#i've only posted about them three times including this and every single time i manage to go 'hey did you know heath was originally meant as

[peridots-pixiwolf]

[Start ID. A green-toned drawing of two characters from an original universe, shown from the shoulders up. It's framed as though they're taking a selfie. On the left is Heathrow, a human with dark skin, long hair, a good number of facial scars, and two painted lines below each eye. He wears something akin to a green hoodie, with fluffy plant matter sewn into the back of the hood. On the right is Crassie, a half elf, which in this universe entails long pointed ears, a pair of short pale horns, a slightly rabbit-like nose and markings under her eyes. Her skin is olive-toned, sporting a couple distinct scars on her face and hand, and she's wearing what is essentially a bush and spiked glovelets. Both of them are smiling, Crassie a little bit wide-eyed and Heathrow with a fond expression. The background's a saturated green with the text "1 YEAR!". End ID]

A redraw-in-spirit of the post from last year's Feb 16 that introduced these two to my blog. It's their birthday :]

[superkooku]

Dionysus' iceberg

This post is what remains of an initially very long rant idea. That means there will probably be a part 2 😏.

Here's the reason for my title :

In theory, you can stop there since my meme pretty much summarizes my complaints. But since I like ranting, I'll continue 😈

The tip of the iceberg

When you think "Dionysus", which words come in mind first ?

Probably "wine", "party", "alcohol" "fun god".

These words are what most people remember about Dionysus. And yes, I'm not going to deny, they fit.

Unfortunately, my problem comes with the fact that 9.5 times out of 10, Dionysus' personality will exclusively revolve around these aspects.

Since the issue is about modern adaptations and perceptions, I'll use a modern term.

I'm sure most of you are familiar with flanderization, right ? If not, the link to TV Tropes' article on the subject is available.

Many adaptations fell into that trap for, I think, every single Olympian.

Hades, god of the dead, lord of the Underworld = Satan, evil death god, darkness and sorrow

Aphrodite, goddess of love and beauty = Superficial bimbo who only cares about her pretty face

Zeus, king of the gods, lord of the sky and thunder = 100% pure God OR more recently : evil king god who constantly abuses women.

The gods are stripped of their complexity to fit simpler and more "digestible" characterizations. It doesn't help that the cultural context surrounding them is also taken away...

But this is about grape boi, right? Well, Dionysus is no exception to that rule. In fact, he might be one of the worst cases.

So far, he was never really portrayed in an "insulting" light, like Apollo in Lore Olympus or Hades in the Percy Jackson movie. Fortunately.

But, from all the popular adaptations I've seen, none of them manage to portray Dionysus ! None ! Does that make them automatically bad ? No, of course. It's just something I noticed.

God of war ? Doesn't appear, only mentioned

Disney ? Don't even try 🤣. Just a drunk goofball. Yes, that includes the fantasia segment and Hercules.

Lore Olympus? Well, he's a baby for 99.99999% of the time, so it doesn't count. But he's still a quiet little Gucci bag for Persephone.

Hades I ? Just a nice guy. But hey ! He can give us useful boons ! And I like his sass.

Maybe he'll do more in Hades II. They're usually more accurate than most, right ? Though that's not a very high bar. And they know about Zagreus ! Surely that's a good sign, right ?

Nevermind...

Here's what all these adaptations tell us :

Dionysus is the god of wine, feasts and parties

He's an Olympian

He likes to get drunk and party 🥳

And that's it.

Again, I'm not blaming anyone, but if the myths stopped with those three points, wouldn't everyone wonder why he's even an Olympian ? I sure did when I was a kid.

We have the god of thunder, the goddess of wisdom and war strategy, god of music/arts/medicine/100 other things, the god of the oceans ! Many cool gods !

And some drunk dude. He's not given any particular power, except the power to stay super passive no matter the stakes ! If the story revolves about epic godly fights (which is often the case), he's absolutely useless.

Heck, Hades II even actively depicts him as a pacifist who can't handle war. While he's not physically a weakling, he sure psychologically is.

Why is this a problem ?

I am not going to beat around the bush: this gives us a very incomplete and incorrect perception of the god.

Even the things that aren't forgotten about him (like his link to wine) aren't explored.

The thing with Hades II (that's the last time I'll mention it) is that it tries to deepen the flanderized version of Dionysus. He's not stupid, but afraid. He drinks to forget his issues.

While this characterization can be very interesting taken separately, we must remember that this isn't an OC, but an interpretation of a cultural figure.

It must be accurate ! While I can accept some liberties, I think that those should mostly be an extension of the original material, not a total deviation.

Dionysus isn't a scared little boi or a stupid drunkard you can manipulate. In fact, that's quite the opposite. And he's not afraid to get his hands dirty.

(even if the "dirt" in question is the blood of his enemies).

Under the surface

Though it's rather "stuff you can find on Wikipedia". Or by reading the myths.

More about it in part 2 of the rant...

It'll be about theater, madness, travels, link between mortality and immortality and... pirates turning into dolphins.

The actual interesting stuff about Dionysus.

Edits :

1. Thanks to @st4riel-the-w1tchling for clarifying the situation about Percy Jackson. I made my own research about BoZ. My opinion is basically still the same. Again, nothing terribly offensive, but nothing that interesting for Dionysus either.

2. I made part 2 a while ago, might as well add it here :

[poisonandpages]

Part of my childcare course includes practical experience working in a local early years centre, so that started this week. Highlights so far;

One child asked me about 5 minutes in "what are those broken thing in your eyes?" Took me a minute to realise he probably meant light reflections and not like. Dreams.

On my first day a child gifted me a very small rock he found in the garden.

I've been given post-it notes with scribbles on that I was informed are "bus tickets."

I taught one child the phrase "silly goose". She refused to call me anything else for the rest of the day.

I heard the phrase "skibidi toilet" in the wild for the first time ever when a child said he was going to make one out of legos. I hated it.

I tried to help this same child process the idea of "If you insist on trying to climb into the lego bucket you're going to get legos in your boots." After the third time it happened he was still acting surprised.

I tried to guard a child who was having nap time in the quiet corner as some of the noisier kids wanted to play nearby. When I made the "shh" gesture at them with my finger over my lips, they repeated the gesture to each other and walked away with big, slow, deliberate steps in a way I can only described as "Scooby Doo walking." I then struggled not to wake the sleeping child by laughing my ass off.

I said "whoops" when one child fell over and now he says "whoops!" whenever anyone falls.

Multiple children seem to have become very attached to me and have said "I'll only do (x thing they're being asked to do by a practitioner) if you sit with me." One refused to get his nosebleed attended to without me.

I asked a child "What comes after three?" and he responded with "Lots." For a moment I just sort of knelt there holding four fingers up thinking "Well technically you're not wrong."

Two separate children on two separate occasions said "I love you" apropos of nothing.

A very quiet girl who has not liked me much so far because I keep asking her to not hit people when she's upset came up to me for a cuddle before pick-up time on Thursday.

The children were acting out stories and one child volunteered to act every single time. After every performance she would take the most exaggerated bow I've ever seen.

I managed to get a child who clearly has a developmental condition to go from screaming and throwing things to using sentences and moving very gently within a few days.

I have received a LOT of praise for how I've "handled" the children with additional support needs, which feels very weird because to my mind I'm just doing the bare minimum of talking to them instead of shouting at them.

I had my doubts before starting and I have since been hit by children running full pelt into my legs, had play-dough put in my hair and ears, been screamed at, and been open-mouth coughed on a whole bunch, but this week has cemented it for me; I love working with kids. This is where I'm meant to be.

[fundielicious-simblr]

Hey there! I’ve been a fan of the Collinses (and associates! lol) ever since you started posting. Now that I’ve begun my own blog, I have to say (with the utmost admiration and respect) I’m stunned that you’re able to manage so many damn families!

I’ve played plenty of fundie saves before, but always with a single heir per generation, which means I’m woefully inexperienced with rotational gameplay. It’s so difficult, especially when you have to juggle varying levels of fundie-ness between households, extended family relationships, constant pregnancies, timeline issues and taking posed/stages screenshots for posts on top of actual gameplay!

If you’re up for it, I would so appreciate any advice/tips/tricks you have to offer re: dealing with rotational fundie gameplay. Either way, many thanks for sticking around for so long and sharing your sims with us ☺️

Hi! I'm so happy that you enjoy the blog, honestly I've been doubting whether that many people read it anymore, I just keep posting for my own personal satisfaction. As usual I'm a rambler, so this is about to be a mini-thesis, which will be below the cut!

If there's anything that I can say to explain how I do it, it's that you should just plan. Plan, Plan, and Plan. I micromanage every little thing that happens in my sims lives, I have two saves: one for gameplay and one for taking pictures. This is so that I can be ahead in terms of the plot lines and pictures without having to rush the actual game. I've mentioned it a few times here and there, but I have this mega doc with literally everything that pertains to my sims. It's got their life stories, love stories, random facts like allergies, their birthdays, the 'outcomes' for labour and delivery which effect how many kids they have, what kind of jobs they work, etc. For planning I also have a mega note on my phone with each post and what I'll write for it, I plan what will be said and who will be included, and sometimes the outfits required for them to wear or whatever poses I'm going to need for the post. It's also where I dump future ideas that I'll eventually work into a post if I want to. Since weddings are a pillar of fundie life, I have a separate note with all things weddings, before I wedding I plan the outfits for everyone from the bride and groom and their parents to the bridal party. I assign the wedding a colour scheme and then assign different people different colours. I also plan which poses I'm going to do, which for the main couples is a lot since they have a lot of posts for their weddings. For side characters that only get one post for their weddings I'll usually do a whole photoshoot then just pick two or three pictures to post.

One thing that also helped was me putting them in categories like 'heir' 'part heir' or 'side character', that helps me prioritise whose stories to focus on and how much they'll be seen on the blog. Honestly speaking, there are some sims that I only interact with when it's time to include them in a storyline, for that I let the Neighbourhood Stories take over and check in from time to time when I need to add a kid to the family or dress them for events. Since I have two saves, what I've found myself doing is playing with the side characters in the 'picture save' so I don't lose any game time that I could be using to play with the main characters in the main save. For rotational gameplay in order to make posts, I select certain narrators and basically just rotate between them with select characters sometimes getting a post or two. For this generation I've got Adalynn, Valentina, Lana, Maggie, and Brittany as narrators (there may be more, but for now I'm sticking with these). With Lana marrying into Adalynn's family I'm experimenting with her showing us what life is like for those in Newcrest since Adalynn moved away from home when she got married. Right now I see her as an opportunity to include more side characters since she's married to the 12th child in a cohort of 13, so her experiences and interpersonal relationships will be different than the older siblings and we may see more other character involvement . Maggie and Brittany are seldom narrators, with Brittany only really showing up at Harvestfest to do her family catch up - though I'm also experimenting how to bring them into the plot a bit more because they bring the political drama.

Since pregnancy is involves the changing of time and seasons (and I play on a 4 day = 1 year system vs the game's 28 day year), I make very good use of MCCC and pause pregnancies so that I can have control of how they're documented. The way pregnancies will be documented depends on how I've labelled the characters, narrators will always have more focus on their pregnancies (even though Valentina is done having children she'll narrate the pregnancies in her family) and will share about other pregnancies in the family. Circling back round to the 2 game system, since the way I play is faster than the game's passage of time, once I'm done posing and taking screenshots in my picture save then I usually sit back and actually enjoy playing in the actual game save, where I will then rotate households depending on whatever mood I'm in.

Thank you again for being so nice! I hope this extendo reply is able to answer some of your questions, but if it doesn't then feel free to message me and I can see if I can help.

[xlii-60]

The Miscellaneous Bin - Will Paquin

Welcome to another type of review I'm looking to do on this blog- the miscellaneous bin! Named after the bin in record stores where some of the more random things go, this specific type of review will be dedicated to things that aren't exactly albums. Songs that only exist as singles, EPs, and maybe even general artist reviews will be filed under this, and so I'm starting out with an artist I've liked for a little while now, Will Paquin! I'm going to be talking about 3 of his songs, Circles, In Two, and Now You Know, but I genuinely adore every song he's put out so far.

Like a lot of people who listen to Will Paquin, I found him through TikTok, before I ended up deleting the app some time in 2021. The reason I included Now You Know rather than Chandelier, which was Paquin's first release after a TikTok of the initial guitar riff went viral, is because Now You Know is the song I found him through!

Immediately, the most recognizable aspect of Paquin's music, and what drew me to looking at his page just beyond the first clip I heard, is the style he plays guitar with. Starting from Samba guitar (and inspired by Baden Powell, Toquinho, and Luiz Bonfa), he uses a spiderwebby, delicate finger-picking that adds both a thrumming heartbeat and a lacy membrane to his music. Now You Know, released in February of 2021, takes a moment or two to get to that fingerpicking, and the lyrical content of the song is angry, frustrated, exploring the themes of making mistakes and having to learn the hard way. The opening lines of the song were all I heard at first, as I had managed to find the song just before its release, and I found it constantly stuck in my head, with the backdrop of that delicate, hypnotic guitar.

I've been following his music since then, though not directly through TikTok anymore, since I haven't had the app in years now. Of these three, the next to release would be Circles, in August of 2022. Circles jumps almost instantly into that familiar guitar, though unlike Now You Know's anger and frustration, Circles carries a sort of longing sadness, a feeling of searching and missing something. There's a piece somewhere that's dislodged, and it's beginning to drift away, but there's a grounding nature to the idea of someone in particular, keeping them in your mind, maybe to the point of obsession. It's a very beautiful song. I've included two of his newer tracks here because I enjoy all of his stuff but particularly enjoy the way his vocal style and musical style have developed alongside each other in the recent releases. Not mentioned in this post is his newest, Lightning, which is really incredible as well.

The last track I'll talk about in this post might be my favorite of the three, released in November of 2022, In Two. The track is more gentle than circles, almost feeling like you're being told some sort of secret. Paquin's vocals on the track are ginger, nearly whispered at times, creating a quiet, delicate bubble, as if you're being let in on something only a select few get to know. The lyrics of In Two seem to detail a somewhat codependent relationship as it begins to fall apart, especially with the chorus, "Half of me is half of you now, I'll have to cut myself in two." It's a heartbreakingly beautiful song, that feels as emotionally tender as the delivery of its lyrics.

Overall, I'd say, like I'm sure a lot of others would, that Paquin's finger-picking is one of the main things that drew me to his music, but the development of his style and his vocals, as well as his lyrical content, are the things that keep me coming back to listen again and again.

Here's some links if you'd like to check him out yourself:

Youtube

Spotify

Soundcloud

[letsplayzelda]

Hey Listen!

This is my Zelda sideblog to word vomit about my fav lil guys throughout the series. Here I go by Twilight and use they/them pronouns. I'm currently playing through Tears of the Kingdom rn and may post spoilers about it.

Anyways, here's a list of which games I've played (thoughts and word vomit included):

The Legend of Zelda: I've beaten the first quest! Did not 100% it bc this game was too hard for me to manage that. This forced me to have quicker reactions in games and I'm greatful lmao

Adventures of Link: I cannot for the life of me progress. I'm definitely overleveled for where I need to be, but Death Mountain simply bests me every time. I'm still trying tho.

A Link to the Past: I've played the opening, but that's about it.

Link's Awakening: Finished the Switch version! I wanna play the DX version at some point, but that probably won't happen until I play all the other games in the series at least once. I get a little depressed every time I think about Marin...

Ocarina of Time: I have played this game like three times. First on GameCube, then the 3D remake on 3DS, and then the N64 multiplayer mod. I plan on 100%ing it at some point, but I just dread doing heart containers and skulltulas. I wanna play Master Quest at some point too. Agh Link at the end of this game just makes me wanna sob.

Majora's Mask: Similar situation to OoT (I have the Collector's Edition for GC), except I never finished the original version. I've only beat the 3DS version. Recently started the multiplayer mod, but we've only done like 2 cycles.

Oracle of Seasons: I have the 3DS Virtual Console version, but I haven't played it yet.

Oracle of Ages: I played a little bit of this game, but it's been so long that I'll probably restart it when I plan to finish it.

Four Swords: I literally bought a used dsi to get this damn game. I've beat this game, but I've yet to 100% it. Kinda hard to bc it's not as fun playing it single player.

Wind Waker: Playing this game was such a treat. I played the GC version so sailing took literal ages but besides that, I rly enjoyed Tetra <3 tho Nintendo did her dirty. On the trend of beating games, I haven't 100% this one either. There's so many side quests that I simply cannot invest my time in. Like the Goron one? No clue what's going on there.

Four Swords Adventures: Ik there's a sub-fandom that rly loves this game but that's literally the most ik about it. I've yet to play it but I'll have to hunt down a copy at some point.

Minish Cap: oooo I fucking love this game. I haven't finished it yet, but that's because I got sidetracked by so many different things. I've wasted so much time trying to get all the figures it's insane. Plus this game is gorgeous <3

Twilight Princess: I played the Wii version of this game and honestly, I wished I didn't. Not bc I don't like this game, but because I did not like the motion controls. And this was the first time Link was right handed which is kinda lame. So I'll probably play one of the other versions of this game at some point. BUT, I adore the story in this game. Love Wolf Link and Midna. I literally cried at the end of this game, it was absolutely devastating.

Phantom Hourglass: I'm like halfway through this game I think. I'm not a big fan of it's controls or graphics, but I enjoy the follow up to WW. Also Linebeck's character development is very sweet.

Spirit Tracks: Once I finish PH, I'll play this one. Ik I probably don't need to, but I like following timeline stuff.

Skyward Sword: I played the Switch version and it's probably the only way I would've been able to get through it. I mainly played with motion controls but would switch to button controls for certain fights bc I was sick of struggling. Link and Zelda's relationship in this game is very cute. I also rly enjoyed the dungeons and getting more of Hyrule's history.

A Link Between Worlds: My second Zelda game ever, and I still consider it one of my favorites. Ravio and Hilda are some of the best characters ever. I can't remember if I 100% this game, but ik I got very close if I hadn't. If ALttP is as good as this game, I will probably love that game as well.

Tri Force Heroes: I've played some of this game, but I feel it suffers from a lot of the same issues as FS since no one ik has this fucking game. Have I finished it? No. Will I? If I can find two people to suffer through this game with me. I enjoy that the game doesn't take itself too seriously and has a bunch of fun outfits, but that's all I can rly say about it.

Breath of the Wild: My first Zelda game!! I've spent almost 500 hours in this game and still haven't 100% it. I'm at like 86% with just 150ish koroks left but now that TotK is out, it will be a while before I touch the game again. I fucking adore this game (although I hated it at first) and the relationship between Zelda and Link is just. Mwah. Mipha, Sidon, and Urbosa are my favs from this one <3

Tears of the Kingdom: I've been playing this since release day and have been loving it! It definitely fixes a lot of the weird quirks BotW had, but I'm finding I have more issues with this game so far. I'm at around 130 hours with 3 dungeons done so far, but I'll likely dive deeper into my thoughts once I finish the game.

[bratbarzal]

On Your Side (NH13) / Chapter Eight

Pairing: Nico Hischier x Fem!OC Poppy Jensen*

*I say it's an OC, it's just a name and third person POV. I use minor character descriptions because I don’t get on with writing vague reader inserts/YN for long-form, story heavy fics, but I will generally try to avoid including race and body type or really any physical descriptors. I’m always open to feedback on my writing, or how to be more inclusive.

WC: 18k (I need help)

Chapter Warnings: jealous!nico makes a tiny cameo lmao, fluff!!! it's everywhere!! like those pranks you see on tv where they put like honey on someone then send them through a door with a bucket of feathers hung precariously over the top. so fluffy. and little sprinkles of fake dating!! the best writing trope there ever was. poppy's family are a living breathing nightmare, so angst there including comments about food/weight/eating and just a lot of ignorance and judgement, and nico is her saving grace. repeatedly. that's all I've got.

Series Masterlist

Previous Part (Chapter Seven)

A/N: you know that meme of sarah paulson laughing at her phone in ahs and she looks like a clown that's me rn after finally finishing this!!! not a single thought in my brain in the 14 days since I posted the last chapter. no gender reveal in here it will be in the next chapter tho!! I didn't really want to time jump too much in one go or include too many milestones because I feel like I'd just be skipping stuff for the sake of it, and I wanted to dedicate a chapter entirely to one aspect of the pregnancy. I literally had one conversation in this pre planned and the rest came to me after DAYS of staring at a blank page lmao but I hope you all enjoy as always would love to hear any thoughts any feelings anything at all 💖

Nico

Coming to the realisation that he is seriously no good at the concept of baby steps takes Nico a grand total of three days. 

To give himself credit, it has been three long days of battling every instinct in his body to hover protectively in Poppy’s peripheral. 

The first day had been the easiest - mainly due to the fact he and Poppy spent it together anyway, her having the day off of work and him only having that morning training session and an afternoon practice after he had dropped her home. 

He had been able to shamelessly dote on her in the safety of his own home - he had ordered her in a late lunch, a giant caesar salad she had no chance of getting the whole way through and some sweet potato fries, and she hadn’t been sick again the whole time they had been together. They had sat with each other on the couch, creating a joint calendar where they could figure out when to book her first scan, and he had sat and watched her as she made the appointment, biting nervously at the skin around her nails until he pulled her hands away from her mouth to break the habit. 

They had marked the date in their phones, Friday 23rd, where they would both be at work but Nico didn’t have a game, and had given it the cryptic title of Blueberry Day in case anyone accidentally came across it, because that is how big Google had told Poppy the baby would be by then.

And it had been then that it dawned on Nico that he was now responsible for a pretty big secret, which made the second day almost unbearable.

The Devils hosted the Avalanche at home, and where he spent his evening dealing with the mammoth task of playing some of the greatest players in the league, and the team that had taken home the cup only two seasons prior, he had spent his entire day with the even bigger workload of keeping his mouth shut around his parents.

His mother, specifically, who had mastered the art of knowing her son like the back of her hand.

Keeping secrets had never been Nico’s strong suit. It’s probably the youngest child in him, he thinks, his siblings having tried every single trick in the book on his parents before he ever had the chance, and he never managed to perfect his poker face - especially when it came to Katja.

His mom, who had once told him she had memorised the depth in which he breathed in his sleep, and so she could always tell he was pretending when he curled himself up in bed with his hand tucked under his pillow, holding his beat up brick of a phone under it while he waited for updates from his friends on the latest football score-lines from across the European leagues, and faking snores when she came to check up on him.

She would always huff out a resigned sigh, would reach under the pillow and take the device from a clutch too tight for him to have been asleep.

“You can text your friends in the morning, Neeky,” She would say as she tucked his phone into her back pocket, levelling him with a knowing look when he peeked an eye open only to roll it at her astute observation skills. “You have school tomorrow, you need to sleep.”

But during the second day, when he had managed to grab brunch with his parents before he was shut away in preparation for the game, as much as he still feared being on the receiving end of that dissecting glare, he had to bite his tongue to keep his priorities in check.

He had promised Poppy he would move at her pace - baby steps and all - which means respecting her boundaries and only telling other people when she is ready to do so.

So when his mother had brought up Poppy, had asked how she was getting on after being sick, and how he was getting on after she had laid into him after his event the week before, he had told the whitest lie that he hadn’t had chance to check up on her yet.

He had rationalised it by telling himself it was the truth. He hadn’t checked up on her yet, that morning. Not until after brunch, when he had arrived at the arena and had made a bee-line straight for her office.

As much as he wanted his mom to know - wanted to share what could be the biggest thing to ever happen to him with the woman who gave him life, and wanted to see her reaction in person before she was to fly home in a few days - putting pressure on Poppy to tell her just because she’s in the country and will be leaving soon hadn’t exactly seemed like the best idea. Pressing her on it and coercing her into something she might not be ready for had felt unfair - especially given how patient she had been with him.

Only, when he made it to her office, and had heard the sound of her melodic laughter even through the closed door, and had opened it to see her sat across from Josh from PR, all other rational thought had left his head. He had to clench his free fist and bite his tongue to save from screaming the news from the rooftops - thinking there might be someone jumping the queue of who needed to know first.

“Nico!” She had shot up from her seat at his arrival, and he had thought his mind was playing cruel tricks on him when he had seen her eyes light up, but then the telling twist of her lips followed. She was happy to see him. Thank God. Calm down, he had told himself. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, I just,” his eyes had darted inconspicuously over to Josh, “I’m cutting it a little bit fine for training and I need to talk to you about the thing.”

“The thing.” Poppy had pressed her lips together in amusement, her own focus going back to the man sat on the other side of her desk. “Sorry, Josh, can I come find you later?”

“Of course, you know where I’ll be, Poppy,” Josh stood, “Good luck today, Nico,” he smiled as he passed him. “Go, Devils!”

Nico had jut his head as an acknowledgement, able to just about stop himself from outwardly cringing and rolling his eyes, muttering out a quick and direct, “Joshua,” as if that was any reasonable kind of response.

“You’re disturbingly bad at being subtle.”

“Yeah, well I was on the spot,” he huffed back, eyes narrowing at the chair that was supposed to be his, but now looked uncomfortable and worn. “How’re you feeling?” He had rounded the corner of her desk, instead, stepping more into her side of it and placing a strawberry smoothie he had picked up for her by her monitor before perching himself on the corner. She had still smelled a little like him, like she had used his shampoo when she had been over the day before and the scent still lingered in her hair, and he watched with bated breath as she chose to stand in front of him instead of sitting back down. 

“I’m fine,” she shrugged, arms crossing over herself as she leant against the wall directly in front of him. 

“Fine?”

It wasn’t that she didn’t look fine. She had probably looked the best he had seen her in a good few weeks - colour in her cheeks, hair down and brushed smooth instead of haphazardly pushed back, a soft gleam back in her eyes - but if his sister and mother had ever taught him anything of serious value about women, it would have been that fine never means fine.

“I’ve been resisting the urge to puke in my trashcan for a good hour at Josh’s cologne,” she had admitted, her lips twisting guiltily as if she hadn’t wanted to say anything even remotely mean.

“He smells that bad?” He hadn’t been able to help but tease, and had chuckled heartily when she leaned over to shove at his shoulder.

“No, it was just strong. I feel like I need to sniff coffee or something to reset my senses.”

“Do you want me to get you some?”

“No,” she leans back against the surface behind her. “I thought you were cutting it a little bit fine for training.”

“I am. Do you have plans for tomorrow night?”

“I do actually,” she had craned her head back, wistfully, but had only kept him sweating for a moment before adding, “I’ve made arrangements with my bathroom floor. Candles, Hozier playing, non-alcoholic rosé, I think if I can convince my brain that spending all my time with my head in the toilet isn’t that bad, the nausea will go away.”

“If anyone can reverse-psychology morning sickness, it would be you.”

The smile she had given him back was astute, head tilting from her position against the wall as she raised a brow at him. “Where do you want me?”

If only she knew the half of where he had wanted her. 

“My mom’s going home on Friday morning,” he had mirrored her stance, crossing his arms over his chest and spreading his legs just a little as he sat atop her desk, angling himself so that she was directly ahead of him. “They’re coming to my place for dinner tomorrow night, and she’s been on at me since last week about seeing you again, so I figured it would be nice if you were there.”

“She’s been on at you?”

“Neeky, you should see if Poppy’s free,” he had tried his best to respectfully imitate her voice, and had ended up sounding somewhere in between a muppet and a chipmunk. “Will Poppy be at your game tonight? Will she be at the game on Thursday? She’d probably extend her trip if you asked her to, I don’t even think she flew out to see me in the first place.”

“It’s because she knows.”

“She knows?” 

“Well, she thinks she knows,” Poppy had rolled her eyes affectionately. “She called me out back when you had the signing last week. I’d told her about how I wasn’t feeling or sleeping too great, and she assumed it was because I was pregnant straight away. She’s kind of the whole reason I ever thought to take a test in the first place, apparently you Hischier babies all wreak the same kinds of havoc in the womb.”

“Oh, God, please tell me she didn’t go into too much detail,” he cringed, his face curling up at the thought of what his mother could have possibly said to her - at the thought of her even jumping to that conclusion in the first place. 

“No, it was really sweet, actually.” Poppy hummed, smiling softly just at the memory, “I was trying not to freak out at even the thought of being pregnant, and she spoke about it like it was the greatest time of her life. Even after I told her I wasn’t, she made me feel like it would be okay if I was,”

“That explains why she laid into me after,” he scoffed in amusement, remembering in vivid detail the lecture she had given him as he drove her back to meet up with his dad after the event. “She bit my ear off the whole way back to her hotel about how I need to appreciate the good people in my life more.”

“Aw,” Poppy cooed, pushing herself off the wall and stepping into the space just in front of him, reaching to pinch his cheek gently and mocking him with, “Did Neeky get a telling off from his mommy?”

He had swatted her hand away despite his cheek curving into her touch, trying to suppress the smile teasing his lips at even the closer proximity. “She saw us talking before the event, noticed we weren’t exactly in the best place and she told me to sort things out before I lose you, basically.”

“Her manifestation skills are crazy off the charts,” Poppy had scoffed, gesturing to her belly and lowering her voice like she was sharing an inside joke, “You’re pretty stuck with me, now.”

“What can I say? She’s good.” He had succumbed to the grin that was tugging at each corner of his mouth, so big that his eyes began to crinkle in the corners, and Poppy’s own gaze had flickered down to it and smiled back instinctively. “So, dinner?”

“That depends,”

“On?”

“Are you cooking?”

Nico had sighed, rolled his eyes dramatically and levelled her with as straight a face as he could muster, ignoring the urge to crack a smile at the way her own lips twitched with mirth. “I’m a good cook, Poppy.”

“Of course you are.” She nodded in agreement. “Hell, if I had a particular affliction for plain chicken and rice every day of the week I’d actually say you’re the best cook in Jersey, and I grew up with a house chef!” 

“I’m good with vegetables, too.”

“Just what every pregnant girl wants to hear.” Nico had wished he didn’t find her sarcasm so endearing, she was making it too hard for him to defend himself.

“Why don’t you come over earlier, then? You can supervise,” he hadn’t paid any mind to how desperate he had seemed, pressing and pressing and relenting to her every whim like it was nothing. He’d long made up his mind that things would just be like that for the foreseeable future. “I’ll even provide the candles and the music you’ll be missing out on.”

“Now you’re speaking my language.”

“Is that a yes? I promise I’ll go easy on the cologne.”

“Yours is fine,” Poppy shook her head, affectionately, lips twisting like she had been caught out at something she had no intentions of admitting, “Okay, yeah, I’ll be there. It sounds nice, actually. I did promise your mom I’d catch up with her, too.”

“Perfect,” and only because he seriously was cutting it fine to get to their final practice skate before their game that evening, he had jumped up from the desk, pressed a fleeting kiss to the crown of her head, and parted with, “I’ll pick you up at 6.”

And despite how insistent he had been with her in her office, it had been the third day that opened Nico's eyes to just how nigh on impossible baby steps would be when it came to how far gone he was for Poppy.

It had started in his kitchen, where they had easily settled once he had picked her up from her apartment after work, and the two of them were prepping vegetables to roast for the pasta sauce. Poppy had been laughing at the way he cried while cutting onions, he had been laughing at the way she frowned when she noticed the wine in the corner he had bought specifically for his parents, and they had conversed with ease the whole time as she cut the peppers and he cut the tomatoes - sharing stories of cooking with their families as children; specifically how Poppy used to spend her weekends with her grandmother, and would follow her around the kitchen like a magnet.

“Are you excited to tell her?” He had asked, leaning against the counter after putting their vegetables in the oven to roast and drying his fingers off with a hand towel. 

“I think so,” she had hummed in response, “More than I am to tell my mom, that’s for sure. I think I’m gonna put it off for as long as I can.”

“You don’t think she’ll be happy for you?”

She could only scoff at that, avoiding his gaze as she fiddled with her own fingers, inspecting her nails and shrugging. “She’ll find some way to make me feel bad about it.”

“Why would you feel bad about it?” His heart had sank at the thought - beyond the initial panic and fear at telling him the news, Poppy had been nothing but excited since. Disregarding the ever-present nausea and the exhaustion, she seemed to be running on the fumes of happiness the past few days, their shared secret eliciting subtle smiles whenever their eyes met at work.

“I know that I shouldn’t,” Poppy settled into the counter to the side of him, her posture slumped and defeated, “But she won’t understand it. She’s really old fashioned with stuff like this, and as proud as I am of what we’re doing, and how we’re dealing with this, she’s gonna turn it into something ugly. Lawyers and custody agreements and all those scary, official, set-in-stone kind of things.

And I realise that technically we should be agreeing on all that stuff if we’re not together, but I don’t want to ruin what we’re doing. The whole baby steps thing doesn’t exactly work when we have to pay people to figure everything out for us, you know?”

“Yeah, that makes sense,” he had tried to keep a reassuring tone, despite the heavy weight that settled on his chest - a sense of impending doom cast over the two of them like a fast approaching dark cloud.

The thought of being on the other side of a nasty custody battle against Priscilla Jensen had made his heart do that hollow kind of thud in his chest. The kind that rattled and stuttered and filled his entire body with unrelenting doubt. The woman had hated him since the first moment she ever laid eyes on him, and that was before the possibility that he could have her grandchild snatched from her clutches in some court order.

Not that he ever would, but it wouldn’t stop the obviously insane thought from crossing her warped mind, and her doing everything in her seemingly unlimited powers to stop it happening.

“Maybe we should just tell her that we are together,” he had said it before even thinking it through, but as soon as the words left his mouth, some of that doubt had eased.

Surely it would lessen the blow, he had thought, if her mom knew that she was in a loving, committed relationship. That this wasn’t some mistake they would both come to regret and resent, or that there would never be an instance in which Nico could ever do anything so spiteful to Poppy as to interfere with her or her family’s rights to their baby.

Poppy’s brows practically met her hairline, shooting up in surprise, her eyes darting to meet his in alarm. “You think that we should pretend we’re a couple? To my mother?”

“It’s not like we wouldn’t pull it off,” he had shrugged, again feeling more comfortable the more the idea fully formulated in his mind, his shoulders straight and his tone fuelled by bravado. “She knows who I am, we’ve been in each other’s lives for years, we’re gonna be in each other’s lives for a long time, we would barely even be pretending, Poppy.” 

He could practically see the cogs turning in her brain, her head tilted, her eyes narrowed and a pensive pout pulling at her lips before she asked, “You’d do that for me?” Like he would be putting himself out. “Knowing what she’s like? Nico, you’re literally throwing yourself to the wolves.”

“I told you before, Poppy, I’d do whatever you need me to do,” he swore, “Even if that means looking your mother in the eye and praying I don’t turn to stone.”

When she grabbed the hand towel from the side and swatted him with it, he caught the fabric with a hearty laugh, his chest swelling with pride as he saw how much effort she was putting in to hold back a grin of her own.

“It’s not the worst idea,” she hummed, “I’ll probably feel less anxious about it if I can share the blame with you.”

“There you go,” he gave her a warm smile, like it was nothing at all for him to be on the receiving end of Priscilla’s wrath. Like the woman didn’t terrify him to his very core. “When should we tell them, then?”

He probably wouldn’t have asked if she hadn’t brought it up, but with his own parents coming over in less than an hour, he had thought he would be able to gather his wits about withholding the truth if he had a timeline for it.

“I don’t know, in a few weeks, maybe? You guys have that stretch where you’re close to home the back end of March, and my brother is coming over for Easter. Maybe if we do it while the whole family is around it might save an argument. Plus, I’ll be around 12 weeks then, I think I’ll feel better telling them when we’ve had those first couple of appointments and we know everything’s okay.”

“Whatever you want to do, I’ll be there, Poppy.” He reached over to clasp his fingers around her hand, which she swiftly turned in his clutch to interlace her own fingers with his. “What about mine? Ideally I’d want to tell my mom in person, but I don’t think she’s coming out for the rest of the season now after Friday.”

“Oh, yeah,” Poppy frowned, her gaze turning guilty as she looked up at him, “Did you want to tell her tonight?”

“Not if that’s too soon for you,”

“If anyone deserves to be the first to know, it’s her, I think,”

“Are you sure?”

And even though it had been the desired outcome, for him to get to tell his parents in person, to see their reactions and gauge their thoughts on it all, he would have held back if that was what Poppy wanted. He would have settled for a FaceTime call if he needed to.

“Yeah,” Poppy smiled, “She called it, I kinda want to see her reaction to be honest.”

“She’s gonna lose her mind.”

“In a good way?”

There was a flash of something vulnerable in Poppy that squeezed relentlessly at his heart - a childlike insecurity wherein she craved any kind of maternal approval, and he felt content in knowing she would at least get some in this instance. 

“Poppy, you don’t even want to know the half of the torture she’s put me through since she met you. The idea of you giving her a grandchild is like the second coming of Jesus or something. She’ll be on cloud nine.”

And despite the cute little snort she did, and the way her lips curved up in the corners, that vulnerability remained. 

“You don’t think she’ll be a little disappointed? Or your dad, even? Like I’m taking your focus away from what’s important?”

Important?

Nico blinked slowly as he tried to comprehend what she was saying, and where it had come from. 

Had he really made her feel like she wasn’t important? Like she hadn’t been his sole source of reprieve and release most days?

“Poppy, you’re important.” He said it with ease, but the weight of the words and how much he meant them pushed on him until he was stepping forward, until his hands gripped at the sides of her upper arms and he just about saved himself from rattling the message into her bones. “My parents know that more than anybody, more than even I do sometimes. There isn’t a single inch of them that would be disappointed in either of us, not for this.”

“Are you sure?”

He raised a hand to tuck her hair behind her ear, thumb swiping from her cheekbone up to her temple, “I’m positive,” he had hummed, “If it helps, we can tell my family the same thing we’ll tell yours-,”

“I don’t want to lie to your parents.”

Nico had always thought the way his parents loved Poppy was endearing - the way his father would ask about her work after he kept tabs on her projects with the Foundation online, the way his mother was always checking up with him about her wellbeing and what she was getting up to even outside of work - they had taken to her like she was their own, and he never had any worries or doubts about her being good enough to impress them. 

But the way Poppy loved them back - Poppy who had such fractious relationships with her own parents, who had never grown up with the reassurance that she would be loved and respected no matter what, or that whatever she ended up doing or achieving in life would always be enough - the way she embraced his mom and dad, had never shied away from their enthusiasm or made him feel embarrassed by their interference in her life, was something so precious he couldn’t even fathom the way it made him feel.

Poppy, who has always cared so much about him and his family, that the thought of being dishonest with them had turned her stomach.

“How about a half truth, then?”

“What do you mean?”

“We love each other, right?” She had nodded without any hesitation, and despite the fact that she had told him before, he feels warmth and relief pool in the pit of his stomach. “And we’re figuring out how this is going to work for us, right?” Another nod, and the gentle flutter of her lashes as she maintained eye contact. “Then I don’t think it’s a lie to tell them we’re together. And it helps with the overlap in case our families cross paths down the line, I don’t have to ask mine to bend the truth.”

“Is that what we’re doing? Bending the truth?”

“I think so,” he breathed, confident in his convictions that they weren’t going to have to lie. 

He loved her, she loved him, they were together in the sense that they had each other’s backs in a situation that had the potential to turn their whole worlds upside down. His parents didn’t need to know that he had hurt her before that, had messed things up so bad that she had no faith in his word that he wanted to be with her - but he knew that could be resolved. He felt it in his bones, knew in every fibre of his being that he could prove himself to her. They just needed time.

Time without interference from anyone else that there was an ever-looming deadline on those decisions.

Baby steps. Their own way.

“You don’t think she’ll catch us out?”

He tried to move swiftly past the way his heart sank at the thought that Poppy would always feel like someone was trying to catch her out or prove her wrong. She didn’t deserve that, and thankfully, he knew she wouldn’t receive that from his parents. Maybe they could help him reverse that damage, restore her faith that there would always be people in his world that would be in her corner.

“She’ll be too relieved at the thought of having another daughter that she won’t even care, Poppy. Especially considering it’s you.”

“Okay,” she had breathed out, like a sigh of relief, “Do we need a plan? A backstory?”

He had broken out in a wide grin at the thought, laughter bubbling up from the depths of his chest and he couldn’t even feel guilty about the way she arched her brow, unimpressed and concerned at the same time. “Poppy, we have a backstory. Don’t overthink it. We’re not lying, remember?”

She had started to smile back, bashful and sweet, and he had to force himself to take a step back so that he didn’t do something stupid and impulsive again. 

And he had spent the hour after that until his parents arrived all but tying his hands behind his back to stop himself from touching her, settling for the occasional bump of hips as they moved around his kitchen and the knock of elbows as they set the table together, repeating the baby steps mantra in his head and growing more and more frustrated with every iteration of it.

Only after his parents had arrived and they all sat around talking once they had eaten did he let himself ease into his instincts, self-indulgently slinging an arm across the back of Poppy’s chair and relishing the pounding of his heart when she’d laugh so hard at something that she would lean back into it.

They were yet to broach the big news, deciding between them to wait a little into the night so that they didn’t have to answer too many questions, and Nico had held his breath every time his mother started onto a new topic, just knowing she would be the one to prompt the conversation somehow.

“You know, Poppy,” she had leaned onto the table, pushing her glass of wine forward as not to spill anything, and had given her the kind of smile Nico associated with the gushing, proud speeches she would blurt out after long bouts apart. Where she would get sentimental and sappy and he would pretend it embarrassed him but really it stirred the kind of gratification he longed for when he was homesick. “I’m so glad we got to sit down and do this, I was worried after the last time I saw you we wouldn’t get the chance before I left.”

“Me too, I really appreciated your help back at the event, I figured I couldn’t let you go home without us seeing each other again, and it’s been really nice to catch up on everything.”

“It really has, I’m happy you could fit us in. I was telling Rino how I threatened you not to hang out with him without me when I’m gone next week.”

“I was hurt you agreed so easy, Poppy.” Nico’s father had chided in faux-outrage, with a fond roll of his eyes.

“You can’t call dibs on Poppy, Mom, especially if you’re pouncing on her when she’s sick.”

“I did no such thing!” Katja had gasped, and Poppy had leaned so far back that her head was resting just beyond the inside of Nico’s elbow, no intentions of sitting up or moving, watching his parents with an affectionate beam that lit up her entire face. “I gave her advice on how to feel better! And look at her now, glowing!”

“I wouldn’t go that far,” Poppy scoffed, “I’m probably a couple months from the whole glowing thing.”

He had felt her go rigid against him as soon as she said it, had tried to rub comfortingly at her shoulder to ease the tension as she looked up at him in alarm - hoping he could telepathically communicate to her that everything was going to be okay.

“A couple of months?” Katja questioned, her brow quirking in the same way Nico’s would whenever he was confused, or weighing up different possibilities in his head.

Poppy’s eyes stayed on his, apologetic, questioning, seeking his approval, and all he could do was smile as he looked down at her, letting the lopsided grin that was twitching at the sides of his mouth take over before he gave a quick nod, letting her take the reins on this.

“Uhh,” she turned back to face his parents, smiling nervously as she looked between them before settling on his mother. “You were right, before, about the dream thing.”

Nico watched as his mom’s lips turned up, the all-too-familiar knowing glint in her eye that only ever shone when she was proven right. The smile took over slowly, until her eyes wrinkled in the corners, and her nose scrunched in delight. “You’re pregnant?” 

Poppy could only nod, and Nico felt his heart swell three times bigger as her face transformed with unadulterated joy.

When she had told Nico, she had been afraid. She had been scared of his reaction, and fearful of what the future held, and he felt proud to know that she didn’t feel that way, anymore. Not in that moment, at least. Her features shone with lighthearted elation, and he could feel his own morph to mirror them.

“Oh, Poppy,” his mom had cried out, her own eyes welling up as she shot up from her seat and rounded the table, “That’s so wonderful!”

He watched tenderly as the two of them embraced, Poppy standing and melting into his mother’s arms, Katja rubbing at her back and most likely squeezing her - a feeling he knew all too well.

And when he looked over to his father, he found him already watching him, and met his eyes immediately, the corners of them crinkling and his lips curved into a soft, perceptive smile that communicated a thousand feelings. Pride, congratulations, acceptance, excitement.

Nico had hoped when Poppy got a good look at Rino, she would see the same - see there was never any need to pretend, any need to lie, that the truth sat between them all comfortably in the shape of familial, unconditional love and support.

“Tell me everything,” Katja had parted with her hands on Poppy’s arms, holding her in front of her with eyes full of wonder, “Nico never said you were seeing somebody.”

“Oh, I-,” Poppy had gawked.

“Mom-,” Nico had sighed.

“Kat,” Rino laughed heartily from across the table. “Don’t be silly.”

With Poppy still grasped in her arms, Katja looked between the three of them. Poppy’s guilty smile, her husband’s amused chuckling, the expectant pressing together of her son’s lips.

She had glanced between Poppy and Nico, doing the math in her head before she gasped. “You two?”

He nodded from behind Poppy, watching her body stiffen in anticipation of a bad reaction, his cheeks starting to ache already from the joy pressing into them. 

“You’re having my grandchild?” Her eyes had gone round, glassy in an instant, and Nico couldn’t remember the last time he had been able to share something with her that brought her this much happiness. She had always been proud of him, but this was something else, entirely. “I knew there was something going on!”

“You didn’t know,” Nico scoffed, standing to rescue Poppy from his mother’s excited shakes, pulling her into his own clutches and pressing a kiss to the crown of her head. His hand had inched by default from her hip bone inwards, thumb and fingers cradling the unchanged curve of her belly, but the thought of the tiny seedling sprouting in there set sparks off in his own stomach.

“I’ve known you were hiding something. You’re a terrible liar, Neeky, you were breaking a sweat at brunch yesterday, pretending nothing new was going on,” Katja had pointed, her face morphing into sheer excitement as she shifted toward his father, “And I told you they’d end up together years ago!”

“Mom,” Nico had all but whined, unable to be truly embarrassed when he felt Poppy’s body sink back into his, the tension seeping from her bones as she melted into the moment - any previous anxiety or worries washed away by the fact his mother had come to the conclusion all on her own. There was no need for either of them to fabricate up some story or tell any half truths.

“She did,” Rino stood from across the table, circling around to congratulate the two of them, himself. “The first night we met you, Poppy, she said she had a feeling.”

“You really are good,” Poppy marvelled, her body vibrating with laughter against his. Comfortable, happy, cherished, just how he wanted her to be.

“No, I just know what’s good for my baby boy.” Katja cooed, reaching out to pinch at Nico’s cheeks affectionately before she took Poppy in her arms again, the four of them trading hugs between them like they were in an assembly line, his parents embracing her just like he knew they would, like she was one of their own, expressing their excitement with crinkled eyes and soft kisses to her cheeks.

In the almost 3 weeks that followed that night, baby steps had turned into what Nico could only describe as a misguided, drunken stumble - where he let unsteady limbs carry him in the wrong direction, but still somehow always ended up safe at home.

There had been the shameful Valentines Day incident, where he had built up enough blind courage to ask her over for another dinner date, and had been shut down before he could even properly propose it to her. 

“You doing anything tomorrow?” He asked when he had dropped by her office to offer a quick goodbye before the team flew out to Nashville, watching as her attention barely strayed from her computer, already so deep into her workload so early into her day.

“For Valentines?” She asked across the desk to him, “Oh yeah, I got men lining up down the block to take me out for a dinner I can’t keep down,” she scoffed, oblivious to the flash of something that had washed over him at the thought of her going on a date with someone else.

“Funny,” he gulped.

“Me and the girls usually do Galentines, like a boozy brunch kind of thing, but obviously I’m ruled out this year,” she broke from her typing to gesture at her stomach before going back to it, “Nia found a Paint’n’Sip near her apartment though, so that’s where I’ll be. Sans-sipping, of course.”

Nico had never struggled so much with the English language in one sentence than he had there.

“Galentines?”

Despite the embarrassment that had tickled his spine at asking, the way she smiled when she looked over to him made up for it.

“Valentines for the gals,” she pushed herself from her keyboard, giving her full attention over to him, then, “You boys really miss out on all the fun festivities, you should start a new one! Valen-guy-nes!”

“I’ll be sure to run that by the team on our flight later,” he scoffed.

“C’mon, that’s genius!”

And while he had never ended up asking her for that dinner, he had sent a bunch of flowers straight to her office, and reaped the rewards of his actions when she sent him a picture of two painted mugs beside each other on the Wednesday night, one with pink hearts and unfamiliar writing that said World’s Best Mommy-To-Be beside another, blue hearts with Poppy’s handwriting that read World’s Best Baby Daddy.

The latter end of that same week had been their Stadium Series game, one of the biggest events in the team’s calendar all year, and one he had been looking forward to since it was announced the year before.

The Devils organisation had set up their own celebrations for the guys to mark the monumental occasion, allowing them to bring their loved ones  out to East Rutherford to take part in a family skate. The guys were bringing out their parents, their siblings, their partners, their children. And Nico had wanted more than anything to bring Poppy.

He had followed up on what had now become a routine, dropping by her office that Friday when he arrived at the Rock with a red berry smoothie in hand, perching himself on the corner of her desk and talking through her plans for the day.

She had asked the same of him, knowing his father and sister would be joining him at the stadium, and wanting him to pass on her greetings.

“You could say hi, yourself,” he had said, head tilting as he watched her push back from her desk, her chair rolling to give her enough leverage to properly look up at him instead of half-focusing on her work. 

“We’re not really involved in the stadium stuff, now,” she had frowned, brows furrowing and her own head tilting in response. 

“Would you want to be?”

“Want to be what?”

“Involved.” He crossed his arms over his chest, surveying every iteration of emotion that crossed her face, before adding, “You could come out on the ice with us, for the family skate.”

“Won’t there be cameras there?”

He shrugged, having not put that much thought into that aspect of it. He just wanted his family with him, and she was a part of that now. “If there are, they’re following Jack and Luke, they’re not following me.”

“I think you underestimate how much people pay attention to you, Nico,” she had scoffed, “You get seen carting Bambi on ice around and people will start to ask questions.” She stood from her chair, fidgeting with her fingers as she stepped around him to busy herself with some unnecessary task to avoid the conversation.

“Would that be so bad? For people to ask questions, to know what we are?”

He was thankful for the smile that she gave, one of amusement.

“Nico, we don’t even know what we are.” She scoffed, “And as much as I would love to do it, I also kind of want to protect our peace for as long as we can.”

Protect our peace.

His mind had taken him somewhere he hadn’t wanted to go.

To private pictures being posted online, endless threads of vitriol and lies, and finding her in tears one day at the way her life had been turned upside down.

“Makes sense,” he agreed with a heavy sigh, his chest tightening as his thoughts spiralled. “I’m sorry, that was impulsive, I was just thinking about it and I wanted you to be there.”

He wanted what all the other guys had - to guide her around on wobbly legs and hold onto her for dear life as someone he treasured more than anything. He wanted to share this incredible thing with her, to stand in the centre of a stadium that could facilitate over 80,000 people and know she was the only one who could ever make him feel whole.

“It was sweet,” she reassured, her hand reaching out to rub soothingly at his arm as she stepped back toward him, “And I will be there tomorrow for the game. You just won’t get the pleasure of witnessing me make a fool out of myself on the ice quite yet.”

“Probably for the best,” he let his hand move between them, a curved finger stroking gently at her stomach, always relishing the reminder of what was in there, “I’ll get you out there one day.”

She smiled, big and bright, and his heart skipped a beat in his chest. “We’ll see.” She had said, like a promise, and despite him stumbling in his attempts to take another step in the right direction, he had still felt like he stuck the landing.

The weeks ahead had followed the same pattern.

Nico would suggest something to Poppy that fell just outside the remits of baby steps, she would find a way to shut him down - rejecting him with the kind of grace he wished softened the blow even the slightest, but didn’t - and he would go back to the drawing board on how to warm her up a little more to his attempts at moving the goalposts of their relationship.

And then, finally, Blueberry Day arrived.

Nico has circled the date in every diary he owns. The one on his phone, the little magnetised version attached to his fridge at home, the one he shares with his family in an online drive.

The date of Poppy’s first scan. 

He drops by her office to pick her up at lunch, having showered after his morning skate and freshened up enough not to cause concern when he takes her for something to eat before the appointment. 

They grab lunch together, Poppy’s morning sickness having subsided for the most part, only coming in the odd bout here and there and she no longer has to stress about certain foods aggravating her stomach. She’s now kicking into cravings - or, so she says.

Conveniently, it’s anything sweet - which helps his cause with the smoothie thing. She had directed him to a bakery nearby the clinic, and the two of them sit in the corner, Poppy trying her best to gulp down her water in preparation for the scan and chatting to him around mouthfuls of almond croissants and strawberry jam.

He tries to control his urges as he notices her press her fingers to her mouth when she watches him talk, cleaning them of the sticky sweet substance and batting her eyes at him like it’s nothing. 

3 weeks of taking things slow have done nothing but take a toll on him, every sense heightened when it comes to the girl in front of him - everything she does so endearing and captivating that he can’t remember the last time his heart wasn’t racing.

And when they’re sat in that darkened room together - her shirt raised to reveal the skin of her stomach, her fingers linked through his beside her on the bed, and both their gazes widened and glassy as they watch the slight staticky movements of a tiny peanut like figure on the screen in front of them - he feels like he is about to implode.

It’s a euphoric feeling if anything, unlike any emotion he’s ever felt before. That tiny peanut is theirs. Their blueberry. Their baby. And it’s still so small but is already occupying such a big part of his life.

He wakes up, and he thinks about it - anticipates his morning routine when the baby comes, getting up before Poppy, getting a bottle ready in the kitchen while he makes himself a coffee, getting the first feed out of the way so that she can sleep in. He goes to work and he thinks about it - one day carrying his little mini me around the arena, pointing out all the corners of the building in which he and Poppy became what they are now, what they could be in the future. He goes back to his apartment and he thinks about it - about a floor littered with toys and books, laughter bouncing off the walls, joy emanating from everywhere he turns in a place that had never felt as much like a home.

And his chest aches with optimism and longing.

It aches so much that when they get their little printouts of the scan, monochromatic stills of the ever-growing life in Poppy’s belly, he can’t stop himself from looking at it every chance he gets. 

How he manages to lose it is beyond him - but it arouses a panic like nothing he’s ever known. 

When he’s in the locker room after a game against Montreal, adrenaline still pumping through him to suppress the incoming ache of his body, he reaches into the pocket he knows he had stored the picture, only to come up short. He waits until the room has emptied, the boys trickling out annoyingly slow as his stress levels increase, before he gets on his hands and knees to look for it. 

He had it before practice earlier. He’d swiped tenderly at the curve of it’s little body as a calming practice, the picture grounding any nerves he had for the game later in the day. And after that, he had been too into his routine, and too surrounded by his unknowing teammates, to get it back out again. 

“Are you looking for something?”

He’s on all fours like a dog in the locker room when Poppy finds him, completely forgetting the two of them were going for dinner to talk about the next appointment. He turns to see her leaning against the open door, observing him with a quirked brow and a gaze that is a combination of amusement and accusation.

“I’m-,” He’s still a little out of breath from the game, and from darting around like a mad man in search of the small square of photo paper. He feels out of sorts in so many ways it’s a surprise he hasn’t blown up in some sort of catastrophic meltdown - hair still slick from his post-game shower, which he feels like he dressed too quickly after, the seams of his t-shirt twisting awkwardly around his elbows. “I’m good.”

He doesn’t want to stress her out. 

“You’re good?” Poppy asks, stepping a little further into the room, nose scrunching only slightly as she tries not to breathe too much in through it. Testing the limits of her dwindling morning sickness shouldn’t be subjected to the various smells of the locker room.

“Yup,” he gives a guilty smile, standing up from where he was crouched and dusting himself off. “Couldn’t be better.”

“Really?” She steps closer.

“Uh huh,” he stands firm.

“Not even if you had this back?” She holds the sonogram between two fingers and extends it out to him, and he practically charges over to close the distance to take it back and examine it closely. 

Monochrome. Peanut shape. Poppy’s name in the corner. 

“How did you get this?” He turns it to look at both sides, as if she would have written her name in sharpie on the back. “It isn’t yours?”

“No, mine is safely locked in my car where it can’t be dropped for the whole building to see.” She’s still smiling despite the condemnation, her head tilted and lips twisting with mirth as she takes in his flustered appearance. 

“Who saw it?” He winces in preparation for the answer, praying to whatever God is out there to please not let it be one of the brothers.

“Timo,” she tells him, thankfully deciding to put him out of his misery already instead of dragging it on. “He’s very excited.”

“Fuck,”

“Yeah,”

“Why didn’t he-,”

“He seems to be very into finding new ways to make you suffer, I think. I just bumped into him on his way out, he was really happy with himself.”

He and Timo have been fine ever since their blip back on his birthday, he had thought. Clearly not fine enough.

He’s in for it the next time Nico sees him, he thinks.

“He’s supposed to have my back.” Nico pouts as his thumb swipes at the picture, his lips slowly softening into a smile as the gesture calms him once more. “I’ve done so well not telling anyone, and if he just gave this back to me, you’d never have known he found out.”

“Oh, I’d have known, he can’t hold his waters to save his life,” Poppy scoffs, watching as Nico goes to grab his jacket and get his phone and keys. “Probably for the best he came straight to me or someone else would have noticed him getting giddy and we both know he would have blabbed.” 

“He’s a traitor.”

“He’s your best friend,” Poppy smiles as he frowns, thick eyebrows curving down until a little line forms between them, and she reaches to smooth it out from sheer instinct. “Now we both have someone who knows.”

“My entire family knows, Poppy,”

“Yeah, but do you don’t see them everyday, it’s different,” she shrugs, and when he realises she doesn’t actually mind it, the tension releases from his shoulders. “Plus, I’m actually conspiring to steal your parents so they’re our family now that I have the perfect in.”

“They’d go willingly, I’m not sure that’s stealing.”

“And now that Timo knows about little Cheeto, you have someone you can get excited with. The perfect distraction.”

“Cheeto?”

“Yeah, ‘cause it looks like a little Cheeto in there.” She steps straight in front of him, the picture between them, and she traces a pointed finger around the shape. His eyes follow the movement, their arms bumping, and he looks down just as she looks up at him.

“I’ve been calling it Peanut.”

Her lips twist. “That’s lame,” she nudges at his side, “We’re gonna have to work on your creativity before it comes. I can’t have you naming our baby something boring.”

Her eyes sparkle in amusement, and he likes the way his stomach flips at the mention of our baby.

God, he wants to kiss her - the lingering twist in his gut at her previous rejection be damned.

“I thought Peanut was cute.” He tucks the photo into his pocket and slings an arm around her shoulder as they make their way out, their steps syncing as they walk toward the exit - Poppy making no effort to shrug away.

“Cheeto’s cuter.”

“Fine, Cheeto it is.” He relents immediately, because he had realised something the second he and Poppy saw the little Peanut-Cheeto hybrid forming in her belly. 

He doesn’t need to move the goalposts or make efforts to convince her of anything. Acquiescing to her every whim is the least he can do for the girl who’s building their future. He can revert to his old ways, with the kind of easy conversation and familiarity that lay the foundation of something bigger. Something better.

As long as she keeps giving him moments like this, with soft, devoted smiles and tender glances that say more than a thousand words ever could, he’ll go at whatever pace she wants. 

Poppy

Poppy has convinced herself that there is an ever-evolving part of her brain that is actively praying on her downfall. 

It’s the only logical explanation for why on Earth she would ever keep a man like Nico at arms length, she thinks, because ever since she told him she was pregnant, he has been some sort of godsend, showing up for her in every possible way.

It had started with smoothies in the mornings - he would bring them to her everyday, or have them dropped off if he wasn’t around. Had tumbled then into getting lunch delivered to her office, always fine tuned to when she might be hungry, or what she might be hungry for - even when he was on the road and hadn’t seen her in a couple of days. It was followed by texts to cheer her up when she started to miss him a little, or when she was overwhelmed with emotions for whatever reason - she felt like he just knew her like the back of his hand.

It made it all feel so easy.

And he had been attentive to the newly acquired hormones without even being aware of it. The smallest ticks he has always had, the pushing back of his hair, the crooked smile that presses one side of his cheek up when he knows he’s being funny, every shift of his muscles when his arms fidget as he speaks, have all all managed to settle the bubbling in Poppy’s stomach that had her yearning for physical touch.

He had even been helping her in weird, subliminal ways. 

When his mother had told Poppy that while she was pregnant with Nico, she had movies playing in her head the whole night while she slept, she thought she was being hyperbolic.

But, God, had her dreams been intense. 

And it probably hadn’t helped that first night after she told him - after she had slept in his bed the night before, had used his shampoo in the shower despite him buying her her own, and had even spritzed his cologne on the sleeves of the hoody he had loaned to her - that she retired to her own bed wearing that same hoody and keeping her hair down for once through the night.

She was enabling herself at that point. Encouraging her own mind to dream of him by flooding her senses until it had no other choice. But the dream she had when she had slept over at his place was a lot nicer than the ones from before, and she wanted to try and replicate the circumstances.

He had been enabling her too, though - and sometimes she had thought he knew exactly what he was doing. 

It had started with their game at MetLife stadium - more specifically, those God-forsaken outfits he and the guys wore to arrive in. She had sworn when she’d first seen him in it that he’d chosen it specifically to be dream-fodder. She could foresee many restless nights tossing and turning in her sheets, visions worsening with the vivid mental bank of pictures she saved of him in that tank top, the chain she had gifted him slung from the neck, thick muscles and broad shoulders-

And that had only been from a picture.

She’d gone to the game with Nia, who had flashed her phone to Poppy with a quick quip of, “They look straight out of The Sopranos,” and it had been a tweet of the boys on the carpet.

She had only seen him at that point - the image burned into her retinas as she nodded and hummed along to whatever her best friend had been saying up until the point the team came out onto the ice.

And then he had scored within the first minute, and she had watched a stadium full of people erupt into mostly-celebration for the man who held her heart, who’s baby she was carrying in her belly, and her whole body had buzzed with pride.

She got to watch him thrive on the largest stage he’d ever played on, and she had started to feel weirdly possessive and uncharacteristically regretful.

He had tried to share some part of this with her when he’d asked her to come out for the family skate, and she had turned him down.

And it was with that regret that she decided to meet him after. She brought Nia for protection, flashing her staff pass to get the two of them to the designated family lounge at the stadium, where Nico’s dad and sister were waiting for him, too.

She got to introduce Nia to the two of them, that immediate circle of people being some of the only people in the world to know the true extent of her relationship with Nico, and so when they finally reunited, and he swept her up into his arms, taut muscles wrapping around her still vibrating frame, she let herself melt into him. Let herself bask in his touch for as long as she could withstand, pressing her face into his chest and circling her arms around his torso, holding out to hear the rampant thud of his heartbeat.

And he had been so happy that it felt contagious. Spread onto her like a lingering fever, that she didn’t actually want to shift. It remained for weeks, flooding into her bloodstream when she needed it the most.

When she became emotional out of nowhere, when she became fearful or stressed for no reason, she thought of him - of his unwavering support, of the ease in which he cared for her, cared about her, and she relied on that to get her through most days.

And most nights.

Dreaming of him in that tank top, or out of it.

Dreaming of him in her bed, on her couch, in her kitchen - every corner of her apartment tainted in the best possible way - and it ended up being the only thing keeping her resolve in tact.

In her dreams, she never held back. She never thought too much about things, just let pure intuition and desire take over. Instead of stepping back, instead of pressing that restrictive hand to his chest, she pulled, she gripped, she held on for dear life.

Because as long as she could have him in her dreams, she didn’t have to give in to him in person. She could maintain her insistence on taking things slow, on figuring things out in their own time, without all the intensity and pressure of rushed intimacy. She no longer had to overthink every interaction, able to take his word at face value, and lose herself in the familiarity of their teasing back and forth.

And in reality, when he flashed her one of those dimpled smiles, or let his darkened gaze linger on hers for so long it made her breath stutter, she didn’t feel like she was about to fall.

Not in a bad way, at least.

He just has an innate ability to make things easy for her. 

When she had her first scan, he could have made it hard on her. Could have let his nerves overshadow hers, could have asked a bunch of questions that scared the living crap out of her, but he had let her take the reins. He did the same with his parents - let her bask in their praise and adoration, never made her feel guilty or selfish for the way they kind of made that moment about her instead of him.

And, as they make the drive to her parent’s house over in Alpine, he does the same - distracting her with questions about them and their lives to fill the heavy silence - quelling her anxiety with lighthearted jokes and genuine interest in her family.

He asks her about her brother, who he had met briefly one time before in passing, but who she rarely sees - and she tells him about his family, his wife and their two boys, who are coming over from the West Coast for Easter and who he will meet when they get to the house.

He asks about her nephews, about her bond with them, and she gets to tell him that, despite her rocky relationship with her brother, his wife Kimberley often FaceTimes her with updates on the boys, and she’s managed to maintain some semblance of a connection through a phone screen with them.

He reluctantly asks about her mother, and Poppy ends up being the one to really delve into that minefield. 

Only, this time when she talks about it, there isn’t the same heaviness she had felt when they first proposed telling her - all those weeks ago back in Nico’s kitchen.

There’s trepidation, but there isn’t fear.

“She might not be horrific to be fair. She loves Easter. And Oli’s here with the kids so she can’t be as awful to me as usual if she still wants them to think she’s their gentle unassuming grandma.”

“And you’re gonna be on your best behaviour so she’ll stay in a good mood, right? Play along so she lowers her guard?” he asks, sending her a sidewards glance.

“Ha, you wish!” Poppy chuckles, “I have a whole list of sickly sweet nicknames in my head for you that are gonna drive her up the wall. She hates that lovey-dovey stuff. You can’t take my one source of fun from me, Nico.”

“Poppy, that isn’t gonna help me win her over.”

“That ship sailed a long time ago, baby,” she makes a mocking kissy face at him, and something fizzes in her gut at the flush that swarms up his neck.

“Fine, what about your dad, how do I win him over?” Nico glances quickly over to Poppy, one hand in control of the wheel and the other drumming slightly on his lap in time to the low hum of music playing in the car. “Is he a hockey guy?”

“God no,” she scoffs, her body angled toward his, legs bent so her knees are toward the centre console and she can watch him as he drives, looking out the window for an extended period still making her feel a little sick. “No offence.”

“I want to say none taken,” she likes that she can see the indent of his dimples still from this angle.

“Not a hockey family,” she sighs. “Do you know anything about football?”

“I know a lot about actual football.” Another quick glance over gives her a quick glimpse of the flash of amusement in his dark eyes, warmth and familiarity bubbling in her stomach.

“What does that even mean?”

“Soccer, Poppy.” He corrects, that almost-instinctual sour face he pulls whenever the word doesn’t quite taste right coming from his mouth tugs at his brows. 

“Absolutely not,” she cautions him, straightening in her seat, “He has this stupid story about how Ronaldo once stole his table at his favourite restaurant in Turin, and I don’t want to have to hear it again. I’m not even sure it was actually him, but either way, he hates soccer.”

“Noted.” Nico chuckles.

“Golf?”

“I like it, I’m not the best, though.”

“Do you know enough to hold a conversation?”

“Does that not risk him wanting to play?”

Poppy reaches toward the screen in the middle, tapping away the warning that comes up on the navigation for impending road works, figuring the more delays they can encounter, the merrier - even though they’re probably not even 10 minutes away by now.

Maybe all the roads can just close down? She and Nico can do a swift u-turn and haul ass back to Jersey City. Where’s the harm in just texting her mom the news? She’ll get a lecture either way, she thinks.

“He likes winning, it doesn’t matter if you’re bad.” She shrugs, her head pressing sideways into the headrest as she again focuses on his profile. 

“What about tennis?”

“Ooh, perfect,” she cheers, “He loves Federer!”

“Really?” Nico turns, excitement in his eyes and a genuine smile twisting at his lips. 

“Yeah!” She responds, “I think so!” And when she actually does think about it, she realises she isn’t sure. “He goes to the Open in Queens every year, I can’t actually remember if he roots for anyone.”

“Real helpful, Poppy,” 

“You’re asking me how to impress my parents like I’ve ever even done it,” she scoffs, liking the way he shakes his head as if he’s trying his best not to find her funny. 

It’s helping. He’s helping.

Just like he had when she had been nervous to tell his parents - and that had turned out okay. He’d made her feel comfortable and supported, and even just doing this - driving her home, subjecting himself to the horrors of a Jensen family dinner and heeding none of the warnings she tried to give him - made her feel even the slightest bit better.

“My dad isn’t as hard as my mom, don’t worry about it.”

“I want him to like me.”

“My dad doesn’t really like people. He likes money and things like boats and cars,” she sighs, eyes following the movement of his other hand settling on the wheel, the flex of his fingers as he splays and stretches them out, the whitening of his knuckles as he tightens his grip back up, the glint that reflects from his wrist, “Ooh, and watches! You’re a watch guy!”

“I’d like to think there’s more to me than just being a watch guy,” he scoffs, and when she rolls her eyes in response, the view out of the window catches her eye, and that impending sense of doom fills the car once again. 

She could make the rest of the drive with her eyes closed. Just a few more turns until they make it to the gate, swirl up the winding driveway and arrive in the courtyard of her parents’ home, the grandeur of it all swallowing her up into a deep, vacuous pit of ignorance and facade.

Nico must notice the stiffening of her spine or the clench of her jaw, because she’s shocked back into the moment with the clasp of his hand around hers. 

“It’s gonna be okay, Mohn,” he reassures, but where Poppy would usually find his optimism endearing, this time it makes her feel worse.

He doesn’t know the half of it. 

He’s never had a reason to believe it wouldn’t be okay.

It had been for him.

His parents had been accepting, had welcomed Poppy with open arms and warm embraces, and God, was she thankful for that - but knowing he’s about to enter into this with blissful ignorance encompasses her with a sense of dread.

“Could you promise me something before we get there?” She asks, shuffling completely to face him in the seat, knees knocking against the centre console and her free hand falling atop where their others are intertwined. 

“If you’re gonna ask me to take the seat by your mother at dinner, then no,” he chuckles, and when he glances out the corner of his eye, and notices her demeanour, he squeezes her hand consolingly. “Sorry, go on,”

“I really don’t want you to think less of me when you see where I came from,” she chews nervously at the inside of her cheek as she watches him consider her words - watches the scrunch of his face, the furrow of his brow, the downturn of his lips. “Like, I know you’ve met my mom, and I know you think she’s scary, but you don’t know the full extent of it. I really don’t think this is gonna go too well, and you’re gonna see some pretty ugly stuff in there, and sometimes I don’t like who I am when I’m here so I need you to promise me that whatever happens, you won’t run afterwards.”

“I won’t run, Poppy,” he promises, relaying his sincerity in the soft swipe of his thumb over the back of her hand, and giving it one last squeeze before he adds, “I have a car. I’ll drive.”

And he’s lucky he’s driving, she thinks, because she throws his own hand back at him, frowning purposely and dramatically to mask a smile as he gives a hearty laugh, the vibrations of which settle deep in her bones, outweighing the anxiety that had been riddled in them before.

It’s enough that when they park up, and he helps her out onto the gravel while he gets their overnight bags from the trunk, she isn’t overcome with dread.

When he looks up at the overwhelming size of her family home, and his eyes widen and his jaw drops, she doesn’t fear judgement - not from him, at least. 

And once their bags are discarded by the stairs, and she takes his hand to lead him through the house and out to the sprawling garden she knows her parents and her brother’s family are gathered in, she doesn’t feel the need to turn and bolt back out the door.

Their hands stay clasped together as they greet her family. Her brother’s wife, Kimberley, being the first to come over.

She introduces Nico as her boyfriend, and it rolls off the tongue a lot easier than anticipated, the slight reassuring squeeze his hand gives hers easing any guilt she might start to feel over technically lying straight to her sister-in-law’s face. 

Her brother is next, their boys in tow, and then her father.

Her mother keeps a measured distance, narrowed eyes focused on the point where Nico and Poppy are connected, and when she makes her way over, her greeting is cold.

“You didn’t tell me you’d be bringing company.”

“I told dad,” Poppy shrugs, knowing her father would never have passed the message on if she called him during his daily newspaper time. He barely ever listened to her, his nose buried in the business section, and would just hum and grunt in response. “You remember Nico, right?”

“I don’t recall the two of you being together,” she frowns, again glancing down at their intertwined hands.

And, God bless Nico, Poppy thinks, as the poor, misguided soul tries to relay some kind of heartwarming sentiment to Priscilla, with, “We’ve been seeing each other for a little while now,”

“Seeing each other,” she scoffs, “I see my gardener every day, yet I’m not out here skipping around holding hands like children.”

“Maybe you should hold someone’s hand, a little physical touch and you might lose the stick up your-,”

“You have a beautiful home,” Nico squeezes Poppy’s hand once more, this time more like a warning. “Poppy never told me how magnificent it was.”

“Yeah, well, Poppy only seems to think she should feel shame about her home life. She doesn’t understand the amount of work or effort it takes to maintain something like this.”

“Oh, I-,”

“Leave it, babe,” Poppy sighs, tugging on Nico’s hand as she tells her mother, “We’re gonna get something to drink.”

And as she pulls him to safety, toward a table where pitchers of lemonade and water sit, he rolls his shoulders and lets out a huff.

“Has she ever tried leading with hello?”

“My mother doesn’t do niceties, Nico.”

And as the day winds on, Priscilla Jensen does little to prove that theory wrong.

Poppy thinks she’s going out of her way to make Nico feel like an inconvenience - and while she knows she had been childish in not telling her mom directly about his attendance, she had done so with the knowledge that there was always more than enough to go around in the Jensen house - so when she makes little effort to accommodate his presence, Poppy amps up her own efforts to get on her mother’s last nerve.

When they all sit around the table outside for a light lunch, and there isn’t enough seats for everybody, Poppy takes one for the team and perches herself on the arm of Nico’s chair, one arm slung around his shoulders and the other feeding him bites of the sandwich they’re sharing because his hand had taken up residence on her waist.

Whenever anyone has a story to tell, an anecdote or a recap of recent events, Poppy uses the time to insert little quips about Nico. About his experiences travelling, about his life, or about his successes in his career - giving the family who only care about themselves and their own reputation no other option but to learn about him. When her dad tells stories of his recent trip to Prague, Poppy chimes in with “Nico and the team will be playing out there in October, isn’t that right, babe?” And when Kimberley and Oli speak about taking their kids skiing in the Alps, Poppy suggests that Nico give them recommendations.

When her mother demands her to help with another round of drinks, and has only gathered enough glasses for the guests she had originally accounted for, Poppy makes a point of gathering one more. 

And when the festivities start, she recruits Nico in helping her nephews find all the eggs in the hunt - figuring if she has any chances of charming anyone, it would be the boys. And what would annoy her mom more than her grandchildren worshipping the ground Nico walks on?

Nothing.

As little effort as annoying Priscilla Jensen takes, it ends up exhausting Poppy quicker than she had anticipated, and so she ends up folding into Nico’s side while he tries his best to keep up in conversation with her dad and brother. It’s where she stays for almost an hour, still perched on the arm of his chair despite the seats that have since freed up, until her legs start to get restless.

“I’m just gonna run to the bathroom,” she whispers to him, their noses bumping when he turns his head and whispers pleadingly in response for her to be quick.

She travels through the halls with a pep in her step, having enjoyed her afternoon grinding her mom’s gears, and even though she knows winding her up isn’t going to pay off too well for her in the long run, the short run victories are worth it for the time being - alleviating the bubbling panic in her gut, even if just temporarily. If it wasn’t for her pettiness, all she’d have to think about is her nerves around telling the big news - and she’d soon get swallowed whole by her mom’s little digs.

The panic fizzes up a little when she exits the bathroom to find her mother waiting outside, and her breath catches in her lungs at the shock of her lurking there like the grim reaper.

“Jesus, Mom, you can’t creep up on people like that, especially outside the bathroom, it isn’t appropriate.”

“Oh, lay off the theatrics for a day in your life, Poppy, I didn’t raise you to be this dramatic.”

“Are you sure about that? I can go ask the gardener considering how close the two of you are-,”

“Don’t get clever with me,” she narrows her eyes at her daughter, “You’re not as cute as you think you are, and the more games you play trying to rile me up, the more your little friend will see that. It’s unbecoming to be so childish, dear.”

“It’s also unbecoming to be such a bad host. If the ladies at your luncheons could see you now, they’d throw you out on the streets, Mom.”

“I’m not entertaining your immaturity any longer, you get your fun in while it lasts, I’m sure by the time you go home tomorrow your friend will see you for what you are,”

“He’s my boyfriend-,”

“And please go easy on the chocolate, the egg hunt is for the children, Poppy,” her mom chides, a judgemental roll of her eyes and a bobble-head like shake of her head causing Poppy’s fists to clench by her sides.

“I’m your child, am I not?” She asks, petulantly.

“You’re a grown woman who might want to start thinking about how hard it’s going to be to shift that little pouch you’re getting now that you’re older.” She sneers back, a pointed finger gesturing to her daughter’s torso. “Don’t think I didn’t notice when you were reaching for those glasses in the kitchen, before.”

“Pouch?”

“The extra belly you have going on from no doubt eating a bunch of processed garbage at that circus you call a workplace, honey. I’m telling you, there will come a point that it doesn’t just go away if you skip a couple lunches.”

It’s just like her mother to strike low when she’s losing an argument.

And where Poppy would usually be offended - disgusted, even - at her need to comment on even the slightest changes in her body, or how she can even find ways to slip a subtle dig about her job into a completely unrelated conversation, she bites her tongue. The snappy response fizzles back into her throat as she waits for her mom to continue on her way back to the festivities before she turns on her heels and steps back down the hallway in search of the mirror at the end.

Extra belly?

She lifts her sweater and turns where she stands, and, sure enough, there’s an ever-so-slight roundness to the bottom of her stomach that hadn’t been there last week.

The tension seeps out of her body as she presses her hand there,, cups the shape with curved fingers and strokes at the skin with her thumb.

“Hi, baby,” she whispers, biting back a beaming smile - and before she can lose herself in the moment, and someone else catches her in the hall looking like a crazy person, she drops the fabric back over her torso and sets off in search of Nico.

She finds him back out in the garden, standing beside her dad and looking as uncomfortable as ever, arms folded across his chest as he watches Oliver’s boys fight over a little egg they both found at the same time. 

“So,” she hears him speak after clearing his throat, “Do you like golf?”

“Hey, babe,” she approaches from the side, looping her hand through the crook of his arm and folding into his side. “I need to show you something,” she hums, and turns to her dad, “I’m just gonna borrow him for a second, we’ll be right back,”

“Don’t rush on my account,” he scoffs, and, thankfully for him, she again can’t find it within her to care about how rude he’s being. 

She tugs at Nico’s arm until it uncrosses with his other, and slips her hand into his, intertwining their fingers and pulling until he stumbles to follow. She guides him back through the house, and into the closest bathroom she can find, shutting and locking the door behind the two of them.

“I don’t think locking us away in a bathroom is gonna give your parents the best impression of me, Poppy,” he sighs, letting her push at him with two hands on his firm chest until he’s sitting on the closed toilet seat.

“Like I said earlier, we’re past the point of no return with those two,” she sighs, the disappointment only lasting a second before she remembers why she lured him into the room in the first place. “Look!”

She lifts her sweater, angling her body how she had before and biting her lip as she awaits his reaction. 

“Is this an attempt to seduce me?”

“What? No!” She tries not to succumb to the heat filling her head. “You think I’d shove you on a toilet to seduce you?”

“Depends how desperate you were, I suppose.”

“Is that what works for you? A girl flashing you her stomach?”

The banter is nostalgic and familiar, and she feels more at home in the small guest bathroom with him than in the rest of the house, entirely.

He shrugs with a smirk, and gives one of those trailing, darkened looks down her figure as he says, “Depends on the girl.”

“Shut up,” she scoffs, ignoring his chuckles as she looks down at her belly and caresses it as she had to herself in the mirror, highlighting the swelling with her fingers. “I have a little pouch!”

“Like a kangaroo?”

“No, like the woman growing your offspring inside her.”

He reaches a hand out and presses it beside hers on her stomach, his palm cupping the roundness of it, and Poppy finds herself holding her breath in anticipation.

His touch is gentle, and his dark eyes roam the expanse of her skin, assessing the slight change there, committing it to memory before that lingering smirk melts into a soft smile.

“Hey, Peanut.” he hums, pulling her closer with another hand at her waist, and she steadies herself with her hand on his shoulder. Her fingers curl around the back of his neck, scratching slightly at the base of his skull, and his clutch at the dip of her hip while he runs the tip of a finger over the beginning of a bump. 

“Cheeto,” she corrects him.

“Sorry, Cheeto.” His laugh is breathy and his voice is low, “Getting big in there, huh?”

“As big as a fig,” she beams with pride, heart palpitating when he looks up at her, chocolate eyes gleaming and lips stretched into a smile.

“A fig?”

“Yeah,” she pushes down the memory of the last time he looked up at her from that angle, and makes a fig sized circle with her fingers and holds it to him. He lifts his own fingers to copy it before moving it back down to her belly and resting it there for comparison, features flushed with awe as he pictures what it would look like in there.

“Wow.”

“Yeah.”

His touch lingers for a good minute as he watches her belly and she watches him, taking slow, measured breaths to quell the rampant beating of her heart. 

Her anxiety starts to dwindle somewhat, and a thought settles within her that no matter what else happens while they’re here, she’ll always have this. 

She’ll always have him.

Poppy has never wanted to hurt someone as much as she wants to hurt her brother right now. 

She could honestly leap over the dining table and throttle him - but then again, she should have been fine tuned to the way he and her father had been talking all day, the two of them never being able to go a full five minutes without talking business.

“What do you mean Rich Horowitz got in before you?”

She wishes with all her might she didn’t come from a family where they had mortal enemies, but here she is, listening to how her brother has fumbled one of the biggest investment opportunities of his life to her dad’s biggest opponent. Losing out on millions of dollars that is now going straight to Rich Horowitz's pockets.

“He sniped me, Dad,” Oli all but whines from his place at the bottom of the table, Kimberley having disappeared a while back to put the kids to bed - something he clearly has no interest in helping with. 

If she thinks he’s put her in a bad mood, when she looks over to her dad, she thinks he’s turning purple.

“And how on Earth did you let that happen?!”

“I didn’t let it happen,” Oli scoffs, “He was eavesdropping like a rat at the country club and I-,”

“Stop talking.” Philip snaps, pointing his knife down the table at his son, “This is your problem, you don’t know when to shut up. Why were you talking private business for the whole world to hear at the club?”

“Because it was a business trip? That’s what we do, get a few holes in and share investment tips-,”

“Maybe next time you can ask to share some brain cells.” He growls as Kimberley returns, meekly sitting beside Oliver and immediately taking a big gulp of her wine. 

Poppy tries to focus on her breathing, tries to focus on the calming presence of Nico beside her, their chairs moved so close together that their thighs touch, and he helps her feel warm all over.

She can do this. Just wait for her dad’s anger to pass and bring up her own life. 

Poppy’s father gives a disapproving huff, and his fork hits his plate with a loud clatter as if the conversation has put him off his food entirely. “What about you, Poppy? Any horrific news that you’d like to share with the table? I know how the two of you like to try to one-up each other.”

See, she tells herself, that hadn’t taken long at all. 

“Oh, uhm,” her chest feels tight, cold even, like she’s been out in the crisp air a little too long and needs a hot drink to settle herself back in, “Actually-,”

“Have you joined the Church of Scientology? Pledged your inheritance away to some fruitless non-profit? Have you gone and got yourself a heinous lower back tattoo?”

“Philip, please,” her mother scoffs, as if the tattoo is the worst option in the list. “Let’s move on, Kimberley, how is James getting on in the first grade?”

“Oh, well, he-,"

And only because the interruption and swift change in subject grates at Poppy, she straightens up in her seat, a hardened glare directed towards her mother, and she blurts out before she can think twice about it, “I’m pregnant.”

The way her mother turns her attention back to her is slow. She blinks, as if she’s registering what was said, and swivels in her seat to narrow her eyes back at Poppy.

“Ha!” Oliver pipes up from further down the table before their mom has a chance to react. “That’s hilarious.”

“No it isn’t.” Priscilla snaps, “It is not funny in the slightest.”

“Why would it be hilarious, Oliver?” She frowns over at her brother, trying to tell her mind to succumb to the way Nico’s hand settles above her knee to calm her, but nothing at this point will work.

“You as a mother? You can barely take care of yourself, you don’t know the first thing about being a parent.”

“Well I figured if you could have a go at it, anyone could.”

The two of them are both airing grievances to a party that isn’t listening, isn’t technically even fighting back, just firing bullets at one another with little regard for where they might ricochet.

“See. You’re a child.”

“And you’re a loser. You have everything in your life handed to you and you still fuck it all up.”

“And what, you’re going to have a baby with him?” He points towards Nico with the edge of his fork, immediately getting her back up. “With some jacked up meathead who slaps plastic around with a stick for a living?”

Nico’s grip tightens on her flesh, and while her heart tells her he’s trying to reassure her, trying to stop her from sinking to his level or taking the bait, her head tells her otherwise. Her mind says he’s offended, he’s hurt, and she can’t go another second without at least trying to defend his honour.

Defend the perfect man who’s been by her side all day - has been by her side since the second he found out. Who brings her smoothies every morning like his father brought his mother when she was pregnant, who looks up all the vitamins she needs and makes sure she’s fully stocked up, who holds her hand and supports her in anything and everything she does.

“Don’t talk about him like that,” she sneers, feeling the pressure of his hand when she starts to stand. “Just because you’re a fuck up and an embarrassment to your family, doesn’t mean you get to point the finger at my life. Nico is a great partner, and he’s going to be an even better dad, because he has a big heart and a sense of fucking direction and dignity, something you wouldn’t know if it came and slapped you in the face-,” 

“Mohn,” Nico tries to ground her, delicate fingers stroking at the arm attached to her now pointed fingers, but it’s no use.

“Which, if you say one more thing about him again, I’ll slap you in the face. You have no right to pass judgement on my life or the people in it.”

“Poppy, stop it!” Her mother slams her own cutlery down onto the table, the glasses shaking and the liquid within them sloshing around at the intensity. “There’s no need to threaten your brother over something that isn’t even real. You should apologise for causing such a scene!”

Poppy doesn’t think that even dignifies a response, so instead of biting back, she reaches into her pocket, pulling out her copy of their scan and sliding it across the table.

There is a slow, prolonged silence that lingers between everyone at the table, and Poppy can see her dad shifting uncomfortable out of the corner of her eye, can feel Nico’s gentle touch on her wrist, but all she can focus on is her mom’s reaction. 

Her lip curls as she eyes the square of paper on the table, and she doesn’t even reach to pick it up for a closer look.

“You are unbelievable.”

There’s a small part of Poppy that withers and dies in an instant at the tone in which that sentence had been uttered. A minuscule scrap of dwindling hope that maybe she would have been happy. Maybe her mom would have overlooked the outdated ideals that she has tried for so long to impose on the rest of the family and just be happy for her daughter.

But she should have known better.

“You aren’t married, Poppy, how many times have I drilled into you how important it is that these kind of things are done right?” She shoulders the blow, the implication that anything about this is wrong incessantly plucking at her nerve. “Could you be any more belligerent? Are you doing this just to spite me?”

“To spite you?” Poppy scoffs, “Yeah, I’m changing the entire course of my life and future because I thought it would be funny to annoy you. My God you’re so narrow minded-,”

“You watch your tone with me when we have guests, Poppy.” Her voice is raised as she scolds her daughter, and it takes Poppy back through the years - being lectured about her grades, about her friends, her clothes, her weight, her career. Nothing she has ever done has appeased her. Even giving her another grandchild, bringing life into the world and trying to prove herself - it’s never enough.

“He’s my guest! He’s mine.” She doesn’t care that it’s petulantly possessive. She’s had enough. She isn’t going to let her mom use Nico of all people as a tool to silence or embarrass her. “And he’s had to stand around all day and listen to you all drop petty little digs while he tries his best to impress you! But you’re all so ignorant and rude, and none of you have even attempted to get to know a single thing about him! I don’t know why I even bothered bringing him here, or sharing what is supposed to be the greatest news of my life with you guys, because all any of you do is judge and shame people, and I won’t let you do that to us.

“We’re having this baby, and we might not be married, we might not ever even get married, but we make each other happy, and we love each other, and I couldn’t care less about how it looks to anybody else.”

She snatches the photo from the table, and turns to her brother with a pointed finger, unable to help herself before she spits, “And hockey pucks are made out of rubber, you fucking idiot.”

Her mother scoffs at the curse, but Poppy can’t find it in her to care as she storms out, ignoring the footsteps that follow as she stomps through the house towards her bedroom. 

“Don’t walk away from me, Poppy,” Priscilla calls out after her, quickening her steps to catch up before the inevitably infamous slamming of her bedroom door occurs. “I won’t have you behaving like this under my roof.”

“That’s fine, Nico and I are going to leave.”

“You’re doing little to disprove the fact that you’re immature, reacting like this,”

“You think I’m reacting poorly?” She stops in her tracks in the hallway, turning to face her mother with a heated glare. “Why do I always have to prove something to you in the first place? You couldn’t just support me, just this once? Be happy for me? You don’t think I need my mom right now to tell me that everything is going to be okay?”

“You’re being dramatic.”

“And you’re being heartless and cruel.” She hates that she’s about to cry. Resents the tears that well on her lash line or the lump that forms at the back of her throat. “You know how long Nico and I have known each other, how close we are, how could you possibly say that what we’re doing is wrong?”

“You went on a date with someone else 2 months ago, Poppy! I’m not as stupid as you think I am, you can’t hide your mistakes and lie to me like some teenager anymore!”

“I’m not lying-,”

“You’re being irresponsible, and you can’t seriously stand there and try to convince me otherwise. Having a baby with a man you’ve barely even been dating for five minutes, who you don’t live with, who travels here, there and everywhere for work and can’t support you-,”

“You don’t know him.” Poppy snarls, “You’ve made absolutely no effort to get to know him. Not today, and not in the years that you’ve known he was in my life, so you don’t get to tell me what kind of man he is, or what kind of partner he’s going to be for me in this. And I don’t need to convince you of anything. If you can’t be happy for us, then you won’t be involved.”

And with that, she marches into her bedroom and slams the door behind her.

Her heart pounds against her ribcage, her breathing heavy as she paces the floor by her bed.

She had always known it would end up like this - in some almighty, entirely unnecessary bust up - but there could never have been enough preparing herself for just how much it hurts.

Her mother had berated her, her brother had bullied and belittled her, and her dad had sat there in a detached silence that probably was worse than saying anything in the first place. None of them were ever going to have her back, or ever going to be in her corner, and she should have known better - should have known from an entire lifetime of the same thing happening for all the other decisions she ever made for herself.

There had been a fight around her choice of college, her choice of career, her choice of living arrangements. Why would this have been any different?

So, as she finds herself stuck in the constant loop of condemnation and judgement, she starts to feel it manifest itself in her surroundings. In the walls of her bedroom she was never allowed to decorate, in the closet full of clothes she was never allowed to choose for herself, in the house full of people who pretended to care but didn’t, not really.

Except for Nico, who finds her repacking her overnight bag and stuffing it with a bunch of other things she doesn’t want to have to return for.

He watches silently as she whizzes around, perches himself on the edge of her bed, beside the bag, and waits for her to tire herself out a little before he asks, “Is there any chance that you’re adopted?”

She scoffs, stopping in front of him and running a frustrated hand through her hair in an attempt to calm herself down. “Nice try. Flattery won’t really help right now, Nico.” 

He reaches out to take her hand, tugging until she steps closer, and he parts his legs to accommodate for her body. “Are you okay?”

“We need to leave. I can’t sleep in a house with them all here, their rotten energy is gonna seep through the walls and suffocate me. I can’t expose Cheeto to that.”

“Poppy,” he chuckles, breathily, a soft and reassuring smile remaining on his lips as he looks up at her, “I don’t want you getting worked up over nothing-,”

“It isn’t nothing.” She frowns. “What my brother said about you, it was disrespectful and rude, I don’t like that he talked about you like that, he’s such a dick,” she groans, heat rising up her neck in morbid embarrassment at her family’s behaviour. “Calling you a meathead? And he says I’m the childish one?”

“I’ve been called much worse, Mohn, trust me.”

“Yeah, well, none of it is true.” She steps a little closer, her knee knocking against his thigh, “He wishes he had even an iota of your emotional intelligence, but his head is stuck so far up his own ass that his disgusting hair sticks out of his nostrils.” Nico smiles wider, and she reaches to cup his cheeks, hoping to pass her sincerity through the touch. “I think the world of you, Nico, you know that, right? There isn’t another man on the planet I’d rather have this baby with.”

“Of course I know that,” he tilts his head in her hands, smiling teasingly as he reminds her, “I’m yours, remember? I don’t care what anybody else thinks, it’s you and me, yeah?”

She nods, heart warming at the earnestness in his gaze. 

“The unmarried mommy and the meathead. We should get t-shirts made.”

She swats at his shoulder, snorting out a giggling laugh that clouds the corners of her eyes. “That’s not funny.”

“It is.” He affirms with another nod, placing his hands on either sides of her hips to hold her in front of him. “He was wrong about you too, you know. You were ready to drop gloves for both of us.” His palm caresses the slight swelling of her baby - the beginnings of her pouch, “You’re protective of the people you love, and you’re loyal, and you care. Our baby couldn’t be more lucky to have you as their mommy.”

Before the tears that line her eyes can fall, she scrunches them shut - and with darkened vision and a will to clear her mind of the million racing thoughts, she leans forward and kisses him.

It isn’t the passionate, all-consuming kiss like they had shared before. It isn’t steamy, isn’t sloppy or rushed. It’s gentle. It’s familiar. It’s brief, but intimate and impactful all the same, and he juts his chin until his lips press firmly into the touch of hers.

And when they part of equal volition, her eyes flutter open slowly to his doing the same.

“I’m sorry, that wasn’t fair,” she breathes into the small space between them, “I shouldn’t just plant one on you when I told you that we shouldn’t-,”

“It’s okay,” he interrupts, voice slightly hoarse. “You can plant one on me any time.”

She breaks into a slow smile, one that ends up so big and so bright that her jaw aches slightly, and she wraps her arms around his shoulders, collapsing into a hug where she squeezes around him. He holds her back, hands rubbing up and down her sides until he can feel her relax and melt into his touch.

“Are you sure you want to leave?” He whispers into the side of her head. “In the middle of an argument?”

“It isn’t gonna get resolved, there’s no point waiting around,” she sighs, pulling back a little so that she can see him again. “Plus, we’re gonna need to go looking for a Drive-Thru or something, I’m starving.”

“What are you hungry for?”

“I’ll know when I see it.”

“Poppy,” he chuckles, standing as soon as she steps back and reaching for the bag she had packed. “You’re gonna pass out as soon as we get to the bottom of the driveway.”

“Am not,” she pouts, the two of them making their way towards her bedroom door. “I’m so amped up right now, I could take on a bear. I won’t be sleeping all night.”

Poppy wakes with the shutting off of the car, the soft hum of the engine beneath her ceasing the vibrations that had lulled her to sleep in the first place, and she blinks away her confusion to look at Nico across the centre console.

He’s leaning against his seat, angling his body to face her directly, and he smiles softly as her eyes focus on his.

“We drove past that bear you wanted to fight about half an hour ago.”

“You should have woke me,” she croaks, breaking eye contact to look past him out the driver’s side window. “This isn’t a Drive-Thru.”

“No, I thought you might have worked up a bigger appetite in the big Jensen family smackdown.”

“Hilarious,” she yawns, arching her back to stretch it out as she leans toward the windshield, getting a better look at where they are. “Is this Rosie’s?”

Rosie’s diner had always been a hotspot for the two of them whenever he drove her home from The Rock, slotted just by Lincoln Park, and perfect for a post-game catch up late into the night, Poppy and Nico had spent one too many evenings ignoring the passing of time in a corner booth, a basket of fries between them and a thousand secrets shared.

She hasn’t been back here in a while.

“You’ve been eating sweet stuff all day, figured you’d be alright with pancakes.”

“You’re good at that, huh?” She smiles, “Knowing what I want?”

“I’m great at it.” He brags, unclipping his seat belt. “Wait here, I’m gonna check if the kitchen’s open.”

And he’s gone before she has a chance to question him. Why wouldn’t it be open? It’s a late night diner.

The car is too warm for her to care though - a cosy kind of heat, that almost has her lulling her head back into slumber before the car door is yanked back open beside her.

“So I kind of wanted to surprise you,” Nico says, slight urgency in his tone as he reaches over her lap to unclip her belt, “But I realised just now that I don’t want you to feel like I was blindsiding you with this.”

“With what?” She shuffles until her legs hang out of the car, looking up at him.

“I know that you kind of expected things not to go well with your family, but I also know you, and that you probably hoped there would at least be one of them that was happy for you.”

“Your family was happy for me,” she shrugs, trying to ignore the pang of longing. It has to be enough, she thinks, otherwise the hurt she’s feeling will just snowball into something worse. 

“Well you deserve more. And I happen to know a few more people in your family who might give you the reaction you’re looking for,”

“My cousin?”

“Where would I have found your cousin?”

“That’s my only other family?”

“No it isn’t,” he chuckles, extending a hand to help her out of the car and tucking her into his side when she’s stood on the sidewalk. He nudges the door closed behind her and locks it with the key in his pocket, guiding her towards Rosie’s with an arm around her shoulder. “Cheeto has a whole bunch of uncles who you’re not gonna be able to hide that little pouch from for much longer.”

“The guys are here?” She gasps, her face lighting up as she angles it to look up at him and stops in her tracks. “We’re gonna tell them?”

“Only if you want to.”

She nods, smiling so big she’s about to bare teeth, and he takes her hand to pull her toward the entrance.

“There she is!” Jack exclaims when the two of them make it into the diner, standing from his spot in one of the booths and extending his arms out in a boisterous greeting.

Nico has somehow managed to round up a good chunk of the guys, the diner otherwise empty as they take up two booths, with a few of them standing between. There’s Jack and Luke, Timo, Johnny, Dawson, Holtzy, Jesper, Nemo, Jonas and Bass, and Poppy doesn’t even feel intimidated by the rowdy bunch as she and Nico make their way over. 

She feels comfortable, like she should have felt around her actual family, at ease and somewhat excited.

“Thank God, Luke was getting hangry, we told him he had to wait until you guys got here to order.”

“Luke, it’s past 10pm, how can you be hungry at this time?” Poppy questions, standing beside Nico once they get over to the booths. She at least had a valid excuse - growing human life within her and being neglected by her own mother’s portion sizes at family dinner.

“This is prime snack time, Poppy, I usually have a grilled cheese before bed.”

“You’re not supposed to eat cheese before you sleep, Luke, it gives you nightmares.”

“Wow, okay, mom, did you call us out here just to impart your almighty cheese wisdom?”

“Cut it out,” Timo reaches over to smack Luke lightly upside the head, sending Poppy a proud, encouraging smile as she just chuckles in response. 

“I called you all out,” Nico puffs his chest a little, taking a deep breath as if preparing himself, “We have something we want to tell you guys.”

“Can you tell us after we order? I’m starving,” and when Luke ducks out of the way from Timo’s extended arm, Jack reaches across the table and swats him, himself. “Oh, come on, we all know they’re just gonna tell us they’re finally together! They can do that once I’ve got a burger or something.”

“That isn’t what we want to tell you,” Nico rolls his eyes affectionately, pulling Poppy into his side for comfort, where her lips twist in amusement at the scene before her.

“You’re not together?” Jack frowns, looking between them. 

“We’re figuring it out-,” Poppy shrugs, at the same time Nico responds.

“We’re working on it.” 

“Jesus,” Luke mutters, shielding himself from the onslaught of hands that reach out to smack his head. “Why are you all hitting me? They’re the ones who called us out here in the dead of night to tell us something we’ve all known for months. Next thing Dougie will be calling a press conference to tell the world he’s ginger. I don’t see anyone smacking either of them upside the head.”

“Well we can’t hit Schao ‘cause he’s our captain,” Jack explains.

“And you can’t hit me ‘cause I’m-,”

“A girl, yeah whatever,” Luke huffs.

“Actually, you can’t hit me ‘cause I’m pregnant.” She gives a smug smile, reaching into her pocket for the now-worn scan picture.

“And I’d hit you back.” Nico scowls playfully, watching their jaws drop in turn like a Mexican wave.

The guys all shoot up from their seats in unison, scrambling out of the booths to swarm the two of them, crowding around to get a look at the picture, a chorus of questions shouting out that fill the diner with a rambunctious echo.

The only thing Poppy can make out is Jack’s cries of Baby Schao, Timo’s bragging of I knew first and John and Nate’s childish singing of Poppy and Nico sitting in a tree. 

She feels her heart swell to four times its regular size.

She feels giddy, and proud, and loved.

“Alright,” Nico calls from beside her, bringing the rowdy bunch of men to silence, “Let her sit, then you can bombard her with your questions.”

She slides in a booth between the two brothers, and Nico slides in across from her between Timo and Jesper. The rest of the guys lean over from the booths at either side, leaving a couple of them standing in the aisle beside the table.

And as she looks over at Nico through teary eyes from her space across the booth, a smile so big it aches carved into her cheeks, their calves tangling under the table, the sonogram of their baby resting between them on the top, and surrounded by their found-family, she feels a kind of happiness she doesn’t think she ever has before.

He had assured her earlier that she could plant one on him any time, and she thinks that she might just have to start taking him up on that. 

Next Chapter

Taglist: @alwaysclassyeagle @bunbunbl0gs @idgaf-if-youre-here @youflowerr-youfeast @thearchersstuff @bellsdi0r @wonderheartz @jjgsunflower @butterflies35 @kenziepickle @josierosie @laheyxlover @mrsmattytkachuk @dasiysthings (sorry if your tag hasn't worked btw)

[robotsprinkles]

(sorry in advance if this is poor etiquette or annoying or dumb or anything)

(also disclaimer that I'm not an expert by any means. I've built my own pc and watch a decent amount of component reviews, but I don't like. do benchmarks or a lot of builds or know the best all the best combinations for every component and all that. also my memory is kind of scuffed)

I'm not going to touch on laptops because I don't really care about and haven't done much research on them (I'm using some old as crap hp laptop my mum used to use for work for uni. pretty much just running firefox and notepad to take notes and browse the web. everything else I do on my desktop) so this is just for desktops/towers

Since none of the recommended prebuilt towers have gpus and are all running apus, I'm assuming that this post is more for workstations and the like, and not for gaming-capable pcs and 3d modelling and animation, which is what I'm going to be focusing on

(so if you're looking for a workstation/office pc and don't care about gaming, just read the op and ignore this. this is only really relevant if you care about gaming or want to do 3d work in blender or maya or whatever and want to upgrade without needing to buy an entirely new system)

(also I used pcpp to spec some builds that're mostly identical to the three towers listed at the end of the op, but with an additional gpu. they're at the bottom of the post)

quick notes:

if you buy a prebuilt that has ddr4 ram with advertised speeds of 3000 or greater make sure they actually enabled xmp otherwise it's going to be running at a slower speed than what you paid for (a lot of oems and SIs just don't enable it for some reason. even though it takes barely more than a minute)

16GB of ram is I think more or less the standard minimum requirement for games these days (for an actually decent experience)

a lot of SIs and oems will just. skimp out on ram and give you a single stick of ram instead of two running in dual channel

also they'll often have a stupid parts selection that wastes money on overkill coolers and/or psus, rgb and so on (or cpu/gpu combinations that will cause one to bottleneck the other).

a lot of them pick stupid cases that have terrible airflow so make sure you find one that doesn't do that

apparently some of them somehow manage to put the cpu cooler fans on backwards?

if you're going to be playing a lot of modern "triple aaa" games and the like most of them are 50-120GB these days (some of them going upwards of 170GB) so if you don't want to keep uninstalling and reinstalling them, it's probably a good idea to get either a 1tb ssd or a secondary 2tb hdd for storing games you're not currently playing but don't want to sit through downloading from steam or whatever next time you want to play them

never get a pc that has a 120mm aio (liquid cooler). 120mm aios are almost always worse than a similarly priced air cooler and are basically a scam

for cpus (this is kinda barebones because I just got a 5700x and didn't bother to research too much into the higher end and low end options)

the r5 5600x is still a solid choice (for games, I'm not sure about productivity. I think it's one of the better/best 6-cores for productivity?), but according to pcpp you can get an r7 5800x for only about an extra $20 so. yeah.

if I remember correctly, the 5800x is far more power efficient than an i7 11700k for equal if not better performance (excepting multithreaded performance)

gpus

from my experience, the gtx 1070 still runs most games pretty well (depending on settings), and I think the same goes for the 1660 super.

from what I can tell I think the rx 580 and 6600 are good too

personally, I wouldn't buy a dell prebuilt (that includes alienware because alienware is just ancient dell cases with decorative plastic crap slapped on and a different logo. and also bad performance).

I'd say the same for hp and probably lenovo

most dell (and alienware) towers I've seen use a proprietary motherboard and case, which makes them pretty much unupgradeable; you can't use those motherboards in non-dell/alienware cases, and vice versa. (they do have prebuilts that don't do this but I wouldn't take the risk)

to memory, their power supplies are usually either repurposed server psus or also proprietary or weird enough that it causes issues with trying to fit standard atx psus into their cases

this also tends to be true (at least regarding motherboards and cases, not sure about psus) for hp and lenovo, though I'm aware that at least some of the lenovo legion systems use standard motherboards

(for those wondering, the proprietary garbage dell and hp tend to do is have the front io be part of the motherboard, unlike the standard which is to have the front io be in the case. also some of their pcs have the cpu cooler be load-bearing/screwed into the case and not the motherboard for some reason?)

(also when I say alienware has bad performance I mean it tends to force the components to throttle for no good reason, such that you end up with components behaving like a lower grade part.)

if you buy from an SI (skytech, xidax, cyberpower, etc) you'll get standard, non-proprietary parts and be able to upgrade without issue, but they do still tend to be variable in build quality and a decent amount of them will — like the oems — pack in bloatware you don't need that tank performance.

also SIs and oems will sometimes glue cables/plugs into the headers which. eh.

for those willing to put in some extra work you can theoretically build a pc that's only a little more expensive ($3) than the dell tower that has basically all the same specs, plus a proper discrete gpu (so you get some kind of decent gaming performance if you want). and if you don't want the gpu you save around $100 so

of course, you do have to build it yourself (there are places you can pay to assemble it for you but a. that's more cost and b. they often neglect to enable xmp and properly set fan curves. you can easily rectify those issues by hopping into bios though. if you're fine with the additional cost of going to a pc builder then go ahead)

for those worried about it: pc building isn't actually as difficult as you probably think (I built my own pc for the first time a couple months ago; the hardest part was cable management. by which I mean making the cables look nice and neat. if you want to make things easier on yourself get a magnetic screwdriver)

(you can get windows for free by creating install media and activate/license it with massgrave. I'm pretty sure you can get office for free with it as well)

I tried to spec match (+gpu) the lenovo and the hp below (though with these two I couldn't get it to be as close with the additional gpu. they're still cheaper than the oem equivalents if you cut the gpu though)

no gpu

with gpu

So You Need To Buy A Computer But You Don't Know What Specs Are Good These Days

Hi.

This is literally my job.

Lots of people are buying computers for school right now or are replacing computers as their five-year-old college laptop craps out so here's the standard specs you should be looking for in a (windows) computer purchase in August 2023.

PROCESSOR

Intel i5 (no older than 10th Gen)

Ryzen 7

You can get away with a Ryzen 5 but an intel i3 should be an absolute last resort. You want at least an intel i5 or a Ryzen 7 processor. The current generation of intel processors is 13, but anything 10 or newer is perfectly fine. DO NOT get a higher performance line with an older generation; a 13th gen i5 is better than an 8th gen i7. (Unfortunately I don't know enough about ryzens to tell you which generation is the earliest you should get, but staying within 3 generations is a good rule of thumb)

RAM

8GB absolute minimum

If you don't have at least 8GB RAM on a modern computer it's going to be very, very slow. Ideally you want a computer with at least 16GB, and it's a good idea to get a computer that will let you add or swap RAM down the line (nearly all desktops will let you do this, for laptops you need to check the specs for Memory and see how many slots there are and how many slots are available; laptops with soldered RAM cannot have the memory upgraded - this is common in very slim laptops)

STORAGE

256GB SSD

Computers mostly come with SSDs these days; SSDs are faster than HDDs but typically have lower storage for the same price. That being said: SSDs are coming down in price and if you're installing your own drive you can easily upgrade the size for a low cost. Unfortunately that doesn't do anything for you for the initial purchase.

A lot of cheaper laptops will have a 128GB SSD and, because a lot of stuff is stored in the cloud these days, that can be functional. I still recommend getting a bit more storage than that because it's nice if you can store your music and documents and photos on your device instead of on the cloud. You want to be able to access your files even if you don't have internet access.

But don't get a computer with a big HDD instead of getting a computer with a small SSD. The difference in speed is noticeable.

SCREEN (laptop specific)

Personally I find that touchscreens have a negative impact on battery life and are easier to fuck up than standard screens. They are also harder to replace if they get broken. I do not recommend getting a touch screen unless you absolutely have to.

A lot of college students especially tend to look for the biggest laptop screen possible; don't do that. It's a pain in the ass to carry a 17" laptop around campus and with the way that everything is so thin these days it's easier to damage a 17" screen than a 14" screen.

On the other end of that: laptops with 13" screens tend to be very slim devices that are glued shut and impossible to work on or upgrade.

Your best bet (for both functionality and price) is either a 14" or a 15.6" screen. If you absolutely positively need to have a 10-key keyboard on your laptop, get the 15.6". If you need something portable more than you need 10-key, get a 14"

FORM FACTOR (desktop specific)

If you purchase an all-in-one desktop computer I will begin manifesting in your house physically. All-in-ones take away every advantage desktops have in terms of upgradeability and maintenance; they are expensive and difficult to repair and usually not worth the cost of disassembling to upgrade.

There are about four standard sizes of desktop PC: All-in-One (the size of a monitor with no other footprint), Tower (Big! probably at least two feet long in two directions), Small Form Factor Tower (Very moderate - about the size of a large shoebox), and Mini/Micro/Tiny (Small! about the size of a small hardcover book).

If you are concerned about space you are much better off getting a MicroPC and a bracket to put it on your monitor than you are getting an all-in-one. This will be about a million percent easier to work on than an all-in-one and this way if your monitor dies your computer is still functional.

Small form factor towers and towers are the easiest to work on and upgrade; if you need a burly graphics card you need to get a full size tower, but for everything else a small form factor tower will be fine. Most of our business sales are SFF towers and MicroPCs, the only time we get something larger is if we have to put a $700 graphics card in it. SFF towers will accept small graphics cards and can handle upgrades to the power supply; MicroPCs can only have the RAM and SSD upgraded and don't have room for any other components or their own internal power supply.

WARRANTY

Most desktops come with either a 1 or 3 year warranty; either of these is fine and if you want to upgrade a 1 year to a 3 year that is also fine. I've generally found that if something is going to do a warranty failure on desktop it's going to do it the first year, so you don't get a hell of a lot of added mileage out of an extended warranty but it doesn't hurt and sometimes pays off to do a 3-year.

Laptops are a different story. Laptops mostly come with a 1-year warranty and what I recommend everyone does for every laptop that will allow it is to upgrade that to the longest warranty you can get with added drop/damage protection. The most common question our customers have about laptops is if we can replace a screen and the answer is usually "yes, but it's going to be expensive." If you're purchasing a low-end laptop, the parts and labor for replacing a screen can easily cost more than half the price of a new laptop. HOWEVER, the way that most screens get broken is by getting dropped. So if you have a warranty with drop protection, you just send that sucker back to the factory and they fix it for you.

So, if it is at all possible, check if the manufacturer of a laptop you're looking at has a warranty option with drop protection. Then, within 30 days (though ideally on the first day you get it) of owning your laptop, go to the manufacturer site, register your serial number, and upgrade the warranty. If you can't afford a 3-year upgrade at once set a reminder for yourself to annually renew. But get that drop protection, especially if you are a college student or if you've got kids.

And never, ever put pens or pencils on your laptop keyboard. I've seen people ruin thousand dollar, brand-new laptops that they can't afford to fix because they closed the screen on a ten cent pencil. Keep liquids away from them too.

LIFESPAN

There's a reasonable chance that any computer you buy today will still be able to turn on and run a program or two in ten years. That does not mean that it is "functional."

At my office we estimate that the functional lifespan of desktops is 5-7 years and the functional lifespan of laptops is 3-5 years. Laptops get more wear and tear than desktops and desktops are easier to upgrade to keep them running. At 5 years for desktops and 3 years for laptops you should look at upgrading the RAM in the device and possibly consider replacing the SSD with a new (possibly larger) model, because SSDs and HDDs don't last forever.

COST

This means that you should think of your computers as an annual investment rather than as a one-time purchase. It is more worthwhile to pay $700 for a laptop that will work well for five years than it is to pay $300 for a laptop that will be outdated and slow in one year (which is what will happen if you get an 8th gen i3 with 8GB RAM). If you are going to get a $300 laptop try to get specs as close as possible to the minimums I've laid out here.

If you have to compromise on these specs, the one that is least fixable is the processor. If you get a laptop with an i3 processor you aren't going to be able to upgrade it even if you can add more RAM or a bigger SSD. If you have to get lower specs in order to afford the device put your money into the processor and make sure that the computer has available slots for upgrade and that neither the RAM nor the SSD is soldered to the motherboard. (one easy way to check this is to search "[computer model] RAM upgrade" on youtube and see if anyone has made a video showing what the inside of the laptop looks like and how much effort it takes to replace parts)

Computers are expensive right now. This is frustrating, because historically consumer computer prices have been on a downward trend but since 2020 that trend has been all over the place. Desktop computers are quite expensive at the moment (August 2023) and decent laptops are extremely variably priced.

If you are looking for a decent, upgradeable laptop that will last you a few years, here are a couple of options that you can purchase in August 2023 that have good prices for their specs:

14" Lenovo - $670 - 11th-gen i5, 16GB RAM, and 512GB SSD

15.6" HP - $540 - 11th-gen i5, 16GB RAM, and 256GB SSD

14" Dell - $710 - 12th-gen i5, 16GB RAM, and 256GB SSD

If you are looking for a decent, affordable desktop that will last you a few years, here are a couple of options that you can purchase in August 2023 that have good prices for their specs:

SFF HP - $620 - 10th-gen i5, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD

SFF Lenovo - $560 - Ryzen 7 5000 series, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD

Dell Tower - $800 - 10th-gen i7, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD

If I were going to buy any of these I'd probably get the HP laptop or the Dell Tower. The HP Laptop is actually a really good price for what it is.

Anyway happy computering.

[maychild]

ranking all movies in the halloween franchise

despite being a jamie lee curtis fan, i've never managed to watch any of the halloween movies so i thought i'd rectify that this spooky season. ratings taken from the letterboxd system just bc it's easier, and general disclaimer that these are just my own personal opinions, posted here just for posterity, y'all will like what u like and i will do the same.

HALLOWEEN I (1978) 2.5/5 STARS

look, i understand why it's a cult classic but it was a bit too slow for me and very painfully 70s. michael wasn't terrifying so much as he was a creepy stalker. really only liked laurie and dr. loomis out of all the characters.

HALLOWEEN II (1981) 3.5/5 STARS

this, i liked much better than H1, which i know is sacrilegious but it was def. more my speed in term of slashers. i didn't like the family connection that this movie forced on us, but it is what it is.

HALLOWEEN III: SEASON OF THE WITCH (1982) 1/5 STARS

i get what they were trying to do, and i respect the vision of trying to make a horror anthology around the halloween holiday but...this was such a bad movie. it didn't make sense most of the time; i'm still salty about the ending; i didn't like any of the characters and for some reason they had to include ROBOTS. like WHYYYY and it wasn't terminator robots, the coolest of the robots in media, it was robots made of papier-mâché who folded as soon as u looked at them wrong. overall, such a hot mess of garbage. (but i love the title, i guess?? and the Irish villain brought a certain gravitas to this movie that was both jarring and fun.)

HALLOWEEN IV: RETURN OF MICHAEL MYERS (1988) 4.5/5 STARS

genuinely the first entry in this franchise to scare me (maybe because the protagonist was a young child??) i did like that we got dr. loomis back tho. loved rachel's character and her and jamie's interactions. but this was so trauma-filled and again more horrifying for me than all three of the previous movies. very exciting slasher.

HALLOWEEN V: THE REVENGE OF MICHAEL MYERS (1989) 2.5/5 STARS

another garbage entry mostly for how horribly they treat poor jamie for the vast majority of this film, assassinated dr. loomis' character, and then killed off rachel, only to replace her with her friend, tina. i also hated the whole cult plot line, which starts here, and is as dumb as making michael and laurie brother and sister. and the vast majority of these characters are so dumb, and i'm so dumbfounded that they've lasted as long as they have in a horror film. this movie asks u to suspend your disbelief to the breaking point.

HALLOWEEN VI: THE CURSE OF MICHAEL MYERS (1995) 1.5/5 STARS

this movie, i swear i thought i couldn't hate a movie as much as i hated H3 and H5, but then this movie came along and PROVED ME WRONG. like, noooope, we're here to make an even worse movie!! i gave this one a whole 1.5 rating simply for paul rudd (yes, that paul rudd, he was the only thing keeping me sane while watching this shit show.) WHY DID JAMIE HAVE TO BE PREGNANT???!! WHY DID THE CULT HAVE TO HAVE HER AND HER CHILD???!! HAS THIS CHILD NOT SUFFERED ENOUGH??? the cult of thorn plot line is meh, whatever for me, i can take it or leave it, but i'm just so mad at jamie's death and subsequent trauma from everything she had to go through. every single character annoyed me (except for paul rudd and donald pleasence, who prove that good actors can polish a turd only so far...)

everyone was dumb, the whole town of haddonfield was dumb, and i was dumb for watching this...

(i know there's a producers' cut too, but i cannot find it and at this point i don't even care to bc i just want to burn watching this movie from my memory...)

HALLOWEEN VII: H20 TWENTY YEARS LATER (1998) 4.5/5 STARS

(i know they don't title this as H7, but i do just bc i want to and it is technically the seventh film so i'm gonna do what i want)

i appreciate the blank slate this movie starts out with (no cult of thorn, no jamie lloyd, but no dr. loomis either unfortunately).

is this a masterpiece?? no, but i had fun, and it made me terrified during certain scenes so i thought the tension was great. and the laurie/michael standoff at the end was superb. i do think this movie has some deep things to say about trauma, so i liked that too. no one annoyed me too greatly, and i am def. mad they didn't end this whole franchise with this movie since i think it was a pretty satisfying ending overall.

HALLOWEEN VIII: RESURRECTION (2002) 0.5/5 stars

JUST WHYYYYY. another garbage movie. this movie irked me so much. it tried to say some deep stuff about fiction and reality, but the writing was so bad, i couldn't take it seriously. not one of the characters were worth rooting for; they were vapid and shallow (even our final girl ends up being saved at the last minute by the greedy capitalist who put her in this situation in the first place). laurie's death was so dumb, there was no connection to H20 (i know i would've still hated this movie even if they did connect the two films beyond just recapping that laurie killed the wrong guy in H20 and that she was headmistress of a private academy).

HALLOWEEN IX (2007) AKA ROB ZOMBIE'S HALLOWEEN 0.5/5 STARS

is this the worst movie in the franchise?? not by a long shot. is it also the worst remake in the history of remakes? no, but it should be in the top twenty at least. this remake was very much not for me. rob zombie is beloved, and i can understand if this becomes a cult classic (if it hasn't already just because of the originality), but it was just very meh to me.

humanizing michael ain't it either. (i will say the mask in this was way more terrifying than any of the previous ones so points for that.)

i tried going in with an open mind, i really did, but i hated malcolm mcdowell's dr. loomis. i am and shall forever be a donald pleasence fangirl. dr. loomis is supposed to be michael's foil, and a character that you can root for. but mcdowell's loomis went far past the rooting for & liking stage, and well into narcissistic ahole stage.

it's def. the anti-Carpenter Halloween in terms of pacing, profanity, violence, and brutality, and, again some might like that, but i found it's definitely not for me. and am firmly in the camp that this movie is waaaayyy too over-the-top in terms of everything.

HALLOWEEN X (2009 AKA ROB ZOMBIE'S HALLOWEEN II) 1.5/5 STARS

i will admit i like this one far better than the '07 version just bc of the way the whole film handles trauma, PTSD, healing, and all those aspects, but rob zombie and i still do not vibe. and that's okay.

i...i do not know what they did with dr. loomis character, and am baffled he suddenly did a 180 and became a narcissistic asshole for no reason at all (well, there were traces of it in H1 where malcolm mcdowell played him as this hipster wanna-be doctor who wanted to be michael's friend more than he wanted to be his doctor). it honestly felt like Hollywood's interpretation of what a psychiatrist was, if they had never met a psychiatrist in their life and just based it on businesspeople they had *actually* met in Hollywood and were like "well, close enough."

my biggest gripe with this movie is that it felt like it was all over the place; michael wasn't really michael so much as he was a mentally ill dude who knew how to eviscerate people in an efficient manner. it was jut really bleak, traumatic, brutal, and gory. laurie survived, but mostly physically, not really emotionally. she wasn't really laurie any more, so it's debatable to what extent she "survived".

HALLOWEEN XI (2018) 5/5 STARS

I FUCKING LOVED THIS i just did. i'm not sorry. this??? so fucking fantastic.

i still maintain jamie lee curtis is the best thing about these movies (and...i guess michael myers too. but, again, i'm a scaredy-cat, so the less thought about that asshole the better.) and i love when they have her be a powerful badass. i am firmly Team Laurie and always will be (and now Team Karen/Allyson/Laurie too).

(the kills here were also brutal and gory, and gahhh, i am not a fan of gore, but the story kept me interested and on the edge of my seat.)

HALLOWEEN KILLS (AKA HALLOWEEN XII) (2021) 3/5 STARS

...meh. i didn't love this, but i didn't hate it either. it's just very underwhelming after the brilliance that was the 2018 remake.

is this technically a good film?? yeah, it was filmed fine, nothing too spectacular tho. but the writing is a mess, felt like the writers couldn't write themselves out of the awesome ending they produced in 2018. but really. they should've ended this whole franchise with the 2018 remake, so that way at least the franchise would've ended with a bang (i know i have halloween ends to watch too, but am not hopeful about that entry either...)

the nicest thing i can say about this sequel is it's not a stinkin' pile of garbage as some other movies in this franchise. too silly and cringe in certain parts, and the pacing was off (certain characters whom i thought would've been killed off as soon as we saw them on-screen weren't killed off until scenes later, which i thought didn't work for a slasher film like Halloween).

we also focus way too much on supporting characters that were introduced just last film, and while i like what others are calling the "fan-service-y" parts, like all the callbacks to previous Halloween films, and having a focus on tommy, marion, and lindsey, the film was trying to do too much by focusing both on legacy characters AND the new characters. also, imho, laurie is sidelined for most of the action, and while that meant that the other two strode women were being badass by themselves, i think the halloween movies work much better when it's just laurie vs. michael, instead of haddonfield vs. michael bc most of the characters of haddonfield and haddonfield itself aren't developed as much as laurie, so we don't care as much, or at least i don't bc i know michael is going to murder them eventually, if not right away, but with laurie, there's some hope that she will emerge victorious.

HALLOWEEN ENDS (AKA HALLOWEEN XIII) (2022) 2.5/5 STARS

i'll be honest: i don't actually hate the whole corey storyline. i went into this not expecting much because i knew nothing could surpass the 2018 remake for me, and i think that mindset helped a lot. was the corey character and storyline stupid?? sure, but not as dumb as the Cult of Thorn storyline they tried to foist on us. anyway, at the end of the day i'm just here to stan laurie strode, and be her hype girl.

again, just...meh for me. there was so much melodrama in this movie when this should've just been a fun slasher movie, but i guess the film felt it had to explore how much trauma all these characters had and never actually properly dealt with it (seriously, all these characters were so mean and bitter to each other, and i get it when u had a crazed psychopath stalking a town for years, no one will feel all that warm and fuzzy to begin with).

also, still very salty about karen's death from the last film. #justiceforkaren

[diecastcarlove]

HKS Toyota GR Supra from MiniGT - based on the 2020 Tokyo Auto Salon car

HKS specializes in the engineering, manufacturing, and sales of high performance aftermarket and accessory automotive parts and components.

Here's a little bit of info on how I go about managing my diecast car collection.

Whenever I get a new car, I "catalog" it in a variety of ways which includes this unboxing collage of images. Then I research the car (since almost all the cars I collect are modeled after real-life counterparts) and I come up with a story in my mind's eye that I want to re-create so I can make a single photograph to have to remind me of the car down the road. (See what I did there?)

In this case the story is: An HKS race car is in the company garage getting tuned up. Some executives pull up in an HKS Honda (company car) to monitor progress.

Then I build a set. The set might be as simple as placing the car on a turntable with a mirror under it or more elaborate like this one where I either commission or buy a diorama that I can then use to help illustrate the story I created in my mind's eye.

I found a great diorama that I bought for this shot. The diorama usually costs five to 10 times what the cars cost me. But it is the only way to quiet my mind when I get to work on these pictures so I spend the money and just decide to have fun.

I also bought some 1:64 scale props and people to add to the set. Sometimes these details are so far in the background you don't see them unless you know to look for them, but I have decided that every detail counts and I won't be lazy. I spend the time putting it together. Sometimes it takes hours. I tend to knock stuff over once it's set up because I have giant hands and fingers and thumbs. I've started using some 12" long tweezers to help me place items inside the diorama.

After all that I set the lighting. In this shot I am using a ProFoto C1 Plus that I am shooting through a thin, white scrim. This creates a nice, large, even light source.

Once I have everything where I want it, I work the set and select my final image. Then I do my post work in Photoshop and Boris FX Optics.

I realize that the audience for this work is very small compared to the audience I had when I was a bird photographer, but I get no less satisfaction from it in any event.

I've included the catalog shot, the BTS shot and the final image for any of you who are interested. Depending where you find the images, if you cannot see all three go to my blog - diecastcarlove.blog and you'll see the entire lineup.

Thanks for looking.

[thecheesywritingcabin]

Regular Routine

So, the last two months have been moving at a rapid pace. The third draft feels like it's about halfway done, but it's still too early to start talking about beta-reading and whatnot.

Since I'm working at the moment, I thought it might be nice to talk about my writing/editing routine. It might be nice in terms of catharsis, as well as gives me a little break from my edit today.

So, let me break down how I survive working on this and my job as a pathology collector. Spoiler alert: this is a very, very long way of saying "take some breaks".

What Is Your Current Writing Routine?

Unless I have time off, I only edit on Sundays. Sometimes I'll get spicy and do some the Saturday evening, but more often than not I'm dicking around playing video games and decompressing from work.

Now, sometimes I'll plan some extra writing time in around work, but that can be a little bit of a nightmare.

How Long Do I Work For?

I don't talk about myself much online, so let me give you some context. I'm in pathology, and my roster is a mess. In fact, Wednesday and Thursday I don't know where I am until 6am that morning, or the previous afternoon if my boss has had time to plan. Monday and Tuesday meanwhile I work two shifts that are both three hours long - this used to be eight hours accumulative, but the evening shift had its hours cut. Friday I work five hours and on alternate Saturdays I work three and a half hours.

So, this sounds manageable, right?

Here's where it gets weird. First of all, the mornings of Monday, Tuesday or Friday I can get redeployed elsewhere, working either longer or farther away. One time, I worked from 8-2pm, then 3-6pm about 30 minutes away from the first location. Early in my career, my boss was so short staffed I wound up working close to 12 hours. Never again.

Wednesday and Thursday meanwhile I've more or less been locked into a 9.5 hour shift because few other staff know how to work that particular room.

In summary, most weeks I work about 36 hours, not including the weekend or redeployment. That translates to 75.5 hours per fortnight, just 30 minutes shy of full time hours here in Australia.

How Do I Manage These Hours and Writing?

For those of you who haven't worked in my industry, there can sometimes be gaps as wide as 2 hours between clients. During this time, it's best to do the store orders, stock counts and any miscellaneous tasks since there are a lot of those.

However, doing all these tasks take up about 15-20 minutes of your day. In fact, it's pretty easy to complete them all in the first hour if no clients show up.

In my company at least, you can be sent to rooms where there is nobody but you on site, and your clients are in the single digits.

You can probably see where I'm going with this.

Once the daily chores are done and there's no clients, I will whip out my journal and set a timer for 10-15 minutes, taking advantage of the excess float time. If I'm doing a big chapter, I might even do a draft on my lunchbreak if it's long enough.

In fact, a good chunk of Draft 1 was written like this.

This Sounds Exhausting

Well, that's because it is. There's no nice way to say it, but there's a reason there were 5-6 years where I posted nothing on Tumblr. Writing on the job takes away time that I might have otherwise used to rest in between clients.

It's all about finding balance. I do it on days I have the energy, but if I had a busy day or things have been going badly I won't touch my pen.

I'm sure most of you have heard a variation of this advice: find the gaps in your day, maybe get up earlier or stay up later if you need to, so you can allocate that time to write. That's basically what I do, but sometimes you need to take a break.

The problem for me while writing Draft 1 of Case of the Crawling Shadow, at least for a while, I would try to cram writing into every spare gap I had. This is a side effect of doing Camp Nanowrimo in 2022, but even going into Draft 2 I tried to keep up that momentum.

I wore myself down until I feel like a nub of a person. I was trying to do 3 chapters worth of editing a week, and suffered for it.

What's Happening Now?

At this point, my goal is to finish the Case of the Crawling Shadow's third draft so we can start sending it to beta readers. It's about 50% done, but going slowly. My body is still a bit grimy from the whirlwind drafting process, and I've been working resting into my editing time.

With any luck, we'll finally be able to start getting the ball rolling this year. I'm pretty excited for it. For now, I am alternating editing this chapter and building a McMansion in Sons of the Forest.

[absentlyabbie]

@iha-etscho0l genuinely, @vaspider is entirely correct that your six year old outdoor cat has undoubtedly been less fine than you realize, and as you clearly at least partly know and acknowledge, it is entirely luck that nothing truly awful has happened to your cat yet.

the "yet" is key and inescapable. I had a glance at your blog and saw that you feel this intensity about keeping cats indoors and only outdoors for short, supervised excursions is not caution but paranoia.

as the old saying goes, it isn't paranoia if they really are out to get you.

i'm not exactly holding out hope of convincing you, but my stories in this post are not unique. as a quick scroll through the notes will plainly demonstrate, it's in fact the opposite.

i'm not rattling chains and shouting into bullhorns about maybes and hypotheticals. what i've shared here is what i've seen and experienced, personally, directly, and with painful, scarring intimacy.

i was light on certain details in my original post because it hurts to recount, was traumatizing to experience, and can be traumatizing just to read about. but just to try to relate to you that the danger is real, and imminent, and almost inescapable for outdoor cats, even yours, i'll go into some specifics.

(this will be difficult to read and some descriptions will be graphic. scroll by if you're not up for that right now):

one of the first times i went outside to find the carport and driveway dotted with kitten corpses thanks to one of the local packs of wild and half-feral dogs, almost every one of the kittens died, their bodies shaken and broken and loose-limbed where they hadn't already gone stiff, fur matted from the mouths of the dogs and spotted with blood, on bodies that fit in one or two of my hands. the dogs weren't hungry, it was sport. they rolled in, chased the kittens and caught them up in their teeth, violently shook them to death, dropped them and moved on.

every single one of the kittens i wanted to call mine, take away with me and make an indoor cat when i could move out on my own again, every one of them died first. including shadow, who died in the incident above, and princess, who got old enough to be spayed and close to a year in age and just... vanished. but because we'd had large birds of prey circling in the few days before, we do know what happened to her. she was a survivor of another shaken-to-death batch, one i'd actually managed to find tiny and terrified in the bushes at the edge of the property. i roamed the property and nearby area for almost three weeks, calling for her, heartbroken, hoping maybe, maybe i'd get lucky somehow one more time and find her again, safe, but afraid.

it's probably for the best i never found princess, considering how i found simon, one of her cousins and agemates. he vanished in the shaking-death incident princess survived... only i found him more than a week later, and the dogs hadn't just shaken him to death. [warning: graphic] i found him behind a bush far closer than i would've imagined. found the half of him left, anyways. he looked almost pristine from the ribcage up. only, there was nothing below, and i remain scarred and on the verge of panic and being sick every single time i remember how i turned my head, and finally found him--at exactly the right angle to see directly into his perfectly intact but empty ribcage. i am trembling and holding back tears typing this now, and it's been more than 10 years.

there was ninja, the tiny black kitten who didn't live nearly long enough, because he was snake bitten only a day before my folks were scheduled for a trip away. which meant i was alone with him, desperately trying to comfort him in a little cardboard box inside the house, hoping against hope he'd somehow get better. but of course he didn't. i kept the little box he was in by my bed and in the scant hours i slept, he died.

another kitten who died so, so small... i can't even remember her name now. she was a pretty little fluffy tortie, and we named her something elegant, refined. she died in my lap, wrapped in a towel, as i tried to get her to take a little water from a dropper, overwhelmed by the respiratory infection that ravaged her and took out a third of her littermates too.

there was the sweetest little boy kitten, we hurt too much by then to name him, but he was so fluffy and soft and the color of a toasted marshmallow. he was affectionate and playful and so very friendly. a survivor of another attack by another pack of dogs or coyotes. this was a lot closer to the end, and we kept the garage door up about six inches to let the current kittens and their mama shelter in there in case of danger. my mother was especially "paranoid" with the kittens in the garage that they'd get up in the undercarriage or wheel wells of the car or van, and we always carefully accounted for every one of them before we left, to avoid tragedy. only, i was sick that day, and it was early, and they were late for church. every other one of them was accounted for, and mom checked every bit of the vehicle she could get any kind of view on so thoroughly, called for the "babies" in that high-pitched tone that always brought them running, and the little marshmallow boy never turned up. they were running quite late by then, but my mom, still so worried, stood out at the edge of the carport to watch as her husband rolled very slowly out of the garage--just in case, just in case. and it happened so fast. the car inched forward, and that little marshmallow of a kitten tumbled out of the wheel well right in front--and went immediately under the tire. crushed to death as my mother stared in horror. she could hardly speak the rest of the day.

you have been lucky. you have been so lucky none of these things has happened yet to your cat, that you've not been out in the dark, voice run ragged calling for her and getting no answer, no sign of her, for hours, days, weeks. so lucky she hasn't come home with a sudden, unexpected infection and rapidly declined, sick and weak and spinning circles and unable to control her bladder, pus oozing out of an ear and smelling unbelievably foul as you hold her wrapped in a towel on the way to the vet so she can go gently to sleep and not hurt anymore.

(that happened to me, too. tux, a black and white boy so big and tough, one of three that survived to adulthood, one who'd survived all the dogs and other predators, who survived a nasty spiderbite that left a pit in his face. the smell lingers in my memory.)

i genuinely, truly hope none of this ever happens to your cat. i really, really do, but the odds are not in her favor and are in fact stacked deeply against her.

the one (ONE) cat who survived those years of trauma (one of the mamas, mean for years until we finally caught and spayed her) has been an outdoor cat and survived more than ten years, learning to love my mother and trust her and enjoy what comforts can be provided. and she's still lived with terror and pain and sickness, every bit of which wouldn't have happened to her as an indoor cat. that cat is made of fear, "paranoia" except the kind that is horribly well-founded. she is so sweet, and so constantly afraid of everything, because she has to be to keep living.

i still am not really holding my breath that any of this will convince you, if you do even read it. but i hope if nothing else, my words and what i've been through stay with you, and you think on them, think on them hard, and make a careful, considered decision about what's best for your cat, what will give her the better, happier, healthier, safer, and longer life, without all the fear and horror and pain and illness.

i certainly can't predict even then what decision you'd make. i obviously have an outcome i'd hope for, but even with a long and measured think on it, you may never change your mind. all i can possibly ask is you hear what i and so many others have seen, heard, experienced, and witnessed, and you give it some weight and some time to think.

i truly wish your girl the best of luck. for every day she roams outdoors, she will need it.

i'll tell you what converted me to being all-in on keeping cats indoors only:

living for a year and a half in a rural area with a sudden feral cat colony explosion on the property.

i moved in with my folks for a bit and at that time, one (1) stray cat mama had taken up residence on the property, but was too feral to let my mother anywhere near her. but especially after she brought three kittens around, mom fed her and the kittens in hopes they'd grow trusting enough she could catch for spay and neuter at the minimum. momcat stayed mean and hella wary, but the kittens would hang around a little nearer and play with my mom via long stick, but still wouldn't come close enough to touch or catch.

unfortunately, two of the three kittens were girls and started having kittens of their own before further progress was made, shortly after i moved in. and that was pretty much instant doom.

there were so many kittens. SO MANY. multiple litters. every time we turned around, more kittens.

we fed them. we hunted for and located the kittens every time anywhere on the property and would move them to a repurposed doghouse anytime a mama cat had them somewhere else, so that they could grow up human-socialized and we could spay/neuter them when they were old enough. (also it was a handy tactic to push the issue of the mamas getting more used to/trusting of us themselves. only really worked with one of them, though.)

and we watched them die.

we watched litter after litter of kittens never make it to the age they could be spayed or neutered. the moms stayed, for the longest time, too skittish to more than briefly touch, much less catch and crate for a vet visit.

it sounds like a silly joke to say i have kitten-related ptsd, but i absolutely do.

too many goddamn times i'd walk out of the garage and find the carport and gravel drive strewn with tiny bodies. others simply went missing, never to be found.

one in particular, i wish i hadn't found, and the visual literally haunts me still, almost a decade later.

i saw so many kittens die of snake bite, spider bite, wild dogs, birds of prey, hit by cars, respiratory illness, covered in fleas and eyes crusted with infection.

and we loved them all. scrimped for antibiotics if the vet could be convinced to give it to us despite our being unable to bring them in. bought flea collars and ointments. we cared for them and fed them and petted them and played with them, brushed their fur and cleaned up their little faces, put ice in their water in hot summer, rigged a heating lamp in their house in the winter.

and they died. horribly. that property is pocked with unmarked graves of kittens and cats.

all the best intentions, not enough resources, and it didn't matter anyways because the population went from three to almost twenty (at times, over thirty) in the blink of an eye.

they died and died and died. our hearts broke over and over again. the stress and anxiety wore us down like sandpaper. i think, by the end of it all, we managed to find less than 10 of them all homes, including batman the disabled kitten i found a home across the country through tumblr.

it was carnage and tragedy, frankly. and we were helpless.

it only ended because they started dying faster than they could be born, and because we finally caught the two remaining mom cats in traps and got them spayed.

the points about outdoor cats being invasive predators devastating to local wildlife populations is true and valid and important.

but i know cat people, and cat people who don't know better than to let cats outdoors. what matters to you is the cat itself, generally. the cat being happy and taken care of.

keeping cats outdoors, letting them outdoors, is not taking care of the cats. it's not protecting them. it's not giving them any happiness or invigoration that couldn't be provided to them as indoor-only pets with just a little research and effort.

they die. they get ill. they get hurt. they're at risk of predators, and cars, and disease, and carelessly cruel children and deliberately cruel adults. they're at risk of disappearing on you because someone else saw a cat outdoors and intervened to give it a better, safer life not in conflict with the local environment.

and if that offends and angers you that someone would just take a cat they saw roaming outdoors, even collared, and that it sounds like i'm endorsing that, i am, but not if you intervene and be that person yourself for your own cat.

if what matters to you is doing right by your cat because it's family and a living creature whose happiness and health and safety is important to you,

keep them indoors. not part time. always. exclusively.

[jesslockwood]

Photo Opportunities

Word Count: 2.7k

Pairing(s): Tom Holland x Actress!Reader

Warnings: FLUFF with a slightly (barely) suggestive sentence towards the end 

A/n: damn I can't write anything except actress reader? smh but this is for @londonspidey ‘s sit-com Writing challenge (ik I'm early lol) but I was so excited I wrote the whole thing in one go lmao the prompt is bolded!

Calling yourself a fan was an understatement. You were obsessed with anything and everything marvel. And oddly enough, you could after today say you were in the club. It wasn’t a public fact yet, until later that day actually, at the Marvel panel at comic con that you were being announced as the actress for the character, Felica Hardy and no one else knew except for the people who cast you and your best friend who signed an NDA. You were technically still a known actress for your roles on television mainly as Thalia on the PJO Disney + series and a couple of still decently sized films. 

You were currently wrapping up signing autographs for fans of yours for today. Your team had planned it out so it wasn’t suspicious that you were at the con with a few of your castmates scattered doing other junkets and press so people wouldn’t guess who they were acting as the cast for new marvel projects. 

You had been planning to go meet your best friend, who wasn’t in the industry before getting a text that she bought you both a photo-op with someone and she wouldn’t tell you who. You couldn’t only assume it was a marvel actor that you would indeed, freak out. 

Y/b/n: btw I brought you a mask. I get the wig lol.

You: please tell me it doesn’t cover my full face. Also, how are we posing?

Y/b/n: I bought as many photo ops as I could so a lot of different ones, And if I tell you the poses it’ll spoil it.

You: is this with the money I pay you to be my assistant with? Lol fine I’m omw with security

Y/b/n: maybe… 

Y/b/n: and they’ll need more backup security for who we’re getting a photo op with than you do for your hellfire.

You roll your eyes before taking your stuff and exiting the booth, before heading out the backways with staff security and your detailed security for the day. You only had security because you wanted to explore the con when you weren’t needed.

Your best friend had also been your assistant for the con weekend, but you didn’t want her to be confined to you the whole three days so when she could, you would let her explore it, at least she could experience it as a fan, right?

When you made it to that part of the building, you wanted to wait in line with her, which your security didn’t agree to so she texted you when there were about five people ahead of her. She was one of the last in line, with you asking her to be kind, so others would get their chance to be first with whomever it was. 

When she texted you and your detailed exit, getting a few stares and others taking their phones out to either take photos or tweet, you wave at them before joining your best friend in line.

“Here,” she says before handing you none other than a black cat mask before she puts on a red wig. 

You glare at her slightly trying to not make a scene, before putting it on. 

“I’m assuming you're Mary Jane?” you laugh figuring out that it had to be someone from Spider-Man.

“How’d you- never mind.” She laughs with you.

She then explains how she’s going to pose for your five photo ops, joking in between how she should “get a raise for this”.

You catch sight of him before sucking in your breath. This was either going to go down amazingly or terribly, there was no in-between with you. 

“Excuse Me, are you Y/n Y/l/n?”

You turn around and are met by some fans who were standing in line behind you.

“I am! How’s your con going?” you ask politely to the two of them.

“It's going amazing! We love you as Thalia! Could we maybe get a picture? Only if it’s okay?”

“Of course! Thank you for supporting me!” your best friend grabs their phone to take the photo, before you take off the mask, and stand between the two fans, and your best friend snaps a few photos. 

“Thank you so much! And Are you fans of Tom?”

You start slowly walking back to catch up to the line. 

“Yeah, I love him as Spiderman, but I also enjoy his other roles. He's very talented, I'd love to work with him one day!” 

“Have you seen him in Uncharted?  We love Him as Nathan drake!”

“I have, he was amazing per usual! How are you two posing with him?”

They show you their innovative pose. You laugh and tell them it's great before you have to wish them goodbye before heading up for your turn for the photo op. 

“How do we want to pose- hang on, I recognize you!”

You freeze slightly before your friend mouths for you to flirt. You look down at the mask in your hand before getting into character and saying “Of course you do Spidey, I'm always causing you trouble.” you put on the mask and wink. 

He seems slightly stunned, laughing, feeling like he’s seen you somewhere, not only because he found you extremely gorgeous, while in his peripheral vision he sees his brother/ assistant, Harry waving like a madman on the side. 

Your friend directs you both through the poses, first, one both him putting “webs” onto you as she looks over his shoulder, the second one, both of you kissing his cheeks, the third, all jumping in the air in your best superhero poses, the fourth one she gets a photo op alone and the last one she gives to you,

“Seriously, who are you?”

“Your Wildest dreams, baby,” you say, taking off the mask. 

Your best friend yells “freestyle” from the sidelines before Tom dips you, gently, with you shocked, holding the mask out with your free arm and the photo captures that moment. 

 He gently helps you stand back up fully, not before you drop the mask.

“Nice moves Spider-Man.”

“Not so bad yourself, Black Cat.”

You laugh before, taking off with your best friend, well more her dragging you to the printing station leaving the mask behind. Tom picks it up before shoving it in his back pocket to hopefully give back if he could find you. 

-

`You were sitting in the green room, trending on Twitter before you were actually supposed to be trending on Twitter, and god knows where else.  

Someone had snuck a video of you and Tom, up till him dipping you, and a video of you interacting with the fans in the line.

Your Y/b/n was currently reading off some tweets out loud

“‘A kind queen we stan.’  I agree, I also agree with ‘Date her if you can't date me tom!!!’.

‘THALIA AND PETER PARKER??? My two fandoms have collided.’ same, same. Oo this one says, ‘if she ain’t playing black cat I will sue marvel.’ I'm dying at the reply ‘She needs to post the photos or I'll sue her!’. This one’s funny, ‘she could squash him like a bug in heels but he liked his queen like that.’.”

She pauses watching you texting.

“Y/n? Y/n?”

“What? Sorry I was only half listening. I was texting my publicist. She said to stay on the DL until tonight. 

“Well we should get food, you haven't eaten since this morning.”

“By the way, your show has shot to number one on Disney +. Also, you have like three times the followers you had before, probably cause you're trending on every platform, even Tumblr!”

“Wow you should just become my social media manager now.” you joke trying to ease the joy yet weirded out feeling in your stomach.

“Does that come with a raise? Because after today I've spent way too much of what I'm paid.” she jokes back.

-

After finishing his photo ops Tom asked Harry who she was and to find out. By the time he finished autographs for the day, Tom and Harry walked to the panel room in the back for announcements, one that included him for the new Avengers movie, while Harry gave him the rundown.

“So she’s an actress, she plays Thalia on Disney plus’ Percy Jackson series, and that's her most known project. The other girl with her is her assistant best friend, and now she's trending everywhere. People dug up some old photos of her being a marvel/Spider-Man fan, so there's that. And she's here at the con for the rest of the weekend. She's doing photo ops tomorrow at one, and yes she's single from what I gather since you were looking at her like this.” he makes a weird face before tom smacks him.

“And plus you have time in your schedule to get a photo op with her, that is if you eat lunch quickly.”

That gave Tom an idea. 

“Harry I’m going to need you to book me one, oh and help me find a Spider-Man costume!” He says, before leaving harry to do ‘assistant’ work. entering the green room for the announcements, watching them announce a new movie.

“We are so excited to announce to the Marvel Universe, and spider-verse-” that perked tom’s ears, “-directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood, and today we are announcing our amazing Miss Felicia Hardy, please give a warm welcome to the stage, Your Black Cat!”

You suddenly emerged in an aisle way, dressed in all black with a leather jacket, black ankle boots, and of course black sunglasses indoors.

The music is marvel music until it suddenly changes after a recorded laugh from you into “I can’t be tamed by Miley Cyrus”.

You start owning the music while saying hi and touching fans’ hands. You decide to take off your sunglasses and throwing them to a fan, for them to keep, before getting on stage.

“What a Performance from the one the only Y/n Y/l/n!”

You laugh, being met with the loudest applause you had heard all con before being handed a Mic. 

“Thank you but I'm a terrible dancer.” You Joke.

Tom was staring at the screen stunned. You had been the black cat all along. You were in the marvel universe and spidey one,  so he'd definitely be seeing more of you. The hard part is that you seemed so genuine when you talked, interacted with fans and was no doubt, stunning. 

“Better close your mouth or the flies will get in.” Tom turns around to find the voice of none other than his friend slash bully, Sebastian Stan, along with Anthony Mackie.

“Looks like the kid has a crush!” Anthony laughs, pointing to the screen you were on.

“I-I don’t! I don’t even know her!” Tom tries to come to his own defense, hopelessly.

“She’s got you whipped already don’t even deny it.” Harry comes in, joining the teasing of one, Tom Holland.

“Maybe we can invite her out for drinks tonight, then fanboy over here can meet her, and then probably scare her off!” Anthony mentions.

“You haven’t looked on the internet? They’ve already met.” Seb says, before showing Anthony twitter. 

Anthony stands there slightly shocked before bursting into laughter.

“Well, she’s damn well a keeper for Tom since she obviously likes him.”

A staff member peaks their head in the green room to tell Tom he’s up next.

“Well, that’s my cue to leave you two!”

On the other hand, you were on an adrenaline high from being on stage, and seeing all the fans. You knew tomorrow was going to be crazy, as you expected people to book your photo op left and right since the announcement. 

You had decided to decline an offer from your fellow marvel universe castmates, Sebastian Stan and Anthony Mackie, which they so graciously told you that whenever you’re free, the offer still stood. 

You had gotten to your hotel room seeing your phone blowing up on the social media apps for the second time that day. 

You responded to the important stuff, before heading to bed, knowing it was going to be hectic.

-

You had been right, it was absolutely insane, the number of people who showed up. You had fully booked all your time slots for photo ops. You had seen so many people dressed up in marvel cosplay, ranging from Loki to Ironman, even some people dressed up as your character, which was wildly insane to see.

You had been nearing the end of the line and had enjoyed every moment with the fans, and you couldn’t wait for your autographing session later that day, to truly get a chance to talk to the fans and connect with them and how they felt about you being their beloved Black Cat. 

After a few more photos, posing how they wanted, you see a fully dressed, head to toe, mask and all, Spider-Man. You had seen some spider-mans but most took off their masks to snap a picture. The person was the last in line. 

“Hey Black Cat.” The southern American accented voice tells you, seeming very familiar. 

“Hey, Spider, what poses do you have up your sleeve?” you ask kindly.

“I bought a few, Cat.” they laugh.

“Okay, You can do whatever a spider can right?” you pull out a line out of the comics jokingly.

“I can do flips if that’s what you’re asking.”

“Is that some kind of nerd pick-up line? Because it’s only kind of working.” you laugh. 

“I really can, but this is one.”

He gets down on one knee, holding a black cat mask instead of a ring. The photographer captures the shocked expression on your face.

“I- Don’t- What- Spider I-” 

“Ow My feelings…” Suddenly their voice changes into a British accent before they pull off the mask to reveal-

“Tom?”

“I guess you don’t have a spidey sense darling?” The photographer captures the moment without warning eating the moment up. 

You laugh at that. 

“I guess you found out my true identity Spider. And it’s nice to officially meet you, Tom.”

He laughs, just as nervous as you, he notices he has gotten closer to you and a strand of hair loosely is blowing in your face, so naturally, he pushes it behind your ear. Another snap of the camera can be heard. 

“NOW KISS!” a voice belonging to your best friend yells from the side, mid-eating a churro.

You both laugh really hard at that.

The both of you calm down, slowly leaning lost in the moment. The camera snaps again. You both look at the photographer weirded out, and they just shrug.

“Wait can you actually do a flip?” you ask, pulling away, not wanting prying eyes aka the photographer, to pry in your business. 

“I can, though I’d show you later, maybe in the greenroom?”

“That sounds naughty, but, sure.” you joke around. 

He laughs before, you both take off from the area going to grab the photos.

-

After spending most of the day together when you could, you get Tom’s number, before heading back to your hotel room. He texts you as soon as you get back. 

Spider: I had fun today, minus finding our assistants making out.

You: we should ‘snog’ too, it’ll gross them out ;)

You: I had fun too btw. Are you leaving tomorrow?

Spider: lol we should. And yeah an early flight, 6 am to be exact. Hbu?

You: Yeah me too... another day another dollar lol

Spider: ill miss you, Cat.

You: stop talking like we’ll never see each other again lol. As a matter of fact, come to my room, we’re watching a movie!

Spider: alright, I’ll order snacks. 

  You sigh smiling at your phone. You haven’t felt this giddy in a long time.

Your phone pings with a few Instagram notifications.

Tomholland2013 has started following you.

Tomholland2013 has tagged you in a photo.

You open Instagram to find the photo of him “proposing” to you posted.

“Ow, my leg, my- feelings...Welcome to the Universe, Cat.” the photo is captioned. You decide to post, the photo of him dipping you.

“So what do you say, Spider? Wanna help me pull off the Heist of the Heist of the Century?” you caption it, Before getting comfortable to watch a movie. 

What an opportunity ;)

Tags:

@lolooo22 @webmeupspiderdaddy @harryhollandsgirlfriend @spideyspeaches @greenorangevioletgrass @queenofthepouges @sheranatic111 @keithseabrook27

[lancerious]

All righty, here is the Deltarune Chapter 2 tier list...you may notice the list is quite shorter for this chapter. I'll explain why.

I'll be honest with y'all, I don't have strong opinions on the majority of the more major Chapter 2 characters, so putting most characters in a tier list didn't make a lot of sense to me. Besides, I can't remember if some characters had actual dialogue outside of their battles, and if you read through my Chapter 1 tier list HERE, you'd see that was one of my rules. So...yeah, sorry if you were expecting a bit more...most of the characters I have strong opinions on are from Chapter 1, not Chapter 2.

Oh, by the way, the reason no characters are on the "S" tier is because that tier is reserved for Lancer and King only. It is a truly special tier reserved for the best of the best. The reason no characters are on the "D" tier is because I don't have severely negative opinions about any characters listed. Anyway, here we go!

Also if you want to know my rules check out my Chapter 1 tier list, I don't feel like repeating them here :P.

Starting off with the "A" tier...

Character #1: Swatch. Swatch! I LOVE Swatch. He's an exception to my "has dialogue during a battle and outside of battle" rule because he...doesn't fight in a battle, lol. But I'm including him in this list anyway because I love this guy. Definitely my favorite character introduced in Chapter 2. His personality is somehow so funny to me, even though it's not intended to be. His implied interactions with Rouxls Kaard are honestly one of the most hilarious aspects of this chapter in my opinion. Seriously, what's not to love about Swatch?

Character #2: Berdly. Now, I know I said in my Berdly Deltarune bingo post HERE that I'm not super invested in Berdly, but compared to almost every other Chapter 2 character, he is way up there. I do like Kris and Susie more, but Berdly is a very respectable character and has a lot going for him. He has improved by a fair amount already and has tons of potential. I can definitely see me liking Berdly a lot more as time passes.

Character #3: Swatchling. Swatchlings are neat! I love how they come in different colors, and their personality is another one of my favorites, though that's mostly because it's a lot like Swatch's. I don't really have a lot to say about Swatchlings. But I do like them a lot! They were fun to encounter, and I honestly like them almost as much as Rudinns.

Character #4: Spamton. Ah, the man himself...Spamton G. Spamton. The one every single Deltarune fan is fanatic over. And honestly, I can certainly see why. Pretty much everything about Spamton is unique and well-executed. I've recently begun to like Spamton quite a bit, though I won't be posting about him all the time, I can assure you that. If I had made this same tier list several months ago, Spamton would have been near the bottom, but I've really been trying to appreciate the little man, and I think I can confidently say I am a bit of a Spamton fan myself! Good character!

I can imagine I'm making some of you lose brain cells now.

Character #1: Tasque Manager. Honestly, when I first began making this tier list, I forgot about Tasque Manager. But boy, I am glad I made this tier list, because I forgot how decent of a character she is. Her connection with Jevil is one of the most interesting aspects of Chapter 2 in my opinion...it brings a lot of questions to my mind regarding how the Dark Worlds work. Besides this, Tasque Manager is pretty good! I like how she assists the party in sparing the Mauswheel, and her desire for order is cool too. Not a bad character, though she can be a bit forgettable in my opinion.

Character(s) #2: Sweet Cap'n Cakes. I'm just going to group these guys together as my opinions are equal for all three of them. I really like how SCC are the opposite of Rudinns. They constantly protest the law and are quite rebellious, while the Rudinns simply go along with everything so they don't get imprisoned. It makes these characters more interesting in my opinion. They're all pretty friendly as well, and their dynamics with one another are very entertaining and fun to watch. Definitely decent characters!

Character #3: Addisons. Addisons are another exception to my "has dialogue during a battle and outside of battle" rule, and this is where my opinions will begin to be controversial: Addisons are overrated. Now, I am NOT saying Addisons are bad characters by any means. I personally simply don't understand the hype behind them. They have a connection to Spamton, but that's about it. They're regular NPCs beyond that. However, they are still interesting characters! I do like them, just not on the same degree as some Deltarune fans.

Oh boy...best get this over with.

Character #1: Queen. Like the Addisons, I do not dislike Queen. She is a decent character, and I find some aspects of her fairly interesting. However, I...don't understand the hype. This is going to be very controversial, but King is the better villain. Queen is...sort of a villain? In one scene she's traveling with Kris (you) in a car, and the next she's imprisoning everybody except Ralsei? Just...what? I don't understand...she's too fickle. Villains should be a clear-cut antagonist in my opinion. They shouldn't be sending mixed messages like Queen does. However, as much as I could complain about Queen, I again do not dislike her. I can...sort of see why people are into her, but yeah...I've never been a Queen fan, and likely never will.

Character #2: Noelle. How do I explain this...I view Noelle the same way I view Ralsei. Neither are bad characters, but because they are so popular and treasured amongst the Deltarune community, I automatically like and appreciate them less. Now, Noelle is not, I repeat, NOT a bad character! I truly do believe she has potential. But I simply can't fully bring myself to like her. I am truly trying, but I'm not there yet. Like several other characters I've mentioned before, I can understand the hype around Noelle. I hope I can learn to appreciate Noelle more as time goes on.

Character #3: Werewerewire. Werewerewire is all right. They, along with Werewire, certainly bring a unique concept to Darkners as a whole. The idea of being controlled by an outside force is honestly quite dark while also being intriguing. I like how the Werewerewires seem to be perfectionists and greatly dislike it when Kris spares them instead of beating them in a battle. Even though they don't speak, I wanted to include them on my list.

Character #4: Werewire. And the final character I'll be covering in this post is Werewire. Most of what I want to say about Werewires has already been said with the Werewerewires, but I do want to add one thing: The quote describing Werewires as "walking through a nightmare" is quite chilling to me. It implies they have no free will and are truly corrupted and controlled by a higher authority, presumably Queen. It does hint at Queen being more ruthless and villainous than she lets on, which is something I definitely like.

And that's everyone! I'll be posting the combined tier list of Chapters 1 & 2 tomorrow so you can more clearly see and understand where I personally rank all these characters. Hopefully you enjoyed, and thank you for reading :)!

Again, if I used the wrong pronouns for any character, I am using the pronouns from the wiki, so if I got any pronoun wrong, I am sorries :(.

Have a grand rest of your day ^-^!

[theygender]

Ignoring the inaccurate claims people are spreading in regards to the information Plume is providing about trans healthcare because that's a whole other post, one of the main things that I keep seeing people saying is "$99 is way too expensive, it's way cheaper to use insurance at Planned Parenthood!" Which like objectively. Yes. You are correct. Getting your transition covered by your insurance—especially at an informed consent clinic like Planned Parenthood—is going to be a lot cheaper. But this service isn't FOR people who have easy access to trans-friendly insurance and Planned Parenthoods

I live in a rural conservative state with exactly one Planned Parenthood that's three hours away from my city. We had a second one several years ago but it got shut down by transphobic/pro-life protestors, and there are no other informed consent clinics in the state. Given that this is a conservative state with absolutely zero laws to protect trans people and several laws specifically discriminating against us, many people do not have access to health insurance that covers transition related care. Given that 10% of the state's population doesn't have health insurance, that means 1 in 10 people won't have access to any medical coverage at all. My girlfriend, a trans woman, is one of those people

So let's take a look at how much HRT might cost a trans person in my state without access to our single Planned Parenthood or insurance coverage

You would have to see a gender therapist first to get a referral for HRT. Based off of a local therapist's website (the only one I could find who actually had their prices listed), they charge $325 for the initial visit, and $205 for all following visits. Many gender therapists require that their patients see them for at least 6 months before they'll give you a referral, and once a month is generally the longest amount of time therapists feel comfortable going between appointments. So already, just to get your referral, you're looking at a bare minimum of $1,350 without insurance. Even then you wouldn't be guaranteed a referral, and the therapist could tell you that they want you to go through more appointments first or that they don't think HRT is right for you at all

If you do manage to get a referral then next you'll be seeing an endocrinologist. Researching the costs of endocrinologists in my state shows that they range between $135 and $265 per appointment, so we'll take the average of $200. This $200 price would also apply to your first visit, after which they could still deny you HRT. If they do allow you to start HRT then they generally ask you to come back for follow up appointments every three months at minimum during the first year, which means your first year of appointments would cost $800. You will need blood work done at each of the appointments. It was a bit harder to find sources on the costs of this blood work, but what I've found suggests that it can cost anywhere between $100 and $1,000, with a $100-$500 range being the most common. If we use $300 as the average of this range, that comes out to $1,200 worth of blood tests in your first year on HRT. All of this combined adds up to a whopping total of $2,000 for endocrinology services

Altogether, this estimate comes out to $3,350 for one year's worth of HRT prescriptions and the associated blood work. (I'm not including the costs of the actual medication itself because they would be the same regardless of who you get your prescriptions from.) Because my estimates used middling costs, allowed generous amounts of time between appointments, and assumed that you would stop seeing your therapist after you got your referral, it could easily cost a lot more. And this also doesn't account for the cost of travel if your nearest trans-friendly therapists and doctors are a significant distance away

Plume costs $99 a month, and blood work is included in the subscription fee. They provide three months of prescriptions at a time with three months between blood work/appointments, and according to reviews from some folks who have used them they allow you to cancel your subscription in between appointments and then restart it when you need new scripts/tests. If you stay subscribed for the full year it would run you $1,188, and if you follow the model of canceling in between appointments it would only run you $396 for the 4 months you would actually be using the service. AND all of this comes with much more efficient care, without having to spend 6+ months trying to convince cis therapists and doctors that you Really Are Trans before they'll even consider treating you

YES, there are better options out there for those who actually have access to them, and if you're one of the people who does then by all means go with those options! But please, don't ruin one of the only safe and affordable methods of trans healthcare for those of us who don't have the same opportunities just because it's not a good option for you

[izzyspussy]

okay so i love reddie as like. a concept but i can't do horror movies so i can't watch it, and i've never read the novel. with that in mind: do you have any cute reddie fics i could read without knowing anything beyond the very basics of the plot of it?

I am glad to do this! Disclaimer though, I uuhhhh. "Cute" is not usually in my list of Things I Am Looking For when choosing a fic, so... proceed with caution I suppose. Anyway.

*Pennywise voice* C'mon, Anon, come take your fic...

Canon Compliant (To Degrees) But Not Dependent on Context

I killed a clown. AMA! T, outsider POV, post-canon (Eddie lives)

This could be read as AU, or it could be read as the characters just keeping the real events on the DL. So honestly, however much you may or may not know about canon it can be applied or not as you see fit. I read it (for the first time) before seeing Chapter 2 myself.

I (39M) got stabbed twice today and now I want a divorce. Help?

little pieces of the nothing E, post-canon (everyone lives)

Canon doesn't really come up except in passing.

After Derry, Richie and Eddie start hooking up in secret. Richie knows it's never going to be anything serious—and he's fine with that, really—but sometimes Eddie makes it too easy to pretend otherwise.

Every Crease and Slope M, post-canon (everyone lives)

This one could be described as "cute" I think! Again, canon doesn't really come up.

“Get your foot out of my armpit,” Eddie says, shoving Richie away. “What the hell are we watching?”

“I’m so glad you asked,” Richie says. For a moment, his stomach twists nervously. But the truth is, he knows he has nothing to be worried about, not anymore. “Who here likes to objectify men?”

Shotgun T, post-canon (Eddie lives)

I don't remember but I don't actually think canon comes up at all in this one. And it's cute! Richie fake dates his PR manager to make Eddie jealous because they are both stupid lmfao.

The TRASHMOUTH got off a good one last night … in a spontaneous wedding ceremony with RUMORED GIRLFRIEND Anna Gonzales!!! Spotted hand in hand outside the famous Graceland Wedding Chapel in Las Vegas last night, our favorite raunchy stand up staple was being anything but TRASHY with his new bride.

Change Partners T, post-canon (Eddie lives)

For this one you mostly just have to know that there was an evil clown and it was scary, and made Richie even more scared of homophobia than he might have been otherwise. His phone gets stolen, hacked, and leaked.

"Rich," Eddie says heavily. Meaningfully, and Richie holds his breath, both afraid and hopeful that Eddie is about to say something really sappy, like I always knew and it didn't matter to me, or you know I support you no matter what. Eddie takes a deep breath before he speaks, and Richie closes his eyes, braced for it. "I didn't look at your dick pics."

we were the pretenders E, post-canon (Eddie lives)

It's porn! Only relevant canon: Richie fell from several feet in the air, likely resulting in minor injury.

He watches Richie twist again, the shift of muscle beneath his t-shirt, and then, possessed by some impulse he doesn’t want to examine too closely, says, “I could give you a massage, if you want.”

when everything feels like the movies E, post-canon (everyone lives)

Canon is relevant in this one, but not directly, plenty of context is provided, and the plot of the fic is separate from the plot of canon (it's just character development and romance, babey!).

If he were anyone else, this would be the moment for him to ask what the hell Eddie is doing: in California, generally, and showing up at Richie’s door with a stack of luggage and no explanation, specifically. It’s an interrogation that Eddie has been dreading mostly because he doesn’t actually have any good answers.

Don't Break Character M, post-canon (everyone lives)

I have read this fic three times! I love it! There is one moment that is basically an easter egg for canon info, but you won't miss anything if you don't get it.

It takes one day for a fan to notice. WAS ANYONE GONNA TELL ME RICH TOZIER IS A HE/THEY OR DID I HAVE TO READ THAT IN HIS TWITTER BIO MYSELF??

Eddie Kaspbrak, Office Uncle Extraordinaire T, outsider POV, post-canon (Eddie lives)

I also read this one for the first time before seeing Chapter 2. It has easter eggs for canon(s) as well, but the POV character knows less than you do so those are just fun extras.

Eddie's coworker finally convinces him to bring his elusive spouse to an office party. It goes about as well as you might expect, which is to say spectacularly.

Alternate Universe

Paparazzo, Please M

Cute, cute, cute! But with a suitable amount of angst to make it readable to me lmfao.

Eddie is Richie's first and favorite paparazzo.

hello 911, would you like to hear my dick joke? M

This fic has everything. Cuteness, jokes, making out, grievous injury, Stanley Uris...

Eddie is a 911 operator and Richie takes getting minorly stabbed as an opportunity to get flirty. Much to everyone's chagrin, it works.

HONEY, LET'S GET MARRIED! T

Who doesn't love an ensemble cast and a fake marriage?

Richie offers to marry Bill so he can get financial aid for grad school, Eddie loses his marbles, and Stan makes it his problem.

cherry red E

When the characters think they're in a porno, but then the author makes them fall in love lol RIP.

As it stood, Eddie knew exactly what sort of person he was. He was a shitty, neurotic, repressed as all hell pretentious asshat, and he made every single decision every single day of his life based off of that knowledge. Sure, deciding to get screwed was a weird - but perhaps inevitable - lapse, but he thought he’d chosen the person to screw him quite well.

Just Friends T

When everyone in your life knows you're in love, including the children.

Richie brings Eddie home for a good-old-fashioned family shindig. Everyone thinks they're dating. And it gets worse.

Hope this satisfies your curiosity, Anon! I would say I hope you don't get dragged into the gutter with the rest of us, but I would be lying. Enjoy!

♥ Jack