#i think this is. the longest post ever made about charlie game

[princesable]

hi this is "That Thing". he probably has a name but everyone just refers to him with various vague and slightly rude terms. he thinks this is funny so he doesn't correct them. if youve ever seen me make a post/tag a post vaguely mentioning someone and its "Formatted Like This" its most likely about him. the average charlie princesable follower doesnt know about this guy which is funny because if youre in a server with me you are Painfully Aware He Exists because i love making people look at him.

his entire bit is that i thought it would be really funny if there was a guy who had no positive traits. no redeeming qualities. what if there was a guy who was so sucks and he made it literally everyone around hims problem. you'd get this guy. he's supposed to be extremely one note and lack basically any character depth because it's really funny to me to have a cast of characters i have put so much thought and effort into to make sure act like Actual People and then just dump in this dude who kills people for fun and thats it thats his entire character.

as previously stated yeah he just kills people. thats his gimmick. he shows up and kills people crazy style. no one takes him seriously because he's like. Cartoonishly Evil. so theyre all like. oh this guy cant be serious. there is no way a real human person would act like this. unfortunately there is. he sucks so bad and unfortunately he is having a great time being here.

everyone also hates him because hes an asshole and well he loves this. he loves that everyone hates him. he thinks its hilarious. any attention is positive attention or whatever.

he shows up during chapter 2/part 2/watever the fuck because twitch (pretend you know who that is) is like hm. you know its been weirdly difficult trying to kill sherwin. because that is the plot of charlie game. i wonder if that guy down the street still kills people. and theyre like hey do you still kill people? can you help me a kill a guy. and hes like. yeah thats what i do. extremely riveting i know.

he had a completely normal childhood he literally just did a complete 180 over the course of a single night and only one person is actually concerned about this.

^ yeah what this guy said. ignore how he's my discord icon. thats not an exaggeration btw it was literally A Single Night.

other fun facts i want to mention that dont need their own paragraph: his hair is naturally black but he dyes it orange exclusively to piss his younger sister off because she has orange hair. he has two swords because thats the most extra shit i could think of. he genuinely never stops smiling it’s infuriating. his associated animal is a rabbit. all of my friends hate him. i hate him. he's existed for 2 years and has unfortunately had a massive impact on the plot. he's the only charlie game character with a fancam. i like to think his the culmination of me growing up watching 2010s animation memes. i would say we should kill him with hammers but unfortunately that is exactly what he wants.

tldr: everyone thinks sherwin is the worst person alive and its just because i never talk about This Guy. i am accepting questions and concerns at anytime.

i am concerned.

[whalyrae]

THE OLD GUARD - CHAPTER 3

"We don’t get a say on how it ends, we never have. But we can control how we live."

Summary : You are a powerful witch, cursed and hurt through ages. Owner of your esoteric shop, you were resigned to live this lonely life when the powerful magic of soulmates and fate came to you.

Pairing : poly BTS x reader (she/her)

Genre : soulmate au, demons bts au, witch y/n au, fluff, angst, eventual smut, polyamory relationships

Status : In process

Word Count : 4.5K

Warnings : eventual smut, angst, mention of depression, death, suicide, past trauma, violence, blood, past (sexual) abuse, past torture, PTSD, scars, self harm, and more.

Tag list : @blackrockshooter780 @babyymeme @starrlo0ver @suckerforv @mushroom-main @m1sss1mp @prettydancingdamzel @i-have-no-life-charlie @avadakadabra93 @veronawrites @kawaiikpoplover268 @didi-9310 @ghostlyworld @carolinexkpop @gooooomz @00ihatesnaku

A/N : HEY YO I'M BACK !! Okay, I'm really sorry it took so long to publish the chapter... my exams, and after that I took a long rest because I travel in Spain and then in Paris during a whole month ! So as an apologize, this chapter is hella long I think it's the longest I've ever wrote in my life jfdkljgfk... I hope you'll like it !

Feel free to comment or send me a message (anonymously or not!) and give me your reactions, your impressions, your questions… I don't mind at all, on the contrary!

In the next chapters, there will be revelations, and answers to questions hehe so please don't hate me too much…!

A BIG THANK YOU again for all these views, I thought that by being absent for so long, my writings would be forgotten … but not at all!

Enjoy your reading, and thanks again, take care, I love you ♥

OH BY THE WAY !! I made a spotify playlist ! If you have any songs who made you think about the story, you can share it to me and I'll add it on the playlist !

Here is the link : The Old Guard Playlist

ps : sorry for the mistakes, it's already 1am here, but I really REALLY need to post something..... ENJOY :D

Masterlist | ao3 | wattpad

Chapter 2 // Chapter 4

☾ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾ ☾ 

“I did it! I beat Ganon! Did you see, Jimin ?”

Jungkook put down his controller next to him on the couch, raising his arms with a big smile. Beside him, Jimin didn't seem to pay attention to him. His eyes focused on his cell phone. 

Jungkook frowned, and turned to Taehyung, sitting on his right. 

"Taehyung, Taehyung! Look!!!"

But he noticed that Taehyung also seemed lost in thought and was not paying any attention to him. 

Jungkook puffed out his cheeks, a pout on his face. 

"Hyungs! What's going on?”

“Do you know where Yoongi is? " 

Taehyung's question surprised Jungkook. He arched an eyebrow and thought for a few seconds. 

He knew that Namjoon and Hoseok had gone to the public library for some research, but he couldn't remember which. Jin had gone to the grocery store. 

And Yoongi... well, he didn't remember seeing him or even remembering him leaving the apartment. 

"He's been missing for a while, he doesn't answer when I try to call him..." Jimin sighed as he threw his phone down next to him. 

They remained silent for a few seconds, while the game on the television continued to play its cinematic. 

Jungkook turned his head and noticed that the window was slightly open. He pointed at it with his chin to his partners. 

The three demons then glanced at each other. They figured it out. They knew where Yoongi had gone.  

"You think he went..." began Jungkook. 

"I wouldn't even be surprised, he was very quiet yesterday after Namjoon’s explanations." Jimin continued.

And they all knew that at those times, it meant that Yoongi had something on his mind. And when he did, he became the most stubborn person alive. Nothing and no one could make him change his mind. 

"That guy... Ah, when he gets home, he'll hear me." Taehyung sighed and ran a hand through his hair. 

Jungkook jumped to his feet. 

"Are you going to wait quietly for him to come back?" He asked, crossing his arms before straightening up from the couch. "Because I'm not. We've been waiting for this moment for way too long." 

°°°

Yoongi was… well she couldn’t describe him. His voice was sweet, his little vibrato always made her body shiver a little. Besides, he was so kind, so gentle, she had never seen so much tenderness in a gaze that was destined to her. 

Well, of course, there was Jin. But that was so, so long ago. 

She bit her lower lip nervously. Thinking about him made her heart ache. She was close to him like she never was since the two of them were separated, yet so far at the same time. She still hadn't thought about how she would manage it. She'd never figured out how to get his memory back, and she’d never found him at all to try anything though. 

At first, she had planned to spend the afternoon with her books, researching curses, spells, or some kind of memory-related magic. She wanted to have some sort of plan before she tried any approach with her soulmates. 

But it seems that one of them decided otherwise. 

Yoongi never took his eyes off her. She seemed to be lost in her thoughts for some reason, probably his visit disturbed her. 

He couldn't read her mind, she was probably powerful enough to block her mind to telepaths, as he and his demon boyfriends were. His admiration for her only grew stronger and stronger. 

He wanted to know what was happening in her head, what seemed to be troubling her. 

From the moment he saw her through her shop window in his cat form, busy watering her plants when he saw the lines on her face when he realized he was standing in front of his last soulmate, the world stopped in front of him for a moment. 

Just as he felt when he met Namjoon, Jin, Hoseok, Jungkook, Jimin, and Taehyung. That feeling of being face to face with someone he'd known all his life, even though he'd never spoken to them, someone who completed him, who finally made him feel whole and fulfilled. 

A soul mate, pure and simple. 

She felt the same way. Like the day before with Namjoon, and when she was with Jin before they separated. However, she wasn't used to experiencing... so many positive feelings and emotions like that.  

She'd also thought that Namjoon would never talk about her or want to see her again. 

Apparently, she was wrong. 

She fidgeted nervously with her fingers, keeping a certain distance between them. She wanted to ask Yoongi where the others lived, to meet them, and finally see Jin again after all these years.

But the problem was that Jin didn't remember her. And when Namjoon, Yoongi, and the others hear about what happened, they probably wouldn't want anything more to do with her. And that was what she was afraid of. 

The pain of losing a soul mate is a sharp pain, like having her heart ripped out, without any anesthetic, raw. 

She met people who had been rejected by their soulmates, or who had experienced the death of their soulmates. They were a shadow of their former selves, and remained so for the rest of their lives, until their last breath. Most of the time, they ended up taking their own lives, the latter being a gentler and more bearable solution than living without one or both halves. 

She'd been through it once, with Seokjin. If she hadn't been immortal, she wouldn't have survived it. 

"I don't know what's been going through your head, or what you've been going through all these years alone," Yoongi began, taking a step towards her, "but it's all over now. I mean, you're not alone anymore, not now that we've found you. You should have seen Namjoon when he came home yesterday, I haven't seen him this excited since we met Jungkook decades ago." He let out a chuckle. 

She looked up at him, he was close to her, very close. 

If he knew, he wouldn't say that. Even though she couldn't deny that those words warmed her whole being without really controlling it. So, Namjoon was happy to meet her? Were they all? 

"You really thought Namjoon wouldn't tell us about you and we wouldn't want you?" He asked, tilting his head to one side. 

"Honestly, yes." she admitted with a shrug, smiling shyly, "I'm... old, very old, I spent several centuries alone, never finding my soulmates so... I always told myself that they weren't looking for me, or simply didn't want me."

And the only one I ever knew, I lost him, she thought.

"Oh, sweetheart," he murmured, his deep, soft voice making her shiver, "I'm sorry it took me so long to find you, we all are, believe me."

He raised his hand, without hesitation, to place it gently on her cheek. Normally, she wasn’t the most comfortable with physical touch, but strangely, she hadn't flinched, she hadn't moved. The warmth of Yoongi's hand against her skin felt good and soothing in a way she couldn't describe a comfort she hadn't felt... for ages. 

She surprised herself leaning slightly against it, even closing her eyes when he started to rub softly her cheek with his thumb. 

She opened her lips to reply but heard something behind Yoongi that made her take a step back. She heard the bell of her shop signifying that someone was entering.

"I knew it!" she heard a deep voice approach them, "I knew you wouldn't listen to Namjoon hyung!"

She tilted her head as Yoongi turned his, not disturbed by the interruption. She was surprised to find herself facing three new people. She didn't need to ask who they were, nor she didn't need to ask Yoongi who these three beautiful and handsome men standing in front of her were. 

When her eyes met those of the smallest of the three, while the other two were talking to Yoongi, she didn't even know about what because she wasn't paying any attention. Her gaze was completely absorbed by this pink-haired person standing a few meters away from her. She was feeling for the second time today what she had felt earlier with Yoongi.

These three people were part of their bond. They were their soulmates too. 

One of the other two noticed the smaller boy's attitude and turned toward him. 

"Jimin, are you..." he began, turning his head to follow his gaze, "Okay..."

His voice trailed off when he saw her.

She didn't know what to say or do, she could feel four pairs of eyes on her now. 

She noticed a smile tugging at the corner of Yoongi's lips and she bites her own nervously. 

He knew that the maknaes would notice his absence, and would quickly realize where he was and, most importantly, that they would come to her. 

"Are you..." the smaller one, Jimin, whispered in a trembling voice, taking a step towards her. 

"Yes... Yes, I am." she replied, looking away, "It's a pleasure to meet y-ah...!"

She hadn't had time to finish her sentence when she felt a pair of arms around her waist and a body pressing against hers. She looked down, surprised to see a pink ball, slightly trembling. 

"We've been waiting for you for so long..." he murmured shakily. 

She felt her head spin slightly under all these new sensations, not so new, but ones she hadn't felt for ages. It was as if she was rediscovering them.

She didn't know how to react and didn't have time to think about it when she felt two new pairs of arms around her waist. 

"Jimin, don't monopolize her yet!" a young man with blue hair sulked, "Ah, I can't tell you how happy I am to finally meet you... Can I call you Noona?"

She didn't know what to say and didn't have time to think about it either.

"Noona," the tallest of the three murmured as he hugged her a little tighter, "I can't believe I can finally hold you... You’re real...!"

She was surprised to see Jimin sobbing quietly in her arms. She looked up, utterly confused, and searched for Yoongi, who was standing not far from her, his hand resting on Jimin's back, stroking him affectionately as he looked at her. He gave her a gentle smile and shrugged. 

"They are our maknaes, Jimin," he pointed to the pink-haired one, "Taehyung," he pointed to the blue-haired one, "and Jugkook, the youngest." He finished by pointing to the last one, who was looking at her with shining eyes.

“Noona, you’re so gorgeous,” Jungkook said, making her blush furiously. 

“Kook’… you're making her uncomfortable," Yoongi grumbled as he brought his hand up to stroke Jimin's hair. 

"I'm not... thank you..." she smiled as she saw Jungkook's face light up, then looked down at Jimin, "Is he all right?" she asked, worried to see him in such a state. 

"Don't worry about him," Taehyung caught her eye and gave her a big smile, "he's very sensitive and just happy to finally find you."

"And we've been waiting for you... "Jungkook continued before letting out a shy little laugh, "Ah, you must have heard it lots of times since yesterday but... It's true... we've been looking for you for years, without success..."

"We've all always had that hole in our hearts..." Jimin spoke again, raising his head, his eyes bright and slightly red, "It was painful sometimes when all that was missing for us was you, I don't even want to imagine how you must have felt without any of us..."

She didn't even notice that tears had started to fall as they spoke. She wasn't the kind of person who cried easily, far from it. But in less than two days, this was already the second time it had happened.

She didn't know why she was so moved by their words, perhaps because they were the people she'd been looking for all her long life, never finding, thinking they didn't want her, which turned out to be wrong. 

She could feel the deep empathy in their words because they'd been through the same thing as her - less so because they were all together - she felt understood by the people who were meant for her, and that feeling was indescribable. 

Noticing her tears, the three maknaes backed away slightly but stayed close to her. 

"Noona I... we're sorry if we said something hurtful..." murmured Jimin nervously. 

"No, I'm the one who's sorry," she replied, shaking her head, "I'm just... I don't know, it all seems so unrealistic..."

And it still was. Knowing that she found her soulmates, that Jin was only a few miles away... After all those years of loneliness, of feeling guilty, of secretly envying the people who crossed her path, happy with their soul mates...

She thought back to Minji's words, yesterday’s evening in their apartment...

« You deserve it more than anyone else. You spent your whole life helping anyone who asks for help, sacrificing your life more than once - literally - for the helping and saving. You deserve to be happy, with those who are destined for you. »

The thought of those words made her tears double. Because after all these years, centuries even, in darkness, the light was finally coming to her, the hope of a more bearable and less lonely eternity was growing inside her.  

“Hey, sweetheart, please don’t cry,” Yoongi’s sweet voice brought her out of her thoughts, “You’re prettier when you smile.” 

She blinked several times and looked at each of the people around her. 

There they were, her soul mates. 

“Ah, I think Namjoon hyung and Hoseok hyung are back home," suddenly muttered Taehyung, who had his phone in his hand, "They want to know where we are..."

"I think we're in a bit of a mess..." chuckled Jungkook, resting his cheek against her shoulder. "Oh, you don't know Hobi hyung yet!"

"Same for Jin, I think we're going to have a bad time when we get home... they're going to be even more jealous!" added Jimin with a small smile.

Her eyes had widened when he'd mentioned Jin's name. He was with them. There was no doubt about it now. The confirmation twisted her stomach slightly with anticipation and excitement. 

Jin was alive. He was in the same town as her after... over five hundred years apart. She didn't know how to deal with it all, again, it all seemed so unrealistic. She felt like she was in a dream, that she'd wake up sooner or later, and that everything she was experiencing now was an illusion. 

If this was indeed a dream, she hoped she'd never wake up.

"I have an idea! Why don't you come with us?"

She lowered her head at Jimin's question. This was something she hadn't expected. 

"So you can meet them too and see Namjoon again! Good idea, Minnie!" Taehyung came and hugged his partner, kissing his cheek affectionately. 

Jimin giggled in Taehyung's arms, making her smile. But the idea of finding herself in the same room as not just one, but all her soul mates. Seeing Jin again, without the certainty that he'd regained his memory... If they found out the truth, what had happened, she'd lose them for sure.

Selfishly, she didn't want that to happen. She wanted to see Jin again, of course. It was all she could think about, constantly, ever since they both split up. But the risk was too big now. She wanted to come to him with a plan, a way of getting his memory back if he hadn't. She owed him that.

"I know we're all more than happy to find her finally," Yoongi began, "but our beautiful soulmate can't just walk away from her business, can she?"

"But Yoongi hyung... I don't want to leave her..." pouted Jungkook, rubbing his cheek against her shoulder.

"I know Kookie, me neither," Yoongi sighed softly, understanding with Jungkook because he too didn't want to part with her, "but I think she needs some time to herself, to get over her emotions, am I right?"

He looked at her, his lips stretching slightly into a thin smile. She could see in his eyes that he wasn't reproaching her and that he was also prepared to stay if she asked him to. Every one of them was ready to go and get the moon for her if she asked them to.

"I understand... it must have been a lot of emotions for you..." Taehyung sighed sadly as he pulled away from Jimin, "So can we give you our phone number? And we'll give you our address too!"

"Good idea!" Jimin exclaimed and snapped his fingers to summon a piece of paper and a pen, " So you can come and see us whenever you like! Usually, there's always someone at home, but if there isn't, we'll give you the code, and you can just make yourself at home and wait for us!"

"Deal," she replied as Jimin wrote their numbers and addresses on the sheet of paper, "and you, feel free to come here, whenever you like, my apartment's upstairs, but I suppose you already know that..."

"What was I saying, she's extremely intelligent, our soulmate, as well as being beautiful," Yoongi smirked, making her blush.

"Aaah, I don't want to leave you, Noona..." Jungkook whined, grabbing her arm, "You smell so good too..."

YoShe u held back a smile, feeling a slight pinch in her heart.

She didn't want them to leave either.

°°°

“You did what ?!”

Sitting on the sofa, Yoongi chuckled as the three maknae shrugged their shoulders at Hoseok, Seokjin, and Namjoon. Namjoon had his arms crossed against his chest, his eyebrows furrowed, while his two companions beside him looked desperate but amused at the same time. 

"You're incapable of listening to a tiny indication, are you..." Namjoon blurted out accusingly, "I hope you haven't scared her..."

"Knowing these three," began Hoseok, addressing the maknae, "they would have been able to jump on her..."

Jimin, Taehyung, and Jungkook glanced at each other. Without needing to reply, Jin's eyes widened. 

"You jumped on her..." It wasn't a question, but a statement. 

"I... I wouldn't go to the extreme of using the word jump Jin hyung..." defended Jungkook with a pout, "and then... it was Jimin who clung to her first and cried like a baby !"

The said Jimin turned to his boyfriend, outraged and betrayed. 

"At least I didn't make her feel uncomfortable by showering her with compliments! "Oh noona, you're so beautiful, you're so intelligent noona!" cried Jimin, pointing his finger at Jungkook, who was frowning, and Yoongi, who wasn't paying any attention to the conversation.

Hoseok and Jin couldn't help laughing as they watched their younger partners bickering, while Namjoon rolled his eyes and ran a hand through his hair. He should have known that his partners wouldn't listen to him and would go and find her the second his back was turned. He wasn't that angry with them, he understood them. From the second they'd said goodbye the day before, all he could think about was seeing her again. Yoongi was the most stubborn and obstinate of them all, and if the maknaes were by nature very impatient, he was even more so. 

He couldn't blame them, she was their soul mate just as she was his. And even if a reason they didn't know existed had darkened her heart and saddened her soul, she could not want to have something to do with them. She just couldn't. 

His four companions had only listened to their hearts.

"Did it at least go well?" finally asked Hoseok, who had settled on the floor, facing the maknaes, "how is she?"

"She's incredible hyung!" exclaimed Taehyung, "She's beautiful and her voice is so sweet..."

"Aaah, I miss her," Jimin added as he dropped onto Taehyung, "we shouldn't have left..." 

Hoseok chuckled and turned to Jin. 

"That means we're the last ones who didn't meet her, ah, that's not fair... Jin, are you all right?"

They all turned to the older man who had sat on the edge of the large sofa. He was staring into space, his face disfigured by pain. 

Yoongi was the first to react and got up to approach his elder. 

"Hyung, is it the same as yesterday?"

Jin took his head in his hands, nodding. He didn't understand why these violent migraines were suddenly coming to him, and more importantly, why he was now having these flashes and memories that weren't his own. 

Or were they? He had no memory of living in a human village with a hill and a big oak tree. And who was this person he was with? He couldn't see their face correctly, it was blurred, like everything that had happened since yesterday. 

"What's wrong with him, Yoongi?" asked Namjoon, concerned. 

"He's never been like this..." Jungkook sat down next to him, also worried.  

Yoongi told them about yesterday's episode in the kitchen, which made Jin wince, not wanting to bother them with it. 

"It's nothing," Jin muttered after a few seconds massaging his temples, "It's just tiredness I guess."

He wouldn't talk about the memories flooding his mind. He didn't want to worry them anymore. He'd look for the answers himself. 

"Hyung you've been very tired before, you've never had this kind of response..." replied Jimin who had gone into the kitchen to get him a glass of water. 

"He's right, maybe it's a problem with your powers? Or... argh, I don't know." Taehyung grumbled in frustration. 

"It'll be fine," Jin reassured him with a small smile, "I'll get some rest, and everything will be better tomorrow. But I will remember that you met our soulmate and Hobi and I are the only ones who don't know her."

He chuckled when he saw the innocent looks on the maknae’s faces and ruffled Yoongi's hair to reassure him. 

"If it happens again, you won't be able to escape," Yoongi replied simply, rising to his feet. 

He said nothing, but when his gaze met Namjoon's, the two demons understood each other. Jin's condition coincided strangely with the meeting of their last soulmate.

Pure coïncidence? Or was there a link between her and Jin's condition?

°°°

Every day there was an outdoor market in Seoul. She used to go there regularly to find various types of plants for her potions, spells, and other magical preparations. But also, fruit and vegetables for her personal use.

This time, Handong has decided to come with her. She closed her shop for the morning and set off in the early hours. 

She looked up at the sky and spotted the moon, gradually disappearing to make way for the sun. The full moon was for tonight. 

She knew that the moon was a very powerful force for witches. It was also that moment when she recharged her crystals and prepared her moon water for the month. 

But above all, the full moon influenced her powers. It was the best time to cast powerful spells and make sure they worked. It was therefore the perfect opportunity to find any spell that would help Jin recover his memory. 

The day before, after Yoongi, Jungkook, Taehyung, and Jimin had left, and after spending a good hour recovering from her emotions, she went back to combing through every magic book and grimoire she owned, whether in the bookshop or her personal library.

She hadn't found anything very conclusive. All the chapters on memory magic had one thing in common: the spells, their effects, and their duration always depended on who was casting them and who was being affected by them. 

The spell cast on Jin could have disappeared, just as it could still be present. She could only know this by seeing him and talking to him. But even that was a tricky thing to do. 

"Is everything all right, sweetie?" Handong asked in a soft voice, after noticing that she’d been quiet for a while now. 

"Hm?" she turned her head towards her, before smiling and nodding, "Yes, of course! sorry I... I was thinking about my research last night."

"Don't apologize," Handong smiled at her, "It's perfectly understandable. Don't hesitate if you need advice, I'm not a specialist, but I'll gladly give you my opinion."

She nodded again and explained what she’d found. Her different ideas, but they all came down to a single point. She had to see Jin to find out about his condition and memory. And that was where she was stuck. 

During her explanations and conversation, she had arrived at the market, and without stopping to talk, she looked at the different stalls, buying some fruit and vegetables from old ladies. 

In the distance, she notices a stall selling papaya. She hadn't seen or eaten papaya for a long time. It was also Jin's favorite fruit. 

Handong was busy with a merchant, so she waved back and headed towards the stall. She greeted the old woman manning the stall and looked carefully at the fruit on display. 

As she reached out to take one, she saw an arm in her field of vision landing on the same papaya as her. Surprised, she turned her head mechanically to see who it was, before freezing, her eyes wide. 

No, it couldn't be true. 

She had to be hallucinating, it couldn't... be him. 

And yet she could recognize that face, those features above all others.

Jin. 

Kim Seokjin was standing in front of her. 

°°°

"By the way hyung, why were you and Joonie at the library yesterday?" 

Jimin was currently sitting on a stool, watching Hoseok who was busy preparing lunch while Jin was away. 

"Namjoon wanted to research our soulmate," he explained as he chopped some onions, "At first I didn't understand why honestly, but you know, over time, you and I know very well that Namjoon's instincts are never wrong."

"Does that mean you've found something?" exclaimed Jimin, suddenly straightening up. 

Hoseok nodded, now working on dicing the vegetables. What they had found in the library... he could still hardly believe it. 

Should he tell Jimin? Or should he wait until they are all together to share the results of their research? 

He didn't have time to think about it any longer. He heard a loud knock, startling Jimin. It wasn't long before Yoongi and Jungkook emerged from their room, also startled. 

"What's going on here?" Asked the older one, "I don't suppose we were expecting company?"

"Maybe it's Jin who's back and his arms are too full to open the door!" Jungkook added, tilting his head to one side. I'll get the door!"

He trotted to the door, dressed in a long sweatshirt belonging to Namjoon, who was still asleep in the room, just like Taehyung. 

He opened the door with a big smile on his face. 

"Hi! What took you so long Jin hyun..."

He didn't finish his sentence. His voice faded as he saw what was standing in front of him. At his silence, Yoongi and Jimin joined him, themselves freezing in front of what was in front of them. 

Y/n was standing in front of them, totally panicked, out of breath, and sweating. 

But she wasn’t alone. 

"Help me... please..." she begged, her voice breaking. They could see she was holding back tears. 

She was supporting Jin, his arm wrapped around her shoulders. A completely unconscious Jin. 

[osatokun]

New Orleans chronicle [long post]

Post for the people who comes in my blog and wondering who are the characters I constantly draw (and will go on drawing).

All of them - PC and NPCS from the Vampire the Masquerade games I play. Most of them from the longest game I had with friends, with its ups and downs the game lasted almost 2 years. here is the main player crew:

Charles Arthur Drinkwater (real name Benjamin Thomas Fox) -242 years old Scottish Malkavian, personal little mew mew of the local Harpy, surgeon since he was 20, and consultant in the weirdest occult questions. I played him, he was my first serious male character and it was very interesting experience. Dakota Salmon (real name Numpai) - 200 something something (230? 240?) years old Gangrel. She was primogen of the local Gangrels until the entire clan was exiled from the city. Highly respected by the clan, strong woman with cold logic and warm heart. She came back to the New Orleans in hopes to return gangrels their place in the city. She was played by @fj0rge Veronica Sugar (real name Veronica ) - a 100 something something years old Toreador, part of the coterie Charlie is in. A singer and vampire with the most high rating of humanity in the city. Crazy enough to get into Charlie's adventures and support him. She was played by @maria-ruta

Some of the names were taken form the New Orleans by Night book, but the characters are totally different. Plus our DM added just about every splat in the game. The game was set in 2022. From the foundation of the New Orleans it was ruled by Etienne Doran, Ventrue who always dreamed of making New Orleans the new Carthage. He drove the mages away from the city, united with local werewolves and in generally kept piece New Orleans (most of the time). However he was murdered in 1997 by unknown Gangrel, the entire clan was exiled, but no one ever found the assassin. Some of the names were taken form the New Orleans by Night book, but the characters are totally different. The game was set in 2022. From the foundation of the New Orleans it was ruled by Etienne Doran, Ventrue who always dreamed of making New Orleans the new Carthage. He drove the mages away from the city, united with local werewolves and in generally kept piece New Orleans (most of the time). However he was murdered in 1997 by unknown Gangrel, the entire clan was exiled, but no one ever found the assassin.

(here is Etienne and his sheriff and Brujah primogen Simon)

Since then New Orleans was ruled by princess Marceline, supported by local harpy, adopted Etienne's childe, Rene. Rene is also one of the reason Charlie traveled to the New Orleans. They did their best, but no one had the charm of Etienne, who could stop the war with a single smile

Now, to the main plot of the game (oh I'll try to be short) The main conflict is set around the prophecies of the future where masquerade will fall and the vampires (and werewolves) become part of the human society. Think True Blood style. Technocratic union mages,led by Eureka Jones returns in the city. As we learned much later,her department is trying to bring the project of integrating vampires into society to life. If her project fails, the future of vampires going to be..very sad. Charlie knew about this possible future from the very start which scared him a ton, but he could not ignore how much technocrats made to the people. And Rene, a true son of his sire, collaborated with mages for the future that he(and Etienne) always wanted. Eureka is magnificent but I have to finish her still..

In the same time, the Sabbat pack lead by Sascha Vykos, comes to the New Orleans. He knows about the future of vampires, but wants to play the main role himself. To ruin Technocrats he aims to find Traitor, the mysterious figure who collaborate with mages in their experiments. Dakota returns to the city to help fight with Sabbat (and possibly return Gangrels their place in the city) AND (like Sabbat war is not enough) the mysterious Gangrel courier named Mohammed arrives to the city, carrying a small suitcase. With the ancient vampire head in it. Living head. As we learned later, the head is imprisoned by the angel Gangrel named Enkidu, the angel constantly chops Gangrel's head somewhere in umbra, not letting him to heal. Both Enkidu and Angel leads courier to the unknown destination, when one courier dies, the other is chosen to continue his journey. The existence of the head was kept in secret until the end of the game (not surprising Charlie knew this secret tho..),but Sascha knew about it and wanted to get the head to help him find the Traitor.(and, well, diablerise later as a treat) Mohammed and Dakota (he quickly grew on her and they kept their loving relationships even after the game ended)

Long story short-the Traitor was Ada, Gangrel who killed and diablerised Etienne. Their souls willingly united and the developed a plan to bring new future to the vampires. In the end, Vykos pack was slain by Dakota, Ada, werewolf leader(poor lad died), Gangrels and one particularly charming Nosferatu. Gangrels was allowed to get back in the city, however Dakota and Mohammed (and Yaropolk) left to Russia, as they were sick of Camarilia and mages. However no one can deny that Gangrels led by Dakota played the biggest part in saving the city. What's Charlie's role you might ask? And where is his charming wife? Well, from the very beginning DM hooked me with a dream. Charlie saw a changeling in his nightmares, who asked him for help. And so, his personal storyline began. Of course he assisted other characters when he could, but his mine line is based around saving changeling. No one cares about them. They have no place in Technocrat's future, but now they are his family. He tried to find and then heal the changeling from his dream, who turned out to be young Balor princess, Monica. Her soul was stolen by the Settite leader(one of the two),mysterious Imhotep, who rumored to be Giovanni. Later Charlie learned that he's an actual mummy, which didn't stop him to awkwardly mess with the ancient creature. And poor Monica was in coma for the last 3 years, but thanks to her ability to travel through dreams she could try to seek help

While looking for changelings to find the one who called him, he met Glinda, the cursed Balor ex queen, imprisoned by other changeling house, Beaumayn in 1999th. Her changeling self fell asleep and she was guarded by a chimerical Dragon (who could take human form ),who acted like her abusive husband. While trying to learn who Glinda is, Charlie looked into her soul and immediately fell in love for the rest of his life. During the game they even ended up getting True Love merit Q_Q

A little backstory: as a teenage changeling queen Glinda saw the prophetic dreams about the end of the changelings. When she looked for the way to save her people, he was talked by Pentex and Nephandi into bringing a little apocalypse. Using the energy of the Red Star they'd bring a strong old spirit into the world, put it into Glinda's body and let her give birth to a new changeling-spirit creature, that will destroy the half of human population. Since Changelings get their powers from the dreams and fantasy, they will become stronger, because people will start dreaming more, hoping more, believing in magic and stuff. In fact a naive teen was talked into rape. The other house, Beumayn, freed Glinda's chimera, the Dragon, and burnt her in the chimerical flame, trying to kill her changeling soul and the spirit inside her. However, the spirit escaped to the Umbra and the connection with him helped Glinda survive. He forgot who she was, and the Dragon became her jailer, acting like her over controlling husband. However, the spirit creature lived and gained power with time, wanting to fulfill it's purpose and destroy the world.

During the game, Charlie found Monica, traveled into Umbra to the gates of Arcadia to get the healing for changelings and another Imhotep's victim. Healed them all, fought the Dragon on the Changeling court and freed a demon named Folly. With the help of the demon he turned Dragon into a simple human and won, freeing Glinda. The demon escaped in Europe and was out of the scene most of the time, but kept reminding Charlie about himself in many ways. Charlie learned that Monica's father was killed by her own mother, Imhotep's cultist, and adopted young Changeling. He also introduced her to a werewolf of the same age, Joshua, wanting her to have day-walking loyal friends wo she won't be alone. Later on they started dating, and in return Monica tried her best to represent Charlie to Gilnda in the best way possible. Glinda, Charlie and Monica quickly started to live together, Charlie tried to keep peaceful relationships between changelings and vampires/mages (or better say not making it worse).In the end, mages, vampires and Glinda united to destroy the old spirit without harming changeling. And Charlie, Glinda and their newly created chimera Jeff (who they consider to be their son) located Imhotep. Stole his power jars (I'm too tired to phrase it not in a silly way, but think of Baldur's Gate 3 quest with a mummy), destroyed most of them and watched Imhotep's army of ghosts destroying his body. Charlie offered the fame for killing Imhotep to another Settite leader, Manon, and in return she joined the ritual of the spirit's killing. Charlie knew that mummies are immortal, sooner or later he will come back, so he and Glinda dedicated their lives to the searching of the way to permanently trap Imhotep's soul and prevent him from stealing lives again. They lived +/- 6 more years in New Orleans (but traveled a lot), and then left to Egypt. Glinda stopped aging, gaining a lot of energy from their constant adventures and, possibly, connection with her true love. Monica, however, lived normal human life, forgetting she was a changeling once. She married Joshua and became a writer under the nickname Little Spider. Charlie made sure to collect savings for her, got her home, and the old Monica's home became a freehold for the new Balors. Ofcourse A LOT things happened in the game. And Charlie's story goes beyond one game, he have a lot of adventures in my imagination. But I hope that's enough..for the start! Some of the characters I managed to draw. I was so charmed by Glinda I just draw her most of the time haha

Dragon (Gregory Dequir) and Imhotep

Jeffrey

More finished arts for this game -> here Gangrel line up by @fj0rge -> here Nosferatu line up by @fj0rge -> here Veronica's references by @maria-ruta -> here and here and more Veronica here

More characters drawing by Ruta -> Jake(brujah) Jack(Gangrel) (Veronica has a J boyfriend collection) and silly guys Sad Charlie and Veronica comics by Ruta -> here

Thank you for reading!

[nicky999doors]

notes on impish behavior below ...

it’s a long post but if you’re interested in how these songs came about this is it! 

track 1 is a horny song about wanting someone to devote themselves to you in the way that you have already done for them. images of a medieval king riding a porche into a downtrodden village in the middle of the night to meet someone was such a vision for this song. directly inspired by link up by tinashe. 

track 2 is me learning how to harmonize in my own way, this is quite literally about my ex-boyfriend and how being a forgiving person can sometimes put you in a worse situation. inspired by charli xcx and the song gory love by casablancas. 

track 3 is something i kind of wrote for my best friend, we both feel similarly about entering relationships and how we are always waiting to be tricked. inspired loosely by hyperpop, the idea of a hi hat being mischievous, build a bitch by bella poarch bass and i love a heavy bass drop. track 4 is quite literally about having sex with a werewolf. allowing yourself to open up sexually. learning how to hold control and how to give it as well. inspired by truffle butter by nicki minaj, in my pocket by mandy moore and probably fanfiction. 

track 5 is literally another horny song. when you’ve had a taste of someone and you literally can’t think about anything else but getting another. sonically this is  like me trying to mix hyperpop clanging and mechanical sounds with something by the band spoon. hence the bass guitar and the organic hand claps. the organic with the mechanic.  track 6 is a major diss track to LA and the guy i dated at the beginning of the year. track 5 is also about him lmao, he clearly ruffled my feathers. i say some not so nice things on this track but they’re also the truth so do with that what you will. majorly inspired by blink182 with guitars and the vocals and big sean for lyrical content and feeling like hot shit vibes. 

track 7 is my cinematic jammm. this song is about making a pledge to stay alive no matter what anyone does to you. losing hope and getting to your rock bottom to realize you can climb out. you will not be stuck there. you actually refuse to be stuck there. sonically i’m not sure where this came from but those horns are supposed to sound like a medieval firing squad. i knew i had something when i started getting those kick drums to glitch. 

track 8 is an anxiety attack. it’s crawling out of the pit of hell only to realize that you have to pick up a sword and start fighting for your life. it’s about realizing you’re stronger than you give yourself credit for. you’re also way stronger than that wimp ass ex-boyfriend of yours. inspired by every anxiety attack i’ve ever had but i think also 100 gecs??   track 9 is my demonic hip hop shit. this one is supposed to have a boss battle type energy to it, probably inspired by literal video games. It’s a lament on once being trapped and left alone, but here to stay. you can hear my producer tag clearly for the first time on this one, and it’s supposed to show that i’m not afraid of the dark anymore. 

track 10 is something i put my whole boy pussy into tbh. this is the most emotional track i think i’ve ever made and also the longest song i’ve ever made. this is my epic about betrayal and hating loving someone who constantly disappoints you. ethel cain’s music gave me the courage to make this track.

track 11 is my last statement and my diss track to anyone who thinks they can do or say whatever they want to me because they’ve deemed me attractive. i think i just got so sick of feeling misunderstood at the time and i talking to people who weren't treating me as a human (whether in a good or bad way) someone said it gives them fall out boy vibes but honestly i can’t even say who inspired it, maybe also capri songs by fka and ty dolla sign there are a bunch of different ways to read the album, i kinda also have a story behind the whole thing and some things i’ve envisioned (i’ve touched on some concepts in my promo art) but this is like--- the truth. this is the way and reason the songs were made and where i pulled from. i got to reference a lot of things i love on this album. it’s not perfect but it’s how i wanted. 

[wasp-coffee]

I posted 21,958 times in 2022

117 posts created (1%)

21,841 posts reblogged (99%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@eraseorzero

@soldiercastiel

@finleycannotdraw

@hairbackc0llarup

@agenderarkham

I tagged 2,265 of my posts in 2022

#top gun - 573 posts

#maverick - 409 posts

#top gun maverick - 371 posts

#pete maverick mitchell - 339 posts

#iceman - 235 posts

#mcr - 233 posts

#tom iceman kazansky - 218 posts

#my chem - 209 posts

#my chemical romance - 203 posts

#rooster - 154 posts

Longest Tag: 140 characters

#i don't think i'll ever trust a biography of her made by a man because their view their opinion is the only lens we've ever seen her through

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

omg u mentioned mav + wolf friendship??? where was this do u have photographic evidence i would like to see the wolfmav friendship

Hello! Yes!

This is a few shots before but Wolf leans in a bit after this and says "Gutsiest move I ever saw, man"

He is also the one who calls Charlie to tell her Mav's going to quit so he obviously cares about Mav to some degree at that point.

(sorry I am literally grabbing these as I go-)

There's this... twin primal scream after the mission

See the full post

15 notes - Posted September 1, 2022

#4

hey im cody (@incorrecttopgunquotes) and i had a full on laugh when i saw your url in my notifs this morning because yesterday a wasp flew in my coffee and stung me in the mouth so the irony is great

kfjdodjdjdid oh my god-

is your mouth okay??

this url is a really bad pun, not a threat - i swear XD

bestie→bee's tea→wasp coffee 😅

thank you for sharing that's absolutely hilarious :)

16 notes - Posted August 26, 2022

#3

Goncharov this, Goncharov that, has no one seen the holiday special????? How the Gonch Stole Christmas

18 notes - Posted November 22, 2022

#2

What if Hollywood/ Wolfman owned The Hard Deck instead of Penny?

Either of them looking on to Rooster’s performance, remembering Goose so clearly. Bradley doesn’t remember them - he was a kid - but they remember him from the funeral, his birthday parties, a few little league games. Rooster doesn’t know them anymore - they were just two of many uniformed uncles - but still has the feeling he’s met them before, or seen them, the two guys who own The Hard Deck. 

When Mav gets thrown out The Hard Deck they’re smiling and laughing along with everyone else, when he nears the window they’re the ones that meet his gaze. Knowing, realising, recognising the grief in Mav’s face as they look between the spitting image of his dead best friend and pure heartbreak. None of them are in Rooster’s life anymore. He outgrew all of them.

Thanks to @i-put-the-pan-in-panic for helping me with this one 

21 notes - Posted September 9, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

love is stored in the appendix

21 notes - Posted April 3, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[lifeofkaze]

Thanks for tagging @weasleysandwheezes Doing this as an own post sounds like a good idea!

1. why did you choose your url?

Different variations of my online nickname "Kaze" (pronounced Kah-ze) have been with me for more than ten years now and this was one of my most used combinations. There is also no real reason for "Kaze" in the first place, it started as a teen and I just liked the sound of it back then.

2. any side blogs? if you have them, name them and why you have them.

I don't because nobody got time for that. I did think about opening one for World of Warcraft fics featuring my game characters but tbh, this one takes enough time as it is. So you just have to endure the occasional gaming posts, sorry!

3. how long have you been on tumblr?

Tumblr never was that big of a thing in Germany or at least where I'm from anyway, so I only joined back in January when I got back into writing.

4. do you have a queue tag?

Not really, when I can't post live I usually just save stuff in my drafts and go from there.

5. why did you start your blog in the first place?

I started writing again after the longest time ever and hated what fanfiction.net, where I was active back in the days, turned into.

6. why did you choose your icon?

It's a portrait of my MC Lizzie Jameson which the insanely wonderful and talented @witchy-push drew for me 🥺

7. why did you choose your header?

*checking what my header is* Ah, that's the view from just beneath the mountain top my girls and I hiked up on my hen do :)

8. what’s your post with the most notes?

Hm, I think either a Neville smut or Charlie fluff, not sure... but knowing I strongly suspect the smut 😂

9. how many mutuals do you have?

I follow almost everyone back that's active in the fandom but my core mutuals I'd say are around 7 or 8.

10. how many followers do you have?

125 and I'm still baffled by that.

11. how many people do you follow?

95

12. have you ever made a shitpost?

Who hasn't?

13. how often do you use tumblr each day?

Let's skip that question, shall we? 👀

14. did you have a fight/argument with a blog once?

I haven't so far and I hope this is going to stay that way.

15. how do you feel about “you need to reblog this post”?

Depends on the content, sometimes I do, sometimes I don't.

16. do you like tag games?

Yes!! I always try to answer, but sometimes I forget it (I'm deeply sorry if I do, I'm beyond grateful when someone's tagging me, I love you all!)

17. do you like ask games?

Absolutely! Doesn't matter if it's about me, my MCs or my WIPs. I just haven't been able to do many of them lately because all my creative energy is focused on completing this goddamn fic. 😂

18. which of your mutuals do you think is tumblr famous?

I'm admiring all of them from afar (or not as afar, depends on how close they let my little stalker self get xD)

19. do you have a tumblr crush on a mutual?

Like I said, I'm crushing hard of all of my amazing Tumblr friends 💛

20. tags (no pressure): @the-al-chemist @me-charlie-you-angels @samshogwarts @whatwouldvalerydo

[hotchkiss-and-tell]

I posted 1,959 times in 2021

63 posts created (3%)

1896 posts reblogged (97%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 30.1 posts.

I added 1,135 tags in 2021

#cw nancy drew - 462 posts

#fan art - 103 posts

#cw nancy - 84 posts

#ace - 82 posts

#music - 79 posts

#nancy drew - 75 posts

#ace x nancy - 74 posts

#clue crew - 61 posts

#curse of blackmoor manor - 58 posts

#cur - 57 posts

Longest Tag: 78 characters

#you gonna tell me the rawleys had their nieces doing the same chores as nancy?

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

When Ned asks Nancy who she thinks the Black Cat is, these are all the options for the conversation.

Warnings at Waverly Academy

46 notes • Posted 2021-09-27 23:01:55 GMT

#4

A library book I was reading in the sun had something odd about two pages in the middle. Just little white shadows I could see in the margins. Breaking out my black light beam revealed this secret message in UV pen. I thought it was funny and I had to share it with my fellow detectives: 

“I haven’t told anyone this, but FedEx is evil. They’re not from this world. They’re an alien race. They died out when they came to earth so now they’re alien ghosts. They are working with UPS and the mail truck. They have hypnotized Jimmy Johns. UPS and the mail truck are also dead aliens. My friend and Amazon Prime are the only ones that can help. Use this info. Anyone who knows is in danger. “

I hope I haven’t endangered anyone by getting this message out.

49 notes • Posted 2021-02-25 00:56:52 GMT

#3

What if

one of the Nancy Drew games where we’re supposed to be scared that someone is following us or monitoring our every move included Nancy getting texts that were photos of herself (no face reveals of course) and were taken where she had just been investigating?

Can you imagine LIE or SPY with that? We wouldn’t have to rely on other characters telling us that we were being watched. We’d experience it for ourselves!

60 notes • Posted 2021-07-24 04:37:07 GMT

#2

I can’t remember: Does CLK ever say who bakes the pies at the Lilac Inn? Does Emily do it or do they pay a chef? Pies were ready before the kitchen burned down on the day that Nancy visited because she had to pack them up for delivery later, so who baked them all? Jane, Emily, or mystery chef?

63 notes • Posted 2021-01-12 04:08:41 GMT

#1

Dates or Time of Year for Each Nancy Drew Game

whatamagicalplace made one of these charts last year. Those efforts gave me a starting point but I wanted to tweak it after doing my own research. I decided to share my final result since my version differs from hers in several ways. My reasoning for each game is discussed below; but if you have any evidence to add, feel free.

SCK: Nancy says in the opening letter she took a semester off school to visit Eloise in Florida. The banners for Senior Prom are still prominent throughout the school and the event is scheduled for May 23. Game takes place in a single day but that day could be any time in late spring semester prior to May 23.

SCK2: Homecoming banners are prominent and the event is scheduled for Sept 23. A flyer with Jake’s secret messages has a date of Sept 05, so let’s assume Jake was still alive then. The game says Nancy is there to investigate after Jake was murdered “last week.” That could mean three to seven days after the murder since it happened on a Thurs. Thus Remastered takes place in a single day but that day could be anywhere from Sept 08 to 22.

STFD: Nov 13 (confirmed with calendar). Game takes place for as many days and nights as player needs.

MHM: “Winter Festival” and Charlie studying for finals indicates late Nov to early Dec. Newspaper about the lost gold at the end is dated Mar 03; it could’ve been published after money settlement and the renovations completed though. Game takes place for as many days and nights as player needs.

TRT: December. The Spanish letter from Lisa’s friend is dated Nov 30 and acknowledges that Lisa is already in Wisconsin. By now, time should be well into Dec. 

FIN: Possibly Nov (game’s release) but there are no confirmed dates on anything. It’s likely during the school year since Maya is doing the interview for the student newspaper. Game takes place over three days.

SSH: Calendar on Henrik’s desk is for the month of April. The book version takes place during the DC Cherry Blossom parade which usually occurs last week of March or early April. Game takes place for as many days as player needs. (Early April timeline would match with end of game trailer and dates for DOG.)

DOG: Jeff’s calendar is open to April. Culprit’s log book says Sally is due to move in to the cabin on April 19. Sally says she spent four weeks at Moon Lake, implying the game starts May 18. But I really don’t see Jeff’s character forgetting to change the calendar, so either Sally moved in early or she means four weeks total including seeing the property, bidding, and the final sale plus moving in. And let’s remember there’s no safe water source, so it’s unlikely Sally could live there for four weeks straight. Sally says the dogs howled a full week before they attacked the house and then they appeared every night since; maybe Sally lasted 9-14 days with the ghost dogs. The game could likely begin anywhere between Apr 28 and May 18. Then continue for as many days and nights as the player needs.

CAR: Culprit’s emails with black market dealer date from May 23 through June 04. Harlan’s appt book opens to June 09-13 with the significant clue on June 10. Game is a single day, likely on June 10, but could be as early as June 05.

DDI: June 17 (confirmed with calendar). Single day of gameplay.

SHA: Sept 15 to 17. Nancy’s airline ticket confirms arrival date in AZ. Timeline of the game takes place in three days. (Tex’s b-day is Sept 16!)

CUR: This is anybody’s guess. Hugh and Linda were married Aug 22. The lawyer’s letter to Mrs. Drake states Linda must live at the manor for another three months to fulfill the “six-month-habitation-clause” and those six months must be consecutive in the first year of marriage. Game could be late Nov at the earliest. However, frogs are chirping when Nancy arrives at the manor which is a spring thing and Bess and George say they are attending sailing camp. The fact that no one is suggesting that Linda can leave due to health reasons and start the six months over when she’s well again makes me think the year is half gone already. So the game could also be taking place in April or May at the latest.

CLK: May 07 (confirmed with calendar). Single day of gameplay.

TRN: We see snow in Copper Gorge, but it’s in Colorado and snow can be any time of year there. Frank and Lori are wearing the puffy vests and everyone else has jackets and sweaters. Fatima says it’s the off-season now and summer is the busy season. Makes me think winter is my best guess.

DAN: Game takes place for as many days as player needs. The newspaper on Day 1 is dated Aug 28. Newspapers continue to appear through Sept 06, which publishes that the journalists are negotiating for raises and the sounds of the impending strike are occurring outside JJ’s apartment. Day 11 (Sept 07) and onward have no more newspapers appear on the kitchen table. Let’s say Aug 28 to Sept 07 for simplicity.

CRE: Mike’s calendar is set to March. Quigley’s tape recorder log updates as of Mar 28. Craven’s shipping records say his latest sample was sent to Aikens Biotech on Apr 09. Game takes place in a single day, probably Apr 09 or 10. (Mike just hasn’t turned over the calendar yet)

ICE: Newspaper in the lodge is dated Jan 13. Elsa’s resignation letter is dated Jan 15. Lodge computer says Lupe checked in on Jan 15 and she noticed the lack of maid services for days. Game likely takes place that same week, starting maybe Jan 18 at the earliest, and lasts over several days and nights.

CRY: May 31 (confirmed with calendar). Single day of gameplay.

VEN: Newspaper in the Ca’ terrace says chalice was stolen “this morning” and the police records say the theft happened Jan 25. When Nancy nabs Nico on the stakeout, the next day’s newspaper is dated Feb 03. Since game takes place over several days, it likely plays from Jan 25 to Feb 03.

HAU: Night of May 28. The wedding is set for June 01. The end dialogue says Kyler and Matt couldn’t stop saying “I love you” from when the rocket launched to four days later, which was their wedding day.

RAN: The float plane pilot says resorts like Dread Isle shut down in the summer for “hurricane season” in the Bahamas. And the game was released in July. Since we see the map that charts all of Nancy’s past cases (including HAU) so the game is after the wedding on Jun 01. But there is no reference to the current date aside from “summer.” Single day of gameplay.

WAC: The essay Mel receives from her teacher with the plagiarist comments is dated Nov 21. Since two more nights of sleep are required to trigger events in the game, we can figure that the game takes place from Nov 21 to 23.

TOT: Scott’s calendar is open to May and filled in with code until the 19th. The log book of precipitation is filled out until May 24. Game likely takes place from May 20 to 25.

SAW: The TE-Japan brochure in Nancy’s teacher tote says her exchange program runs from Jun 01 to Sept 15 with different durations of 2 weeks, 3-4 weeks, and 5-8 weeks. With no specific date in the game and the player taking as many days and nights as needed to solve the mystery, we have to settle for saying it takes place in “summer.”

CAP: Karl’s daily calendar is on page March 12. When Nancy finds the final forged email from “Markus” she remarks that it has tomorrow’s date, which is Mar 13. Game is a single night of play on Mar 12.

ASH: Newspaper and police report of Nancy’s arrest say the game is done in a single day of August 18. The fire took place on Aug 17.

TMB: It’s the desert and there are no dates on any clue in the game. Since Lily is a student and Abdullah and Jon are professors, perhaps the game takes place in summer between any busy semester/class schedules.

DED: Ellie’s notepad in the control booth says she gave the coil demo to Nancy on Oct 29. Nancy arrived in daylight hours but since Ellie is on the night shift, the demo could have taken place on either side of midnight which means the game could start on either Oct 28 or 29. (Nancy arrived 10/28, night fell and midnight passed, then Ellie gives demo 10/29 OR Nancy arrives 10/29, night fell and it’s not midnight yet, then Ellie gives the demo still on 10/29.) Game continues for as many days and nights as the player needs.

GTH: Jessalyn’s phone recorded her bachelorette party antics from the night of Oct 27 to early morning of Oct 28. Addison says Jess had vanished for the second time after sun-up. It is unclear how many days Jessalyn has been missing before Nancy arrives on the island. Nancy was deep asleep when Savannah calls her for help, which means Jess has been gone at least a full day. Then Nancy arrives on the island at night which either means it’s evening on the same day of Savannah’s call or another day has passed by the time Nancy gets there. Oct 29 is the earliest possibility. Game takes place over three nights. Likely set between Oct 29 and Nov 01.

SPY: The newspaper reports that July 14 is near and it will be the eighth anniversary of Revenant’s first attack. Alec’s letter documents that his sister was kidnapped on the first of the month and has not been seen since. Game takes place between Jul 02 and 14. While Nancy cannot sleep or change the time of day, it is hard to believe that traveling back and forth throughout Scotland’s towns and the different phases of the spy operation all take place in a single day.

MED: Summer in the southern hemisphere, so datewise it’s set between Dec and Feb. Again there’s no sleep or time of day transitions but the elimination rounds likely take place over several days.

LIE: Employee timecards are recorded through July 05, the artifact exchange log is filled out through July 06, and the packing slip on the open crate says received July 06. Game is a single day of play, likely on July 06 or 07.

SEA: Soren’s winter guest log says Nancy is visiting in January. Game takes place for as many days and nights as player needs.

MID: Minion’s plane ticket TO Austria where the game begins is dated Oct 26 and the game goes into Halloween.

90 notes • Posted 2021-04-18 03:08:54 GMT

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[talkfastromance4]

Love So Sweet-- boxer!Luke AU

I’ve finally finished this! This is the longest thing I’ve ever posted in one go. I originally wanted to do this in parts but I have too many in parts I’m still posting now lol. I hope you enjoy this as much as I did writing it! And yes, the title is from TEETH and you’ll see why at the end ;)

Word Count: 19.6k

Warnings: swearing, fighting, drinking (only casually), smut and sexual occurrences, unsolicited hitting on a girl at the bar, mentions of domestic abuse/violence

Masterlist

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Without further ado, enjoy! Please let me know your thoughts on this I’d LOVE to hear your feedback! :)

____________________________________

Luke Hemmings is a player and a boxer, the ultimate troubled duo. He’s the best fighter at Seconds of Summer gymnasium/arena and he goes through women like his fights, quick, fast and onto the next one. Even though the girls know they won’t get a second call from the devastatingly handsome fighter, they were still his entourage at every fight. Cheering him on and wearing scantily clad outfits.

Luke’s been undefeated since the start of the season, but that was all about to change on Friday night when he saw, quite possibly, the most beautiful girl he’s ever seen. She’s standing with her arms across her chest while he slips into the ring. Calum is murmuring tactics in his ear but he’s only half listening. He’s watching the dark haired beauty chew on her nail while she listens to her friend, who Luke recognizes is Penelope, or Nell. Nell is dating Calum.

Excellent.

“Bro, did you hear me? He’s quick on his feet so be wary,” Calum claps his friend on the back and Luke nods, sneaking one more glance at the pretty girl.

The sound of the bell signifies the start of the match and Luke began the dance he knows all too well. His height makes it difficult for him to move as fast as his opponents but it anchored him well enough to throw some great punches and uppercuts.

He won the first round, but he kept peeking at the new girl during the second. She wasn’t even really paying attention, instead she was scrolling through her phone or talking with Nell who was watching Luke adamantly. At least she was interested.

“Come on, Luke! Get your head in!” Calum shouts from behind and Luke regains his focus on the opponent dancing opposite him.

Luke took a running start and flipped the guy over his shoulder so he fell onto his back, his body making a loud thud and the crowd went crazy. Luke tucks a loose curl from his bun behind his ear and he strolls over to where Nell and the pretty girl were.

His usual gaggle of girls scream his name as he approached but the girl he was keen on noticing him was completely oblivious. That irritated him. Why come to a match if you aren’t going to watch?

Luke sighs and winks at his fans who squealed in response. The ding of the third and final round sounded and he turned around and was met with a hard fist to his jaw. It causes Luke to stagger as he rubs his jaw, the taste of pennies fills his mouth. He spits out fresh blood and curses at himself. This girl is getting in his head and he doesn’t even know what the hell her name is.

He lunges for his opponent but he’s tripped up, falling hard onto the floor and the guy is on top of him. Luke hears so much noise and the sound of flesh hitting flesh, then he thinks of the girl and with all his willpower he flips himself over with a loud grunt. He has the other guy pinned by the neck and the ref counts to ten.

A double bell sounds the end of the match and Luke clambers off his opponent. Calum and his two other best friends, Michael and Ashton, are jumping on him in victory. The crowd is going nuts, Luke’s breathing is heavy and his eyes scan the crowd for Nell and the girl but they’re gone.

He almost lost because of her and she didn’t even fucking witness his win. Unbelievable.

• • • •

“Why are you in such a mood? You’re on your tenth win!” Michael exclaims while they’re at their favorite bar, Charlie’s after the match.

“Thought I was going to break that streak tonight, Mike,” Luke says tipping his beer bottle to his lips.

“Yeah, what happened that second round?” Calum asks.

“I dunno, I got in my head,” he shrugs. He glances at the door just as Nell walks in searching for Cal. The girl he saw is close beside her. “Fuckin’ hell.”

“Hey guys!” Nell greets excitedly then looks to Luke, “congrats on the win, big man. Ten and counting.”

“Thanks, Nell,” Luke grins brushing his curls back with both hands, his eyes roaming over to the brown haired beauty.

She’s standing awkwardly playing with the pendant of her necklace. Luke can see her eyes are a deep blue.

“Oh! Everyone, this is my cousin, Evie. Evie these are Calum, Ashton, Michael, and the champion over there is Luke,” Nell introduces pointing to each person.

“Hi, it’s nice to meet you all,” Evie gives a small wave to the group, her eyes slide over to Luke whose gaze hasn’t left her.

“She just moved here from Wisconsin,” Nell continues finding a comfortable spot in Calum’s lap who kisses her cheek affectionately.

“Well, welcome to sunny LA,” Ashton laughs with his arms open.

“Thanks,” she smiles a bit awkwardly and Luke can tell she’s shy.

As annoyed as he is that she distracted him earlier, he finds it endearing. He can feel she’s got a thick wall up and he wants to do anything in his power to knock it down. Just as long as she doesn’t keep getting into his head during fights.

• • • •

The next time he saw Evie was at his next match, and just like the first one, she wasn’t watching. She was on her phone or looking anywhere and everywhere around her except for at Luke and the ring. He almost lost again, but when that thought entered his mind it made him angry so he ended up winning anyway.

Ashton was throwing an after party at his place, lo and behold, Evie was off to the corner nursing a drink in her hand while Calum and Nell were on the opposite corner near the beer pong table... Her dissociation irritated Luke and it increased each time he saw her doing. Taking a quick shot and leaving the platinum blonde who was flirting with him mirthlessly in midsentence, he makes his way over to her.

She looks up at him, giving him a weak smile then turns her attention to the contents in her cup as she swirls it in her hand.

“You’re not a people person, are you, sweetheart?” Luke asks under his breath sidling closer to her. Normally he uses the form of endearment on his gaggle of girls as part of his tactic to get them into his bed, but it drips condescension with Evie.

“What do you mean?”

“At the matches and the bar you’re on your phone and now here,” he tilts his head down to look at her, his height overpowering, “you’re in the corner like a pretty little wallflower.”

“I’m not bothering anybody, so what’s the big deal?” she shrugs.

Luke is surprised at her retort to be honest. He thought the quiet, shy girl wouldn’t have a bite in her so he grins devilishly. “It bothers me,” he says lowly digging his hands in his black jeans.

Evie’s eyebrows raise in response. “How?”

“It bothers me how you’re always on your bloody phone when you come to a fight. You get in my head and it messes up my game. I’ve almost lost twice now because of you.”

“How exactly is that my fault? Why are you watching me anyway when you should be fighting?” her big blue eyes turn steely, he notices her sky blue manicured fingers tighten on her red solo cup.

“You distract me.”

“That sounds like your problem, not mine.”

“Evie! Come take a shot!” Nell shouts from across the room. Without another word, Evie skips around Luke’s large frame to join her cousin and his friends.

He sets his jaw and watches her go, wondering what the fuck this chick is doing with his head.

• • • •

The group of friends decided to go to a bar downtown. It was nothing like Charlie’s. It was more of a club than a bar because of the bouncers out front with a velvet rope and a massive line stretching down the sidewalk.

Luke is surprised to see Evie has joined them and even more surprised at the outfit she’s wearing. Normally when he’d see her at the ring she has on leggings and a simple shirt. Now she’s sporting black high-waisted shorts with a red sparkly tank top, he can’t help but notice the perfect amount of cleavage showing either.

Evie gives him a small smile in greeting when she walks past him. The smell of her perfume—roses and something fruity—are left in her wake leaving him momentarily stunned.

“You all right, man?” Calum asks walking by with Nell on his arm.

“Yeah, fine,” Luke mumbles following them inside the bar.

It’s dark and hazy from the random smoke machines that would go off with the bass drop of the songs. It’s crowded too and Luke searches for Evie only to find her up front leading the pack while he takes up the rear. The shortest and shyest girl of the group is leading them through the bar?

He sighs in slight irritation when he realizes he’ll have to keep his eye on her for the night so she doesn’t get into a compromising situation. He knows how guys’ minds work and Evie has that perfect innocent look with those big eyes of hers that draws you in.

Once they’re up at the bar he orders a round of shots first, something simple like a lemon drop. The group gathers in a big circle clinking their glasses and Luke’s eyes stay glued to Evie as she sucks the sugar off the lemon and licks left over sugar off her lips.

Luke orders another shot for himself. This is going to be a long fucking night.

The drinks flowed constantly and the girls danced along to the music. Luke had even saw a prospect of a girl across the bar but when he heard Evie shriek in laughter he was pulled right back to his unofficial post of watching out for her.

He tells Calum he’s heading to the bathroom quick who nods and Luke gives one more look at Evie. She’s leaning against the bar sipping on her drink listening to whatever Nell is telling her. Luke slips by dancing bodies quick as he can, now that he’s heading to the bathroom the need to relieve himself has increased.

When he’s finished he splashes water on his face and gazes at himself in the mirror. His eyes are bluer and he realizes he’s not even drunk because he’s been so preoccupied watching out for Evie.

Sighing at his reflection, he heads out of the bathroom but when he returns to his group, Evie isn’t in sight.

“Hey, where’d Evie go?” Luke asks Ashton who’s talking to some girl with bright orange eye shadow on.

“Uh, bathroom,” Ashton answers then turns back to orange eyeshadow girl.

Luke sighs scanning the crowd for her face before ordering a beer. Nell is making out with Calum against the bar so she clearly didn’t accompany Evie to the bathroom. He takes tender sips of his beer scanning constantly for Evie’s red shimmering top.

Finally, after what feels like hours, he spots her weaving in between people and Luke stands up a little straighter as she approaches. He frowns when he sees the look on her face then spots a guy behind her clearly trying to get her attention. Luke’s grip on his beer tightens, coaxing her to get to their group faster silently in his head.

When the guy grabs onto her wrist and waist pulling her against him, Luke springs into action. He slams his beer bottle on the bar top and stalks over to Evie.

“Let me go,” her voice is high as she tries to break free from the stranger but Luke is stronger.

He wedges himself in between Evie and this asshole easily, he pushes Evie behind him then glares at asshole.

“Hey man, I had her first—“

“She didn’t want you,” Luke says, his voice steely. “Walk away.”

“Whatever,” asshole scoffs shaking his head, “fucking tease of a slut anyway.”

The next thing Luke knows his fist has connected with the guy’s jaw causing him to stumble backwards into a throng of people. There’s gasps then Calum and Ashton are beside Luke when the asshole regains his footing. When he sees two other large men standing before him, he rubs his jaw then ducks away back into the crowd.

“What the hell was that?” Calum asks Luke in alarm.

Luke ignores him and instead turns around to look at Evie who’s being consoled by Nell. Her eyes are wide in shock and she’s clearly visibly shaken and what just happened.

“Are you okay?” Luke asks sincerely taking a hesitant step forward.

Her nod is jerky while she rubs her wrist, Nell is rubbing her back and hugging her to her side. Luke nods then puts a couple twenties on the bar to cover the rest of their drinks.

“Let’s get out of here,” he says and everyone agrees quickly.

He makes sure Evie is in front with Nell, Ashton and Calum are on his side as they basically escort the girls from the bar. The car ride was silent, the altercation sobering everyone up pretty quickly. Luke is only half listening to Calum berate him for punching someone outside of the ring but Luke would do it again in a heartbeat.

His breath catches at the realization.

Nell decides to stay the night with Evie and the guys want one more drink so they were going to go to Charlie’s but before they drove off Evie approaches the passenger side door. Luke rolls the window down.

“Thank you, for what you did,” she thanks him.

“You’re welcome,” he grunts clearing his throat. Their gaze holds for a moment before she nods then retreats to the entrance of her apartment.

• • • •

Luke tried to get Evie out of his head by getting someone else underneath him. It wasn’t until he opened his eyes while he was pounding into the girl he picked up at the end of his practice match that he realized he picked her out from the crowd only because her hair was the same color as Evie’s.

He closed his eyes again and focused on reaching his climax but it only made it worse because all he saw were Evie’s big, dark blue eyes.

Well, that didn’t work.

At his next match three weeks later, Evie is with Nell with the others surrounding them. She was still on her phone but not as often as the first couple times. That eased Luke a little. Slightly. Not really.

At Ashton’s that night he finally corners her because he needs answers. He pulls her out on the balcony, the summer breeze cools his burned temper slightly and she stares up at him in shock, her mouth open slightly. Luke tried not let her pink lips distract him.

“Why come?” he demands shoving his hands in his pockets

“What?”

“Why come to the match when you don’t even watch? Whoever you’re texting on your phone is more important so why come?”

“What is your deal with me Luke? You have a whole group of girls watching you, why does it matter so much what I do?”

“Because! You’re there with Nell then you act like we’re all beneath you or something. Like we’re not important enough for your time. It’s aggravating.”

“You want to know why I’m on my phone?” her voice changes and her eyes harden.

“Yes.”

“You really want to know why I don’t watch your fights?” Her normal soft voice is now monotonous with a hint of hysteria at the end.

“Yes,” he chuckles sardonically. “These are really simple questions.”

“Fine!” She throws her arms up as if in defeat. “I’m on my phone because my friends back home keep me updated on where my ex is. I can’t watch you fight because that’s what my ex did to me. Broken jaw? He gave me one. A split lip? I’ve had three. I’ve been bruised and beaten and I only come because Nell is my favorite cousin but I can’t tell her any of this because she loves it. There, are you satisfied now?”

Luke is frozen in his spot. He wasn’t expecting any of that and now he feels like a complete ass. His shock is quickly replaced with anger at whoever her ex is because any man who hits a woman is the lowest of the low and the scum of the earth.

“I—I’m sorry, I didn’t—“

“Now you do know,” she scoffs pushing past him and forces the glass door open. It slams against the wall as she stalks past their friends.

“Evie, wait!” he calls after her but she’s already rushing out Ashton’s front door. Everyone is calling her name then turn to Luke.

“What happened?” Nell asks worriedly.

“I messed up,” Luke mutters. “Fuck!” he runs his fingers through his curls in exasperation.

Nell runs out the door after her cousin and the others look at Luke waiting for an explanation but he won’t give them one. He’s not going to air Evie’s secret. He wanted to get her walls down but he never could have imagined the warzone he’d find behind it.

• • • •

Evie isn’t at his match the following Friday and it brings a bit pit to his stomach, he feels awful about what she admitted to him. After he practically bullied her into confessing it in the first place. After his win, he jogs to Nell who is looking somber.

“Where’s Evie?” he pants.

“Home. She wasn’t feeling well,” she responds stoically. “I don’t know what happened between you two, but she’s being more withdrawn than normal. You better apologize or do something to fix this Luke.”

“I will,” he nods frantically.

After his shower, Ashton is waiting for him by his cubby where his clothes are.

“What happened with you and Evie?” Ashton asks calmly.

“I really fucked up, Ash,” Luke sighs shaking his head.

“What’d you do?”

“I confronted her about being on her phone during my fights and . . . you can’t tell Nell this, but Evie’s ex was abusive. She said she’s had a broken jaw and a split lip and who knows what else. I think that’s why she moved, to get away from him.”

“Shit,” Ashton mutters looking at his feet. His hazel eyes are hardened when he looks back up at Luke. “You better fix this. Nell said she’s been real torn up.”

“I know. It’s all my fault. Do you know her apartment number? I want to go apologize.”

• • • •

Luke takes a deep breath before buzzing Evie’s apartment number.

“Yes? Who is this?” she asks over the intercom.

“It’s me, Luke. Can I come up? I want to talk to you.”

“We did enough talking, Luke.”

“No! Please, Evie. It’s really important,” he begs. It’s silent on her end of the speaker for about ten seconds then he hears the buzz of the door unlocking.

He bounds to the elevator and rushes to her door on the third floor. He knocks twice on her door and it opens wide to reveal Evie in sleep shorts and a thin hoodie. Even with no make-up, she still made Luke’s heart skip a beat.

“What’s so important?” she folds her arms.

“Can I come in?” he asks softly.

Evie sighs with her lips pursed contemplating until she finally steps back into her apartment with Luke trailing in behind her. He glances around her apartment, it’s warm and inviting with a fresh scent he can’t quite place. It feels very homey with pictures and art on her walls, fluffy rugs and blankets on her couch.

“What do you want, Luke?” she asks softly.

His eyes finally land her, really taking her appearance in. Her hair is curly in a low ponytail, she’s got dark circles under her eyes as if she hasn’t been sleeping well. That makes him feel worse.

“I want to apologize for last week. I’m so sorry Evie, if I would have known—“

“I didn’t want anyone to know,” she admits quietly, “I wanted to come here because it’s far from him. I dyed my hair and wanted to start over.”

“I’m so sorry,” he repeats, his sorrow heavy in his words.

“You said that already,” she flashes a small smile but it doesn’t meet her eyes.

“And I’ll keep saying it until it takes away how big of an ass I was to you. I’m not normally like that, I don’t know why it bothered me so much.”

“You’re used to girls watching your every move then throwing themselves at you,” she shrugs. “No big deal.”

“It is a big deal. I don’t want you to ever feel unsafe when you’re around me. And now I realize what I did at the bar probably made you terrified of me but I don’t—“he shakes his head. “When I fight it’s strictly tactical and in the ring. I do training everyday, I’ve been fighting since I was—“

“I’m not scared of you, Luke.”

“You’re not?”

“No,” she sighs. “And what happened at the bar . . . yeah it was scary but if you didn’t punch him who knows what that guy would have done. It’s just with the fights . . . the sounds bring it all back. What he did to me.”

“Fuck, I’m sorry. Can I make us some tea or something? Do you want to talk about it? Or, not talk about it? We can talk about anything else.”

“Tea sounds nice.”

• • • •

“It hasn’t really hit yet that I’m free of him, Danny is his name” she shakes her head while they’re sitting on her couch. A movie is playing on her TV while they’ve been talking. “Bad choice of words but I’m scared he’ll find me.”

“I won’t let him. He’ll have to come through me first.”

“He doesn’t stand a chance,” she smiles and he returns it.

“How long were you with him?”

“A year. My longest relationship and of course this is what happens.”

“I’m sorry you went through that. Why haven’t you told Nell?”

“Because she’d want me to go to the police but it wouldn’t do any good.”

“Why? Then you wouldn’t have to keep checking behind your shoulder if he followed you here.”

“If anything he’d get six months.”

“Did you get photo evidence?”

“Yeah.”

“Then he’d be locked up for sure—“

“Luke, you and I both know he wouldn’t. He’s conniving and he’d pay his way out of it which would only make it worse for me,” she snuggles a big white pillow against her chest.

They’re silent for a few moments watching the movie but Luke has no idea what is going on with the plot.

“You need some sleep,” he peers down at her worriedly. The dark circles under her eyes seemed to have gotten darker since he first arrived.

“Which is another way of saying ‘you look like shit,’ thanks,” she chuckles nuzzling closer into the pillow.

“No that’s not—“he sighs shaking his head. “Your eyes look sleepy, that’s all. Have you had trouble sleeping?”

“Lately, yeah,” she admits, her eyes roam over the characters on the screen. The light from the TV glows on her face, his heart aches at how tired she looks.

“I’ll stay until you fall asleep.”

“That might be awhile,” she warns.

“Good thing your couch is comfy,” he throws a blanket over her and stretches his legs out on the L-shaped portion of the couch, “and can hold a giant like me.”

She chuckles softly as he burrows further into the cushions, draping a blanket onto himself as well. He really likes how she has so many. It makes him feel cozy.

“Thanks, Luke.”

• • • •

Luke’s not quite sure what jolts him awake, but when his body jerks he has a momentary lapse of memory where he is. The TV is going through featured Netflix shows and movies when he looks down to see Evie has somehow scooted herself closer to him in her sleep. Her pillow is against his right side and her hand is clutching the fabric of his sweatshirt.

Luke smiles down at her then searches for the remote, it’s tucked in front of her. He pulls it away then uses the flashlight on his phone to figure out the buttons. Once the screen goes black, Evie stirs next to him mumbling incoherently, her fingers flexing on his sweatshirt.

“Sorry sweetheart,” he hushes, “just turning the TV off. Go back to sleep.”

She hums in acknowledgment and Luke tries to stand up without jostling her.

“Don’t go,” she sighs sleepily.

Luke freezes. Did she really say that?

“Are you sure?” he asks a bit louder.

“Stay,” she nods with her eyes still closed, “please.”

• • • •

His little sleepover with Evie from the night before has been running through Luke’s mind all day. Instead of straying his focus it has somehow kept him more on target with his punches and dodges from Calum as they practice in the ring. When he moves to the bag he’s imagining it to be the face of her ex, he doesn’t know what he looks like but he punches it as hard as he can anyway.

Once he’s finished practice and showered he calls up Evie who answers it cautiously.

“Hey, it’s me, Luke,” he says wondering why she answered that way.

“Oh thank God,” she exhales, “I thought—“

“Shit,” Luke closes his eyes slamming his head back against his seat, “I’m sorry. Of course you’d be weary because you don’t have my number and would think it’s—I’m sorry, Evie.”

“It’s all right, Luke,” she chuckles, “I’m good. What’s up? How’d you get my number anyway?”

“Nell gave it to me. I just finished practice, would you want to grab a bite to eat?”

• • • •

Evie is giggling hard behind her hand as Luke finished his embarrassing story. They were at a diner not too far from her apartment where she ordered a grilled cheese with a strawberry milkshake and a plate of fries in the center of the table.

“Ashton really thought baby turtles were tadpoles?” she snorts and it’s so damn cute Luke thinks his smile is going to be permanently stuck on his face.

“That’s closer than his second guess of thinking they’re mosquitoes,” he chortles popping a fry in his mouth.

The booth they’re currently sitting in is in the far corner by the window and he’s got his arm around the back of the booth but when Evie shifts, his fingers will brush her shoulder. His initial irritation for her is long gone and he hates himself for even feeling that way in the first place.

Now, he feels nothing but calmness when he’s with her, sitting here feels so natural and easy. When he picked her up at her apartment she told him she slept all day after he left to go to practice. Her eyes appeared brighter and she didn’t look so sleepy anymore which pleased Luke.

“You boys are funny,” she snickers taking a hearty sip of her shake.

“Excuse me, I’m a man,” he squeezes her shoulder and she leans into him.

“If you say so,” she giggles then picks up her phone at a buzzed notification. Apparently it’s irrelevant because she locks it right away then nudges him. “Don’t you have a fight in a few hours?”

“Yeah,” he shrugs. “I don’t need to be there until 7. Fight’s at eight.” He plucks up a French fry, dips it in ketchup and holds it in front of her mouth.

Without a thought she takes it and chews slowly as if she’s thinking of something to say.

“You don’t have to come, Evie,” he tells her gently watching her as her eyebrows furrow together.

“I know,” she nods then says more softly, “but I want to see you.”

“You can see me after. We’ll probably be at Charlie’s or I can come to your place and watch Friends.”

“I just won’t watch, I promise I’ll be fine,” she insists.

Luke knows he should convince her more to stay at her apartment but the thought of not seeing her for almost two hours doesn’t sit well with him. Her presence has impacted him greatly these past few weeks.

She nods again then rests her head on his shoulder. Her willingness to do that jumpstarts his heart and he rubs her shoulder. He wishes there was a way she could watch him fight without memories creeping up from her past.

Then, suddenly, he has a thought.

• • • •

When it’s almost time for him to fight, Luke grabs the small box from his cubby and moves to the door. Calum yells at him.

“I’ll be right back, I have to give Evie something,” he says dismissively then exits the locker room.

Cheers and calls fill his ears immediately as he enters the darkened ring area. He pushes through the bodies easily knowing where exactly Evie is standing. He spots her in between Ashton and Nell and sure enough, she’s on her phone.

“Luke, what are you doing?” Ashton asks.

Luke’s stomach flips when Evie’s head snaps up at the mention of his name, he smiles easily and she returns it. He pulls the box out of the pocket of his hoodie and pulls Evie aside, her hand is warm and comforting in his large one.

“Shouldn’t you be in the locker room?” she asks with a smile.

“In a minute. I got something for you,” he hands her the box.

Evie looks up at him in confusion before sliding it open then she gasps, her eyes are wide when she looks up at him again. They’re air pods.

“Luke, this is—“

“I sent you a link to a playlist on my Spotify,” he talks over her, “put these in, listen to it and you won’t have to hear the punches.”

Her mouth hangs open as she stares at the gift and then moves to her phone to find the playlist he was talking about. He titled it as her name with a blue heart next to it.

“They’re some of my favorite songs, and others made me think of you,” he shrugs sheepishly.

“Luke,” she shakes her head again then launches herself in his arms to hug him tightly.

He wraps his arms around her tightly, lifting her slightly off the ground because of their height difference.

“You’re so sweet,” she says into his neck and he shivers. Her arms release from his neck and he sets her down on the ground again. “Thank you so much.”

“You’re welcome,” he grins then looks above her head at the ring. It’s almost his turn. “Come on, let’s get you back to Ashton and Nell before Calum comes out here and kills me.”

Before he does go back in the locker room, he helps her sync the air pods and slips them in her ears. She snatches his hand and leans up to kiss his cheek murmuring, ‘good luck.’

That night is the fastest Luke has won a match because he still felt Evie’s kiss on his cheek. It fueled his adrenaline and fueled his desire for her more. He showered quickly so he could go out to her and she was the first one to congratulate him and hug him on his win. He would have just loved to hold her as long as possible but his other friends wanted to show their congratulations as well.

After some small chit chat they all decided to head to Ashton’s place to drink in celebration.

“Ride with me?” he asks her as they walk out of the building hand in hand. Their group is loud to their cars but Luke and Evie are in their own little world.

“Okay,” she smiles sweetly up at him.

After a few rounds of drinks, Ashton’s living room has gotten a little stuffy. Luke stepped away for a minute to use the bathroom and when he returned Evie was nowhere in sight. He began to panic slightly when Calum jerked his head to the balcony where the doors were opened partly. Luke nodded his thanks and slipped outside to find Evie leaning against the cement wall staring out at the skyline.

“Cooler out here, yeah?” he asks.

“Yeah,” she sighs, “You found me.”

“I had a little help from Cal,” he grins sidling up next to her.

“Man, he ruined it.”

Luke laughs. “Did the earphones help?”

“They did,” she turns her head to look at him. His back is against the wall but he’s been staring at her the whole time. “You didn’t have to do that though, those are expensive.”

“I don’t mind.”

“You’re something else, Luke Hemmings.”

“You’re something spectacular, Evie Carson,” he nudges her playfully and she blushes.

“No, I’m not.”

“But you are though,” he disagrees lightly turning his body so his right arm is leaning on top of the wall. “You’re the sweetest girl I’ve ever met.”

“That doesn’t make someone spectacular,” she rolls her eyes.

“You’re also witty, and smart, and braver than anyone else I know. You’re funny, and beautiful without even trying.”

“You left out my eyes,” she bats them at him for good measure and he laughs.

“Can’t forget those beauties,” he strokes her cheek just below her eye.

“You’re pretty spectacular too, you know.”

He snorts in response.

“You are! You have this bad ass exterior with your leather jacket and painted nails and boxing, but deep down you’ve got so much heart and soul. You’re funny and charming and I trust you.”

He swallows hard. He’s wanted to kiss her for a while now, and this seemed like the perfect opportunity but he didn’t want to go for it and make her feel forced. He leans forward to touch her cheek again, then ghosts his fingers on her jaw and under her chin.

“Can I kiss you?”

“Yeah,” she barely whispers.

He tilts her chin up slightly then presses his lips to hers softly. It’s innocent enough but when Evie squeezes the sleeve of his leather jacket he takes that as his cue to deepen it so he threads his fingers in her hair to make the kiss deeper. He feels her hesitancy and he doesn’t want to push her so he breaks away slowly. He gives her one more peck. Then another.

She breaks into a smile bowing her head bashfully. Before he can ask what’s wrong she buries her face in his chest.

“Thank you,” she muffles, “that was perfect.”

“Anytime, sweetheart,” he smiles wrapping her up in his arms resting his chin on her head. He kisses her hair and sways from side to side.

When he feels her begin to shiver they head back inside and are glued together the rest of the night. They’re sitting on Ashton’s couch with his arm wrapped around her shoulders and Evie is nestled into his chest with her arm draped over his stomach. They were having quiet conversation until her head became slightly heavier and her breathing became deeper, he knew she was asleep.

“Has mine eyes deceived me?” Ashton asks pulling attention to the two on the couch. “Someone got through your hard, icy heart?”

Their friends all laugh and Luke shakes his head.

“Shut up,” he says softly, “if you wake her I’ll fight you.”

Ashton puts his arms up in defense and Evie shifts on Luke’s chest.

“Be nice,” she sighs heavily and pokes his stomach.

“Did he wake you?”

She shakes her head. “No. I was just resting my eyes, and you’re comfy.”

Luke smirks and rests his lips on her head, not kissing her but just feeling her warmth.

“Do you want me to take you home, lovie?” he murmurs. She hums a yes. “All right, come on.”

• • • •

After a long while of saying goodbye they were finally on their way to Evie’s apartment. Luke still didn’t want to leave her and was pleased when she asked him, ‘aren’t you coming?’ He couldn’t get out of the car fast enough just so he could hold her hand. Luke has never been the type of guy to be excited just by holding a girl’s hand before but with Evie it was different.

Everything with Evie was different. He took the key from her easily as she struggled to put it in the slot. She kicks off her shoes, he does the same, and follows her to her bedroom. He’s not quite sure if she wants him to spend the night but when she grabs her pajamas and motions to the bed saying,

“Make sure it’s warm for me when I get back.” And left to her bathroom.

He lets out a sigh of relief but can hear his heart pounding in his ears. Sure, he spent the night before but that was under different circumstances. This, though, this was something different entirely. Tonight they shared a kiss and Luke wasn’t afraid to admit that he liked her. He adores Evie.

Just as he pulled off his leather jacket, he had on a white t-shirt and his dark grey joggers (he’s thankful he didn’t wear his jeans otherwise it’d be an uncomfortable night) Evie returns. Luke can’t help but smile at her outfit, cloth shorts and a t-shirt with an elephant on the front. Her face was free of makeup and he could still smell the mint of her toothpaste.

“I thought I told you to keep the bed warm,” she pouts standing in front of him tossing her clothes in a pile on a chair in the corner.

“I got distracted,” he shrugs.

“By what?”

“You,” he pokes her nose causing her to giggle.

She stretches up on her toes to kiss his lips quickly then grabs his hand and pulls him to her bed. They climb in together, Luke is surprised at how comfy her bed is, and he pulls her close. She tangles their legs together and he puts his fingers through her hair before leaning in to kiss her.

It’s slow and languid the way their lips move together, he’s hesitant as he slips his tongue in her mouth. Evie sighs into him clutching his shirt in her fingers. He smiles.

“You taste minty,” he mumbles.

“You should brush your teeth,” she sighs dragging her nails over the scruff of his cheek but keeps kissing him.

He chuckles dryly against her lips. “Are you saying my breath stinks?”

“Maybe,” she sighs then giggles.

“I thought I was the asshole in this relationship?” he smirks stroking her cheek with his thumb.

“You did not just call me an asshole!”

“You said my breath stinks!”

“Did not! You can go to sleep without brushing your teeth? Disgusting,” she teases then captures his bottom lip between hers.

“Then why do you keep kissing me?” he asks after they have to catch their breath.

“Because I like kissing you. But go brush your teeth so you can come back faster and I can keep kissing you,” she kisses his nose then nips at it with her teeth.

“Ow! Fine, I’m going, you didn’t have to bite me,” he pinches her side before slipping out from the covers.

He doesn’t spot an extra toothbrush and doesn’t want to be a creep and go through her drawers and cabinets, so he uses the mouthwash on the counter. He gargles twice just to make sure she’s satisfied then jogs back quickly to his sleepy girl who is now very much wide awake. She’s sitting up against the headboard then smiles gleefully at the sight of him.

“Feel better?” she asks.

He takes his place back into her bed then pulls her easily onto his chest, she laughs as one hand holds onto her waist and the other cups her cheek.

“Now I do,” he breathes staring into her eyes.

Evie bends down to kiss him again but he easily takes the lead, massaging his tongue against hers running it over her bottom lip. She hums at that and it tightens his stomach. They continue to kiss in whispers until their lips are chapped and their breathing is irregular and Luke pushes her away gently.

“You should get some sleep, lovie,” he whispers kissing her jaw.

“I don’t want to sleep. I want to keep kissing you,” she pouts.

He traces her pouted lip and he wants to keep kissing her, too. He wants to do more than kiss but that’s for another night down the road.

“I do too, but we’ll have plenty of time to kiss tomorrow. It’s . . .” he stretches his arm to snatch his phone from the floor to look at the time. “It’s 3:30 in the morning, you need to sleep.”

“Fine,” she sighs rolling off him in a huff. He pulls her right back so he can run his fingers through her hair.

“Am I forgiven?”

“If you keep playing with my hair, then yes.”

He smiles and settles into the bed, his body is totally relaxed. He finds he’s like that a lot when he’s with Evie. He’s never been one to cuddle with other girls, after he’d sleep with them they’d always leave. He never cuddled. But with Evie it’s easy because she fits so perfectly against his body.

“Luke?”

“Yeah?”

“Before, when you said you were the ‘asshole in this relationship. . .’ does that mean we’re in a relationship?” her voice is quiet and he can hear the hesitancy in it.

He swallows hard. “I want to be, but only if you do, too.”

“I do want to.”

He hears the smile in her voice and he kisses her forehead.

“And you aren’t an asshole,” she says.

“To other people I am. You’re the only exception.”

• • • •

A few weeks have gone by and Luke and Evie have been spending so much time together. She’ll come by after his practice and head to the diner for lunch. Kissing is always evident and one night in particular is fresh in Luke’s mind when they went one step further.

When they were watching Friends he pulled her onto his lap, with one hand holding onto the back of her head and the other precariously close to her core on her inner thigh, she boldly moved his fingers to the round wetness between her legs.

“Want my fingers, baby?” he murmured and she nodded biting her lips.

He slid his hand from her hair to her lower back and began to rub his finger in circles on the outside of her underwear. He felt her bundle of nerves and the wet spot on her panties grew slightly. With their eyes still locked on each other he pushed the fabric aside and teased his finger up her slit. She jolted at his touch and he smirked.

“I haven’t even done anything and you’re already this wet for me?” he grinned teasing his finger up once more.

“Don’t tease, please,” she practically whined and Luke’s eyes darkened at her form of submission.

He removed his finger and before she could protest he held it in front of her mouth, the tip of his finger coated in her arousal.

“Suck,” he commanded softly, “then I’ll give you what you want.”

Her lips fluttered in a faint smile, she took his hand in both of hers then slipped her mouth over his long finger. Her tongue swirled around it as she took it all in his mouth. He enjoyed watching her mouth work on his finger, the idea of her doing that around his cock caused it to twitch in his sweats but he ignored it. He wanted to please her and only her.

“That’s good baby,” he praised removing his finger with a pop. A line of spit was connected to his fingertip and seeing it sling back to her lower lip aroused him in a terrible way. He kissed her roughly and inserted his finger into her entrance easily.

She gasped in his mouth as he twirled his finger inside of her and she rose on her legs so he could get a better angle. He pumped into her languidly, then when he added a second finger she moaned loudly and knocked her forehead against his. He tilted his head so he could still see her face as he twiddled and scissored his fingers inside her.

She came on his fingers that night and Luke can still hear her pretty moans while he’s going over the fight schedule with Cal. The look she made when she came undone on him was imprinted on his brain and the way—

“Luke!” Calum shoves him snapping his that encounter with Evie out of his head.

“Sorry, what?” Luke clears his throat looking over at Cal.

“I said, you’re going to be doing five fights in two days. Peterson is still out because of his wrist so you’re taking his slot on Thursday along with yours and Jacobsen is out for his fight Friday morning, and then you’re going against Hayes Friday night. Will you be able to handle that?” he raises his dark eyebrows.

“Oh,” Luke blinks looking at the schedule. “Yeah. No problem. Is that all?”

“Yeah, hey . . . Luke?”

“What?”

“Listen, I’m real happy you and Evie have gotten together. But, I don’t want her to shift your focus in the ring.”

“Cal, if anything,” Luke places his hand on Calum’s shoulder, “she makes me more focused. I gotta go get her, I’m making her dinner at my place tonight. See you Thursday.”

“No, I’ll see you Tuesday for practice, Luke,” he shakes his head.

“Right. Tuesday. I’m just messing with you, I know I’ll see you Tuesday. Later.”

Calum shakes his head again as he watches his lovesick best friend and champion walk away to get his girl. It’s a nice change seeing a genuine smile on Luke’s face instead of a permanent grimace. He’s got Evie to thank for that.

• • • •

Luke wasn’t the best cook so he resulted in baking a pizza for him and Evie. He blushed when he told her but she kissed his cheek assuring him, ‘I love pizza.’ So while he was kneading the dough on the pan she was getting the cheese and chicken ready to place on the pizza.

The playlist he made for her was playing and he was singing along to it, she loved listening to his voice. It was so pretty and comforting. When it was time to put on the toppings, she scooped up some cheese and put it in the sauce then held it up for him to eat. He took it gladly smiling then kissed tomato sauce off her thumb. She giggled and he winked before doing the same to her.

Before she could even lick up the sauce on his finger, he swiped it on her cheek near her ear and she gasped.

“Hey!”

“Oh no, let me get that,” he grins. He grabs her waist and licks up the sauce with a wet kiss, but he doesn’t stop there. He moves his lips to her ear then onto her jaw until finally on her neck where he begins to suck and bite.

She sighs running her hands up his arms moving her head to the side so he can access her neck better. He’s on his third mark when the oven dings signaling it’s all heated up.

“Luke, Luke, baby the oven’s ready,” she giggles.

“It can wait,” he mumbles squeezing her hips, his thumbs creating circles on her exposed skin.

“No, you’re hungry. Put the pizza in and we can continue,” she giggles shoving him off playfully.

He grunts but does as she says. She adjusts her shirt watching him pick up the pizza pan and checks out his ass as he bends down to put it in the pizza. He catches her and he smirks.

“Were you checking me out?” he asks even though he knows she was.

“Who me? No way,” she waves him off and turns away from him.

“Get back here!”

He lifts her in his arms causing her to squeal and he collapses onto his couch with her straddling his lap. He unzips her sweatshirt so she’s just in a tank top with her cleavage in front of his face. With one look she connects their lips together and they make out for a while before it’s her turn to drag her lips onto his neck.

Luke rolls his head back onto the couch as she sucks expertly on his skin. His large hands are holding onto her waist, he rocks her slowly against him moaning at the friction of their bodies. Tied with her mouth on his neck if Luke died right there he’d die a happy man.

“Mm, baby, you’re good at that,” he moans as she continues to suck on his skin.

“I’m good at something else, too,” she exhales and he gets goosebumps.

Before he can retort she’s slipping off his lap onto the floor and begins to undo the button of his jeans. She’s meticulous and takes her time with his zipper as he stares wide eyed as this beautiful girl before him shucks his pants down his thighs. He gulps when her finger lightly traces around the perimeter of the head of his dick. It twitches in response and she smiles.

“Can I?” she asks flicking her big beautiful doe eyes up at him.

Luke’s voice is gone so he just nods.

She lifts his girth into her palm, Luke is aching when she presses soft kisses up his shaft and then a wet one over his slit. She continues to kiss him preciously then darts her tongue out as she kisses up and down his shaft again.

“Fuck, baby, don’t tease,” he pants reiterating what she told him when he fingered her a few weeks ago.

“What do you say?” she asks and Luke is alarmed that she’s got a small dominant side to her. But he fucking loves it.

“Please, baby,” he exhales lifting his hand up but then drops it back to the cushion. He doesn’t want to grab her hair yet, he doesn’t want to push her.

She smiles again (fucking hell) then spits heavily on his head watching it dribble down before she took him completely in his mouth. Luke couldn’t contain his moan from feeling her mouth wrapped around him. He’s imagined it when he’s in the shower or thinking of her late at night but the real thing is so much better.

She lathers him up with her spit by moving her head up and down and when she’s satisfied, she begins to pump her hand up and down as well and Luke’s mind goes blank. The pizza is forgotten. The day is gone. Hell, his own fucking name has escaped his mind.

The only thing he’s focused on is watching his pretty girl bobbing her head up and down his cock, taking him as far as she can without gagging and what she can’t take she squeezes gently with her fingers which surprisingly feels good.

He’s a moaning mess and she’ll say ‘yeah?’ and ‘does that feel good?’ which causes vibrations and more sensations and he can’t form a coherent sentence so he just keeps moaning. When he’s getting close she sucks on his dick like a literal lollipop and then her fingers begin to fondle his balls and he feels the tight knot in his stomach begin to unravel.

“I don’t swallow,” she says quietly but keeps working at him and he doesn’t care.

“That’s fine, don’t stop . . . I’ll tell you when,” he gasps and bucks his hips slightly.

The sound of her slurping sends him over the edge and then he’s pushing her off him with rushed ‘baby, baby, stop, stop’ and he’s coming over his own fingers. Her small hand is beneath his though and she helps him release until he’s fallen back against the couch hot and bothered and totally satisfied.

He doesn’t even notice her leave until she’s sitting beside him with a wet paper towel in her hand and cleans up his hand and thigh. She rolls it up in a much larger dry piece of towel and he rolls his head to the right to look at her dazedly.

“Hi, honey,” she giggles and he gives her a lazy smile back.

“You’re fuckin’ incredible,” he sighs then purses his lips. She takes the hint and leans in close to peck his lips three times.

“I wanted to make you feel good,” she shrugs.

“You exceeded. That was fuckin’ phenomenal.”

She giggles again and then the oven timer is going off. Luke groans about to get up then realizes his dick is still out with his pants still around his thighs.

“Shit,” he mumbles shuffling them back on while Evie is laughing beside him. “Quiet you.” He wiggles a finger at her in warning and she fake bites in his direction while he heads into the kitchen.

The pizza they made is delicious and they eat a majority of it before deciding on eating mint ice cream for dessert. Luke has an idea and he tells her to go in his room and pick a movie on Netflix to watch. She gives him a quizzical look but does as he says and he pulls out some whipped cream along with the tub of ice cream.

When he enters his room he hears the sound of Mary Poppins Returns on the screen and Evie is sitting cross legged in the center of his bed. She smiles at his appearance and he sets the ice cream on the bed along with the whipped cream and one spoon, she looks confused.

“Just one spoon? No bowls?”

“Nope,” he says smoothly reaching forward and tugs her towards him, her ankles on either side of his legs. “Can you do me a favor, sweetheart?”

“Yeah . . .?”

“Can you take your leggings and underwear off for me?” he smiles pressing his forehead against hers. He hears her sharp inhale and is happy when she complies. He balls up the fabric tossing it to the side somewhere.

“Now,” he mumbles kissing her cheek, “can you lie back for me?”

She nods and slowly lowers herself on her back. Luke grabs her ankles yanking her further down the bed so her naked butt is on the edge. He kneels down then grabs the ice cream and spoon. He puts a small amount on the spoon then drags it carefully from her bellybutton her mound and on the inside of both of her thighs. He sticks it back in the container then picks up the whipped cream.

He sprays the cream on the lines he just made and sets the can on the floor next to him. He hums as he looks at her, she looks delectable and her pussy is throbbing already as he looks up at her. Her eyes are wide with excitement and lust as she realizes his plan.

“You’re my sweet treat,” he rasps then attaches his mouth to her stomach.

The ice cream and whipped cream are cold on her warm skin and it tastes so good on his mouth. He takes his time licking and sucking it up making sure he gets it all off her skin. When he reaches her thighs some of it is rolling onto his bedspread but he could give less than a fuck. He swipes his tongue at the rogue ice cream melting down her thighs and glances up at her before pressing his mouth to her core.

Evie gasps at the coldness of his mouth from the ice cream and whipped cream but then his tongue starts to move in intricate designs and she enjoys it. Her fingers are clenching the bedspread but Luke drags her hand into his hair and she’s yanking on his curls.

He hefts her thighs over his shoulders as he devours her rapidly and excitedly. She’s the sweetest thing he’s ever tasted and his tongue moves in expert precision. Soon she’s rocking her hips into his mouth and her moans are sinful, her fingers yank harder as he feels her come for the first time. He smirks on her pussy lips because he hadn’t even used a finger yet.

“Fuck, Luke,” she whines but he doesn’t stop.

She’s panting and wiggling above him, her thighs clenching around his head as she comes. He peeks at her through his lashes and her mouth is open in pleasure while her eyes are closed and he hopes she’s seeing stars.

When her hips slow back down he removes his mouth and kisses the inside of her thighs, biting lightly to mark her up as she relaxes.

He rests his cheek against her thigh and stares up at her as she opens her eyes slowly. “Hi honey,” he mimics her from earlier.

“Don’t be cheeky,” she sighs and he laughs against her thigh.

• • • •

The incoming fights have been on Luke’s mind all week. He hasn’t seen Evie since he made her pizza Saturday night and he’s had to force his thoughts of her away but it didn’t quite work. It’s been a long four days of constant footwork and practice from Cal.

Evie’s been all too understanding during the whole ordeal but he’s been sure not to tell her he’s doing four fights in two days. He’s not exactly sure why but he doesn’t think she’d like that too much. Nell was even in the dark about it too, so she was spending the night with Evie while Luke and the guys were at the matches.

The first fight went well and Luke walked away with minimal damage, just a small cut on his lip and bruised knuckles. His next fight was at 8:30 so he had a little time to call her.

“Hey you,” she greets and he can hear the smile in her voice. He wishes he could see it.

“Hi baby,” he smiles sitting gingerly on the bench.

“How’s practice?”

“Uh, good. Calum’s making sure to put me to work,” he chortles, “I just wanted to hear your voice before I get back to it.”

“You’re sweet. I wish I could see you tonight,” she says sadly.

“I know lovie, me too,” he murmurs. “Haven’t seen my sweet girl all week.”

“I blame Cal, tell him I won’t allow him to work you this hard ever again.”

“He’d laugh in my face,” he laughs at the sternness in her voice.

“Then I’ll tell him,” she states proudly.

“That won’t end well, baby,” he mumbles leaning against the cold cement wall. It feels good on his sweaty skin.

“Why?”

“Because, he’ll laugh at you, then I’ll have to punch him for doing so, then Nell will punch me . . . it’s a vicious cycle.”

“Or no one can just not punch anyone.”

“Double negative sweetheart.”

“I don’t care, it makes sense okay?” she sniffs and Luke laughs.

Calum pokes his head in jerking his head behind him signifying it’s almost time for the second fight. Luke nods and waves him off.

“I gotta get back to it, lovie,” he sighs. He’d much rather stay on the phone with her. “I’ll see you tomorrow night after my fight, okay?”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to come tomorrow? I’ll bring my air pods.”

“Yeah, I’m sure, it’s not a major one. I miss you.”

“I miss you, too. Don’t practice too hard, okay?”

“Can’t make any promises babe,” he smiles. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Have a good night.”

“You too, Luke.”

She says his name so softly he almost wants to dip out of this next fight, snatch her away from Nell and snuggle her close in his bed all night. But he can’t.

• • • •

Nell had convinced Evie to surprise Luke at his match on Friday.

“Come on, Eve, you haven’t seen him all week and I know he’ll love seeing you there. He’ll be so surprised!”

Evie thinks about seeing Luke’s smile when he’d spot her in the crowd, it’s her favorite smile that he has reserved only for her and that alone convinces her. She decided to wear a black crop top with high waisted shorts and black ankle boots, hoping when Luke sees her he’ll be stunned into silence.

They arrive at the arena around eight o’clock, Luke usually goes on at 8:30 on Fridays but when they get there Michael and Ashton find them first. Their eyes are wide and slightly panicked.

“What the hell are you two doing here?” Ashton demands blocking their view from the ring.

“We came here so Evie could surprise Luke,” Nell answers folding her arms.

“He didn’t want you to be here, Evie,” Michael says.

“Yeah I know because it’s not that big of a fight but I haven’t seen him all week because Cal’s been having him practice every day,” Evie says sadly.

“Wait, he told you he’s been practicing?” Ashton asks.

“What are you guys saying? What’s going on?” Nell demands looking between the two tall men.

“Uh. . .”

“Well, you see, the thing is—“

“AND HERE’S LUKE HEMMINGS BACK IN THE FIFTH ROUND! AFTER BOTH WINS LAST NIGHT TONIGHT SHOULD BE A PIECE OF CAKE RIGHT? LOOKS LIKE HE’S LOSING HIS THUNDER, THOUGH!” The announcer’s voice booms throughout the arena.

Realization dawns over Evie’s face, Ashton and Michael’s faces pale when Evie pushes them out of her way and she looks down into the ring. Sure enough, there’s Luke swaying slightly as he raises his hands up slowly to his face. Even from a distance she can see how bruised up and battered he is, his technique is sluggish and Evie’s stomach drops.

“He hasn’t been practicing all week has he?” she asks quietly. “How many fights has he done?”

Radio silence is her response and she whips around, her eyes icy as she stares at the two men. They cower at her gaze.

“How many fights has he done?” she asks again enunciating each word carefully.

“Four,” Michael answers quietly, “in two days.”

“WHAT?!” Nell exclaims pushing through them this time so she can take a look at him down below. “How could Cal let him do that?”

“They were short, some guys were injured but the slots had to be filled,” Ashton tries to explain weakly.

“And he didn’t want me here—“

“Because he didn’t want you to worry or to see him fight,” Michael finishes with a sigh. His green eyes are sad as he looks at Evie.

It only takes Evie a beat before she’s darting down the stairs into the pit where the arena is. She ignores the calls from Nell and the guys even though they’re following her. She shoves past the cheering fans until she’s in Luke’s corner where Calum is standing. He glances at her then does a double take, his eyes going wide.

“Shit,” he mumbles as she stomps over to him.

“Get him out of there, Cal, he can barely stand!” she orders attempting to climb into the ring and stop him herself.

Calum stops her. “I can’t, he’s in the middle of a fight. I’m sorry Evie, he didn’t want you to know!”

“I don’t care! Look at him!” she cries pointing to him as he staggers heavily against the ropes. His body just looks heavy and drained of all energy.

Calum stares up at his best friend and prized fighter with his mouth open. The bell dings loudly and Luke slumps onto the floor in the corner of the ring. Evie tuts and scrambles into the ring, the guys in the crowd cheer thinking she’s some sort of show but she ignores the catcalls.

Luke’s breathing heavily as she crouches in front of him, her heart sinks at the sight of him. His skin is scattered with patches of black and blue, one of his eyes is swollen shut and his lip is puffed out from a large cut. He’s broken and battered and it breaks Evie’s heart.

“Oh, Luke,” she whispers sadly.

His head tilts up at the sound of her voice, his good eye tries to blink open through the sweat. He smiles, but it’s more of a grimace, as he looks at her fondly.

“He got me good if I’m imagining you here,” he croaks.

“No, Luke, baby,” she holds his cheeks gently tilting his head up so he can look at her. “I am here but you need to stop, you can’t take anymore.”

His eyes struggled to focus on her through the blood and sweat but he mumbles out a barely coherent, ‘I’m fine.’

“No, you are not fine,” she stresses. She spots a towel near his back, she picks it up and dabs away the sweat from around his eyes and on his forehead.

“Evie, give him this, he needs to drink,” Calum says from her left holding up a bottle of what looks like Gatorade.

She tilts it in his mouth and he drinks gratuitously, which sort of seems to do the trick because he appears more alert. His one good eye zeroes in on Evie and his special smile for her shows.

“I can do this, baby because you’re here,” he croaks stroking her cheek with the backs of his knuckles (which are also bruised and bloody) “I can finish. Just tell me you love me.”

“Oh Luke,” she sighs shaking her head, “I do love you. I love you so much but I didn’t want to tell you like this.”

“I love you too, baby,” he slurs trying to smile once more. “I’ll win for you.”

“Make it fast so I can get you home,” she warns then presses her lips to his clammy ones gently.

The bell dings again for the start of the sixth round, he’s only got two more after this. She helps him stand, he squeezes her hand tightly before Calum helps her out of the ring.

Evie doesn’t put her air pods in the whole fight because she’s more concerned in watching Luke. His footwork seems a bit more energetic and she’s praying he’ll knock out the other guy quickly by the time the eighth round begins. She doesn’t wince at the sound of skin connecting with skin, or the hard thumps of their feet on the floor of the ring.

Her focus is on Luke and his fourth (probably) wave of adrenaline. His opponent sends Luke a hard hit that sends him falling into the ropes. His body draped over it like a rag doll. He’s panting but when he looks down at his Evie, it’s like a switch goes off.

This amazing girl is standing here watching him after she told him she loved him and she mouths it to him once more, giving him a small nod. She’s his reason to finish this fight, not for the glory or the title of being undefeated. He wants to finish it so he can take her home and hear about her week.

That’s more important than any stupid fight.

Luke stands up straight then quickly whips around throwing a hard right hook to his opponent. He’s momentarily stunned and Luke uses that to his advantage and gives him a swift uppercut, followed by a roundhouse kick to his stomach. He does one more quick jab to his neck then another left hook and the guy is down.  

The crowd goes crazy, the bell is ringing and the ref is shouting out Luke’s name lifting his hand in the air as he’s announced the winner. Luke doesn’t care though. He nods his thanks for the acknowledgment then helps his opponent rise from the floor.

“Really thought I had you, man,” the guy who Luke thinks his name is Rob says. “That your girl that was in the ring?”

“Yes,” Luke answers gruffly. He was already so exhausted, he didn’t want to have to fight again if this guy says something crude about his Evie.

“Reminds me of my wife, she hated seeing me fight. She a keeper?” Rob pants wiping blood from his lip.

Luke’s shoulders relax when he learns the guy is married. “Yeah, she’s a keeper.”

“Good. Take your girl home before she fights you next,” he chuckles then holds out his hand, “you fight really well.”

“Thanks, you too,” Luke says shaking his hand quickly.

Calum escorts Luke from the ring, and Luke leans on his friend for support and it isn’t long until Evie is on his other side offering her support.

“Hey Cal, guess what,” Luke sighs happily. His ears are still ringing and his head feels like it’s underwater. Apparently that’s what five fights in two days does to you.

“What, mate?”

“Evie loves me,” he says proudly leaning towards Evie who stumbles a little under his weight.

“That’s great because I think she hates me,” Calum grunts pushing open the locker room door.

“I don’t hate you, I’m just very upset with you,” Evie sighs helping Luke sit down on the bench.

“Same thing. I’m sorry, Evie, but I promise I won’t let him do this again. And I’m giving him the week off next week,” Calum says.

“Come on, I can go two more rounds,” Luke sighs resting his head against the wall. His eyes are closed.

“You can’t sleep yet, you need to shower, babe,” Evie tells him pulling onto his hand.

“Wanna shower with you,” he mumbles and Calum chuckles. Evie blushes.

“I think you should just take him home,” Calum laughs.

“Can you help me get him to the car?” Evie asks going to his locker to grab his duffel bag and things.

Just then Ashton bursts through the door saying a string of apologies but Evie stops him.

“It’s fine, Ash,” she sighs, “I just want to get him home. Can you help?”

“Absolutely. Come on, Luke,” Ashton hefts him up easily against his body.

• • • •

It was a bit of an ordeal getting Luke into her shower, he simply insisted on going to her place because he wanted to be around everything that is her. He kept begging her to join him in the shower but she refused because he still had to get his cuts taken care of.

He sat in her kitchen while she hustled about getting healing ointment and bandages. He was a tad more alert but his body ached and all he wanted to do was crawl into her bed and hold her close. She hummed quietly as she cleaned him up, his eyes trained on her.

“You’re so beautiful,” he murmurs and she smiles.

“Thank you,” she says quietly.

Once he has bandages on his knuckles and ointment under his swollen eye, she held out her hands to drag him into her room. She flicked on her string lights that were on her ceiling and Luke clambered into her bed heavily. His eyes were closed then he opened them in concern because she wasn’t next to him.

“Why aren’t you in bed?” he asks.

“I don’t really want to sleep in these clothes,” she chuckles.

He groans.

“What’s the matter? What hurts?” she freezes taking her bra off.

“You’re undressing and I’m too tired to open my eyes and watch,” he pouts into her pillow.

Evie laughs and continues to take off her clothes. “Well, maybe you shouldn’t fight four fights in two days.”

“I’m sorry. Do you hate me?”

“I love you, Luke, how could I hate you?” she sighs finally slipping into her pajamas which was a shirt of Luke’s. It fit her like a nightgown and still smelled like him. She slept in it every night.

“Because I didn’t tell you about the fights. I lied to you. I never wanted to lie to you and I did and I’m sorry,” he says in a rush.

She gets into bed and he immediately nuzzles his face into her neck, his arms wrapping around her. He even tangles his legs with hers and she can’t help but giggle at him basically koala-ing her. Her fingers move to his hair so she can play with it and her other hand tickles his arm across her stomach.

“I get why you didn’t tell me,” she sighs kissing his forehead, “but as much as I would have hated it, I would have been there and watched each fight.”

“Really?” his voice his muffled by the fabric of his shirt on her chest.

“Yes. I support you Luke because this is your life. But I don’t want you to ever do this many fights without telling me, okay?”

“Believe me, I won’t ever fight this many again. But I’ll tell you,” he promises. He lifts his head looking at her through bleary eyes. “I’ve wanted to do this all week.”

“What?”

“Be with you in bed, I’ve missed you so damn much.”

“I missed you,” she smiles scratching at his beard affectionately.

He glances at her lips then her eyes before pressing a gentle kiss to her mouth. He inhales sharply tightening his hold on her as he deepens the kiss. It stirs a fire in her lower stomach and they both desperately wish they could do more than kiss but Evie pushes him away gently.

“You need to sleep, honey,” she tells him.

“I know,” he sighs dropping his head to her chest again. “Just wanted to kiss you.”

She smiles and goes back to scratching at his drying curls, his breathing slows down already.

“Sweet dreams,” she whispers kissing his forehead and begins to hum a song.

“I love you,” he says.

“And I love you,” she whispers. She goes back to humming and he’s out like a light in no time.

Evie stays up a little longer, smiling at each twitch he does in his sleep and simply enjoying just being with him.

• • • •

Calum was true to his word and gave Luke the whole next week off so Luke and Evie spent everyday together. She’d change his bandages on his knuckles and make him hold ice on his eye so it would bring the swelling down.

By Tuesday his bruises weren’t as horrendous looking and the cuts on his knuckles were healing over.

“Do you want to get out of town for a while?” Luke asks her while they’re lounging on her couch. She’s cuddled onto his chest wearing nothing but a t-shirt of his and his fingers are tickling the skin of her thigh.

“Where would we go?” she turns her head to look up at him.

“I’ve got a lake house about an hour away from here,” he smiles, “there’s a hot tub, and a really good restaurant that has the best bread and butter.”

“You had me at bread and butter.”

“What, not the hot tub?” he laughs.

“That’s great too, but bread is better,” she sticks her tongue out playfully.

“Silly girl,” he laughs again and pinches her waist causing her to giggle shrilly. “Do you want to? We can stay there until Friday afternoon.”

“That sounds really nice, yeah, let’s go!”

• • • •

Evie’s expression at seeing his lake house was pure amazement. It was a nice cottage with a bird bath in the front and flowers, and painted yellow with white shutters. She was silent as she walked throughout the house while Luke left to get the bags. The inside had white wood paneled walls and cream colored couches.

The whole place reminded her of sunshine and spring.

She found the hot tub outside the master bedroom on a top deck which had a beautiful view of the lake. She immediately went outside down by the small sandy beach near the dock. Whippoorwill’s trilled in the distance and Evie closed her eyes finally feeling calm and relaxed.

“There you are,” Luke murmurs from behind wrapping his arms around her waist.

“I went exploring,” she sighs leaning against his chest.

“Peaceful, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, it is. Do you come out here often?”

“Not for a while, you’re the first person I’ve brought out here,” he kisses her temple.

“Really? Not even the guys?”

“Nope, this is my hideaway. My safe space.”

Evie turns around in his arms and looks up in his pretty blue eyes. She notes how his left eye isn’t swollen anymore but still has faint coloring from the bruising and his lip is almost healed. Even battered he’s still the most handsome man she’s ever seen.

“Why’d you bring me to your private place?” she strokes his cheek gently.

“Because, you’re my safe space and I love you,” he says simply. He smiles then leans down to press his lips to hers.

She hooks her arm to the back of his neck as the kiss deepens. It’s been so long since they’ve shared a ‘getting-lost-in-you’ kiss because of his injuries from his fights. His hands go immediately to her waist then slips down to her ass. He squeezes and she sighs into his mouth.

“Let’s go inside, yeah,” he mumbles.

Evie just nods, her voice is lost on her from that knee buckling kiss. If it wasn’t for Luke’s strong hand in hers she’d probably fall flat on her face. He leads her through the house to the bedroom.

Her attention is distracted by Luke’s soft lips on her neck and his wandering hands moving up and down her stomach to her thighs. His lips continue exploring down to her shoulder while his fingers pull down the zipper of her jacket and he pulls the clothing off her.

He spins her around, his eyes trained on hers as he backs her onto the bed, her knees buckling as she sits down on it. She scoots herself backwards until her head lands on the pillows, she bites her lip and Luke crawls on top of her. He dips his head low so he can kiss her tenderly, her fingers tangle in his curls.

“Want you so bad,��� he exhales letting his hand wander down her thigh.

“Take me,” she gasps yanking on his hair.

He unbuttons her shorts while she tries to lift his sweatshirt over his head. They’re a mess of tangled limbs and twisted clothing, laughter fills the air until they’re both void of clothes. He notices the rapid rise and fall of her chest as he leaves a trail of kisses down her sternum.

“You’re so perfect,” he breathes on her skin as he moves around her bellybutton.

He shifts himself on the bed so his face is between her legs. Without teasing, he kisses her heat and licks her slowly. Her moans are precious in his ears and he continues to lick her languorously. He wants to make her feel good, so good that she’ll remember this for the rest of her life and he wants to do this for all of his days.

“Luke,” she moans petting his hair before threading her fingers through it.

He hums against her and she gasps, his tongue flicks become faster as he adds a finger, pumping into her slowly. He brings her to her orgasm skillfully and perfectly. Luke sucks off her wetness from his finger and she drags him up by her so she can kiss him.

“Your turn,” she nibbles at his lip but he shakes his head.

“No, baby, tonight is all about you,” he watches her as he teases the tip of his dick in between her folds.

Evie bites her lip, full eye contact on him as he continues to lube himself up with her wetness. He pushes himself in gently, the warmth of her around him consumes him and he pushes in and out to create more slickness. Evie is tracing the features of his face as he does so, soft little grunts escape her each time he goes in and out and then he’s finally in her completely.

Luke exhaled as she inhaled from the moment of connection, her mouth open in a perfect little ‘o’ and her eyes nearly roll back in her head. He’s never seen her more lovely than this moment.

“God, I love you,” he pants then begins to start a steady thrust. When he connects fully in her he rolls his hips and Evie’s nails are scratching up and down his back.

“I love you . . . too,” she moans as his pace quickens.

Luke licks his lips adjusting his right arm beside her head to use it as leverage so he can fuck into her deeper. His other hand is holding onto her hip and soon she’s matching his pace, hips meeting hips, breath being exchanged.

Evie closes her eyes when he hits a certain spot and she begs him not to stop and Luke would never. Whatever she’d ask him in this moment he’d give to her without question. He felt her walls clenching around him and he pumped faster and faster until she’s moaning loudly in his ear.

“That’s my girl,” he praises into her ear. She moans in response and still he quickens his pace.

His hips snap into hers with ruthless passion and she’s coming over him again, her cries are salacious, her nails creating crescent moons into his back with her legs wrapped around his waist.

“Feels so good,” she whines arching her back.

Luke closes his eyes trying to hold his orgasm off but the sounds she’s making and the feeling of her around him becomes too much. His thrusts start to become sloppy but she’s moaning loudly---a fourth one?—and he’s coming as well.

He pulls out quickly because he remembers he didn’t put on a condom so he spurts all over her lower stomach. Her fingers are trying to brush away the curls from his forehead as he releases onto her. Once he’s finished he collapses onto her and they’re a panting mess, he doesn’t even care that he’s getting his cum over his stomach. His main concern is her.

“I’m so in love with you,” she admits tilting his head up from her chest.

He smiles giving her a deep kiss.

“I’m in love with you, sweetheart.” He kisses her cheek, making a trail down her jaw to her neck and to her breast that he sucks on lightly.

“That tickles,” she giggles.

“This is the first time I’ve seen you fully naked,” he muses moving to her other breast so he can kiss and suck on it as well. “Why is that?”

“Because other times you mainly paid attention to her,” she giggles again pointing down to her vagina.

“You call it a her?” he chuckles around her nipple.

“Duh, why would it be a he?”

“Fair point.”

“So what do you think?”

“Of what? Her? I fucking love her,” he sucks loudly on her breast.

“No,” she laughs, “my naked body.”

“I fucking love all of it, you’re so perfect,” he rubs her cheek with the back of his knuckles. He loves the blush on her cheeks.

“Mm, you’re pretty perfect,” she sighs closing her eyes as he continues to cater to her breasts.

• • • •

Luke and Evie stayed at the lake house until Sunday. They spent their time in the hot tub, walking along the lakeshore, going out to dinner every night because Luke insisted on spoiling her. And it was filled with lots of lovemaking.

When he pulls up to her apartment he helps get her bags out then pulls her against him, his lips connecting with hers. The plan was that she’d take a shower and change then meet him at the ring in an hour, Luke had to go over his schedule with Calum.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to wait?” he asks for the twelfth time.

“I’m sure,” she smiles stretching up to kiss his nose, “I’ll see you in an hour. Promise.”

“I love you.”

“I love you more,” she smiles then pulls away shouldering her bags and heads inside the entrance.

Luke watches her disappear, an ever present smile on his face then jogs around to his side of the car.

• • • •

Luke’s been watching the other guys practice while he wants for Evie to meet him at the ring, he’s already gone over his schedule with Calum. The finals are coming up soon so training is going to be more intense but he’s promised he won’t be fighting multiple times in a short amount of days.

It’s been a little over ten minutes from when Evie was supposed to meet Luke and Evie’s very punctual.  He knows if she’s running late by even a minute it makes her anxious. Before he’ll allow himself to panic, he pulls out his phone and texts her. Luke tries to reason that maybe she’s still putting on her makeup or is stuck in traffic.

A few minutes turn into ten and still no response.

Fifteen minutes turn to twenty-five and panic starts to set in. He tries calling her but it rings to her voicemail. He tries again but by the third ring and still no answer, he’s reaching for his keys.

He’s calling her constantly while he’s in the car driving back to her place but she’s still not answering.

“Shit!” he exclaims smacking the steering wheel.

Something is very wrong.

He parks haphazardly outside her building and takes the steps three at a time until he’s on the second level. He pounds on the door shouting her name but its radio silence on the other side.

Luke searches frantically for his phone to try calling her again. With bated breath he waits and waits and very faintly hears her ringtone through the door.

Something is really wrong.

“Fuck,” he hisses fumbling for his wallet to get the spare key she gave him.

Then he remembers he left his wallet in the car and not wanting to waste more time he grabs hold of the doorknob and shoulders onto the wood as hard as he can. It bursts open, the knob clattering to the floor and he’s searching frantically for Evie.

“Evie?” he calls.

A chair is knocked over, the lampshade by her couch is askew. His heart pounds in his chest as he makes his way through her apartment. It’s eerily silent save for slamming of his heart in his ears and then his heart stops.

She’s lying on her bathroom floor crumpled in a heap with a small pool of blood near her head. Her phone is cracked next to her fingers.

“No, no, no, no baby, please,” Luke begs falling next to her. He touches her wrist and feels a heartbeat, it’s steady and thanks God it’s there.

“Evie? Lovie, can you hear me?” he asks brushing hair from her forehead, that’s when he sees the gash as the source of blood. It’s a pretty deep cut right above her eyebrow.

She makes the tiniest of scowls but makes no noise. Panicking again, Luke dials 911 and explains what he’s seeing in a rush and to please, please send help.

“Please hurry, she’s . . . she’s not waking up,” he cries and tries talking to her gently.

“Sir, an ambulance is less than five minutes away, they’ll be there soon, okay?” The dispatcher speaks calmly. “I’ll stay on the line with you until they arrive, but don’t move her.”

“Okay, okay,” he pants.

He still tries to wake her up and is careful not to touch no matter how desperately he wants to. Then he hears sirens and soon after quick and heavy footsteps down the hall.

“We’re here! She’s in the bathroom!” he shouts voice shaking.

Two EMT’s, one male and one female, push past him. He watches in shock as they speak medical jargon to each other and into their radios. Two others arrive with a stretcher and a neck brace that is wrapped quickly around her neck.

Luke watches in horror as they lift her onto the stretcher and he follows them wordlessly downstairs and outside. He’s stopped when he goes to climb in the ambulance.

“Sir, there isn’t enough room but you can follow us to the hospital,” the woman tells him.

“Okay,” he says hollowly then she touches his arm.

“Don’t worry, we’ve got her, sir. What’s her name?”

“Evie—Evelyn—Carson,” he croaks and tries to clear his throat but there’s a lump preventing him doing so.

“And yours?”

“Luke Hemmings.”

“We’ll see you at the hospital, Luke.”

He runs to his car and called Calum immediately, his tires squeal as he follows the ambulance.

“Hey, what’s—“

“Is Nell there?”

“Yeah, she’s—“

“Meet me at the hospital,” Luke rushes and turns the corner sharply.

“The hospital? Luke—“

“It’s Evie. Just hurry, I’m behind the ambulance.”

He hangs up before Calum can say another word and tries to keep his foot steady on the gas. He couldn’t help the tremble of his hands.

• • • •

Luke’s leg is bouncing erratically as he waits to hear news of Evie and for Calum and Nell to arrive. The doors to the waiting room swing open revealing a frantic looking Nell, she makes a beeline for Luke.

“What is going on?” she demands tears brimming her eyes.

“I—she was supposed to meet me at the arena in an hour after we got back. She wasn’t picking up after thirty minutes and I went to get her and had to break down her door. Her place is turned over and she was . . . she was on the floor in the bathroom. Blood was on her forehead and the floor and she wouldn’t wake up. I don’t know what happened,” he finishes in a choked sob.

“Danny,” Nell mumbles sadly.

“Who’s Danny?” Calum narrows his eyes.

“Her ex,” Nell breathes, “He found her.”

“You know about that? How?” Luke asks.

“Ashton told me. I figured if she wanted to tell me, she would. But she’s been so happy with you—“

“I should’ve been there,” Luke cuts her off shaking his head. He rubs his face twice with his hands, the image of her lying on the floor is ingrained in his mind.

“Luke Hemmings?”

He whips around quickly then is surprised to see a police officer standing in front of him. He was about the same height as Luke but in his late thirties and a hard, steely look in his eyes.

“Yes?” Luke asks stepping forward slowly.

“Can I ask you some questions, please?”

• • • •

Luke slumps back in his chair in one of the private offices of the hospital, Officer Roth is sitting across from him with a notepad.

“I’m telling you, I would never ever hit my girlfriend! Or any woman for that matter!” Luke thunders for what feels like the hundredth time. He feels like a broken record repeating the same story of how he found Evie.

“But you are a boxer, correct?” Officer Roth narrows his eyes.

“Yes, I fight at Seconds of Summer,” he sighs.

“Have you met this ex-boyfriend of Miss Carson’s before?”

“No, but she’s told me a lot about him. I don’t know how he found her but he did and all I want is to see how she is.”

Officer Roth eyes him up silently then folds his arms. “Your hands look like they’ve been through some fights, and that shiner on your eye looks pretty rough.”

“I fought four fights in two days last week,” Luke forces his voice to remain calm. “Evie and I went to my lake house because Calum gave me the week off—Calum. Go get Calum Hood, he owns the gym and is my trainer. He can tell you I was at the arena until about two thirty when I went to Evie’s. Please. I need to see she’s all right.”

Officer Roth takes his time tapping his pen on the desk, closes his little pad and pockets.

“Fine, but you stay here, got it?”

Luke nods watching Officer Roth heave out of the chair and exit the room. Luke’s leg is shaking as he waits in anxiousness. He has no idea what status Evie’s in or if she’s awake. Is she asking for him? Is Nell with her?

Minutes tick by and then the door opens. Luke twists in his chair to see Calum is behind Officer Roth.

“You’re good to go, Mr. Hemmings,” Officer Roth says. “I apologize for the third degree but . . . well, under the circumstances and your state, I had to ask those questions.���

“I get it but Danny’s the one you need to give the third degree to. Am I free to go?” Luke rises from his chair.

“Yes, I hear Miss Carson is asking for you. I’ll be by in a few minutes to get a statement from her. If Danny’s still in the area, we’ll do our best to find him.” He holds out his hand, “I’m sorry again.”

“Thank you,” Luke shakes his hand then rushes past him with Calum. “Thanks for setting him straight.”

“No problem, I can’t believe he thought you did this,” Calum says bitterly.

“She’s awake? How is she?”

“Freaking out because she woke up in a hospital and has no idea where you are. Nell is trying to explain but she’s a little frantic. She’s down this way.”

Luke picks up his pace pushing through the double doors into another hallway filled with constant telephone rings and murmurs from the nursing staff. Calum leads him into a room to the left and Luke’s chest breaks open when he sees Evie.

There’s a bandage above her left eyebrow and her lip is swollen and bruised. Discoloration of bruises peek out from the hospital gown she’s in and though her body looks worn and torn, her eyes are alert when they land on Luke.

“Luke!” she cries trying to reach for him but he moves to her first.

“I’m here, baby, I’m right here,” he rushes sitting next to her. He takes her hands gently in his, her eyes welling up with tears.

“Where were you?”

“A cop had some questions for me,” he says grimly, “he wants to talk to you, too so he can try and find Danny.”

“Why was he talking to . . .” her voice tumbles off an edge until her eyes widen in shock. “They thought you--?! Oh, Luke, I’m so sorry.”

Her eyes well with fresh tears and her breathing has become irregular and rapid as she sputters out incoherent apologies.

“Shh, shh, breathe, lovie,” he cradles her face softly trying to calm her down. “It’s all sorted now. I’m still angry about it but from their viewpoint, I do look like the bad guy. And I am.”

“What? No, you’re not—“

“I should’ve been with you, I wouldn’t have given him a chance to touch you,” says through his teeth.

He caresses her forehead, his heart falling once more at the sight of the stitches below the bandage. He overheard the nurse telling Nell while he was reuniting with Evie that she had severe bruising on her stomach. It made him sick and angry that this happened and he was right within reach.

Danny was probably there when he dropped her off. A new wave of anger ripples through him and he has to pull his hands away to try and cool his temper. It’s taking all his willpower now not to go out and find Danny himself.

“Luke, look at me,” Evie says softly.

He stares at her blankly. She reaches for his hand lacing their fingers together and squeezes.

“What happened isn’t your fault. I have no idea how he found me but I’m glad you’re the one who rescued me. I could’ve . . .” she swallows thickly closing her eyes at what possibly could have happened to her then opens them again to look into his sad blue eyes, “You saved me. That’s what matters.”

He sighs unevenly then nods just as there’s a knock on the door. It’s Officer Roth with a fellow officer to ask Evie what happened. Luke holds her hand the entire time as she explains through a shaky voice. When she falters, Luke kisses her hand in assurance and she continues until the officers have all they need.

Officer Roth gives Luke his number in case Danny returns and they can call him right away.

• • • •

Calum and Nell came back later that night while Evie was sleeping with new clothes for her to change into when she’s discharged. She has to stay the night for observation and with the bruising on her stomach the doctors and nurses wanted to monitor it in case there was internal bleeding.

Evie didn’t want Luke to leave her and he was more than happy to stay with her, he didn’t want to leave her side either.

“We cleaned up her place the best we could,” Nell informs while the three of them are standing just outside her door.

“Mike and Ash are fixing her door right now,” Calum adds.

“Thanks,” Luke nods. He heaves a deep sigh exhaling through his nose as his fingers rub at his eyes. “I doubt she’ll want to go back once she’s checked out tomorrow night.”

“Take her to your place, she’ll be safe with you and I don’t want Danny coming back,” Nell’s voice shakes in anger at the mention of Danny.

“I should’ve stayed with her,” Luke mutters. He shakes his head, jaw working as his body trembles in anger once more.

He wants—he needs to punch something. He’d choose the wall but the sound would wake Evie up and he didn’t want to pay for damaging the hospital.

“Luke, you can’t beat yourself up over this,” Calum sighs, “You couldn’t have known he’d be there. It’s because of you she’s safe now. This could have been way worse.”

“I don’t understand why he left in the first place,” Nell mentions then at the look on Luke’s face she adds quickly, “I’m glad he did! But why show up, do what he did and then leave?”

“What did Evie say happened?” Calum asks quietly.

“She told the cop he was already in her apartment. He must have asked a tenant where she lived and found the key she hid in the light to get in. She said he wanted to talk, he apologized apparently but she told him to leave. He snapped and—“Luke tries to swallow the lump in his throat “—and threw her chair before he began hitting her. She didn’t fight back, in the past it only made it worse when she did and then she passed out when her head hit the edge of the counter.”

“I thought you found her in the bathroom?” Nell asks.

“I did. Maybe he dragged her in there? I don’t know, the son of a bitch probably thought he killed her and left. That’s the only reason I can think of as to why he’d leave.”

“When—“

“Luke?” Evie calls out worriedly.

Without a second glance, Luke heads inside to be by his girl instantly, grasping her hand and dancing his fingers across her cheek.

“I’m right here, sweetheart. Calum and Nell are here, they brought new clothes and we were talking,” he explains dropping into the seat beside her bed.

“Did they leave?”

“No, do you want to see them?” he asks and she nods. “Guys, come on in.”

Nell enters first sprinting to her cousin’s side and hugs her tightly. Earlier when she was in the room Evie was still delirious and the only thing on her mind was Luke. They’re both crying and exchanging apologies.

“I should’ve told you what Danny was like,” Evie wipes under her eyes with the hand that’s not holding Luke’s.

“I understand why you didn’t. I should’ve told you I knew anyway. I’m so sorry you had to deal with this on your own,” Nell sniffs. “We’ll all watch out for you. He won’t get away with this and if he comes back we’ll make sure he’s locked up.”

“Thanks, Nell,” Evie gives her a watery smile.

There’s a knock on the door and a nurse comes in to check on Evie’s vitals. Someone will be checking on her every few hours.

“We’ll let you rest, Eve,” Calum says.

“Thanks guys.”

Luke nods his goodbye, eyes focused on Evie while the night nurse checked her vitals.

“Everything sounds good,” the nurse says, “can I check the bruising on your stomach?”

Luke watches in silent anguish at the careful way Evie moves the blankets and her gown. His eyes are trained on her face, she’s biting her lip but a small squeak slips by signifying this is painful for her.

“It hurts,” she whispers “can you help?”

The nurse aids her by lifting the gown slowly. She presses on Evie’s stomach gently, Evie winces at the pressure.

“Has there been blood when you used the bathroom?”

“No,” Evie’s voice is strained.

“That’s good. I’ll let you get more rest and be back in a few hours. I’m Cheyenne and I’ll be watching over you tonight,” Cheyenne smiles. “Call if you need anything.”

“Thank you,” Luke says watching her leave then helps Evie get tucked back in under the covers.

“Thanks,” Evie smiles.

“Try to get some sleep, lovie,” he murmurs kissing her forehead minding the stitches above her eyebrow.

• • • •

It’s been two weeks since the incident with Evie. She’s been healing nicely and the cut above her eyebrow is now raised soft skin, and pale pink in color after the stitches were removed. Luke would trace his fingers over it and kiss that spot randomly throughout the day.

He knew she hated it and felt self-conscious about it so he made it his duty to show it as much love as he could. She’d only been to her apartment once and that was only so she could get extra clothes and her favorite blankets.

Luke had passed the divisional and is now moving onto the title win which has a decent amount of prize money that will really help out the gym. Calum has increased his workouts but scheduled them around Evie’s work schedule so Luke can pick her up.

It’s a lazy Saturday morning as they’re cuddled up on his couch watching old Disney movies. Evie is on top of him, their legs tangled together under her favorite fuzzy blanket and Luke’s fingers are tracing patterns on her back.

“Can you teach me how to fight?” she asks suddenly.

Luke’s dancing fingers stopped, he craned his neck in an odd position so he could look at her.

“What?”

“Can you teach me how to box? Or show me some easy moves?”

“Evie . . . why?”

“So if Danny comes back I can defend myself.”

Luke shifts underneath her so he doesn’t have to strain his neck in an awkward position, she shifts with him raising her head from his chest.

“If he comes back,” Luke’s voice is dangerously controlled, “he won’t even get a chance to fucking breathe in your direction.”

She smiles lightly at his need to protect her.

“I know but I want to learn so I’m prepared anyway. And it will make me more comfortable watching you instead of listening to music. Please?”

Luke sighs mulling it over, it’s not a bad idea. She should at least know the basics just in case something were to happen and Luke wasn’t there. But he meant what he said. If Danny comes back Luke will deal with him personally.

“All right,” he agrees and Evie squeals with glee then attacks his face with kisses. “But if anything hurts or you feel uncomfortable, you tell me and we stop. Deal?”

“Yes, deal. Thank you, honey.”

She presses her mouth to his sealing the deal.

• • • •

When Monday night rolls around Evie joins Luke at the gym into the training room. He’s spent the last forty-five minutes going over boxing basics and showing her the moves. He takes careful care of wrapping her fingers in tape then kisses her knuckles when he’s finished.

He slips on punching mitts then moves in front of her. He smiles at the sight of Evie, her dark brown hair is pulled back into a loose braid and she’s wearing a sports bra with some leggings. There’s a determined look in her eye that he finds so endearing.

“I’m not punching one of the bags?” she asks almost sadly.

“No, not today. Those are a lot harder than these,” he indicates the mitts on his hands, “I don’t want you to hurt yourself, lovie. Let’s start with an easy combination of a jab cross and right hook. Get in your stance . . . good. Keep your hands up by your face and start when you’re ready.”

Evie nods taking a deep breath then jabs her left hand across her body to hit the mitt on Luke’s left hand, she follows with a quick right hook on his other hand then repeats. Luke nods as she repeats it, her body dancing as she keeps her feet bouncing.

“Very good, lovie, keep going,” he encourages.

Evie continues, her eyes trained on the mitts. With each punch she hits harder and harder as an anger bubbles up to the surface. Each punch is for every hit Danny gave her. Each strike is for every time he yelled and swore and then more anger arose because he found her and could have almost ruined her and Luke.

Evie became relentless, hitting faster, faster, and faster still. Her face becomes red and her breath comes out in rapid huffs. Luke has been watching her carefully and when he sees her eyes flood with tears he springs into action and lowers the mitts.

She’s still punching the air and then his chest as he pulls her against him, crushing her arms so she stops. Evie chokes out her sobs into his shirt.

“I’ve got you baby, it’s okay.”

He rocks her gently from side to side as she continues to sob and gasp, finally releasing her pent up emotions she didn’t realize she buried.

• • • •

Title fight day is upon Luke and he’s trying to get in his own head and zone out the raucous cheers and buzz from beyond his changing room. He’s pacing, rotating his neck and loosening his shoulders as he attempts to block it out.

If he wins these twelve rounds he’ll also receive a whopping $50,000 prize money which would really help the gym. He tried not to think about it all coming down to him and to focus on the fight, his moves and the weak spots of his opponent.

His name is KJ Andrews who has a reputation of getting where he’s at from the ground up at his own gym he uses for youth.

There’s a quick knock on his door then Calum enters, a quick grin flicks across his face.

“Got time to meet a fan before you go out?”

“Yeah, I s’pose,” Luke huffs checking the tape on his hands.

“Don’t sound so enthused, honey.”

Luke’s head snaps up to see Evie step from behind Calum, a smile on her face as she approaches him.

“He should’ve said it was you,” Luke grins meeting her halfway. They join hands letting them hang loosely between their bodies.

“Four minutes, Hemmings. See you out there, Evie,” Calum bids them goodbye closing the door behind him.

“How’re you feeling?” Evie asks, eyes searching his face.

“Okay, good I guess. I just want to get out there,” he licks his lips. “Do you have your air pods?”

“I won’t be using them,” she shakes her head, “I can handle it but I have them just in case. This is a big fight for you, Luke, I want to be completely involved.”

“I love you,” he sighs bending down to give her a gentle kiss.

“I love you, too,” she mumbles on his lips giving him one more just as the announcer’s voice booms from the arena. “You’ve got this, Luke. I’ll see you out there.”

“Bye,” he says faintly. He gives her hands a gentle squeeze as she backs away, their fingers slipping away as she slips out the door.

Luke takes several deep breaths then heads out of his changing room and up the stairs. He cracks his knuckles then punches his palms, his adrenaline is kicking in.

When he steps out into the arena, the blue spotlight hits him but he pays no mind to people shouting his name or what the announcer is saying. Calum joins him as he makes his way to the ring and slips beneath the rope to go in his respective corner. KJ is already across from him, they both glance and nod at each other as the announcer rumbles stats.

“How’re you feeling, mate?” Calum asks rubbing his best friend’s shoulders.

“Good, I’m ready. Where’s—“

“Behind you with everybody else,” Calum smiles nodding behind Luke.

Luke cranes his neck and spots Evie right away. She smiles sweetly and waves up at him then gives him a thumbs up. His heart soars.

He can do this. He’ll win these twelve rounds and then ask Evie to move in with him. It’s crazy to think how six months ago was when he first spotted Evie. Crazy to think that six months has gone by. So much has changed but he knows he wants to spend the rest of his life with her.

The clang of the bell echoed all around followed by the loud cheers and applause from the spectators. Luke and KJ met in the middle, knocked fists and the referee blew his whistle.

• • • •

Sweaty and out of breath, Luke’s limbs were like jelly when the ref raised his right arm up above his head exclaiming ‘WINNER!’ of the title fight. The cheers were louder than ever but through his exhaustion he smiled looking out into the crowd. The house lights came on and he could see every cheering face but he only had one in mind.

When he spotted his friends he notices Evie isn’t there. Calum pointed behind him signifying his changing room and Luke nods. He’ll get to her soon enough.

Evie is setting up the six champagne flutes carefully on his coffee table with the champagne bottle in the center. The twelve rounds were intense and at some moments she thought Luke would come up short but he never failed.

She cheered as loud as she could when he was announced the winner, stray tears fell from her eyes from how proud she is for him. She snuck away quickly to set up this little celebration station for him when he arrived with everyone else.

The door opens behind her and she spins around.

“Congratu—“

Her congratulations falls short and her smile disappears when she sees who’s standing in the doorway.

“You always did heal up fast,” Danny says stepping into the room.

His presence casts a dark shadow in the room and over Evie who steps off to the side. The bottle opener is by the door still in the bag and her eyes scan frantically for any sort of defensive weapon she can use. The announcer is still calling out congratulations and she prays silently that Luke will be here soon.

“What do you want, Danny?” she asks her voice shaking.

“Why don’t you come back home? Your family misses you . . . I miss you,” he chuckles stepping even closer.

“You had an odd way of showing it at my apartment,” she bites back as furiously as she can.

“I was just angry you managed to hide from me for so long. And to cheat on me nonetheless,” he chuckles again.

The closer he gets Evie can smell liquor reeking from his body, her heart accelerated in fear.

“I didn’t cheat on you because we aren’t together. You hit me and verbally abused me, I left you, Danny. Just leave me alone, please.”

“I can’t do that, Eves, I love you too much. Come on, just come back home with me, I promise I’ve changed.”

He’s invading her space now, she flinches at his use of her old nickname but instead of fear she was filled with rage.

“You don’t love me. You don’t beat up someone you love. You’re sick and you need help but it won’t be from me,” she says vehemently. “You won’t hurt me again.”

In his drunken (or hungover) state, his actions were sluggish but Evie was faster as he lifted his arm. Evie pushes him back and throws a right hook as hard as she can into his face. A satisfying crunch sounds followed by pain in her hand that shoots up her arm.

She lets out a cry from the pain as he stumbles back then the door opens and Luke is there.

“LUKE!” Evie shouts cowering further into the corner as Danny continues to stumble.

Luke launches himself at Danny, kneeing him in the gut and punching him a few times until he’s slumped in a heap on the floor. Danny groans as Luke holds him up by the collar of his shirt.

“You’ll never touch her again, you bastard,” Luke spits then gives him on final punch and Danny is knocked out. He rushes over to Evie who collapses into his arms then lets out a whimper. “Did he hurt you? Where are you hurt?”

“I-I punched him and I think I hurt my hand,” Evie lifts her right hand that is already looking swollen and red.

Luke holds it gingerly in his own hands inspecting it. He flexes her fingers straight, she winces as he feels the bones and her wrist.

“I don’t think it’s broken,” he murmurs, “but we can have a doctor check it out.”

“Luke, we have—what the hell?” Ashton exclaims behind them.

“Call Officer Roth,” Luke tells them, “and make sure he doesn’t fucking move. I’m taking Evie to have her hand looked at.”

Luke holds her left hand leading her cautiously around Danny and out the door. Nell gives Evie a concerned look but Evie smiles and mutters an ‘I’m fine.’

The doctor on site inspected Evie’s hand and came to the conclusion it was only sprained. Evie is given an ice pack and told to keep ice on it to keep the swelling down and take ibuprofen for the pain. Two cops enter the gym after the doctor leaves, Officer Roth spots them from across the way.

“Are you all right, Miss Carson?” Officer Roth asks.

“I’m okay,” she nods, “I hit him this time.” Her eyes widen at her confession. “You aren’t going to arrest me are you? He came at me first and I defended—“

“No, no, you aren’t going to get arrested,” Officer Roth smiles kindly. “We’ll make sure he’ll be locked up for a long time. Apparently there’s an order for his arrest back at his place of residence, other girls have come forward explaining what he’s done. I’m so sorry you had to endure all of this.”

“He’s going to be taken away?” she asks faintly.

“Yes. Some allegations are from seventeen year old women,” Officer Roth responds gravely, “he won’t hurt anyone ever again. I promise you. You may have to head back home and speak to a judge and the police there, though. To give your statement of the past and from what happened a few weeks ago.”

Luke hold rubs the back of her neck in assurance at the news.

Evie takes a deep breath.

“If it will put him away I’ll do anything,” she nods, “Thank you Officer Roth.”

“I’m glad this will all come to an end for you. If you ever need anything, don’t hesitate to call. And congratulations on the title, Luke. My partner and I heard the news from people on our way in.”

“Thank you,” Luke smiles and Officer Roth nods one last time before leaving. Luke turns to Evie and shakes his head in wonder. “You actually punched him.”

“I did,” she laughs shakily. “It felt good.”

“That’s my girl,” he kisses her temple then holds her against him in a warm embrace.

• • • •

After Luke joined Evie on the trip back home to give her statement and photo evidence of what Danny did to her, he asked her to move in with him when they got back to LA. She agreed happily throwing her arms around him.

Danny will be in jail for the rest of his life and Evie finally feels like she can breathe. She’s happy with her new life with Luke, she adores the new friends she’s made and is happy she gets to experience this all with her cousin Nell by her side.

Luke and Evie are practice fighting at the gym, it’s a weekly thing now. Evie has excelled in her boxing but will only use it as a workout and not as a profession like Luke.

They’re moving quickly and fast across the room, Luke taunts her (all in good fun) just to get her riled up and at her first slip-up, he cages her against the cool wall in between his arms.

“You’ve got to stay focused, baby,” he smiles leaning close to her body.

“You fight so dirty,” she giggles reaching up to scratch at the stubble on his chin.

Luke rubs the scar above her forehead with his thumb then slides his eyes down to meet hers, an amused look on her face.

“But your love’s so sweet,” he grins slotting his lips against hers in a loving kiss.

Copyright talkfastromance4 © All works is intellectual property of the author. All rights reserved. Any redistribution or reproduction or any part or all contents in any form is prohibited. You may not, without written expression and consent from the author, distribute works amongst other social media platforms

[scullysexual]

hunger games au (with mulder and scully)

Just a little self-indulgence fic and an idea that wouldn’t leave me alone. I’m sorta proud of it rn and decided to post it. This is pretty much for myself and I’m not gonna much in terms of making sure everyone reads it. If you like it, feel free to let me know if not bye. Not much is gonna be changed in terms of plot, this is literally going to be fanfiction in it’s finest form. It might have elements of a crossover if I can’t find the appropriate xf character to play the hunger games character but we’ll see. Words: 2809.

- - - 

There’s nothing there except a swirling black void, harsh waves crashing, screams of men, and a father drowning in the sea.

Dana wakes just before her father goes under. Her stomach tightly coiled with a realisation that her consciousness has yet to remember.

It’s chilly, the tips of Dana’s fingers red raw from the cold night. She tucks them beneath the blankets and rolls over to the other side. Adjacent to her lies her sister, buried beneath three blankets. Only the tip of her noise is really visible, the rest of her obscured by blankets or vibrant red hair.

Not too far away is her younger brother spread out in the space left by their elder. And finally, on the double bed near the corner, her mother sleeps.

Dana rises, pulling off the covers and bracing the chill. She dresses quickly and quietly, careful not to wake her remaining family members. She pulls on yesterday’s clothes, her boots, clips her hair back in its familiar style and heads towards the kitchen.

“Morning.”

Bill Jr. sits at the table, lacing up his shoes, his miner’s hat beside him.

His presence startles Dana.

“I thought you’d be gone by now,” Dana says. She makes her way towards the jug of water.

“I’m going now,” he tells her.

Bill stands almost immediately after and picks up his hat.

“There’s not a lot of bread left. Make sure you leave enough for Mom, Missy, and Charlie.”

Dana’s eyes move to the basket holding the bread. Bill was right, there’s barely any left. She adds trading with the baker onto her mental list of things to do today.

Bill hasn’t gotten far down the street before Dana’s following him but he doesn’t slow down to walk with her or even take note that she’s behind him. It’s no bother to Dana anyway, as he turns left, she turns right, headed towards the woods.

Technically, entering this area of the District is illegal. Hunting and trading is high on the list of crimes and the punishment for it is death. At least it should be. Most turn a blind-eye to it. The Peacekeepers that guard the city are just as poor and hungry as many of the other residents and while only a few will venture into the woods themselves to procure food and plants, they won’t say anything if they catch you trading.

It’s the Capitol you really need to look out for and their cameras. While it’s not been confirmed, it’s rumoured that they hide cameras so as to spy on the Districts. Dana has yet to find any cameras walking around town and with the fence meant to keep wild animals out, she doubts there would be any cameras in the woods.

But still, she bares it in mind when she enters.

There was a time when she didn’t need to hunt. There was a time she didn’t live in the Seam. Most residents of District 12 are miners however her father was one of the fortunate ones not to have that profession. He was a sailor, in charge of carting coal in a ship back and forth to the Capitol. He was also one of the rare ones to be allowed to leave.

He used to say the Scullys were for fit for District 4- the fishing district. There was even some speculation that the family was from there originally and somehow ended up in this district.

She can still the remember the house they lived in, caught between the Merchant Town and the Seam. Her only problem back then was having a sense that she didn’t belong anywhere. Too poor for the Merchant Town residents, too rich for the Seam residents. Even when they had to move, the Seam residents still viewed her as one of the more fortunate ones.

The move had been caused by the death of her father. Caught in a storm just off District 4, his ship had capsized, killing all members onboard. The family had been notified of his death via an eviction notice. Her mother had crumbled, becoming just a shell of her former self. Billy had tried to become the man of the house and, in theory, he was but he was too much of a rule abider and even when things began to take a sharper turn for the worse, he still wouldn’t venture into the woods to hunt. Melissa was just too soft to hunt. Dana had tried to teach her but Missy had started crying at the sight of the wounded creature. Charlie, the youngest, was just too young at the time. He was seven- too scared and confused to really do it anything. So it had all fallen down to Dana, at eleven years old, her stomach grumbling, it came down to her to get the food on the table and it had been that way ever since.

Dana follows the path of stamped grass and weeds all the way to the entrance to the woods. Not a real entrance, just heavy-duty netting that’s been ripped and nobody’s bothered to fix. The fence is supposed to be electrified all day, every day but there’s barely enough electricity to power the important buildings, nobody wants to waste it on this. Still though, Dana listens for the faint buzzing and if there isn’t one, it’s safe and she sneaks through.

The woods don’t scare her anymore. There are still the wild animals lurking about but as soon as she’s armed with her dagger and spear she feels practically invincible against them.

She reaches for her weapons now, hidden behind a fallen tree, deep down in a hole. It’s nothing fancy, metal is hard to come by so the spear is just pieces of wood stuck together but it’s effective and sharp and does the job.

Her dagger, however, is the real treasure. On one of her father’s trips a man had given it to him and when her father returned he kept it hidden from the rest of his family, presenting it to her the first time they came out here.

While they had no reason to hunt when her father was alive, her dad had still taught her to. That had surprised her, he always appeared much like Bill Jr., always following the laws. Until Bill, however, William Scully was smart. He knew his profession made him stand out against the miners, knew the Capitol would see him as a looming problem, knew that one of these days his time would be up, his family would finally suffer the consequences and they would need every help they could get.

The dagger was expensive. A green and gold handle with real sharp steel at the end of it. They would have a lot of anything they wished for if Dana sold it but none of her family members knew about it and it was the last gift her father ever gave her.

“What took you so long?”

Dana turns to see Ethan standing behind her, already prepared with his bow on his back and his own wooden spear at his side. He was the closest thing she had to a friend, having found each other the first time Dana fully ventured into the woods without her father. She had been scared when she saw him, tried to run for it but fell over instead. Ethan had been furious, screaming at her that she had scared his dinner away. Dana felt tears prick her eyes but she would not cry even as he called her stupid and useless. Finally he asked what she was here for.

“To hunt,” Dana said meekly.

Ethan had laughed, shaking his head and walked away.

A few days past since at incident and she hadn’t seen him again, not until she was trying to kill a rabbit. Leaning against a tree, watching her struggle. He hadn’t announced himself, for the longest time Dana didn’t even know he was behind her but an arrow had pierced the rabbits head and that’s when she spun around and saw him.

After that they became hunting partners. He would shoot the smaller animals with his arrows, her the bigger animals with her spear. Eventually, Dana had mastered stealth. She knew how to sneak up on the animals without startling it and kill it with her dagger.

She also looked for plants, too. Some for eating, some for healing. There were no hospitals here, most replied solely on homecare or you could pay a visit to the Scullys where they would stitch you up and allow you to live a little longer.

And that was her day. Hunting animals and trading in the early mornings, school till three o’clock, and a healer in the evenings.

All except today.

“How are you feeling?” Ethan asks as they begin their usual route through the woods.

Dana thinks back to the way her stomach coiled when she woke. The worry for herself, for her family. For Ethan and his family.

“How everyone feels on this day,” she answers.

This day. By law, written as a holiday but in reality it is as far away from one as possible. School is shut, businesses close early, everyone meets at the Square by 2pm, dressed in their best preparing themselves to cry themselves to sleep or sigh in relief that they have survived another year.

“We’ve been lucky this far,” says Ethan with a shrug.

It’s all bravado, she knows. He’s just as worried as she is. But she has gotten lucky. Three siblings and herself and not once since becoming of age has any of them got chosen. Still, each year becomes more nerve-wrecking. Melissa’s eighteen, her name is in that box eight times. Bill’s aged out, thank god. Dana lost count how many times her name has been entered (taking tesserae means your name is added each time as a trade but there’s only enough for one person so Dana’s had to take out one for each member of her family already making her name being entered four times more. The tesserae given out isn’t enough to last which means taking out more and in return her name being entered multiple times more). It’s only Charlie, who only turned twelve last month, who’s name has been entered once. He’s the least of her worries.

Ethan isn’t much better. While he only has an older brother, who has also now aged out, he’s just as poor as her, his name is also in that box more than it should be.

“Come on,” says Ethan pulling her thoughts away from boxes and names. “Let’s focus on hunting. Maybe find something nice to celebrate later.”

Dana watches him walk off for a moment, temporarily stunned.

“You’re really not worried?” she asks.

He stops and looks over to her, his eyes scarily vacant.

“We don’t need to worry till 2.”

He’s right, Dana realises. Worry makes her clumsy, loud, and if she wants her family and herself to eat tonight, she needs to push that worry away.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

Dana pushes the front door open carrying her winnings in a bag at her side. She’d done good today, most people at the Hob were anxious to sell before they had to shut down for the day. In the woods, she had managed to kill three squirrels, earning her one and a half loafs of bread from the baker, a few coins for selling the strawberries, and even a turkey to eat tonight. The greens she found, she kept herself, rabbit pelts she traded for a blanket, and a few herbs to add to the medicine cabinet.

Melissa greets her when she enters, already dressed in what looks to be one of their mother’s old dresses from when she was younger. Her hair is pulled back and braided in parts. She looks beautiful but then Melissa always looks beautiful no matter what.

“Dana’s back!” she calls.

“Send her in!” Mom shouts back.

Melissa takes the bag, putting the stuff away and Dana enters the bedroom here her mother is currently having a fight with Charlie’s hair.

“Put that on.” She nods to the floral dress laying on the bed.

Dana hates dresses but it’s almost customary to wear one. That or a skirt. Something feminine.

“That’s gonna have to do.” Maggie pats Charlie on the shoulder telling him he can go. “Is Bill back yet?” Maggie asks.

“He wasn’t in the kitchen,” Dana answers as she climbs into the dress.

“I don’t want us being late,” Maggie mutters.

Her mother almost becomes unbearable on this day. Stressing and running around like times is going to go quicker just because it’s today. They could have a whole 24 hours and she’ll still be worrying that if someone isn’t back at this time it’s just going to make them late.

Once dressed, Dana sits as Maggie pulls the clips out of her hair along with leaves and dirt.

“If you’d come back sooner you’d have had time to bathe.”

“Sorry, I was out getting our dinner for tonight.” There’s a harshness to Dana’s tone as she says the words. She still felt a slight resentment towards her mother. She went away in many of her children’s eyes, leaving them to fend for themselves. Had it not been for Dana, Maggie would have watched all her children die of starvation and not done anything about it while she withered away herself.

Her mother’s proclaims of she was grieving weren’t a good enough excuse for Dana. They were all grieving after all, all coming to terms with his new life, yet they didn’t stay in bed all day.

Her mother was better now but Dana was waiting for the day she would disappear again. It happened once, it can happen again.

There’s a slight tug on her hair in response to her words and Dana tells herself to keep quiet.

Melissa enters and seats herself on the other stool. Her presence is sure to stop any more awkward conversations and stray comment between Dana and their mother.

“You okay?” Missy asks.

Dana nods. She tries to draw on Ethan’s strength, his optimism.

“Lasted this long, haven’t I?”

Melissa smiles. “One more year and it’s over.” She’s talking about herself. One more year and it is over for her. She no longer has to worry. She just has to suit up for the mines or follow her mother and become an official healer.

A silence passes over all three women for a moment. Dana watches her mother braid her hair in the mirror, Melissa messes with one of the clips her sister was wearing earlier. It’s quiet except for the sound of the door opening and Charlie saying hi to their brother. There’s a bit of chatter between the two by the door but nothing the girls really pay attention to.

“It’s barbaric.”

Dana’s eyes widen and Melissa stops playing with the clip. They eye each other in shock as if their mother has just broken the law or something.

In some cases, she just did.

Negative words aren’t supposed to be said about the Games, even in the safety of their houses. They’re a holiday, a festivity meant to be enjoyed and looked forward to.

At least that is the case in the Capitol and the Career Districts.

In all the others, the Games are seen, as their mother just said, as barbaric. Brutal, cruel, and vicious. To put 24 kids in an arena and watch them fight to the death is viewed with the heaviest of contempt. But it’s a punishment and a reminder of a history that can’t be forgotten.

“You should watch what you say,” says Dana calmly. “People could be listening.”

Melissa’s eyes look wearily around the room as if trying to find who could be listening. Dana doesn’t believe they are but on a day like today, she couldn’t be completely sure about that.

“You’re done,” says Maggie moving away. “I’ll make sure Bill looks presentable and then we’ll leave.”

Dana runs her hand through the braid, silently admiring her mother’s work.

“Do you really think they’re listening to us?” Melissa whispers. “Patty Bullock said that at school once. Nobody believed her but…”

“They film everything today, don’t they?” Dana says, her attention still on her hair. “Do you really think they start at 2?”

It was almost unheard of for Dana to speak like this but she had her doubts about the validity of this theory. Still, it was good to be mindful of it’s possible truth.

“You sound like a boy in my class,” says Melissa. “His nickname is Spooky.”

The door opens with Charlie telling them it’s time to go. They follow each other out, headed for the Square, and Dana doesn’t think much more of this Spooky.

[lunasilvermorny]

Headcanon facts #20

Non-MC-related relationships.

Friendships:

Barnaby and Ismelda - I know that it’s part of the canon that they are friends, but in my headcanon they are best friends. The part where Ismelda tried to use love potion on Barnaby is not part of the headcanon, so she doesn’t have the same creepy vibes to her. Although she was mad at him for switching sides at the end of year 3, she still cared deeply about him and stayed in touch with him behind Merula’s back. She also had a crush on him and it got resolved in year 5, but again - no love potion. Also, she hates that Barnaby is involved with Luna (and it’s not part of the headcanon yet, but she might successfully come between them in year 6.)

Barnaby and Merula - Even though she’s not as close to him as Ismelda, toward the middle of year 4, they become friends again.

Barnaby and Rath - I wouldn’t say they’re good friends, but since Barnaby is the other Slytherin Beater in my headcanon, they spent a lot of time practicing together.

Tonks and Tulip - So, it’s never clearly stated in the canon (although hinted in many occasions), but in the headcanon they are best friends. The fact that they both love pranks so much brought them together and they’ve been friends ever since.

Charlie, Barnaby and Liz (Technically also Luna) - Their fascination with Magical Creatures brought them all closer.

Jacob and Chester - In the game they just mention that Chester knew him (and they were... sort of friends? I can’t recall a specific time where Chester said it.) Anyway - in the headcanon they were friends, although Jacob was a few years older. Chester mostly looked up to him.

Love interests:

Chiara and Jae - I’m usually not part of the majority when it comes to ships, but I think that in this case, many people would share my love for these two together. JC hinted on it many times in the game, when they paired them in the background and I loved it so much that I made it a part of the headcanon. They started dating in year 5 and stayed together ever since.

Penny and Andre - It was brief, but the two dated for a few weeks in their 4th year.

Penny and Talbott - It may change, because it’s a headcanon for their 7th year, but for now - they start dating in their 7th year and stayed together after they graduated.

Jacob and Duncan - They weren’t just best friends, they were genuinely in love.

Crushes:

This list wouldn’t be complete without one-sided crushes, right? Also, Luna has so many that I felt it’s only fair to show the ones that aren’t related to her.

Rowan’s crush on Bill - Okay, okay. It’s the most basic crush and basically (though not officially) confirmed in the game, but I had to include it because it’s the longest crush in the game that stays one-sided. This crush also put Rowan in a very awkward position, since Luna is somewhat romantically involved with Bill, so he had to act like the best friend and support her, even when it hurt him a bit. He told her many times before that he was over him, but he never completely got over it. (Even Ismelda got over Barnaby at some point. Speaking of Ismelda...)

Ismelda’s crush on Barnaby - Yes, this one is confirmed in the canon, but I included it because it’s a bit different in the headcanon. The biggest change that I already mentioned in this post several times - THERE IS NO LOVE POTION. Heard that, JC? My headcanon-Ismelda knows the meaning of consent - and mine is way meaner than the game’s version. Maybe you should refresh your knowledge as well, JC.

Liz’s crush on Rath - It wasn’t long lived, but Liz had a small crush on the Slytherin Beater, in her 4th year.

Penny’s crush on Bill - It’s not as much as a full-crush, more like an interest that came every once in a while, but she never did anything about it because of Luna’s complicated relationship with him.

Andre’s crush on McNully - JC gave us the smallest window to ship these two before they completely ruined it, so I’ve decided to turn this train-wreck into a simple crush. Andre got over it once McNully started to get on his nerves.

Roommates bond:

So, it sounds obvious, but in the game - some characters act like they barely know each other, even ones that supposedly share dorms with them for 7 years. Na-ah, not in the headcanon. So just a quick mention of the special bond that these roommates share:

Tulip, Badeea and Luna.

Rowan, Talbott and Andre.

Penny, Tonks and Chiara.

Merula, Ismelda and Liz. (Although Merula and Ismelda bullied Liz at the beginning, they became more friendly around the 5th year.)

Charlie, Ben and Jae.

I didn’t include the Quidditch characters in this one, because it’s never really stated in which year they all are, and I haven’t decided myself yet for the headcanon.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

#1yrago My RSS feeds from a decade ago, a snapshot of gadget blogging when that was a thing

Rob Beschizza:

I chanced upon an ancient backup of my RSS feed subscriptions, a cold hard stone of data from my time at Wired in the mid-2000s. The last-modified date on the file is December 2007. I wiped my feeds upon coming to Boing Boing thenabouts: a fresh start and a new perspective.

What I found, over 212 mostly-defunct sites, is a time capsule of web culture from a bygone age—albeit one tailored to the professional purpose of cranking out blog posts about consumer electronics a decade ago. It's not a picture of a wonderful time before all the horrors of Facebook and Twitter set in. This place is not a place of honor. No highly-esteemed deed is commemorated here. But perhaps some of you might like a quick tour, all the same.

The "Main" folder, which contains 30 feeds, was the stuff I actually wanted (or needed) to read. This set would morph over time. I reckon it's easy to spot 2007's passing obsessions from the enduring interests.

↬ Arts and Letters Daily: a minimalist blog of links about smartypants subjects, a Drudge for those days when I sensed a third digit dimly glowing in my IQ. But for the death of founder Denis Dutton, it's exactly the same as it was in 2007! New items daily, but the RSS feed's dead.

↬ Boing Boing. Still around, I hear.

↬ Brass Goggles. A dead feed for a defunct steampunk blog (the last post was in 2013) though the forums seem well-stocked with new postings.

↬ The Consumerist. Dead feed, dead site. Founded in 2005 by Joel Johnson at Gawker, it was sold to Consumer Reports a few years later, lost its edge there, and was finally shuttered (or summarily executed) just a few weeks ago.

↬ Bibliodyssey. Quiescent. Updated until 2015 with wonderful public-domain book art scans and commentary. A twitter account and tumblr rolled on until just last year. There is a book to remember it by should the bits rot.

↬ jwz. Jamie Zawinski's startling and often hilariously bleak reflections on culture, the internet and working at Netscape during the dotcom boom. This was probably the first blog that led me to visit twice, to see if there was more. And there still is, almost daily.

↬ Proceedings of the Athanasius Kircher Society. Curios and weirdness emerging from the dust and foul fog of old books, forbidden history and the more speculative reaches of science. So dead the domain is squatted. Creator Josh Foer moved on to Atlas Obscura.

↬ The Tweney Review. Personal blog of my last supervisor at Wired, Dylan Tweney, now a communications executive. It's still going strong!

↬ Strange Maps. Dead feed, dead site, though it's still going as a category at Big Think. Similar projects proliferate now on social media; this was the wonderful original. There was a book.

↬ BLDGBLOG. Architecture blog, posting since 2004 with recent if rarer updates. A fine example of tasteful web brutalism, but I'm no longer a big fan of cement boxes and minimalism with a price tag.

↬ Dethroner. A men's self-care and fashion blog, founded by Joel Johnson, of the tweedy kind that became wildly and effortlessly successful not long after he gave up on it.

↬ MocoLoco. This long-running design blog morphed visually into a magazine in 2015. I have no idea why I liked it then, but indie photoblogs' golden age ended long ago and it's good to see some are thriving.

↬ SciFi Scanner. Long-dead AMC channel blog, very likely the work of one or two editors and likely lost to tidal corporate forces rather than any specific failure or event.

↬ Cult of Mac. Apple news site from another Wired News colleague of mine, Leander Kahney, and surely one of the longest-running at this point. Charlie Sorrel, who I hired at Wired to help me write the Gadget blog, still pens articles there.

↬ Ectoplasmosis. After Wired canned its bizarre, brilliant and unacceptably weird Table of Malcontents blog, its editor John Brownlee (who later joined Joel and I in editing Boing Boing Gadgets) and contributor Eliza Gauger founded Ectoplasmosis: the same thing but with no hysterical calls from Conde Nast wondering what the fuck is going on. It was glorious, too: a high-point of baroque indie blogging in the age before Facebook (and I made the original site design). Both editors later moved onto other projects (Magenta, Problem Glyphs); Gauger maintains the site's archives at tumblr. It was last updated in 2014.

↬ Penny Arcade. Then a webcomic; now a webcomic and a media and events empire.

↬ Paul Boutin. While working at Wired News, I'd heard a rumor that he was my supervisor. But I never spoke to him and only ever received a couple of odd emails, so I just got on with the job until Tweney was hired. His site and its feed are long-dead.

↬ Yanko Design. Classic blockquote chum for gadget bloggers.

↬ City Home News. A offbeat Pittburgh News blog, still online but lying fallow since 2009.

↬ Watchismo. Once a key site for wristwatch fans, Watchismo was folded into watches.com a few years ago. A couple of things were posted to the feed in 2017, but its time has obviously passed.

↬ Gizmodo. Much has changed, but it's still one of the best tech blogs.

↬ Engadget. Much has changed, but it's still one of the best tech blogs.

↬ Boing Boing Gadgets. Site's dead, though the feed is technically live as it redirects to our "gadgets" tag. Thousands of URLs there succumbed to bit-rot at some point, but we have plans to merge its database into Boing Boing's and revive them.

↬ Gear Factor. This was the gadget review column at Wired Magazine, separate from the gadget blog I edited because of the longtime corporate divorce between Wired's print and online divisions. This separation had just been resolved at the time I began working there, and the two "sides" -- literally facing offices in the same building -- were slowly being integrated. The feed's dead, but with an obvious successor, Gear.

↬ The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs. Required reading at the time, and very much a thing of its time. Now vaguely repulsive.

↬ i09. This brilliant sci-fi and culture blog deserved more than to end up a tag at Gizmodo.

↬ Science Daily: bland but exhaustive torrent of research news, still cranking along.

The "Essentials" Folder was material I wanted to stay on top of, but with work clearly in mind: the background material for systematically belching out content at a particular point in 2007.

↬ Still alive are The Register, Slashdot, Ars Technica, UMPC Portal (the tiny laptop beat!), PC Watch, Techblog, TechCrunch, UberGizmo, Coolest Gadgets, EFF Breaking News, Retro Thing, CNET Reviews, New Scientist, CNET Crave, and MAKE Magazine.

↬ Dead or quiescent: GigaOm (at least for news), Digg/Apple, Akihabara News, Tokyomango, Inside Comcast, Linux Devices (Update: reincarnated at linuxgizmos.com), and Uneasy Silence.

Of the 23 feeds in the "press releases" folder, 17 are dead. Most of the RSS no-shows are for companies like AMD and Intel, however, who surely still offer feeds at new addresses. Feeds for Palm, Nokia and pre-Dell Alienware are genuine dodos. These were interesting enough companies, 10 years ago.

PR Newswire functions as a veneering service so anyone can pretend to have a big PR department, but it is (was?) also legitimately used by the big players as a platform so I monitored the feeds there. They're still populated, but duplicate one another, and it's all complete garbage now. (It was mostly garbage then.)

My "Gadgets and Tech" folder contained the army of late-2000s blogs capitalizing on the success of Gizmodo, Boing Boing, TechCrunch, et al. Back in the day, these were mostly one (or two) young white men furiously extruding commentary on (or snarky rewrites of) press releases, with lots of duplication and an inchoate but seriously-honored unspoken language of mutual respect and first-mover credit. Those sites that survived oftentimes moved to listicles and such: notionally superior and more original content and certainly more sharable on Facebook, but unreadably boring. However, a few old-timey gadget bloggers are still cranking 'em out' in web 1.5 style. And a few were so specialized they actually had readers who loved them.

Still alive: DailyTech, technabob, CdrInfo.com, EverythingUSB, Extremetech, GearFuse, Gizmag, Gizmodiva, Hacked Gadgets, How to Spot A Psychopath/Dans' Data, MobileBurn, NewLaunches, OhGizmo!, ShinyShiny, Stuff.tv, TechDigest, TechDirt, Boy Genius Report, The Red Ferret Journal, Trusted Reviews, Xataca, DigiTimes, MedGadget, Geekologie, Tom's Hardware, Trendhunter, Japan Today, Digital Trends, All About Symbian (Yes, Symbian!), textually, cellular-news, TreeHugger, dezeen.

Dead: jkkmobile.com, Business Week Online, About PC (why), Afrigadget (unique blog about inventors in Africa, still active on FaceBook), DefenseTech, FosFor (died 2013), Gearlog, Mobile-Review.com (but apparently reborn as a Russian language tech blog!), Robot's Dreams, The Gadgets Weblog, Wireless Watch Japan, Accelerating Future, Techopolis, Mobile Magazine, eHome Upgrade, camcorderinfo.com (Update: it became http://Reviewed.com), Digital Home Thoughts (farewell), WiFi Network News (farewell), Salon: Machinist, Near Future Lab, BotJunkie (twitter), and CNN Gizmos.

I followed 18 categories at Free Patents Online, and the site's still alive, though the RSS feeds haven't had any new items since 2016.

In the "news" folder, my picks were fairly standard stuff: BBC, CNET, digg/technology, PC World, Reuters, International Herald Tribune, and a bunch of Yahoo News feeds. The Digg feed's dead; they died and were reborn.

The "Wired" feed folder comprised all the Wired News blogs of the mid-2000s. All are dead. 27B Stroke 6, Autopia, Danger Room, Epicenter, Gadget Lab, Game|Life, Geekdad, Listening Post, Monkey Bites, Table of Malcontents, Underwire, Wired Science.

These were each basically one writer or two and were generally folded into the established mazagine-side arrangements as the Age of Everyone Emulating Gawker came to an end. The feed for former EIC Chris Anderson's personal blog survives, but hasn't been updated since his era. Still going strong is Bruce Sterling's Beyond the Beyond, albeit rigged as a CMS tag rather than a bona fide site of its own.

Still alive from my 2007 "Science" folder are Bad Astronomy (Phil Plait), Bad Science (Ben Goldacre), Pharyngula (PZ Myers) New Urban Legends, NASA Breaking News, and The Panda's Thumb.

Finally, there's a dedicated "iPhone" folder. This was not just the hottest toy of 2007. It was all that was holy in consumer electronics for half a decade. Gadget blogging never really had a golden age, but the iPhone ended any pretense that there were numerous horses in a race of equal potential. Apple won.

Still alive are 9 to 5 Mac, MacRumors, MacSlash, AppleInsider and Daring Fireball. Dead are TUAW, iPhoneCentral, and the iPhone Dev Wiki.

Of all the sites listed here, I couldn't now be paid but to read a few. So long, 2007.

https://boingboing.net/2017/12/29/my-rss-feeds-from-a-decade-ago.html

[theonetrueotaku]

Just Another Game

Yoongi/everyone - Canon-based - Mature - Post-Answer

In This Chapter: “Prologue”

Set during 2019, after their world tour and after Answer’s release.

Min Yoongi’s career has put him in bisexual hell: living with six hot bandmates who think it’s really funny to flirt and get handsy with him and with each other all the time. Between constant struggles like not knowing whether he and Jimin nearly made out while drunk, to bed sharing with Jungkook every other night, to not being sure how to stop imagining what it’d be like to kiss Namjoon, it’s only a matter of time before he loses his mind as he realizes he’s in love with six perfect but very straight boys.

After Yoongi drunkenly comes out as bi, he can’t remember the confession the next day. Taken by surprise, the boys lightheartedly start a competition to see who Yoongi finds the most attractive in the group. The objective is set to getting a kiss from Yoongi before he finds out about the competition. Though they mean well, things go downhill fast for all of them. As they each realize they are attracted to Yoongi, they start taking things too far beyond what they’d signed up for.

Read below the cut or on AO3.

At the very least, Yoongi could still see his hands clear as day.

That was it. That was the test. Yoongi’s standard for being too drunk was as simple as whether or not he could see his fingers clearly if his eyes darted down at them quickly. If he could see the perfect cut of his nails then he was safe enough.

The laughter that would echo after every little thing he said was not concerning anymore so long as he passed this test. As long as the boys were enjoying his company, the consequences of his words weren’t really top of mind at the moment. In fact, all he could feel was the pleasant warmth that came every time one of the boys smiled at him over something he said. It was happening pretty often. What Yoongi wasn’t aware of was that he was cajoling these reactions out of them through lavish compliments and embarrassing behaviors.

Seeing them all so tipsy and calm after an intense week gave Yoongi some hope for the rest of this wretched break Big Hit had them on. The most pessimistic of the group, Yoongi was bitter that the band was being given the worst kind of time off the company could have possibly envisioned.

Everyone was scrambling.

The stress all started with the Big Initiative. One year of time off, that was the premise. According to Big Hit, it was the real deal: Time for the boys to improve themselves, time for the company to expand. It was supposed to make things easier on both groups. If you heard the boys retell the story, though, their takes were very different. If they really were to take a whole year off for the sake of putting more time into their next release, that wasn’t any kind of vacation offer. That just meant more time to work harder than they ever have before.

It was right about time for Yoongi to start getting bitter when this drinking opportunity came around. He was sure that the boys were happier seeing him make an ass of himself than seeing him preach about the amount of work they do that others don’t give them credit for. Truth be told, Yoongi hated getting like that. It made him sound unappreciative and callous. Conversations like that would always end in a reminder that he was giving ARMY too little credit, and all it would serve to do is sour his mood and leave him feeling guilty.

Being drunk off his ass and having fun for a night was a better alternative. Even Jin must have known that when he’d made the reservation.

Yoongi giggled to himself again. ‘Reservation’ was a strong word.

“What are you laughing at?” Jin asked, reminding Yoongi that his current pillow was living and breathing. A jokingly bitter Jin rubbed at his arm as if it was bruised from how long Yoongi had been lying there. Rolling his eyes, Yoongi didn’t even answer.

A malicious spirit in Yoongi was pretty amused at the idea of how many people Jin must have fought out of their spot just to close an entire in-demand karaoke venue on a Saturday night. Only the finest for the band, echoed Jin’s words in Yoongi’s head.

The youngest half of the band was especially appreciative considering they were supposed to be sitting at home with their tails between their legs. Off-handedly caught playing tag in the building during their practice hours, their instructors treated them to an unnecessary lecture that took Namjoon and Jin everything not to eat their own words over. Yoongi knew those two had the highest respect for their elders, but he could read on their faces how badly they wanted to tell the instructors to bite it after looking at Jimin, Jungkook and Tae’s guilt-ridden faces.

Jin must have sensed how badly they had needed that time off when he made the call. Sure Namjoon was pissed when he heard they wouldn’t be getting the sleep necessary for their practice the next day, but even he seemed to understand that Jin had the right idea.

For someone who got his way, Yoongi would think that Jin would be smiling just a bit more.

“My shoulder is falling asleep,” Jin complained as Yoongi’s head continued to rest on his arm, sharply nestled in muscle there that Yoongi was doing his best not to comment on aloud. It’d come out as a compliment, yes, but he was managing to hold onto this one. That was more than could be said about most other thoughts he’s had so far.

“You’re comfortable,” Yoongi mumbled back, a bit grumpy that Jin was complaining at all. His eyes were focused firmly on the flashing, dizzying lyrics projected onto their screen.

“Oh come on, he’s tired,” Namjoon joked back with a slight tease in his voice that Yoongi worried wasn’t aimed at Jin. “Look at him.”

“I am looking at him - and all I can see is that he’s cutting off my circulation.”

“Leave him alone,” Hobi teased. “When’s the last time you’ve seen him so comfortable?”

“He napped in a massage chair four hours ago,” Jin pointed out. Jimin started giggling at this point. The laugh went on so absurdly long that Yoongi very belatedly began giggling too. “What are you laughing at now?”

Yoongi shrugged, looking up at the glass chandeliers hanging all along the ceiling. Jin had picked a beautiful place. Though he’d never been there before, it didn’t take Yoongi long to feel at home there. Even though they were seven in a private bar for 100 people, they’d made it as cozy as they could by sitting along the stage. Sitting on the longest couch, Yoongi and the eldest of the group were spread out with still enough space for them to all put their feet up on the coffee table - if only Namjoon would let them. Yoongi had to settle for getting his legs up on Namjoon and Hobi’s laps after he complained long enough, leaving Jin with the better but still unenviable position of ‘designated neck pillow’.

It was the least they could do after forcing Yoongi to promise he wouldn’t actually leave them and fall asleep in a corner of the bar. For as long as they were forcing him to stay awake, he would be as comfortable as he could make himself.

Slamming down shots with a very stiff rap line wasn’t the best idea. He could tell they three were the least sober of the bunch. Namjoon and Hobi were lucky enough to be calm drunks, though. Meanwhile, when intoxicated, Yoongi enjoyed an arsenal of personality type potentials. They were rarely in a color the band didn’t love, though, as evidenced now by their smirks and giggles whenever Yoongi made little comments or snips at each of them.

It was comfortable like this, even if he was slowly losing sight of his hands on the next vision test. His sobriety was fading like his once vibrant red hair was paling into a strange brownish-pink. At least he knew he was safe and in for a great night no matter what. His boys would make sure he made it out alright. He was going to sit back and enjoy it. This was the relief he needed. He felt this strange completeness, as if too whole or too happy to care what happened with him.

Draped along one of the giant bean bag chairs was Jimin, looking regal as ever. Yoongi was so paranoid about looking at him nowadays. As he realized now that he was staring at Jimin, he all but blushed when Jimin noticed and threw a casual smile his way.

Unknowingly, Namjoon distracted him as he ruffled his hair. By the time Yoongi looked up, the purple-haired band leader was turning his eyes back to Tae and Jungkook. “Don’t worry about Jin. You rest as long as you like. You deserve it after today.”

“What happened today?” Jin asked, the concern hiding somewhere so deep in his tone that Yoongi decided against teasing him for it. Namjoon didn’t answer, which left Yoongi curious as to exactly what he meant.

“He’s very hard on himself lately,” he heard Hobi say instead. Yoongi made a face and focused back on Tae and Jungkook, in their performance of a lifetime. They were both putting their hearts into it but Yoongi had to resist a giggle. Tae tried his best to make it through an English-language rap while Jungkook hummed syllables in the right notes. Charlie Puth was a favorite of theirs, and See You Again was a great song….Well, where Jungkook could mimic notes just fine without the words, Tae found it much more difficult to rap as Wiz Khalifa, let alone without even knowing the lyrics.

Tae was enjoying it though. No one could put his energy into question. He was ten times more invested in this than anyone in the room. Yoongi immediately had the urge to tease him for it but held back. He needed to be nicer to Tae. It’d only been a few days since he’d been called out on his behavior lately and he intended to make a change.

He debated calling out a compliment to Jungkook, silencing himself when he thought of where that boy’s head seemed to be lately. He didn’t know quite how to move forward with him but it seemed like making him the center of attention would be the wrong move. The more concerned Yoongi acted, the more he knew the boys would get on Jungkook’s case. Worried as he was, Yoongi knew that attention wasn’t what Jungkook wanted.

Turning back to his present company on the large couch, Hobi’s yawn made Yoongi remember the work day they’d had before this. Earlier that day, he, Namjoon, and Hobi spent countless hours at the studio, writing while the others trained. Glancing over at Namjoon now, Yoongi appreciated the difference between how Namjoon had been feeling before and how happy he looked now.

Playing leader and songwriter at once was weighing on Namjoon, apparent by the subtle bags forming under his eyes. They were all going to be called out soon for not getting enough sleep, but Namjoon in particular looked exhausted. The entire time they were working at the studio, he’d bring up the others and how he wanted to check in on them during their break. The rap line never took breaks, so Namjoon withered away in his thoughts all day as Yoongi watched. Looking at his lip, his memory was served with confirmation that Namjoon was still mercilessly peeling away at his bottom lip whenever he got too distracted.

After him, Jin was the closest to match Namjoon’s tired posture. As the oldest, Jin determined the tone of the group. So long as he kept his head up, Yoongi knew they had a chance of surviving. It was only after turning his head and staring up at Jin for far too long that Yoongi even noticed it looked like he was losing sleep too.

Pouting, Yoongi’s stare moved right back to Namjoon at just the wrong time. Reminded again of Namjoon’s new hair color, Yoongi kept his eyes on the way the color would weave in shades that matched his skin tone so perfectly. It brought out his eyes in ways Yoongi had once gotten far too used to.

Namjoon’s eyes were meeting Yoongi’s gaze for a very long time before Yoongi finally startled.  By the time he realized he’d been caught, he had to wonder how long he must have been staring. Namjoon’s smile had disappeared. The concern in his gaze immediately had Yoongi stammering for an excuse only to get cut off:

“Is there something on my face, hyung?” Namjoon swiped a finger across his cheek and pouted when he found nothing, a little too tipsy to realize that he was misunderstanding.

Yoongi took the excuse for what it was worth. Pretending to wipe something off the corner of Namjoon’s lip, Yoongi had tried to concentrate on one patch of his skin to really sell the lie. Unfortunately, his eyes wandered and he found himself looking up at Namjoon’s hair again as his finger swiped the edge of his lip.

“I really love your hair like this,” Yoongi said so quickly that he didn’t even register his own words for a minute. The sincerity of the complement, his hand right on Namjoon’s mouth, and the lack of distance between them all spelled out immediate regrets for Yoongi.

For some reason or another, Namjoon seemed equally shaken by their proximity.

“I miss the blue,” Jin interrupted without looking away from his phone. Though Hobi made a tsking sound at the rudeness of the comment, he didn’t defend anyone, clearly resigned to accepting this is the way these boys would talk to each other.

“Me too,” Yoongi mumbled, still startled and not coming to his senses.

“Which one is it, Yoongi? Do you like his purple now or do you miss the blue?” Hobi asked, calling him out on his words. Now Namjoon even looked a little bothered.

“Blue was good, but I like purple the most,” Yoongi said, choosing honesty and the resulting embarrassment over stressing Namjoon out about his choice of hair color. Or maybe Yoongi was honestly afraid Namjoon would change it if he thought people didn’t like it. He had just barely started enjoying the view-

Ooh, that thought was dangerous.

Swallowing hard, Yoongi avoided all of their eyes and looked forward instead. Almost on cue, he made eye contact with a tired-looking Jimin.

He was still sitting alone while Tae and Jungkook went for a well-requested encore. Yoongi wished he was leaning his body on him instead. Unlike Jin, Jimin wouldn’t complain about the weight or the burden. Yoongi would even be pulled in tightly and cud-

These thoughts were getting carried away.

Yoongi knew he and Jimin needed a tiny bit of space between them, especially while drunk. Especially after last time.

Even so, that part of him that kept thinking dangerous things suddenly wanted to hear Jimin sing. He wanted a serenade at least if he couldn’t touch him instead.

Dangerous thinking.

As Jungkook and Tae finished, Yoongi almost immediately blurted out his thoughts as the boys handed a mic to Jimin. “Jiminie, sing me a song!” he announced across the couch to a very amused blond vocalist.

“Hyung, don’t worry. I’m singing everyone a song,” he teased back in a slanted tone. He was tipsy too, huh.

“No, Jimin, sing me a song,” Yoongi called back over the noise of the karaoke machine prompting a new song selection. Jimin looked confronted, even nervous for the entire time that he was choosing a song.

Read the rest of this chapter “Prologue” on AO3.

Extra Scenes on Tumblr | Ask to Get on the Tag List

[dinamnealey]

Dina Recommends: Cabin Pressure

Hi!

As some of you might know, I'm not always up-to-date with the latest pop culture fads, or the hottest new things on the entertainment front. I don't really play video games, I don't watch a whole lot of movies or TV series, and I haven't been following a lot of manga or anime series ever since I was fifteen and read all of Love Hina. (I have an... interesting relationship with Love Hina as a result of that, but that's a story for another time.)

But this doesn't mean I don't have my moments. I have plenty of stories, movies, series and whatever that I'll shamelessly fangirl over... but I notice that some of the things I end up fangirling over are things that not a lot of people I talk to have heard of. Oh, these series or whatever often have sizeable fanbases, with their own TV Tropes pages and everything, but they're not really in the public eye the way, say, the Harry Potter books, or the Marvel movies. or Monty Python are.

So I decided, why not dedicate the occasional journal post to talk about and make small reviews of some of these things? Maybe, if I fangirl a little, I can get a few more people curious about those very things... and maybe they'll check them out.

Anything is fair game for these reviews... I might talk about books, or movies, or comics, or podcasts, or TV shows, or whatever. It might be old things, or new things, it might be kiddie cartoons or hardcore fetish stories... there are only three criteria that a work must fulfill:

It must be entertainment-related.

It must be something I unabashedly like.

It must be something I think MORE people should experience.

So, with that out of the way, let's begin!

For my first review, I decided to talk about the BBC radio sitcom, "Cabin Pressure."

"Cabin Pressure" is a radio Britcom of 26 episodes (or 27, since the last one is a double episode), plus a Christmas special, and it's about the life of the people at "MJN Air," the world's smallest airline, which consists of one single 16-seater plane. ("I don't have an airline, I have one jet. You cannot put one jet in a line. If MJN Air is anything, it's an air-dot.") Four people work at MJN Air, and these four are also the main characters of the show:

Carolyn Knapp-Shappey (played by Stephanie Cole), the elderly and somewhat jerkish owner of the plane and of MJN Air.

Martin Crieff (played by Benedict Cumberbatch... yes, THAT Benedict Cumberbatch), the skilled, but inexperienced and rule-obsessed captain.

Douglas Richardson (played by Roger Allam), the experienced and intelligent, but reckless and sarcastic first officer and co-pilot.

Arthur Shappey (played by series creator/writer John Finnemore), Carolyn's overenthusiastic and incredibly stupid son who works as a steward.

Though there are a handful of recurring characters, the series focuses on these four and their struggles with difficult passengers, long flights, a plane that keeps breaking down at inconvenient moments, and of course with each other. Martin is always trying to prove himself in the eyes of everyone else, Douglas splits his time in roughly equal parts between making creative sarcasms and thinking up schemes to either benefit him or to get everyone out of the fix-of-the-week, Carolyn desperately tries to keep costs down at the expense of everything else, and Arthur seldom has a clue what's going on.

But there is more to them than this. Carolyn isn't JUST a mean old penny-pinching lady; she's a divorcee with huge financial problems and who struggles to keep MJN afloat because even though she's the owner of the world's smallest and least-equipped airline, at least that's better than being just a "little old lady." Martin is a bit of a loser who struggles to be taken seriously, but never gives up because flying is his PASSION and being a pilot means more to him than anything. Douglas is an ex-alcoholic who was fired from his old job at "Air England" because he got into too many shenanigans. And Arthur.... Arthur is actually a total idiot, but he's genuinely sweet and well-meaning. Over the 26 episodes, the characters actually do change and grow quite a bit.

Also, given that John Finnemore's father was a pilot, the series is very technically accurate about usual procedures and common hazards and problems of the job... or at least people SAY it is, and since I know absolutely nothing about planes or piloting I'm just going to take their word for it. It certainly SOUNDS like it's accurate.

The real charm of the series, however, it that it's FUNNY. Since it's a radio drama, everything stands and falls on the dialogue and the performances thereof... BBC radio comedies do in my experience tend to deliver here, but in "Cabin Pressure" the touch is magical. The writing is really sharp, and the actors deliver their lines perfectly. Especially Douglas's creative sarcasms, delivered in a real deadpan voice by Roger Allam, frequently has me laughing out loud, but Arthur's inane ramblings are often just as funny, partly because John Finnemore plays them with such earnest enthusiasm. The back-and-forth banter between the characters is a delight to listen to... since the majority of the episodes tend to take place during flights, much of the banter really comes from them trying to entertain themselves with weird conversations, silly word games or debates on the most ridiculous topics. Highlights include "Supervillain Celebrities" where they discuss which celebrities have names that sound like they beling to supervillains, and the ridiculous game where Douglas and Carolyn try to see who can go longest speaking only one-syllable words:

Carolyn: Tea? Douglas: No. Could I have...the one that is NOT tea? Carolyn: "The one that is not tea"? Which one is that? Douglas: You know what it is. Carolyn: Beer? Oh, dear Doug, no, you can't have beer. Douglas: No, not beer. Carolyn: Wine? No! No wine for you, my friend. Douglas: I do not want wine. I want the hot drink made from a bean, which comes in types such as "Gold Blend." Carolyn: I think I know which one you mean, but I will need you to ask for it by name, just to be sure. Douglas: ...Fine. I will have tea.

In my humble opinion, "Cabin Pressure" is a brilliant, intelligent and hilarious show. Of course, not ALL the jokes hit perfectly, and it takes a couple of episodes before things really get into the groove, but that's just to be expected.

Perhaps you balk at finding out that the show has been taped in front of a live audience so there is laughter involved... not a laugh TRACK; the laughter comes from genuine audience reactions, but I know a lot of people absolutely hate the "laugh track" type comedies... or perhaps, especially if you're unfamiliar with the more cynical British sitcom format, that the characters are too flawed and that a lot of the unlikeable guest stars get away with bad behaviour. In which care you're especially likely to feel that the show is a bit too mean to Martin (a bit of a Charlie Brown "loser" type character). But, if you like radio sitcoms, they don't come much better than this.

[theritualofourexistence]

Christmas Day Wrap-Up

Get it?!

The leaves have all but disappeared from the trees, car windows are frosted in the mornings, and breath can be seen in the air signaling another holiday season. My third consecutive holiday season spent single. Two years is the longest I’ve been single since before I started dating and while it feels weird at times, that is NOT what this post is about. Because, though I have spent another year single, so much life happened in the past year that I only rarely missed the opportunity to share it with a significant other. So, to start my annual look back on the past 12 months, I want to remind you that your relationship status should never dictate how you enjoy a holiday season.

This year. Goodness. I still can’t believe we elected a circus clown for a president. It has made this past year challenging in new ways for me, and for the first time really, I have learned what it means to stick to my metaphorical guns when the government seems to be disregarding many of the things that matter deeply to me. There were marches, there were protests, and there will be many more to come. As long as human rights continue to be neglected, I have faith that people will continue to stand up for those in need. Despite the outcome of the last election, love will continue to fight in an effort to trump hate.

In the past 12 months, I titrated off of my anxiety meds. It took far longer than I had intended but I did it. I spent weeks with headaches and dizziness and came out on the other side, Paxil-free. The weight I gained while on the meds didn’t melt off of me like I was hoping BUT I proved to myself that I could be in control… and still, months later, I am in control.

I was finally free of my anxiety meds in time to struggle through one of the hardest summers I have faced.

In May, the health of my 15-year-old cat, TW, started to decline.

In June, my mom had foot surgery, and though it was a challenge at times, I was able to help her during her recovery.

In July, after weeks of illness that required near constant attention, we said goodbye to TW. Though I will probably always be sad about it, I am glad he is at peace.

In August, we brought home my orange kitten Rooster, only to learn a few weeks later that he has a heart condition. Fortunately Rooster is doing well and though he was unable to move to DC with me, he is a sweet and playful little man who keeps me, my mom, and our two girl cats on their toes.

The summer was hard. There are times when I still feel that even now. But ultimately, I made it through. I have to be okay for now, knowing that we don’t have any idea how long Rooster will be with us, but I am trying hard and most days are alright.

At the end of my rocky summer, I started my graduate program! After almost 5 years of real world work in my post-undergraduate life, I committed to a program that I am excited and enthusiastic about. And, just this past week, officially finished my first semester in the journey towards my Masters degree in forensic psychology.

I spent the fall semester living with my best friend and her fiancé. We watched hours of excellent TV together, ate many wonderful meals, and even found a wedding dress for their wedding next year. We shared excellent game nights with my other best friend and HER fiancé, now living a mere 45 minutes away from our apartment in Alexandria after moving home from Guatemala. Though I cannot guarantee what may or may not happen politically over the next 18 months, I can say with sheer, bursting joy that I will get to share in the weddings of my two favorite people. In the face of uncertainty, I have learned the value of anchoring myself to my loved ones, and the next year and a half are dedicated to celebrating you, Kelley and Kaity. I am so grateful for your unwavering friendship and I cannot wait to help send you off on the next new chapter of your lives.

There were times over the past few months when I wondered if I should go back on my anxiety meds. If I should try to find a different pill, something that would maybe work better and have fewer side effects. But every time I had that thought, I went to bed and woke up the next morning confident that I could continue to face each day without medication.

I set a handful of goals during the year, some of which I met and conquered, some of which escaped me.

I biked to class once a week for most of the semester, I ended up getting all A’s… I didn’t really lose any weight or establish an adequate exercise routine, but at least I know what I need to work on.

I finished my lower leg sleeve and I started work on the tattoo project I am lovingly referring to as my “knee-sis,” in honor of the 5-year anniversary of my undergraduate thesis… which remains the most downloaded document on Gettysburg’s online database, by the way.

I had panic attacks again. I understand them much more now and definitely have more control. Furthermore, I had only a handful, which is far, far better than I was doing before starting my medication almost three years ago. Every panic attack that I can control without taking any pills is the biggest success story ever. I am so proud of myself for continuing to wage this war with my mental illness- and I am so ready to be helping others do the same.

Many little things proved to be either points of light or little hiccups… Penn State football had a fun season but fell short at the end, the Eagles are on track to do something similar but it has been so fun to watch Wentz triumph and raise this team from the NFL trenches. The US Men’s National Team failed to qualify for the World Cup… and so did my other two favorites, The Netherlands and Italy. I watched my soccer hero, Gigi Buffon, play his last international match with tears of heartbreak in my eyes. Is it silly to be so emotionally engaged in sports? I’m sure some people think it is… but when things feel like they’re falling apart around me, sports have been a consistent comfort. I am curious to see how the Eagles’ season ends and I will be cheering hard until the last moments… and of course, I will watch the World Cup as well… if only to root for everyone who has to play Portugal.

In the past 12 months, I read a lot. More than I have for a long time, I think. I read a ton of Vonnegut, a ton of Rick Riordan. I read the entire first volume of the collected stories of Sherlock Holmes. I read the Golden Compass trilogy for the first time. I re-read “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” and “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” when I needed to find comfort and familiarity. Being in grad school will mean my personal reading will slow, but I am so grateful to so many books for providing an escape this past year. There is so much peace in knowing books will always, always be close at hand if I ever need to step back from reality or take a break from the world.

This year I made steps toward understanding and defining my sexuality and though that will undoubtedly bring some complicated interactions, it is so rewarding to better understand myself. There were times I worried a lot, times I felt my single-ness acutely, times I felt lonely, and countless times when I felt sad and angry and overwhelmed. But ultimately I succeeded in conquering a lot this year, and when I fell, I got back up.

My hardest battles have taught me the most valuable lessons and the challenge now is learning to trust that that is true for this chapter of my life as well.

So, onward to 2018, and no matter what it brings I will continue to fight. For myself, for my loved ones, and for everyone else who is willing to accept my help on the road towards equality and equity.

“Climb every mountain, ford every stream, follow every rainbow ‘til you find your dream... a dream that will need all the love you can give, every day of your life, for as long as you live!”

[rememberthattime]

Chapter 51. The Move III. Home

What a month. December 2019 started in Sydney, but in just four weeks, took me through New York (Chels was in Hawaii), Dallas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Seattle, and finally London.

Somehow this was our LEAST busy holiday over the past three years, but it flew by nonetheless.

The month began with an international move... obviously challenging, and further complicated by EY’s mobility team. Movers, cleaners, and interested Gumtree buyers cycled through the house, while Chelsay and I balanced enjoying our final days in Manly with UK visa applications.

Eventually our Aussie apartment was empty. Just four massive bags remained - they held our only belongings until our shipment arrives in London sometime in April. Those four bags would be heading in opposite directions for the next 10 days though: Chelsay’s followed her to Hawaii, while mine were heading to New York.

I’m extremely jealous of Chelsay’s trip to the North Shore. Not only did she get to hang with Sumner, Chris, Miles, and Orly, but she enjoyed a few post-Sydney surfs, Island vibes, and beautiful weather.

Meanwhile, I had intense work meetings in New York, which required staying an extra few days for the biggest presentation I’ve given to-date. I was at least able to stroll around Manhattan between meetings, with highlights including Gramercy Park, East Village, Greenwich Village, and snow in Times Square.

Our Christmas Break really began once Chelsay and I finally made it to Dallas, though we were only home for one day before embarking on a family road trip.

Chelsay and I have traveled to around 50 countries, yet there are so many places we haven’t explored in our own backyard, including the Deep South. With plenty of time in the US this December, we decided to take a short road trip through Louisiana and Mississippi with Jeff, Liv, Matt, and Emily.

Some highlights:

A foggy visit to Evergreen Plantation. Although the plantation was a primary filming site for fictional Django Unchained, its slave past was very real. Despite our tour guide’s best efforts to portray a “different narrative”, the slaves’ conditions were pretty clear... “Remember: snakes, gators, mosquitoes, yellow fever.”

Jambalaya, Beignets, and Hurricanes in New Orleans’ French Quarter, paired with our over-the-top Southern accents (“There’s been a muwduh!”)

Strolling Barataria Preserve, a swampy bayou coated in Spanish moss... but with zero bathrooms along the trail. What happened in the bayou stays in the bayou. 

Touring antebellum homes in charming Natchez, though the biggest highlight was Jeff trying to understand how their 1980′s occupants got cable. 

Friendly and entertaining strangers throughout the entire trip. Zippy the gas station attendant (“Energy drink, for the guy that’s gotta push the car”), our Uber driver Mahogany (“Reroute me”), the Mississippi McDonalds cashier (“Y’all wan’ dat wit pe-can sauce!?”), and a New Orleans man training his pet raccoon.

The road trip was great siblings trip - no doubt one that we’ll laugh about for a long time. But after covering Sydney, New York, Louisiana, and Mississippi in just two weeks, it was time to settle down for a bit.

Luckily we had almost a month to relax: 23 days before our one-way flight to London, split between Dallas and Seattle. I hardly worked and Chelsay was already well into sabbatical-mode, which meant we had zero responsibility while home... It was a return to childhood.

Some highlights:

These aren’t in any order, except for this first one: Matt’s quizzes. It’s become a Kern tradition that Matt puts together ~15 ten question quizzes. They’re all creative categories, with our annual favorite being “Synonym song title & band”. Matt’s past four annual quizzes were all excellent, but this Christmas’ installment, Kern Family Quizzes 5: The Moscow Incident, was by far the most impressive. It included an audio/visual component, and categories ranging from “Name this platinum song being played on recorder” and “Name the two actors’ whose faces I’ve merged into one”. Matt could make millions if he sold these games.

Speaking of games, the Kern’s and Wright’s combined to complete four escape rooms. Perfect 4/4. Grandma Helen calls them “Crazy rooms”, which is absolutely understandable after a T-Rex roared at us for 20 minutes in one of our Seattle escape rooms.

Continuing in the friendly competition category, the Kern’s love bocce... especially bocce with a wrinkle: wild bocc’ (aka free-range bocce). Most bocce is played in a walled rectangular arena. Not for the Kern’s though. We drive to the Trophy Club Park and set up our “course” through trees, along hills, across sidewalks, and between the small children panicking as we hurl 3 lb balls towards them. Like a windmill in putt-putt, these obstacles make the game more challenging, especially the scared children. Plus we all just like getting outside.

One last friendly competition: giant jenga at Jeff & Liv’s new house. Their “starter” home is so big that they have an entire room for giant jenga... and we needed the space. This genuinely could’ve been a Guinness record for longest game. For at least an hour -- every single turn -- we were sure the tower JUST HAD to fall.

The next four bullets are all cowboy related. Chelsay and I have been together for 10 years, and every time we go to Dallas, she insists on visiting a dude ranch. We’ve never had enough time... until this Christmas. Chelsay finally got her wish when we drove an hour outside Fort Worth to Beaumont Ranch. This day trip could’ve had its own post, but I’ll have to summarize in a few short stories.

First, the main event was a cattle drive on horseback. Our instructor, a true Texan cowgirl, led us into the 800-acre plains in search of rogue longhorns. Chelsay was the first to come across wayward cattle and, despite her metropolitan upbringing, instinctively started yelling in an extremely southern accent: “Go on, git! Heeyah!” Our Texan instructor had to be insulted.

Second story: Matt is very good at lassoing. I was not. This video pretty much tells the story.

Last story from our cowboy day. The ranch had its own replica western town, so Chelsay had the idea to make a “duel” video. We talked about the dialogue for under 10 seconds, but the result was pure gold. Oscar worthy (at least better than The Irishman). You might think that we added the music afterwards to sync with our actions... Nope, that was just my mom holding her phone close to Chelsay’s camera. That should at least be up for Best Sound Editing.

My parents, Chelsay, and I fell into a nightly routine of Dark from Netflix Germany. Phenomenal show, despite watching an English-dubbed version. We finished two seasons in under 10 days.

Obviously we hit all the favorite food spots, led by Feedstore, Mi Cocina, Anamias, Christinas, Costa Vida. We also added a new favorite: HG Supply and their tasty impossible whopper bowl with quinoa and chili. 

On the topic of food, I must have eaten 100 cookies while home. We had the traditional Kern Christmas cookie bake-off (A+ humor, but C+ presentation), but Chelsay also picked up a baking addiction. It was 11 pm and we’d all be heading to bed, but Chelsay was still laser focused and meticulously decorating her cookies. Her efforts showed though: A+ flavor, and A+++ presentation. 

Next up was our return to Seattle. On Chelsay and I’s first full day, we decided to go on a long hike. We actually didn’t hike much when lived in Seattle, which we now realize was dumb. I definitely took the Northwest’s landscape for granted — every time we visit, I’m blown away by the sky-scraping evergreens, fresh scent, crisp air, and looming mountain ranges that surround the city. Anyway, we’ve been trying to catch up on our hiking whenever we visit, and the closest trail to the Wright’s house is Mt. Si, a semi-challenging 8-mile hike. It’s the medium-well steak of hikes. Danny, Chelsay, and I endured a sweaty couple hours -- just to give you an idea of the hike’s height, the peak was snow-capped, but the views made the steep ascent worthwhile. 

On the same ‘missed PNW opportunities’ line: when I lived in Seattle, I ever took advantage of the many nearby mountain villages, especially the Bavarian-themed Leavenworth. Tucked in the Cascade Mountains, you would never believe Leavenworth is just two hours from bustling Pike Place. Gothic-lettered storefronts line the half-timbered town’s main street: Munchen Haus, the Sausage Garten, Ludwig’s, and Starbucks (it’s still America after all). Danny, June, Chelsay, and I enjoyed a quiet walk on Blackbird Island, threw snowballs for target practice, and warmed up with hot cider and big (BIG) game of Uno. We also built up our shaka inventory with our Leavenworth friends Alex & Charlie.

It's also worth mentioning that I went to a Hawks game with Hanan. It was a rivalry game and the stakes couldn't be higher: SEA vs SF. Sunday Night Football. Last game of the 2019 regular season, and the winner took the NFC West. The 49ers went up 16-0, but the Hawks stormed back and had the ball with a chance to win on the last play. Russell Wilson hit Jacob Hollister close to the goal line, but a 49er tackled him quickly. Hollister reached for the goal line as he fell, but came up an inch short of a game-winning touchdown. Even though the Hawks lost, it was still a great time.

Speaking of great times, we hosted New Year’s Eve at the Wright’s house in Woodinville. What an incredible night. Midnight seems to get later and later every year, but Chelsay and I stayed up until 3 am catching up with Devon & Babs, Martiin @ Michelle, and Austin & Kels. Danny, June, and Chels were such amazing hosts - I kept telling them my friends didn’t deserve their hospitality.

We may have been in the US for five weeks, but it felt like only five days. Although it fly by, these stories and pictures are proof that our time was well spent. 

And even though we were boarding a one-way flight to London for the next few years, there’s no question where our true home will always be. 

[professorsaber]

Fandom Meme: Hit Me Up

Originally posted by @fanficmemes​, I saw this posted by @universe-on-her-shoulders and @anotheruserwithnoname.  I tag: @clara-is-brave, @randomthunk, @infiniteregress17, @lullapiee, and @frombothofmyhearts.

1.  Your current OTP(s)/OT3(s)/OTX(s)

The Doctor and Clara Oswald; Supergirl and Jimmy Olsen; Marty McFly and Jennifer Parker

2.  A pairing you initially didn’t consider but someone changed your mind (bonus points: who was that person).

None yet, though I didn’t pair Twelve and Clara until I saw “The Caretaker.”  So, they changed my mind.

3. A pairing you used to love, but it all fell apart for you.

I’m not sure.

4.  Have you added anything cracky/hilarious to your fandom, if so, what.

No… Not yet, anyway.

5.  What’s the longest you’ve ever been in a fandom

I’ve been in Back to the Future since 1998 or so.  I was nine at the time, and I’ve never really given it up.  I didn’t discuss it online until 2010, though.  I passively observed starting around 2006. (It’s a small fandom.)  But in general, 19 or 20 years for BTTF. Harry Potter a close second, at 1998 - 2008, then Heroes 2006 - 2009/10.

6.  Do you remember your first OTP, if so who was in it.

I was never a “hardcore” shipper until Twelve and Clara came along. They are far and away my TRUE pairing.

7.  Name a fandom you didn’t care/think about until you saw it all over tumblr.

None so far.  Maybe I haven’t been here long enough!

8.  Say something genuinely nice about a character who isn’t one of your faves (chars you’re neutral on are fair game, as are chars you dislike)

Mon-El in the Supergirl TV series.  Chauvinism was deeply ingrained into him by his culture, and it didn’t fully go away, but he saw what was wrong with the old Daxam and made an earnest effort to change.

9.  Name three things you wish you saw more or in your main fandom (or a fandom of choice)

Doctor Who: support for Whouffaldi, Moffat, and Series 10.

10.  Choose a song at random, which ship or character does it remind you of

“Run” by Matt Nathanson - Whouffaldi

11.  A pairing you ship that you don’t think anyone else ships

Whouffaldi, at times, especially when I’m not on Tumblr.  Very especially when I browse TV Tropes.

12.  Your most scandalous headcanon for your current OTP(s)/OT3(s)/OTX(s) 

I’m not sure it’s “scandalous,” since I’ve seen others say it, and I waffle on weather or not I believe it, but that the Doctor and Clara were sleeping together during Series 9.

13.  Do you have any hard and fast headcanons that you will die defending, about anything at all (gender identity, sexual or romantic orientation, extended family, sexual preferences like top/bottom/switch, relationship with poetry, seriously anything)

Other than Whouffaldi and bi Clara Oswald (though both are canon, IMO), that the Doctor fled Gallifrey because his family was murdered during a purge.  I think I picked this one up partially from the Gallifrey audios, which I haven’t actually listened to...

14.  5 favorite characters from 5 different fandoms

Clara Oswald; Doc Brown; Supergirl (TV); Sherlock Holmes (Elementary); Hiro Nakamura (Heroes)

15. 3 OTPs from 3 different fandoms

See #1.

16. 5 favorite ships

Add to #1 Hiro/Charlie and Alex/Maggie in Supergirl.

17.  Just ramble about something fan-related, go go go (prompts optional but encouraged)

I had heard things about Doctor Who for years, but I didn’t start watching until the summer before Season 9, when I pulled up “Listen” on demand.  That immediately hooked me on the show.  It baffles me that people don’t like that episode; in my mind, it’s on par with “Blink.”