#i got at least one more set for him in these eps | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

storiesofsvu · 7 months

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City Views

Rafael Barba x reader warnings: language, smut, oral, a form of cock warming i guess? lol, dirty talking, cum shot. requested: yup. can't remember who lol. Havent written for Barba or watched his eps in a while so hopefully this isn’t ooc.

Rafael was in his home office later than he had originally planned, one thing simply turned into another and another and another, the next thing he knew the small pile of paperwork had become a mountain. Normally this was just a minor frustration, but tonight was supposed to be date night.

When you’d first gotten home you’d checked in, leaving a kiss on the top of his head, asking how long he thought he would be. An hour and a half later and you were back, sliding a glass of scotch onto his desk with a small sigh and a raised brow that silently asked when he was going to close up shop. An hour after that you’d given up hope for stage one, wandering back into the office to place a take out container on his desk, making sure that he at least ate. Every intrusion pulled his focus, causing him to lose his train of thought and have to start all over again, even if you didn’t actually say anything. Which is why when the door creaked open again he let out a huff, his pen lifting up off the paper as he started to speak.

“If you interrupt me one more time so help me god I will—” He completely forgot how to speak when his eyes moved from the paper in front of him to the doorway and his mouth practically started to water.

You’d changed out of your clothes, a simple yet stunning black lace three piece set hugging your skin perfectly, adorned with light pink flowers, though the kicker was Rafael’s favourite shirt draped over your shoulders, hanging open in the front so he could get a glimpse of the lingerie. You let out a small chuckle, sauntering through the room up to the side of his desk and your fingers curled under his chin, closing his mouth.

“Cat got your tongue?”

“I...” he started, gulping as his eye swept over your body, lingering on the swell of your chest and you smiled.

“See something you like?”

“I most certainly do.” His hands came to grip your hips, tugging you towards him as they slid up your sides, spreading warmth across your skin, “querida you look amazing, but you know I have to finish this.”

“No one said anything about you stopping.” With a smirk you sunk to your knees, hands spreading his legs so you could settle between them, “I’m sure I can find something to keep me occupied.”

“Christ.” Muttering, he shook his head at you, nudging you backwards slightly so his chair was closer to the desk and he picked up his pen again.

Only a moment later your hands were softly rubbing up and down the inside of his thighs, squeezing every so often and every time he glanced down he had a perfect view of your cleavage, pushed up by the fancy bra, your nipples nearly peaking over the top of the lace. He took a deep breath, feeling himself twitching in his pants already and did his best to focus on the work in front of him.

Your hands continued to rub up his thighs, one of them coming even higher to palm at his cock through his pants and he let out a groan, unable to control his hips rocking toward the touch. You continued to grope him, smirking at the feeling of him starting to get hard, knowing just what kind of an affect you were having on him. Your hands reached up to his belt, undoing the buckle before slipping into his pants, pulling them down a few inches to pull his cock out and he let out a hiss.

You spat into your hand before wrapping it around him, beginning to lazily stroke, letting out a needy whine as he got hard, twitching in your hand. Above you he let out a soft sigh, his eyes briefly closing, fingers clenching around his pen before he attempted to shake out of it.

“You like that?” You asked, a smirk in your voice as your hand tightened around him, squeezing ever so softly and a drop of pre-cum began to leak out of his tip.

“You know I do.” He groaned, hips rocking toward you, thrusting his cock further into your hand.

“If this is too distracting I could always just play with myself…” You teased, your hand leaving him and trailing down your own body. You barely got it to the waist of your panties before Rafael let out a low growl, catching your other wrist in his hand, tugging you closer to him.

“Uh-uh.” He shook his head, “you know better than that.”

Grinning, you leant forward on your knees, your hands braced on his upper thighs and your tongue darted out to wet your lips, “you want me to suck your cock while you work? Keep you nice and warm and hard until you’re finally ready to fuck me?” You licked a broad stripe up from the base of his cock to the tip, flicking it, lapping up the pre-cum as you did so and he twitched again, “stretch my pussy out, fuck me nice and deep, filling me up completely.” Your words were accented by kisses along his shaft, sucking at the sensitive skin, “I’m wet already just thinking about it.”

Rafael’s free hand tangled into your hair, redirecting your mouth so he could drive his cock between your lips, “then get to work.”

“Mmmhm.” You mumbled back, slowing sinking down on his cock until the tip of it hit the back of your throat.

You held yourself there, tongue drawing patterns across his cock, tracing the veins as you moaned around him, sucking him deeper into your mouth, feeling him throb. You hollowed your cheeks, relaxing your throat so he could press even further into you. You could hear the scratching of his pen as he scribbled through whatever he was working on, but you could also hear that his breathing was getting laboured. Rafael began to shift uncomfortably in his seat, your mouth incredibly warm and wet around him, holding him there, tickling at his cock with your tongue. He twitched inside your mouth, letting out a quiet swear when you moaned around him, the vibration enough to make him stall in his words. You could feel the drool pooling in the corners of your mouth beginning to leak out of your lips, smearing around the base of his cock and you finally pulled off, taking a gasping breath.

Your hand replaced your lips, stroking up and down his length while your mouth moved down to his balls, sucking them into your mouth, your tongue toying with them. A groan left your lips as you rubbed your thighs together, pussy pulsing around nothing, eager for Rafael’s cock to fill you up. Your mouth slipped off his balls, a string of drool connecting the base of his cock to your lips and you glanced up at him with a smirk when you felt his eyes on you.

“God you’re so pretty like this…” he mumbled, his hand caressing your cheek gently, thumb tracing the outline of your lips and you were quick to suck it into your mouth. “Such a good little cock sucker.”

He pulled his thumb out of your mouth, causing you to chase after it, your lips landing on the head of his cock when he wrapped his hand around it, redirecting it into your mouth before his hand moved to the back of your head. He guided you up and down, pressing ever so lightly on your head when you deep throated him, setting up a languid pace for you to bob on his cock. As relaxed as you were, you weren’t afraid to start to make a bit of a mess, spit slicking his length, coating your lips, smearing across the crotch of his pants, a bit of drool dripping down your chin.

Rafael could feel his heart racing in his chest, the sounds coming from below him were driving him absolutely wild and he knew by the way you’d began rocking your hips in time with your bobbing that your pussy was completely drenched. His writing was getting sloppier and he knew he was going to have trouble reading it in the morning, but the thoughts of work were slowing slipping from his mind as the only thing he began to worry about was the feeling of you choking on his dick. He managed another sentence before tossing down his pen and letting out a louder moan, leaning back into his chair and closing his eyes.

You pulled off his cock with a lewd pop, a small giggle escaping your wet lips, “finished?”

“Something else came up.” He muttered, smirking down at you and you chuckled, still stroking him.

“Certainly did.” With a wink you wrapped your lips around his cock again, picking up the pace as his hips began to rock up to meet your mouth, hands tangling into your hair again. You took him as deep as you could, hands massaging his balls and he grunted, throbbing in your mouth before he finally pulled you off, leaving you panting.

“If you keep that up you’re gonna make me come.” His hands slid down to your shoulders, yanking you up and into his lap, where his hand found its way between your legs, cupping your heat, “and considering you’ve ruined these panties it would be a waste to not feel that gorgeous pussy.”

With a quick smirk Rafael leant in, catching your lips in a kiss, groaning over the taste of himself in your mouth as your tongues quickly started rolling against one another. His arms wound around you, holding you close as he stood up and you wrapped your legs around his waist. You couldn’t resist grinding your clothed cunt against his hard on, your panties dampening from both sides now. He crossed the room to the couch across from his desk, gently dropping you onto it.

“Why don’t you get rid of that excuse for underwear?” He asked, his hands making quick work of his shirt, letting it drop to the floor behind him.

Your hands reached up behind your, un clasping the bra and tossing it aside, “you could just pull them to the side?”

“God you’re feeling dirty tonight, aren’t you?” Rafael grinned, stepping toward you so he could cup your tits, thumbs brushing over your nipples and you let out a happy sigh that morphed into a moan when he pinched at them, gripping the flesh harder.

“Got bored,” your eyes fluttered shut as he continued to play with your tits, “watched a few videos…”

“And were you touching yourself?”

“Only over my panties.”

“Good girl.” His hands left your chest, one cupping your cheek to direct you into a kiss before he shoved his pants down, “now get up on your knees and turn around.”

You eagerly did as asked, bracing yourself on the back of the couch and sticking your ass out as Rafael dimmed the lights in the room, making the view through the darkened window come a little more to life. Stories above the city streets below, the skyline full of sparkling lights, night sky twinkling with stars, you were high enough there was a very little chance of anyone seeing you, but the thrill was still there and sent shivers through your body. Rafael’s hands soothed up your thighs, pulling your cheeks apart before his fingers slipped into your thong, pulling it off to the side to expose your glistening pussy.

“God you’re just fucking drenched.” He muttered, bending over you to swipe his tongue through your folds, pulling a gasp from your lips as he sucked on your cunt for a moment, growling at the taste of your juices. “Always so sweet querida.” Two of his fingers easily sunk into you and you couldn’t help but push back onto them, whining as your eyes fluttered shut and he chuckled, “and already ready for me… you really are needy tonight.”

“Raf.. please…” Your head fell forward onto your forearms, practically panting in need as his fingers danced across your body, a feather light touch on your skin that left fire in its tracks.

“God you’re so hot when you beg.” He replied, hand wrapping around his cock as he guided it your leaking cunt.

He rutted against you, cock sliding through your folds, smearing your juices all along it and you let out a long moan, body shaking as wetness leaked out of you. It wasn’t a want, it was a need, your pussy absolutely throbbing, your clit swollen and sensitive, twitching every time his dick rubbed past it. He finally gave you some relief when the head of his cock nudged at your cunt and your body relaxed, a sigh escaping your lips as he sunk deeper into your heat inch by inch.

“Fuck…” You groaned, pushing your hips back toward him, making sure every inch of him was fully seated inside your throbbing cunt.

“You’re squeezing me so tight already, shit.”

Rafael braced his hands on your hips, starting to pull his cock out until only the tip was left inside you before he sunk all the way in again, moaning right along with you. You were perfect, pussy fitting him like a fucking glove, pulsing around him like heaven, just the way he craved, the way he loved. He couldn’t help but set a steady pace, knowing you were both so riled up already he didn’t want to waste time but also didn’t want to come instantly. Each thrust of his hips were met with a little squeak or whimper from you, the harder ones earned moans, soft swears, his name tumbling from your lips like a sweet prayer.

“S-so good.” You groaned out, gripping the back of the couch harder when Rafael circled his hips, cock hitting every spot of your walls.

“Take me so well.” He husked, picking up the pace, a hand sliding up your back until it tangled into the roots of your hair, tugging your head up so you could see the faint reflection in the dark window.

“Fuck…”

“Like that don’t you?” He chuckled, “bet you wish they could see how you take my cock, hmm? How messy this little pussy is? God you’re dripping down your thighs that’s how much you like the way I fuck you, isn’t it?”

“Mmhmm.” You managed out, a strangled moan breaking free from your throat, “ ‘m close…so close…”

Rafael knew what you were begging for, and he knew he wasn’t far behind you, hand winding around you to find your clit, pads of his fingers rubbing at it, pressing harder with each circle. You were slick with wetness, clit hard and throbbing under his fingers while your pussy pulsed around his cock, juices coating it, squelching noises and the sound of skin on skin bouncing off the walls of the room.

“Come for me querida, come all over my cock.” He grunted, feeling himself throb inside you, his hips beginning to lose their rhythm, stuttering against yours as you cried out, pussy clamping down around him as your juices dribbled out, leaking down your thighs.

“Fuck!”

It was only a second later that he groaned, his hips hitting yours, cock deep inside your cunt as his cum shot out of him, coating your walls and you let out another whimper at the sensation. He squeezed at the base of his dick, making sure to fill you with as much cum as he could, your pussy milking every last drop out of him. He dropped his torso over yours, holding you flush to him as he panted, messy kisses pressed to the back of your shoulders as your bodies trembled together.

“Oh my god…” He mumbled and you laughed softly, shifting to collapse to the couch underneath him, whining when his cock slipped from you.

“Still mad about the interrupting?” You asked with a smirk as you rolled over and it was his turn to laugh.

“Absolutely not.”

_____________________

@fandom-princess-forevermore @thatesqcrush @alexusonfire @bisexualcrowley @detective-giggles @plaidbooks @averyhotchner @beccabarba @permanentlydizzy @prurientpuddlejumper @letsdisneythings @neely1177 @mrsrafaelbarba @lv7867 @bisexual-dreamer02 @skittle479 @amelia-song-pond @madamsnape921 @altsvu @svulife-rl @caracalwithchips @mysticfalls01 @ssaic-jareau @barbasbodaciousbeard @alwaysachorusgirl @beardedbarba @michael-rooker @rafivadafreddy @darkheart-brightsmile @australiancarisi @ex-uallyactive @lawandorderuswnt @lustvolle-liebe @sia2raw @narvaldetierra @lannister-slings-and-arrows @poisonedcrowns @anlin2058 @xoxabs88xox @momlifebehard @im-just-a-mississippi-girl @godard-muse @somethingimaginative17 @alexxavicry @dextur @onmykneesformarvel @kmc1989 @valentinesfrog @silversprings-mp3 @wittygutsy

#rafael barba #rafael barba x reader #law and order svu #svu #law and order #law and order special victims unit #rafael barba smut

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aphrogeneias · 6 months

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are we still thinking about best friend!eddie? what about best friend!eddie who is writing the most devastating love songs for you and you’re just like “omg babe who’s the lucky girl?” and it’s not till you go see corroded coffin at the hideout and he finds your eyes in the crowd when singing one that you’re finally like “oh…”

Eddie would always insist that Corroded Coffin didn't do ballads.

"We're not sellouts", he'd say, enunciating the word like it was poisonous. The boys agreed with him, and being the main songwriter, that was quite definitive. Except you knew better.

You knew about the songs he'd write in his old, battered notebook. The ones he'd sing when it was just the two of you in his room, sitting on the edge of his bed with his black acoustic guitar on his lap.

This machine slays dragons, it said. It broke hearts too, sometimes.

Sitting on his floor, you'd wonder what those songs were really about. Who they were about. Songs about unrequited love, longing for someone you can't have. Waxing poetic about hair and eyes and a body admired from a distance, untouchable.

You'd sit and listen and wonder, praying that someday you'd know, even if it would break your heart even further. Eddie would finish his songs with a smile, looking down at you from where he sat, a golden halo around his curls coming from the window behind him.

"You really won't tell me who these are about? Do they know, at least?"

He'd tell you what he always did. "Does a song really have to be about someone?"

"We both know they always are. Whether the composer wants to admit it or not." You'd tease with a smile that wouldn't quite reach your eyes.

"This composer has nothing to admit." He'd set his guitar aside and join you on the floor, picking up his notebook to hide it once more. "Besides, you're my only muse."

Your skipped a beat everytime he'd say that. Changing the subject, you turn to him. "Do your muse a favor, then, and play this one on Tuesday? It's really good, Ed."

"I'll think about it."

On Tuesday, you and the five drunks scattered around the Hideout got to listen to a new song — a Corroded Coffin original, along with the other two they'd always play, straight from their EP. "Someone convinced me to do this one live. I hope she enjoys it."

And as his brown eyes, glinting under the weak spotlight over the stage, met yours across the room, and remained there through the first verse until the chorus, you knew. When his voice lowered and softened, crooning the words you heard earlier that week.

When the crowd around you disappeared and you were the only two people in the bar, and the sound of his voice and guitar were the only ones echoing through the walls, you knew.

You finally knew.

#is this anything?#i hope it's something anon <3 #eddie munson x reader #anonymous #inbox

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yelena-bellova · 2 years

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Twenty Years Later: Joel Miller x F!Reader - Chapter Five

Chapter Five: Soundtrack of Life

Plot: Y/n, Joel and Ellie journey to Bill and Frank’s house, where Joel and Y/n are forced into a conversation.

Word Count: 11.2k

Warnings: tlou ep.3 spoilers, language, guns, canon-typical violence, mention of killing (16+)

A/N: You guys blow this thing up more and more each week and I’m blown away each time. I see all your lovely comments, even if I don’t respond. A gentle reminder that this is a 16+ fic and I will not be adding anyone to the taglist who does not have their name on their page. Gotta look out for younger eyes 👀

Regarding this chapter, I did NOT intend forit to be this long. I honestly thought because the episode was all about Bill and Frank that it would be the shortest, but here we are. It contains one of my favorite scenes of the entire series, I’ll let you guess which one it os 😉

—————————

May 16th, 2002. Austin, Texas.

Y/n considered herself a fairly confidant person. She kept her fear reserved for things like family emergencies, natural disasters…things out of her control.

Not first dates with men she’d known a week.

She was pacing her kitchen, heels clicking against the linoleum floor and her sundress swishing each time she looped around. Her hands wrung themselves against her abdomen. She had never felt so nervous about a date, not even in high school. She figured it was a warning sign of some type. Either she was making a huge mistake or a fantastic decision. She rested her head against one of the cabinets and prayed it was the latter…

Outside Y/n’s complex, Joel had just parked his truck. Dressed in a long sleeved plaid shirt rolled up to his elbows, jeans and dress shoes, he felt constrained. Like his chest had expended three sizes and the shirt was no longer able to accommodate it. Or was he just hot? Hungry?

Joel tightened his grip on the steering wheel and shut his eyes. He was nervous.

It had been at least one, maybe two years since he’d been on a date. A neighbor’s daughter that Joel had felt obligated to go out with so that it would sate his street in their constant attempts at setting him up. It had been much longer since he’d voluntarily sought someone out. Taking a deep breath, he reminded himself it wasn’t marriage. They were just going to dinner. If nothing happened, it wasn’t the end of the world…

Joel sighed, but he wanted something to happen…

He picked up the roses from the passenger seat, a nod to the night they’d met, pocketed his keys and stepped out of the truck. He felt dazed as he climbed the stairs to the second floor. 41B, Y/n had told him. When he reached the door, he hesitated to knock. Such a minuscule part of the night, but the mere act of coming to her door felt like the beginning of…everything.

Three raps broke Y/n from her panic party.

She’d put on an old record, hoping it would ease her nerves. It hadn’t done a thing. She stood up straight, drawing a deep and tried to force confidence through her body.

When Y/n opened the door, Joel lost any and all words he’d been thinking over in his head. She was dressed in a simple yellow flowered dress, but it was her wearing it that melted Joel. She looked like sunshine itself.

“Hi,” she smiled.

“Hi,” Joel exhaled, “Sorry if I’m late.”

Y/n looked at the clock near the door, “Only a minute. I think I can excuse that.”

Joel huffed a nervous laugh. What came next?

“These are for you,” he stated, holding out the flowers.

Roses. Y/n was shocked that Joel had remembered the tiny detail of their night in the bar. Tommy’s nickname was going to stick so long as she stuck around the Millers, she had a feeling…

“They’re gorgeous,” she giggled, “You’ve got a good memory.”

Joel gave a half shrug, rubbing his sweaty palms against his jeans after.

Y/n felt like her brain had stopped processing for a split second. She jumped back to reality, “Come on in, I’ll go get these in some water.”

Joel followed her into the apartment, shutting the door behind him. It was modest, minimally decorated but the walls had pictures strung all over them. He could already tell she was more sentimental than materialistic. The roses had been a good decision.

Y/n made her way to her kitchen, carefully balancing as she crouched down to dig through her cabinets for a vase. Flowers. He’d brought her flowers. What guy did that on a first date? Was that a Texas gentleman thing? She didn’t particularly care, it was one of the sweetest gestures someone had ever made towards her. And tying it back to the night they’d met made it that much sweeter.

“Nice place,” Joel called from the entry area. The apartment was open so if the front door was one end, the kitchen was stretched twenty feet away from it.

“It’s decent,” Y/n replied, filling the vase with water, “Moving was such a spur of the moment decision, I didn’t think I was going to find anything.”

Joel awkwardly balled his fists at his side, he didn’t want to walk too far and cross a line. It was only then that he realized there was music playing.

“Linda Ronstadt,” he blurted.

“Oh yeah,” Y/n smiled, heading over to turn off her record player, “You like her?”

“Love her,” Joel replied, good taste in music was another box ticked for him.

“Okay,” Y/n announced, more to encourage herself, and crossed the room, “All set.”

She grabbed her purse off the hook and Joel opened the door for her.

“Where are we going?” Y/n asked as she locked the door.

This was the part Joel was dreading most of all. “Yeah,” he began, shoving his hands in his pockets, “There’s a place ‘bout ten minutes away called Tito’s. It’s, uh, it’s not the fanciest place but-“

Feeling a sudden, and most likely brief, wave of confidence wash over her, Y/n turned around and put her hand on Joel’s chest.

“Hey,” she smiled, “I don’t care about any of that. I work in a hardware store, I’m not expecting Seasons 52.”

Weight both lifted and slammed into Joel’s chest. If Y/n’s laugh could warm it, her touch could give it new life.

A corner of his mouth quirked upwards, “Okay.”

With an affirmative nod, Y/n allowed Joel to lead her down the stairs, open the car door for her and take her deep into the Friday night Austin scene…

—————————————

Tito’s had ended up being the perfect place.

There was very little a fancy restaurant could add to a date. Sure, the setting could be romantic, but that didn’t guarantee romance. At the end of the day, whether you went to the biggest hotel in the city or a fast food joint, it all boiled down to feeling that spark.

Joel and Y/n’s spark could have set fire to Austin.

“So wait,” Y/n tried to contain her laughter, they were seated out on the patio, “Tommy seriously nailed his pants…to the wall?”

Joel took a swig of his Budweiser and shrugged, “And tried to blame the nail gun.”

Y/n covered her mouth as she snorted, “So no tequila the night before a job anymore, huh?”

Joel shook his head, pointing off into the distance, “And a mile down the road, he just shot straight up in bed because I told you that story.”

Another round of laughter. “Oh gosh,” Y/n sniffled, “Can’t imagine what you two were like as kids.”

“You have any brothers or sisters?” Joel asked, every time he asked her a question, he got to stare at her. It had made him more chatty than usual.

“Two,” Y/n answered, “Sister and a brother, both older.”

“Baby of the family,” Joel observed.

“Yes, and as the age-old tale goes,” Y/n scrunched her nose and smiled, “I’m the little lost bird. Brother’s an Ivy League english teacher who vacations in Europe every year. My sister’s married to a ridiculously successful doctor and just had a baby.”

Joel listened carefully, coming up confused. “I’m not following,” he said, wiping his mouth with his napkin, “What about that makes you lost?”

“They’re both very settled,” Y/n answered, swirling her beer, “They both knew exactly what they wanted in life and they went for it. One of the whole reasons I moved to Austin was to try and find that…thing, you know?”

Joel nodded, “Yeah, I get it,” he decided to lighten the mood, “And the hardware store’s it, huh?”

Y/n smiled and rolled her eyes, “No, the hardware store’s not it. But it makes me happy.”

“That’s a step in the right direction, then,” Joel commented, never taking his eyes off of her.

Y/n could have sat there for the rest of the night just enjoying the warmth of his stare. “So,” she shook herself out of the daze, “What about you? Is construction your thing?”

Joel laughed under his breath, “Pays the bills. Wasn’t originally what I saw myself doin’, but it’s work.”

“What did you want to do?” Y/n asked.

“Music,” Joel answered, “Guitar.”

Y/n’s eyes widened, “You play?”

“I used to,” Joel said, knowing the question that would come after. That was the true test…”Still do sometimes, just for myself.”

“What made you stop?”

Joel sighed, staring down at the condensation that his beer had formed on the table. Either he was about to bring the night to a grinding halt or…well, he hadn’t seen the second option yet. From anyone.

“I met someone,” he started, “We had a kid. She ran out on me pretty soon after. Not a lot of time left over to go around playin’ gigs.”

The chatter around them seemed to fade as Y/n took in the reality of Joel’s answer. He was a single father, and had been for a while, it seemed. All of him made complete sense suddenly. The constant worry lines on his face, the responsibility, the work ethic…

“Boy or a girl?” Y/n took a chance and asked.

“Girl,” Joel answered, a small smile coming to his face, “She’s about to turn thirteen.”

Y/n continued, “What’s her name?”

Joel was surprised, more than surprised, that Y/n wasn’t running the other way. There weren’t a lot of women who willingly took on single dads. Here she was wanting to learn about his little family.

“Sarah.”

Y/n nodded, letting the information rest on the table. “Sarah,” she echoed, “What’s she like?”

“She’s…” Joel let out a laugh under his breath, “She’s incredible. Gets straight A’s, plays soccer, got room in her heart for just about everyone she meets…”

Y/n listened enthusiastically as Joel told stories about his stories as a single dad. How Tommy was helping to raise Sarah, how the three of them were extremely tight knit, how he wished his long hours didn’t interfere with getting to spend time with her…not even for a second did she think about leaving.

“You love her so much,” Y/n blurted before she could think it through. She just had to say it.

Joel smiled warmly over his beer bottle, “She’s my world.”

It was a moment so tender, it almost broke your heart. Joel was letting Y/n closer than anyone else had gotten…ever. And she wasn’t pulling away, she was digging in.

Inside the restaurant, there was soft music playing over a dance floor. Joel and Y/n had eyed it all evening, wondering if their night would inevitably end up there. From outside on the patio, they could hear the song change to one they both knew.

“I love this song,” Y/n said in passing.

Joel had been waiting all night for his nerves to calm or for the perfect song to transcend pass the anxiety. This was as good as it was going to get.

“You wanna dance?”

Y/n’s smile spread across her face, “Yeah.”

Joel stood and held out his hand for Y/n to take, their palms tingling at the touch. He kept a loose hold on it as he led her into the building, snaking through the crowd and onto the dance floor. Their were couples packed wall to wall, but they were able to find a pocket of space just for them.

Y/n’s heart did double time as she rested her hand on Joel’s broad shoulder. Joel pulled her towards him, connecting their hands and holding them up. They hadn’t yet been this close and it felt as intoxicating as they thought it might.

Joel’s hand rested on the higher part of Y/n’s hip. He exhaled shakily, hoping she hadn’t noticed. Slowly, they began to sway to the soft guitar.

The world was on fire and no one could save me but you….

It’s strange what desire will make foolish people do….

They moved as one, Y/n’s gaze resting over Joel’s shoulder because she knew if she looked in his eyes, she’d be overwhelmed.

Joel’s desires were doing battle with his self-control. He wanted to wrap himself around her entirely, leaving no space between their bodies. He would, of course, leave it up to her. She got to decide where the night went.

I never dreamed that I'd meet somebody like you…

And I never dreamed that I'd lose somebody like you…

Their chests brushed against each other, sending a thrill through their bodies. The second it started to fade, Y/n chased it, inching closer to Joel till their torsos aligned.

Joel’s head instinctively turned towards her just as she looked up. Y/n’s nose grazed his cheek, his beard delightfully scraping her skin. If they had intended to make eye contact, they never made it there. With Joel’s breath fanning her face and the scent of his cologne enveloping her, Y/n didn’t dare move and disturb the perfection.

No, I don't wanna fall in love…

(This world is only gonna break your heart)

Feeling confidant that she wouldn’t pull away, Joel’s arm slid around Y/n’s waist, his hand resting across her lower back. Y/n’s skin felt inflamed, like the building’s walls had fallen and the heat of the night was swallowing her whole. Her cheek fell against Joel’s closing the very last bit of space that laid between them.

No, I don't wanna fall in love…

(This world is only gonna break your heart)

With you…

That was it, it was a done deal. There was nothing left for them to do but let themselves fall. Their hearts hammered in time with one another, their respective anxiety intertwining at the base of their souls and transfiguring. Instead of a storm, raging, crashing, knocking them over, it became a wave, powerful and passionate. Drawing strength from each other, they allowed the full force of their feelings to flood them.

When the night was over, Joel drove Y/n back to her apartment. They’d chatted on the drive over, but the dance had left them both stunned. Where was there to go from there? What were they supposed to say when a whole conversation had been had in each other’s arms?

They walked up the stairs, coming to Y/n’s door and nervously pausing.

“I had a great time,” Y/n said, fiddling with her keys in one hand.

“Me too,” Joel smiled, broader than his usual thin lipped smirk.

The space between them grew tense. Who was supposed to ask who out for a second date? Were they supposed to kiss? What was-

“So…” Joel set aside all his excessive thoughts, “Did I earn a shot at a second date?”

A laugh rippled through Y/n’s body, thankful that he’d been the one to bring it up. Drawing from Joel’s confidence, she closed the space between them and placed a hand on Joel’s shoulder.

“I think your chances are pretty good,” she softly told him.

Joel’s heart throbbed at both Y/n’s touch and her words. His hand found its way to her waist, not wanting to let the closeness go just yet. They only needed to move a few inches, just a few measly inches and then they’d have it all.

Joel’s breath fanned Y/n’s lips as they allowed themselves to be drawn into one another. The delicious space, hanging on the edge of desire and satisfaction, was enough for them. That was how they knew there was something different to what they felt. Just to be close was enough.

“Maybe we should wait,” Y/n whispered in their shared space, pressing her fingers into Joel’s shoulder a little, “Wouldn’t want to rush anything.”

The tip of Joel’s nose rubbed hers, admitting a defeat that didn’t feel like one. “Wouldn’t want you to think you can take advantage of me or somethin’,” Joel smirked, “I have my reputation to think of.”

Y/n’s laugh mingled with Joel’s, her skin tingling as he brushed a stray piece of hair from her face.

“I’ll call you,” Joel assured.

“I hope so,” Y/n smiled before daring to press her lips to his cheek, “Goodnight, Joel.”

“Goodnight,” Joel choked out, the touch of her kiss paralyzing him.

She unlocked her front door and headed in, Joel stood on the welcome mat until the lock clicked. Alone in the concrete hall, he boyishly kicked his foot and grinned.

Y/n rested her forehead against the front door, shaking her head and grinning.

Joel got down to his truck, started it up and fell back in his seat.

Y/n laughed against the door, playing the night back in her head.

Joel smiled and slapped the steering wheel.

They felt weightless.

—————————

2023. Outside Boston.

Grief hung like a storm cloud over the group.

Y/n had left Joel and Ellie to make a lavatory out of nature, and was walking back. They’d camped overnight in a forest, a few miles outside of Boston. Joel had instructed they were leaving as soon as the sun came up.

When she got back to their camp, she found Ellie sitting up against her tree near the creek, Joel’s jacket draped over her legs.

“He’s still not back?” Y/n asked.

“Nope,” Ellie popped her lips.

Y/n rolled her eyes, if Joel was going to boss them around, he needed to comply with his own demands. She set off into the forest, going the same way he had.

The sound of the larger creek welcomed her. She scanned the area, looking for Joel’s tall frame and finding nothing. She slapped her hands against her legs in a shrug, if anything had happened to him, they’d be dead too. Where was-

The scrape of stones caught her ear.

Y/n gazed down to see Joel, hunched over on the river’s bed of rocks. With a fair bit of distance between them, Y/n could see him stacking stones. He was building a cairn.

He was building Tess a grave.

Y/n’s feelings contradicted themselves. Joel’s loss of the woman he cared for felt karmic, in a way, and yet the sight of him, so broken and empty, reminded her that bitterness had no place commingling with loss.

She didn’t disturb his memorial, she simply leaned against a nearby tree. Tess’ last wish hadn’t been selfish, she had begged for protection for Joel. They were, perhaps, the most heartbreaking final words Y/n had ever heard. She’d promised Tess, what else was she supposed to do? She couldn’t let Tess die in a horrific sacrifice thinking that Joel would meet her soon after.

Y/n sighed, letting her head hit the tree. The day was already exhausting her.

She decided to let Joel have a few extra minutes, walking back to their campsite. Ellie was in the exact same position as when she left. All of this trauma was being rehashed for one girl, but Y/n still believed she was worth it.

Footsteps behind her signaled that Joel was back from his solitary service. He didn’t look in either Y/n or Ellie’s direction, only trudging to his backpack and squatting beside it. It had been a near silent walk from Boston, Ellie asking Y/n an occasional question or Joel giving directions. They were all avoiding each other for different reasons.

Joel blamed Ellie.

Y/n blamed Joel.

And Ellie blamed no one, but could sense tension when she saw it.

“You want your jacket back?” Ellie asked Joel, testing the waters.

Joel continued digging through his backpack, responding with a small shake of the head. He still refused to look at her. The only gesture he made was after digging out and taking a bite of food, he threw the remainders to Ellie.

“I’ve never been in the woods,” the girl continued talking, “More bugs than I thought.”

Y/n leaned up against a tree, waiting and watching how the interaction played out.

“Look, I’ve been thinking about-“ Ellie started.

Joel rose to his feet, throwing his backpack over his shoulder, “I don’t want your sorries.”

Ellie sat forward, “I wasn’t gonna say I’m sorry. I was gonna say that I’ve been thinking about what happened. Nobody made you or Tess take me. Nobody made you go along with this plan. You needed a truck battery or whatever, and you made a choice. So don’t blame me for something that isn’t my fault.”

Joel’s eyes scanned Ellie before looking to Y/n, who simply raised an eyebrow at him. She was in total agreement. And the truth was, Joel didn’t have a reason to put any of what happened on Ellie. But he wanted someone to be angry with, someone to fling his grief at so that he wouldn’t have to deal with it any longer.

The rational side of him won out. He gave Ellie a small nod, mentally collected himself and picked up his rifle. It was time to hit the road.

Ellie got up and handed Joel his jacket, “How much longer?”

“Five-hour hike,” he answered.

Y/n collected her backpack, tied her jacket around her waist and came to stand with Ellie.

“We can manage that,” the girl shrugged, she was the most confidant out of all three of them.

Joel glanced over at Y/n again, the two of them communicating their indifference wordlessly, before turning on his heel.

Y/n put a hand on Ellie’s head and waited for Joel to be out of earshot, “Attagirl.”

Ellie smiled up at the woman and they fell in step a few feet behind their guide.

Joel got them out of the woods and onto a dirt path, leading their party silently and expecting the same in return. Y/n was perfectly content not to utter a word, but Joel was quickly learning something she already knew; Ellie didn’t do “quiet.”

“You’ve gone this way a lot? No infected?”

“Not often, no,” Joel answered.

“What are you looking out for?” Ellie asked.

“People.”

“Oh,” she rested a beat, “Are Bill and Frank nice?”

“Frank is.”

Y/n stepped forward to walk alongside them, keeping to Ellie’s side. “You haven’t told us anything about them,” she spoke up.

“There’s nothing to tell,” Joel answered.

“I’m entrusting two strangers with our lives,” Y/n scoffed, “There’s a lot to tell.”

“They’re good,” Joel said with finality to his tone.

“Oh, well…” Y/n mumbled under her breath, she was over the whole What-I-Say-Goes front.

Ellie was undeterred by their bickering. “How’d you get that scar on your head?”

Joel sighed, already exasperated and it was barely morning.

“What? Is it something lame?” Ellie inquired excitedly, “Like, you fell down the stairs or something?”

“I didn’t fall down any stairs,” Joel answered.

“Okay, so what then?”

Joel paused before speaking, “Someone shot at me and missed.”

Y/n hated the jolt of concern that shot through her chest. Old habits and all that.

“See, that’s cool,” Ellie insisted, “You shoot back?”

“Yeah,” Joel said.

“You get him?”

“No, I missed too. It happens more often than you think.”

Ellie thought it over, “‘Cause you suck at shooting or, like, in general?”

Joel glanced at her, vaguely insulted, “In general.”

Ellie fell back a step to get a look at Y/n. “What about you?”

“What about me?” Y/n echoed.

“How’d you get this scar?” Ellie poked the white mark on her bare shoulder. She didn’t feel comfortable touching Joel, but she was comfortable with Y/n.

By now, Y/n had scars littered all across her body. Ellie could have pointed to almost any one of them and she would have had to think about where it came from. But the one in the rivet nestled between her scapula and her clavicle was one she could never forget.

“A bullet ricocheted off a wall,” she answered, “Hit me instead.”

“That’s slightly less cool than his,” Ellie commented.

Joel caught himself before he hung back a step to get a look at the mark. It was instinct to worry about her.

“You know, seeing as it’s just the three of us,” Ellie began, “I was thinking I should prob-“

“No,” Joel cut her off, already knowing what she was after.

“Yeah, well, Y/n might feel different,” Ellie said, looking to her only ally.

“She doesn’t,” Y/n answered, smirking slightly at her blind enthusiasm.

They walked a few more feet before coming up on a once-white building.

“Cumberland Farms,” Ellie read the sign.

“Hang back a minute,” Joel instructed them both, though he knew it was useless, “I gotta grab some stuff I stashed.”

“Stashed?” Ellie questioned as she followed, “Why do you have stuff stashed here?”

“You ask a lot of damn questions,” Joel complained.

“Yes,” Ellie smiled, owning every bit of her personality, “I do.”

Joel forced open the door to the old storefront and they entered. It looked just about the same as how he and Tess had left it a few years back.

“So are you gonna answer me or what?” Ellie continued.

Joel relented, “We hide supplies on routes, in case we find ourselves short on gear, which I currently am ‘cause-“

“No way,” Ellie zipped over to the other side of the room, honing in on an old arcade game.

Joel ignored her, Y/n simply smiled to herself.

“You ever play this one?” Ellie asked without really seeking an answer, “Oh, I had a friend who knew everything about this game. There’s this one character named Mileena, who takes off her mask and she has monster teeth-“

While Ellie continued chattering, Joel was pacing the floor, trying to remember where his hiding place had been. Y/n crossed her arms and watched amusedly.

“You forgot where you put your stuff,” Ellie stated.

Joel was quick to defend himself, “No, I’m just zeroing in on it. It’s been a couple of years.”

Ellie and Y/n peered over at one another, sharing a knowing smirk.

“Go see if you can find anything in back,” Y/n instructed, Ellie would have gone even without the prompting, “Practical.”

“Trust me, it’s all been picked over already,” Joel grunted, shaking a wall display.

“Maybe, maybe not,” Ellie replied in a sing-song tone, “Is there anything bad in here?”

“Just you,” Joel called out.

“Ah,” Ellie rolled her eyes, “Getting funnier…”

Y/n set down her backpack, deciding to help speed up the process so they could get back on the road. She walked over to a section of floor that Joel hadn’t searched yet and started kicking around.

“I don’t need help,” Joel muttered.

“If we leave it to you and your shitty memory,” Y/n strained as she shoved a shelving unit with her shoulder, “We’ll be here till dark.”

Joel didn’t want to get drawn into an argument, he also couldn’t resist the person starting it. “My memory’s fine.”

“Oh, really?” Y/n waved a hand across the floor, “Point to the treasure.”

Joel’s lips thinned in frustration, mostly with himself for not being able to find the stash before she latched onto it.

“It’s somewhere on this aisle,” he begrudgingly told her.

“This aisle,” she repeated, the two of them going in opposite directions.

After a minute or two, there was a sound from the back room. “You all right back there?” Joel called.

“Yep!” Ellie replied.

“How likely is it that she’s doing something she shouldn’t be?” Joel asked Y/n, who had weeks more experience curbing Ellie.

Y/n jumped in place on a loose piece of the floor, “100%.”

Joel exhaled and continued searching, eventually feeling a slight raise in one of the tiles. He kicked a few old newspapers aside to discover his hiding spot. And better yet, he’d found it before Y/n did, taking away the opportunity for gloating.

He knelt down and flipped open his pocketknife, cutting open the cover and removing it.

Y/n stopped her hunt and came to crouch down next to him, visually sifting through the supplies. There wasn’t much.

It went against Joel’s natural programming to not be concerned when the back room went silent. Ellie had been gone long enough to have picked through everything at least twice. “Ellie?”

No response.

Now Y/n was on edge as well, rising with Joel. She raised her voice a little louder than him, “Ellie?”

They both unholstered their guns, walking in rhythm together towards the back room. Joel stuck a hand out to form a barrier between whatever unknown threat might have been lurking and Y/n. She annoyedly shoved it away and aimed her gun at the doorway.

They unclenched when Ellie walked out, touting a box of tampons. “Picked over, my ass,” she commented.

Y/n and Joel returned to the stash, Joel unloading his assault rifle and Y/n picking through a tin of first aid supplies.

“What are you doing?” Ellie asked Joel.

“There’s not much ammo out there for this thing,” he replied, bringing the lid back down over the supplies, “Makes it mostly useless.”

Ellie saw an opportunity, “Well, if you’re just gonna leave it there…”

Joel stood to his feet and made direct eye contact, “No.”

Y/n stood up, slung her backpack over her shoulder and lightly pushed Ellie ahead of her. Tess was no longer there to keep occupy Joel and she wanted to put as much space between the two of them as possible.

They were on the dirt road for another hour or two, time didn’t seem to matter in the middle of nowhere. Ellie barely complained, content to take in all that nature had left to offer. At some point, Y/n and Joel had fallen in step with one another. Even sworn enemies would have cracked under pressure and started hurling insults at one another. Their ability to stay silent with one another was unmatched.

“So,” Ellie eventually killed the quiet, “Are you ever going to tell me?”

“Tell you what?” Y/n replied.

“Why you two broke up.”

Joel scrunched his eyes shut, the darkness of his lids a more preferable place to be.

Y/n took the hit and answered, “We never said we dated.”

“You didn’t have to. You knew each other in Texas but you don’t talk,” Ellie began to list off her reasons, “And when you do talk, it’s only to fight.”

“Friends fight too,” Y/n suggested.

Ellie scoffed, “Not like you two.”

There was passion that bled through Joel and Y/n’s arguments that was only born from love. It was one thing they’d never be able to change.

“You don’t need to say anything,” Ellie continued, “I’ll just know that I’m right.”

Joel stopped short, putting a hand up to Ellie and trying to stay calm. “You do not need to say every fuckin’ thing that pops into your head,” he said, driving certain syllables harder than others.

Ellie was unfazed by him, turning her gaze to Y/n. “Was he always this grumpy?”

Y/n sighed, her time in Austin was a piece of her past she didn’t want anyone having. The obviousness of her and Joel’s fractured connection bothered her, it made it that much harder to sever it entirely. She picked up the pace again, getting ahead of Joel and Ellie.

Joel’s eyes followed her, something inside of him twinging against his will. He spared a glance at Ellie and continued on the path.

“Yeah,” Ellie smiled to herself, “They dated.”

They walked a little further before Ellie got distracted by something in a field. “Holy shit,” she exclaimed.

Up on a hilltop lay the rusted remains of a plane crash. The three of them stopped, it was getting harder for Joel and Y/n to remember a world where things like airplanes had existed.

“You fly in one of those?” Ellie asked,

“A few times, sure,” Joel answered.

“Yeah,” Y/n said.

Ellie’s excited eyes scanned the wreck, “So lucky.”

“Didn’t feel like it at the time,” Joel recalled, “Get shoved into a middle seat, pay twelve bucks for a sandwich…”

“Or hit turbulence,” Y/n remembered.

“You got to go up in the sky,” Ellie stated, her voice filled with wonder. Another simple pleasure stolen from her…

Joel had always been more of a realist than Y/n, who wanted Ellie to hold on to whatever pieces of happiness she could. “Yeah, well, so did they,” he added, killing the levity of the moment.

“Grim…” Ellie commented as they continued walking. “So everything came crashing down in one day?”

“Pretty much,” Joel answered, giving Y/n space to interject. She’d gone silent again.

“How?” Ellie asked, “I mean, no one was infected with Cordyceps, everybody’s fine, eating in restaurants and flying in planes. And then all at once? How did it even start? If you have to get bit to be infected, then who bit the first person? Was it a monkey? I bet it was a monkey.”

Y/n almost laughed at the absurdity of it all. Almost.

“It wasn’t a monkey,” Joel answered, “I thought you went to school.”

“FEDRA school,” Ellie replied quickly, “They don’t teach us how their shitty government failed to prevent a pandemic.”

Joel sighed, he couldn’t fault her for wanting to know how her world was destroyed before she’d even gotten there.

“No one knows for sure, but, best guess,” he began, “Cordyceps mutated. And some of it got into the food supply. Probably a basic ingredient like flour or sugar. There were certain brands of food that were sold everywhere, all across the country, all across the world. Bread, cereal…”

Joel and Y/n didn’t have to look at one another to know they were having the same thought.

“Pancake mix,” Joel continued, “You eat enough of it, it’ll get you infected. So the tainted food all hits the store shelves around the same time, Thursday. People bought it, ate some Thrusday night or Friday morning. Day goes on…they started to get sick. Afternoon, evening, they got worse,” Joel paused, a flash of blood coming to his mind, “Then they started bitin’.”

Y/n shut her eyes, as if it was all playing out in front of her again.

“Friday night,” Joel was able to push out, “September 26th, 2003. And by Monday, everything was gone.”

Y/n didn’t know whether to scream or stay quiet. Her entire world had come crashing down in a span of 72 hours.

“It makes more sense than monkeys,” Ellie said, then looked at Joel, “Thanks.”

“Sure,” he replied. Joel still wasn’t sure what to do with her, but he was trying. He only had to try for a few more hours, anyway.

Y/n kept her eyes down as she walked, only stopping when Ellie and Joel fell out of step. Joel had his arm stretched over Ellie’s chest to keep her in place.

“What now?” Y/n asked, nearing her breaking point with patience.

“We’ll cut across the woods here,” Joel directed.

“Isn’t the road easier?” Ellie asked.

“Yeah, it’s just,” Joel took a breath, looking ahead to Y/n, “There’s stuff up there you shouldn’t see.”

Y/n chortled, she couldn’t take any more of his mood swings. One minute he didn’t care, the next he was watching out for their sensitive eyes?

“Well, now I have to see,” Ellie sang, walking ahead to join Y/n.

“I don’t want you to,” Joel pushed.

“Newsflash, Joel,” Y/n announced, “It’s the fucking apocalypse. We’ve all seen things we don’t want to see.”

Joel paced after them, chasing Ellie more than his ex, “I’m not kidding. Ellie!”

“Can it hurt us?” Ellie asked as Y/n fell behind her.

“No,” Joel answered truthfully.

She spun around to face him as she strolled, “You’re too honest, man, Should’ve said axe murderer.”

While Ellie walked ahead, Joel sped up to match Y/n’s pace. “I’m serious, she shouldn’t see it.”

“You know what,” Y/n didn’t break stride, “I’m sure our delicate little sensibilities can handle whatever it is.”

Anger is intoxicating, but it can also be all-encompassing. It can numb all other senses, blinding all other emotions until the red is staining every part of someone’s perspective. Y/n’s rage with Joel was deceiving her into thinking everything that came out of his mouth was either an insult or an overreaction. Joel knew that the second she found what he was trying to shield her and Ellie from, she’d regret it instantly. But it was futile to fight her.

“Uh, whatever it was,” Ellie called from the front of the group, “Think it’s gone.”

Y/n felt sure of herself as she trudged on, until the details of Ellie’s expression came into view and she followed the girl’s eyes. There in a ditch, lay skeletal remains. If you reconstructed them, they probably made up about a dozen people.

“About a week after Outbreak Day, soldiers…” Joel started to explain to Ellie, “Went through the countryside, evacuated the small towns. Told you you were going to a QZ, and you were…if there was room…if there wasn’t…”

“These people weren’t sick?” Ellie inquired.

“No,” Joel replied, “Probably not.”

“Why kill them?” Ellie continued, “Why not just leave ‘em be?”

“It was their fucked up way of trying to contain the infection,” Y/n spoke up, trying to hide her trembling breath. It wasn’t the first open grave she’d seen, this was one of the easier ones to stomach. This was all bones.

Y/n turned on her heel, eager to get as far away from the hellish memories as she could.

————————————

Eventually, they made it to where Joel told them Bill and Frank lived. It was a small chunk of a town completely gated by a tall fence.

“Stay here,” Joel instructed Y/n and Ellie before punching in the entry code on the gate’s keypad. He let them go through first, it was the only place safe enough to do so.

Y/n’s breath caught in her chest, it was the first time she’d seen an actual town in…she’d lost count of the years. The white picket fences, the boutique shops, the houses. Actual houses. It nearly brought tears to her eyes, it reminded her so much of Austin.

The three of them walked to Bill and Frank’s house, the nicest looking one on the block. Joel took notice, however, that the flowers decorating the front porch were dead. Scorched by the sun. Bill would never let that happen.

He opened the front door, taking cautious steps into the entryway. Y/n and Ellie followed close behind.

“What the fuck,” Ellie elongated, it was probably her first time inside an actual house.

“Bill?” Joel called out. No answer. “Frank?” Nothing.

Shit.

“You stay there,” Joel directed Ellie, not looking Y/n’s way since she was going to do what she wanted anyway, “Ya hear anything, you see anything…yell.”

Joel and Y/n didn’t make it more than one step before Ellie spoke up, “What if they’re gone?”

No. Joel couldn’t think about that. He didn’t want to grieve over one more person.

Y/n set off down the hallway, keeping her pistol drawn at her side. Joel had gone through the kitchen, but the two rooms were connected. They made it to the bedroom door at the same time, Joel knocking and jiggling the knob. Nothing.

“Would they leave?” Y/n asked.

“No,” Joel shook his head.

The back porch door shutting got their attention.

“Ellie?” Y/n called, getting nothing in return. She set off back to the dining room where they’d left her, Joel just a step behind.

She was sitting at the table holding a piece of paper. Her expression was undeterminable, like she was between emotions and deciding which one to land on.

“It’s from Bill,” she finally told them.

Y/n sighed, holstering her gun, taking off her backpack and settling into a chair between Joel and Ellie. Joel put away his weapon too, neither of them needed to pretend there was any hope.

Ellie scanned the envelope the letter had come from, “‘To whomever…but probably Joel,’” she tossed it back onto the table, “I figured I fell under “whomever.” It came with this.”

She slid a single car key across the table.

Joel shrugged his backpack off next to Y/n’s, but wouldn’t sit. “So they’re dead?”

“Mm-hmm,” Ellie hummed.

Joel turned away, the very little emotion he let himself feel coming to the surface.

“You-you wanna?” Ellie offered.

He shook his head, “Go ahead. You do it.”

Y/n leaned against her knees, holding her hands to her lips, bracing herself.

“August 29th, 2023,” Ellie began to read, “If you find this…please do not come into the bedroom. We left a window open so the house wouldn’t smell, but it will probably be a sight. I’m guessing you found this, Joel, because anyone else would’ve been electrocuted or blown up by one of my traps. Hehehehehehe-“

Ellie looked up in confusion, Y/n gave a small nod for her to continue.

“Take anything you need,” she kept going, “The bunker code is the gate code but in reverse. Anyway…I never liked you, but still, it’s like we’re friends, almost…And I respect you. So, I’m gonna tell you something because you’re probably the only person who will understand. I used to hate the world and I was happy when everyone died. But I was wrong, because there was one person worth saving. That’s what I did. I saved him. Then I protected him. That’s why men like you and me are here. We have a job to do, and God help any motherfuckers who stand in our way. I leave you all of my weapons and equipment. Use them to keep-“

Ellie sucked her bottom lip, not knowing how to proceed. None of them had to ask what the next two words were.

Joel stepped forward robotically and took the letter, reading the rest over silently. Tess’ name struck a blow to his body, he wanted to curl in on himself.

“Stay here,” he mumbled, striding towards the front door with barely contained hurry.

Y/n shut her eyes, keeping her hands in a praying position. It was the first time in twenty years she couldn’t tap into the anger that lived inside her. She felt pure sorrow that Joel had to lose someone else he loved, regardless of whether he’d ever admit to loving Tess.

Outside, Joel took deep breaths that at one time would have been described as cleansing. But he felt no better when he inhaled than he had before. Bill’s letter weren’t just his last wishes, it was a call to action. He couldn’t have known the situation Joel was in when he wrote it, but he supernaturally addressed every part of it. He lifted up a silent apology to Tess, for not being able to save her.

Joel crumpled the letter in his palms and let it drop to the grass. He held up the key Bill had left him, forcing himself to move to the garage doors and open them.

Y/n and Ellie sat up straighter upon hearing the noise. “Stay here,” Y/n echoed Joel, rising up and heading out to see what he was doing.

She walked around to the open garage doors to see Joel hunched over the front of a truck. The hood was open and he was investigating its internal organs. Y/n had barely caught a glance at the empty spot where the battery should have been before Joel slammed it shut. There went that happy thought…

Joel’s eye caught the refrigerator nearby, a couple cans of oil and other auto supplies sitting on top of it. Bill had been a survivalist, it was his nature to prepare for every possible outcome. He crossed the space and opened the fridge, spotting the materials needed to construct a car battery from scratch

He smirked, maybe they had been friends…

Y/n joined him at the door, she was no mechanic but the men throughout her life, Joel and Tommy included, had taught her enough about car repair to know they were battery parts. A spark of hope lit inside her.

It dwindled in both her and Joel when the reality of what it meant hit them.

Y/n suddenly felt too close to him, she moved away and crossed her arms, going to stand on the furthest side of the truck. Joel didn’t move until she stopped, coming to stand on the other side of the vehicle. They wanted a proper barricade between them.

Y/n had made a promise to Tess that she would protect both Ellie and Joel. In the moment, it had seemed like the only honorable thing to do. Now, staring down the task itself, she wanted to admit her selfishness and run. Run back to the QZ, back to the Fireflies, back to the only semblance of safety she had. And with every turn she made in her mind, Ellie was waiting for her. Ellie was at the center of this all. She was the job. Everything else came second.

“If we do this,” Y/n started, her words slowly and cautiously calculated, “You are going to have to start treating me like an equal. I am not some delicate flower that you need to protect and I’m not some child in need of protection. We’ve already got one of those. I live in the same world you do. I didn’t hesitate to kill that Clicker,” she pointed behind them as if the monster’s carcass was present, “And I won’t hesitate going forward.”

Joel looked up at her out his eyebrows, “Can you blame me, last time I knew you?”

“We don’t need to keep bringing us up,” Y/n shook her head, a joyless smile on her face, “We are completely different people. Matter of fact, think of us as strangers. We only know each other from this point forward.”

Joel thought it over a second, accepting the truth of it. “Okay,” he said, “But you have to trust me that I know the best way to get to Wyoming-“

“I don’t trust you,” Y/n retorted.

“I don’t trust you either,” he echoed, bitterness rising to both their surfaces.

Y/n bit down on her bottom lip, if this was going to work, they needed to put away all of their past. Not just the good parts.

“We have to put this on ice,” she said, “What matters…is her. That is all that matters. Not us, not what happened…her.”

Joel’s thumb twitched against the hood of the truck. There were many questions he’d been wanting to ask Y/n, but there was one that was non-negotiable if he was going to take on this task with her

“Do you actually believe that she’s the answer to this?”

Y/n’s face softened, only slightly, but enough for Joel to see the gleam hope in her eyes. “I do,” she replied, earnestly.

Joel breathed a heavy sigh, looking down at the truck. He glanced back up at Y/n, scanning her up and down as if to take full stock of the woman she was now. “Okay.”

Y/n nodded, her body alight with apprehension. “Okay.”

A ceasefire had been called.

“I’ll start on the battery,” Joel announced, eager to get away from the conversation as quick as he could, “Can you do a once over on this thing?”

“Yeah,” she answered, forcing past the hurdle that was doing something Joel asked of her.

They worked in silence, Y/n checking that the car was in working condition and Joel constructing their battery. It was the first time they’d been able to tolerate each other’s presence in the last two days.

After a half hour, when Y/n was long past done, Joel stepped back and examined his work. “It’s gotta charge for a while,” he announced, “But it’ll work.”

“Okay,” Y/n sighed, glancing over at him before heading back out the garage. Joel was close behind.

They came back into the house, finding Ellie waiting for them at the table still.

“Show me your arm,” Joel ordered, he needed to be 100% certain that she was safe to transport.

Ellie stood and rolled up her sleeve, the second bite still had blood caked around it, but it was clearly healing. They had no reason to doubt it would continue that way.

“I just finished makin’ a truck battery,” Joel said, “It’s charging right now.”

“Okay,” Ellie replied, her face showing a hint of hope.

“And I have a brother in Wyoming,” Joel continued, “He’s in some kinda trouble, and I’m heading out there to find him. He used to be a Firefly. And my guess is he knows where some of ‘em are out there. Maybe they can get you two to wherever this lab is.”

Ellie’s eyes bounced between Y/n and Joel, “All right. Uh,” she began to fiddle with her hand, “Listen, about Tess-“

Joel held up a hand, he took a second to collect himself before speaking. “If I’m takin’ you with me, there’s some rules you gotta follow. Rule one, you don’t bring up Tess. Ever. Matter of fact, we can just keep our histories to ourselves.”

Y/n made a mental note of where Joel was emotionally.

“Rule two, you don’t tell anyone about your…condition,” Joel focused his eyes on Ellie, trying to drive the point home, “They see that bite mark, they won’t think it through. They’ll just shoot you. Rule three,” he pointed between him and Y/n, “You do what we say, when we say it. We clear?”

“Yes,” Ellie answered.

“Repeat it,” Joel demanded.

Ellie took a breath, “What you say goes,” she looked between the two adults once more, “Are you two gonna be able to get along?”

Joel glanced over his shoulder at Y/n, who was leaned up against the door frame. She had her hands tucked behind her as if she was trying to make herself as small as possible. They communicated their truce with their eyes.

“We’ll be fine,” Y/n said to Ellie, maybe saying it would make it so…

Joel sighed, it felt like he was signing on a metaphorical dotted line. “Okay,” he finally said.

The three of them stood in the dining room, all with their own separate reservations but with no choice in the matter. They needed each other, even if no one dared to admit it.

“So what now?” Ellie broke the silence.

“We grab what we can,” Joel responded, “Let’s check the bunker first.”

He brushed past Y/n, who followed with Ellie in tow, and located the hidden entrance to Bill’s bunker. Joel climbed down the ladder first into the pitch black room. Flipping on the lights revealed walls of canned goods, guns, supplies, various tools and first aid kits. In the middle lay a desk setup with a laptop playing music and monitor screens showing footage of outside the house.

“Ho-ly shit,” Ellie said for both her and Y/n, “This guy was a genius.”

“Little bit,” Y/n added, scanning the walls, “Back then, everyone called people like him crazy. I’m guessing he was okay with it.”

Joel went to work at the computer, switching off the song.

“Why was the music on?” Ellie asked.

“If he didn’t reset the countdown every few weeks,” Joel explained, “This playlist would run over the radio.”

Ellie glanced over the screen, assured now of her theory from the day before about Joel’s radio codes. “‘80s.”

Joel didn’t really care anymore, “Grab some cans from over there. Nothin’ dented or swollen.”

Ellie wasn’t so easily distracted, she was still gazing at the guns. “Dude,” she started to draft another pitch.

“No,” he replied without even looking up at her.

“There’s a whole wall of them,” she declared, as if that made a difference.

Joel shot her a glare, signaling there was no discussion to be had. Searching Y/n out again and receiving a frown in response, Ellie backed off and went to collect the canned goods.

Y/n traced her fingers across the wall of guns. She doubted her pistol was going to get them very far. It had taken an assault rifle and an axe just to kill the Clicker that had attacked them.

She loathed to ask Joel for help, but she was good at shooting, not specs. “Which one takes the most basic ammo?”

Joel peered up from the monitor screens, the sight of her standing amongst so many weapons was still a little shocking. “That beige and black one,” he nodded in her direction, “Standard shotgun.”

Y/n nodded once in awkward thanks and removed the gun from the wall, testing the weight and feel of it. She crossed the room to one of Bill’s work tables and took a box of bullets, stuffing it in her jacket pocket.

“I’m gonna start upstairs,” she announced, strapping the shotgun over her back and climbing up the ladder.

The three of them worked around the house, collecting any and all supplies they could possibly need. Ellie found toilet paper, Y/n found some unopened dry goods, Joel found clothes for them. It was strange to think that once upon a time, desires had felt like essentials. A new TV, concert tickets, expensive wine…Y/n felt like she was seeing heaven when Joel pulled out a box of women’s t-shirts.

Joel monitored the battery closely, it wasn’t charging as fast as he wanted it to. “Needs another hour,” he told them.

“They have hot water!” Ellie exclaimed, soaking her hand under the garage’s running faucet, “I’m takin’ a shower. And then you’re showering, because seriously,” she turned to Joel and scowled as he headed back to the house.

Joel stopped what he was doing, unsure of how to respond. “I smell that bad?”

Y/n was sorting through some shelves, collecting a few tools they could take with them for the truck. “I’m not even answering that,” she replied.

Joel took what he could from her answer. “You take the next one,” he offered, trying to put his money where he mouth was and bench their grudge.

“Should I be offended?” Y/n fired back, raising one eyebrow. “Thank you,” she finally said.

Joel gave a nod in reply before getting back to work.

Y/n eventually headed inside to wait for Ellie to be done. The girl emerged with wet hair in fresh clothes.

“That felt so good,” she groaned in happiness as she passed Y/n in the hall.

“I bet,” Y/n smiled, “There extra towels in there?”

“Yep,” Ellie called, she was already halfway down the stairs, passing Joel as she descended.

If Y/n and Joel had dodged any awkwardness in the past 48 hours, it had boomeranged back around and slammed into them. They stood in the hall, keeping three feet of space between them and struggled for words.

“I’ll be quick,” Y/n said finally, heading into the bedroom that connected to the bathroom.

“Sure,” Joel replied, fiddling with his fist at his side.

Showers were one thing that no one ever took for granted anymore. Water supply in the QZ wasn’t consistent, one day you could have warm water and the next it’d be ice cold. You couldn’t count on anything to stay the same. So when Y/n had complete control of the temperature and made it burning hot, she felt like she could cry from pure joy.

Joel stood outside the bedroom door, leaned up against the wall. He wasn’t sure what to do with himself. Sweet images of early mornings with Y/n stormed past his defenses, flooding his brain. How she looked with wet hair, the smell of her skin after using some soap he couldn’t remember the name of…he tried to ignore the fact that it was all on the other side of the door.

Y/n emerged from the shower a few minutes later, having gotten all the dirt out of her hair and nails, and wrapped a threadbare towel around her torso. She quickly dried off and changed into the new clothes Joel had found them. It was a plain t-shirt, a men’s button up to go over it and a plain pair of jeans. Gone were the days of dressing up because you felt like it. It was a stupid thing to miss, but Y/n felt the loss regardless.

Dressed, she opened the bathroom door. The sound signaled that Joel could come in.

He came around the corner, having just put his memories to bed when he saw her. Pruny, barefaced and natural…the way he’d always loved her.

“All yours,” Y/n muttered, unable to break the eye contact they held.

Joel cleared his throat and his mind, “Thanks.”

“I’m just gonna be here,” Y/n gestured to the dresser and the attached mirror, “Try and get a comb through my hair.”

“Okay,” Joel nodded.

He walked past her, their shoulders brushing as he did, and closed the bathroom door behind him. It was the first time they’d touched in twenty years.

Now anger was rarely ever born from just anger. No one hated someone just to hate them. There was always something deeper beneath it. More often than not, anger found a companion in heartbreak. They’d collide, morphing together to make something so complicated, you couldn’t tell one apart from the other.

Y/n reached for a spare comb, her trembling hands causing her hair to catch in the teeth. Harboring the anger had been effortless, it was a fire that stoked itself. It was the pain, the flame that started the blaze, that was causing her to feel like she was burning, from the inside out.

The tears welled in her eyes, she refused to let them fall until her reflection was nothing but a blur. She dropped the comb on the dresser, and fell back onto the bed. It could no longer be contained.

Joel had broken her, destroyed her. The loss of him was a hurt that had refused to fade with time. She could feel her heart splitting back open just being around him, the same way it had the day that they’d parted. She wanted to scream, to cry, to break the way she had after he’d left. With the simple act of calling a truce and playing nice, she had reopened the wound she had spent twenty years trying to heal with her unbridled bitterness. She was bleeding out.

On the other side of the door, Joel was propped up against the shower with one hand. Rivulets of the stream dripped down his hair and face. He stared down at the drain, his emotions mixing and swirling much like the water at his feet. Joel had never considered himself particularly favored by the world. There were only two times when he’d felt like there was some higher power bestowing happiness upon his unworthy head.

The first was when Sarah was born, when he got to hold her for the first time.

The second was when Y/n entered his life.

Now her mere presence felt like a punishment. A reminder of what he’d done to her, a child’s taunt of a love he could never go back to. Knowing she was on the other side of the wall caused every muscle in his body to tense. Joel was still himself, regardless of what the pandemic had turned him into. The guilt he’d long tried to drown was rising to the surface, threatening to rebel and throw him underwater. Mixed with the fresh loss of Tess, he was overwhelmed. If he didn’t keep repeating the same three things to himself, she lied, she’s a liar, she’ll lie again, he would collapse entirely.

Y/n sniffled, rubbing her fingers under her eyes in a desperate attempt to stop her tears. She was so tired of crying over Joel. She wished for blind hatred, not the memory of his smile. Bitter regret, not the ghost of his lips. She couldn’t take another time of looking into his eyes and seeing the man she had loved with her whole heart.

Had they known that with a mere twelve feet of space and one shoddy door between them, it still wouldn’t have changed anything. Their chapter was over.

Needing distance, Y/n got off the bed and combed her hair as she walked down the stairs. She found Ellie seated in the front room at the piano.

Ellie turned to her and smiled, “Well, that’s an improvement.”

Y/n bristled, “Be nice to me. I am keeping you alive, after all.”

Ellie hummed as if that was up for debate and turned back to the piano, “You ever learn to play one of these?”

“A little,” Y/n replied, coming to join her, “I played as a kid, not as much when I was an adult.”

“You wanna play something?” Ellie suggested, it didn’t feel like it was for Y/n’s benefit so much as her own.

Y/n motioned for Ellie to make room and settled in next to the girl. It had been over twenty years since she’d felt ivory beneath her fingers, and this one was a beautiful model. She wracked her brain for songs where all the chords were still intact.

She placed her hands accordingly, pressing down on the first keys.

“Slow down, you crazy child,” she softly sang, “You’re so ambitious for a juvenile. But then if you’re so smart, tell me, why are you still so afraid?”

“You can fucking sing?” Ellie cried excitedly.

“Where's the fire, what's the hurry about,” Y/n kept going, “You'd better cool it off before you burn it out. You've got so much to do and only so many hours in a day.”

Ellie swayed a little, taking in the curiosity of the person she hardly knew, yet liked better than anyone. She couldn’t help herself from sneaking a finger onto a key and quickly pressing down.

“Don’t mess me up,” Y/n laughed as she continued to play, “But you know that when the truth is told, that you can get what you want, or you can just get old.”

Joel had just pushed his wet hair back and buttoned up his shirt he’d found. Renewed by the hot water, he grabbed the stick of deodorant he’d used and left the bathroom. The music and it’s sweet accompaniment drifted through the bedroom door, hitting Joel and rendering him breathless for a moment. All he could feel was her, wrapping her arms around him with each word.

Ellie continued to hit random keys at inopportune times, Y/n’s knocked her shoulder against hers.

“You're gonna kick off before you even get halfway through,” Y/n crooned, her grin causing her to enunciate differently.

Joel quietly made his way down the stairs, feeling his body unnaturally relax with each note Y/n sang. Her voice hadn’t changed at all.

“When will you realize,” Y/n did a little flourish with the keys, leaving Ellie no room to mess with the melody, “Vienna waits for you.”

When she removed her hands, Ellie clapped and whooped. The mood had been so dark since the day of the shootout, it felt like a single ray of light was shining down on them.

Joel watched her sing the last line from the hall, it was like his memories had come to life right in front of him. How hard was it to bury the past when it was everywhere you looked?

Ellie turned around and saw Joel, “Well, don’t you look pretty.”

Y/n rotated on the bench and faced Joel. It was unfair that he seemed to be getting more handsome with age. With his hair slicked back and his plaid shirt rolled up to his elbows, it stirred up a singular butterfly in her stomach. She was quick to put it down.

Joel’s eyes flashed to Y/n before catching himself and looking back to Ellie, “Shut up.”

He tossed her the deodorant. “Nice,” she commented, swiping it on before handing it to Y/n. “Hey,” she trailed after Joel, “Did you know Y/n can sing?”

Y/n snorted as she used the antiperspirant. Ellie was the only thing keeping her spirits up on the trip. Everything else hurt, but the young girl’s joy acted as a balm.

Joel went back out to the garage to confirm the battery was charged up. He installed it quickly and headed back into the house. “We’re good to go,” he announced, slinging his backpack over his shoulder.

Ellie and Y/n grabbed their jackets and bags, the three of them filed out of the house in hopeful silence. They shoved their things in the back seat of the truck, leaving one side clutter-free.

“Why don’t you take the front?” Y/n suggested to Ellie, already climbing in the back.

Ellie jumped into the passenger side, a toothy grin spread across her face as she started fiddling with the foldout mirror.

“It’s your first time in a car?” Joel asked from beside her, not the slightest bit amused.

“It’s like a spaceship,” Ellie said wondrously.

“No, it’s like a shit piece of Chevy S10,” Joel grumbled, “But it’ll get us there…I think. Seatbelt.”

Ellie glanced up from playing with the radio dials, confused.

Undeniably in sync with each other, Y/n reached through the gap between Ellie’s seat and the window as Joel reached over the girl and pulled the belt over her body. “Seatbelt,” Joel repeated.

Ellie took it from him and clicked it into place, “So cool…”

Y/n watched from over their shoulders. It wasn’t lost on her how it had taken no time for Joel to start acting like a parent again.

Joel started up the car as Ellie dug through the glove compartment. She held something up to Joel that Y/n couldn’t see.

“Put it back…” Joel directed, “Ellie…”

Ellie ignored him, popping in the cassette tape and hitting play. Soft guitar rang through the truck’s speaker system. Ellie was about to skip the song when Joel and Y/n piped up at the same time.

“No, no, wait-“

“No, leave it.”

Their words collided, surprising them both. It was the first thing they’d agreed on.

“This is good,” Joel said as he made a turn, “This is Linda Ronstadt. Do you know who Linda Ronstadt is?”

“You know I don’t know who Linda Ronstadt is,” Ellie rolled her eyes.

Y/n smirked from the back seat before the nostalgia washed over her again. The song had been a favorite of hers for decades, but there was one night in particular she distinctly remembered playing it on.

Joel drove down the path that led to the gate, letting the song fill the cracks of him left by all the beauty disappearing from the world. There was still a musician living inside him. “Oh, man…” he muttered.

In the rear view mirror, Y/n and Joel’s eyes flickered to one another. The second their gazes connected, they diverted them back to the road. In their minds, they were back in Y/n’s shitty apartment, leaving for their first date.

“Eh,” Ellie remarked, “It’s better than nothing.”

Y/n couldn’t contain the chuckle that bubbled from her lips, nor could Joel hide his flash of a smile. She was going to make them both feel ancient before their journey was over.

Joel pressed the gate code on the remote Bill had left in the garage, the gate opening for them like the parting of the Red Sea. Even he, in all his jadedness, felt some sort of hope.

Y/n settled against the window, taking one last look at the town Bill and Frank had kept up over the years. Their legacy was one not of sadness, but of renewal. They had supplied her, Joel and Ellie with the resources to go forward with their journey. They were helping them in their mission to change the world. It was a kindness she’d never get to thank them for, but she’d certainly never forget.

They drove into the sunset, golden hour embracing them and welcoming them onto the open road. Maybe, just maybe, this was the turning point for them…

————

A/N: Just an FYI, we hit the 50 mentions limit so the taglist will be split between the post and the comments :)

TYL Taglist: @bachiracore @stolenxkissess @kayleezra @the-wistful-reader @allthesesonsofbitches @goth-detectives365 @trippovert @rh1nestonecowg1rl @emiliaserpe @khaleesihavilliard @frietiemeloen @gracie7209 @dorck26 @thegirlnextdoorssister @alanis-altair @mariwinns16 @whosscruffylooking @endofthexline @alexiaricciardo @eonnyx @pedrosmexicangf @scarlettequinn @ao-sleepy @toinfinityandbeyonce2 @deanlovescassie @turmoil-ash @sorrowjunky @kpopslur @xxlilyxx90 @midgetpottermills @presidential-facts @scoopsnini @tubble-wubble @jamesdeerest @burninggracesandbridges @star-wars-lover @lucyhotchner @cococola-cocaine @witheringhqarts @fall-writes @alwaysdjarin @xxmoonn @emilia-the-artist @wand-erer5 @boneyarrd @lizard-zombie @itwasallinmyhead1 @cassidylea123 @paleepeaches @mxltifxnd0m @kettlekatie @ultimate-cinephile @gloryekaterina @caramelkatsukis-bitch @whovianayesha @memeorydotcom @deadunicorn159 @get0ut0fmyr00m @siriuslymooned @emmyeed

#Joel miller x reader #joel miller x f!reader #joel miller x female reader #joel miller imagine #Joel miller fanfic #joel miller fanfiction #the last of us imagine #the last of us fanfiction #the last of us fanfic #twenty years later

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lighteez · 7 months

Text

Comforting Sanji

Hello, hello! This one shot is based after the straw hats saved sanji. (it was ep 796 i believe where sanji's sis cuffed his hands) It'll be based on him finally getting his shackles away and it left a terrible scar on his wrists, so once the crew left whole cake island, you got worried over sanji and decided to take care of him after finding out about his past. You comfort him, cook for him, and tend to his wounds while cursing his entire family and the big mom family. (im on ep810 and i just saw the sanji x luffy fight, i was crying an ocean omg, i cant… it broke me seeing luffy and sanji cry) (p.s. IT HAS SPOILERS!! AND READER IS FEMALE!!!)

“SANJI!” You screamed when you saw the crew members return back with Sanji. When he saw you, he looked at you differently, his smile was still warm, but his eyes screamed a different story. He was hurt, he was in pain.

You gripped the railing of the ship angrily, jumping out of the ship and ran towards him and the crew. Hugging them all, you told them that you took care of the ship well and made sure nothing happened to the Thousand Sunny.

Luffy laughed and nodded, “Thanks for ya help, now let's go back and have a feast! This time with our cook’s dishes!” He screamed like always, running back to the ship with Chopper. They were both happy to get their crew mate and friend back on board, the most exciting part? Sanji's delicious food! You on the other hand felt worried that he might be mentally tired, so being the caring person that you are towards your crew members, you tapped Sanji on his shoulder.

He turned his attention towards you and stopped walking, a curious expression on his face. “What is it? Is something wrong?” He smiled brightly. Taking in a deep breath, you relaxed yourself and spoke up.

“I’m glad you’re back, Sanji. Are you feeling okay now?” You asked, looking into his eyes to make sure he wasn’t lying to you. Seeing him take a deep breath as well, he relaxed his shoulders, or at least tried to relax. He simply nodded, faking another smile. “I know you’re lying to me… You’re mentally exhausted, am I right?” I asked, looking over to the ship as I saw the crew happily waving at us to hurry back so we can leave this weird island.

Sanji’s smile fell and he looked down at the ground with no facial expression playing on his face. All those horrible memories of the vinsmoke family came back to him, and he knew it was going to take more time to forget them again. “We really can’t lie to ya, huh? You see right through us.” He whispered, taking out his packet of cigarettes only to see that he was done with them. A thought came to mind, that he must’ve chain smoked a lot while being trapped with them.

“Sanji… I’m sorry all this happened to you. Let’s go back on the ship, I apologize I wasn’t much help.” I frowned, looking at the floor as well. This entire crew are always in their own world, having fun with another, but when their past or traumas come back, they are actually exhausted and worn out. You hadn’t noticed that these wonderful people suffered so much before they all met. It somehow felt like it should be your job to help these people who took you in when you had nowhere to go.

“It wasn’t your fault, and you always help us.” He smiled and ruffled your hair. You sighed in defeat, even though they say these things, you still feel useless, so you try your best to help around in the ship. Sometimes you would even train with Zoro and try to learn some fighting techniques. “Come on, let’s get out of here now. I don’t like Whole Cake Island.” He physically shivered and walked towards the ship with you following him.

Once on the ship, you all finally set sail to meet up with the other crew members who stayed on Zou Island. The crew was back to being cheerful, loud, funny and completely normal as if nothing ever happened these last couple of days. You ended up hearing all the news from Carrot about Sanji being a Vinsmoke, almost marrying that daughter from Big Mom, and his past. The more she talked about what happened, you became worried and angry. Nami chimed in on the conversation and said that Luffy and Sanji had a big fight.

Looking over to Sanji and Luffy, they seemed perfectly fine dancing and laughing with the others, as if nothing ever happened between them. Letting out a small smile towards Nami you told her to stop bringing up the past, it would only stay in her mind if she keeps remembering and repeating everything that happened. Nami agreed and just began to drink all the booze to lighten up. Carrot followed Luffy and ate all that she could.

Hours went by in a flash and you excused yourself to freshen up. The only ones still up was Brook and Pedro playing songs while Carrot danced with Chopper. Luffy and Nami were knocked out asleep, and of course Luffy was still eating Sanji’s dishes while sleeping. Everything felt good, and right in its place, however; Sanji was stuck in the Kitchen, cooking and cooking away. You already knew that sometimes he cooks whenever his mind is full of thoughts, and considering all that went down, you were sure he was recalling back old memories.

Instead of going to the bathroom, you headed towards the stairs and walked to the kitchen. Peeping into the window you saw him there cooking multiple different dishes and keeping himself occupied. “Sanji, do you need help? Please rest up, I’ll take care of the cooking.” You came inside and walked up to him, but he didn’t seem to hear you at all as he had a painful expression on his face. Immediately, you turned the stove off and grabbed his hands, pulling him to sit down on the stool.

“Sanji, what’s wrong? Are you okay? Are you in pain?” You put the back of your hand on his forehead, but he wasn’t running a fever. Sanji snapped out of it and his expression melted. Looking up at you, he had those same eyes from when you saw him coming back to the ship.

“I’m fine, I was just thinking about things like always. Don’t worry, okay?” He said, taking a deep breath, but you knew he was broken. As you looked down at his wrists you saw scars of some handcuffs and you let out a loud gasp quickly grabbing his hands to scan the injury.

“How can I not worry?! Your wrists are hurt! Let me go get Cho-” Before you could turn around to get Chopper, he grabbed your hand and pulled you back.

“Don’t… I’m fine, really. These will go away at some point.” He said, referring to the scars.

“Sanji, these will leave a horrible scar. Please, at least let me treat them.” Sanji looked up at you and locked his gaze on you before agreeing with you. “Okay, I’ll go get the first aid kit. Wait here and don’t you dare move a finger.” You warned him before jogging towards the infirmary room to get the first aid kit. Chopper taught you the basics of tending a wound so you knew how to handle this situation.

Once you gathered the things, you headed back into the kitchen. Sanji was staring at his wrists that were resting on his lap. He looked tired and worn out, how could you comfort him? What can make him feel better and forget all those horrible memories? You want to help him forget and comfort him. Sanji seems so fragile right now, and you wanted to care for him right now, even if it’s just for a night.

“I’m back, put your wrist on the counter there.” You laid the first aid kit on the counter nearby his extended wrist. Taking out things one by one, you suddenly blurted out, “The Vinsmokes are all assholes. They don’t deserve you at all. May they all get a slow painful death and regret everything!” Anger was building up inside of you as you could only imagine all the shit he has been through since he was a child.

Surprisingly, Sanji let out a laugh which surprised you. After cleaning his wound he was just looking at you with a smile again, “Thanks for this. I’ll be fine, I swear.” He whispered, but that didn’t calm your anger down one bit as you started wrapping the bandages around his left wrist first.

“I know you’ll be fine, Sanji, but I can’t help it. If I was there with you, I would’ve killed them with my bare hands, they don’t deserve to live at all. Fuck them all and I will pray for their down fall everyday.” Your words flew out of your mouth, saying the most horrendous things about the Vinsmokes. If only he could read your mind, he would hear all the ways you would be torturing them right this moment. Sometimes, horrible people who don’t redeem themselves at all deserve the worst kind of death.

His right hand grabbed your wrist and gave it a squeeze, “Hey, a lady shouldn't stress her pretty mind out over the past.” He chuckled, as you looked at him, softening your gaze when you guys met each other's gazes. “And you’re kind of squeezing my wrist there.” A small wince came out his lip as you gasped and stopped gripping his injured wrist.

“I’m so sorry! I didn’t realize I was hurting you!” Without thinking you grabbed his left hand with caution rubbing his arm gently. “You’re okay, right?” You looked at him with gentleness as he stared at you, clearly surprised that you’re being so careful with him. It was the first time he’s seen you this caring towards him, as if he would break with a gentle touch.

He snapped out of his thoughts and nodded, “Yeah. I’m fine, don’t worry.” He looked back at the stove where the food he was cooking probably got cold now. “I should get back to cooking, I’m sure they’re all waiting for my food now.” He chuckled, getting up from the stool, but you pushed him back down to sit down.

“You’re not going to cook with injured wrists, and plus you need to rest, everyone has to rest.” You sighed, frustrated at him because he didn’t want to rest up and listen to you. “Once I’m done bandaging your right wrist, I’m going to get everyone to sleep. I’ll stay awake to make sure there’s nothing over the horizon, and tomorrow morning I’ll cook breakfast, okay?” You went over your list to him as you grabbed his other hand and cleaned his wound, applying ointment as Sanji said nothing.

The silence dragged on between you two as you cleaned up his wound. You broke the silence first to say this, “Nami told me what happened with Luffy and you. I didn’t expect that to happen honestly.” A small groan escaped his lips as you took your hands away from his wrist, “I’m sorry! Did I hurt you again?” You asked him as he shakes his head in response.

“No, you didn’t. I just-” He stopped mid sentence and sighed deeply, “I feel so horrible for doing that to Luffy. I know he forgives me for what I’ve done, but- I should’ve been stronger. Instead I hurt my captain after he took me in as part of his crew. I’m such a horrible fucking-” You quickly covered his mouth with your hand, being worried about him. You didn’t want him to finish that sentence at all.

“Don’t say that, Sanji. You’re not a bad crew mate. I know that you had your reasons, okay? We all know that you would never intentionally hurt Luffy.” You finished talking before removing your hand away from his mouth as he looked at you again, but this time he showed you a sad face. He really does regret what he did.

“I-I know, but Nami slapped me. She actually thought I would turn my back to them. I feel so bad, I want to take back everything I did and said. I just feel so-” His voice choked up, looking away from you as he bit his lip. Sanji was crying. “So guilty and weak.” His last words hit you like a train, you haven’t seen him cry before and your heart swelled with pain. You don’t like seeing him so hurt or cry.

Again, without thinking, you wrapped your arms around his shoulders and pulled him into a tight hug. A tear rolled down your eye, crying with him. The pain and guilt he must be going through right now made you want to protect him and the rest of the crew from any kind of harm. You stroked his messy hair, calming him down as he clinged to your shirt like a little kid who had gotten a small paper cut. “There, there… Don’t cry, Sanji dear. I’m here. You’re not a horrible person, okay?” You whispered as your chin rested on top of his head as he hugged you tighter, crying into your shirt.

“I’m sorry for causing everyone harm. I was- I was trapped with that old man and those so-called brothers. They threatened me so many times by saying they will kill people who are important to me and blow my hands away. I felt horrible that I said those words to Luffy and Nami. I didn’t mean them at all, I swear. I almost made a mistake by marrying someone for political reasons and not because I truly loved them.” He cried out loudly, his tears running down his face and staining your shirt.

Your heart broke into millions of pieces as you held him tighter, probably squeezing the air out of him. You planted kisses on top of his head, reassuring him that he will be safe now, and nothing bad will happen to him ever again. Tears fell down your eyes as well, feeling sympathy towards him as you tried your best to understand how he felt right now in the moment. “It’s okay, Sanji. You had very good reasons, that only proves that you were thinking about us before thinking of yourself. You’re a great guy, I’m sure you’ll find the love of your life out there, so please forget about that. You’re safe now, with us, with your friends.”

In the process of comforting him, your anger rose inside of you, wishing hell upon everyone who harmed Sanji and your crew. Your breathing picked up as you grabbed his cheeks and pulled his head up to make him look at you, your thumbs clearing his tears. “Sanji, dear. I’ll make sure to protect you and the crew. I will do anything in my power to kill all those assholes who made you all feel pain. I swear on my life.” His eyes widened as he tried to not cry again.

“Don’t swear on your life. Everything passed now, we’re all okay now. I’ll be okay.” He leaned into your touch on his cheeks as he held you closer to him. “After a few naps, I will forget all that happened to us. It won’t haunt us again.” Sanji whispered, closing his eyes as he enjoyed your hands on his cheeks, they were warm and tender. You sighed, your gaze falling softly as you saw him enjoying your comfort.

“Okay, but still. I won’t let this go. I’ll do everything in my power to keep you all safe.” You whispered softly, a small smile creeping up your lips as you stared at him warmly. “Let’s get your wrist wrapped up and you can go to sleep, okay? I’ll clean up the mess and get everyone to sleep in their rooms.” He opened his eyes and looked at you, his eyes were glistening and red from crying so much. You wouldn’t trade this moment between you two for nothing, you knew right there and then that it’ll be your official job to make sure they’re all mentally and physically okay.

Sanji gulped and looked away from you, “You’re being too kind to me. I should be a man here and help you out.” He chuckled softly as you followed his lead.

“No, just for right now… Just for tonight, let me take care of you, is that fine?” You asked him as he looked back at you, his stare sent your heart racing. He looked at you so gratefully and tenderly as your heart melted with warmth.

He didn’t respond at all, he just kept staring at your eyes with a smile. The warmth from his gaze sent your stomach doing flips, you liked this side of him. “Sanij… I should really bandage your wrist now.” Clearing your throat, you went back to his wrist, placing it on the counter as you grabbed the bandages and began wrapping his wrists gently.

Once you were done, you put the things back into the first aid box, closing it when suddenly Sanji pulled you into a back hug, his face nuzzled in the crook of your neck, “I’m sorry, but please let me hug you… You’re an angel, y’know that, right?” He whispered against your neck, his arms tightening around your waist, sending a shiver down your spine. A small blush crept up your cheeks as he held you so close.

“I’m not an angel, Sanji. I don’t mind your hugs.” You whispered back, looking down at the counter as he breathed gently against your neck. The atmosphere around you two seemed warm and sweet, you wanted to hug him, but you knew yourself, you would start pampering him and treating him like a lover would.

The biggest secret you ever kept from the crew is that you started falling in love with Sanji, you didn’t know when, but all you remember is that Sanji showed you his real self. Not his weird perverted self, but the most intimate parts of his life. His eyes shine whenever he talks about the all blue, or whenever you help him out in the kitchen, he gets so excited to teach you new recipes. His interests are rather adorable and you find yourself wanting to learn more about him over time.

“Sanji… Go rest up. You need it.” A small whisper left your lips as he groaned in protest.

“I’m sorry… I can’t help myself after you comforted me this way.” He whispered as well. “I remembered something, the girl I was going to marry… she sympathized with me like this, but she wasn’t like you. You’re assertive and more- demanding. I just- I apologize if I’m comparing you two” Sanji let out a small grunt, probably regretting what he said.

Something in you felt angry again and almost snapped at him, “Don’t… Just- Stay like this, don’t think about anything or that girl who caused you harm as well. She’s Big Mom’s daughter, I will hate her too for life.” The last sentence left your lips as you shut your mouth and slapped a hand over your lips, realizing what you just said.

You heard Sanji laugh against your neck, squeezing you softly. “Alright, I get it.” He responded, “You’re gonna fight her too, huh? Two beautiful women fighting over me? That sounds nice.” You became angry again and twisted your body to look straight at him, grabbing his tie and pulling him down towards you.

“Don’t talk about that bitch, I hate her. Understand?” His face was shocked when you did that suddenly. “I’m just protecting my crew mate from harm.” A low grumble left your mouth as he stared at you with wide eyes.

Sanji visibly gulped nervously as he nodded, biting his lip as you pulled him closer to you, “Sanji… I really do care about you and want to keep you safe from here on out. Can I do that?” You asked him, your gaze traveling down to look at his lips as he started blushing. Your head was wrapped around him, but you didn’t want to tell him that you had feelings for him at all.

“S-Sure… I don’t- I don’t mind.” He mumbled, his hands went back to your waist, holding you closer again. The air around you both became stronger and thicker with anticipation. Silence came over you again as your gazes kept wandering around in each other's faces. Your grip tightened around his tie, not wanting to let him go anytime soon. “We… We should clean up.” He said softly, licking his lips.

You didn’t respond at all, not wanting to break this moment between the two of you. All these thoughts that ran through your mind made you wonder what would happen if you really did kiss him right here and then. Would he return the kiss back to you or not? Will he regret it? Does he only think of you as a friend and crew mate only? Is it too soon? You hadn’t moved from the spot at all and neither had him.

The urge to kiss him was too strong, the urge in general to just confess your feelings to him was unbearable in this moment. “Sanji, go rest up… Uhm- I’ll go now.” You told him, letting him go easily and grabbed the first aid kit, going back to the infirmary to put it away, but he grabbed your arm and pulled you into him again.

“I don’t know if I’m going crazy or not, but… May I kiss you? If you let me of course.” He was holding you so close to him, his breath fanning near your face as you tried your best to resist kissing him without saying anything. He’s too good to be true. A simple nod came out of you as he sighed, “I need to hear your words, not just a nod. Please.” He begged you, gripping your waist with one hand as the right one came up to caress your cheek, his fingers sliding into your hair as he looked at you with- adoration?

“Yes, please… Just kiss me, Sanji.” Without warning, you leaned in to kiss his lips, wanting to feel his lips on yours now. The second you pressed a kiss to his lips, he held you so close, grabbing the first aid kit and throwing it to the counter, bringing you closer to his body as he kissed you passionately. In that moment, nothing else mattered besides your lips on his, kissing him desperately and filling the kiss with so much love and adoration.

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forsakenwitchery · 2 months

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It's been a long time since I've really ranted about something on here but like.

HOTD is just… On another level of bad? At some point this season, I got so tired of getting angry with the writing I just straight up started laughing at almost every single scene. I managed to find a sliver of enjoyment in the shitshow what S2 turned out to be. Not anymore.

Small costest backstage at the end because I felt like looking at myself smiling after writing all this down lol

Having seen some and read about some E8 leaks I'm just… I guess I'm checking out. What they've done to the Greens and specifically Aemond this season is Merlin's 'Morgana suddenly full evil' level of shit writing. And I can't handle yet another favorite nuanced character of mine being stripped of any nuance by the shit writers. But at least with Morgana there was a lot of her, and with Aemond it's 2 minutes of peak character assassination per episode and it isn't cutting it.

I feel so bad for Ewan and the rest of the Green actors who gave it their all - and in some scenes you can clearly see Ewan giving his all trying to fight the shitty writing, but there's only so much an actor can do with a script so bad.

Like when in ep. 5 everyone kept referring to Aemond as if he's suddenly Satan incarnate (Alicent, Daemon ahhh pretty sure there was someone else this episode ‘cause I remember three characters) I knew they decided to flip the switch with Aemond suddenly going full caricature villain (and yeah he was no saint BUT LIKE BBQ-ING HIS BRO?) with no proper buildup for it but HOLY SHIT I didn’t think it would be ‘blink and he’s full on sociopathic villain’. And the way they really did try and hammer that point home with him yanking Helaena now is just… Fucking wild. But like, he wasn’t wrong with dismissing Alicent who turned out to be the biggest traitor on TG this season (RIP S1 Alicent). He’s not wrong in saying they need Dreamfyre. But the show sure did go about him technically not being wrong yet showing it in the worst way possible very... head-on and with lacking any nuance. It truly feels like Condal & Co just couldn’t handle how popular Aemond became in S1 and gave him as little screen time as possible while simultaneously trying to make him as unsympathetic and suddenly 180 as possible. Which just doesn’t work without the proper buildup if you stop to think for even one second.

Then we’ve got Alicent who drilled it into her sons’ heads they’ll be dead unless they fight Rhae and now she’s also 180 and doesn’t understand why they want to fight and turns out to be the biggest traitor basically surrendering her children, the city and her brother to the woman whose husband killed her grandchild. The fuck did S1 Alicent go? Can we see her? Is she in the room with us? You know, the one jumping Rhae with the knife for Aemond? By all means, she and Aemond should have had a dynamic akin to Cersei and Joffrey’s if they were dead-set on making Aemond pretty much THE (only) villain in the show (which should have been about everyone being a criminal lmao). But like… We came to THIS? THE FUCK. THE FUUUUCK. Like imagine for one second Cersei pretty much throwing her kids to their enemies. This is. I don’t know which level of bad writing is this. We’re so far past the rock bottom at this point, the bottom doesn’t exist, the depths this season has reached don’t even have a proper name.

Then we’ve got Helaena. All season I’ve been waiting to see more of her. All season. And I waited. And waited. Her being the Dreamer sounded cool on paper. And they just ended up using her as a device to show ‘Aemond bad’ again? And HELP DAEMON? And like... to spoil the end of the story for those unfamiliar? THE FUUUUUUUUUUUCK. THE FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.

Like damn, I knew they were baiting us with the promo and I knew it would be OOC for her to want to fight but at the same time I was kinda hoping at least she’d want to? Like she’s sane in the show. Her son was beheaded in front of her eyes. I kept hoping this show would have at least ONE female character actually willing to fight, but no. The balcony scene was good. But in spite, not thanks to what the writers clearly meant for this scene to be. Phia and Ewan really did give this scene their all and try to add nuance where they just once again tried to write Aemond off as a dick.

I haven’t seen the Aegon scene but apparently, they tried to make him look dumb again? And since there’s no rush to vacate KL in the show, why the hell didn’t he try to at least take his daughter with him? Like we get it, show, you hate the Greens and therefore all the Greens hate each other apparently (not buying it no matter how much you’re selling it tho), so him not bothering with Helaena is like okaaaay suuuure (not), but HIS KID? He was the hightlight of the first part of this season, and now we're... back at it again. Yay.

Also tbh I hated Daemyra as a concept in S1 as a ship but I LOVED their dynamic if it makes sense. It was truly interesting and both characters really shone in their shared scenes, so when Rhae’s arc this season started to feel like Groundhog Day I really missed Daemyra since at least their push and pull with Daemon made her feel more alive and interesting idk. But like. Their reunion scene looks like a grand meh? Daemon looks like he cares. Rhae came off to me like she doesn’t give a single fuck about him. Rhae in general was one of my fave characters in S1 and now it’s just. Huh? Them trying to saintify her absolutely ruined the character for me, she’s just so bland now which with her amount of screen time just… Doesn’t make for a very compelling show.

So. Yep. Those are my thoughts and feelings. tbh I don’t even know when I became so attached to the Greens. Like maybe it was in spite of the show trying to ruin and ignore them. Sort of like when you start rooting for the underdogs. But now I just feel really hollow and drained and sad for the actors. On both teams tbh, ‘cause like… What even is the point of this show anymore? There’s no war. Aemond is the only one who’s willing to wage it and the show villainizes him for it. Even in ep. 8 Rhae still says she doesn’t wanna fight the war. What did we spend 8 episodes, then, on aside from some character assassinations?

What’s the point if you don’t really feel anything towards most of the characters? Not even anger or apathy? ‘Cause like, I couldn’t care less when Rhaenys died. I’m sure when Jace kicks the bucket it would be the same. If the characters themselves can’t be bothered (where’s the aftermath for Blood and Cheese ffs?), why and HOW the hell should the viewers care? I’m sure they’ll find a way to make even Helaena’s death as meaningless as possible with giving her zero agenda in the matter.

I truly don’t think I’ll be watching S3. I don’t think I have it in me to witness how they screw up the Greens even more than they already did. It’s not even fun anymore how dumb the show is, it’s just draining. Motivations and relationships changing 180 between episodes or even during them (sometimes even during scenes), major events not phasing anyone and having no consequences. Characters the show chose as THE main characters living in Groundhog Day with nothing to do. We’re supposed to just believe the characters are suddenly completely different than they were weeks/months ago in show’s time just because the show says so. HOW ABOUT NO?

I’m only holding out hope for Daeron but at this point? I’m sure he’ll have a total o 1-2 minutes of screen time each episode as well and they’ll ruin him somehow, too. Still funny though how him and Aemond are both 16 which I’m sure is just another writing plot hole but on the off chance it isn’t… The only cool and redeemable thing the show can do at this point in my eyes is make Daeron and Aemond twins. You know, at the very least to give Ewan the screen time he deserves AND give him some better material to work with. But ah well.

At this point I’m choosing to more or less ignore everything that’s happened in S2, ‘cause the sure itself sure as hell ignored 2/3 of it, so why can’t I. Honestly, I want to do a full Helaena and Aemond cosplay, not a costest, if not for any other reason than to freaking forget S2 ever happend and maybe do some scenes which should have been in it, shippery or not. tbh I wasn't even shipping Helaemond until I saw Ewan and Phia's interviews about them and I was SO HYPED. And Tom's interviews. I was so hyped for siblings interecting in general and I feel like both the actors and the audience were done dirty in the worst way possible.

Also also the last thing I want to say is that it's super sad to see viewers turning on Aemond because it's so clear that's what the show wants everyone to do and neither Aemond nor Ewan deserve it. That's very telling of how badly he's written this season, he's not a villain you love to hate, he's just there for people to hate him. I hope at least Ewan doesn't get hate for his character, but we all know some people are braindead enough to project characters onto actors, so... :(

ALSO ALSO ALSO I don't really feel like fighting over this show because I don't think it deserves any more of my nerve cells, so should anyone decide to come at me for this post don't bother, I'll just reply with print screening this part. But it's kinda funny how tumblr seemed to have an actual war over this show when the show straight up refused to commit to anything.

To everyone who has read thus far – here, have some cute backstages from our costest. I’m sure we could all use a hug and a laugh. I know I could.

#anti hotd #hotd critical #hotd leaks #hotd spoilers #anti ryan condal #anti sara hess #pro aemond targaryen #aemond targaryen #team green #pro team green #helaena targaryen #personal #personal posts #helaemond

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soshadysoquiet · 2 months

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An attempt to salvage S4, for your delectation. S4E5

This one got long, get yourself a snack.

EPISODE 5

Flashback to Luther: He's set up base camp in the academy's condemned halls and is trawling through phonebooks for days. Making money clearing tables so he can pay a sketch artist to draw her. Posting missing posters for Sloane. Seen begging the others to help him search at times - Diego and Lila feed him at their house and Diego is asking where he's living. Laughs about it but looks worried. Moves in with them briefly, moves out. He tries talking to the police. Lamenting drunkenly about it at the bar Viktor works at with Five drunk beside him. Sobbing at home around a pillow with the drawing of Sloane's face taped to it. Picking up more work at the club, more drunken nights at the bar with Five or Klaus or Diego right there with him. Missing messages on the phone from siblings until it's that they need to get to the hospital to see Klaus, them all putting in money for rehab for him together. Them all going to more family gatherings and Luther starting family newsletter. Seeing things that remind him of Sloane and smiling, rather than crying. Being there for Diego and Lila, helping take a drunk Five home, asking Ben to chip in for Klaus' rehab. Visiting Ben in prison, being more lively with the family and less morose, getting the academy into slightly better shape. The camera pans around to the sketch artist picture of Sloane, now in a frame next to the phone as a call is recieved, Luther picks it up this time, though the camera stays on the picture - we hear it ask if he wants to take a call from the state penitentiary (i.e. Ben calling to come get him from Ep 1).

In present day the siblings are lolled in their seats. Reggie shares a look with Abigail, then starts to speak, taking them back in time.

We see the start of the mission etc the same, same rules from Reggie, Ben gets Jennifer out and down and the others come to find them and start berating him (Luther, Allison and Diego at least, Klaus is so high/nervous he's laughing it all off panickedly.) They get too loud and shots ring out Ben dives from the container, holding Jennifer, the Horror's tentacles lash out to help them land safely. Diego throws a knife at the shooter. Jennifer grabs a tentacle for stability. The gunner goes down. Jennifer's hands glow as she touches the Horror and Ben's stomach begins to beam the same dark light as her hands. The horror explodes into mess of action. Jennifer is thrown, Ben is screaming, the others are in shock and trying to call to Ben. The portal expands as the Horror pushes its way through and it seems like Ben is folding back on himself, diminished by the Horror.

Reginald bursts onto the scene as the Horror starts thrashing and injuring the umbrellas. He's shouting at them to attack, that they have to, that they need to put it down. There's so much chaos and fighting screaming, roaring. The remaining guards of the container are getting killed and firing at the Horror. Reggie shoots Jennifer in the head and Ben is can't be seen beneath the mass of tentacles, Reggie shouts to the umbrellas to take action or let their brother suffer like this.

One by one they do as Reggie begins to physically push them. Luther is strangling tentacles, eyes wide and frantic, shouting for Ben that they're coming for him, Allison is scream/sobbing 'I heard a rumour that you stopped, that you went away' at the tentacles and the mass of Horror where Ben had been standing as it's getting bigger. Diego is throwing knives and Klaus isn't laughing anymore but he's on his hands and knees shellshocked and mouthing 'Ben' soundlessly. The Horror is gradually beaten back by their combo. Where it was is a lifeless Ben.

They're exhausted and covered in blood. Reginald gives them the lines they've been repeating. Is seen berating it at them in the Minerva on the way home, making them say it to their reflection, making them say it again and again and again. When they arrive back and Viktor goes to meet them, sees them with Grace beside him, asks what happens. They one by one repeat one of the lines lifelessly until Reginald tacks on 'Ben was the best of us' etc.

In the present day the siblings wake thrashing and horrified from their group memory. Some lash out at Reggie, at each other, some are sick and quiet.

Five, swallowing roughly, asks what happened. Reggie explains that Jennifer is one of the 43, like all of them has a unique ability and that it took him a while to find her - she can reverse portals. Normally such a power in this primitive world wouldn’t have ever surfaced, but when in contact with Ben enables the reversal of the portal in his stomach, and frees The Horror into the world. The Horror was the reason his home world was ravaged into ruin

Abigail pipes in that her research was what had caused the Horror to arrive in their world in the first place, and that her attempt to fix it, by splitting all the science and energy she had used in creating the machine that had freed it, resulted in the Marigolds - the science had to be transformed, it couldn’t be undone, but it was too late for our world. It was dangerous to leave the marigolds together in their container in case they reacted again, Reginald says he thought that humanity would suitably numb the Marigolds, perhaps leave them just useful enough without being terribly dangerous.

Pause to shoot scathing remarks at Reggie.

Reggie remarks about even the best laid plans.

They get back on track with what does that mean for them now, Ben’s already run off with Jennifer. Then we must move quickly- says Reg. As the moment Jennifer touches the Horror we are doomed. They must be kept apart, failing that, one or both must die.

Viktor says to Abigail then why were you trying to get us to save Jennifer, or getting Ben to do it? Lila reminds them about her being part of the cult that is promoting The Cleanse.

Abigail looks to Reggie, who is shocked. Says that the cycle has to be fixed Reggie, it can’t go on like this. Reggie affronted and they have a fight, she leaves, saying that if he could only see what he’d done wrong, what they all always did wrong, then they could save the world this time, truly.

Pause for them to mock Reggie that his wife’s idea of saving the world is making an apocalypse, which is what he’d always tried to fight.

‘Yes, well, she came back different than I’d anticipated.’ He says, and says he must move to prepare. Half of them follow him demanding what that means - Viktor, Luther, Diego.

Allison and Klaus - who had been the least reactive and most shocked by the Ben flashback, are collecting themselves. Five says he’s wondering what Jennifer meant by ‘what they All Always do wrong’ Klaus and Allison are asking what he even means, shouldn’t they go find Ben?

Even if we find Ben, we don’t know how to stop this, what we did wrong, what we always do wrong. If we could find out that maybe we’d know what to do right - Five.

Lila exclaims about the subway, Five is looking grim. Lila says you know that means we’ll have to go past your apocalypse again right? Klaus is saying woah woah woah what? Allison is frowning.

Five briefly explains the subway lines, that the map is unreadable - brings it out, plus the city blueprint - but that there’s Some stations that all the trains stop at. He says -I was getting confused about it, but seems like when you take the timeline train at those stations, you have to travel to a new connection Above Ground.

And guess whose own personal hell is the crossroad station right next to this one. Lila taps where they’ve made a mark on the map. Allison and Klaus share a look. Okay FAMILY MEETING - she shouts upstairs.

Jennifer and Ben are talking about what brought them together, she says that of course the real reason they're together is "it" pointing to The Horror. She says she wants to meet it, can she?

Lila and Five are discussing if he’s ready for this as we see all the fam depart from the house in groups, he says they’ll find out and blinks them into subway

Diego and Luther are in Wanda, Luther ask’s if he’s okay. Diego says feeling sidelined by his own wife? I’m great. Luther points out that they Do get to break into the CIA at least, flashing Five’s ID pass. Diego grins at that, saying that yeah, they’ll find Ben and save his sorry ass, then he’ll give Five and Lila a piece of his mind.

Viktor is saying to Allison and Klaus if they’re sure about this? Allison says she can handle Dad, and Klaus says it’s not like he can kill me now, and not that we don’t think you can handle Dad’s psycho wife on your own but we’d feel better if we knew you were okay so - manifests Dave and introduces - he’ll protect you, or let me know if you’re not safe, not sure how this works long-distance really. Viktor seriously says thank you to Klaus, and let’s go to Dave.

Ben and Jennifer: Ben's unsure, usually a unanimously negative reaction to the Horror, she’s saying let me change that etc.

In the subway, Lila and Five are below the apocalypse station, Five’s shaking himself, drinking from a hip flask he stashed at Reggie’s, Lila’s telling him he doesn’t need that. They go up the stairs, Five doesn’t make it out the station before blinking back downstairs. Lila groans, goes down to find him drinking and pacing.

Diego and Luther get into the CIA with 60% lunacy, 20% luck and 20% innovation

Viktor is trying to tail Abigail - going to keepers HQ, but finds instead them amassing for war, he blends in with Dave watching over.

Diego and Luther shenanigans and locate Ben Via CIA tomfoolery, also find out Dad runs the CIA basically and has been keeping tabs on all of them, but also he’s got info on the other 43, and one of them is Sloane. She’s actually hidden in Reggie’s basement. Luther is frantic that she was right under their noses, they have to get to her, Diego sees his emotions and just says ‘lets go get your wife bro’.

Allison and Klaus worm their way in with Reggie and pester him constantly, they bring up their life and throw out ‘not that you’d know’ when saying how important it might be for them all to know there was a danger in this timeline and demand to know what he’s going to do - He says isn’t it obvious? Your brother has to die. They’re silent. Then very Not silent.

Allison lays into him about how he’s a conniving SOB and none of this was part of the deal, he says well you got what you wanted, didn’t you? No matter the cost? Are we so very different? She’s shocked silent.

Klaus pipes up that it’s no wonder we turned out the way we did with you as a father, but what’s truly impressive is that we manage to be Better than you at every turn, despite being raised by you -if you can call it that- with you as a father. Allison casts him a shocked look.

Klaus goes along the lines of ‘whilst my sister may have a saviour complex a mile wide, and a self important streak to match-‘ ‘thank’s Klaus’ ‘-She’s actually caring and reliable, and a better parent than you could ever be.’ Allison is very touched, and turns on Reggie ‘And despite Klaus’ self-destructive attention seeking-‘ ‘hey!’ ‘He’s the person I’ve come to rely on most, and trust, and I respect that he has even a shred of sanity after the hell you put him through.’ They share a mo, Reggie goes to interrupt and Allison rumours ‘I heard you can’t make a call on killing Ben without my say so.’ Klaus gives her a high five and they sit back to let a very pissed Reggie track down Ben for them and tell them about the cleanse.

Ben and Jennifer: He’s uneasy, worried that it will change what they have, she’s insistent, that there’s nothing to be worried about, that she can give him the total acceptance he’s always craved, always deserved.

In the subway Lila is berating Five, he snaps back, she slaps the hip flask away and it spills out on the tracks. He’s pissed, shouts about how maybe it’s a little hard to go back into he literal hell he’s been avoiding for years without something to take the edge off. She softens a bit, a little impatient but says that he’s dealt with this before, it’s only the once and it’s different this time, he’s not alone, he’s got his family with him, right? - awkward smile. Five softens too, if a little in defeat. Yeah, yeah I do. She offers her hand and he takes it, slowly she leads him back, at the top, he freezes, but makes himself walk out into the apocalypse.

Reggie, Allison and Klaus have left the premises and are also circling around the part of the city with the Academy, but there’s protestors from The Keepers everywhere trying to keep out the non-believers, they’re stuck trying to find a way in.

Ben to Jennifer: Promise me this won’t change anything, I’ve got no one left but you- releases The Horror

Viktor and the throng of keepers has been swept up to the old Academy and is guarding it. Viktor finds Abigail and confronts her - what is all this, I thought you wanted us to save him? Save them, and the world? You used me just like him! - Abigail responds that no, you out of all of them were the one who broke the mould, the one who would listen. You, Viktor Hargreeves, are your own person. Viktor, taken aback, takes that in, as Abigail stands aside so he can get to the door of the mansion.

Luther and Diego in Wanda scream back into Reggie’s house. They race through the halls to the basement, almost a replica of the journey to where Luther had once locked up Viktor. In there, Sloane is in Abbigail’s old chamber, Luther is shouting and works to get her out. Diego finds Grace hooked up and silent, and Pogo in another chamber. He shouts ‘Luther, Luther we need to calm down and figure this out rationally!’ Luther calms, agrees, and focuses on the details - the technology is what he used on the moon, he gets them all unhooked, they’re out but they’re not moving. Luther is talking to Sloane, calling to her, that he’s here and he’s never forgotten what they had, she' comes's coming around around. Pogo is waking up on his own, but Grace isn’t. Diego kneels by her and holds her hand, says he knows it’s bullshit that she can’t feel anything, that she helped make him the man he is now, the parent he tries to be for his children, even if it’s tough some days, and that more than anything, he’d like her to meet them, because he knows she’d be so proud. Grace wakes up, Sloane does too - astonished and joyful that Luther is alive. And the reunions are very heartfelt.

Ben and Jennifer: Jennifer is entranced by the Horror, reaching out. Nothing will change, I know you’ve only got me. Me, and our squid -

‘And us.’ Viktor announces coming round the corner, Ben frowns, Jennifer is surprised. The Horror is wavering towards Jennifer. Viktor says that they might not be close, maybe they pushed themselves on Ben, maybe none of them would get along anyway and we can never replace the family you lost, but we’d like to try being the family you found, if you’re up for letting us get to know you. Ben for a moment lets his guard down, his grip softens on his powers briefly and The Horror shoots out at Jennifer. Viktor shouts ‘No’ and shoots his powers, but we see as the Horror touches Jennifer before getting severed that her powers awaken. Ben screams, the Horror writhes, the Cleanse is beginning.

#tua #the umbrella academy #five hargreeves #diego hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #luther hargreeves #viktor hargreeves #allison hargreeves #ben hargreeves #lila pitts #season 4 fix

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supercutszns · 8 months

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A best friends to lovers between Luke and a Ares reader where some how Ares ends up at Camp-Half-Blood and gets to meet all his kids, and despite his seemingly uninterested demeanor when he meets the 2 best fighters of his cabin (Clarisse and the reader) he’s genuinely impressed but doesn’t show it. Reader ends up feeling like she disappointed Ares due to his lack of emotion despite the days and nights full of intense training she’s put in since being at camp and ends up ranting about it to Luke who ends up confronting Ares despite the intimidation he feels when doing so because he wants reader to know how amazing she truly is and knows that if it comes from the father she looks up to so dearly that she’ll believe it finally. Ares reluctantly ends up talking to the reader and says something along the lines of Luke being a decent boyfriend and that he has some fire for being a child of Hermes. Ares genuinely thought the two were together but shrugged it off when the reader disagreed despite her feelings. After Ares and tiny Ares have their heart to heart, or as close to one of those as u can get with that cabin, reader ends up thanking Luke and confessing her feelings.

Ik that was a lot sry! I’ve just had the idea since the Ares ep came out. Have a great day 😊😊

omfg i am eating this up. u had me at best friends to lovers

ares coming to camp and meeting his kids😭😭 my god that’s so bittersweet especially with clarisse and reader being the best fighters :( luke confronting ares i’m FERALLL U KNOW HE WOULD CONFRONT A GOD FOR HIS GIRL HE DOES NOT GAF (or at least he pretends to. he’s still a little scared)

he’s already angry at the gods and the one that happens to be your father just disregards your strength?? you’re upset and you confide in him about how inadequate you feel and luke’s like oh i need to beat a bitch up

luke gets ares alone the second he can and like tries to be diplomatic but it’s obvious how much he hates ares right off the bat. basically comes in fists ablaze and ares says “no i actually was super impressed by her i just didn’t feel like telling her lol” and luke is like. what is wrong with you

eventually the conversation ends on a somewhat lukewarm note; when luke turns to leave ares says kinda nonchalantly “i see why you two are together, you’ve got a lot of fire for a hermes kid”

luke just goes: huh??????????? and ares is like “you know, you and my daughter” luke just stares at area dumbstruck and he just sighs and is like. jesus fucking christ there’s no way

then he talks to you (a little begrudgingly but only a little; he wonders if some of aphrodite’s matchmaking tendencies have rubbed off on him) and he tells you very sparingly that you’re gifted, then he’s like “please for the love of Me, Ares, the War God tell that boy you like him i think he’s going to set me on fire.”

he ends the conversation at that so obviously you’re dumbstruck (both by the praise and by your father urging you to ask out your best friend) but when luke comes around to ask how it went you know your dad got something right.

you thank him for everything and work up the courage to mention what ares said at the end, and luke laughs a little and is like “that’s so weird he said the same thing to me” so you shrug and say “maybe he has a point.” luke doesn’t get flustered often but he def is now so you take it upon yourself to kiss him to drive the point home <3 after that you confess the full scope of your feelings and he kisses you bc he’s just so eager and he mutters against your lips that this is the only time he’s ever respected a god in the slightest. then you guys go spar together like old times except this time there’s 90% more making out 💗💗

#perrie prattles #perrie’s asks #luke castellan #luke castellan x reader #luke castellan headcanon #luke castellan drabble

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thehyperfixationcorner · 2 months

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Phineas and Ferb S1 observations (after rewatching for the every episode review video):

Isabella doesn't appear nearly as much as I thought she would! In fact, she really only has one and a half focus eps (even one good scared not really about her). As an Isabella enjoyer, I was kinda disappointed, but it did improve by the end so I assume S2 does the legwork.

Baljeet and Buford also appeared less, though that definitely improved by the end too!

Phineas was way more likable than I remembered! Not that I disliked him, but I found him boring as a kid. Now I see the appeal. He's such a nice, kind kid! Plus super autistic we love it 🥰

First seasons usually feel like they take time to find their footing, but I'd say the show was pretty good from the getgo! Barely a rough patch! Very impressive!

In fact, there was ONE episode I found kinda mid. Not even bad. Just mid. ONE. ONE! YOU KNOW HOW IMPOSSIBLE THAT IS???

I was surprised by how many specials there were early on! Usually a show like this waiys for a second season, or at least does only one! Phineas and Ferb did 5 (It’s About Time, Dude We're Getting the Band Back Together, One Good Scare, Phineas and Ferb Get Busted and Out to Launch)! To use an apt comparison, Spongebob had 5 specials (Christmas Who, Party Pooper Pants, Ugh, Lost Ep, Have You Seen this Snail) by Season 4! The confidence is astounding (and fair, since every special got a pretty high ranking!)

The A and B plots have yet to intersect like I expected! Good idea, though, sets things up first before breaking

Insane how many iconic songs and eps have already happened, I'm shocked at how many top tier ones there are that will seemingly be ranked low by the iconic eps of future seasons! There could genuinely be episodes at 70th or 80th place that I adore!

Perry got more emotive and interesting as time passed

Only two episodes showed other agents!

Vanessa really doesn't appear that much huh

You can see how Norm was a one episode gag that slowly turned into a brilliant running bit XD

Candace joined in or had a whole different motivation or only got into the busting at the very end way more than I expected too, which I'm happy about but still, wow!

I thought it would take a bit for Candace to be written really well. Scratch that. She's now one of my all time favourite fictional characters and we're only at S1

Stacy. That is all.

#disney #sunny stimms #phineas and ferb #dwampyverse #isabella garcia shapiro #candace flynn #buford van stomm #baljeet tjinder #buford and baljeet #phineas flynn #perry the platypus #agent p #vanessa doofenshmirtz #dan povenmire #jeff swampy marsh #stacy hirano #o.w.c.a #norm doofenshmirtz

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bengiyo · 3 months

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Love Sea Ep 2 Stray Thoughts

Last week, Tongrak, a successful romance author, was sent by his friends to an island to relax and work on his next novel. Unfortunately, Tongrak was a complete asshole about this, and took that out on his host, Mahasamut, who seems fully equipped to deal with a spoiled rich kid from Bangkok. Tongrak apparently needs to have sex to work through the scene he needs to write, and is also clearly interested in Mut. We left at Mut accidentally scaring Rak and trying to take care of him.

Lol, I love them opening up with voiceover reaffirming that Rak wants to fuck Mut. This is not one sided.

As charged as that was, sex on a beach is grimy!

Chapter 2: Echoes Across the Endless Blue

Oh right, Mook has to change a light bulb.

Rak is being so dramatic about a scratch.

"This isn't a bad," and, "Open your mouth," and, "Not your turn," are sending me.

Head on the beach in episode 2? Finally, adult gay representation in BL.

I'm with Mut! I would be annoyed as hell if my partner wanted to stop and immediately begin writing as things were getting good.

Man, this apartment gets used semi regularly now for the shows.

Wow, MAME is giving ass now.

Well, I'll give them points for mentioning the condoms, but docking several for using teeth.

Don't act like you ain't have a great time, Rak. I saw those expressions.

Rak is so consistently rude! He's even rude about the social politics of sex! Mut even offered to help with cleanup.

I wonder how long Vie has been crushing on Mook, because she's clearly enjoying having someone like Mook around.

They made this boy play the exposition gossip two shows in a row.

I do love the way Mut is rolling with Rak's aggressive behavior. If the rich guest is sprung and throwing money you already said he didn't need to throw at you, then by all means.

Well well well. Rak showed some consideration there about how public he's being with Mut. I like knowing that Mut is out and still carries so much respect in his community. But also, you gotta know how much you can get away with and where you can do it.

My man got locals jumping into conversations to gas him up. Respect. It's hard when tourism is a big part of your economy, because the finance class does not share.

A queer man kicked out of the home by his dad who has worked hard to build his place in his community? No choice but to stan.

Oh boy, when the writer is the executive producer and the director, they can include a romance author as a lead character to speak to their detractors.

Yes, please eat before more flies show up.

MAME characters are so interesting in that they'll go out of their way to set two people up, and then be damned sure they explain their baggage to each other.

Why would this man jump into the ocean on his own like that?

Whoa, what about this location triggered all this trauma? Seems like he has a friend who got abandoned with a pregnancy, and that connected to his mom's issues with his dad?

Are we gonna end every episode on the boat after a flash of trauma?

A romance novelist who doesn't believe in love. I am invested.

Those reveals came fast at the end, but at least we're seeing where the transactional presumptions around sexual loyalty may have come from with Rak. I like that Mut takes the money in stride, and was plain about how hard the hustle is for local businesses on this island. I'm also so relieved that we have adult, out characters discussing how public they can afford to be with their flirting. There's too much Thai BL in the bubble right now and failing at it. I'm really enjoying this.

#Ben watches #love sea #love sea the series #thai bl #bl series

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colie-nne · 1 year

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first moments drive to survive | se4 r.2022

pairings: formula 1 grid x fem driver!oc

warnings: a bit of swearing | This is quite a long one

a/n: lines in bold and italics are the lines of journalists or the show’s narrator, and indents are radio moments or interview clips.

Ep1 : Clash of The Titans

Four rookies entering Formula 1 this year.

Valentina who was sitting in her team’s uniform waves to the camera. It was cut short when it shows Yuki with his clapper. “My name is Yuki Tsunoda.” Haas’ Mick, “Mick Schumacher” and Nikita, “Nikita Mazepin, Haas Formula 1 Team” It then cuts to Val just staring, “Is it rolling?” she inquires after the prolonged silence. The crew laughs before beckoning her to introduce herself, “Yeah, go on” She clears her throat, “Hi, I’m Valentina Corbyn and I drive for Alfa Romeo.” Closing the clapper board a little bit too hard as she visibly flinches, “Oh!” The people behind the cameras laugh before it cuts to a different set-up.

Pictorial on the track

7:21

“Eye contact with the cameras,” the photographer calls out to get every drivers’ attention. The video however zoom in on Valentina who was leaning on the car.

Spotting the camera she tries to send a disapproving look, pointing to the camera man as she shakes her head. The camera shakes in response.

7:34

There’s a lot of male pride and ego flying around… Val’s laugh is the first thing heard, “and I’m here to balance it!!” Exaggerating her actions as she points to herself. "Ooo, I just gave myself an ick, with what I've done there."

7:58

Showing a thumbs up, “You guys are good. Everyone’s all good,” the photographer ends their session as he walks away.

In the background, however, the well-known chaotic pair are at it again. This time Lando is seen fist-bumping her, walking side by side back to the garage. Val stopped in her tracks after he whispered something to her, and her expression showed faint shock at whatever that was. She completely faces him before playfully hitting his abdomen.

The action pushed Lando back and bumped into Carlos, who was behind them. Like a fed-up older brother, he just shakes his head and wraps an arm around Val’s shoulder, urging her to rush forward.

BAHRAIN Are you happy? Her look of confusion’s evident on her face, “Like the with the results of the race?” She makes sure with the person interviewing her. In which she gets an approving nod on her end. “From starting in 9th then to p5? Of course, very. It isn’t what we expected for my first race but it’s something that I’m happy this early on” Do you plan on placing higher? Quirking up a brow, “Yeah, I hope so. No driver is ever satisfied in their position unless they’re at the top. But I’ll take my time before I show the world more of what I got… at least, that’s what Kimi told me.” Val finishes with a refreshing smile directed at the camera.

Ep 2: Ace in the Hole aka a look into Lando and Val’s friendship

5:25

Lando and Valentina’s friendship started way back before their karting days. This year despite being rivals on the track, you can say that they’re quite the opposite off-track, in some way or another.

Panning the view to Val, hiding in the shade, she scrunches her face as she looks at Lando, about to swing the golf club for the nth time that day. Max, a mutual friend of theirs, motions her to come closer.

Pushing herself off the cart, Lando takes his chance to swing. After taking a couple steps closer, a groan erupts from him, earning him a chuckle from his friends.

“That’s quite a bad hit right there, innit?” Val teases him as soon as she’s stood next to Max.

Moving to get his turn, Max agrees with her while getting in position, “Yeah, you’ve had a shocker there, mate.”

“Shut up, the both of you,” Lando grumbles before jokingly kicking some dirt towards Val’s direction, causing her to shriek in displeasure.

6:14

Walking back near the cart, Max brings up Lando’s new teammate, Daniel Ricciardo. “So how are you feeling about Danny Ric this season, mate?… Confident?” Val, who is seen sitting on the grass, turned to look at Lando's expression.

Shrugging, “He’s obviously a good driver. Seven-time… Seven-time winner?” He said before looking at Val who is nodding at him.

“I got faith in you, buddy,” Max finishes as he takes a swing for his turn. Seconds later, it was Valentina’s turn to swing. Clearing her throat, she points at Lando before imitating Max’s tone, “I’ve got faith in you too, mate.” Swings the club… and intentionally misses the ball.

Lando stood there looking at her in faint disbelief, “You didn’t even hit the ball”, gesturing to the still intact golf ball and tee.

“Yeah, 'cause I also need to have faith and win myself.” She told him, as a matter of fact, before making a proper swing.

What is it about your and the Alfa Romeo rookie's relationship? Chuckling at the question, “Val? We’ve known each other for quite a while, probably half my life, more so hers. She’s like an itch that you can’t get rid of… but in a good way. Vali’s been one of the constants since before karting, as am I to her, so I’ll say we have a good ass relationship.” He ends his statement with a fond smile. What does it feel like to see her joining formula one and being rivals on track? Sucking in a breath, he wears a cheeky smile as he answers, “Seeing her come up on here and race us, makes me feel accomplished. Just 'cause I’ve seen where she’s started… And we’ve experienced a lot of things together with the others, so to get a chance in Formula 1, it’s more of like a win for the both of us, really.” “To being rivals it- we’re both really competitive people, too competitive as I might say so. But a race is a race, a win is a win, at the end of the day- or a race really, we’re still friends, nothing's about to change.” Raising his eyebrows teasingly, “We’ll just have to prove who’s going to one-up the other this time.”

Ep 3: Tipping Point

MONACO

In the last five races, you’ve started up in p5 and then p3 in Portugal. In this race however, not only did you manage to outsmart the Max Verstappen in that last corner, but you have also won your very first Grand Prix, this early on in your career. How do you feel about that? Val, who was sitting back on the chair, smiled widely when asked about her unexpected win. “Honestly, it still hasn’t sunk in. It’s been like 2 or 3 weeks. But I feel great as a whole, makes me feel good about myself, like an unexplainable tingling sensation that happens throughout my body.” She said, wiggling in her seat to show the feeling. You have also celebrated with McLaren’s Lando Norris, who we’ve just known is a very close friend of yours. Taken aback, “Really? You’ve just known… isn’t that like common knowledge for you guys at this point?” She questions with a light voice before continuing. “Jokes aside. It’s amazing, it feels amazing to actually stand on a podium with one of your closest friends. Cause after all that daydreaming as kids you never would’ve thought you would reach the top this early on in your career..” And since then you’ve never dropped out of the top 5. “Yeah, that’s what keeps me awake at night. It’s become a “wow” factor for me as the season progresses. Never really thought I’ll be with the people I looked up to growing up, but now that I’ve stood- is standing, rather, next to them I feel like I’ve reached the next step or like phase of my life and that, along with this Grand Prix win, would help me become a better driver and a person as time passes.”

Ep 4: A Mountain to Climb

You’ve entered this season with two rookies and reports are already saying that you’re offering Alfa Romeo’s Corbyn a seat in Haas this early on in the season. What has Haas' Guenther have to say about all this? “I- uh, she’s good despite being a rookie, even better than some…” he looks around, giving them "the look" that says everything about what he means, “but I have a reason to believe our... negotiations will be on hold. Like how she did with her team in the last two years.. she uhm-”

With McLaren’s shoot on hold, Guenther takes his chance to walk right behind the team to have a small chat with Val who was once again wandering around the paddock.

The rookie still chatting up her closest companion, Lando, looks off to the side when her name was called. Lando, taking his chance, shoots her arm. Receiving a groan from her.

Guenther who was now closer to them call back her attention, “Hey, you. Answer my call yeah?”

She laughs knowing the meaning behind his words, but being the cheeky person that she is, tilts her head before innocently saying, “My phone isn’t on me. I’m sorry, I guess?”

Back to the interview, Haas’ team principal can only drag a hand down his face while letting out a breath, “That would be true if she’s been in contact with us, but she isn’t, so no.”

Ep 5: Staying Alive

Zooming in on Val congratulating Lando and Danny on their 1-2 Monza Win

The camera zooms past all the McLaren employees to show Valentina rushing inside towards Lando who’s still in the team’s garage after the podium.

Her voice, barely audible is heard over that chatting in the room, “Norris!!” she reaches up to take him into a hug, which Lando reciprocated. Letting go, Val pats his shoulder a wide smile on her face, “Well done, mate! McLaren be getting that 1-2 win, yes?”

Giving the younger one a never-changing appreciative smile, he pats her hand on his shoulder in return, “Yeah…” Their conversation fades out as Lando walks her out of the garage to where the rest of the drivers are.

Finally seeing the other McLaren winner, Val quickens her steps offering her hand out for a fist bump with Daniel, “Well done to you too, Ricciardo!”

He pushes her sideways by his hip, “Aww, isn’t that sweet. But don’t push it, kid. You’re just saying that, so I’ll congratulate you on your next win.”

Releasing an exaggerated gasp, she looks at the other two drivers, Carlos and Lando, “I am not... but you did say next so...” Fading out the conversation, she tries to kick his shin, which he did evade.

Ep 6: A Point to Prove

A driver and their engineer's radio moments are one of the most awaited when it comes to Formula 1. And to say that Val and her engineer Alejandro's radio moments are entertaining is an understatement.

HUNGARY The whole Turn 1 drama but in Val’s POV

It’s lights out and away we go

Corbyn-Alfa Romeo oh... my... gosh... Alejandro... Keep position, multiple crashes in turn 1 Yep.. so early in the race, guys. Too early

Corbyn trying to take advantage of the chaos and- OH NO! Being pushed on the rear by the McLaren...

The Aston Martin into the Ferrari, the McLaren and the Alfa Romeo

Corbyn-Alfa Romeo Holy shit, that did not just fucking happen Language Sorry sorry Copy, Val. Red flag then Lap 3. Box please, Box Okie

Ep 7: Growing Pains

So far, the fellow has been the only one to raise Alpha Tauri’s Yuki Tsunoda’s spirits after a temper tantrum. And to say that isn’t a shock actually, with both drivers having fits on track you can say that the other actually handles themselves better.

Standing by the door, Val currently has a clear view of the paddock’s entrance. Seeing Yuki’s familiar stature walking towards the building, she races both her arms up, as he enters, to get his attention.

Clearing her throat, she lets out the phrase she’s been practicing all night just to race Yuki’s spirits. It sort of became a thing between the two young rookies.

“Hey, Yuki-san!! Kyō no rēsu no junbi wa dekite imasu ka?” She said laughing at her broken Japanese. In response, Yuki laughed at her attempt and gave her a high five before responding and walking further away from the camera. (Are you ready for today's race?)

Ep 8: Dances with Wolff

Belgian Grand Prix - Qualifying

Corbyn-Alfa Romeo Val, red flag ahead, slow down. Vettel’s still half a second behind. What’s happened? …. Ale? …Norris has had a bit of shunt in Eau Rouge exhaling loudly Fucking hell should’ve called this off earlier.

Seeing the wreckage, the rookie is seen stopping a close few feet away, before getting up from her seat. Norris shook his head at her actions.

Corbyn-Alfa Romeo No, Val, the race is still a go. Continue on, he’s fine The hell he is... shitting, FUCK! Calm down, he’s fine safety’s on the way she waves her hand, asking if he’s ok You guys are fucking kidding me, should’ve prevented this earlier Copy, copy. Vettel had shared the same thought. who’s now directly behind you and Val, language, please. ok... ducking bum heads they are.

Ep 9: Gloves are Off

QATAR

We’re in the desert. We’re in Qatar for this year’s brand-new circuits in the Middle East

The few-second clips has shown Mercedes’ Toto Wolff arriving, Checo and his team on the track, Carlos and- rather Carlos’ team can be seen scurrying around the place, trying to find their missing driver.

A few minutes in and the drivers and their are getting ready for today’s practice. Buxton's voice in the background is heard as the hunt for Carlos Sainz is starting,

Valentina has clearly been a fan and paddock favourite ever since her debut. The way she fits in with the other 19 drivers who clearly dominate the area is surprising. Throughout the season Val has shown how capable she is as a rookie driver deserving of her seat, her confidence and attitude on track are what keeps her in the positions she’s currently at. And with the outstanding results she’s been getting, there’s no doubt she’ll be getting some contracts on her desk. But what these people forget is that this astonishing driver is the youngest on the grid at only eighteen...

Zooming in, a very peculiar situation can be seen inside the Ferrari motor home. A driver who clearly isn’t supposed to be there is currently on the couch, sleeping with Ferrari’s missing driver.

Valentina is seen still wrapped up in her team’s jacket, leaning toward her fellow Spaniard who lets her, despite being called by his team a couple times. Seeing the camera recording them, Carlos places a finger towards his mouth gesturing for them to keep quiet as he points it to Valentina.

This is a sight that the whole Formula 1 community has come to cherish.

For the second time in the series, Will Buxton, a known F1 journalist talks about another possible driver change, now for Red Bull Racing. Other than the fight for the championship, Alfa Romeo has had a massive comeback, currently running for fourth place verse McLaren. Points have been increasing, the majority coming from the rookie, Valentina Corbyn, who has scored the most points than the other three… Adding to her tremendous starting career as an f1 driver, Valentina not only has had Haas coming after her, but Red Bull Racing’s Christian Horner has also been a frequent guest at Alfa Romeo’s motorhome. With Red Bull only having signed Sergio Perez as their driver this season, is he ready to lose his seat to the 18-year-old that fast? “Bonjour” “Bonjour” Red Bull’s Christian Horner greets the journalist in front of him. “There seems to be a high level of tension between the drivers, the team principals, and now the newly signed and rookie drivers. Is it good for Formula 1 or is it a bit—“ Cutting him off Christian answers, “It’s a competition, you know? It’s not a kids club. And you know, we operate in different ways. Toto will shout and scream at the camera. Maybe I’m a little bit more, calm.” “Other than that, rumours have been circulating that you’re in the process of having Alfa Romeo’s Corbyn sign in with Red Bull for next year’s season. What does that mean for Perez?” With a neutral stare, the Red Bull team principal crosses his arms to his chest, “Contracts are what keep a driver’s career running aside from their skills. Valentina’s a very skilled driver so if she does end up with us, the media isn’t going to be announcing it to the world.”

Ep 10: Hard Racing

Interview cameos can be fun from time to time. But when two youngsters are in the same room, the fun comes first before you can even start something.

0:21

"Right!"

"Testing, three, four. Nutsack, five, six," Daniel started as soon as he sat down.

Lando, who has his foot in the air, can be seen trying to swat something, or rather someone, with his other slipper.

Pointing to Val, who was by the door, "Oi get her out. What the hell you’re doing here, anyway?"

Shrugging, she just raises her hands in surrender, "Don’t worry Lando, I've seen weirder stuff that you do."

Throwing his slipper at her response, the video pans as she's seen exiting the room.

Sighing at her antics, "Ok… Action!"

2:59

Who’s your money on? Smiling, Daniel shakes his head, "I’ve gone back and forth. At this rate, it’s a flip of a coin," he said, voice filled with hesitance. George, contrary to Daniel, went with a straight answer, "I think Lewis is gonna get it." Along with Lando, who was quite happy with his response, "I think it all points to one person… Max Verstappen" Pierre, with confidence, "Lewis and Max won’t see the second corner." Valentina, however, didn't give a clear answer when asked. She's caught off guard by the question as she stopped tying her hair up mid-way. "That is a dangerous question. If I want my dad to kill me, I’ll have to answer Max… But if I want Hor- a certain someone to get mad at me, I’ll say Lewis... You know what, let’s just wait and see." She concludes with that know loved smile of hers.

Welcome along to the final round of this 2021 season.

The clips show a range of drivers getting ready in their own garages, all went by smoothly before it ended with Alfa Romeo's final driver.

Val, having a hard time zipping her suit up, points to the camera mouthing, “See you soon on the podium!” Winking, after she's zipped up with the balaclava on her head before securing her helmet in place.

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in-my-feels-probably · 1 year

Note

I can’t remember fr 😭 but here’s maybe another idea? Carmenxreader where the reader works as a chef at the restaurant as well and one day when they’re specially stressed out carmy blows up on her face (kinda like how he does to Sydney on ep 7) and she straight up walks out as well, the difference here is that they live together and obviously they can’t exactly ignore each other at home OR as an alternative, he blows up in her face and she has that kinda silent anger that’s even scarier than when someone has a screaming match with you, so when she simply turns around and goes back to work, Carmy is afraid for his life because he can practically see the anger radiating off of her, either one is fine! And ending is up to you! (But make is happy pls because I am a baby and will cry at too much angst :’)) thank you!!

Crash and Burn

Request: Carmenxreader where the reader works as a chef at the restaurant as well and one day when they’re specially stressed out carmy blows up on her face (kinda like how he does to Sydney on ep 7) and she straight up walks out as well, the difference here is that they live together and obviously they can’t exactly ignore each other at home OR as an alternative, he blows up in her face and she has that kinda silent anger that’s even scarier than when someone has a screaming match with you, so when she simply turns around and goes back to work, Carmy is afraid for his life because he can practically see the anger radiating off of her, either one is fine!

Hi! I’m so sorry for the long wait, I’ve been so busy but I’ve got some time now. I’m still getting the hang of writing for Carmy, so bear with me if it’s a little bit rusty. Anyways, I hope you enjoy it!

(Warnings: swearing, shouting, slight angst, let me know if i missed anything)

—

Today was not your day. It wasn’t anyone’s day at the Beef’s, to be more specific.

And to make it worse, you were prepping for a catering event Carmy couldn’t say no to. You needed the cash, and so it had to be done. But—of course—everything had to go wrong, one shitty situation after the other.

First, the meat delivery man dropped off fifty pounds of the wrong kind of meat, which immediately put Carmy in a bad mood. Then, he accidentally scorched the bottom of a pan after he forgot to check it while he was whisked away doing other things, and he had to start his stock sauce over completely. Unfortunately for you, it was a new recipe, and he was the only one who knew how to make it. It set him back at least an hour, and now you were rushing to pick up the slack of his duties on top of yours while he continued his.

It seemed as if everyone was having a bad day. Marcus couldn’t get the consistency of his cake batter right. Richie left his cigarettes at home and was forced to work through his smoke break, loudly griping about it to you while he chopped vegetables. Tina was late to work because of an appointment she had to take her son to, and she refused to cancel it and make another. Not that you blamed her.

You could overhear the phone call she had with Carmy letting him know she was stuck on the L train. When he asked why she couldn’t have just rescheduled, her scolding could be heard even from outside his office door.

“It took me three fucking weeks just to even get the place to answer the phone without putting me on hold, I’m not about to wait another month!”

Carmy sighed, wiping a hand down his face. “We’re really busy today, Tina, if you could just please hurry—”

“Yeah, I’ll tell the conductor to step on it. Give me a minute, kid, I’ll be there soon.”

She arrived shortly after her phone call, making herself scarce when she saw Carmy hunched over a pot, muttering fragmented sentences to himself that would make a sailor blush. You quickly hurried her over, telling her to grab a knife and help you chop.

The icing on the fucking cake—metaphorical of course, since Marcus had yet to actually bake any cake—was the client calling Carmy in the middle of the lunch rush and demanding the event’s catering be pushed up half a day, or else they would cancel entirely and expect a refund. A refund you didn’t have, as you had already spent the moneyt, so you had no choice but to oblige them. Meaning that instead of the extra time in the morning everyone had to prep, they’d instead have to finish that evening. And as if that couldn’t get any worse, Richie was going to have to leave halfway through the dinner shift to go pick up his daughter, which was unmissable.

It would be you, Carmy, Tina, Marcus, and Sydney after the restaurant closed, working overtime and scrambling until you finished.

Although, it was hard to ponder the next few hours when you were up to your neck in to-go orders, wrapping up sandwich after sandwich that Richie was making and sending your way in between taking orders at the counter. In fact, everyone was up to their necks in duties, frantically working and bustling around the kitchen.

“Sydney, I’ll sign the lease to my apartment over to you and my savings account for rent if you take that meat cleaver and hit me over the head with it. If I don’t die, at least I’ll get sent to the hospital and be able to get the fuck out of here,” you groaned, wrapping yet another sandwich and sliding it back to Richie at the counter.

Carmy tsked, not looking up from the now four separate pots on the stove he was managing. “Considering I live there, too, I think you’re gonna have to tough this one out for me.”

“For fucks sake,” you whined, heading into the front of house to grab more wrappers.

Richie patted your shoulder on your way back into the kitchen, chuckling when you glared up at him. In a rare moment of peace when there was a gap in customers, he headed back into the kitchen to help you with the online orders.

“Hang in there, kid,” he said, reaching into his back pocket before he groaned. “Shit, do you have any smokes?”

“Nope,” you replied, immediately souring his relatively calm mood.

“Fuck!”

He then took to angrily assembling and wrapping orders, shooing you away from the to-go station. Not that you were complaining, you could practically feel the anger radiating off him as he worked.

You chose to help Carmy, who looked like he was about ten seconds from a mental breakdown. You rested a hand on his back as you approached him, gently rubbing up and down.

“Where do you need me, love? Can I help?”

He sighed in frustration, shaking his head. “Nah, I’ve got this. Can you help Tina in the walk-in? She’s been in there a while.”

“Yup,” you smiled, hooking an arm around his middle giving him a quick hug, before heading into the back where the freezer was.

When you opened the door, Tina was standing on her tippy toes, trying to put a big container of sauce on the top shelf. You furrowed your brows in confusion, wondering why she hadn’t asked someone a bit taller, like Marcus, to help her lift it up. She’d been gone from her station for what was probably twenty minutes now, and it was hard to imagine her standing like that instead of simply asking for help.

You let the door close behind you, stepping in to help. “Tina, what are you doing?”

“I’ve got it, it’s fine. I’ll be right out,” she replied, taking a step up onto the bottom rank of the shelf.

“Tina—” you gasped, eyes widening.

She quickly turned towards you, one hand clinging to the shelf, the other supporting the container. “Y/N—”

Suddenly, her foot slipped down off the shelf, and she lost stability. The container came crashing down, splashing sauce all over the floor and across your shoes and the bottom of your pants. You quickly jumped over the puddle, offering your hands for Tina to take.

“Come on, then. Get down, I’ll get us a few rags and we can clean this up,” you said, taking her hands in yours as you helped her step down. “We only lost the top bit, I think the rest of this is salvageable. I’ll ask Marcus to put this up on the shelf once we get it cleaned up in here.”

“Damn it,” she muttered, slipping her shoes off at the door so she didn’t track sauce all over the kitchen.

You did the same, opening the door for her. “It’s alright, I’ve done this at least twice since I started working here. Sydney, too. It’s not our fault these shelves are so fucking high.”

Tina managed a chuckle, grabbing the mop bucket. “What a shitty day.”

“Agreed,” you replied, heading over to where you kept the clean towels and rags stocked.

You passed by Carmy on the way, who raised a brow at your disheveled appearance. “Drop something?”

“Not me, just in the splash zone. Don’t worry, I’ll get it cleaned up.”

He was slicing meat now, and he frustratedly paused, setting his knife down. “Which sauce?”

“Uh, the garlic aioli, I think. I’m not sure, they’re all the same color, but it currently reeks of garlic in the walk-in, so I think my guess is pretty accurate.”

“Shit,” he sighed, picking the knife back up. “Could you be more careful, please?”

You raised a brow. “Well, I wasn’t the one who dropped it, but—”

“Yeah, yeah, just be fucking careful, alright? I don’t think we’ll survive any more shit today, we’re barely gonna make it as is.”

You flinched back at his sharp tone and raised volume, trying not to look too affected by his words. Suddenly, Richie called over his shoulder, scolding Carmy.

“Cousin! Be fucking nice, leave her alone. Don’t be a dick, it was an accident.”

Carmy’s face fell as he watched your falter, and he cleared his throat, sniffing. “I’m sorry, I know it’s not your fault. There’s just too much shit to deal with today.”

You nodded and went to grab the towels, circling back by him as you walked past. You spoke carefully, not wanting to make him feel any worse than he already did. You knew he was under a lot of stress and didn’t mean to snap at you, but you’d much rather avoid any further potential snapping if you could, letting him be.

“Take a breath, Carm. We’re gonna be fine, we still have all evening.”

He nodded, mustering up a small smile. “I know. I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright, really,” you said, rubbing his shoulder as you walked back into the walk-in.

Sighing, you got down on your hands and knees and started wiping up the mess. Tina stuck to the higher bits of the shelf that the sauce splashed onto. It took about ten minutes, but you finally managed to get everything up. You wiped the bottom of your shoes last, and then all the sauce was gone. Tina ran a mop through the freezer one last time, and you were finished after you got rid of the dirty rags.

You joined Sydney at her station, tying a new apron around your waist.

“Shitty day?” She asked, reaching for a sharper knife. “Twenty bucks on it getting even shittier.”

You huffed out a laugh. “I’d lose that bet. I guarantee we’re all gonna want to quit by tomorrow morning.”

“Fantastic,” she said, plastering a fake exaggerated smile on her face.

—

The rest of the dinner shift was—as predicted—miserable. Richie practically danced as he clocked out, saluting everyone before running out the back door to his car. Thankfully, he closed the front of the restaurant before leaving, which saved you all an extra half hour.

Everything settled down a bit once you all were steadily working in the back, but you were still rushing to make your new deadline. Everyone stuck to their own stations, in the zone as they worked.

You finished your first round of work, deciding to see if anyone else needed help with getting theirs done.

“Hey, Tina—”

She put a hand up, stopping you. “I’m good, mija. Talk to Jeff.”

“Heard,” you grinned, before walking over to Carmy. “Need me to do anything here?”

He took a breath, eyes scanning over his work before he nodded. “Yeah, uh…I braised the beef earlier. Could you slice it up thinly, and then pass it to Sydney? She needs it for prep.”

“Yup,” you nodded, grabbing a knife and the tray of meat.

You began to make small talk as you worked, first with Carmy, then with everyone else. It was beginning to get late, and you all were a little delirious. Soon enough, the kitchen was full of laughter and scuffling feet as you moved around, telling joke after joke. It was a little loud, admittedly, but everyone seemed to be in high spirits.

“Alright, alright, I’ve got one,” Marcus said, loading a tray into the oven. “When does a joke become a dad joke? When it’s apparent.”

You stifled a laugh as best you could, but you failed when Tina burst out laughing, crossing her legs.

“Stop it, I'm gonna piss myself!”

That got Sydney, who’s laughter was practically echoing off the walls. “That’s some popsicle stick shit right there.”

You wiped your eyes with the back of your hand, tears falling as you chuckled. You could feel the heat in your cheeks as you laughed, your stomach beginning to ache. You looked over at Carmy, and realized that he had stopped laughing. He had smiled and chuckled at the first few jokes, but now he was quiet, working with tired eyes.

“You got any jokes, Carm?” You asked, taking a step closer to him.

“What?” He asked, finally looking up at you. “Uh…no, no I don’t.”

“Oh, come on,” Marcus drawled over his shoulder, turning to look at Carmy.

“No.”

You nodded, urging him along. “Yeah Carm, just give it a shot.”

“No,” he said curtly, turning back to his work.

You gave him a grin, trying to put him in a better mood. “Carm, just try—”

“Y/N! No!” He shouted, dropping his knife on the counter with a loud clang. “Could you just leave me alone for a minute, please? I mean, fuck! What’s with you today? We’ve got shit to get done. Just work! Without all the yammering, preferably.”

“Woah!” Tina shouted, immediately coming to your defense. “Take the stick out of your ass, leave her alone!”

Your jaw slacked at his words, but you quickly recovered, standing up straight. You could feel the ache in your heart at his scolding, and the tinge of embarrassment heating up your cheeks. But you steeled your emotions, setting your shoulders back as you picked up your knife, continuing to chop. You could hear arguing around you, but you ignored it, keeping your head down.

Carmy immediately regretted his outburst, and he would have reached out to you if Sydney and Tina hadn’t immediately put themselves between you and him.

“You alright?” Marcus said quietly, coming to stand by your side.

You nodded, giving him a small smile. “I’m fine, I promise. Thanks.”

“Y/N,” Carmy started, and you could see the regret in his eyes.

He dropped what he was doing, trying to come over to you. But you raised a hand, stopping him in his tracks.

“I said I’m fine,” you replied curtly, turning to Sydney. “Syd, I’ll finish slicing the beef so I can give it to you, and I’ll finish up with anyone else who needs me for something. But I’m leaving the second I’m done.”

Sydney gave you a look of sympathy. “You don’t have to, I can finish this.”

“I’m not gonna throw a tantrum and make your job any harder just because I want to leave,” you sighed, throwing a sharp glare towards Carmy.

You could see his jaw clench, and he cast his eyes to the floor. You scoffed, quickly going back to your work. Working as fast as you could, you finished within the next half hour. Walking over to Sydney, you placed the tray of sliced beef in front of her.

“Here,” you groaned tiredly, pinching the bridge of your nose.

She frowned, patting your arm. “Go home, babe. Get some rest.”

“I will, let me just ask Tina—”

“I’m fine,” Tina interrupted, holding her hand up when you tried to speak again. “Marcus, too. Seriously, mija. Go home.”

You finally relented, nodding. “Alright, fine. I’ll see you guys in the morning.”

“Love you,” they called out in sequence, watching you grab all of your things and head for the door.

You called back to them telling them you loved them, passing Carmy on your way out. He looked up at you as you walked past, his face full of regret, and a slight bit of fear. You smiled sweetly at him, making him shift back and forth uncomfortably.

“See you at home.”

He visibly paled, and you choked down a sinister laugh as you walked out the door.

—

Hours later, Carmy gently opened up the front door to your shared appointment. He was practically tiptoeing, trying not to wake you up. As he flicked on the lights, he took a startled step back when he saw you sitting on the couch, a book beside you that you had long since abandoned. The TV dimly lit the room, on a low volume.

“There’s leftovers in the fridge,” you said quietly, not taking your eyes off the TV. “Eat.”

You may have been pissed—beyond pissed—but you didn’t want him to starve. The whole day, and you couldn’t remember seeing him eat even once.

“Y/N—” He started gently, but you cut him off.

“Eat…then we’ll talk.”

He sighed, nodding as he walked over to the fridge. After a few minutes of dawdling around the kitchen, he finally joined you, cautiously taking a seat next to you.

You didn’t turn to him as you spoke. “Did you finish? Everyone get home okay?”

You could hear him fidgeting next to you, which led to you finally faltering and looking over at him. The look on his face almost made you take pity, but you waited for him to speak first. He finally did, breaking the silence.

“I’m sorry,” he said, fiddling with his hands in his lap.

You raised a brow, having to urge him to continue. “For?”

“For being an asshole,” he finished, his eyes softening on you.

You nearly smiled, raising a brow. “You really mean that, don’t you?”

“You were trying to help, and I was being a dick about it. You were under just as much stress as I was, and it was out of line yelling at you in front of everyone like that. I shouldn’t blow up on anyone like that, but especially not you. I’m sorry.”

“You really embarrassed me, you know,” you said, your voice beginning to waver.

Carmy winced as you spoke, nodding. “Yeah, I know. I’m sorry for that, too.”

Sighing, you gently took his hand. He immediately clung to yours, squeezing it as he turned to face you more.

“You could just talk to me,” you whispered, rubbing your thumb along the back of his hand. “Tell me if I’m being too loud, or if you want me to do something else. I just want to help you. We all do. And we can’t do that if you don’t tell us what you need.”

“They all think I’m an asshole, don’t they? I would if I heard someone yelling at their girl like that.”

You shook your head, squeezing his hand again. “No, Carm. They don’t think you’re an asshole. They know you’re under a lot of pressure, and honestly, I think they’d say you’re handling the change of pace really well. Marcus and Sydney would, at least. Not sure about Tina. Definitely not Richie.”

Carmy let out a laugh at that, leaning back into the couch. “Yeah, well…he’s an asshole, too. Takes one to know one.”

You grinned, resting your head on his shoulder. “You’re not an asshole…at least, not all the time.”

“Fuck you,” he spat, although he was grinning, too. “And yes, by the way. We finished up, and everyone made it home safely. It’ll be a long day tomorrow, but we’ve done the hard part.”

You hooked your arm under his, leaning against his side. “I’m glad. It’s good money. We needed this job. Not sure it was worth all the rage, but I’m sure I’ll be saying differently tomorrow.”

“It’ll be worth it,” he said, leaning over to press a kiss to the top of your head. “Thank you.”

You smiled, grinning dramatically. “What would you ever do without me?”

He shrugged, leaning further into you as he let out a deep sigh. “Crash and burn, probably.”

“Well, we can’t have that, can we?”

—

A/N - Hi! So sorry again for the wait, I hope this is what you were looking for. Let me know what you think! Thank you again for requesting :)

#the bear x reader #the bear hulu #the bear #the bear imagine #carmen berzatto x you #carmen berzatto imagine #carmen berzatto #carmen berzatto x reader #carmy berzatto x you #carmy the bear #carmy berzatto imagine #carmy berzatto #carmy berzatto x reader

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ithebookhoarder · 1 year

Text

Calling Out (Matt Murdock x Reader)

Description: You're always there for Matt when he needs you, but tonight he's keen to remind you that he's there for you too.

A/N: Set during S2 Ep 10 after the attack on Reyes - I couldn't resist.

Warnings: Angst, mentions of violence, mentions of death, gun violence references, injury references

Masterlist

Sleep was impossible.

No matter how hard you tried, you’d been tossing and turning since the moment you’d got home. It didn’t matter what you did, you couldn’t seem to turn it off - to quieten the worsening anxiety inside of you.

You’d seen the news. You hadn’t meant to be watching but it had been on in the corner of the office, as it always was, silently playing in the background.

The rolling banner on the screen was what caught your attention first, followed by the collective murmurs of disbelief from colleagues surrounding you: DA dead in courthouse shooting.

Your stomach had dropped instantly.

Matt.

Even now, in your apartment, the all-consuming terror roared inside of you, drowning out anything other than the voices in your head. The fear and adrenaline were pounding in your veins, no matter how many times you told yourself that Matt was ok. He was alright.

He’d answered the phone the moment you’d called, voice frantic as you begged to know what had happened - that he was alive and unharmed. You’d even spoken to Karen and Foggy to corroborate that fact.

That had been enough for then, enough to calm yourself and allow you to go back to work safe in the knowledge Matt was coming home to you. That he’d eventually walk through your door tonight after finishing patrol, after he’d washed away the grime and the dirt from a night in the city. It was routine - your routine… yet he still hadn’t come.

Where was he? Why hadn’t he come yet? Was he hurt?

It was hard to shut the thoughts down, especially as you kept replaying today over and over again in your mind.

What if... Those two words taunted you.

What if Matt had been sat closer to Reyes? What if he hadn’t heard the gun cock? What if the bullets had been just an inch closer and killed him and everyone else in that office?

Sure, Foggy had been hit but at least he would recover. Matt had been just quick enough to change what should have been fatal to a flesh wound. But that was Matt all over… He had always danced with danger and death, but right now it felt like he’d never come closer to it.

You choked back a sob and grabbed your phone.

“Hello?”

Of course he picked up on the first ring.

"Hey, Matt," you choked, doing your best to keep your voice calm and steady. It was no use though, he knew you too well - and that was without his ‘super-senses’. He could probably hear the way you were biting your lip and fighting tears through the phone.

As if reading your mind, Matt’s voice became filled with concern. You could even picture his brow creasing, as it often did when he was upset. Normally you were the one to make it better, kissing his forehead until the lines simply melted away. But tonight, it was the other way around.

"Y/N? Honey, what's wrong?"

"Nothing," you answered quickly. "I just… I needed to hear your voice. I know it's late, and you probably only just got back from patrol, and I’m so sorry, but I was wondering if you were still coming over or not-"

"Hey, hey. It's ok, don't apologise," Matt soothed. "I was late getting back in and wasn’t sure if you would be asleep by now, else I’d have called to tell you. Why? What’s wrong?"

"I told you, it’s nothing. I just wanted to... to make sure you were okay-"

It would have probably been more believable if your voice hadn’t decided to crack at that exact moment. As it was, your hands began to tremble, making it hard to keep a grip on your phone.

Thankfully, Matt could read you like a book.

"Y/N, listen to me very carefully… I’m okay," he soothed, letting the words sink in. "Sweetheart, I’m okay. I promise."

"I know, Matt, but ... When I saw what had happened on the news, I couldn’t breathe. It’s one thing to know you’re out at night, doing what you do, but that’s different. That’s the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen and not… this was close, Matty. This was you, in broad daylight and I can’t lose you. It was close, too close."

The words fell from your lips without you even realising. It was as if he had removed the cork from a bottle, all the pent up emotions and fears simply spilling over in a steady stream.

You didn’t know how to make it stop.

"Y/N… do you want me to come over?"

You immediately froze at the question. The answer was on your tongue but a sudden rush of guilt hit you before you could give in.

He was probably exhausted and given what he’d been through, asking him to come all the way over to your apartment just so you could squash your own fears was selfish.

"No, don’t worry about it, Matt. You just got in and you need to sleep. You've been through a lot today and I - I’m being stupid. Don't worry, please."

"But-"

"I’ll just see you at the coffee stand, before work, ok?" you rushed, wiping a stray tear away as it finally broke free. “Love you, Matty. Goodnight."

You hung up before he could say another word.

Hearing his voice had been helpful, you couldn’t lie, but it was no substitute for seeing him in person. To be able to hold him, to breathe in the scent that was so distinctly him.

Taking a deep breath, you lay back against your pillows, staring aimlessly at the ceiling fan as it span in circles over and over and over…

Until there was a knock at the door.

You paused.

Peeling back the sheets, you stumbled to the door, somehow knowing who it was long before you stared through the peephole.

“Matt?”

You couldn’t quite believe your eyes as you took him in, in the flesh, on your doorstep, at 5 in the morning. Hell, his hair was still sticking up at odd angles, and he had his favourite pair of grey sweatpants on, like he’d got out of bed and run the entire way here.

The sight was enough to make your heart ache all over again.

“What are you doing here?”

Matt’s lips tugged into that familiar smirk that you loved so much. “Isn’t it obvious? I wanted to see you."

Just like that, the tears began to flow. You couldn’t help it as you collapsed into his arms, letting him haul you close as relief washed over you.

“I’m here,” he purred. “I’m here...”

#ithebookhoarder #masterlist #thesilentmage #marvel #matt murdock x y/n #matt murdock x you #matt murdock x reader #matt murdock #daredevil x reader #daredevil x you #daredevil #charlie cox #matthew murdock #marvel daredevil #daredevil netflix #foggy nelson

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littlespoonevan · 1 year

Text

left half my heart in our living room

that episode did severe emotional damage to my psyche and then i turned on grow by sigrid and proceeded to make it worse :) i don’t know what this is i just needed to write some words because buck and eddie said So Many words in this ep and i felt all of them 💔

spoilers for 6x15

I feel like she sees me.

The sentence sticks in Eddie’s head. Niggling at the base of his skull like an itch that won’t go away.

“You’re quiet,” Buck says when they’re on the way home from the cemetery and it’s around that moment that Eddie realises he hasn’t said anything since they got in the jeep. Too consumed by their conversation from before.

I feel like she sees me.

He looks over at Buck now, one hand on the steering wheel, one resting on his lap, and he looks…comfortable, on first glance. But then Eddie notes the tense set of his shoulders and the way he seems to be staring at the road a little too hard, like he’s purposefully trying not to look in Eddie’s direction.

For one bitter moment, Eddie wonders if Natalia would notice those things but he shakes the thought away. He shouldn’t put this on her. She only knows what Buck’s told her.

“Do you really believe that?” he asks finally, voice quiet and a little bit too tentative. “That she sees you better than-“ me “-than any of us?”

Buck’s mouth parts and it’s clear he hadn’t expected the question. Eddie watches him while he works himself up to an answer – the way he shifts in his seat, the way his eyes dart to the rearview mirror instead of Eddie himself, the careful intake of breath before he finally decides to speak.

“I mean, it’s different,” is what Buck settles on. “Her perception of death and how it affects you, it’s-“

“Because none of us have ever had any experience with death,” Eddie can’t help cutting in.

“Eddie,” Buck sighs and it sounds like please.

“Chimney’s heart stopped last year,” Eddie says. “And when I got-“

“She doesn’t look at me like I’m a ghost, alright?” Buck says, sharp and slicing through Eddie’s intended comment about his own brush with death.

The words make him stop short. He clenches and unclenches his fists in his lap as he digests them. "What d’you mean?”

Buck sighs again and it seems more upset than before. “Maddie, Bobby, you- you all look at me like…like you’re not even sure I’m really here. Like I’m gonna disappear at any minute. You think I don’t see it but I do.”

“Because you died, Buck,” Eddie exclaims, frustrated and weary and more vulnerable than he’d planned on letting himself be. “You died. And for three minutes and seventeen seconds I thought I was going to have to live in this world without you and I didn’t want to.”

That makes Buck clap his mouth shut and he doesn’t say anything else but Eddie can see the tears gathering at the corners of his eyes. The car stops abruptly then and he takes stock of his surroundings for the first time since they got in the jeep. They’re outside his house now.

He takes a measured breath and unclips his seatbelt, shooting a wary look in Buck’s direction. His hands are still gripping the steering wheel and he’s staring straight out the windscreen but he cut off the engine, at least.

“Come inside,” Eddie requests softly, climbing out of the jeep and not waiting to see if Buck follows.

He lets himself into the house and hears the slam of Buck’s car door as he’s dropping his keys on the side table. He hesitates when he gets to the living room, unsure whether he should keep travelling to the kitchen or just drop down on the couch and bury his head in his hands.

Buck comes inside before he can decide, the click of the door soft as he closes it behind himself.

“You looked at me like that too,” Eddie says without turning around. It’s easier saying it without Buck looking at him, even though he can feel Buck’s stare like a brand on his back. “After the well. And- and the shooting. I remember.”

“I’m used to losing people,” Buck says after a beat. “The fact that I got to keep you felt like a trick somehow. Like if I looked away for too long you’d be gone again.”

Eddie huffs a humourless laugh, feeling tears sting behind his eyes. He finally turns, finding Buck standing in the entryway. He gives Eddie a helpless shrug when their eyes meet.

“And I’m not allowed to feel like that?”

“You are,” Buck insists, body shifting like he’s about to charge forward but in the end he only takes one step. “I just don’t know what to do with it.”

“Why not?” Eddie asks and they’re teetering dangerously close to a conversation they’ve never let themselves have before but he doesn’t know how to stop pushing either.

Buck answers anyway.

“Because if I think about how much you see me – how much I let you see without you even asking – I feel terrified. Because I’ve spent years trying to get you to let me all the way in but it’s really fucking scary to imagine me doing the same thing. To believe that you’d even want that.”

Eddie works his jaw, swallowing against the heaving ache in his chest. He gets it, is the thing. No matter how much they’ve taken care of each other, no matter how much they’ve acted as one another’s soft place to land, there’s still a voice in the back of his head that says, you’re being a burden. Stop it.

“I don’t care if you want to start dating again-“ Lie. That’s a lie. “-but don’t- don’t say-“

As if sensing he can’t actually get the words out, Buck immediately starts shaking his head. “I won’t,” he says. “I won’t. I’m sorry.”

Eddie nods, clears his throat, and glances between the couch and the dining room. He doesn’t know what to do now, doesn’t know how they go back to having a casual beer, but before he can come up with something to say to break the tension Buck is stepping forward, crowding into his space and folding him into a hug.

I don’t remember the last time we did this, Eddie thinks even as his muscle memory reacts. His arms come up around Buck, one hand gripping his shoulder while the other wraps around his waist. Buck’s face burrows into his shoulder and Eddie only hesitates for half a second before he presses his temple against the exposed line of Buck’s neck and breathes him in.

“I’m not gonna disappear,” Buck whispers and, ridiculously, it makes fresh tears spring behind Eddie’s eyelids.

“Me either,” he replies and Buck’s arms tighten around him in response.

And he thinks they’re at an impasse now, a sort of crossroads they can’t turn back from but aren’t able to move forward from yet either.

If this is where they have to stay for now, he thinks he might be okay with that.

#buddie #buck x eddie #911 fic #my fics #911 spoilers #6x15 #everyone listen to grow by sigrid right now!!!!!#(and make gifsets please 😇)

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radioactive-dazey · 1 month

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About to finish my 2nd rewatch (this year) of the entire TSSCU, and wow I could talk about POF all day.

From how the fandom reacted (both positively and negatively), to the way Patton was acting, how Roman was his cheerleader to the end and the END CARD OH MY GOD THE END CARD.

Every time I rewatch that episode specifically, it's like I'm seeing it the first time again. Every moment I sit there and notice new things and think/process it differently. It's insane how I connect the same dots and reach a different conclusion, EVERY SINGLE TIME.

It made me cry on this rewatch. For some reason I empathize with Patton more. This is arguably the most heaviest episode of Sanders sides to date. With how intense it was it's hard to believe how digestible it really is. You UNDERSTAND what's being said, even if you aren't able to put it in your own words.

Also something I haven't notice anyone bring up before: Patton was player 1 in the eps thumbnail, typically that slot is reserved for the "leader" or "best player" (at least it is in my household)

Player 1 gets control of all the settings, levels, and sometimes power ups depending on the game

Roman was player 2. :') he was really just dragged along for the journey. I feel for him in this one guys. They make me cry. Both of them.

Patton needs to take a breather, Roman needs some sort of confidence boost, both of them deserve so much more patience from the fandom (cuz holy fuck the hate Patton especially got from this ep was INSANE)

#gosh. sanders sides man #sanders sides #thomas sanders #patton sanders #roman sanders

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halliescomut · 3 months

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Love Sea Ep 2 Thoughts

Okay. I've had some time to consider the episode, organize my thoughts (potentially) but I think this still might be a bit of a ramble....sorry.

So we do start off right where we left off where they're coming back on the boat, and they're talking on the beach. I mentioned in my watch along a lot of these thoughts, so I'm kind of just expanding on them, so it might be helpful to read that first. But I've taken an interest in a lot of the body language happening in the show, and looking at the scene it gives me this feeling of Mut sort of invading Rak's space, but just enough.

Like their legs are entwined, but there's decent distance from their upper bodies, which given Rak's hesitation to get too close, or be too charmed by Mut really works for me. Given the scene prior, and Rak's sort of level of upset, it feels pretty clear that Mut is working to kind of distract Rak. And Rak basically jumps on that opportunity. It actually kind of reminds me of Sky in that way, like we don't have a confirmation of Sky's general MO in regard to sex, but the ONS read a little bit to me as an intentional decision to distract himself. I get that same feeling here, Rak doesn't want to think about why he reacted as he did, or consider how vulnerable he made himself, and so he kind of thinks by jumping into a sexual experience that will distract both him and Mut.

I have (as is kind of always the case with Mame) reservations on the kind of D/s undertones she uses. I got to be honest, part of the issue is the weird commitment to putting Peat's character in the more submissive position (she did it with Sky too) I honestly don't find that it suits him or his characters well, and is based solely on his body type versus his personality. Setting that aside for now, I will say that I appreciate direct expression of oral sex. In LITA specifically (I know I'm calling back to that a lot, but it's hard not to use it as a comparison, specifically for the NC scenes) we saw two separate allusions to oral sex, or honestly we were robbed of two NC scenes involving oral. The ONS, where Pai doesn't let Sky give him a BJ, and then the bathroom scene that ended up getting cut where we see Prapai giving. I made this observation (among friends, not publically...I don't think) that I think the intentional exclusion of that specific sex act in Thai BL leads me to believe there's a particular reason why it's not included. In terms of MM sex we see your standard penetrative sex pretty regularly, and then small sprinkles of handjobs in general, but oral is almost never even alluded to, much less shown. Now I'm honestly not super caught up on a lot of Thai BL, but I would say I've seen more direct expressions of oral in the last year, than I had seen in two years prior since I got into Thai BL. So overall I think it's a step in the right direction in encouraging a more well-rounded and accurate depiction of the gay experience.

In terms of the actual physical acting of the scene...I'm gonna say C+. It's less about their facial expressions and more about positioning and timing...in a way. I will salute the decision for oral sex if you're doing it on a beach, because that is going to be your least chafe-y option.

Following this we get a return of the humor with Rak saying they need to go back to the hotel room immediately...Clearly leading Mut to believe that the sexy times will continue, but they do not. Rak starts writing, we don't get insight into the specific scene, but I do wonder if the written scenes mirror the IRL experiences or not. Like how similar are they? During that time we see Mut basically pouting and then googling Rak. This gives us our first suggestion in the show I think that Rak is basically a self-insert for Mame. And we see the covers for The Boy Next World as well as Love Director, two novels that 'Rak' has written and are being made into series. He follows that up by checking what looks to be basically Rak's Instagram, containing many pictures of Rak looking incredibly attractive and then basically excuses himself to take a shower.

Rak finishes his scene, and I'm not really sure if he's kind of run out of mojo, or if he's just done with that scene in general, but he goes looking for Mut and he sure does find him. Now I did miss the arm movement initially and thought we were just appreciating the rear view so to speak, but then you realize that Mut is in fact jacking off.

Overall, it seems a case of "Well, we've already crossed the line" and we have the most minimal discussion of terms. I'm not a person who cares at all about the sexual decisions that adults make, but as someone who is close friends with people who have and continue to work in the sex industry, it is of course not a necessarily safe way to go about those types of negotiations. This is not a dealbreaker for me by any means in regards to watching the show, I genuinely don't expect anything overly realistic, it's just an observation.

Moving on to the main event as it were, the sort of antagonistic flirting is on point, which with Fort and Peat is not surprising. They mentioned that Mame gave them an opportunity to do what felt natural for their characters and I do feel that in the conversation and acting in the shower. Once we move back to the bedroom things move very quickly, and while I think the scene is very good, it doesn't feel passionate in the same way the earlier scene does, or previous NC scenes we've seen from FortPeat as PrapaiSky (except for one in particular and I'll get back to that). I'm not personally sure if this was an acting choice, if it was just how the scene ended up, if it was directing, I truly don't know. I think though it really fits the situation in a particular way. The almost emotionless sex feels appropriate because they don't truly have feelings for each other yet, not really. Flirting and attraction aside, there's not a true emotional connection, especially on Rak's part. And I'm sorry, but it reminds me of the ONS in LITA. It's the only sex scene we see of Prapai and Sky where there are positions where they aren't facing each other, which creates an emotional distance. It's why we see missionary position so often in BLs even when that may not be the go-to position for MM sex. Having characters face each other creates an emotional connection.

The choice makes sense if you consider that both Rak and Sky are going into this sexual encounter with the intention of maintaining emotional distance. And even Mut and Prapai at this point, while intrigued by this very attractive person, aren't coming into it from an overly emotional place. So, overall I do think in this scene it's a vibe that really works for me, and I'm interested to see how these scenes change as the characters open up more to each other.

Once Rak is done, he's very definitively done and sends Mut away, but does admit to himself that this Mut is one of the best he's ever had.

We then cut to the next day and get more of what I personally call Mut's village rounds, just him going around and talking to different people from the community, and we see more interactions with Palm, the bartender from episode one. They're interactions are really cute, I actually really enjoy him. He has good doofus energy. Anyway, after that Mut heads to the hotel because Palm told him that all the single staff there were trying to 1- figure out Rak's sexuality and 2- potentially woo him because he's rich. So Mut is there sitting with a group of ladies, to Rak's eyes he's flirting, but we don't hear much if any of the conversation, so it's unclear if there's actual flirting or if it's just Mut's general charisma. I also don't think we've gotten any specific clarity on Mut or Rak's sexuality in terms of whether they are gay, bi, or pan. I personally suspect that Rak does not feel attracted to women, but that's my own read on it. Mut is harder to nail down, but we haven't seen nearly as much of him in a flirting-approriate situation. But back to the point. Rak sees Mut with the women, he hears hotel staff talking about how he's a catch or something (I skimmed over that on the second watch, sorry) and he's jealous.

We see a peek at Rak's impulsiveness here (like the beach and the shower, and even the robe scene of last episode) and he sends Mut 65,000 Baht which is $1,771 in USD, so not small change, and basically comes up and stakes his claim on him. We get more of Peat's English here, and I'm guessing we might get more of it when he returns to Bangkok, or maybe just more if we see more conversations with Connor. I have feelings about the whole "I paid for you, I don't share", as discussed above, but I do think it gives insight to Rak, and the kind of slippery slope he's found himself on here.

Mut leaves with him after agreeing to feed him and we do get an adorable montage of them on the motorbike. While the tone of the episode shifts throughout, I don't feel like it's quite as abrupt as the previous episode, and I think the motorbike scene really sets up the future of Rak kind of finding some peace not only in Mut, but also in this rural community. Once they arrive at the area where the restaurant is we get the joke that the motorbike ride set up, which is that it may not be the best mode of transportation if you spent the previous night engaging in pretty vigorous anal activity. Fair enough, and the teasing there from Mut using his Southern dialect is downright adorable, but what's most interesting is we get confirmation that both Mut and Rak are out in their communities.

While this is not necessarily surprising with Mame, outside of her university set stories most of her characters are reconciled of their sexuality from the start. They may not necessarily be publicly out, but they're aware of and enerally accepting of their sexuality and even confident in it. I actually think Mame's spectrum of where people are at in their coming out journey is one of the better aspects of her shows, as it gives people at all different parts of that journey characters they can relate to.

We re-encounter Palm here, he's kind of similar to Mut, or at least Mut a few years ago, a less than flush native of the island who works whatever odd jobs he can find. Rak finds him a bit annoying which is fair, but I did enjoy the small bit of teasing between Palm and Mut. I think they have a pretty cute bro relationship. Once they go to sit down Rak (and we the viewer) get to meet another community member who heaps quite a bit of praise on Mut for his work and contribution to their community. Mut's shy reaction is very sweet and the scene overall offers a glimpse to Rak of the person Mut truly is, beyond the shameless flirt.

We also get backstory for Mut, learning that he had a falling out with his father at 15, leading to him leaving that home. It's not clear if his sexuality may have been a factor, but homophobic parents have been present in Mame's work before and are something that very sadly continues to be consistent in many queer kids lives IRL, so I don't think it's farfetched. This particular scene is one of the most well-acted I think we've gotten from Fort in it's minimalism. I think Fort feels comfortable with the flirty-charmer character type, and the way he holds himself, how he schools his face, his tone, as he talks about the fallout with his father is so well done. His eyes too, Fort does a lot of really excellent acting with his eyes. What particularly felt accurate to me was the sort of emotionlessness that we see. Experiences like he had, particularly with a parent are really hard to reconcile. As humans we want to have a loving relationship with our parents, more specifically we want to be certain they love us. When it becomes clear they don't, it's a very difficult thing to accept, in particular because it's necessary to simultaneously recognize that you are not at fault in the situation. That's kind of why most people require actual therapy to work through experiences like this. But when that's not an option, the way you deal with it is usually dissociation. You can't dwell on it, let it get to close, because then it will cause a problem, so you keep it at arm's length. That's what we see here with Mut, and what Fort portrays so well. We also get one of the most heartbreaking lines in Mut saying "My dad never takes back what he says. I suppose that's the only thing we have in common." Mut is proud of being a person who keeps their word, we see him mention it before, and we now see that it's a trait with a direct connection to his father. Seemingly the only potentially positive connection he can create there.

For Rak's part, we see those little cracks forming in those walls, he recognizes Mut's vulnerability, he's practically appalled at the idea of Mut's father kicking him out, which based on what we can presume is a very close relationship with his mother, sister, and niece, is understandable. He doesn't understand that betrayal from family really. But he's starting to see Mut as a more well rounded human being, versus the way he'd initially saw him which is solely a potential sex partner/distraction. We then start to get our first bit of insight into Rak when Mut asks him why he became a writer. In the voiceover we hear that he started writing to escape, but his spoken response is that it started as him just wanting to share stories he loved with people. Given that his chosen genre is romance, he wanted to escape to these happily ever after love stories, and share them with people who also want that, because to him happily ever after is only a fantasy, it's not attainable in the real world. Peat's body language is wonderful here, the crossed arms, and looking off kind of the side instead of meeting Mut's gaze directly show that he's being deliberate in how much he's sharing, but in the end I think he still reveals more than he intended with his answers. Mut questions if he's happy, and Rak says that if he weren't he wouldn't be Tongrak, the writer, to which Mut replies "That's all there is to life. And you've been doing a good job". Now I kind of feel like there's nuance missing in the translation, but I'm not the person to address that. But the sentiment seems to be 'happiness is what's important, and by valuing that you're doing a good job' and Rak is very touched by that. He says he doesn't recieve compliments very often, and while I don't know if that's fully accurate given his success and handsomeness, there's a great deal of difference in someone complimenting your work or your looks and someone recognizing that that you're doing a good job as a person, especially a person with a traumatic past. Being a survivor of any kind of trauma creates a lot of pitfalls that are difficult to overcome and create even a semblance of a normal life, and so having that effort recognized, even if not directly is really affirming. We see Rak very intentionally return this compliment to Mut, which communicates a level of recognition.

This conversation also kind of confirms for me that Rak is a bit of a self-insert character for Mame, especially considering that he brings up criticism that his stories get. I've never directly seen or encountered it, but I have heard rumors of Mame getting upset and even responding to negative critiques of her work. Her use of more problematic tropes is a valid criticism, and while I can see some progress from one series to the next, I do also feel like she falls back on what's "easy" instead of really trying to push her stories into more positive directions. While her sexuality is her business, she is a woman writing about gay male relationships, and honestly sometimes it's unrealistic to the point of being distracting. As I've said before, I don't truly expect realism from Mame, but her stories are meant to be in the genre of realistic fiction, they're not fantasy or sci-fi (leaving TBNW out of it for now). It's also very important to recognize that many gay men who watch BL do find some of the tropes she often uses to be damaging, both because they portray gay men in not the best light, but also because they set up potentially problematic expectations in young queer or questioning men who might partake in her stories.

We then cut to night again, joining Mut at home and he's trying to weasel information out of Kom, who does ask Connor, but Connor refuses to give any, only telling him to ask Rak himself, which I appreciate. We can suspect that Connor is kinda trying to matchmake here, but I appreciate him being a good friend to Rak and not revealing his secrets. In the end he calls Rak and invites him diving and we get to the last portion of this episode. Let us pray I can fit my thoughts in a single post.

Now aside from how honestly weird it is that Rak showed up for diving in a small fortunes worth of luxury jewlery (why?), when he sees Palm there as well he gets a little upset, seemingly because he thought there was potential for another hookup. Which I guess is fine, but why would you think diving is the code word for that, when it's literally part of how Mut makes is living? But moving on, they get out into the water, Mut get's Rak all set in his gear and as he's going to get Palm to help him get his gear on Rak goes ahead and dives (that impulsiveness again!). Setting aside my frustration with Rak's fully dangerous decision here, we do get a really lovely little scene of the underwater flora and fauna. Things take a downturn when Rak has a series of flashbacks. It's not really clear what triggers them here, but we see three scenes back to back. First his parents arguing, when he's quite young...8-9 (?), then him comforting his sister, both of them late teens it looks like (they look to be in school uniforms, but could potentially be college), after her boyfriend leaves her after finding out she's pregnant, and then with his mother again, the final sentence is a bit garbled, and not translated in the captions, but logically I think it's something along the lines of "Don't trust in love, if you don't want to end up like me."

As a child, watching two women he cares for deeply suffering because men that they trusted to love and care for them simply didn't would certainly put a bad taste in anyone's mouth about love. So we've kind of identified the catalyst for why Rak doesn't believe in love, even having witnessed it with Kom and Connor. Though I understand in the book there's perhaps some insight into negative feelings related to that relationship, and Kom "taking Connor away". I haven't read either Love Sea or Love Sand, so this is based off of conversations with people who have, so I could be wrong, but I don't think it's a stretch to think of Rak grappling with negative thoughts related to Kom and Connor, even if he's recognizing that those thoughts are a bit ridiculous. It's normal to mourn the loss of what was easy and comfortable when friends find romantic partners and you have to figure out what the new normal is, you just have to make sure you keep resentment and negative feelings under control and don't let them fester.

I will point out though, is that one cinematic choice that's made here is having the sort of washed out blue tones of the flashbacks match the underwater coloring. It keeps the scenes from being too jolting as they cut back and forth, an dI think it was an excellent idea.

Due to the flashback Rak kind of panics, looses his regulator and Mut basically finds him just in time. Giving him some mouth to mouth oxygen before getting him reset so they can go back to the surface.

This type of scene would have been very difficult to film, even if it wa managed in a single take, which is kind of unlikely, and so massive props to Fort and Peat for doing some amazing work here.

Returning to the boat we see Mut become very serious about how dangerous Rak's actions were, but that seriousness is balanced with a lot of empathy as well. I can't fully express my thoughts on the metaphor I feel like is intended in the "they need buddies" conversation, but there's something happening there. Mut does try to talk about why Rak panicked, but Rak shuts him down and we get a convo about the wordplay that is their names instead. Mut here is trying to lighten the situation a bit, and I think Rak kind of recognizes that, but is too stuck in his darker memories to really let it happen and he says something I don't know that he means to. That "Love is a figment of our imaginations". And he believes that, and you can see that Mut know he believes it, and his reaction is the most "Oh sweetie" look I've ever seen. (Seriously, Fort's expressions are always so fantastic). The moment is broken when Rak pulls a Kim Theerapanyakul and says "I'm hungry" and walks away.

We do get s teensy post credits scene which returns us to the restaurant where Rak sadly finds out that at many fresh seafood restaurants those tanks aren't just for ambiance (Bless you red fish for nourishing us) and we get some more good natured flirting from Mut "Will you eat me if I'm tasty"...boy if you don't.

Now we saw this same kind of thing last ep, where we ended on a pretty serious tone, go the end title screen and then a more humorous scene after. I think it's kind of intended to leave us as an audience on a more positive note instead of just wandering through the rest of our day traumatized and sobbing.

As we see the actual credits roll we get confirmation of my suspicion that the scene might change and progress as the episodes go on and indeed this episode we see Mut join Rak at the beach at a companionable distance. A bit curious to see if we might also have a change up when they go to the city.

Overall this was an excellent episode, clearly much to unpack (as you can see by this 4000 word post. It's well paced, the acting is very good, we're kept engaged as an audience. I didn't talk much about P'Vie and Mook, but I'll make a much shorter separate post for that.

#love sea #love sea the series #love sea ep 2 #tongrak #mahasamut #mutrak #tongrak x mahasamut #fortpeat #peat wasuthorn #fort thitipong #HallieSMeta

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