#i spend like half of the time thinking about the mess that is the timeline

[godofstupidsentences]

Just realized that if season 5 ended in October (circa) and season 6 started like three months later but stiles (and consequently Theo) wasn’t brought back until SIX months later…

Theo turned 18 in hell

[still-a-morosexual-help]

Another realisation about Solomon post? Yes.

But First!

Let's talk about MC and Mammon's friendship (like I haven't spoken about it enough)

(platonically) general MC is probably the closest with Mammon:

• Beel mentions this in early S1 - saying that MC frequently seeks Mammon out to talk with him

• Levi mentions this in both S2 and Nightbringer

• Belphie briefly implies it in a chat

• Mammon has spoken about it multiple times

• Mammon & MC have been sharing a room frequently enough for him to leave his toothbrush and phone charger in their room from early S1 all the way up to S4

• His birthday is the only one they took charge and planned on their own, starting the gift giving a whole week before the actual date

• He's the only person in the circus event that they instantly remembered without having to talk with him first

• He's the first one in Nightbringer to fully accept them and start bringing them into the family shenanigans

• There are dialogue options like this, that aren't really options at all

• He's always their first - their first friend in every timeline and alternate universe

Okay so, now to the actual point of the post:

Solomon (in Nightbringer) asks MC if they've made any progress towards making the new pacts and MC says they're working on Mammon.

We know, obviously, why MC picks Mammon:

• He's their first. Not only does it seem like the right thing, they know him enough to know he'll throw a huge tantrum if he wasn't their first

• He's the safest and easiest option (I speak about this in more detail here) but basically he's the most settled after the Fall, the least likely to react badly or in anger, the least likely to accidentally hurt them and an extremely loyal ally (post here)

• Most importantly, he's their friend and they genuinely just like spending time with him

Solomon however, says something along the lines of picking Mammon being a smart choice because Mammon seems lonely.

Solomon's first thought was to see MC and Mammon's relationship from a strategic point of view. He saw a weakness (a true weakness btw, I actually have half a fic written from a year ago about Mammon being lonely in the Celestial Realm and I really need to complete it) and he exploited it to get what he wanted - similar to how he made a pact with Asmo in the present day timeline.

Solomon saying/doing this isn't really a bad thing, but I think it really adds to his character and shows his differences when compared to MC. It also really adds weight to the whole:

• locked away in a basement and hidden from the world during his childhood

• had one childhood friendship which is implied to have ended badly

• spent thousands of years without any real friends despite the fact that he had at least three people (Asmo, Barbatos and Thirteen) who genuinely cared for him

• admitted to not seeing the demons he made pacts with as friends until either s3 or 4, despite the fact that, even pre-series, Solomon is one of the people Asmo genuinely likes, cares about, values the opinion of, wants to impress and initially feels nervous around because of this

I just...

I love it when they give you a smiley and chill, kinda goofy, character whose past is a little mysterious and then you figure out oh he's got a tragic past and also his world view and thought processes are very messed up but also a product of his past

10/10 character actually

Relevant Posts:

• Solomon's World View and Thought Processes

• How Solomon's Past Shaped Him

[yelena-bellova]

Heartfirst: A Ted Lasso Story - Chapter Eleven

Chapter Eleven: Christmas for Two

Plot: Away from their families, Jamie and Y/n attempt to do Christmas together.

Word Count: 4.1k

Warnings: f!reader, language, talk of alcoholism, child abuse/neglect

A/N: A little Christmas in July/Phil Dunster Emmy nomination gift for you all! I have no clue what the timeline on s3 is, but this felt like a good place to put a Christmas chapter. I also did my best to combine English and American Christmas traditions/vernacular, hopefully did okay. Hope you enjoy!! 🎄❤️

—————

The coach’s office was a mess of ribbons and wrapping paper.

Ted gasped as he opened the box sat in his lap, “You are kiddin’ me.”

Stood in a corner of the room, Y/n beamed.

“C’mon now,” Ted pulled out the bottle of American barbecue sauce, “Where’d you find this?”

“Specialty store in Chiswick,” Y/n replied, “I was there seeing if Britain had finally caved and brought over Ben and Jerry’s. Spoiler alert: they have not.”

Ted was grinning ear to ear, “Man, this is special. Thank you, Y/n.”

On their traditional half-day of work on Christmas, the AFC Richmond staff were holding their party. Gifts were exchanged and treats were eaten. One room over, the Greyhounds were having their own celebration.

“Yes, I think you’ve got us all beat for gifts,” Rebecca said from her corner, sniffing one of the tea bags in the collection Y/n had gifted her.

“Not true,” Y/n held up a finger before holding up the spa certificate Rebecca had just handed her. “I just know the power of American barbecue.”

“And yet,” Beard held out his hands in expectation, “None for me.”

Y/n rolled her eyes, knowing how happy he actually was with the philosophy book she’d found him.

“So,” Ted drummed his hands on his desk, “What’s everybody’s plans for today?”

“The Higgins’ door will be open and ready to receive any and all weary travelers,” Higgins volunteered, “I believe most of the boys are coming.”

“I’ve got dinner with Nora and Sassy,” Rebecca said.

“Fun,” Ted said, looking over across the room, “What about you, Roy?”

“Phoebe’s got a pageant at school,” the coach replied, “Fuck knows why it wasn’t last night.”

“Nice,” Ted smiled, “Y/n?”

Y/n exhaled, “Well, my sister couldn’t come over this year, so it’ll just be dinner with a friend.”

“What about your folks?” Ted asked.

“Yeah, uh,” Y/n tried to put on a smile, “They couldn’t make it either.”

“Too bad,” Higgins empathized, “Well, if you and your friend don’t feel like cooking, there’s always room at our table.”

Y/n nodded, “Thanks.”

Things lasted another half hour or so before people began to trickle out, off to their respective plans. Y/n stayed behind, having volunteered to clean up since everyone else’s day was time sensitive. She was just tying the trash bag of wrapping paper when there was a knock.

Jamie hung on the frame that separated the coach’s offices, “Ready to go?”

“Yeah,” Y/n set the bag in the corner of Roy’s office, “That’ll be Monday’s problem.”

Grabbing her bag of gifts and switching off the lights, Y/n glided past Jamie, who followed behind. They ducked out into the hall, some of the last people in the building.

Christmas was an off holiday for both of them. With the match against Crystal Palace that weekend, Jamie couldn’t get away to Manchester to visit his mom. And Y/n hadn’t lied when she said her sister couldn’t travel to spend the day with her, but she had lied about her parents. They had every opportunity to phone and ask her to come home, or to visit. They just chose not to.

So, with nowhere else to go, Jamie and Y/n had decided to spend the holiday together.

“Are there even any markets open on Christmas Day?” Y/n asked once they were in the parking lot.

“Yeah, I think there’s one near here,” Jamie unlocked his car door. They’d carpooled in the interest of the shopping they had planned after the party.

“I hope you thought right,” Y/n said as she climbed in the passenger seat, “Or else it’s going to be a pretty funky dinner.”

Jamie had, indeed, guessed right. There was one market open for half a day in Richmond for the cooks who’d forgotten that one ingredient. Y/n and Jamie, however, were starting completely from scratch.

“Okay,” Jamie tugged on one of the shopping trolleys and swung it around, “What do we need?”

“Everything,” Y/n stated, “You ever cooked a Christmas dinner?”

“Uh, no,” he replied, “You? We’re fucked if you say no.”

Y/n scanned the rows of aisles, unsure of where to start. “No, I have. It’s just been a while. Like, not-since-America while.”

Jamie puffed out his cheeks, “Right.”

“Okay,” Y/n clapped her hands together, “Turkey. Main attraction. Let’s start there.”

Down the aisle where the entrees should have been, there was an empty case. A few lonesome birds were still chilling, but it was clear all the good ones had been chosen long ago.

“So we’ve either got a fuckin’ Goliath,” Jamie held up a massive turkey in one arm, then the smallest in his other, “Or its baby.”

Y/n crinkled her nose at the colorful description. “I mean, that one’s meant for way more than two people,” she pointed to the first option, “It’s not like we need leftovers.“

Jamie nodded, that was true. Roy had allowed him one cheat day for the holidays, the free pass ended at 12AM, December 26th. But be was determined to enjoy the one meal.

“So the baby?” Jamie held up the small bird.

“If you stop calling it that,” Y/n grabbed the cart, “Yes.”

Jamie laughed cheekily, setting the turkey in the basket. “Right, what else?”

“Stuffing, potatoes, something for dessert,” Y/n listed items off her mental menu. She glanced over at Jamie, “Really hope we can cook.”

They went around the rest of the store, picking leftovers off the barren shelves. Unfortunately, that left either the specialty items or the nearly expired dishes, which was how they ended up with the most expensive potatoes, gluten free stuffing mix and a pudding that was on its sell-by date.

“Who was your secret Santa?” Y/n asked as they passed the wine aisle.

“Dani,” Jamie answered, “Why?”

Y/n stopped and backtracked her steps, reaching for the first bottle of red wine she saw. She’d stopped by the locker room on occasions where the Greyhounds won and had caught a whiff of the strong Mexican liquor Dani favored. A world didn’t exist where she felt like subjecting her stomach to that.

“Smart,” Jamie agreed as she popped the drink in the trolley.

They managed to get in and out quick enough that the only person who recognized Jamie was the cashier, who didn’t do more than wish him luck on the upcoming match. Y/n wasn’t used to worrying about being photographed, but she knew that any time she stepped out with Jamie, there was a chance of it.

As they loaded the bags into the boot of Jamie’s car, Y/n caught one lone present, wrapped and tied with a ribbon, pushed to the side.

“Did you forget someone today?”

“Huh?” Jamie hummed. Y/n pointed to the box. “Ah, no,” he shut the boot before she could get a better look and smirked, “That’s for later.”

Y/n pursed her lips a little, smiling as Jamie walked the cart back to its station.

“Alright,” he said as they got back in the car, “We doin’ this at my place or yours?”

Y/n thought for a second, “Do you even know how to use your kitchen?”

“Course I do,” Jamie paused a second, “I mean…pretty sure.”

“Uh-huh,” Y/n chuckled, “My place it is. That, or we ask Sam for the keys to the restaurant.”

Jamie backed the car out of its spot, “Think we need to have a bit more confidence for that.”

Y/n agreed silently, before her thoughts fell to the inevitable. A few weeks prior, during the whole Twitter fiasco, Sam’s restaurant had been broken into and destroyed. The night of the Arsenal match, the boys had all gone over to repair it, surprising Sam. Y/n had yet to see it in its restored glory.

“I feel like we got a pretty good handle, though,” Jamie interrupted her thoughts, “We got the meal, the crackers, place’ll be all decorated…”

Hoping his eyes were more focused on the road then her, Y/n grimaced.

“Yeah,” she said, “That’s, uh…”

“What?” Jamie asked.

“I’m not…totally decorated,” Y/n struggled to get out.

“You’ve got a tree at least, yeah?” Jamie replied.

Silence.

Fate bestowed him a red light, and Jamie turned to Y/n with widened eyes. “You haven’t got a tree? The fuck’s wrong with you?”

“I’ve been busy,” Y/n defended the decision, “I’ve barely been home between the away games and working late. There wasn’t much of a point in getting one.”

Jamie let his hand smack against the steering wheel, “Unbelievable.”

“Wha- you don’t have one either,” Y/n argued. There’d been a stunning lack of Christmas cheer in Jamie’s house the last week when he’d been appointed to host the monthly team dinner.

“That’s different,” Jamie put his foot to the gas as the car behind him honked.

“How?” Y/n laughed.

Jamie shrugged, “I dunno. You’re you. Figured you’d be one of those people who’s decoratin’ the day after Halloween.”

In another life, that was her. Y/n had been all over Christmas in her younger years. Every holiday was a speed bump in getting to December 24th and 25th. But once she’d graduated and started her corporate life, it became less and less of a big deal. If it was a year Caylee came to visit, she’d dust off decorations and make a show of it, but it just seemed sad to do it all on her own.

“Well, I’m sorry to disappoint,” Y/n smiled, ignoring the particular bit of backstory she didn’t feel like sharing.

“You’re not,” Jamie replied as he signaled to get into the next lane, “‘Cause we’re fixin’ this.”

Y/n looked out the window, the turn that would’ve been theirs was drifting further and further away. “Where are we going?”

“You’ll see.”

Ten minutes later, Jamie was pulling the car into a Christmas tree lot. Or rather, what once was a Christmas tree lot.

“Can’t believe these places are even open today,” Y/n commented as they walked up to the shop.

“They’re here for the sad sacks who wait till the last minute,” Jamie remarked smugly, nudging Y/n’s elbow with his.

Like the market, the lot was sparse. The only trees left were either the type that shed its needles if you breathed on it or the ones that were already turning brown.

“I’m not overwhelmed by our options,” Y/n said, scanning the rows over again.

“Hang on,” Jamie climbed behind one of the half-dead ones, having spotted a flash of green as he’d passed. He pulled out a miniature one that barely went up to his waist.

“It truly is a Charlie Brown Christmas,” Y/n remarked, smiling at the juxtaposition between Jamie’s size and the tree.

“I mean, it is going in the bin tomorrow, innit?” Jamie picked up the glorified shrub and brought it to the poor worker stuck there on Christmas Day. “We’ll take this one.”

“And we’ll just stick it in the car,” Y/n added, catching Jamie’s confusion and whispering, “We are not making him go to the trouble of tying a houseplant to the roof.”

As Y/n handed the worker a few bills, Jamie spotted a small stack of ornaments and stands for sale as well. He grabbed one of each and pulled a few pounds out his wallet, adding to the total.

“Thank you,” Y/n said to the man, “Merry Christmas.”

Jamie looked proud as they walked back to the car, “Now it’s Christmas.”

Y/n couldn’t argue with him.

—————————

Once they got back to Y/n’s place, Jamie took over unpacking the groceries, while Y/n dug through the hall closet to find some lights for the tree.

“Oi,” Jamie called down the hallway, holding the box of stuffing, “We can still cook this normal, yeah? We don’t have to do anything different.”

“I would think,” Y/n yelled back, waist deep in old boxes, “It’s just bread.”

Jamie went back to the kitchen, he remembered his way around from when they’d unpacked it months ago. The only thing that had changed was the light fixture.

“That’s new,” he said, hearing Y/n’s footsteps approaching.

“Oh, yeah,” she replied, setting an old strand of multicolored lights on the counter, “Ted helped me install it last week. Couple shocks…mostly Ted, but we got it up.”

Jamie chuckled.

“Okay,” Y/n looked to the pile of food beside the stove, “I’ll do the turkey, you start on sides?”

Giving a little salute, Jamie went about grabbing bowls and spoons. Y/n pre-heated the oven and took the turkey out of its wrapping.

“Ugh,” she groaned, peeking inside the bird, “I forgot how disgusting this part is.”

Jamie glanced over and scoffed, “Nope.”

Y/n shut her eyes as she reached in and pulled out the giblets, nearly gagging as she did.

“Carry on with that,” Jamie teased, making a show of pouring in the very dry stuffing mix, “I’ll stay doing this.”

Annoyed, and slightly jealous, Y/n cupped the unmentionable parts of the turkey in her hands and approached Jamie.

“Hey, hey, hey,” he held up a wooden spoon as if it were a shield, “Get away. There’s probably, like, four different bird diseases in there.”

“Yep,” Y/n continued walking towards him, “Don’t get smug in my kitchen, or you’ll be benched with three of them.”

Jamie held up his hands in defeat, “Truce.”

The two of them snorted and snickered before carrying on with their tasks.

It all flowed rather well. Even though they were lacking in skill, Y/n and Jamie felt good about how well everything seemed to be going. In between mixing and flipping, they managed to get the tree in its stand and start decorating. As Jamie was finishing with the ornaments, Y/n popped over to check the turkey, surprised by what she found.

“Shit,” she exclaimed, reaching for the oven mitts.

“What?” Jamie called.

Hurriedly, she opened the oven door and pulled the bird out. The outer layer was far beyond well done, looking tough and chewy.

Jamie entered then, puzzled, but chuckling. “Thought you said you knew how to cook a dinner.”

“I do,” Y/n replied, her voice jumping an octave, “With a much bigger bird. This is a pigeon!”

Jamie was full on laughing by then, covering his mouth.

“Oh, yeah, Padma Lakshmi,” Y/n retorted with a smirk, “Smell that?”

The air was thick with the scent of something burning, and it wasn’t the meat. Jamie pushed past Y/n to get to the stuffing and potatoes he’d put on. Determining the stuffing was the cause of the scent, he switched the burner off and attempted to scoop it out of the pot.

What came out was one giant clump, burnt to a crisp on the bottom and around the edges.

Y/n snorted as she set the turkey on the counter, hand on her hip as she watched Jamie work up a reply. When he came up with nothing, holding the burnt blob on an oversized fork, the two of them fell into a fit of laughter.

In the spirit of Christmas magic, they were able to salvage the dinner. They scooped out the good stuffing, trimmed the chewy parts of the turkey off, and agreed the potatoes were the only dish that looked semi-normal.

After, with their paper crowns on their heads, Jamie and Y/n sat on opposite ends of the couch, still amused at their efforts.

“I think we did pretty good,” Jamie gestured to his chest.

Y/n made a doubtful noise, “We’re a ways away from opening our own Ola’s.”

“We’re keeping takeaways in business,” Jamie replied, “Think about it that way.”

“Oh, that we are,” Y/n smiled, taking a sip of wine, “That we are. And hey, you got to eat.”

Jamie slapped a hand over his sated stomach, “Don’t know if my body’s knows what to do with it.”

Y/n laughed before Jamie smacked his hands together. “Right, time for gifts.”

Y/n stayed in her spot, “That’s assuming I got you anything.”

Jamie looked back from the front door, shooting her a quirked eyebrow. Y/n smiled and got up, like there was a chance in hell she’d have neglected to get him something.

They each went to retrieve the gifts, meeting back on the couch. Jamie was holding the mystery box he’d had stashed in his trunk.

“You first,” he said as they swapped packages.

Y/n unwrapped the square, nearly holding her breath as she took off the box’s lid. Peeling back the tissue paper revealed-

“Oh, good Lord.”

Jamie was somewhere between a grin and a smirk. Whatever it was, he wore it proudly.

Y/n held up the #9 ‘Tartt’ jersey and smirked at Jamie. “Really?”

“You’re gonna work at a football club, you gotta have a kit,” Jamie shrugged.

“And it had to be #9, huh?” Y/n quirked an eyebrow, “Couldn’t have been Colin or Sam’s?”

Jamie scoffed, “They ain’t your favorite.”

Y/n let out a single laugh, “What makes you think you are?”

“Don’t see either of them sittin’ here on Christmas with ya,” Jamie replied, “In a flat they found for ya, eatin’ a dinner they cooked with ya.”

It was hard not to laugh at Jamie’s cockiness. Behind the raging over-confidence, there was something sweet behind the gesture that Y/n could appreciate.

“Well,” Y/n set the jersey back in the box, “I’m not wearing it to matches.”

“Oh, why not?” Jamie asked unseriously.

“Because I’m there for all of you,” Y/n smirked, “And if I’m wearing anyone’s shirt, it’ll be Roy’s.”

“Oh, fuck off,” Jamie moaned. Roy and Y/n had bonded on the mornings she joined them for training. The two of them took such joy in torturing Jamie.

Y/n set the Tartt box to the side and handed Jamie his gift. He went about unwrapping it, a little speechless when he removed the last of the paper.

“This from last week’s match?” He asked.

“Mm-hm,” Y/n hummed, hugging her legs to her chest.

In a thick silver frame was a picture of the Greyhounds on the pitch at Nelson Road. Sam, Jamie and Isaac were the most prominently featured. Sam had just scored a goal and a heap of the players were celebrating. It was a perfect representation of the brotherhood they carried with them on and off the field.

“One of the photographers snapped it and I asked him to send it to me,” Y/n explained, “I noticed you didn’t have any pictures up at your place, thought this could be the first one.”

Jamie’s home decor was less than personal. His first few years in the Premier League hadn’t come with many close relationships, his own fault. Most of his family pictures were tainted with memories of something that had happened the days they were taken involving his dad. That didn’t leave him many options.

But this, Jamie thought as he weighed the frame in his hand, this was special. Not only was it his team, his mates, his place in the world, but Y/n had seen the value of it all.

Jamie looked up at her, the corners of his lips tugging upwards, “I love it.”

Y/n grinned, shopping for everyone had been stressful. It had been a long time since she’d had to choose personal gifts, and there’d been a part of her that wanted to throw away the whole gesture. But she’d pushed past her instincts, choosing to give into sentiment. One look at how touched Jamie and the others had been told her it had been worth it.

“Well,” Jamie set the frame on the coffee table, next to his kit, “We can call this a win, yeah?”

“For sure,” Y/n said, reaching out to clink her wine glass against Jamie’s, “Best makeshift Christmas ever.”

“Yeah,” Jamie cackled.

“Best Christmas you’ve ever had?” Y/n asked, “Go.”

Jamie blew out a breath, thinking back. The last few holidays had been spent either in Manchester with his mum or on his own. Two years before, when he was back at Man City, he’d ended up with his dad for part of the day, which left him miserable. If he was being honest, the last Christmas Jamie had truly enjoyed was the one he was currently celebrating.

“Eh, probably when I were a kid,” he answered, “Forget how old I was, but it was the first year I remember being really into football. Me mum got me my first kit.”

Y/n looked over her wineglass, “Was it Roy’s?”

Jamie sighed, glaring softly at her, “Not the point.”

Y/n chortled.

“It was one year me dad was too drunk to remember what day it were,” Jamie went on, his eyes falling on the wall as the memories hit, “Spent the whole day worried he was gonna show up, but…never did. By dinner, I think even mum knew he weren’t coming ‘round, and everything just sorta…relaxed, y’know? Didn’t feel like Christmas till then.”

Jamie’s blue eyes melted into some sort of sad resignation. It was a piece of his history that still hurt, but enough time had passed to see the silver lining, if there was one to be found. He wouldn’t have told the story to anyone else, but this was Y/n. She understood.

Y/n smiled softly, feeling the melancholia. “And you went to bed wearing your little Roy Kent jersey?”

Jamie’s smile came back, thankful for the change in tone. “Fuck you,” he replied, downing the last of his wine, “Right, what’s yours?”

Y/n sighed, like Jamie, there weren’t many to pick from. “Probably when I was eleven. My parents were hosting some party and they pawned me and my sister off on our grandparents. I think they could see that they had zero interest in being with us or giving us a good Christmas, so they went overboard. My grandma got me and Caylee in the kitchen cooking with her,” Y/n glanced at the kitchen where the remnants of dinner sat, “Clearly none of the skills stuck with me. My grandpa had all the movies playing, he tried to keep us laughing as much as he could.”

Taking a breath, Y/n continued, “I remember Caylee and I wrote this Christmas play before dinner. There was a lot of dancing and a lot of off-key singing,” she laughed, Jamie snorted, “But…damn it if our grandparents weren’t up on their feet clapping as if we’d just done Hamlet.”

Though shitty parents came as no surprise to Jamie, he was still a bit shocked. His voice was soft as he asked, “They really just left you?”

Y/n nodded, hugging herself, “Most years.”

The two of them sat in silence, their mutual history sitting in the gap between their bodies. The holidays amplified the best in the world, goodwill and generosity, but for those already hurting, the ever-present loneliness only intensified.

“Don’t know why people have kids if they don’t want ‘em,” Jamie mused, his eyes flitting to Y/n.

She shrugged, her hand curled against her lips. “I’ve been asking myself that since I was old enough to. Haven’t found an answer yet.”

In the moment their eyes met, Y/n and Jamie were struck by just how similar they really were. They’d known it already, it was one of the reasons they got along so well, but it felt like there was a different reality to it. Another layer peeled back, another piece of themselves they were entrusting to the other. And, above all other things, it was safe.

Y/n sniffled, wiping a stray tear away, “This is getting depressing. It’s Christmas.”

“Yeah,” Jamie cleared his throat.

Climbing off the sofa, Y/n went over to the kitchen bar and grabbed her Bluetooth speaker. She connected her phone and pulled up her Christmas playlist.

Jamie watched from his spot on the couch as she slid over to him, hand extended. “What are we doing?”

“We’re going to dance,” Y/n replied, “And we’re going to celebrate the fact that it’s Christmas and we’re somewhere better than we’ve been.”

If it were another day, Jamie wouldn’t have hesitated to make some joke of what Y/n had said. How of course it was better, because he was there. But all he really wanted to do, and what he did do, was take her hand, anchor them together and dance to whatever overly cheery song was playing.

All over Richmond, the uplifting mood was hitting its peak. Ted was on the phone with Henry, sharing his dinner and his son’s lunch, talking about what Santa had brought. Rebecca was giggling with Nora and Sassy at a five star restaurant. Keeley was seated at a full family table at her mother’s. Roy was with his sister, applauding Phoebe as her and her classmates took their bows. Beard was helping Leslie carve a massive turkey as Sam, Dani, Jan, and the rest of the Greyhounds sat around foldout tables. Y/n and Jamie were giggling uncontrollably as he picked her up and spun her around, the sounds of Nat King Cole filling the flat.

For all of them, it was Christmas to remember.

—————

Heartfirst Taglist: @lalla-04p @optimisticsandwichgladiator @makingmunson94 @taytaylala12 @storysimp @sokkigarden @lightninginab0ttle @poohkie90 @alipap3 @verra-nerevarine @shineforever19 @spaceagechimera @burnafter-reading @qardasngan @cyberpvnk-enthusiast @sogoodtoheritsvicious @buckybarnex @angelsunflxwer @blueanfield @thewildestwonderland @sablecities @oxxolovemelikeyoudooxxo @strawberryacethingz @mentalistfan @tortilla-maria1 @katdahlali @for-fuck-sake-im-alive @glitterquadricorn @jamieolivia27 @imvibin69 @katlizada @lil-tracys @fanaticalfantasist @heyitz-julia @cactajuice @peachyy-tea @notalxx @rockchickrebel @anxiety-prime-max @loveforaugust @jellycolors @actuallybarb @heletsmelovehim @lovinnscarletknight @imfalling-inlove @leslieiscrying @meg-ro @littlemisssunshine192 @beboldbebravethings @maydayfigment @spencerreidsbookclub @dream-alittlebiggerdarling @lemoonandlestars

[bansheeys]

Sylvanas bakes something for Jaina. It either ends up miraculously tasting incredible, or being a complete disaster from start to finish.

This prompt occurs sometime in my Tangled Fates fic, where Jaina travels to another timeline where she and Sylvanas are married.

Thanks for the idea! Hope you enjoy it!

Now I want donuts...

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

With the final stroke of Sylvanas’ elegant, elvish signature, the office door swung open. She looked up to see her very pregnant wife walking toward her with determination.

“You know you’re banned from coming in here, right, Dalah’surfal?” Sylvanas said, her tone only half-joking.

Jaina was just days away from giving birth and had been forbidden from entering the office. The healers had prescribed bed rest to reduce her stress, which meant no paperwork or overseeing the kingdom.

As much as Sylvanas detested paperwork, she was willing to shoulder Jaina’s responsibilities. Her wife, however, was not pleased. Jaina had tried to sneak into the office many times, like an elf addicted to mana, twitching to tend to the paperwork. Sylvanas had ultimately prohibited her from entering the office.

“I’m not here for paperwork,” Jaina said. She lowered herself into the chair in front of the desk, resting her hand on her stomach and looking uncomfortable. “I have a favor to ask.”

Sylvanas set down her pen and tilted her head. “Luckily, I’m done for the day. What does your heart desire?”

Jaina looked down at her hands, fidgeting with the fabric of her dress. “I have a craving...”

Throughout the pregnancy, it wasn’t unusual for Jaina to crave something sweet. She once woke in the middle of the night wanting rice pudding. Now, all she wanted was rice pudding. 

“I think there’s one serving of the pudding left,” Sylvanas said.

“No!” Jaina practically shouted, causing Sylvanas to raise her eyebrows. “I’m craving something unusual. It requires a bit of effort.”

Now, Sylvanas was curious about what Jaina wanted. So far, her wife’s cravings had been fairly ordinary. Vereesa had warned her about this—she’d craved cherry pie topped with cheese when she was pregnant with the twins.

“You know I’ll get you anything, Jaina.”

“Okay... this is very specific, and I understand if you don’t want to go through the trouble of getting it...”

“Jaina, just tell me what you want.”

“In Dalaran, a high elf with a bakery stall sells the most delicious glazed donuts!”

Sylvanas stared at her, confused. The request didn’t seem unreasonable or odd, and she couldn’t understand why Jaina was nervous. There was nothing unusual about this craving.

“Let me tidy up here, and then I’ll head out,” Sylvanas said, rising from the desk.

“Wait, there’s more…”

“Do I need to make a list?” 

Jaina squeezed her eyes shut. “I want pickles, too. But the pickles have to be on top of the donut.”

Sylvanas curled her lip in disgust. “That... is an interesting choice.”

“I told you it was a strange craving.”

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

The kitchen was in chaos. Mixing bowls were scattered everywhere, their rims dripping with batter residue onto the counter. A bag of sugar had spilled onto the floor beside broken eggshells, leaving the floor sticky.

Sylvanas had never been much of a baker. She loathed when her father dragged her into the kitchen, insisting she learn to cook. Sylvanas preferred spending her time on archery and trap skills. Eventually, her father gave up on her ever mastering the culinary arts. 

Her hair was pinned up in a messy bun, and flour was splattered across her face. If Sylvanas were alive, she imagined she’d be a sweaty mess from kneading the dough. 

She hadn’t realized how challenging baking could be. Had she known it was this difficult, she would have asked Aimee, the bakery stall owner, for recommendations on other places that sold glazed donuts.

When Sylvanas arrived in Dalaran, she realized the high elf had started closing shop early. She recalled the surprised look Aimee had given her when Sylvanas approached the stall.

Aimee relaxed at the mention of Jaina’s name, revealing that Jaina had been a daily visitor to the stall during her time in Dalaran.

When Sylvanas requested a glazed donut, Aimee frowned. The baker had run out of them—Khadgar had ordered the last dozen for a so-called secret meeting.

Perhaps it was the oversized pickle jar Sylvanas was carrying or the crushing blow clear across her face, but Aimee took pity on her. The baker quickly scribbled down the recipe for the famous donuts.

Sylvanas darted around Dalaran, collecting the ingredients without regard for their cost. She was eager to get back home and begin making the donuts.

Sylvanas sighed as the dough started to become soft and slightly sticky. The shopkeeper had assured her that the flour had magical properties, eliminating the need for the dough to rise. Sylvanas was grateful for that convenience.

When Sylvanas returned home, Jaina was at the door, eager to snatch the items from her hands. Sylvanas quickly devised an excuse to keep her wife occupied while she made the donuts.

“It’s a surprise,” Sylvanas told Jaina.

Jaina eyed her with curiosity. Before she could bombard Sylvanas with questions about the surprise, Sylvanas gently nudged her toward the office. She suggested that Jaina handle the more mundane paperwork, though, to be fair, Jaina found all paperwork exciting.

Sylvanas moved swiftly around the kitchen, grabbing a rolling pin and the bag of flour. She dusted the counter with flour before rolling the dough into large balls.

Once Sylvanas was finished, she arranged the donuts on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and set them aside while she prepared the glaze.

The glaze was a blend of powdered sugar and vanilla extract, promising sweet goodness. Sylvanas was tempted to taste it but knew it would likely taste like ash in her mouth. With a sigh, she stirred the sugar, water, and vanilla extract until the sugar dissolved.

Sylvanas moved to the stove, where a Dutch oven was heating up. She checked the thermometer to gauge the oil’s temperature and smiled when it was precisely where she wanted it.

Sylvanas picked up the baking sheet of donuts, lifted the Dutch oven lid, and carefully lowered two donuts into the hot oil. She let them fry until they were golden brown on each side.

Once golden, Sylvanas quickly removed the donuts, dipping each into the glaze one by one, and then placed them on a wire rack to put the pickles on top. She repeated the process until all the donuts were finished.

As the donuts cooled and the glaze set, Sylvanas beamed with pride. She had never baked anything so intricate before. Though she knew these donuts probably wouldn’t match the ones from Aimee’s stall, she hoped Jaina would enjoy them.

“Sylvanas, what are you doing?” a voice called behind her. 

Sylvanas turned to see Jaina standing in the doorway with a hint of annoyance. Jaina glanced around the kitchen, taking in the mess scattered across the floor and counters.

Sylvanas gently walked over, took Jaina’s arm, and guided her to a stool. “Come sit,” she said. “I want you to try something.”

Jaina narrowed her eyes as she sat down, her gaze sweeping over the kitchen’s disarray. “Sylvanas, you had me go into the office after you returned, and now you’ve made a mess of our kitchen.”

Sylvanas ignored Jaina’s complaints. Instead, she grabbed a small plate from the cabinet and placed a cooled donut on it. Then, Sylvanas set the plate in front of Jaina, stopping her mid-sentence.

Jaina glanced at the plate and then looked up at Sylvanas. “What’s this?”

“I went to the stall, but it turns out Khadgar had taken the last of the donuts,” Sylvanas explained.

“That bastard,” Jaina muttered under her breath.

“So, Aimee gave me the recipe, and I made my own,” Sylvanas said, her nerves surfacing as she worried Jaina might not like her baking.

“You made this? For me?” Jaina asked. Sylvanas nodded with a coy smile.

Jaina grinned as she picked up the donut and examined it closely. Sylvanas held her breath while Jaina took a bite. Jaina closed her eyes as she chewed, then moaned in delight.

As Jaina finished the donut and licked the glaze from her fingers, Sylvanas let out a relieved sigh. “Was it okay?” she asked.

“Sylvanas, it was amazing! If I’m not careful, I’ll eat three more!” Jaina laughed. Sylvanas joined in the laughter, pleased that Jaina enjoyed the donut. “Come here,” Jaina said, inviting her closer.

Sylvanas leaned over the counter as Jaina had asked. Jaina kissed her, her lips still smeared with the sweet glaze. Sylvanas was surprised to taste the sweetness lingering on Jaina’s lips.

“Who would have thought pickles and donuts would make such a great combination?” Jaina joked as she reached for 

another donut.

“Our daughter has quite the interesting palate,” Sylvanas said with a grimace at the unusual combination of flavors. 

“Let’s hope she doesn’t decide to become a chef.”

[dairy-farmer]

Good Morning (time neutral)! This going to be a long one because there's quite a bit of backstory involved~❤️

Sooooo, there's a fic called Hasn't This Kid Ever Heard of Stranger Danger? (https://archiveofourown.org/works/41872041/chapters/105073314) that I really like: Very long story somewhat short, Jason's death and return happens on a much more compressed time scale so that he gets back to Gotham to start Hooding it up when Tim is still a younger side of 13. As part of his information gathering, Jason basically hides out and watches from a tree on the Drake property as Tim returns home every night: he does not like what he sees.

See, because of a combination of 'I can't get close to this kid, I can't take the pain of losing Jason someone again', Bruce generally still lashing out in grief, and Tim's debilitating self-esteem issues (thanks Jack and Janet 😠), Tim is not (at least obviously/observably) close with Waynes outside of being Robin. Because of this, Tim absolutely refuses to stay in the Manor no matter how injured he is, because of a combination of fear of slashing out but also of overstaying his welcome and being driven off to be alone again. So Jason basically sees Tim coming home alone after patrol every night, almost always with injuries of varying degrees - arm wrapped up tight in a bandage, bruises and stuff, limping, ect. And Jason starts to stop being mad at Tim and becomes even more furious with Bruce and the rest of them.

(In this time, Tim has noticed someone watching him from the tree -and doesn't say anything to Bruce because he's worried about being a bother- and has taken to leaving packaged food and bottled water under the tree; basically like they're a feral cat he's trying to befriend.)

After a couple months of this, Tim has a really bad day and finally stands under the tree to invite Jason down/into his house, letting Jason know that Tim has figured out who he is ("Red Hood? Jason?... Robin?"😿), at which point Jason immediately adopts/becomes a big brother to Tim. (There's also Jason reconciling with the family, Tim getting very injured because of his parents doing stupid shit, and lots of therapy for everyone). Great Story!

But to my point: there is a scene fairly early, after Jason has basically started living with Tim as his big brother but during which time Dick and Bruce have no idea about any of this, where Jason rescues the three of them from the mission gone wrong. But see, since this is before any therapy, Jason and Tim are fairly codependent and close. Jason pulls a whole "Back away from the Baby Bird" thing with the bad guys before shooting them. During the exchange, one of the bad guys notices the possessive edge with which Jason refers to Tim/Robin and makes a comment suggesting Jason is in a naughty relationship with Robin. Obviously Jason kills them immediately after that, and checks on an injured Tim first, calling him Baby Bird and petting his hair and checking for concussion.

(It's a great scene: Bruce is out of commission and Dick is pretty heavily concussed, but Dick is worried the bad guys are right and that the Red Hood is going to kidnap Tim and do terrible things to him - if he hasn't already! Dick tasers Jason, it's a whole thing.)

SO... To the actual prompt/idea: The Wayne's/other people think Jason is taking advantage of/trying to groom Tim.

Setup: Firstly, in the fic Jason 18(ish) and Tim is 13. So that's messed with some numbers and the timeline! Let's forget the accelerated timeline of Jason's death and recovery and let's say Jason died at 14, spent 6 months dead, 6 months and 2 years catatonic, one and a half(ish) years post pit with the league, in 6 months causing trouble and stalking Tim. The whole Tim intervention thing happens when Tim is 10 instead of 12, and Tim spends the first one to two years training and only going out on patrol very very occasionally: enough that people know there is still a Robin, but Tim only really became an act of patrol member around the time Jason showed up in the city. Now, dear Dairy, you may ask why have I messed with the timeline in such a way? Because this way I can say that mentally Jason is only about 16, instead of around 19: 5 years may have passed since his death, but only two of those were when Jason was conscious and mentally growing.

Second, the bad guys were right; Jason is in a relationship with Tim.

Tim is so sweet and gentle and desperate for attention, and is there for the perfect Target for an evil groomer to take advantage of. But in this case, it's Jason! Jason was Robin and would never do something like that! So now Jason is spending time with him and caring about him and in general just acknowledging that he exists. And Jason absolutely loathes adults who prey on children, to a murderous degree. But, because he is mentally 16 and Tim is 13, he doesn't see his love and attraction to Tim as a problem: 16-year-olds and 13 year old date all the time!

Just imagine the drama! The Wayans finally acknowledge, after the horrible incident with the mission gone wrong and Red Hood saving them, that they do in fact love Tim and see him as part of the family. And! Jason is alive! Bruce and Dick and Alfred are so happy, their family is back together and has even grown a bit with the addition of Tim: Jason and Tim might be clingy and physically affectionate, but that's fine! They're both traumatized and leave each other as brothers!

... Until Dick walks in on them in the library making out: Tim sitting on Jason's lap, legs on either side of his, so small that even in this position Jason has to lean down to kiss him. Dick might have even found it.. sweet or cute?... If it wasn't a 19-year-old making out with a 13-year-old baby!!! Oh shit, oh shit! The goons in the warehouse were right! Dick's little brother back from the dead was molesting his new younger brother 😱! The fact that Jason is his brother and he loves them is the only reason that Dick doesn't straight up attack him, instead just storming in to yank Tim off his lap and start screaming and yelling.

All the noise brings Bruce and Alfred running, and they walk in on Dick squeezing and trapping Tim in his arms while screaming at Jason with angry, hurt, and scared tears in his eyes. The two eldest men managed to calm the situation down and ask what happened. Dick explains what he walked in on, and of course Bruce and Alfred are horrified! Except... Jason and Tim, well obviously alarmed at everyone's actions, also look... confused.

Bruce insists that Jason and Tim explain their side of the situation -maybe it's just a huge misunderstanding? Well, it turns out that it kind of is; Jason only views himself as being 3 years older and more mature than Tim, since he spent three of the last 5 years dead and/or catatonic. Hell, because Jason died so young, he never even really had a girlfriend or boyfriend! He's basically as inexperienced as Tim. So really it's a perfectly normal relationship without a huge power gap that just so happens to look like a huge 19 year old man molesting a barely teen.

Bruce, Dick, and Alfred just being so stressed because while legally Jason is committing a crime by being with Tim, for anyone with all of the information there is nothing wrong going on.

Also, I picture cis-male Tim in this like in the inspiring story, but honestly it doesn't matter if he's cis or trans. (But I do really like the image of the size difference - Jason with a massive grown man cock, rubbing against Tim's little, barely pubescent one. Jason being able to take Tim's entire cock - and maybe his balls- into his mouth with no effort, and Tim being so embarrassed and self-conscious about the fact that he can barely fit the head of Jason's in his mouth. Of course, once Tim is fully grown it will all have even out; Jason will actually have to pay attention to blow Tim and Tim will be able to fit more than half of Jason's cock in his mouth.)

ethically dubious jaytim relationship yes!!!❤️❤️❤️❤️ they're so happy and content and feel safe with one another. jason losing years to the whole debacle means that his physical age doesn't match his mental age and so of course he feels attracted to tim because jason was still a teenager as well! and tim is in such a precarious place and has never had the devoted love and attention of another person and while he doesn't consciously realize it, the fact that jason is so much older is a plus because it fills that need in tim's brain to be protected and loved by an older male.

it being such an uncomfy situation for bruce and dick and alfred who see them together and can't help but just FEEL its wrong. even though they know the circumstances are unique they can't help but tense up whenever jason and tim are around others- they've warned the two to keep their relationship quiet and under wraps because of the tricky situation and how it all looks. tim and jason are so innocent with their relationship but that doesn't mean the three of them aren't pacing back and forth the first time they have sex. little 13 year old tim is having sex with a near 20 year old under their roof and they're letting it happen, they're actively encouraging it by providing them with condoms and a room to fuck in-

just the complex mind fuckyness of it all ❤️❤️❤️❤️

[placeholder-mcd]

Hiii hello I was thinking about your silly little Devices this morning and found myself wondering “what the hell is going on with them???” because while the PEE is labeled in its diagram the PXE isn’t. So I proceeded to spend an hour and a half trying to deduce just that. I have no idea if I am anywhere CLOSE to correct or accurate with any of this but it WAS fun to speculate here ya go

I snapped a little. Hopefully tumblr doesn’t butcher the quality and hopefully my handwriting is legible. For the amusement of the jury here is the full Mess of a canvas i was working on:

this is extremely cool of you

there are two pretty well-defined categories of transport to alternate universes in most sci-fi: there's time-like travel, and space-like travel. time-like travel to alternate universes is the """creation""" of alternate universes by changing the natural course of causality via time travel eg. 5243 or 5956; space-like travel to alternate universes is like Lampeter / Multiversal Compass where you're transitioning to a different "region of the multiverse" or whatever

since the SCPverse has narrative dimension, there's also "story-like" travel to alternate universes, in which you essentially abuse plot convenience to travel to whatever alternate universe facilitates the rest of the current story taking place. The PEE is the first ever attempt at this type of interdimensional travel

The PXE is intended to be much more comprehensive in scope. Its main chassis is near-identical to the PEE (you can actually see that the body of the PXE is built off the PEE model), but it also incorporates the jank-ass Para!SCP-5956 from Paraline. These facilitate story-like travel and time-like travel, respectively.

the designation "███X-MCD/II" could be interpreted as "this is the PXE mark two". But why not just abbreviate to PXE Mark II? Why have a more convoluted designation? And what is the purpose of this redaction? Is there another common type of designation used by the Foundation which would have the relevant researcher's initials in the designation?

presumably, PHMD can use this thing to go just about anywhere he wants -- like, okay, it's only got 2/3 of the types of multiversal travel capabilities (SO FAR) (THAT WE KNOW OF), so maybe he can only explore causally- or narratively-relevant universes, but that's still got to be uncountably infinitely many potential realities -- so, like, why doesn't he? Why is he hanging around in admoline and causing problems here? What does he have to gain from this? What is he going to accomplish here that he won't be able to find someplace else in the infinite multiverse?

since PHMD carries over he and Gears' invention of the PH-GOS after the 6820 timeline reset (renaming it to the PH-OS and pretending he designed it independently), and since it seems to be an extremely powerful piece of technology (the ultimate reality anchor), it's safe to suppose some elements of the PH-OS were integrated into the PXE in the interim. The PH-OS is concerned with the ontokinetic / informational view of the current state of the current universe; perhaps it can be repurposed as a tool for scanning and processing data about alternate universes

Why can Ilse see through PHMD's bullshit? Why doesn't she draw attention to it? Why are they rhyming at each other?

What happened to the Ilse from Paraline?

[mychlapci]

Okay but drift going back in time through some mishap and telling himself "I'm not going to do anything to influence the timeline again" and then he sees a young college student ratchet flirting with another mech and throws the whole thing out the window

Maybe they are at a shady bar, drift went to make sure he stayed out of the way of his past self and ratchet went with a bunch of classmates for their first pub crawl. Of course he's not going to refuse a drink from the hot older guy at the bar. He doesn't even notice the way drift scares off his classmates until it's just the two of them.

He does notice when he gets up to leave, much drunker than when he sat down, and drift drags him over to a corner and bends him over a stool. It's not even a dark corner, the whole bar can see them as Drift takes Ratchets seals and fucks him full of transfluid. Maybe that's where the party ambulance rumors start, as half ratchets class watch him moan like a whore for a mech he just met and doesn't even know the name of 🐢

hghhhh that's exactly what i meant by Drift catching a possessive streak over seeing young Ratchet… he knows they haven't met yet and they're not conjuxed, but seeing him get flirted with immediately made him forget his promise to not mess with the time-line. It's just that… Ratchet’s getting flirted with by some life-less, idiot student that cannot possibly become Ratchet's first… No, Drift won't allow it, he can't allow it. Ratchet deserves to have his seals broken by a good spike, an experienced spike, a spike that knows his internal nodes inside and out. He ends up chasing away the guy and cannot stop himself from offering Ratchet a drink… they chat for a while and Ratchet keeps getting more and more buzzed and his friends have disappeared to the other end of the bar, conflicted about the scary older guy that's currently getting closer and closer to Ratchet… but Ratchet doesn't seem to need any help, in fact he appears to be enjoying himself, putting his hands on the older mech, shimmying closer to him in turn, arching into every touch, generally being a giant flirt for a guy that has yet to tell him his name...

Drift getting Ratchet, now stumbling and a little drunk, into a corner and shoving his spike into that tight, virginal heat, feeling Ratchet's seal snap when he pushes in. Ratchet whining and whimpering, drawing curious optics towards their little corner of heaven as he has his first proper overload, legs quivering so much he doesn't think he can stand for much longer… His classmates then spend the entire semester talking about the Party Ambulance that lets just about anyone have a turn on his holes <3

[getvalentined]

@takenbynumbers: tseng for the ask game - 13, 24, 35, 44. :)

[For the Random Character Asks game.]

13. Dumbest thing they’ve ever done?

Canonically? Probably that time he messed up that mission with Veld and almost got them both killed. (The one that leads to one of my favorite lines from Veld, which basically translates to "...They say that subordinates are a lot like their superiors, so maybe I'm still naive, too.")

Headcanon? When Tseng was about seventeen he once accidentally stole one of Veld's extremely expensive pens after a group meeting, didn't realize it until two days later when he found it in his desk drawer, and proceeded to spend the next week trying to sneak it back into Veld's desk instead of just telling him that he'd accidentally walked away with it.

After a series of failed attempts that landed three colleagues in trouble (all of whom insisted that they would willingly sacrifice themselves to keep Tseng out of trouble because Turks are and have always been ride-or-die, even in exceptionally ridiculous situations), the incident was resolved when Reno finally just took the pen from Tseng, slipped it into his pocket, and walked into the armory.

A few seconds later he walked back out, holding up the pen like a lighter at a concert. "Hey, Chief! Isn't this like your sixth-favorite 'I'm a rich bastard' pen? I don't think it goes in the materia locker."

As it turned out, Veld had been so busy over the past week and a half that he hadn't even noticed it was missing. He thanked Reno, theorizing that he'd accidentally carried it in there himself when getting kitted out for a field assignment, and just accidentally left it in the locker.

(This event may be why Reno was given the vice director position upon Tseng's promotion within the department, but neither of them will confirm or deny the possibility.)

(Also I know the Ultimania says that Reno is 25 during the Crisis but that makes absolutely no sense with the timeline of the Compilation so I reject this as soundly as I reject Sephiroth being born in 1980.)

24. Most annoying habit?

For simple habits, like tics, Tseng tends to use fountain pens not because of any preference of his own, but because he will fidget with click pens or snap the lid on and off capped pens over and over and over until everyone around him wants to strangle him alive. Veld got him into fountain pens so that he'd stop doing that during mission briefs and meetings.

For more complex issues, as indicated in the story above, Tseng is horribly indirect in social situations. This is doubly true when he thinks someone else has a problem with him, which leads to him asking questions of mutual acquaintances, making observations and constructing timelines to try to figure out whether he or the other party is in the wrong, and overthinking every previous interaction he can think of instead of just asking the other person what's going on.

This is less annoying for the people who don't realize it's happening, but for everyone else there's a lot of "Just ask him. Oh my god. Just ask him what's wrong! Tseng you are THIRTY-EIGHT YEARS OLD just ASK HIM if he's mad at you!"

35. Their idea of a perfect day?

Even with alarms off, Tseng wakes up a little after sunrise, even on the weekend. He rolls over, slings his arm over Reeve in bed and stays there until Reeve wakes up about an hour later. They get up, Reeve checks his phone—Tseng takes it from him, because they're off work today. He goes through Reeve's notifications, snoozes all of them for 48 hours, then gives him back his phone.

Reeve makes coffee while Tseng makes sure Cait Sith is set on assignments for the day, and then both and and Reeve see him off for the day. Cait Sith won't connect directly with Reeve except in an emergency, and Tseng isn't worried about that; he can take care of himself, and things are quiet these days anyway. The biggest problems they have to deal with these days are ordinary people with legal agreements, not overpowered superhumans with lethal aggression.

Tseng gets dressed before Reeve, because Reeve likes to shower first thing in the morning and Tseng likes to shower before he goes to bed. He makes breakfast while Reeve is washing up, and gets a call from Reno that he's letting Elena off early today because she has a date. It'll mean they're running a little skinny through the weekend, but the mission board is almost empty so he's not pressed about it. Tseng says that's all right, he trusts Reno's judgment, and he'll talk to him on Monday.

He pages through the worst gossip rag in Junon while Reeve eats breakfast, periodically turning the magazine around to ask if Reeve thinks a particular photo of this or that public figure was taken by Kunsel. Reeve agrees with him every time, except for the one of Vincent, and they both admit that Kunsel is too scared of Vincent to have done that. They spend some time theorizing who would have taken the chance, going well past the point that breakfast is done, but don't reach a consensus before an alarm goes off and it's time to head out.

Up on the roof of the WRO's executive housing facility, Tseng and Reeve load up one of the organization's aircars—like an airship, but stripped down to the smallest versions of the barest essentials until it's not quite the length of a travel trailer—and spend the next few hours in the sky. The autopilot gives Tseng some time to read, although it always makes Reeve anxious. This is funny, singe Reeve helped develop the aircar in the first place, so he knows there's no risk of them going down just because Tseng took his eyes off the instruments for a few minutes, and Tseng teases him about it until Reeve begrudgingly concedes.

They touch down in Costa, but not on the landing pad—not even properly in town, instead settling just past the cliffs that divide the commercial, public beaches with the less-accessible stretch of shoreline to the north. Reeve unloads the aircar and Tseng sets up, propping up an umbrella, unfolding chairs and draping them in towels, situating the cooler and pulling out one of those cheap premade smoothies-in-a-pouch for lunch. He gets changed while Reeve has his own lunch, and they spend the rest of the day at the beach; around sunset they get back in the car (leaving all those things they brought on the sand, no one can get here except from the air and everything is replaceable anyway) to head into town, where they get dinner from a food truck on the side of the road as they walk from the landing pad to the hotel where they'll spend the night.

Tomorrow afternoon, they'll head home. But for a little over 24 hours, there's nothing but sunshine and sand and water, ice melting in a plastic cooler, slightly-uncomfortable folding chairs and sand-crusted towels. No work, no responsibilities, no crises to avert.

And when Tseng goes back to work on Monday, he'll remember exactly why that work is worth doing, which feels pretty perfect to him.

44. Their happiest memory?

I would say that Tseng doesn't have a lot of happy memories, but that's not really it. The thing is that for Tseng, happiness is a fleeting, finite thing; contentment is possible eventually, but happiness is different, happiness is deeper, and it isn't until after the world has come to and end multiple times that he finds it in a more permanent sense. Before that, his happiest memories are...not what most people would consider pleasant? But they're happy nonetheless.

Pinned under rubble when he was too young and too naive to know when to give up, sure that he was going to die, and then having Veld show up to save him after insisting over and over that he wouldn't.

Security footage taken from Kalm, seeing Aerith under a blue sky for the first time and knowing that it was where she was meant to be, that she was finally getting to see the world that belonged to her.

Sitting in the forest outside the Forgotten Capital, bruised and bleeding after days of torture at the hands of the Remnants, watching Vincent work on treating Elena's injuries—first, before Tseng, because she was unconscious and he wasn't—and eventually turn to Tseng and declare without a hint of uncertainty that she would pull through.

If asked, Tseng would say that he has a lot of happy memories. Nobody else would think they're happy at all.

[writeriguess]

The Umbrella Academy mansion was buzzing with the usual activity. Each sibling was caught up in their own world, leaving you to find a moment of peace amidst the chaos. You had been helping out with some mundane tasks, but now you craved a brief escape from the incessant whirlwind of their lives.

It was late in the evening when you stumbled upon Five Hargreeves in the mansion’s library. He was hunched over a stack of books, an assortment of old, leather-bound volumes and faded manuscripts strewn about. His furrowed brow and concentrated expression suggested he was deep in thought, or perhaps deep in the tangled mess of a new timeline dilemma.

You hesitated at the door, not wanting to intrude, but Five’s sharp eyes caught your movement. He looked up, his gaze softening slightly when he saw it was you.

“Hey,” you said softly, stepping into the room. “I didn’t mean to interrupt. Just looking for a quiet place.”

Five’s usual scowl melted into a rare, genuine smile. “You’re not interrupting. I could use a break from all this,” he gestured to the cluttered desk, “but it’s hard to step away when there’s so much to untangle.”

You approached the desk and glanced at the books. “Time travel stuff?”

Five nodded, running a hand through his hair in a gesture of frustration. “Yes. The more I dig into it, the more complicated it gets. Sometimes I think I’m just chasing shadows.”

You studied him, sensing the weight of his burden. “You’re always chasing shadows. But maybe what you need is a break. A change of pace.”

Five’s eyes met yours, and he raised an eyebrow, a hint of curiosity in his gaze. “And what do you suggest? A vacation from time?”

You smiled, feeling a bit daring. “How about just spending some time with me? We could go for a walk, or maybe just sit somewhere quiet. Sometimes the best way to clear your head is to step away for a bit.”

Five considered your offer, the tension in his shoulders easing slightly. “You know, that doesn’t sound half bad. Alright, let’s take a break. But if anything goes wrong while I’m away, you’re responsible.”

You chuckled, feeling a wave of relief. “Deal.”

You led Five out of the library and through the mansion, heading towards one of the quieter spots in the garden. The evening air was cool and refreshing, and the stars were beginning to twinkle overhead.

As you settled onto a bench in a secluded part of the garden, Five took a deep breath, his expression relaxing for the first time in what felt like forever. He sat beside you, his usual seriousness giving way to a more contemplative mood.

“This is nice,” Five admitted, his tone softer than usual. “I’ve been so focused on fixing everything that I forgot how important it is to just... be.”

You nodded, appreciating the quiet. “Sometimes we all need to step back and remind ourselves of the simpler things. It’s easy to get lost in the complexities of life.”

Five glanced at you, a thoughtful expression on his face. “You’re right. It’s moments like these that help me remember what really matters.”

You smiled, feeling a warm connection between you. “I’m glad you think so. It’s nice to have these moments with you.”

There was a brief silence, and then Five’s hand gently brushed against yours. His touch was tentative but reassuring, and you felt a flutter of emotion.

Five looked at you, his gaze intense yet tender. “I don’t often let myself enjoy moments like this. But with you, it feels different. More... right.”

Your heart skipped a beat at his words. “I feel the same way. There’s something special about being here with you, away from all the madness.”

Five’s fingers interlaced with yours, and he squeezed your hand gently. “I’ve been thinking a lot about what I want, and what I need. And being with you feels like a step in the right direction.”

You turned to face him fully, your heart racing with anticipation. “Five, I care about you too. I’ve felt a connection with you for a while now. And being here, in this moment, makes me realize how much I value it.”

Five’s eyes softened, and he leaned in closer. “Then let’s not let these moments slip away. Let’s make the most of them, together.”

As the stars above shimmered softly, Five’s lips met yours in a gentle, heartfelt kiss. The touch was slow and tender, a promise of something deeper and more meaningful. You kissed him back, feeling a surge of warmth and affection.

When you finally pulled away, Five looked at you with a mixture of relief and happiness. “Thank you for being here, [Y/N]. For reminding me of what’s important.”

You smiled, feeling a deep sense of contentment. “Thank you for letting me be part of this moment. It means a lot to me.”

The two of you sat together under the stars, hand in hand, savoring the quiet and the closeness. In the midst of the Hargreeves family’s tumultuous world, you had found a moment of peace and romance that promised to be the start of something beautiful.

And as the night wore on, you and Five remained in each other’s company, finding solace and connection in the timeless moments you shared.

[intoloopin-archive]

A CHAPTER: THE SHARP AND THE BLUNT (PART 2/2).

tws: dubious consent (Haruki is still very weird and forward about initiating sex! and sometimes that gets Toxic). alcohol abuse and alcoholism. semi-smut (the driest, most unsexy and robotic blowjob in the world is given). insinuation and one very direct discussion of sexual trauma, abuse by a past partner, abuse of workplace power and stalking. a little hint of body dysmorphia (Hanjae's inner voice is often not very kind about how he looks). internalized homophobia, and a hint of biphobia in between the lines. queer pessimism (it gets a bit Hurtful). as always: if I missed anything, please tell me. starring: Lee Hanjae. Fukunaga Haruki. featuring: Dylan Hwang / Hwang Chihoon. their fellow LOOPiN members (old OT10, no Gyujin, still stuck with a bit of Beomseok). Uhm Junghwa (new manager extraordinarie). the ghost of Choi Sangwon. a brief mention of Night Child / NTCD. timeline: early to the end of mid 2022 | quick flash forward to september 2023 (additional context under the cut). word count: 14,138 words. author's note: lil delay because life has to be life, sometimes, and because the hotel scene from May 26th was way more challenging to get right in tone than i originally expected (it's one of the ones to watch out for), but here we are!!!! the Hanruki end. things get much more heavy, morally grey and blantly sad in this final part, so really, mind the tags, skip if you must. and: music rec moment two. stay safe out there, everyone!

March 13th, 2022.

Hanjae doesn’t shower, or change clothes, or gets to sleep on the couch. He lays on it and spends the whole night awake, on his phone, and on his Nintendo Switch after that, back on his phone. He catches the sun rising through the window’s curtain and maybe he sleeps, briefly.

Was it even real?, he wonders when he finds himself with his eyes wide and restless, staring up at the ceiling; Did it even happen?

He pokes and pokes at the one painful spot over his shoulder, the marking of Haruki’s teeth, and gets consumed by shame at the confirmation that yes, it was real; yes, it did happen.

When Junghwa steps into their apartment to wake everyone up in the morning, Hanjae’s sitting on the couch, breathing into his hands. He still looks like a mess. Hair, clothes, face – a mess.

She gives him a crumbling look, half pity, half exhaustion, and laughs humorless. “Out of everyone, I didn’t expect you to misbehave, Lee Hanjae.”

Hanjae peeks up at her through his clammy fingers. He feels a genuine and terrifying urge to throw up on her shoes and buy her new ones immediately after.

“12 AM to 8 PM for you,” Junghwa tells him, with a sigh. She walks more into the house, close enough to lay a merciful hand on the crown of his head – pat, pat, pat. “Just this one time.”

Haruki hours, he thinks, dazed, because that’s what everyone calls it, because he’s the one stuck with the alternative schedule the most: fails to wake up for practice often, gets shoved at the company until late at night. He’ll probably get the same sentence today. He and Hanjae might have to train alone, together, for hours. His stomach takes another queasy turn.

Hanjae watches the world move around him, for once out of the routine; after hearing his fate, Taesong takes a minute out of washing his face to force Hanjae to gulp down ibuprofen while Haegon shoves a pillow at him. Junghwa goes upstairs to knock on Haruki’s door, phone against her ear as she calls him, and then comes down in record speed, by herself.

She asks everyone, “Shall we go?”

“Can I get Haruki hours, please?” Seungsoo begs from where he’s resting his head against the wall, eyes closed, sipping Gatorade.

Junghwa doesn’t look at him as she firmly says, “No.”

“But I’m dying,” Seungsoo whines. “I’m fucking dying. I can’t work. I’m gonna drop dead, dead.”

Minwoo shoves him angrily out of the way to open the front door, tells him, “Then drop dead, Seungsoo. Drop dead.”

It takes a while for the house to fall back into quiet, after everyone’s gone. Hanjae swears he hears the sound of everything amplified now, gonging inside his head. Maybe it’s the hangover – it’s probably the hangover, but he hasn’t had enough of those to figure all of their symptoms out.

He sleeps again, a miracle, wakes up again, and there’s the faint smell of something being stir fried coming from the kitchen, slowly drowning the whole room.

“I’m making tofu,” Haruki says when Hanjae sits up to check. He’s a slouched thing behind the stove, yet he’s flashing him a grin. “You want some?”

He looks, from a distant inspection – normal, regular, like Haruki always does in the morning: a little wan, with his voice a little deep. They’ve kissed, they’ve made out, and he’s absolutely normal, proposing to make Hanjae breakfast-lunch.

Hanjae says a meek ‘yes’ to tofu, and Haruki tells him, “Five minutes.”

It’s enough time for Hanjae to go brush his teeth, and hyperventilate in privacy: every corner of their bathroom makes him think back to Sunyoung’s, and to being on the floor– being kissed on the floor– being kissed by Haruki on the floor until he wasn’t.

He goes back to the couch, a stiff walk. Haruki comes to sit with him, holding a single bowl of food with two runny eggs on top, and Hanjae jumps back up and three feet away. He bumps his heel bone on the coffee table, and the pain is a shock up his entire leg; serves him well, serves him right.

“I want to apologize for yesterday or earlier today at night,” Hanjae says in a single breath, his voice coming out rough around the edges. His arms are set like wood on his sides, tight, fisted.

In front of him, Haruki’s face goes through a journey: startled, then confused, then amused, smiling. He takes a big bite of food. “Oh, you mean the bathroom? That’s what you mean?” He asks, covering his chewing mouth with a hand, and Hanjae nods once. “Pfff, no need. It’s not your fault a girl had to pee.”

“That’s not what I meant, not, not what I’m apologizing for.”

“So what are you apologizing for?” Haruki asks him, tilting his head, dark hair falling like a cloak over his eyes. He wrinkles his nose. “Didn’t I kiss you? I’m sure I kissed you. I’m sure you kissed me back.”

“Hyung,” Hanjae says, helplessly, and has to turn his face to the side, closing his eyes briefly. “Still, everything– We were drunk, and everything, it wasn’t… appropriate. To happen.”

Haruki has stopped chewing when Hanjae looks back at him, has gone full body still for a moment. When he gulps the food down, it looks like it’s a painful thing for him to do.

“Appropriate,” he repeats, looking down at his own feet, like it’s an odd word, an annoying one. “Just sit down, Hanjae. Sit back down. We’re not done yet.”

“We’re not… What?”

Haruki abandons the bowl and chopsticks, puts them roughly on the table, then motions to the vague spot on his side – come here. Hanjae doesn’t move. He still has some word stuck under his tongue he has to work out.

Haruki doesn’t take his paralyzes at all. He clicks his tongue, walks up and close and puts both hands on Hanjae’s shoulders, maneuvers him and sits him back down not that gently on the couch. He tucks himself close to him, sideways, a bent knee almost on his lap, and stays there.

He eyes Hanjae openly then, a brand new thing. Haruki’s seen him, could have gotten sick of seeing him with how much it happens every day, but now Hanjae knows with certainty that he’s never been evaluated by him, or taken into this much consideration up until this very moment.

He hooks Hanjae’s ear lobe between two fingers and pulls, taps at the hoop earring. “I thought you would be a bad kisser,” Haruki says. “But you’re not.”

Granted, Hanjae wouldn’t call their kiss a good kiss. Both their mouths tasted bitter, he remembers now, and their teeth clunked against each other like two cogs being put in an unfit machine. It happened so quick– everything, so quick.

“Thanks,” he says nonetheless, and again, “Thank– Thank you.”

Haruki laughs at him, wispy, a single ‘ha’, and the air around them grows more tense. Haruki pushes himself close until he's full on Hanjae’s lap, a similar position to some hours ago. Hanjae turns his face a little away, to the side; sets his eyes on a wall, right where a painting Haegon made when he was eight years old hangs, framed. 

The cushion of the living room couch smells like an amalgamation of all of them, he notices. There’s a stain on it where Chihoon had once spilled fancy carbonara – a meal everyone saved the whole month to have on their third debut anniversary. Seungsoo had offered him three bucks to lick it clean. The video of Dylan concluding the bet is a blurry 1 minute thing O.z had recorded, still somewhere far down Hanjae’s gallery.

“Hanjae,” Haruki says now, and taps at his nose. “You’re too tense. You’re zooming out. Get out of your head.”

“It’s just–” Hanjae mutters, and can’t stop – just can’t stop: “Here? Wouldn’t it be bad? If someone walks in, if they forgot something and want to come back, and I heard, I think I heard that, isn’t there a camera here, a camera Seo CEO looks through–”

“There’s no camera. Not a single one anywhere. I would know,” Haruki looks right into his eyes to reassure him, or tries to; Hanjae can’t sustain it much. His hands are a constant goosebump on their trail on the back of Hanjae’s neck, up and up and suddenly down, up again. “Do you want to take this to your room?”

But it’s not Hanjae’s room, singular. It’s impossible to look anywhere and not see one of Seungsoo’s too colorful caps, or Minwoo’s notes, scrambled and frantic, the only indication he’s yet to fully move into the studio.

This is LOOPiN’s home, collective. They’re coworkers sharing space at their core, and it’s– It’s all just–

Hanjae makes a whimpering sound, involuntary, not an answer to anything, and with that Haruki’s off him, a sudden rise up and turn around. He walks away with a loud sigh and Hanjae thinks, disappointment and relief an ocean in his stomach, It’s done. It’s over.

It’s not; Haruki just goes to open the fridge’s door, takes something out, pours it somewhere, comes back to the couch with it. He stands it for Hanjae to take – a red plastic cup filled to the brim with some leftover wine.

“One complaint,” Haruki tells him, and goes back to where he was; a stable weight on Hanjae’s lap, both arms hooked around his neck. “One sip.”

“It’s– It’s morning, hyung.”

“No. No ‘hyung’. Stop that,” he says, and Hanjae can’t figure out, either by hearing it or looking him in the face, if Haruki’s being serious or not. He’s still smiling. “I don’t like it.”

“So what,” Hanjae asks, and sinks deeper into the couch when Haruki makes to push himself closer, “Do you like, then? About me if, or this, or–”

It’s all he can get out before Haruki puts a hand over his mouth, firm.

“I’ll blow you,” he says bluntly, and puts his hand away. Another paper thin smile. “Will that shut you up?”

Around a gulp, Hanjae nods, manages to let out a shaky, “Ok–ay.”

Permission granted, it takes a moment for anything to even happen. Haruki grabs the cup out of Hanjae’s hand quickly and downs it, almost fully drains it. He takes a deep and loud breath when he gives it back, eyes closed through it, before he begins to go down on him.

When Haruki kneels in between his legs, Hanjae tries to put a hand on top of his head, a timid and gentle fondling, but Haruki bats it away, says, “Just stay still.”

And Hanjae stays still. He looks up at the ceiling – eggshell white, the same as all the walls, with the faint darkening in a corner where there once was a leak. The kitchen sink hasn’t been closed all the way, and he can hear the drip, drip, drip of the water falling on dirty tableware under the sound of his loose belt being unbuckled, his zipper working open, the downing of his jeans.

What a waste, he thinks, over and over, tells himself that’s all he must think now; what a grandiose waste.

The blowjob’s a not so quick, but fully methodic thing. Hanjae taps Haruki on the shoulder when he’s finally near coming, says so around a pant. And then comes, Haruki swallows, that’s it – that’s the full scope of it, Hanjae has decided. Privately, he calls it efficient instead of emotionless, or confusing, or unsettling.

He zips himself back up as Haruki wipes his mouth and goes to collect the pot, the chopsticks. Hanjae catches him by the wrist before he slips away, asks, “You?”

Haruki laughs – Hanjae’s never seen him laugh so much so quickly, or in such a high pitch. He says, leaning forward, “Me? Me what? What are you even going to do? You look like you’re about to have a panic attack, Hanjae.”

Hanjae’s grip on him goes loose. Haruki breaks free of it and puts his hand on his pocket, rubs it in for a second like he’s trying to get it clean. Or maybe Hanjae’s just seeing things with his blurry hangover vision, his clear hangover discomfort.

“Right,” he mutters, and feels like he’s coming down from somewhere. His hold on the cup had faltered through their whole endeavor, and the spilled wine made a new damp on the couch’s arm. A story. He locks eyes with it.

“Don’t worry about me,” Haruki’s saying, back turned to him, halfway across the room already. The pot of leftover tofu clanks where he drops it, careless. “I’ll just shower.”

“You’re sure…?” Hanjae asks.

“Uh-huh.”

“Really?”

“Really. Now stop talking, alright? It’s not going to make me put my mouth on you a second time.”

Hanjae blinks once, and then too many times to even count. “Okay,” he says, quietly. “I’m– Okay.”

Haruki flees the scene before he notices, goes upstairs; comes back down and looks around for a long beat as if he’s forgotten where he is, where he’s headed.

He goes to the bathroom and closes the door loudly, then soon opens it again, peeks his torso out. He’s got a towel thrown over his shoulder and a smile that’s blinding when he says, looking back at Hanjae: “But next time. Make it up to me next time.”

April 14th, 2022.

‘Next time’, in industry lingo, as Hanjae has learned over the years, is the vaguest time scheduling there is. So Haruki said ‘But next time. Make it up to me next time’, and a day later LOOPiN released the final teasers for the ‘Punch’ EP, and things got hectic – music shows, variety content, a fanmeet, a fansign.

And then Seungsoo made everything come to a halt by jumping Kwon Dongwook and half of NTCD at Rewind K-Pop Fest on the 8th, getting them all thrown out of the event four hours earlier.

They missed the SHINee tribute they were set to be on. Hanjae even got handed Key’s bandana and the same blue shorts he used in the dance scenes in the ‘View’ MV, taken directly out of SM Entertainment’s archive. He had just stepped out of a makeup chair when he got the news, and was made to sit back down immediately to dismantle the whole look.

“Pussy didn’t even fight back,” Seungsoo grumbled, in their kitchen: icing his face where it hit a pole after Code pushed him off Hyunbin’s neck. He wouldn’t stop talking about Dongwook – it had been five hours, and everything that came out of his mouth was soon followed by ‘Kwon Dongwook that bastard’ this, ‘Kwon Dongwook that fucker’ that. “He made me look like an asshole.”

Hanjae ignored him. All he wanted was to drink a glass of water in silence and not look a single person in the eye that wasn’t Mijoo, his guitar instructor, in six hours time.

“You made yourself look like an asshole,” Taesong corrected him, pointing a spatula around from behind the aisle, and he sounded and looked angry in a way Hanjae hadn’t seen him in years. “You made all of us look like assholes, and now Minwoo’s going to kill you. He’s going to kill you because I’ll allow him to kill you. I will help him kill you. You deserve to be assassinated.”

“You deserve to be assassinated, you snake! You’re talking with Joseph Song, Taeng! Night Child’s Joseph Song, behind my back, about him, about me! Fuck you!”

Taesong dropped the spatula, put both hands on his hips, and looked up at the ceiling: his ‘Lord, give me strength’ pose. “I don’t talk with Joseph Song about Dongwook, or about you, Seungsoo. All we do is exchange schedule information to know when we all might meet, to try to keep peace between us and them because you’re all insane. All you, insane.”

“I’m not insane!” Seungsoo said, rising up from his chair, and Hanjae escaped the kitchen then, didn’t want to hear his bullshit claim to be functional.

He spent half an hour tuning and running his fingers over his electric guitar’s strings, and did the same with Dylan’s old acoustic one, and pressed random notes on Zhiming’s keyboard in their improvised music space, which was just a vacant corner in Heagon and Beomseok’s room.

On his phone, he got one message, and had to read it once and twice and a third time even, just to figure out what to say:

[haruhyung]: are you free ?

Hanjae sent, fingers flying over the keyboard:

[You]: Guitar pravtice with Mijoo nim sun

[You]: *practice

[You]: **soon

And shortly after, an afterthought:

[You]: Sorry

On his screen Haruki typed, deleted, typed again – the speech bubble looked like a glitch. Somewhere down on the first floor someone snorted, loud and mean, and Hanjae shuddered.

After five minutes, Haruki sent:

[haruhyung]: ok .

More texts came after those, spaced out between days or just hours, sometimes full sentences or just direct question marks, one time with a photo attached in the morning. Hanjae didn’t see it right away, went back to check during lunch break and found nothing but a short trail of deleted messages. 

It’s all the interaction they have behind the scenes lately. No more idle talk in the practice room, no more shared space in the house, just ‘free?’ and ‘no’ and ‘sorry’ and ‘ok.’

Now: a live session for the english version of ‘You Can’t Hold My Heart’ that they managed to film in one single take. Jooheon PD promises to treat them to something for it, and everyone’s saying suggestions on top of suggestions at the speed of light. Hanjae’s trying to gather up courage to ask for hot pot again, preparing for the complaining it’ll cause, when his phone dings.

[haruhyung]: ditch with me .

[haruhyung]: discreetly .

Hanjae takes a wild look across the studio until he finds Haruki: set against a wall in a corner, waiting to be looked at, tapping one foot on the ground. After what feels like a minute of unstable eye contact, but couldn’t be more than a second or so, Haruki ducks his head down and goes back to typing.

[haruhyng]: im really not going to ask again .

It takes little to no excuse to ditch dinner – barbecue, they have decided, and Hanjae’s trying to cut off red meat, doesn’t want to go somewhere so crowded after seeing so many people all day, he says, and Haruki interveins to ask Jooheon if he can pay their cab home. No one asks why he’s not going; no one was expecting Haruki to want to go.

They don’t take the free cab home. They’re instead back at Deh’s apartment complex, taking the stairs quietly.

“I’ll be coming three times a week to feed her cats this month,” Haruki says, unlocking and holding the door open for Hanjae so he can step inside. “She’s traveling out of town.”

“Hm,” is Hanjae’s shaky answer.

The inside of Deh’s apartment looks very much like what he would assume it would: neat, colorful, synthetic fur coats everywhere – really, everywhere.

While Haruki gathers up the cats, two small and loud things, Hanjae sits down on the printed loveseat and makes direct eye contact with a wigged mannequin head next to the TV, plastic lips shiny with lipstick.

When Haruki comes back to the living room, duties all done, he opens the big window on the far left and sits on the cushioned frame, one elegant leg over the other. 

He says, with a cig materialized between his teeth somehow, “Deh’s got a lighter on the second drawer– Second drawer, Hanjae– Yeah, that one, the green one. Come here. Bring it over.”

Hanjae brings it over, and Haruki tilts his head up, points to his cigarette, still hanging from his mouth. Hanjae lights it up for him after a couple of clumsy tries, and flees – bolts away with the lighter at the center of his fisted palm, goes to sit back on the couch, grows uncomfortable, slides down to the floor.

Haruki watches him move with an enerved smile on his face. “How funny,” he says, dryly, and then no one says a thing. He smokes, and Hanjae can’t stand the smell, coffs into his hand once. He sees Haruki move even closer to the window, peeking outside.

“So,” Hanjae tries, when it all turns into too much – the smoke, the quiet. He’s tracing a pattern with his finger on the carpet; a circle on top of a circle on top of a circle. “Do you– You come by often? To see her?”

Haruki makes a choking sound. His eyes are very narrow when he looks at Hanjae. “What are you trying to ask?”

Hanjae forces a shrug that he knows falls very flat.

“Deh’s a woman, Hanjae,” Haruki says after a beat, with a strong emphasis on ‘woman’, and Hanjae turns bright red and hot on his face, immediately responds with ‘Yes, I know’ – would rather shoot his own foot than insinuate she’s not. “And I’m not interested in women, so no, I don’t see her.”

“But you– You never told,” Hanjae stammers, and Haruki tilts his head at him, frown easing. “You never told any of us you’re not straight.”

“None of you ever just asked me,” Haruki counters, and there’s a little humor in him, somewhere – a bit of pride at that, maybe, until he recalls, “Except for Zhiming once, but he doesn’t count. Zhiming somehow always knows. Side effects of having a gay mom, I guess.”

“Did you know before? Before your… Your whole relationship, with– was your relationship what made you…” Hanjae stops talking. Haruki’s eyebrows have darted up and they stay up, waiting, challenging; ‘go on, finish the sentence’.

Hanjae sheepishly goes back to the mannequin head. It has a pink rhinestone hot glued on its nose, mimicking a piercing.

“Alright,” Haruki says, giving in. He rearranges himself on the window, puts his two feet steady on the floor, manspreading. “This again– Alright. You get three questions. Just three. Then we’ll never talk about it again, so be wise. If it’s something stupid I won’t answer.”

Hanjae accepts this, tonguing his cheek while he thinks. He has a billion questions, too many, all build up in these two months, but they’ve all escaped him somehow. He settles for an hesitant, “‘This again?’”

“I know you know Chihoon’s aware. And now Jiahang is, too,” Haruki says, and Hanjae patiently waits for more information. A whole minute goes by and Haruki, smoke coming in and out of his mouth, doesn’t offer him anything else.

“Since when?”

“Dylan? L.A. After the beach with you, he caught the… aftermath,” he grims, humorless. “And J.J knows since last week, after the festival. The day you ditched me for guitar practice with Mijoo nim.”

“That’s not,” Hanjae offers, alternating between looking at him and not looking at him; peeking instead at the shape he made on the green carpet, there still. “Not what I meant.”

“Of course not,” Haruki agrees, and his smile turns tiny, tinier, up until it no longer exists. 

He takes a big drag of the cigarette, the last one; tosses the bug right out of the window without putting the flame out. Behind him, the world looks pink, green, warm yellow. It’s the sort of spring that makes you feel like it’ll never leave you.

“Look, Hanjae, you don’t want to know everything. Not very pretty, with him being married and a dad and my boss and all. Bottom line is he casted me, he made me into a trainee, and that might have saved my life. I understood the way he looked at me and decided to just– let him have it. So I asked him out, kind of. He said yes, kind of. Next thing I knew, it had been going on for years.”

“Years?” Hanjae lets out, a little scandalized, too blunt, and Haruki gives him a look – ‘last question’. He rushes to amend it with, “Why?”

Haruki, with a hint of afternoon sun contouring his falling face, says, “I don’t know. I don’t know why,” and it’s the one thing Hanjae didn’t want to hear.

He wished for: because he loved me, or because it made me happy. But he knew it wouldn’t be that, felt it like a hollow in his stomach. From that day in the rain, he knew.

“I have a question for you, now. Just one,” Haruki says, turning his face back inside. Hanjae hums, letting him go on. “Are you dragging it out on purpose? Fucking me, I mean. Are you trying to make it some grand thing?”

Hanjae takes a beat to respond because he knows he should. He thinks about it deeply, eyes stuck in a corner, and shakes his head ‘no’. It’s the truth; he’s not trying to turn it into a grand thing – he understands now, with a tang of sadness, that he can’t make any of it special.

“Good,” Haruki says, and nods too. “You shouldn’t. I know marketing wants everyone to think I’m some sex god, but I’m not. I’m really not. You should just get me out of your system already. Quick and nice. It’s not like there’s a point in waiting, or… courting. We’re never going to date, Hanjae. You know that.”

“Yes. I know.”

“So…?” Haruki looks around, to all the space, and Hanjae does too. There’s very little of it, it’s a little room, but still, it looks so lived in. It looks like a place that’s loved.

Hanjae lowers his head down, eyes his small circle, fading. “Would Deh mind?” He asks, a whisper.

“Hanjae, she won’t know. No one will know,” Haruki says, and he’s grown annoyed now, shifty in his seat. “No one cares to know. No one gives that much of a fuck, or– It’s fine. It’s really fine.”

“I just– the thing is–,” Hanjae stutters, and tries to push through even when Haruki makes a discontent noise. “I never planned to do anything about it, or act– really act on liking you. This,” he motions to the drift between them, the awkward air: this, “Is not just me thinking you’re attractive, or– I really respect you, hyung, as my bandmate, as my colleague. If anything, what I always wanted was just for you to trust me with who you are, someday, because I think you’re– I just want us to be closer. Any way goes. That’s what I feel.”

He takes a peek up, over his own bangs, and sees Haruki’s eyes flickering. He widens his stance, knees more apart, and his voice sounds very low when he says, “You can grow real close to me now.”

Hanjae sighs at him, because he can’t help it. He tries to think of words, better words. Tries to build some sort of bridge out of them.

“Is it a good time?” It’s what he asks. “It’s been– It’s been a really long week, and you just… Aren’t you tired? I’m tired. You look like you’re tired.”

Haruki’s face clouds, gets taken over by something very cold. “I am tired. I’m tired of you rejecting me.”

“I’m not. I’m not rejecting you. I just don’t want to feel like I’m making a mistake. I don’t want to make a mistake, and I think, neither do you, right? Again?” Hanjae asks, and immediately regrets it when he catches the effect of the word ‘again’. It makes Haruki close his legs shut, makes his jaw tense. Hanjae says, quicker, “I’ve lost a team one time, hyung, by being impulsive – and it looked like this, it felt just like this.”

The silence that gets in between them is loud, almost sticky. Hanjae fights an inner battle to not fill it up with, ‘Please let’s talk, can you talk to me, really talk to me, just talk to me, and tell me what is it that you actually want.’

In a room away, the cats scratch a door, begging to be let out, and Haruki’s new phone goes off – a familiar ringtone, a lack of surprise or urge to pick up Hanjae’s seen before.

Haruki rests his head back against the wall, closing his eyes. His chest visibly rises and falls when he breathes. “Ah, this is funny,” he says. “So not today, then, but soon? When I look better, not tired, is that it?”

“If you still want to.”

“If I still want to…” Haruki repeats, like he’s testing out the words, like he wants to figure out how they sound all together. And then rising up, out of the window, splinting behind the couch, behind Hanjae, “Okay. Alright, okay. If that’s what it takes– It’s on.”

“It’s… on?”

Over his shoulder, Hanjae catches the hint of a big grin being thrown at him. “It’s on.”

April 29th to May 6th, 2022. 

After Deh’s apartment and the sex that didn’t, Haruki turns into someone else for a week.

It’s impossible to not take immediate notice; when Hanjae and Dylan sit down on Friday to play Fifa at night he catches the whole thing, even though he’s not a fan of sports, or video games, or hanging out. Hanjae scores two goals and Haruki cheers him on, in an enthusiasm that makes it seem like he’s winning the real World Cup.

When he excuses himself to use the bathroom, Hanjae and Chihoon share a quick, tense glance.

‘What’s happening?’, Dylan mouths, putting the game on pause, and Hanjae mouths back, ‘I don’t know’, pressing for it to go on.

Later, they order takeout food for everyone, and Haruki doesn’t drink anything with his pizza except for a Sprite Zero. He gathers up everyone’s scattered plates after dinner and takes them to the kitchen, where Hanjae has just begun to do the dishes.

He circles him around the room, then leans on the counter, close, says, “Hanhan, what did you do with my KidSuper jacket? I can’t find it anywhere. Come help me look when you’re done with that. I’m in the laundry room, come help me, don’t forget to help me look, yeah?”

It’s an excuse. There’s no KidSuper jacket that needs to be found in the laundry room. Hanjae goes in, Haruki closes the door shut and immediately kisses him against it, suddenly.

They break apart, and Haruki taps Hanjae’s chin up, making Hanjae’s hang open mouth fall shut. He breathes into his face, mutters, “Cute– You look cute surprised,” and leaves – just leaves, vaporizes in thin air.

Six entire days of this: playing cat and mouse at odd hours, being shoved and kissed by Haruki somewhere, catching no sleep, having anxiety all night, wondering if anyone saw it, if anyone has catched on to this whole… energy. 

“You look like a zombie,” Haruki tells him, once – a direct whisper into his ear, with the slightest press of teeth. “Is it because of me? Are you not sleeping well because of me?”

It all comes to a halt on Friday, just as suddenly as it began, because Haruki snaps over something in the afternoon, and he won’t tell anyone what it is.

He locks Dylan out earlier than he’s ever done it, skips dinner, ignores calls; gets fully trashed somewhere between midnight and 4AM, alone. Beomseok had bought fancy imported dry sake for his older brother, a wedding gift he was keeping in the dorms, and the whole thing’s gone, drained.

Beomseok made a big commotion about it, went on to bang on his room door until the entire house was awake at 6 in the morning on a day off, soured everyone’s moods, split them into two: people pissed off at him and people pissed off at Haruki for pissing him off.

It’s tense through the whole day, with no one seeing eye to eye quite right, and when schedule breaks go this south Hanjae knows to expect an empty house after the sun sets.

Soon enough: at 6PM a voice message from Jiahang on their group chat, saying, ‘I’m going clubbing! I’m going clubbing and everyone can come with me! I refuse to not have a nice night tonight, I refuse it!’

Hanjae’s the first one to answer him, off the shower:

[You]: Pass

[jayjayjiji]: 🍅🍅🍅🖕🙄🖕🍅🍅🍅

Hanjae’s midway through sliding his shirt over his head when Haruki barges in without knocking. He stands there, arms up and tangled with the fabric, in his pajama bottoms, short hair wet. Haruki’s a figure that flops on his bed, face and stomach first.

He’s the only one who didn’t get a haircut for ‘Punch’. The hair stylist had run a hand through his hair, moved Haruki’s bangs one side and the other, said, like a joke, “But he’s perfect! He looks perfect already, Junghwa, what do you want me to do?!” It’s a wild thing now, at the back.

“I will sleep with you,” he announces, voice coming off hoarse and loud; drunk again, but mildly.

Hanjae, fully clothed, says, “Seungsoo–”

“Going out. Not a problem. And Minwoo, he is out.”

Hanjae takes small strides to get the burst open door shut. He takes a long peek at the two sides of the corridor: empty.

Behind him, he hears Haruki grumble, “These days, they’ve been so time waste. A waste. Why are you not caring?”

“What do you mean?” Hanjae asks, and comes back near, not too much. He’s still standing up in the crack diving his bed from Minwoo and Seunsgoo’s bunk one.

“I’m trying,” Haruki stresses. “To appeal to you. With my all, to get you to. Start something. You never do. Do something,” he commands at Hanjae, less angry, just agitated. “I am right here, so just– anything.”

Hanjae sits down on the edge of the bed, then. A calculated descent over the sheets.

“But hyung,” He stutters, and Haruki grunts something incomprehensible under his breath. It doesn’t sound like korean, it doesn’t sound like japanese, it doesn’t sound like anything. “Haruki, there’s people at home. No one’s left yet, we don’t know– Don’t know if everyone will.”

“So what? You were all always– So what?”

Hanjae hesitates, worrying his mouth. He takes one of his hands and slowly places it on Haruki’s hair, trying to somewhat pet it, but Haruki isn’t satisfied with that, and turns his face to the side, looks at him with a strong frown. Hanjae puts his hand back where it first laid on his lap, goes back to picking at the hem of his shirt.

And then Haruki reaches out a hand himself, and places it on Hanjae’s exposed knee, squeezes, sinks nails on it. Hanjae pushes himself further back, startled, and the hand follows, leaving a scratch; he almost falls off the bed trying to sneak away from it, and the hand stills, lifeless, not that far away.

“It is like,” Haruki says, and stops for a moment, gulps spit and something else down. “Like when you touch me is all so nothing. Like you do not… You do not really want me. Like you are not trying to make me remember. How can I remember. That you want me. I can not know if you are, just… Not leaving something behind. Like haunting.”

“Haunting?”

Haruki stops moving completely. “I really miss the way, really…” a breath. “The way you looked at me before.”

“And how,” Hanjae prompts, leaning closer, eager to hear it, “How did I look at you before?”

Haruki ignores him. “It is gone,” he laments, and Haruki actively looks like he’s grieving the death of it, whatever it might be. “You have not even fucked me yet, and– gone.”

It’s a quiet, long minute. Hanjae sees Haruki’s eyes go glossy in real time, catches the whole process up until Haruki turns his face away, presses it on the mattress again, hides it.

Haruki pushes his upper body up with his elbows, covers his face with his hands, inhales. Looks at Hanjae again, his eyes peeking through his fingers, dark.

“Ah, you are so nice, Hanjae. Very, very nice, you,” he says, voice still. He stands an arm out, matches every single word with an absent tap on Hanjae’s shoulder. “And all worried, all in your head. It is so annoying. So weird how you–” And he doesn’t say; doesn’t tell Hanjae what’s weird about him.

The hand on his shoulder goes up, scoops his jaw for a tiny moment, then yanks him forward by the back of his neck – Hanjae has to put a knee on the bed frame to not fully stumble. It’s a grip locking him in place, now, as Haruki drags his face near.

“Pick a fucking date. Pick a date,” Haruki tells him, and his voice almost doesn’t sound like his own; is a pure growl. “I am tired. Tired.”

He leaves the same way he came: a door meeting the lock loudly.

Before going to bed, Hanjae selects another shirt to sleep on, a clean one, red like blood in the water.

May 26th, 2022.

“I think I just– Hyung, I think it all comes down to the fact that I don’t understand what you’re asking, because you’re not– you’re not asking. We’re not communicating.”

Haruki’s long pace back and forth in the hotel room comes to a halt. He’s only in underwear under the bath robe he’s got on, black and with an embroidered logo on the chest and back – they both were, up until Hanjae put his shorts back on.

It didn’t take long for Hanjae to pick a date for them to officially have sex: the pre-Camp Camp filming days are the calmest, with the ease of certain success making everyone better to work with, smoothing all the nerves, and a day before they start shooting LOOPiN always have the liberty to do whatever they want. Most staff are too busy setting up cameras around the park, testing the traps, and putting the winning team barracks up to keep them all in check.

Hanjae brought it up to Haruki a couple of days before they traveled to Jeollabuk over their stale text messages, and promptly got an ‘yes’ and nothing further; Haruki kept his distance like a bride on a wedding day over the weeks, barely a blur on the corner of Hanjae’s vision.

So here they are, a day away from being shoved in a park to pretend it’s a jungle. Hanjae walked around with a condom in his short’s pocket since morning and he’s been trying to look forward to it, trying to rationalize the hollow in his stomach as positive anxiety.

By mid afternoon, everyone was leaving the hotel – absolutely everyone. Hanjae couldn’t put a finger on it, but he felt like Haruki had something to do with it. They were sorted into their dorm roommate arrangements by Junghwa, all in the same corridor, both of their rooms at the extreme ends. Hanjae waited for his text to come over Haruki and Dylan’s suite, then made his way in a quiet and dragged on zig-zag – tapped a little song on a vase with a single flower on the hallway table just to bite time.

Dylan was still there when he got in, angrily tying his hiking shoes, and he refused to look at them as he made his way out. He stopped at the door, turned, looked like he was about to say something.

Haruki went to shove him off the room with a tight, “No, Chihoon, I don’t want to hear you, not today, no one wants to hear you, leave, get out.”

Things happened at a weird pace from there. They made out for a long minute, came close to fully undressing then froze awkwardly in the middle of Haruki’s bed, paused it.

“What do you want to do?” Hanjae asked from where he was set on top of him.

“Whatever you want,” Haruki answered, absently tugging at one of Hanjae’s red ears.

So he tried to work with whatever, since he didn’t know what he wanted – he tried to remember some guilty ridden fantasy of his which Haruki had starred in and use that as a guide, but the search came out blank. Hanjae wasn’t getting them anymore, funnily enough, ever since he had been kissed by him a second time.

But no matter what he tried, be it a kiss on the neck or a firm hold on his tight, Haruki barely made a sound, barely seemed to engage and, the most defeating of all, he wouldn’t get hard. It took Hanjae a long moment to notice, too long, and he did so by accident; went to push him by the waist closer but his hand slipped down, and he noticed how limp he felt under his underwear.

That wouldn't do; he asked Haruki again he wanted him to do, what he shouldn’t do, and under the scrutiny Haruki only blurted out dismissively, “Stop, no one fucks to get comfortable, anyway”, and Hanjae’s hand fell from his shoulders.

He said, “What?” and Haruki, “What what?”

“What do you mean?”

“Mean by what?” Haruki asked, an uneasy sound, and Hanjae could almost feel him growing cold under him, losing body heat, so he stepped away.

That was a whole hour ago. They’ve been trying to recover, but the mood has gone sour. Hanjae has put his shorts back on a couple minutes after his boner fully died and Haruki seemed to take that as a personal offense, hence the walking.

Hanjae reiterates: “I just can’t know if you like anything if you don’t tell me or… respond. Physically.”

Haruki rubs a hand over his face. He’s annoyed but he’s trying to mask it, says like a tease, “What’s with the language? Did you do research?”

Hanjae sighs. He’s tired of hearing this tone on him. He’s tired of one too many things at once, a Russian doll of exhaustion. A block; the everyday chaos of work, another; the weight of lying to everyone, the effort of keeping it up, and the core one: Haruki not wanting him, pretending to do so, going about it like a chore, like something he must cross off a list.

“What am I doing wrong?” Hanjae asks. “Can you tell me?”

“No, not– You’re not doing things wrong, it just doesn’t happen, okay?” Haruki lets out. “I don’t really get hard, or anything.”

Hanjae processes the phrase word by word. “You mean, you mean never? Or–”

“Not never, just not always. Not a lot.”

“Hyung. Shouldn’t you get that checked?”

“‘Get that checked’,” Haruki parrots, half heartedly, and then quieter, to himself, “I need a fucking drink. ‘Should have sneaked something, should have– Got something.”

Seeing him stuck in place, an unpleased thing, Hanjae can’t help but think back to his snaggletooth days, the pre-rhinoplasty times, that one White Day in seventh grade where his deskmate pity gave him half a chocolate, and wonders if he’s lying, if he’s making something up to make him feel better, if he noticed that Hanjae’s not feeling great, nowhere close to nice.

He’s been hiding his right hand under the cover, trying to not let Haruki hold it, not that he’s tried to do that yet, nor does it seem like he’ll want to.

“We can just not do anything,” Hanjae reminds him. It’s his fourth time saying it, and it gets the exact same reaction out of Haruki each time: an annoyed huff, a roll of eyes. “Not have sex, if it’s not what you want. If I’m not– Not attractive to you.”

“You are, you are. Very attractive,” Haruki says. “Happy?”

“And if I am,” Hanjae prompts. “It’s okay, right? You think it’s okay?”

Haruki’s mouth hangs semi open, his eyes semi shut, when he shoots him a look. “What? I– What?” It’s almost a hiss.

“Can you just tell me why?” Hanjae presses. It’s the right wrong question; it sends Haruki back to pacing, his back turned to him. “Why do you want us to have sex?”

“You want this to happen,” Haruki tells him. “You always wanted it to happen, everyone knows, you made this happen, with all– everything.”

“And you want it too?”

“That’s such a stupid question! Am I not here? Didn’t I tell you to be here?”

“You’re not just,” Hanjae takes in air, sharp through his teeth. “Looking and understanding and– letting me have it, like–”

He can’t fully say it, Haruki doesn’t allow him, shuts it down with a sharp, “Are you my therapist? You’re my therapist now? Fuck off, shut up, be quiet for just a fucking a minute, will you?”

Hanjae withers. From a place inside him, he recalls, he had hoped. He had cultivated hope the size of a grain of sand that maybe, just maybe, the hesitation ment care – that perhaps Haruki liked him, and didn’t know what to do about it, how to go about it. A nice piece of fiction to cling to. But no. It’s clear now: no.

“I really don’t want to pressure you,” Hanjae says, and tries to make his voice louder as the phrase goes on, less miserable, but fails at it.

“Yeah, yeah, I get it, Hanjae, I understand korean, I understand what you’re saying, I’m not fucking stupid–”

“I didn’t say– I didn’t say you are,” Hanjae tries to reason, but all the sound gets drowned out; there’s only Haruki talking quickly, loudly.

“–So you can stop repeating all these good phrases now, these made up phrases. No one speaks like that. In the real world, no one says that–”

“I mean it.”

“–You’re not pressuring me, Hanjae, trust me, you can’t do that, no one– There’s no pressure, or urgency, or anything. I don’t feel any of that coming from you, so,” Haruki flashes him a smile, thin, ironic, sharp. It looks like something that would be carved out with a pocket knife somewhere.

“Then why,” Hanjae breaths. “Why don’t we end this here? Can we end this here?”

“Again?” Haruki asks, with a laugh. It’s a mean sounding one. “Are you serious?”

“No,” Hanjae says, and swallows. “All of it.”

He almost regrets saying it, given how hard Haruki’s face crumbles. It takes a full minute for him to recover, and Hanjae watches him try to piece an expression back together until he can no longer look.

“Bullshit,” he hears Haruki say, and then again, “Bullshit. C’mon, just. Give me a minute, alright?”

He moves very close, very soon, back on the bed. Their knees are touching again, and they both feel icy.

Haruki says, “I can do better, I promise,” and there’s a hint of a plea there. Hanjae hates to catch it.

“Haruki, it’s okay. It’s okay–”

“No, just, if you just,” His hands hover over Hanjae’s chest, unfocused, trying to be everywhere and nowhere at the same time. “I can do this, I can, really, if you just try to be more horrible, if you– if you force me, then–” and Haruki shuts his mouth very tight, looks down at the tangle of sheets between them, about to fall off the mattress.

Hanjae at him once and again, forces his eyes to stay open even though. He takes hold of both of Haruki’s wrists feather light, puts them away from him, pushes them to be on Haruki’s own chest. They fall limply on his sides once he lets go.

“Haruki,” Hanjae begins to say, and then stops, has no idea how to proceed. He puts his hands on his forehead, digging. He presses the heel of them over his eyes, hard. “I’m not… I’m not going to do that to you. I don’t want to do that, so can we not? Please? Can we not?”

He takes his hands off his face to try to look him in the eyes, to tell him with them to: I’m not doing that.

Haruki stags up, seems to tense from the heel off his feet to the top of his head. “This is so– awful, awful. What is it, your face is– It looks so–”

Hanjae takes notice of his frown, his quirked down mouth, his eyes – watery, blinking. It’s a sad face, an about-to-burst-into-tears face.

“I can’t stand this, I’m not– Not going to stand here, and be looked at like–” Haruki swallows dry, goes back into motion; picks his shirt back up from the floor, puts it on in a hurry. “I’m going to the pool. I’ll be in the pool, away from you. The whole trip, away from you.”

He stops abruptly at the door, a shaky hand on the handle. Haruki says without looking back at him, exasperated, “You’re gonna let me walk out? I’m leaving, I’m walking out.”

Hanjae says nothing, and experiences what might be the heaviest silence of his life. He feels it from within, taking the form of a bone crushing pressure.

Haruki is even quiet when he leaves, making the door fall shut with almost no sound; a complete dissonance.

June 2nd and 3rd, 2022.

Hanjae lays down, once he’s alone. He spends the rest of the day checking the door, checking his phone – a wild expectation followed by nothing, nothing, except for a tense engulfment of sleep.

Summer comes and Hanjae sees more rain clouds then he sees of just Haruki. It’s voluntary and it isn’t; they’re both avoiding each other.

But promotions are not done, yet, so it’s not as intense as it could be. Just yesterday they got sorted out to film a Heart To Heart episode, and had to scrap it midway because it was heavy, horrible, quiet. Their prompt was: Beach, and they couldn’t hold even a one minute conversation about it.

He got an email from Seo CEO in the morning: ‘Let’s all keep a serene work environment free of misunderstandings and intrigue’, he wrote, underlined and in bold.

Hanjae presses the cold bottle of energy drink against his face, the back of his neck – pure sweat after filming another music show performance. He’s by the vending machine, catching some air, seeing Idols come and go, staff hushing from one side to the other. Some of them bow their heads at him, and Hanjae greets them back with an enthusiasm he knows falls short.

There’s a small commotion in front of their dressing room when he gets there, and he could spot it from a distance. A girl group or at very least a group of around twelve girls, Beomseok and Seungsoo supporting their exposed arms on the doorframe when they talk to them, smiles warm and easy, so he knows exactly what it's all about.

Haruki’s the odd one out, in the middle of them, the center of all attention. He’s always been popular in the hallways, no stranger to little pieces of paper sneaked into his cafeteria orders, someone coming up to him and asking if they can take a selfie, if he’s got a minute – he’s known for dismissing all requests politely.

Hanjae tries to walk by them meekly, without touching anyone, just muttering polite ‘Excuse me’s until he’s allowed through; he isn’t allowed through. Haruki’s got one warm over his shoulder before he can get even a foot inside, before he can even process how, locking him in a clumsy armlock, turning him around, pushing him close.

“And what about him?” He asks the girls, and he’s close enough to press his cheek against Hanjae’s; they’re the exact same height, and their bones fall perfectly aligned. Someone laughs about it, someone woos. “What do we think of him?”

A girl, the closest to them, wearing the sparkliest makeup Hanjae’s ever seen says, joking, “Oh, him? Hmmmmmm, let’s see…”

At his back, Hanjae feels a lingering over and soon can hear Dylan say, a sharp whisper, “Haruki, stop that. Stop.”

Haruki ignores him. His hold on Hanjae’s neck gets tighter, turns into an one armed hug. “Hanjae’s very very shy, but he’s also very very nice. A proper gentleman.”

“Really?” Another girl asks – long curled hair, jet black, dimples showing. “I thought all gentlemen had gone extinct.”

“Noona, so did I! But not Hanjae. He’s proper old school.”

“If that’s true, then he’s cute,” she says, and comes boldly forward to pinch Hanjae’s cheek. Haruki watches her do so with an enthusiastic nod of approval, and Hanjae can feel his sharp sideways grin form in real time. “It makes him the cutest out of all of you.”

“It’s all true, trust me, trust me. He is the cutest out of all of us, yes. Can you believe he’s single? I think it’s so sad, how single he is, how alone he is all the time, always too lonely. We should solve that, no?”

The girl smiles back at him – amused, having fun, flirting with Hanjae, with Haruki, with the two of them at once in front of everyone when she says, “We really should.”

Around them, everyone’s gone into a frenzy over the situation. Seungsoo is slapping Haruki on his free shoulder, screeching ‘You’re so crazy today, Haruki, what’s gotten into you, you crazy man!’, and Hanjae can’t tell if he’s breathing. Then he can feel his lungs moving and nothing else. There’s a small turmoil under them, right where his heart should be, an agitation – fight or flight, and he fails both. He freezes, throat tight and dry.

And then: the enerved click of Junghwa’s heeled shoes, her voice loud when she says, exasperated, “No, no no no, out, out, out! All of you girls out of here right now, what is this?! Where are your managers?!”

The girls scatter in a hurry, all waving goodbye and giggling. Seungsoo puts his hand on his heart and makes a show out of sighing, looking sad, makes a couple of them laugh louder.

Door shut, Junghwa slaps him and Beomseok naked arms with her papers, half joking, half actually slapping them. “I leave for five minutes! Five minutes! What is wrong with you men!”

“We were filming Tiktoks! Innocent little Tiktoks!” Seungsoo says, but he’s laughing, proudly taking his beating. Beomseok simply steps out of her reach, shrugging.

Junghwa stags when she’s in front of Haruki, papers down. She looks for a long moment at his face, searching for something and Hanjae knows what it is: a sign of winter coming earlier.

She’s gentle with him in a different, more impersonal way. He’s the only one out of all of them Junghwa doesn’t call by the first name; she doesn’t use ‘kid’ or ‘boy’ or ‘son’ either.

‘Fukunaga-ssi’ is what she says now, asking if they can have a word in private, and Haruki complies, follows her out, mute.

Hanjae slides his earphones in and tries to not watch them – doesn’t want to look him in the eyes, and thinks he means it forever, feels like it’s a vow being made.

Everyone’s getting more or less undressed by the time he looks up again, falling back into their usual clothes, and the small glimpses of everyone’s torsos at the corner of his eyes are depressing, being back an old discomfort. He sinks into his seat, blinks something off his eyes, looks at the floor. Counts to ten, scratches at his marked hand.

Jiahang comes to sit by his side, gingerly tapping his face with a makeup wipe, a question on his frowned brow, a deep concern. He’s wearing one of Minwoo’s ancient black hoodies, the one with the falling apart NASA logo that fits him too short at the arms.

Hanjae has no idea why his mouth tastes so sour, seeing it; why the next breath he takes through his nose is so sharp.

Junghwa and Haruki come back soon enough, and he and Hanjae are the only ones left to change. She hurries everyone else out, says, “Boys, grab your things– and make sure you have all your things, please– Yes, Kim Haegon, I am talking directly to you, kiddo.”

In a blink there’s only a fan in a corner, making noise, and Haruki in pristine white performance clothes in front of Hanjae, wearing an overshirt with a cascade of thin chains on the back.

“We’re alone,” he says, suddenly, while staring at the floor. “If you want to you can–”

Hanjae stands quickly up, puts a wall and a door between them, turns the lock shut in the small bathroom attached to the room. He’s only sharing space with a shitter and a sink, a little mirror, and he doesn’t want to see even an inch of himself in it.

When he steps out, jeans and an white shirt, Haruki’s gone. His stage jacket lies abandoned on the floor, a tear on the shoulder, a loose chain on the opposite side of the room.

Hanjae staggers at the door, and sees himself walking back to pick it up without thinking. He’s very cautious when he folds it, very gentle when he tucks it under one arm.

[...]

On the ride home Hanjae lingers on the backseat, blearing some song loud enough to not think – pure instrumental, a booming bass.

When they stop in front of the dorm, he stays planted where he is; unties his seatbelt and then thinks better of it, clicks it back shut.

“I’ll go to the company,” he tells no one, just says it out loud, and no one bothers to object. He rides with Junghwa to the New Wave building, even quieter, almost one with the silence.

He doesn’t give her a chance to speak to him when they park, just hops off and goes straight through the reception to practice room #A2, the one with a bunch of old instruments tucked into the lockers, mostly hand-me-downs, some of them broke beyond repair.

He’s aiming for the one drum kit that’s probably around the same age Hanjae is, nothing fancy: it was some staff's son's, someone else’s teenage dream, and he said Hanjae could have it – it’s what his kid would want. It has million pieces of old stickers glued on it and Hanjae never felt like fully peeling them out.

His mind gets lost in the long choreography of setting it up piece by piece. When he finally sits behind the seat, his hands move on their own, just making noise.

And then he finds his way into a rock song through muscle memory. By the end of it, Haruki is a long silhouette in the corner of his eyes, dressed from head to toe in funeral black, and Hanjae almost loses the hold he has on his sticks.

Hanjae’s sweatier than before, breathing slightly through his mouth, still upset with him.

Haruki has a very firm walk when he comes deeper into the room. He stands a paper out in front of Hanjae, his face turned away.

“Phone number,” he explains, waving it even closer to Hanjae like a treat, a gift. “From the girl, earlier. The one that liked you.”

Hanjae lowers his drumsticks as he stares at it, letting his hands fall to his tights. He has no idea what his face is doing, but he knows that if he says I don’t want it, that won’t be all that he’ll say. He might cry; he might fail himself and cry from exhaustion, maybe. Probably something worse, uglier.

“It’s better if you start seeing someone, now. Really seeing someone. This whole thing, it’s so much bullshit. It’s bullshit, Hanjae, it’s like you said. So let’s end this here, like you asked,” Haruki says, and when Hanjae doesn’t move to take up his offer he shoves it in his pocket, walks away, goes to one of the side bars. He puts an extended leg there, a perfect stretch, as he keeps up, carrying an echo: “We’re not compatible, anyway. There was never anything really happening.”

Hanjae’s acting before he knows it. He puts the sticks on their case, tries to get the zipper shut with a hard push that doesn’t do anything. He tries again, harder, and the dent gets stuck on fabric, almost breaks.

“So don’t get sad, Hanhan,” Haruki concludes, turning around, crossing his arms in front of his chest, and his posture is perfect, fully straightened out – a wall again. “It’ll make me upset.”

Hanjae looks at him, as straight in the eyes as he can from a distance – keeps looking even when Haruki dips his chin down, offering only the top of his head.

“It was fun for a day, right? You had one fun day, got your dick sucked,” he says, and he sounds like he’s smiling, like he’s trying to make it sound light, to paint it as something funny. Trying to be intimate, a bit they did. “I don’t mind that we never really– It’s not important to me. I didn’t even want to have sex with you, so– who cares?”

Hanjae closes his eyes tight shut, tries to take a steading inhale. He hears Haruki say, as if from underwater, “But I did want to like you. That week, with all the kissing, all that– I tried to like you. ‘Just didn’t work. Didn’t work.”

“You tried,” Hanjae says, a breath. “You tried to like me.”

From the opposite corner of the room, Haruki puts his face back into view, and the smile he has grows more forced, more visibly sad. It reminds Hanjae of a chalk line drawn on a black board, crooked.

“I told you.”

“What? What did you tell me?”

“Hanjae,” Haruki warns him. “Let’s not make it awkward. I understand you had your ideas, all these expectations–”

“I didn’t. I didn’t have any expectations I didn’t tell you. Everything– I told you. I tried to be honest. At Deh noona’s. That was really all I had to say.”

“Sure,” Haruki says, with a tiny laugh, the hint of a sneer.

‘Sure’. Hanjae’s up from the seat, can’t no longer sit down, can’t barely stand being here.

Haruki keeps eying him like he’s expecting Hanjae to walk straight out of the door, and grows startled when he doesn’t, when he walks near him instead, at half an arm’s distance.

“Why do you think I didn’t mean it? That I was lying?” Hanjae asks the shrunken figure of him. “What sort of person do you think I am? What sort of person do you think being interested in you makes me?”

He’s close enough to see how tightly Haruki’s jaw sets when he looks away, at a nothing point on the far left. His hair falls on his eyes, a curtain. “What sort of question–”

“Every time,” Hanjae speaks over him, and it hurts to do so, because Haruki reacts badly to it, flinching. But someone has to say it; he has to say it, he can’t keep on not saying it. “Every time I wanted to talk to you, hyung, just talk to you, to make sure you were enjoying anything in any way, you looked at me like I disgusted you, like you hated me. Do you hate me? Why? What’s so wrong about all the things, all the things I've done? What’s not correct? I tried being close, and it didn't work. I tried to give you space, and it didn’t work. I still don’t understand, so can you tell me? Can you make it clear to me now?”

Hanjae’s out of air, when he closes his mouth shut. The whole room – sucked out of air.

Very quietly, Haruki says, “I asked for one thing, one thing, and you didn’t do the one thing–”

“You just said– You said you didn’t want to have sex with me. Then why? Why ask? Just because you could? You just asked because you could?”

“Stop,” Haruki tells him, voice rigid. His arms have unfolded and are now holding on to the side bar with all they have. “Stop with the whole why, why, why, just drop it. I’m not saying. Not saying.”

“You can say. I want to listen. I want the answer,” Hanjae says. “I still– I want to be your friend, now. I want you well. To think you’re not– To think you’re hurting, it’s painful. It’s painful.”

“Oh, you’re in pain– You’re in pain, you,” Haruki spits, and laughs, and sniffs, all at once. “Give me a fucking break! Go care about people that care about you, Hanjae, this is so pathetic, everything you always say is– Quit wasting your time with all of this, when you can get a nice girl, someone nice like you and have a nice, normal thing that’s not– Not this. You can choose to not have this, so I don’t understand, I don’t understand why– And you, you won’t understand why, so fuck off, just fuck off! That’s what I want, what I always wanted! For you to fuck off.”

It’s said like an ultimatum, and it sounds harsh enough for Hanjae to feel it more on his chest than on his ears. He tries to take another look at his face, to match the tone to an expression, but can’t – Haruki won’t let him, and Hanaje won’t insist. It’s not his place to insist, and it’s been made clear now. 

He leaves him alone, carrying himself very tightly out the door, out the corridor, out the entryway.

Out on the outside world, it’s already close to being night, and Hanjae takes in the stale air, looking up. He sits on the New Wave front steps despite himself, and the concrete’s warmth is a faint discomfort about to leave him.

The drum was still set there, in the room. Hanjae had wanted it, and promised to care for it, and still: left it there. He’ll have to go back for it, be back and fix it, put it back in place.

He should clean it first, and the floor, maybe the mirrors – not all, just some of them, the ones that look worse. Everything that looks bad, everything not quite right.

When he walks back into the practice room, there’s no sound, no lights on, and Haruki is no longer anywhere to be found.

The drum set is back on the case, compact inside the locker, exactly where it should be, exactly what it should be – as if it had never been touched at all.

[…]

Food tastes bland during dinner, and Hanjae doesn’t have it in him to pretend to have an appetite for Taesong’s sake.

He's been testing out recipes lately. He wants to impress his mother in law because he knows he wants to marry Yunhee, now. Not even two years together and he knows he wants to be with her forever, is sure that it’s mutual, it’s certain they’re in love.

He wants to show it to everyone; he gets to show it to everyone.

“Are you okay, Hanjae?” Taesong asks, over and over again – at the dinner table, on the couch during a drama commercial break, while they’re sharing space in front of the bathroom sink, brushing their teeth.

And each time Hanjae answers “Yes”, a tight “Yes”, and none of them sounds convincing enough, not even one of them he can get right.

Later, in his room: Seungsoo out, Minwoo out, and Hanjae all alone. Typical. Routine. Things as they’ve always been; as they’ve never stopped being, not even once. Haruki’s voice rings on his head when he lays it on the pillow: so alone, all the time, so sad, all lonely.

He checks the time on his phone: 8:03PM. Too early. Hanjae drops it, closes his eyes for a long time, checks it again: 8:16PM, and the pop up notification of receiving two messages from Dylan six minutes ago.

[dylari]: r things w/ haruki done?

[dylari]: plz answer quick

[You]: What do you mean?

[dylari]: idk how else to read this

Chihoon sends him a cropped screenshot showing a single lengthy Kakao message. ‘i don t know whyy is so hard’, the first line reads, ‘f or anyone ti just on ce do what i avsk and n ot sometind ellse like hsnaje he is sp–’

Hanjae stops reading it. He enters his phone’s gallery and deletes it, goes back to the chat and Dylan’s text now shows up as a blurry gray square, only says ‘media not found’.

[You]: Did he send you this?

[dylari]: yeah

[dylari]: our chat is his diary ig

[dylari]: when talking irl gets hard he blows my phone

[dylari]: i thought you knew

[You]: I didnt know

[You]: Sorry to hear you have to deal with that

There’s a long pause from Dylan’s side. When he resumes typing, Hanjae has long deleted both messages, regretted them – is sitting up on the bed with a hand on his face, a hard press, and regretting that too.

[dylari]: dude i dont mind knowing

[dylari]: look dont worry hanjae this is fine

[dylari]: im his roomie im on it i can take care of this

[dylari]: ill keep an eye on him now

[dylari]: im sure you tried your best your own way so thank you

[dylari]: telling you that now because he wont say it even if he wants to say it he wont so let me do that for you

[dylari]: good job

[dylari]: go breath

Hanjae falls asleep with his phone held tight, tight to his chest: 11:49 PM. He dreams of it ringing, ringing, ringing, and not being surprised, just being afraid.

[...]

It’s way past 1AM when Hanjae’s mattress sinks to the weight of Haruki sitting at the far end corner, some few inches away from his feet.

He had heard him unlock the door and come in, Seungsoo with him, making the most amount of noise – slurring more than singing some old pop ballad.

Minwoo had jumped awake out of bed, angry; threw a pillow at them, and then a shoe, told them both to fuck off, and disappeared.

Seungsoo began snoring as soon as his body hit the bed, loudly, which only happens when he’s exhausted; they must have danced all night, must have club hopped all night, trying to be too shifty to get caught.

Haruki stayed for a long moment in the middle of the room after tucking him in, silent. And then he sat there, in Hanjae’s bed, not moving, not breathing, Hanjae even thought, until he took a long inhale through his nose just now.

Hanjae won’t look; he can’t look at him. He promised he wouldn’t.

“I’m gonna leave you alone, now,” Haruki tells him – tells him directly, because Hanjae can almost make out the shape of his stare on his back, right at the shoulder. He bit very close to there once and meant nothing by it, thought nothing of it. “You’ll never have to talk to me when we are away from a camera, Hanjae. I promise. You’re gonna look around and I’m not gonna be there. Not an inch of me. I’m not gonna be there.”

He sounds so clear when he says it – slow, but still sober in a way Hanjae doesn’t hear from him much. He keeps on looking ahead into the dark, a hand gripping this pillow; his eyes won’t close.

Haruki swallows, resumes: “The thing is, you’re too nice, Hanjae, so, so nice, you’ve been so nice, so it’s not– It’s not you, it’s not. It’s me. I can’t– I can’t have that. Doesn’t work. I know it, for a long time. So with you, I was just… Lying. To you, not to me. I know that’s wrong, and I know what’s wrong and I just, still– I know. I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Hanjae, I’m sorry, I shouldn't have– I’m sorry. I’ll stop. I’ll stop, I promise, I’ll stop. I’ll stop everything, everything, so don’t cry, alright? Why are you crying? Don’t do that– Over me? Don’t do that. I’m sorry. Don’t cry, Hanjae, don’t cry, please, I’m sorry, I’m very sorry, I– I didn’t want to make you cry. I didn’t want–”

September 26th, 2023.

He can see Haruki clearly now, the stark shape of him. He’s still wearing the outfit intended for the airport – a sleeveless designer shirt, blue overcoat, and a wine purple trouser with an abstract David Bowie painted on the right leg.

Hanjae observes him from a small distance, catching his breath. He had run there, trying the piece the way back together from memory, growing a little desperate everytime he turned left and it wasn’t the right left; every time he saw an abandoned lot and it wasn’t the right lot.

But he was the one to find him in the end, sitting right on the floor, tense but not so small. He has a moment now to think of the right thing to say.

Hanjae wants to go with the essential: your sister’s at home, she’s looking for you, she wants to know you’re well. As does everyone; as does everything.

He opens his mouth: can’t make it. Opens his mouth again and takes another breath, a hissy breath, through the teeth.

Hanjae isn’t looking at the ground, this time, as he walks forward; he steps over a twig and it breaks loudly in half, disrupts his equilibrium lightly, and Haruki takes a slow look behind his shoulders. Their eyes meet then – and Haruki’s have grown tiny on his face, swollen. They quickly look down, at himself, to the ground.

“Someone found my spot,” he says hoarsely, with a single laugh. He picks one of the bottle pieces on the floor near him, raw glass, and throws it down the hill. It doesn’t make a sound. Hanjae keeps waiting for the glass to break and make a sound, and doesn’t hear it, never hears it. “They got rid of all my chairs– that sucks. That just sucks.”

It’s been a long, long year – 2023, that is. The oddest one yet, their busiest. Hanjae’s half an actor now, goes to TV and gives magazine interviews alone now, and Haruki models often, editorials and campaigns and a whole outdoor, once.

Hanjae squats near him, some inches behind; he’s still scared of how big the drop is. He waits, and waits, and waits more.

Haruki leans a bit on his back, tells him, “You can see his house from here. That's why I liked it, it’s why I came.”

Hanjae squints, looks ahead, trying to spot it even though he has no idea what to look for. He’s never been to Choi Sangwon’s. He knows some of the others have, back when they were Boy Of The Week trainees. Their reports were mixed: he had a big pitbull, a bathroom wall painted in a horrible shade of red, and all the carpets somehow smelled like they were brand new, like no one ever stepped on them.

Haruki laughs, meek, and points ahead; right at the only house with no light coming from the windows, empty. 

“That one,” he says. “I had a key copy, front and back door. I had a floor mattress, mine. I got clothes there, still– mostly underwear, sleep clothes. And my favorite necklace pin, family heirloom, in a drawer, there.”

Hanjae gulps something acid down his throat. “I see,” he says. “I– I see it.”

Haruki turns his whole face at him, suddenly. Looks sad, and tries to not appear sad, smiles. All white teeth. “Are you happy, Hanhan? Like, ever? Are you well, most of the time? Is your girlfriend nice to you, lately? You’re so busy now. With your dramas and all. I hope she understands. I hope she’s watching them, that she likes to see you on them.”

“I’m well, hyung. I’m– Yoora and I, we–,” Hanjae swallows again, dry. The raw truth is: happiness creeps up on him and it’s a battle to let it linger, when he looks around himself. He tries to start over, tries to sound firmer. “And you?”

“Pfff. What do you think? I know you saw the whole,” Haruki makes a hand motion – mimics an explosion, a disaster. “I heard you. Through everything. And thank you, by the way, for not bringing an army with you. For not acting like I’m a princess– Like I’m a runaway princess.”

Hanjae nods, uses that to say ‘you’re welcome’, and doesn’t mean it much. He should have brought an army with him. Or just his sister maybe, whom Haruki adores; avoids but adores.

Hanjae clears his throat, says, “Furumi’s at home. She wants to see you– talk to you.”

Haruki lets out an airy laugh. “Right. The baby.”

“You asked,” Hanjae reminds him.

“I know,” Haruki says, and turns his face upfront; looks at the drop, looks at the house. “I know I asked.”

“Hyung,” Hanjae says. “Can you tell me what happened?”

He sees Haruki run a hand over his face, up his hair, leave it there. He soothes himself before he speaks, a whole damn breaking sort of thing;

“It was so– I was checking on what Monica sent me to wear at the airport, and when I saw Bowie my first thought somehow was, did my boyfriend get a funeral? He was afraid of that. Of dying without a ceremony. His only real fear, I think, the only fear I figured out,” Haruki trails off, for a moment; seems to dive deep into a memory, takes a moment more. He comes back with a sneer. “Why the fuck Bowie? He didn’t like old music, didn’t like rock. Nothing connects– it’s just two dead people, that’s all, that’s it. And Chihoon was right there, right behind me, but for a moment– For a moment, it didn’t look like it was him. It looked like, from this one angle– Fuck, I can’t even say his full name, now. My first boyfriend, a name I can’t say. How sad. How very sad…”

He sounds like he’s giving Hanjae a cue to laugh. Hanjae doesn’t, wouldn’t be able to remember how to do so even if he tried.

Haruki says, “The thing is– The thing is, he made himself my life and then he died. He chose to die, picked a date and a place to die, and I can’t grieve, I shouldn’t want to grieve because it would be insane to feel– When I know he didn’t love me. He didn’t even fucking like me, treated that fucking dog better– Liked the dog better. It could kill me off, and he would say it was my fault. Everything about me made him so angry, all the time, all the time so angry when we were in private. My age, my face, my name, my accent. Everything. And everyone knows now. They all know, because I had to say– Because I can’t get a hold of it, lately. It’s always very cold in the winter, I always felt it, but now it’s the whole year. I feel very– very sad, cold, all year.”

“But they want this so bad, Hanjae,” Haruki tells him, quieter, holding in tears. “All of them. It’s not like you and me. We just landed here. To dance. To act. They live and breathe this thing, this Idol group thing, and it hit me then– It hit me that I can’t be like them, our members. That’s why I panicked, that’s why I couldn’t go to Fashion Week, why I had to come back here. I can’t do it like everyone else does it because it’s never been the same, my career– I don’t think I deserve these things. I didn’t even want them. I was in college, I came here to be in college. I wanted to dance, just dance, like my grandmother did– I wanted to do something for her memory, I wanted to be something she would be proud of, something anyone– anyone would look at and be proud of, and now no one fucking talks to me, anymore, my family doesn’t talk to me. I don’t know my mom’s new phone number– he didn’t even let me keep my mom’s new phone number. ‘Said I didn’t need it, said it didn’t matter.”

“I wish, back then–” Hanjae says, barely feeling his tongue moving. “That I did more. Anything.”

“You really wish that, don’t you? You mean it,” Haruki sounds like he’s marveling at it, that is a truly remarkable thing that Hanjae has said something and meant it. “You’re the nicest guy I’ve ever been with, Hanjae, really. The coolest, too. While I’m the worst one, right? Worst person you’ve ever been with. By miles. You can’t– Never again. No one like me. Never again.”

“Not like him again,” Hanjae tells him. “For you, not like him again.”

Haruki shows him an even sadder face, more wobbly, and shrugs. Just shrugs, looks away.

“I think no one,” he says, with a firm nod. “No one is better. It feels fitting to let that die, too. If I can’t get it right.”

“That’s not true,” Hanjae says, more with his clenched teeth than with his voice. “Not true. It’s not– Not better.”

“Oh, you don’t think so?” Haruki asks, and it’s just words. Just words being said to fill in silence, to cover up a strong sniff.

Hanjae can feel it again; the sharp line of disconnection rising, cutting the air in half, and he still doesn’t know how to stop it. He doesn’t know how to reach him.

He tries; he has to try. Hanjae licks his lips, forces some sound out of his throat: “You know– Haruki, you know, that all of us, everyone, will listen to anything you have to say. All the time.”

“I know that? Do I? And anything? That’s big. That’s really big. You shouldn’t let anyone say anything– no one should have to listen to just anything. Look at Chihoon now, Jiahang now. What good did knowing everything do?”

Hanjae’s at loss of words again, breathing around a lump on the middle of his throat. He’s too bad at this, too tired to think – just off a long action shoot. He still has his outside mask shoved into his jeans back pocket.

Somewhere in the distance, he can hear a dog haul; a coded hymn to the moon, maybe. Something about wanting life to stay still, wait a little longer. And then silence, a defeating one. A shuffling coming from Haruki in front of him.

“Can you, we– Ah, it’s so,” Haruki begins to say, shaking his head. “Can you hug me? If it’s not too hard or– bad for you. Just one time.”

Hanjae’s up on his feet before he’s even done talking. He stands his hand out, a timid invitation, and Haruki takes it, allowing Hanjae to help him up.

Haruki lays his forehead on his shoulder and stays there, being hugged, fully still until he takes a big shuddering breath. His arms stay glued to his sides, limp.

“I’ve never really– I never did just this,” he tells Hanjae; a shaky whisper, an old time secret. “It’s never been just this, before.”

Hanjae turns his face to the side and away so he can suck in air, so he can close his eyes shut, for a moment. He can’t think too much about it now. He taps at Haruki’s shoulder blades warmly, like a dad or a coach would – pat, pat, pat.

It gets an airy laugh out of him, a long and disbelieved one. “Bro hug!” Haruki exclaims when he steps away, whipping at his running nose, “You just gave me a bro hug. It’s really over now. We’re never going to fuck now. All that, over. What are we, if we’re bro hugging?”

“We’re a team. We’re friends,” Hanjae says, and thinks; you said so right here, once.

Haruki’s face makes too many things at once, hearing it. He looks down at himself again, accessing all the damage done to Monica Imano’s design. Bowie’s face has turned red with dust, and it looks even more smudged.

“VIANFINO is going to fire me,” he concludes with a dry chuckle. “They told me one more slip– the sponsoring, over.”

Hanjae bats an idle leaf off his shoulder and for once Haruki doesn’t flinch out of reach. He tries to give him a truthful close mouthed smile.

“Leave it to me– Leave them all with me,” Hanjae says, and leaves his hand there, a firm hold on him. “I’ll wash them.”

[hupla222]

Bad Future AU - Gyms

Just like I said, I'm back talking about more changes that have taken place in this alternate timeline. This time, the gyms of Sinnoh. Some are similar, some are different, but each has a new story. Sorry I don't have character refs this time. But they all do have new looks. I could make some if anyone wants to see any particular character. Anyway, let's get into it!

Oreburgh City - Merlot (or Mars as we knew her) runs the gym as a normal gym. With Roark unable to run it, the gym was offered to the strongest trainer. Merlot entered because she was bored and ended up winning. She has Purugly as her ace.

Eterna City - Gardenia still runs it but she is often very busy raising her young daughter, Clementine. As such Cheryl runs the gym half of the time. Both of them would rather spend time with Clementine, so the gym is empty a lot of the time.

Hearthome City - Fantina remains the leader although she never made it in the contest world. Instead she embraced a more gothic nature, running the gym as a sort of haunted opera. She's awfully dramatic but she takes her role as leader seriously.

Veilstone City - Felicity (or Jupiter in our timeline) has taken over the gym here, running it as a poison gym with Skuntank as her ace. Maylene was never able to become leader, she was too busy being a performer in the game corner trying to make ends meet. As such, Felicity was assigned the role to keep her out of trouble. She has too much fun thinking of new puzzles to mess with challengers.

Pastoria City - Still run by Crasher Wake or Johnny as he calls himself now. His wrestling career never seemed to take off so he took a job as the warden of the Great Marsh. He's passionate about this job, although he seems more humble here than he is in our timeline.

Canalave City - Riley took over for his friend Byron after his unfortunate passing during a cave in on Iron Island. He still runs it as a steel gym to honor his friend but he has many doubts about how well is doing as gym leader. He wished he could have been there for Roark before the boy ran away.

Snowpoint City - Candice reprises her role as gym leader. She is a very serious, no nonsense person due to being trained to be the next guardian of Snowpoint Temple. She rarely ever smiles or even takes breaks from her training.

Sunnyshore City - Due to Cynthia abandoning the league and Lucian being moved up as champion, Volkner took the empty slot in the elite four. As such another aspiring inventor from Sunnyshore, Cyrus, runs the gym. He seems quite happy in this role, showing off his inventions to the town. The gym is now dark type and Cyrus uses his Honchkrow as his ace.

[idksmtms]

I’m back and this is part 2, and some things I forgot to specify before, so if you want you can already start writing it and none of the backstory is missing! 🦋🩵💙

Thank you all for complimenting my ideas 🥹🥹! 

Sooo, let’s precise some things that I forgot to add before:no one to this day knows she did not actually steal the lighting bolt that time (besides Poseidon, Hermes that stole it, no one else is really sure) and in this, Poseidon does not have any other kids, Percy is the only one. He is not married. 

The timeline is a little messed up lol, but that’s the beauty of writing a fan fiction, you can do and write whatever you want. 

While all the other gods have kids everywhere, like in the mythology and the tv show.

After a lot of years apart, Poseidon and Y/n meet again when she is hurt badly during a battle with evil creatures or something and Poseidon basically heals her while she is close to the water (not that she needed his help, but he saw the chance and took it) and after that he appears, they spend the night together after all those years apart, that night of twelve years ago Percy Jackson is conceived and at that point, they have to do everything they can to protect him. He is a forbidden god. 

The name him percy because let’s pretend it’s unique, and Jackson because is his “aunt’s” Sally last name. And let’s say he will have both of his parents’ powers because they are two different kind of gods (Norse and Greek) that’s why he can control water and also can do things that a witch does lmao(his mother’s “Scarlett witch” powers).

Y/n and Poseidon have helped Percy stay hidden his whole life, while themselves were far away from each other. 

Y/n sent specifically Grover ( he like heard her voice telling him what to do, she did not tell him who she was )for him, and sally for Percy is actually like an aunt, her and y/n met when sally was younger, became great friends and y/n was always visiting her on earth( even if she actually couldn’t) so when she brought Percy to Sally she accepted with no hesitation to take care of him.

Sally has always told Percy that his parents loved him, but they could not keep him, one day they would be riunited and Percy never knew what to think about this. 

When he arrives at the camp half-blood ( because everyone thought he was a demi god but just more powerful than others) everyone were shocked when Poseidon claimed him, since he has always loved Y/n, it was in the history books, he has always refused to get married, clearly for them he was whoring around just like the other gods. (They did know about Y/n and Poseidon story, but after all the punishments and suffering and years away from each other they could have never imagined that Percy was actually son of both of them, after 200 years and counting they still loved each other ).

In the meantime, the Olympians are not the only ones that find out about Percy. When it’s time, Y/n tries to claim him, but Odin decides to punish her and imprison her (Odin is a bitch in this, like Kronos).

Percy starts his mission with annabeth and Grover, because the oracle told him that he needed to find out all the truth about himself, he basically had to go to find out who is mother was and why she abandoned him and he also wanted to save Sally and find the damn lighting bolt to stop the war between the two brothers. 

He finds out the truth at the end of his journey, when he is with hades he understands that he does not have the lightening bolt but here’s the plot twist. When they arrived there, Hades sensed it like it was someone that he knew, but not Poseidon, someone else, and that’s where he figures out that Percy is also Y/n’son, because his powers resemble a lot y/n’s ,and offers to help him, because they used to be good friends. Hades tells percy that he is actually a God and the story of how his parents met, when she was punished and all of that. Story that he has already heard from Sally, that told him Y/n’s story, the punishment and all of that, but she never mentioned that Poseidon and y/n were together, so that he could not understand right away who is mother was, he just knew the story about Poseidon forbidden lover.

Y/n stil imprisoned in Asgard can sense the imminent battle between Zeus and Poseidon and that her son is in terrible danger, she is finally capable to free herself from her father’s prison (she is basically the most powerful Norse goddess, just like Poseidon is actually more powerful than Zeus) and while she tries to go to her son she is attacked multiple times by monsters because she is getting closer to Olympia and she is on earth ( place she was banished from) while Percy is with Ares, y/n claims Percy. 

Poseidon has the triton, for y/n I was thinking, as I said before, the crown of the Scarlett witch? Of course in blue. 

Now that Zeus knows that he is Poseidon and y/n’s son he is actually more mad than before, but deep down he knows that he cannot hurt the child: 1. Because he is a god; 2. Because his parents will start a war if he harms him, and he cannot win if y/n and Poseidon attack him. 

In that moment y/n enters Olympia to get to her son, and Poseidon, that was about to surrender to his brother to save Percy, feels his lover and mother of his child aura so he stops. If they have to, they will fight Zeus and protect their son. (I was thinking so many things for this scene that my brain was hurting, so you choose how the battle evolves )

Now this is the reunion scene and it’s up to you!!

Just some suggestions: y/n and Poseidon being badass and fighting next to each other, them being proud parents, of course a kiss between the two of them (more kisses when they are alone👀), a lot of hugs with Percy, they then explain everything to him. 

Y/n at the end tells Zeus that it was good for him to surrender because he could have never won against them and she tells him that she did not steal the bolt the first time and even prove it maybe(but I can’t think how she could). Another pact of peace is made between asgardians and Olympians.

This was it!! Sorry i took my time with it, I trust you completely with this, you can of course add all the details that I didn’t think about, I hope you liked this and that you will enjoy writing it !

🦋🩵💙

Ok firstly, wow! I love how detailed and well thought out this is??? Amazing. Nonny you amaze me every time!!!

Secondly, don’t apologise! Take all the time you need, creativity should have no time limit.

Thirdly, I’m so sorry but I am not a marvel fan 😭 so like I might have to edit the request a bit around that but it won’t change much

But eeeee!!! I’m so excited to continue writing this!! I started part one yesterday and I’m loving it!

[batfambyval]

Ok so idk if anyone needs this, but here’s a timeline/list of all the ways Jason Todd’s age/relationship with time was messed with after his death.

Dead for 6 months

Catatonic due to oxygen deprivation and head trauma

In a coma for months after being his by a car

Continues to be catatonic for over a year

Tossed in the Lazarus Pit, mental faculties return but physical aging is wack

Spends an unspecified amount of time in the Hundred Acres of All where time doesn’t pass (but far as I can tell it was years for him mentally)

So his aging, mental and physical stopped for 6 months, physical aging resumes without mental aging for like a year and a half or two years, mental aging resumes and physical aging is slowed, and then physical aging is paused while mental aging continues for years.

So not even considering chronological aging, which is another can of worms entirely, Jason Todd’s age is… who even knows at this point. This is why he’s so fucked up. Like is he mentally older or physically older??? Depends on how much the pit slows/reverses aging and how long he was with the all caste. You could make arguments for either.

Anyway I think about this a lot and wanted you all to feel my pain.

[sgcairo]

About 2th dottore.. I like to think that dottore fell first and HARDER. First time meeting pantalone didn’t waste a minute straight up flirting with him, of course failed because he’s just..not flirting like a normal guy and pantalone has high standards PLEASE TELL ME

This is where the timeline absolutely wrecks me because there's two ways this could've gone:

1. Dottore is a new recruit, and spots the ever lofty Pantalone within the palace. First thought: Hot damn. He proceeds to try and talk to Pantalone, only to be waved off as Pantalone "doesn't have time to discuss paltry business plans right now".

2. Dottore comes to request funding for the first time (because apparently you have to do that) and spends most of the time filling out papers and flirting with Pantalone at the same time, which goes straight over the Regrator's head.

But I'm going to go with the first one because it's a ride.

The first time Dottore sees him, he's still recently expelled from the academia and not at all used to having people look down on him. The Fatui are brutal in terms of rank, and if you're inferior in terms of status, you generally get ignored, brushed off, or shoved out of the way. Dottore didn't become the Second Harbinger in a day, no. He had to prove himself somewhat, and had to ascend the ranks by clawing himself up the Harbinger ladder.

He started at the bottom, looking up at those prized seats as the Tsaritsa's most trusted and with the most venerated power. At lot of his time was originally spent doing maddening amounts of research and experimentation, always dashing around the palace and frantically muttering his new theories. He wanted to get to the top. No, he needed to.

That's around the time that he encountered Pantalone for the first time.

It was, quite simply, humiliating. Dottore saw him, took a few moments to process his majesty, then just had to push through the crowd that surrounded the Ninth Harbinger, two measly spots above Dottore. Oh, but he was so much of a mess that as soon as the Regrator turned to look at him, the words flew out of his mouth in a horrible jumble.

"L-Lord Harbin-"

"I don't have time for pathetic half baked plans, I will not be giving grants without a proposal."

"I- Sir, that's not what-"

"Move along. If you want a grant, have the paper on my desk with an adequate proposal. Now leave, my patience grows thin."

And of course, Dottore was left red faced and with his mouth open, shot down before he could even say anything.

It was just a crush, at first. He occasionally saw Pantalone in the halls, but never engaged him after such a mortifying ordeal, more content to instead watch him from afar, hidden in the trickle of agents that were scattered through the halls of the palace.

In all honesty, he forgot about Pantalone for a while between that ignorant, pathetic stage and his ascent to being the Second Harbinger. His experiments were made in frenzies of madness, ultimately gaining traction and catching the Tsaritsa's eye. His talents boosted him up the ranks as he aged, segments joining him in his ambitions, his station quickly overcoming Pantalone's and heading straight for the top.

By the time he noticed Pantalone again, he had fully grown an ego and was not ashamed of it in thw slightest. Pantalone had changed somewhat, the man somehow got even more graceful with age. No longer soft around the corners with youth, but with hardened eyes and cruelty that only a bastard of many years could have.

And the Doctor professes that he'd cut out his heart and let Pantalone do some questionable things with it.

Let's just say that Dottore got the equivalent of blocked and reported for that one.

Pantalone has standards, and men proclaiming that they'd let him eat them like a gourmet dinner is not on the list. He always did desire a spouse of similar power and prowess, a good match for his business. They would have to be elegant, and match his tastes nicely. Good manners, no doubt a good manipulator, and not want anything outside of the mutual benefit the marriage gave them, Pantalone didn't have time for foolish things like romance.

And yet... seeing an upset and sniffling Doctor laying on the floor of his lab after having an experiment fail for the 54th time makes him change his mind a little, because he's just so pathetic. It's weirdly enticing, and Pantalone thought himself to be above that. But no, Dottore is loud, brash, and weirdly entertaining, especially in such a strange and amusing situation.

Pantalone has a thing for pathetic men. You heard it from here first.

Long story short, Pantalone has completely forgotten the pathetic mess that tried to approach him that day all those years ago, and when I'm he hears it from Dottore, he breaks down laughing.

"I always knew you were pathetic!"

"..."

"But that just means I get to pamper you to make you feel better, darling."

"...I hate you sometimes."

"I know."

[liloinkoink]

lamplight time! did i write continuation to the last bit i posted the other day? no i did not! i’ve hopped earlier in the timeline: martyn’s first attempt at traveling with a sentient fire, from outsider pov

Nights at the Drowsy Dragon Inn are never particularly exciting, except for those when the inn sees an adventuring party. Most of them set out from the little town to make the hard trek up to the ruins of the city of Dogwarts, and very few of them come back. Sadie likes to entertain the thought that they simply traveled elsewhere instead, finding another town to spend the night after a successful adventure. Then another party will breeze through, talking of the incomplete quest’s impressive reward money, and she knows.

She usually feels bad for them, hearing them talking about that place, and give them a secret little discount for their stay. Her husband thinks that it’s stupid.

“They’re going to die anyway,” he says. “They’re not gonna need the money.”

It’s the principle of the thing, she tells him. She’s being nice. How could she not? On a mission like that, it’s possible it’ll be the last nice thing anyone will ever do for these people.

It’s not like they never come back. Sometimes they do. Whole parties return, empty-handed but alive, and she charges them a perfectly normal amount fee.

But sometimes…

Tonight, a man comes in alone. Sadie recognizes him, but only sort of—He’d come in with a party of four a few months back. She remembers them because they’d been noisy, chattering and shouting constantly. The whole time they’d been here, they’d been riling each other up and laughing long and loud. They’d been difficult to miss for the nights they stayed here, making it even harder to miss now the way quiet follows the lone traveler as the door shuts behind him.

Sadie remembers him especially because he’d been friendly, having been the one to pay for the rooms here when the four had stayed. He’d been lively then, chuckling under his breath as he’d walked up to the counter and cracking jokes as he’d handed over their fate.

There’s no laughter now. No little party of friends. Just one man, passing through the front room of the Drowsy Dragon Inn at half past midnight. His hair’s a mess, tufts of blond hair sticking out in clumps, sweaty bangs dried to his forehead. There’s stains on his clothes—mud on his pants, sweat on his chest, soot on his sleeves. He’s not bloody, at least, but he’s dirty, and there’s tears in the fabric that look like must’ve been attacked. He’s wearing, she notes, the same faded green shirt he’d been wearing when he’d been here months ago, the cleanliness of which she decides not to think anything more of.

He’s also carrying a torch. That’s not super unusual—travelers carry them at night to keep monsters at bay. Most travelers extinguish them when they get to a well-lit town, though she supposes with the way the rest of him looks, she can excuse him forgetting.

His name had been—… uh. His name had started with… it’d started with… J, she’s pretty sure. John, maybe. James?

Regardless of what his name might be, the man walks up to her counter. She sets aside the book she’d been reading and smiles at him. He tries to return it, but he’s out of breath, and he takes a moment to catch it, resting his free hand on the counter. Did he run all the way here? Dogwarts isn’t close. He must have been running for days.

“Hello,” she says, smiling anyway, “Need a room?”

“You have no idea,” says… oh, was his name Jack? No, not Jack… “I don’t have any money on me, but if there’s anything you need help with around here, I’d be more than happy to do it tomorrow morning.”

He’s not the only person to make Sadie a deal like this—it’s not uncommon for adventurers to leave all their money in the care of the most careful member of their party. That’s all well and good till that member runs off and leaves, or worse, is eaten by beasts in the forest outside of Dogwarts (or whatever it is that happens to the people who go).

“It’s starting to get cold,” she says, “If you can bring in enough firewood tomorrow to last me the rest of the month, the room’s all yours.”

“Great. Thank you so much, really,” he sighs, tension draining out of his shoulders. Exhaustion bleeds from every inch of him, and the promise of rest does little to stem it. He reaches down, patting an axe at his belt. It’s damaged, but it shines brightly by the light of his torch. “I’ll get on it first thing after I wake tomorrow.”

“Of course,” she smiles, taking a key from the rack behind her. She holds it out, but before she hands it to him, she points to the torch in his hand. “I’m going to have to ask you to put that out, though. Fire hazard and all.”

It is at this moment when her weary, polite guest becomes unreasonable.

When Sadie points to it, the torch in his hand crackles loudly, and he stares at her a long moment after she speaks, uncomprehending.

“Nnno,” says the man, slowly, as if he’s uncertain. Then, with more conviction, “No. I can’t do that.”

“No,” she repeats. He nods, once.

“I can’t,” he says, “Sorry, it’s really important this doesn’t go out.”

“It’s really important that my inn doesn’t burn down,” Sadie replies.

“It’s not going to catch, I promise,” He insists. The fire in his hand almost seems to dim, as if to prove it. “I’ll be really careful.”

“You’re right, because I’m not letting you stay unless you do the properly careful thing and put it out.”

“I will cut down double the firewood if you don’t make me put this out,” he sounds like he’s pleading. Sadie cannot imagine what could possibly be so taxing about snuffing out a single torch.

“I won’t need any firewood ever again if you burn down my building. Pass,” Sadie says. She knows it’s a low blow for the already deeply frazzled man, but she shoots for it anyway, certain it’ll be the end: “You already can’t pay. Either put it out or sleep outside.”

The man’s face falls. The torch flares up once, but dies back down immediately. Nothing about this makes Sadie feel better about the situation.

“I’m… a paladin now,” he says, half a non-sequitur, by way of explanation, “I can’t let this go out. It’s a holy flame. Part of my oath.”

“I’ve never heard of an oath like that,” she says. She doesn’t think he has either, if the uncertainty in his voice is anything to go by, but she can’t imagine what he actually needs the torch for if he’s lying.

“It’s more like a pilgrimage, then,” he doubles down, “Please.”

“I’m not letting you bring an open flame into the room,” Sadie says, folding her arms, “This is the last time I’m going to say it. Put it out or leave.”

The man looks around, a bit frantic, and all at once she feels bad for him again. Curse Sadie and her bleeding heart for all these poor, doomed adventurers. She can only imagine what he’s just been through… And his whole party is gone… It must be very hard for him. Grief does strange things to people, doesn’t it? No wonder he’s imprinted on his little torch.

“That’s it!” The man shouts. He drops the sizzling torch onto the counter and runs off to a sitting area in the corner. Sadie jumps back out of her chair, startled, before the sight of an open flame on her wooden countertop catches up with her.

She snaps the torch up off the countertop and, as it sizzles in her hands, most of her pity for the man goes up in smoke. Running her hand over the wood where the torch had been, Sadie finds there are no scorch marks. It’s a pleasant sort of warm, but certainly not hot enough for having just been in contact with a live fire.

Said man, for his part, doesn’t even seem to notice her distress. When she looks up, he’s too busy scrambling onto one of the tables, planting his dirty boots onto the clean wood as he reaches for one of the lanterns dangling from the ceiling.

“Hey!” Sadie yells, “Get down from there!”

“I just need to borrow this real quick!” he says, which doesn’t actually address what she said at all, but then he has the lantern free.

There’s a slam as the man jumps off of the table and onto her floor, carting the large lantern with him. He drops it on the counter, grinning all the while.

“You said you can’t have an open flame,” he says, “So if I stick the fire in here, I’m good, right?”

Sadie opens her mouth to respond. She feels like there’s a dozen reasons she should say no to that, but it dawns on her that if she does, she’s going to have to keep arguing with him.

“Fine.” She holds the key out to him, sighing, “But when you leave tomorrow, I want my lantern back.”

“I can do that,” He takes the key, stuffing it into his pocket, and then takes the torch back. He unlatches the lantern with one hand, then dips the torch inside, touching it against the candle within.

Sadie watches him, if only because he’s doing it on her counter. The wick catches, and then the whole wax stick explodes into flame. The man doesn’t flinch, though Sadie does, jumping back at the audible fwoomp of the fire taking it over all at once.

Strangely enough, the torch goes out. He hums, then sets the scorched wood aside without any further inspection, like this doesn’t surprise him.

“Alright. We’re all good, then?” he says, patting the lantern with one hand. It sizzles, though he doesn’t acknowledge it.

“All good,” Sadie confirms, because she isn’t sure what else to do. The man grins, exhausted but relieved, and the lantern in his hands seems to glow brighter with it.

“Awesome. Thank you, dude, I really needed to sleep in an actual bed,” he says, picking up the lantern with both hands. The metal will probably be too hot to touch directly soon, but he doesn’t seem phased by it yet.

“Sadie,” Sadie says.

“Martyn,” he replies, and with that, he’s gone, taking his lantern to the room down the hall.

Sadie watches him go a moment, then sits back down, taking up her book. Where did she get the J from…?

[secretdestinypainter]

The Best New Book Releases Out of 2024:

In today's world where everyone is having different screenings and digital distractions, I feel like there is something great and truly magical about diving into a good book. Books have the power to transport us with the well of knowledge, introduce us to fascinating characters, and make us think about different imaginations that nothing else can do not even this digital media. I love reading books and exploring new characters based on interesting stories. Let me join you on a journey to the enchanting world of books, where we can learn and explore adventure, knowledge, and inspiration awaiting on every page.

When it comes to new releases, I’ve been loving the Black horror girlie surge that’s been part of the Horror Renaissance, the latest of which is Dead Girls Walking by Sami Ellis. It’s a YA slasher that follows a girl looking for her mother’s body at the summer camp that — get this — her serial killer father once owned. Supreme horror mess of the highest order.

Another new horror title, albeit an adult one, is Diavola by Jennifer Marie Thorne. Diavola also has some family drama going on, this time set against a haunted Italian villa during a vacation. Finally, there’s the conclusion to troubled, half-Native teen Jade Daniels’s Indian Lake saga in The Angel of Indian Lake by Stephen Graham Jones.

Stepping outside of horror, Like Happiness by Ursula Villarreal-Moura sees protagonist Tatum Vega getting her newfound peace upended when news breaks that a famous author — someone she dated years ago — has been accused of assault. And, from the author of The Enchanted — which I inhaled when it was first published years ago — comes Sleeping Giants, a tale of foster kids, abuse, and real-life monsters. Lastly, Worry by Alexandra Tanner, is a debut described as “a Seinfeldian novel of existentialism and sisterhood.”

In the featured books below, there’s an entry into a popular cozy mystery series, queer love across timelines, a reimagining of Icarus, and more.

The Good, the Bad, and the Aunties by Jesse Q. Sutanto

isSutanto stays with her foot on our necks with these new releases, phew. After last year’s über popular Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers, she’s back with another cozy mystery, this time a continuation of her bestselling Aunties series. Here, Meddy Chan travels to Jakarta to spend the Chinese New Year with family. But then, a former fling of one of Meddy’s Aunties — affectionately known as Second Aunt — shows up trying to stunt with bougie gifts. Well, one of the gifts was actually meant for a business rival, and it being accidentally given to Meddy’s family sets her and her Aunties up to become mixed up in a decades-long feud between Jakarta’s business organizations. When things get really real — and Meddy and her family are put in harm’s way — it’s up to Meddy to save them all.

There’s Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension by Hanif Abdurraqib

Hanif Abdurraqib is the National Book Award-nominated author of A Little Devil in America, and here he aims his poetic eye at basketball. With his usual mix of the personal and communal, he looks at one of America’s favorite sports, examining its history, who makes it and who doesn’t, and LeBron James.

How to Solve Your Own Murder by Kristen Perrin

This is being compared to Knives Out, which makes it perfect for the fun-seeking cozy mystery reader. Almost 60 years ago, Frances was just a teenager at a fair with friends when a fortune-teller told her that someone would kill her. She spends the rest of her life trying to figure out her own future murderer. Then, one day, Annie is called to her great-aunt Frances’ huge country estate. She’s been murdered, and it’s up to Annie to figure out who did it. Good thing the dearly departed Frances kept detailed notes on potential suspects…

Icarus by K. Ancrum 

In this queer Icarus retelling, the titular character is an art thief, but one with a victim who kind of has it coming. Icarus only steals from the wealthy Mr. Black by replacing his priceless art with his father’s flawless forgeries as part of revenge for Icarus’ mother’s death. A strict set of rules keeps Icarus from being exposed, until he gets caught by Mr. Black’s son, Helios, one night. But the enigmatic Helios doesn’t turn him in — instead, he asks for Icarus’ friendship. This friendship turns into something more that threatens everything — even what Icarus and his father hold dear.

The Emperor and the Endless Palace by Justinian Huang

Across multiple timelines and lives, two men are reborn, each life proving to them the eternity of love: a young emperor gets seduced by a courtier in 4 BCE, an innkeeper helps a mysterious visitor in 1740, and a college student meets an intriguing stranger in modern-day L.A.

The Rise and Fall of the Second American Republic: Reconstruction, 1860-1920 by Manisha Sinha

Sinha gives us a new look at a pivotal moment in U.S. history: Reconstruction. Despite Reconstruction’s claim of granting true freedom to Black people after the Civil War, the country’s leaders proved to not be very concerned with equality after all. And, by looking at imperialist desires, northern labor conflict, women’s suffrage, and the Chinese Exclusion Act, Sinha shows how the failed promise of Reconstruction resulted in capitalism running amok and a special kind of race-based tyranny.

Blogs like these are immensely helpful for people who love to read different books which include their summary plots, characters, themes, and a major part of a story. If you want to have more synopsis regarding your favorite books you can schedule a book club event on tinyti.me website, where you can organize book discussions, meet and greet different authors, or get regular updates about upcoming book events or holidays.