#i was (and still am) a massive shawn fan

[louisdeadpoets]

my roman empire is the q&a room set up for shawn mendes’ 2019 tour

[intrepidradish]

Last Line Meme

Wow I've never been tagged on anything before. Exciting stuff! Thanks @convallotoxin.

I know you probs want DE content, but I am still working on my Good Place story which is nearing completion. Sometimes it's just delightful.

“This is special, Shawn. Thank you.” Michael murmured. His heart was beating fast, pounding away in his human chest, quicker than ever, but it was nourishing. Blood was reaching places in his fingertips and in his toes, Michael was positive never received that rush. 

“Imagine if this was shit though. If it was a gray sky. If it were raining,” Shawn muttered, “wouldn’t be so special then, would it?” He side-eyed Michael as if challenging him.

Michael snorted a laugh, picked up Shawn’s hand and kissed his bent fingers. “Shawn, I’m positive it would.”

Shawn had to look away, but there was a slight smile at the edge of his lips even in the orange fading light.

As for Disco Elysium stuff, here is the latest line from the failed Jean/Harry case fic.

“True love.” Jean murmured, “Doesn’t really happen to guys like us.” Jean opened his final beer.

“Doesn’t look like it.” Harry ███ and he stood to get glasses taking the first bottle of tequila with him. “We’re rats in a fucking science experiment, Jean. The overlords are watching with their massive impassive eye and we’re squirreling around down here fucking and ██████.”

Jean held his head, cigarette hanging loosely from his lips. “It’s ██████ much.”

“It is,” the glass was filled with clear, like water but with a taste that draws saliva to the corner of your mouth. Harry bought limes, two withered ones, but deigned not to use them. “God is in heaven or ███████████████ Host almighty.”

And the night fell.

Uh...and I was diddling around with a Kim POV yesterday that will probably never be completed because its so formless:

It’s easy to attach the Trigat Sunshine Pro. You are a staunch fan of the Trigat Sunshine line. You purchased this one yourself, and then convinced the precinct to adopt the instant color version, which you also take home and service. You wish the transfer let you keep the Kineema. You wake up in a sweat nightly thinking about her in the hands of some fool putting their heels on the seats.

This post is now dead-ending since I don't know anyone else to tag besides the people already tagged.

[empathiquesempathiques]

NOT THE USUAL QUESTIONS ABOUT YOUR MUSE.

tagged stolen from by : @frayededges​​

tagging : if u see this you be tagged   .

What are their 5 most recent google searches

‘how to deal with chemical burns’

‘how to accurately hide ur feelings for ur best friend from ur other best friend’‘

‘‘sesame street’‘

‘‘local hospitals [for safety reasons]’‘

‘am i unlovable (quiz edition)’

What is their love language?

physical touch !! and acts of service .

When they're overwhelmed / upset, what do they do to calm themselves? what could someone else do to calm them?

usually,  -  eric tends to distraction himself with other people (namely his siblings/parents, sometimes shawn/jack/rachel.) but if their not available,  he tends to go hiking to scream for awhile before going home to watch some cartoon.. his favorite cartoon is futurama. honestly the best thing? someone could do for him if their spiraling is to just.  talk to him.

List 5-10 songs that remind you of your muse!

enough for you by olivia rodrigo

do all my friends hate me? by mckenna grace

scare myself  by nessa barrett

How does your muse handle emotions? what does it take to get your muse to cry? what are they like when they’re angry?

bottle it up, bottle it up if it’s bad. he can’t be anything but funny right? he needs to be the punch line of every joke, if everyone’s laughing with him then nobody’s laughing at him. eric doesn’t cry a lot, it takes an extreme amount to make eric cry and more then likely will only do it in their room. if your muses sees eric cry, then their special.

internalized it but also most of the time, their more hurt then angry.  but the emotion they can cope with is anger, so he does stupid shit to rebel against that. which he almost always regrets doing. 

Does your muse cuss? do they do it a lot? what usually makes them cuss?

eric does cuss, semi-frequently but would try not to in  front of a younger audience though he really is the ‘’oh fuck-’’ *pause* ‘’OH NO I DIDNT MEAN TO SAY THAT- SHIT-’’ ..

How does your muse handle distressing and/or overwhelming situations?

fixes it, tries to fix it the best that he can, because the people around him need to be okay more then anything. if he’s hurt in the situation, unless it’s just massive, he pushes his emotions away and focuses on the objective at hand, making sure everyone else is okay.

How does your muse handle blame/guilt? do they avoid it? find something/someone else to blame?

oh he accepts that he fucks up a lot, accepts the guilt and blame, even if sometimes it takes a bit to process that it was wrong. he accepts his wrongs and wouldn’t try to push it to someone else, normally.

What are the last 5 texts they sent and who are they to?

'’i will not be in your room tonight x’’ to cory

‘‘yo are we out of honeynut cherrios?’‘  to rachel (who texts back ;  ... you are yes, i am not.)

‘‘i’m sorry.’‘ drafted, not sent. to jack.

‘‘do you wanna grab some dinner and we can go look at duckies???’‘  to his mom.

‘‘realistically chupacabra is real, sir.’‘ to his dad.

What’s their usual body temperature? are they always hot/cold? do they easily become one of these?

god eric runs extremely hot, he can’t ever seem to be a normal temperature / cold one.  will sleep shirtless & sometimes nude to try and be less hot. almost always has a fan blowing on him and only vaguely gets better in winter / colder times. 

Do they still watch cartoons? if so, what are their favorites?

OH GOD YEAH?? he loves them a lot,will always i think. his favorite is futurama, he ‘’vibes’’ with the humor of it. they also dig spongebob square pantsalot.

What are some vocal headcanons you have? do they have a stutter? a vocal tic? do they stumble over their words or use a lot of ‘uh’s and ‘um’s? do they have a word they like to say a lot? 

eric’s voice is very standardized & normal toned in general. though when emotional or if he wants it can get very high and squeeky. ( FEENY, FE-FE-FEENYYY-) as an example. tends to be even tone and unmoving when serious.

How do they usually greet people ( people they know , don’t know .etc )? 

he will greet strangers (with unknown intentions) happily with a wave , stranger with (known intentions) he’ll tend to stare down until they calm down a bit. most people he knows are greated with a hug/hyper hi.

How does your muse react to affection? do they like it or not? are they touch starved? what is their favorite form of physical affection?

 eric !!!!! loves affection so much god,though after hs (a headcanon i need to write)  he’s a been more skeptical of s/o’s showing affection and has to get used to it being normal/good. but generally he loves hugs & cuddling. his favorite is generally one armed hugs & for s/o’s, sitting on the lap.

Is there somebody they haven’t been able to forgive? What did they do? Do they want to forgive them?

i don’t think so. eric is a very forgiving person & i think the only people he’d straight up not forgive would be ones who hurt his family & those he cares about.

Do they pick wildflowers?

 yeah, it’s a nice past time

How does your muse handle bad people? are they a fighter? do they avoid conflict? 

talk it through if possible  , fight if needed.

When does your muse ask for help? ( when things get bad , before they get bad .etc )?

he refuses too <3 until the last moment  possible <3

What are some trinkets your muse has?

old school memories , if anything.

On a road trip, are they the driver, the DJ in the passenger seat, or one of the people eating snacks and huddled under the bags in the back?

he’s definitely the driver, sometimes in charge of snacks.

Is your muse open about their struggles or do they bottle everything up? why?

bottle it up babyyyy, he tries to deal with everything on their own and hates asking for help. tends to think it makes him weaker if he does. he just wants to be the funny one for everyone else. not the one in pain.

List some things that remind you of your muse! ( the forest , books , rain .etc )

-jokes

-hugs

-the color blue

-a half eaten pizza

-shaky hands

Do they sleep in normal clothes or pajamas? To what degree are they clothed?

see above but ; naked or shirtless with boxes.

Do they have a sensitive spot/s?

his neck is extremely sensitive & his hips are too, makes him giggle very easily depending on what’s being done.

Where is their favorite place to be kissed?

platonically or romantically works; the shoulder??? want him to devote himself to you- romantically; ,,the neck because in their words ‘’i am a simp BITCH-’’

Does your muse ever want kids? if so, how many and would they adopt? if not, why? 

does he want kids? yes, 100%. does he actually think that he’d be  a good dad? no. would want the whole white picket fence deal with  2 kids / 5+ animals in a perfectworld.

What type of tiktoks do they watch?

pet videos to the zodiac sign call outs to the ‘’you are loved’’ reminders

How much does your muse care? would they die for the ones they love?

eric cares a lot about his family & friends. he’d happy die or get hurt to help them.

Does your muse know how to cook? are they good or bad?

he can cook, do NOT let him actually cook ever please-

Is your muse good at taking care of themselves? or do they need constant reminders to eat/drink/rest?

it depends on the day, good day? he’s fine / good with it. bad day, he has  30+ reminders on his phone to do things and get them done easier. would get them done sooner if someone else reminded them as he’d feel like he has too.

[godsofhumanity]

ATHENA COMPLEX (WEBTOON) | REVIEW

aight so i’m sure a lot of people have heard about this comic available on webtoon.. i think it’s getting popular again because it’s just come back after being on break for like 3 years lol,, anyways @greekschist recommended this webtoon to me, and now that i’ve finished season 1, i’m here to share my two cents about it :D

OVERVIEW: Suffering from heartbreak after being rejected by Poseidon, goddess of wisdom, Athena, becomes human to seek revenge... but as a high school boy. There she plots to befriend Poseidon’s reincarnation, Adrian, who doesn’t have the slightest clue about the world of the gods. But will her sweet vengeance be thwarted by other opposing forces, or will her own one-sided love hinder her plans?

RATING: 4/10. it’s a little bit weird,, plenty of creative license used in here. if you like cheesy “rom-com” with a dash of heartbreak and trauma, then this is probably the comic for you <3

AVAILABLE ON: webtoon

spoilers undercut!

THINGS I LIKED:

- character designs!!!!!!! i didn’t like everything, but Poseidon’s design was really awesome.. the blue and gold palette worked wonderfully for him. i also like Metis’, Iolo’s, and Ares’ designs ^-^

- cliffhangers. i think something this webtoon does really well is leaving cliffhangers.. little bits of information are very slowly revealed, but without just giving it to the reader in one go.. i think this helps draw the reader in.

- the art. the opening panels that appear to look like gold, resembling depictions of mythology commonly observed on ancient greek pottery are done so well!!! really breathtaking to see. 

- fighting scene are also done marvellously,, even if at times i felt the plot was a little wishy-washy, i continued to read just to see the fighting panels because they’re so gorgeous to look at <3

- interesting take on the original mythology. i really like the idea that Gaia curses all the gods because she’s sick of their fighting and can’t take it anymore. i also liked the way the idea of Athena being the prophesised child was dealt with- it’s something i think about a lot, like, what if Athena actually did have a brother who took over from Zeus.. it’s interesting to think about.

- relating to the previous point, i think it’s a cool idea that perhaps the prophecy will still come true- even though Athena is a girl, and the prophecy tells of a male child, Athena goes around parading as a boy on Earth, so in a sense, the prophecy is still being fulfilled, and that’s pretty clever to me.

- Ares!!!!!!!!!!! i know he’s meant to be a piece of shit, but i really like his character arc,, and i mostly continued to read season 1 because i wanted to know what was happening with Dogres.

- the way that no character seems to be painted in black and white- there is no “absoluteness” in this story- no one’s right and no one’s wrong, there’s just perspectives and experiences. i think it’s easy in mythology to just point fingers, but this webtoon avoids doing that, and i really liked that even the worst of the bullies still have sides that might appeal to the audience.

- Adrian being aware of his water blessing.. manifesting Poseidon’s horse and completely bashing those two hunters of Artemis were probably my favourite scenes.. the art for the action scene is done sooo well

- Ares debut panel where he emerges in a tornado of fire,,, we get it Ares

- Apollo healing Shawn. finally some good fucking news

THINGS THAT I DIDN’T LIKE:

- Athena’s whole motivation. it seemed to me from chapter one itself that Poseidon has only ever approached Athena from a fatherly, or brotherly perspective. it’s fine to feel admiration for people, especially older people, who have become father-like figures,, but the way she’s thrown such a massive temper tantrum just because he said that he didn’t return her love in the way she wanted it... idk... seems awfully spoiled of her (and i’m glad Poseidon said no).

-  - the way that Poseidon looks so godly, and then Zeus looks like blonde nagito komaeda.... i am NOT a fan.

- adding to the previous- Apollo’s design.. people in the webtoon comments were like “apollo senpai notice me” but he looks so average,,,, idk,, i just don’t get it.. 

- Nike... she’s kind of annoying,,, and she keeps on changing her mind about what she thinks is good for Athena and idk,, probably the top character that gets on my nerves

- the whole plot where Athena was like “oh sibyl i’m actually only talking to adrian because i like you~”... it felt unnecessary and also weird,, especially the episode where she comes home and nike is like “what’s wrong?” and iolo tells her that “Athena has never taken advantage of a human before”... why start now, Athena?????????

- Athena’s muscular design,,, literally NONE of the other titans are depicted with as much muscle as she is so i just don’t quite understand where it came from?? also Poseidon saying “oh i don’t see you as a woman because you wear armour all the time” but like?????? what????? i know that’s the whole point, but i just... hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

- Athena not even changing her name when she pretends to be human... why would you not just make it like “Athens” or “Athenian”... 

- those two huntresses in the last few episodes of season 1 acting all “badass” and hunting down Adrian,, when in fact they were actually just bullies,, using magic on a literal child who has no idea wtf is going on... 

- Artemis and Apollo being so cold to each other

- i hate the way Athena seems to be the only one who “cares” for humanity and even then,, she obviously doesn’t care enough because she’s plotting to absolutely demolish a small human child solely because he just happens to be Poseidon’s incarnation (through no fault of his own)

- i mean,,, how is it that there is NO ONE else who even moderately cares for humanity??? is this not a portrayal of the gods of humanity?

[canonicallysoulmates]

My thoughts/views/opinions about Clif’s insta post....

Important Disclaimer: The following is just my opinion regarding Clif’s instagram post. I don’t speak in representation of anybody but myself. I don’t speak for my fellow j2 fans, and I don’t speak for my fellow tinhats. This is just my POV regarding this situation. 

Warning in advance, I am going to do my best to keep this post cohesive and coherent but my brain is jumping from point to point so if I come off as scatter brained in some parts I apologize. 

Before I get into this post, some of you might be wondering why I am dressing this in the first place when Clif’s post didn’t make mention of j2′s sexuality or of tinhats, it is because I am openly a tinhat and I am vocal one at that, and this is not my first rodeo I know even though he didn’t mention tinhats directly and he brought up things that are discussed by both tinhats and non tinhats alike I know, and I’ve already seen it, that we tinhats are gonna get the brunt of it from the het stans.  

For those of you that don’t know what this post is about, earlier today (12.2.19) j2′s bodyguard Clif made an instagram post regarding j2 and their families and some theories/speculation that there have been regarding j2 and their families, I’m not going to link to the post, or share the post, or even quote the post - even though I will address contents of it - if you really want to know what the post said you can look it up yourself. 

Before I talk about Clif’s post let me address the elephant in the room: Jensen’s comment. Or I should say “Jensen” because I don’t believe it was actually him who left a comment on the post. “Jensen” said that those who theorize about him and Jared’s lives are bullies. Well, he didn’t say exactly that what he actually said was that those who create the “false narratives” that Clif mentioned in his post are bullies. 

I call bullshit. On both the statement and on Jensen being who commented. 

Speculating/theorizing and pointing out what you see regarding a public figures life in your own accounts where you don’t tag anybody does not make you a bully or a hater. That is an idiotic thing to say, if you go by that then speculating that j2 are totally 100% happy in their hetero marriages makes you a bully and a hater too, or is there an exception to hetero positive things because it sells the narrative that they want 🤔

I personally don’t believe Jensen is the one who posted that comment because to me it doesn’t sound like him, I think it was somebody else on his account.

And I find it very...interesting and fitting that “he” commented on this post when on insta his and D’s bearding has been turned to 1,000x, they have reached Shawn Mendes Camilla Cabello levels of extra, even if I thought he was straight I would still think there were problems in that marriage because of how over the top they are lately; it reminds me a bit of a celeb couple from here in PR, for months they been saying they’re fine, that they’re in love, they’ve been going on trips together for all the world looking like a happy couple and then...about 2weeks ago they announced they were getting divorced. 

Back on track, this whole thing is a mess and it’s stupid af, I don’t know what in the hell Clif was thinking when he made that post, I don’t know what he was trying to achieve; I don’t know why he found the need or thought it was a good idea to bring forth things that were being discussed in fandom on the DL and to insert himself into a narrative in which he plays no part, like not to be rude, he can say he’s family all he wants but he’s just a bodyguard and I feel like I should say an occasional one like don’t oversell your importance dude. And even if he was family, the things he brings up in his post are discussions concerning only Jensen, Jared, Genevieve and Danneel. 

And I find it frustrating af funny that he’s so up in arms about what fans speculate in their accounts and he says he considers the boys family but he tends to be silent when j2 are being dragged through the mud and receiving actual death threats. I guess protecting the happy family image is more important.

Jared and Jensen are not the only celebrities to have their lives theorized about, they’re not the only ones who have fans that point out jewelry items like wedding bands or potential house moves, this is something every celebrity has gone through, it even happens to youtubers and instagram influencers. So chill tf down.

My best guess as to why this whole mess happened, because this is a mess of a situation, is that there’s something going on behind the scenes and either they don’t want us to focus on it- in which case good job idiots now fans are speculating like crazy- or they do want us to focus on it and they figured adding fuel to the long burning fire was the best way to make us follow the smoke. 

When I say long burning fire I mean long burning fire, nothing that Clif brought up in his post is new, they’re all things that have been discussed in fandom by tinhats and non tinhats alike for years. 

J2′s living situation, the wedding bands, criticism of the wives, these are all things that have been discussed in this fandom for years and they’re relatively small topics, I imagine that maybe back in the day when j2 first got married these were discussed more often but now a days not a lot of fans, at least that I have seen, talk much about j2′s houses/apartments, or about the wedding bands and when these topics are brought up it’s usually for a day or two tops and I’m being generous like it’s not a massive topic of discussion. 

He brings up the lacking wedding ring and the selling of homes, the ring thing was barely discussed most of us were focused on bigger things, and let me tell you that home thing has been talked about so on the DL in this fandom that I have seen people that are active, way more active and in the know than I am in this fandom be confused af as to what he meant - it’s that apparently Jensen and D are gonna sell the house or something - I’ve barely seen people talk about the house thing and the talk I’ve seen has been facts it’s all about the property and if it appears listed and the like and yet he brings it up along with divorce/separation which has even me going 👀 because in the convos I’ve seen about this topic nobody has ever speculated about this meaning a divorce, I’m sure there’s people that have and I just haven’t seen it but still it’s like why bring this barely being talked about thing and do so while mentioning a separation/divorce like 🤦‍♀️ Now everybody knows about it and is going to be talking about because he brought it to attention. what an idiot. 

Small thing, I take issue with him saying that for some people their passion is to build dream homes and sell and that we have no clue what hard work that is because I’m sure there are people in this fandom who work in real state or who flip houses for a living and they do those things while also speculating/theorizing about j2. 

He talks about how one of the j’s gets criticized for not being home a lot, I will say I have seen these criticism go to both and as I have said in the past I don’t agree with this POV, but it’s a very small niche of fandom that makes comments like that like borderline you have to look for it;  and on the wives being criticized/judged (<- his word not mine) for managing their careers and home life at the same time: yeah no, Daneel and Genevieve are not criticized for managing their careers and home life they’re criticized because they like to act as if they do these things without any help. They have nannies, G has people that help her with her blog, D didn’t start the brewery up by herself and she doesn’t work it by herself and one of her most recent acting gig was on spn a role everyone knows she only got cause she’s married to Jensen. They like to pretend they’re wonder woman and super relatable when in reality they’re privileged, and hey there’s nothing wrong with being privileged enough to be able to afford childcare but there is something wrong with pretending you don’t have that advantage and taking credit for work you don’t do ie. acting like you’re maintaining a home and taking care of the kids all by yourself, and then turning around and acting like your life is a struggle. 

Unless there’s something going on behind the scenes I can’t think of a reason as to why he would bring this stuff up, if anything doing so is stupid because now fans that might not have known about any of these things will know about it and while there’s plenty of sheep who will clap their hands and say ‘those people are so horrible :(’ there are those who are going to get curious and look these things up and where do you think their search is going to land them?  They’re gonna land at the anti blogs, and the hat blogs because we’re the ones that tend to discuss these things. 

Honestly, if  they actually wanted fans to stop speculating they have failed in an impressive way, they achieved the opposite. 

I personally think there is something going on behind the scenes, I don’t know if it’s good or bad but I think something’s going on maybe it’s a divorce or a big project or even something related to spn like a movie but I feel like something is coming our way....

One last thing before I wrap this up, I said this in another post, and I said it on my twitter acc as well but I also wanted to put it here: Clif’s post changes nothing regarding my love and opinion of j2, my status as a tinhat, or the content of my blog. I still love j2 as much as I did before this mess, I’m still a tinhat, and I will continue making tinhat posts both here and on my twitter account. 

This is all I have to say about this situation, I think, these are definitely the main points I hope everything I said came across clearly as I said in the beginning of this post my brain is jumping from spot to spot so it probably came across as a little scatter brained and ramble-y. 

[longitudinalwaveme]

Where Are The Ghostbusters When You Need Them?

Hi! Thanks for checking out my story!

Despite the title, the story actually does not feature the Ghostbusters, but it does feature the Flash Rogues. That's almost as good, right?

The story can't really fit anywhere canonically since Evan and Sam are alive simultaneously, among other things, but hopefully it'll be an enjoyable story anyhow. 

Mirror Master I: You ever seen one of those creepy houses? You know, the ones with broken windows and crumbling spires and ivy growing all over them? The ones that used to belong to super rich people and are now allegedly owned by some mysterious “third cousin once removed” that no one’s ever actually seen? The ones that stupid teenagers dare each other to spend the night in? Well, Central City has one of those creepy houses. Or, more accurately, Central City’s Pine Woods suburb has one of those creepy houses. It’s commonly known as the old Jackson place. It's a three-story mansion, with broken windows, crumbling stone, a creepy staircase, massive spires....the works. It was even used as a set for a horror movie back in the 80s. Even though it technically isn’t in the city proper, it’s close enough that everyone knows about the house-and the stories surrounding it. Allegedly, the old Jackson place was built by Adolphus Jackson in 1792, after he immigrated from somewhere in Ireland with his family. They were Central City’s first settlers (the Rathaways were second). He and his wife, Betty, had sixteen kids (although only ten survived to adulthood). All the dead kids were buried in the backyard of the house, so things are already getting creepy. (Some people say that you can hear crying when you go by the house, and other people have claimed to see ghostly children.) His oldest son, Jared, inherited the house when old man Jackson died in 1846. (He was buried behind the house, and yep, people have claimed to see him, too.) Jared worked alongside Martin Garrick (yes, he IS related to Jay Garrick) and my great-great-great-great-grandfather, Shawn Scudder, in Central City’s Underground Railroad. (Am I shaming my heritage? Yeah, probably. Moving on.) People have claimed to see the ghosts of slaves and such around the old Jackson place, and they’ve also claimed to see the ghosts of Harold and Rufus Jackson, an uncle and nephew who fought on opposite sides of the Civil War. In 1877, Jared died, and his second son, Arnold, inherited the house. (His oldest son was Harold, who died at the Battle of Chancellorsville.) Arnold got married to his second cousin, which is several levels of weird, and he added onto the house, making it a lot bigger and more impressive looking. He died in 1885, after adding to the family’s sizable fortune, and his son, Bernard, inherited the house and made it even fancier. Bernard is also where the really messed up stories about the Jackson place begin, as his oldest son, Robert, fell in love with a girl his father hated (partially because he had planned for his son to marry Lydia Rathaway, Piper’s great-great-great aunt). Their arguments over it got really nasty, and so eventually Robert ran away with his chick and got married to her, only for his father to threaten to cut him off. Sonny boy decided that he wanted the money more than his wife, and he abandoned her and was remarried to Piper’s great-great-great aunt. There was only one snag: his old wife had gotten pregnant and drowned herself in the pond (now dried up) on the back of the property to get revenge a few days after her baby was born. (People claim to see her ghost quite frequently.) Her parents, the Desmonds (and the Rathaways, who were mad that Bernard had had his son marry their daughter when he already had a wife) sued the pants off the Jacksons and the family was reduced to semi-poverty. Robert hung himself a few weeks after the lawsuit was settled (he allegedly haunts the house, too) and Bernard started drinking. A lot. He died in 1910 (probably from alcohol poisoning) and the estate was inherited by his only surviving offspring, a 19-year-old daughter named Alicia, who became a librarian and never married. (Alicia didn’t live in the house after the age of 21, probably because of all the bad memories, but people still see her ghost there.) She died in 1971, and the house, which had sat unused for over three decades, had already gained a reputation as being massively haunted, a reputation that only increased when some stupid 17-year-old broke into the house on a dare, fell down the old stairs in the dark, and broke his neck in 1995. (Since then, people have claimed to see HIS ghost as well.) So you get the point: the old Jackson place is massively haunted, massively creepy, and massively empty, so, of course, Captain Cold decided that we needed to break into the place on Halloween. Now, to be fair, we do something to get our adrenaline up every year on Halloween, but there’s a difference between going to a commercial haunted house, where nothing is real, and going to an old house that might actually be haunted, especially when said old house is falling apart and everyone is wearing ridiculous costumes (as we do every year). Earlier in the month, we had decided to dress up as classic movie monsters. Or at least I thought we had. As it turned out, some people had badly missed the memo….

Mirror Master II: Okay, so maybe the scarecrow costume I had wasnae all that scary, but it wasnae my fault! How was I supposed to ken that all the scary scarecrow costumes would be sold out by October 24? I wasnae PLANNING to be the Scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz! But I’m off topic. All of us had agreed to meet on the front lawn before we broke into the haunted house, so at 7:00 PM on Halloween night, I got into me costume and went to the lawn. Golden Glider (dressed as a vampire), Scudder (dressed as a zombie), the Trickster (dressed as a bedsheet ghost), Captain Boomerang (dressed as Frankenstein’s monster), and the Pied Piper (dressed as the Phantom of the Opera) were already there, and, of course, as soon as he saw me costume, Scudder started laughing.  “They were sold out of the scary costumes, ye eejit,” I said. “Then why didn’t you alter it or something? You don’t look scary at all!” Scudder asked. “Hey, at least I look scarier than the Trickster. And besides, not all of us be seamstresses, Scudder,” I replied. (He’d made his own costume and thought that nobody knew. Eejit.) Scudder flushed and suddenly became very interested in the bushes. At this point, Captain Cold showed up in cat ears. That was his whole costume. Otherwise, he jus’ looked like a hockey fan (which he be). His sister-a bonnie lassie, she-wasnae pleased with that. “Lenny, you were supposed to dress up as something scary!” “I did. I’m a werecat.” I’m nae sure why he thought that would be convincing. “Oh, come on! You didn’t even try!”“I never try. Why are you acting like this is something new?” The Glider threw up her hands. “Because you promised me you would try this year!” “I have a tail. Does that make it better?” The Glider rolled her eyes.“I give up.” She tossed her golden hair over her shoulder-I tell ye, she is a bonnie lass-and went to talk with the Piper. The Weather Wizard showed up a few seconds later, and I saw soomthing I never wanted to see: him in a dress. “What are ye supposed tae be, me gran?” The Wizard scowled.“I’m a witch!” I looked at him oddly. “Ye could have been a werewolf, and ye decided tae be a witch?”“It’s thematic! You know: wizards are magic; witches are magic….” I laughed. “Look, if ye want to dress up like a lassie, ye kin. Just donae expect me tae understand why.” The Wizard stormed off, and the Top arrived on the lawn, dressed as a gigantic top. Scudder laughed so hard that he had tae sit down, and I laughed pretty heartily myself. “What is so amusing?” the Top asked. Naebody bothered to explain that it was because he wasnae cooperating with the theme, because we all knew he wouldnae listen. “They’re just being stupid, sweetie pie. You look amazing,” the Glider said. (I’m nae sure if she meant it or if she was just trying to calm him doon.) Luckily for the Top, Heat Wave decided to show up at this point, and his costume made Captain Boomerang laugh so hard he wet himself and made me laugh so hard that I had to join Scudder on the ground, so everyone forgot about him. “Why are you wearing a tutu?” Captain Cold asked (as soon as he was capable of speech again.)“Well, I was gonna be Frankenstein, but Digger stole my idea, and I didn’t have any other ideas, so I decided that me in a tutu was scarier than any monster,” Heat Wave replied. I looked him over again and immediately wished I had nae doon it. He was right; the sight of a 6’6”, 250 pound man in a frilly pink tutu is more terrifying than any monster. His logic seemed to work on everyone else, too, because Captain Cold quickly changed the subject. “Okay, are we ready?” Scudder raised an eyebrow. “To break into the creepy ghost house? No, but I know I’m doing it anyway,” he replied. (At the time, I thought that he was being a wet blanket, but as it turned out, he was right to be a tad worried.) “As long as we’re bringing flashlights, I suppose so,” the Piper said. (He had been against going to the haunted house, tae, but he had been opposed to it because of some kid who had died there back in the 90s because the house didnae have lights, not because of Scudder’s ghosties, which he didnae believe in. Because of that, he had changed his tune after Cold promised him that he could bring a flashlight if he wanted tae.)“Then let’s go,” Captain Cold ordered.  With that, Scudder and I transported everyone to the house via Mirror Realm. Having only lived in Central City for a year, I had never seen it before, and I was a tad freaked out by what I saw. The house itself wasnae too bad, but the creepy dead grass and trees, and the graveyard in the back of the house, were spooky, especially under the huge moon.“‘Abandon all hope, ye who enter here?’ Really?” Golden Glider said scornfully, pointing at a sign in the yard. Her brother shrugged. “Probably some kid’s idea of a prank.” Piper, meanwhile, was looking nervously at a different sign. “Cold, this sign is from the government. It says the building is condemned. Are you sure we’ll be safe to go in there?” he asked. “Since when do we care what the government thinks?” Captain Cold replied. “When a building might collapse on our heads!” Piper exclaimed. “And when it’s haunted!” Scudder added, sounding happy to have an excuse tae go home. Captain Cold sighed and rolled his eyes. “Piper, if the house seems like it’s gonna collapse on us, we’ll just have Scudder and the Scotsman transport us out. We’ll be fine,” he said. Piper seemed to relax.“Good point,” he said. Sam  didn’t look as calm. “But what about the ghosts?” he asked. “Sam, ghosts don’t exist. They’re a product of overactive imagination and too many horror stories,” the Piper replied, only for Captain Boomerang to join the conversation.“They are too real! My second cousin’s ex-girlfriend’s ex-boyfriend’s dad’s third cousin’s aunt saw one!” he exclaimed, sounding offended. Piper didnae look convinced. “That’s hardly conclusive proof of-” he began, only tae be cut off by Captain Cold. “Enough about ghosts! Let’s go inside already!” he exclaimed. With that, Trickster picked the lock on the door. He pushed it open, producing a loud CREAK, and then we went inside. 

Weather Wizard: I’m going to tell you a secret: the witch costume was an accident. I swear, I thought I ordered the Dark Wizard costume, but when I opened up the package a week before Halloween, I found a witch costume instead, and because I didn’t have another two weeks to wait (or any more money) I was stuck with it and just decided to pretend it had been my plan the whole time to save face. (At least it matched the theme, unlike cats, tops, and ballerinas.) But I digress. So, after the Trickster picked the lock, we went inside and Piper and Cold turned on their flashlights. The hallway contained cobwebs and a moth-eaten carpet, but nothing else.

“We'll cover more ground if we divide and conquer, so let’s split up into groups and search this place for valuables. Lisa, you’re with me. Scudder, you’re with McCulloch. Mardon, you’re with Rory. Rathaway, you’re with Jesse. Dillon, you’re with Harkness,” Cold barked.

“WE’RE SPLITTING UP? That’s like the #1 way to die in a haunted house!” Scudder whined. (As it turned out, he was right to be worried, but at the time, I thought he was overreacting.) Hartley sighed.

“Sam, ghosts do not exist,” he said. (He was wrong.) Then he turned to Cold and asked,

“How will the Mirror Masters be able to transport us to safety if we’re not in the same part of the house?” Cold rolled his eyes.

“Piper, unless there’s an earthquake, the Mirror Masters will be able to get to all of us before the house falls. They basically have access to a teleportation system. We’ll be fine,’” Cold replied. Piper didn’t look entirely convinced, but he didn’t keep arguing.

“Why am I with Harkness? He’s an uncultured boor,” Dillon demanded.

“Well, I ain’t too fond of you, either, you wowser!” Harkness yelled.

“Why can’t I be with Roscoe, Lenny?” Lisa asked. Cold sighed wearily.

“Fine. Dillon, you’re with Lisa. Harkness, you’re with me. Sam, stop whining. Now let’s go!” Cold exclaimed. McCulloch saluted, dragged Scudder into a mirror, and vanished, and the rest of us fanned out to search the house. After walking through some more cobwebby hallways, Mick and I reached what I assumed was the living room. The room was filled with decaying furniture and mysterious old knicknacks, everything was covered in cobwebs, and part of the roof had fallen in. Seeing this, I had to wonder if the Piper had been right about the dangers of the building.

“How long do you think it’s been since someone touched any of this?” Mick asked me.

“If I had to guess, I’d say at least forty years,” I replied. I glanced out the window and noticed that a cloud had covered part of the moon and that the rest of it had turned red, and I shuddered. “Mick, there’s a blood moon.” I said quietly.

“So? They talked about that on the news,” Mick replied as he started pawing through the knicknacks laying on the floor.

“Never mind,” I said quickly as I joined him. I didn’t want him to think I was scared or anything. Several minutes later, we were still sorting through things and had found nothing but a broken teacup, a broken porcelain doll, and a dusty beaded shawl.

“I hope the whole house ain’t like this. If it is, Captain Cold’ll be mad,” Mick said. I shrugged.

“That’s his problem, not mine.” I heard a rumble of thunder in the distance, and, a few seconds later, the sobs of a child. Mick looked up from the floor in shock.

“Did you hear that?” he asked me.

“The thunder, or the kid crying?”

“The kid crying!” I nodded.

“Yeah, I heard it too. Why?”

“Because we need to go help that kid!” he replied. I rolled my eyes.

“Mick, we’re here to get rich, not help some kid.” Mick ignored me and pulled me in the direction of the crying sound, despite my attempts to break free from his grasp. We had gotten halfway across the living room when we saw a little girl. Her hair was in...uh, ringlets, I think they’re called?-and her dress came down to the floor. She was crying (of course) and Mick went over to her.

“Hey, there, little one. Are you lost?” he asked gently. I thought about leaving Mick with the girl and continuing to search for loot, but there was something about the little girl that made it impossible for me to pull away, and NOT in a “she’s so small and helpless” way. Mick reached out to put his hand on the girl’s shoulder-and his hand went straight through her! My knees went weak under me, and then the world went black. When I came to, I found myself on a dusty couch. I looked around the room and saw Mick waving good-bye to the vanishing ghost.

“Oh, hey, Mark. Glad to see you up-although there wasn’t really a reason for you to faint like that. Georgia was just worried that we were gonna hurt her doll. When I told her we weren’t, she cheered right up and went away,” he said cheerfully.

“The ghost has a name? And is friendly?” I asked. Mick nodded.

“I don’t even think she knew she was dead. Poor little thing,” he said, and I sighed in relief.

“In that case, let’s get back to work. If she’s the only ghost here, we’ve got nothing to worry about,” I said. (Famous last words.) With that, the two of us continued our search of the living room.

Trickster: The Piper and I- James Jesse, con artist extraordinaire-decided to investigate the attic. I’m a horror movie junkie, so if I’m breaking into a haunted house, what better place to get that adrenaline rush than the attic? Piper and I climbed three sets of narrow, creaky, cracked, cobwebby stairs to the attic (although Piper got winded halfway up the second flight and I had to drag him up the last one). Then I opened the door to see lots of cobwebs, a shattered mirror, a broken window, an old, rusted bedframe, some old-fashioned cabinets, a sword, an old rocking horse (sadly, it was too small for me), and a bunch of other old stuff. The roof was low, and it was really dark. My heart pounded, but in a good way.

“This is so much better than the fake haunted houses! We should go here every year!” I exclaimed. Piper swept his flashlight from left to right, and then started examining the boring knick knacks that were lying around. I pulled out a yo-yo and some bubble gum and waited eagerly for the walls to start dripping blood. After about two minutes, Piper pulled a stack of old papers out of one of the cabinet drawers.

“James, these are from the Civil War!” he exclaimed excitedly. I yawned.

“So?” I asked. Piper looked shocked.

“James, these are valuable historical documents! If they’re really as old as they look, they could provide priceless information about the role of Central City in the Civil War!”

“Can they summon a ghost?” Piper sighed.

“No. They cannot.” I blew a particularly large bubble.

“Then I’m not interested. Let’s find something that CAN summon a ghost!” Piper rolled his eyes.

“James, you’re not going to find something that can summon a ghost, because ghosts-” Suddenly, the windows rattled and we heard a loud moan.

“Don’t exist?” Piper squeaked. Five seconds later, a transparent man with a noose around his neck appeared and floated towards us. Piper screamed and bolted down the stairs, and I whooped with joy and followed him, narrowly missing the ghost’s clammy hands.

“Catch me if you can, you stupid ghost!” I yelled. I followed the Piper to the second floor and into a spooky old bathroom, complete with dusty mirror, a big tub with clawed feet, a broken toilet, and a sink. Mold was growing in the sink and on the walls, and I grinned. This day just kept getting better and better! Piper slammed the door and locked it behind us.His chest was heaving and he looked exhausted. (Rich kids don’t have much reason to be athletic.)

“You were saying?” I asked ‘sweetly’. Piper gave me a death glare.

“NOT the time!” Piper said. I laughed.

“Do you really think a locked door will keep out a ghost? It can’t even keep us out!” I asked him. Piper’s face went white, and he ran over to the dirty mirror.

“Sam! McCulloch! Get us home now!” he yelled. There was no response.

“Piper, you know the Mirror Realm doesn’t work that way. You can only talk to them through it if they want you to, and if they haven’t had the good luck to run into a ghost, they won’t be able to guess that you might want them to pick us up.” I said as I played with my yo-yo. Piper whimpered and buried his head in his hands, then started muttering incomprehensibly as I whistled merrily.

“How can you be so happy?” Piper demanded after a few minutes.I grinned.

“Kid, we’re being chased by a real, honest-to-goodness ghost! It doesn’t get more awesome than that!” Just then, the ghost drifted through the door, and I pulled out my camera and started snapping pictures as Piper screamed.

“We’regoingtodiewe’regoingtodiewe’regoingto die !” He darted to the door, fumbled with the lock, and opened it just as the ghost brushed his clammy fingers against his back. He screamed louder and ran down the hall. I snapped a few more photos, stuck my tongue out at the ghost,and followed Piper. The ghost roared angrily and flew after me. I caught up with Piper after about a minute and lead him into a dumbwaiter, then slammed the door behind us.

“James, how is this closet preferable to hiding in the bathroom? The ghost can still walk through walls!” Piper demanded.

“Piper, YOU’RE the one who had all the servants. Shouldn’t you know what a dumbwaiter is?”

“I know what a dumbwaiter is,I have just never seen one before. I was not allowed to spend time with the servants.You can hardly blame me for mistaking it for a closet. Besides, my point still stands: why would hiding in here keep us safe from the ghost?” I laughed.

“Piper, that ghost is Robert Jackson, who hung himself because he wasn’t rich anymore and gave up the love of his life for money! Entering the dumbwaiter that the servants used would be beneath him. As long as we’re in here, we’re safe. For a guy who’s college educated, you sure are stupid,” I explained. Piper frowned.

“You were taking selfies with the ghost, and I’M stupid?” he yelled. I smiled “innocently”.

“I never said I wasn’t stupid...but I’m not a graduate from Harvard, either. But I knew how to save us from the ghost, and you didn’t,” I replied. Hartley sighed wearily.

“Whatever you say, James...but how did you know what a dumbwaiter is? You thought that the American Civil War started in 1961 until last month, so you cannot have known about them from history, and you were not wealthy, so you cannot have had servants who used one,” he asked.

“My Nonna Gianna was a maid for a wealthy family in Italy when she was a girl, and she used a dumbwaiter when she worked for them,” I explained.

“Wait...you’re Italian?” Hartley asked.

“Sí. Well, Italian-American, anyhow.My paternal grandparents immigrated from Italy in 1935 after Mussolini took over and invaded Ethiopia. When they got to America, they joined the Big Circus because my Nonno Antonio had been an acrobat in Italy. They had a whole lot of kids, and my dad was the youngest. He was born in 1955, and he married my mother, who was a second-generation Italian immigrant herself, in 1980. I was born eight years later,” I explained.

“But your name is James Jesse! That doesn’t sound remotely Italian!” Hartley protested.

“Hel-lo! My nonni were Italian immigrants performing for the American public at the height of World War II! They took stage names: Jesse for the last name, and Rosie and Jared for their first names. By the end of the war, they’d gotten so famous under the Jesse name that they couldn’t really change it back to their real one, so they just kept the stage name. My dad’s real name was Alessandro, but he called himself Jacob. My mother’s name really was Helen, though, because her parents had given her an American name. My real name’s actually Giovanni Giuseppe. How’s that for a mouthful?” I exclaimed.

“Sai parlare italiano?” Piper asked.

“Nonni, nonna, nonno, pizza, spaghetti, Venice, Rome, sí, il Dulche, Mamma Mia, madre, padre,  nipote, figlia, figlio,Ti amo, caro, Coinvolgimi, bella noche, Dov'è la birra? That’s all the Italian I know. Well, that and a lot of swear words,” I replied.

“En d’autres termes, tu sais autant d’italien comme vous le français?” Piper asked. I looked at him oddly.

“English?”

“So, in other words, you know as much Italian as you do French?” he replied.

“Yeah, pretty much. Not everyone can afford tutors for twenty languages,” I said.

“I only speak six languages-Spanish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, and Mandarin Chinese, and I can only write in the first four. I’m passable in Arabic and Russian, too, but I’d hardly say I can speak twenty languages.” I grinned evilly.

“Let’s go find some more ghosts!” I exclaimed.

“No! I’m staying right here, where it’s safe,” Piper yelled.

“Spoilsport,” I said. I started using my yo-yo again.

Captain Cold: So, as I guess you already know, I ended up partnered with Captain Koala, because he and Roscoe insisted on being stubborn morons. I wanted to look for the safe, but Digger insisted that we go to the kitchen because he was hungry, and, since Digger seems to have an immunity to food poisoning, I figured it would probably be safe to let him eat 85-year-old food, and feeding him would get him to shut his big mouth besides. Digger, who practically has an internal homing device for food, found the kitchen in about a minute flat. The kitchen was dusty, covered in cobwebs, and filled with a lot of rusted-out junk, and it was so dark that, without my flashlight, I don't think I would've been able to see two feet in front of me. It was a little creepy, I’m not gonna lie. But I don’t scare easy, so I started pawing around for valuables while Digger found the world’s oldest box of crackers and started digging in. I found a bunch of silver spoons and shoved them into my bag…and then something weird happened. A really attractive lady appeared out of basically nowhere and walked right through me like she couldn’t even see me. It felt like when I accidentally shot myself with my cold gun, and I frowned. Ghosts weren’t supposed to exist. However, I had business to do, so I ignored the ghost lady and went back to my work. Digger, on the other hand, didn’t take the ghost so well. He let out a string of Australian swear words, yelled something about a “ghost sheila” (knowing him, it was probably the exact opposite of polite), grabbed his crackers, and started to run. I grabbed him by his scarf before he could exit the room.

“Let me go, you bloody loon! You’ve got kangaroos loose in your top paddock if you want to stay here with a ghost, Cold!” Digger yelled.

“Stop freaking out, Digger. She doesn’t have any weapons, she’s not dripping blood, and she’s not bad to look at besides. Just ignore her. We have work to do.” Digger looked closer at the ghost and grinned.

“Bloody oath! She is a beautiful Sheila, ain’t she?”

“Yeah, she’s pretty. I just said that. Now get to work.” I said. Digger ignored me and walked over to the ghost.

“G’day, Sheila. I’m Captain George Harkness of the Australian Secret Service. Who are you?” he asked. (He tells every girl he takes a fancy to that he worked/works for the Australian Secret Service. It’d be a great pick up line if it wasn’t a total lie.) I rolled my eyes as I helped myself to some fine china plates. Was Digger seriously hitting on a ghost?

“Is Australia a northern state, Master Harkness?” the ghost asked. She sounded terrified, and had an accent I couldn’t quite place. Digger laughed.

“Oz? In the North? Sheila, it’s called the Land Down Under for a reason,” he replied. The ghost looked terrified and started to cry. I tried valiantly to ignore the sound and shoved the remainder of the china into my bag.

“What’re you crying for, Sheila?” Digger asked, sounding annoyed.

“B-b-because if you a Southern soldier, you gonna take me and my baby back to slavery!” I noticed that she was, indeed, carrying a baby and grimaced. I did NOT have time for dealing with this crud. Digger walked back over to me.

“I didn’t notice she had an anklebiter. She’s a lovely sheila, but not enough for me to want to be a daddy. And why’s she wailing about slavery?” he asked.

“How should I know? I dropped out of high school at 14, and I don’t have many dealings with ghosts,” I replied in annoyance as the ghost’s wailings got louder. She moved rapidly toward Digger and fell on her knees.

“Please, don’t take my baby, Master Harkness. Let him be free, please, please!” she begged. Digger shot me a pleading look, and I sighed wearily. How did Digger get himself-and me- into these situations?

“Look, lady, we don’t want you or your baby. Now go on, shoo. You and the kid are free, and “Master Harkness” and I have business to do,” I said. The ghost stared.

“Ain’t you Confederate soldiers?” she asked, obviously confused.. Digger and I looked at each other in equal confusion.

“What’s a Confederate?” Digger asked the ghost.

“They’s the soldiers who be fighting to make their own country,” she replied.

“What’s she talking about?” Digger asked me. I shrugged.

“The Civil War…..I think,” I said, drawing desperately from my memories of 8th grade history.

“You mean the war you Yanks had between each other? What’s that gotta do with this sheila?” I racked my brains for any connection between the two and wished that I hadn’t chosen 8th grade history as the class to sleep through.

“Um...she was talking about slavery…I think the South had slaves...probably….and that was maybe why the war started? Possibly? And-and since you said you were from the South, and she’s probably about as well-educated as we are, she didn’t realize that you meant you were from another continent entirely, and so she thought that you were gonna want to make her a slave again,” I said, feeling pretty proud of myself for figuring all that out.

“Didja hear that, Sheila? I’m not a Confederate, whatever that means! Australia’s an island. It ain’t part of America. Now, it’s London to the brick that I’m dangerous, so you probably wanna steer clear of me, but I’m not gonna be taking you to slavery, neither. And, hey, if you got any single friends without anklebiters,, tell ‘em t’ look up Captain Harkness, will ya?” Digger told her cheerfully.

“I..I’m free?” she asked quietly.

“As a bird. Now get outta here. You’re safe in this city,” I told her flatly.

“Thank you, sir! Thank you!” she said. She kissed her baby, and they passed through the kitchen wall and vanished into thin air. As soon as she was gone, I glared at Digger.

“Okay, now that you’re done hitting on a ghost, can we get back to work, please?” I asked.

“If you want to, that’s fair dinkum. I’m gonna go back to my chips,” Digger said. He tried to walk back to the table, but I grabbed him by the scarf before he could and forced him to clear out the rest of the valuables while I took a smoke break. He swore colorfully in Australian the entire time, but I ignored him. He was just packing the last of the chinaware away when another ghost, this one holding a gun, showed up. One look at him told me that we were in trouble, and so I ran out of the room, Digger hot on my heels.

Golden Glider: So, while Mick and Marky-Mark were in the living room, James and Hartley were running around like lunatics, and Lenny and Digger were running away from history as much as they were running away from ghosts, Roscoe and I had decided to investigate the backyard. It contained a rotting porch and a small cemetery, one which was surrounded by a wrought iron fence. It was quite dark, because there were no porch lights, but that just made it all the more romantic. As soon as we left the house, I snuggled up close against Roscoe and we both sat down on the one intact porch step. “Isn’t the darkness so romantic?” I asked him. He looked puzzled, and it was adorable. “I believe that the darkness is the absence of light, my darling,” he said. I tittered. “You’re so funny, Roscoe,” I cooed. He smiled. “I am glad I have pleased you, sweetums,” he said. A cloud moved and revealed the moon, big and red and lovely. I pointed at it in excitement. “Roscoe, look at the moon! Isn’t it beautiful? Doesn’t it remind you of us?” I asked. Roscoe looked concerned. “My darling, the moon is a celestial body that revolves around the Earth. I do not see how it can remind you of us. Did no one teach you about the nature of the moon? It is not a human being,” he said. I sighed; having forgotten how literal Roscoe can be. “Roscoe, dear, I was speaking figuratively. I said it was like us because it’s beautiful, just like we are,” I explained. Roscoe’s eyes lit up in understanding. “I see. Forgive my confusion, my darling,” he said. I kissed him on the cheek. “Of course, honey,” I replied. He kissed me on my cheek, and then I kissed him full on the lips. We were still embracing five minutes later, when a young girl in a white dress appeared. She was completely transparent, and stared at us in silence for a few seconds. “Are you lovers?” she asked quietly. “We are indeed, and my Lisa is a goddess among women,” Roscoe replied. Her face fell, and then twisted into fury. “How dare you flaunt your happiness in front of the grave of a poor rejected woman? Is it not enough that I was rejected by my Robert? Is it not enough that I killed myself of despair? Must I be mocked by your love as well? For your impudence, I will make you suffer as I have suffered!” she screamed. She moved over to Roscoe, kissed him on the lips (please don’t ask me HOW) and then disappeared. Roscoe shoved me off his lap violently and stood up. “Get off of me, you wretch!” he spat. The words felt like a blow. “R-R-Roscoe, what….what’s wrong?” Roscoe had never talked to me like that before, and in that moment I saw Lewis-my “father”-in his face. “You are what is wrong! I am a gentleman, and you-you are common trash. Why I was mad enough to kiss you I’ll never understand!” Roscoe said coldly. “What are you saying?” I asked. “I am saying that I have had enough of dating a welfare queen,” Roscoe replied. Normally, I would have struck back, but I was so bewildered by his behavior that I just stared at him. After a few seconds, he scowled. “What are you staying for, you pathetic wretch? Leave me!” he ordered, and I found my tongue. “No, Roscoe. I am staying right here with you. You may not think you love me anymore, but you will not drive me away. I won’t give you the pleasure of ordering me around like a dog,” I said. “Why not? You are a dog,” Roscoe spat. I moved to slap him, but before I could, we were interrupted by another ghost, this one wielding a old-timey gun, who charged at us. I kicked at the ghost on impulse, but, of course, it went straight through him. While I was distracted, Roscoe abandoned me, but after I regained my balance, I rushed after him and we went into the dining room. “Stop chasing me, you hussy!” he yelled. “I’m not chasing you, I’m running away from the ghost,” I said. As if on cue, the ghost lifted a table and threw it at Roscoe’s head. I pushed him out of the way and narrowly avoided being hit myself. “Why did you save me? It will not make me love a woman like you,” he demanded harshly. This time, I did slap him. “You’re welcome,” I spat. Roscoe frowned. “You dare lay a hand on a gentleman?” he demanded. Before he could continue, however, the ghost levitated all six chairs in the room, and so I grabbed him and pulled him into the hallway. A series of loud crashes followed almost immediately. “I notice that you don’t complain when I touch you in order to save your life,” I said pointedly. Roscoe sniffed haughtily and didn’t reply. Under normal circumstances, I would have led us to the door and left the house, but with Roscoe acting so strangely, I couldn’t. I didn’t want to leave only for Roscoe to keep treating me like dirt, so I decided to stay and take charge of the situation. “All right, so where do we go from here?” I asked. Roscoe scowled. “‘We’ are not going anywhere. Have I not made my disdain for you utterly clear? I am going to one of the bedrooms to go to sleep, and you-I care not where you go, so long as you stay away from me,” he said. I shook my head firmly. “No, we’re staying together. Even if you really do hate me, from a logical standpoint you’re obviously safer with me around,” I replied. Roscoe pondered this for a few seconds, then nodded. “Very well. We will stick together. However, let me make one thing clear: I do not love you. Our current predicament does not change that,” he said, and I felt my heart break. I slapped him again and said, “Fine! See if I care!” With that, I pulled Roscoe up the stairs to the second floor and into one of the bedrooms, which contained an canopy bed, a broken window, an old armorie, and a painting of a handsome young man. The plaque beneath it read "Robert Jackson, beloved son". It was a picture of the man who had spurned his lover. How appropriate. Roscoe laid down on the bed and fell asleep almost immediately (he is definitely not a night owl) and I started crying. How had this perfectly romantic night gone so badly awry?

Mirror Master II: After a quick trip through the Mirror Realm, Scudder and I arrived in the basement. It was awfy dark doon there, I’m nae gonna lie, but the way Scudder was reacting, you’d have thought it was a torture chamber. He was jumping at every little sound and keeping so close tae me that I was practically tripping over him. After aboot a minute of that, I got fed up with him and decided tae tell him tae grow a spine.

“Stop acting like a wean, will ye? It’s hard eno to move doon here without having tae avoid you,” I told him. He moved about an inch further away.

“If we run into a ghost, I’m feeding you to it,” he muttered. I laughed and started looking for trinkets, while he stayed right next tae the stairs. After a few minutes,  I uncovered an emerald ring.

“This is worth something, int it no?” I asked happily. Scudder shrugged.

“Great, you’ve found your prize. Now let’s get out of here!” he said.

“Not yet! I need a bigger haul than this!” I replied. Scudder frowned.

“Look here, you second-rate Mirror Master. I am not about to have my brain turned into soup by a ghost just so that you can sell two rings instead of one. We’re going upstairs now,” he said.

“Who are ye calling a second-rate Mirror Master? I use the Mirror Realm better than ye ever could, ye minger!” I yelled.

“You don’t even know how it works. You just swiped my equipment, you Glaswegian thug!” Scudder replied. Then I punched him, and he punched me, and we got into a fist fight. He was trying tae get oot of my stranglehold when soomthing weird happened: a ghostie showed up. You ken those drawings of fat rich people? It looked like that. I was so surprised that I let Scudder go, and he screamed like a lassie and dove intae the Mirror Realm. Me? I just froze. I didnae have a clue how to fight a ghostie, so I did soomthing pure stupid: I waved at it!  The ghostie levitated a lamp and threw it at me head, only narrowly missing me. I dove intae the mirror after Scudder. He was panicking.

“I don’t wanna die I don’t wanna die I don’t wanna die; please don’t let me die please please please don’t let me die!”

“Calmy doony, Scudder. The ghostie canae come intae the Mirror Realm,” I said. Ten seconds later, the ghostie came intae the Mirror Realm.

“You just had to say it!” Scudder wailed.

“Dinae just stand there, run!” I yelled. Both of us took off running, and only stopped when the ghostie vanished. I grinned.

“We did it! We escaped the ghostie!” I yelled. Scudder smiled slightly, but then he looked around and his smile vanished.

“Oh, no. This is bad, this is bad, this is really bad,” he said.

“What do ye mean? We escaped from the ghostie!” I replied.

“Look around you! Do you recognize any of this?” I looked around, and realized that we were in big  trouble: I didnae recognize anything around me, and I ken most of  the Mirror Realm like the back of my hand.

“We’re lost,” I said.

“No duh, really? I had no idea,” Scudder replied sarcastically.  I tried tae punch him for that, but he dodged me swing.

“I don’t see why you’re punching at me. I was against coming to the creepy ghost house from the start, and if we had stayed home and watched A Nightmare on Elm Street like I suggested, we wouldn’t be in this mess! But did you-or anyone-listen to me? Oh, no! “Ghosts don’t exist, Sam.” “Stop being such a wimp, Scudder.” “We’ll be fine.”  “Stop being such an idiot, Scudder.” Well, WHO’S THE IDIOT NOW?” he yelled hysterically, and I wished that Captain Cold hadnae put me with him, because he looked downright loony.

“Ah am, all right? Now help me find a way oot of here!” Sam laughed weakly.

“Find a way out of the Mirror Realm? You might as well tell me to beat Superman in a fist fight. It’s impossible. There’s a reason that I never go out of sight of the mirror portals: the Mirror Realm is so vast that if you get lost, you’ll probably never find your way back to them-and they’re our only way out of the Mirror Realm. I can’t get us out without the portals, and, thanks to you, Len, and that ghost, I have no idea where they are. Heck, I don’t even know where WE are!” he exclaimed.

“The Land  of Abstract Art, mebbe?” I suggested. We were surrounded by swirls of colors and strange shapes, ye ken? Scudder didnae seem to find that as funny as I’d thought it was.

“Really? We’re lost in a never-ending mirror maze, and you’re cracking jokes?” I shrugged.

“Aye. Beats whining aboot it, ye jerrie.” To tell the truth, I was just as freaked out as Scudder was, but I wasnae about to let him know it.

“You’re a lunatic,” he spat.

“Ah am’nae!” I yelled back. I punched  him, he punched me, and we ended up in another fistfight that only ended when both of us collapsed from exhaustion. Apparently, all the running had taken a lot oot of us. Scudder basically ended up falling asleep on my lap, and I was too tired to move him. After aboot a minute of embarrassment, I fell asleep tae.

Heat Wave: Hi, there. I’m Mick Rory, but you can call me Heat Wave. Everyone does. So, uh, while everyone else was running away from angry ghosts, Weather Wizard and I were still searching for valuables, and not finding any. After about an hour of searching, I got bored, pulled out my flamethrower, and lit the sofa on fire. It was beautiful and pretty and warm, and I decided to touch it. Bad idea, because I was still wearing the tutu, and..well...tutus are really flammable. The fire didn’t exactly hurt me (the prison doc tells me my skin’s so badly burned by this point that it doesn’t feel pain anymore), but it did freak out Weather Wizard, who doused me (and the sofa) with what felt like a gallon of water.

“Hey! You put out my beautiful sofa fire!” I complained. The Wiz scowled.

“In case you didn’t notice, YOU were on fire, too!” he said angrily.

“And now I’m sopping wet AND don’t have my precious fire. I don’t see how that’s an improvement,” I replied. In response, the Wiz beaned me over the head with his wand. (He doesn’t have a good swing, so it  didn’t really hurt.)

“Being wet doesn’t kill you, you big oaf! You know what does? BEING ON FIRE!” His face was red and his eyes were crackling with electricity, so I knew he was pretty upset. Because he can create tornadoes, I decided to apologize.

“You’re right, Mark, and I’m sorry. Thanks for saving me,” I said. His eyes stopped crackling.

“Just don’t do it again,” he said. I nodded and sat down on what was left of the sofa, and Wiz went over to the window and gazed out of it.

“A storm’s brewing,” he said. I don’t think he was trying to sound spooky, but with his tone of voice and his witch costume, he did. A few seconds later, lightning flashed and thunder boomed. Wiz opened the window and leaned out. The wind whipped his (impossibly spiky) hair, and he stared at something in silence. After a few seconds, it got creepy, and so I went over to him and dragged him away from the window. I closed it as soon as he wasn’t in the way.

“Come on, Mark, let’s go to another room. Captain Cold’ll be mad if we don’t find something valuable,” I said. When he didn’t move, I picked him up, threw him over my shoulder, and took him up the stairs and into a bedroom which looked like it might have belonged to a little kid at some point, since there were a bunch of old toys in it. One of the windows was broken, and everything, including the toys, a rocking chair, and a crib, was covered in dust and cobwebs. It was very spooky, although it was in better shape overall than the living room had been. I started looking for something valuable, and the Wiz made a beeline for the window.

“Hey, knock that off! Just ‘cause you’re the Weather Wizard doesn’t mean that you get to look at the weather and not help me!” I said. Wiz turned around and locked eyes with me.

“The storm...it’s an ill wind that blows no good,” he muttered. It was almost like he was in a trance or something. And then it happened: a ghost appeared. Now, it wasn’t super gory-really, it just looked like a transparent teenager-but let me tell you: it was scarier than anything I’ve ever seen in a horror movie. At almost the same time, it started to rain heavily. The Wiz passed out again, and the ghost advanced on me. I decided that discretion was the better part of valor (what? I saw Shakespeare on TV one time), threw the Wiz over my shoulder, and ran downstairs and out of the house with him. (Question: Why is it that he was WAY heavier when he was unconscious than when he was conscious?) I wanted to make Captain Cold happy, but I wasn’t gonna fight a ghost just for some loot. As soon as we got out the door, the ghost stopped following us, so I dumped the Wiz on the ground and began what proved to be a LONG wait for the Mirror Masters to come pick us up. Wiz woke up about five minutes after we got out of the house and cleared up the rain (thank goodness), then took a look at me and smiled.

“You should see yourself. Your tutu’s unrecognizable and I can see your underwear,” he said. I felt my cheeks heat up. Man, that was embarrassing.

“Yeah, well, you fainted twice, so I think we’re even,” I replied. The Wiz flushed, and looked at the ground. A few seconds later, he yawned, then produced a wind that dried up the ground.

“I’m gonna take a nap. Wake me up when Scudder shows up,” he said. With that, he curled up on the ground and dozed off. After a couple seconds, I sat down next to him, and, after a few minutes of trying and failing to come up with an excuse for not finding any loot, I dozed off too. (One of the benefits of being….less than legally employed is that you learn to fall asleep anywhere.) I woke up about twenty minutes later when the Wiz poked me in the side with his wand.

“Huh?” I asked drowsily.

“Where are the Mirror Masters at? Surely they’ve gotta be finished by now,” he whined. I shrugged.

“Maybe they’re still looking for stuff. Or maybe they hit the jackpot and are still gathering up all the stuff they found,” I suggested.

“Well, they better hurry up. I’m bored and tired and I want to get back to my nice soft bed,” the Wiz replied.

“I’m sure they’ll be here soon,” I said. Then I fell back to sleep and was dead to the world for another forty minutes.

Pied Piper: After being trapped in the dumbwaiter for about ten minutes, I turned off my hearing aids. Not being able to hear is never a pleasant experience, but it was highly preferable to listening to a bored Trickster sing “This Is the Song That Never Ends” again and again and again. This solution worked reasonably well until I realized that I very much needed to use the powder room and needed advice as to how to do so without attracting the nightmare creature that wanted to devour my internal organs. Therefore, I had to turn my hearing aids back on, because none of the other Rogues have ever bothered to learn sign language and I had no desire to play charades. As soon as my hearing turned back on, I was greeted with what must have been the fortieth rendition of “This is the Song That Never Ends”.

“James. James. JAMES! I, um, need to use the powder room. Do you have any idea as to how I can do that without meeting the ghost?”

“Depends. What’s a powder room?” He batted his eyes and smiled in the most irritating manner imaginable.

“You know full well what a powder room is!” I exclaimed. James’ smile grew wider as he shook his head.

“I can’t help you if I don’t know what you need, Piper,” he said. I sighed and gave in.

“It’s a restroom,” I said, blushing terribly. James laughed and did a particularly impressive trick with his yo-yo.

“Oh, so you need to pee! Why didn’t you say so?” he asked.

“Because my parents did not allow me to discuss bodily functions in public. Ever,” I replied.

“Did your parents allow you to breathe without their say-so?” I frowned. My parents had indeed controlled my days down to the second before they disowned me, but I didn’t want to admit it, so I said,

“Never mind that. Just tell me how to use the powder room without getting killed!”

“Oh, that’s easy. I’ll close my eyes, and you can do your business in here,” James replied. As I did not have access to a mirror, I cannot be sure about this, but I believe that I blushed even harder.

“No!”

“Why not? You can even blindfold me if you want. Believe me, I do NOT want to watch that,” James replied. I scowled.

“Because that is disgusting, James.”

“I don’t see why. It’s what we did in the circus,” he said, sounding genuinely confused.

“This is not the circus!”

“Well, it isn’t exactly Rathaway manor, either. I’m not saying that it isn’t gross, but this place is in bad condition already. You can’t make it much worse,” James replied.

“I think I would rather face the ghost,” I said. James laughed.

“I can’t believe that you’re more scared of breaking your parents’ rules of being “proper” and pretending that you don’t have bodily functions than you are of a literal ghost,” he said.

“This has nothing to do with my parents!”

“Somebody’s in de-ni-al!” James singsonged.

“I’m not in denial. Just because I do not want to be Digger does not mean that this has anything to do with my parents,” I insisted.

“Yep, definitely in denial,” James said. I ignored him and pulled out the mirror that I had brought with me in order to contact the Mirror Masters.

“Sam! McCulloch! If you can hear me, I need you to get me-and James-out of this house!” Nothing happened, and I sighed wearily. There went that idea. About three minutes later, I decided that I couldn’t wait any longer. I opened the doors nervously and, not seeing anything, bolted down the hall to the powder room, used it, and was on my way back when the ghost reappeared. I screamed like a little girl (which is quite humiliating in hindsight) and just froze up in terror. If I had been alone, I don’t want to know what would have happened next, but, luckily for me, James showed up at exactly this point and yelled,

“Hey, Casper! Over here, you preposterous poltergeist!” The ghost howled and started chasing him, and he whooped with glee and ran down the hall in the direction of the staircase. Thirty seconds later, I heard a loud cry of pain from James. I bolted to the top of the stairs and saw that one of the steps had given way under James, and that he had clearly broken his ankle. Worse, the ghost was floating over top of him, and, for the first time, he looked scared. I stared at the scene for a few seconds, unsure of what to do, and then pulled out my flute and started playing it in the desperate hope that its hypnotic powers would work on a ghost. I tried to ignore the fact that my knees were shaking under me as I played, and, after a few seconds, the ghost stopped howling and floated away from James. I carefully went down the stairs to my partner, still playing, then knelt down beside him and put the flute away.

“Do NOT do that again! You scared the daylights out of me!” I snapped. James smiled.

“Aww, you do care,” he said. All his fear seemed to be forgotten and I shook my head in amazement. He had almost been killed (possessed?) by a ghost, and he was already making jokes.

“I did owe you. After all, if you had not attracted the ghost’s attention, I might have been killed. How’s your ankle?” I asked.

“It hurts like the dickens,” he replied.

“Can you walk?” James stood up shakily, winced, and quickly sat back down, then smiled and said,

“I can walk on my hands!” He proceeded to demonstrate. In spite of myself, I laughed a little.

“Can you keep that up long enough to get to the front door?” I asked him after I stopped laughing.

“Probably. Why?”

“Because we are leaving. I don’t know how long my hypnosis will last, but it will wear off eventually, and I do not want to be here when it does,” I explained.

“Aww, but I wanted to see some more ghosts!”

“Can you run on your hands?” I asked. James grinned slightly.

“Maybe?” he asked. I shook my head.

“Let’s go. We can watch The Shining when we get home if you want,” I said. (It’s James’ favorite horror movie, and very useful as a bribe.) James’ grin widened.

“You know me well, Piper. Let’s go home,” he said. With that, we left the house-only to find Mick and Mark asleep on the lawn; Mick in little more than his underwear.

“There’s something you don’t see every day,” James said.

“What, Mick and Mark sleeping on the lawn or Mick in his underwear?” I asked.

“Both, but mainly Mick in his underwear. That’s an image I’ll never get out of my mind,” he replied.

“Me, neither,” I agreed. After a few seconds, James sat down on the ground and pulled out a pack of bubble gum.

“I swallowed my gum when that step broke under me. Want some gum?” he asked.

“I suppose,” I replied. James handed me a stick of gum and then took out one for himself as well. I sat down next to him, unwrapped the stick of gum, and started chewing it. James blew a huge bubble.

“How do you do that?” I asked.

“Blow bubbles? Haven’t you ever had bubble gum before?” he asked. I shook my head.

“My parents said that gum was for plebeians,” I replied.

“Well, if they really did cut you off, you are one now, so that shouldn’t be a concern anymore,” he said. I smiled.

“You have a point. So, carnie, how about teaching this ex-patrician how to properly blow bubbles with bubble gum?” I asked.

“You’re on!” James exclaimed.

Captain Boomerang: I hate all the bloody ghosts in that bloody ghost house! (I also hate Cold for making me go into the ghost house, but that’s beside the point.) After Cold and I ran out of the kitchen, the ghost chased us through several rooms and to the basement stairs. We exchanged a brief look and ran down the stairs into the basement.  

“If that bloody ghost follows us, I’m gonna be as mad as a cut snake,” I said. I was tired of all the running, tired of risking my life, and even more tired of not getting to eat my chips.

“I think he’s stopped chasing us,” Cold said as he looked around. Then he gasped.

“What is it?” I demanded. Cripes, I need a coolie , I thought.

“The Mirror Masters...at least one of them left their Mirror Gun here. It’s their only way back into our dimension. They’d never leave it here.”

“Well, if they’ve carked it, there’s nothin’ we can do. Let’s take our loot and leave this spooky place before another ghost shows up!” I said. I thought that I’d made a good point, but Cold disagreed and punched me in the face.

“We don’t  have any proof that they’re dead, so we’re goin’ in after them. They’re too valuable to lose, and besides, the Rogues don’t abandon their own,” he said. Cold activated the portal to the Mirror Realm and dragged me inside by the scarf. As soon as I got inside, I had a sickie and vomited all over the floor.  

“Scudder? McCulloch? It’s Cold. Where are you?” Cold yelled. No answer.  I stopped vomiting and looked around, then noticed something shiny. I went over to it and discovered that it was an emerald ring.

“Cold, have a Captain Cook at this! We’re rich!” I exclaimed. Cold looked at it...and went pale.

“Oh, no….one of the Mirror Masters must have been spooked by something and dropped it-and if they ran that way and were so panicked that they didn’t notice that they dropped a valuable thing like that, then they’re lost in the Mirror Realm,”  he said.

“Okay. They’ve carked it. Oh, well. Let’s go home,”  I replied. Cold shook his head.

“No. We’re gonna find them,” he said.

“Cold, you just said that they were lost in the Mirror Realm. If THEY got lost, we’ll get lost, too,” I protested. Cold didn’t listen.

“We ain’t gonna get lost, because we’re going to make a trail to follow,” he said. He drew one the spoons out of the bag and placed it on the ground next to his feet. Then he moved about ten feet forward and did the same thing, and did it again about seven feet after that. He’s got kangaroos loose in his top paddock for sure, I thought.

“What are you doin’, Cold?”  I demanded.

“I’m making a trail,” he said.

“Outta  spoons ?” I asked.

“Didn’t you ever hear the story of Hansel and Gretel?”

“I don’t read fairy tales. They’re for wusses,” I said.  Cold scowled.

“Look, I have  a little sister, okay? Anyway, Hansel and Gretel didn’t want to get lost in the woods, so they used bread crumbs to mark where they’d been. That way, when they turned around, they’d know which way would take them back to their starting point. This is the same idea, only our markers can’t be eaten by anything,” he said. With that, he started dragging me by my scarf towards the direction he thought the Mirror Masters had taken.

“You know, I can walk on my own,” I said.

“ Maybe so, but if I let you go, you’ll probably  be walking towards the exit, so I’m keeping ahold of you to be on the safe side,” Cold replied. I stuck my tongue out at him, but he ignored it.  After about twenty minutes of walking, we entered the weirdest place I’d ever seen. There were all these bloody weird shapes and colors, and I couldn't tell which way was up. It freaked me out, but for some reason, it didn’t seem to bother Cold at all.

“Cold, this is really freaky. Can we go back now? We’ll never find the Mirror Masters in this crazy place,” I said.

“Shut up, Digger. We are going to find them, and we are not going to stop walking until we either do or run out of silverware,” Cold replied.

“Ace!” I muttered sarcastically.

“What was that?”

“Nothin’,” I lied.

“That’s what I thought.” He dragged me along for about ten more minutes before I opened my big mouth again. (I think that must be some kind of record.)

“Can we stop now ?”  My legs were killing me (not to mention my neck)!

“No. Stop acting like a six-year-old,” Cold replied.  I really need a coolie, i thought.  

“I wouldn’t be actin’ like an anklebiter if you weren’t actin’ like a dictator,” I snapped. Cold punched me in the side and continued to drag me along like a bloody kelpie. After about four more minutes, i decided that I’d had enough of being dragged around and stabbed Cold in the arm with one of my razor-sharp boomerangs. He swore in pain and let me go, and I grabbed the mirror gun and ran towards the exit. Sadly for me, Cold managed to bean me over the head with a plate and knocked me out. When I came to, I awoke to see a pair of unconscious Mirror Masters. Normally, I would’ve been crosser than a frog in a sock that Cold had knocked me out, but at the moment I was too glad that Cold wouldn’t be dragging me through the Mirror Realm anymore to really care.

“You little Ripper! You found them!” I exclaimed happily.

“No thanks to you,” Cold muttered. He shook McCulloch awake.

“Cold? How did ye get in here?” he asked.

“Either you or Sam dropped your Mirror Gun outside of the mirror in the basement, and I used it to get in here,” Cold explained.

“But how did ye find us?”

“Stubbornness, mainly,” Cold replied. I laughed.

“That’d be right!”  I exclaimed. Cold looked at McCulloch oddly.

“Why is Sam sleeping in your lap?” Cold asked.

“ WHAT? ” McCulloch yelled. He quickly moved Sam off his lap and stood up. This woke Sam up, for obvious reasons. Once he realized what had happened, he noticed Cold, gave him a huge hug, and then punched him in the face.

“I’m...getting some mixed messages here,” Cold said.

“I’m happy you found us, because I thought we were going to die here, but I’m about equally angry at you, because you wouldn’t have had to rescue us if you hadn’t decided to take us to the creepy ghost house in the first place,” Sam explained. I laughed. It’s always good to see Cold get taken down a peg, the arrogant knocker.

“I do nae see why you  being here is a good thing. We do nae ken  how to get back to the Mirror Portals from here, we’ll all die here,”  McCulloch said.

“Actually, we won’t. I marked the path we took from the portals with our loot, so we’ll able to get back fine,” Cold replied.  McCulloch grinned, and my stomach growled.

“Can we go home now? I’m hungry,” I asked.

“Ye and me both, Digger,” McCulloch said. Cold nodded.

“Let’s get back to our reality,” he said. With that, we started the long walkabout back to the Mirror Portals.

Top: My nap lasted precisely twenty-five minutes and fifteen seconds. Then I awoke to see Lisa crying quietly. Normally, I would have felt  horrible upon seeing such a sight, but  at the time, I simply felt disgusted.

"Stop sniveling, you piece of gutter trash. I will  not be moved by your feminine wiles,”  I spat. (I have since apologized profusely for this comment, and for all others made under the influence of the ghost, but my darling Lisa is still distrustful of me, and her brother would have beat me to within an inch of my life for them  had she not stopped him.)

“All right. I WILL stop crying. I should have known better than to show weakness in front of a man who’s just like my father,” she replied angrily. If I had been myself, I would have been horrified by this accusation, but as I was, I merely sniffed dismissively.

“I am nothing like your father. He was an alcoholic boor who lived off of welfare for most of his life, and I am a gentleman,”  I said haughtily.

“And yet you’re calling me names just like he did,” Lisa replied. (In hindsight, her self-confidence was quite admirable, but at the time, I found it irritating.)

“Shut your mouth!” I snapped, unable to refute her argument.

“And let you walk all over me? I don’t think so,” Lisa said. Furious, I raised my hand to slap her, but thankfully, the Civil War-era ghost interrupted us before I could. Lisa grabbed me and pulled me out of the room before the ghost began to levitate anything, thereby saving my life for the third time that night.

“I told you not to touch me!” I said icily. In response, Lisa kissed me on the cheek and I pulled away sharply in utter disgust. (I believe that she was trying to make me uncomfortable in an attempt to snap me back to my senses.)

“I just saved your life again , and you want to complain about me touching you? AGAIN?” she yelled.

“I was aware that we were in danger. There was no need for you to touch me,” I replied coldly. The ghost drifted out of the bedroom we had  been in, and  the two of us ran to the stairs-only to find that one of the steps had collapsed. Lisa sighed and slid  down the banister to the bottom of the stairs, and I reluctantly followed her when the ghost appeared behind me and it became apparent that there was no other means of escape. (We were able to keep our balance because my darling Lisa was a figure skater and I am very resistant to vertigo.) We ran back through the dining room and back into the backyard, and were greeted by a most unusual sight. The ghost who had kissed me was holding hands with another ghost, this one with a noose around his neck.

“Oh, darling, you’re back!” she cooed. The other ghost kissed her.

“Yes, and I’ll never leave you again. I’m so sorry that I abandoned you all those years ago. My father was wrong: you were more important than our money ever could have been,”  he said.

‘I forgive you, Robert,”  she replied. Lisa started to cry again.

“Oh, shut up, you sniveling hussy! You are too far beneath me to deserve my sympathy,” I said harshly. Lisa frowned  and dried her tears rather angrily, then elbowed me in the side.

“Where have you been, Robert?”  the  female ghost asked.

“I don’t know. All I remember before seeing you tonight was a lot of anger at something,” the other ghost replied. The female ghost embraced him.

“Oh, well, you’re here now. That’s all that matters,”  she said. They kissed again, and then the female ghost noticed us and frowned.

“Are you the lovers?”  she asked.

“Formerly. I thank you profusely for showing me my folly,”  I said. Lisa nodded sadly.

“Why do you want to know? You can’t possibly make me any more miserable,” she said. The ghost smiled.  

“Because I am going to show you both mercy. Since my happiness has been restored, I will restore your happiness,” she said. She kissed me once again, and all my love for Lisa came flowing back-as did a crushing sense of guilt.

“My darling, I am so sorry for what I said. I don’t know what came over me, but I swear to you that  I do not care how rich you are. You are a goddess, and I adore you. Please, please forgive me,” I pleaded. I felt like an utter cad. Lisa frowned.

“R-Roscoe?” she asked nervously.

“Yes, sweetums,”  I said. I tried to kiss her, but she pulled away.

“Don’t , Roscoe. After what you said to me tonight, I just don’t trust you. How can I be sure that you aren’t saying you don’t care that I’m “gutter trash” only because of your hormones? What if two or three years down the line, you don’t find me attractive anymore? Will you still love me, or will I suddenly become a “welfare queen” again? I still love you, but I can’t trust you anymore,” she asked

“You...you are breaking up with me?”  I was heartbroken and rather tempted to attack the ghost (if that was even possible), but I could not really blame her.

“I’m not sure. Let’s call it a vacation,”  she replied quietly. There was an awkward pause, and then I said,

“In that case, since our date is off, perhaps we should go to the front lawn and wait for the Mirror Masters to take us back to our hideout.”  Lisa nodded, and we left the backyard, walked quickly through the house, and made it to the front lawn of the house without issue. Upon arriving, we saw Mark curled up on the lawn, fast asleep, Mick napping in little more than his underwear ( a sight that will haunt me until my dying day), and James and Piper blowing bubble gum. James waved at us.

“Hi there, lovebirds! How was your date?’ If there is one thing that James is the master of, it is saying things at the most inopportune times.

“Badly,”  Lisa replied. With that, she left my side and sat down next to Mick. James looked at me quizzically.

“It is a very long story that is frankly none of your business,”  I told him. I walked a few feet away from him, sat down, and buried my head in my hands, ashamed of what I had done to the one person in my life I ever cared for. Apparently, I dozed off at some point, because the next thing I remember was the two Mirror Masters arriving alongside Digger and Leonard.

“Look alive, everyone! We’re moving out!” he barked. Five minutes later, we were all back in our hideout (thanks to the Mirror Masters). Lisa immediately ran over to her brother and started sobbing. My stomach twisted with guilt and I looked away.

“Shhh..shh...shhh..Sis, what happened?”  In response, Lisa told him the whole story through hiccups and sobs. When she was finished, Leonard marched over to me.

“ Is this true, Dillon?” he demanded.

“Sadly, yes,”  I replied awkwardly. In response, Cold punched me so hard he knocked me to the ground.

“Then you’re gonna wish you’d never been born. NO ONE hurts my baby sister,”  he snarled. He moved to hit me again, but before he could, Lisa ran over to him and grabbed his arm.

“Lenny, don’ t!  He was under the influence of a ghost!  It wasn’t all his fault,” she said. Cold scowled, but he walked away anyway as Lisa helped me back to my feet.  

“Are you alright?” she asked.

“Better than I should be after treating you so terribly,”  I replied.

“It’s good to to have you back, Roscoe,” she said.

“Does this mean that  we’re back on?” I asked eagerly.

“No, Roscoe, I’m afraid not. It’ll  probably be awhile before I feel comfortable around you again,” she said. She left me and went upstairs, and I was left to mentally berate myself for my idiocy.

Mirror Master I: And...that was basically it. We managed to get home alive from the creepy ghost house, everyone changed out of their costumes, and most of us, exhausted, went to bed (except James and Piper, who decided to watch The Shining for some reason.) The next morning, Trickster went to the hospital to get his broken ankle treated, and the rest of us decided to never, ever go to any house that was supposed to be haunted again. A week later, the Flash caught Len trying to fence his loot, so he’s in prison again. Lisa still hasn’t forgiven Roscoe, and James’s ankle is still very broken, but otherwise, things are pretty much back to normal for us Rogues. So, with that in mind-we would like to wish you all a Happy Halloween!- What James said.

FIN

[sophia-becketts]

thoughts on the documentary (that no one asked for all pilled into one post so I don’t saturate the tag)

- when you open netflix it was the first thing to pop up and it was a picture of shawn and miss who shall not be named we are off to a shitty start

- the difference between 2019 shawn and 2020 shawn holy shit

- ugh get gerty off my screen

- 20 minutes in and already having to deal with the camila bs. cute.

- their “relationship” is so forced lmaooo it’s so embarrassing

- right, so shawn and camila weren’t friends, she goes over to his dressing room and then suddenly they’re writing a song together? Yeah I call 🧢

- the moon analogy. give me a second I gotta go throw up.

- a grown woman can’t tie her own shoes? alright.

- those shots with the vintage filter on it are UGLY.

- quit it with the camila shots. literally no one cares.

- whoever edited this did not do a good job imo. Some scenes go on for wayy too long (I had to mute the guitar scene in the beginning bc my ears were hurting) and some scenes feel repetitive.

- BRIANNN

- shawn’s apartment is GORGEOUS (and I like how it isn’t massive? Like I suppose it’s expensive for Toronto’s standards but still it’s like a two bedroom apartment, small kitchen, small living room. It isn’t a gigantic penthouse)

- shawn and aaliyah’s relationship is so pure omg

- lmao I love aaliyah definitely the superior mendes

- SHAWN SPEAKING IN PORTUGUESE

- they had to ruin a wholesome moment between shawn and his parents by bringing up camila

- I already wrote this but they’re so forced. They don’t know how to act like a real couple and it really shows.

- also her speaking over him really pissed me off. It’s his documentary sit down.

- Brazil STAYS superior

- I drag him a lot but I do love this man. The tour shots made me very emotional and realize how much of a fan I am.

overall, it was okay? The tour shots were beautiful and it was nice to see shawn’s family and friends HOWEVER, I agree with the critics who said this felt superficial. The scenes on him in Brazil were definitely vulnerable but everything else was just things we already know about him, he has anxiety and is a perfectionist. I definitely feel like they could have done more and I understand when people say this was just a promo for wonder.

(Hop on ask if you wanna discuss)

[sardonicnihilism]

A Biography of the Woman Who Never Was

Part 3 The Young Adult

Chapter 32

Shannon looked over her list of damnable tomes. *The Liba Lnteus*, *The Beale Ciphers*, *The Voynich Manuscript*, *Magic of Abramelin the Image*, *The Codex Gigas*, *The Book of Soyga*, *The Rohonc Codex*, *The Great Omar Book*, *The Ripley Scroll Book*; each one of these horrid abominations was said to bring death and madness to all those who sought them out. These were grimoires of the most blasphemous and dangerous depths. Yet, none of these were what she was looking for.

Shannon lifted her head, staring off into space, tapping her pencil off the library table she was seated at. She was trying to clear her mind, think of new avenues to approach. The continuing elusivness of the book made her feel uneasy. Certainly there had to be some mention of it somewhere.

She looked over to her right and saw a typical, pink eraser. She stared at it for a few moments and opened up her left hand. The eraser wiggled a bit, and then jumped into her hand. Shannon smiled as she ran it between her fingers.

She then noticed a strand of her hair, resting on the book she had been reading. She put her hand about one foot over top of it. The hair began to move like a snake. It reared up, standing straighter and straighter, until it left the page and floated in the air.

Shannon moved her hand to and fro, the hair following suit. Her hand and the hair danced in the air. She stood up and began to actually dance - swaying, gliding, bending, and reaching. The hair began to glow and catch on fire. It elongated and started to spin around her. The two dance partners floated up into the sky.

They were suddenly no longer in the library. She doubted if they were even still on Earth. It was night here. They were in a forest with trees and vegetation that had no root in Terran soil with the cries of animals that had never trod the world of man.

Shannon's clothes had now been burned away, but she didn't care. All there was, was the dance. The string of fire encircled her even more closely. Eventually it touched her and she burst into flame, but she felt not one ounce of pain. Indeed she was in a state of euphoric rapture.

She and the flame were now one. She flew across the night sky, leaving streaks of light behind her, creating complex, geometric patterns. In her mind she heard a young boy ask what was that; to which the voice of an old woman responded, "That is the Sky Dancer of Chaos and Eternal Night". She then exploded across the sky. Shannon was then back in the library; same position, mindlessly drumming away.

Shannon took her glasses off, laid them on the book, and slouched back into her chair. She was unnerved at her apparent day dream. She was even more upset at her lack of progress.

"Hey stranger," Sam's voice called out.

Shannon looked over in the direction it had come. "Hey. What are you doing here?" She was legitimately curious. She had come to Chambersburg Public Library because her college library had failed to yield any results in her search, but it was more than sufficient for the tasks of any college assignment.

"Looking for you. I haven't seen on campus for a while. I called to see if you were ok, and your mum said you were here. I found a ride in and decided to see if you were ok."

"I am. Just - looking."

Sam pulled out the chair next to her and sat down. "That bloody book again?" he asked both concerned and annoyed.

"I still hear things, see things, sometimes even feel them. Prayers and church haven't worked. Maybe if I find something, anything, it'll help."

Sam put his arm around her shoulders. It was striking how large and muscular she was. She felt more of stone than flesh. Yet her face was scared, sad, and tired.

"Listen," he said softly, "you said yourself, they gave you a strange liquid to drink, yeah? I'm guessing that it was some sort of hallucinogenic and it's messing with brain up there," he gently tapped on the side of her head which made her smile. "Instead of looking for some book which may not even be real; maybe you should go to the doctor's instead?"

Shannon leaned over and put her head on his shoulder. "And say what? I might have had some bad acid? Besides, everyone had masks on. I have no idea who all was there. Hell, my doctor could have been one of them for all I know. Shit, you could be one," she turned her head and looked him in the eyes.

"Nah, ain't me mate. I don't believe in any of that mumbo-jumbo. Strict atheist here. Of course, you could think I'm just lying to you. Not like I can prove my innocence."

"Honestly, at this point, I really don't give a shit if you're legitimate or a spy. You're the best friend I've ever had. So if this is a performance, all I ask is that you keep it up."

"Will do," Sam answered back cheerfully.

Shannon looked at her list again. She tore the paper from the notebook and crumpled it up. Real or not, she was done searching.

Suddenly something came to her, something Jen had said. She had called Lovecraft a seer. She also said that his works were based on the coven's text. Finally her last thought sprung up in her mind again, *real or not*.

She ran up to the librarians desk and asked to sign into a computer. The librarian told her what number to go to, and she ran over and started typing.

Sam was extremely confused and worried. He ran over to her and asked, "What are you doing?"

"Checking out a thought," she said, super focused on the screen.

"Alright, and how's that?"

"I found this new website called Amazon. They're an online bookstore. Fairly large selection too," she said excitedly. "Hopefully they don't try to start selling other things as well and just stick to books."

As soon as the page loaded, she typed "Lovecraftian horror" in the search bar. Once the search was done, she began to scroll through the selections. Her brow furrowed with frustration, not seeing what she had hoped for. Then a look of absolute joy came across her face as she said, "There!" Shannon pointed to a listing and Sam started to read it aloud.

"*Behind the Bleeding Veil* by Shawn Baxter, 1934. *Behind the Bleeding Veil* is the first book in the Goddess Saga. This book of Lovecraft inspired horror revolves around a sheltered young girl, her mysterious past, and her bizarre college roommate. Originally banned due to its graphic depiction of lesbian sex and gore, it was later reprinted in 1967. Includes the standard cosmic horror troupes such as cults, horrifying, unknowable gods, and cursed books ( *The Book of Forgotten Nightmares *)." Sam stopped and looked at Shannon who was smiling ear to ear.

"I don't get it," he said confused.

"It was all made up. Whoever started that coven, must have read this book and thought it was real. Just like the publishing companies made a *Necronomicon*, they must have made a version of *Nightmares*. It's nothing more than a story someone took seriously." Relief washed over Shannon in tidal waves, washing her clean.

"Pretty much how all religions get started." Sam added jovially.

"Unfortunately, that means you were right and I am having a prolonged, psychotic reaction to a hallucinogenic compound."

Sam turned to Shannon and asked, "Hospital?"

"Hospital," Shannon agreed.

As they were leaving, Shannon turned around and saw a massive black shadow, bubbling with white, distorted, grotesque faces. She raised her hand and the mass was blown away in an explosion of fire.

"I am the Sky Dancer of Chaos and Eternal Night," she whispered underneath her breath and walked out.

***************************************

"Can we talk?" Shannon asked, in a low, shy, almost mournful voice.

Chris wiped the sweat from his brow and gave her a suspicious look. "I got some time between sets. Never was a fan of deadlifts anyway. So, what is it?"

Shannon handed him a piece of paper. "It's for your friend. It's the name of the toxin that was used and the drug that's used to treat it."

Chris took it and looked it over.

Shannon hung her head and looked at the floor as she continued to talk. "Given how long it's been, the damage might be permanent. The doctor said that I might have some continuing effects given it's been almost two years. Still, it should help him a little."

She then lifted her head and looked Chris straight in the eyes. "I'm so sorry. I should have listened. You tried to be a friend and I was a bitch. I hope you forgive me, but I don't expect it, and that's more than fair."

Chris handed the paper back to Shannon. "He committed suicide last year." He paused for a beat, then added, "But thank you anyways. I, I know you must have been going through some stuff, and I'm guessing still are. I understand. I might have reacted the same way if the roles were reversed. Understanding doesn't equal forgiveness though. And forgiveness doesn't mean things will go back to the way they were. It's been a while, both temporarily and emotionally."

"I know," Shannon said as she took the paper back.

Chris stuck out his hand. Shannon took it, shook it, turned around and walked away.

Shannon got to her car where Sam was waiting for her.

"Well, how'd it go," he asked sympathetically.

"About as well as I had any right for it to go," she answered back, putting her sunglasses on.

"You going to be ok?"

"Eventually," she said flatly, and got in her car.

Sam got in the passenger side. "You know, you've missed most of this semester. You got a lot of work to make. You think you can do it? Maybe you can take a leave of absence, all things considered?"

Shannon buckled up, turned the car on, and put it in drive. "I'm not going back," she simply said.

[wr1ter-reader-dreamer]

Better Than I Ever Could’ve Imagined (Pt. 2)

Werewolf!Shawn Mendes x Reader

Masterlist

Part 1  -  Part 3  -  Part 4  -  Part 5   

The world stopped for just a moment as I gazed up at him, my breath hitching in my throat. The crowd around me was cheering, but I couldn’t hear it as his soft brown eyes flashed black for just a moment. I gasped as a grin slowly spread across his features, my heart stopping for just a moment before restarting and beating harder than before.

Shawn stepped back in front of the mic and removed it from its stands so he could walk around the stage, his eyes never leaving me and his grin never fading.

“I’ve always wanted to play ACL,” he spoke, pausing to give the crowd a moment to stop screaming, “I’m so grateful I could be here today. I love you guys.”

I forgot to breathe as his eyes connected with mine again briefly before he turned to look at his band behind him. The lead guitar nodded at him and he turned back to the crowd, a smile still on his soft lips, “This next one is one of my favorites. I want you to scream it for me.”

The first notes of ‘Mercy’ slipped through the massive speakers and the crowd around me erupted, but I couldn’t focus on that. Shocked to my core, I turned to Dede to find that she was already grinning at me.

 “Am I crazy or did he totally look right at me?” I asked , a small grin starting to make its way onto my lips.

She squealed, grabbing my arms and shaking me as she shouted, “He totally smiled right at you! Oh my god!”

I laughed at her antics, “Maybe this outfit was a good idea after all.”

Dede laughed with me, turning back to the stage and prompting me to do the same. I allowed my eyes to slip closed, a stupid grin on my face as I savored the moment for just a second before tucking it away in my mind to remember later. Shawn may have smiled at me, but it didn’t mean anything. I was just another fan in the crowd he happened to make eye contact with.

With that in mind I focused back on the concert, allowing myself to really hear the music for the first time that night. The beat of the song and Shawn’s angelic voice slipped in and settled in my heart, and I started to lose myself, singing and dancing along with the crowd around me. I screamed for Shawn as he ran around the stage, a euphoric glow radiating off of him as he poured his heart into every word he sung. The Texas heat started to get to him, sweat dampening his wild curls and causing his shirt to cling to his lean muscles. I half hoped it would start raining just so I could see him soaking wet. That and I needed something to cool down the heat bumbling in my stomach from the way he kept yelling “Scream it!” and running his hands through his hair.

The rest of the concert flew by all too fast, Shawn glancing at me a few more times but never letting his gaze linger the way it had before. Before I knew it, the last notes of his last song were fading away and he was making his way off stage, constantly turning to wave and blow kisses at his fans. The crowd continued to scream for a few moments after he disappeared from view and then the noise faded to the dull roar of hundreds of conversations as people made their way away from the stage. I turned to Lila and Dede, a smile on my face as I forced them to linger   so I could savor the post-concert euphoria I was feeling.

“He was so good,” Lila gushed, her eyes flashing gold as a smirk slipped onto her lips with her next words, “and he looked good enough to eat.”

Dede and I burst out laughing, shoving her lightly for her comment. Lila was never one to hold back when she found someone attractive. If her words didn’t give it away, the gold flash of her eyes as her wolf surfaced did. Lila, like many people today, was a werewolf. Society had long ago gotten over their fear of werewolves and they no longer had to hide. It was now just as common to see a werewolf as a human, and we all got along for the most part.

Lila’s eyes reminded me how Shawn’s had flashed black, and I frowned. I was about to ask the girls if they had known that Shawn was a werewolf when someone cleared their throat loudly.

Simultaneously we all three turned to look for the source of the sound. The majority of Shawn’s fans had cleared out as we had been talking, so there was now nobody between us and the metal barrier keeping the crowd away from the stage. The sound had clearly come from the man standing just beyond the fence resting his arms on it and looking directly at us.

“Can we help you?” I asked, crossing my arms and raising an eyebrow. I tended to be mistrustful of strangers, especially men, and was not amused by the unwanted interruption.

Lila elbowed me, her eyes going wide as she hissed, “Y/N! That’s Shawn’s manager. Be nice!”

The man chuckled, his eyes meeting mine as he extended his hand for me to shake, “Andrew Gertler.”

I shook his hand tentatively, still suspicious as to what he wanted, “Y/N.”

“Well Y/N, I have been given the very important task of convincing you to come back stage.”

“What?!” Lila squealed excitedly at the same moment Dede and I said, “The fuck.”

Andrew laughed at our shocked expressions and nodded, “Yup. Shawn sent me himself. He wants to meet you.”

My eyes narrowed as I turned to Lila, “Are you sure this is Shawn Mendes’ manager?”

She nodded vigorously, starting to bounce with excitement as she shook me a little, “Yes! You have to go!”

I frowned and glanced back at Andrew, still not convinced. People like Shawn didn’t notice and want to meet people like me. Besides, I didn’t know this Andrew guy and I wasn’t too keen on going anywhere alone with him no matter who he worked for.

“Your friends can come too, if you want,” Andrew said, seeming to read my thoughts.

“Oh please Y/N!” Lila said, full on bouncing with excitement now, “For me?”

I glanced to Dede, who shrugged, before turning to Andrew and sighing, “Ok, let’s go.”

[suchalilyofthevalley]

I’m going to be blunt with you - I don’t think you genuinely work for the media or PR as you say. You keep throwing around “facts” and then when you give us ideas (such as the 3-5 album ordeal) - you instantly back away and then change it around. If you’re supposedly a Shawn fan, you would see he is being mistreated. Even if artists have a say, you can see is mistreated by his clout team. ALL PR Stunts do not go past a whole year, so it is obvious they are setting up for a single release (1)

To build on “breakup” album. Even with the pandemic, the pattern is still there. If he isn’t breaking up with his team this year, I don’t see it going past the first few months of 2021. He is unhappy. You can tell he is a puppet. Don’t come at us for being worried and figuring out how soon it will end. There are many other sources out on the media saying this is a job/stunt and it will end soon. (2)

So first off, brave of you to hide behind an anon ask. Let’sset some facts and records straight here cause I’m not here for bullshit and I’mfar too old for fandom petty nonsense.

I’ve never said I was media. I’ve always said I worked inPR. If you check back into my gettingon my PR soapbox tag, I’ve been doing these posts since May 2011. Wellbefore my foray into the Shawn fandom. So, here’s almost a decade of receiptsprior to me stepping foot into this space talking about PR, touring, ticketing,the music industry, the PR industry.

Also, want some receipts that way with am I really a PRprofessional with oodles of experience? So, I’ve known @suzteel, @andiwontforgetyou (previously @facethefall-blog) & @whenidance for ages – helloIRL friends, all these girls have been with me through ups and downs of jobsand clients, both have been with me at events when I’m working or had access tobecause of work. We’ve gone on vacations together, been at each other’s houses,there in good times and in bad. I wouldn’t have gotten through losing my Mom alittle over two years ago without these ladies. Fun fact, D (@suzteel) & N (@andiwontforgetyou) aren’t even IN this damn fandom so there’s no point in them‘vouching’ for me for clout and L (@whenidance) is one of my best friends goingon almost a decade and knows more about me than anyone aside from my childhoodbestie. It’s my fault L is actually a Shawn fan and why we went on a massivelyinsane road trip for this kid last year. L also has been with me repeated timeswhen I’ve been with one of my former clients in a social setting.

Also, I’m not in this to become fandom famous or internetimportant. Believe me, I have like 450 followers on this blog, most of which aredead blogs from when I was around with Glee. Also, notice I never throw theseposts into main Shawn tags. If I wanted all this glory, don’t you think I’d bedoing that? It’s all based on interacting with folks who follow me or find mewho actually have an interest in this piece of the business. This is me wanting tohelp folks who have a genuine interest. I give no shits about being some bigperson in the fandom. No thank you.

I’ve also saidbefore I never went into PR for the fame of it, to be some clout chaser orto make a fuckton of cash. It’s always been about the client and their work.Always. Their goals are what’s most paramount, be it from smaller brands andtalent to some of the A-listers and Fortune 500 companies I’ve worked with.

I’ve always said I’m going to shed light on the facts of theindustry. That’s what I did here. I’ve never interjected my opinion into itbecause facts are facts and opinions are subjective. So, I’ll call out thedifferences in here below.

The album thing? I’ve got you some receipts. I’ve never waiveredthere. I’ve never been the one to say YES HIS DEAL IS FOUR and then back away. That’swhat y’all have gravitated to due to some other folks saying that was what theythought and that was their opinion. This is the firstask I got about deals from early March and here I’ll even pull it out foryou:

Yes, the number of albums is anold industry standard, that way the label actually holds you for a bit longer -however, there have been instances where it’s based off of years. 

Each label has its ownnuances and how they like to approach business. If an artist is more likely tocrank out singles or an EP before approaching a release for an LP and they’retesting the waters, a contract based off of year length may be theirgo-to. 

There also could beclauses that wrap both up, saying you’ll need to release X number of albums ina Y year span. 

Contracting is socomplicated and so individualized, it’s really and truly hard to say in ablanket way yes THIS is how it all shakes down.

There were posts where @thotmendes mentioned some of our conversationsand said in thispost here that I had said an industry sweet spot was 3-5, and then wentonto say that SHE thought his deal was 4. 

What I said in last night’s post here for reference too:

Contract terms – you’ll see some intro deals based on years with options provided to extend based on years or albums, but we’ve got no real clue as to what the terms are with Island on this specifically. Folks keep assuming it’s 4. It could be 5, it could be 6. We don’t know what the original deal was. 3-5 is an industry sweet spot, but I’ve also seen some intro deals be 6. There could be year commitments tied into those as well aka 4 albums in 6 years, etc. Each label has its own formulaic equation as to how these things piece out and it changes per label, per artist, per genre - and how that all plays out into what the marketplace is consuming/streaming/spinning.

So please do me a favor and don’tcome at me saying I’m wavering on things without receipts. As you can see here, I haven’t.

Who said PR relationships ONLY last a year? They can be asshort or as long as people feel they need to leverage. PERSONAL OPINION ON THIS:I think PR relationships are stupid, pointless and beyond reproach. If you’re apublicist and that’s what you’re leaning on to do your job to get your clientscoverage and buzz. You aren’t worth your damn salt. Especially when you’ve gotA+ level talent you’re working with like he is. Even if you’ve got Q level talent, it’s still abullshit approach IMO. The same goes for calling/hiring out paps.

I’ve never once ‘came at fans’ for having concerns or beingconcerned. I’m concerned as well. Why I’m trying to give some color to theindustry piece of it. The only thing I said inthis post last night is that I was tired of the mistruths and conspiracytheories being spun as what’s really going on. Also – where are these “sources”out in the media saying it’s coming to an end? Blind items do not count. Ragsources are fine and dandy, but they’re also not legitimate sources. Come to mewhen you’ve got something from People, US Weekly, Billboard. Even then it’ll bewith a grain of salt until we hear it directly from their team(s) aka Dvora, theshared publicist.

MY PERSONAL OPINION: I am a Shawn fan. This kid’s music and hisshows have helped me get through some of the most difficult points in my life. Myass hiked to MEXICO CITY from NYC for his last three shows of SMTT thisDecember - the crazy road trip I referenced above with @whenidance. He gives me JOY. It’s why I care the way I do, it’s why I feel likescreaming and why I want to go legit work/help this kid out. It’s why I’mconcerned and trying to share some knowledge where I can, and what’sknowledge/facts about the industry versus what’s not true about the industry.Notice I said industry because I don’t know what this kid is wading throughright now and it’s not fair of me to say YES it’s this and assume like I haveany idea. CAUSE I DO NOT. I absolutely hate this nonsense we’re wading throughof whatever the teams have going for him/with him, I’m not a fan of this. Icame to be a fan of his, not of theirs. I don’t like what’s shaking out. Do Ifeel like this is PR? Damn right I do. Can we think this may have started outmore innocently and was positioned differently than what it’s evolved to? Yeah,for sure. BUT WE DON’T KNOW. All our thoughts are conjecture here. I don’t wantto see him unhappy, miserable, not feeling creative or supported. The wholepurpose of building a team around you that you trust is for that. I’m hoping thateven in this disasterpiece shit show, he can find that inner strength to dowhatever he needs to across the board to get back to a place where he’s feelinghimself, happy and being his own best version of the Shawn he wants to be.

Also – I’m leaving anon on for now, but if y’all can’t put on big boy/big girlpants and talk/behave like adults, it’ll go off and you’ll have to show yourface :)!

[cannibal-wings]

Hello! I recently found interest again in outlast after literal years (i was sadly just a casual fan when the first game and dlc released) and i'm so glad to see that there's still people in the fandom :') I wanted to ask if it's not too much trouble, what do you think about the trailer of the third game? What are your thoughts about the multi-player aspect of the game? Have a nice day!!

Hello hello! We’re still kicking! Somehow, despite everything, we’re still here. Which I absolutely love. Lets keep it up Outlast fandom. Ok, the trailer for Outlast Trials! -Negative 100 out of 10 no Trager narrating like the xbone trailer. I’ll be serious now. Besides the aesthetic being exactly my thing, the setting seems like a great return to form.

One thing that felt “off” about Outlast 2 was that sometimes that open environments felt... too open? Outlast and WB were great at making you feel trapped and claustrophobic, with some outdoor sections to break it up. I’m def not saying that all of Outlast 2′s outdoor sequences were bad, a lot were really good. But it’s nice to see us return to being indoors.

I’m extremely interested in a multiplayer survival horror experience in the world of Outlast. A lot of multiplayer survival horror rely on combat as part of the game play, so I’m very interested in a game like Outlast Trials which will (hopefully) not have any combat. And be instead about navigating the level designs with two people and solve puzzles while being hunted. The only downside is that I have to trick one of my friends into playing this with me, hahaha. Upshot to that though is that they appear to be saying that you can indeed play this game solo too, which is nice. Because sometimes your friends are just... not that into being chased around in horror games.

It’s set in the past, which an aesthetic I have a mild love for... so I’m def biased about that. And I do so love me some shitty, shitty, doctors being absolutely horrible. I’ll be honest right now. After the comics and the ending of Outlast 2 I’ve given up on the writing team delivering a story that I’ll like or like to have link back to the first game. So all I’m really looking for here is a fun, pulse pounding game, that I can play alone, or trap some friends into playing with me. If the story also ends up being good then that’s just a bonus.

I really do hope for their next project they do something other than Outlast. Back when Outlast 2 was in development Red Barrels was saying how they wanted to branch out and try something new for their next game. So to see them announce Outlast Trials, I was like “oh no, you guys know you don’t have to just keep doing Outlast right? I’ll play other things.” If I had to guess, Outlast Trials will be a shorter experience (what I think they’re good at) and they’ll make maybe something new for the next one. ANYWAYS this got really long. tldr, Welcome back to the fandom, we’re still here, still friendly. Go read my fic Survivors, the first part is called The Aftermath at Mount Massive. I am looking forward to Outlast Trials a lot. And take a breather Red Barrels.

PS: lets see if we can get Shawn Baichoo to voice the male lead so he can be the voice actor for every male protag in Outlast still. haha

[darlinrogue]

The Undertaker has never been one to mince words, which is why he now stands with his arms crossed and nods to a chair, directing Adam (the irony) to sit. "You're making a mistake with the Dark Order, boy. Take a seat."

Holy Baloney is that the Undertaker?

Adam and ‘Taker 

Somewhere on file, in the back of Adam’s head, was a formative memory from his snot-nosed brat years of around eight or so, of the Undertaker crucifying Stone Cold Steve Austin on live, national TV. It may’ve actually been trauma that he then reenacted when he hung Chris Sabin, but hey, that was the Attitude Era in a nutshell. Adam had watched the old tube TV with his delicate, developing eyeballs glued to the screen. Trying to make out the shitty picture from all the static. It was probably why he had to wear reading glasses as an adult. Can’t say his mom didn’t warn him. Yeah, Adam grew-up watching all the big names: Shawn Michaels, Bret Hart, and Dusty Rhodes, AKA his best friend’s dad, because, life is surreal. John Cena-- Adam still had the stupid green he used to come out in. The one a promoter made him remove because he was, ‘too much of a stud’ to hide his face. Rey Mysterio, real big inspiration. There was also Sting, which was very surreal nowadays. He’d seen enough Chris Jericho that losing to him really sucked. Hell, he even saw some of Kenny Omega’s earliest matches on the indies and on Deep South. Back when Adam was a hotshot teen wrestling in his backyard.  It was all enough that it made walking into the locker room and confronting the man inside, a bit of a fever dream. 

Also, made him wonder what the hell was in that whiskey he drank earlier. 

The man was massive, much larger than the screens implied. Adam was far from little but he didn’t hit this wall of meat’s chin. Broad as a freight train, Adam would rather hang-out on the tracks than take a lariat from this mountain. Way older than he remembered. All grizzled in the face, with a soul melting glower that made Adam consider returning to church in the next week or two. Evidently every Easter and Christmas was not enough. The dark leather coat, shrugged over his massive shoulders, was longer than Adam was tall. He filled the entire room. Cold bit at Adam’s nose and lips, like Winter had followed him inside. 

He also had really pretty green eyes, like, wow, what a wonderful color. 

Adam glanced behind him and checked the hall. Brandon wasn’t following him with a camera, or anything. There was no personal enemies lingering in the shadows for a surprise Superkick Party. Dynamite ended a little under five minutes ago. Adam was here for his stuff before he called an Uber and returned to his hotel. He’d probably hang-out in bed for an hour or two and watched telenovelas to practice his Spanish. All while getting way over emotionally invested in the cheap drama. It was low stakes and stupid, and he needed that in his life right now.  Not a single one of those thoughts helped Adam cope with the fact that someone, who had a strong suspicion was the actual, real life, Undertaker, was waiting for him in his locker room. Like, this was some kinda intervention. 

“Am I being ribbed?” He voiced, incredulous. 

His brow furrowed and he checked the corners for hidden lens. It’d happen before, not totally unrealistic. Adam slunk into the room, sticking to the walls and angling for his gear bag. Maybe, he’d make a break for it. He had young lungs and his cardio was damn good, if he could say so himself. Yeah, this guy had longer legs and thighs thicker than his torso, but he was also like fifty. Still, too curious to run, Adam sunk down onto a bench, toes tapping against the cheap carpet. Was kinda wishing he brought a whiskey with him. Instead, he had a bottle of stale, hot water that he left in his bag. He broke the cap and took a sip, eyes still latched on his dark companion. 

“Listen, I, um, really don’t know what’s going on here,” Adam admitted, he lifted his hand, planting his elbow on his knee. “I just work here man, like, I don’t sign a single check in this joint. When they were handing out EVP jobs, my name wasn’t on that list. I didn’t want a gig like that, anyway. Responsibility and important phone calls? Not really my speed.”

He was rambling, which seemed to be an easy thing to do around this guy.

“But um, one,” he lifted a single finger for emphasis. “Uh, for the record, big fan. Your match at Wrestlemania twenty-six? My personality for an entire year. Because, well, you’re stupid like that when you’re a twenty-something. Made me realize I needed more sparkles on my gear. Two, listen the thing with the Dark Order --I mean, I don’t know why you even care-- but as much as I am loathe, loathe--” Big word, put that on a scrabble board. “To tag with Silvers and Reynolds I am even less interested in getting my shit rocked in a three-v-one next week. Which is what will happen if I don’t find partners. Sometimes, you gotta scrape the bottom of the barrel. And listen like--”

Adam took another swig of water, and wiped the excess that dribbled down his chin. He had whiskey earlier and his braincells were not firing in tandem. He smoothed his hand over his chin and through his beard. He was not going to inform the Maybe-Probably-Undertaker, that he had no other friends and no other options. He had some dignity. It wasn’t much, but he was trying to keep it, dang it. 

“Reynolds and Silvers, cools guys, the whole cult thing is unfortunate, I’d share a drink with them otherwise,” Adam said. He opened his arms in a broad, embracing gesture. “They’re not complete dunces in the ring either. I mean, I whooped both their asses before, but, I have been kicked by Silvers, and it fucking hurts. So, I uh, appreciate your--”

He paused, teeth gritted, searching for a word.

“Concern.” Yep, that’ll have to do. “But I got this handled.” Probably. 

Adam sat-up, searched the room again with a couple pointed looks and then repeated:

“Am I being ribbed?!” 

[softboywriting]

Soft Love | Shawn Mendes

Summary: You and Shawn are friends with sexual tension and you both model for the same company. [plus size/curvy reader] [fluff] [flirting] [non-au]

Word Count: 1.5k

|Masterlist In Bio|

“Oh my God, you're the lady from the DK ads!” A guy says as he approaches you outside the shoe store at the mall.

You smile warmly and nod. “I sure am.”

“You're so hot.”

“Thanks.”

Shawn comes out of the shoe store and walks up to you, eyeing the guy who's gushing over you very obviously. “I'm all good, I swapped out the shoes, we can go.”

“Can I have your autograph?” The guy asks and you frown. You didn't really have any way of signing anything.

“Do you have a pen? Or something?”

“Fuck...no.”

“Language,” Shawn mutters to the guy and you elbow him.

The guy pulls out his phone and asks for a picture instead. You don't mind and say no problem. Except it is a problem because as soon as you lean into frame with the guy, he kisses your cheek. That's enough to peeve Shawn off and he steps between the two of you, towering over the guy.

“Get out of here,” Shawn quite literally growls to the guy and he turns tail and walks away quickly.

“It's not that big of a deal Shawn. God, people are going to think we're dating if you keep being so defensive around me.”

Shawn rolls his eyes. “If you let one fan kiss you on the cheek without asking, others will follow suit. Believe me. I know.”

“Yeah yeah. Come on let's go. You got your shoes and I need to get ready before the campaign launch party tonight.”

_____________

You walk into the party at a private mansion and everyone turns to look at you. It's so crazy, you never thought you would be here like this. The face of DK Ladies Wear, one of the top clothing companies in the nation. You grin as you walk toward your management team, the three people who believed in you from the beginning. For a girl of your size and curves, being the face of DK was a huge feat. You and your team fought tooth and nail to get here, and damn it was paying off.

“Hey! You didn't text me!” Cara, your agent, says as she wraps an arm around you. “I would have let everyone know so we could have surprised you.”

“Yeah, well this is plenty attention. How's my dress?”

“Looks insane,” Shawn says as he walks up beside you and puts his arm around your back. “That red looks incredible.”

Cara raises her eyebrows before turning away.

“Thank you Shawn.” You flush and lean into him. He smells amazing, looks absolutely delicious. He's in a button down that is similarly red colored to your dress and black slacks with his boots. His hair is properly curly, messy and soft looking. Fucking hell he was going to drive you insane.

“Can I get you a drink?” Shawn asks close to your ear as a song comes on and starts playing loudly across the main room.

“I'll have whatever you're getting.”

“Sure you can handle it?” He asks and it's far more suggestive than you think he means it to be.

“I'm sure I can.”

Shawn slides his arm away and goes toward the bar to get your drinks with a grin. You make your way over to the area where a bunch of the photos from your ladies wear campaign are hung on massive banner like canvases beside Shawn's men's wear photos. You just smile, so satisfied with every single one of the pictures. Even the ones of you in the lingerie are outstanding. Never did you think you would be confident enough to do lingerie photos yet here you are.

“Beautiful aren't they?”

You look to your left and see a guy with a camera around his neck. He looks kinda smarmy, like a paparazzi. You're sure no paps were allowed in to this party but you know that doesn't stop them from getting in. “Yeah, they are.”

“She's pretty for a big girl.”

You step in front of the guy and cross your arms. “What the hell does that mean?”

“Oh, I didn't realize you were the model.” The guy chuckles coolly. “I mean you're pretty, look at you. Gorgeous, but if you lost a few pounds you'd be phenomenal.”

“I’m phenomenal now. Get fucked.”

“Such a mouth. Y'know language like that makes for an ugly lady.”

You hear your name and look to where Shawn is approaching you with your drink. The guy turns and walks off with a shit eating grin. “God, I hate people.”

“What happened?” Shawn asks warily, eyeing the guy.

You take a long sip of your drink, a whiskey ginger, of course that's what Shawn was drinking. Good god it's strong. “Typical fat shaming asshole.”

“Want me to say something?”

“No. You don't need to be picking fights. Let it go, it doesn't bother me. I've heard everything there is to hear. He won't be the first or last to call me names or comment on my body.”

Shawn scoffs, clearly not happy that you have to deal with people being rude to you. But it didn't matter. It really didn't. You were making bank and the haters were just angry.

“You look amazing in this one,” Shawn says, changing the subject as. He points to the one of you in a black lace nightie with matching boy shorts like panties.

“Me? Look at you? Those boxer briefs leave little to the imagination.” You point to the photo of him leaned against a counter in his underwear. “Did you even wear a cup in that one?”

“Nope.”

“It's my favorite.”

Shawn glances back at you and smirks. “This is my favorite,” he says and points at the picture of you in a pink bra and panties that is of you looking back, showing off your butt. “I bet it's better in person,” he mutters.

You elbow him in the side and he looks to you with a blush on his cheeks. “Shawn, you got something to say?”

He downs his drink quickly. “Do I?”

“Yeah. You've been so defensive and protective of me since this campaign launched last week. I saw you yelling at your friends in the comments on my Instagram. Now you're being flirtier than ever..” You set your drink down on a nearby table before standing in front of him and walking your fingers up his chest teasingly. “You seem a little jealous that everyone gets to see me in my underwear.”

“Oh, psh, come on. Everyone gets to see me in mine,” he rolls his eyes, looking away.

“Don't lie to me Mendes.”

Shawn sets his drink on a passing waiters tray and grabs your waist, hands going up and down your sides. “Fine. I want you. Is that what you wanna hear? You wanna hear how I dream about you? How you are all I can think about when I'm supposed to be writing with Teddy in the studio or doing press for this campaign or watching some movie at home?”

“Yeah?” You grin and he twirls one finger around a piece of your hair. “We're both single. What's stopping you?”

“Dunno if I'm good enough for you.”

You lean in and whisper against his ear,  “You're more than good enough, you're perfect. You're the only guy I want.” You press a kiss to his cheek and leave a faint red lip print.

“Guess I know who you're going home with tonight.”

____________

You wake up to your phone LED notification blinking in the dark on the nightstand beside you. You grab it and turn it on to see you have twenty missed messages and and abundance of notifications from just about every social media app you have clogging up the screen. You open up Twitter and immediately see photos of you and Shawn leaving the DK party together...and the comments people were making. Cats out of the bag it seems.  

Suddenly the phone is yanked from your hand in the dark and you let out a yelp in protest. Shawn tosses is somewhere off the bed, it doesn't make any noise so you assume it landed in the laundry.

“No phones.” He grumbles and puts his arm around you, snuggling against you. “I don't wanna know what anyone thinks.”

“But what if-”

“Nope.” Shawn slides his hand over your stomach and tugs at your side until you roll to face him. He presses his nose into your neck and sighs.

You run your hand over his hair and he tangles his legs with yours. You run your hand up and down his back, fingers gliding over the toned muscles and soft skin. “Can we stay in bed all day?”

“That's the plan,” he mumbles, voice muffled. “I definitely want more time to kiss every inch of you and give you the attention you deserve.”

“God, you're so soft.”

He shrugs. “Not as soft as you.”

“Hey.”

He leans back and presses his lips to yours, a little off center in the dim room but still sweet nonetheless. “I love soft.”

“O-oh.”

“Go back to sleep.” He rubs his hand over your hip and down over your butt. “You'll need plenty of rest for later.”

The end

Please reblog and leave comments or asks! Thank you! ❤️😊

[lovestrucked-again]

Planes - Shawn Mendes

Summary: Unaware of who the handsome boy seated next to you is, the two of you start talking...

 Part 2, Part 3 __________________________

“The gate to flight CL321 will be closing in 15 minutes, please make your way to the gate as soon as possible, thank you.”

You were late, very late. You were running through the crowds of people at Singapore airport towards the gate for LA with your single suitcase. You were late to the airport in general but the additional hold up at check-ins had completely threw off your plan. Approaching the gate, you saw a massive line up outside the glass door towards the entrance of the plane allowing you to sigh in relief.

The small weekend holiday in Singapore was last minute planned as one of your childhood friends had announced her wedding suddenly. The trip was pretty good overall with the only problem exhibited being almost late to your plane home. You placed your suitcase on the conveyor belt and took out all the items from your pocket, placing them in a tray and walked through the scanner. As you began picking up all your belongings and walking towards the waiting area you noticed the large line-up still outside. However, you were one of the last few passengers that walked in before the gate closed. The line-up outside seemed to consist mainly of teenage girls all holding signs. A few cameras among them.

“Passengers in rows 20-30, please start making your way to the entrance.”

___________

Why am I so far back damn it, counting the rows down to your seat you kept your eyes on the roof of the seats 23, 24, 25, ah got it, 26C. Looking to your empty seat near the aisle and the passenger who was already sat next to you in the middle, you choked. He was handsome. From the depth of his brown eyes, to the gentle expressions of his face. He had tousled dark brown hair which was thick and lustrous.

“Did you want help putting that up?” he asked pointing towards your suitcase while looking back at your staring gaze.

“oh eh-um, no I can do it myself thanks,” you stuttered, gently smiling as you pushed the lever down of the suitcase. Carefully using both hands, you picked up the suitcase and placed it in the storage compartments above. You sat down in your seat, not looking at him and staring only at your hands as you played with them self-consciously. You weren’t sure whether he was looking at you or not but the idea that he could be, made you extremely nervous.

You looked in front and behind as more of the seats filled up and people piled in. Using your chance of looking around you sneaked a glance at the man beside you. His eyes were shut and he had earphones in, clearly unaware of your stare. You mentally sighed, having silently hoped he was paying attention to you before leaning back in your seat.

The flight attendants began making their way around, checking all seatbelts were worn. You assumed that the man next to you had fallen asleep. The flight from Singapore to LA was a night flight and so many other passengers were also sleeping. Apart from the few teenagers listening to music or looking bored next to their parents.

You had been on planes before, constantly travelling to meet people for fun and for work. But you had once been through a terrifying experience with plane turbulence. That experience scared you and you were reminded of it whenever the plane took off or landed due to the sounds of the engine squealing. So when the captain announced take off, you clenched your fists and squeezed your eyes shut, oblivious of the man whose attention was in fact, on you.

_______

You were very conscious of all the small actions and movements you made, making it an exhausting plane flight. Flying from Singapore to LA was driving you insane especially with the flight duration being so long but soon, sleep began to take over you.

The man started talking to you first after he noticed your head drooping from one side to another. He tapped your shoulder very lightly, stirring you up from your sleep.

“Did you want to lean against my shoulder?” He whispered, aware of all the sleeping passengers. You could hardly make out his face in the dark but mumbled a quick thank you, unable to properly process what he said. You felt a hand gently bring your head down against something firm and drifted back into your sleep.

“Good morning ladies and gentleman, in a few minutes the crew will be serving drinks followed by breakfast. Our menu is in the seat pocket in front of you, thank you.”

You opened your eyes slowly to the dim lights turning on. You sat up straight in your seat before remembering what occurred. Quickly glancing over to him to check if he was awake, he was staring at you smiling. Omg what happened. Did I drool? You bought your hand to the sides of your mouth, wiping away anything.

“I-I’m sorry,” you started, not knowing what else you could say. Fuck this is embarrassing.

“My name is Shawn,” he said, extending a hand out to you.

“I’m Y/N,” you said, taking his reached out hand to shake. An awkward silence lingered for a few minutes before he turned his body around to face you better and continued…

“I don't want to sound stuck up or anything but do you by any chance know me?” He cautiously asked, staring intensely at your expression. You thought for a minute, not recalling seeing this man anywhere else.

“Uhh no? Should I?” you asked, just as cautious as him.

“Oh maybe not then, I thought you looked like someone familiar is all.” He says, softly laughing to himself, amused at the situation before another silence looms over. The quietness between the two of you was killing you but you didn't know what to say.

“Soo, are you on your way home or?” he began,

“Yeah I am, I was in Singapore for my friend’s wedding. What about you? Heading home?”

“I have some work stuff in LA to do before I can go home.” He sighs, bringing a hand through his hair.

“Sounds like you're a bit homesick?”

“yeah a little,” he chuckles. Shawn finds the situation amazing that his able to have a conversation with someone and feel so relaxed. He doesn't feel the need to keep a wall up or hide things from you even though you’ve just met. And so the conversation continues. You talk about your favourite movies, vacation places, hobbies and even discuss your favourite pizza toppings.

The cabin crew reach your row for breakfast and offer you a choice of bread or eggs as the main to which you choose bread. The lady places your meal down on your tray and you lean back to allow them to talk to Shawn and the other passenger but they immediately pull out a different place and place it on Shawn’s tray. You stare at his food, slightly confused at his nicely laid out pancakes and fruit on top compared to your butter and bread.

He notices you constantly side eyeing the pancakes as his asking about your holiday and laughs. He picks up a pancake from the tower and places it on your plate.

“O-Oh you don't have to, you probably paid in advance for that,” you ramble, lowkey excited for something sweet.

“It’s okay, I can’t finish it all anyway,” he says, handing you the small jar of honey.

“Thanks.”

The plane flight is only 1/3 of the way through and light is already seeping through the windows. You are slightly tired but don't want to sleep if there’s still a chance of talking more.

“Do you wanna watch a movie?” he asks, pulling out his laptop from underneath the chair in front. “I’ve got like all the best movies downloaded.” You laugh at this instantly remembering his favourite movie.

“Harry potter of course.” You declare.

“definitely” he says, dead serious as he turns his laptop on. You notice the tattoos on his hand as he switches the button on.

“What’s that tattoo?” you ask him, curious of the bird you see on his hand.

“Oh this,” he says looking down, “it’s a swallow. It’s meant to symbolise home. Sailor’s use to get them every time they returned from a voyage.” You let the information sink in and realise something.

“When was the last time you’ve been home then?”

“It’s been a couple of years, work’s really busy.” He says, pulling up the movie on the screen and handing you the right side of the earphones. He adjusts the laptop so its facing you and he leans over to you a little more.

“Ah I see, you must miss your family a lot.”

“Very much,” he mumbles, looking at the side of your face as you stare at the screen.

You were watching the first Harry Potter movie and this was your first time to his surprise. Shawn was constantly commenting on things for you to pick up and laughing to himself at scenes. You couldn't help but laugh at his reactions, he was adorable. You noticed that his eyes would crinkle around the sides when he laughed and it made your heart melt. Once the first movie finished, you went onto the second one, then the third, and so on.

Both of you eventually fell asleep and were awakened to the announcements. “Good evening ladies and gentleman, we will soon be landing, please fasten your seatbelts, close your trays and open your windows. Thank you.”

You feel yourself start to tremble a little as the plane wobbles and drops in altitude.

“Y/N Are you okay?” he asks, noticing you squeeze your eyes shut. “yeah I’m fine,” you manage to say as you try calming yourself, “I’m just not a fan of flying,” You finish. Shawn thinks to himself a little, contemplating whether he should or shouldn't. But he doesn't care in this moment. He grabs your right hand and holds onto it with his, intertwining your fingers together. You look up at him and he smiles.

The plane lands safely and your hands are still linked with his as you shuffle out the seats to bring out your luggage from above. He lets go of your hand to help you bring your suitcase down and places it on the floor before grabbing your hand again. He brings your connected hands into the side pockets of his denim jacket. You smile to yourself, completely immersed in his adorable personality.

The doors of the plane open and he walks ahead of you, still holding your hand as you exit the aircraft. He asks where exactly you live in the city and you make small talk about your favourite places nearby. When you enter the airport he seems a little nervous, scouting the area for something.

“Where are you heading?” You ask, not wanting to part so soon, “did you want help finding your way there?”. You realise it’s almost 1am and you should be heading straight home but the idea of possibly never seeing him again scared you. You wanted to cherish every moment.

“I’m waiting for my manager to call…” he says, pulling his phone out. “Maybe I’ll just call him first,” he mumbles as he dials a number and puts the phone to his ear. You look around the airport while he talks, not paying attention to what he’s saying. The airport was very silent, most people passed out on the chairs in the waiting areas for boarding. You turn towards Shawn when he lets go of your hand and runs it through his hair in distress. “Okay bye.”

“What happened?” you ask, as he begins biting his lip.

“Y/N, I know this is probably very rude to ask but can I stay the night at yours?” He asked.

[incomingalbatross]

For the ask: 001: Doctor Who; 002: Wodehouse ship of your choice; 003: character of your choice from Psych.

Thank you!

Doctor Who

Favorite character: ...I mean, it has to be the Doctor. He’s the embodiment of Chaotic Good, and he’s so entertaining and absurd and so deeply good at the same time. Even if there are regenerations I like less than others, I always love the Doctor.

Least Favorite character: ...Rose Freaking Tyler. I don’t talk about her much, because I don’t want to inadvertently start something with anyone who feels differently, but this is not a Rose-friendly space.

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon): Canon-ish: Ben/Polly, Amy/Rory, Martha/Mickey. Non-canon: Harry/Victoria, Jenny/the son of Kate Stewart (he only barely exists in EU, but the idea of the Doctor’s daughter marrying the Brigadier’s grandson is just really cute to me)

Character I find most attractive: ...Hm. The Eighth Doctor, maybe?

Character I would marry: Harry Sullivan. He’s a sweet, gentlemanly dork of a Naval surgeon with traditional values--what’s not to love?

Character I would be best friends with: The Doctor. Not so much because he’s the character most like me, but because he’s very good at Being Friends With People.

a random thought: One thing I really love about the New Series is the increasingly consistent trend--especially in Moffat’s era, I think?--of explicitly treating the TARDIS as another character. It’s been there implicitly for a long time, but they made it much more canon and I appreciate that.

An unpopular opinion: Missy is not the Master, and I’ll never believe she is. This isn’t even about her gender, but about her whole personality.

My Canon OTP: Ian/Barbara, from the First Doctor’s era. This isn’t exactly controversial--I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anything, in fandom or EU, where they weren’t happily together--but I love them.

My Non-canon OTP: Master/Clara... Which is entirely the fault of my sister’s fics. I wasn’t expecting to ship them!!

Most Badass Character: ...There’s so many to choose from. Aside from the Doctor, maybe Sarah Jane? Aside from being one of the greatest companions, she got her own spinoff show in which it was established that she’s been regularly saving the world on her own, she adopted two children and began mentoring three more in her fifties, and she was generally amazing for five seasons.

Most Epic Villain: ...The Master gets highest points for Presentation (as Megamind would say), and the Daleks are the most consistently menacing... But I think Rassilon scares me the most. He’s the founder of Time Lord society, and he’s evil. 

Pairing I am not a fan of: The Doctor/anyone other than River, honestly. (Well, or his Gallifreyan wife from pre-canon days--I assume they were a good match, from what canon evidence we have)

Character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another): ...A lot. Today, though, I’m going to say Sarah again. As said above, she’s a hero in her own right, and there’s no force in the universe that could stop her from having adventures. Reducing her to “female character pining after the Doctor and unable to get over losing him,” as they did in “School Reunion”, was a massive injustice to her character. (ESPECIALLY since their Classic relationship was not romantic. I mean, they’ve been shipped, of course, but their was nothing romantic in the writing or--IMHO--even the acting.)

Favourite Friendship: I think I’ve said this before, but the Doctor and the Brigadier. I love constant their friendship is, how much they’ve done for each other and respect each other, and how easily they fit back together every time they reunite.

Character I most identify with: ...I honestly don’t know. I love almost all of them, but I don’t think any of them click in quite that way, you know?

Character I wish I could be: Romana, maybe? She’s a Time Lady who traveled with the Doctor--that’s a pretty good deal!

Wodehouse Ship: I’m going to go with Mike/Eve here, for fun

When I started shipping them: As soon as the name “Jackson” appeared in Leave it to Psmith, I think. I trust and support Mike’s judgement. :P

My thoughts: I wish we’d, you know, seen them together. But I like that Mike has a wife he can take care of! I think that suits them both. (I also have a headcanon that Psmith went off--to the Drones, maybe?--and dug up dirt on Rollo, and that these discoveries were what pushed Mike to propose. Because he’s an honorable boy, and I think getting him to propose to an engaged woman would take some intervention from Psmith... Also I don’t like what we’ve heard of Rollo.)

What makes me happy about them: That they exist. That they got their farm, and that their best friends married each other, so the two couples can look after each other when they need to! 

What makes me sad about them: No content. :(

Things done in fanfic that annoys me: ...I’ve never read any fic of them that wasn’t written by myself or one of this Tumblr microfandom, so... Nothing, really!

Things I look for in fanfic: Anything of them interacting with Psmith/Eve is especially fun. (Someday I’d like to try the scene where they find out Psmith and Eve are engaged. Because A) if they’re told soon enough, it would be the same meeting where they share the news that they got the farm, which sounds delightfully chaotic B) last they knew, Psmith and Eve hadn’t even met, and C) the second Mike heard they’d met at Blandings, he’d know Psmith was behind getting them the money. Somehow.) 

My wishlist:

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: ...I’m sure there are other Wodehouse Protagonists who would suit them, but none come to mind. They’re good with each other.

My happily ever after for them: Hmm... For them to have lots of kids, and the Psmiths as neighbors, and play cricket with their combined families every summer. Margery can visit and be the fun aunt, and since they’re doing well financially maybe the Jackson parents will come live with them at some point? (I’d also like them to have a chance to help Psimth and Eve out of some significant trouble, since it’s usually the other way around... I don’t know what, though.)

Psych character: ...I’ll pick Henry, since I’ve been talking about him a lot lately

How I feel about this character: Good! He’s a good, though flawed, dad, and a good cop. (One of the few Lawful Goods in this cast, in my opinion.) He’s solid, and principled, and one of the few people who can really, truly keep up with/keep a hold of Shawn.

Any/all the people I ship romantically with this character: His wife, I suppose? I don’t remember being a big fan of her, but he clearly still loves her, and I’m a sucker for “divorced couple reconciles” anyway... So yeah, Maddie.

My favorite non-romantic relationship for this character: Shawn, of course. Henry just... he built his whole life around raising his son, and it shows with him and with Shawn. They’ve both affected each other so much, and I love that the show just shows them being more openly important to each other as it goes on.

My unpopular opinion about this character: I’m not sure what’s “unpopular” here... But I think his training of Shawn was less about wanting him to be a cop, and more about giving Shawn A) something halfway constructive to do with his racing brain, and B) the tools to survive whatever trouble he'd get into in the future. Because, even then, Henry knew Shawn was never going to stay out of trouble.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: I wish Shawn had told him he loved him out loud, to his face, which I don’t think quite happened. I’m pretty content with Henry’s content overall, though, I think.

Favorite friendship for this character: I’m going to cheat slightly and say Gus. It’s not exactly a friendship, but I love the implicit history there, and the way that Gus is practically his second kid and they both relate to each other as such. (I am also highly indignant that the “Henry & Gus” tag apparently doesn’t even exist on AO3... Distressing.)

My crossover ship: ...I got nothin. However, I have decided that in a Star Trek fusion AU (sort of a crossover!) Shawn’s mom would be a Vulcan. That’s the closest I’ve got.

[jawnjendes]

shawn meets... | isabella

SUMMARY: in the life of a rockstar, shawn mendes comes across some unique people. sometimes, things stray from the norm. (AU, shawn x every one of my oc’s)(continuation/spin off of goth gf)

AN: time for a new oc! and by NEW i mean, new to yall,,, ive had this oc since i was 15

***let me know if you wanna be added to the taglist

previous chapter 

isabella’s origin story not available | isabella’s playlist | masterlist

Out of all the places he’s been to, London seemed to bring the most interesting people to Shawn’s already interesting life. He couldn’t tell if it was because he was an international singing sensation, or because of his own strange luck. Was his college life this weird with people?

College… it felt like somebody else’s life. It had been a few years since he walked through the massive campus, but there were still days that Shawn found himself missing that life. He especially missed it these days because he still had Brian in that life. Not to mention it was all mundane and normal. A number of people knew Shawn, but it was not the colossal amount that knew him now. Back then, he could go to a karaoke bar and get as trashed as he wanted, and the only consequence would be a killer hangover. Back then, he would be going to a karaoke bar with his best friend.

These last few months were a grieving period. Shawn hadn't planned on taking time off, but the funeral was the last straw. Hearing the broken wails of Brian's mother as the casket was lowered into the ground was all too much. He couldn't handle the guilt that sat on his shoulders, or the grief that weight down on his chest. He couldn't look his friend's family in the eyes and say it was his fault why their son was dead. So time off was taken, and a tour was canceled, and much therapy was had.

Now, four months later, Shawn was getting back into the swing of things. He was back in London with the intention of songwriting and possibly some recording. His mind was still cloudy and his chest was still heavy, but he was deemed functional enough by Andrew and his therapist.

However, Shawn couldn't wander the streets alone. That was the case ever since his first fan mobbing in Los Angeles a few years ago. More recently, ever since the girl who bruised Shawn’s wrist happened, Jake had to be at his side at all times. Even at a crowded karaoke bar where his face blended with everyone else under the dim lights, and where everyone focused on the person singing onstage.

Shawn looked down at his right wrist. The bruises were long gone, and he could still play guitar just as he did before. The thought of never playing again gave him an uncomfortable chill. He couldn't be thinking about that, not when worse things had happened. Brian was the one who pointed out how odd and nonhuman that girl was. Shawn wouldn't have been able to figure out the truth about her and her employer. He really needed the karaoke bar tonight.

At least Jake was considerate enough to sit a couple of stools away from Shawn, giving him the illusion that he was here by himself. He nursed his beer and scanned the room, not really listening to the karaoke host introduce the next singer. Shawn was not really sure what he was looking for here. He chatted with the handsome, blond bartender, but he got busy with the night rush. All Shawn knew was that he didn’t want to be stuck alone in a hotel room, and he really didn’t want to be around more people who would share their condolences and fond memories of someone they hardly knew. It wasn’t until he heard a familiar song play on the speakers did Shawn finally focus on the stage.

If it was his own song, Shawn would have had to leave the bar. But it was Niall’s On My Own, making Shawn briefly consider texting the Irish singer to see what he’s up to tonight. However, he quickly zeroed in on the girl singing, and he started to wonder if he really did have a type.

She had short, choppy black hair, like she had cut it herself. These round purple sunglasses hung on the bridge of her nose, and it was the only thing that stood out from her all black ensemble: a low cut tank top, ripped jeans, and Converse high tops. She moved animatedly around the stage, that short hair bouncing and getting disheveled. She didn’t seem to care about how she looked.

Shawn turned back to Jake and gave him that look. “Are you seeing this?” Jake merely gave him a thumbs up.

The other thing about this girl was her voice. Every person that sang before here was… not good. This girl had a strong, rich voice. She could give Niall a run for his money with all the runs she threw into his song. She was talented. Shawn hadn’t heard a voice like that since he heard Bella Santiago sing in person for the first time. (Still a shame that girl won’t accept any record deal she was offered.)

Everyone in the bar seemed to like this girl too. The crowd roared with applause and cheers when she hit the bridge of the song. Shawn bopped his head along to the beat, feeling a genuine smile on his face for the first time in weeks. He clapped as hard as he could when the song ended, but then his heart dropped as he saw this girl walk off the stage and head for the bar. He turned to face the bartender, but looked down at his half empty bottle. His heart nearly stopped when the girl took the empty stool next to him.

Surprisingly, it wasn’t a British accent that came out of her. At least, not a noticeable one. She sounded more American than anything else.

“Thanks, Seth,” she said to the bartender as he seemed to make a Blue Moon magically appear out of nowhere. “What’d you think?”

“Showing everyone how it’s done, like always.” He winked.

She giggled. “We getting outta here soon?”

“After last call, won't be long now."

Shawn felt a blow in his stomach. She was here with the bartender. Well, time to call it a night.

Then, there was something like magic. Shawn had turned towards Jake to signal him to get out of here, but there was a tap on his shoulder. He turned back around to find the girl looking at him.

“I sat here for a reason, you know,” she said, eyebrows raised.

Magic!

Shawn grinned. “That reason being?”

“Handsome chap, alone in a bar? Too good to be true, so I had to investigate. You here alone, mysterious stranger? I mean, apart from your bodyguard, of course.” She took a gulp from her beer.

Shawn was thrown off by that entire string of words. He couldn’t even try to play dumb. “How did you-”

“He’s had that protective look in his eyes since I sat down,” she explained. “And I know protection like nobody’s business.”

“Oh, you’re a bodyguard, eh?” Shawn asked, his eyes shamelessly trailing down her petite body. Yes, it was an excuse to look at the decent amount cleavage she had going on.

“Eh?” she repeated with a chuckle. “What, are you Canadian or something?” She laughed like it was such a ridiculous thought.

He blinked. “Yeah. Yeah, I am.”

The girl laughed even more, her eyes squinting. “Are you joking? Canada’s not real!”

Maybe she had a few too many drinks. Shawn watched her with a polite grin as she hiccuped.

“You’re alright, mysterious stranger.” She held out her hand. “Isabella Montgomery.”

“Nice to meet you,” Shawn said as he shook her hand. For someone who just danced around onstage, her hand was quite chilly.

She quirked a dark eyebrow. “Gonna stick with the mysterious stranger thing, are you? Suit yourself.”

Either she recognized him and pretended like she didn’t or… she just didn’t recognize him. Whatever the case, Shawn was perfectly content with being a stranger tonight.

“You gonna sing tonight?” Isabella asked him.

“Oh no, I’m not drunk enough for that,” he said. “Besides, I don’t think I could follow up the show you just put on.”

She smiled. “You’re probably right. But I’ve got the smallest feeling you might be an alright singer.”

Okay, she definitely recognized him.

“I don’t really want the attention on me tonight,” he admitted.

Isabella nodded understandingly. “I see. Well, would you wanna get outta here?”

The two of them looked at each other for a split second. Shawn was quite forward himself, but he wasn’t that quick. Not to mention, he just overheard her make plans with Seth the bartender.

“To another pub,” Isabella hastily corrected. “There’s a place my friend over here and I are gonna head to. You wanna come along?”

“Oh!” Shawn felt a little more delighted now that she clarified the bartender situation. “Yeah, I’ll go with you. Where's this place at?”

Isabella licked her lips and grinned. She looked for her bartender friend, who just announced last call on the microphone. When he returned to his post, Isabella waved him over.

“Yes, my dear?” Seth asked.

“My new mysterious mate wants to come with us,” she told him.

“Oh, does he? Think he can handle it?”

“I can handle it,” Shawn piped up. “What kinda place is it, anyway?”

Isabella and Seth shared a look, silently communicating. Then, they both turned back to the mysterious stranger.

“It’s, er, a nerdy… type of place,” Isabella explained slowly. “People cosplay… Dungeons and Dragons type of things. They take it very seriously, won’t even break character if you talk to them. It’s a weird environment, but it’s fun nonetheless.”

Shawn nodded as he took in the information. Wouldn’t be the first nerd-themed place he’s been too. But it has been a while. “I’m down. Sounds fun.”

“There’s karaoke there too,” Seth added. “And, we can promise that you will continue being a mysterious stranger while we’re there.”

A karaoke bar where no one will recognize him? Sounds like a dream.

“Let’s do it,” he told his new friends.

This nerd bar was hidden. The shelf behind the bar was actually a secret door. Seth pushed it open with surprising ease while Isabella hopped over the bar. Shawn looked at Jake, who didn’t seem suspicious or hesitant. Yet.

Seth let the others pass through first before shutting the shelf door behind him. Then, Isabella led them down a hallway lit by dim blue lights. She pushed open another door, revealing a bar that was much darker than the previous one. It felt more like a nightclub.

Shawn could barely make out people wearing long colorful robes, dancing under the strobe lights. Definitely nerd space. An unrecognizable song was blaring over the speakers. As Shawn tried to figure out what exactly the lyrics were saying, Isabella nudged him.

“I’ll sign us up for karaoke!” she yelled over the music.

“Wait-” he tried to say, nerves building up in his stomach.

“You’re singing with me no matter what!”

And she disappeared towards the stage.

Before Shawn could stop her, Seth came in for the distraction. He pulled Shawn over to the bar and ordered something for the three of them. Soon enough, there were shot glasses lined up along the surface of the bar, and Isabella had found the boys.

“Oh, fuck yeah!”

Each of them grabbed their tiny glass. Shawn looked around for his guard, now nervous about being left alone, but he found Jake in the far corner of the club. Watching. Waiting. Unbothered.

That was enough for Shawn to down one, two, three shots of whatever the fuck with these people. He felt fire in his veins, euphoria surrounding him. Everything he was previously worried about didn’t matter anymore.

“We’re gonna sing Panic!” Isabella told him at some point.

“Can’t wait!”

Next thing he knew, Shawn was onstage in front of a massive group of nerds, High Hopes blaring on the speakers. Isabella was next to him, microphone in hand as she belted out the beginning of the song with her killer voice.

Shawn took over the first verse, and the two of them harmonized wonderfully. At least, with the alcohol in his system, it felt that way. The two of them danced around on stage like fools, not caring about looking cool or composed or even trying to sing well. Isabella sounded naturally good, though. She messed up her hair and nearly tripped on her feet a few times, but man could that girl carry a tune.

“Had to have high, high hopes for a living Didn’t know how, but I always had a feeling I was going to be that one in a million Always had high, high hopes”

It was liberating. It was spiritually healing. It was different than performing in an arena of thousands of people. He could just be silly and not have to put on his tour persona.

They only sang one song, but it was enough for Shawn to feel something other than the crushing grief that was frequently on his shoulders. He felt good, almost happy. He danced with these strangers and drank some more. He saw pretty lights dancing around the ceiling, he could almost see the stars and the moon through it too. It was magical, to say the least.

"Guys, I'm getting hungry!" Isabella exclaimed after a while.

"Well, I'm getting tired!" Seth told her. "What about you, mysterious stranger?"

"Fooooooood!"

The three of them (Jake in tow, of course) left the way they came in. Seth pushed open the shelf door and let the others through. Shawn's ears were ringing once he was back in the quiet, but there was still adrenaline coursing through his system. He wasn't ready for the night to be over.

But Seth was. He stretched his long arms over his head and yawned once all of them were out in the humid night. “I’m out for the night, lads. It was cool hanging out with you, stranger.”

“You too, brother,” Shawn said, clasping his shoulder.

Seth then turned to Isabella. “I’ll see you at home?”

“See you at home,” she confirmed.

Then, Seth stalked off down the street, practically disappearing into a dark alley. There was a cracking sound that broke the quiet night, but Shawn wasn’t exactly preoccupied with that.

"Where we gonna eat?" he asked Isabella.

However, Jake stepped in. "We should really get going. It's late enough as it is."

"But I'm hungry!" Shawn whined.

"Yeah, the boy is hungry!" Isabella assertively repeated, placing her hands on her hips. "Can't let him starve now, can we? There's a burger joint down the road, 's not that far."

The two of them stared down the bodyguard. He usually took Shawn away from the fun despite the singer's protests. It was always because they had something to do or somewhere to be the next day, but there were still a couple of days left before the demands came back… before the prominent absence of a certain Brian made itself known yet again. Shawn wanted to savor this time, drunk or not.

Jake seemed to realize this as well, because he suddenly approved. “Alright. You eat, and then it’s back to the hotel.”

Isabella bounced on her feet. “Sweet! Let’s go!”

She linked her arm with Shawn’s and led him literally ten steps up the road. The burger joint was empty apart from the cashier working the graveyard shift. Jake went to sit at the booth in the corner, continuing to do his job.

“God, I’m dying for a veggie burger,” Isabella said, looking up at the menu.

“Are the garlic fries any good?” Shawn asked.

“Wouldn’t know, I have a garlic allergy.”

He looked at her, surprised. “Shouldn’t we go somewhere else? What if your food touches garlic?”

She waved it off. “I don’t have severe reactions or anything. And I’ve been here loads of time. Trust me, it’s safe.”

Well, if she knows her own body… The two of them ordered, and Shawn made sure to keep the allergen out of his meal as well. Then, they sat down two booths ahead of Jake, still keeping the illusion that Shawn was out and about on his own.

Under the much brighter lights of this establishment, Shawn could make out Isabella’s face a little more. She had the babiest baby face a person could have. If they hadn’t met in a bar, Shawn would have thought she was a teenager. The pink blush on Isabella’s cheeks only added to that. Maybe she had used a fake ID at the bar… she could actually be a teenager.

Isabella caught him staring, and immediately knew what was on his mind. “I’m twenty-four, just so you know.”

“Oh, I wasn’t-” he tried to say.

“Lots of people give me that look. You know how many clients of mine think I’m an intern?”

Shawn blinked slowly, his hazy mind still processing what she just said. “Um, what is it that you do?”

“I’m a lawyer for muuu- ah, uh - immigration lawyer.” She grinned nonchalantly.

“That’s awesome,” Shawn said.

“Yeah, a few years back I volunteered my services when people in the States were being wrongfully detained at various airports,” she explained. “I got hired by a law firm in New York, so I lived there for a bit.”

Shawn was impressed, but he thought about exactly how long ago those events took place. He was still a little weary about Isabella and her age, so he counted backwards on his fingers. However, the math got difficult and fuzzy in his still inebriated mind, so he took her word for it.

“I promise you I’m older than I look,” Isabella said with a laugh. Then, she turned serious. “Can I be honest with you?”

He nodded rapidly, numbers still flying around in his head.

“I know you’re not just a mysterious stranger,” she admitted. “I know who you are.”

His eyes widened a little bit. Was this another disturbed fan interaction? Oh god, maybe he should have listened to Jake and gone back to the hotel.

“You performed at Sapphire Lilith’s birthday party,” Isabella clarified, seeing the look on his face. “I was there.”

“Oh,” Shawn said, his shoulders relaxing. “Yeah. I performed at her house.” And he spent a blissful week with Sapphire, only to result in her ghosting him and the death of his best friend. He cleared his throat as that memory came to mind. “How do you know Sapphire?”

“Her parents died few years ago and she needed me to look over their wills,” Isabella said casually. “Oh, and she got robbed a few times and needed to me look into the legal part of it.”

Shawn tilted his head. “But aren’t you an immigration lawyer?”

“Yeah. We also went to the same sleepaway school years ago.” She shrugged. “Uniforms for girls were pink, but you would never catch me in that shit. I spray painted my dresses black and wore sneakers. I got in so much trouble.”

“Wow. Got ourselves a rebel here.” He chuckled, his hand sliding across the table.

Isabella was faster than him. A single blink later, and she was standing. “I think our order is ready.”

Something fell out of her pocket, making a small clattering noise. Shawn immediately reached down to pick up the item, only to be confused at what it was.

“You dropped your… wand?”

He didn’t even get a good look at the dark wood before Isabella snatched it out of his hand and shoved it back into her pocket. Her eyes were suspiciously wide again.

“I, uh, I love Henry Popper. Be right back!”

As Isabella went to the cashier, Shawn looked back at Jake two booths behind. He seemed more confused than suspicious. Or, spaced out. His eyes were staring back at the guy he was supposed to be guarding, but it didn’t look like he had processed anything that just happened.

Then, Isabella came back to the table, non-too-gently setting their tray down on the table. The noise was loud enough to make Shawn jump and face her again.

“Sorry for freaking out,” she said, somber.

“It’s okay. Hey, I love Harry Potter too,” he replied. “I’m obsessed. Did you get your wand at Universal?”

“Uh, yeah. I’m a Gryffindor.”

“Me too!”

Isabella pointedly grinned and tilted her head. “Really? You give off big Hufflepuff energy.”

“Why does everyone say that?” Shawn chuckled before taking a bite of his burger.

“Because it’s true?”

“And how would you know that?”

“Who has the wand between the two of us? And don’t talk with your mouth full!”

Shawn playfully narrowed his eyes as he chewed and swallowed. “Didn’t realize I was talking to the queen of all things Harry Potter!”

Isabella chuckled. “You could say he’s like a friend to me. As a matter of fact, I saw him yesterday when he came round for tea.”

That got a laugh out of him. Any worry he had about this girl was now gone. He would much rather be here than be alone with his thoughts in a hotel room. How often does he get a genuine conversation like this anyway? How often does he get the time to talk to anyone and form one-on-one connections?

He was doing exactly what he wanted to do: make music and perform it. Six years ago, Shawn had no idea what it would cost to be able to do this. When was the last time he had spoken to any of his friends? His family? He looked down at his meal, suddenly not very hungry.

“Hey!” Isabella said, lightly tapping his arm. “Don’t get sad on me now! Am I really that depressing to be around?”

“Of course not,” Shawn said without missing a beat. “And I’m not sad.”

“Please, you reek of stress, loss, and…” She sniffed the air. “Guilt?”

Shawn scrunched his brows, pretending like he was not just attacked. “Where do you get all that from?”

She coughed. “Just a guess. I imagine, being a mysterious stranger, it’s hard to come by actual friends.”

That was something he could talk about without getting too deep into his drunken feelings. “I… yeah. People define you by what you are on the outside and see nothing else. Don’t even take the time to see what’s inside, in your heart.”

Isabella was playing with her fries. “I know what that’s like. All I’ve ever been is a blood sucking parasite with a wand. Doing what you know you’re destined to do comes with a lot of sacrifices.”

“Absolutely,” Shawn agreed. His own cave of regrets came to mind, but he wasn’t drunk enough to share any of them.

next chapter

_______

taglist: @normalcyisoverrated-beyou @someoneunimportantxx @iloveshawnieboi @shawnsunflower @chillingbythesea @theprivatesmutacc