#i think about what could've been every day

[rcmclachlan]

8x06 fix-it fic: Amnion

Buck doesn't bounce back from Tommy the way he did with all his other breakups for reasons he can't articulate or even look at. He thinks of how long it took him to recover from Abby, but even that felt different, because he'd had hope carrying him through most of it. He doesn't have that now.

The worst part is it's bringing everyone else down. It's starting to affect the job, and he can't take any more of Bobby's pity dinner invites or the kid gloves Eddie handles him with. Then one day, Chimney (in an attempt to lighten the mood) asks Buck if he's pregnant, and it awakens some primordial rage in Buck that he never knew he possessed and damn near rips off Chimney's head about it.

But once the blood levels in his adrenaline start rising and he calms down, he starts thinking about it. Before he knows it he's thinking about it day and night, and now that's starting to affect the job more than his heartbreak had been.

Then one night Maddie invites him over to watch trash TV and eat junk food until they can't feel feelings anymore, but instead of the patented Maddie Hug he's expecting, she hands him a First Response test stick the second he walks in the door.

Five minutes later, he comes out of the bathroom pale-faced and dripping tears because there are two lines in the test result window, and Maddie leads him over to the couch where they curl up and cry together. Just like the old days.

Maddie asks if he's going to tell Tommy, but there's no judgment in her voice, like she's behind him no matter what he decides, and Buck tries to make her laugh when he says, "How do you know it's his? I could've been living it up for the last month. New person almost every night. Exploring myself."

She just gives him a Look. Also patented.

Under the weight of her scrutiny, Buck thinks about Tommy's face before he left the loft that night and how ''Buck'' looked and sounded so wrong coming from him. Like the shape of it was so painful he could barely move his mouth around it.

Finally, he shakes his head. His eyes well up with more tears, which feels impossible, because the human body can't possibly produce this much liquid. He's going to drown them both. "I thought... I thought we had a future, Maddie. I really did. I guess I still get one... but only with part of him."

A couple of months pass and Buck's entire world shifts. The 118 have rallied around him in a way that almost feels like they're closing ranks to every other firehouse. Eddie becomes especially protective and devises a 5000-point care plan that makes him twitch if Buck so much as thinks about deviating from it, but he also keeps telling Buck that he needs to tell Tommy about the pregnancy.

"If only to get his family history," Eddie says reasonably, but there's something pleading in his voice every time, like there's so much more under the surface that he's trying to keep under wraps. Like there's more about this that he thinks Tommy should know.

Chimney's in the middle of explaining why he's stealing the cool uncle crown from Buck and sitting pretty on the throne when Buck asks him about it.

"Is there something about Tommy that no one's telling me?"

It trips Chimney up. Literally. He just barely catches himself from going headfirst into the kitchen counter.

Buck's heart starts pounding. "Chim, does he know?"

"No," Chimney says, firm and almost a little offended. "We promised you we wouldn't say anything. But Buck... you should tell him. You should talk to him."

Part of him wants to whip his phone out right then and there and dial Tommy's number. He could do what he did the first time: ask to meet somewhere and laugh about bad coffee and plead his case for a second chance. He could reach across the table for his hand, but this time, he'd stand up and walk over to Tommy and place it on his belly. "I don't care about firsts or lasts," he'd say. "I care about only's. And you're the only one I want."

But the other part of him, still licking its wounds, hormones in flux and forcing organs to shift and bend as it makes room for the thing he and Tommy made together, bares its teeth and snaps, "He made it very clear that he had no interest in hearing what I had to say."

Chimney never brings it up again.

Meanwhile, Hen goes a little overboard with forcing him to undergo random physicals—she pops out of the shadows twice a day to ambush him with the blood pressure machine, and he keeps threatening to avoid rooms that have doors—but he loves it. His body is a complete stranger to him for the first time in a long time, but the changes he's experiencing are interesting and he's having a blast cataloging every new one. He and Hen have a spreadsheet with like fifty tabs, and she helps him navigate every test his actual OBGYN sets him up for.

He's over her house at least once a week, although pregnancy talk at the dinner table is verboten.

"If one of you says the word 'amniocentesis' one more time, I will start a food fight," Karen had said, finally putting her foot down. Across the table, Denny perked up.

As much as he hesitates to even think the Q-word, it's a pretty quiet pregnancy. The cravings are kind of wild, though, and he goes most of his first trimester feeling like he's going to die if he can't eat rice krispie treats with cottage cheese. Every time Bobby sees him cracking open another container of Hood, it looks like he's seriously reconsidering sobriety.

But as incredible as they are about the pregnancy, they're all tiptoeing around the other elephant in the room: when Buck is going to stop working scenes. He and Bobby have a series of discussions that satisfies neither of them and resolves nothing, and it builds to a big blow-out that ends when Bobby tearfully begs Buck to stop risking his own life and the life of Bobby's grandkid.

After that, it's like some stone thing in him dissolves into sand and he finally eases back a bit in his fifth month. He doesn't put up a fight when Bobby orders him to only handle the winch or stick with hose duty, and if he stays a little closer to the engine because he gets winded so easily these days, no one comments on it.

In his sixth month, the inevitable happens: there's a call out at Palos Verdes and it's all hands on deck, which means the 217 is there too. At first he thinks he might make it through without running into Tommy at all, but he turns a corner and—there he is. Smudged with mud and looking like a drowned rat because of the downpours, but in his turnouts he's big and capable and, for a second, he's walking into First Presbyterian and apologizing for missing the ceremony.

But the memory is easily wrestled back into the past the second Tommy's gaze fixes on Buck's belly.

Buck wants to stage a retreat that would make the Allies at Dunkirk stand up and applaud. He wants to throw his arms open so Tommy can get a better look at it, say something cool and mean, like, "Did you know that INNOTEX makes turnouts for carriers these days? Pretty progressive of them, if you ask me."

He wants to be weak and ask if Tommy will spare him a hug. Just one. Nothing greedy. Just—a moment to soak in his warmth, to inhale the smell of his skin. Enough to carry him through the rest of it.

But he does none of that. He inhales through his nose, lifts his chin, and says, "Firefighter Kinard."

At that, Tommy smiles, and it's completely awful. There's no joy in it. Not even amusement. He looks like he wants to be sick, and Buck feels like a monster.

But Tommy swallows and says, earnest as anything, "Congratulations. I-I knew you'd find it. I never doubted for a second that you'd find the person who'd be your last."

Even as he says it, Tommy's face does something indescribable, but it rips through Buck's chest and shatters his ribs, tearing through pericardial layers until it scores the vulnerable muscle of his heart. It's so shocking that it almost knocks the truth right out of Buck's mouth.

Someone comes over the radio and requests all available first responders with flight experience to report to the B-zone, and Tommy straightens up and locks whatever it was away.

With an unsteady hand, he tips an invisible hat to Buck and says wryly, "Firefighter Buckley," before jogging away.

And Buck stands there like an idiot watching him go. It's that night all over again. It's Buck instead of Evan.

"See you around," he whispers, and then runs back to his post in the A-zone.

+

Tommy gets the call when he's halfway through a burrito foisted upon him by Dana, who had taken one look at him and said, "You look like a flood victim. Eat something before I get HR involved."

He'd taken a mutinous bite and couldn't argue with her. Months later and it still felt like he'd watched everything he loved wash away with a tide he couldn't fight. Except he'd sent the tide himself. He had no business feeling like this.

But they send him to the site of a car accident where a pregnant driver had been T-boned by some asshole who ran the red light, and the RA unit called to the scene didn't have the right equipment to assess the fetus. But the victim's belly was hard enough to warrant a med evac.

By the time Dana gets the victim loaded on the backboard and inside, Tommy's already on with both First Presbyterian and LA General to see whose neonatal surgery team is available.

The door on Tommy's side slides open and Tommy turns in his seat to ask what the hell Dana's doing over there, but it's Hen who's pulling herself inside.

His stomach clenches with dread. "Hen?"

"I'm riding with you," she shouts, taking the headset that Dana gives her.

He looks just beyond her and wishes he'd had the presence of mind to listen to the manifest when Dana had read it aloud to him, because Evan Buckley is strapped to the gurney and looks like he's on a completely different planet.

"Hen." Tommy can't hear him say her name, but he sees Evan's mouth shape the word. Evan reaches clumsily out for her with one hand while pressing the other to his belly.

Hen murmurs something to him that the comms can't pick up, and Tommy wonders if they've notified Maddie, if they've notified the father, whoever they are. If they're already at the hospital waiting for them. If Tommy will have to see them, talk to them face to face.

Tommy bites the inside of his cheek until he feels the hot wash of blood over his tongue, then forces everything down to join the burrito from earlier that really wants to make a reappearance. It isn't his right to know any of it. That went out with the tide, too.

He locks it down tight enough that he gets them into the air so easily they might be a feather on the wind, then he heads in the direction of First Presbyterian. The real start of it all.

They're maybe halfway across the city when Evan shouts, desperation and fear carrying his voice over the rotors, the words sliding together, "Hen, check Nora! Y-Y'need to ch—"

"Nora's fine, Buck," Hen says, her voice clear as a bell in Tommy's ear.

Staring at a skyline he can't see, Tommy says, "'Nora'? Was someone else in the car with him?"

When Hen comes over the comm, her voice is as inescapable as a flood. "Nora's what he decided on for the baby. It's her name."

Tommy's hand tightens on the cyclic so the way it starts shaking won't be so obvious. "Nora was my grandmother's name."

He'd told Buck about the woman who was basically the only family he could stand, who was responsible for not letting him become his piece of shit father, who accepted him when no one else would. She'd meant the world to him. She'd been the world to him. And for Evan to give his kid her name—

Realization hits like a levy breaking, and he turns to look wide-eyed over his shoulder at Hen, because it can't—he couldn't be—

"Patient, male, 33, prenatal course complicated at 8 months gestation," Dispatch had said.

The timeline is right.

Hen stares right back, as good of a confirmation that he could get outside of a DNA test.

Without breaking her gaze, Tommy tells Dana to take over. She gives him an unreadable look but says nothing except, "Copy that," and smoothly resumes their journey while he squeezes into the back. There's hardly any room next to the gurney and his knees are compressing his lungs, but he takes Evan's' hand and stares blankly at the shiner forming around his right eye until Hen breaks the silence.

Why didn't you tell me, he wants to demand, but he knows that if he so much as opens his mouth, he's going to start screaming until someone sedates him.

"For the record," she says, "I hate what you did. I hate what you took from him. But I understand why you did it."

Tommy rolls his lips inward and wants to suffocate himself to death. She understands? Does she? Does she know a life can be obliterated in the span of a minute? Does she know what it is to live a half life, to walk through the world like a five-year old drew a scribble on a blank sheet of paper that was supposed to be a person?

Does she know what Evan looks like when his joy is sucked away? Because Tommy does. She hates what he did? No one hates what he did more than him. No one hates him more than him.

Shakily, he lifts his other hand and touches the tips of his fingers to Evan's birthmark, which used to know the touch of his lips so well that Evan would joke that it was actually in the shape of Tommy's mouth print. Like a brand.

He forces himself to inhale. It seems impossible that Evan's here, carrying their child, their Nora. Evan used to say the lightning strike gave him super powers, made him invincible, and Tommy's ashamed to admit that he almost believed him. It seemed like nothing could ever bring Evan Buckley down, but here he is in Tommy's sky, halfway to Heaven already.

He glances at the LifePAK—where Evan's life has been concentrated into a series of lines and numbers, the reading strong despite everything—and then looks back at Evan, who is still the most beautiful man Tommy has ever seen even now.

"Evan," he chokes out.

There's no answer. At least not from Evan.

Across from him, Hen breathes through her nose and then quietly says, "I'm only going to say this once, Tommy, so I hope you're listening. If you can't trust him to know what his own heart wants, then this flight will never have happened. When he wakes up, you will not have been here. I'll change the manifest myself."

Tommy closes his eyes. Something hot spills down his cheeks.

"I know things haven't been all sunshine and roses for you. Lucy's said you've basically shut down since it ended. I know you're hurting just as much as Buck is... which is why I'm telling you: be sure. He's going to have enough on his plate without worrying about whether or not you're going to swan out of his life again. You need to be sure, Tommy."

Tommy doesn't say anything, but he opens his eyes and holds her gaze without flinching, and he tightens his hold on Evan's hand.

The rest of the flight passes in the kind of silence that feels like a cyst was lanced. Or maybe a boil, as it were.

+

Buck wakes up in stages to find he's in a hospital bed, and when he puts a hand on his belly it's smaller and almost deflated beneath his palm. He is just starting to hyperventilate when suddenly Tommy's there, murmuring to him, "You're okay. Everything's okay, I promise, she's fine. She's fine. Look."

And Buck, heart racing, forces himself to breathe slowly while he follows Tommy's gaze down to the bundle in Tommy's arms. Then he stops breathing altogether.

"She's fine," Tommy says. "A little early, according to the doctor, but absolutely fine."

Buck collapses back to the bed and weeps in relief, because she's fine. She's here and she's fine and she's perfect. Tommy gently places her in Buck's arms before retreating to the chair next to the bed which has a dent in the vinyl in the shape of his ass.

But Buck is enraptured with Nora, who smacks her lips in her sleep, and he marvels aloud, "She has my mouth."

"Thank God for that," Tommy says with a laugh. "It'll help take the focus off my nose. Poor kid."

It hits Buck like lightning that Tommy is here. He's in this room and talking about Nora like—like he knows. And there are things Buck should probably be saying, like apologizing for not telling Tommy about her as soon as he found out, or asking why he's there at all, but the words are crowding in his mouth and he can't figure out which ones should go first.

Tommy's lips twitch in a smile that is awful to look at, like he completely understand Buck's struggle, but his voice is soft and even when he says, "I need you to know that it wasn't about you. Not you personally. It never was."

Buck stops trying to speak and just stares at him, because that is bullshit, and oh, he knows which words should come first, and he opens his mouth to release them into the wild but Tommy holds up a hand.

"I know," he says. "I was a coward and an asshole, and I'm more sorry than I can possibly say. I won't ever be able to make up for what I did. But I need you to know why I did it."

And, in fits and starts before he finally finds the thread, Tommy tells him about Jeremy.

After Tommy ended things with Abby and then finally came out, he dated around for a long time before he met Jeremy, who was brilliant and fun and new. Tommy was the first man Jeremy had ever been with, and Jeremy was the first person Tommy saw a future with. He'd been so sure about Jeremy. He'd believed that Jeremy was it.

Until, almost two years in, Jeremy ended it. He'd sat Tommy down and said kindly, cruelly, "You're amazing, Tom, but you're just the first. You can't be my last." And then he'd left Tommy completely shattered in the rearview.

"That night, when you asked me to move in... it was like I was watching him put on his coat all over again," Tommy says shakily. "But what I felt for you was lightyears beyond anything I felt for him. I'd fallen so hard for you that I knew if I had to watch you walk away I'd never get up again."

Buck stares at Tommy, eyes rimmed red, and says, "So instead you made me watch you walk away."

It must land like a fist because Tommy exhales sharply and hangs his head, bowing around the pain. He sits like that for a moment, absorbing it, before he lifts his head and nods. "Yeah. That's exactly what I did."

There are deep, dark circles under Tommy's eyes that speak of a hundred sleepless nights, and his body is sharper, leaner, trimmed entirely of anything soft. He's made entirely of angles. He's so unfairly hot. He's miserable to look at.

Buck swallows and murmurs, "You look like there's no love in your life, Tommy."

Sucking in a trembling breath, Tommy smiles weakly and sketches a shrug. It looks like the fatigued steel of his edges are starting to crack.

"I left all my love with you that night." His gaze darts down. "Among other things."

Buck looks down at Nora, who's sleeping the sleep of someone already exhausted by existence, or maybe just by her fathers' drama, and thinks that maybe he really has been carrying all his love plus Tommy's around. Because otherwise he has no idea how he's so full of it.

"She's absolutely perfect," Buck says, smiling dopily.

"She's... more than anything I could've ever dreamed of."

He looks up in time to see Tommy drop his gaze to the floor at the same time his shoulders lift and lock like they're bracing for a blow. And in a voice so thin it's barely a sound, Tommy says, "I know I don't have... any right to ask, but is there any... any chance I could be part of her life?"

The tears that have been languishing at the edges of Buck's eyes finally see an opportunity. He doesn't think he could've held them back any longer if he tried.

Mouth trembling, he whispers, "Just hers?"

At that, Tommy looks up, eyes wide, disbelief and hope chasing each other across his face like dogs. He jerks a little in his chair but he doesn't move. He doesn't move.

Buck stares at him, a tsunami pulling everything back from his shoreline, and bites out, "Thomas James Kinard, if you don't get over here and kiss me, I swear to Christ—"

But Tommy's out of the chair and at his bedside, cupping Buck's face and tenderly smearing a kiss over his open mouth, licking the relieved gasp right off Buck's tongue.

Between them, Nora makes a tiny noise, and Tommy startles away just enough that he can press the side of his head to Buck's and gaze down at her with a tremulous smile.

"She really is something, huh? Sorry about the nose, kiddo," he says softly.

Buck knocks their heads together and says, "I happen to love that nose, thanks. And like you said, my lips will help balance it out."

Huffing a laugh, Tommy kisses Buck's lips. And the side of his nose and the bolt of his jaw. Then he leans down and presses a kiss to Nora's little pink and blue hat.

"I'm sure if you are," Tommy murmurs, tilting his chin up so he can flash a brave smile up at Buck, who smiles back.

"I was always sure."

[bunnys-kisses]

｡ﾟ•┈꒰ა a butcher au - max verstappen ໒꒱┈• ｡ﾟ

max could've been a lot of things. but he was very good at cutting meat. those curious blue eyes didn't flinch at the sight of guts and blood. he simply worked and he in turn lived a happy life. in a way it got certain frustrations out, that he was never a good driver. when he craved up meat for sale at the small shop he worked at, in the apron and heavy gloves, he liked that no one recognized him. the weight of expectations didn't fall to heavily, instead he got thanks yous and no one praying for his downfall. he did have favorite customers though. the old nonnas who came in who were very particular, but always left heavy handfuls of change in the glass tip jar. the love sick man trying to win of a new woman of the week with his attempt at fine dining. and you.

you had lived out in the small town near the italian and french border for a few months now. an aunt of yours had died almost a year ago and you get saddled with the small property she owned. you took it as a chance to go somewhere else, having lived in the bustling city in another part of the world. so, the small town life was nice. and every week you'd come in and see max. he was always happy to see you. he'd often say to you, "i think i have something better in the back." before he flashed you a smile and headed to find a better cut.

he liked you, there a fondness he carried for you. you were just very polite and sweet. your grasp on both italian and french was a little rusty, but max was helpful as he wrapped up your order and told you to have a nice day. over the months you became comfortably familiar.

while max was comfortable at a distance, he was surprised when he heard your voice from the front. he looked down at himself, elbow deep in an animal all morning... staining the front of the apron and the gloves he wore. there was even specs who knew what on his upper forearms. "shit." he sighed to himself. he knew that his job required getting a little dirty, but he didn't want the beautiful woman who came in every week to see him look like a serial killer. he quickly took off the apron and gloves (even attempting to pick the dried blood off his arms) before he went to see you. you were at the front with other groceries in hand. you were just in yesterday. he looked at you with a little confusion. and you simply smiled. you placed two sunflowers wrapped in last weeks newspaper on the counter near the cash register.

you couldn't look him in the eyes when you asked him, "i couldn't wait for you to make the first mood, max. but... would you like to have dinner with me?"

max picked up the flowers, they looked beautiful even in the somewhat bad lighting of the butcher shop. he looked to you, your smile had dropped and you looked nervous. while max was wrapped up in receiving flowers and your request, he realized he hadn't said anything. he put the flowers down and took you by the hands across the counter and said, "yes! of course!"

you ended up having dinner with max at your home a few nights later. you two had been texting over the course of those days. and while he found himself comfortable messaging you. being in your home felt nerve wracking, he hadn't been on a date since he left his home town after he turned eighteen. but, you looked beautiful in the kitchen. making sure that everything was perfect for dinner. occasionally his eyes would scan over your form as you worked in the kitchen. you seemed to natural there. the way you prepared the sausages in the pan (the ones he sold you days prior) made max feel more at ease. there was a joke there about you knowing how to prepare meats. while most of the time he simply ate vegetables when he got home, after being around cut up animals for hours on end made him want to eat a stalk of celery by the time he got home. but to see someone so beautiful work a kitchen marvelously and the end result being something so beautiful.

"i made these rolls earlier today." you said as you brought the bowl with some on there, "i'm not the best baker ever. i'm pretty sure i can't compete with the place a few doors down from you." you laughed as you turned back to around to grab the pot of stew that you finished.

max eyed you behind as you walked away and was already in love.

you returned with dinner in hand, oven mitts protecting your hands from the hot surface of the pot. it smelled good. it smelt like home. and it made max feel warm all over as if his body wasn't heated from the warm summer night. you smiled when you sat across from him then clinked your wine glass with his, "to the first date in a long time." and max took a sip, he got lost in your eyes for a moment. and there was little room for dessert when you pulled max into the bedroom. the bed frame creaked as he was almost pushed onto it. you stood in front of him and he wrapped his strong arms around you then kissed at your clothed middle.

the clothes came off and he saw you eye his chest for a moment. he almost wanted to recoil a little from the attention. he wasn't built like a statue. he was strong for years of lifting things around the shop and walking to and from home every morning. but before he could say anything or move, you ran your hands down his chest. feeling his soft skin under your palms then said, "holy shit, this is what's been hiding under those aprons you wear." he looked away for a moment felt heat in his cheeks before you pulled him by his chin into a heated kiss.

you got max onto your back and straddled his waist. you watched him swallow before you kissed him along the neck and collarbones. your rubbed yourself up against his abdomen and shuddered from the stimulation of your clit. max clutched onto the covers under him and you went in for another searing kiss. it was perfect, you were perfect. your movements were slow, feeling him up against you. it was teasing for both of you until you got yourself seated on his cock. which made him tense up and feel a flare of his across his body. your hands on his strong shoulders for leverage as you moved up and down. max shuddered and his swallowed hard, "shit. please." he said as you moved against him. you replied, "you feel so good. i'm surprised no one else has tried to pick you up in town." you giggled, the heat in your cheeks was heavy. he simply held onto your hips and started to work alongside you, letting the pleasure bubble up, "i get nonnas and their granddaughters visiting from overseas. usually they are too scared to talk to me. or i'm too scared to talk to them. they see the blood or the animal in the back and get scared." maybe it wasn't polite to talk about work while he was fucking you, but you didn't seem to complain. he found that you didn't flinch at how the sausages were made in the shop. he clutched further onto your soft hips. his hands were used daily for taking apart the meats that arrived. he was usually in the back carving like he was making a masterpiece. the anatomy of the beast burned into his head. but while he held you, his touch was full of tenderness.

he wasn't trying to carve himself into your skin, he wanted to make you feel good. he wanted to be good in your world, and as sweet moans left your lips he knew that he was doing just that. he looked up at you with those blue eyes, the pupils a little wider from the heat in his body. the euphoria that was a drum in his chest as he continued to meet your pace. he then added, "plus, now i have no reason to talk to them. not when i have you." you blushed a little bit, looking away for a moment as he did earlier before you leaned in and kissed him on the lips. your hands splayed across his chest as you worked along his cock. up and down as a fire burned in your belly.

you two kissed once more as you pace started to stagger. you felt the heat become fuel in your blood as you worked his cock. he felt like a dream, an utter euphoria that you couldn't put into words. you had been with others before. but in the low light of the home you now owned with a man you met by chance while living in this small town. there was a certain niceness to it. a comfort you longed for while stuck on packed buses or falling asleep during meetings on a year prior. in the warm heat of the summer, you felt good as you moved against him. so long tinder, so long bumble, you met the man of your dreams while he was covered in blood, whose hands worked diligently every day to deliver the finest cuts of meat. not only to you but to large portions of the town. maybe it was love right off the bat, regardless you felt a warmth in your chest for him.

you kissed once more as you both loss the rhythm, soon you finished with a moan against his lips and he followed soon after. he clutched onto your hips tightly as you continued to thrust on top of him. eventually the pleasure flooded your brain and you slowed down to a stop. the kiss was broken and you both panted heavily. max cupped your face for a moment ans said something you couldn't quite pick up, but you responded with, "right back at ya." between heavy pants. and max knew it was love.

you soon laid in bed with the butcher, curled up against him. both feeling the after shivers of climax. you felt comfortable in the crook of his shoulder and your face up against his softer chest. you could tell he was strong, but wasn't opposed to homemade cooking.

he lazily took your hand in his other one and kissed across the knuckle. he sighed against your fingers, rubbing them up against his cheek soon after, "if this is a ploy to get a discount

you looked at him and chuckled, "damn, my plan is ruined."

he chuckled, "i'll need a few more homemade meals before i can do that. don't want the little nonnas to think they can seduce me into better prices." then kissed your hands once more.

you sighed and pressed further into him, feeling a sense of comfort in his arms, "next time i'll bring more than flowers."

he simply laughed, but in the back of his mind he thought, don't bring me a ring. that's my job. and maybe it was a little bit too soon to jump to that next step. but, as he held you in his arms it felt like a perfect piece. he wouldn't mind giving you discounts, of course if you were married then it would be free. but as he kissed the top of your head and heard your breathing level out and eventually fall asleep, it felt nice. it felt like home.

[nearlydawn]

nights like this.

⋆ pairing: josh washington x fem!reader ⋆ genre: fluff ⋆ warnings: no y/n, just slight flirting, mutual pining, before prologue ⋆ wc: about 3.1k ⋆ note: not proofread, expect part two ⋆ requested: no

masterlist ⋆ about ⋆ ask

tuesday, 7:56 pm.

both you and josh had been planning this night for what felt like weeks—a movie night. to be frank, neither of you are very coordinated when planning hangouts, but when you stepped inside and saw nothing laid out—blankets, snacks, drinks—or even a recorded movie ready—you knew this was going to be a mess, a small frown tugging at the corners of your lips.

sometimes things are better done spur of the moment! josh sheepishly let you in, insisting he forgot, but you knew he didn't—he couldn't have. texts back and forth every day talking about how excited you were proved that—not to mention hannah and beth were trying to tidy things up in the living room, waving at you with smiles on their faces. "i'm sorry—really—i'll get popcorn going," he rushed out, shaking his head softly as he made his way into the kitchen. you could've sworn he was blushing. from embarrassment. obviously. you didn't mind in the long run. you were here, and now the party was really going to get started. "it's alright, josh."

-

you sat criss-cross on the washington’s couch, remote in hand as you scrolled absentmindedly through the channels. josh, on the other hand, was in the kitchen whipping up popcorn. you were supposed to be looking for movies… but nothing seemed to be on tonight. nothing interesting, at least. it bored you to the point you were lost in thought while clicking the down button. their house was one you'd been in many times, and honestly you treated it like your own—albeit a bit better since you wanted to make a good impression. every time you arrived you just felt an immense sense of comfort, like you were wrapped in a warm blanket the second your foot hit the hardwood floor. but i guess that's just the effect the washington's have. on everything, really. whenever you get texts from them you're unable to hide the smile from your face.

the subtle pops and snaps of the kernels filled your ears, as well as the overwhelming smell of butter. it was a nice contrast to the frustration you were feeling... just seeing the same shit as you switched channels—almost to the point where you just wanted to take that dumb, plastic remote and throw it at the screen. deep breaths, you said. just take a deep breath.

click after click, channel after channel, nothing. the only things coming up were reality tv, animal planet—hell, judge judy. honestly, you could've settled for something dumb like 'ridiculousness' or 'the impractical jokers', but you desperately wanted to find a horror movie. you know. that cliché movie scene where the girl clings to the guys arm helplessly as she pretends to be scared—nuzzling her face into his shoulder to 'hide' from the absolute terror on screen. and then the boy consoles her, telling her that there's nothing to be afraid of, but deep down the girl just wanted an excuse to be by him. -

“aye, ya find anything?” he walked up behind you, a dopey grin on his face. his hands rested just behind your head, leaning on the couch. his voice broke you out of your small fantasy... unfortunately. you glanced behind yourself, thumb still auto-pressing like a zombie. “nope. no luck,” you sigh, scrolling so far you reached static.

“mm, well, i'm pretty sure i have dvds lying around somewhere,” he shrugged, patting your shoulder gently as he stepped back.

“now that's more like it.” you smiled with relief, setting the remote down by your side as your hands came to rub your face. "any idea where they are?"

you stood up from the couch, circling it as you followed him back into the kitchen. josh hummed softly, trying to think whilst pouring the popcorn into a medium sized tin bowl.

“they’re either in my room or my sisters, i’d assume,” he concluded, shooting you a knowing look. “we’re all movie people.”

you nodded, walking over to the fridge as you grabbed two bottles of water. “i can go check with hannah and beth,” you smiled.

hannah and beth. they had left the living room in silence the second they were done organizing—no hello or hug like usual. it was a bit strange, but you chose not to question it. i mean, they were only helping him, you know.

your hand lingered on the fridge handle for a moment, closing it quietly as you walked back to the couch. the cold of the water bottles were beginning to burn your hand—a sensation you never enjoyed. quickly, you set them down on coasters on the coffee table, wiping the condensation on your pants.

“so you don’t want to come to my room with me?” he teased, following after you as he brought the popcorn out.

“ew, josh,” a slight scoff escaped your lips, faint blush dusting your cheeks. “i’d much rather talk to your sisters.”

you feigned annoyance, but the smile creeping up on your face clearly said otherwise. it was incredibly hard to hide the fact his little comment made your heart race and all of your blood rush to your face.

silence fell between the two of you—a tension filled silence. your heartbeat echoed in your ears, trying to steady your breathing. his eyes scanned over your face, and suddenly the world seemed to stop. the glow of the tv seemed to illuminate his face perfectly—accentuating all his features. it was like he was luring you in. a sort of magnetic pull that just had you absolutely captivated.

conflicting feelings arose in your mind. it was a known fact that you liked josh—but should you act on them? your heart wanted you to walk forward and close the distance, but your mind was unsure. you were good friends, sure, but it was far-fetched to say he felt the same. he was unobtainable in your book.

“suit yourself,” he grinned, shrugging nonchalantly.

the second time you were broken out of your thoughts.

his voice was smooth—the way he replied igniting a spark within yourself. he turned around almost as soon as he spoke, disappearing into the hallway that led to his room. as his footsteps slowly dissipated, you finally exhaled. honestly, you didn’t even know you were holding your breath.

but, did he always look at you like that?

- the walls of their home were decorated in a plethora of family photos, some of just them individually. there weren't many of josh, but the ones they did have up were cute, mostly him as a little boy with a goofy grin on his face. excited about his first day of kindergarten—catching his first fish—all his milestones. you couldn't help but look at all of them as you wandered around in attempt to find hannah or beth. you envied the washington's a bit—a well off family with a big house that just so happened to own an entire fucking mountain, not to mention the lodge and other buildings on that property. (dare i say nepo-children?). no matter how many times you were in that house, you only seemed to remember where hannah's room was, aside from the living room. your footsteps were quiet as you navigated, walking up the staircase with your left hand on the railing. as you reached the top of the steps, you b-lined it to hannah's room, knocking on her door gently. you could the muffled sounds of laughter, followed by soft steps as the door swung open—beth greeted you with a tight hug. hannah was sitting on the floor in front of a line-up of nail polishes. fun! "hey," she grinned as your name fell from her lips, "long time no see! i thought you and josh were supposed to be watching a movie?" she let her hands fall to your sides, holding your arms as she gently shook your body back and forth. "yeah, we were going to—" you smiled, laughing a bit as she took your hand and brought you into the room, "i came to ask if you guys had any dvds. he said they might be in here." the twins shared knowing glances, and they both nodded as they looked back at you—almost in sync. it was scary. were you first hand experiencing twin telepathy? they had a full-on conversation with their eyes alone. "they're in my room, i'll take you." beth took your hand in hers again, leading you out of hannah's room almost as soon as you arrived. you quickly waved to hannah, mouthing 'bye' as you were practically dragged through the endless hallway. a couple turns away and you were in front of her door. a small, mischievous smile tugged at the corner of her lips, glancing between you and the door as she opened it. "can i tell you something?" it came off as a question, but you knew she was going to say it anyway. beth walked straight to her bedside, picking up a stack of movie cases. you stood in the doorway, leaning on the doorframe with you arms crossed. a bit skeptical, you nodded, "of course." she almost seemed giddy at your reply, walking calmly over to you to hand you the tapes. there was an expression you couldn't quite read on her face. it was like she was excited—but also like she wanted to hide it at the same time. your arms opened to take the dvds, holding them to your chest as you read the titles from the top down, slipping the case to the bottom of the stack once you were done. "i'm pretty sure josh has a thing for you," beth started, tucking her bottom lip in between her teeth. she was trying to shut herself up, but honestly she couldn't keep it in any longer. your eyes flicked between the names of the movies and her face, your brows furrowing. she knew something you didn't. "what do you mean?" curiosity laced your voice but your eyes never met. you avoided her gaze. she leaned on the wall beside you, watching as you were suddenly so focused on reading all of the movie titles. "well, for starters, you are the only girl he's ever invited over to the house," beth nodded, sticking out a hand to count how many things she was listing off. she stuck her thumb out. "the only time he ever sees sam and the others are when we go to the lodge or hang out as a group." you hummed a small 'mhm', wanting her to continue. to say you were intrigued would be an understatement—you wanted to hear more, needed to hear more. just a half hour ago you were trying to convince yourself it was too good to be true, and now you weren't so sure. "and, he keeps asking han and i what kind of things you're into." she stuck out her pointer finger.

resting her head on the wall behind her as she looked up at the ceiling, she continued: "he's been listening to a lot of fleetwood mac ever since we mentioned it to him."

a small laugh managed to escape you as you listened to her, followed by a gentle nudge on her part. "i'm serious, i've never heard someone listen to gold dust woman so much!"

“maybe he’s just being a good friend—y’know, i always try to get into—“ beth placed her pointer finger to your lips, a quick and silly way to silence you.

“can you just trust me on this one?” her voice was desperate but playfull, her hand dropping to her hip.

a beat of silence fell between you two. it wasn’t awkward, just giving you time to think about it all. and then it dawned on you.

he’d been flirting with you the entire time.

stolen glances, the way his hand brushed against your own, little presents here and there—everything began to make sense. and you looked like a fool. blush instantly rushed to your cheeks, shaking your head as your eyes met beth’s.

“and you’ve known this for how long?”

“about 4 months. he begged us to not say anything—i swore on my life.”

another beat of silence.

“does josh know that i—“ you began, cut off by beth once more, this time by her words.

“nope, not to my knowledge. unless han said something, he is also oblivious.” she reassured, placing a hand on your shoulder.

“is it as painful as watching chris and ashley dance around the topic?” you questioned, tilting your head slightly with a bashful smile on your face.

“worse, actually, way worse. you guys are always so close to making a move, and then you chicken out.”

you shook your head once more, then glanced back down at the movies. they were all comedy except for one—‘the shining’. you’ve already seen it, quite a few times actually, but it wouldn’t hurt to play it. you politely handed the other movies back to beth, tucking the horror case underneath your arm.

her palm fell from your shoulder, taking the movies into her hands as she returned them to her bedside, then right back to the spot she was standing at.

“okay, but, that still doesn’t explain why he ‘forgot’,” you put air quotes up, “about our hangout today. is something up?”

“well,” she sighed, glancing to the floor before she met your eyes again. “i honestly don’t know. i think you just make him nervous, he was kind of just sitting around fidgeting all day.”

you nodded, butterflies swirling in your stomach. you made josh nervous? hell, he made you nervous. palms all sweaty any time you got too close—your body naturally heating up—not to mention how you always get red in the face when he stares at you for too long.

“promise you won’t say anything.”

“i won’t.”

-

eventually, you had made your way back to the living room, this time ignoring the family photos and instead trying to figure out if you were going to say something to josh. each step you took matched your heart beat, nice and steady. that was until you spotted josh on the couch, eyes closed.

your heart fluttered a bit just seeing him. despite only being apart for a couple minutes, you couldn’t help but miss him. it was a familiar feeling, unfortunately, it came with the burden of having a crush on him.

as if he felt your presence (undoubtedly heard your steps), his eyes opened as he turned his head to look in your direction—immediately sitting up straight with a small smile.

“there she is,” he stood up, walking over to meet you in the middle, “i’m guessing they had the movies?”

“mhm,” you nod, handing him the case. “you’ve seen ‘the shining’ before, right?”

he shook his head, taking the dvd into his hand, examining it. his eyes glanced between you and the writing on the case. "horror?" he questioned, sauntering over to the tv—you followed after. "would you rather watch 'pretty woman' or 'ferris bueller's day off' again?" you teased, leaving him to put the movie in while you sat on the couch, sneaking a few pieces of popcorn. josh chuckled gingerly, popping the disc from the holder straight into the dvd player. you changed the hdmi until it displayed the previews for other movies, signifying that you were on the right one. he strolled back over to you, sitting on the other side of the couch. comfortable silence fell between you two as he skipped the previews, immediately turning the movie on. he seemed invested—which was good—but you were starting to get bored. it was a great movie, don't get me wrong, but having seen it a few times... it just wasn't something that sparked your interest. compared to the other movies, this was the best bet. "scared?" you turned your head to look at him, a small smirk on your face. "need someone to hold onto?" "yes, definitely," he retorted, a dramatic flare grazing his voice. josh almost immediately moved closer to you, your knees touching as his arm hung on the spine of the couch—behind your body, of course. "what would i do without you?" you rolled your eyes, graciously accepting the newfound warmth that spread through your body. yes, from the proximity, but also because your heart was racing once more. he seemed so eager to be beside you. which is a good thing. - minutes passed and you found yourself watching josh's face more than the movie. he was completely entranced—hyper-focused on the screen in front of him, oblivious to your fond eyes examining his every expression. and over that time, your positions had changed. his arm was now resting around your shoulders, pulling you (basically) as close as possible, with your legs touching, both of you glued to each other. you could feel each time he was startled—his body tensing—then relaxing. eventually you decided to watch the movie, your eyes returning to the bloody horror that was being displayed. your head rested on his chest, and you wrapped your arms around his abdomen—a lazy hug, but also because it was more comfortable this way. you swore you could feel his heart rate pick up. "scared?" he mocked, glancing down at you. you scoffed, shaking your head gently against his body. “if anyone’s scared it’s you,” you retorted, looking up at him through your eyelashes.

josh looked back down at you, this time holding the eye contact. both of your eyes simultaneously flicked between the others eyes and lips—the two of you thinking the same thing.

your lips parted almost instinctively, both of you leaning in—

“am i interrupting something?”

hannah’s voice cut through the tension like a knife—neither of you even heard her coming. you sat up quickly, blush evident on your cheeks.

“not at all,” josh replied, his arm still around hour shoulders—he seemed rather calm—but his body was tense against yours.

you didn’t want to admit it, but it was so excruciatingly obvious she interrupted something. with the way she was grinning, she had to have known it too.

a small smile fell on your lips, looking at her, that same mischievous smile that her sister wore was now on her face.

beth was right. you and josh dance around the topic too much—at this point, you need to come up with your own choreography for it. the fact you two almost kissed—faces so close—yet so far.

how long were you going to have to wait for it to happen again?

thank you all for being so patient while i took my time writing this. pretty sure i experienced writers block lmao? i got kind of lazy halfway through but hope you enjoyed!!! let me know what you think in the comments pretty plzz tried to hurry this shit out like 3 days ago and got bored but now i REALLY had to have it done by today so i could watch arcane s2 LMAOO also i'd like to say that i got my layout inspo from ruewrote, so thank you for having a blog (lol)

[hextechmaturgy]

lucanis' romance is disappointing because like many other aspects of this game you can practically smell all the wasted potential

spoilers below!

we know from the stories that came before veilguard that cousins lucanis and illario grow up knowing caterina has a favorite grandson she intends to make first talon one day. it's implied and sometimes outwardly said that lucanis is indeed a better assassin than illario, and being a better assassin in a FAMILY OF ASSASSINS is a big deal. at the same time, we find out that illario is the more personable between the two. lucanis says he can charm just about anyone and zara calls him 'amatus' right before illario fucking kills her, so we know that's true. we find out through banter that lucanis had a crush on viago and failed miserably to show him because his only idea was to get him a knife, and, should you have an active romance with him, he will also admit to your companions that you are his first relationship

lucanis spends his entire romance backing away from you. he barely reacts to your flirting, he ducks away from a first kiss to 'clear his head', he won't shut up about coffee, and the moment you commit to him is just a quick scene where he SAYS he made you dessert, meanwhile, pretty much every other character is kissing you and declaring how much they care for you, emmerich's first kiss happens relatively early into the second act and it's such a sweet scene.

all this tells me is the writers were going for 'fail boy's first romance', packed with the slow burn of someone who has no idea how to show you how much he cares for you. it's sweet! i romance alistair every time for pretty much the same reasons. there's something very disarming about a strong, capable man who turns to mush around you because you're just that precious to him, because he's afraid you'll cringe and run away at his inexperience/awkwardness/eagerness.

but while i think that idea was perfectly executed with alistair, i think what we got for lucanis is extremely weak, to a point where i started wondering if my game was bugged and i had missed a romance flag somehow, or soft locked myself into someone else's romance. that's when it becomes a problem for me. when i flirt with him and he DOESN'T REPLY, it's not even him looking awkward, it's him not looking interested. he certainly sounds cute and awkward around neve, why does he show her that side and not rook? it felt like they were meant to be together, especially with the whole 'pick between treviso and minrathous' storyline, but i checked out neve's romance and that one is really good, one of my favorites in fact, SO WHAT GIVES? it's not that lucanis is reserved as a character, it's more like the game wasn't programmed with his reserved nature in mind. so he shows you he's committed by making you desert... couldn't we have had a scene where we watch him baking, instead of hearing him say he did it? we run into him preparing a surprise and he's out of sorts, or he asks us to go on another grocery run and you piece together what he's planning from peeping the ingredients. SHOW DON'T TELL IS THE MOST BASIC OF WRITING ADVICE, SO PLEASE ???? they did it with kaiden in ME3, he cooks for you and burns the garlic because you're just so distracting. there were multiple opportunities for cute and unsure, neve's romance is surprisingly tender and this one could've been too.

as it is right now, lucanis' romantic interactions feel like game bugs, his pet demon seems to be far more entertaining than him/is generally mega underutilized (can you imagine a scene of spite getting done with lucanis' bullshit and sleep walking some more to tell you he's smitten), and if you are planning to have lucanis as your romance, you should go into it knowing that after your first good, dare i say EXCELLENT first romantic chat at that coffee shop ("like a kiss goodbye" charmed me there and then) you'll be waiting until literally the end of the game for any sort of pay off. there's a good romance to explore here, the complete opposite of zevran as far as crow romances go, but sadly these fun dynamics will only get decently explored in fanfiction i fear

[itstheval]

Telling the Truth

"Why didn't you tell us?"

"Why would I?"

"What? We're your-"

"Friends, yes, I know, but think about it. Think, with me. First thing I could tell you is 'We're guaranteed to win'. Cool! Blinding great. Except you'd know that winning was costing me my life. Something that seems to have upset you, even AFTER the fact!"

"Well, yes, that's because it's your LIFE! We didn't…we don't want you to die for us, Siffrin!"

"Even if it meant saving all of Vaugarde?"

"…"

"We did NOT save Vaugarde without that wish. I can tell you that with a straight face. In whatever magic realm of make believe where I don't wish, we're all standing still as statues right now. I knew that as SOON as I knew that I'd made a wish. You don't need that choice in your mind. Especially not when I'm the one who's dying…If I'm the one feeling it, it should be my choice, shouldn't it?"

"Siffrin…"

"You said first thing you could tell us. Implying there were more things." Odile's voice was stern. Cold. Steel. Good, she was the one person who could understand without her heart weeping. Maybe, just maybe, she could convince the others.

"Oh, there were plenty more things to tell you! Like how the end of the King wasn't the end of the loops? How we were trapped here, by whatever this was? Would you want to know that? That every time we won, it was just washed away like a kayak too far at sea?! Or how about everything I'd failed to do, would you want the list of that?"

"Yes."

The word cut through everything else. Her stare was impassive. Almost empty. Somehow, colder than before.

"Well, I didn't want to tell you about it. It was over a dozen loops before I found that out, and can you imagine having…having THIS conversation a dozen times? Two dozen? Watching your heart break every single time? Watching Mirabelle sob, watching Isabeau practically shut down? Just so I could have a scrap of comfort?! Any Siffrin that would do that to you is a Siffrin that wouldn't have wished at all. Any person who would destroy all of you, who would break all of your hearts, just to have two days of understanding, that person's on the path to being the next King."

"Siffrin. This was…" Odile, of all people, having to choose her words carefully. She was close to understanding. She was close to breaking. It was in her pose, her words, her face. "Not a matter of emotions, beyond a certain point. While I believe you, and your kind heart does you credit…You clearly, fundamentally, could only follow one path at a time. If you had shared your knowledge, you could have been done many loops before…We could have helped you."

"No. You couldn't."

"Oh?"

"The books that told the truth? The books that explained how bad I'd blinded myself? Written in a language only I could read! And that was AFTER I killed myself trying to speak it! The wish, to make the Head Housemaiden tell us what happened? None of you could've believed hard enough! Yeah, I could've asked you about staying together…If I'd had any reason, at all, to think that's why I was looping. NOTHING said that! That wasn't the wish I made, I wished to stay with Mirabelle. I could do that even if you all split up. It would've blinding HURT, but I could have! Nothing. Nothing at all you could have done would save me. Not until the end. Not until you DID."

"You have some proof of this?"

A thud. A book, borrowed from the House…stolen, truly, but no one there could read it, and what good was a book no one could read? A book, laying on the ground between them, the sound of it having shocked the other two from their emotional stupors.

"If you can read this…If you can tell me the title of this…I'll admit I was wrong."

Odile's hands were shaking. Odile's hands never shook. Not with the tremors of age, not with exhaustion, but now…With her fingers outstretched to the book, she was trembling. Cautious. Like it would bite her. She picked it up, turned it around, and stared at it.

Her eyes widened. Then narrowed. Flicking across the title. Opening the book, and her eyes darting back and forth. Looking for something, for anything, as even the steel in her soul bent under the weight. Her back hunched, her brow furrowed, and the signs of a headache were obvious.

A flip of the page.

Another.

Then, a scream of rage, as she tossed the book into the campfire, and fell to the ground, clutching her knees. She sobbed. The Madame, the great Odile, unflappable, steel-spined and sharp-eyed, sobbed like a lost child. It felt like the most damning victory imaginable.

"That's why I didn't tell you. How you're feeling right now. I'd do that to you, every time, for NOTHING." They had to understand, by now. Looking around, at the shattered wrecks of the three, hearing sobs and seeing blank-eyed stares, they did.

Now, only now, could the healing actually start. Now that they believed. Now that they knew. Now that they understood what hat happened, and what impossible choices there were to make. Now that it wasn't 'Silly Siffrin got mixed up in emotions, isn't it cute?', now that it wasn't 'We can talk about whatever happened, Feelings Buddy!', now that it wasn't 'Oh, your fee-fees, your ling-lings'.

Loop said to tell them the truth. They knew how much it would hurt when they said it.

Well, let's see how that works.

[allwormdiet]

Sentinel 9.6

Well.

At least we're not as fucked as Brockton Bay.

"Ugh, how dare crime be prevented so I can't beat the shit out of the people doing the crimes for my own catharsis" - sentiments of the utterly normal

This glimpse into the inner workings of these two has not endeared me to them any further, tbh. I think the time in which they can actually turn these impressions around is starting to dwindle.

So. Here's Sophia's worldview laid plain, and it's about what I expected. Might makes right, violence and desperation and greed are the true nature of humanity, everyone can be divided between sheep and wolves and she refuses to be a sheep.

Mostly I think I'm just curious as to what, exactly, shaped her to be this way. Like obviously whatever caused her to trigger is a factor, but I don't know if any parahuman has had a complete overhaul of their personality brought about by their power coming online; I suspect that she'd followed some version of this mentality before the worst day of her life (so far) proved her right.

I can't imagine Piggot would be thrilled that Shadow Stalker thinks so highly of her, or at least the why of it.

This is cool, though. Give Wildbow credit, he can make just about any sensation of using a power sound rad as hell.

*sighs* Fucking Nazis

At least Sophia is sensible about what to do with them

Another neat fight scene, this one is a bit quicker than the Travelers tussle so I kinda like it more. That and it involves beating the shit out of Nazis.

Ruh roh Raggy

hiimdaisy_adachi_murder.mp3

Oh yeah, why eliminate the villain who you know is a particular threat to you, specifically, when you can try to torment her first?

This isn't even me saying that Sophia should try to murder Skitter, bc obviously I prefer the latter to the former, but taking the whole thing of seeing her secret identity into consideration, the response to crossing paths should be "take her down fast and hard," not "put her back against the wall and make her panic"

It's gonna fucking break her brain when she realizes Taylor is Skitter, huh?

There's something really funny about how basically every outsider POV we've gotten on Skitter involves hating her ass. Truly cursed to be unpopular.

I like the logical weaknesses of Sophia's power so far. Things getting into her shadow form, like bugs, fuck with her ability to remanifest because she has to "shove" them out of where she's going to solidify. The electricity I'm less clear on, maybe just some quirk of what she's "made" of in her altered state, but it's a good way to explain why she can't just leap through buildings willy nilly. The thing with the gas/vapor absorption that gets mentioned in a second also makes sense and is pretty neat.

Hey Sophia do you maybe regret playing with your food a little bit

Also still cool to see Skitter's powers from the outside POV

God that's so cool

...Y'know, if these two could get over their bullshit for like, a minute, they could probably have some very cathartic hate-makeouts. More blood than normal for kissing but less blood than normal for their usual interactions.

Lol

Lmao

Nuts that what threw her off in this moment was looking for a secondary murder weapon to cover up her power's tell.

Also: get fucked Sophia.

And you fell for it hook line and sinker, because you're a petty tunnel-visioned sadist.

Got the whole crew doing the group pose, love to see it

Also: hi Aisha, glad you get to join the team, sorry you had a trigger event, hope the future scenes with you are less uncomfortable than your first one

Skitter is so fucking good at playing up the villain role, she really should be proud of the work she puts into it.

Not entirely sure why they're kidnapping Shadow Stalker, but I'm sure it's going to be another photo album moment for the Undersiders and their rise to prominence.

Concluding Thoughts

Y'know, a lot of trouble could've been avoided if Sophia just ignored that impulse to play with her prey. I'm not gonna be like "oh why can't she just rein in the violence" because every parahuman we've met so far is either a participant or facilitator of violence, but the cruelty is what's gotten her in trouble here. Not only did she only get baited into this trap because she refused to make an earlier attempt at the killing blow, not only did she take the bait of hunting down a lone villain while a PRT convoy was under attack by fucking Nazis, but the hostility might have been avoided if she hadn't gotten her kicks from tormenting and assaulting Taylor. If Sophia was just Emma's friend who hung back and watched as she tormented Taylor, things might've differently all the way back in the medical tent, but alas, she was a willing and gleeful participant.

Little concerned about what the fuck they're going to do to her, but there's nothing to do but wait and see.

Also, cautiously glad that Imp has arrived, she seems fun from what I've picked up via osmosis, again fingers crossed that her continued presence in this story doesn't involve nearly as much wincing as Tangle 6.3 because holy shit.

[void-ink-studios]

Rinse and Spit - A Mouthwashing AU

I fully blame @hrhowling for infecting me with these brain worms, and @an-artist-complex for encouraging them.

So....

Here we go.

There is an intention to make this the first part of a series, but in case that doesn't happen, I at least wanted to make this first part stand alone.

Enjoy~

Word Cout: 2,100

Content Warning: Jimmy is his own content warning.

Curly had decided he hated the sun set.  At least the sunset that seemed to be the only thing displayed in the Med Bay window screen.  He hated every aspect of it.

He hated the way the reds and oranges were too bright, painfully so, constantly bathing his body in its burning light.  He hated the way it flickered and tore, as if a company like Pony Express couldn’t have afforded to spring for a screen that actually worked.

Or, in light of recent news, maybe they really couldn’t after all.

He hated how it buzzed and crackled, never offering him a single moment of silence as he sat here.

He hated it so very much.

Yet he poured every ounce of energy he had into looking at it.  Studied every pixel, every strange artifact of light.

Because what was the alternative?

The alternative was acknowledging the agony he was in, every moment, every breath, every slight shift in his body.  The alternative was to stare into the metal ceilings of the Tulpar and worry about each and every seam.  The alternative was to wiggle his limbs, and see if today was the day he had the strength and pain tolerance to sit up.

He deserved this.  He knew he deserved it.  It had become part of his regular cycle of thoughts, right alongside wishing for death, or praying that this is just some horrific dream he’d wake up from any day now.

But the longer he stared at that god damn sunset, the more he had to come to grips with reality.  And every second of that reality was earned and deserved.

He often thought back to where he went wrong. And there was a lot of time to think.

He thought about telling... Him it would all be okay. How he listened to Him talk about how there was no survivors despite the efforts of the brave Captain Curly. Curly had been so confused about what He meant at the time. He could've seen the warning it was. The threat it was. Why didn't he go to the cockpit with Him?

He thought about Her, desperately hiding the gun so that even if she couldn't reach it, He wouldn't either. When she told him she was pregnant, told him a second time what happened. Curly had been so worried about Her hurting herself that he didn't even stop to think about how he was hurting her.

He thought about that late night conversation with Her. About the dead pixel on the screen in the Lounge. He had told her how he looked at the bigger picture. How true that was. Standing too far back to acknowledge the details, the important details. Why were there no locks on the sleeping quarter's door, but they needed a code just to get some fucking sweetener?

Anya...

Maybe that's why he stared so heavily at the sunset to his left. Maybe he was looking for a dead pixel of his own. Just something that could connect him to Anya. Something that could tell her that he Understood.

He stared at the sunset because what was the alternative?

The alternative was to look at the other side of the room.

Curly didn't get many visitors. He didn't blame them. Swansea wasn't paid nearly enough to look at his traitorous captain, and Daisuke was just a kid, one who didn't need an anatomy lesson.

No, Curly didn't get visitors. Only one of two people would ever be on that side of the room. And he couldn't dare look either of them in the eye.

He decided to try and sit up today. He hadn't tried in... Jesus, how long has it been? How long has he been sitting like this?

Regardless, he had tried a few times before. He was sick of sitting in his own filth. Festering in his own blood and pus. His body protested his every movement as he tried to prop himself up on the stumps where his hands once were.

I hope this hurts.

It did...

I hope this hurts.

It so very did. He couldn't do it.

He heard the heavy doors slide open, metal grinding against metal. He didn't look. He couldn't.

Please no...

"Feeling lively today, aren't we?"

Curly still couldn't look at Him. He knew what was coming.

"Hey. If you're awake enough to squirm, you're awake enough to look at me."

He still didn't move.

"I said Look at me."

Curly felt hands on his head, forcefully turned to face Him.

A face of a friend. Or, what was once a friend. Or, maybe not even that. Whatever he was then, it didn't change what he was now. A truth Curly tried to ignore, one that he was forced to stare at every day.

Jimmy was a monster.

"...You still think you're too good for us, don't you?"

Curly stared at Jimmy. Before, Jimmy would say things he thought unnerving, but ultimately harmless. He had made dark jokes before, things Curly would laugh at uncomfortably, and they'd move on. He'd say things that were needlessly defensive or aggressive, things Curly would try to talk him down from, with mixed results, and they'd move on.

Curly couldn't do either of those things now. Even if he could speak, he couldn't speak over the look in Jimmy's eyes. Was that emptiness always there?

Jimmy grabbed him by the collar of his hospital gown, pulling a wheezing gasp from his mangled throat.

"You think you're too good for us. For this job. Even when we're keeping you alive and cleaning up your blood and shit, you still think you're too good for us."

Jimmy made a sound, one that might've been a laugh or a scoff.

"Well. So much for your greener pastures."

Jimmy dropped him back onto the bed with a rough thud, sending shocks of pain up and down his back and head.

Curly watched as Jimmy casually, oh so casually, walked towards the desk scattered with pills. The former captain couldn't look at his despised sunset anymore. Not when he knew what was coming.

"At least you have these to make you feel better. Open up."

I hope this hurts.

It does.

I hope this hurts.

Jimmy is far from gentle in opening his mouth, shoving fingers against his tongue and down his throat. Curly chokes, he does every time. He had thought he at least would stop struggling from reflex, but his body fails him again.

He flailed his arms against Jimmy's shoulders and face as his mouth is wrenched further open and the pill is dropped in.

"Stop fucking moving."

Curly wheezed as Jimmy lifted his head up by his jaw and slammed him back down. Small mercies it's only against a pillow.

Jimmy used his fingers to shove the pill down his throat, either not knowing or not caring that he can't breathe.

It's over before Curly knows it, trying his best to gather his breath back as Jimmy's fingers retract. The two pilots look at each other, a pair of empty eyes meeting a lone trembling one.

"I'm fixing things. Stop looking at me like that."

Curly flinched, but it doesn't make the incoming punch any softer. Or the next two or three.

"You're not better than me, Curly. I'm the fucking captain now. And that means-"

"Jimmy?"

Curly's breath paused, his eye flicking back to the door. Anya stood there, compressed in her body language.

"What?"

"U-Uhm, Swansea wanted to see you? Something about a problem in the Lounge?"

"Unbelievable. Can't you guys do anything without me?"

"If it's not a good time-"

"No, no, I'll go take a look. Do my job. Someone has to around here, right?"

Curly watched carefully as Anya steeled her expression. She moved out of the doorway, no longer meeting Jimmy's gaze.

"Right... I'll take over from here."

"About time."

And with that, he's gone. Curly was aware how loud his breathing is. For once, even the buzzing of the window screen seemed quiet, drowned out in comparison to his labored breaths.

Anya moved to sit next to him. Just as she always does. She's always quiet, occasionally filling him in on the goings on of the ship. Told him about their precious Cargo.

Fucking Mouthwash.

What a joke.

Today, she's silent. Mostly just staring at the pain medications on the table across from her.

He wished he could say something to her. He wished he had his own dead pixel to point out to here. One hidden right under her nose, right here in Med Bay. Then she'd smile, maybe laugh a little bit about it, like she would've before-

Take responsibility

"How are you today, cap- Curly?"

Curly looked at her. Anya. Sweet Anya...

The best he could giver her was a shrug, even as it pulled painfully on his neck and shoulders.

"Quiet day today... We ran out of Chicken Noodle Soup. Looks like it'll be clear soup for now."

Take responsibility

Anya looked at him. Her eyes were empty to, but not like Jimmy's. Hers were drained.

"...Are you okay, Curly? I um... I heard Jimmy."

He didn't know what to think about that. She's asking him if he's okay? He doesn't drop his gaze, as much as he wants to. She deserves better.

And isn't that just the thing?

Anya deserves better. She always had. She should be in medical school, not drifting in a floating cage in who knows what section of the void of space. She should have had a better captain. A better crew. Someone who could-

Take responsibility

"Now you know how it feels."

Her voice cuts through him, her words akin to dumping ice water onto his chest. Her face said she regrets saying it the second it left her mouth.

But it took all the air out from Curly's lungs.

"I-I'm sorry, that was cruel..."

No, Anya, I deserved that.

"You know something silly?"

Curly tilted his head at her. She had his attention. Undivided. Even when it didn't mean much anymore.

"...I can't bring myself to hate you. Even though you got us into this mess. Even though you didn't do anything. I can't hate you."

You should. I should've said something. Done something.

"A part of me wants to. Would make things easier. Wouldn't fix anything, but it'd make things easier. I don't know how much I can keep going, Captain."

Curly's breath hitched, his eye flicking between her and the pill bottle.

He groaned, gurgled, tried to force his useless throat to make words. He knows she'd probably want to hear from him the least but... well, she should hear from someone.

"Don't try to strain yourself, Captain. Just... try to go to sleep. Forget I said anything. I'm sorry."

No, you shouldn't be sorry, this isn't your fault, I-

The door slid open one more time, and the both of them flinched. Neither of them looked at the door. They looked at each other instead. Dreading the same phantom opening his mouth and making some remark-

"We need to talk."

Swansea...

Curly looked at the round man, a grim expression on his face.

"Swansea, I just got back here, I can't leave him alone like that. He just had his pill, he could vomit, and I need to be there to adjust him if he does."

"It won't be long. But we need to talk."

"About...?"

"Something that needs to be done. Privately."

Swansea cast a dark look at Curly, a withering one. The mechanic and captain rarely saw eye to eye, especially during those last few days before the crash. He had never visited him in the Med Bay. Not that he blamed him.

"Is it a team meeting again? Is Daisuke and-"

"Daisuke has Jim distracted for a bit. This isn't a team meeting. This is a you and me meeting. Meet me in Utility, if you want."

Anya looked between him and Curly. "I really should keep an eye on him."

"You can do whatever you want. But I have a plan. You can either be in or out of it. Just figured you might want in."

Anya wrung her hands together, looking at the sunset.

"...You'll be alright, captain?"

Curly nods. He can at least give her that much. She doesn't have to care for him, not right now. She looks hesitant. He tries to nod a little harder, but the wheeze that escapes him betrayed his efforts.

"Whenever you're ready, Anya."

"...I am."

The two turn to leave. Curly groans, trying to get his voice to wrap around the words he wants. Words he should've said a long time ago. Words he doesn't think he'll ever be able to say.

Take responsibility

I'm sorry.

[bloodfreak-boyking]

NEVER FORGET WHAT THEY TOOK FROM US

[girlthativealwaysbeen]

pata hai last kuch din i was very busy with my project kyunki final dena tha and binding karni thi etc to wo karwayi then i went to the bookfair bekaar tha then parso submit karne jaa rahi to subah accident hogaya (bhai ki bike skid hogayi and we fell down) and now i have a big ass blue bruise on my upper thigh and my parents don't even know lmao and kal ek science conference thi to i had to sit in an auditorium for 6 hours listening to accomplished people speak. that's what you missed now your turn

omg i knew everything in this except for the accident cause i stalk your blog vigorously everyday are you okay!!!!!!!!!! did you get tetanus shots!!!!!!!!!! also on your upper thigh oh no that's where future jiju is supposed to write MINE na as per our beloved song guilty as sin?

[theflyingfeeling]

Fourtheenth Day of Gift-Giving: Fun Adventures

Prompt: A group project in school brings some unusual friends together

Yes, it's a high school AU, somewhat inspired by / based off this fic idea I had a while ago! I've never written a high scool AU before so pls be nice, also I've taken some liberties with the prompt again, because there's no group project per se, they're simply in the same chemistry class 😌

Banner made by @kraeuterhexchen again, thanks for suffering for me a bit I love youuuu <3

~

Aleksi muffled his third yawn in a row on his palms. Every single week at this exact time he regretted his promise to his father that he’d take at least four optional courses this school year on top of all the compulsory ones in exchange for a language course in Amsterdam next June. The tragedy was that his schedule was already so full with the compulsory courses alone that he could barely find gaps to fill with anything else at more humane times than at eight o’clock on a Monday morning, which was when his additional chemistry class was held. It didn’t help that none of his friends or acquaintances were taking the same class; Aleksi envied them for their superior life choices.

Chemistry could be alright at best, but in general it wasn’t among his favourite subjects. Rather than reaction equations, Aleksi was much more fascinated by the only other guy in the group he knew by name, who, by the happy coincidence of the two of them both being late to class on the first day, ended up being his lab partner. He didn’t know Olli because they were buddies, quite the contrary, in fact; one of Olli’s friends was still bitter about Aleksi standing him up regarding a music project (which had been but a case of bad communication, of which Aleksi was deeply ashamed, even though in the eyes of his own friends it had been ‘such a big-dick move to put that cocky emo loser back in his place lol’), so Aleksi wasn’t exactly surprised that Olli never replied to his sleepy greeting on Monday mornings. Thinking back to it, Aleksi couldn’t recall the boy saying anything at all during the chemistry classes, so that by now he would’ve started suspecting Olli was mute, if it wasn’t for the times he had seen Olli laugh and joke about with his friends at recess. From the little Aleksi had heard when he had passed by the group in the school corridors, Olli had a soft, quiet voice, often blending under the much louder ones of his friends, which was why Aleksi had set making Olli speak to him as his main ambition for the course, rather than getting a high mark.

“Morning,” he said to Olli like he did every Monday, and like every Monday, Olli barely glanced his way. What made this Monday different from all the other Mondays was that Aleksi could’ve sworn he had seen Olli nod at him this time, sort of in a blink-and-you-miss-it kind of way, although it may as well have been just his tired brain making things up. Nevertheless, it gave Aleksi the spark of hope that had him sit up straight, ready to converse Olli’s ears off in case he finally happened to be in the mood, but before he could open his mouth to ask Olli about his weekend, the teacher started the lesson by shoving hand-outs on their tables.

That day, however, Aleksi was determined to succeed in his plan at long last, even if he had to get a little creative.

While Olli was concentrating on keeping his eyes open as the teacher explained the theory behind the day’s experiments, Aleksi picked up his pencil and wrote on the corner of Olli’s hand-out:

Hi! :)

The anticipation nearly had him tremble as he waited for Olli to react in any way; for the longest time, bordering Aleksi’s patience, Olli did nothing but stare at the letters Aleksi had scribbled. He still didn’t look at him, still didn’t say anything or – god forbid – smile; he just blinked at the single word that had appeared in the corner of his paper.

Then, after a million years in Aleksi’s experience, he grabbed his own pencil.

hi

Those two letters alone made Aleksi feel like a winner already.

How are you?

Still keeping his eyes firmly on the paper, Olli seemed to be pondering his answer for a while.

good

Aleksi wondered if Olli was as terse speaking up as he was in writing.

Great to hear! I’m doing good as well :) Do you have a long day on Mondays?

Exactly like a moment earlier, Olli did nothing but stare at their brief written conversation. Aleksi wanted to believe that Olli was just about to write his answer but was ruthlessly interrupted by the teacher ordering them to walk over and look closer as she’d perform an example experiment for them to later mimic.

They didn’t get a chance to continue their little chat later on in the lesson, and they never spoke during the practical experiments they were asked to do – or rather, Olli never spoke, despite Aleksi’s best efforts to at least have him answer some simple yes-or-no questions, such as ‘do you want to try first?’ or ‘can you pass the pipette?’ or ‘oh fuck, do you think we should tell the teacher?’ when their experiments sometimes failed unexpectedly. The best Aleksi had gotten out of Olli was a suppressed snort when the other day Aleksi had accidentally spilled some red colour additive on his brand-new Off-White t-shirt.

“Quit laughing, or I’ll tell everyone it’s your blood,” he had said in hopes of making Olli properly giggle, but it had seemed to have the opposite effect, for Olli hadn’t let out a single sound for the rest of class after that. Later, Aleksi had wondered if it had been because Olli was scared Aleksi actually might, and to prevent his friends from getting wind of them being lab partners – because clearly he was that opposed to the idea of being associated with Aleksi – he had firmly kept his lips sealed for the rest of the class and all the ones that followed it.

This day, someone must have put something in Olli’s breakfast porridge, however, because when the class was dismissed, Olli spoke in his low, quiet voice, not even directly at Aleksi, but more to his general direction, so that Aleksi knew the words were addressed to him.

“See ya.”

“Yeah, see ya!” Aleksi replied, perhaps a little too eagerly, rolling his eyes in frustration when Olli hurried out of the classroom.

It wasn’t much, but it was a start.

~*~

The next Monday, Aleksi decided to go past formalities and straight to the point to get Olli to interact with him.

Had a nice wknd? :) 

Aleksi was most definitely too optimistic for his own good, but he had a feeling Olli didn’t take half as long to answer this time, even though his reply remained brief.

yup

Literally on the edge of his seat, Aleksi waited for Olli to elaborate on his reportedly ‘nice weekend’ – in vain. He rolled his eyes and picked up his pencil again.

What did you get up to?

Olli flipped pencil in his fingers like one would do with a drumstic, clumsily, almost dropping it on his desk. Aleksi saw an attractive blush slowly spread on Olli’s cheeks and hoped it wouldn’t discourage Olli away from the budding conversation. 

At last, Aleksi’s patient waiting was rewarded.

went to see a gig

Aleksi clenched his pencil into his fist out of sheer excitement. If there was a topic Aleksi could’ve chatted about for hours on end, it was music, his first and (so far) only love. He knew Olli played in a band and was sure that if he only could somehow make Olli lower his walls for him, they might actually find a lot to whisper about to pass the time a bit more merrily on Monday mornings.

So cool! Who did you see?

Olli didn’t keep him waiting for long, which Aleksi decided to take as a sign of Olli also being keen on their current conversation topic.

If only Aleksi knew how to help Olli get out of his shell a little more.

a friend’s band

Aleksi nodded, careful not to appear too enthusiastic or intrusive to scare Olli off, now that he had gotten him to write more than one word at a time.

Any good?

The teacher was just about to have the class gathered around her table again, so instead of a thorough review of the music show, Olli only jotted down a wonky yup in response before hurrying to the front of the classroom. During the whole rest of the class, Aleksi was not given another chance to fish more out of Olli’s weekend.

Well, he sighed to himself, standing up to join his coursemates, another Monday, then. 

~*~

Later that day, sort of by coincidence (of having purposefully lingered around the music classroom on the pretext of asking the music teacher about an upcoming extra credit class), Aleksi learnt Olli’s band had a practice slot in the music classroom on Monday evenings. His plan was not to spy on Olli, but he figured he might as well use this newly-acquired information to squeeze a little more out of Olli in their next chemistry class.

Any plans after school?

Only when he noticed Olli freeze upon seeing the question on the margin of his notebook, Aleksi realised how it must sound like to him, so out of the blue.

Just curious btw :) 

Olli seemed to hesitate before answering.

band practice

Aleksi hid his smirk behind his palm.

Hook, line and sinker, he thought to himself, the pencil in his hand itching to write down all the follow-up questions he had prepared. By the end of the class, Aleksi congratulated himself, for his plan to have Olli blabber about their common interest had worked out splendidly: Aleksi had learnt, for example, that Olli had been playing the bass for seven years already and that their band was actually working on their first EP, which Aleksi was genuinely impressed by. What really had made Aleksi feel like he was on top of the world, however, was when he noticed the smallest hint of amusement on Olli’s face; he still hadn’t managed to lure Olli to look him in the eye, but he had made him smile, which was perhaps even better.

The rest of the week Aleksi spent barely paying attention to what his friends were talking or laughing about in between classes, too busy searching for his chemistry class conversation buddy with his eyes. He did so every day, even though he was convinced the principal granting him the rest of the semester off with no consequences was more likely than catching Olli looking at him.

That was, until he did.

It was only a fleeting moment in time as they passed each other in the canteen and over before Aleksi’s heart could settle back to its place from his throat where it had jumped up to. He couldn’t tell since when his lab partner looking his way had started rousing this kind of reaction in him; then again, Olli had never really glanced his way before, so how could he have known?

Maybe that was also why Aleksi hadn’t noticed the shade of Olli’s irises until now. They were dark grey, he could tell, serious but not cold by any means. He couldn’t wait to take a closer look at them the next time he was given the chance.

Perhaps it was time for Aleksi to change his tactics.

~*~

“Hi Olli,” Aleksi said as soon as Olli walked up to his desk the next Monday. As if surprised to hear his name spoken out loud, Olli looked up at him, and Aleksi was granted another glimpse of those mysterious eyes.

Olli didn’t let him rejoice for too long, though, before turning his gaze to his desk as he sat down.

“Hi.”

And that was it: their first spoken conversation (in which Olli had also participated), despite Olli avoiding his gaze for the rest of the class, as was his right. Aleksi supposed. Even Aleksi himself was too giddy about the interaction to think of anything else to say.

It was almost ridiculous, if he was honest with himself. Yet, for the first time during the whole autumn semester, Aleksi was looking forward to the early Monday morning chemistry class.

~*~

Within the next couple of weeks, their conversations evolved from exchanging casual greetings (‘Hi Olli!’ ‘Hi…Aleksi’) to deep discussions about the current events in their lives (‘How’s it going?’ ‘Good.’ ‘Awesome’), which was equal parts exciting and frustrating to Aleksi. His heart would do the silly bouncing-up-to-his-throat thing whenever Olli blessed him with a quick glance of his dark eyes (Aleksi could swear they were a different shade every time he looked), but the moments only ever lasted for a second or two at a time. On the bright side, Olli would no longer rush out of the classroom to get out of having to perform any more small talk, but instead took his time putting his books and pencils back in his bag carefully, even if Aleksi never managed to open his mouth in time before Olli would make his inevitable escape. Aleksi suspected that it was, indeed, the newfound thrill of being graced with the occasional, fleeting look from Olli that rendered him speechless and caused him to miss his chance of getting to talk with Olli at least until they’d reach the classroom doorway. From there onwards they’d go their separate ways anyway, to their different worlds: Aleksi to one in which Olli was a moody emo kid with no sense of humour (or so Aleksi had been told by Isac who went to the same biology class with Olli), and Olli to one in which Aleksi was probably portrayed as a self-satisfied snob who once did his friend dirty.

The Monday after that, Olli never walked in through the classroom door, no matter how intensely Aleksi stared at it. When the days passed and Aleksi hadn’t caught a glimpse of the boy by Friday, he became worried, to the extent he considered walking up to Olli’s friend group to ask about him. He was almost certain that the one with the short platinum-blond hair might have actually told him, or at least he looked the least intimidating out of them all. One of them was almost two heads taller than Aleksi, so he saw it best to stay out of his way, although his smile – in those rare occasions he did smile – was anything but frightening. The one with the baggy clothes Aleksi had once heard rapping at a house party was tiny in comparison, but something about the angle of his eyebrows gave Aleksi the chills. Joel was obviously out of the question; Aleksi would probably never dare speak to him after The Incident. Joonas, on the other hand (Aleksi knew his name because he and Joel often squabbled loudly, with Joel shouting his name in bewilderment, his obvious affection for the boy poorly masked as annoyance), seemed like the kind of guy who would whisper you the right answer just in time before the teacher’s drill of a stare would bore a hole through your skull.

Taking a deep breath to brace himself, he watched as Olli’s friends were stepping in the Swedish classroom. As if on cue, Joonas was the last one about to walk through the door, and seeing his chance had come, Aleksi zoomed over and grabbed him by his sleeve.

“Hey,” he said once he had pulled Joonas aside, hidden from the disapproving looks of Joel and company.

“Huh?”

“Do you happen to know where Olli is?” Going straight to the point seemed like the best strategy to get anything out of Joonas, in case Aleksi had completely misjudged him and he was about to be punched in the face.

“He’s caught the cold. Why?” Knitting his brows and eyeing Aleksi up and down, Joonas seemed sceptical about Aleksi’s intentions, to say the least.

(It had Aleksi wondering if any of his own friends would act as protectively about him, but that was a matter of concern for another day entirely.)

“Ummmm… I have his chemistry homework for him.”

Aleksi could almost hear the cogwheels turning inside Joonas’ head until his expression brightened.

“Aaah… Right! Yeah, I suppose you would.” (Whatever Joonas meant by that.) “I’m gonna go over later today to see how he’s doing, so I can forward the message for you.”

“Oh, great! Thanks!” Aleksi said, as if he had any clue what they had actually been given as homework four days ago.

Ironically, Aleksi was saved by Joel calling for Joonas from inside the classroom.

“I’ll catch up with you later, alright?” Joonas winked at him, and then he was gone. 

Joonas never did catch up with him, however, and so Aleksi was saved from the embarrassment of admitting he hadn’t been following their chemistry lesson after all, more or less due to the disappointment of not seeing Olli after having spent the entire weekend planning what he’d say to him. Not knowing if Olli would be attending the upcoming Monday’s class either, the weekend went by slower than ever, which normal-Aleksi would’ve embraced; this new, strange, maybe-crushing-on-his-quiet-lab-partner-Aleksi was on pins and needles.

~*~

There it was again, that awful skip of his heart, when Aleksi saw Olli enter the classroom on Monday. So relieved he was that he had no means to tone down the excitement in his greeting.

“You’re here!”

Olli looked up at him but said nothing, his silence a pang to Aleksi’s chest. His joy upon their reunion changed into defeat in less than a second, and Aleksi felt like a right idiot for having thought Olli, too, might have been waiting to see him again.

Suddenly fascinated by the cover of his chemistry course book, Aleksi put his head down to hide his disappointment. He was already settled for staring at the abstract drawing for the next 75 minutes to avoid more heartbreak, but then a slip of paper appeared in front of him.

can’t speak doctor’s orders

On his face, Olli was wearing a kind, small smile. In that instant, Aleksi forgot what he had even been so saddened about. He flashed Olli a smile in return and started searching with his eyes for a pencil; he would’ve felt too weird talking to Olli out loud without him being able to answer. Tragically, it seemed that in anticipation of possibly seeing Olli again after so long, Aleksi had forgotten to pack his pencil case. Noticing this, Olli offered him his own, the same, tiny smile still on his lips.

Shame! You’re usually so talkative

He knew he was taking a risk poking fun at Olli’s quietness, but to his great relief, Olli’s smile widened and his shoulders twitched in a voiceless chuckle. Encouraged by this, Aleksi continued with an equally risky revelation.

I missed you in class last week

Having written down the words, Aleksi could barely look at Olli as he felt his cheeks heaten up. He let Olli take back his pencil from his fingers, as well as the paper slip from his desk.

Olli spent almost a minute writing down his reply, erasing and rewriting, until he finally passed the paper back to Aleksi, immediately directing his face to the opposite side of the classroom.

missed you too

Aleksi had never seen three words so pretty in his life.

~*~

What followed next was an entire week of unexpected encounters between the two lab partners, as if the universe was purposefully making them cross each other’s way to make up for the past seven days of not seeing each other. On Tuesday, their shoulders brushed walking past each other in a crowded corridor. On Wednesday, they were returning their trays at lunch at the exact same time and exchanged brief smiles. On Thursday, they almost ran into each other at the restroom door, which is when Aleksi learnt Olli had regained his voice, mumbling a small ‘oops’ after having bumped into Aleksi.

On Friday, at the last recess of the day, Olli’s friend Joonas grabbed Aleksi by his wrist and pulled him into an empty classroom.

“Wait here,” he ordered, and utterly confused as he was, Aleksi had no choice but to obey.

A moment later Joonas returned, pushing a red-cheeked Olli into the room before promptly leaping back to the corridor, closing the door behind him.

For one long, anxious moment, neither of them said anything, Aleksi because he was still too baffled by the latest turn of events to open his mouth, and Olli because he was… Olli.

“Ummmm…” Olli finally said, his voice a little hoarse, so he cleared his throat and tried again. “I just… ummm… there’s this… band… tomorrow…”

Aleksi had to bite his lip, both at how adorable Olli was, fumbling with his fingers as words fell out of his mouth one by one, as well as to keep himself from blurting out ‘yes’ before Olli even got around to asking him anything.

“And I was just… thinking if… ‘cuz I have an extra ticket… so… I thought maybe you–”

“Yeah!” To Aleksi’s turmoil, his tongue could sometimes be quicker than his brain. “I mean… what?” 

Behind the classroom door, someone clicked their tongue.

“Yeah, ummmm.” Olli scratched the back of his neck. “So yeah. Would you… like to come? To the show? On Saturday? With me? Maybe? I mean, of course you already have plans–”

“I don’t!” Aleksi hurried to say. “I can come. But… will your friends be coming too though?”

Olli shook his head. Aleksi decided not to dwell on what the evident horror in Olli’s eyes was a sign of. It might have been because he, too, thought it was a little too soon for Aleksi and Joel to make amends – or maybe he was just that terrified of being seen with Aleksi in public.

“No, they won’t. I mean, Joonas was supposed to, but he, ummmmmm, he’s going… ummmm…” Olli’s gaze wandered towards the door, as if for help.

“To my great-uncle’s funeral!” the door whispered at him.

“To his great-uncle’s funeral,” Olli confirmed.

“A-ha,” Aleksi nodded. “Sorry for your loss,” he said to the door.

“...Thanks,” the door replied. Holding back his laughter, Aleksi turned back to Olli who, for the first time since Joonas had urged them on the stage of their current scene, was looking at Aleksi, his round eyes expectant and hopeful for Aleksi’s final answer. Aleksi thought of taking a step closer to him, perhaps even gently touching his hand, but decided against it before his brain would command his limbs to make such reckless movements.

“Guess I’ll see you on Saturday at…?”

“At six. At Sandro’s.”

If Aleksi didn’t get a wink of sleep the following night, it wasn’t only because of excitement; the moment he laid his head on his pillow and closed his eyes, his mind was filled with pictures of a boy with twinkling eyes and a bashful smile, keeping him awake until he fell asleep to them.

~*~

Aleksi couldn’t bring himself to care if he looked a little dumb, smiling to himself and leaning his chin on his palm at eight o’clock the next Monday. Even the teacher announcing a pop quiz could not have washed away the dopey grin that had been painted on his lips since Saturday evening.

He was smiling at the way Olli’s eyes had brightened when he had spotted Aleksi in the crowd. He was smiling at Olli’s shy offer to get him a Pepsi. He was smiling at how star-struck Olli had looked when the band had first got on stage and the way he had lost himself in the music, rocking his head and closing his eyes as if to let the bass lines and guitar riffs swallow him whole. The band had been excellent, Aleksi had to agree, but more than half the time, all Aleksi had seen or heard was Olli.

And for the last three minutes of the show, all Aleksi had felt was Olli; more specifically, he had felt Olli’s hand searching for his, fumbling and hesitating until it finally clasped Aleksi’s during the final song of the band’s setlist, a melancholy rock ballad that prompted lighters and cellphone flashlights to be lit. In Aleksi’s eyes, they were all dim in comparison to the glimmer in Olli’s eyes.

Lying in his bedroom later that evening and throughout the entire next day, Aleksi had still felt the warmth of Olli’s hand in his, even though they had let each other go as soon as the stage lights had been turned off.

“Hi.” Olli’s voice brought Aleksi from Saturday evening back to Monday morning. 

“Hi,” he simply answered. There were a million things he wanted to say to Olli, but his sleepy, happy brain was still working on finding the exact words.

The smile on Olli’s face told him he’d have time to figure it out, at his own pace.

In the meantime, Aleksi could always improvise, and so he picked up his pencil.

♡

They both stared at the tiny heart on the corner of Olli’s notebook, and just when Aleksi was about to convince himself he had made a terrible mistake, Olli took the pencil out of his hand.

♡ ♡

[dogearedheart]

🏞🏞🏞

[gaydryad]

so for Writing Reasons I've been going back through all my old personal writing (including some very old social media posting) and the sheer force with which I wanted to dress up or roleplay "as a guy" from ages 12 to 15 is truly stunning. WHILE BEING AWARE OF TRANS AND NONBINARY PEOPLE. AS A OPTION. FULLY ZERO-BRAIN-CELL AWARENESS-ZERO ASS EGG

[britneyshakespeare]

i cannot be judged to give an accurate review of wisdom teeth extraction surgery because i was going to be panicked anyway, right? i'm not as sensitive to anesthesia as i wish i were, and oral pain has been some of the most intense pain i've ever experienced in my life (these experiences are common in natural redheads), and i was super anxious and unwilling to do this anyway. but. BUT. one thing i can say about that particular office that did mine this morning is. i have a particular allergy to a specific medication i was prescribed once via intravenous injection when i was 9. it gave me hives. i discontinued usage of it after a couple weeks. whenever i have to fill out any medical paper work since 2008 i have known the name of this medication and been prompt with informing correctly about it. and it is not a painkiller. but. they didn't tell me this after my paperwork, or during my consultation appointment, only AFTER i started crying half-consciously during the surgery when i was aware of my teeth being pulled and instruments being moved around in my mouth. only after the surgery did they tell my mom "yeah we didn't give her the painkiller because of her allergy to (specific medication)" and like. that's not really fun

[bluenotemagpie]

catching up on doctor who. surprising nobody, this former theatre kid who had a major beatles phase at the age of 12 and a major doctor who phase at the age of 14 is a big fan of the devil's chord

[lordsardine]

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[florida3exclamationpoints]

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