#i have a really hard time from september until december every year again so please be a bit patient with me🤲🏼 | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

beelspillowpet · 4 years

Text

A Lesson in Love - A “Character Analysis” on Asmodeus

I had to come for the tracks, wigs, and weaves of bitches when Pomade dropped because I saw people talking shit about my boy. This was a milestone “project” or “reward” I guess?

I hit 400 followers today while I was out running errands!!! Thank you guys SO SO MUCH for the love and support! I can’t WAIT to produce more content for everyone!!!

Below the cut there WILL BE talk of season 3, as well as some talk of chapter 16. There’s a healthy amount of theorizing on his personality as well, I hope you don’t mind! This came out more like a plea to get people to change their minds about how Asmo really is, rather than a comprehensive essay of sorts. So here we go!

There’s something we apparently still need to talk about in this fanbase. The unrealistic idea of Asmodeus being a sex freak, and an unreliable person in general despite there being little proof of it. We need to set a few things straight about Asmo moving forward.

December 25th rolled around and Asmo’s audio drama and song were released. I take it everyone enjoyed both parts, as well as I did. My timeline both on twitter and tumblr were filled with Asmodeus content, as well as the other brothers and such. But I mostly got Asmo content. However, in peeks and cracks, if I looked hard enough, I still saw people who absolutely loathed Asmo or who were indifferent to him. Keep in mind; I think it’s okay. You don’t have to like everyone.

I’ve only joined the fanbase in September, but even I could tell some of these takes were old fashioned. I downloaded the game on October 17th, a very important anniversary for me, while I

was still in bed in the morning. I blazed through the entire story of season 1 and now I am stuck in season 2, specifically in Chapter 24. I obviously don’t have every card of Asmodeus with his Devilgrams, but I have been analyzing his character over the past few days for this.

So needless to say, I have a considerable amount of information on him, as well as personal thoughts that may help some learn to love him. Or at the very least, from spreading a negative idea of him around as if it were true. Enough that should help clear his name, so to speak.

Let’s look at his title; Avatar of Lust. Now naturally the thoughts that come to your head are sex and other sexual bits. So I can understand how some people would come to the conclusion that he’s just a sex freak. But if you look under the surface of his title, like I’m sure you’ve had to for your own personal favorites (*cough* Lucifer, Belphie, and Satan ESPECIALLY) you would discover that Asmodeus is more than just about sex. In fact, sex takes up very little of his pass time, if you were to believe it!

In recent chapters, as I’ve been told, Asmodeus doesn’t really get around much anyways:

Granted, this was said while in Celestia, but I imagine not much has changed for him since his fall, as well as his brothers.

Not really comfortable being with just anyone, huh…? Sounds like someone who doesn’t have sex so warily often as you’d think!

Being lustful can come in many shapes and forms. It can be merely in appearance, which Asmo is not afraid of doing. He’s very comfortable about skinship and it’s very apparent in how he dresses and acts that he wants you to adore his body. To worship it! Maybe not sexually, but aesthetically! Being lustful can mean just thinking about sex or sexual scenarios often, which if you take a peek at Asmo’s chat’s either with you or his brothers, is very apparent too.

Personally, I believe that people would assume he is not good in a relationship because he would have a “cheating problem”. I don’t think Asmo is a monster, just like I don’t think any of the brothers are monsters. They may be demons (technically fallen angels) now but they used to be angels too. Their falling out with their Father doesn’t mean they’ve completely abandoned morality, it was a rebellion for Lilith’s right to live. Not for them to sin as they pleased. For all we know they might have been fine in Heaven otherwise! (with the exception of Lucifer.)

A monster knows right from wrong and chooses evil anyways. An ignorant person doesn’t know right from wrong. Asmodeus is not a monster, nor is he ignorant.

When Asmo genuinely loves you, I think he would take steps to calm down that side of him, if it were to exist. Lust is fairly limited, but it is a part of love to some extent. LOVE is vastly different. Love has many languages, and they aren’t all spoken either. For me, personally, I found that Lucifer’s love language can be either very direct, or roundabout so as to not let it go to your head, for an example. Asmo is just far more direct about his care for you.

I feel as though Asmo gets a lot of crap constantly for his presumed nature and because we don’t get to see much else of him at first, especially in season 1, his impression on us sort of stays. With most of the fanbase either somewhat new to the game or somewhere lost in the sea of the difficulty curve that is season 2, we can only assume based on what we’ve seen, and what others have headcanoned about him.

Let’s break and talk about Satan for a moment; this is going somewhere.

I’m led to believe that Satan can control his sin fairly well. He’s easy to get irritated, sure, but he isn’t as much of a walking ball of rage as I suspected. I would argue that, aside from Leviathan, Satan can handle his sin the best out of the brothers. But again, we’re forgetting about Asmo. The Avatar of “Lust”. Like I’ve shown before, he doesn’t really sleep around a lot, according to anon.

At worst, Asmo being flirty is through text and he’s not actively trying to sleep with you. It can be interpreted that way, but for me personally, it comes down to having a friend that is very up close and in your personal space.

(I myself am one of these types of people. Having ADHD, my social cues are always sort of off, and I’ve struggled with coping with it for years. With my best friend, we have seen each other naked countless times and have slept in the same bed as well. We were never romantic with each other. We were just very comfortable being close and personal with each other.)

I’d like to point out also that Asmo isn’t even there for most of season 1 too. Which can give you the idea that maybe he just was out sleeping around a lot, but to me he probably just went out partying a lot. You don’t get known that fast for sleeping around. Maybe in 5,000 years, sure, but I’d imagine being a party boy, as his Devilgram “Guided by Desire” suggests.

So the idea that Asmo isn’t in the house a lot because he’s out having sex all the time isn’t true is it? He’s probably just out partying, which can LEAD to sex with someone sure, but again, Asmo doesn’t feel comfortable doing that, now does he?

I feel like of all the boys, Asmo is the one who radiates with everyone else the most. Most people will never realize how surreal it is that Asmo is faking it until he makes it. He doesn’t always think he’s beautiful, or that he’s worth all the love he’s striving and straining to get. Something that is extremely relatable for a lot of people with self-worth issues. Asmo is just like that, but instead being sarcastic and self-deprecating, he simply works to make himself look as beautiful as possible, so that in his eyes, his beauty matches the affection he gets.

Which is why, when he falls in love with you, it’s strange. You are constantly telling him he’s nice and pretty, but you aren’t lusting after him. You’re just being nice. It may just be me, but when people are overly nice just for the sake of being nice, I’m very attracted to that. That is Asmo, to some extent. The fact that he reflects the insecurities and habits of others so clearly may make others uncomfortable, but that brutal honesty veiled behind insecurity is what a lot of people with self-image issues deal with.

Now for me to share my favorite personal idea for Asmo that completely changed how I saw him in season 1 onwards; Asmodeus is an empath. Now let me explain:

First, what is an Empath?

The term empath comes from empathy, which is the ability to understand the experiences and feelings of others outside of your own perspective. Seems simple, right? Everyone can do this to some extent. However, what makes you an empath is the fact that empaths genuinely feel the same pain as you do. So much so your experience becomes a very personal part of their own. They are capable of being able to feel other people’s emotions without them speaking, or even showing signs of it through their body language.

This would explain, for me personally, why there’s so little of him in season 1. The intensity of what goes on in the house, his sensitive soft-spoken mannerisms, the only time he truly gets mad is when he’s childishly arguing with Mammon? Asmo is afraid of true conflict, he’s afraid of violence and negative emotions. Let’s face it; everyone is indifferent or hates you at the start of the game.

While this changes fairly quickly, all the intense feelings come to a head in chapter 16. All those negative emotions swirling around, of course Asmo isn’t going to want to be in the house when it’s that intense. The attic didn’t just disappear completely, too. Belphie was still in the attic hating humans. That negative emotion could be affecting Asmo and he didn’t know why, so he could have been out of the house more.

Where Asmo can feel the emotions of others, it may mostly be the negative ones because they fill him with anxiety and panic if it persists. Which can be helpful in making him so urgent to want to make others smile and feel better, right?

Imagine being intimate with Asmodeus, and suddenly you aren’t in the mood for it anymore but don’t want to make things awkward. He could pick up on it in an instant and wouldn’t get mad because he understands how you feel completely.

Now to close this out about something that genuinely hurts me; Asmodeus is a narcissist.

I mean, the wiki says that he is, but personally? No, no he isn’t. Since when is loving yourself a bad thing? Sure he may go a bit far sometimes, but people with self-image issues need to go a little harder than the rest to make sure they're getting the love they need.

(Talking about myself AGAIN, but I do this a lot. At random, I will look up in my own mirror in front of my desk that I sit in front of all day and tell myself I am a cute bitch. I am VERY VERY cute and anyone would be lucky to have someone as drop dead gorgeous as myself. I say that a few times a day. In reality, I am very insecure about my looks. I do believe I’m cute, but sometimes it’s hard to say it. Which is why I force myself. Why wouldn’t Asmo do the same?)

Talking yourself up to be as beautiful as a sex god is no easy task, but Asmo isn’t the Avatar of “Lust” for no reason. When an insecure girl talks up her beauty, it’s her being strong and independent. When Asmo does it, its narcissism… it doesn’t really seem fair, now does it? Maybe he’s just an insecure person who needs to tell himself ALL THE TIME that he’s beautiful. That if he stares at his reflection long enough, he may see it too.

(Also, Simeon literally calls him out on being insecure. Insecure people tend to try and overcompensate where they feel they’re lacking.)

”Asmodeus is hinted to be insecure and seeking for love and attention. When Simeon was asked about what he thought of Asmodeus, he says that Asmodeus is still trying to fulfill the role of the angel he used to be; an angel that was adored and loved by many. Asmodeus laughs at Simeon's remark and brushes it off by saying that he is only jealous.” - A section from said Asmodeus Wiki.

People can choose to love or hate Asmo, obviously. Making things up about his character without having anything but speculation and having that dictate how he acts is plain silly. This entire “essay” if you can call it that, comes from the heart. I love Asmo as a character, and in the beginning he did make me uncomfortable, I didn’t like him that much. But I learned to look past that and figure out why he acts the way he does. Something didn’t sit right with me about him for a while, and it was that air of insecurity that I didn’t see at first.

All I can really ask for, is giving Asmo another chance as a character. He’s not as wild and wacky as Mammon, or as cool and sexy as Lucifer, or as edgy and precious as Belphie, but he matters in this story too. He fell from grace with his brothers for Lilith. Give him another chance, and let him show you that he is the Avatar of Love.

#obey me #obey me shall we date #obey me swd #om!#om! swd #om! asmo #om! asmodeus #obey me asmo #obey me asmodeus #Thanks for 400 followers!

461 notes · View notes

whump-town · 3 years

Text

Counting Down The Days

The real kicker here is that I don't even like Christmas and I don't know at all why I thought of this...

Fluff, not really sad

No Pairings

Spencer has never liked Christmas.

As a child, December rolled in and cast over the city an impossible task. His thin wrist grabbed as he tucked pudding into his sweater and his ears tugged at when he bolted for the door, knowing getting caught one more time would mean child protective services would come back. And each time he picked his mother up off the floor, every time he tucked himself in the coat closet to try and hide from her wailing and shouting, he knew they would see through the veil. His mother wouldn’t survive having him taken away. No one else can get her to take her medication. No one else could read her books in their original forms. German and Arabic and Spanish. And what was the point in reading Don Quixote except to do so in the original Spanish?

But not getting caught shoplifting in December, when all of the staff of every store was watching for just that, is impossible. December met icy cold fingers dragging through his stomach and lying to his mother that he had eaten something while he made her ramen. He can go one more day but she can’t take her meds on an empty stomach.

As an adult, these things have changed drastically. Christmas is great. He really can’t complain. He loves dressing up for Dave’s fancy dinner and turning into a bragging point. The feeling of Dave’s heavy arm around his shoulders, showing him off to his friends. Finally being able to understand what it must feel like to have a parent bragging about you to other adults, even if at a certain point they’re just trying to show up to their friends. That doesn’t change the flush in his cheeks or how nice he feels smiling and stuttering around an explanation of his PhDs. Stomach twisted up and cheeks hurting when Dave finally leans in and relieves the guests with a “see? Kids so damn smart I don’t even understand what he got a degree in!”

He misses Morgan and Hotch.

They’ll come around for Christmas, he knows.

Hank is getting so big and he’s carrying on the tradition of all of Spencer’s other nephews and calling him “weed” but there’s nothing like that big baby smile when he comes in through the door. Tottling steps and an armful of baby. It just makes him want his own kids but for now, he’s content with his nephews. Jack calls him a lot. He got the ability to do math from somewhere but certainly not from his parents -- Haley was an English major and Hotch uses a calculator for basic math. So Reid is generally the only person that he knows who can talk math. Christmas will bring Henry and Jack home from college. There’s speak of a boyfriend but Emily knows only minimally about this from what she’s heard from Hotch and what Jack has told Hotch is also minimal at best. Henry is… JJ gets a lot of radio silence from him but Hotch is quick to assure her that is just typical. Jack did the same thing but now he’s a senior in college and Hotch is lucky if he goes three consecutive hours without some sort of text or call.

“Who is my doctor at home?”

“Do you think Uncle Derek can change my oil? Wait, can I go that long without checking it?”

“What year was Aunt Jessica born? Don’t tell her I asked you that.”

“How old are you again? 53? 60?”

Spencer is just excited to have everyone under one roof.

Hotch and Emily grew up under the kind of parties that Dave throws for Christmas. Tokens to be shown off by their parents and ignored under every other circumstance. Both having been shipped off at least once during their childhoods when they no longer fit a certain look. Emily was no longer young enough to attract her mother’s friends, breast a little too formed, and acne that could not be tamed. Hotch with shadows of bruises that would not heal. Dead eyes that no longer raised from the floor.

Dave’s parties bring out the worst in them. Emily is a very bad influence on Hotch and together they have considerable tolerance for alcohol, they can do some damage. But they’re not loud. Spencer loves to watch the two of them, the way they ease into the night. Hotch warm now, his edges softened to pleased little smiles and thoughtful hums. Emily is chatty, leans into touch, and stretches out like a cat bathing in the sun. The night ends with their soft arguing. Spencer could butt in at any time to the subjects that they talk about but he finds himself far more content to sit and watch. Emily’s toes tucked under Hotch’s thigh and his head turned on the sofa, lazily listening to her speak.

They always approach every subject as if it’s the simplest thing. Let it be Marx, spending the hours in front of Dave’s parlor fire speaking in hushed tones about surplus-value and what makes a commodity. About the ins and outs of Cormac Mccarthy, Hotch loves The Sunset Limited and Emily does not. Whitney Houston and how poor Hotch’s Spanish is and if that’s his fault or hers.

Garcia loves the parties even if it does create a little cognitive dissonance for her. Her parents would hate this but she feels pretty in her gown and no one lets her forget it. She keeps track of the kisses placed on her cheeks. Derek smelling of something woodsy as he leans in with a wink, “you’re very beautiful this even, mama.” And Savannah smells warm and inviting and she gives the very best hugs. “Green,” she whispers, “is very much your color.” How Hotch hums along to songs and always gives in to her request for one dance, his smile growing wild as she steps on his toes.

And Spencer loves that she always asks him to match her. So he’ll proudly come in with his matching bowtie or pocket square. Lending her his elbow as they step in, stepping just out of the way that the right people come to greet him and no one else. Morgan is warm and tight, always squeezing just a little too hard. JJ fussing with his hair.

But it’s only September.

He’ll have to pass through Halloween. Jack and Henry are too old these days to run through the bullpen dressed as whatever fictive hero they have grown obsessed with this fall. Coming up to his desk knowing he’s hidden the largest bowl of candy, that he’ll sneak into their pockets whole-sized candy bars to eat as they trick or treat. At best he might get some pre-game pictures from them both, neither having grown out of their love for Halloween. Jack is still very into dressing up but Henry will still throw something together.

There will be Thanksgiving, a holiday choppily shared between them all. Just showing up at Dave’s randomly or Morgan’s depending on who wins that argument this year. He’ll be lucky to see them all under the same roof. If it’s at Dave’s then he’s guaranteed warm and cozy Hotch and Emily. Both bothering Dave in the kitchen, their lost childhoods always burning the brightest around one another, and exasperating Dave. Maybe Garcia will win her favorite game and Dave will teach her to cook whatever he’s decided they’ll have this year. If it’s at Derek’s then at least he’ll get to see Hank. JJ and Savannah will be there, they’re pretty good friends. Garcia will certainly be cooking something and Derek will be manning the grill.

But it’s months out until December.

And all Spencer wants is unabashed affection.

Dave’s arm around his shoulder and his high sung praises.

Emily snagging him up to dance to “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” and kissing his cheek for the trouble.

To see Matt and Luke interact with the team. Dave’s attention turning to point out his other boys, “knuckleheads but they mean well”. How Tara will take up the empty space left on the couch and butt into Hotch and Emily’s argument, turning warm and comforting like the other two. And Spencer can’t wait to see how similar the three of them are-- you just have to see through the layers.

Until it’s nearly two in the morning.

Jack and Henry are missing, Luke thinks he might have seen them on the back porch.

Emily is sleeping, head in Tara’s lap and feet in Hotch’s. The other two blinking slowly into the fire, glasses of wine warm in their hands and dangerously close to falling.

Matt is sitting on the floor, children spread out around him.

There’s the buzz of conversation still coming from the kitchen. Garcia, JJ, Savannah, and Kristy giggling over wine and gossip they’re certainly not supposed to know.

Spencer looks up at the calendar sitting above his desk and crosses off the day.

He always hated December. He never got to appreciate Christmas. They represented everything he didn’t have, all the things he thought he could never have. But as mid-September leaves a crisp edge to the air, he finds himself counting down the days tell what used to be a measure of his insignificance.

Now it’s the only day that seems to matter. The only day he feels like he matters. Surrounded by the warmth of familiarity. By love.

He misses his family.

#criminal minds #criminal minds fanfiction #spencer reid #emily prentiss #penelope garcia #savannah morgan #derek morgan #aaron hotchner #jack hotchner #david rossi

45 notes · View notes

damonsvftie · 4 years

Text

𝐌𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐨𝐞 𝐌𝐚𝐠𝐢𝐜✨

HARRY POTTER MASTERLIST

MEGA MASTERLIST

Summary: it’s that time of the year where everyone has been pulled under the mistletoe but what happens when your the only one who hasn’t?

Note: h2gkmo I love this Sm also it’s 3.8K WORDS

Warnings: none I believe apart from kissing

September, October and November, has already flew by so quickly as if it were a blur and I can’t seem to comprehend that its currently December.

Not that I dislike this certain month but it’s just the whole ‘mistletoe’ thing that I’m not quite fond of. Last week, some boy from Slytherin managed to get a girl he liked from Hufflepuff under the mistletoe, and let’s just say, the tension was absolutely incredulous.

Being a Hufflepuff, she kindly made up an excuse and hurried out of the the great hall. If that were me, I would probably shove my plate full of food down their pants. I mean the audacity though?

It’s that time of year again where Hogwarts is practically covered in a blanket of snow and every single student walks down the corridor with a soft knitted sweater hugging their bodies tightly to stop them from catching a cold. Well mostly everyone, since Malfoy wears very extra stuff during this season.

The last day, I saw Harry snogging Cho Chang under the plant. Okay maybe it wasn’t snogging, but they still kissed! And Hermione had told me all about some oaf from RavenClaw who tried to do the same to her but it didn’t really work out since she smacked him across the face with a heavy book.

—

“I’m so glad no ones tried that on me yet,” I mumbled le as I tucked into a plate full of food.”it’s absolutely ridiculous! I mean the audacity they have to think I’d want to kiss them. I have to puke,” complained Hermione, her facing saying it all. From the corner of my eye, I saw Ron Weasley gulping hard as he tugged at his collar. “You know.. sometimes both of you are very scary,” making me roll my eyes at him.

“It’s not even that bad, it’s just a kiss,”. The way Harry blatantly blurted that out as if it’s the tiniest thing in the world while he drummed his fingers on the table. “You can’t chat! I saw you snogging Cho Chang a day ago,” I argued. Harry’s cheeks were beginning to flush a shade of crimson as he swiftly diverted the attention onto me again.

“And? At least it was Cho and not someone like Pansy Parkinson, besides even Lavenders after Ron,” he mumbled looking annoyed. “Bloody hell I almost forgot! She can’t seem to stay away from me. She’s like a leech,” he complained, his lips curving into a frown.

Hermione shut her book and put it down. “Y/n, hasn’t anyone tried to get you under the mistletoe yet?” Her lips curving into a small smile, preventing me from shoving a forkful of food down my throat, my hand in mid air. “Uh- no,” my cheeks slightly blushed in embarrassment . For some reason my response made Ron giggle to himself.

Irritated, I smacked him behind his head causing him to yelp. “Ow! What was that for?” His brows furrowing as he rubbed the spot I had hit him in. “You dare laugh at me Ronald Weasley and I won’t hesitate to curse you!”

“Both of you please! I’m trying to finish this book off,” Hermione’s facial expressions exasperate as her eyes bore deep into our souls, intimidating us until we both shut up. Huffing under my breathe I continued to pick at my food until someone spoke once again.

“Hey! Give me my book back!”. To my surprise, Draco Malfoy stood towering over Hermione, his book in her hands as he held it high. Her attempts to try and grab it back were failing as she jumped high on the spot. “Malfoy give her book back,” spoke Harry through gritted teeth. “How about no? Besides Potter, this is between me and her so stay out of it,” he sneered.

“Come on Malfoy, stop being such a git,” defended Ron. Whatever the boys had said didn’t really matter to him because of course it went through one ear and out the other. “Oi! Give. Her. Book. Back,” my nostrils flaring as I folded my arms against my chest.

Unexpectedly, he started making owl noises just like the day he was attacked by Buckbeak, slowly striding towards me as his eyes darted up and down at my figure, supposedly ‘checking me out’. “why... what are you going to do y/l/n?” His face inches away from mine. I felt his cool,minty breathe fanning against my face causing my eyes to flutter rapidly in intimidation. Everyone in the great hall had fixed their attention onto the commotion we were causing, making owl noises every time one of us firedback. “Gone silent now have you?” The tone in his voice mocking as he took a step back and swiftly turned on his heels.

I don’t know what I was thinking, but I pulled him back towards me, one of my hands cupping his face as my lips pressed against his instantly. My other hand, smoothly grabbed the book out of his palms, shoving him back once I got what I wanted. “You were saying?” My voice sarcastic as he stared at me, mouth hung slightly open In awe.

Tossing the book back to Hermione, we all sat back down, the golden trio gasping under their breaths. “Did you just KISS Malfoy?” Rons voice exaggerated as his eyes shot wide open. “Yes- Yes I did,”

—

As we walked the hogwarts grounds, Harry and Ron didn’t stop annoying me about Draco. “So let me get this right, you kissed Malfoy to get mione’s book back? Blimey you have some guts don’t you?” A giggle trailed behind his irrelevant question.

I was down right agitated. I paused in the middle of no where, my lips pursing into a line. “I don’t know why both of you think it’s so funny and or hard to believe I kissed him? It’s not like I like him or something!” My voice slightly laced with anger as I strided off into the other direction, ditching the trio.

I could heard Hermione calling after me but it was too late. I was gone. If I were being realistic, I didn’t know where I was headed to as I entered hogwarts, twisting and turning through the dingy,dark corridors until I bumped into something rock hard, resulting in me too lose my balance and collapse.

“Look where your going,” I groaned as I sat up on the cold floor. “You bumped into me, not the other way round,”. It couldn’t be. I recognised that same bitter and unpleasant voice. My eyes trailed up to the figure that looked upon me from down below as I whimpered underneath him in pain.

It was Malfoy.

He stuck his hand out in offer for me too take it but of course I didn’t. Pushing his hand out of the way, I scrambled to my feet my teeth gritting. “Why are you ALWAYS in my way?!” I yelled, although I was lucky enough that the corridors were deserted.

“Me in your way? YOUR the one who keeps getting in MY way! Don’t get too ahead of your self y/l/n!” He firedback immediately, his face scrunched up.

My hands found their way to his collar, fisting at the material, pulling him close until our noses were almost touching. “Listen here Malfoy, stay. Out. Of. My. Way,” I protested my breathing heavy.

His serious face turned looser as a small smirk spread across his face. His hands travelled up my visage, his thumb lightly grazing my lip, tugging it down, the flesh of my lips revealing.

What was he doing?

My breathing hitched, while my heart did a flip in my chest. My grip on his collar slackened as my hands fell by my side before I walked right past him.

—

I should have known better. The more I added fuel to his fire, the more frustrating he was going to become. It was slowly starting to become a very common thing for the two of us to have an argument with each other, while everyone just rolled their eyes at us, since it was starting to get out of hand and become a regular thing.

Something inside me told me that he thoroughly enjoyed bickering with me even when I had at least tried to be civil with him.

“I just wanted say.. maybe we should be civil,” my words sincere as a half grin crept up across his face. “You want US to be civil? Why.. you think I’m going to stop?” He taunted as his smile dropped, his face serious than ever. “Yes- you know why? Because I’m mature unlike you. If I’m honest I don’t understand what pleasure you find in fighting me all the time,” my eyes turning a darker shade as I clenched my fists by my side.

His facial features turned soft almost as if it were putty as I finished my sentence with a sigh. His body instantly loosened up as he took a few steps away from me. “Your right. I’ll leave you alone-“ he muttered before disappearing in the dark.

Was I seeing things or did Draco actually agree with me for once? Was he actually going to put an end to his daily dose of torture?

—

“Did he actually offer to stop and leave you alone?” The confused looks on their faces. “Yep... but it’s quite unbelievable,” the look on my face twisting the more I thought about it. “Wait Wait Wait! Let me get this right... Malfoy’s going to leave you alone for the rest of your life? Bloody hell thats fabulous!” Ron’s lips transitioning into a wide grin as he took a sip out of his cup.

“Why are you so happy? He said he’d leave ME alone not YOU,” I answered back , trying to put Ron off, making his face droop. Within seconds I decided to change the topic so I didn’t have to fight Weasley.

“Anyways- So- hows your defence against the dark arts thing going?” I questioned Harry as he swallowed his food. “Well- we haven’t come up with a proper name for it but we think it should be named ‘Dumbledores army’ and I guess it’s going alright,” he sighed right after causing me to raise a brow. “Somethings off- what’s wrong Harry?” My voice gentle as I glanced at the other two.

“Harry’s worried someone’s going to bail out on us to Umbridge,” the fearful expression on hermiones face explaining it all. Did I mention that Dolores Umbridge was claimed to be the headmistress of the school? We were all lucky enough that she hadn’t created any sort of ridiculous rule in which we were no longer able to talk to our friends.

Everyone apart from a bunch of slytherins, who were named the ‘inquisitorial squad’, including that evil little cockroach Malfoy, loathed her. The trio had managed to gain access to the room of requirements in which they all hosted sessions where they practised spells such as how to unleash a patronus charm.

“Y/n why don’t you join? The more the merrier besides we need to prepare incase anything happens,” the tone in hermiones voice soft. “Guys.. I don’t know.. what if you know.. Umbridge finds out?” I asked wearily, fingers drumming the table.

Disappointment smeared across their faces. I couldn’t disappointment my friends like that. “You know what? Fine, I’m in!” I blurted as their mundane facial expressions changed into goofy smiles and wrinkled eyes.

—

“Expecto Patronum!” The tip of my wand unleashed a faint sort of white vapour which slowly transitioned into a p/n. “Blood hell y/n! You got that right on the first try,” remarked Ron as he stared up at my patronus in awe.

Suddenly, the chandelier started to swing and the floor beneath us was shaking under our feet. Everyone huddled together as it stopped. Then another loud bang came from the door as it crumbled, leaving a tiny cracked hole in which we heard Umbridges voice.

With one last swish and flick of her wand, she blasted down the door completely, walking in infuriated with the inquisitorial squad following behind her. Draco Malfoy stood on the side, his hand gripping Cho Chang’s arm tightly as she hung her head in shame. She had betrayed us.

My eyes met Malfoy’s as I lowered my wand. Each member of the squad practically forced us all the way into umbridges office however Malfoy shoved Cho to the side and came headed in my direction. “Do as I say,” he muttered under his breathe, his hand gripping my wrist causing me too flinch.

“What- What are you doing?” I whispered frantically. “Don’t question me y/l/n,” he replied, his lips barley moving as Umbridge yelled at us all.

One by one, each army member was escorted by a slytherin however Malfoy waited for everyone to leave. “Come on, let’s get out of here,” he mumbled, peering out the door making sure the coast was clear. His hand slowly slid down my wrist, intertwining his fingers with mine.

I didn’t dare speak of it, besides I felt safe with him for some reason as if I were able to trust him. Quickly, we ran down the corridors hand in hand making sure no one spot us. “Wait stop,” I panted as i breathed heavily, leaning against the wall. He stopped for a moment, his hand on his hip as he patiently waited for me too regain enough energy to walk back to my dorm. “Let me walk you back to your dorm,” he insisted.

—

“Goodnight,” he mumbled before turning to walk away. “Draco Wait-,” I called for him reluctantly as i leaned against the door of my dorm room. He turned to face me once again, one of his brows raised in confusion. “Why did you help me? I mean you could have just turned me in like the others,” I questioned hesitantly. He seemed to have straightened his posture as he looked down at the floor before glancing at my visage. “Don’t question it y/l/n,”

—

“What? That’s not possible.. how did Malfoy not turn you in?” Harry exclaimed, his face distorted as he gave the type of look when something was brutally unfair. “I bet he likes you, I remember when he came back and made up an excuse about his whereabouts,” chimed Hermione plainly as she stuck her nose into her book, causing me too flush red.

Running towards us was Fred and George Weasley as they explained what Umbridge was currently doing. “You lot might want to check this out,” their voices weary as they glanced one another. Within seconds we all made our way outside the great hall where the rock solid walls were covered with every stupid law she’d had every created. A new one of her ridiculous educational Decrees was being hung by Filch as he tried balancing on the highest step of the ladder.

My eyes trailed from above all the way down, now examining Draco’s face as he looked up, a smirk painted across his face, after all he was part of Umbridge’s clan. I don’t know why but he looked immensely alluring and it really bothered me. Why did he look so perfect? I didn’t like him did I? No of course I didn’t What type of dumb question was that?

—

Tonight me and the army decided to sneak out after curfew and meet up in the Gryffindor common room. I slipped on my robe as I softly shut the door behind me, trying to make sure it didn’t creak. I tiptoed down the corridors because we were all aware that the inquisitorial squad members were lurking around, keeping an eye on us. I couldn’t risk using a lumos spell because I knew that if I did someone might see the light at the tip of my wand easily so I attempted to guide myself in the dark, sticking my hand out incase I bumped into anything.

Unexpectedly, I tripped over my own feet causing me to fall frontwards, straight into somebody’s arms, my hands flung around their neck, clinging onto them for dear life. We stayed like that for a good few seconds, my breathing hitching as my chin laid propped up on the mystery persons shoulder.

Pulling away from me the person chanted a ‘lumos’ spell, holding their wand between our faces. “Draco?” I shrieked, my face distorted since I knew I had been caught. “What are you doing after curfew?” He interrogated. “Nothing I Uh- I was trying to sneak out to get some fresh air,” I lied, the tone in my voice making me sound sheepish. “Don’t lie to me y/l/n you were going to another one of those meetings, weren’t you?” He snarled, his grip on his wand becoming tighter. “Uh.. okay fine! I am, but please don’t tell on me I beg you,” I pleaded my lips curving into a frown.

His facial expressions changed and became softer than ever, his irresistible,grey eyes glimmering from the tiny source of light as he parted his plump lips to say something. “Go,” he whispered lowly. “Thanks Draco,” I muttered. For some reason my feet were glued too the floor as if they weren’t willing to move. I had the sudden urge to kiss him but I held back until he himself leaned a little closer, his lip ghosting mine before I took steps backwards and disappeared into the darkness.

Was I developing some sort of feelings for him? All he did was save me from landing into trouble twice and actually leave me alone for once. Did he feel the same way?

I had to at least thank him for how humble he was being over the past month so that same week I went to Hogsmeade and bought him a ring with a snake wrapped around it. After all his help, this was the least I could do to repay him.

It was Christmas Eve today and I told one of the sweet slytherins (who I knew was trustworthy) to go and put this perfectly tiny box wrapped up in black paper under the tree in the Slytherin common room.

—

Today was Christmas Day and I ran down the stairs to my common room early in the morning to open up my gifts. Harry hurled me a handful of presents as I struggled to carry them all. “Merry Christmas y/n!” They sung in unison as I started to unwrap them all. Ron had given me a perfectly knitted sweater with the first letter of my name on it. Hermione had bought me a stack of muggle books that had very interesting covers and Harry had bought me a box of assorted sweets from honey dukes because he knew I had a sweet tooth.

“Thanks guys I really appreciate it,” I gave them a warm smile. “Y/n I uh- there’s another gift addressed to you,” Ron fiddled with the present in his hand, taking a close look at it. “It’s not addressed from anyone though,”. He tossed me the dark green wrapped gift as I glanced at them unsure. My hands began unraveling the box taking a peek on the inside. To my surprise, there was a immaculately beautiful necklace with a dark green gem in a pendant. Holding the necklace between my fingers I gave a glance at it before putting it around my neck, trying not to overthink it.

—

“I wonder who gave you that?” Questioned Ginny as she squinted her eyes. Walking into the great hall was a certain blonde haired boy with his annoying group of posse following behind him like a bunch of lost puppies. He looked incredibly charming as he wore a dark green sweater with a black scarf wrapped around his neck as he tugged at it too loosen it a bit. I could just about see the ring that he wore around his finger.

Something about the way he accepted my gift made me smile to myself. “Bloody hell y/n are you blushing?” Joked Ron as I pursed my lips. “Totally not,” i responded as I bit the inside flesh of my cheek too stop myself from grinning.

From across the hall my eyes met his and I felt a unknown spark run through my body. A toothy smile crawled across his face causing me too smile back at him. Oh god I thought to myself, I couldn’t do this. I hid my face in my hands embarrassed as my friends laughed at me. “Y/n are you sure you don’t like Malfoy?” Teased Fred Weasley. “Yep it’s confirmed she does,” added George. “No I don’t,” I mumbled as my voice was muffled by my hands.

“If you’ll excuse me I have somewhere to go,” I muttered before leaving the table in embarrassment. I could see Blaise Zabini and Goyle patting Draco on the back in what seemed like encouragement as he got up. Was he going to follow me?

I strided down the corridors when I saw him calling after me. I swung my head around as I continued walking and he disappeared. Walking backwards, I tried looking for him when something bumped into me from the front. “Where do you think your going?”. I recognised that same tune that use to annoy the hell out of me.

“Draco? Where did you come from? You were right behind me,” I asked curious, trying to change the subject. “Took a shorter route,” he explained. The gap between the two of us was at the point of closing.

“You uh- wore the necklace I gave you,” his cheeks flushing slightly as his rough demeanour vanished. “You were the one who gave this? Why?” My voice cracking at the end. “And you gave me this ring- why?”. He was trying to use my own words against me as I giggled to myself. “It’s more of a thank you gift than you know-,” I elaborated as I crossed my arms.

“So why did you gift me this necklace?” The curiosity in my voice making him pause for a good second. “Let me guess.. don’t question it? That’s what your going to say right?” I giggled to myself. His face slowly dropped his lips parting as he looked above the two of us. “The mistletoe,” he choked. Above our heads, was a magically growing mistletoe that rained glitter.

He scratched the back of his head as i hung my head. “You don’t have too if you don’t want-,” I quickly cut him off by placing my lips against his, savouring the sweet flavour. Initially he was shocked, his eyes wide open until his lips moved in sync with mine, his eyes fluttering closed as he cupped my visage, my body flushed against his.

Pulling away, his eyes fluttered back open, his thumb drawing circles on my cheek as he pulled me back in one last time,his plump lips on mine before pulling back making me admire his enticing face. “Merry Christmas,” he whispered as my hands wrapped around his neck pulling him in for the tightest hug ever.

—

Taglist: @summer-writes @gryffindors-prefect @harry-pottery-barn @adderallanimal @voldygonemoldy @reemusluupin @chaotic-fae-queen if you want to be added or removed lemme know

804 notes · View notes

youngbeezer · 3 years

Note

number 5 for the tiktok thing with jon toews?

Referenced Post

Prompt-- 5. Running into each other's arms after not seeing them for awhile (w Jonathan Toews)

A/N: Here's another blurb from the 14 oddly romantic things blurb set. I only have one more after this, so this series(?) is coming to an end. I have enjoyed writing all of these sm! Welcome back captain serious!!!

Thank you for requesting, hope you like it :)

Word Count: 1345 (these have been so long lately idk whats going on)

Warning(s): mentions of his illness(?), but other than that i dont think any!

join my taglist :)

The sound of my phone’s ringtone awakens me from my deep slumber. It takes me a few moments to come to my senses and to rub the sleep out of my eyes, and once I am able to recognize my surroundings, I realize that I am once again waking up to a cold and empty apartment. It’s been the same feeling for almost the past four months.

Like usual, after last year’s NHL season ended, Jonathan and I went back to Winnipeg to spend our summers there in his hometown with family and friends. But this time, when I went back to Chicago for work in mid September, Jon did not come back with me.

During December, he started to experience these symptoms that left him feeling drained and lethargic. So, after seeing multiple doctors, Jon thought it was best to stay back at home to try and better understand his condition and get his health back on track.

Unfortunately, my job as a teacher was still in Chicago and needed me back right away, thus preventing me from staying in Winnipeg with Jonathan during this difficult time for him. It was definitely hard on our relationship being so far from each other, especially since Jon was sick and I couldn’t be there for him. But, we talked everyday and we both are very comfortable in where we are in our relationship, so we made it work.

So far, Jon does not know much on when he will be back in Chicago, and right now it is starting to seem like the next time I’ll be able to see him is when the school year is over and I am able to go back to his hometown.

I am brought out of my jumbled thoughts when my ringtone goes off once more signaling I have a text notification. I reach over to my bedside table to retrieve my phone off of the charger.

‘Good morning, beautiful.’

‘Hope you have a great day, say hi to all your kids for me.’

‘Love and miss you.’

I let out a sigh and go to wipe off the few tears that I feel running down my cheeks. Coming up on that four month mark has been extra hard lately. I miss waking up to his lazy morning kisses along my back. I miss the way we move in perfect harmony when we are doing our morning routines in the bathroom. I miss his goodbye kiss he gives me every day before going to practice. I miss everything about him. I also feel like such a bad girlfriend not being able to be there in support and to take care of him when he has been dealing with such a scary and unknown illness.

I wipe off the few remaining tears lingering on my cheeks and go to text back my boyfriend.

‘Love and miss you too! I’ll call you on my lunch break xx.’

I go to get ready for my day since I have to be at the school by 8:00 AM and it is already nearing 7:15. I take a quick shower and quickly blow dry my hair. I make a quick pitstop to check my phone and find another message from Jon.

‘Sorry baby, I think I have a doctor’s appointment during your lunch break.’

‘I’ll talk to you later, love you.’

I frown a little at his message. First, I worry that he has another doctor’s appointment-- since last time I heard, he was getting better; and I also frown at the idea of having to wait all day until I can hear his voice.

Today’s gonna be a long day…

(...)

Today was a long day.

First, I forgot to bring in the worksheets I printed out last night for my lesson plan so I had to switch everything around. Then, one of my students scraped their knee during recess so I had to take care of them and bring them to the nurse’s office, thus making me miss out on my lunch break (where I wouldn’t have been able to even talk to Jon anyway). And now, I am putting bandages on the back of my heels where my wedges gave me blisters. For some reason, I thought it would be a good idea to look cute today instead of being practical since I walk around and stand all day long.

My students were just dismissed, so I am currently just organizing everything that I’ll need to have ready for tomorrow. Once I finish up, I gather all my belongings and start making my way out of the classroom. I make sure to say good night to my favorite security guard before trekking to the parking lot.

When I make it out of the school building, I immediately go to take off my wedges. As I look back up in search of my car, I stop dead in my tracks.

Standing in front of my car, with my favorite flowers in his hand, is Jonathan.

Everything that was once in my hands has now clattered to the ground as my hands instinctively move to cover my mouth in both shock and excitement. Tears start to gather in my eyes as Jonathan gives me a huge smile.

Once the initial shock wears off and I realize it is actually my Jonathan standing right before me in person, I let out a little squeal and start jogging over to him. He sets the flowers on the hood of my car as I get closer and opens his arms to welcome my body.

He stumbles back a little when I jump into his arms, but he quickly recovers with a breathy laugh and by tightening his arms even more around my torso. As his arms wrapped around me, tears flowed freely.

“Oh my god. You’re really here.” I cried out, clinging onto him in fear that this was all a dream and he would soon disappear.

“I’m here baby. I’m right here.” He soothed into my ear, running his fingers through my hair.

At this point I felt like I was just uncontrollably sobbing. All the pain and loneliness of being apart, and the stress of not fully knowing how he was feeling and doing-- all of it is over now.

“Hey, y/n-- baby, please stop crying.” He shushed into my ear, trying to calm me down.

“I missed you so much.” I hiccup out. I pull away a little from his embrace to instead cup my hands around his neck to get a good look at him. “You look so good.”

Before I can ramble even more, Jonathan leans in and kisses me. Our bodies pressed together and our lips molded as though we were never apart. His lips were softer than I remember and tasted sweet against my own. I could feel his breath tickle beneath my nose as my left hand moved from his neck to his head to card my fingers through his hair.

It eventually started to grow sloppy as both of us could not contain our smiles any longer. I let out a little giggle when our teeth clack once more which prompts us to break apart from each other-- but not before Jonathan gives my nose one last peck.

“I love you so much.” I breathed out.

“I love you too.” He beamed back. “Let’s go pick up all your stuff in the middle of the road, eh.”

I look back at my belongings, totally forgetting that I dropped everything when I first saw Jonathan. We both make our way over there and gather all my stuff up before making our way back to my car.

Jonathan’s hands card through mine, giving it a little squeeze before mumbling out,

“It’s good to be back home.”

I smile but raise my eyebrows just a little up at him and ask, “I’m glad you are too, but isn’t Winnipeg technically you’re home?”

He gives me one last little peck before murmuring against my lips,

“Wherever you are is my home.”

Taglist; @heatherawoowoo @barzysandmarnersbitch @joelsfarabees @hockeyplayerstories @barzy-xoxo

tagging a few mutuals as well,,,,

@lovereadinghockeyy @carepriceisgoodathockey @prettyboyjackhughes @2manytabsopen @frederikanderson @bb-nhlqueen7 @cherrybarzy @jamiesdrysdales @luukasreichel @gigissports @cherrylita

#jonathan toews #chicago blackhawks #jonathan toews imagine #jonathan toews blurb #nhl #hockey #nhl imagine #nhl blurb #nhl fic #hockey imagine #hockey blurb #hockey fic #my writing #hope you liked it :)#14 oddly romantic things blurb set

54 notes · View notes

pocketfulofrogers · 3 years

Text

Everything Comes Back to You

Pairing: Dean Winchester x Reader

Summary: Dean can count on one hand the amount of weaknesses he has. Despite his every effort to keep his distance over the years in an effort to keep you safe, he find himself at your door a few too many times. Everything changes when it you who calls him.

Notes: My first supernatural piece! A story told through many years.

September 14, 1996

There were few things you despised more in this world than calculus. The lecture had drug on and on, monotone and continuous, until you felt like you could scream. A miracle of reprieve came when the door opened and in walked a boy who seemed to glide on charisma. He made some kind of offhand joke and flashed a smirk that had half the girls already in his palm.

For you, it was what you saw in his eyes that drew you to him. Something akin to the pieces you kept buried deep within you.

December 22, 1996

You’re sweet, unbelievably so. The way you taste, the way you sound, the way you feel. It’s so easy for Dean to bury himself in you, forget about everything that isn’t in this bed. You had been the solace he didn’t know he had been searching for- offering just a few moments of peace in this life he had no say in.

Most days he believes you may be the light that will save him, other days he believes it unfair to ask such a thing of you.

You nuzzle into his chest and his arms around you tighten. “What are you thinking about?” You ask.

Maybe it’s how tired he is, running between the motel to check on Sammy and darting straight back to the comforts of this bedroom that has him feeling so unnaturally mushy. You’d say it’s the Christmas spirit looming in the air, threatening to infect him with just a bit of joy.

You did love Christmas, and he loved you.

But love was not something he was allowed in this life - stability never something he’d known. Dean knew the drill all too well. The moment he allows himself to plant any semblance of roots, it’ll be time to load the Impala and disappear. Kansas may have been home once, but it isn’t home now.

Still, he couldn’t help himself when it came to you.

Sometimes his mind wonders to what his life could be if he were to just ask you to run away with him. Leave this little town and never look back. No more hunting, no more fighting, just wonderful, uncomplicated, boring life. Life with you.

He’s never met a hunter that’s successfully left the life, though. The longer you knew him, the higher the chances got for you to get caught in the crossfire and he’d never forgive himself if something were to happen to you.

You’re silently watching him, waiting for a response to a question he had already forgotten.

“I should go check on Sam.”

April 18, 2002

“You gave my address to who? Mom, just because someone says they knew me doesn’t mean you should tell them where I live! It doesn’t matter if he seemed like a ‘wonderful young man’ you know there are things out there.” You’re pacing in your living room now, tempted to grab your shotgun.

“Oh, Y/N, stop it with that nonsense. He had a photo of you and now he’s on his way.” Your mother dismisses you.

You groan and toss your head back. “Well hopefully you can describe what he looked like to the cops when they find me-“

Then a car pulls up, engine roaring and rock music blasting. You knew that car, you knew it well. Sneaking up to the window, you take a peek around the curtains and see the sleek black Impala. A man gets out, the leather jacket he’s wearing tickles a memory long buried.

It isn’t until you see his face that it settles in- butterflies swimming in deep rooted anger. The boy who left you with nothing but an aching hole and a postcard with no return address was all grown up and damn if he didn’t look good.

“Gotta go.” You hang up the phone.

When he knocks, you brace yourself- scrounge up all the will-power you have so you can kick him out. There will be no apologies or pleasantries. No sir. None. Not one.

But Dean’s always been one step ahead of you, so, he’s quick to start when you open the door- death glare only momentarily stalling him. “Listen, I know-“

“Get back in your car and go home.”

“Just hear me out for a minute.” He pleads.

You want to tell him to go, you really do, but one glance at those green eyes and every fiber of your being is pleading for you to just wait. Call it hope, call it weakness, call it a desperate need for some form of closure, you let him in.

Narrowing your eyes, you ask him, “Why are you here?”

“I wanted to see you.”

You hate how that almost settles your anger, how after all these years he still had some ridiculous hold on you. “How can you possibly believe I would want to see you after what you did? That kind of hurt doesn’t just disappear, Dean.”

“I know, I know. I’m also here to apologize. I should have said more-“

“More?” You interrupt exasperated. “Please tell me you did not come all this way to ask me to absolve you of your guilt.”

“That’s not-“

“Because you showed up on my doorstep, asked me to pack a bag and run away with you- leave my life and everything I’ve ever known to go who knows where with you. And then, when the sun rose in the morning, you were gone.”

“You hadn’t exactly been happy with me.” He tries to defend himself.

“Yeah, but you know what I did that night? I packed a stupid bag and waited for hours in front of that stupid diner. Waiting and waiting, but you never showed! You just left me! Know what I got out of it? A postcard from Topeka with a half assed ‘I’m sorry’ written on it.”

He falters under your gaze. “Y/N, I am sorry. I really am.”

“I just want to know why, Dean.” Your voice falls and he can no longer meet your eyes. “Come on, there are a million excuses. You couldn’t leave Sam, you couldn’t leave you dad, you didn’t actually love me. Just pick one so I can move on.”

“I did love you.” He bites back.

“Then what, you couldn’t leave the life?”

His eyebrows furrow as he takes a step closer and lowers his voice. “What do you mean?”

You sigh. “I was young but I wasn’t stupid. The family business wasn’t sales, Dean.” His eyes widen. “People started disappearing right before you and your family showed up. They stop disappearing and then all of a sudden, you’re gone. I had my suspicions, but it wasn’t until I met another hunter a few years later that I knew for sure.”

He makes his way into your living room and you want to ask what gave him the idea that you wanted him in your home.

“If you know about that side of this world, then how can you blame me for wanting to protect you from it?”

Of all of the reasons you had come up with as to why the boy you thought was the love of your life had left you high and dry, this wasn’t one. Had he truly loved you? Had he weighed his heart and your life to determine which he valued most? You can’t tell if that idea hurt more than the rest.

“Who were you to make that decision for me?”

“Who are you to expect me not to have?”

It’s quiet, uncomfortably so. Dean rakes his fingers through his hair and your arms tighten across your chest. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. None of it. He wasn’t supposed to have left you destroyed, calling out for him in the middle of the night. You were supposed to have moved on, supposed to have said goodbye to the boy with so much sadness in his eyes and so much love in his heart.

You never really do forget your first, though, do you?

He sighs, drawing your attention back to him, and pulls his gaze from the ceiling. “This isn’t what I came for.”

You tighten your arms across your chest and take a step closer, then another. “Do enlighten me, then. What are you really here for?” You’re dangerously close now, a breath away and Dean can barely think. “What is it you want?”

You look up at him and in a second he’s gone, just like that first day. It’s nostalgic and painful and warm all at once. How was it you still had this power over him?

“You.” He breathes out.

October 14, 2006

“Hey, uh, Fairmont? That’s close to Eudora, right?” Dean asks, trying so hard to seem casual.

Sam peaks around the bathroom door, noticing his brother has been ‘cleaning’ the same weapon for the last thirty minutes, and raises a brow. “Yeah, not too far.” Dean just hums. “What’s in Eudora?”

“Huh? Oh nothing, just thought a detour would be nice with everything going on.”

Sam spits his toothpaste into the sink. “Didn’t we spend a Christmas there?”

Dean stalls. “Well, you know, we moved around so much it’s hard to tell when we were anywhere, really. I couldn’t-“

“No, no, I’m sure we did. I had that English teacher that snored through Shakespeare.”

“Your memory is definitely better than mine, I couldn’t tell you much about-“

“And there was that girl, gosh, what was her name again?” Sam prompts his brother, already knowing the answer.

“There’s been so many girls, Sam, can’t expect me to remember all of their names.” Dean chuckles nervously.

The flop sweat on Dean’s forehead is almost reward enough, but hearing him sputter and flail was just too good for Sam to give up.

“She had the hair and the mom, liked Christmas.” Dean stutters again. “Oh right! Y/N! Aka the girl who’s name you say in your sleep on a weekly basis.” Now he’s red. “How long has it been man? If you could’ve made it work, you would’ve. What’d she say when you saw her last?”

Suddenly the floor is very interesting to Dean. “That I can’t keep coming in and out of her life.”

“That’s all the closure you’re going to get, Dean, take it.”

October 18, 2006

Work had been the worst. The only thing you wanted was a bubble bath and a huge glass of wine. The last thing you expected when you finally reached your driveway was Dean Winchester sitting on your porch, but of course, with the cluster fuck of today, this might as well happen.

You take a moment to collect yourself before stepping out of your car.

“Heard you took down a Rougarou in Tennessee. Thought you said you didn’t want a part of this life.” He raises a brow and you can’t tell if it’s an accusation or an ‘I told you so’ moment.

“Was there for business, it was just good timing. Guess you were right, though, can’t just sit by.” You shrug. He looks like he’s waiting for something, something you’re sure you can’t give him. “What are you doing here?” You ask, sounding more tired than upset.

“I know, I’m sorry. But we had a case nearby and Sammy told me no, but next thing I know I’m in my car and then I’m here. Really, it’s your fault. Should’ve moved.”

You snort. “And you wouldn’t have found me?” He only shrugs. “What is it you want, Dean?”

“A friend?”

“You drove all the way out here for a friend?”

“Guess you could say I’m in short supply.”

You look him up and down, noticing the bags beneath his eyes and something in you aches for him. Of course, you had heard about the passing of John, that may be the very reason he’s here, but knowing Dean, it’s not a subject he wants to touch.

Ten years later and you can still read him.

“Fine, but don’t ask me to run away with you.” You tease. “Twice is enough for this lifetime.”

June 16, 2013

Dean is in the middle of another argument with Sam trying to defend the importance of bacon when his phone rings. Sam’s dramatic sigh of relief earns an eye roll from his brother.

“Dean Winchester.” He answers, but he can’t hear anything on the other end. “Hello?” He tries again and this time he makes out heavy breathing. “Who is this?”

“Dean.” His name barely slips from your lips and to his ears before you groan.

He leans forward quick enough to earn concern from Sam. “Where are you?”

“Sound stressed.” You chuckle before sputtering.

“Y/N, tell me where are you.” His voice is the kind of calm that would usually send ice through your veins, but right now you were struggling just to keep your eyes open.

“Not sure.” Your speech is slurred and the panic Sam sees in his brother’s eyes drives his fingers faster as he works on a trace.

“How bad is it?”

“You should see the other guy.”

“Dammit, Y/N, not the time. Where are you hurt?”

“Broken ribs, I think. This gash in my side seems a little alarming.” You squint down at it trying to determine if your blurry vision was a result of the gapping wound or the nice blow to the head you took. “Objectively, all very bad.” You mumble.

Dean is over Sam’s shoulder now and if he hadn’t looked as terrified as he did right now, Sam would be making a less than funny comment about it.

“Were you on a hunt?” His voice is still cool, but he begins to waiver when he has to strain to hear your confirmation. “Is it still after you?” He has to press the question two more times before he gets a response, by then he’s already started the Impala.

“Finished him ‘for he finished me.”

“Y/N, were on our way.” Dean grits out. “You just hold on a little longer and we’ll get you all patched up.”

You barely manage to hum response before everything begins to fade out, Dean yelling your name in the background.

June 17, 2013

They had only barely made it in time. Dean had come sliding to your side, bandages already in hand. He spoke softly to you, a drastic contradiction to the frantic shake of his hands.

Sam had never seen his brother like this before.

“Dean, I don’t think…”

“No! Just,” Dean tossed the keys to Sam and slipped his arms beneath your limp body. “Get us to the nearest hospital.”

He sat in the back seat with you holding as much pressure against the flaps of skin as he could, still talking so softly to you. Sam’s heart ached as he heard his brother beg you not to leave him and make promises they both know he can’t keep.

When he could no longer feel you breathing, his eyes shot up to the review mirror and Sam slammed on the gas.

Squealing into the ambulance drop off, Sam began to yell for help as he pulled open the back seat door. Dean was frozen, all of the color drained from his face.

Emotion cut off from his voice, he had barely managed a whisper. “I think she’s gone.”

From there, he had spent the last six hours trying to force himself to come to terms with the fact that he had lost one of the only good things in his life. Sitting there in some criminally uncomfortable waiting room chair with his head in his hands.

All he could see was you. You twirling around in a bright sundress with the Kansas sunset kissing your skin. Your eyes closed- lips parted slightly as you slept soundly. You angry, red in the face accusing him of using you as some kind of sick tie to a simpler time.

Was that all she was to him? No, he shakes his head at just the thought of it. To him you were the only thing that made sense. A singular constant that he felt like his whole being revolved around.

But he had never told you.

Finally, by 5am he had almost convinced himself that he would be fine.

So, when the doctor comes out with blood speckling the bottom of his scrubs, he wants to shut down, but he needs to know.

“Just give it to us straight, doc.”

“She’s alive.” He says. “The surgery was tough and she gave us quite a scare, but she is alive.”

His knees almost give out from beneath him.

June 20, 2013

Everything hurts. Your side, your chest, your head, your skin. The gentle breeze from the vent above you is what pulls you out of the darkness. The harsh fluorescent lights are almost enough to send you right back to the comfort of the dark, but a shifting pressure at your thigh piques your interest.

Slowly, trying not to groan despite every muscle in your body screaming, you look to your left. Dean’s arm is draped lightly across the tops of your thighs, his hand curling in at your hip. For a moment you do nothing but watch him sleep, his eyes fluttering behind his eyelids every so often.

He looks like shit.

Dark, sunken bags have built up beneath his eyes and it looks like he hasn’t shaved in days. A part of you feels flattered imagining the fuss he had to have made to not only get you here, but to stay here himself.

Without thinking, you begin to move your hand to caress his cheek. Your fingers trace the lines of his now furrowed brow before you thread them through his hair. The movement hurts, but it’s worth it.

Especially when you’re rewarded with a lovely green as his eyes slowly open. For a moment you think there may be no yelling or ‘are you out of your mind’ speeches when a smile begins to slowly light up his face. And then, as if he’s suddenly remembered what has happened, his smile shuts down into a scowl.

“You almost died.” He hisses lowly.

“Almost.” You echo and try to cough out a laugh, but it devolves into a groan. His alarm doesn’t disappear when you try to wave him off. “I’m fine now, so why don’t you go shower or something? You smell.”

“So you can try to slip out?” He narrows his eyes at you. “Not happening.”

“You’re usually the one that slips out.” You mutter, but he doesn’t hear you. “You can’t kidnap me, Dean.”

“The hell I can’t.”

June 23, 2013

“Bedroom here, bathroom down there. Sam and I are here… and here.” Dean’s pointing to doors as you struggle to hobble behind him on his tour of the bunker. When he stops, you almost run into his back. “Sammy went to grab some stuff from your house, but it looks like you don’t live there anymore.” He only raises a brow when you advert your gaze.

Instead of responding, you turn around to point at a door a couple down. “Mine? Sounds good.” You scurry as quickly as you can into the room, but Dean catches the edge of the door before you can shut it.

“You’re not going to explain yourself?”

You laugh bitterly. “Explain myself? Are you kidding me? I don’t answer to you, Dean.”

“You know that’s not what I meant.” You want to turn away from him, but he’s holding your gaze too intensely. “What’s going on with you? You’re living out of cheap hotels and hunting on your own now?”

“Oh, that’s rich coming from you.”

“Y/N, cut the shit. It’s just you and me here. Have you even told your mom what happened?”

And it’s this comment, this sincere question that takes the final piece of your resistance from him. He watches as the tense set of your shoulders fall and your face relaxes. The malice and resentment slips from your features and it’s a relief.

“She’s dead.” You barely manage to whisper. “Vetala. Didn’t know they worked in pairs. Her husband found her tied up in the kitchen three years ago.”

He’s stunned. It’s probably the only thing you could have said that would steal his fire in an instant. He knew that kind of pain, that kind of drive. He knew it too well. You sniffle before quickly wiping your eyes and his face falls imagining the pain you’re feeling.

To his surprise, the moment is gone as quick as it started when he watches you swallow down your emotions and rebuild that wall in almost an instant.

“Don’t worry, I know you’re not one to be domestic. I’ll be out of your hair the second the doctors clear me.”

It stings. “Just like that?” He asks, not caring this time if you hear the hurt in his voice.

“Why would I stay? You make it clear what you want each time you stop by my house for a quicky and then slip out without a word.” The stunned look on his face is infuriating. “I get it, Dean. It’s convenience and consistency. Not love.”

“Not love?” He repeats your judgement, rolling the word around his tongue and he has to admit he hates the taste. He repeats it again, louder this time and it startles you. “Y/N I gave up everything I ever wanted that night I left you at the diner because I love you. I have tried and tried to stay as far away from you to keep you safe because I love you. I show up on your doorstep in moments of selfish cowardice because I can’t stay away! Almost my whole life I have been drawn to you time and time again and I know it hurts you. It kills me to hurt you, but I can’t stop because I love you.”

Dean’s chest is heaving, his breath falling across your face with how close he is to you now. “You love me.” He has to strain to hear you, but you need the clarification. Love or loved?

“When I saw you laying on the ground, bleeding out, I wished it was me instead. But when I held you in my arms and you…” His voice breaks and his eyes water. “And you stopped breathing…”

Before you know what you’re doing, you have your hands cradling either side of his facing, soothingly hushing him.

“Dean.” You murmur. “I’m okay, you saved me.”

“Stay.” The word bursts through his lips without his control. “Please, just stay.”

A single tear falls from your eyes as you nod knowing that the idea of a place called home had changed over the years, but this, him- he had always remained.

#dean winchester #dean winchester imagine #dean winchester fanfic #dean winchester x reader #supernatural #supernatural imagine #supernatural fanfic

64 notes · View notes

achaoticeternal · 4 years

Text

the 1 // d. malfoy

DRACO MALFOY X MUGGLEBORN!READER folklore/evermore series masterlist

Summary: he couldn’t see past one thing, and because of that, he left. but it could have been fun, if he could have been the one. Word Count: 2.9k Warning: Blood Prejudice. Angst. Lost love. A/N: it is implied that the reader is not in slytherin but a house is not specifically mentioned.

It’s funny how the simplest things one sees in their everyday life can bring back a spiral of memories - good or bad. Green apples, paper airplanes, and the combination of silver and green were now forever tainted in your mind. It was silly that something as human and simple as blood and family had to be the downfall of what was thought to be a love that would last a lifetime. And however hard you would try to cast away and thoughts or feelings or symbols of him, memories always had a way of persistently reminding you of what was no longer yours and possibly was never yours...

Hogwarts, 4th Year

September welcomed you with the last tastes of summer warmth before winter came stalking back, only to bring the tundra with it. It was the year of the Tri-Wizard Tournament and a year of making new, international acquaintances with the women of Beauxbatons and the men of Durmstrang.

Your summer had been less eventful than that of your peers whom a great majority had attended the Quidditch World Cup and some even experienced the Death Eaters return. Rumors had been around about He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named returning and which wizarding families would side with him. Of course, house and blood prejudice played a part in it all, but you managed to look past all of the controversies in the wizarding world. Over the summer, you had grown into yourself and blossomed into a beautiful witch who was very bright for her age. Others around the school had noticed as well, including the men from Durmstrang that created competition for the boys of Hogwarts.

However, with it now October, none of them caught your attention yet as you walked back to your seat in the arena with Hermione after leaving the Champions Tent to check in with Harry, whose name had unfortunately spouted for the Goblet of Fire. Today was the first challenge of three, and you had done your best to be supportive of your friend.

“Hermione, please calm down. Harry will figure it out, he always does,” You glided down the steps in front of her, looking for your fellow Gryffindors.

“But a dragon! This challenge is unbelievably foul! And that Daily Prophet woman has made this all so much-” As Hermione rambled on, she paid little attention to her feet and accidentally stepped on the back of your heel.

The misstep along with the shock had caused you to lose your balance and begin to take a tumble down the steps. As you felt gravity pull you down and prepared yourself for the inevitable pain with it, a pair of arms and a masculine frame had caught you before the disaster could occur.

“Careful, (y/l/n), we can’t have you harming that beautiful face. It would be quite a shame if you took a nasty tumble down the stairs,” he spoke, his tone a fine line between flirtatious and condescending.

“Oh, I-” The boy helped you balance yourself on the steps again, and you finally lifted your head to meet the eyes of your savior, “Draco.”

“Are you alright, (y/l/n)? Not to frightened by the dragons, are you?” His grey eyes peered back up into yours as you were slightly taller than him due to the steps of the stairs.

“No, no, of course not,” You shook your head softly and smiled to the boy, “Thank you, Draco.”

As if on cue, Hermione had invaded the private moment between you and the Malfoy boy, “Excuse us, Malfoy, but we would like to go sit with our friends before Harry enters the arena.”

His gaze broke off to glare at Hermione, “Oh yeah, you catch quite a view of him cowering away from the beast. I bet he’ll forfeit the challenge five minutes in.”

Draco’s entire demeanor had changed from a strange kindness to a smug arrogance as he sneered at the Granger girl. You didn’t want anything more to come from the encounter, so you caught Draco's attention again by lightly fixing his hat that had become lopsided, “Thank you again, Draco, but we should really be getting to our seats.”

His eyes flickered back to you and his features softened again, “Well if you feel like joining me in cheering for Krum, there will remain a seat open for you.”

With that, he allows the pair of you the breeze past him as he returns to his seat. A warmth stayed persistent on your cheeks as you made your way next to Ron, who looked quite disgruntled.

“(y/n), what was that back there?” Hermione questioned as the pair of you took your seats,

“What happened? Harry say something?”

Before you could speak, Hermione replied, “I accidentally tripped (y/n), but Draco caught her before she could tumble down the steps. Which I guess is somewhat lucky, but he flirted with her.”

“Malfoy?!? But he-,” Ron looked at you, both quizzical and worried, “Did he do anything? He jinx you?”

“Um... no,” You looked between the two of them, lost in their confusion.

“But Malfoy can’t stand muggle-borns, even if they are kind or pretty as you, (y/n),” Ron wrinkled his nose at the thought.

“That’s just it,” Both yours and Ron’s attention snapped to Hermione, “I don’t think Malfoy knows that you’re muggle-born which probably is in your favor, you saw how he looked and spoke to me.”

A canon erupted, signaling that Harry would enter the arena in only a moment. The shock of it all had left you confused, “it was probably just a one-time encounter. Let’s just watch Harry, and let that just blow over.”

With that, the three of you cheered for the Gryffindor boy and mostly forgot about your encounter with Draco. Sure, the memory of it would continue to puzzle you and keep you up at night to only be lost in thought. Yet, December rolled around quicker than anyone expected and with it, exciting news.

Along with the Tri-Wizard Tournament, the tradition of the Yule Ball would fall on the eve of the winter solstice. Many girls around the school were already gossiping about dates, dress, and dancing even though many of their male colleagues seemed to be quite opposed to the event. That was until the school announced that the Weird Sisters would be playing a set at the ball.

Of course, the main chatter was who the champions were taking to the Yule Ball because every girl wanted Cedric or Viktor to ask them and every boy was lining up to ask Fleur. Yet poor Harry couldn’t seem to catch a break-even in finding a date for the night. But Hermione would be quite the talk of the town once everyone realized that she was Viktor’s date for the ball, and he had taken a further interest in her. The pair of you chatted as you walked towards your classes together - she was going to the astronomy tower and you were going to divinations.

“I still can’t believe you snagged Viktor Krum! I mean I’m not exactly surprised with both your beauty and brains-”

“Oh stop that,” Hermione blushed and tried to quiet you down, “Who are you going with? I know that you’ve been asked at least five times today!”

As she showered you in compliments, you saw the flash of platinum blonde hair breeze past the pair of you with a few followers trickling behind. It was undoubtedly Malfoy and his crew who were also headed to Professor Trelawney’s class.

“I haven’t said yes to anyone yet,” you admitted timidly.

“What?!? You have to be kidding me, (y/n). I know at least half the Durmstrang boys would love to be your escort for the night-”

“I-I know that, Hermione,” you flushed as the pair of you paused on the stairs, “I’m just... waiting for the right person.”

“Alright, just make sure you say yes to him. Or else I fear Harry or Ron will ask you,” You bid each other goodbye and separated to your designated classes.

As you made your way up the north tower to try and make it to class a few minutes early. Even though other students may have found her strange and overbearing, you knew that she was deep down a kind lady who wished the best for everyone she crossed paths with. Yet before you could make it up much further, you felt a light tug on the hood of your robes.

“Oh!” you jumped slightly at the shock.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you, (y/n),” Michael Corner smiled as he glanced up at you, “do you have just a quick second?”

“I do, but let’s step into the window sill so that we’re out of the way,” you suggested. He stepped over onto it first, before offering his hand out to you, “Thank you.”

Few students passed by the two of you and up into the north tower, there was still 5 minutes till classes started but you still hoped to be early enough to snag a seat in the front.

“Well, how can I help you, Michael? Did you get my notes from Cho? I asked her to pass them onto you, but I can make you an extra copy-”

“No, no, she passed them along to me. Thank you for that. Potions is sadly not my area of expertise,” He smiled as a little blush dusted his cheeks, “I actually was wondering if you had a date to the Yule Ball? And if not-”

“(y/l/n)!” you heard Draco call and quickly hurry up the steps towards you, “Thank Salazar I found you before classes started.”

Draco paused next to you, giving you the kindest eyes before his gaze turned towards Michael. His expression changed into that of one mixed with jealousy and disagreement, “Corner, shouldn’t you be out in the greenhouses. Why don’t you leave (y/n) alone before someone gets the impression that a Ravenclaw is going to skip class.”

Michael glanced at you then over to Draco before disappearing down the stairs. Before he completely vanished from your sight, he looked back up at you with a very apparent look of disappointment in his eyes. Draco now took the spot where Michael was previously and held your right hand in his.

“(y/l/n), I don’t know if you realize but you are quite a wanted woman recently,” Draco smirked, his grey eyes flickering across your face as if gathering information.

“I guess so... I mean with the ball and everything, I have gotten plenty of proposals.”

“So I’ve heard, but you’ve yet to say yes to any of them, or so I’ve heard.”

“Correct again. I haven’t given my word to attend with anyone, but I did promise a dance or two to a few gentlemen,” you tried to analyze the situation as best as you could, but Draco remained unreadable to you. He also knew how to put up a good front.

“Well, (y/n), I am hoping that you’ll give me the pleasure of being my date to the Yule Ball, and hopefully, you will allow me to take you to Hogsmeade in the next few weeks,” his face had softened as he waited for a reply, his smugness and confident stance faltering under your gaze.

“Draco, are you asking me out? As your girlfriend and to the Yule Ball?”

“I figured- you know... two birds with one stone.”

“I would love to be your companion to the Yule Ball,” You beamed at him, “and your girlfriend.”

That day had long passed now. So had the Yule Ball and your entire fourth year. Now you were at the end of your fifth year and Draco no longer treated you like a prized possession, let alone sparing you a glance.

At some point in your relationship, the sweetness of being in love ended as he began expecting behaviors and ideas from you that you never expressed before. He still held Slytherin above every other house and expected you to treat those not in Slytherin's house the same way he did. He wanted your attention and affection at every second, instead of allowing you to be with friends and he rarely ever returned affections either. But the worst behavior that Draco partook of that crossed every line for you was the blood prejudice.

He held being part of the Sacred Twenty Eight to a higher degree than necessary in all aspects. There was a difference in being proud of your bloodline and then being prideful of your bloodline. And the Malfoy family very much fell into the pride of being Pureblooded Wizards.

That was when a puzzle really clicked into place for you. Yes, Draco had loved you for you, but he also needed his parents to love you. He tried to pressure you into a perfect little box that he could wrap up and present to mummy and daddy. You understood why he felt the needed to continue being the perfect Malfoy, but you couldn’t understand why he thought it was okay to pull you into it. His parents would never accept you for one reason.

“I don’t understand this, (y/l/n). we took a break just like you asked and it has done nothing. I know you still love me, so let's stop this ridiculous behavior. My parents want to meet you again. Mother loved you and I’m sure this time father will...”

“No, Draco. I don’t want to go back to the Manor,” You shook your head and took deep breaths.

“Well, that’s odd, but we can go to your estate-”

“No, can’t you listen-”

“The Three Broomsticks then, but please, I need you-”

“No, Draco, you aren’t listening to me,” tears threatened to spill as you felt your heart begin to shatter. You had never lied to Draco, but the truth about your family had never come to the surface.

As far as it concerned the Wizarding World, the (y/l/n) Family was also a part of the Sacred Twenty Eight Pureblood families. You understood the confusion and had to explain it to many of your friends and professors. But now Draco had to know the truth, even if it meant he wouldn’t be yours anymore.

“I’m not whoever you’ve painted me out to be,” your bottom lips quivered as you took a deep breath, “I’m not exactly who you think I am.”

Draco’s whole body dropped, “what do you mean?”

“Yes, I am part of the (y/l/n) bloodline, but I’m also a muggle-born.”

“No, that doesn’t make sense.”

“My grandparents had five children. My two uncles, my father, and my two aunts. All of them great wizards, except for my father who had no magical abilities - the only one in our family. He married my mother, who is a muggle. However, I am a witch.” you confessed it all, praying that he would understand. Maybe he would love you enough to glance over this fatal flaw.

“A squib? Your father is a squib and you never bothered to mention it!”

“It wasn’t that important I thought, because I’m still a member of a Pureblood family! I thought that you would see over it because it’s such a small hiccup.”

“I- no, I can’t just look over it. You know I can’t and you know I won’t,” Draco glared, looking at you with the same disdain that his father had when speaking of muggles.

“Draco, please. We can lie and just paint over this. I’ll even get my family to lie, but I don’t want to lose you. I’ve never felt like this with anyone, ever in my life,” A few stray tears managed to escape your defense as you begged him.

“(y/n), we both know who my parents, who my family, who we are associated with. I can’t risk it and neither can you.”

“I love you, Draco. And everyone knows it.”

“I love you too. And hopefully, you will get it through your head while I can’t love you anymore.”

During your sixth and seventh years, you never spoke to Draco, let alone offered a glance in his general direction. He shattered your heart after you had thought you had found your person, your soulmate if you will. The only thing the shocked you was that he never mentioned or let lose the dirtiest secret of your family. It wouldn’t have changed much but still have hurt you enough in many social circles.

Even after the Battle of Hogwarts had passed, you still hadn’t made up with Draco and even Harry Potter, his schoolyard nemesis, ended up coming to terms. All your friends were engaged, married, or dating. You had also tried, but nothing ever came of anything you attempted to pursue. The spark you once had with who you thought was the love of your life never reappeared with anyone else.

However, you heard from the newlywed Potter’s that Draco had married - an arranged marriage - but married nonetheless. To Astoria Greengrass who was two years your younger back in school. Both purebloods, caring for their family lineage. The news had come to you at the end of another failed relationship and felt like a ton of bricks on your chest.

No, the Malfoy prejudice was in no way your fault. You had done everything you could to salvage the relationships and love him unconditionally. But sometimes you wonder...

if one thing had been different, would everything be different?

113 notes · View notes

zmediaoutlet · 4 years

Text

in support of Texas relief, @doilycoffin donated $100, and requested Liam & Cordell Walker. Thank you for donating!

to get your own personalized fic, please see this post.

(read on AO3)

One of Liam's earliest memories is the time Cordell dropped him on his head. Not actually accurate at all to the way it went but that's how it's told in the family mythology. He was really little, three maybe or four—for some reason that part's indeterminate—and Cordell was climbing the stable and playing adventurer, or maybe just showing off and the adventurer part was a good excuse. Liam was following Cordell around like he always did and he tried to climb up, too, on the fence that kept in the horses when they were let out for their run, and Cordell told him no and that he was too little but Liam was determined to try. Cordell climbed back down and tried to steady him where he'd made it up to the top rung of the fence, and Liam lost his balance anyway, and fell straight backwards and landed headfirst on the dirt. There was a little rock and then a lot of blood, and then stitches, and Mama fussing and their dad ripping Cordi a new one—Liam doesn't even remember that it hurt—but the part that sticks it as a memory is how they all rode together in the truck back and forth from the doctor and Cordell held his hand in the backseat and he was crying, the whole way home, a silent seeping kind of crying that made his face a shiny mess. Liam thinks about that weirdly often. Cordi looking out the window and crying.

When the story gets retold for new friends, or the kids, or Cordell's buddies from the Rangers come around for coffee and Mama's pecan pie, they tell it that Cordell's so clumsy he dropped his baby brother on his head. Liam sort of hates it, every time. Cordell laughs and does the aw shucks routine he's so good at, relaxed with his beer and shrugging embarrassed apology. When Liam was about to head off to college, his eighteenth birthday dinner, Daddy told the story again as a kind of miracle survival, and Liam got up from the table real fast and went out onto the porch, annoyed for some reason beyond measure. It was Cordi who got up and came after him and said, a little cautious, "What's up, Stinker?" and Liam said to him, mad, "Why don't you ever tell people it was me? I was the one climbing up after you. It's not like you did it on purpose."

Cordell just blinked at him. "What does it matter?" he said. "You were the baby and I was a dumbass kid. So what?" He hooked his arm around Liam's neck and he smelled like sweat and Old Spice and that laundry detergent Emily bought that wasn't anything like the one they used at home. Liam pushed at his side but didn't try hard to get away. Not that it would've worked. "It's how we figured out how hard that head was, right? Come on. Mama's gonna wonder if you didn't like the brisket."

Liam let himself be dragged back into the house, and Cordi pushed him down into his chair right between him and Emily, and Emily smiled at him easy, and passed him the potatoes. "One month 'til the dorms," she said, very quiet so no one else could hear under Cordell telling some awful lie about Liam having gas, and Liam laughed, surprised, and it just happened that it was the same time everyone else laughed so that was okay. He always liked Emily. Cordell punched his thigh lightly on his other side, and gave him a warmer more real smile, and Liam dropped it, and he didn't complain about the story again.

Seven years between them. Liam always wondered if he was an accident, even if Mama said that with Cordell going to school she was ready to have another baby around the house. Cordell was always the one who was getting into trouble. Rambunctious, loud, falling headfirst into things and getting dragged out covered in mud. Liam learned from his example what not to do. Do not: run along the bleachers at the football stadium and vault the handrails until your foot gets caught and you fall and snap your wrist clean in two. Do not: get caught drinking beer with your high school girlfriend behind the horsebarn, and make Daddy give the most mortifying sex talk in the world afterward. Do not: make friends with the most delinquent-ass kid in the whole hill country and wind up explaining every other week why, really, he wasn't that bad, give him a chance—

Somehow even then he was the golden child. Not the best grades, not the most obedient. That wasn't what their dad cared about. Cordell was good on a horse, good on his feet. Respectful when it mattered and devil-may-care when it didn't. In high school he was the quarterback, of course he was, and Liam was right there in the stands with their parents every Friday night, cheering his lungs out. Weirdly boastful with his fourth-grade friends: his older brother was the star of the football team. His older brother could ride a bull for ten seconds and get off hardly winded. Bookish, kind of short, he needed the borrowed glory of Cordell's success to be proud of. Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it got him pushed over on the soccer field while some bigger boy went, gawd, William, who cares?

Liam never got in trouble. Never broke a bone. After bringing Cordell back from the hospital with a fresh new cast on his ankle and a dopey slightly-drugged smile on his face, Mama settled him in bed with Liam's help and turned off the light and then, in the kitchen, sighed and said, "Liam, you are a real relief to the mind, do you know that?" He was proud of that, too, in that moment. It wasn't until later that it nagged at him. A therapist asked him, much later in a sleek Manhattan office that smelled faintly of sage, "Do you think your predilection for being contrarian results from that time?" He went home annoyed with her, and was more annoyed when he told Bret the story and Bret didn't even turn around from the carbonara he was making and said, "Babe, you're the most contrary person I know."

He wasn't. He didn't—think he was. He… was, he realized, after a week of sitting with it, and a week after that it made sense. He didn't pick fights, and he didn't make waves. His rebellion was quiet. His hard head, forcing him to make his own space in the world. Not able to live up to Cordell and knowing instinctively that it would be awful even to try—and so taking the opposite turn, every time. It was better than being compared, even if he knew there was no chance but to be compared.

He studied hard. He read, all the time. He liked math and literature equally and did equally well in both. He hated P.E. but he did what he could there, too, and he learned to ride even if he didn't actually love horses the way the rest of the family did, and when Daddy asked if he wanted to join up with the little league baseball Liam asked to play soccer, instead, and Daddy frowned but Mama said, "Why not, I've seen enough boys drop foul balls for a lifetime." So, soccer, and most of his games were during the day or on Saturday mornings, but Cordi came to a lot of them anyway, and when Liam's team won Cordi would jump down onto the field and grab him up by the waist and crow David Beckham, right here! Little David Beckham for sale! Liam would struggle and then he'd be slung headfirst over Cordell's shoulder like a potato sack and his face would get so red from laughing that it hurt.

On September 12, 2001, Mama and Daddy were gone from the house when Liam got home from school and he was glad for it. That was a Wednesday. He was in sixth grade. The teachers weren't even trying to hold normal lessons and everyone was talking about what had happened the day before. Melissa Kettering was out that day and the rumor was that her dad had been on a business trip in New York. Liam had raised his hand and asked the social studies teacher if there was going to be a war, like there was after Pearl Harbor, and she sat down on her desk and shook her head and didn't answer.

He was trying to read his book for English when the phone rang. Cordell, calling from his apartment in town. Hey, buddy, he said, over the line, and Liam sat down on the floor by the phone table and closed his eyes, unaccountably almost about to cry. Is Daddy there? Liam told him he was home alone. Lucky, Cordi said, you can totally throw a rager, and Liam didn't laugh, and neither did Cordell, even though he always laughed at his own stupid jokes. Hey, um. I shouldn't—I don't know if I should tell you this but I've gotta tell someone, and Em's in class, and I just have to—I did something, and I need to—

He interrupted himself and Liam could hear him breathing over the line. He didn't want Cordell to say anything. If he didn't say anything then Liam could pretend that he was going to tell a story about some party they'd gone to at Emily's sorority, or that Hoyt had come back into town and they'd seen a show at ACL, or that he was gonna come stay that weekend, and maybe he and Liam would go riding. Anything but what he was about to say. Liam could hear it, in his head. He could hear it like it had already been said and it was echoing, now, inside, like a verse from a song he'd always, always remember.

Cordell graduated from the Marine boot camp on a Saturday in the middle of December. Liam went along even if he wasn't allowed to attend the actual ceremony and Daddy complained about the cost of the plane tickets until Mama told him to shut up. Liam sat between them on the flight and it was the first time he was ever in the air. Over the top of Mama's crossword book he watched the clouds go by over New Mexico, Arizona, with complete wonder. San Diego, then, different to Austin—palm trees, and the air so wet, and even the parking lot at their hotel smelling like warm flowers.

Mama gave him fifty dollars before they left for the graduation. They were bringing Cordell back, after, because they got one night with him before they had to give him back to the military. "Order a pizza," she said, "at 4:30 exactly, and we should get back at the same time the pizza comes so we can all eat together." Liam watched American Pie on the hotel tv while he waited, something he would never have been allowed at home. He made the call when he was supposed to, and when the girl on the phone asked him what toppings his mind went completely blank because he was never allowed to make that decision. Cordi liked ham and pineapple and none of the rest of them did. Liam ordered it with extra pineapple.

When a knock came on the hotel room door Liam jumped up to open it, cash in hand. The one holding the pizzas was Cordell, grinning at him with Mama and Daddy standing behind. "Pizza delivery," Cordell said, and Liam crashed into him for a hug so hard that Cordi almost dropped the boxes and said whoa, Stinker, soft and laughing.

His hair was cut off, an inch on top and shorter on the sides, so he looked like those pictures of their grandpa when he was in Korea. He was skinny, too, which Liam didn't get, because he thought boot camp was all about building up muscles. "Mostly running," Cordi said. He was tired, dark circles under his eyes. He was stretched out on one bed with his strange starched blue pants and the awful khaki shirt that made him look washed-out pale even if he'd been running around San Diego for thirteen weeks, and Mama was sat next to him squeezing his arm like he'd evaporate if she looked away for a minute, and even Daddy was hovering. Proud but worried. Liam sat by Cordell's boots and tugged on the laces, wanting to ask more questions but not daring to.

Cordi fell asleep before six o'clock. Daddy turned on the television real quiet to the news. More stuff about the invasion. Liam hoped it'd be all over by the time Cordi got there. Mama boxed up the remaining pizza, shaking her head. "Don't know why you picked pineapple, kiddo," she said, and Liam shrugged, sitting at the table, watching Cordell's face, turned away a little on the pillow. Liam wanted to shake him awake but of course he didn't. For his whole life, after, he gets a little sick to his stomach when he smells pineapple.

While Cordell was in Afghanistan Mama and Daddy had Emily over to the house a lot. She was sweet. Respectful of Mama, calling her ma'am half the time, and charming to their dad even though Liam knew that she and Daddy probably disagreed on more than things than not. She liked that Liam played soccer and asked if he ever watched the Premiere League. Liam didn't even know what that was. She helped Mama cook supper and went out and took pictures of the horses which made Daddy smile, and one time when Liam went outside after dinner to read she was there crying, on the porch, quiet with her hand over her mouth, and Liam hung back and didn't know what to say. "Sorry," she said, dashing at her cheeks with the heel of her hand. She licked her lips and nodded at his book, sniffing. "That's a good one. You should read the sequel, too." He did, and told her about it, and she smiled like a sunrise, the way she always did, and he felt like—he didn't even know, what he felt like.

Liam was the best man at their wedding. He felt and looked ridiculous. Fifteen in a tux and he didn't know how to tie a bow-tie, but Cordi didn't either, so Daddy had to do it for both of them, grumbling the whole time that they should've learned this by now. "Not a lot of bowties in Kandahar, Daddy," Cordell said, winking at Liam, and Liam—blushed. Ridiculous, and embarrassing, the way the whole affair and the lead-up had felt, but Cordell didn't seem to care or notice, so—there was Liam, blushing in a bowtie.

Cordell had only been back for a year and somehow things were off. He was serving the rest of his contract out in the reserves but he wasn't finishing up his degree like he'd told Mama he would. He'd entered the training program for the state troopers and was set up to be a highway cop, of all things. He'd rented a house in Austin with Emily and they lived together the whole year before the wedding—an argument with Daddy about that one, which Liam listened to from the hallway with his heart pounding—and they weren't even going to be married in the church because Emily didn't want a wedding mass and, Liam suspected, Cordell didn't either. Daddy lost that argument, too.

The wedding was tiny. Liam the best man, Geri the maid of honor. Emily's aunt that raised her on one side and Daddy and Mama on the other, and a handful of Cordell and Emily's friends making up the numbers in the little rented hall. Afterward they had a bigger barbecue out at the ranch and in front of the crowd Emily fed Cordell a dainty forkful of the lemon cake and Cordell responded by dotting a tiny bit of frosting on her nose and kissing it off, and Mama's best friend Sue-Ellen sighed and said to Mama, where Liam could hear, "Well, Abilene, maybe they're atheists but I daresay you raised that boy right every other way," and Mama said something dry back but Liam was watching how Cordell cupped Emily's cheek in his hand, smiling down at her like she hung the moon, and he thought, yeah. Yeah, Cordell was just about perfect, wasn't he.

"High school in the fall, right?" Emily's aunt said, later. "Emily says you play soccer. Going to try out for the team?"

Cordell and Emily were dancing, swaying in the grass, the bonfire leaping up behind them. His hand still on her cheek. "I'm quitting soccer," Liam said, without even realizing he was going to. "I'm going to try out for wrestling, instead."

He figured out he was gay relatively early. His friends at school got hold of a Playboy in fifth grade and didn't really know what to do with it beyond blustering. This was before anyone but nerds was on the internet, and Liam was a nerd but did a decent job of hiding it. Scott beckoned Liam over while they were waiting for the buses and showed him the top of the magazine, the bold logo and the girl with her boobs pushing up out of her bra—the group of them snickering, saying how hot she was—and that they were going to look at it at Scott's house later if Liam wanted to come over—and Liam said, "No, my mom's making me go to the store with her." The lie came out effortlessly.

They did have a computer at home, and dial-up internet it had been very, very hard to argue Daddy into. He hardly knew how to find anything but he did some careful searches while Daddy was out with the horses and Mama was cooking, singing bad over the stove like she tended to. Made Liam's face hot to see some of what he was seeing. Hoyt came over, once, while Cordi was away in the war, and he helped Liam and Mama dig out a bunch of tomatoes that hadn't grown in right, and afterward they sat on the porch drinking lemonade while Mama asked Hoyt all about the oil field he said he'd been working in and Liam watched how Hoyt's legs sprawled out on the porch, how his jeans hugged up against his calf muscle and how the sweat had made his white shirt nearly transparent, and he had to sit very careful on the bench with his knees drawn up to hide the effect it had on him.

When Cordell came home from Afghanistan they threw a huge party. Everyone came, Daddy's friends and Mama's, and Emily and their friends from college, and even Hoyt, magicked up out of somewhere (for the promise of free beer, Daddy said), and then Liam, the youngest person there, watching from the corner of the porch as always. Cordi was very tan and finally bulky with muscle and his hair had grown out, just a little, from that military buzz, and he barely detached himself from Emily the whole time, his arm always around her shoulders or hers around his waist, and when they did step apart his eyes followed her and she watched him right back, smiling at the most random times. Liam was fourteen and a little more aware of the world and he wondered abruptly if they'd had sex yet. Cordi had only been home one day and he'd slept at the ranch and not at Emily's apartment. How would they have found the time?

He was chewing his thumbnail over it when a sweaty weight crashed down on his shoulders, arms trapping his in. Hoyt. "Hey there, Stinker," Hoyt said, and Liam shrugged fretfully and said, "Don't call me that," and Hoyt laughed at him but stood up and ruffled Liam's hair completely backwards instead.

"Still pretty shrimpy," he said. He was grinning, like he had some big secret. "You planning on growing up anytime soon, champ?"

"Don't you have a sketchy job to get to?" Liam said, annoyed. He tried to fix his hair and gave it up as a lost cause the second Hoyt's grin got bigger. Asshole.

Hoyt sipped his beer. Twenty-one—he was allowed, although Liam had noticed that Mama was being a little free with handing out drinks to Emily's college friends. "Glad big bro's home, I bet," Hoyt said.

Liam didn't dignify that with a response. Hoyt laughed, under his breath, and held out the beer for Liam to take, which he did because he didn't know what else to do. "Go on," Hoyt said, nodding at it. "I won't tell your mama. Not fair that everyone else gets to celebrate while little Liam's sober. And boring."

"I'm not boring," Liam said, although he knew he was because half the kids at school clearly thought so. He took a sip of the beer, anyway, not knowing if Hoyt would snatch it away. Nasty, and he made a face that made Hoyt hoot, and then he took a bigger gulp, determined at least to get something out of it.

"There he goes," Hoyt said, weirdly delighted, and he clapped Liam on the shoulder the same way he would Cordi when they were in high school, and the bit of warm in Liam's belly went lower. "That's a welcome home."

Liam kept the beer, curled against his chest. He felt dumb holding it and also weirdly adult. "He's not even here," he said. Sort of scoffing. "Doesn't matter."

Hoyt curled his arm around Liam's shoulders again and ignored how he went stiff, and nodded out at the party. Music playing from a radio Daddy had set up on a truck-bed. Emily and Cordell, dancing in the firelight. Same as it would be for the wedding reception a year from then, although of course Liam didn't know that at the time. "Aw, he's here," Hoyt said. He squeezed Liam's shoulders. He smelled strange, like—skunk, and Mama's compost bin. It was gross but also kind of appealing and Liam shifted, hoping his dumb body wouldn't react. "He's just with his girl, and who could blame him. No call for getting jealous."

He wasn't jealous. Not—exactly. That night after Mama and Daddy went to bed the party kept on, and Liam went to his room and watched from the dark window, the bonfire still going and all the college kids still going, too. When he finally fell asleep he had a strange, blurry dream about Hoyt—building a bonfire together, and Hoyt smiling at him and being a jackass and then touching his face, the same way Cordell touched Emily's face, and then Hoyt touching his stomach, low—and then the dream shifted, the weird way dreams shift, and it was Cordell, touching his stomach, and smiling at him, and leaning in close—with his hair longer like it was before he enlisted—but wearing for some reason the dumb khaki shirt of his uniform—and then Cordell's hand—

When he woke up he was soaked and it was bright morning. He washed his underwear out in the sink, feeling like his head was screwed on to someone else's body, and then he hid the underwear in the hamper, and showered, and tried not to think about it. He had that dream or one like it on and off for years, until he finally lost his virginity to Michael in college and it went away. He never told his therapist about it, or Bret, or anyone. He could rationalize it but he couldn't ever acknowledge it out loud because of what it—felt like, to think about it. To make it real in a place that wasn't just his stupid, crazy, dreaming head.

He had the dream again the night before he came out to his parents. January 2nd, trying out his new year's resolution of honesty. He figured in a ruthless sort of way that if his parents kicked him out or hated him or tried to change him then at least he had early acceptance at UT for the fall and a full scholarship and it was just eight months where his life would be completely over.

Cordell was at home on the ranch and Liam figured that's what triggered it. A couple days of vacation, since he'd worked over Christmas, and he and Emily and baby Stella had stayed up for ringing in the new year, and everyone had taken turns kissing Stella's forehead when midnight struck. Liam had been allowed a glass of champagne, Mama not even fussing about it since it was a holiday and the house was full—so he had two glasses—and when he went to bed he could still hear Cordell laughing from the front room, telling Daddy some story about a bust on the highway, something about stolen Santa suits, something light.

He dreamed they were swimming, up at the lake, and Cordell was naked. Laughing, that same too-loud booming laugh, but just because he was happy and not like he was making fun. Being kind to Liam. Holding him from behind with his arms around Liam's chest, their legs slipping together in the water. Liam could imagine what it would be like for a man to do something to him, he'd seen porn by that point, and he'd seen Cordell naked too because of the vagaries of living in an old house without a lock on the bathroom door, but somehow there was still a disconnect in his head. He was turned on beyond belief but nothing—happened, just the vagueness of Cordell behind him. His big hands.

Mama took Emily and the baby in to town, that day, for shopping. Daddy said they'd just bought half of Macy's and Mama shushed him so Daddy was up at the barn, checking over the new foal. Liam sat on the porch with a cup of coffee and watched birds come to the new feeder Mama had got from Emily and he tried to rehearse it, in his head. What to say. He'd seen it in movies but it didn't feel possible to come out of his mouth.

Cordell sat by him, on the bench swing. "Since when do you drink coffee?" he said. Then, less casual: "Is that my mug?"

"Yes," Liam said, and didn't protest when Cordell took it out of his hands. He rubbed his palms on his jeans. He had a hard time talking to Cordi after he had one of those dreams and so it was a relief that most of the time Cordell wasn't around, that he was in town at the house he shared with his wife. With his wife, Liam reminded himself, as though that could help. Another thing to make Liam different. Wrestling instead of football, reading books instead of riding, and now—this, on top of everything.

"Whatever's going on," Cordell said. Liam blinked, came back to the world. The cold, and the swing barely rocking from how Cordi had set his boot on the porch and pushed, and Cordell looking at him very steadily. "You know you can tell me, right?"

Liam swallowed. "Even if it's—" Bad is what came to his mouth and he shook his head. He prayed about this, he resolved. It's not bad. "Weird?"

"If it weren't weird you probably wouldn't be being so weird about it," Cordi said, frank, and Liam shoved his shoulder. The dream dissipated just like that. How could he possibly be crushing on his brother when his brother is this much of a jerk. Cordell swayed, grinning, letting Liam push him even if Cordell outweighed him then by fifty pounds, but then he set his hand on the back of Liam's neck, more serious. "Whatever it is. We can figure it out."

Liam licked his lips, and nodded. He knew then that was going to tell Cordell the one secret, if not the whole of it, before they left the porch that morning, and Cordi would—back him up, with Mama and Daddy, even if he didn't get it. "Give me back the coffee," he said, and Cordell raised his eyebrows but passed it back, so Liam could take a gulp. The caffeine probably wouldn't help but maybe it wouldn't hurt, and it felt nice to hold the mug. "Promise you won't freak," Liam said then, even if he was—mostly, ninety percent, pretty sure—and Cordell said, immediately, "I promise," and Liam believed him. That was the thing, with Cordell, in those days. It was easy to believe him.

It's Mama who calls, when Emily dies. Liam's already in bed because he's got court in the morning and Bret shoves at his shoulder, says, "Oh my god answer it and then change your ringtone, I hate that song," and Liam's still fuzzy from sleep and doesn't quite process that there's no good reason Mama would be calling him after nine o'clock in Texas because she always thought that was bad manners, it had been drilled into him all his life, and he says, mumbly, still waking up, "Hey, Mama," and there's a sharp intake of breath on the other side of the line before she says, Honey, I'm sorry, but I have real bad news.

He flies out the next day. Bret tries to dissuade him. "There's nothing you can do right now," he says, as though that's the point. JFK to Austin-Bergstrom is four and a half hours and he spends the whole time with his chest this weird achy knot. It doesn't feel real but it is. He texted Mama his flight plan and she says that Daddy will pick him up at the airport, and when he gets into the truck Daddy shakes his head and says, "Good to see you, son," but without any truth to it. Liam doesn't take it personally.

Cordell's not at the ranch when they get there but the kids are. "Hi, Uncle Liam," Stella says, remarkably clear, until he hugs her, and then she curls his hands into his shirt and cries silently, her shoulders shaking. August doesn't get up from the couch, sitting there with one arm crossed over his chest and the other over his mouth, and he looks—Liam's always shocked by it—so exactly like his mother. Stella's a copy of her grandmother, to the point that Mama set her prom picture side by side with Stella's first dance photo and the only real difference was the dress—but Auggie always took after Emily, from coloring to temperament to those long straight eyebrows, that mouth that curves up into a wide, easy smile. Not smiling now, and not for a while, and when Stella pulls away and wipes her eyes Liam sits down next to Auggie and sets his hand on the back of his neck and Auggie just folds over, quiet, like whatever was holding him up just isn't there anymore.

"Where is he?" Liam asks Mama, in the kitchen later. The sun's going down. It hasn't even been twenty-four hours.

Mama's eyes are red-rimmed. "Where do you think?" she says.

Liam takes the truck. Lady Bird Lake is officially closed at night but of course that makes no difference. He parks and walks, up to the lookout, and Cordell doesn't hear him coming. He's sitting on the steps to the gazebo, his elbows braced on his knees. The light hitting his hair. Long again. Liam doesn't know how he's always skirting regs and getting away with it, except of course Cordi gets away with everything. Golden child.

He regrets the thought as soon as he has it. "Cordi," he says, and Cordell looks up in complete surprise. Liam smiles at him, as much as he can, and comes and sits on the step. He tries to think of what to say and can't come up with anything.

"Aren't you in court tomorrow?" Cordell says, after they sit there for thirty seconds. His voice sounds thick and distant.

Liam shakes his head. "Today," he says, and Cordell nods and huffs and says, "Right," and then looks down at his hands again. They're twisted together, his thumb rubbing hard and repeatedly at the mount of his other palm. Liam reaches over and puts his hand over the knot of Cordell's fingers and Cordell's jaw flexes but he lets Liam do it. "I'm sorry," Liam says.

"Everyone is," Cordell says, halfway bitter. Liam squeezes his hands and Cordell makes a rough low noise, some sound Liam has never heard him make. "Jesus. They won't let me go in to work."

"Of course they won't," Liam says, and Cordell pulls his hands away, pushes them into his hair. "Cordi, they have to—they're going to be looking for who did it and it has to be by the books so it'll stick. They're not going to risk screwing it up."

"I just want to—" Cordell cuts himself off but Liam can imagine what goes there. He touches Cordell's back instead and the muscle flinches. Set to fly off the handle any second. Fight or flight, but Cordell never used to run from anything and Liam can't imagine he's going to start now.

He stands up. "Wrestle me," he says.

Cordell looks up. "What?"

Genuine surprise. At least it's not misery. "Come on," Liam says. "See if you can pin me." These jeans are nice, were a gift from Bret, but he'll sacrifice them. He holds out a hand and Cordell lets himself be pulled upright, and it's a shock like it always is when Liam's been too long away, how much taller Cordi still is. Liam always was the shrimp. He pushes Cordell's chest, lightly, and Cordell slaps his hands away. "Cordi," Liam says, coaxing, and pulls at Cordell's wrist. "Let me take your mind off it."

Stupid thing to say and he knows it as soon as he says it. Cordell gives him an ugly look and shoves him for real. "Take my mind off it?" he says, while Liam's staggering backwards. Liam sets his boots in the dirt and braces, and when Cordell pushes him again Liam grapples, and they are wrestling, then. It's sloppy, bad holds, both of them in too-slick boots for this ground. Liam manages to swing Cordell around and get his back on the ground but Cordi's always been stronger and shoves him off, and then they're just—flat-out scrambling, Liam's hand sinking into a patch of mud and both of them breathing hard, Cordell twisting out of his grip and getting an arm over his chest, tight, before Liam eels over and flips them—gets Cordell on his back on the dirt—his leg over Cordell's—and then Cordi drops his head back against the ground and taps out, panting.

"You been practicing?" Cordell says. His eyes are closed.

Liam sits up, says, "Class at my gym." Cordi nods and Liam gets off him, kneels next to him in the dirt. The gazebo's bright and the skyline's pretty, on the other side of the lake. Liam looks at that instead of at his brother, so he won't have to see the tears seeping down Cordell's temples, wetting his hair.

"It's not okay," Liam says. He sets a hand on Cordell's chest. At the DA's office in Manhattan he's comforted widows, widowers, orphans. Some of them seeking justice but most of them knowing it won't really be found. Cordell, he thinks, is one of the latter type, but Liam tries out the lines he's learned anyway. "It's not okay and it's not fair. I can't pretend I know what you're going through but I'm sorry." He swallows, his throat trying to close without his say-so. "Jesus. I'm so sorry, Cordi."

"Yeah," Cordell says, rough, and grips Liam's wrist. When Liam looks down Cordell's eyes are still closed. They stay there for a while, by the lake, long past when it's uncomfortable.

When they finally get up, Liam's knees creak like an old man's but Cordell doesn't make the joke he should. He leaves Cordell's truck and drives them both back into town, and gets drive-through Whataburger that Cordell picks at instead of eating, and says, "Do you want to go back to the ranch?" and isn't surprised when Cordell shakes his head, no. They get a hotel instead, two queens and a respectable mini-bar, and Liam calls Mama from next to the ice machine in the hall and says that he's got Cordell, and they're fine, and they'll be back in the morning. She clearly wants to object but doesn't know how and Liam hangs up before she can figure it out.

He gets back, with the ice. Cordell's sitting on the end of the bed watching the news like it's the Superbowl. "I was thinking about the funeral," Cordell says, when the door closes behind Liam. "I have to plan the funeral and I don't even have her body."

Liam sets the bucket on the bar and sits on the other bed. "We'll help," Liam says. Cordell's cheek sucks in on one side. "You don't have to do any of this alone."

"Yeah," Cordell says, remote, and Liam looks at him. Weird hollowness in his stomach and he realizes only after a second why: it's the first time, all his life, that he can remember Cordell lying to him.

The Rodeo Kings operation is supposed to be quick. Three months, is the estimate: to get in, to learn the operation, to get out. They need an agent who can be convincingly skilled as a traveling rider, who knows a ranch operation, who can act. There's a depressingly short list and one name at the top of it. Everyone thinks it's a bad idea except for Graves, and Cordell.

"It'll give me something to think about that's not this," Cordell says, when Liam's trying to talk him out of it. They're on the back patio of his and Emily's house in town. The kids are still staying out at the ranch. It's two weeks after the funeral and they haven't gone back to school. Cordell hasn't shaved in a few days and the sound as he scratches his jaw is loud. There's no music playing from the kitchen window, like there used to be. The plants out here are already dying. Liam wants to grip Cordell's shoulders, get in his face and yell, but doesn't dare to. He gets a deep sigh, instead, and Cordell flipping a poker chip between his fingers like a restless card shark, and then a smile, fake as fake. "Anyway, who do you know who can ride a bull better than me?"

"No one," Liam says, and Cordell nods, like damn straight, and in the morning Liam goes in to the Travis County DA and announces he'd like to transfer offices, due to a family emergency that's going to keep him here in Texas, and it's only afterward when some calls are made and the paperwork's signed that he calls Bret, back in Manhattan, and leaves a voicemail that he's going to be staying a lot longer than he thought.

It isn't three months. As the operation drags on, Liam sweet-talks his way into being one of the assistant attorneys on the case and he tries to alleviate how Graves is getting more and more suspicious. Cordell's old partner James gets promoted to captain, six months in, and he vouches for Cordell, too, not that it seems to matter either way. Cordell's the one who's embedded with the rodeo and he'll either finish the job or he won't. They don't have another agent to send in, not without compromising the work that's been done so far, and nothing else will do but to wait.

The kids ask Liam for updates every week when he comes for dinner at the ranch. "I can't tell you everything," he says, like he does every time, and Daddy's quiet at the head of the table, and Mama quieter on the opposite side. Cordell has a rendezvous every Monday when the rodeo takes the day off with a burner cell phone and an agent waiting impatiently for his call, and his reports are terse: still trying to get them to trust me. They're suspicious of newcomers. The ring seems really tight and I can't figure out an opening. Give me time. He's allowed to call Liam the same day and Liam answers every unknown number on Mondays, giving hope to spam callers nationwide. Cordell usually sounds tired but he still calls and they have a dumb, simple conversation—about how the Rangers beat the Angels, how he's breaking in some new boots and has a blister the size of Indiana, how he's craving, inexplicably, sushi. "Sushi?" Liam asks, trying to imagine when Cordell ever tried it, and Cordi says, with rare humor, "Hey, I'm not a big fancy New York lawyer but I've had my share of raw fish," and when Liam hands the phone over to the kids they lean over the speakerphone and talk over the top of each other about a class project Stella did, and a history paper Auggie got an A+ on, and Liam watches with his hand over his mouth for the moment when Cordell has to interrupt and say, tired-sounding still, "Sorry, guys, I have to go," and the goodbyes have to be quick, and then that's it, for another week.

The first time Liam sees him when he's Duke it's a shock to the system. Seven months in and the reporting agent says that Walker missed his check-in. Walker—that's what they all call him, even when Liam's in the room with them. There's a small frenzy in the operation office. Graves calls for Cordell's head, predictably at this point. James, trying again to calm her down, but looking a little like he agrees. Liam leaves the office unnoticed and walks outside to feel cold air on his face and feel less—how he feels—and there's a text, on his phone, from an unknown number. The Alibi, Driskill ST, thirty minutes. Come alone.

Ridiculously illicit. Liam takes off his suit-jacket and tie and ruffles his hair into something unprofessional and goes. It's hard to park—Monday night football—and inside is the opposite of his scene but he finds a seat at the bar. A girl in a too-tight orange t-shirt gives him a once-over and he smiles tightly, ignores her, drinks a watery beer, and almost exactly on the thirty-minute mark someone sits down next to him and it's—not his brother.

Duke Culpepper was the fake name they picked. Originally from Texas but had some misdemeanors that made Texas unfriendly so he'd been hiding out in Tucson for a few years, working the rodeo there. Not dangerous but willing to get up to something that was, and he looks the part. He smells like sweat and horse manure and hay and some shitty, awful aftershave, and there's a bruise on his jaw like someone suckerpunched him, and he doesn't look at Liam but smiles sweet at the bartender and says, with a fake low drawl, "Darlin', I wouldn't mind a shot of bourbon, when you have a chance."

Jesus, Liam thinks. The bartender has an expression like Cordell slid a hand down the front of her jeans and made her the happiest woman alive—the shot takes about ten seconds to arrive, when Liam's been waiting for a second beer for five minutes. Cordell knocks it back in one motion and says, "Again, and—" and he turns, like he noticed Liam for the first time, "another round for my friend, here. We're celebratin'."

She blinks, notices Liam's empty glass. While the next round's being prepared Liam raises his eyebrows and plays his part. "What are we celebrating?"

"Got a new job," Cordell says—but no—it's Duke, who's saying it, Duke who's drawling lazy and has his hat cocked at an off-angle and who's got a bandana tied around his wrist which for some goddamn reason is working the whole, hot-ass look.

"Congrats," the bartender says, and Duke grins wide and winks at her and downs the second shot, letting out a little whoop. "Another?"

"Better make it a double this time, sweetheart," Duke says, and Liam puts his hand on the warm lean stretch of thigh knocking against his under the bar and squeezes, very lightly, a warning, and sees Cordell's eyes tighten just slightly, and sees how his shoulders round out, like he's ready to get in a fight. Cordell takes a deep breath and toasts the bartender, but turns to look at Liam, face a grinning glad mask. "Got a new girl, too. Real pretty."

The bartender's disappointment would be funny, any other time. "Your lucky day, then, huh?" Liam says. Cordell's knee presses hard into his under the bar. "Girl got a name?"

"Miss Twyla Jean," Cordell says, almost crooning it, and Liam raises his eyebrows—he thought they had embarrassing Texas names—and then Cordell downs the double-shot, grimacing at the sting, and then says, much quieter so that only Liam can hear: "All it took was me making it eleven seconds on a bull and she took me straight to bed."

Liam takes a deep breath. Cordell's jaw flexes, in the silence, and he puts the empty shot glass on the bar. "Thanks for celebrating with me," he says, and slides off the barstool, backwards. He grips Liam's shoulder so hard that it actually hurts. "Gotta get back. Job won't do itself."

"Godspeed," Liam says, toasting with his beer, and Cordell gives him a tight smile and tugs his cap and walks out of the bar, taking with him the smell of the stables and his too-tight jeans and this sensation under Liam's gut that's murky and dangerous, unsettled. His shoulder hurts. It's only after he's written down Twyla Jean's name and texted it to James, and gone home to the apartment where Bret's still bitching about the décor, and taken a shower, and pressed his forehead against the cold tile, that he realizes that Cordell was wearing a fucking Texas Rangers cap. The absolute bastard.

The night he hears from Cordell again he has a fight with Bret. The same fight, worked over the same way. Bret hates Texas. He hates being away from his friends. He hates the politics and the food and how Liam's always with his family. He doesn't want to go to family dinner at the ranch because he's sure Liam's dad hates him. "He doesn't hate you," Liam says, for the fifth time, but to be honest he's not sure. Daddy never seems to like Bret that much, either. Cordi's never met him and Liam wonders, like he's wondered many times, if they'd get along, at all. Wonders if that'd be a dealbreaker and then wonders, washing dishes while Bret watches MSNBC in chilly silence, if the fact that he's wondering if it would be a dealbreaker makes it a dealbreaker, after all.

The text comes as a relief. Annunziata's. He dresses down more carefully than the first time. It's a weird spot, on the outskirts of town where it feels less like Austin than like a suburb. Karaoke and Italian food and mostly-fake cowboys slapping their knees to the absolutely horrific song being sung—very suburb. And there, at a table right by what passes for a stage: Cordell. But, no: Duke, Duke Culpepper, with his arm slung around the shoulders of Twyla Jean and his lips on her ear, grinning, wild. It catches Liam's breath like it did the first time. Duke, confident in his body and happy and having a good time, easy. Hot. Jesus, Liam doesn't get how it's so hot.

He waits in the backroom and watches Cordell shoves his face into the water. It's disturbing how panicked he is, once he's Cordell again and not Duke. "You have to," he's saying—babbling—"You have to tell them, they're going to kill people, you can't let them go through with it—" but of course that's not either of their decision and Liam can't help. It's awful, an awful awful feeling. His big brother looking to him for an answer he can't give. Cordell pushes his hair back from his face and puts his hat back on and looks miserable but he goes back, he sits right back down with that girl and lets her slide her hand down his thigh up the inseam of his jeans and Liam watches from the corner of the bar, where he won't be seen, drinking a beer he doesn't want, seeing his brother be someone who's not his brother. Maybe someone his brother could have been. They're going to sleep together, tonight. Liam knows it. They've been fucking for three months. Is it easy, he wonders. It shouldn't be, for Cordell, but maybe for Duke it is.

He goes home to Bret and wakes him up, and apologizes for the earlier fight, and kisses him, and gets Bret on his belly, and fucks him that way, a little hard, kissing the back of his neck, making Bret gasp and flinch and groan, delighted. "Where did that come from," Bret says, lazy and satisfied, and when he falls asleep Liam takes a shower and then only then calls James, from the hall outside their apartment door, leaning with his forehead against the wall. The bank location has been obvious since Cordell reported about Twyla Jean; the only thing that wasn't certain was the time. It'll be fine, James says, firm, and hangs up on Liam to coordinate with the rest of the team now that Agent Walker has finally come back in from the cold, and Liam stands there with his eyes closed in the hall and thinks, yes. Yes, it'll be fine.

After the bank—after the clean-up—Graves debriefs Cordell for a long time. It borders on unlawful interrogation at a certain point but Liam doesn't dare intervene when she's this furious—he can't risk being taken off the case. It takes James making a call to her supervisor at the field office, who then calls her and pulls her out of the room, for Cordell to be given a reprieve, and Liam goes in to the conference room and finds Cordell still in the stupid black hoodie stained with Crystal West's blood, his head in his hands, breathing with his mouth open like he can't get enough air.

"Cordi," Liam says, and Cordell shakes his head. Liam licks his lips and checks the hall. No one's guarding them—they wouldn't, because Walker's one of their own—and he says, "Get up." Cordell looks up at him, finally. "Come on, quick before she gets back. Come with me."

Cordell follows him. Down the hall, left to go through the atrium instead of the bullpen, then through the glass doors to the hall to, at last, the men's room, and Cordell stands in the middle of the tile blinking until Liam nods at the sinks and says, "Do it."

He's sloppier about it, this time. His hair hangs dripping in front of his face. He pushes it off his forehead and looks up at himself, in the mirror, panting a little. Water drips off his nose.

Liam brings him paper towels and he dries his face. "You should take that off," Liam says, and Cordell looks down at his clothes like he has no idea what he's wearing and only just realized, and tears off the hoodie in an awkward tangle. Underneath his t-shirt is black so Liam can't tell if it's stained. The big silver cross swings from his neck.

"What happened," Cordell says. A croak.

"Graves didn't tell you?" Liam says, and then bites his tongue. Obviously not. "Clint and Crystal are both dead. Clint at the bank. Crystal crashed the car. They think she passed out. Blood loss." Cordell nods, tight, looking away. These are his friends, Liam reminds himself. These are the people he knew, the only people he really talked to, for almost a year. "Two more people died at the bank. Twyla wasn't there and we don't have information to tie her to the job. I don't know where Jaxon is but we have people looking. They're still trying to recover the stolen money."

"Graves did tell me that much," Cordell says, and turns around, leaning his ass against the sink. It's slowly draining, behind him. "I think she wants to arrest me since she can't arrest them."

"I think so, too," Liam says, and Cordell smiles a little. He looks like he hasn't slept all year. "You did your job. It's over."

"It's not over," Cordell says, immediately. He drags his hand through his hair. "Graves made that clear. The money's still missing and Twyla and Jax are in the wind."

"And Duke's being sent to jail," Liam says. "So his part in the Rodeo Kings gang is over."

Cordell wipes his fingers over his mouth. He's still wearing that bandana around his wrist. Liam wants to take it off of him. Throw it away, burn it. "Duke Culpepper, common criminal," Cordell says, drawling it a little.

"Never liked him anyway," Liam says, and Cordell smiles, dropping his head. Liam touches his shoulder, grips his neck. "Hey. Means you get to come home. The kids will be over the moon."

"Yeah," Cordell says. He brackets a loose hand around Liam's wrist and nods. "Yeah. Can't wait."

His smile faded, as soon as Liam said it. Liam thinks about that, for that whole night, and for the whole next day, after, when James tells him that Cordell put in for one week's leave. "You talked to him?" Liam says, and James shakes his head, says, "He called Connie. I think he still doesn't even know I'm the captain."

He tells Mama and Daddy that Cordell will be home next Wednesday. Stella's frowning, not eating her dinner. "I saw that bank robbery on the news," she says. Auggie's big-eyed, watching, next to her. "Was that Dad's big case?"

"It was," Liam says, and Auggie's eyes get bigger. "But there's a debriefing period. We need to make sure his undercover identity doesn't have any loose ends that'll tie him back to his real one."

Daddy's eyes narrow and Mama's quiet. Liam got pretty good at lying, over the years, but he never was quite able to fool them.

He calls Cordell the next day. "Tell me where you are," he says, and Cordell doesn't answer for a long moment, letting the silence stretch out over the cell line. Liam considers it a victory that he even answered the phone.

He has a room at the Fairmont, on the fifteenth floor. Liam knocks and it's a minute before the door opens. Cordell's in bare feet, jeans, an ACL t-shirt. Liam follows him in and the room is—nicer than Liam's current apartment, that's for sure. King bed, outstanding view. "Wow," Liam says, and Cordell says, "Better than the Super 8 in Kermit," sort of sarcastic, and then sits down on the bed like he can't stand up anymore.

Liam doesn't sit. He doesn't think he's really invited, even if Cordell let him in the door. "I told them next Wednesday," he said. "Mom and Dad, and the kids. A week. Do you think that'll be enough time?"

"Honestly?" Cordell says, and doesn't elaborate.

There's a table, with four chairs, like a dining area. On it a box, like one of the evidence boxes from the office. Liam walks over and tips back the lid and: there's Duke Culpepper. The striped shirt he wore when Liam met him at Annunziata's. That was—god, only three days ago. A plastic bottle of aftershave. The cross necklace. The gun. Liam picks it up and checks the revolving chamber—that one bullet, still ready. It makes him nauseous just like it did the first time.

"I know you're probably not okay," Liam says. Understatement, he thinks, of the century. He closes the box and pushes it away, toward the center of the table. When he turns around Cordell's holding the beer in one hand and playing with a poker chip, in the other. "I know you're going to need some time. But when you're done, we need you back. The kids, and Mom and Dad. And me."

"C'mon, you don't need anybody, Stinker," Cordell says, with the barest thread of levity. "You climb right up to the top of the barn all by yourself, when no one's around to stop you."

Liam pauses, confused by the subject change. Surprised, then. "You were there for that?" he says, and Cordell shrugs, one corner of his mouth lifting.

When Liam was eleven, and Cordell was at college, and the world hadn't yet turned over on its head. It was early August and his school hadn't started, and Daddy and Mama had gone over to the feed store to pick up a truckload for the horses. He was bored, and tired of reading, and he'd gone out to the barn and looked up at it and thought about how Cordell had done it, at his age or maybe even younger, and if Cordell could then Liam could, too, if he set his mind to it. It wasn't even all that hard, once he was looking careful for the places to set his feet. He sat down on the top of the barn and looked out over the ranch—and further, over the where the road into the ranch pushed out into the hills, down toward the town. He wondered how far he could really see, to the horizon.

"Swung by to pick up my football stuff," Cordell says, now. "Em parked on the other side of the house and I didn't think anyone was home, until I looked out the back. You were up there just—taller than anything." He shrugs. "See? Didn't need my help after all."

"I wouldn't have climbed it if you hadn't dropped me on my head," Liam says, and Cordell snorts, shakes his head. Liam bites the inside of his cheek and crouches, and Cordell's forced to look at him or be ridiculous and so Cordell looks at him. Liam reaches out and gets his hand, the hand with the poker chip, and squeezes it, and Cordell swallows and squeezes back. The edges of the plastic bite into Liam's hand. "Come back," he says.

Cordell takes a deep breath. "I will," he says. "I promise, Liam."

Liam stands up and hugs him, around the shoulders, and walks out of the room. He takes the elevator back to the lobby and steps out into the sunshine, and takes a deep breath, and calls Bret to arrange lunch. Cordell's promises. Fifty-fifty, anymore, that it ends up being true. Liam decides to believe him. He's hardheaded. He might as well be hardheaded and optimistic about it.

#ffcc #walker #walker texas ranger #walker fic #my writing #if anyone ever needed an in-depth character study of liam #...here it is

55 notes · View notes

jungle321jungle · 3 years

Text

Your Words Fill The Space Between Us

The published letters that detail the romance that changed the kingdom.

~~~~

Aka Roman and Janus send each other letters

Taglist: @angels-and-dreams @ollyollyoxinfree @gattonero17 @chumo-cookie @dreaming-always @anxiety-ismy-name @mrbubbajones @janustheliar @why-do-you-care @hogwarts-my-love

Ao3 - Masterlist

Your Words Fill The Space Between Us

September 18th

I received the gift you sent with your previous letter, and I wanted to ensure I thanked you for it- despite how bold it was. But I suppose that has always been something I liked about you- even if my heart very nearly stopped when Mother asked who the flowers and watch had come from. I was forced to give her the flowers (but I kept the watch for myself) after telling her it came from a businessman I work with (I am blessed that she didn’t ask which of them it was). Though I was disappointed to give up the flowers. I don’t even remember mentioning my favorite flowers and yet you knew anyways. Are you using your power for useless things again? I hope not, you have enough on your plate as it is without worrying about what I like and dislike. But if it truly crosses your mind do know that what I like are your letters and the rare moments we spend together.

But enough about that, more importantly I will be aiding my father this year so I too will get the pleasure of attending the New Year’s Ball. I hope when I arrive you can finally show me the spot you’ve described with the view of the whole city.

~~~~

September 23rd

I am glad my present to you was received well. As to your comment regarding whether or not I was using my power correctly, all I must say is that if it is my power I shall use it as I please. If that happens to be to determine your favorite flowers so be it, my servants are paid accordingly. Also, once I get more power laws change and I get you- so I truly see no downside.

I cannot wait until you get here, I will show you all my favorite spots here to view the scenery and my favorite places in town to shop and eat. We’ll need to think of an excuse for why we spend so much time together though, but we have the time to work out a story.

Speaking of, with this letter I am sending you a book. It’s one I just found by chance and I fell in love with instantly, I’m sure you’ll do the same. Be sure to send me your thoughts when you finish.

~~~~

October 17th

You are utterly horrific. Sending me a book that plays with my emotions like that. I wouldn’t have gotten so invested if I just knew she was going to die like that! Not even from her disease but from an assassin that’s horrible. Just horrible.

I stayed up to finish the last few chapters and now it’s late and I’m crying, but I don’t want the maids to hear. You’re horrible. And to prove it I’m sending you a book.

~~~~

November 2nd

I truly am dastardly aren't I? I laughed a lot at your letter, it was the exact response I was expecting. You never disappoint dearest. As for the book you sent me I unfortunately am yet to open it. I wasn’t planning on sending this letter until completing it, but things have gone bleak in terms of negotiations. I’ve been spending all my time locked in my office taking over my father’s daily work in addition to my own while he tries to calm things with the other delegations. At present I should actually be overlooking some documents, but I feel if I do I will truly lose my mind.

I miss you.

I know that if you were just here sitting beside me I would instantly feel energized.

At least the ball is next month.

~~~~

November 4th

I doubt you have even received my last letter as I write this, but I must tell you to withhold sending other letters. I’m not entirely sure why, but Father is suspicious of something and is having mail checked.

I’ll send word when the coast is clear.

~~~~

December 22nd

My father has found whatever it is he is looking for, so we should be fine now. But that did take longer than I thought. So much has happened in the last few weeks.

Mother’s sudden illness, and sister’s broken engagement, not to mention that the countries on either side of us have declared war and both are begging for us to pick a side. It’s beyond tiring. Father still insists upon holding the ball though, so I’ll see you then. I wonder if this letter will even reach you before you depart for the capital.

I hope I’ll have the time to show you around as I promised.

~~~~

December 27th

I was about to respond to your first letter when the second arrived. You must’ve sent one of your fastest messengers. As for your third and most recent letter I received it just before climbing in the carriage. We are staying in the Barony tonight, which is where I write this letter from. But I will wait to have it sent to you until I reach the capital.

I too hope we can meet up during the festivities, at least for a minute and even better if that minute was spent alone so we can speak freely. But please, remember that you mustn't push yourself too hard.

~~~~

December 31st

There is a small balcony west of the ballroom and past the room where the ladies rest. It’s secluded. We can use our usual signal, I’ll meet you there.

~~~~

January 1st

I cannot describe how amazing it was to simply hug you again. And as I said before it was wonderful to see how your dancing had improved. I’m sorry that our time together was so short, I will send you word as soon as I know when I can slip out of the palace. Maybe, two nights from now I can try? That’s when the commoners set up an array of stalls with games and prizes. Would you like to go?

~~~~

January 2nd

Of course I want to go! We will go and I will beat you at every game! But I don't have any clothes that would help me blend in. Also, how do you intend to disguise yourself?

~~~~

January 3rd

With this letter are clothes for you to wear tonight. I’ll meet you outside the gates by the large willow about an hour after dinner. And as to your question, I will be wearing a blonde wig.

~~~~

January 4th

You cheated. That’s the only way you could have won so many games. I don't care that you said you didn’t, you most certainly did.

~~~~

January 5th

You are free to believe what you like.

For the closing ball tomorrow we can meet at the same spot as the first night. And I have a surprise for you.

~~~~

January 6th

I swear I didn’t know.

I am so sorry. I didn’t know, I saw you crying and run off and I’m sorry that I couldn’t run after you. I’m sorry. Can I come by so we can talk?

~~~~

January 8th

You’re leaving tomorrow right? Please respond so I can see you before you do.

~~~~

January 9th

I understand you’re mad at me, and I won’t even ask you not to be. But I will ask that you at least try understand the position I am in.

And I hope you travel safely home.

~~~~

January 16th

Did you really not know?

~~~~

January 19th

I didn’t. My father sprung it on me, the same way he did to every party guest. He didn’t even tell me which nation he was leading towards in terms of support, much less this.

~~~~

January 22nd

Will you marry her?

~~~~

January 25th

I don’t want her. I want and I love you.

~~~~

January 28th

That’s not what I asked. I asked if you will follow through with the engagement.

~~~~

January 31st

I don’t have a choice. I thought I could spend more time living as the Crown Prince before I could reject the role and leave the crown to my brother. I thought I could do that if my parents ever brought up marriage- but this is more than a marriage. It’s war.

If I don’t marry the Delphine our trade routes are shut off- and since we already cut ties with the empire by my father announcing the engagement. If I reject this for you, I put the whole kingdom at risk. I… I don’t know if I can do that.

~~~~

February 4th

Surely there’s another way! Why can’t she just marry your brother?

~~~~

February 10th

Do you truly think I haven’t looked for one? My hands are tied. The only possible thing I could do to even have you near me is to bring you here as an advisor or the like when the time comes. I can find a way if it’s that.

~~~~

February 14th

No. I will not stand to the side just watch as you dance and hold hands with her for the public’s morale. I would rather die than that.

~~~~

February 19th

Please don’t be so dramatic. I am trying all I can think of in between my hectic schedule. But if you truly don’t like my efforts tell me, do you have any brilliant ideas?

~~~~

February 25th

Don’t mock me, Your Highness. You’re not the one who has had his heart stepped on repeatedly. You’ve been making me promises for years- am I not allowed to be upset when I find out that they’re hollow?

~~~~

March 2nd

You’re unbelievable. Feel free to sulk all you wish, meanwhile I need to continue my regular duties, prepare a wedding, and prepare for war.

~~~~

March 5th

War? I thought our kingdom was just to supply aid.

~~~~

March 8th

I’m getting married to the daughter of a nation who declared war upon the empire. Of course war will come to our borders as well.

~~~~

March 23rd

Father got the invitation to the wedding this morning. I wanted to tear it to shreds. Have you truly thought of nothing yet? Something other than me working for you?

~~~~

March 29th

I’m sorry to say I haven’t. In the months since the ball and start of the war I haven’t gotten anywhere with my Father- and Mother’s decline isn’t helping.

~~~~

April 1st

What? I had heard she was getting better?

~~~~

April 6th

That’s just the rumor I spread to redirect attention. She’s getting worse if anything.

~~~~

April 10th

I am so sorry.

~~~~

August 12th

It’s been a long time since my last letter, I’m not sure how many months. I guess I should follow custom and congratulate you on the wedding even if I am late. You at least looked very nice on your wedding day. You’ve truly perfected that fake smile.

I’m sorry for how I acted when I heard about your engagement. I know you didn’t want this either. And I know it’s late for this, but I’ll come work for you if that’s what it takes. The more I try to pretend that I don’t love you- the harder it gets- and the more it hurts.

~~~~

August 17th

Lord Roman Regis,

Please do not waste my time and deny that you are the author of the letter I just read. I intend to keep this letter brief. I do not wish to know what kind of relationship you have with my husband, but I must request that it ceases. My husband serves as a figure to both nations, and he cannot have anyone dragging him down. Especially not someone of a lower stature.

If you contact him again, there will be consequences.

Crown Princess Delphine Ekans

~~~~

August 22nd

Crown Princess,

Your Highness I apologize for any misunderstandings I may have caused, but please speak to Janus. I’m sure he will explain everything.

Lord Roman Regis

~~~~

August 26th

Lord Roman Regis,

To think a measly count’s son can not only tell me what to do, but he can be bold enough to refer to my husband without a title. I already asked you not to drag my husband down, and by doing so you have disregarded my warning.

Do remember that you have brought this upon yourself Lord Roman.

Crown Princess Delphine Ekans

~~~~

September 5th,

Ro,

You know all those times I told you to just get out there and just love the prince if you actually love him? Well this is not what I meant. I mean like you should speed up that “perfect” plan you two always talked about, not that you should wait so long that he got married. And definitely not so long that his wife outed your “despicable crush on the married crown prince”- however I can say that the papers are currently god tier with gossip. I have been asked for interviews like four times and I love it. Oh and have some faith in me, I didn’t talk to them- for long.

Anyway, lover boy should be able to help you out of this, right?

The better you,

Remus

~~~~

September 10th,

Remus,

Sometimes I hate you, and then when I remember we shared a womb I hate you even more. But even so, I thank you for being the one “calm” person about this. Mother and Father (mainly Mother) have been up in arms about how big of a disgrace I am, and just about every noble in the kingdom is in agreement. It doesn't matter that just about every unmarried woman pines after the Crown Prince even after he got married, because when a man does it- because that Witch known as the Crown Princess publishes my letter- I’m somehow a deviant.

I haven’t left the manor since word got out. And I am just flooded with letters from friends and other nobles, but truthfully I am too scared to read them. Maybe I’ll have a trusted maid read them and pick out the kind ones, but I am not sure.

I have no clue what is going on with Janus at the moment. I am yet to receive anything from him- most likely due to the Crown Princess’ interference. I wish I could know what was happening behind the palace doors... I truly do.

This is why I just wanted to run off to somewhere else, but Janus was confident he could change the laws for us and then we could go live quietly somewhere... I wish things were that simple.

I rather not discuss this anymore truthfully. I'd like to have a normal conversation again. So tell me, do you have any stories to tell of your travels? Reading them would prove far more interesting than anything here.

The best twin,

Roman

~~~~

September 18th,

Remus,

Given I am yet to receive a response from you, so I assume you are on the move once more, but I thought I should send you an update letter before you hear the filtered version from word of mouth.

I am currently being escorted to the palace. I know some will think I am to get some sort of punishment, but Janus sent one of the guards with a verbal message that he is handling this in his own way. I have no choice but to place my trust in him. Mother was still worried about it, Father interestingly seemed to be rooting for me but we didn’t get to talk more about it. But I know I will see Janus soon and that thought comforts me. Even though I know his wife will be close behind.

I’ll keep you updated on what transpires. But I still expect traveling stories. Like honestly, what was the point of you joining the navy if I don't get to read any seafaring adventures? You aren’t fighting in the war so surely there must be pirates or something? Or some stories about sirens and other such creatures? I want to read them all.

And in return you can have me as your wonderful twin.

The twin that matters,

Roman

~~~~

September 21st

Roman,

It almost seems strange to be able to address you by your name in a letter, but I like it all the same. I am very sorry for my silence and for Delphine’s actions. The former was a result of a few things: the first being my traveling to the battle front. I'm sorry I did not tell you prior to leaving, I did not want you to worry, but... I spent some time in battle. I was on my way back when your letter reached the palace and Delphine had taken it before I knew it even existed. Then upon my return I was busy dealing with Mother’s health and my war reports- I had intended to write other excuses here but truthfully I was scared of your reaction. I was scared that you would have just given up on me- on us. I had written and thrown away over 20 letters that I started without finishing before Delphine handed me a paper with a letter I had never seen published on the front page.

We had a long argument, about her not having the right to do such a thing to a “friend” of mine. It took a lot of time to cool things down and convince everyone to allow you to come here. Your father had sent me a letter saying he was worried for your safety, and that was enough to pull them to my side to bring you out of harm's way.

I am sorry I cannot currently go to see you, right now everyone believes I am just trying to clean up a mess that my wife blew way out of proportion and going to you would only start rumors. The knight who will deliver this letter- Virgil- can be trusted. He may huff and roll his eyes, but he does not pry and will not look at the contents of the letters. As he put it, he will only do the bare minimum of his job, and being curious and nosy takes too much energy. So you can send your letters through him. I swear I will figure something out.

In the meantime I hope your quarters are comfortable, let me know if they are not.

Yours,

Janus

~~~~

September 22nd,

Janus,

You are an absolute idiot. You went to war, without telling me? What if something had happened to you? Are you crazy? No of course you are. You’re absolutely insane- and I am so so glad that you are alright.

It has been strange being here in the palace, I don't often leave my room due to the looks servants give as I pass by, but my room is comfortable and Virgil makes good conversation. He certainly doesn’t have the demeanor of most knights which is enjoyable. Reminds me a bit of my twin in a way- but I think both would disagree.

Regardless, I have a request for you even though I know you will disagree. I wish to speak with the Crown Princess. I do not know how much you have told her, so I can keep things sounding one sided if you wish- but I want to speak to her. If you don't give an answer I like, I will simply write to her myself.

Roman

~~~~

September 22nd

Roman,

And you call me crazy. Why would you want to meet with the woman who ruined your life? You wrote in the same letter that even servants are scorning you- I will have Virgil report to me who they are so they can be fired immediately- and yet you wish to speak with her? I will not allow it.

Janus

~~~~

September 24th

Janus,

As you read this the Crown Princess should be receiving her letter as well. I kept it simple, just asking for tea with the promise of an apology. But before I schedule a time to meet with her, I want to know... do you like your wife?

Roman

~~~~

September 25th

Roman,

Delphine showed me the letter and she gave some unkind phrases to go with. I told her not to accept your invitation- but I think she wants to even more now. As to your question, I don’t know what I think of her. I hate what she has done to you, but I do not hate her (entirely) as a person. I admire the fact that she will go to great lengths to help her people, but I certainly do not like her. Or perhaps it’s better to say that I like her in the way one likes a business partner? Appreciating when they get the job done well, and hating when they don't. I am not sure if that answers your question, but I do not know how else to better phrase my thoughts.

Janus

~~~~

September 27th

Janus,

I met the Second Prince yesterday. He came to my room and chided me for not getting enough sunlight and fresh air, before he ordered me to accompany him to the gardens. He seems far too kind to be of royal blood. Oh, while he denies it I definitely say Virgil stealing glances at the Prince. It was quite adorable actually.

I am laughing to myself as I write this and he looks on, it is most amusing. Do tell you brother to visit again.

Roman

~~~~

September 28th

Roman,

Patton is definitely too pure for this palace, if he wasn’t the spitting image of father I would think he was illegitimate. As for him and Virgil... I rather not speculate, no one and I mean no one is good enough for Patton.

In more important news I will be accompanying Delphine to your tea tomorrow. At least for the beginning of it. Seeing you two together with my own eyes is the only way I can be sure someone won't attack the other.

I’ll see you then love.

Janus

~~~~

September 29th

Janus,

Since I am sure you are worried about what I and Crown Princess Delphine spoke of in your absence here is a few notes about what we discussed:

The fact that I have loved you since our academy days

That my feelings won't change no matter what she does

That I don't want anything negative to befall either country

She did not once ask about your thoughts or feelings, they seemed relevant to her

She doesn’t want me near you. She says it will ruin the reputation she is building

I do not know what this means for us, but at the very least I think I understand what you meant about having a business partner relationship.

Roman

~~~~

October 2nd

Roman,

Good to know your talk with her was for mostly nothing. She has more recently gone to my father about some scheme to boost morale and he seems to be on board. So she’s at least distracted for the time being.

In surprising news Mother wishes to meet you. She’s probably the one person who knows everything simply because she sees through every lie I tell. But thankfully she never questions me on the truth. You’ll receive an official invite from her soon.

Janus

~~~~

October 4th

Janus,

Your mother is one of the kindest people on the planet. She kept fretting over if I was okay, and meanwhile she is the one bedridden. And you were certainly right about her knowing the whole story, because it is clear she is rooting for us! She told me she just wants you to be happy, and marrying for love is something she wished you could do. She did also say she wanted to give the Crown Princess a “stern talking to”, and I think that would be hilarious to watch.

Roman

~~~~

October 14th 4th

Logan,

This year has been an absolute shitshow. Have you even heard what’ss going on? Because I haven’t heard a word fom you. But I suppose what else should I expect from the disaprearing count? I just want to marry for love and be done with the fucking war? Is that so bap? Delphine is making this hard, but I know she just wants things to be not war… it’s all so annoying. What should I do lo?

Your only friend,

Jans

~~~~

October 5th

Mother and Father,

I want you to know that despite all that has occurred I am well. I have gotten a chance to speak to the Crown Prince and Princess, and the Queen. Currently the Crown Prince intends to release rumors regarding the Duke’s family (which may or may not involve treason so please pull any assets out quickly) to stop the month long gossip about me. Once that happens, I am not sure if I will be staying here or returning home but I will let you know once I figure it out. Living in the palace certainly isn’t bad after all. The food is to die for. I may try to lengthen my stay just because of it. So don’t worry about me, worry about Remus who just sent me a letter detailing too many things about pirates that would make you cry in shame.

The lesser of two evils,

Roman

~~~~

October 8th

Crown Prince Janus Ekans,

I was quite surprised to get your letter and even more surprised by it’s contents. I have told you multiple times it is not becoming of a prince to send letters written in a drunken stupor.

Yes, I am well aware of the gossip in the capital that you have involved yourself in. But I saw no need to send you a letter of my own thoughts when I am not involved in your marital issues. If you were simply writing to me to rant and rave, then your letter was received. And I would like to say that I do have other friends.

Regardless, please expedite the report enclosed, it is part of our winter preparations.

Count Logan Ackroyd

~~~~

October 9th

Janus,

I went into town with Prince Patton (who gave me permission to call me by his name) and Virgil today. We went in disguise of course, but we got to go to a great many shops and try some good food. I bought you a present while we were out, but with the current circumstances I don’t believe I should send it with this letter. If you ever find the time to drop by my room please come and get it.

As we went about I couldn’t shake two thoughts from my mind, the first being that fall looks so different here in the capital, and the second was that it’s been nearly a year since we promised to do such things together. I still await the day where you show me your favorite spots.

I hope those times come soon.

Roman

~~~~

October 10th

Roman,

I too hope for the same, and I would love to see what it is you got me, but we have an obstacle at present. A few actually. While the war is finally moving in our favor, I fear that the Duke’s situation is less clear than I thought. In addition to that, Father wants you sent home to the county sooner than later. And if that’s not enough, Delphine wishes to speak with you before you leave- I will do my best to convince her otherwise. I’m not sure when they want your departure to be, I’m currently negotiating and thankfully Patton is on my side.

Janus

~~~~

October 11th

Ro,

So in my quest to find exciting stories for you I may or may have not taken a cutlass to the leg. It nearly got cut clean off! Or well that’s the story I’ll tell at least. Anyway, I’m gonna be home for a while so you should come visit your dearest twin. And as for get well presents there’s nothing better than basically all the sweets in the capital so I’ll take those please and thank you. Oh and buy me some of those racy novels you pretend you don’t read. Mother saw the word “tentacle” then burned mine.

Your horribly wounded and now sickly and pathetic twin,

Remus

~~~~

October 12th

Janus,

I heard from Prince Patton that there will be a party next week. He was asking me if I plan to go with him, and truthfully I’d like to, but I also don't want to undo anything either. What do you think?

Roman

~~~~

October 13th

Roman,

I’m afraid that your attendance will not be a good idea. But, I’ve heard sickness is floating around the palace. It would be truly tragic if I can’t attend. The greatest of tragedies.

Janus

~~~~

October 15th

Dearest Husband,

At least for the sake of appearances, can you pretend like you’re not missing your lover when we’re in public? It’s very nearly sickening.

Your Wife,

Delphine

~~~~

October 15th

Delphine,

I don’t believe I ever said he was my lover. Also if you want a conversation just come here. Thomas is a knight not a messenger.

Janus

~~~~

October 15th

Dearest Husband,

Sir Thomas shall be what I ask him to be. But on topic, if Lord Regis is not your lover then Queen Mother is in perfect health. If you’re going to ignore my and your kingdom’s wishes then at the very least be subtle. Please and thank you.

Oh and I will not be joining you for dinner, your sister asked me to dine with her.

Your Wife,

Delphine

~~~~

October 17th

Janus,

I’m afraid the party must wait (and for shame my meeting with the Crown Princess must wait as well). I have just received word that Remus was injured- not gravely though- so he is currently resting at home. I must return as soon as possible to rescue my parents from his madness. Well after I buy all the things the idiot requested.

Roman

~~~~

October 18th

Janus,

I love the jacket thank you so so so much. I’ll be sure to wear it the next time I see you, which will likely be the New Year’s Ball. I’ll write to you again as soon as I get home.

Roman

~~~~

October 21st

Janus,

I have just arrived and I already wish I had stayed in the palace. Mother is already talking about how lucky I am that despite the “scandal” she found a woman who would be willing to marry me. Maybe I’ll tell her to invite this poor girl over while Remus is here. Hopefully that scares her off.

Roman

~~~~

October 26th

Roman,

What do you think about eloping?

Janus

~~~~

November 1st

Janus,

You are aware of the fact that you’re married right? Also two men marrying isn't exactly legal. Also you know, the war?

Roman

~~~~

November 7th

Roman,

Trust me when I say the war will come to an end soon. And screw the laws and my wife. If I just kidnapped you, what would anyone really do?

Janus

~~~~

November 13th

Janus,

For starters I don’t think announcing kidnapping in a letter is the proper way to kidnap someone. Also I would like to point out that in the past years I always wanted to run away and you said no. Then a few months after I drop it you’re getting engaged.

Roman

~~~~

November 18th

Roman,

Virgil said the same thing. You two spent too much time together while you were here. And I’m a married man now. I’ve grown and I’ve changed. And running away sounds better and better.

Janus

~~~~

November 20th,

Logan,

If I said I wanted to elope with Roman to your domain what would you say?

Janus

~~~~

November 23rd

Janus,

You assigned him to be my guard of course we spent time together. Also I’ve been receiving letters from Prince Patton, he truly is a ray of sunshine. He told me that the Queen is doing better and I am elated to hear that. Please pass my well wishes to her.

Roman

~~~~

November 24th

Crown Prince Janus Ekans,

What would I say if you wanted to elope here? Well, I would remind you that you have responsibilities. While I do wish for your happiness do remember that the country lies on your shoulders as well. However if there was such a way that everything was sorted beforehand, then I would still say no.

Count Logan Ackroyd

~~~~

November 28th

Logan,

That’s unnecessarily rude. I will take your response as a positive one.

Janus

~~~~

December 4th

Dearest Husband,

I am apologizing in advance for what I must do. I did not anticipate such a situation, but the Duke has my hands tied. You know I will always do what I believe I must for the good of our nations, and to stop this war. I beg you to keep these thoughts in mind.

Your Wife,

Delphine

~~~~

December 4th

Lord Roman Regis,

I beg you to keep the crown standing tall despite everything. This is not your opportunity.

Delphine

~~~~

December 10th

Janus,

Is it true what everyone’s saying? That the Crown Princess is going to be charged for treason? Was that why she sent me a strange letter?

Roman

~~~~

December 15th

Roman,

She sent you one too? And yes I’m afraid it’s true… but I don’t think that’s how it started. I was aware of the fact she was working with the duke to supply troops using her knowledge of how both armies could work together, I truthfully think he took advantage of her. But her name is on some of the documents which can be read negatively.

I apologize in advance for my lack of responsiveness and attention to you. For now I need to convince Father not to execute Delphine and others in her position. This is all truly at the worst timing, we were in the midst of discussion to end this whole war.

At the very least I’ll see you come the New Years Ball.

Janus

~~~~

December 29th

Roman,

I’m sorry it’s taken me so long, love but I think I have things sorted. At the ball my Father intends to announce the annulment of my marriage- claiming that Delphine unfairly used me. That’s not true of course, but it’s the best way for us to keep her here as a “hostage” and to withdraw our support in this war and try to reclaim a more neutral stance. At least outwardly, things are always more complicated when you look closer.

But with the war coming to a true end, and the end of my marriage, perhaps it’s time I take ‘crown’ out of my title? Patton would certainly be a better face to be out there right now as we try to maintain the rockiest of peaces. And once he takes over maybe I’ll just have to vanish in plain sight. I know a certain count who would take us in without complaint.

We can speak on it more at the banquet, I’ll meet you in the same spot as last year. We can use the same signals.

Janus

~~~~

January 2nd

Janus,

I have spent the past day thinking over the words you told me. I'll admit when I received your most recent letter, I took your words to be akin to wishful thinking. But now after hearing all the plans you made for us, this sounds like something we can really do. My heart beats faster at the thought.

Running away with the Crown Prince, it sounds like a novel doesn’t it? If we were to leave, when would we go?

Roman

~~~~

January 3rd

Roman,

Ideally I’d like to leave as soon as the snow melts, but diplomacy is known to take it’s time.

Janus

~~~~

January 4th

Janus,

I’m ready when you are. Just give me some notice to pack up my things at home and to write a letter that will make my mother sob when she realizes that she can’t marry me off for a reverse dowry. Yes, I know such a thing doesn’t exist, but I’m not sure she does.

Also I spent today with Prince Patton and Virgil and my stance has not changed.

Roman

~~~~

Roman,

Do me a favor and keep your fucking mouth shut? I don’t need Prince Janus interrogating me anymore.

-V

~~~~

January 8th

Janus,

Virgil left a note on my bed last night saying in not so nice words that I ratted him out to you. I take it I was right! You need to speak with your brother then we can be official cupids.

Also I’m leaving today, so make sure your next letter goes to my home.

Roman

~~~~

January 13th

Roman,

I will do no such thing. No one on this planet is good enough for Patton.

Janus

~~~~

January 28th

Logan,

You have till March to prepare our rooms. No, I won’t be telling you my arrival date.

Janus

~~~~

January 30th

Janus,

I don’t know if I ever told you, but I’ve kept every single letter you’ve sent me. The good, the bad, and the pointless ones. I’ve kept them all in a box in my wardrobe and my maids know not to touch them. I think I’ll take the box with me when we run.

Roman

~~~~

February 2nd

Roman,

The Prince is being weirder than usual and is fretting over little stuff and he keeps mumbling your name. Do me a favor and take him off my hands fast.

Also he got very mad at me when he found out we exchanged letters. It’s not like we’ve been doing this since you left or anything. He’s so jealous it’s stupid. Sometimes I like to imagine what would have happened if you had been the one forced into a political marriage- and then I quickly stop because I realize he would order me to go arrest and or kill someone and I legally can’t say no.

Save me.

-Virgil

~~~~

February 3rd

Roman,

I have a box of your letters as well. Even ones you haven’t written but are about you- so even some of Delphine’s have been included. Our story is certainly different from that of other couples, and our letters reflect that. I’ll bring my letters as well, maybe we can organize them all into a large collection.

That was an incredibly sappy thought, and yet I wish to follow through with it all the same.

Janus

~~~~

February 7th

Roman,

I deeply apologize. I saw the play. I know we promised to watch it together, but Patton begged me to go with those eyes and that expression and I couldn’t say no. I will make it up to you. I’ll sit through an opera in the future maybe? I know you like operas even if I don’t.

In good news I plan to send a carriage for you, it should arrive on the fourth of the coming month. It will bring you here to the capital, we can see a horrid opera and then we can be on our way to our future. So you have a full month to pack.

Janus

~~~~

February 12th

Janus,

I can’t believe you watched it without me. It will take more than an opera to make up for this. You can start thinking now on how to make it up to me.

Roman

~~~~

February 19th

Janus,

As the days grow closer my excitement grows more and more. Even now I’m writing this to you rather than sleeping as it truly sinks in that we’re going to do this. I can’t wait.

Roman

~~~~

February 23rd

Roman,

My feelings are the same as yours. This morning I announced to my family my intentions. I didn’t tell them where we’ll be going of course, just that I will be relinquishing the position of Crown Prince and that I will be traveling. Father was enraged, sister was surprised, but Mother and Patton seemed to understand and once the three of us were alone they assured me that they are happy for me. I have a few more people (boring nobles) to tell, but now that they know there’s no going back. So you’re not allowed to have cold feet.

Janus

~~~~

February 27th

Janus,

Please if anyone was to have cold feet it was you. I’ve been willing to run away with you since the day I first laid eyes on the pretty thing you call a face.

Roman

~~~~

March 4

Janus,

The carriage should be here any minute, and I’m writing this letter that I intend to hand deliver to calm myself. My room is packed into bags, and I’ve already said most of my goodbyes. I don’t know when I’ll be back, but I’m sure time will fly when I’m with you. It always does.

Roman

~~~~

Jan,

Truthfully I wish you didn’t have to leave, but I understand it. So I wish you luck in chasing your love, while you’re gone I’ll make some changes around here so you can lead the life you want when you get back.

Be happy, and don’t forget to write.

Patt

~~~~

March 19th

Patton,

I have arrived safely, and both Logan and Roman are doing well. The former was griping about needing to share his estate with us, but all it took was me bringing up a few embarrassing childhood stories for him to loosen up. I don’t know when I’ll be home, but if you’re ever in the mood to frighten Father, tell him that we’ll need a royal wedding upon my return. I finally got to do the proper proposal I’ve had in my head since the New Year’s before last, and it was perfect.

I wish you luck in dealing with the state of affairs, if you need any help send me a letter discreetly and I can offer some aid.

Best wishes,

Janus

P.S. Fire Virgil if you feel like it. You can do better.

~~~~

A Forbidden Romance Years in the Making!

It’s been years since the ex Crown Princess and now hostage of the kingdom Delphine outed then Lord Roman Regis for loving a married man. Afterwards he was shunned by society and took shelter in the palace after his father begged for his shelter. Generously, the former Crown Prince agreed given he was tied to the scandal. But now we know that was never the whole story. Rather the two have been in a secret romance since their school days.

Now, as if his sudden disappearance was nothing, First Prince Janus Ekans has returned with his betrothed Lord Roman Regis, by his side. Previously talks of Crown Prince Patton signing the new law has been floating for a long while, but it seems the pen will finally be put to paper so a royal wedding may commence.

The couple will wed immediately following the signing of the new law legalizing gay marriage. And it will surely be a wedding to remember.

#jaz's oneshots #Janus Sanders #roman sanders #remus sanders #logan sanders #patton sanders #virgil sanders #roceit #love letters #letters #a story in letters #princes

10 notes · View notes

letsdiscoverkitty · 3 years

Text

Home/Family Update - May 2021

I will take this right back to when I was discharged from the Priory in December. From there I moved back home with my parents; it was a bit of a difficult transition as I didn't have any home leave in the lead up to being discharged due to COVID and my consultant wanting me to make the most of my time on the ward. Add to that my EDP going completely awol, meaning that our whole 4 week pre-discharge meetings and relapse prevention plan went out the window. So yes it was a bit of a rocky start, and that is without you factoring in COVID lockdown/Christmas.

Being discharged from an IP setting is never easy no matter who you are; changes in environment and routine can throw you off track without you even realising it and I did find myself struggling with this. I also had the difficult navigation of adapting to coming home in terms of my dad and his recovery. For those who might not know, last March my dad fell down the stairs in the middle of the night the day that my parents arrived home after a month in NZ. He suffered 3 brain bleeds (a subdural, an extradural and a subarachnoid), multiple facial fractures and a break in his spine. That night was one of, if not THE, worst of my life. We were told that it was very likely that he would not survive and that if he did he would be in a vegetated state or not able to take care of himself...we were told to prepare for the worst. By some MIRACLE he defied all the odds and at the age of 74 after spending 11 or so days on the ICU, a further 2 weeks on a trauma ward and then another 3 months in a neuro rehab, he was discharged home and is now, a year on from the accident, completely independent, no sign of further brain bleeds and is actually much fitter than he has been for, well, 50 years! Honestly, we never expected anything like this sort of recovery and from an outside perspective he is doing perfectly. However, there are things that will never be the same again and I don't think it is until you are with someone 24/7 that you are able to tell. He has changed quite a bit as a person; in some ways this is a good thing but in other ways it is not so. He cannot deal with changes in environment or routine; even things like having the bread on the side instead of in the bread bin completely throws him off and he doesn't even register that the bread is there. He gets very easily agitated, can be extremely rude and a little aggressive. Now some of this was already there (a lot of it was) but it has become more acutely obvious since the head injury. I have SO much respect and love for my mum - I really dont know how she has held herself up over the past 2 years, as well as helping dad when he was initially transitioning home (I was still in hospital but it sounded like he needed a lot of help for the first few months - which I only saw an inch of when they were able to visit me in hospital (he used to wander off and didn't know where he was etc. which is thankfully no longer and issue!)).

This is hard for me to say but I will admit that I have struggled more than I thought I would with being around him; in short I pretty much went through the whole mourning process whilst I was in hospital as the last time i saw him on the trauma ward before they stopped all visits and before I was admitted, he didn't know who I was...He thought he lived in another country and was telling me all sorts of stories that were fabricated, before telling me that he needed to go and pick up the mercedes and drive to sainsburys to get the Gin and petrol (we don't have a mercedes and he doesn't even like gin!) Anyway, I digress. So yes, I basically mourned for someone who was still alive physically but mentally had changed as at the time I didn't know whether he would be in a vegetated state or make a good recovery. Thankfully we are on the good side and he is doing so incredibly well but the bottom line is that he is different and living with him, at the age of 26, is HARD. We have good days and bad days (as any young adult who lives with their parents does) and there are many many days that I wish I wasn't living at home but I do my best to hold myself together during those times, especially for my mum because she, I tell you, is absolutely incredible. How she has put up with him for so long I honestly do not know!

Talking of mum, I would say that since the whole accident with dad, we have become a LOT closer. We really had to lean on each other over that month; we were driving down to Brighton every single day to see dad on the ICU and on the Trauma ward until we were stopped from visiting - it was mentally and physically exhausting for the both of us, especially as we were still barely processing the trauma and struggling with flashbacks in the night. We were the first ones on the scene of the accident (if it weren't for mum's medical training, dad would not be alive today). Of course we still have our moments but I feel like our relationship almost "levelled up and matured over the past year. We have bonded over being in nature and walking (because what else can you do when the country is in lockdown!?! but also because we have always been an "outdoors" family (well my mum, Andi and me have))- we also talk about dad and the accident quite a bit too, which has helped me beyond belief (and her too). We give each other space, and yes there are days when we dont get on but who doesn't have days when they dont?

On balance I would say that home is "okay". It is manageable. No the environment is not perfect and I do find it affects my mental health quite a bit and holds me back in some ways (I cannot wait to be able to move out one day) but I am incredibly grateful to have parents that are willing to and can afford to take me under their roof and help me out during this time.

Gosh, this has already ended up so much longer than I thought it would, I am sorry! In short: home life is okay. We are here and that is the most important thing. We saw Andi a two-ish weeks ago as we were in Cornwall for our usual time-share (we were so lucky that Boris allowed self catering two weeks before our usual time share week) - I think it was good for them to get out of their flat as I don't think they had left the small area where they live since last September when we went down to Cornwall (I was given leave for a week as it was sold to my consultant to help my dad's recovery, which is definitely did but yes we did pull the right strings to get that one!)

Anyway, I shall leave this update here and start the mammoth task of the next one. I am sorry that this is taking me so long, it's quite hard to write and think back and reflect (although actually quite helpful for me to do) so I do find that I have to come back to it a few times. Please stick with me x

-----

I forgot to add that dad had an assessment before we went away to Cornwall to see whether he can have his driving license back and (as mum and I predicted) he failed. To say that he did not take it well would be putting it lightly!!! I am actually ashamed of the way that he behaved and the things that he said/the reasons he fabricated as to why he had failed (let's just say he got sexist and rude - which I have ZERO time for and was appalled by him - I am so glad I was not with him/mum after the assessment as I would have blown my fuse at hime). He could not even entertain the idea that he had failed. He blamed everything/anything else that he could - even saying that it was the system and one of the first things he said to me was "I understand now, I've worked it out, it's the system, they aren't allowed to pass many people first time so that's it", which I just *speechless*. Mum and I have talked about it a lot and we don't think that he has ever "failed" at anything in his life. He also believes that he is 10000%. fixed and has no issues or problems and doesn't need any support or guidance. He refuses to listen to mum and I when we try to tell him about how unwell he was, he refuses to believe it and won't take it. One thing that mum and I are very glad of is that all of this driving stuff is OUTSIDE of the family. He can't put it on us. It is coming from an external place and we can support him if he lets us but that is his decision as to whether he lets us or not. He has never been a good patient; and he also won't take any advice (in anything) from mum or let her be right about something either, which is just sad, really sad. This is not a new thing, it has always been this way. And the more I reflect on our family/have reflected over the past year with dad in hospital, the more I see that I don't like. The way dad has behaved and treated mum, how he was always missing in my childhood, how alcohol always came above family, how old fashioned and unwilling to learn he is, how distant and uninterested he was, how he never says please or thank you, never asks how anyone is and refuses to talk about mental health (yep, despite so much going on in our family with mental illnesses, he refuses to talk about it and won't even ask "how are you?" or offer support etc)...I don't mean to be so negative about him, I really don't. I love him, he is my dad, but there is a lot of healing that needs to be done, and it is going to take time.

#personal #update

20 notes · View notes

official-weasley · 3 years

Text

The Irreplaceable Charlie Weasley: Pt. 6, Ch. 1

PART 6: THE YEAR WHEN EVERYTHING FALLS INTO PLACE Chapter 1 - What is he Doing Here?

Charlie

I had nothing but an amazing Summer so far. I did great on my O.W.L.s and my family was proud. Mum told all the relatives how good Bill and I did, without thinking how embarrassed we would be by getting tons of congratulations letters. And to top it all off, Nova was staying with us for the entire Summer, and due to everything that happened in our Fifth Year between us, I was really glad she could be here.

The fight we had still haunted me at night sometimes. We needed almost a week to feel comfortable with each other again and for the things to go back as they were. When she came after me into the Forest, I was hesitant to talk to her. The whole week when she was in the Hospital Wing I was spending with Hagrid or in the Forbidden Forest so I had things to distract me from the fact that every time I went to visit her, McNully was there.

There was a point where I lost all hope that I would ever call her a friend again and it meant so much to me that she finally gathered the courage to tell me everything and own up to her mistakes. That talk in the Forbidden Forest changed everything. I felt different after it and I couldn't help but repeat her words in my head...

“How could you think, after all, we were through, that Murphy would replace you? Please promise me, you will never, not even for a second, think that I would replace you with anybody. There is not a person in the world that could take your place, Charlie Weasley.”

I knew I was self-conscious about our friendship and Bill and Penny both told me that I don't give myself enough credit but I couldn't help it. When you have friends it's expected that sooner or later a love interest will appear and you can't expect that things will be the same after that. When I was sneaking into the Forest that week she was injured, I came to terms with that. I just wanted my best friend back and I was ready to conceal my feelings forever.

But after the things she said, that she wouldn't replace me with anyone I couldn't help but think about something Bill said to me when I told him I fancied Nova when I said it was normal for her to blush even if we're friends.

“No, it's not mate. Do you blush if Jae says something nice to you? Or Tulip? Or Tonks?”

And when she said all those things something clicked in my brain. Perhaps they were right, perhaps Nova did have feelings for me but struggled to understand them as our friendship meant so much to her. The moment she placed that kiss on my cheek I knew that I was approaching the situation all wrong. I was afraid that she wouldn't like me back but instead, I had to be patient. I could feel there was something more between us when we were standing embraced in the Forest. I could feel something with her that I never did before and I knew it wasn't just friendship.

I knew at that moment that I have to be patient with her. Nevertheless, I needed almost a year to admit my feelings for her to myself. I need to give her time to think things through and to sort out her emotions.

My attitude changed with her when I made that decision. I was willing to wait to see if something sparks in her. I was beginning to be calmer around her and talk to her without being so shy and awkward because something was telling me that we were going to end up together.

I was always the shy one, the one that thought nobody wanted because he had freckles, even though my mum always said they were cute. So did Nova, she loved them.

I surprised myself a couple of times when I said something to her that I before would never have the courage to, and I also winked at her a couple of times. To say that it made Nova confused was an understatement. Lately, she keeps looking at me as if I was a riddle she can't seem to solve and I can't help but like it. I am giving her subtle hints that I fancy her and she is too oblivious to notice. I thought Ravenclaws knew how to solve puzzles.

Bill wrote to us a couple of times per week and just like he promised Nova, he sent her pictures of his mates, their regards and at the end of each letter he always wrote that he is okay and safe as he knew how much it meant to her. He was in love with his job and I was so happy for him but I couldn't help to be a bit jealous as I have to wait for two more years to start working with Dragons.

—

It will be Fred and George's First Year at Hogwarts this September and they wanted to know everything about the Sorting Ceremony. Nova and I were sitting on the sofa, as the twins sat on their knees in front of us.

“Oh, it's okay, I guess.” Nova said uninterestingly. I knew the look in her eyes. She was up to something, so I decided to go along with it.

“What's that supposed to mean?” Asked Fred. She sparked their interest.

“You know, there's singing and it's terrible!” She started to explain.

“Yeah, they forgot to give one kid earmuffs, and now he's deaf.” I said, looking terrified. I could see in the corner of my eye that Nova had to try hard not to laugh.

“You're joking!” George said, incredulously.

“Oh, no. It's true.” Nova looked at me. “When they did it to Charlie, he was screaming for solid five minutes.” She pursed her lips, shaking from holding in the laughter.

“It hurts?!” They both sat up straight.

“Didn't I tell you?” I confirmed Nova's statement.

“Mum, we don't want to go to Hogwarts!” Fred shouted towards the kitchen. My mum came to the living room at once, her hands on her waist, narrowing her eyes at me and Nova.

“Charlie, Nova, what did you tell them?” She asked carefully not to sound too angry in front of Nova. I knew that if I was doing this alone she would already be shouting.

“They said that the Sorting Hat hurts you when you get sorted.” Answered George. Mum looked at us as we tried to keep up a straight face.

“Oh, that it does!” She said casually and went back to the kitchen. I can't believe she went along with our joke! The twins were stunned, with their mouths open.

They stood up and ran upstairs and we didn't see them until dinner. They both came down with what seemed every Winter hat in the house. Nova, Ron, and I burst out laughing. My dad had no idea what was going on and my mum rolled her eyes when she turned around to see what was happening.

“Boys! What are you doing?” She asked.

“If the sorting hurts, we might as well do everything to make it as painless as possible.” George said, proud of his idea. Nova and I burst out laughing again.

“What's all this about?” My dad looked at my mum, puzzled. “Nova and Charlie told the boys how much the Sorting hurts.” She leaned to dad to hide a wink from Fred and George.

“Oh, right. Really unpleasant that is.” He said quickly. “Not a bad plan, but the hats won't help the pain, boys.” He added and buried his nose in his newspaper which was shaking and I knew he was trying his best not to laugh.

“Well, that settles it then, we're not going!” Fred took half of his hats off and followed George upstairs.

We waited for a few seconds then everybody started laughing.

“Thanks for not ruining the joke, mum!” I said.

“With the amount of trouble those two have put me through, it's a miracle you found something that scares them.” She squeezed my shoulder.

Even though we didn't even start the school year yet, Nova and I couldn't help but be excited as we would both come of age in December. We couldn't wait to rub it in our friends' faces when we will be able to take our Apparation tests and they won't. We had to wait almost a year to go to Hogwarts, now they will have to wait to get their test!

We also knew that turning 17 meant we could do magic outside of school and I couldn't wait to not think about consequences if I cast a spell outside school grounds.

Besides messing with Fred and George and Nova completely losing hope of ever beating Ron in Wizard's Chess, we spent most of our time on our Quidditch pitch. Nova stayed with Ginny and watched us play because Ginny was too young to fly and because of Bill being gone and Ron playing, there would be an uneven number of players.

I didn't mind as I knew Nova was watching me and it gave me a boost of confidence each time. I was proud of myself for how I was handling myself around her all Summer. Of course, I still blushed every time she leaned on me or hugged me but I was trying my best not to be as awkward. I have never wondered more what was going through her head as she still couldn't figure out what was I doing differently and I could see that it was really bugging her but she was too shy to talk about it.

It amused me to see how she struggled to understand what was going on and I knew I could tell her how I feel but I wanted to make sure that she was over McNully and I wanted her to realize she liked me. I didn't want the idea in her head just because I would tell her that I fancy her. I wanted her to come to the conclusion on her own no matter how stupid it might sound.

—

As always, when one of us goes to Hogwarts for the first time, my mum cried as she said goodbye to Fred and George. She cried when it was Percy's First Year two years ago and she cried when Bill and I first started school. Because Bill wasn't the oldest to be at Hogwarts anymore, mum gave all his responsibilities to me. It felt good being an older brother and I promised her that nothing will happen to her little angels. Even though I knew already that the second they find out the sorting doesn't hurt, they are going to do everything in their power to prank me all year.

Nova and I decided that it was pointless keeping the twins away from Tonks and Tulip as they were asking about their pranks and ideas to cause mischief ever since we mentioned that we all got detention because of Tonks' Dungbomb.

—

After me, Bill, and Percy being sorted in Gryffindor, I wasn't even surprised that the twins were too. When George sat down, our eyes met and he mouthed 'you're dead'. I couldn't help but be curious about what they are going to come up with. Of course, I wouldn't go as easy on them as I did on Tulip and Tonks, since I was a Prefect and their brother, so I am quite positive Gryffindor will come last this year when it comes to House points if they are going to behave as they do at home.

I went down for breakfast the first day of the new term. I sat next to Jae at the Gryffindor Table, surprised to see him. I couldn't find him on the train when I was patrolling the corridors and he came way past curfew to our dormitory.

“Mate, tell me what is going on or I will take 20 points from Gryffindor for coming to our room after curfew.” I sat down and grinned.

“I thought you were asleep.” He looked embarrassed.

“Nobody can sleep through your racket.” I chuckled. “Where were you anyway?” I took a plate and put some eggs and bacon on it.

“I was with Tulip. We're dating.” He leaned across the table and whispered, careful so that nobody could hear him.

“Congrats, mate! We were wondering last year when you took Tulip to the Kitchens if you were doing it.” I winked at him.

“We're not that quick, Weasley.” He rolled his eyes.

“Hey, Tonks asked the question not me.” I chuckled as I remembered Bill's reaction when she said it. I will miss having him around.

“Sooo, how did it happen?” I tried imitating Penny as much as possible as I was sure she was going to be over the roof when Tulip tells the girls.

“We weren't DOING it in the Kitchens that day, but I did tell her that I fancy her.” He said proudly.

“Good for you, mate!” I was really happy for them. I knew he liked her since last year and they did kind of fit together, liking to break the rules and hang out in the Kitchens, out of all places.

“Just please don't tell Nova. Tulip said she wanted to tell the girls on her own.” Jae said.

“Of course! Wouldn't think of it.” I smiled.

“Think of what?” Nova hugged me from behind as Tulip sat carefully next to Jae not to be too obvious. To me, she couldn't be worst at hiding the fact that they were together.

“You.” I winked at Nova. At this point, I knew I was having too much fun messing with her. Tulip giggled and Nova sat down next to me slowly.

“Excited for our Sixth Year?” She changed the subject even though I knew she was still going about it in her mind.

“Sure. Two more to go and then the real adventure begins.” I answered. She didn't look happy about that. I knew it was going to be hard on all of us when we'll have to part ways but I was sure we were going to be just fine.

“That reminds me, Tulip, any career interests yet?” I turned to her.

“I was thinking of looking something at the Ministry and try it out. Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad.” She shrugged her shoulders and I knew that after Jae told Tulip he fancied her they didn't do any talking. Poor Kitchen Elfs.

“What's up with you?” Nova narrowed her eyes at me after I chuckled at my thoughts.

“Oh, nothing.” I grinned. At this rate, she will be confused the whole year-round.

“Hi, Nova.” And then came the guy to ruin my entire week. I felt Nova stiffen next to me. I don't think she talked to McNully since we talked it out in the Forest. She slowly turned around and I knew she looked at me to see my reaction, before making a full turn.

“Hi, Murphy.” She said and I could tell she was embarrassed. It hurt to know that she wasn't completely over him and I felt bad in a way, knowing that they might've had a future if Nova didn't decide to pick her best friend over him.

“I was wondering if you would like to hang out after class today in the Courtyard?” I was surprised he was able to complete a full sentence without giving the odds of it happening.

“I'm sorry...I can't. I have Advanced Transfiguration today.” I looked at her. I knew that was a lie. I also knew I shouldn't feel good about the fact that she wasn't telling him the truth but I did. It had to take a lot of courage to say no to hanging out with the boy she liked.

“Oh, another time then.” McNully sounded disappointed. Welcome to my last year, Quidditch Commentator!

“Why did you lie to him?” I whispered to her after he left.

“I told you last year, you come first.” She gripped my hand.

“Nova, we're doing fine. You like the guy.” Even I was surprised at my words but I didn't want to be the one to keep her from dating someone. It was obvious he fancied her back.

“No.” She sighed. “I don't even know if I fancy him anymore.” She gave me the same puzzled look as she did when she was trying to figure me out. I smiled as I knew she was getting there.

14 notes · View notes

calm-and-wine · 4 years

Text

(I’ll give you) the best years

PART VI / EPILOGUE (masterlist)

here we are, the last part, more of an epilogue really. it’s quite short, but it also felt right, so hopefully you won’t be too disappointed.

as it is the end, i want to say the biggest thank you to everyone who has read and interacted with my little story. i’m so glad you loved and accepted Nulu, it truly means the world. also, if you’d ever wonder about anything or want to talk about this little family, please feel more than welcomed to pop into my inbox! i love you all, happy reading!

PART VI / EPILOGUE

September 2030

Lucy was tired, but content. She was probably supposed to be wiped out, sleeping for hours on end would be acceptable too. After spending over 8 hours yesterday in the car with children, a whining almost 4 years old and a fussy 6 months old, she had every reason to feel half dead. Even though Niall provided her a little break, sending her grocery shopping while he watched the kids, she was still half dead. She actually really liked going to the supermarket, might have even spent extra long roaming the aisles, just to get a bit more alone time. She loved her children, of course she did, but everyone needed a small break once in a while.

But none of that stopped her from getting up early, starting the preparations, then waking the kids before they started crying, and doing the rest of cooking with both her daughters in tow. She was in a great mood, any tiredness or lack of sleep forgotten. After all, it was Niall’s birthday. And her husband deserved all the good things, always.

“Mummy, can I decorate? I wanna make them all pretty.” Evelyn, her eldest asked, her big blue eyes pleading, just in case her mum declined. It was almost impossible to say no to her when she looked at someone like that, a power she was perfectly aware of. Sometimes Lucy could not believe she wasn’t even four yet, she was way too smart.

“Sure, Eve, but just a few, okay? We’ll put the fruits and everything else on the table, so everyone can make their own.” She put a few pancakes on a plate before placing it in front of her daughter. Evelyn was nothing if not helpful. Lucy looked to her other side, where Olivia was sitting in her high chair, playing with her teddy and a wooden spoon. Apparently there were no better toys than kitchen appliances or whatever else you could find lying around the house.

There was soft music playing in the background, the last of the pancakes sizzling in the pan, a bubble of excitement fluttering in Lucy’s stomach. Life was good, better than good. She had everything she could have ever wanted, more than she even dared to dream about. Sure, it wasn’t always perfect and it definitely wasn’t easy, but they were healthy, and most importantly, there was a lot of love to hold it all together.

Evelyn was born on the 14th of December 2026 and neither Lucy nor Niall knew what to do with the happiness and love bursting through them for this perfect little bundle they created. In the following months, Lucy was very glad Niall was home, because no matter how peaceful she might have looked, Evelyn was no angel. And Lucy would probably lose her mind, if it weren’t for him. He worked in the studio with the boys, but it wasn’t any crazy schedule, just slowly putting songs together, always making sure not to put too much on his wife’s shoulder. She was also very glad he convinced her to go ahead with the training centre, which opened in February of 2027, because it became a source of normality for her, a reason to leave the house and clear her mind, usually for a few hours twice a week.

One Direction released their second album since reactivating in September of 2028 and then embarked on a tour, Lucy and Evelyn joining them for most of it. It was crazy at times, but Niall said nothing would ever beat standing on stage in front of thousands of people and turning your head to see your wife and kid dancing hidden on the side stage. She found out she was pregnant again on that very tour. They weren’t really trying for another kid, but they also weren’t actively preventing anything, just letting the universe work however it wanted to. So, on the 14th of March this year, Olivia was born. She was much calmer than her sister, which Lucy took as a blessing, only hoping it wouldn’t come doubled as a toddler rebellion or something. And once again, Niall finished tour early December, spending the last couple of months of her pregnancy home, helping her and being her rock, then enjoying another newborn bliss together. The band came back to work since, once again popping into the studio every once in a while, but there was no rush. Harry welcomed his second child recently, joking that Niall should pick up his pace, because he had been married way shorter, yet they had the same number of offsprings, his kids only a year apart.

But for Lucy and Niall, there was no rush. She loved what they had, had felt this way for years upon years, pure contentment. She couldn’t even pinpoint a moment when she wanted something more than she already had, since she started dating Niall, not really.

She put the last pancakes on the plate, the ones Evelyn decorated were already placed at the table, so she picked Olivia up, settling her on her hip, grabbing Evie’s hand and going upstairs. Her eldest giggled excitedly, letting go of her mum’s hand as soon as she opened the door to the master bedroom and sprinting before jumping on the bed. Lucy only hoped she wouldn’t land on Niall or kick him in the ribs. There was no stopping her when she got like this, though.

“Dada! Wake up! It’s your birthday!” she screamed, jumping up and down on the bed.

Niall hummed, scrunching his eyes for a second, which earned him a giggle from his daughter, before opening them and instantly grabbing her to bring her down on top of him, tickling her before blowing a raspberry on her stomach.

“Hello, pumpkin,” he said, planting a kiss on her cheek, her eyes glistening and a huge smile showing all of her teeth.

“We made breakfast, you have to hurry,” she said proudly, going to stand up on the bed, Niall’s hands instantly going up to secure her in case she lost balance. He sat up looking at his wife, who stood near the doorway, their other daughter tucked in her arms, hiding her face in her neck. Their daughters couldn’t have been more different, Evelyn was a natural firecracker, while Olivia seemed timid and shy, he couldn’t wait to see them grow into two amazing women. “Dada!” Evelyn pulled on his hand, rushing him.

“Okay, okay, I’m getting up, Evie,” he laughed, standing up and helping her down from the bed. He grabbed a sweater to cover his bare chest, barely managing to pull it over his head, before Eve started pushing on his leg, trying to make him move. “Go ahead, I’m right behind you,” he said, which earned him a huff.

“Just not too fast, bub,” Lucy reminded, when Eve rushed out of the room.

Niall stopped in front of his wife, a huge smile on his face, his hair a complete mess and his eyes still sleepy.

“Happy birthday, baby,” she said, when he wrapped an arm around her, planting a sweet kiss on his lips.

“Thank you,” Niall said, giving her another peck, before kissing the daughter in her arms on the head. “And you, what got you all shy, bug?” he asked, pinching her leg lightly. Olivia finally looked at her dad, twisting in Lucy’s arms and reaching for him. Niall laughed lightly, taking her from his wife and tickling her before she let out the most beautiful giggle and hid her face in his neck. She was too cute. Both their daughters were absolutely adorable and as much as he loved it and was a proud dad, it sometimes made it hard being a parent.

“Come on, or Evie will lose her mind and the pancakes will get cold,” Lucy said, intertwining her fingers with Niall’s free hand and leading them downstairs.

“I really don’t know where she gets her lack of patience from.”

“Oh, you don’t?” Lucy snickered, looking at him with a raised brow.

“Okay, so maybe I have a slight idea,” he chuckled, “but I’m not that bad.”

“Yeah, but you’re also not 4.”

He looked at his wife, both their eyes glistening with glee. “Point taken.”

They reached the kitchen and Niall stopped in the doorway surprised. It was more than he expected, the table was perfectly set, fresh fruit, chocolate and maple syrups, bacon and even whipped cream laid out, along with a stack of pancakes way too big for them.

He looked at his wife incredulously. “You did all that? With two kids to look at?” he asked, forever in awe of his wife.

“They were on their best behaviour,” she assured.

“You’re an angel,” he whispered in her ear, kissing her cheek.

“Dada! I helped! And I have a present for you!” Evelyn said, practically jumping by the kitchen table.

Niall put Olivia in her high chair, while Lucy shook her head at their eldest’s antics. They were supposed to have cake and give him presents later, but at this point she wasn’t even surprised Evelyn couldn’t wait.

“Okay, come here then,” Niall said, sitting in a chair, grabbing Eve and sitting her on his lap. “Oooh you made me a card?” he asked, his voice excited, when his daughter handed him a colorful piece of paper.

“Mumma helped with spelling,” she noted, looking up at him with the biggest smile.

“It’s beautiful, I love it. We’re gonna hang it back home. Thank you, pumpkin.” His heart was so full, he couldn’t even comprehend it. He kissed her cheek, then the other, then the crown of her head, until she giggled.

“Can we hang it here until we leave?” Evelyn asked, looking at him with her usual big eyes. They came to their house in Ireland for a few days to change the scenery. And because Lucy always tried to get him here for his birthday, knowing how much he loved his home country. He appreciated the gesture a lot, even though now his home was wherever his family was, the place didn’t matter much.

“Of course,” he assured, placing the card on the edge of the table so it wouldn’t get dirty. “Let’s eat now, yeah?”

She nodded, her blonde hair bouncing around her shoulders. She was a perfect mix of Niall and Lucy, the hair was all her mother’s, but the eyes were just like her dad’s. She made a move to get off his lap, but he secured an arm around her waist to keep her with him.

“Don’t leave me, it’s my birthday!” he said dramatically, earning himself another chuckle. It was his favourite thing to do, trying to make his girls laugh, all three of them.

Lucy finally moved, going to make some coffee for him, taking a minute to watch her family, while it was brewing. They were all in pajamas, Evelyn wearing a blue robe with pink hearts on it, Niall in plaid bottoms and a sweater, she was wearing cotton pants as well, with Niall’s hoodie. He was feeding Olivia, her high chair turned towards him, while making sure Evie didn't fall off his lap, completely adored by his daughters, just as much as he adored them.

“Hey, come eat,” he said, looking at her, a lopsided smile on both their faces.

She nodded, pouring the coffee and bringing it over for him, before sitting herself on the other side, so she could admire her family.

The house was filled with chatter and giggles, Lucy and Niall’s eyes shining with emotions, the smiles constant on their faces. When they ate over half of the pancakes and their bellies were full, cheeks hurting from laughing, she got up to clean up a bit, hanging Eve’s card up on the fridge. Niall got up too, placing Evie on his chair, and came up to do the washing, ignoring Lucy’s protest that he shouldn’t do any cleaning on his birthday, while she put the leftovers into the fridge.

When they were both done, he pulled her into his body, before they joined their kids. They should get dressed and go out for a walk, but he wanted a minute with his wife.

“I love you so much, Lulu,” he said softly, after kissing her, their first proper kiss of the day.

“Love you, baby,” she reciprocated, raking a hand through his hair.

He stood with his arms around his wife, planting soft kisses across her face and on her neck, while watching the kids over her shoulder, their eldest daughter gabbering on and on about something she was clearly very passionate about, while their 6 months old looked at her sister with big eyes, probably not understanding a word, but giving her her full attention. Niall’s heart was so full, he was sure it must burst one of those moments. He felt that way whenever he had his three girls right with him, just like this. Not even doing anything special, just being together, being a family. He truly did not know what the hell did he do to deserve it all, the most amazing wife and two beautiful daughters.

He drew his eyes back to Lucy and just knew she was filling similar things, one of her hands clasped on the back of his neck, while the other was travelling up and down his side.

The way they looked at each other and were together, made her feel like they were two teenagers in love. Crazy about each other, with heart eyes and butterflies in their stomachs. It didn’t mean their love wasn’t mature, their relationship stable. But in those moments, she felt incredibly lucky. That after all these years, the spark between them didn’t dim. That her body still felt warm whenever he was near, her heart skipping a beat whenever he looked at her. It was something she was incredibly appreciative of, their love evolving, growing to new heights, but never really changing. Deep down she not only hoped, but knew that it would be like that forever. That not only this was the man she’d grow old alongside and spend the rest of her life with, but that she’d be completely in love with him for every minute of every day. And for just as long, she’d be utterly, absolutely loved by him.

taglist: @stylishmuser @verorax @georgiahoranxx @exoticniall @awomanindeniall @soullikestyles @bopbopstyles @nannav47

#1dff #niall horan fanfiction #niall horan oneshot #one direction fanfiction #one direction oneshot #one direction fan fiction #one direction one shot #niall horan fan fiction #niall horan one shot #dtl

38 notes · View notes

artificialqueens · 4 years

Text

Me and You Together, 3/10 (Taywhora) - Ortega

fic summary: The cardinal rule of having flatmates is that you Do Not Catch Feelings For Your Flatmates, because everything inevitably goes to shit and gets made horrifically awkward. A’whora and Tayce both know this, but being in first year of uni and making good decisions have never really gone hand in hand.

a/n: again, fucking bowled over by the love and support this has had so far. i cannot thank any of u enough, ur all absolute wee diamonds in the sky. hope u enjoy this one- we’re in January for this one, where the girls have to deal with the consequences of December…and Tayce is tasked with keeping a secret for Lawrence.

last chapter: September- On a damp, bright Saturday in September, six flatmates move into their student flat and meet for the first time.

this chapter: January- Tayce and A’whora still have unfinished business from a night out and a hungover morning in December. But it’s only awkward if they make it awkward…right?

***

Tayce is pretty sure she’s going to combust if something doesn’t happen soon.

It’s been a month and a week since A’whora kissed her, and twenty-four hours shorter than that since Tayce kissed her in return. Or thereabouts, it’s not like she’s counting. It’s not like it’s been consuming her every thought every waking moment of the day or anything.

In all fairness, Tayce seems like it’s an achievement to think about a kiss for that length of time. Especially through her first semester essay deadlines, Ellie’s raucous eighteenth, her first Christmas back home, her first New Year seeing all her old school friends after uni and updating Cheryl and Cara on everything. She’d drunkenly come out to Cheryl too after being gently encouraged and supported by Cara, and they’d both cried as Cheryl held her and confessed that since uni had started she’d also begun seeing a girl she really liked too.

It’s funny how at uni everybody seems so much more free. Away from a stifling hometown, Tayce and her friends can properly spread their wings and be who they’ve always been but have either not realised it or been afraid to show it. Tayce is the happiest she’s ever been when she’s at the flat with the others in her little bubble of a home away from home, with Bimini’s intelligent insights and Tia’s funny quips, Lawrence’s chaos and Ellie’s kindness and A’whora being…well, her best friend.

Except she’s not really sure that best friends kiss each other like that.

But maybe they do, because since they’ve all come back from home after Christmas A’whora hasn’t mentioned the kisses, as if nothing out of the ordinary has happened between them. Hasn’t even joked about it with her or in front of the others (which is fair enough, as if Lawrence knew she’d probably tease them about it until they graduated). Tayce is pretty sure that none of the others even know, or at least if they do they’ve not spoken about it.

And the worst part is that A’whora has been absolutely…normal. Fine.

See, Tayce could’ve dealt with any awkwardness- she’d be upfront, bluntly ask A’whora if she wants to forget about it or what she wants the plan for them to be. Even better would’ve been if A’whora had rugby-tackled her the moment she’d got back from Wales and smothered her with kisses, told her how much she’d been thinking about her while they’d both been away. Tayce supposes it’s kind of her fault they never properly talked about it since she’d practically bolted out of A’whora’s room when she’d kissed her that morning, but she’d been nervous in case she’d made everything too weird. A’whora hadn’t seemed to be complaining at the time, though.

In fact that night, A’whora had been up for plenty more than just a drunk kiss. If Tayce thinks about everything she’d said when they were walking home her face still gets hot and she has to squeeze her thighs together. She’s definitely glad they never crossed any of those particular lines when they’d both been drinking, but sometimes when she’s lying in bed at night Tayce lets her hands drift between her legs as she thinks about A’whora telling her how much and for how long she’d wanted her.

Best friends definitely don’t do that.

So Tayce feels guilty spending time with just A’whora these days, the fact that things haven’t been awkward between them somehow being worse than if they were. She’s not been avoiding her per sé, she’s just been finding ways to make sure it’s very rarely the two of them alone together: hanging out in the kitchen with everyone instead of in her room, going to bed when the others do instead of staying up with A’whora, inviting the others to anything A’whora suggests the two of them do together. It’s silly, and Tayce does miss spending time alone with her, but A’whora acting like nothing’s happened while conversely Tayce wants everything to happen hurts her embarrassingly more than she’d care to admit.

Such a time is a lazy Sunday afternoon halfway through the shittiest month of the year, when the weather outside is full of misty rain that’s a recipe for frizzy hair, puddles, and misery. Just to add to the rubbish day Tayce is holed up in her room, watching the grey clouds drift and overlap over each other to create a paint colour chart in the sky as she begins an essay that’s due in a mere five days. It’s been hard to focus on anything when her head is full of her best friend and imaginary scenarios but the prospect of an all-nighter isn’t one that’s particularly desirable either, so she and the ninety-five words she’s written so far are engaged in a stand-off as Tayce waits for the essay to write itself and the word document waits for her brain cells to conjure up any more opinions on “Is art a conveyor of emotion?” (4000 words).

And then there’s a knock on the door that doesn’t wait for permission to enter and A’whora bounces in. She’s in a pair of grey joggers and a baggy navy pyjama top that she’s tucked in at the waist and rolled up the sleeves of, and her hair is up in a bun that’s had approximately 5% effort put into it apart from the little diamante hair clasp she’s slid through it at the top.

In spite of herself, Tayce can’t help but snort when she sees her. “Only you could make your shitty potato loungewear fashion.”

“Shut up! This is haute couture. This is actually my final project for the semester,” A’whora jokes in return, moves to sit at the foot of her bed and pout at her. “Tayyyce. I’m boreddd.”

Tayce raises an eyebrow at A’whora’s whining from over her laptop screen. “And I’m doing this essay. Find someone else to bug.”

“Don’t be such a hound,” A’whora frowns, falling sideways and landing onto the bed so she’s hugging Tayce’s legs through the duvet, her head resting on her shins. “I’d annoy Ellie but she’s in town with one of her friends from home. C’mon, let’s do a movie day. We’ve not had one in ages. I feel like we’ve barely had any time together since you got back.”

“Just been trying to catch up on all my coursework. It’s not personal,” she lies, her heart sinking only the tiniest bit at the realisation that her attempts at staying out of A’whora’s way have obviously been louder than they’ve been subtle.

“Please?” A’whora bats her lashes, and if it was impossible to say no to her before it’s surely illegal to do so now.

Tayce sighs and closes her laptop, eliciting a smile from the other girl. “Fine. Fine! But you better ask the others, I don’t want them feeling left out.”

It’s a good spur-of-the-moment excuse to make sure Tayce doesn’t have to spend two hours cuddled up next to A’whora while her heart hurts, but she’s confused by the way a small look of something passes over A’whora’s expression. She can’t put her finger on what it is, but A’whora’s agreeing and bounding down to the living room before Tayce can figure it out.

Tayce throws on her dressing gown over her clothes before leaving her room to join her, the blue fluffy one with the narwhal hood that’s complete with a horn on the top. She doesn’t own many embarrassing items of clothing, but this is definitely one of them. It doesn’t matter too much, though. A’whora’s seen her in it before, when she’s been hungover or sad or hangry and on her period.

It’s so funny how she can only have known her five months and still feel closer to her than half of the friends she spent six years with at high school.

In the kitchen, A’whora’s already cheerfully getting organised as Bimini and Lawrence lounge on the sofa lazily. Tia’s not in either- it emerges she’s gone round to Veronica’s, which nobody’s surprised about.

“Main question is, what’re we watching?” Bimini asks. “It’s a lazy Sunday so it can’t be anything that’s too good. I want something I can rip the piss out of while I watch it, y’know?”

There’s some squabbling about film choices as A’whora makes popcorn in the microwave, burns it, then subsequently has to make another packet. It’s eventually decided that they’re going to watch Love Actually despite the fact it’s January, because they all either hate it or like it because of how bad it is and the film will simply be a vehicle for them to yell jokes over.

“Have we got anything to drink? We could make this into like…a day drinking situation,” Lawrence suggests casually.

“You’re not helping the stereotype that all Scottish people are alcoholics at all,” A’whora quips, causing Tayce to let out a too-loud laugh.

“Listen, if you’ve not figured out that I’m a walking talking stereotype by now, A’whora, are we even friends?” Lawrence shoots back, and A’whora shrugs in an unspoken fair enough.

Tayce tilts her head then remembers something. “I actually still have loads of canned cocktails in my suitcase that my Mum got me for Christmas. Haven’t unpacked them yet. Think there’s about…twelve?”

“Ooh, three each? That’s alright!” Bimini smiles, clearly buoyed by the prospect of being slightly tipsy in the middle of the afternoon.

“Right, that’s settled then. I’ll go get them,” Tayce decides. A’whora’s crossing the kitchen before she knows it.

“I’ll help you with them.”

Before Tayce can speak, Bimini gives a snort. “ ‘Ow much do you think canned cocktails weigh, exactly?”

As Lawrence bursts into peals of laughter, Tayce watches as A’whora rolls her eyes at them, then turns on her heel to follow her to her room. Tayce can’t help but be a little wary, though. It does kind of seem like A’whora’s trying to get her on her own, which Tayce wouldn’t mind if she knew where she was coming from. But she doesn’t.

Tayce kneels down onto the floor as she rolls her suitcase out from under the bed, chatting mindlessly as she does so because if she’s talking it means A’whora doesn’t have a chance to bring up whatever she clearly wants to bring up. “I think there’s actually eleven here, you know. Because, uh…I think I drank one of them while I was at home, so we’re gonna need to fight over who gets one less. I don’t fancy my chances in a fight against Lawrence, she’d probably give me…what’s that expression? A Glasgow kiss? She’d give me one of those. Although Bimini, what do you think they’d be like in a fight? You know I think they’ve secretly got a set of knuckledusters, they seem the type. Although when I think about it-”

“Tayce,” A’whora cuts in, forcing her to snap her head up. Her expression is troubled, and a little frown dips on her forehead as she looks at her. “What’s wrong? Why are you being so…I don’t know, weird? Like you want to get rid of me?”

Tayce feels ashamed for being called out on her behaviour, and she can feel her stomach drop as she looks back at the cans in her otherwise empty suitcase. She wants to tell her there’s a reason for the way she’s been acting but A’whora beats her to the punch, murmuring with her head down and not meeting Tayce’s eyes.

“Is this because we kissed?”

“A’whora…” Tayce immediately groans in exasperation, the heat rushing to her cheeks as if she’s been slapped. She’s embarrassed, because she knows she’s got the capacity to talk about this like a grown-up but there’s a part of her that’s cringing, because if A’whora’s about to tell her she regrets it then she’s not sure she’ll ever live it down.

There’s a small silence where neither of them seem to move, let alone speak. A’whora is yet again the one to break it. “I just feel like you hate me all of a sudden.”

Fuck. If there was one thing Tayce had wanted to avoid, it’s this. Even though she herself is hurting she can’t bear the thought of having hurt A’whora’s feelings too, so she frowns, reaches up and squeezes A’whora’s hand which prompts her to look at Tayce. “I don’t hate you, Rory, of course I don’t hate you. I just…”

Tayce looks up to the ceiling as she searches for the right words, even though she’s not really sure what they are. She wants to tell A’whora she’s yearning for something to happen again between them and that even the fact she’s holding her hand is setting her pulse off all too quickly, but now’s not the right time. Besides, she doesn’t even know if A’whora feels the same way. Either way, Tayce can hear A’whora holding her breath, can feel the way her body’s tense beside her, so Tayce finally formulates something that doesn’t sound too hot or too cold.

“…I just don’t know where we go from here, that’s all.”

A’whora visibly relaxes, then shrugs. Her voice is quiet as she speaks. “Well, it’s only awkward if we make it awkward. And I feel like I’ve been okay at not making it awkward?”

Tayce narrows her eyes at her, laughs. “So what you’re saying is it’s all my fault.”

“Yes.”

The pair of the giggle softly and things already seem to have shifted back into comfortable territory. The green of a spring bulb popping up through the snow.

Tayce swallows her not-inconsiderable pride and smiles up at A’whora. She supposes going back to being friends and not ever talking about the fact that they kissed again is better than existing in a tense purgatory for the rest of their time in the flat together, even if it does make her feel a little sinking feeling of disappointment and a sense of mourning what could’ve been. “I’m sorry for being such a…mingebag.”

A’whora cracks up, repeats “mingebag!” incredulously, before her laughter dies down and she gives Tayce’s hand a squeeze in return. “That’s okay. Just good to know you still like me.”

They share a soft smile before piling the cocktails high in their arms, cradling them as if they’re babies as they rush back through to the living room where Bimini and Lawrence are hanging up a huge white sheet on the wall opposite the sofa for the projector. The projector had been Tia’s addition to the flat, an AliExpress purchase that had turned out to not be broken, or unusable, or made for a doll’s house.

“Tia won’t mind us borrowing that, will she?” A’whora asks with concern. Lawrence scoffs, bats a hand in her direction dismissively.

“She’ll be too mouth-deep in Veronica to care when she realises we’ve used it, let’s not lie!”

There’s a cry of disgust at Lawrence’s turn of phrase from the others, and as Tayce sets up the cocktails on the little coffee table A’whora brings the bowl of popcorn through.

“It’s fun to be able to make jokes about Tia and her girl, in’t it?” Bimini chuckles good-naturedly. “Always feel like we can’t properly tease her when Ellie’s there ‘cause she always looks like she’s about to jump out the window any time we mention Veronica’s name.”

The revelation that Ellie has feelings for Tia had come via a drunken, tearful confession to the others the night of her eighteenth birthday, when Tia had left the party with Veronica instead of staying overnight at the flat. Poor Ellie had been so devastatingly upset that the others had seemed to forge an unspoken agreement that the situation wasn’t going to be fodder for flat jokes. Instead they make sure to ask Tia how her budding relationship is going when Ellie isn’t around.

As she and A’whora laugh in agreement at Bimini’s joke, Tayce doesn’t miss the way Lawrence grows uncharacteristically quiet.

“When d’you think Ellie will get over Tia? I mean it’s a shame she doesn’t like her back, but she’ll ‘ave to at some point.”

“She won’t. She’ll just pine after her every day until we graduate,” Lawrence says. It’s meant to be a joke but her delivery is somewhat flat, and Tayce wonders if she’s the only one that picks up on it. From the way A’whora and Bimini are laughing, it appears she has been.

Bimini and Lawrence step back from the sheet, satisfied with the job they’ve done. A’whora’s busy plugging in the fairy lights Ellie strung up where the wall meets the ceiling a few months ago, and Tayce can’t help but think to herself that sacking off her essay was a good idea as she glances at their setup. Never let it be said that their flat does things by halves.

“Oh! We should bring duvets through. And blankets,” A’whora suggests, and Tayce’s heart is both warmed and hurt by how adorably enthusiastic she is about the whole endeavour. She wishes she could shake the lingering feeling of disappointment she’s got in her gut at the knowledge that they’ll probably never talk about their kiss again; they’ve moved on from it, it was a one-time thing, and it’s only awkward if they make it awkward so Tayce bringing it up would be awkward, right?

So she settles on the sofa with Lawrence while Bimini helps A’whora gather up all their pillows, cushions, blankets and duvets from their respective rooms. Tayce is about to become lost in her own head when Lawrence turns to her with a look in her eyes that Tayce has never seen before. It’s almost conspiratorial and definitely suspicious, and for one horrific moment Tayce is convinced that Lawrence knows everything that happened in December.

“What is it?” Tayce asks her, before her flatmate can even open her mouth. Lawrence sighs, tips her head back to the head of the sofa and squeezes her eyes shut.

“I need to tell you a secret.”

Tayce’s heart drops as if she’s on a rollercoaster. Her mind immediately jumps to A’whora. What’s she told her? What does Lawrence know? It would make sense to wait until A’whora was out of the room before telling her anything. Tayce tries to keep her face impassive as she turns to Lawrence, nods quietly. “Okay, spill.”

“You can’t tell anyone, Tayce,” Lawrence insists, looking at her pleadingly. Tayce promises she won’t, although in retrospect she probably should’ve asked what it was first. The way Lawrence is acting is intriguing, though. It makes Tayce think it’s something about herself if it’s something she doesn’t want the others to know so badly.

“Christ, this is so cringe,” Lawrence groans, dropping her head forward and resting it in her hands. Tayce can still see the pink flush that’s started to dust her face, and by now she’s convinced that this has nothing to do with A’whora and everything to do with Lawrence herself.

Lawrence mutters out something incoherent into her hands. Tayce frowns, humoured. “What?”

A huge huff comes from the girl on the sofa beside her, and as she removes her hands from the front of her face she sticks them to the side of it like blinkers on a horse. It’s the quietest Tayce has ever heard Lawrence speak as she says the secret again. “I’ve got a crush on Ellie.”

Tayce’s face lights up at her friend’s confession. “Do you actually?”

“Christ, don’t make me say it twice. I’ll get struck down.”

Tayce leans into Lawrence, uses both her hands to lightly poke her in the arm. “Look at you! Being cute and having feelings!”

“It’s not, though! It’s not cute at all! It’s just sad!” Lawrence rolls her eyes, shaking her head at the same time. “Because she doesn’t…she’ll never see me like that, and she’s too busy making cow-eyes at Tia all the time anyway, so. It’s pointless, I don’t even know why I’m even hoping for something to happen.”

“Hey, listen! How long do you think Ellie’s gonna be able to keep moaning about Tia when she’s still seeing Veronica? I mean there’s only one way that relationship is going, the only ‘end’ there is in ‘girlfriend’. So Ellie’s gonna have to get over it eventually!” Tayce says supportively, shaking Lawrence’s arm to gee her up. Lawrence bats her away, though, giving another sigh.

“Tayce, it’s not exactly like she’s gonnae suddenly realise that I’ve been here all along! Like some fuckin’ chick flick. I’ve fancied her for years,” Lawrence explains. The information knocks Tayce for six, but when she thinks about it it makes sense- the way Lawrence gently bullies her so much, the way she gravitates towards her all the time, the way she gets quiet if Ellie starts moping about Tia. Tayce had never thought about it in that light before.

Lawrence hugs her knees to her chest as she continues. “Realised I liked her the last time we were at the caravan. And obviously we were at opposite sides of the country but like…I’d still meet up with her in Summer, get the train to Dundee and have sleepovers and all that shite. And when she came into the kitchen on that first day I was so happy she was gonnae be living with us, and I am still happy, because obviously she’s my friend? But like…it’s just shite to know that she’ll never like me back.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Ellie’s type is obviously tall, dark and skinny. Which…” Lawrence gestures at herself with a deprecative laugh. “…how can I be any of that?”

“Right, for a start! Stop thinking about what you’re not and start thinking about what you are,” Tayce says firmly, gripping her hand tightly.

Lawrence rolls her eyes and fixes her with a pointed stare. “Oh, like what? I’m beautiful on the inside! I know I’m the fat funny friend, Tayce, you can spare me the bullshit.”

“Well…you’re fat, and so fucking what of it? Doesn’t mean you aren’t drop-dead-fuckin’ gorgeous. Being fat and being beautiful aren’t mutually exclusive.”

“Very easy for you to say, sat there wearing size eights. Tell that to literally any piece of media we consume. Or any of my brain cells. Even if there are only about ten of them,” Lawrence sighs, then pauses. “I do like the way I look, and I don’t want to change anything about myself. It’s just…several things make that very hard almost all of the time, and it’s tiring to feel like you’re constantly fighting a losing battle. And it’s not like I’m pinning all my self-worth on a girl liking me back, but just…it would be nice to be the one that someone has a crush on for a change, if that makes sense?”

Before Tayce can say anything to affirm how Lawrence is feeling, a movement from down the hall makes her flinch and point at Tayce accusingly. “Not a fucking word, right? Least of all to A’whora, if she knows then I might as well just tell Ellie myself and like fuck is that happening.”

Tayce nods rapidly in a promise as A’whora and Bimini emerge from the hall comedically draped in materials, like a child’s attempt at a dress made out of knitting and featherdown quilts. They all set about arranging everything to make their setup as comfy as possible, and as the film gets loaded up they get comfortable in their respective positions. Lawrence is at one end of the sofa, with Tayce in the middle and A’whora at her side, while Bimini sits on the floor with their back to the sofa because they’re quite happy sitting there with enough cushions and pillows. The big lights are turned off, the film begins, and the room is filled with the soft glow of the fairy lights and the hazy light from the movie and all Tayce can think about is A’whora, warm and soft and squashed up beside her sharing the blanket.

Tayce feels silly for being so disappointed. This was what she’d wanted- they’d talked about it. They’d addressed the fact that the kiss had happened, and now they were just…moving forward. Not making things awkward. Because obviously to A’whora, the fact it’s happened has made things awkward.

And that shouldn’t hurt Tayce as much as it does.

It’s hard to dwell on things for long, though, when she has block four flat ten’s very own Ant and Dec in her living room. Lawrence and Bimini keep her and A’whora giggling pretty much from the film’s first scene, and they all fall about screech-laughing when Bimini forces them to pause it on a shot of Liam Neeson’s hall in which there’s a horrific blob of a child’s painting on the wall that looks so cursed they just had to point it out.

It’s probably because Lawrence and Bimini are distracting her that Tayce doesn’t initially notice A’whora leaning into her at first until she’s pressed up against Tayce’s side. This isn’t anything out of the ordinary. They’ve always sat close before, but this time things feel different. This time it feels as if there’s little sparks of electricity between them, metaphorical manifestations of the anticipation Tayce feels of something she’s yearning to happen.

So when A’whora bumps her knuckles against Tayce’s, brings her hand over hers and laces their fingers together, Tayce feels as if she’s suddenly evolved into some ridiculous cartoon character; she can practically feel her eyes bulge out of their sockets in shock and she has to stop her jaw from dropping onto the floor. If her heart could comedically fly out of its chest it would. Tayce keeps her gaze steady and focused on the film, blocking out her peripheral vision and not even turning to see if A’whora’s looking at her too. Because if she is it would make everything ten times worse (better?) than it currently is, and Tayce’s head is already in a spin. They’ve held hands before. It’s not like this is different.

But it is. Before they hadn’t kissed. Before A’whora hadn’t told Tayce she wanted to sleep with her. Before all of Tayce’s feelings for her friend were cooped up into neat little boxes in her mind that were so full they were close to bursting, but now they have and now it’s After and so holding A’whora’s hand has gone from usual to extraordinary, routine to electric.

Tayce hopes A’whora can’t feel the way her pulse is racing because that’ll definitely let her know something is up.

She’s suddenly startled out of her overthinking by a tut of disapproval from Lawrence. “How many fuckin’ couples are in this film and there’s not one single lesbian?”

“Lesbians didn’t exist in 2003, remember?” Bimini deadpans, causing A’whora to giggle.

“Yeah, lesbians were invented in 2013 when Orange is the New Black aired.”

“Nah! When did Sugar Rush come out? Mind that programme on Channel 4? I remember watching that through a crack in the living room door when my parents thought I’d gone to bed,” Lawrence recounds excitedly, her enthusiasm at remembering her lesbian awakening making Tayce laugh and relate at the same time.

“For me it was Sophie and Sian. Remember on Coronation Street? They were my first lesbians.”

“At least you all got representation at some stage. If I wanted to see another pan I’d have to watch fuckin’…Kitchen Nightmares,” Bimini rolls their eyes, their joke making the girls howl with laughter and let out cries of consolation.

And then A’whora squeezes Tayce’s hand under the blanket.

Tayce thinks only for a second before squeezing it back, and subsequently doesn’t think before turning and looking at her friend beside her. A’whora shoots her a little smile that if Tayce didn’t know better she’d say was innocent, but the twinkle in her eye and the way she shuffles herself to lean closer against her and tuck her other hand into the crook of Tayce’s elbow makes her heart give a judder like she’s been crashed into from behind.

She supposes it’s only awkward if she makes things awkward, just like A’whora said. So when Tayce gently strokes A’whora’s hand with her thumb, it’s only to illustrate to A’whora that things aren’t weird between them. It’s not to see how the other girl is going to react to that at all. It’s not because being affectionate with A’whora just feels correct and perfect, the easiest thing in the world.

Tayce is holding her breath waiting for A’whora to do something else. Something to raise her hopes, something to show her that maybe she does want something to happen between them again. She wants the film to go on forever and give them infinite time in this no-man’s-land of comfortable tension, because when it ends she knows A’whora will probably just get up from under the blanket and slip away as if everything is back to normal.

When A’whora lets go of her hand, Tayce feels her hopes drop into the pit of her stomach, a rollercoaster coming to a dead stop. The ride is over.

But a second later she wraps her arm around Tayce’s waist, squeezes her close in a hug, and the ride begins all over again. Tayce’s heart rate spikes as she shifts a little, getting comfortable before bringing her arm around A’whora’s middle too and holding her right back.

It’s then that Lawrence’s voice makes Tayce snap her head away from the film, her glazed-over eyes having to focus on her friend who’s regarding her with a raised eyebrow. “Fuck’s going on under that blanket? You two fingering each other?”

Bimini snaps their head up and yells as Tayce tries to conceal the wave of panic that hits her, rolls her eyes and shakes her head and tells Lawrence that she needs to get her mind out the gutter. She’s sure that being called out will make A’whora flinch away, a woodland animal startled by a twig breaking, but she just giggles and buries her face into Tayce’s side all bashful.

God, Tayce wants to kiss her so much.

The film reaches the scene where Emma Thompson cries in her bedroom to Joni Mitchell, and the sniffing from the floor indicates she’s not the only one.

“Bimini! You said you hated this film!” Tayce laughs, nudging her friend with her foot.

“Yeah, but anyone who doesn’t cry at this scene is a hard-hearted bastard,” they reply, voice thick with emotion.

“Aww, BonBon. It’s okay, I’ve got a little tear as well,” A’whora murmurs from Tayce’s side. She huffs a sigh. “I can’t even believe anyone would fall for that pencil-skirt-wearing cow. I mean, she fucking manspreads and that’s supposed to be some sort of sexy come-on?”

“Aw, and like you could do any better?! We’ve all seen you trying to flirt, it’s embarrassing!” Lawrence cries in outrage.

Tayce is reminded of nights out earlier in the year when A’whora would talk to girls at bars and Tayce would always feel this inexplicable burn in her chest in response. She remembers the unfounded relief when A’whora would come back home to the flat with the rest of them, one-night-stand missions failed, and the churn in her stomach the times when she’d leave with a girl she didn’t know and sneak back into the flat at nine in the morning, ready to tell the others about her exploits from the night before which Tayce never wanted to hear.

She’s really fancied A’whora for a long time, now she thinks about it.

“I could so do better!” A’whora complains, and Tayce isn’t looking at her but she just knows she’s pouting.

Lawrence chuckles, tilting her head in amusement. “Go on then! What would your plan of action be, Miss fuckin’ Womaniser?”

There’s a pause before A’whora says, “Well I’d probably wait until we were both drunk on a night out, do tequila shots with them, drape myself over them, kiss them, then get them to take me back home.”

Tayce thinks she deserves an Oscar for the way she refuses to outwardly react to the way A’whora has essentially just described their kiss from that night out. Inside, however, it’s a different story. She’s not sure it’s possible for her heart to go any faster, and every cell of her body seems to buzz. She can barely hear Lawrence and Bimini laughing in response to A’whora’s comment for the way her blood’s roaring in her ears. Once the others stop paying attention and go back to watching the film, it’s only then that Tayce turns her head, raises one unimpressed eyebrow at A’whora who’s looking up at her with a scheming smirk on her face and a glint in her eye.

And right as she’s looking at her, A’whora closes her eyes and plants a kiss against Tayce’s arm then goes back to watching the movie as if nothing ever happened.

It’s at that point that Tayce feels her mouth dry up, feels something coil tight inside her and a throb between her legs. Something is going to happen the moment the pair of them are alone, she can feel it. There’s no way it can’t. In stark contrast to earlier, Tayce now wills the film to end sooner rather than later.

And it does. Finally. The credits roll, the Beach Boys are playing, and Lawrence slaps her thighs. “Well, that was a heap of shite!”

“I’ve still not forgiven Alan Rickman. God love the dead old bastard,” Bimini shrugs, heaves themself up off the floor and slides their phone out of their back pocket, scrolling busily. “Oh, Ellie’s asking if we wanna come join her an’ Anne for drinks. Apparently they’re in some boujie cocktail bar in town spending all their student loan and need responsible adults to stop them.”

“Why the hell are they asking us then?” Tayce quips, the giggle it elicits from A’whora sending a shockwave down her spine.

“I’m down to go meet them both. I’m already tipsy, might as well go the whole hog and get rat-arsed,” Lawrence says decisively, leaping up from the sofa and fixing Tayce and A’whora with an inquisitive glance. “You two coming?”

Tayce lets go of A’whora’s waist and stretches to make a point. “Nah, babe, I can’t. Got this essay due on Wednesday I’ve not started.”

Bimini snorts. “Yeah, I forgot. You’re dead on it and organised, in’t ya?”

Tayce pulls a face at them while Lawrence asks A’whora.

“Mmph. Think I need a nap before I even think about drinking any more, hun.”

Lawrence eyes them both suspiciously and appears to be about to say something else before Bimini tugs on her arm and distracts her. “C’mon then, let’s leave these two to be boring. Have fun, losers!”

Goodbyes are exchanged between them and Lawrence and Bimini finally leave, the fire door to the kitchen swinging shut and leaving the warm glow of the fairy lights, the blanket, the sofa, and A’whora gazing at her with that shit-eating smirk on her face again.

So Tayce wastes no time in bringing a hand up to her jaw, leaning down and kissing her, and judging by the way that A’whora melts into her and lets out a little happy sigh of satisfaction she’s been waiting for it just as much as Tayce has. They fall together like it’s easy, as if both of the times they’ve done this before have been all the practise they need. A’whora brings her hand to rest against Tayce’s cheek as if she’s trying to somehow pull her closer than she already is, and her neediness makes Tayce giggle against her lips. In turn it sets A’whora off, and when she pulls away their faces are still close and there’s little smiles on each of them.

“What’s so funny, you little bitch?” A’whora smirks, her barbed words cushioned by the way she’s wriggling onto Tayce’s lap and bringing her arms up to circle around her neck just like she did the first time in the club.

“Just you’re kind of giving me mixed signals here, baby. Saying you don’t want things to be awkward and then moving to me the entire film,” Tayce mutters, keeping a playful smile on her face despite the fact her words hold entirely too much truth.

It clearly takes the wind out of A’whora’s sails because she casts her gaze down, pauses before speaking and looking at Tayce from under her lashes. “I didn’t mean that, I just meant…I want us to be able to do stuff and not have it be awkward afterwards.”

Oh.

This is a game changer. So A’whora doesn’t regret anything. She doesn’t want them to go back to the way things were- well no, she does, just with an extra little bit of something more added in. She wants the friendship they have but she also clearly wants Tayce like she wants her back, and the realisation makes Tayce squeeze her thighs together, anticipation now so high she feels scared for her blood pressure.

Tayce tries not to let her realisation show on her face. Instead she looks at A’whora with interest, raises an eyebrow at her in amusement. “What’s ‘stuff’, then?”

“Well, just like…if we’re both horny and in the same flat then it saves us having to swipe Tinder for hours on end only to find a girl with a boyfriend who’s looking to ‘experiment’ and never found another girl’s clit in her life, doesn’t it?” A’whora shrugs blithely despite the blush that’s hit her cheeks, her turn of phrase making Tayce bite back a smile. “Whereas I’ve been told I’m quite good at that.”

The twinkle is back in A’whora’s eye again and the combination of that, her smirk and her words make Tayce’s stomach do a somersault. She can’t let it show, though, can’t let A’whora see her crack so she blinks to maintain her composure, tilts her head with mock-curiosity. “Have you now.”

“Yeah. Could show you if you wanted,” A’whora grins brazenly back at her, shifting a little in Tayce’s lap and sending her into orbit. “Plus I can’t remember if I put on matching underwear this morning, so…you should come help me check.”

Tayce breaks the stalemate to throw her head back in a laugh. “Jesus Christ, Lawrence was right. You actually can’t flirt to save yourself.”

She watches A’whora’s face drop into a pout and instantly feels as if she’s kicked a puppy, so Tayce brings one of her hands up to rest on top of her thigh and gives it a squeeze. “Says a lot for how fit you are that it’s still working though, doesn’t it?”

The pout cracks into a scheming smile, and Tayce matches it before A’whora leans in and kisses it off her face. It’s more heated this time, that little undercurrent of intensity as Tayce runs her tongue over A’whora’s and hears her whimper against her lips. As A’whora pushes her fingers into Tayce’s hair Tayce lets her hands drift around to the small of her back, and the way A’whora keeps shifting needily in her lap only makes Tayce want her more, which she didn’t think was even possible.

“We’ve got a free flat, you know,” A’whora mutters in between little kisses, her voice low as she whispers against her lips.

“Probably a good thing. You couldn’t be quiet if your life depended on it,” Tayce teases, running her fingers over the waistband of A’whora’s sweatpants in an attempt to try and convey how much she needs her.

“Oh, you have no idea, babe,” A’whora smirks before pulling away, ripping her top out from where it’s tucked into her waistband and tugging it off, barely even giving Tayce a chance to react. She’s left in a little black bralet with Playboy logos along a white band at the hem, and Tayce feels her mouth go dry.

She’s really, really hoping A’whora put on matching underwear this morning.

But she’s still taken aback because after all- they’re in the middle of their living room, and any of the others could walk in at any given moment- so she can’t help the way her mouth drops open and the way she lets out a little shocked giggle. “A’whora!”

“What?!” A’whora smiles smugly back at her, clearly glad she’s got the reaction she wanted.

“We’re not shagging on this couch, are you insane?! It’s rotten! Kim Woodburn would have a fit if she saw it!”

“Oh, so we are going to shag?” A’whora regards her with one cocked eyebrow, and Tayce can’t help but mirror it. There’s a pause before she gives a small huff of mock-resignation, sealing their fate.

“God. We’re really doing the whole friends with benefits cliché, then?”

A’whora smirks affectionately at her. “Only awkward if we make it awkward.”

She holds out her pinkie between them and Tayce takes it with a resigned laugh, the childish nature of their promise contrasting deeply with the whole situation.

“C’mon then, bestie, lead the way.”

And as A’whora scrambles excitedly off her lap and Tayce takes the opportunity to smack her ass playfully, she feels her heart soar and her head grow light at the thought of being able to do everything she’s been thinking about doing for over a month with one of her best friends in the world.

She wonders why everyone seems to say that a friends with benefits situation isn’t a good idea. This is already the best decision she’s made in years.

#rpdr fanfiction #rpdr uk #ortega #me and you together #taywhora #uk2 #lesbian au #british au #college au #freshers au #roommate au #tayce #a'whora #friends with benefits to lovers #lawrence chaney #ellie diamond #bimini bon boulash #tia kofi

14 notes · View notes

iknowyouthinkimbulletproof · 4 years

Text

If this is the last time- Calum Hood

A/N: first 5sos fic! Calum hood x y/n. Y/n’s gender is female for this fic, it just made it easier to write, my apologies to anyone it might upset, but you can always request. based off of If This Is The Last Time by LANY. Feel free to correct any mistakes! i don’t know if anyone will like this, but i do soooo.

https://open.spotify.com/track/3bsRMvQja4huvPWo1S5ONc

NOT MY GIF

plot: Entries for y/n’s last diary/book.

2077 words. * marks song lyrics

y/n’s diary:

(June 8th 2081) There's nothing better than the support of your family, so imagine having been admitted to the hospital and having every person you’ve grown to know as family waiting for you to leave the hospital. We knew it was coming, that one of us would have to go, but we didn’t know who and when. It’s me and soon. I’m not afraid though. My family’s strong, I know they are. Today he told me I looked beautiful, like he has every day of our life together, but it felt different. It was like a reassurance that no matter what, he meant his vows. Everything felt different today, even the simple touch of his hands while he drove me to the hospital. Especially the way our children said they loved me this morning. I’m ready. There's no point in fighting the cancer, it’s too far along and I'm far too old.

*I know we're gettin' old*

(January 15th 2082) It had begun after the boys last tour, the realization that we were no longer as young as we used to be. Our children started high school and y/s/n starting his own band, following in his father’s footsteps. y/d/n was too, but she had taken the football/soccer approach. They were good at it too. y/s/n having the same beautiful voice as Calum, but preferred the drums. He learned from a young age, he never really stopped admiring his uncle Ash. Which was really Ashton’s fault, almost spoiled him as much as Luke did y/d/n. Luke never got the girl he wanted, so he treated her as if he was one of his own. All the boys did, but Luke was like a second father to her. Which didn’t help with the Cake rumors during touring.

*the lines on our hands have changed, But you still look at me the same*

(September 29th 2082) My life has been amazing, maybe not from the start, but from the moment I laid my eyes on Calum Hood, the past didn’t matter. Nothing matters, nothing but him. Well until my children of course...and then my grandchildren. He stood by me for all of it and I love him for it. He promised forever and that's what we got. There's nothing I could ever do to repay him, or at least in my eyes.

*Hey, mom, guess what? You're really tough.*

(November 15th 2082) This is for my children, I hope you’re reading. I love you, I'll always love you because there’s no way not to. From the moment you were both born to the moment your children were born, I was amazed by the amount of growth possible. I hope one day you’ll have the same joy I did watching your grandchildren being raised by the amazing creatures you created. I hope that one day when you pass, it’ll be surrounded by the ones you love. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to love you, I don't know what I did to deserve you, but I'm very grateful.

*And I know you did all you could. Just to make sure my life was good*

(December 25th 2082) It was worth it, all of it. The pain, the tears, the blood. My life is complete.

*Sorry for the fights and the tone of my voice, Sorry for the nights when I made the wrong choice*

(January 1st 2083) Not a lot of people know, but Calum and i’s relationship was almost torn apart when our children were in high school. It had nothing to do with them of course, but life for Cal had been stressful. He had confessed he felt like he had no purpose now that he thought his career was over. Of course it wasn’t true, but he was like a bull in a china shop. After many nights of hushed fighting, y/s/n had gotten into it. He had convinced his father to start therapy and got him into football/soccer again. From then on, y/d/n got him to become her team's coach and he stayed there until retirement, he said he felt complete after retirement.

*Life is flyin' by and it's hittin' me now. I hope it's not, but*

(January 5th 2083) Sitting here rereading all of my old diaries, has me regretting not taking the course of treatment. I'm gonna miss everyone. That might be hard to believe considering I will no longer be roaming the planet, but everyone means so much to me.

*If this is the last time, please come close*

(January 12th 2083) It's too soon.

*I love you with all my heart, you know. I don't wanna cry, I'm bad at goodbye*

(January 13th 2083) This is my written goodbye for those who I love.

Michael you’ve always been my best friend. I appreciate you taking me in like you knew me forever, like I was there with you and Calum throughout school. I'm sorry I didn't give you another niece to spoil, I know you wanted one you didn’t have to say it. With everything in me, I hope you're the last one of us here, I trust you the most other than Calum to take care of our families. If you are, I hope I don't tear you apart, we’ll all be up here waiting for you.

Luke, where do i start, i owe you 30 bucks. You always said that I would go before Cal, you were right. Don't worry, no hard feelings, none of us actually expected it so soon. But you better be there when my first great-grandchild is born. Make y/d/n name them after me. I'm just kidding, although……

Ashton, thank you for being the big brother I didn't know I needed. Thank you for loving my family like your own and for taking care of Cal when I couldn't. I’m coming to join you right now, see you soon brother.

Kristal, Sierra, and kay-kay…...Bye my bitches, see you soon. I'm just messing with you, you better keep your stubborn asses on this planet a while more. I'll be taking care of ashton for you kay.

For the fans, who have loved my not so small family, there will be a 5sos reunion waiting for you when you pass, but not too soon.

y/d/n and y/s/n stick together or you grounded. I love you, I already said everything I needed to say to you, take care of my grandchildren.

Now Calum, i don’t think i need to write anything for you, we’ve always been honest with each other. Don’t come see me until you’ve met our great-grandchild, stay there for a while until you have enough memories to share with me. Hold our children tight, i know i won’t get to anymore. Just because I'm leaving doesn’t mean you don’t get to spend more time with me, I'll be watching you. When you join me, we’ll get to spend more decades together, and just like the first time you met me, you won’t be able to get away

*If this is the last time,Then let's do the things we always do,Like go to the mall and buy some shoes*

(January 16th 2083) My last day before I'm on bed rest, for the rest of my life in fact. y/d/n was determined to take everyone in the family to the mall. I didn’t get anything of course, but I did suggest a couple of clothing items for my funeral. My funeral, that’s weird to think about. I did get Calum a pair of shoes though. His feet will not walk in with the raggedy old shoes he loves so much.

*I don't wanna cry, I'm bad at goodbye. If this is the last time*

(January 21st 2083) Here I am, on my deathbed, writing what will probably be my last entry. Calum on the other bed in the room, of course he had it pushed next to mine. “We haven’t slept apart in decades, why start now.” I hope he doesn’t take it hard, but I can feel it coming. I can feel the pull. Watching the monitors and seeing the numbers change drastically. We've been saying goodbyes for a while now. As much as it pains me to say this is my final goodbye. Goodbye.

*Hey, dad, what's up? Miss you so much

Yeah, the shade of your hair has changed

But I look up to you the same*

(March 20th 2085) y/n asked us to turn her diary’s into a book series, we had, this is my continuation of the last one. y/s/n has promised to keep publishing them after i’m gone. He said he knew how much it would mean to his mother. Unfortunately this is my last entry as well. I will be joining y/n soon, i knew i wouldn’t make it long without her, i was right. They say i’ll probably die in my sleep sometime this week. I have our children staying with me, waiting till I go. I already said my goodbyes to our grandchildren and my brothers. My mother has been gone for a while, I can't wait to see her again. Mali wished me luck and said she would see us again. I hope it’s not too soon, I want her to be there while y/s/n and y/d/n grieve a second death. y/n said she wasn’t afraid, i understand now. Anyways, I guess this is goodbye.

*Taught me how to fish, taught me how to ride a bike*

(July 25th 2086) Hey guys, it’s y/s/n and y/d/n this time. I hope you enjoyed reading mom, and some of dad's writings. I'm not quite passing yet, but my sister and I thought this last book is not quite done yet. We wanted to add our goodbyes to mom and dad as well. Maybe we shouldn’t write it here, but it feels right. We wanted to say thank you to all the fans who have supported our parents for decades, or even the newer ones. So thank you, you made our parents who they were and in return, made us and our families who they are. We love it thank you. So, goodbye dad. It might be a few decades till we see each other, but we are currently teaching my son how to ride his bike, just like you did me all those years ago, thank you for that. y/d/n is teaching hers to fish, we know it wasn’t mom's idea of fun, but she always did it with us, so now we are doing it with our families.

*Taught me how to love, how to treat a woman right. Life is flyin' by and it's hittin' me now*

(September 6th 2086) y/g/d/n here, i asked mom if i could write something as well, just wanted to thank my grandparents for everything! That's a lot to thank for, I know, but I forgot before they passed. I also wanted to inform them that I finally started college, makes me think of what they would have done if they were here.

*If this is the last time, please come close

I love you with all my heart, you know

I don't wanna cry, I'm bad at goodbye

If this is the last time

Then let's do the things we always do

Like go for a drive or watch the news

I don't wanna cry, I'm bad at goodbye

If this is the last time*

(May 7th 2090) The last entry of the last book of my grandmother’s series. It’s y/g/s/n for your information. The last written update, it’s been years since grandma wrote in this book, but she got what she wanted, uncle Michael truly was the last of the bunch. He’s here waiting for his turn, but he did what was asked of him….and Luke. My first child wasn’t named after grandma, but when we were having our second Michael jumped at the opportunity, he’s holding y/n right now. He said she looks like a young grandma, so i guess it’s fitting. He’s on his way to join our family right now, I'm the last to say goodbye. I know you probably heard it a lot in this book, but thank you guys for everything, we love you.

#calum hood x y/n #calum x reader #calum hood #5sos imagine #sad imagines #fluffy angst?#fic #imagines #sorry not sorry #Lots of Love #-Lizza

56 notes · View notes