “Occupied!”

“It’s a stalled bathroom,” a voice shouted from the other side, and Bella froze. That was her brother. And if Michael was around…

“Come on, Lilith,” a second voice said. “Open it up.”

“Oh,” Caleb said quietly next to Bella. “Isn’t that…?”

“Yeah,” Bella breathed out. “That’s Mortimer.”

⬨⬧⬨

“You know,” Morgyn said as they waltzed around the dark wood office, “I thought breaking into Sage Reyes quarters would be a little more interesting.”

L flipped through the large reference book titled Materials for Spells and Their Uses. Large illustrations took up one side of the page as scrawled text filled the other. Simeon looked over the personal collection of materials that were stacked in the sage’s office. Like everything about the school, it was grandiose. Lots of dark wood decorated with warm gold accents, and piles and piles of books stacked together. A radio was set up over the mantle of a fireplace, and the windows looked out into the mountains behind them. Sage Reyes did indeed have his own cauldron, which currently bubbled as L retraced her steps.

“You mixed it with a love potion?” Simeon said, leaning over the pot. “No wonder you got such nasty results.”

“It made sense at the time,” she muttered. “How long does it need to cook for?”

“Oh now we’re following instructions.” Morgyn dropped into Sage Reyes’ seat and spun around. “You think it’s a cushy job, being a sage?”

“No,” L and Simeon said together. L turned, holding the tome out in front of her. “Maybe I did it backwards.”

“Love spells are notoriously finicky,” Simeon said. “And you’re not going to fix her with one.”

“I know that.” She waved a hand at Morgyn. “Can you grab me the valerian root?”

They huffed and stood up from the chair. “Valerian root, valerian root. What does that look like again?”

“Here.” Simeone handed them a corked bottle with what looked like pink budded wildflowers. “The spell’s going to be confused, L. It needs to be detangled.”

“And it will be.” She moved the ladle as Morgyn dropped the root into the cauldron. A plume of pink smoke burst up with a sigh. “The way I figure it, we can displace the spell with another spell.”

Morgyn dropped the bottle on the desk. “Nope. Not at all. This isn’t a fairy tale, L. True love’s first kiss isn’t going to save the day.”

“It could help it along a little.” She yanked three empty bottles off the shelf and quickly magicked the contents of the cauldron into them. “Look, I can’t help Bella, we all know that by now. But if we guide the spell towards its completion, it’ll pass on its own.”

“Or it’ll make things much worse,” Simeon said.

“I guess we won’t know until we try,” she said.

L held up one of the vials to catch the ephemeral light that hung from the ceiling. Pink liquid reflected like stain glass against her skin. Then, she heard from outside: voices.

“I wish Keisha would keep a better hold on the students,” Sage Reyes deep voice carried as the doorknob rattled. All three of them stood perfectly still. “That’s the second time today the potions classroom had to be cleared.”

“You know how kids are,” came the voice of Sage Dyer. “They can be–hey!”

The trio stared at their professors, who stared right back. L felt her heartbeat in her chest. She did the only thing she could think to do, which was launch the first vial across the room. It landed at the feet of their professors and immediately a large plume of pink smoke erupted up. They both stumbled back, and L shouted, “Run for it!”

She didn’t wait to see if her conspirators followed her order. Bolting forward, she slid past the two sages and burst into the hallway. Morgyn was just behind her, one hand clutched to their skirt to keep it from flying up. Simeon moved slowest, but thanks to the confusion of the smoke, he was able to barrel past the two sages. Students stared at them as they raced past the herbalism room, and the potions class where Sage Hughes had her hands on her hips. She shouted something at L, but she didn’t stop until she saw the doors of the bathroom. Her boots slid across the tiled floor. Out of breath, hair flying every which way, she gave a wild eyed gaze to the two students standing in front of the door. Michael and Mortimer. Just the two idiots she wanted to see.

“You!” she shouted and pointed a finger at Mortimer, who jumped in surprise. “I have a job for you.”

Morgyn crashed straight into her, followed by Simeon, who managed to grab them both by the sleeve to keep them from completely falling over. Wobbling upright, L produced a second potion and held it out to Mortimer.

“Oh hell no,” Michael said.

“Shut it, pretty boy,” L snapped. “Consider me, for this brief moment, a fairy godmother. Mortimer, you’re our hero. Are you ready to rescue the lady fair?”

Mortimer’s mouth opened and closed. After a few stuttering sounds, he said, “What?”

“I’m vetoing this,” Simeon said.

“Seconded,” Morgyn gasped. They clutched a hand to their chest as they tried to catch their breath. “L, this is a bad idea. You’re only going to make things worse.”

“L!” came the sharp, sudden voice of Sage Hughes. She marched forward, and the three delinquents jumped back. “You and I are having a talk!”

“Nope,” L said and tossed the second vial. This landed a few feet from her, but it was enough to draw back the crowd of nosy students and give the sage second thoughts. Now with a clock ticking down, L turned, final potion in hand, holding it out desperately to Mortimer.

“We’re on Beauty and the Beast rules, Mort,” she said. “And this time you get to play the beauty.”

“Do not take anything she gives you,” Michael said.

L grabbed onto Mortimer’s hands, holding the vial in his palms, and she stared into his eyes. He lurched back, thudding against the bathroom door.

“Don’t think, Morty,” she said. “You’re at the tallest tower, you’ve defeated the dragon, you’ve raced to the top of the stairs, and she’s waiting for you to throw open that door, and save the day with a kiss. You can do it. Throw caution to the wind, embrace destiny.”

A muffled conversation was happening behind the door. L dragged the potion flask up and yanked the cork free.

“Your princess waits,” she said.

The potion bottle was nearly to his lips when the door pulled back, and Mortimer fell like a log. Everyone shouted as the vial fell from his hands and crashed to the floor, sending up a rising tower of pink smoke. Michael and L staggered back, but it hit face first against Lilith, who coughed and wheezed as she accidentally breathed in the concoction. L's eyes went wide.

“What is–” Lilith waved a hand in front of her face, eyes squeezed shut. “L, what are you doing?”

“I was trying to help,” she said.

“Yeah,” Caleb said, standing over the prone Mortimer. “It’s really obvious.”

“Do you feel anything?” L asked.

Lilith turned away from the crowd. “What did you just poison me with?”

“It’s, well–”

“Class 3!” boomed Sage Reyes. He and the other sages marched forward. “I need to see all of you in my office!”

“Seems we have the entire class right here,” Sage Dyers said. She rubbed her eyes, streaming pink tears from them. “Except one.”

“No,” called a small voice. “I’m here.”

The door to the stall opened, and there was Bella, face still slimy and green and wart covered, her normally shiny black hair in dark clumps around her face. The way her eyes drooped and her mouth bubbled, she was almost unrecognizable. Michael and Mortimer stared in open shock. Lilith opened her eyes and looked straight at Bella. L sucked in a breath.

“If your fairy tale plan was stupid before,” Morgyn muttered, “it’s definitely screwed now.”

“Shut it.” L raised a hand in their face. “Maybe this is exactly what they need.”

Caleb helped Mortimer to his feet, and Lilith stood between them. She stretched out a hand to Bella, who hesitantly took it. Their fingers interlocked, and Lilith stared down at the green hand she held, turning it over like an archeologist finding a pot shard. She blinked some more, her red eyes starting to water pink.

“Bella,” she said and looked up into her eyes. “I take back everything I said. You really are hideous.”

L breathed out. Welp. That was that.

“Alright, alright,” Sage Hughes said, ushering the other students away. “Let’s get to class. Marks off for tardiness.”

“Come here, darling,” Sage Dyers said, stretching out her long, black tipped fingers to Bella. “We’ll get you fixed up.”

“We didn’t even do anything,” Michael complained.

Sage Hughes put a hand on L’s shoulder. “You and I are going to have a little talk after all this. You can tell me why you attacked your teachers with the weakest love potion I’ve ever seen.”

“Ever?” L said. “That seems like a low bar.”

“And you’ve limboed right under it, kid.” She snapped her fingers at the rest of them. “Let’s get moving. There’s going to be a lot of detention notes going around.”

The whole class groaned. L felt a need to defend herself.

“I was only trying to help,” she said.

Bella shot her a withering glare beneath her brows. “L, maybe in the future, you should stop trying.”

“Wait, okay,” Mortimer said. “So that’s Bella.”

“I’m sure Miss Faba can enlighten us all about what happened,” Sage Reyes said. “In detention. My office, now.”

L looked up at him and let out all her breath. Sometimes, you just can’t fight fate.

⬨⬧⬨

Bella sat outside in the courtyard, relaxing on the large fountain. Yesterday’s adventure had come and gone, and while the class would be scrubbing potion stained tiles for the next three weeks, at least she was herself again. Lilith had rolled her eyes as Bella checked herself obsessively in the mirror, ensuring every flaw was gone. Bella had let her. Whatever brief camaraderie they’d shared, it was gone now. Things were truly back to normal.

She should be reading her astronomy book, but she’d let her mind wander instead. A cool autumn breeze ran through the trees. The mountains nestled around all of Glimmerbrook, making the whole world feel small and isolated. It was nice right now. After everyone had seen her at her worst, she didn’t mind being alone.

But around here, no one was alone for very long.

“Hey,” Mortimer said as he approached the fountain. Bella hadn’t even noticed him coming, hadn’t had time to fix her hair, or adjust her top, or ensure her long legs were in focus. He’d caught her in a moment where she was completely off in her own world. She supposed it was fair. He so often was.

“Hey,” she said and folded her book. “Did you come out here to study too?”

He held up his own textbook. “It’s one of the only classes I like around here. How are you doing today?”

“Do you mean am I a grotesque monstrosity unfit for human society?” She closed her eyes to the breeze as it ruffled her hair. “I’m feeling normal.”

“That’s cool.”

He shrugged his shoulders, and Bella peeked an eye open to look at him. No, Mortimer wasn’t anyone’s teenage heartthrob. He looked like he’d never done laundry a day in his life, and his greasy hair was stuck straight up in an attempt at some fashionably punk. But there was a softness to the eyes, and in the curve of his lip. There was something gentle about him. Bella hadn’t known much gentleness in her short time. Something about him was comforting, and she could easily imagine sinking into his arms as he explained the universe to her.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

He blinked. “What for?”

“It’s L’s fault, really,” she said, “but I did sort of help her make a mess, and now we all have detention for weeks. I should’ve dealt with it. I just didn’t want anyone to see me like that.”

Mortimer climbed onto the fountain, sitting up on top of the edge and letting his feet dangle down into the seat. “Why not?” he asked.

Bella huffed out a laugh. “Why not? I was disgusting. I looked disgusting.”

“You certainly weren’t as appealing as you are now,” he said. His gaze was up, staring at the tower of the school with a distant expression. “People are so quick to judge based on appearances though. I think it makes a monster so interesting. Having some creature drag itself up from the depths, and everyone throws spears and rocks, but in the end most monsters just want to be home. They’re antagonized. They want to feel safe, just like anybody else. Laughing at someone just because they don’t look ‘normal’ is so messed up. Who gets to decide what’s normal anyway?”

Bella gazed up at him. A small smile pulled at her lips. “I guess that makes sense.”

“Have you read Frankenstein?” he asked. Bella shook her head. “Most people only know the movie version, and it’s pretty good, but the book is incredible. The creature is giant, with oily skin and hair, and everyone fears him just because of his appearance, but he’s well read, and learned, and everything he does to get his father’s attention just ends in more cruelty. He’s one of my favorite literary characters.”

“I always liked Bride of Frankenstein,” Bella said.

“I guess that’d be more your kind of monster,” he said, sliding down to sit beside her. “She’s beautiful, but it hides the creature underneath.”

“You think I’m a creature?” Bella asked.

He smiled. “No. I think everyone feels like a creature sometimes. We all feel the slings and arrows of the world. Sometimes it feels good to see something they call hideous fight back. I always thought you’d be the type to fight back.”

Bella sat a little straighter. “You thought that, huh?”

He nodded. The two sat in silence for a moment, neither quite sure what to say next. The breeze rustled the treetops again, and then the upstairs window hinged open, and L leaned out the side.

“You’re supposed to be helping us in the potions room!” she shouted down.

Bella looked up, hoping her sharp gaze could cut L from this distance. She saw Michael appear in the window and sweep her away with his broom. L threw up her hands and marched off. Bella almost laughed when her brother tossed a thumbs up her way and quickly latched the window closed. She shook her head and turned back to Mortimer.

“I guess we should go,” he said.

“Oh, they can wait,” she said. “Besides, we’re studying, aren’t we? Have you read Jane Eyre?”

“Once,” he said. “I’m more of a Turn of the Screw fan.”

The wind whistled up, climbing high into the mountains. The orange autumn trees rustled and swayed. Students occupied the dorms while in an upstairs room, class three scrubbed away, the sages watching on. Eventually, Bella and Mortimer would be roused from their spot and forced to join the others. The excitement of the day before had finally died down, and maybe they could survive the next few weeks of detention. For now, it was another day at Nightshade Academy.

#magic high #ts4 #ts4 fanfic #bella goth #mortimer goth #michael bachelor #l faba #morgyn ember #simeon silversweater #caleb vatore #lilith vatore #tess dyer #ethren reyes #keisha hughes #glimmerbrook #ts4 realm of magic #ts4 vampires

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dracowars · 4 years ago

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can i request an imagine im so sorry if it’s too long for your liking but could it be a pureblood slytherin reader x draco imagine where the reader and draco are dating but after some bad news from home (maybe she doesn’t have the kindest parents like draco) she distances herself from everyone and keeps zoning out and finds herself astronomy tower thinking really dark thoughts but draco has constantly been watching over her and is super worried and maybe they have an argument at the tower and draco gets stupid and says something mean or even is dumb to think to accuse her of cheating at the end in which the reader maybe either slaps him (for dramatic effect) or if that’s too much she just says it’s over between the two and she walks off and draco is shocked and tries to stop the reader but she’s already gone and she doesn’t show up to breakfast or lunch and maybe in their class they learn about the boggart again and since they’re older their fears have changed and maybe the reader isn’t paying attention and she’s brought up to test her boggart and it’s draco saying those same things and maybe her parents come out as well and it’s essentially that draco’s unkind words are her fear because it’s the last straw for her until everything breaks because she was holding onto him and she runs out of class and class is dismissed because no one wants to go after that and the reader skips dinner and can be found in moaning myrtles bathroom having a panic attack and she gets really frustrated and hits the the sink really hard to feel something and you can hear myrtle begging the reader to stop and maybe someone sees her and runs to draco to get help but draco runs to the bathroom she’s not there anymore and he finds her at the astronomy tower feeling numb and he overhears her talking to herself and it ends in fluff because he can’t lose her and he figures out it’s probably her parents pressuring her too much again and he can relate because of his and they get back together and it’s just really fluffy at the end maybe they sneak in the kitchen for a quick minute dinner since the reader didn’t eat and draco has to be really kind to the elves heheh

darkness | draco malfoy

pairing: draco x slytherin!reader

word count: 3,1k

summary: where y/n's parents make her life a living hell and draco doesn't really help

a/n: normally i do not write about things like this but i actually really liked the request so i wrote it anyway. i don't mean to offend anyone with this if i misrepresented something, i did my best to get familiar with the topic <3

warnings: angst, major mental health issues including dark thoughts and self-doubt, hints of su*c*de, mentions of blood, cursing, very sensitive topics in general

universe: harry potter

The cold wind blows through your hair and makes it swirl around the air and into your face, goosebumps spreading all over your body at the sudden coldness. To prevent your hair from flying around, you tame your hair with a hair tie, your gaze fixed straight ahead while your face is illuminated by the setting sun.

You really missed this place during the holidays. The astronomy tower.

Whenever you are stressed from doing a lot of homework or studying in general, this is the place you can hust go to and are somehow always able to relax. The view is breathtaking and you love to watch the sun - or the moon, depening on what time of the day you find yourself up here - shine.

And this special place also gives you the security that you so urgently needed.

The winter holidays were a living hell for you. You have extremely strict parents who see a great importance in your education, but that is basically the only thing that interests them about you. That you bring honor to your pureblood family. That they can proudly show you off to other pureblood families even though they know nothing about you and who you really are.

Until recently they did not even know that you are in a relationship. Unfortunately, one thing led to another and they found it out by an unlucky coincidence which consisted of them picking you up at platform 9¾ for the very first time since you have been at Hogwarts. There they saw you with a platinum haired boy, kissing.

This boy turned out to be Draco Malfoy, the son of the pureblood Malfoy family, who you parents cannot stand at all. To put it in other words, they loathe each other to death and that for probably no reason, at least you have not been able to figure it out yet.

So of course they were not very thrilled that you are in a relationship with a Malfoy, which they showed you straight away. They locked you inside of your room at home because you had to 'think about your actions and their consequences'.

However, when they realized that their behavior would not change anything, they began to put you down. They threw the worst swear words at you, wanted to force you to break up with him and told you what a terrible shame you are for your family. That Draco could never love you and that you are ugly, cheap and overall useless. That is how it went on for your whole vacation.

Your parents always treated you this way, it was not new to you. Nevertheless it hurts every time, even if you try to hide it. You would rather keep all the pain inside of you than to tell others about it, because they are not able to help you anyway. Unfortunately, you did the math without your boyfriend.

This morning at the Central Station of London, Draco immediately saw that you were not feeling well. Any attempts to get you to tell him what is going on with you had been useless though so he left you alone at some point, but you still noticed how he kept staring at you for the whole train ride to Hogwarts.

You would love to tell him, tell him about everything, but something inside of you is stopping you from doing so. An invisible barrier inside of your head, probably fear, that you simply cannot overcome. You know that Draco's parents are pretty similar to yours, but still you just cannot manage to talk to him and you notice how it slowly but surely destroys your deep bond with one another.

Continuing to look into the distance and watch the clouds encircle the beautiful setting sun, which colors the sky in reddish colors, your thoughts suddenly wander to gloomy places. Dark places where you usually only go to when you are locked inside of your own room at home.

But now they are even attacking you at your safest place.

You perfectly know yourself that you are not good enough for Draco. You do not deserve this incredibly great person as your boyfriend. You do not even deserve him as a best friend, no, you do not deserve him at all. You are worthless and for him you are nothing more than one girl out of many.

And still you keep on being selfish and do not end it.

Completely lost in your own dark thoughts, you do not even notice at first how the tears are already streaming down your cheeks like waterfalls. Sniffling, you rub your eyes, smeer your discreetly applied mascara, and wipe the tears from your face.

"Why am I still doing this to myself?", you sob and lower your head, looking deep down at the grounds of Hogwarts. The tears that are enriched with pain flow out of your eyes and fall into the dark depths, causing you to slowly close your eyes.

The sudden mention of your name from behind you makes you abruptly breathe out in shock and your head jumps up as you turn around. Your eyes lock with the gray, sparkling eyes of your boyfriend, who is currently looking at you with pity.

"W-What are you doing here, Draco?", you sniff and wrap your arms around your body in an attempt to hide from him so he does not have to look at you.

"Why are you crying?", he asks, ignoring your question, and before you can realize, he is already standing right in front of you and gently places his hands on your tear stained, puffy cheeks. Gently wiping away your tears with his thumb, he searches your eyes for answers that can explain your current terrible condition. He cannot bear to see you like this, so fragile and deeply hurt.

Whatever happened, he will make sure you know that he is and always will be here for you. And he will not let, whatever it is, continue to hurt you so badly.

"If you do not tell me, then I cannot help you", he softly whispers and brushes the strands of hair behind your ear that have escaped from your ponytail in the wind and then carefully lifts your head so you have to look him in the eyes.

"It's nothing", are the only words you get out, your throat thightening, but all you would like to do is to just finally tell him about everything.

"Do you even realize how worried I am about you, Y/N?! It is killing me!", Draco suddenly raises his voice at you, causing you to flinch and take a step back, your back now touching the railing. Noticing the power of his words, he sighs and looks to the ground in shame.

Your head processes his facial expression and his gestures and again makes you believe that his sadness is your fault. By not being able to control your stupid feelings, you hurt him.

"I-I really have to go", you stutter out and quickly run past him, pressing your coat around your body.

"Have fun with Blaise then", you hear him say and you abruptly stop in your motion. Not fully understanding the words he just said, you turn to him.

"What?", you ask with not more than a breath coming out, hurt evident in your expression as he suddenly stomps in your direction furiously, a disgusted look on his face while he looks into your eyes.

"Don't act stupid now, Y/N! You hardly speak a word to me anymore, you avoid body contact, you are totally dismissive in general and you can't even look at me anymore! Why do you not just admit that you are cheating on me?!", Draco accuses you out of nowhere, not knowing what he is even saying himself, and you could swear that at this very moment your heart has finally burst into a thousand splinters and your last hold has now completely disappeared.

Losing the control over your body for a second, your hand lands on his cheek with full force. There is a dead silence before you just turn and leave, leaving him behind on the astronomy tower. You can hear him say your name after you, but you block it out and run down the stairs, crying, your vision blurred.

Missing one of the last stairs in your hurry, you fall down onto the cold floor. You get up again as quickly as possible when you hear steps behind you and you run. You run for your life while you disappear into the endless corridors of Hogwarts, making your way to your dorm.

The next morning your eyelids stick together from all the crying and you have a aching headache. You did not close one eye that night and just laid there crying in your bed silently until at some point there were no more tears.

In front of the door of your prefect dorm room, you can hear how the other students are leaving your house on their way to breakfast, but your stomach makes a flip when you only think about food. That is the reason why you decide to stay in your warm, safe and comfortable bed a little longer and to skip breakfast, which is unnecessary anyway. Avoiding other people seems like the best idea for you right now.

Just in time for the beginning of your first lesson of the long day, you made it out of your bed and are now sitting in Defence Against the Dark Arts with Professor Snape.

Your thoughts are whirling around in your head and you do not understand a single word Snape is saying in front of the class, even if you are really trying your best to understand him. Furthermore does it not help your concentration that you see how Draco keeps staring at you from across the room out of the corner of your eye. However, you do not have enough strength for this anymore after a while and therefore focus your gaze out the window at the rising sun.

At least you are distracted until all of the students get up from their seats all of a sudden and you only watch them confused until you notice that they are only waiting for you to join them and you quickly walk, almost stumbling, to them. Ignoring the looks and laughter of everyone, you play around with the hem of your grey Slytherin sweater and ignore them while doing so.

"Well then, let us begin. Ms. Y/L/N, would you please do us the honor and start", Snape clears his throat as you look at him in shock, noticing by the expression on his face that he definetely knows that you did not listen to him at all and have not been present with your mind.

Since you do not have a chance to defy yourself anyway, you nod and go to the position he points at in front of an old, dusty closet. With confusion all over your face, you switch between looking at Professor Snape and the cabinet as he suddenly opens the door and you take a big step back, startled to death.

"Have fun with Blaise then", Draco spits in your face disparagingly and is now slowly walking towards you after stepping out of the cupboard, increasing your pulse. The tears find their way back into your eyes right away while you just keep looking at him petrified, frozen in your spot.

"Why do you not just admit that you are cheating on me?!", he yells at you again and your vision becomes more and more blurred, your ears start to beep while he shouts at you, bringing back the painful memories of yesterday.

"No! Please don't leave me, Draco!"

It is like you are back on the astronomy tower again, your hair blowing in the wind as he steps towards you. In the next moment he is gone all of a sudden and instead of him, two other people are now in front of you.

"You are a shame for our whole family, you stupid brat", your father insults you and you fall onto your knees, holding your hands against your head in pain.

"Stop it! Please!", you beg them, but of course they do not stop, they only make their words worse.

"Draco can never seriously love someone like you. I mean, look at you! You are less worthy than dirt", your father tells you and your entire body is now trembling when you finally see a black cloak in front of your eyes and your parents vanish into thin air.

"Please stay with me", you choke through your tears, words addressed to Draco who had to watch the scene in front of him with pure horror in his eyes.

Breathing heavily, you look up at Professor Snape, who looks at you in disbelief, but as your eyes wander around the room to see everyone staring at you, your legs automatically carry you out of the classroom in the next moment, unable to bear their burning glances.

You run down the empty corridor with a faint vision in search of a safe place to hide until you arrive at one of the girls' bathrooms and rush in, not thinking about someone possibly being in there.

Slamming the door shut behind you, you stumble to the sinks with trembling knees and support all of your weight with your hands on either side of one sink as your legs fail beneath you. Clinging to the edge of the sink, you cry bitterly. The cold walls of the bathroom echo your crying several times, allowing you to hear your own pain.

"What is wrong, Y/N?", you hear a soft voice next to your ear and when you look up it is none other than Myrtle. Apparently of all places you ended up in her bathroom and are not as alone as you wished for.

"I am fine", you say with a monotonous voice, forcing yourself into an upright position, but literally everyone would see that you are definetely not fine, even a ghost.

"Y/N. You look anything but okay. Can I somehow help you-"

"Just leave me alone!", you angrily yell at her and lose control of your body, only seeing a thick, red substance running over your hand when it is already too late. Broken pieces of glass lie around you on the floor, which flew through the air when your fist hit them and inflicted small wounds on your face.

"You need to stop, Y/N!", Myrtle commands, but you do not listen and let yourself fall onto the floor, kicking your foot against the sink and thereby unintentionally loosen one of the old pipes. The sound of flowing water fills the room, surrounding your body on the floor.

On the edge of passing out, you lie in the cold water and stare at the ceiling while Myrtle has disappeared without a trace.

What you do not know, however, is that Myrtle is already on her way to find help and comes across Draco, who is running back and forth through the hallways while searching for you.

It takes Draco a moment to understand Myrtle's fast explanation, but when he does he runs into the direction of the girls' bathroom without hesitation. He rushes through the door into the flooded bathroom and all he sees is the broken mirror and the slightly reddish puddles in the water.

But he does not find you in there and realizes that there can only be one place where you could be.

Walking through the corridors of Hogwarts at lightning speed, he finally reaches the staircase leading to the astronomy tower and goes them up in no time. Once he arrives at the top, he abruptly stops when you come into his field of vision.

There you are, completely broken, leaning your head against the railing, your knees closely drawn to your body while your painful crys echo through his ears.

"Why did you not listen to your parents, you disgusting piece of daughter", you talk to yourself, not noticing that you are not alone any longer. With your already injured hand you hit the pole of the railing once, immediately regretting it as the pain spreads through your body.

However, your gaze lands on a person standing directly ahead and your eyes widen, but unfortunately you lack the strength to stand up, to yell at him, or to resist as he slowly sits down next to you.

Neither of you say a word, but it does not take long before he gently takes you into his strong arms, providing you with the support you needed so badly, so you can cry while he strokes over your hair. He whispers repentances in your ear over and over again. That he regrets his words, that he takes them back and that he was such an idiot.

"You are so wonderful", he confirms and gives you a kiss on the forhead, careful not to scare you away, continuing to stroke your upper arm with his hand.

"Do not believe in what your parents told you, angel. I will stay with you", he shakily breathes and has to pull himself together to not let a tear slip out of his eyes at any moment. "I am sorry that I let you down."

His last few words pull a trigger inside of your head and suddenly everything pours out of your mouth at once. Your fears, your worries. Everything your parents ever said or did to you. You finally tell him about all of it now, even though you should have done it much earlier.

"I love you more than anything, Y/N. You are my world and the reason I live. Never let anyone make you think that I do not love or deserve you, especially not your parents", Draco explains to you sincerely as you stare at him, exhausted but happy.

You slowly put your head on his shoulder and close your eyes, letting the good and bright drown out all of your dark and bad thoughts. Meanwhile, Draco carefully examines your injured hand before scooping you up into his arms while standing up.

"No matter how much you hate me right now, you have to eat something", he tells you, but you do not answer and just enjoy his close presence while you wrap your arms tightly around his neck, letting him carry you away.

If he had known how terrible you were feeling earlier, he would have done something much sooner. He should have been more pushy and not let you get away with a simple 'i am fine'. But now that he knows, he definetely learned from it.

And Draco would have never forgiven himself if he had let you just go like that.

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star-consultant · 4 years ago

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Bright are the stars

You need a Beatle song that perfectly encapsulates your sign? Of course you do. (Spotify playlist)

Aries—“I Saw Her Standing There”

One two three FOUR! An eager and intense song for an eager and intense sign. Aries falls hard and fast, with a tendency to rash vows that everyone doubts they mean—but Aries doesn’t doubt. Paul (who later styled himself as a "ram” at a key point in his creative development) makes good on the Cardinal Fire vibe with his exuberant vocals, and John of the Aries rising contributed the street-smart innuendo that utterly makes the song: And you know what I mean. Fittingly, this song kicked off the group’s first album, which itself has plenty of Aries “HELLO I AM HERE TO MAKE A MARK ON YOUR WORLD! (like me plz ok? this is my heart and i am Doing My Best??)” energy.

Taurus—“All I’ve Got to Do"

A song that takes its sweet time but burrows deeper than the average ear-worm into your consciousness. It’s a patient song that is unassuming but knows exactly what the hell it’s doing. The intensity builds bit by bit, so that you’re unaware when the power of the bridge comes crashing down. Describes the Taurean romantic ideal: lazy, loyal, cozy, constant, tender, and ever-so-true. Also, “All I’ve Got to Do” is featured on the second album, With the Beatles, which has plenty of other Bullish touches, noticeable even with a casual glance at the tracklist: “Don’t Bother Me,” “Not a Second Time,” and “Money (That’s What I Want).”

Gemini—“She Loves You”

Paul is a Gemini Sun, and throughout his catalogue it shows. But perhaps he never topped the Twinniness of this energetic, optimistic, breathless, gossipy classic. It was composed “eye-to-eye” with John, a truly dual-authored song, and one the rare Beatles numbers where the two lead vocalists double up on every single line, in true (Nerk) Twin fashion. Also the first but definitely not the last of their many “third-person narratives,” Paul’s novelistic instead of confessional slant being distinctly a Gemini thing. The speaker in this one couldn’t be more enthusiastic about this relationship if it were already repaired, and he couldn’t be more enthusiastic about it if it were his. Love is great! People reconciling is great! You should be glad, dumbass! But the real corker? What makes this so Gemini that it hurts? Yoko has confirmed that in the early 70s, during her separation with John, she actually had Paul play agony aunt. Then, during that meetup in L.A. where they were last photographed together, Paul urged John to “apologize to her” and get back together... which he did. That’s right. "She Loves You” is not merely a Gemini’s song: it’s a Gemini’s life.

Cancer—“Octopus’s Garden”

Ringo the Crab’s musically-complex fantasy about an underwater sanctuary where children are “happy and safe,” he and his lover can be together, and there’s “no one there to tell us what to do.” George (a triple Water sign himself, probably not-so-incidentally) always insisted that his best mate’s song Had Depths, and he himself supplied a lot of them: check out his lead guitar lines. They function as emotional counterpoint. When Ringo’s vocal line is especially wistful, the guitar is bright; when Ringo ends on a confident note, the guitar is quirky, ironic, even stiff-upper-lip pessimistic. Result: a shifting kaleidoscope of FEELS. The Moon approves.

Leo—“Good Day Sunshine”

Paul perfectly expresses his own Leo moon with a sublime, vibrant ode to laughter, love, and pride on a cloudless summer day. The bit in the lyrics about she knows she’s looking fine and I’m so proud to know that she is mine? That’s not marring the high tone of the song: that is part of the tone. Hear us roar! And by “roar” I mean "laugh and canoodle, coz Leo is about living the good life, bitches.”

Virgo—“Please Please Me”

What’s fair is forkin’ fair, mate! A exemplary blend of Virgo’s Mutable passive-aggressive sensitivity with its Elemental directness... half-critical, half-begging... plus the very sign-typical humblebragging. About their sexual prowess. Damn, Virgo. People forget how Earthy you really are sometimes. But here we are. In very Virgo fashion, instead of ditching the girl he’s decided to harangue her. On a more meta note, the Beatles were still studio virgins when they first began crafting this song, and it took several passes and incorporation of George Martin’s feedback before it became the bursting pop hit as we know it now. There’s that Virgo work ethic paying off.

Libra—“Strawberry Fields Forever”

The imagery of the title suggests an eternal harvest. But the star sign resemblance goes deeper than that: Always, no, sometimes think it’s me, but, you know, I know when it’s a dream. I think, er, no, I mean, er, yes, but it’s all wrong... that is, I think I disagree. Did you just hear your Libra roommate rambling after a joint, or did you listen to verse three of “Strawberry Fields”? Same difference. The song is absolutely lovely, as anything associated with the child of Venus should be, and innovative, as befits a Cardinal sign. Most of all, even in all of Libra Sun John’s weighing and weed-wandering, he knows one thing: he’s got to take someone else along with him. A companion, stat!

Scorpio—“While My Guitar Gently Weeps”

George of the Scorpio moon and Scorpio ascendant had to really lean into this side of his nature to even get this damn track properly recorded. He resorted to the social power play of inviting Eric frickin’ Clapton into the tense post-India studio just to get Lennon, McCartney, and Martin to give his song proper Beatle recording magic. Which it deserved. The dark drama of the hard-won arrangement is the perfect Scorpio accompaniment to the moody, reflective lyrics about “all the love there that’s sleeping” in this weary world. There’s tender, horrified pity here for those who are stifled into inauthenticity: I don’t know how nobody told you how to unfold your love. I don’t know how someone controlled you; they bought and sold you... Bonus points for the Watery ‘just can’t even’-ness of not being able to so much as pick up a damn broom.

Sagittarius—“Something”

You’re asking me, will my love grow? I don’t know, I don’t know! A deeply instinctual lover knows that Cupid has done hit a bullseye. He remains emphatically ambivalent about the future, but he knows what he feels in this moment, and in that moment is romance and wonder that is as deep as the earth is from the heavens. Sags are intense, but of all the Fire signs they are most far-seeing and detached (due to their Mutable quality, which makes them see the world a bit more like an Air sign does). “Something” keeps trying to capture that je-ne-sais-quoi, and despite the speaker’s happiness he can’t help but circle back again and again to take another shot at that the mental target. A philosopher even when in love. Ultimately, however, he doesn’t want to leave her now... which for a restless Sag is already saying a ton.

Capricorn—“Revolution”

John let his unfashionable midheaven Capricorn off the leash with this blunt, pointed savaging of radical and violent revolutions. (Given the tanks on Tiananmen Square and the millions dead on the killing fields of Cambodia, I can’t say that his cautionary note about “destruction” and “minds that hate” was unnecessary.) Few things are more Capricorn than ‘Oh, you want my money? Yeah, first show me that you’ve done your fucking homework, mate.’ Bonus Earth points for the fact that he somehow worked sex—a lot of sex—into this political track.

Aquarius—“Come Together”

John of the Aquarius moon’s decidedly loony attempt to write a political campaign song in order to stop Reagan. (The result was too weird for Timothy Leary, whose reaction was pretty much ‘wtf? I don’t think even I have enough residual acid in my system for this one... ’) John invokes the ideal of collaboration, but his call to solidarity is built around fantastical lyrics that no one can comprehend: He wear no shoeshine, he got/Toejam football, he got/Monkey finger, he shoot/Coca-Cola, he say/I know you, you know me... Oh, right. The lyrics contain exactly one discernible message: One thing I can tell you is you got to be free. How Aqua. Also in true collaborative Water-Bearer fashion, the arrangement really makes the song (special mention to the tight, tight work of the rhythm section). Bizarre genius that attracts a true team effort—it doesn’t get much more Aquarius than that.

Pisces— “I Want to Tell You”

The wall of sound builds up thickly enough that soon the words seem to be traveling through the sea to reach you: I want to tell you my head is filled with things to say... But when you’re here, all those words, they seem to slip away. A gorgeously, emotionally tongue-tied song... about being tongue-tied. Written by George, a Pisces Sun, this absolute mystery of a lyric is all emotion and no logic. If he seems to act unkind, it’s only him, it’s not his mind. Okay, Fishboy. Good thing the track is compellingly lovely and utterly relatable. Which suits the Pisces life exactly: ‘I don’t know what I mean, but it’s exceedingly beautiful and I want you to share it with you very, very much.’

#zodiac #beatles

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lovetenya · 4 years ago

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𝐜𝐨𝐥𝐨�� 𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬: 𝐲𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐰

pairing: tenya iida x gn! reader

warnings: angst. anxiety. paranoia. self doubt. unkind words. non-explicit mentions of physical pain & scarring. implied death, but i don’t elaborate. lying. worrying.

word count: about 1.8k

author’s note: nobody writes any iida angst, (barely anyone writes for him at all) and as a vehement lover of angst, i thought i’d fill that gap. i love tenya, i really do, but i love to think about him in this way just as much as i love to believe he’d be the perfect other half. nobody is perfect, not even ingenium.

loving tenya iida is yellow.

it’s the color of the petals on the soft yellow daisy bouquet that he surprised you with on the night of your first anniversary. although it wasn’t a last minute purchase (how could he forget the best day of his life?), he still wasn’t exactly sure what to get.

what kind of object can symbolize a love so encapsulating?, he thought. there is no tangible item that could possibly show how i feel.

he picked up the familiar flowers from a shop on the corner that the two of you had walked past before on a date. it was one of the first ones, and you pressed your face against the glass to get a better look at the delicate flowers inside.

he caught himself in his romantics when he thought that none of them were prettier than you. nothing was or ever would be better than this moment, where you were on your tip toes in an attempt to see more flowers. that day, he insisted on buying you a small bouquet of yellow daisies, and thought it would be sweet to indulge and revisit the memory.

the week before your anniversary, he made you promise not to execute any elaborate celebratory plans.

“honey, you know that I’d rather do nothing with you than anything with anyone else,” he said. and he was serious. he would rather sit together on the couch half-listening to a documentary (because you can’t keep your eyes off each other) than go out to dinner, where he couldn’t let down his guard.

although he liked to think that his work made the world a safer place, he couldn’t help but feel paranoid whenever you were out in public. how could he be sure that someone in the restaurant didn’t want him dead? how could he be sure that they wouldn’t kidnap and kill you just to make him suffer? if he couldn’t be sure, was it worth the risk?

he’s an iida, after all. with their striking looks and long hero legacy, it’s not exactly easy to blend in in a world whose wellbeing depends on your greatness and ability. there’s a great sense of pride in coming from a long lines of heroes, and his parents were much less than thrilled to receive the phone call that tenya was in the hospital following the incident that rendered his arm “useless”. they weren’t happy to see that he chose to leave his arm that way as a reminder of his dedication.

when they figured he was out of earshot, they asked questions.

did the doctors check for any mental ailments?

will he ever be able to use his arm again?

why didn’t they amputate?

what kind of hero accepts a physical wound and doesn’t try to heal?

what kind of hero goes after a villain on their own?

are you sure he’s cut out to be a hero?

tenya isn’t proud of the publicity his family got following the incident including a certain self-proclaimed hero killer. he isn’t proud of the wary stares he gets from his classmates. he isn’t proud of the violence he’s been forced to commit. he isn’t proud of any of it, really, but he doesn’t regret his actions; not for a second, not even when he’s painstakingly rubbing scar balm into his shoulder, hoping that at least the scars would fade.

the pain, which seeped deep into his muscles and pricked at his bones, was more than just a cosmetic concern. he couldn’t care less about a scar, but with his limited movement capabilities, he knew he’d never be able to teach his sons to throw. the doctors didn’t have to tell him that. but, of course, they did. he knew what it all meant. he saw through their sugarcoating and attempts at softening the blow. they should’ve known better.

although he’s now your tenya, he was a hero first.

before there was you, there was responsibility. before there was love and devotion, there were hero duties and combat instincts. they’re ingrained into his mind, refusing to be ignored. even when things seem fine, he can’t help but make sure. he couldn’t live with himself if his laziness were to cause someone else’s pain. that isn’t what heroes do. when you’re in public, he’s constantly scanning the room and won’t sit with his back to a door or window, because he needs to be able to see who’s coming and going. he has to make sure that everything is fine. he has to make sure everyone is safe, and everything is put-together.

he has to be strong, because there are thousands of people counting on him. he has to be strong, because evil doesn’t rest. he has to be strong, because... if not him, then who?

the day of your anniversary, you texted tenya while he was at work.

you: i hope you have a great day, my love! i can’t wait until you get home so we can celebrate! <3!!

tenya: I can’t wait either! I love you very much, sweetheart. See you later.

he came home with his arms full of the bouquet of flowers, and almost teared up at the sight of the dinner you had set up for the two of you. you always considered every worry, every caution, every gut feeling of his, and he appreciated that more than he’d ever be able to express. no words did it justice.

you’re more than his other half, you’re his everything. you’re everything he needs, everything he can’t be, and more.

you surprised him with an at-home dinner date, where it was perfectly safe and calm, and there were no people hiding in the shadows. music softly played in the background, and the daisies looked perfect on the table.

it’s okay, tenya, you reminded him. you’re home now.

yellow is tenya’s birthday present, or the envelope holding it at least.

there are only so many thoughtful gifts you can give before the inspiration simply runs out, and you have to go bigger. you have to look forward, and think of what will really leave a mark on someone’s life. you only have so many chances to get it right.

one year, for his birthday, you got him the deed to a recently-discovered star and named it after him. a star for your star. your guide in the dark. your light in unimaginable darkness. your ever-present warmth.

many years later, when tenya is long gone, his star sparkles a little brighter.

through the telescope, he seems to be waving hello.

golden yellow is the promise ring that you have no idea how tenya afforded.

you insist he take it back and that neither of you are ready for the commitment, but he refuses, of course.he’s never been more ready for something in his life. he tells you,

“i got it for you because you’re worth it.

every day with you is worth it.

i never want to spent another day of my life without promising to love you every second of every day.

every time you wear this ring, you’ll be reminded of how much i love you.

i saved for months, anticipating this very moment when i’d get to promise myself to you forever.

i promise, you deserve it.

you deserve everything, and i can’t wait to give it to you.”

and you did deserve it. and you deserve him, in all of his glory. forever.

the harsh bruises littering his chiseled body are yellow at first. they turn purple, eventually, before they fade away completely. their sting, however, is more than just the pain of broken blood vessels. they’re a concrete reminder that tenya isn’t untouchable. he isn’t invincible. he’s human, and he bleeds red.

the bruises come when his instincts send him in the wrong direction, when he dodged too late, or when he couldn’t seem to land a kick. he tells you that they’re from when he “tripped going down the stairs” or when izuku “accidentally punched him too hard during a training session.” (lies.)

yellow is the embarrassment you feel when you confront izuku, pleading with him to be more careful with tenya, and he tells you that he couldn’t have possibly caused those bruises, because hasn’t seen iida outside of class in weeks. nobody has. he’s been training more than usual, and hasn’t been at group dinners.

yellow is the sickness and guilt you feel at the realization, because you recently teased iida for not getting his homework done. he smiled weakly, pretending like it was just a foolish slip-up. it was so unlike him, you couldn’t help but poke a little fun.

“ooooh!!! class representative iida tenya, professional stick in the mud, didnt complete his populations analysis essay on time??? somebody call the news outlets!!! or an ambulance, because i think i might die from shock!!!”

he couldn’t blame you for your ignorance, because he liked that you didn’t know. you didn’t know how tired he was. you didn’t know how hard he was pushing himself. you didn’t know how hard he was working. you didn’t know how close he was to breaking. nobody did, and he liked it that way. nobody wants to see their leader falter, or hesitate, or fail, so he didn’t let them.

while he didn’t like to make you wait, he especially didn’t like to make you worry, and he figured the best way to do that was to keep it all in. he was supposed to be an upstanding hero, worthy of admiration and inspiring greatness in all, but at the end of the day, your opinion of him mattered the most.

in his mind, he was supposed to be your hero. and he tried, with every fiber of his being, to be your everything.

he was supposed to keep you safe, not keep you up at night, wondering if this morning was the last time you’d get to kiss him goodbye. he’s supposed to come home to you, and he promised, even though he couldn’t be sure, that he would. he didn’t want to lie about that.

his lies are yellow. they’re made with hope of protecting you, with keeping you safe from the evil swirling through the world.

what you don’t know can’t hurt you, right?

...right?

they’re made with intentions filled with sunshine and his golden gaze when you’re supposed to be studying, but the temptation is too strong.

his intentions are filled with the colored pencils scattered on the floor of his dorm room from when you sketched each other for the first time.

they’re filled with honey coated love, first sweet and satisfying, but eventually leaving you with a sore throat. they leave you feeling his love, but also his lies.

and through it all, you still love him, maybe even to a fault.

even when he’s yellow.

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ohbae-me · 5 years ago

Note

mammon #5 for the prompt list? 👉👈

5. Forget it, you're a fucking asshole; Mammon Angst Prompt

&& kisses meant to distract each other.

@maywish27 hope it’s okay that I combined these! If you had something else in mind, please let me know~

Angsty Mammon hits me right in the feels. Someone give my boy a hug.

Mammon was having the worst day already, and it was only lunchtime. First off, he woke up late and got yelled at by Lucifer. Then because of that he'd left all his homework in his room, causing him to get yelled at yet again by his teachers, which would surely only lead to more yelling from Lucifer later on. Secondly, Levi had accused him of stealing more money, and this time he really hadn't done it!

Not only that, but thanks to all the mornings events, he had missed out on walking to RAD with MC.

He'd heard her enter the cafeteria before he'd seen her. Her laugh never failed to perk his ears up. For once though, he didn't want to see her. It would mean he'd have to tell her why he was so moody and she would realize how big of a screw up he was.

"Hey, Mammon!" She said as she sat across from him. Deciding it was better to say nothing, Mammon just stabbed grumpily at his food.

"Is everything okay? I missed you this morning and you don't seem too happy.." She reached forward to touch his arm, concern etched on her face.

"I'm fine." He spat.

"You don't look fine-"

"Just knock it off will ya? I don't need some human nosin' around in my business. Just stay out of it for once!" He knew he was being harsh, but his mouth always seemed to work faster than his brain. Her surprised expression melted into a sad look and Mammon faintly registered the stabbing feeling in his heart.

"Mammon, I was just trying to help…"

"Yeah well I don't need your damn help! Are all humans this stupid? Save your pitiful look for someone who gives a shit and stop treating me like a fucking child!" His fist hit the table and they stared at each other, mirrored faces of anger.

"Forget it. You're a fucking asshole." She grabbed her bag and stormed out of the bustling hall. Mammon shoved his tray away as he rose, ignoring the angry questioning of Asmo beside him as he stormed out in the opposite direction.

Screw this. He was calling it a day. He didn't have it in him to deal with anymore bullshit.

With an exasperated huff he collapsed into his bed. He let himself stew awhile before he fully comprehended exactly what he had said.

Fuck. Lucifer was right. If there was anything Mammon was good at it was being an idiot. It was his own fault he overslept and was unprepared. Then he went and took it all out on the one person who was always on his side. This was exactly what he'd been trying to avoid. He didn't want to tell her he'd messed up, but managed to make it ten times worse. He wouldn't be surprised if she never wanted to speak to him again.

He kept replaying the way her eyes flashed with hurt at his words. He thought about how MC had once told him that he was the one brother she was most comfortable with because he had never snapped with her, never resorted to his devil form to threaten or intimidate her. He fisted his fingers in his hair and curled up tighter, hot tears falling freely onto his pillow.

What a stupid way to mess everything up! He couldn't have just told her he was having a bad day and left it at that?! He was greed, not wrath for fucks sake.

Lucifer was right again- he really was the worst of all of them rolled into one.

He felt a sinking feeling in his gut as a knock sounded on his door, pulling him up from his spiral of self deprecation. He figured it was Lucifer- ready to finish off his punishment for the days' events. This time Mammon knew he deserved it, and resigned himself to his fate when he heard the door click open then close again.

"Mammon." His eyes flew open in surprise. The last person he'd expected to come see him was MC. "You missed dinner."

"..." Had he really been in his room that long?!

"There wasn't much left thanks to Beel, but I made those noodles you like so much…" Her voice was tense, guarded- but not unkind. "We don't have to talk right now if you don't want to, but you should eat."

"Quit bein’ so nice to me will ya?" Mammon grumbled as he shifted in his bed. He heard her sigh, then felt the bed dip as she sat on the edge.

"Come on, Mammon. This isn't like you. Can't you just tell me what's up?"

"It's nothin'." He mumbled.

MC was quiet for a moment before she spoke.

"Look. I'm used to your little tough guy act, and I'm used to you referring to me as a weak human but you're usually not this much of an ass about it. Did I do something wrong? Did I upset you somehow?"

"No, no nothin like that. It's my fault. I-I'm sorry. It's just.. it's just ugggh!" Mammon sat up and scratched at his hair in frustration. "I screw up a lot. I know that- but I just screw things up so often that no one believes me when I'm actually innocent! Somthin’ goes missing and everyone assumes it was me and-" As he rambled, MC listened. She let him pour his heart out over the whole situation until he started to spiral towards a darker place.

MC grabbed his cheeks and placed a kiss right on his lips, effectively stopping all brain function.

"Wh-what was that for?!" She still held his cheeks and he wondered if she could feel them burning under her palms.

"To distract you from shitting on yourself so much." She said firmly. "Look, Mammon. Maybe they aren't completely unwarranted in their blame- which doesn't make things right on either side. But they are certainly not perfect either. I get that none of you can help it. It's just who you are. And I love all of you regardless. All these flaws are actually kinda endearing in a way. You steal, sure. But you are also the mediator. You care deeply for your family and it shows. You hold them all together. Plus, you are incredibly kind, even if you try and hide it." Her hands moved to wipe a remaining tear away, then to push his hair back.

"And I could go on and on if you want. Next time, just talk to me okay? You big dummy." Mammon just nodded as he processed her words. He didn't really know how to feel about what she'd said. Despite everything he had told her, she still said she loved him? Well, she'd said all of them but he wasn't going to linger on that part.

"Now, go eat your noodles before they get gross and soggy. I'm guessing you missed breakfast this morning as well as lunch and dinner. You must be starving. I'll put a movie on. I'm picking though, since you were still a jerk earlier."

He watches her move around his room as he eats. She knew exactly how to hook up his complicated sound system for their movie. She pulled the comforter and pillows off his bed and nested herself right into the couch like the room was hers. His heart warmed at the thought that she was still comfortable here with him.

When he was finished, she leaned forward and patted the spot on the couch behind her and he didn't hesitate to crawl in and wrap his arms around her as they got comfy. He couldn't focus on the movie though. His mind was still reeling from everything that had happened today. So instead he sat with his arms around MC, his head resting on her shoulder.

"Thank you." He whispered. He wasn't entirely sure if she'd heard him, but he felt her squeeze his arm before taking his hand in hers. If she noticed the tears dripping on her shoulder, she didn't say anything. He'd pick himself up tomorrow and find some way to thank her properly, but for now he'd let her hold all the broken pieces.

#Mammon #obey me mammon #obey me #angst #fluff #shepwrites #obey me fanfic

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hexhealed · 4 years ago

Photo

˗ ˏ ˋ ( kristine froseth, twenty-one, cis woman, she / her ) — is that ANDROMEDA BLACK just saw in the courtyard? i hear they’re a SLYTHERIN, returning for their SIXTH school year, but something more juicy is them being ENTERPRISING & THOUGHTFUL as well as DETACHED & CONFLICTED. if you want some more details on them, i guess i could tell you that they’re PUREBLOOD, and from the rumors i heard, they’re currently allying with THE NEUTRALS. personally, i think they remind of: solemn family portraits lining a darkened hall, puppet pulling at her strings, archaic tomes precariously stacked, aristocratic nose to the grindstone, the sweet sting of venom, honey, & healing. but that might be just me. — ( kit, she / they, 23 ) ˎˊ ˗

TW — unhealthy family dynamics, emotional abuse / neglect, v. vague allusions to mental health issues.

basics ,

full name. andromeda cygnella black. known as. andromeda, andie. age / date of birth. twenty-one / april 2nd, 1960. year. sixth year. blood status. pureblood. house. slytherin. alliance. neutral. gender / pronouns. cis woman, she / her. orientation. bisexual, biromantic, grey-ace. extracurriculars. chaser for the slytherin quidditch team; member of the herbology, potions, slug, and occamy dueling clubs; hospital wing volunteer. additional stats. click here.

early life ,

andromeda is born a mere few months after bellatrix, and is instantly her mother’s darling. for a long time, she doesn’t question — doesn’t even truly comprehend — the way her mother favors her, desperate as she is for her parents’ approval. they are exacting, demanding, withholding; they praise one daughter or another, it seems, only to shame the other two in their failures.

andie takes what she can get, where she can get it, for as long as she can, letting her parents pit her against her sisters in a constant battle for attention, affection, and approval. but it’s a battle she starts to lose, middle child that she is. despite all andromeda’s efforts, it seems being perfect comes as naturally as breathing to little narcissa, and druella redirects her favoritism towards her youngest daughter. and while bella is at a disadvantage, she makes up for it in sheer willpower; she turns herself into their father’s perfect slytherin heir, what andie was supposed to be. ( note, of course, that this is how andie experiences this; the truth is that each sister was of course neglected and traumatized in their own way ! )

for most of her early childhood, andie doesn’t really question the world she lives in; doesn’t think too hard about the wealth, the blood purity, the high society circles in which her family moves. it is as natural as the air around her. yet she manages nonetheless to ruffle feathers, draw suspicion. at age six she questions innocently why uncle marius has been cursed from the family tree; the answer horrifies her, though she tries to hide it, saying nothing and staying up late at night wondering if her parents would ever disown her for something like that.

( ..... will probably add some more once i’ve sorted some more black sisters plots ? )

she really enjoys quidditch and plays whenever she can find an opponent ( bella doesn’t care for the sport, and lets her know as much. ) it’s not a ladylike pursuit, her mother reminds her, but at least her father approves. at first, it’s only the children of her parents’ friends, all pureblood, all high-society, but as one by one they start going off to hogwarts, andie needs to find herself new friends. this is how she takes her first steps out of her ignorance, more interested in finding playmates than purebloods; but the common little muggleborn derisions that are the black family bread and butter do not do well among her new friends, and she starts realizing for the first time the unkindness of her family’s beliefs.

this is where the split starts, between andie and andromeda black, because whatever she is, she must be hidden; she leaves the façade of andromeda standing as she carefully slips out from behind it, and no one is much the wiser.

hogwarts ,

to finally go to hogwarts is a relief for andie. it offers an escape out of the stifling environment and the constant disapproval of her parents; at the same time, though, it gives her every opportunity to impress them. and she still wants to, especially following in bella’s footsteps; she’s always admired her older sister, always wanted to be just as clever, just as talented, just as capable. it’s this burning desire to be valued that has the sorting hat deciding, after just a few moments, to place her in slytherin.

and so without realizing she slips back, subsumed once more into pureblood ideology, so much stronger when impressed by her peers; it’s much easier to dismiss her parents as outdated, and keep her mouth shut, than it is to disagree with the cool upper years, especially when they are conspicuously nice to her.

as time passes, though, she slowly becomes something else other than bella’s little sister, expanding her horizons at last somewhat. she excels academically, as is expected of her — cygnus and druella would not suffer their children to enter school unprepared — and joins the potions and herbology clubs, spending less and less time in the slytherin common room. hoping to play quidditch, she tries out her first year but fails; in her second year, she secures a spot as a chaser.

her year three electives become something of a bone of contention over the preceding summer; alongside arithmancy, andie signs up for muggle studies. her family disapproves. she has to assure them it’s a purely academic pursuit, that she’s only curious but never sympathetic — and she doubts whether they’re convinced.

she’s still trying to be and seem apolitical, trying to toe the line, but with each passing year she finds it less and less sustainable. once, she might have been ignorant, simply might not have known better; now, she knows better, and she’s just a coward. at this point she can see straight through her family’s pureblood supremacy. but then, as much as it turns her stomach, they are her family. she loves them. and more than that, she fears them.

so to assuage her guilt andie simply overworks herself. ( can’t feel guilty if you’re too tired ! ) between club meetings, quidditch practices, and homework, she’s overworked as it is, but when her potions professor approaches and suggests, given her skill, she may be helpful to madam pomfrey in the hospital wing, she cannot refuse. it’s simple work, preparing ingredients, cleaning, changing sheets, but she finds it oddly rewarding.

in her o.w.l. consultations, andromeda decides to pursue healing; she’s fascinated by magical medicine, and fantasizes about doing research and experimental magic, about pushing boundaries. but her parents would be happier if she simply said she wanted to be a st. mungo’s healer, so that’s what she says. the christmas holidays in her fifth year are the first holidays she chooses to stay at hogwarts; she tells her parents she simply must, that between her clubs, quidditch, and o.w.l.s she’s much too busy for a holiday. truth is, she simply dreads spending two weeks alone with her family.

she excels at her o.w.l.s, but it doesn’t leave her feeling proud, just relieved that she won’t have to face her parents empty-handed. the idea of spending all summer back in her family home is torturous, but thankfully she doesn’t have to; her parents pull some strings, talk to some old family friends and secure her an internship at st. mungo’s over the summer. she expresses her gratitude politely to them, and her relief to her friends in cautious letters, and stays in a room in the city for nearly the whole summer.

personality , hcs , etc. ,

got the nickname andie at hogwarts; her family has always called her by her full name. her parents seemed unreasonably upset with her about it — something about throwing away family tradition, not honoring their wishes for her, and other nonsense.

loves to throw herself into her responsibilities, hobbies, and interests as a way of avoiding inner turmoil; has a strong problem-solving impulse that gets way worse whenever she has bigger, unsolvable problems.

speaking of, she loves herbology, catch her in the greenhouses most days of the week. she loves the smell, the warmth, the dirt beneath her nails, the way the rest of the school grounds outside feel so distant behind the glass. the greenhouses are her church and sanctuary.

monstrously overworked and definitely verging on a burnout; between school, quidditch, career thoughts, the impending war, volunteer work, and sorting through some deep-seated personal issues.

might be the nicest black sister, but that’s not really a high bar to clear. though she carries a lot of guilt and tries to resolve that by doing good work, keeping her head down and not being explicitly hateful, she’s not exactly kind. she’s a bit of a know-it-all and loves to argue with people, can be really condescending, lashes out when she’s feeling insecure, and can hold a grudge like nobody’s business.

very much enjoys muggle music, after it was shared with her by friends. she named her owl ziggy after ziggy stardust, knowing full well that her parents wouldn’t have the faintest clue what it meant.

plots ,

just wanted to say first of all that i love plotting, hc’ing, brainstorming, etc. so please hit me up ! if nothing here works i’m super happy to think of something else. also, every single one of these is open to all genders unless specified ! i also especially love plotting based on other connections ( i.e. muse a and muse b are friends, muse b and muse c are exes, therefore muse a and muse c do not get along, or smth ) idk i just have a lot of ideas !

friends. this could go a lot of ways ! very importantly, andie doesn’t pick her friends for their politics; they could be death eaters, order members, or neutral. more important is their ability to put up with andie’s nonsense. that being said alliances would definitely play a part in how they interact, etc. ofc.

unofficial engagement. a betrothal is a bit archaic, andie’s made clear in so many words. her parents and this muse’s parents, rather than putting their foot down and making demands, are quite cunning in their attempt to play matchmaker. they invite each other and their family to dinners, ask after them in every letter, and never pass up an opportunity to throw the pair of them together. would definitely be a pureblood, ‘respectable’ and probably but not necessarily a slytherin ! how the two of them feel about it is also very open-ended — enemies, slow-burn, fake dating, friendship, i’m happy with anything !

exes. give me a bunch of these ! there’s so many options for this. their first little ‘relationship’ that maybe lasted only a few months, going on their first lil hogmeade dates together ? first loves making plans to visit each other over summers ? some hookup that one of them thought was much more serious than the other ? something a lil star-crossed & pushed apart by families ? an ex andie unceremoniously dumped last year to focus on her studies ? exes who are good friends, exes who hate each other, exes who are so embarrassed to have dated each other they pretend nothing ever happened, just. any of them. pls.

crushes / flirtationships. all the crushes ! an youthful crush that she swears she’s gotten over but she still gets flustered whenever they talk to her; someone who’s interested in her, but whom she has less than zero interest in ( or, alternatively, is pretending to have no interest in ); mutual crushes but they’re both convinced the other person hates them or is out of their league; mutual crushes but they’re also constantly bickering and everyone thinks they’ve already been married forty years; bad crushes that she feels bad about for whatever reason ( they are death eaters, or seeing someone else, or a rival in some way, idk ), etc. etc.

childhood friends. lots of options here too; high society pureblood kids her parents approved of, but also any halfbloods in and around london who are into quidditch, and would play with andie ?

study buddy. andie’s a big nerd. give her some friends to study with ? someone who won’t give her a weird look when she threatens to hex chatty first years in the library. they can ask each other questions and help with charms practice and share their hopes, dreams, and aspirations ! definitely made a pact last year to get x amount of o.w.l.s. should be in sixth year, but doesn’t necessarily need to be an overachieving nerd like andie.

potions partner. fairly self-explanatory; they’re adjacent to a study buddy but work together pretty much exclusively in potions class. this would ideally be one of two types: either they’re also very, very good at potions and they’ve partnered together to make sure they both get top marks each class, or alternatively, this is someone who struggles with potions and who was partnered with andie, either against her will ( thanks slughorn ) or out of the ( unlikely ) kindness of her heart, and she helps them get up to speed.

academic rival. the opposite of a study buddy. study enemy ? should also be a sixth year so that they share classes with andromeda. they’re both overachieving students and will stare daggers at each other in class whenever the other person raises their hand. andie feels very threatened and definitely lets her insecurity get the best of her in this dynamic.

quidditch rival. is there anything better than a sports rivalry ? no ! this could be anywhere from a friendly bantering rivalry to a full on, hate-your-guts, will hex you on the pitch if i can rivalry ? could be simply because of their teams, because they have issues off the field, or because they accidentally ran head-on into each other in their first match and now can’t let it go ? just think this could be fun !

frienemies. okay, hear me out. gimme a buddy for andie where their entire friendship essentially revolves around gently verbally abusing each other — or at least, that’s andie’s side because she’s a great big bully ! but if they’re ever in trouble or getting shit from anyone she will drop anything and go fight. someone she probably really adores but will only begrudgingly admit to. mostly she calls ‘em names.

petty enemies. so, i know it’s stupid to hold onto old grudges when there’s a literal war on the horizon, but andie ? andie does not. she’s really pettier than that. would love for this to be someone who she just really butted heads with in her earlier hogwarts years and they’ve both just never gotten over it. they’re very petty and don’t even really remember why they don’t like each other but are they gonna get over it now ? heck no.

true enemies. not petty, not somewhat friendly, not a rivalry but a true and burning hatred. just. give it to meeeeeee. this could be a muse with strong political opinions who really hates where andie stands & isn’t afraid to say so, but could also just be more personal; maybe andie did something ? i’m very okay with her being the bad guy here too.

confidant. andie has a lot going on that she doesn’t/can’t really talk to other people about; maybe this muse is just a very good listener, or maybe they have their own deep dark secrets ? either way, they can tell each other things very few others are privy to.

patients. might be a bit of a stretch of the definition since right now andie’s not a medical professional any more than a candy striper might be, but has your muse been injured at any point in the past year/year and a half or so ? it’s possible that you might be entitled to some compensation for them having to put up with andie being annoying as hell during their hospital wing stay.

#ehqintro #⧽ always half - hidden ∖ development .#i hope this is ok ! i triple checked family intros but if there's anything that conflicts or anything pls let me know and i'll fix it !#will i ever write an intro under 2k words ? probably not lmao

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imagineclaireandjamie · 5 years ago

Note

Can you please add to the come Hell or Helwater story? I would be eternally grateful. Also do you post any where but here? Like A03 or something?

Come Hell or Helwater - Part Nineteen

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Eleven, Part Twelve, Part Thirteen, Part Fourteen, Part Fifteen, Part Sixteen, Part Seventeen, Part Eighteen

And here’s where you can find it on AO3.

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

Something was going on. Brianna wasn’t sure what, but there was something strange going on between her mother and Jamie. Whatever it was, they didn’t want her to know about it. Every time she walked into the room, they turned all their attention on her. It was overwhelming and she didn’t like it. She’d rather they told her what was going on. If it didn’t stop soon, if they didn’t say something… she would.

Isobel and Lord and Lady Dunsany had returned a few days after her mother. Brianna’s lessons with Isobel had resumed but neither of them were as interested as they had been. Isobel was excited about her sister’s condition and would be going back and forth between the two houses a great deal in the coming months.

“It’s a comfort to her to have me there,” Isobel explained as she struggled to show Brianna how to do decorative needlework. She was embroidering a cap for her sister’s baby.

Brianna was supposed to be putting a monogram onto a handkerchief for her father, but she couldn’t tell Isobel that the initials were wrong. She just worked quietly on the A and M, figuring someday she could add a J to the beginning and an I and E at the end. It wouldn’t be centered properly in the corner but at least it would properly be his.

“It’s important that she rest and not be upset by anything – it’s bad for the baby,” Isobel explained.

“And when you’re not there, is she upset?” Brianna asked.

“It isn’t polite to gossip about such things,” Isobel replied, more with resignation than an aim to scold Brianna for her question. “But she is certainly more inclined to find things upsetting when there’s no one around who can help her with running the household.”

“And you miss your sister too, I suppose.”

“Of course. We were close when we were younger. Our brother was older and we both looked up to him – Geneva especially. I… I remember his death more than him, really. It brought us closer, I suppose,” Isobel confessed.

“What’s it like?” Brianna asked, suddenly curious. “Having a sister?”

Isobel’s eyes widened with surprise but then she folded her hands into her lap, needle and thread carefully held between the forefinger and thumb of her right hand, the delicate, unfinished cap clutched in her left hand.

“Well… She liked to be in charge when we played, but I didn’t mind. I think she’s always been more fanciful so her games were more enjoyable than anything I ever thought of. There were times when we would quarrel, but I don’t know as I’ve heard of any siblings who don’t disagree from time to time,” Isobel confided with a warm smile. “It was harder for her, being older, I think. She had to do everything first when it came to being about in society when we visited London. She’s also prettier so more has been expected of her in other ways. Her marriage has been a successful one… in some ways more than others. I do think we enjoy one another’s company better now and I am excited to become an aunt,” Isobel said with a grin, her attention returning to the baby’s cap in her hands.

Brianna gave her a polite smile, pondering the relationship Isobel described.

She’d had some friends in Boston, but no one she was particularly close to. Even if she had wanted to have friends over to her house, many of their parents weren’t keen to let their daughters visit the Randall household. Despite the fact that Frank was a respectable professor, Claire not only worked, she had a man’s profession. They didn’t want their children getting ideas. Of course, it could only do Brianna good to see the example set in their own households, so she was always welcome there (but once her mother discovered what was behind their hospitality, she preferred to have Brianna either join Frank at the university or do her homework in her own office at the hospital).

Some of those sort-of friends had siblings, though. Angela’s older sister sometimes let them play with her makeup but she also yelled at them when they accidentally spilled her favorite nail polish on her desk. Barbara’s older brother mostly just ignored them whenever Brianna happened to see him and Barbara didn’t seem to mind too much. Doris had a younger sister who had just been starting school and she complained about how all her old things were being passed down – things Barbara still considered hers.

They’d stayed at Lallybroch for a few days before setting out for Helwater. It hadn’t been much time for Brianna to get to know her cousins (and it had been a little overwhelming because there were so many of them), but maybe she would come to see them like siblings… if they ever got back to Lallybroch.

“And what about you?” Isobel asked Brianna gently. “Do you think you would find the prospect of a younger brother or sister exciting?”

Brianna looked up at Isobel, confused. How had the older girl guessed what she’d been thinking about?

“I… guess,” Brianna replied. “I know I wanted one when I was littler but after a while of wanting one and not getting one, I guess I stopped hoping for one.”

“Mmmhmm…” Isobel nodded, her eyes darting back and forth from her needlework to Brianna, something playful in her gaze and at the edges of her mouth.

“What?”

“Nothing. I suppose… I wished for a younger sister sometimes when Geneva was being unkind to me. I told myself I would only treat my younger sister with kindness. While I may not have gotten a younger sister in the way I’d hoped, the girl I imagined she would be was a lot like you – in behavior more than appearance,” she added with a quiet laugh.

“That’s kind of you to say,” Brianna responded flatly, still confused by Isobel’s behavior. She looked to the clock on the mantel. It was a little earlier than they usually quit for the day but Brianna had had enough of Isobel’s riddles. “I should go back and help Mama,” she said, carefully putting her work away. “She hasn’t been feeling well lately.”

“I heard,” Isobel said, laying her own work aside and rising to follow Brianna to the door. “Send her my best wishes that she’ll soon feel better. Encourage her to rest and take care of her if she’ll let you.”

“I will,” Brianna promised but there was something in the way Isobel said it, in the way that she smiled that left Brianna turning their conversation over and over in her mind as she made her way back to their cottage.

When Brianna arrived, her mother was standing at her work table but she wasn’t working. She had one hand braced on the table, the other at the small of her back rubbing circles into it.

“Are you okay, Mama?” Brianna asked, closing the door quietly behind her.

“I thought you were supposed to be having your sewing lesson with Lady Isobel,” Claire remarked, straightening at the table and reaching for some dried herbs to add to her mortar for grinding.

“I told her I needed to come back early to help you,” she said, moving to a spot on the other side of the table.

“Very well. Here,” Claire slid the mortar across to Brianna and then handed her the pestle. “Grind those and then add them–”

“I know, Mama. I’ve helped you make this balm before,” Brianna assured her with an annoyed laugh.

Claire laughed quietly, moving to prepare the beeswax for melting. She paused at the end of the table, leaning into it again and running a hand over herself, first down her front and then to that spot at the small of her back for a moment. With a small nod to herself, she resumed her task.

Brianna had noticed and again asked, “Are you okay, Mama?” Seeing her mother sigh, seeing her prepare to lie or only tell half the truth, Brianna set the pestle aside with more force than she intended, and asked with more force, “Are you sick? Is that why you and Da have been acting strange?”

“I’m not sick, sweetheart,” Claire assured her. “I’m… I’m going to have a baby. I wasn’t sure for a while and there’s still a lot that can go wrong,” she babbled, “but no, I’m not sick.”

“Oh,” Brianna said, picking the pestle back up and grinding the herbs, simply for something to do with her hands. “Are you… happy about it?”

Claire looked at Brianna for a moment, a smile slowly breaking across her face. “I am. But I’m also terrified. The last time I did this was a looooong time ago.”

Brianna laughed. “I’m not that old.”

“No, but you’re not my little baby anymore either,” Claire lamented.

“You’re still scared even though this time you have me and Da?”

“Last time… I didn’t have much left to lose if things went wrong,” Claire answered, quietly. “This time…”

“You’ll be fine, Mama. Da and I will make sure of it,” Brianna promised.

“That’s exactly what your father keeps saying.”

“Two against one,” Brianna said with a shrug. “You should listen to us.”

Claire chuckled. “I suppose I should.”

“Can I tell Lady Isobel? She’s making a cap for Lady Geneva’s baby. Maybe she can show me how to make one for this baby.”

“That would be nice… And what about you? I know it’s a surprise but, are you happy about it? You won’t be close enough in age to be playmates…”

“I don’t know. It’s strange to think of having a baby here,” she remarked, looking around their small cottage. “But I guess it’s kind of like everything else. It’s strange at first, but then you get used to it and have a hard time imagining any other way. I still miss… I was gonna say ‘home’ but this is home now. Where we were before feels more and more like a dream.”

“Hmmm. It does. Not a bad dream or a good dream… just a little… not real.”

“But I always have you to help me remember it,” Brianna said.

“And I have you,” Claire agreed. “And that is something that will always be just ours.”

Brianna smiled, liking the thought of having something that she alone shared with her mother.

#fangoddes4life #;mod lenny #come hell or helwater au #featuring: bree #featuring: isobel dunsany

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loneswaggingranger · 4 years ago

Text

Does it matter?

By @loneswagger for @pixiethefirecat7

This is for the @friendly-neighborhood-exchange!

Rating: General Audiences

Relationships: Peter Parker & Tony Stark, Peter Parker & Steve Rogers, Steve Rogers & Tony Stark

Characters: Peter Parker, Tony Stark, Steve Rogers, Bucky Barnes, James “Rhodey” Rhodes, Bruce Banner, May Parker

Summary:

When Peter reached forward and called his name, Tony honest-to-god flinched away from him.

His fingers twitched. “Captain Rogers did this, didn’t he?”

Hard brown eyes snapped shut. “Does it matter?”

“Yes,” Peter said, kneeling softly beside the hero’s battered form. “It does.” -

The one where Tony Stark lives with a metal arm, Steve Rogers never became old, and Peter Parker baffles at how incredibly fine they make everything seem. Or, the one where Peter Parker becomes Tony's designated spokesperson. Seriously, what would they do without him? (Nothing, apparently.)

Story under the cut! Hope you like it~

Does it hurt?

He once found Tony shirtless and utterly wasted in the lab, drowning in a sea of one too many shattered decanters, knuckles gone white from wringing that outdated burner phone for who knows how long. Crimson dribbled from calloused palms across scarred flesh, to ripped jeans over to shimmering glass shards littered upon sullied floors.

When Peter reached forward and called his name, Tony honest-to-god flinched.

His fingers twitched. “Captain Rogers did this, didn’t he?”

Hard brown eyes snapped shut. “Does it matter?”

“Yes,” Peter said, kneeling softly beside the hero’s battered form. “It does.”

When Peter came home, he expected many things. He expected his dingy little apartment with the wafting smells of May’s burnt bread, imagined snuggling on the couch with her, and watching cheesy soap operas all through the night. He expected those weekly sessions with just him and Mr. Stark in the lab, planning, tinkering and innovating without a care in the world, positively shining whenever Mr. Stark whistled and said, “You got brains, kid.”

He should have known, expectations rarely matched up with reality.

Said notion found him in front of his lunch one day, mumbling, “Nothing makes sense anymore.”

“Oh?” A tilted look of concern.

“I just- I never expected this, y’know?” Peter twirled a fork aimlessly between his fingers, eyes trained so hard on his meal he thought it might start sizzling soon. Or evaporate into dust. Whichever seemed possible at this rate. “It’s not bad, I mean, you have a great family and an actual kid now- which is totally cool, by the way! And May - May has Happy now, so the apartment's not that empty anymore, a-and she smiles a whole lot more these days. Which is good, I guess. The Accords isn’t even a legit thing anymore, the Avengers come together to sing Kumbaya every other weekend,” His fingers tightened round the fork. “Everything’s all good, yeah?”

There probably would have been a reply, if it wasn't for the tell-tale thump of approaching footsteps Peter never dreamed of growing familiar with.

“Afternoon, Captain Doritos,” Mr. Stark’s drawl felt appeasing at best, challenging at worst.

Captain Rogers threw a half-glance his way, nodding curtly. He went for the fridge in two large strides, swiping out a carton of milk and downing its contents in one vigorous go.

“Ugh, you’re gross, Cap, I’m getting the hell out of here,” Mr. Stark rose from his seat, lightly tousling Peter’s hair as he went. “Finish your grub and hang in the lab with me later, yeah?” His eyes seemed to soften. “It‘ll be just like old times.”

Old times. Right.

“Also-” Mr. Stark slapped the good Captain’s shoulder, smirking wildly at the vexed ‘Oi!’ that elicited. “If we’re watching anything remotely Disney tonight, I’m going back to Pep’s for the weekend.”

“For that alone, we’re watching Moana, Frozen and Mulan!” Captain Rogers hollered after the retreating metal middle finger shot high in the air, shaking his head once it fully disappeared down the hallway. A bemused look. “What’s wrong with Disney?”

Peter scoffed, grin plastered expertly on his face.

Another thing that didn’t make sense, this song and dance. This parade of concealed emotions, this system of tactical meet-and-retreat, this exhibition of faux jaunt put up for one another. The shake in Captain’s tone, the tremor in Mr. Stark’s arm - almost indiscernible and yet there it was. Always there, each time Peter looked.

Captain’s carton of milk slid into the bin by his feet. “So how was your week, son?”

Peter chewed on his noodles thoughtfully. “Tiring, I guess. Lots of homework. Also-” He made a face. “Son? Seriously? How nineteen-thirties can you get, Cap?”

Captain rolled his eyes, mock indignance in his stance. “Great. I have to deal with two Tony Starks in the team now, don’t I?”

“Exactly,” Peter smirked, drawing out the last syllable slightly.

He remembered piecing uncharacteristically silent calls with his own incessant chatter, so that the harsh breaths pulsating on the other end would finally, finally smoothen out. He remembered resting a hand over Tony’s arrhythmically flouncing heart, coaxing him for a meal, a drink or to just breathe. He remembered whispering to him in a voice so soft yet so firm, “Mr. Stark? Mr. St-Tony? Tony, it’s me. It’s Peter. No one else is here, okay? You’re safe now. You’re safe.”

He remembered the world of hurt his hero went through.

It wasn’t like Peter never asked.

He tried asking during the quiet moments, when he and Mr. Stark were the only ones up at ass ‘o clock, when Mr. Stark strolled into the kitchen for customary morning tea (Pepper said weekends were coffee-free days). He tried asking during the loud ones too, when Mr. Stark was drunk on whatever alcohol he was having, when all the Avengers were in the room, because surely Mr. Stark wouldn’t turn down an opportunity to brag about a good story in front of everyone, right? Wrong. That particular fiasco ended with more than a couple uncomfortable looks, a pale-faced Mr. Stark storming out of said room and a flustered Peter trailing after him with his dozen apologies.

It got to the point where Mr. Stark had to sit Peter down, look him in the eye and say, “That’s it.” His finger, the metal one, dug deep into Peter’s collared shirt. “Stop it, kid. Me and Rogers, whatever happened between the two of us, it’s got nothing to do with you. And we’re fine now. We’re fixed. We watch Star Wars and Harry Potter every other Sunday, for god’s sake. There’s no better that we can get.” The other hand pressed on his arm shakily, a sort of pleading in the motion. “You don’t have to do anything for us anymore. Alright?”

Peter stopped asking after that.

Instead, he made observations. His eyes tracked each subtle gesture of wistful longing between the two, sometimes bordering on spontaneous animosity. Day and night, he made summaries, graphs, charts and fifty-one five-page essays for ten days in a row, writing and writing like he was running out of time.

He conducted interviews too.

Colonel Rhodes shook his head so adamantly when Peter pulled him aside for one of his trademark inquiry sessions, refusing to divulge anything more than a clipped but not unkind, "There’s definitely problems this team hasn't come to terms with yet, but it doesn’t fall on your shoulders to solve them, Peter." Dr. Banner had been much more forthcoming, nodding along to Peter’s mini monologue of observations. He even pitched in some of his own discoveries as to how the two skirted around each other when there was or wasn’t an audience, albeit with a mild warning that some things aren’t meant to be pushed too hard.

Even Bucky once appeared in front of Peter’s room, bouquet of purple hydrangeas and mug of hot chocolate in tow after one particularly brutal sparring session which had ended with one man’s ruptured blood vessel and another’s broken nose. He spent an hour trying to convey that, that was just their way of resolving conflict, their way of getting things out of their system. There wasn’t much that could be done about it. There wasn’t much they could do about it.

Or so they said.

But how many sleepless dawns after patrol had Peter spent - huddled under blankets in front of a glaring screen, scouring his way through Friday’s systems, keying in every code, every digit he thought would lead him to the right answer. Something, anything that he could work with.

Two months, twenty days and twelve hours later, he found it. The answer. Or at least, a part of it.

It wasn’t pretty.

He knew. He knew, he knew, he knew that The Winter Soldier wasn’t Bucky, that the man in the video was just Hydra’s brainwashed lackey, that the Bucky he was familiar with would never consent to do anything remotely similar to what he had seen him do. He knew this, and yet some nights still found him jolting awake in a sea of his own sweat; May’s gasps echoing Maria Stark’s dying wheeze, Howard and Tony Stark’s pleas morphing into one, cold unflinching gaze haunting all the moments he fell quiescent.

In the moments that he was restless, however, Peter resumed his search. He ploughed through the frights and horrors and sleepless dawns even more frenetically than he first did, because if he didn’t get to the bottom of this, no one else would. Because he knew there was more than just ‘The Winter Soldier murdered Mr. Stark’s parents’; there was always more.

Because what use was a team, if all its splintered souls did nothing to embrace their blemishes?

“Hey, Pete.”

“Hm?”

“Wanna’ skip out on the theater gig tonight?” Alloyed fingers drummed idly on the lab table. “We could stay in here for a bit, work on those web-shooter combinations. Could order some tacos. Or pizza. Your choice.”

Peter raised an eyebrow. “Thought it was supposed to be tradition.”

“Yeah, I’m getting kinda’ sick of Rogers' princess movie obsession,” His eyes drifted upwards, thumbs twiddling. “You could go, though. If you want.”

Peter pulled back without missing a beat, eyes widening in comical fashion. “No, are you crazy? Lab night with pizza? When do I ever turn that down, Mr. Stark?”

An honest grin slid across Mr. Stark’s features. “Never.”

“That’s right.” Peter closed his eyes, leaning into the touch rifling through his unkempt locks. “Never.”

It didn’t make sense.

Did you know?

I didn’t know it was him.

Don’t bullshit me, Rogers!

Yes.

Peter watched, and still, nothing made sense.

He’s my friend.

So was I.

It. didn’t. make. sense.

Blinding white tore across the starless city sky in sharp erratic bursts, heated claws threatening to eliminate all in its path with each stroke of rampant rage. Ice-cold rivulets knocked mercilessly against bare skin, freezing the seconds ticking by as raddled sneakers thrummed upon asphalt, each reverberating cadence in perfect harmony with the furious anthem of unvoiced justice pumping through his veins.

Said anthem soared ever the more when the Captain’s door flung open, pounding hard at the seemingly bewildered face meeting his view.

"Peter? What's wrong?" The golden boy scanned him up and down, concern thick in his tone. "Why aren't you in your suit? Did something happ-"

Peter threw the answer up in his face, letting the phone explain everything as he panted over bent knees. The stark silence that ensued spoke for itself.

"Stevie, what's- oh." Him. No, Bucky. "Peter. You're- why don't we all come inside, yeah? Rain's pouring out here." The voice, so tender, not like. Not like him. Not. Him."I'll put the kettle on."

Which was how Peter ended up in one of Bucky's oversized shirts, settled opposite two war veterans, hands cupped round a mug of hot chocolate and eyes cast in a blatant show of quiet outrage.

"Explain," The anthem burned strong in him.

"Son-"

"Don't call me son."

"-this was all on me, alright?" Dejected tone, blonde head bowed over clasped hands.

Good.

“I- we disagreed on the Accords because-”

“I don’t care about that, Captain,” Peter set the mug down, flexing his fingers mechanically. “The Accords was rigged to begin with. Whatever that came after, shouldn’t be put on anyone but Ross, that I get.” He pressed a finger to the cracked screen of his phone. “No Captain, I’m talking about this.”

Captain Rogers stared at him with eyes so blue, but like the sick man in the video pointed out, there was a hint of green in that blue. A flaw.

“I’m sorry, Peter,” The captain leaned back into his seat, where Bucky’s prosthetic arm (that Tony Stark built for him) was stretched rigidly upon. “I thought that by not telling him, I was sparing him from the sorrow. But really, I was just sparing myself. I- I never meant for him to get hurt. And I’m sure, neither did he.”

Oddly, that last sentence was what pushed Peter over the edge.

“Neither did he?” His jaw clenched. “Neither did- are you seriously saying that right now? Of course he didn’t mean to hurt you! If he had any control over the situation, any control of the information that you withheld from him, he would not have done that.”

“I know, Peter.”

“Do you?” He hissed. “Do you really? Do you know the pain of losing your parents, of not knowing what the hell happened to them except that ‘They died in an accident’? Do you know the want, the pure want, to kill the piece of shit that took their lives, that walked free as you mourned their deaths? That ripped them from you, before you even got to know them?” His fists shook in tandem with the throbbing crescendo of his anthem. “Do you know, how Mr. Stark fought for you behind the scenes? How he wrote and rewrote proposals to alter The Accords, only to be rejected by Ross time and time again? How he hired lawyers and sometimes personally went to vouch for the others in the Raft? How he lost sleep at night, how he drank himself into oblivion, whimpering your name, begging me each time not to tell Mrs. Pepper or Rhodes, because apparently, it didn’t matter?”

Captain Rogers stiffened in his seat.

“Do you know?”

“No, son.”

“I’m not your son.”

Bucky remained a stock still statue by the Captain’s side.

Peter sighed, shoulders sagging. Deep breath, calm down. “Sorry.” The lingering pulse of anguish pushed to the back of his mind. “That was uncalled for. Sorry. ”

“Don’t be.” Bucky replied with haste.

Peter made another haphazard gesture towards their object of discussion. “Did you guys ever try talking to him about this?”

“I wrote him a letter.”

“Yeah, and sent him a burner phone, I know.” Peter snapped, tone sharp. “Scintillating ultimatum you gave him, by the way. He broke it in his fists after two whole months of drinking and staring.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t say that to me, Cap,” His fingers tapped the mug handle almost frantically. “Say that to Tony. He needs to hear it.”

“It’s only two years for you, Peter, but it’s been seven for us. He might’ve- he might not want to hear about this anymore. We’re fine like this.”

“Bullshit. Don’t think I haven’t notice the way you both act with each other. You guys really need to solve this shit,” Peter mulled over his words, before adding, “By solve, I mean talk about it. Not punch the living daylights out of each other.”

Captain Rogers shrugged hopelessly. “We don’t talk about things like this. It’ll just escalate, and then we’d be throwing fists all over again. Might as well get that done without scarring our hearts more than it already has been.”

“Are you serious?” Muted wrath threatened to positively devour the mug in his hands. “Dude, we could have lost Tony in that war. He could have snapped his fingers, and that would have been the last we saw of him. Would you have lived with this then? Not talking about this, because neither of you can stop feeding your very physical ego for one goddamn second? Because neither of you were brave enough to listen?”

Again, the stark silence spoke for itself.

“You need to talk about this.”

“Look, son-”

“Damn it, Cap!” Peter roared, fists banging against the table. “Call me son one more time!” The mad beast reared its horrendous head, yanking his vocal chords to unrivalled heights, fuelled by the heated flames that grew larger and fiercer with each thunderous beat. It fed off the tension, the visceral need to rip, maw and absolutely pulverise anything and everything that it could find.

Reddened eyes, full of tears unshed, reflected one another transparently.

He couldn’t take this anymore.

“Honestly,” He stood, mug left untouched, voice barely over a whisper. “With all due respect, Captain Rogers. You’re a fucking dick.”

Peter left, door slam behind him, along with Captain’s echoed ‘Wait!’ and Bucky’s muted ‘Kid’s got a point, Steve.’

Peter thought that if he found the answer, everything would make sense. Or, at the very least, he would feel better about things not making sense.

Clearly, he had been wrong.

The first night he stopped searching, his phone rang like the house was on fire.

Mr. Stark had been the first to call. Followed by Colonel Rhodes, then Bucky, then Captain Rogers, then Dr. Banner, and then subsequently the rest of what his team was supposed to consist of.

He refused to answer. He didn’t care if his phone burst from being called 24/7. He didn’t care.

Instead, he spent the rest of his time doing what he did best - he looked out for the little guy. He threw himself in front of cars inches away from crashing into one another, saved kittens from trees, taught children how to look both ways before crossing the street, spent time with that tired old man sitting alone on the park bench every week.

And when he wasn’t doing this, he was with May. May and Happy, sometimes, but mostly May.

He did his homework, with May. He had breakfast, lunch and essentially all his meals, with May. He watched those cheesy soap operas he missed, with May. He did all the things he longed to do, mourning the years that he lost, with May.

“Are you okay, baby?”

Maybe it was her firm arms cradling his head, maybe it was her tentative whisper, but there was something about hearing May calling him baby that made a lump form in his throat.

“I don’t know.”

May hummed. “Do you want to talk to Tony about it?”

“No,” Peter sniffed. “Not for now.”

“Okay, baby,” May rubbed the back of his neck in a way that only she knew how. “That’s okay.”

He stopped going for movies and lab nights on the weekends.

bucko (4:03 a.m.) : Hey punk, stevie and tony talked it out for a while. wasn’t pretty but, it was necessary, I think. you’re a legend, kid

coolestdoctorr(4:23 a.m.): I heard what you did. We all needed that to happen eventually. Thank you for being the bravest of us, for acknowledging our flaws and for bringing our team together as best as you can. Take as much rest as you need, and if you need someone to talk to, I’m happy to listen. Stay safe, and we love you.

warmachineROX (4:29 a.m.): you did great, Peter. I’m sorry i said you couldn’t do this; those boys really needed a nudge. Thanks for doing what you did. Take care, kid.

so-you-got-detention (4:28 p.m.): Peter, I don’t think there’s anything I can say except I’m sorry. You’re right, I should have talked with him about this 7 years ago. I spent a couple long hours with Tony earlier this weekend. That hardly made up for anything, but we’ll work it out. Things aren’t perfect, we’ll get it better. We have you to thank for that. I know you’re angry with me, which you have every right to be, but know that if you ever need help, just call me. I’ll be there.

he’s stark, tony stark (5:01 p.m.): b at ur place in 5 mins[sunglasses emoji]

“Hey, Mr. Stark.”

“Hey, kid.”

“Steve mad at me?”

“Definitely not.”

“...You mad at me?”

A pause. “Not really, no,” Mr. Stark rubbed the side of his chin, tilting his head towards Peter. “Does it matter?”

“Yes,” Peter felt his lips shiver against his teeth, sheen of moist clouding his vision, head bowed low and voice crackling, “It does.”

Arms, one alloyed and the other so very real, quietly rolled themselves round his trembling frame, guiding his head towards the steady rise and fall of his hero’s chest, flesh thumb rubbing slow circles over his back, whispers of soft nothings soothing his hair and eventually, a light peck on the forehead.

They stayed like that for a while, beside Peter’s unmade bed, melancholic warmth emanating like cool salve on an open wound. It was comforting, that lack of sound, that silence that spoke the thousand words they couldn’t.

And then, the patented smirk. “You did good, kid,” His tone, so fond. “Friday probably thinks otherwise, though. She’s a little pissed, I think. Kudos for that, by the way. Real sneaky.”

Purely on a whim, Peter snorted, “Love you too, Tony.”

For a moment, it looked as though Tony might just melt into an emotional puddle of goo. Thankfully, he didn’t; Peter wouldn’t know what to do if he did. Instead, he sucked in a deep breath, squeezed Peter closer to his heart, and in a voice smaller than Peter had ever heard, muttered,“Lab night this Sunday?”

Peter, in all his glorious mess of tears and snot, broke into a wobbly laugh.

Always.

#friendly-neighborhood-exchange #this was fun

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deliriumsdelight7 · 4 years ago

Text

Breaking Cycles - Chapter 9

TRIGGER WARNING: The first scene of this chapter contains references to past drug use, as well as a vague description of an established character death (If you've seen California Solo, you know the one). It also contains a fairly vivid description of a panic attack. If you're not comfortable reading this, you can skip it by CTRL-F'ing "Lacey Rose French" to bring you to scene 2.

The world communicated to him in swirls and spirals. How had he never noticed it before? Everything around him, everything in him, everything that ever was. The links of Jed’s silver bracelet. The curls in Pete’s hair. Jeff’s silver hoop earring. The drugs that pumped through his veins, circulating around and around. The music that eddied out of him, past the whorls of his fingertips, plucked into the tightly-coiled ringlets of his guitar strings, rippling out the speaker of his amp. The music spiraled around them, swelling in crescendo as the four of them fed on each other’s energy. Even the mustard-yellow paisley wallpaper danced and swirled in time with their wild melody.

Then, discord. Panic. One of the four fell, breaking the quartet. Terror hammered a snare drum roll in his chest, tasted acrid in his mouth. Relax. Give him time - he’ll sleep it off. Keep going. Need to finish tonight. Can’t focus - the music comes out stilted and strained, and eventually not at all. Just let me fucking check! Jaw slack, eyes open and unseeing. Skin cold and stiff under desperate fingers. Jed’s dead, Lach! He’s fucking dead!

Lachlan awoke with a choked off scream, clawing at the cloth of his loose-fitting T-shirt with blunt fingernails. His breath came in short, shallow gasps, and his chest was heavy and aching, like something massive was weighing him down, keeping the air from filling his lungs. The cold sweat covering him did nothing to alleviate the burning pinpricks that assailed him from head to toe.

Tears stung his eyes, panicked whimpers escaping with each exhale. Fuck, he was having a heart attack. Or a stroke. Or an aneurysm? He didn’t know what the hell that was, but it sounded bad. He needed a doctor, or - or a hospital, or maybe just a fucking priest to read him his last rites. He wanted to reach for his phone, but couldn’t get his shaking hands to relinquish their death grip on his shirt. He tried to call for help, or just scream wordlessly until his lungs gave out. But all that came from his throat was a pitiful whine.

This is it, a small corner of his mind thought. I’m dying. I’m going to die alone in this bed, and nobody’s going to give a shite. Nobody would even think to check on him until the stink of rot set in, a few days from now. Nobody would come to his funeral. The vultures who descended on his few belongings might take his PC, maybe pick through his CDs and vinyls halfheartedly. Forty-five years, and his only mark on the world would be a dumpster of old clothes and empty bottles.

He lay tangled in his sweat-soaked sheets, helpless to do anything but wait for the end to come. Would it hurt? The sharp pains in his chest were frightening, but not the agony he expected. Was this how Jed felt when he died? Or had Lachlan coerced him into taking enough drugs that he’d slipped off quietly? And what about his parents? Had they faced death as he did now - alone, in pain, and petrified? If so, this was no less than he deserved.

Little by little, the tightness in his chest loosened, allowing him to take longer, slower breaths. His hands relinquished their grip on his shirt and flopped limply to his sides while his pulse gradually slowed. Clarity of thought returned with the calm. He wasn’t having a heart attack. He wasn’t dying. He was just going bloody barmy.

Stumbling out of bed, he picked his way blindly through his flat without switching the lights on, heading to the kitchen to fetch a glass of water. He’d much rather wet his parched throat with something stronger, but like a pure numpty he’d finished the last of his whisky on Wednesday after the shite show that was his last… ever?... meeting with Belle.

He quickly shoved thoughts of that last conversation aside. He didn’t want to think about her just now. He had enough on his mind right now.

Like nightmares. He hadn’t had one of those in well over a decade, ever since… He tried to think, taking a gulp of water between gasps. Last time he’d had one of these episodes had to have been thirteen years ago, now, shortly after Arianwen was born. Catherine had begged him to go sober for their baby daughter, and he’d checked himself into a two-week alcohol rehab program when she was eight months along. She’d gone into labor shortly after he got back, and by the time their little family had been discharged from the hospital she’d been ready to jump into parenthood with both feet.

She hadn’t counted on being woken up by her newly-sober husband’s night terrors on top of their daughter’s nightly feedings and changings. After those first few months, they were both so frazzled that only consideration for the baby had kept them from having screaming rows every night. The word “divorce” had been thrown around more than once. And when he started spending his evenings “practicing guitar” in the basement with his hand on the bottle more than the fretboard, Catherine said nothing. He was pretty sure she’d just been relieved that she had one less screaming infant to comfort.

Lachlan drained his glass and set it on the counter. The glowing numbers over the stove told him that it was after four in the morning. Payday today, finally. If he could just get through the next twelve hours, he’d have the money to pick up a bottle of whisky and drown out all of the regrets that threatened to overwhelm him.

With an exhausted sigh, he trudged back to bed, collapsing face first into his pillow. He didn’t have to get up for work for a few more hours. Chances were good his jittery nerves wouldn’t let him fall back asleep any time soon, but he could at least rest.

******

“Lacey Rose French! How many times have I told you to rinse your tupperware when you’re done with them?” Belle slammed the lid back on the food container with a gag. “Or at least don’t leave them in your lunch bag for days on end!” she yelled over the music as Lacey turned the volume up on her speakers.

“Yes, mum!” Lacey called from her perch on the couch, where she was painting her toenails. “Anything else you want to lecture me on? Want to make sure I did my homework? Or set me a curfew?”

“I wish I could,” Belle muttered, plunging her arms back into the scalding dishwater. Life would be infinitely easier if she didn’t have to pick her sister up from various bars and pubs more often than not, occasionally having to cover Lacey’s bar tab and add the sum to the running tally of money and favors that Belle was owed. She scrubbed vigorously at her baking sheet, her efforts loosening only the top layer of caked on grime. “And how many times do I have to ask you to use foil or my baking mat if you’re going to make nachos?”

“Oh my god, I get it!”

“Clearly you don’t, or you wouldn’t keep doing it!” With a sigh, she stopped scrubbing. Any more and she’d be scratching the surface of her good baking sheet. Another ten minutes of soaking should loosen more of the crusted-on cheese, sauce and grease.

As she dried her pruned, reddened hands off on a dishtowel, she heard the opening strains of a familiar song. It was a song from one of the CDs Lachlan had played last Saturday. The familiar pang of heartache hadn’t really left her all week, but it sometimes liked to give a give a fresh stab to remind her that it was still there.

Spent my days with a woman unkind

Smoked my stuff and drank all my wine

Made up my mind to make a new start

Going to California with an aching in my heart

It had been one of her favorites off of that album, but now she couldn’t stand to listen to it. “Turn that noise off!”

“Oh my god, Belle, what the fuck!” Lacey reared up onto her feet, her stance awkward as she tried to keep her still-drying toes separated. “Why are you being such a bitch this week?”

“Seriously? You have to ask?”

“What, is this about last weekend?” She rolled her eyes. “I said I was sorry about that! Brad had an emergency and had to leave. If I’d known your boyfriend was gonna dump you over it, I would’ve sucked it up and called a cab.”

You should’ve done that anyway, she thought bitterly. “Lachlan wasn’t my boyfriend,” she said, and oh, that shouldn’t have hurt to say as much as it did. They’d had two dates. It wasn’t exactly the end of a long-term relationship. But seeing him, getting to know him and be known by him… it was the one thing she’d had to look forward to. The one thing she did for herself, apart from reading.

“So his name’s Lachlan?” Lacey asked with a sly grin. “Sounds like one of those muscley shirtless guys on those dirty books you keep under your bed. Does he wear a kilt and live in a castle in the highlands?”

“Drop it,” Belle snarled.

Lacey huffed with a scowl. “You know what? You’re being fucking unbearable tonight.” She packed up her pedicure kit (leaving the used cotton balls on the coffee table instead of throwing them away, Belle noticed) and stomped awkwardly off to her room, balancing on her heels to keep her toes apart.

She emerged less than ten minutes later ready to go out: hair pulled into a messy bun, wearing a sleeveless black shirt dress that was unbuttoned low enough to show her lacy violet bra. On her feet were a pair of black strappy heeled sandals.

“I’m going out,” she announced unnecessarily.

“Wearing that?”

Lacey glared at her mutinously, but didn’t answer the question. “As I was saying, I’m going out. I can’t be around you right now.” She snagged her purse and strode toward the door. “Don’t wait up. I’ll find a ride.”

“Lacey--”

Slam!

With another sigh, Belle swept the used cotton balls off the coffee table and into the trash before the acetone could ruin the wood finish. While she was at it, she swiped Lacey’s half-empty glass of soda from where it rested on one of Belle’s paperbacks. The condensation beading on the glass had sunk into the cover; she hoped that in a few hours, the swollen ring would subside. If it didn’t, at least it would match half of the rest of her books.

Turning in a full circle, she considered the apartment. Dishes were soaking in the sink, but the kitchen was otherwise clean. Nearly everything else was either done, or could wait until another day. The only thing she’d been putting off was washing her sheets. They’d stopped smelling like Lachlan days ago, but she hadn’t been able to commit to bringing them downstairs to the laundry.

Tonight seemed as good a night as any, she reflected as she stripped the bed. Lachlan was clearly done with her if his absence at the library tonight, as well as the lack of calls and texts, was any indication. She still checked her phone every ten minutes or so, but refused to reach out herself. She certainly wasn’t going to be the first to break the silence. If he wanted to ask forgiveness for his unreasonable accusations, she’d be generous enough to hear him out. As far as she was concerned, she had nothing to apologize for. No matter how much part of her wanted to.

******

“Tryin’ to burn holes in her dress, Lach?”

“Huh?” Lachlan tore his eyes from the billiard tables and spun on his barstool to look at his drinking partner. His coworker, Tom, was sixty years old if he was a day, his brown, unstyled mullet and thick mustache liberally peppered with gray. The foreman tended to have the two of them working the same jobs every day, so they’d gotten to chatting here and there. Earlier today, Tom had noticed Lachlan’s shaking hands, and during their lunch break had brought Lachlan to the parking lot, ostensibly to help out with some car trouble. The swig from the flask Tom kept under his passenger seat had fortified Lachlan enough to get through his shift, and as a repayment Lachlan had bought Tom his first round.

“Ye been lookin’ at that hen for the past half hour. I figure either she owes you money, or ye’d like a good look at what’s under that skirt.”

That hen was Belle as he had never seen her. Apart from the one time he’d seen her in leggings, she always wore pretty, high-necked tops and flaring skirts that fluttered around her thighs. Now she wore a black dress that looked more like a long men’s shirt, unbuttoned far enough that he could see her purple bra. Her eyes, always a startling sky blue, stood out even further in the field of black eyeliner like twin moons in a night sky. She was currently playing pool with some scruffy, greasy-haired man in a leather jacket… and mopping the floor with him, judging by their expressions.

“Just someone I know,” he said. “Wasn’t expecting to see her here.” He signaled the bartender for another whisky.

“So what the fuck are ye sittin’ here with me for, then? Go talk to her!”

The bartender thunked a new glass in front of Lachlan, who nodded in thanks. “Can’t,” he told Tom. “She’s pissed off at me.”

Tom tried to take a swig of his beer and nod sagely at the same time, and wound up spilling down his front. “Yer fault, I take it.”

“Hers.”

Tom raised his eyebrows skeptically. “Aye, that can happen, I s’pose. Were you an arse about it?”

“Dunno. Prob’ly, knowing me,” he admitted, taking a swallow of his drink with a grimace.

“So go fuckin’ talk to her! Tell her yer sorry, make it sound good, and see if she’ll take you home. Unless you’re lookin’ to spend yer night with me,” he joked, elbowing Lachlan in the ribs.

Lachlan snorted into his glass. “Ugly bastard like you? You’ll have to buy me a few more drinks first.”

“Pretty sure the wife wouldn’t want me takin’ home strays, anyway,” he muttered. “Now go talk to her! She just sunk the eight ball. Now’s yer chance.”

He sat, considered. He was still pissed off at her. Not about kicking him out of the apartment - not anymore. It was annoying, but it wasn’t like he was entitled to spend the night there whether she wanted it or not. But the more he thought about it, the more it frustrated him that she volunteered so little about herself. Oh, sure, he knew about books she liked, and her love of tea and baked goods, but getting anything personal out of her was like pulling teeth. Maybe he was being a bit hypocritical - he hadn’t exactly spilled his guts to her - but hadn’t he earned something?

But he missed her, damn it. Not just because she got him out of the apartment, and not just for the sex. Her bright smiles, her flirty giggles, the rapt look on her face when she listened to him, the faraway look in her eyes when she talked about something she cared about - all those little things filled a hole in him he hadn’t even realized was there. This past week was the most lonely and miserable he’d felt since coming back to Scotland. Wouldn’t it be worth it to swallow his pride just this once if it meant fixing things between them?

It would, he decided. But only if she met him halfway. He wasn’t going to grovel when

Swallowing the last of his drink to fortify him, Lachlan wove through the tables to get to Belle. She was currently bent over the table, re-racking the balls, and fuck, he could see her lacy purple knickers where her dress rode up.

“Any other takers?” she called as she stuffed her winnings from the last game into her bra. Lachlan cleared his throat. Belle glanced over her shoulder at him, then continued what she was doing. “Yeah?”

“Belle.”

“Nope.”

He blinked, stricken. Of all the reactions he might have expected, that definitely wasn’t one of them. Anger, certainly. The silent treatment, maybe. But outright dismissal? “Belle, can we please just talk?”

“Sorry, buddy, you’re barking up the wrong tree.” Done racking up the balls, she chalked up a cue. “If you want, you can call--”

“I don’t want to call you later! I want to talk now!” he snapped. Belle turned to face him, eyes narrowed. Shite, how was he already cocking this up? Maybe he shouldn’t have had that last drink or two. “Please, Belle, I don’t want to fight,” he entreated. “I’m sorry I accused you of cheating on your roommate with me.” He reached out and laid a hand uncertainly on her shoulder.

She shrugged it off impatiently. “My roommate. Right.”

If anything, she looked even angrier now. This wasn’t going well at all. “Belle - I - you’ve got to see things from my perspective,” he pleaded, trying and failing to keep the frustration out of his voice. “You won’t tell me anything about him, except that he treats you like shite. He calls you in the middle of the night, right when you were about to--” He cut himself off. She probably wouldn’t appreciate him announcing to the entire bar that she’d been about to ride his cock. “And you just - just throw me out like yesterday’s trash. Can you really fucking blame me for jumping to conclusions?”

Belle stared at him for a long moment, lips pursed. He didn’t know if it was just his imagination, or an effect of the thick black eyeliner she wore, but the affection he’d missed so much in her eyes was gone. He might as well have been a stranger. Worse - he’d seen her greet strangers at the library with more warmth. He fumbled nervously with his bracelet.

“Well… Lachlan…” She paused, as though waiting for something. Nothing happened, and she continued. “Maybe I was being kind of a bitch. Hell, I was probably being a huge bitch, knowing me.”

“I wouldn’t say--”

“I would,” she interrupted. She leaned on her pool cue, cocking one hip out. “Look, if it makes you feel any better, I’d rather have you chop my leg off and beat me with it than fuck my roommate.” She gave an exaggerated shudder. “She and I barely put up with each other.”

“So I gathered.” He rubbed at his face in an effort to clear his head. Something just felt off about this - something he couldn’t put his finger on. “Belle, I don’t get it. I know talking about your roommate is off-limits - god knows why - but I don’t understand why you put yourself out for someone you seem to hate.”

Lachlan must be drunker than he thought, because for a brief second he thought he saw a flash of hurt on her face. “Who knows why the fuck I do anything,” she muttered.

“What?”

“Nothing.” After a quick glance around the room, she laid her pool cue back on the table. “Looks like nobody else has the balls to play me tonight. Why don’t you buy me a drink, and I’ll tell you a bit about the roommate.”

“I… yeah. That’d be great.” Unable to believe his luck, he gestured for her to lead the way to the bar.

******

Belle flipped over in bed for what was quite possibly the fiftieth time in the past hour. Between working, cooking, cleaning, and her argument with Lacey, she was utterly exhausted and ready to sleep. But she just couldn’t turn her brain off long enough to drift off.

If Lacey needed a ride home, she would have called or texted by now. The bars were all closed by this point. Objectively, Belle knew that she was probably in bed with one of her boyfriends. What were their names again? Brian, Tyler and Brad? That sounded right. But she’d never texted to say she wasn’t coming home.

Images played through her head like a silent movie. Opening credits roll, and the title screen appears: Something Happened to Lacey and It’s All Her Sister’s Fault starring Belle and Lacey French. Lacey dead in a ditch somewhere, or arrested and deported for drunk driving. Lacey going home with the wrong guy, or choking on her vomit in a dark alley. A thousand scenarios played through Belle’s head, each worse than the last, and in every one, the last thing Lacey ever heard from her sister was a complaint about a baking sheet and a criticism of an outfit. Not “I love you.” Not “stay safe,” or even “I’ll see you when you get home.” Her last words to Lacey would be, “wearing that?”

Enough. She couldn’t just lie in bed, desperately hoping for sleep, for another minute. Tomorrow… or rather, today, because it was after three in the morning… was Saturday, the library’s busiest day. In a perfect world, she’d be catching up on some much-needed sleep. But that clearly wasn’t in the cards tonight. The part of her that wasn’t currently worried sick about her twin felt a twinge of resentment. Even when she had the night off from nursing her sister through drunkenness and the subsequent hangover, her night still wasn’t her own. Not really.

Pacing the living room, Belle cast about for something productive to do. The kitchen was clean, the floors freshly swept and mopped, laundry done, furniture dusted. She resisted the temptation to peek into Lacey’s room with an effort; the last time she’d tried to do her sister a favor by folding her laundry and organizing her mail, Lacey had nearly taken her head off.

There had to be something to do. She was kneeling down in the kitchen to see if her pots and pans needed to be reorganized, when she noticed that the grout was looking a teensy bit gray. It hadn’t had a proper scrubbing in… a month, probably. Perfect.

The cold tile on her hands and knees, the smell of the cleaning product, the rhythm of the brush bristles against the grout - they didn’t soothe her, exactly, so much as give her a physical focus. Her thoughts were too scattered to read, but this was mindless while still demanding her attention. She gnawed at a bit of dead skin on her lower lip, teeth clicking together in time with the scrub brush.

By the time she finished scrubbing, rinsing and wiping the tile, the grout in between looked a shade or two lighter. She nodded in satisfaction, tugging at the last piece of dead skin with her teeth. She hissed as it came free, pulling a strip of live skin with it. Tonguing the wound determined that it wasn’t bleeding.

She really needed to break this habit.

At least her little chore had done its trick. She was so exhausted she didn’t think she could stay awake another five minutes. Just in time, too - the first gray of pre-dawn was peeking through the windows. Collapsing into bed, Belle sent a single text out before succumbing to sleep.

Please just let me know you’re okay.

******

Lachlan cracked his eye to the morning sunlight, immediately squeezing it shut with a hiss when the light lanced through his brain. His stomach roiled with nausea. He swallowed hard to quell the urge to vomit. Not a great start to the day. It never was.

At least today he wouldn’t be suffering alone. Last night Belle had matched him drink for drink, only leaving the bar long enough to queue up a few songs on the jukebox. That had surprised him; he’d been under the impression that she rarely drank, if at all. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. He’d been trying - okay, not very hard, but a bit - to get his drinking under control because he thought it was what she wanted. Now he was seeing this whole different side of her. It was… it was something to think about.

Later. For now, he had a naked woman in his bed, and this time he intended to enjoy waking up next to her this time, even if his head was about to split apart. Belle hadn’t been remotely interested in cuddling after sex last night, instead preferring to roll over to sleep. Maybe she’d be in the mood now.

Hopefully she wouldn’t mind taking a rain check on kissing. His mouth tasted like a distillery, and he doubted hers was much better.

A quick grope around the bed revealed only empty sheets, devoid of any warmth other than his own. His eyes snapped open, and he bit back a pained groan as the sunlight made his head throb.

Belle was nowhere in sight. The only trace of her was the slight fruity scent of her shampoo clinging to his pillow. Frowning, he gingerly sat up, breathing hard against the nausea that threatened to bubble over. Gathering what little strength he had, he heaved himself to his feet and staggered out to the living room.

“You’ve got to be fucking shitting me!”

Rage churned unpleasantly with the queasiness in his stomach, curdling together into a knot. She fucking left! After he’d swallowed his pride and practically begged her to talk to him - for the second time! - and spent the night buying her drinks and listening to her vent about her overbearing roommate. After letting her crash here so she didn’t have to deal with said roommate, and having sex that felt impersonal and perfunctory compared to last Saturday. She had the nerve to just leave without so much as a note or a text?

Fuck that. She might not want to have a conversation with him, but she was getting just that, whether she liked it or not. He yanked on last night’s clothes, too pissed off to root around his laundry basket for a clean outfit. He just barely had the presence of mind to remember his sunglasses as he stomped out his apartment door. Thankfully the day was relatively overcast.

Was this some sort of game to her? What was the point? Did she get some sort of rush out of this? Did it give her an ego boost to find some useless waste, convince him that he mattered, make him fall for her, and cast him aside? Well, she was about to find that he wouldn’t be ignored so easily.

Sheer indignation and force of will carried him down the street toward the library. Teeth gritted against the dull throbbing in his head, he stormed toward the circulation desk, where Belle was helping a line of patrons waiting to check out books. He cut to the front of the line without so much as glancing as anyone else.

“Lachlan, what--”

“We need tae talk,” he snarled. “Now.”

Her eyebrows rose, unimpressed. “Okay, first of all, don’t talk to me like that. You may be angry with me, but I don’t deserve to be snapped at.” She gestured behind him with a sweeping hand. “Second, as you can see, I’m busy at the moment. We can talk later.”

“No, fuck that! We’re gonnae have this oot now.” Damn it, he hated what anger did to his accent. Now, of all times, he wanted to make sure he was damn well understood. He gestured behind him to the same gawkers who were silently watching the two of them. “So unless ye wannae give these tossers a show, I suggest ye find someplace private we can talk.”

The silence loomed between them as they stared at each other, her with her jaw set, him with his lips pressed in a thin line. “Fine,” she bit out. Then she called over her shoulder. “Evelyn?”

The head librarian, Mrs. Campbell, emerged from her office. “Yes, dear?” she asked in a kinder voice than he’d ever heard from the stern woman.

Belle’s fiery blue eyes never left his. “I need to take my lunch break a little early. Can you take over for a bit?”

Her lips puckered a bit, but she nodded. “Just this once,” she allowed.

“Thank you. I really appreciate it.” Circling around the desk, she breezed right past Lachlan, refusing to look back to make sure he followed. Even with those impossibly high heels, she still managed to keep a pace so brisk he nearly had to trot to keep up.

She led him out of the building and around a corner, to a secluded stone bench. She perched on one end, slipping a shoe off to rub the arch of her foot. “Well?” She gestured impatiently to the other end of the bench. “You interrupt me at work when you can see I’m busy. You snap at me and make rude demands, and then you insult my patrons right in front of their faces. Now I’m giving up my lunch break to talk, just like you wanted. So talk.”

“Oh, don’t do that. Don’t act like I’m the arsehole here,” he snapped.

“I don’t know how I’m supposed to respond to that.” Her glare said that she knew exactly how she wanted to react, but chose not to. “You’ve been angry with me all week. What makes today so special?”

“Don’t act like you don’t know.” Her confused look only set him off more. “Last night,” he clarified.

“‘Last night?’” she echoed. “Lachlan, I was home all night. I didn’t call, or text, or do anything more interesting than clean my apartment.”

“Bollocks! You were at the bar last night, playing pool.” She opened her mouth to argue, but he cut her off. “Don’t bother denying it. I saw you. We talked. We slept together. So unless you’ve got a doppelgänger with the exact same accent, it was you.”

Belle paled. Without a word, she rummaged through her purse until she found her phone, and made a call. Her foot tapped impatiently while it rang. Once it went to voicemail, she spoke. He’d never heard her sound so angry. “Lacey Rose French, I know you’re there. You will video call me in the next five minutes or so help me, I will kick you out and find a roommate who actually pays rent.” Then she hung up.

“Belle, what--”

She silenced him with a raised hand. “This is probably partially my fault,” she admitted quietly. “I thought, maybe if you never met her, things would be different this time.”

“Met who? Your roommate?” Christ, his head was not up for these hints and riddles. “I don’t under--”

Her buzzing phone interrupted him. Belle answered it, but before she could say anything, a familiar voice came through the speaker. “God, Belle, what now? Can’t a girl get some shut-eye? I had a late night.”

“Apparently.” She turned the phone toward Lachlan. “Look familiar?” she asked.

Lachlan was about to tell her that she was being utterly ridiculous, when he did a double-take. The ground seemed to fall out from under his feet, and he sank weakly to the bench. There, on the screen of the phone in Belle’s hand, was… Belle.

There were subtle differences, he saw now. Differences he’d been too drunk to look for. Hadn’t even known to look for, really. The woman on the phone - Lacey? - wore her hair straight where Belle’s was curled, and wore more eye makeup. Her cheekbones and chin were sharper, but apart from that, they were identical. The same blue eyes, the same pale skin and cupid’s bow mouth.

The woman in the phone winced. “Ah, fuck. This isn’t--”

Belle turned the phone back around. “I’ll deal with you when I get home,” she said ominously, ending the call.

The silence loomed between them. Lachlan leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees, hands loosely clasped between them. He cast his mind back over the past few weeks, the morning’s revelation shining light on so much that had baffled him. Her roommate was her sister. Not a boyfriend, or a fuck-buddy. That was why she dropped everything to pick Lacey up. He could understand that. He’d never done the same for Jed - one had to be sober to be a designated driver, and Lachlan could count his sober nights in Manchester on two hands - but he understood wanting to do anything for family.

But things were different between Belle and her sister than they’d been for him and Jed, he thought with a grimace. Lachlan had idolized his older brother, and Jed had taken Lachlan under his wing, never letting him feel left out even when his older friends didn’t want to hang out with the little kid. Even with three years separating them, they’d been thick as thieves all their lives. But listening to the way Belle and Lacey talked about each other, they could hardly stand to be in the same room.

“I didn’t know you had a twin,” he finally said stupidly.

“That was the idea,” came her muffled reply. He looked over her and saw her face buried in her hands. After a moment she lowered them. For the first time that morning, he really looked at her. Without the lens of rage clouding his vision, he finally noticed just how tired she looked. There were dark circles under her eyes, and her skin lacked its usual luster. Her face was completely blank, her eyes dull and lifeless. “I’m sorry,” she said softly.

Lachlan’s brow lowered in confusion. “For what?”

“Everything.” She sighed, her shoulders slumping on the exhale. “For hiding Lacey from you, and getting angry when you called me on it. For being a jerk when you just wanted an explanation.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “For leading you on.”

His heart stuttered to a halt. She couldn’t be saying what he thought. They were just starting to figure things out. “What are you saying?” he asked.

“I can’t…” She gestured vaguely. “...do this. Be what you want. Be like…” She swallowed, sniffed, chewed hard on her lower lip. “I just don’t have it in me.”

“Belle, no. You’re what I want.” He reached a hand out to her. She flinched away from him, hugging her arms around her stomach like she’d been kicked. His hand flopped down between them.

He didn’t know what to do; several rash impulses warred within him. He wanted to kiss her until she got over whatever the hell was bothering her. He wanted to shake and snarl at her for keeping secrets and letting this mess pile up between them. He wanted to beat the ever-loving shite out of himself for not being more patient. He wanted to chew Lacey out for… fuck it, for everything.

And under all that, he wanted nothing more than to curl up in a dark room and nurse his hangover with some of the hair of the dog that bit him.

Dimly he recognized that all of those were fucking awful ideas - immediate gratifications that solved nothing. Story of his life, that.

With a glance at her phone, Belle stood up and dusted off the back of her skirt. “Break’s over. I need to go,” she mumbled.

He didn’t know what to do. So he let her go.

#breaking cycles fic #Lachelle #anyelle

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