#if i get in a group with him i might actually kill myself. or email my professor and ask to switch

[lesbiten]

my english teacher is making us take the mbti test to assign us groups

[juceynightmare]

dating 101 (18+) part 1 - cody rhodes x reader

my masterlist

dating 101 (18+) masterlist

pairing(s): cody rhodes x reader, roman reigns x reader

warning(s): swearing

genre(s): college!au, slow burn, fluff

|| next part ||

moving in to a new place is scary, especially when that new place is your new college dorm. at least y/n didn’t need to worry about messy roommates or just terrible roommates in general, deciding to opt in for a single room instead. luckily, her room was adjacent to the communal bathroom and… no one else. the only neighbors y/n had to be worried about were whoever was going to be across the hall from her and all those people adjacent to that room.

she had already moved in the day prior, said her farewells to her parents, and was currently spending the day at her desk setting up her google calendar. school wouldn’t start for another week or so, the first initial week being full of multiple move-in days for students to get settled as well as an orientation day where students got put into groups to take a tour of the campus.

y/n kept her door wide open, utilizing the magnet attachment to keep it open so she didn’t need to prop up anything against it. the sounds of people moving in down the hall were used as background noise and, honestly, although y/n wasn’t one for actually putting herself out there, she liked hearing the noises of people talking: it made her feel as if she were part of the community.

a knock on the wall caught her attention, and y/n turned to greet whoever was at her door. that was another perk to having her door open when she wanted it too: if people wanted to say hi to her and befriend her, she happily would!

“hello there, couldn’t help but introduce myself once i saw your door was open. i’m ted, i live right across the hall from you. mind if i join you in here? my roommate is about to move in and i don’t want to be in the way but don’t really have anywhere else to go.” the boy at her door sheepishly asked.

he looked nice enough, definitely not serial killer vibes, and if he was going to be living across from her, why not?

she smiled warmly, nodding her head. “nice to meet you ted, i’m y/n! uh, i don’t really have a place for you to sit right now-”

“oh! i’m, just across, let me go get my chair and i’ll roll it on over.” ted cut her off, already turning around to head back to his room.

y/n peered out the door, noting how tidy ted’s side of the room seemed to be: his door also being held wide open. she also noted that there was only one other desk from what she could see from her area, noting that ted seemed to only have one other roommate. she only hoped that his roommate would be just as kind as ted.

she laughed as she watched him roll his chair over to her room, sitting on it and using his legs to walk it over. he had his macbook in his lap, and joined y/n at the table.

“so, are you always going to be keeping your door open?” he questioned, setting his macbook down on the part of the table that y/n had cleared for him.

“yeah, probably. i’d love to make friends, you know. with me being in this single room, as you can see, i’m already very solitary. i also am far too busy to always constantly be out, so i figured that if i kept my door open that someone might just stop by and finally say hi and: look! it already worked out!” y/n mused, looking over at ted and smiling, which the boy reflected.

ted shook his head in amusement, finding it hard to believe that he had already fallen for y/n’s “friend trap” as he dubbed in his head. “well then, y/n, i don’t mind being friends with you if it means i get to come over here and chill out. my roommate’s a random and we’ve only emailed each other and exchanged instagrams so i don’t know too much about him. some party hungry guy so i’m just hoping he doesn’t bring over too many girls.” he said, glancing over at y/n’s screen and staring at her jam-packed schedule. “holy shit, are you trying to kill yourself? why is your schedule so packed?” he questioned.

y/n groaned at the mention of her schedule, switching her attention from ted’s face to her screen. she sighed, “yeah, let’s not mention it. another reason why i can’t go out and socialize as much as i probably should. my major’s absolutely killer but the money is worth it.”

“what’s your major?” ted asked, pulling up his own google calendar that he had already finished setting up for the quarter.

“materials science and engineering, you?” she replied, fighting back a laugh at ted’s bewildered expression.

“holy shit, yeah ok i see what you mean. and i’m majoring in managerial economics. here, let’s compare schedules. we should go get dinner together.” ted pushed his macbook closer to hers, as the two scanned for when their free times lined up.

“looks like dinner at 7 everyday would be reasonable. ok, next question. pineapple on pizza?” y/n questioned, turning her attention back to ted, and letting out an exasperated gasp at ted’s disgusted expression.

“don’t fucking tell me you like that horrid combination.” ted groaned out, which earned him a loud “what the fuck are you talking about? it’s the most amazing pizza topping ever!” in response.

the two continued to converse in those: “let’s get to know each other!” icebreaker type questions. eventually, the two were doubled over in laughter, their laughs traveling out the rooms and down the halls for others to hear. they were sharing stories of their high schools back at home, and embarrassing stories about themselves in those high school years.

y/n was glad that ted lived across from her, the two hitting it off almost instantly. eventually, a knock was heard on the wall followed by someone clearing their throat. ted and y/n looked towards the doorway, ted standing up with a smile and walking over to the man while y/n stared at him as if she was seeing a ghost.

the man looked familiar, but y/n couldn’t put her finger on it. it was right on the tip of her tongue too, and it bothered her.

“hey! you’re cody right? oh, i see you’re already moved in. sorry i wasn’t there to greet you, i was hanging out with our neighbor across the hall, this is y/n! y/n, this is my roommate cody.” ted introduced the two after shaking cody’s hand. he stepped out of the way so cody and y/n could look at each other.

“hey, did we go to high school together?” cody and y/n’s rang out in sync, catching the two of them by surprise. this caused y/n to laugh, her mood already brightened from her recent conversation with ted.

“wrestling star, right?” y/n questioned, which earned a cocky smile from cody as he raised his arm up to flex his bicep.

“you already know it, sweetheart.” cody mused, laughing at the way y/n’s nose scrunched up in disgust - although he hoped she was simply faking it. he didn’t want to ruin his, well official, first impression on his and ted’s neighbors, especially since it seemed ted and y/n were already well on their way to become good friends. he brought his arm back down to his side, “and you’re that one smart girl that can sing really well, right?” cody shot back.

y/n nodded her head, a blush rising to her cheeks in embarrassment. “nice to actually get to meet you… cody?” she greeted, worrying that she got his name wrong. she smiled triumphantly when he nodded his head, confirming that she got his name right.

“same to you, y/n.” he smiled back. “now, i’d love to sit and talk but is it cool if i steal ted for a bit? we need to talk about some rules for our room.” cody asked, to which y/n nodded at. ted walked over to y/n’s desk, grabbing his macbook and sitting down on his chair. the two men grinned, waving farewell to y/n before walking off to their own room, or well cody walked back and ted rolled his way over to the room.

y/n watched as they closed the door behind them, cody waving once more before the door was shut. she smiled and leaned back in her chair, satisfied that she managed to meet not one, but two people on her first official day at college without counting the full day she had spent moving in and exploring the town with her parents.

just as she was about to turn her attention back to her macbook to continue preparing for her classes, she heard ted and cody’s door open. “let’s grab dinner tonight at 6! downtown or the dining commons, you decide!” she heard ted’s voice.

y/n yelled out a response, “dining commons!”

“see you then, sweetheart!” was yelled out in response before the door shut close once more.

cody. she thought ,as she rolled her eyes in amusement.

she wondered how the two men would get along. she could tell ted was outgoing, and knowing cody’s high school reputation, he mirrored that same eagerness to put himself out there. the two were different from her in that sense, considering y/n wouldn’t exactgly call herself introverted, but she was most definitely more reserved than others.

while speaking with ted, she knew that he would be joining many clubs for his major to branch out. his schedule was already full of a multitude of club meetings, interviews, socials, you name it. although she hoped that he’d swing by her room often.

as for cody, y/n could only imagine that the man would probably be out partying and breaking hearts on most nights, much like he did in high school if she remembers it correctly. she knew of cody because of the rumors being passed around campus, but never really knew him like that. now that she’s met him, she can confirm that cody is just as flirty as the rumors call it.

if those two boys were going to be her main friends during her years in college, then y/n was certain she’d have quite the interesting college life.

|| next part ||

[skythesnake]

Song of the Farmer

hey, uh- I don't know how to format this, is my first time

I don't think there's any trigger warnings, I try to keep it pretty chill. There's some swearing and it will pick up as the story does, but shouldn't be too bad.

Sam/Farmer - Penny/Maru - Emily/Shane

Pat breathed in the crisp mountain air as he got off the bus. The ride had been bumpy and he was horrified to notice smoke coming from the bus' front end. He stepped away quickly and turned at the sound of a clearing throat

"Ah, hello. You must be… Patr-"

"Just Pat. Please." I interrupted. The last thing I needed was my terrible name following me here. The old man standing in front of me smiled

"Alright. You must be Pat. I'm Lewis, the mayor?" That's right. He and my grandpa had been good friends back in the day. He and I had been communicating via email ever since I opened the letter my grandpa had given me.

"Right. It's nice to make your acquaintance." What else and I meant to say here? Something about my grandfather? A man I'd never met except on his deathbed?

"Well, I should show you to you to Hyacinth Farms" This wasn't another reference to Greek Mythology was it? A reference to Hyacinthus, a boy who was killed and turned into a flower as a result of Apollo and Zephros fighting over him. It probably was. I nodded and gestured down the path.The farm was a damn wreck. Weeds, large rocks, and fallen logs covered nearly every inch of the place. And trees were scattered around as if someone had sprinkled seeds around from above and hoped for the best. Worst was the house. It looked worn down and there were holes in the floor of the front porch. A woman with rust red hair stood next to it, a hammer in hand and toolkit sitting next to her. She saw us and waved

"Hey Lewis! And the new farmer! I fixed up the house for the most part, although you might want to get an upgrade from me in the near future." She laughed and Lewis shook his head

"The farmhouse is just fine!" He insisted. Something was clearly between them and I didn't want to get in the middle of it.

"Thank you… uh…" The woman smiled

"Robin"

"Thank you Robin for fixing the house up. It looks great for starting out, it's not like I need anything fancy." She smiled and the two of them left me to settle into my new home. I had all sorts of ideas to start clearing out the farm, but the second I got inside I crashed onto the bed.

Two days later, I'd gotten a good chunk of the clutter cleared out and some parsnips planted. I'd gone into town, but noped out when I noticed a group of people my age chatting in front of the store. I'd gone back later and bought a bunch of other seeds. Making friend's was easy for me, but all three people were *cute* and I didn't trust myself not to say something stupid. Today I was headed through town to go to Robin's. I wanted to follow up on the upgrade. How much was it going to cost me?

"Hey farmer!" I turned to see one of the people I'd seen before, his bright smile was infectious.

"Hello. I'm Pat, and you are?" Start off simple. Don't say anything stupid.

"I'm Sam! It's nice to meet ya Pat!" I smiled at him, unsure of what to say now.

"Do you skate?" He asked, gesturing to the skateboard tucked under his arm. I shook my head slightly

"Nope. Every time I try I fall flat on my face." Nice going, admitting that. I berated myself. He laughed loudly, but I didn't feel judged.

"Yeah, it's kinda difficult at first. Where are you headed?" He asked, curious. I threw my thumb over my shoulder, forcing myself not to stare at him

"Just up the mountain. Robin mentioned a house upgrade and the farmhouse has definitely seen better days." Sam nodded

"I'll walk ya up there. Sebastian lives there too, Robin's his mom. I was headed up to visit him actually." I smiled

"Sure. Is Sebastian an emo kid by chance?" That was the other boy I'd seen standing with Sam in front of the store the other day. I wondered who the girl was. Sam nodded as we started walking

"Yup, that's him! Have you met him?" Oops

"No, I just..." How do I finish this sentence? I saw you with him and a girl and then ran away because you were all too pretty?

"I've seen you and him around, figured I had a pretty good guess."

"What, and you didn't come say hi?" He teased.

"Nah, y'all looked too sketch for me." Oh shoot. Damnit Pat. This is why you don't think without speaking. Sam didn't seem hurt though. He laughed, damn that was a nice sound. We walked the rest of the trail in comfortable silence.

"Welp, this is where our paths divide. Looks like Sebastian is standing over there." I said, pointing to a goth looking kid standing by the waters edge of a lake nearby. Sam waved at me as he walked over to Sebastian. He was nicer than I'd expected for a skater boy hanging out with his goth friends. I walked inside and Robin looked up from the desk

"Hi! Pat, right?" She asked. I nodded and asked about the house upgrade. I nearly choked on air when she told me how much it would be and that I would also need to provide a whole lot of logs.

"Uh, that'll be a while coming. Thanks Robin." She smiled and waved as I headed out the door. I'd have to do a *lot* of farming if I wanted to achieve that amount of money.

[ketavinsky]

No worries about long response times. I might just be in a nostalgic mood but it feels a bit like sending actual letters and getting excited waiting for a response. For me the wandering urge is almost a way to make sure I can’t need anybody. The second I realize I’ve started relying on someone or people know me too much, I get terrified. I’ve still yet to find people who won’t use it against me so it’s easier if I remove the chance altogether. I think it’d be nice someday if the paranoia dies down to have a life with people who know me and let me lean on them without ulterior motives. I think I’d like to bake with someone in an apartment or a house, anywhere with lots of trees and birds around. In the meantime I have my cat and myself, sometimes people online but those often pass too. I’m codependent at core but I’m trying to break it by force I suppose. The idea of a home is everything I’ve ever loved and feared in one, yknow?

I think I understand what you mean. It’s easy for me to theorize why I feel how I do but all of the answers feel incomplete or insignificant to the feeling itself, like I’m missing something vital. I feel a lot of things for old pictures of myself, for lots of potential reasons but I think predominantly I feel grief and disconnect. It doesn’t feel like me but it feels like someone who should have been. I’m not sure if you’re familiar with the story of changelings but it feels a lot like that. There’s this kid in these photos who people tell me I am but I can’t imagine it. They feel so different from me physically, emotionally, etc. My brain refuses to accept that I could have ever been the kid in the pictures and I feel that everyone else can see it too. There’s something wrong about me, some cruelty that made me kill off the person in the pictures and make me into something distinctly Other. Maybe it’s always been this way, I don’t remember my childhood much. I guess from a more realistic theory dissociation is to blame but that seems so empty for everything I feel. I suppose it makes sense though. I’ve always pretended to be someone else, I never felt like I was truly who I was supposed to, expected to be. As a kid it was anyone stronger, braver, more wanted. As a teen I was a horror movie protagonist, or antagonist, either way it made the suffering right and reasonable and palatable instead of just tragic. Now I’m not sure who I am, or who I was, or who I will be. I hope 23 brings me the same awareness.

Not sure how to phrase this in a way that won’t sound weird but I love the way you talk. You make everything sound so effortlessly poetic and important. It hits emotions I haven’t felt in a while. I also love the use of different medias, both in your writing and in your blog. I’ve never been as good with words but it all makes me feel things I don’t have names for, adding layers to each other. I think a lot of times the best word I can identify for your writing is wistful but there’s more than that too. Thank you for sharing it. The email especially struck me. A couple months ago I watched my friend be taken from his room on a stretcher. Overdosed. Two hours prior I had narrowly convinced myself not to do the same. It felt like some cosmic karma. That I should’ve been the one lying there, blank stared and he should’ve kept going. It should’ve been me. Sometimes I think he is me and I am him and no one is anyone except maybe each other. Do you feel that way too? It seems to me sometimes that without other people around, I’m not sure I would even exist.

I’ve been through so many groups and people, desperate relationships and friendships that have felt more like mutual destruction than love and yet I do still miss them. I feel incomplete on my own and I know people will say that everyone is their own person but I’m not. I don’t feel like my own person, I don’t know how or who to be without someone else to reflect off of and live for. I don’t know my own dreams without someone to share them with. I haven’t found anything good yet but I’d take the surety of a constant companion using me over the aching and longing of a lifetime alone. I have these two friends now but I know it must be exhausting for them. They’re together, likely to be married, and so healed and capable while I’m still crashing and burning on the daily. They do their best but there’s things they can never know, never understand. I spill my guts in front of them and they just look at each other, unsure what to do with me. I don’t know either. I’m not sure if it’s selfish of me to let them keep trying. I know they love me, in the first real way I’ve ever been loved. But maybe if I loved them properly, in a way with less claws and teeth and desperation, I’d let them let go of me. In two years we’ll go our separate ways and I’m selfishly chasing every minute I have left.

Got a bit carried away this time. I hope you’re well. -N

hello N! no need to worry about being carried away i always appreciate seeing these messages and as always i apologise for my late response times! i would love to send messenger pigeons or something of the like one day but there is... a lot to sort out before i can achieve this. anyways, i hope you see this nonetheless because i enjoy your takes! i relate to and appreciate your takes on the home -i was about to say the motif of the home, for a moment there, hasty backspacing, etc- and i hope you someday achieve the ideal of someplace safe you can be seen, and see, by others, with your cat as well. the older i get the simultaneously wider and smaller the world gets and i think id someday want an easy resting place to come home to. myself i dont think ive felt home anywhere other than the house i recently moved out of. i mourn that a little bit. the old house.

i understand acutely what you mean when you refer to changelings. i was actually thinking about the last night- i would have replied then but it was a little too heavy, all of it, to hold. i don't know what to make it. i don't even know if that's true. i think after all this time i should know what to make of all of it but maybe it eludes me right now as i type? there's like this..... separation between myself and everyone else that i meet and it can't be overcome- i can only twist myself into different shapes and people. anyways, i was thinking about it last night, because i keep thinking, the world is so huge and we as individuals are so small, but i can't help but think, all the people that i see, they will never understand. you know? say everyone experiences something on this scale of disconnect from their peers and images of themselves) im sure many, many do, i have to tell myself im sure) and say we all contain multitudes (of this i am certain). say those things are absolutely true. even if they were absolutely true i still feel like it can't be understood by many multitudes most. do you think you've been cruel to yourself? do you think you've been cruel to people who have cared about these facets or memories that you feel very little kinship with? where does the cruelty come from and where is it directed? you don't have to answer! i think... that ive been exceptionally cruel to myself and people around me at times, unintentionally, and intentionally too, intentionally a lot of the time, but i think that my unrelenting i-am-standing-on-the-precipice-of-a-cliff-or-a-bear-trap curbs most of these somewhat antisocial tendencies.

thank you for your kindness regarding my writing. i really think it's all i can do sometimes. i dont mean it in a self deprecating way. i feel like... i feel like most of my life has been translating the things i feel and the things i see and above all else the things i hear into recognisable format, with varying degrees of success. when i was young i wished for some kind of technological marvel that would connect my mind with anyone else's and then they would see and i would know that they saw and then in that moment i would finally have an earnest friend. the idea that i might not be able to publish my personal projects for reasons in my control and outside of it is therefore quite excruciating. do you want to be understood? do you think it would salve some part if you if you knew, like really knew, someone could hold your eye and say I GET IT I DO and you could trust that they meant it? i know there's a lot of different ideas there to unpack. the thing of trust the thing of eye contact. i personally kind of struggle with eye contact but im starting to think that maybe im fine with eye contact and i tell people i dont do eye contact so i dont freak them out when i actually hold their gaze? my partner,,.. well as in that piece of writing my partner thinks i have a hollow stare. it's easier to avoid eye contact entirely. i hope you held your eye of the friend if that's your thing. i hope he's alright. is he alright? again no pressure to respond. i hope he's alright. Sometimes I think he is me and I am him and no one is anyone except maybe each other. i think you have a way with words as well- this is beautiful, and i understand, i do. do you think you would be happier if you could be someone else? an extension of them like one of their organs or limbs? do you think that would be easier? i feel like a conjoined twin scavenged from some red and ravaged mess before i had enough grey matter to form memory, but i feel all the time the phantom presence of my unseen unnamed unrecognised other half. you know? i think all the time that if there were two of us this would be easier to bear. like, if i were two and not just myself, i could be happy, or if i were instead the unnamed unseen unrecognised part of the self. you know? if i were the shoulders i could bear it. if i were the hands i could bear it. if i were the lizard hindbrain i would transform it and smother it in tissue paper and then i would hide it away and the not-me, the gestalt entirety, would then be happy. you know?

i want to be able to tell you that im sure your friends love you wholly and selflessly despite how you describe yourself or your fluctuating idea of self but i dont know your friends. i hope that for you, though, i really do. i hope there's an answer too. i feel the same- whenever i move somewhere else i pack all of myself up and crush it and shelve it away so i can use it to entertain the next group of people and each and every time none of them can believe who i used to be or how things were then and i cant explain that each and every time i loved them all and i really do feel like i was inadequate as a human being let alone a friend. it's so easy for some people it seems. these people were bad for you and these were good, or it's complicated and people are complicated and your little life is complicated, but it's all part of you, and this is the life you have lived/are living. i don't think these things encapsulate what it's like. is it like that for you? i'm sorry that your friends look at each other like you're untranslatable unnamable unrecognisable. i am. i hope they love you. i hope you're friends for a long while yet.

earlier this year there was a major fissure in my current friend group. we've all pretty much been living with each other for five years and the friend group split apart due to a financial dispute that became emblematic of Everyone's Personal Life Philosophy and i feel like i'm the only person who recognises why it went so badly because i'm always watching people, you know? on one end one of my friends was super no non-sense logical; another felt undervalued for a gift of service, something he puts a lot of pride in, he's a gardener, he's a cook; another tried to bring a philosopher's love of querying and a very moral perspective that was perhaps inappropriate for the level of emotion at the time; the last, the most recent friend, sort of derided the rest of us for the infighting but aimed for diplomacy; i, the coward, the observer, sat in the background and kind of watched them grow to hate each other. i shouldn't be so melodramatic but the gist is one of the best friends ive ever had has been cruel to the others, something im not sure i know how to forgive yet, and he wont speak to me, and things are different and nobody wants to think about the five years we were a solar system. i don't know what to do with that. i don't know, i don't know. it's such a waste. all of these save for me and another grew up with siblings; all of them grew up with stable homes and parents whose interactions with them were rarely violent if ever; all of them are... i would say functional people, save for me, and i feel like it's such a waste. the house i go back to for the holidays isnt a safe one and so i invest most of myself into friendships and when theyre destroyed it hurts me and i think its such a waste. its such a waste and they might not understand how much of a waste it is but i do.

i hope you and your friends love each other dearly for a long while yet. i truly do hope that for you

shrike/chez/whatever name you please

[blacklodgemusictx]

2.5 hrs? I thought "down here" south from home, Abilene, all cities were right next to each other and required no time or effort to get between.

I have the magical, if annoying ability to sleep the second I'm in a moving vehicle so the trip from Houston to Austin takes no time to me.

I've picked all our hotels for this trip with proximity to venue in mind, but Austin is two shows so apparently I picked it for distance to the second show... we're accidentally 20 miles away from the first show.

We hang out at the hotel. Doug sleeps. I write, mess with my pictures from Houston, get Doordash (Michi Ramen, y'all, accept no substitute! Though I apologize to anyone who met me after as I am now a walking garlic glove.)

I don't know if needs will change in the next few days, but right now I'm so delighted NOT being at work, I'm happy as a clam in bed surfing for the ubiquitous episode of Forensic Files. Updating Facebook, Tumblr, Instagram, TikTok, my own website that I don't even know how to access right now because of hosting issues and my own virtua-ignorance - I'm emailing entries to an extremely tolerant gentleman I met on Fiverr: just update everything now and I"ll learn to internet later, please? Ok.

I've taught myself basic graphic design, marketing and literally created an internet presence purely to try and amplify the presence of these musicians I've come to love so much.

In the back of my mind, a tiny voice keeps whispering: these are skills. Skills people might want. You could parlay this in to a job that doesn't kill your soul, makes you look forward to waking up every day... but I've also never been the type of person who just believes; takes for granted that good things will happen. I'm trying to change and I would love to believe that if I gaze in to the future, I'll see myself happy, doing something I love that fulfills me spiritually instead of just paying the bills... but some lessons hammered in to my head as a child (life, work is to be endured not enjoyed) stick like cement and feel impossible to break.

But I will keep trying. Things change. One of my Zox affirmational bracelets I've taken to adorning my wrist with recently says: 'Just Breathe.' As long as there is breath, there is hope. If you are still here, if you are ALIVE, you can change.

The first Austin show is cold.

The audacity of having an outdoor show in January! But this is Texas. My Rocky Horror troupe at home performed in the cold, I was Janet is the pouring rain once (actual splashing during the swimming pool scene, can you imagine?)

There are heaters, but occasionally the musicians still stop to flex and wiggle life back in to cold digits.

Olivia has borrowed a black throw from the lady of the house and knotted it about her shoulders. A simple knot, a careless/careful draping and suddenly that throw is any stylish piece off a Paris or Milan runway.

Joe and Salim are in layers. I'm layered too, but Salim still lends me his coat while he performs. I wear it like a lap blanket. Wool. Cozy.

I pull up my hoodie. Run inside. Steal some cheese from a charcuterie. "Leave the moon alone" one gentleman, also enjoying the cheese, comments. That's what my hood says. It's an inside joke from the Jimmy Newquist Zoom COVID shows. "Remember Caroline's Spine?" Head shake. "Sullivan? The song about the brothers in the navy who died together? It's the story 'Saving Private Ryan' was based on" He doesn't remember. Normally, I pull out my phone and play the song when I have a captive audience like this, but I shrug and head back outside.

Marty banters. Marty poses like Robert Plant.

Some day, bless them, my musicians will learn that I'm here to document... and that includes the silly stuff too. I have pictures of all of this. I love it though. I love Marty being silly with us. I love that I can talk to him and he will smile and joke. I've met so many who can't be bothered - one of Marty's previous group of contemporaries comes immediately to mind. So many whose self importance takes up too much room. Leaving no room for a fan to squeak by and pass a word of admiration or two.

It was a cold, beautiful night.

I'm already so aware though that the trip is speeding by. Tonight is the Cactus Cafe. Tomorrow is San Antonio and hopefully a friend or two or three to see. Then leg one is over.

Salim brought up a term at the show last night that I am now trying to keep in my head, "Hyper presence." Just be here. Be here now.

Eyes open. See everything. Experience. Be here. Eat the food. Hear the music. Love the companions.

Be alive for this.

Live.

[cliffside-changes]

Cliffside Changes: A New Beginning

Chapter 3: Date Night-mare

When I woke up today, I could not believe I was still inside the body of this hunk. Even though I was in a completely new body, I assumed I had to go to work. So I hopped in the shower and began to get ready for the day. When going through my closet I had what seemed to be all these newer trendy clothes that go nicely with this body. After getting dressed, I went into my kitchen, and made myself a cup of coffee like usual before heading out the door to the office. On my way to work, I wondered if my office life had changed as well.

Once in the office, I began to walk over to my cubicle like I normally do. Everything looked and felt the same except this time I noticed colleagues were actually paying attention to me and checking me out. It was quite a new feeling for me considering I would usually go unnoticed in the office. I just went to my desk and started my work for the day hoping no one noticed how red my face got from blushing from all the new attention. After a few hours of work, I got an email from a supervisor, asking to meet him at his office in an hour.

An hour later…

I could not imagine what this supervisor, Sam, could possibly want. He’s never interacted with me before and we work for different departments so I’m very confused as to why he would want to meet. I will say I always thought he was a very attractive man but I knew that in my previous body I never stood a chance to be with him and just admired him from a distance. 

Once in Sam’s office, he asked me to shut the door so we could begin talking. He looked really good today in his stylish outfit. He began to talk about some work stuff and I sort of began to tune out and just stare at his attractive face. He noticed this and began to turn red. I apologize for staring and he then apologized for BSing a work conversation. He then explained he needed an excuse to call me into his office so we could talk. He then asked if I was free this evening for a date and I said yes. We made plans for dinner that evening and we both went about the rest of our work days. I could not believe how much positive has changed in my life since entering this body.

After work was finished for the day, I still had some time to kill before I would be meeting Sam for dinner. I wanted to go to my cliffside and see if I could alter any of the changes to my body or life myself by falling down the cliff this time thinking of changes or alterations I would want. So As I neared the edge, I began to think about how I still wanted to be in this body as it’s nearly perfect but I wanted to be more intelligent and intune with my sexuality. I then took a leap of faith and hoped for the best with my new changes in mind.

Moments later I could feel myself reemerge from the water… but I felt different. I felt as if I wasn’t all there but I felt more sensations. I didn’t really feel like I was incontrol yet I still felt like I was flesh and blood, I tried to see but all I could see was black. It wasn't until my body got back to my apartment that I understood what had happened. I knew I wanted to get more intouch with my sexuality, but becoming my new body’s cock was not what I had in mind. 

I guess my body was just on auto pilot, as I could feel warm soap and water running down my new form. I also could feel myself being shaved and groomed… I guess my autopilot self is banking on getting lucky. For my sake too, I hope I get lucky because I might as well enjoy the pleasures of being a cock. 

My evening was going as one would expect it to go as a cock, not much going on. It wasn’t until we got back to our apartment I knew I was gonna get lucky, as I could feel the blood flow increase in myself. It was then I knew Sam and my body were beginning to make out. I then felt as if I was being grouped by larger hands and got even larger. After a few minutes of this, I felt as if I was at full mast. I have never felt so good before while being touched like this. At this point Sam and my body were both stripping down and I was being stroked while just in underwear. In no time, Sam had made a move and pulled my body’s underwear off. I felt the air on my skin for a quick second before I felt warmth and wetness. 

I then realized Sam was blowing me and oh my god, I thought normal blowjobs were amazing but experiencing it as a cock is even better. It was as if my whole body was having an orgasm. I could feel the build up of cum start to build up in my balls, which I guess is my lower body now. I felt the pressure begin to build in my throat and it felt so good to choke on my cum as it was going up. Sam kept bobbing his mouth up and down my form and I couldn’t help but want to cum already. I could feel the scruffiness of his facial hair rub up against my being and it was making the liquid in my balls just churn from pure erotica. He kept using his tongue around my head so gently that it was driving me wild and I wanted to burst. It was at that moment I could not hold the cum in my throat any longer and I had to let it go. I have never felt anything like before in my life, it felt so euphoric, it was indescribable… then everything went black.

To Be Continued… 

Hello Everyone! I hope you are enjoying the content so far. I am still a new writer so if you have any pointers please let me know! If you would like to make a requests go ahead and ask me a question or just message me and we can go from there! Or if you just want to message me and talk that’s cool too. Thank you for all the support so far.

-Cliffside 

[progressivejudaism]

I want to share with you an exchange that I had with a Messianic “Rabbi.”  If you are not Jewish, I especially suggest skimming this.

Hi friends,

Rabbi Josh here (he/him) with an installment of “let’s learn why Messianic ‘Judaism’ is problematic and dangerous.” 

Last week, I contacted an organization that calls themselves the “Jewish Voice Ministries” - an Evangelical Christian, far-right group cosplaying as Jews with the goal of using humanitarian work to convert as many Jews as possible to their ministry.   You can learn more about their “white saviorist” message that they use as a cover for their three major goals - which conflict with each other; the first two being the goal to convert Jews, while the third being to support Jews and the State of Israel.  (Hot take- one cannot simultaneously want to eradicate Jews and Judaism; while also supporting Jews and the State of Israel.)

I’ve included both screen shots of the respones and my own commentary below.

I would love to hear your compassionate thoughts on this organization and this figure in reblogs and comments.  All antisemitic, racist, and otherwise inappropriate responses will result in a ban from the PJBlog.

I sent the following message to the organization, hoping for answers to why they do what they do:

Hi there, I’m a little confused regarding your messaging here. Why are you identifying as Jews but yet preaching about Christian theology? As I’m sure that you’re aware, this is a classic antisemitic trope that is not okay. I’m a rabbi with now ten years of academic schooling. I would absolutely love to come to your Church and teach about how to be a better friend to the Jewish People. Please let me know how I can support you on your journey to eliminating antisemitic and bigotry aimed at Jews. L’shalom, Rabbi Josh

A “Messianic Rabbi” responded to this message.  Instead of directly replying to this figure only to get into an ethical stalemate, I would like to use this as a learning opportunity for all of us.  (See this to better understand why the title in quotes)

Below I have provided their responses to my inquiry, to which I will include my own commentary so we can unpack and learn how problematic “Jewish Voice Ministries” and “Messianic Judaism” is and how these kinds of Evangelical Groups effect our safety as Jews:

Shalom Rabbi Josh,

Thank you so much for writing and reaching out to us; it’s a blessing to hear from you. [Jews rarely use “it’s a blessing” in our correspondence.  Unless using Hebrew, culturally I’ve never seen it, especially from Jewish clergy. Similarly, very few Jews in my experience begin emails with “shalom.”  It feels like they’re trying to prove something.]

I appreciate your question and comments and will be happy to reply to them.

We identify as Jews because many on our staff, including myself and Rabbi Jonathan Bernis, are Jews. [This is inappropriate.  Just because a few staff members are Jewish, does not mean that you are a Jewish organization. ESPECIALLY if said staff members have chosen to live life as a Christian -- and thus become a Jewish Apostate.  As an example, should the US Senate identify as Jews because Bernie Sanders, Chuck Schumer, and Jackie Rosen are three of eight Jewish members? No, the answer is no.]

The theology we preach, is Biblical Jewish theology, which was later adopted (and in many cases, unfortunately twisted), by Christianity. [“Biblical Jewish theology” can no longer be practiced. Biblical Jewish life centered around the Temple.  And we have no Temple.  The line of ordained Koheinim (ritual priests) has ended.  And even if we as Jews all collectively agreed and decided to actually build a Third Temple in Jerusalem, we can’t due to political, social, and ethical tensions with Palestinians, Jordanians, and our Muslim siblings - we cannot *just* build the Temple again. Read more here.]

Interestingly, to this day, many in Christianity do not realize that the foundation of their beliefs, is from Judaism. [This is an interesting way to say that "Messianic Judaism” was formed by Evangelical Christians in the 1970s, and use that theology with some Jewish language to pretend to be Jews!  More here.]  And while there has been much in Christian theological teaching that fits the pattern of antisemitic tropes, such is a reflection on the errors of such churches, and not on the very sound Jewish theology we teach and espouse. [This also is frankly not true. Their entire goal is to convert Jews and eradicate Judaism.  There is a long history of Christians attempting to do this-- with the most famous being during the Inquisition where Jews were forced to “convert or die.”  This is the definition of antisemitic theology.  And they are not the only group preaching this harmful theology.  Read more here.]

We appreciate that you would love to come to our church, and we would be honored to host you, were it not for the fact that we do not have a church. [Well if this isn’t a Church, whatever they preach about is certainly not recognized as Judaism by any major Jewish organization. See here for rabbinic responses to the movement. ] Indeed, Rabbi Jonathan and myself do what we've been doing since childhood, and attend Shul on Shabbat. [It was an interesting and non-inclusive choice to use Ashkenormative language here. And that said, while it is true that they might have attended a synagogue as a child, what they are doing now is certainly not Judaism.  For more information about differences between Jews and Christians, see this article on Bible interpretation.]

And while some of our employees are Gentile and do attend churches, such churches are those which understand and uphold the importance of blessing Israel, which includes standing with Israel against anti-Semitism [This is code for “Anti-Israel” sentiment, which is often code for equalizing any critique against far-right leaders in the Knesset to antisemitism.  One could always critique Israel without being antisemitic.  And conflating all critique of Israel as antisemitism is extremely dangerous.  Also, the term “anti-semitism” is not correct with the dash.  Read more here.] and helping raise awareness that (when it comes to ongoing conflicts with Hamas), Israel is not committing genocide, is not an apartheid nation, is not occupying supposed "Palestinian" territory, and any Christian who is truly following what their religion teaches, would and should be appalled by the efforts of the BDS Movement, and folks like Bernie Sanders, who - up until recently - was intent on stopping a $735 million arms sale to Israel, so that the nation could purchase more iron domes from us, to continue to protect the innocent citizens who simply, as you know, just want to live in peace. [I am fascinated by this chunk.  Firstly, I want to identify the clear and obvious antisemitism here in naming Bernie Sanders as an enemy of the State of Israel while using a financial figure to prove how “bad” he is for the State of Israel.  Secondly, it’s fascinating that this “rabbi” chose to lay out all that he preaches about Israel in such a broad way - most likely to make me “feel better” about his stances.  He knows how scared so many Jews are about their movement, and made MASSIVE assumptions about my politics, using poorly written talking points that really do not mean much, and frankly some that are wrong.  As an example, the US does not sell “iron domes” to Israel (not in the plural, or in the present tense).  The US helped to create the Iron Dome System (singular, past tense) which protects innocent civilians in Israel from rocket fire often from Hamas.  The system is singular, and the US helps to maintain said system.  I point out this small thing here because, it is a very clear example of how ignorant this individual is of the real challenges that Israelis and Palestinians, and Jews and Palestinians in the diaspora, face.]

I can tell you though, I do know of a number of churches that would benefit from what you desire to teach. Especially those which erroneously blame our people as the sole purveyors of Deicide. [This is a fascinating way to attempt to emotionally spin this conversation.  (Deicide is the false claim that the Jews killed Jesus, as poorly understood from the Book of Matthew).  Instead of recognizing his own harm in being a part of a system that for now nearly 1700 years has attempted to convert Jews in order to eradicate Judaism, he is focused on something that most Christians *already* agree on.  As an example, this was formally adapted in the Catholic Church in the mid-60s.] 

They would learn much from you, dear friend. [This is a rhetorical tactic designed to make us equal- so that they can continue to preach harmful things about Jews, Palestinians, and the State of Israel.]  And if you need me to suggest some to you, just email me back; I'd be happy to do so.      

Thank you again for writing; I wish you well in your continued spiritual journey as a fellow Rabbi. [See comment above.]

B”H  [Another interesting move.  In my experience, mainly Orthodox and few Conservative rabbis will use this “Baruch Hashem” (Blessed is God) in a meaningful way in correspondence.]

Jack

I really want this to be a learning experience for us all- including me.  I am really curious what you learned from this exchange.  How might you have spoken to this figure?  What did you learn about the movement from this small interaction?  (Also check out their website on incognito mode to learn more)

So what did I learn from this experience?  This organization cares about pushing a particular right-wing and particularly dangerous narrative about Israel rather than actually helping Jews, or frankly helping people on their missions.

From this experience, what do I feel is the most dangerous part of this organization?  In claiming to be the “Jewish Voice,” they are silencing *actual* Jewish voices in the process.  If you cared about Jews, you would learn the history of antisemitism (i.e. do your homework), not pretend to be Jews, not seek to perpetuate antisemitism by converting Jews, and you would always raise up Jewish voices (especially Jews of Color, Jews with disabilities, LGBTQ+ Jews, non-neurotypical Jewry, and Jews-by-Choice).

I hope that you enjoyed learning alongside me with this experience.  I would love to hear your compassionate thoughts below.

[bokutokita]

t h e r e g u l a r : ten - me when the

♡ series masterlist

♡ headcanons

♡ barista talk

[ previous ] [ next ]

Between the stress from the group project situation, the fear of failing class and the constant stress from school, the last thing you needed was to clock in and serve college students overpriced coffee until 9pm. But maybe being around your fun coworkers would actually be a bit of a pick-me-up. You walked into the back waving hello to Atsumu as you passed. Once you got there you saw Fukunaga putting on his apron and approaching the computer to clock in.

“Hey bestie,” you say calmly with a strained smile.

“Sup’ dude?” he says with his back facing you. “Are there any updates to the group project situation?” You start tying your apron and slide the hat on to complete the ensemble “Dude… you have no idea.” 

Fukunaga turns around and gives you a mischievous grin “Oh my god, this is gonna be a great shift isn’t it?” You respond with a cackle and a lazy nod, then just before you can add anything Akaashi walks into the backroom.

“Hey guys, sorry for not greeting you earlier, I was catching up with Kita. Just checking what’s been done and what hasn’t,” he sighs and looks down at the clipboard in his hands, you recognize it as the schedule for the day. “So it’s just gonna be the three of us closing tonight, but Atsumu is here until 7:00PM. I’m gonna have him do some closing tasks once we all clock in.” He takes a pause. “Y/N, I’m gonna put you on bar, I’ll take drive-thru. Fukunaga you take the register, can I trust you to behave?”

“No,” he laughs and bites his lip in an ironic fuckboy-esque move. You can’t help but laugh, knowing that behind his silly jokes are genuinely good intentions to cheer you up, even though they may come out as incredibly immature.

Akaashi looks at him completely unamused. “Didn’t think so,” 

“Sorry boss, I’m in a silly goofy mood.” Fukunaga says in a very serious tone, and you can't help but laugh harder.

Akaashi now looks at him with a mix of confusion and disgusted disappointment, shakes his head and sighs. “Yeah, whatever, let’s just… Have a good close tonight guys. Sorry I’m so tired, classes have been hell. But I know I can trust you to not burn down the store at least.”

You and Fukunaga give each other a glance, then turn to look at Akaashi again. “Nevermind. I don’t even know why I said that,” he mutters, annoyed, as he turns around and walks to the floor, leaving you and Fukunaga giggling as you trail behind him.

---

It’s been 3 hours since you clocked in, a pretty relaxing shift so far thankfully. Not too many people had come in, giving Akaashi a chance to work in the back as you and Fukunaga handled yourselves. Currently you’re cleaning around to kill time, well. You *were* pretending to clean while you showed Fukunaga the insane email you had received that morning. 

“This dude got fucking bodied. Owned. L plus-” 

“-plus ratio I know! That professor had no chill, I kinda feel bad for the guy” you interjected. “But he hasn’t reached out to me yet, it’s been… what, six or seven hours since I received that email and the guy has been MIA.” “Bro I would rather be put into an Amazon box and shipped to Antartica than ever show my face on campus again after that email!” Fukunaga responded with a laugh. “I know he’s an asshole, he’s been an asshole, but if I’m being 100% honest I think he doesn’t deserve this. I don’t think anyone deserves this actually” he finished with a scoff.

You look down at your hands.“... He was a real asshole” You turn around to start cleaning, for real this time,  “Yes, I do feel kind of bad for him, but… He didn’t even give me a chance to explain myself and my situation with this class, and before you even say anything- I know I sound like a broken record, I know I’m not the best student in terms of lecture-based classes… But I really would’ve tried for this project, I just wish I could tell him that, I guess”

Fukunaga got quiet for a second and whispered “Shit dude, you might get to do that sooner than you think.” He tapped you on the shoulder and pointed at the register, and the sight made your stomach turn.

“Y/N, could I please speak to you.”

♡ a/n: two posts?! in one night?! both with written parts?! ig you could say i love spoiling my readers mwah mwah mwah

♡ a/n: this is very exciting!!! i promise I will make the next few chapters more screenshot heavy :3

♡ a/n: ALSO AAAHHHH CLIFFHANGER!!!! i believe next chapter is gonna have a big (if not fully be a) written part so strap on your seatbelts bc these two are finally gonna talk, YAY

♡tag list♡ IF YOU ARE ON BOLD I CAN'T TAG YOU:

@missalienqueen @silverkoushi @ysatrap @sana-li @lightyagamami @cvlliesstuff @acatstalkingyou @winunk @mirikusashes @vincentvangoose @kookie-doughs @polaris-song @thechaosoflonging @goopycookie @celestair @gabixiio @levylovegood @mariyeahh-reblogs @aspenss @a-little-pebbl @yutaeminnie @eitelle @trashy-simp @3pk1s @minawants @bimboing

[acerace]

...you have opened my eyes to a vast universe of VintageBeef lore that I was unaware of. I knew about the New Hermit Order, of course, and the UHC invention, and I've watched a few of his CTM things but -- I will take all the info and lore you feel like giving out because Beef is amazing and my knowledge is so small.

Vintagebeef my beloved <3

So the thing is, right, until about 2016 I only watched two (2) youtubers- Vintagebeef for Minecraft and aDrive for Pokemon (and funnily enough both of them are named Dan irl). So I've watched most of Beef's videos over the years and have a general knowledge of most of his stuff, except because it's been like a decade I don't remember where most of the lore comes from XD

The thing with him is that he doesn't do Lore tm the way other mcyters often do lore- he doesn't have an extensive RP series to draw from like Grian, doesn't have a solo world with steadily increasing amounts of lore like Etho or Zisteau, and while he's played on SMPs and been involved in storylines before it's not really the focus of his episodes unlike with Evo or Legacy or Empires

So where does that leave us?

IRL, Beef always has multiple series running at the same time. Often he's playing on an smp while doing a singleplayer, often modded, series as well as a CTM or modpack with a group of friends. For example, right now he's playing on Hermitcraft, doing weekly Pixelmon and Building a Zoo episodes, and a CTM map with Slip. And to me, this translates to one thing: Beef is an adventurer. He travels frequently- he explores a world and when he decides he's done, he leaves for the next one. That's the basis of my personal interpretation of his series and his character for my writing.

Ok so reading this back, this got extremely long and didn't explain much in the way of lore, somehow? If anyone has any additions to add please do so, I am very definitely leaving out a lot and would love to see what other lore people remember and are using for Beef! I didn’t include the Hermitcraft stuff since my memory of season 4 is blurry (his base was themed after the Martian, that much I know, and he and Iskall were buddies :D) and most of the s5 NHO lore is best watched from Bdub’s perspective from what I remember, and the only s6 stuff is a single line in Hermitgang and then the Area 77 arc with its possibility of an NHO reunion which we did not get rip. And s7 of course had the cloning machine and also the Podzol Party as the main lore. So all the original rambling is still below the cut though it is very long, and I'm gonna bullet point the main stuff here instead:

Actual canonical things:

Invented UHC and was the only survivor of the first ever uhc (Mindcrack UHC s1)

Married to an ender dragon (one of the UHCs I think), later father to a different dragon (Mindcrack season 3? I think?)

Might not have legs if you choose to take that joke as canon (Mindcrack s2)

Was a wizard (RAD)

is a zookeeper (Building a Zoo) 

Had a wife and kids (Sims in Minecraft)

Part of the Trial of the B Team court case (Mindcrack)

NHO founder, founder of the Podzol Party (Hermitcraft)

Created a cloning machine that sort of works (Hermitcraft)

Played the Forest which is I believe the first time he and Keralis played together (look up the trigger warnings for this one, it's a horror game)

Was the creator/owner of Sourceblock SMP (featuring some familiar faces if you know Legacy, Empires, or MCC) and there is literal magic from a mysterious sourceblock of water that teleports people and summons mobs and probably more stuff that I haven't seen yet since I'm still watching it myself

Things you can infer:

Good with animals (Life in the Woods, Pixelmon, Ark)

Is a car nerd (irl and all of the car games he's played)

Is a highly experienced adventurer who has traveled through dozens of worlds both vanilla and modded, across multiple dimensions (Twilight Forest, the Aether, the Betweenlands, Limbo), completed dozens of monuments, fought in blood sports, survived apocalypse after apocalypse, tamed dinosaurs, and played a lot of prop hunt and golf with your friends

If you're looking for what to watch for lore purposes, I'd say the Mindcrack UHCs and Team Canada's RAD series are pretty good, definitely Sourceblock and HC s5, plus the Diversity CTM maps and Ruins of the Mindcrackers maybe? And Mindcrack Prank Wars for the chaos and the origin of Team Canada. And if you can handle horror than the Forest is fun and if you don't do horror you can watch the Pojkband play golf or prop hunt they're hilarious I love them sm I want a Pojkband reunion So Bad 

Beef's first series was a singleplayer series in beta 1.4_01 though he had played the game extensively before that, and was a big fan of Guude, having watched his own Minecraft videos. The series was functionally a hardcore one where if he died Beef would delete the world and start again! I haven't actually Watched this series so idk if he died or how often lmao. When Guude made Mindcrack, which was btw one of the very first Minecraft SMPs, he also hosted a competition for people to join, and Beef submitted a video (which is still viewable on his channel I believe!) and won, and was added to Mindcrack in season 2 :D (fun fact, Guude said that even if Beef hadn’t won he would have added him anyway) 

Two running jokes emerged from Mindcrack- pulling a Vintagebeef and Beef doesn't have legs. The first is a reference to Beef dying of fall damage (I believe the exact instance was him trying to jump into his swimming pool and failing spectacularly) and after the incident, every time someone died of fall damage they were pulling a Vintagebeef. The second joke comes from Guude, who joked that the reason Beef wasn't going to a convention was because he didn't have legs, and then he pranked Beef's base by building a giant pair of legs at the entrance to his castle so you had to walk between them to get into the base. This joke has long since died and both Beef and Guude feel pretty bad about it iirc because there were people who genuinely thought Beef was disabled and were emailing him supportive messages and stuff oops. So if you go looking on the Salad or find old Mindcrack fics, you might see references to Beef having prosthetic legs!

Mindcrack also brought about the creation of several Player groups- Team Nancy Drew, Team Canada, and GOB to name a few relevant to Beef. Team Nancy Drew consists of Beef, Pauseunpause, Guude, and Baj, who formed to investigate a prank on one of the members but I forget who. They're named Nancy Drew after the detective! Team Canada also formed in retaliation to pranks, with it consisting of Beef, Etho, and Pause, the three Canadian members on the server (not including Adlington who moved to Canada but never joined the group). There was also a Team America who pranked them with American flags everywhere. GOB is Guude, OMGChad, and Beef, who played stuff like the Ragecraft, Pantheon, and Monstrosity ctms together but that's way down the line lol

Team Nancy Drew is also notable for inventing UHC. It was Beef's brainchild but it was the four of them who first played it! The first UHC had the four of them working to kill the dragon with no natural regen, with everyone dying but Beef, who "won" the UHC. The second uhc was still dragon focused and iirc is where Beef married the dragon? Memories are hazy but they do kill the dragon in this one I think. UHC was then revamped as a pvp event and became a regular Mindcrack game every few months, featuring most of the Mindcrackers and several special guests, including Dinnerbone, who as we know Thanos-snapped Doc's arm out of existence as a result of Doc killing him in one of them

In one of the seasons of Mindcrack, Beef invited swedish Mindcracker and good friend Anderzel to go caving with him and invented ABBA Rules caving, where the winner takes it all. ABBA Rules is a game where each ore (and also dungeon loot like nametags) is assigned a point value and the person with the most points at the end wins and gets to keep all the stuff collected from the game.

In Mindcrack season 3?, Beef punched the ender dragon in an... awkward area, so when the dragon died and left the egg behind, Guude said Beef was the father of the egg XD I don't remember if I watched s3 so I have no idea if anything Happened with this concept but *history of the world voice* you could make lore out of this!

So Team Canada has played a Lot of CTM maps (which fun fact were pretty much invented by another Mindcrack member, Vechs, with his Super Hostile series! Super Hostile has a bunch of things called "Zistonian", which are references to another Mindcrack member Zisteau, who has a very wild singleplayer series with even wilder lore but I digress). In Ruins of the Mindcrackers, they had a running joke that Beef was Etho and Pause's mom, which is a joke we can leave in the past actually /lh. They also played all the Diversity maps, Sky Factory, Terra Restore, Uncharted Territory uhhh and a couple more ctms and adventure maps! Each map kinda has its own story so in Diversity 3 for example they were trapped in a simulation? I think? Team Canada also recently played the Roguelike Adventures and Dungeons modpack, aka RAD, in which Beef was a wizard with a magic staff that could do anything from summon lightning to control hostile mobs.

Sourceblock SMP is a vanilla survival 1.14 series that ran for one season and the series starts with each of the Players being drawn to a strange sparkling water source that, once they touch it, brings them to the Sourceblock world. It also summons a giant zombie at one point. There's probably more lore for this series but like I said I haven't watched it all the way through yet 

He has a Patreon server called VintageCraft and has done a series or two on there as well, and played a few UHCs with them, so lore that how you will! 

Beef also played a few popular mods, notably Pixelmon, Life in the Woods, and Feed the Beast, with LitW being singleplayer and the other multiplayer. He's also recently played the Zoo and Wild Animals mod a lot. He did a short series with the Minecraft Comes Alive mod where he married one of the villagers and had two children, so that's canon now :D he’s played a Lot of Pixelmon starting when the mod first came out iirc (he chose Turtwig in his first series and built a Grass gym, then made a Normal gym in another series in uhh 2016) and he still plays to this day. Quite a few Hermits played on his Pixelmon servers with him, like Wels, Etho, Iskall, Stress, Slip, Zueljin, and also Guude and Phedran (a Mindcrack adjacent player and creator of the LitW modpack) and a few Mindcrackers on the older servers 

Mindcrack and friends played a lot of other games too- 7 Days to Die, Ark Survival Evolved, Unturned, to name a few, so you can pull a lot of lore out of these as well. Speaking of friends and non-Minecraft games, Beef teamed up with Pause, Keralis, and Slip (a former Hermit) to play the horror game the Forest, which saw them stuck on an island trying to survive against terrifying mutated human... things. They played it a few times as the game updated but as afaik it's the first time Beef played with Keralis and possibly Slip and since the game starts with the Player's airplane crashing, that could totally be how Beef first met them in-universe 

I... think? that’s everything I mentioned in the tags? There is probably way more stuff I’ve forgotten that stems from inside jokes and things that happen within each series, but I hope that was a) helpful and b) at least somewhat comprehensible lmao 

[rosalind-of-arden]

If you take out the automata, the alchemy, and the conspiracies for world domination, The Great Library is just higher education in modern America

Based on a conversation with @thegreatlibraryfangirl

The most evil teacher is just fucking exhausted because he can't find a tenure-track position, has no time for the research he really wants to do because he's stuck teaching 100-level classes, and doesn't have adequate mental health insurance coverage to get his PTSD properly treated.

No one ever says it's homophobia or racism, but somehow Wolfe always gets the shit classes, has the worst office location, and never gets research funding, while the straight white guys keep getting promotions and tenure and research funding. Wolfe was his department’s diversity hire, and his department chair will not forgive him for failing to be properly grateful for having a job at such a prestigious university at all. He was supposed to be the token gay brown professor, not to stand up for himself or angrily demand changes in curriculum meetings.

Santi, Wolfe’s more traditionally masculine cop partner, gets paid more than him, gets better benefits than him, gets more respect than him, but keeps getting asked to do things that are just a little unethical and feeling pressured to do them because he knows they'll be homeless without his job (and they’ll lose his health insurance, which might not cover Wolfe’s PTSD adequately, but it’s a lot better than nothing).

Go break up that student protest, whatever it takes? Santi is hoping the students will disperse quietly because he really can't say no to the boss.

"Nic, can you tell that boyfriend of yours to stop showing up at those protests? If he doesn't settle down, we're going to have to arrest him. And it's making you look bad." Santi is bristling at boyfriend and knows how unhappy Wolfe will be, but what can he do? They need his job to survive.

Then Wolfe is sitting there in his tiny basement office with an angry Jess, trying to say, "I really want to help get Morgan out of trouble, but if they catch me involving myself in this, they're probably arresting me and firing my partner and then my PTSD is going to spiral out of control and kill me" without actually saying that.

What is Morgan in trouble for? Protesting the college’s handling of sexual harassment and assault cases on campus. Gregory, Dean of Something or Other, adored by upper administration because his filthy rich family gives very large donations to the university, tried to coerce her into sleeping with him. She reported it, only to have the case swept under the rug because “think of his career. He’s such an important member of the community. It must have been a misunderstanding.” She found out she’s not the only one. She will not be quiet about it.

Frustrated at being told there was no proof Gregory did anything wrong, Morgan hacked his emails and posted a file full of incriminating evidence to the campus Facebook group. She did it with a throwaway account, but the university suspects her and very much wants her caught and charged with felony hacking.

The university asks Wolfe to look into this, of course. Remembering how Gregory used to harass him back when he was a student, Wolfe quietly slips more of Gregory’s passwords to Morgan, while insisting to his bosses that he can’t find any evidence at all.

Santi’s boss wants him on the case, too. Santi doesn’t know how long he can stall before he’s forced to arrest Morgan. “Just grab her at one of those protests,” his boss says. “Bring her in for rioting, we’ll get her to confess to the rest.” He doubts they’re going to do that with legal tactics. He knows what happens to cops who report things like that, and keeps his mouth shut.

Thomas was the star student in the engineering department, until he turned in an assignment that got him flagged as “dangerous.” It didn’t occur to him that the robot he designed had military applications, but it was a very convenient excuse for his department chair to put him on a watch list. When he gets arrested at one of Morgan’s protests, the chair of the engineering department is happy to bail him out, if he'll just do some work on a special project or two... or twenty.... Thomas practically lives in the engineering department offices now. He has no free time. But if he doesn’t do this, he’s looking at terrorism charges, with that robot he designed as evidence against him.

Khalila is an astrophysics major, easily the top student in the school. She’s going to graduate with honors, she already has offers for fully funded graduate positions at 3 universities, this one included, and job offers from NASA, SpaceX, and Blue Origin. She’s doing a research project on recent space shuttle designs when suddenly, suspiciously, every faculty member starts encouraging her to shift her project in a different direction. Why can’t anyone seem to find a copy of that paper on that shuttle design that NASA suddenly, mysteriously, scrapped? She just wanted to see what was wrong with it and apply that to newer designs.

She finds herself in Wolfe’s tiny basement office, asking him about a strange database error. “This is a waste of time,” Wolfe says. “Those other professors are right. You’re going to ruin your career digging into these kinds of failed projects,” he says, while wondering whether and how to slip her the evidence he’s just uncovered that Elon Musk bribed government officials to bury that perfectly good shuttle design in favor of a SpaceX one.

Glain is a criminal justice major, planning a police career. She understands why people keep telling her that she needs to stay away from Morgan’s protests, but she hates it. Protests are legal. The cops should be going after Gregory. She’s sick of hearing from the campus cops that she needs to be careful who she’s seen hanging out with.

Dario is a filthy rich exchange student from Spain. He was just here for a year of studying abroad, but he’s fallen in love with this gorgeous, genius astrophysics major, and now he’s wondering if he’s going to have to call in favors with his cousin at the embassy because he’s about to get arrested helping Khalila get her hands on some documents. He says he hates his roommate, Jess, but he just paid to bail Jess out of jail, and he’s on the phone with his cousin asking about lawyers.

[aminiatureworld]

Opposites

Characters: Xiao, gn!reader

Word Count: 1,594

Warnings: Swearing

Premise: In which the reader is the brain and Xiao is the brawn

Author’s Note: I wasn’t sure what the general setting should be so I put it in a vaguely college/university setting. Prolly cause that’s around my age and also because I cordially dislike highschool AUs. Hopefully that works out alright!

I had to type out almost 2,000 words on my iphone. I never want to do that again.

Xiao

Honestly none of your friends are actually sure how you two got together.

After all, if someone were to take a picture of you and your partner side-by-side then show it to people not in the know, well the prevailing emotion would be something along the lines of: “Are they classmates or neighbors or something?”

To be fair, when the two of your first met even the idea that you would ever end up in love was something laughable. Having been pushed together for a project, your knee-jerk reaction had been: Oh I’m totally going to end up doing this all by myself.

Thankfully however you’d been quickly proven wrong. Although Xiao hadn’t necessarily been the best about planning and other such things, his work was organized and he always showed up to every meeting with his parts completed.

By the end of the project you never wanted to work with another person on a group project again.

And, to be completely honest, you’d definitely developed a crush on your slightly aloof group partner.

Xiao’s reaction was much harder to read.

At first he appeared to want nothing to do with you. Work was emailed to you with not so much as a subject line; meetups passed in awkward silence broken by tentative questions on your part. You’d sort of assumed that he saw you as annoying and the group work as useless - which to be fair it sort of was useless.

So when he emailed you a few weeks later asking for your number and if you wanted to do something, well, safe to say you almost fell out of your chair.

Though the start was a little awkward, Xiao’s conversational nature didn’t develop much in general, you two fell into a routine of sorts, a relationship of unspoken boundaries and spontaneous confidences.

During the first few weeks of you odd sort of relationship you’d come to the conclusion that, though not a talker, Xiao was ultimately quite apathetic in nature. Eventually however you realized apathetic wasn’t the right term.

Though he might’ve appeared sullen on the outside, Xiao never actually acted in a way that hinted at any resentment or irritation; he never dragged his feet about something or implied it was stupid that you should ask for help or for a favor.

His assertiveness, which might’ve been mistaken for aloofness, was endearing. Xiao never half-asses anything, even when if wasn’t doing something for another person, like you.

You appreciated this side of his personality, the fact that he was quick to act, admired if even. It certainly stood in stark contrast to your tendency to overthink things, something that could quickly end up kneecapping you depending on what decisions were being debated.

It was an alien concept to you, the sort of philosophy Xiao seemed to live by, and its novelty was refreshing.

As your thoughts slid more and more to focusing on Xiao you became more and more aware of the rumors that abounded about him.

He was a troubled youth, he was prone to fighting, he had been so uncontrollable in secondary school that only one teacher had been able to get him to do anything. The only times he spoke was to wound, and he never had a word to say that wasn’t angry.

Well, obviously that wasn’t the truth, but any attempt to clear up the situation was quickly met with odd stares and responses that all smacked of: “Oh you poor idiot, you just haven’t learned yet.”

You would’ve liked to think that you didn’t let it affect your relationship with him, but evidently the rumors had begun to catch up to you.

“Hey, you’ve been avoiding me.”

“Have I?” You shifted awkwardly in your seat. Xiao sighed, evidently aware of where this was going.

“It’s because of what people say about me, isn’t it?”

“Maybe.”

“I see.”

That had been the beginning and the end of the conversation for quite some time, almost as if Xiao had yet to decide whether or not you were one of the few in whom he could entrust the truth. Yet despite the rumors and the odd looks you still found yourself gravitating towards Xiao, and soon enough that initial pull turned into something much deeper.

The day that you two became “official” was the day Xiao told you the truth. He had been a delinquent as a teenager.

Born into a family full of troubles Xiao shouldered the circumstances as best he could.

However things cannot stay untouched forever; the distress that Xiao experienced only grew, the pressure ratcheting up with every incident, every item thrown to the ground, every fight that ended in humiliating pain.

Eventually it became too much, and when it did Xiao took his anger out not on his family, not on the people who had failed him, but on any classmate who antagonized the vulnerable child.

Fights became a regular part of Xiao’s life until university, and it was only in meeting his mentor, Zhongli, that the lost young man had managed to pull his life together.

Things made more sense after that, though one couldn’t say that everything was right with the world. Students, coworkers, the particularly idiotic TA, all of them still carried the sense that Xiao was not to be trusted. You could see how it upset your partner sometimes, when he was ignored at the coffeeshop or excluded from class group chars in the like.

Whenever he did that Xiao tended to retreat into himself, as if worried he might explode again. It took a lot of coaxing to get him out of such situations but it was always worth it to see your partner’s expression soften, to see his small smile once more.

What you didn’t tell him was that you were just as angry as he was, just as resentful at the people within your major which were hellbent on acting like they were still in high school.

Eventually however the trials of your early were utterly forgotten, the questions and the secrets replaced by a sense of slightly hilarious domestic bliss.

You were definitely the brains of the group, something Xiao didn’t seem to mind - though he probably would find that actual statement somewhat silly.

Xiao, on the other hand, held the esteemed position of Person Who Actually Got Stuff Done. You relied on him to get you out of your mental spirals, to pull you out of your room and out of your brain fog and to get you to do something; even if it wasn’t the thing you were thinking about.

In return it was your job to make sure Xiao didn’t get himself killed doing something stupid.

Xiao’s reticence masked an almost supernatural recklessness. Though your partner didn’t own a motorbike, if he had you were completely convinced he’d ride one without a helmet. His almost total disinterest in his own safety was something that you brain shrunk from, and more often than not a crazy plan of his would end with you listing the terrible things that might happen if something were to go wrong, even if those things weren’t always the most realistic.

There was a storm in twenty minutes? It was the perfect time for a walk! There was cavern nearby with tunnels were so tight you had to walk single file? Sure why not!

He would talk about such things as if there was nothing to it, as if it didn’t send your heart rate spiking. There wasn’t the slightest acknowledgment of danger. Even his tone was as gruff as usual, as if it was the most natural thing to want to go mountain climbing, not interesting enough to get even a little excited about.

It was probably good he did martial arts. You didn’t even want to think about where all that energy would go otherwise.

Xiao’s straightforward nature came out in softer ways too, ways that you envied much more than his full-steam-ahead recklessness.

He was never afraid to state what was on his mind. Whether it was correcting a waiter who got his order wrong or telling a rude doormats to fuck off, all these things were natural to him.

To be honest you completely envied that aspect of him, unable go replicate such a mindset in yourself.

When you’d commented on it once Xiao had stared oddly at you. After a moment he told you that he figured it came from his background. Sometimes you had to learn how to say “no” or “that’s wrong” or “you’re a shitty person.”

Just as you tried to curb the most extreme parts of Xiao’s recklessness, so too did Xiao work to bring you out of the spirals your mind went down sometimes, and so did he try to coax you out of the overthinking that kept you from asserting yourself in your life.

Saying you two were complete opposites wouldn’t really be accurate. You shared similar views, similar passions, similar opinions on what mattered. Yet it was true that, in some ways, you complemented one another. And when it came to those traits in which you differed, well you would like to think that your differences just made you stronger as a couple.

Maybe your friends couldn’t understand how you two got together, or why you were so deeply in love with the person you’d chosen to be your partner. But you didn’t care.

You loved Xiao with all your soul, and, at the end of the day, that was all that mattered.

[epicene-humanoid]

some trans Jeff thoughts:

he realized he was trans in elementary school and just went fuck it I'll just start introducing myself as Jeffery and see if anyone decides to stop me (as we know, jeff winger can get away with almost anything)

he got top surgery the second he could afford it (around the same time he started at his law firm), and probably bribed someone to keep it a secret

"I'm jeff winger and i would rather look at myself naked than the women I sleep with" are the words of a man proud of his transition

he's really insecure about his fashion sense, which is why he mostly dresses like the douchey guys at his firm in the start of the show, he thought you can't go wrong with the sleazy lawyer look

he will never admit it but he feels super good about the dean hitting on him, because the dean is a (cis) guy, acknowledging that Jeff is more manly than him

i think he starts out stealth and comes out to everyone one by one, probably starting with abed because he knows abed won't judge him and will probably just see it as an interesting backstory.

abed just says it's cool and maybe worth a prequel exploring Jeff's transition, and jeff asks him to predict how all of the members of the group will react to him coming out.

abed's predictions:

britta will be over-the-top supportive and do a ton of research about trans history, probably put together a slideshow just to prove how progressive she is, and jeff will be a little bit weirded out, but also touched that she did all that for him, though he would never let her know that

shirley will be confused, because she doesn't know how someone she trusts and knows so well could be part of a group she was raised to hate, but ultimately realizes that there's nothing actually against the lgbtq people in the bible, and, as a cool character development arch, starts to advocate against use of the bible to justify bigotry

troy will just think it over and decide that Jeff's physique and coolness are even awesomer knowing how much work he'd had to put in to be like that, and respects Jeff's manliness even more

annie will give him a hug, say something sweet about how she'll always love him, and worry about his health, because even she read somewhere that taking testosterone makes you more likely to have a heart attack, jeff will explain that the risk is still only as high a cis guy, and she'll be the one to always remind him to take his shots

peirce will say at best say "jeff winger used to be a chick?" and at worst call him a slur, either way there's sure to be a lot of misgendering from him, and pestering to know Jeff's deadname (needless to say, Jeff just doesn't tell peirce)

the whole group goes out of their way to keep their beach trips a secret from pierce (the girls don't want him there anyways, he's too liable to be creepy) even though jeff knows that even if pierce saw his scars, all he would have to do is make up a story about some childhood accident and pierce would never question it

sorry this ended up being super long. can I hear some of your headcanons for him?

YES ALL THIS!!! yes yes i’m fully accepting this as canon oh my god

i’m about to type a whole ass ESSAY at midnight because i have been DYING to talk about this for months ajfdksljk,,, this is going to be obscenely long and i might end up adding even more to it as i continue to rewatch the show because there is truly no shortage of trans jeff content (especially when you’re trans and see transness in every little thing ajdkslfkjs)

spoiler warning for literally everything about this show under the cut <3

i 100% agree, i feel like he realized he was trans super young, especially since in the show we see him as a little kid a couple of times. 

like look at little jeff with the oversized sweatshirt and little ponytail!! that’s childhood trans fashion. not to be dramatic but part of me thinks that jeff’s dad left before he fully came out to his family (which gives him even more angst about it, because until that one Thanksgiving episode, he’s never able to prove to his dad that he’s a better man), but part of me thinks that his dad left after he came out (which adds that spicy i-should-have-stayed-in-the-closet guilt that he has to work through). 

either way, because his dad wasn’t there, he had to base his concept of masculinity on something else, which was becoming a lawyer!! there’s some line that’s like “after the dust and divorce papers were settled the only man i looked up to was [the lawyer guy]”. like, replacing your father figure in your mind with the concept of “a job where you can talk your way in and out of anything and distort other people’s concept of reality”? that’s trans.

 and the fucking THANKSGIVING EPISODE... i struggle to watch it without crying hehe <3 yeowch! the dichotomy of willy jr. being the “wrong” kind of man because he’s “too soft” but jeff also not being enough despite adhering to all the social standards of masculinity... fuck!! this whole scene of him telling his dad “i am Not well adjusted” and talking about how he gave himself an “appendix surgery scar” when he was a kid and he still keeps the get-well-soon letters from his classmates under his bed? oh my god. the implication of people loving him not despite his scars but because of them?? trans. i can’t think about this episode for too long or i’ll start yelling.

OH and this scene? where he talks about how his mom got him a girl costume for halloween?? and everyone said “what a cute little girl” and after a few houses he stopped correcting them?? and “once the shame and the fear wore off, i was just glad they thought i was pretty”?? THAT’S TRANS... the man needs validation oh my god... and then in all the halloween episodes we see he has these ultra-masculine costumes (a cowboy, David Beckham, one of the fast and furious guys even though he never watched the movies, a boxer with his DAD’S boxing gloves... god) costumes are about becoming something else and he always chooses to be hypermasculine and that is trans.

THE PHYSICAL EDUCATION EPISODE!!!!!!! being uncomfortable during P.E. is a queer experience. period. but him being specifically uncomfortable in the clothes someone else is assigning to him? trans. “are we gonna talk about clothes like a girl? or use tapered sticks to hit balls around a cushioned mat like a man?” TRANS. and him eventually stripping in public? celebration of transness. and the fact that he eventually becomes comfortable in both the uniform and his own style!! trans!! god i love this episode. 

AND AND AND!!! the gay dean coming out episode!!! where it’s the three of them discussing the best way for the dean to come out as gay despite not entirely identifying with that label!! so we have both frankie and the dean who are sort of ambiguously queer, and jeff who’s a stealth trans man who’s probably only out to only the study group at this point. this scene where the dean and jeff have this like eyebrow communication while frankie is talking is just so cute. queer-to-queer communication. “I am so curious” “oh?” “intellectually.” “oh...” ajfdksljfk this scene just screams high school GSA to me and i love it so much.

and SPEAKING of the dean!! i totally see you on that. i feel like jeff has some internalized homophobia/biphobia (like he’d throw punches over someone else, but when it comes to himself he has a lot of shame). and also seeing the dean so confident in all his different outfits/costumes has a weird affect on him bc it’s like “okay, the dean, a cis guy, can do that, but i as a trans guy could Not because that’s Breaking the Rules”. which, like, throwback to the halloween thing. of course there’s no right way to be masculine, but mr. winger does not know that.

another thing!! the episode where their emails get leaked? that includes his emails with his therapist. fuck!! he was outed to the whole world in that episode!! no wonder he was so fucking angry!! this whole episode (and really any time he mentions his therapist) is so interesting when you think about them as a person he talks to about his transition. OH which adds to the thing with the dean!! “and you told your therapist you wanted to be alone this weekend” and “not you jeff, i know you’ll be visiting your dad” ”I told you to stop reading my emails”. luckily his study group has his back and just makes fun of him for emailing astronauts lmao

and WHO can forget “they’re giving out an award for most handsome young man!!!!” what else is there to say about this line besides: he’s trans. you know he didn’t get awarded enough for being a handsome young man when he was a kid, and no amount of compliments when he’s fully-grown can really make up for that. some people crash a kid’s bar mitzvah to cope with the fact that they struggled to be seen as themselves when they were a teenager <3

also his weird relationship with pierce? where he kind of hates him (understandably lmao) but at times has this almost-friends-almost-father-son relationship with him? especially in this episode where he’s forced to bond with him and ends up having a good time by accident (at a barber shop no less, the perfect place to Be A Man with your Man Friend). idk what to say about him besides the fact that pierce says his mom wanted a girl when he was born and made him dress like a girl (and his middle name is anastasia!) so if they’re gonna do any bonding over transness it’s gonna be that. 

okay one last thing and then i’ll shut up for the night. this episode kills me (and almost kills jeff hahahahelpi’mcrying). it’s a very Trans thing to not be able to visualize your future self, it just is. growing up trans at the time he did? i don’t know what kind of future he saw for himself, but i’m so happy that he ended up with a group of friends who became his family and love him the way they all do. i’m so emotional over this asshole it’s ridiculous. 

in conclusion:

they’re trans, your honor <3

[maeve-writes]

Beautiful Hell

Inspired by:  Beautiful Hell by ADNA 

Pairing: Bucky Barnes (tfatws) x Reader (experiment/mutant!Reader) Rating: 18+, Minors DNI Warnings: Angst, fluff, smut, fingering, unprotected sex, dirty talk. Summary: Your past shows up in an unexpected way thanks to Bucky Barnes. You just wanted to be... normal, not caught up in the life of a hero or worse, and yet you’re drawn to him, addicted to him even. You thought that part of your life was over, but your relationship opens up a whole new chapter that you’re not sure you’re ready for. a/n: Unbeta’d, any mistakes are my own and please forgive me. I have not written anything that wasn’t work related in about three years, so I’m a little rusty. This is just a dip of my toe back into the water. I’d like to continue this if there is any interest! Thanks for reading!

There’s very little that makes you upset these days. You have a great job, a cozy apartment, and wonderful friends. It’s taken a long time for you to find stability and even longer for you to accept that it was okay to have it. Most of that struggle was on your own, but you eventually found others like you that were dealing with the same inner turmoil and you’ve grown.

The group still meets twice a month, but now you run it. You see the same pain and anger in the eyes of strangers that you once held, you’ve been in their shoes and you want to help start their journey of healing and self discovery. You would never turn someone away who wanted help, who sought out the chance to better themselves, but six feet of muscle and adamantium shuffles into the recreation room of the local Boy’s and Girl’s Club, and you bend the already folded aluminum chair in half. 

The squeak of the metal catches his attention and his brow knits together. His eyes dance between your face, the chair, and back again. “Cheap material,” you say weakly with a lift of your shoulders. You watch as he puckers his lips in thought and his hands are shoved into his jacket. 

One of your regulars, Sarah, takes the chair from you and tries to right it once more, but finds it more difficult than you played it up to be. “Set up the rest, I’ve got this,” you tell her, happy to tear your attention away from the man. You reset the bars of the chair and unfold it, placing it on the floor to see if it will act as it should. It’s a little wonky, the bend leans it too far back, but it will hold you - it’s a chair.

You sit among the circle and begin. People sip their coffee and share their stories for the week. The new people introduce themselves, including him, but everyone already knows his name. He didn’t share this time, but you could tell he wanted to from the way his jaw clenched and the uncomfortable shifts in his sheet. You were like that once, you know just how he feels.

Two hours pass and the crowd slowly trickles out. You start the clean up, the putting away of the chairs. You move around the room and do your best to ignore his eyes burning into you - into your soul. “You could at least help clean,” you tell him without looking up from the sink against the far wall where you now stand. “Chairs still need to be put away.”

It takes a few beats, but you hear his heavy footsteps fall behind you and the eventual scrap of metal as the chairs are being folded. There’s a steady rhythm to his method, a clink of his metal arm against the chair, the screech as the chair is closed and his footfalls to the corner to put it away.

You finish your last coffee pot, drying your hands and turn to see the wonky chair in his hold. “Cheap material,” he repeats, looking down at it before he bends it back and forth. You see him trying to mold it back into better shape than you had earlier as your face grows hotter by the second. When he deems it “good enough,” he brings it over to join the others. “Who are you?”

“No one,” you reply instantly. 

His head snaps around, blue eyes burning, “You’re a horrible liar.”

“Not true,” you counter, “I’ve lied to myself for years.”

He turns to you fully and crosses his arms over his broad chest. He doesn’t find your attempt at what he thinks is a joke funny. “Who are you,” he asks again, his voice becoming clipped and impatient. 

You tell him your name, your full name but it does not ring any bells to him. It wouldn’t, not in a way he would realize. “You saved someone years ago, not as… you, but as,” you pause and wave the towel you used to dry your hands, “you know.” You try your best to ignore how his body tenses up and you continue, “You killed his wife and his unborn son. You changed him. Changed everything, really. Somehow, I got caught up in it all.”

His hardened stare quickly shifts into curiosity and you force yourself to look away before you crash into the stormy blue. “They pumped us full of all sorts of stuff. A lot of us didn’t make it. I can still hear the screams if I try.” You grind your teeth to make yourself stop falling into that abyss. “But my dad raised me by himself, he taught me how to survive, how to be strong. He always told me: Girl, if you’re gonna go down, go down swingin’. And I forced myself to keep going, no matter what they did, I wasn’t going to let those assholes get the best of me.”

The towel was back in both of your hands now, pulled and stretched as you tried not to think about the pain and the loneliness that followed. “But eventually I was freed, just like you freed that other guy. I got a chance to be him now… but I didn’t take it.” The terry cloth ripped in half and your arms fell by your sides. 

You dared to look up at the man and you inwardly swore. His face was so painfully beautiful, full lips were in a pout and his eyes twinkled blue in their sadness, in their empathy. “They wanted us to be something and I wasn’t going to let someone else define me. I ran for years, scared and alone. I had to change my life over and over because I didn’t want them to find me, then I realized I was actually doing what they wanted… I was being someone I’m not.”

You crossed the room to the trash can nearby and not too far behind he followed. The two of you began to toss half-eaten pastries and empty disposable coffee cups. “So, I settled down here, started to go by my real name and took any threat that came my way.” You watched him sniff at an uneaten danish, “Cherry, I think.” His shoulder lifts in a ‘what-the-hell’ kind of way and he takes a bite. “It took about two decades for them to stop,” you finish, “and I was able to finally start to live my life.”

He silently offers half of the danish to you, which you decline. “And when the world went to hell in a hand-basket, you what, sat here and lived your life?” The blow was meant to sting and it did. He didn’t know if you were gone in The Blip but from your recoil, he got his answer. “I don’t know what they did to you, but you obviously have the ability to help people, you should use it.”

“I do,” you reply, offended. “This,” you wave your hands around for the second that evening, “helps people. Just because I don’t strap on leather and beat up bad guys doesn’t mean I don’t make a difference.”

Bucky stills completely, even his breathing, and he looks down into the trash can he has been pushing around for you. It looks as though he wants to toss himself in it. “You’re right,” he says with a heavy exhale, “that wasn’t fair of me. It’s just… the world is running low on heroes, they’re now relying on a guy in a bird suit.”

“I thought that guy was your friend,” you ask with a tilt of your head.

When the corner of his mouth tips up into a boyish smile, you mirror it with a toothy grin because of how infectious it is. “Yeah,” he nods, “I guess he is. But I just hate being the only muscle.”

“You’re plenty enough for this hemisphere,” you laugh and reach out to pat his shoulder, when you feel the muscle packed there, you whistle through your teeth, “and maybe the other one, too.”

He laughs and rolls the shoulder you tapped, tossing off your hand playfully. “Yeah, well it wouldn’t hurt to have more because getting hurt hurts.” You two exchange smiles and finish trash detail. He ties up the full bag and prepares to bring it out while you work on putting a new one in the can. 

You lead him out back to the dumpsters and he tosses the bag in after you open the heavy metal lid. When it falls closed again with a loud, ringing bang, you pull out a pack of sanitizing wipes and offer him one which he gladly accepts. “This might not be the right time,” he begins, eyes drawn to the large, smelly trash bin next to the pair of you, “but would you like to have dinner with me sometime?”

“Who knew you were so romantic, Sergeant Barnes,” you tease to hide your fluttering heartbeat that he can undoubtedly hear. Under the pale yellow beam of the streetlights you can see the flush forming on his face that mirrors your own. “I’m free tomorrow around seven.”

Bucky straightens to his full height and his eyes sparkle brightly when that boyish curl makes its way back to his lips. “Then it’s a date,” he nods as you both pull out your phones to exchange numbers and you give him your address.

“Don’t be late,” you warn him, tone playfully serious, “I get angry if I don’t eat before eight. Bad things happen if I don’t eat.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he nods with a low rumbling chuckle, “I don’t plan to disappoint you.”

Your face splits into a smile and you lead your way back in, “See you tomorrow, Sergeant.”

“Tomorrow,” he says, his eyes trained on your every move. “And it can’t come soon enough,” he adds under his breath.

x

Your day goes by in a blur. Work is stressful but rewarding. Even though you love your job, your mind was not completely on it. Just past noon you received a text: Just seeing if this works. I’m looking forward to tonight. Have a good day. BB

It is unclear if he does not really know how texts work or if it is his excuse to send you one, but either way it makes you giddier than a schoolgirl. You reread it several times, answer a few work related calls and emails before you finally answer back: It works! I’m also looking forward to tonight. My day was good, but your text made it better. Hope yours is fantastic! xx

You are hesitant to hit send, but if you are going to shoot your shot, then you might as well go all in. Your phone doesn’t even go to sleep before you get another text in return: I’m about to see the prettiest gal in town, my day will be more than fantastic. How do you feel about sushi and bowling? BB

Of all of the things to do, especially together, you would not think of Bucky Barnes to pick that as your first night out together, but you had a weakness for sushi and your competitive side could never say no to a game or two: I haven’t been bowling in years, but I’m sure I can teach you a few things. xx

Oh, sweetheart, you’ll be learning a thing or two before the night is over. BB

You aren’t sure if you guys are talking about bowling anymore and that thought lights a fire in your belly. With a shaky breath you send your last reply: I’ll be happy to learn anything as long as I get to call you Professor Barnes and I can stay after class for extra credit. ;) xx 

It isn’t until two hours after your lunch that you get your last reply from him: Looking up that reference sent me to the part of the internet that I’m still not used to, but I’m glad I did. You don’t happen to have a skirt and some of those socks that go up to your knees, do you? Don’t answer that, I won’t be able to make it through dinner. See you at 7. BB

You did happen to have just what he asked for and it was tempting to wear it, but you tucked the idea into your pocket for another time. Instead, you picked something more appropriate for bowling, a pair of navy skinny fit cotton dress pants with enough stretch to not rip when you bent over to toss a ball, a curve hugging camisole that was draped by a soft, cream colored cashmere sweater. 

After messing with your hair for an hour, you settled for a messy bun and just finished your makeup when your doorbell rang. You call out to him to “hold on” as you shuffle through your apartment, trying to wriggle into your loafers on the way to open the door. “Sorry. Sorry, sorry,” you apologize as you pull open the door.

He’s standing in the doorway dressed in a canvas jacket over a plain black shirt, dark jeans over his long, thick legs and his normal boots top it off. “You look gorgeous,” he says, forcing you away from your lingering gaze as it continues to travel up and down his body like he’s the one for dinner. “These are for you,” he presents a bouquet of flowers with an unsure smile. “They’re beautiful,” you say wistfully, taking the flowers and stepping aside to let him in. “Thank you.” He nods and stands near the door as you finish putting on your shoes. “Let me put these in water and we can go.” “Take your time,” he says and trains his eyes on you. They follow you through the apartment, to the kitchen as you look through your cabinets for a vase. When you bend over, his head tilts ever so slightly which you can see out of the corner of your eye, but when you turn to try and catch him, he just smiles innocently. “Need any help?”

“I’ll manage,” you laugh and eventually find a vase. The flowers are arranged not so elegantly into the glass, but you add water and place them in the center of your kitchen island. “Now, I’m starving and getting hangry.”

“Hangry,” he repeats. “That doesn’t sound good. I guess I should feed you before that happens.” He holds out an arm and like a magnet you are drawn to him and latch to it, maybe it’s because of the metal. Nevertheless, you walk arm and arm to the sushi hole-in-the-wall two blocks away, eating in a small booth in the corner to hide away from prying eyes.

You learn about Bucky Barnes for the first time. Like everyone else, you hear things from the news, from the internet, you try to shift through the lies and mess. But here you’re learning what he likes, what he’s learned, what he wants to learn. He doesn’t give his past up as freely as you did, it’s obvious he’s still coming to terms with it, but everyone travels at their own pace.

He learns about you, too. He asks you about things none of your past dates have asked. Hell, even your past boyfriends and girlfriends weren’t interested in half of the stuff Bucky manages to squeeze out of you. And you find it so easy to talk to him, so natural. You’ve only known him for two days, but it feels like decades.

Your hand slips into his when you leave the restaurant and head to the bowling alley. He laces your fingers together two blocks into your walk and you once again wrap your free hand around his arm. It pains you to move away when you have to go in and put on the bowling shoes.

“Before we begin,” he says to you as he watches you put your names into the computer, “let’s make a bet.” You finish entering the ‘y’ of his name and lift an inquisitive brow his way. “If you win, you can have one thing you would want from me.”

You twist in your seat and narrow your eyes, “And if you win?”

His tongue darts out to lick his lips, you watch it disappear with a pout, “I get a kiss.”

“You could just ask for one,” you laugh and slowly lean towards him.

Bucky, too, leans in and bumps noses with you, “Yeah, but it’s more fun if I work for it.” He sits back and winks, trying not to laugh at your deflated and deepening pout. “C’mon, sweetheart, you’re up first.”

You sigh heavily and pick up the bright green ball that you picked from the line waiting to be thrown. “Okay, if I win, then I get to wear that skirt and socks for you,” you say over your shoulder before you toss the ball down the lane. It rolls down the center and knocks down all ten pins as STRIKE flashes on the screen above you.

When you flop down in the chair next to him, he’s still staring at the spot where you stood moments before, gears still churning. “Hey,” you laugh, snapping your fingers in front of his face to knock him out of his daze, “are you okay?”

“Would it be wrong of me to lose on purpose,” he asks sheepishly. You roll your eyes and cross your arms and he lifts his own in surrender. “Okay, okay. I get it, that’s no fun. Just know, darlin’, I don’t go down without a fight.” He steps up and takes the same ball you used and chucks it halfway down the lane before it, too, knocks down all ten pins. He turns to you, a smirk plastered on his face.

As much as you loved to have fun, you loved to win more. “Is that how it’s going to be,” you asked, getting up to pass him on the way to take your turn.

He laughs, pressing close as you both slow when you come into each other’s orbit. “That’s how it’s going to be,” he nods and rakes over his lip with his teeth. A challenge is set and you don’t back down. Strikes and spares are thrown by the both of you in between lingering touches and whispered sweet nothings. 

In the hour you two have rented the lane, you managed two games and with one point over you, Bucky wins. He doesn’t claim his prize right there, it’s too public and there’s far too many people around. Instead, he offers to walk you home and you happily accept as long as you can wrap yourself around him once again, which you do.

You two try to take your time on the way back, enjoying the crisp evening air, but more so each other's company. The conversation from dinner continues as a flow of likes and dislikes between more sweet nothings. You’re lovedrunk by the time you’re at your front door and you don’t want the night to come to an end.

Reluctantly, you release him from your hold and he looks as disappointed as you feel. “Tonight has been wonder-” “I had such a great-” you both begin simultaneously and trail off together, ending in nervous laughter. 

“Thank you,” you tell him, leaning up to kiss his cheek, “for such an amazing night.”

“I should be thanking you,” he says, a hand timidly reaching out to rest on your hip. “I’ve been a little rusty at this kind of thing, but you made it easy.” His thumb traces the arc of your hip bone and you step closer to him. “But, you know, I might need some more practice.” You resisted to roll your eyes, but the laughter bubbles between the both of you. The distance closes by one of you, and you don’t care who, but you find your hands splayed across his chest, “I think I can help you out there.”

“That would be my second win of the night,” he grins down at you, his eyes trained on your lips.

“Speaking of my win,” he trails off. His flesh hand raises to your cheek and you instinctively lean into it. Your nose wrinkles at his chuckle but it doesn’t stop you from raising on your toes to close what little space there was between you.

You could sense his hesitation, the silent question of what was enough and what was too much. A small hum bubbled in your throat as you pushed your hands up his chest, nails scraping up his neck and into his hair. You could feel the shiver ripple throughout his body and his teeth came out to bite down on your bottom lip.

It was your turn to laugh now and he licked into your mouth in return, turning it into a whimpering moan. You could feel his triumphant smirk against your lips and you reward it with a tug of his hair. His hips instantly buck against you which throws you off balance, but he catches you with his metal arm winding around your back and pins you against him. 

Your tongues slip and slide against one another, the taste of his sushi and beer choice mixes with your own. Your nails once again claw along his scalp and cause him to growl into your mouth. He surges forward with you in his grip and crowds you against your door, reluctantly breaking away for air, “We should say goodnight,” Bucky whispered against your kiss swollen lips.

“You can tell me good morning when you wake up next to me tomorrow,” you shoot back and roll your hips against his, causing both of you to react with a strained moan.

“Are you sure,” he asks, tucking a stray hair behind your ear.

“I’ve got a spare toothbrush with your name on it,” you nod. You watch him debate the issue with himself before placing one last chaste kiss on your lips before losing his grip just enough to let you open the door.

You two stumble in, Bucky pulling you back to him, his mouth kissing along your jaw as you try to lock up for the night. You barely got the deadbolt turned when his teeth sank into your sink causing you to cry out. He instantly licks at apologetically and turns his attention to getting you undressed instead.

When your sweater is pulled over your head, you push off Bucky’s jacket, both falling to the floor near the door. Shoes are next to go, sloppily kicked off near each other and once again you two are drawn back together, tongues dancing. Your fingers twist into the short brown locks and his hands snaked down to your ass. He lightly cups each cheek, using them to bring you as close as possible, and even though your bodies leave very little room for air to pass through you still try to move closer.

“Bed,” he breathes into your mouth. You give him a quick nod. With a happy groan, he squeezes you by your bottom, picking you up to carry you to your room, your legs instantly wrapping around his waist. 

Your small one bedroom apartment isn't anything special, but it is yours and it has the biggest, comfiest bed that you are in love with. Bucky easily guides you both there, not once breaking your kiss aside from grunting or growling from your teasing hair pulls or the rolls of your hips. 

He climbs onto the mattress with you still wrapped around his upper half, crawling up to the pile of pillows near the headboard where he eventually lays you down. His weight settles above you, and normally, you would welcome it’s warmth and comfort, but at that moment, you want it to be rough and needy. “Bucky,” you whine, this time the one to break the kiss.

Flushed cheeks and blown pupils, he looks down at you, boxing you in with his arms on either side of your head. “What is it, sweetheart?”

“You’re wearing too much,” you tell him as you try to pull off his shirt, it makes it up to his shoulders before it stops. His laugh shakes his entire body and yours, which makes you pout in return. 

“You’re wearing the same amount, doll,” he reminds you, looking down to see your breasts sway in your camisole. “Far, far too much, in my opinion.”

You roll your eyes and playfully slap at his chest, “Then do something about it.” He mutters something about impatience and sits on his knees between your parted thighs as he pulls his shirt over his head to toss it aside.

“Your turn,” he nods to your shirt while he works on the buckle of his belt. You hastily pull the top over your head and work on your slacks, wriggling out of them just as does his own. He sits back on his hunches and looks you over, laying spread out in a matching white lace bra and underwear set. Now at he’s down to his boxer briefs, you can see how big he his, how hard he is, and when his wandering eyes rest on your covered sex, you can see it twitch with anticipation. “Holy shit, you’re beautiful.”

You didn’t think your entire body could blush from embarrassment, but Bucky just proved you could. “That’s my line,” you return, taking in every inch of his exposed skin over hard muscle. Super serum or not, Bucky Barnes was a gorgeous specimen. When you two finally lock eyes once more, you both shiver. “Are you going to touch me?”

He lets out a shaky breath and reaches out to run a hand lightly over your damp panties, slick from your want for him. “I’m afraid I’ll never stop,” he replies honestly, instantly addicted to the needy whimpers you are giving him.

“I don’t think I would want you to,” you groan. “Please?” You feel his fingertips dance over the lace, tracing over the pattern and causing you to throb with need. “Bucky!”

“You need me, don’t you,” he asks, voice dropping to a low rumble that hits you right at your core and makes your toes curl. “You need my touch. Need me to satisfy that ache?” You nod desperately trying to sit up to pull him down on top of you, but he pins you down before you could rise. “Tell me,” he purrs.

“I need you,” you respond instantly. You’re rewarded with his fingers pushing the panties aside and begin to dance along the slick folds.

“You need what,” he goads. He finds your clit and rubs it once to draw a happy mew from you but stops much to your disappointment.

“I need you, Bucky. I need you to touch me, to kiss me,” you whine with a rock of your hips, trying to get him to move again, but he doesn’t. “I need you to taste me, to lick me, to fuck me.”

Smile on his kiss bruised lips, his thumb swirls around your bud and he sinks his middle finger into you with a groan. “You’re tight,” he hisses as he sinks knuckle-deep, “and dripping. Shit, you’re going to feel like heaven.”

You can’t focus on what he’s saying too much. The feel of his fingers pumping in and out of you feels good, feels right, but it’s not enough, even when he adds two or three. He works you open, your slick starting to run down his fingers, and he palms himself over his briefs.  “Bucky, please,” your voice cracks, “I need more.”

He nods, he has time to take you apart with just his fingers later, but it’s been so long since he’s been with someone like this, someone he’s felt like this with, he needs it as much as you do. When he removes his fingers from you, you whine at the loss but it cuts off into a gasp as you watch him lap and suck off your slick from his hand. Bucky freezes, eyes narrowing, and for a moment you’re wondering if you did something wrong. “What? What is it?”

“Trying to stop myself from eating you alive,” he says through clenched teeth, jaw visibly flexing with the effort. You blink up at him, confused, but he shakes his head and forces himself to remove his boxer briefs. “I’m having you for breakfast,” he decides.

“Uh huh,” you reply absently, your mouth watering as his cock bounces against his stomach when it’s free. It’s long, thick, and leaking, trying to hypnotize you and very much succeeding. 

“I’ll let you return the favor, sweetheart,” he laughs. His flesh hand spreads his pre-cum down his shaft and he pumps slowly while his metal hand pinches your chin between his forefinger and thumb. “Still with me?”

Blinking free of your daze, you stare at his lustful gaze and nod. He moves closer, hooks your legs over the bends of his elbows and runs the head of his cock along your folds. Your hole twitches desperately for him, “Such a pretty little pussy, so needy.” Your hands wrap around his wrists and grip at him tightly, hard enough to make him hiss. “You’ve been a good girl, I guess I can give you what you want.”

He pushes in agonizingly slow, the head of his cock sinking in what felt like centimeter by centimeter. You clench around him, trying to draw more of him in, but Bucky takes his time to bottom out. When he is finally fully seated in you, you let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding, and apparently so did he. “Fuck,” you say simultaneously. 

Your legs are positioned around his waist and he once again frames your head with his forearms, which, in turn, pushes him further inside of you. “You feel so good, doll,” he whispers against the ‘o’ of your lips. “So warm, so tight, taking me so good.” Your hands find their way up his arms and into his hair. All it takes is one tug that has him growling, “And I’m going to ruin this pretty pussy so good that it’s going to feel me all week.” He rolls his hips back as slowly as he originally pushed in, “And I wanna hear you tell everyone who it belongs to while I do it.”

He snaps his hips forward driving you up the bed and further into the pillows, a cry getting caught in your throat from it. His pace is brutal, skin slaps against skin, and his mouth seeks out yours. The kiss is sloppy, but hungry, just as primal as his pistoning hips. You hold on to him the best you can as the bed rocks, headboard slamming against the wall. Your nails trail against his skin, egging him on and drawing sinful noises from love-swollen lips. 

His hips shift angles and eventually find that spot that makes you see stars. “Bucky,” you cry out breathlessly, uncurling your toes and removing your nails from his shoulder blades. He buries his face in your neck and marks you with his teeth and tongue as he relentlessly fucks towards your brink. “So… f-fuck- so close.”

“Cum for me then, sweetheart,” Bucky growls against your skin, snaking a hand between your bodies to work at your clit. “Show me how good I make you feel. Cum for me.” His thumb rubs over your bud once, twice and a white hot punch in your gut blossoms throughout your body as you let out a strangled cry of his name. 

You can feel yourself clamp around him, working him impossibly deeper, begging him to fall down into the abyss with you. And he does, hard. He chases his bliss with you, your name a mantra spilling from his lips as he spills inside of you. He doesn’t stop until you’ve both become too sensitive to handle anymore. He pulls out of you with a heavy sigh and falls next to you on the bed onto his stomach. 

“Holy shit,” you finally break the silence, “that was…”

“Yeah,” he agrees, his head turned to look at you with tired, blissful eyes. “Goddamn, yeah it was.”

You weakly reach around to search for his hand and eventually find it, he lances his fingers with yours. You don’t break eye contact when he leans over to share a few chaste kisses before collapsing again. “You’re fantastic, Bucky, and I want you to know that was the hottest sex I have had to date.”

His post orgasm bliss is shattered and replaced with a furrowed brow, “I sense a ‘but’ coming.”

“...but as hot as it is feeling you drip out of me, I need to shower,” you finish. You can see the relief wash over him and he nods in understanding. 

“I’ve got a good memory,” he yawns and taps at his head, “that image is stored right here.” You fight a blush and slide off of your bed to head to the bathroom when seconds later you hear him do the same. He shrugs at your questioning look, “No need to waste water, right?”

You laugh as you turn on the faucets only to be crowded against the wall and your mouth is covered with his once more. The water splashing against your bodies and the echoing sounds of your moans drown out the repeated calls to Bucky’s phone. Mission. Suit up. SW

Answer your damn phone. SW

It’s the green button. SW

Green button and slide right. SW

Dammit, if you blocked me again, I stg. SW

Man, what are you doing in Soho? Yes, I’m tracking you. OMW. SW

a/n: To be continued? 

[ink-and-flame]

Kinktober - Intensity Undone

Kinktober Day 3 Prompts: No Prompts

Fandom: Original

Tags: exophilia, angst, hurt/no comfort, relationship arrangements

Pairing:  Orc(M)/Human(F)| Darnok/Lia,

[Authors Note: Since the plans for Darnok and Lia had changed this is completely off script now and no longer following the outline. The way the rest of this goes is going to be as much of a surprise to me as it will be for everyone else. There are only a few more parts of this left for what I am considering book 1 of this overarching story. This is a bridge story that does not fit anywhere in the Kinktober prompt list. I felt it worked better as a stand alone as opposed to trying to cram kink into it or having 2 separate stories be one. ]

Lia had been ignoring her phone and email for days now, as she knew it was Darnok trying to contact her. Double checking her messages to make sure she didn’t miss something important for work, she sent everything to voice mail and ignored the rest. That last moment in the club played over and over in her head. The look of shock in Darnok’s eyes as she mentioned his engagement. Everything after was a blur and she wasn’t sure how she made it home.

Ember had been checking up on her every day, letting Lia know that Darnok was sending her messages trying to get any information he could on Lia. It was bothersome but Lia understood. She didn’t give him a chance to say anything, but she couldn’t. If she had risked it, she might have simply fallen back into his arms with whatever excuse he could come up with. 

A part of her mind argued that she should have let him speak, should answer him, because what if she was wrong. Though that was the part of her that loved him and wanted to be with him. Lia didn’t trust herself, and whatever reason or excuse he had it wouldn’t be enough. At the end of the day she wanted more than what he was willing to offer, and she had to do what was best for herself.

The phone calls and messages continued into the next week, a few times it was Lucien or Zane calling to check on her, making sure she was ok. Thankfully they had managed to keep all of this from spreading outside their little group to avoid any drama or make things more difficult for Lia when she chose to come back to the club. Lucien had urged her, gently, to talk to Darnok and make a clean break if that was what she truly wanted. 

Thankfully for Lia he had no idea where she lived so he couldn’t just randomly show up at her home without notice. Though she wasn’t sure if he remembered where she worked and hoped that he didn’t show up and cause a scene. There was a small part of her that did want to talk to him and she considered what Lucien said as the days kept ticking by. 

Lia was in the back at work on her break when her coworker walked up to her with the strangest expression, she looked nervous.

“Uh, there is a car outside for you. A really expensive car and the driver said he was here to pick you up?”

Lia sighed and rubbed her face. “I’m sorry, I will go out there and tell them to leave.”

Lia only had a few minutes left of her break and didn’t want to waste it on this, but she had no choice. Walking outside she told the driver she was working and that he needed to leave. Regardless of his insistence that she get in. Turning around she headed back in and tried to ignore the situation. The car stayed right where it was for the rest of her shift and she was tempted to sneak out the back and drive home, but she didn’t want to risk being followed. 

“Ok, my shift is over, clearly you aren’t leaving and I am certain that if I try to drive myself home you will follow me. Right?”

“I have been given instructions to pick you up, and where to take you, that is the limit of my instructions. But yes, I would follow you.”

Rubbing her face with a sigh, Lia felt she had no choice. Giving a vague gesture of acquiescence she waited for the door to be opened and reluctantly got into the car. She knew this was Darnok and not some elaborate abduction, though it certainly felt like one. Of course it did not make her any less angry and Lia held that anger close to her chest, she would need it to keep from falling into his arms the moment she saw him. Despite everything, she missed Darnok.

When the car finally stopped Lia took a deep breath in and waited. The door opened and she stepped out. A wave of conflicting emotions washed over her. She was at the hotel her and Darnok would use on nights they stayed together after being at the club. She wasn’t sure how to feel about this choice, but it did make some measure of sense. 

The driver gave her  a key card and a slip of paper with instructions on it. Rolling her eyes she thanked the driver politely, none of this was really his fault, and headed into the hotel. Making her way past the desk and up to the room she was relieved to find that it was empty. It gave her a moment to prepare herself, take a few calming breaths, and sit down to relieve some tension. 

It wasn’t long before she heard another key card in the door and it opened. In walked Darnok, alone, and looking worried. Lia set her features as close to neutral as she could even though just the sight of him was enough to overwhelm her emotions. 

At first there was silence as Darnok stood somewhat awkwardly just inside the door. He stepped closer and cleared his throat. 

“Lia.”

Stopping him, Lia held up a hand. “Ms. Doran will be fine. If necessary I will allow you to call me by my full first name. Adalia. You have lost the privilege of calling me anything else.”

The startled look on his face followed by one of pain was all that kept Lia from breaking her facade. She did not feel anywhere near as confident as she sounded and knew that she would probably break before he did. 

“Of course Ms. Doran, I understand. Would it be ok if I sat at the table with you?”

Lia nodded and gestured to the chair furthest from her, waiting for Darnok to take a seat. She had not seen him in a bit, but he already looked different. It was hard to place exactly what was different, other than her perception of him, and perhaps that was all it was. 

“I know you are angry with me, upset, hurt, dozens of other things. I would just like an opportunity to explain everything to you. If you will allow it.”

Lia sighed and leveled him with an annoyed expression. “If at any point this starts to sound like excuses. I am shutting it down and leaving.”

“That is more than fair.” Darnok took a deep breath clasping his hands together on the table. 

“I should have told you of my arrangement the moment I started to consider you as my sub, that was entirely my own fault, I own all of that. All of this is my fault and I will never be able to apologize enough.” Dar held up a hand when he saw Lia open her mouth. “Please, just, let me get through this first part or I never will be able to. I will answer every question you have after.”

Lia nodded and gestured for him to continue. Though the word arrangement already had the wheels in her head turning and she was certain some of her initial suspicions about Darnok had actually been true. Maybe they wouldn’t be where they were if she had just asked questions the moment she became suspicious instead of holding it all inside out of fear of losing him.

“I am in an arranged marriage. It had been planned long before I met you, and I have spent much of my adult life trying to get out of it. Well, trying in ways that will not shame either family or get someone killed.” Clearing his throat again Darnok looked down at his hands. “It was obvious to my intended that I didn’t want this, and as a fae, she is indifferent to all of it herself. She does what her parents tell her and that is pretty much that. Though she did notice and eventually we sat down and had a discussion of what is and is not acceptable for our relationship and how we appear in public.” Dar paused and stood up. “I need a drink, do you want anything?”

“Water is fine.” Lia waited as he brought her water from the mini bar and a juice for himself. 

“Our agreement is that in public we appear a normal, happy, loving couple. Whatever it takes to convince the media, our peers, and our families that everything is working out. Privately I am allowed to indulge my sexual desires however I choose but there are rules I have to follow. I can’t be with anyone in our social circle, preferably I keep it out of the city entirely. I can’t fall in love or have feelings for my sexual partners. I cannot be seen publicly with them, and I can’t get anyone pregnant. There are a few smaller rules about visible markings and how I dress, but those are often overlooked.” Darnok took a swig of his juice before continuing.

“I did everything I could to stall the engagement or try to get out of it, but I can’t and my hand has been forced. Both families are pushing for us to be married by the end of next year.” He rubbed his face and looked sadly at Lia. “We have no love for each other, I honestly don’t even think she likes me. Our entire relationship is devoid of intimacy and even the barest shred of warmth. It is entirely a power move and my family was willing to sacrifice me as I am not the oldest son.” Pausing he shrugged. “You can ask questions now if you want. Or just leave, I honestly wouldn’t blame you. It is a fucked up situation that I made worse by not being honest with you.”

Lia sat for a moment, letting everything he said sink in. She toyed with the water bottle a bit as she thought of any questions she could ask. Really he laid it out pretty plainly. There wasn’t a whole lot of mystery, other than the whole arranged marriage part. She wasn’t even aware that was still a thing, but clearly it was. 

“I guess the only question I can think of is just why? Why weren’t you just honest with me from the beginning? It seems like such a simple thing, you could have brought it up that first night, or if not then, after the first month would have been appropriate.”

Darnok nodded, knowing Lia was absolutely right. He should have been honest from the very beginning. It could have avoided all of this. 

“It is a valid question and one I have no acceptable excuse for. The reason I didn’t in the beginning is because of privacy. I had gotten used to the arrangement and rarely had partners that I would do enough sessions with that it would be necessary to disclose it. After that though, I guess the reason was fear. I connected with you in ways I have never connected with anyone, I didn’t want to lose that. I kept telling myself you would move on, or I could just tell you the next month, but I always managed to find a reason to not say anything and it then became an issue of feeling too late.” Darnok looked down at his hands before continuing. “I guess part of me was living in this fantasy world where I could have both. I could keep the families happy, and I could have you which made me happy. I should have known it was impossible and I am so sorry for how much this hurt you.”

It was hard to stay in her seat, not run to him and throw her arms around him. She loved him, Lia knew that she loved him, but that love was poison to her heart. Even if he had been honest from the beginning, she knew she would have fallen in love with him anyway and it would have hurt just as much, but in a different way. 

“At least I understand now. I can’t say I envy your position, and you should be honest with your partners from day one going forward. Privacy or no, this is a cruel thing to do to a person and I would hate for it to happen to anyone else. I am fortunate I got my club membership on my own merits because I like the people I have met there and I don’t want to lose that too. I am sure we will see each other at the club, but I think it would be for the best if you kept your distance for now. Even though I understand your situation, I don’t think I can do any more scenes with you Darnok.”

Lia stood up. It was the most difficult thing she had ever done, but she had to let him go. Mostly for her own sake. He was never going to leave his fiance, he couldn’t, and she loved him too much to be his dirty secret. Maybe others could live with that, but she had grown far too attached and there was nothing to be done about it now. 

“So this is goodbye then?” Darnok asked, looking at her with sorrowful eyes. “You want a clean break, no friendship, no anything?”

“I can’t. I just, Darnok I can’t. Find someone else to be your sex toy. I am a sub, but I am still a person, and I refuse to let myself be used like that.” 

Turning away from him Lia headed towards the door, she could already feel the heat of the tears in her eyes threatening to fall and she did not want to cry again, not now. 

“Please wait!”

“NO! I am leaving and you are going to let me. This is on you. You broke everything Darnok, and you can’t fix this. There is nothing you can do to ever make this ok. Do not contact me again.”

Storming out of the room Lia all but ran to the elevator and stepped inside. She held it together long enough to make it down to the main floor and out the door. Of course she did not have her car, and while she did see the driver she avoided him and just began walking. The hotel wasn’t far from the club, she could see if Ember was there and get a ride back to work that way. As far as she was concerned Darnok no longer existed and she had to restart her life as best she could. 

Thankfully Ember was there, along with some of the others she knew. The walked helped to clear her head and kept her from looking overly disheveled as the tears had time to fall, but the cool air kept her face from going too red or splotchy. Ember called it a night early and headed out with Lia, driving her to her work and then following back to their building. 

Like a good friend Ember stayed with Lia all night, letting her friend rage and cry, doing whatever was needed to get it all out. It was necessary to heal, the wound had to be cleansed before the healing could begin. It was a shitty situation for certain, but Lia was strong and would eventually be able to move on. Until then, she had friends that would help her through all this. 

[rebelwrites]

Chapter One: In The Rearview - Nova

As this is an original fic it is hard to tag, so I’d really appreciate it is you reblogged and shared with your friends and followers 🖤 and if you reblog with comments I will love you forever

A/N so I know you said you didn’t want credit @withmyteeth but you are getting some 🖤 this wouldn’t be the story it is without cricket’s input, thank you for giving that first push to write this when I posted about me wanting to do a street racing story, thank you for being my beta reader, thank you for the additions and thank you for letting me bounce ideas off you 🖤 you are amazing 🖤 I hope you all enjoy this as much as I did writing it!

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Always My Ride Or Die Masterlist

This Months Writing

Every single day for nearly the last three years, the black tarpaulin taunted me from its corner in the garage, a painful reminder of the life I used to have - the life I loved, the life I vowed never to go back to. Gone were the days of burning rubber, redlining as I slammed through the gears and running from the cops, that life was well and truly in my rear view mirror now but for some reason I just couldn’t part with the lump of metal that sat in the garage.

A thick layer of dust covering the tarpaulin, if it wasn’t for Dad being adamant that he wasn’t going to let what was once my pride and joy rot away, the body and frame oxidizing into rust, belts and tires dry rotting from lack of use, hoses corroding from fluids being left to sit, all of which were a deadly combination leading to a final resting place in the back acres of a scrap yard. Every month he would come down to the garage, lift the cover, check the battery wasn’t dead, and kept the car ticking over, making sure it was ready for the day that I got back behind the wheel. He was certain that one day I would but it had been nearly three years since that night, nearly three years since everything changed, nearly three years since I vowed never to get behind the wheel.

It took Dad at least a year fixing the beast that laid dormant, there was a lot of work that needed to go into it and he wasn’t as agile as he once was, but with help from Nate they got the beast back to its glory, it was a shame it would never be driven again. Not by me anyway.

Checking the time on the clock on the wall, it was the only sound that could be heard, ticking as the seconds went by, the day was dragging its arse. All I wanted to do was head home, I didn’t want to spend another moment at the garage with the beast constantly taunting me. It was a slow day at the driver training school. All the paperwork for the week was complete, all emails had been dealt with, and all maintenance requests on the cars had been processed. It was funny how I always said I would never drive again but ended up buying a track and setting up Woods Driver Training. However my days were spent behind the desk instead of behind the wheel, watching the track through my window, choosing to stay here instead of joining them out there, no matter how useful my knowledge might be. I guess I wasn’t truly ready to leave that life behind no matter how hard I tried.

The sound of Dad’s Chevy Nova drowned out the ticking of the clock, meaning he had picked Shelby up from her Dad’s. Again, something I couldn’t do myself because it was too painful and the less contact that was had with Nate the better. Yet every day my heart called for him, just like it called for me to get back behind the wheel. Both of which would never happen, I reminded myself.

“Mummy,” Shelby shouted as Dad pulled her from the back seat of the car, dislodging me from the thoughts.

“Hey baby,” I smiled, bending down to pick her up. “Did you have a good week with Daddy?”

“Yes” she giggled. “Daddy told me to tell you something.”

“Course he did,” I said rolling my eyes. “What message did daddy give you then, princess?”

“He said something like, uh,” she started, screwing her little face up as she tried to remember what Nate had told her, “beasts don’t belong under covers, I think.”

“Well your daddy doesn’t know what he is talking about, Shelby,” I laughed placing her on the floor “Go play, baby, Mummy has nearly finished for the day and then we can go get ice cream with Grandpa.” She didn’t need telling twice as she wandered behind the desk grabbing some of her toys. Turning back to my Dad, I said, “I wish you and Nate would stop, I am not going back to the scene and you both know why. A decision was made that day, a decision that needed to happen for the sake of Shelby.”

“We know you miss it Nov, we see it in your eyes,” Dad sighed, squeezing my shoulder. “That’s why the beast is still here. Because deep down you know it would kill you to part with it.”

“Maybe I am keeping it as a reminder that I am not untouchable as I thought,” I sighed, unconsciously running my fingers over the scars on my shoulder, scars that would always be a reminder that sometimes the thing you love the most can be the thing that will try to kill you first. “Tell me pops, why did you leave the scene?”

“You know why I left Nov, I left because of you” Dad nodded.

“Exactly! And I left because of Shelby. So if you and Nate can just cool it on the whole ‘me returning to the scene’ - that would be great. It’s never going to happen, that life is in my rearview now,” I trailed off.

“You know it will never be in your rearview for long kiddo,” Dad sighed. “Trust me, it’s in your blood, it’s in Shelby’s blood, it’s a bond that will never break and you know it as well as I do.”

“One thing is for sure, I will do everything in my power to stop my daughter becoming like me and her father,” I said, taking a deep breath. “She will not become part of that life.”

“You know it doesn’t work like that, Nov,” Dad sighed. “Look, I tried to do the same, I wanted to protect you from the life of the streets, but it was in your DNA, just like it is in Shelby’s.”

“Not if I can help it,” I sighed, running my hands through my hair. “How do you think she will feel knowing that was what nearly took her mummy away? Or was the reason me and Nate were MIA for the first couple of years of her life? Look, Dad, I know you mean well but I finally feel like I am a good mother. I am actually around for my child now and not palming her off on you all the time to go race or work on the car. So when I say that life is in my rearview, I mean it.”

@chibsytelford @everyhowlmarksthedead @talicat713 @little-diable @band--psycho @mrsmarvelous1995 @withmyteeth @pancakeisreading

[actuallybarb]

The Aftermath ~ Part 7

Summary: y/n goes to therapy, is a confirmed hoodie stealer, and gets a pep talk from sam wilson and wanda maximoff

Pairing: peter parker x reader

Warnings: swearing, angst, fluff, trauma, me attempting to write a therapy session 

Word Count: 3850

A/N: so many things. 1) i’ve never been to therapy (even tho i desperately need it) so i’m solely basing that off of Freaky Friday with Lindsay Lohan. 2) i live for sleepy tropes and i hella indulged. 3) sorry not sorry

                                                         //////////

“Your projects are due next Monday. Have one partner email me who your group is working with, and no, Mr. Thompson, you can’t work with students from other periods. Class dismissed.”

“Want to work together?”

We had been going to class together for a month now, but it always seemed like Peter was surprised whenever he saw me sitting next to him. Maybe it wasn’t surprise...

“Yeah. When do you want to work on it?” I shoved my notes into my already disorderly backpack and slung it over my shoulders. It was starting to get colder in New York, but I was still wearing t-shirts and shorts (mostly because I could keep myself warm and also because I’m stubborn as hell).

“Thursday? Or do you want to start sooner than that?”

“No, I can do Thursday. Are you going to the compound this weekend?” It wasn’t more than a whisper, but I still checked who was around before asking. You can never be too careful.

“Yeah, May’s driving me up after school on Friday. Want a ride?”

I smiled. “That’d be nice.” People were slowly making their way out of the building to head home for the day, but I was heading to Manhattan.

“You going home?”

“No, I’m seeing my shrink. I’ll see you tomorrow, Peter.”

“Yeah. See you tomorrow, Y/N.” He turned right, I turned left, and I might have turned around and glanced back at him over my shoulder, just for a second.

But so did he.

/////////

Taylor’s office had a billion plants and as many windows in it. She always had a candle burning that smelled like clean laundry, and she liked to talk first whenever we met up. That’s why I liked her so much.

“Remember my crazy neighbor’s dog?” She was watering one of her plants when I walked in. “Guess who I accidentally ran over?”

“You ran over a dog?” I left my backpack by the door and grabbed my own watering can.

“No, not the dog. I ran over my neighbor while he was chasing after the dog.”

I laughed. “Like that’s much better.”

“Running over a dog is unforgivable, Y/N. A person is understandable.” We finished watering the plants then sat down at the huge floor-to-ceiling window that took up her back wall. Another reason I liked Taylor: I actually do stuff while I’m talking with her. It’s not like I’m sitting on a couch staring at her while I talk about my feelings, we’re on equal ground. The last couple visits I’ve worked on painting New York, but I haven’t made much progress because I’m a shit painter. “That’s not the point,” Taylor would say, “it’s all about going with it. Be a shit painter. Own it.” Yeah, we get along great.

“No more panic attacks since the first day.”

“Yeah? That’s great.” Unlike me, Taylor is a phenomenal painter. Her skyline had identifiable buildings. Mine had — I think one looks more like a tree than a building. (That’s one huge tree.) “Any nightmares?”

Oh. We’re going there today. “Just on bad days.”

“How often are the bad days?”

After the Blip and before Europe, my bad days went from every day to maybe once a week. Then Europe fucked me over. Now? I don’t know. “Whenever they feel like it.”

“C’mon, Y/N, you can do better than that.”

I rolled my eyes and groaned. “It’s not like it’s a cycle, like the moon or a period or our meetings. It’s sporadic, Taylor, and fucking exhausting.”

“Why? Why are the bad days so exhausting?”

I may or may not have angrily made a bird smash against a window in my painting. “Because I’m the only one who knows. Mom guesses, most of the time, but it’s like she’s still dancing around me. Dad sees it when he’s home, but he doesn’t know what to do. And—“ I almost said ‘and Peter.’ That would’ve been awkward. “And my friends make it better, but they’ve got their own shit to deal with, and I don’t want to dump any of my problems on them. And I know you’re going to say ‘Internalizing your pain is bad, Y/N,’ but it’s the only solution I can handle right now until I muster up the courage to actually talk to my mom again. I mean, last time I needed Jess by my side, how the hell am I going to handle it without her?”

“For starters, I’m proud of you for acknowledging the way to address the problem. And secondly, you don’t have to do it by yourself. I’ve actually been wanting to have another session with your parents, and now seems like as good of a time as any. Bring them around for your next session, and we’ll talk to them, together, about how you can get through bad days with their help. Okay?”

My lips quirked up, just a smidge. “Okay.”

“Now let’s talk about King T’Challa’s new suit, you can’t pretend you don’t have an opinion on it...”

///////

It was a bad day.

Which sucked, because it was also Thursday, and Peter was supposed to be over in half an hour to work on our project. And I was a mess.

“Hey, sweetheart,” Mom called from the living room. Her elementary school got out twenty minutes before Midtown, so she usually beat me home. “How was school?”

“It’s a bad day,” was all I said before I closed the door to my room. I didn’t slam it (not anymore) but I didn’t know anything else. I couldn’t tell if I wanted a nap, I couldn’t tell if I wanted to curl up in a ball and cry, I couldn’t tell if I wanted to fly from rooftop to rooftop until I was too exhausted to come home; I didn’t know. Which sucked, because I’m the only one who could’ve told me the answer.

The was a light knock on my door. “Can I come in?” I didn’t respond, so Mom walked in. “Mind me asking why today was bad?” I still didn’t say anything, my face buried in my pillow. She sat at the edge of my bed, near my knees. “I can usually tell, you know.” It was a hushed voice that came out of her mouth - nothing like the loud and loving woman I’ve known almost my whole life. “You do a good job of trying to cover it up, but I can tell. Your shoulders are tenser than usual, and your eyebrows are crinkled together the second you step out of your room.” She sighed and put a hand on my back - her hands are always warm and usually smell like hand sanitizer from Bath and Body Works because she refuses to use the government-issued ones at school. “You dad and I have no idea what you went through while we were gone. We have no idea what you went through in Europe. But we’re here for you now, Y/N. You carry this weight around with you, and I just — I want you to know that you have people to share it with. Maybe not the weight itself, but the pain it’s causing you.” She removed her hand and set both of them in her lap. “I don’t know how to make the bad days better, so I need you to tell me when you’re ready. I’m here for you, baby.” She leaned down and kissed my head, then stood up and started walking toward the door.

When her hand was on the knob, I finally spoke up. “Thank you.” It was barely a grumble, but she heard it.

The door closed quietly, and I finally decided what I wanted to do.

Cry. I cried. For at least twenty minutes. I cried because of my abilities, I cried because I lost Jess as a mom, I cried because I went to Europe, I cried because Quentin Beck was an asshole that fucked up my mental state for probably the rest of my life, I cried because I killed a lot of people, I cried because now I was friends with Peter but at what cost?

He showed up, eventually. I heard him knock on the front door as I blew my nose. Mom, bless her soul, kept him distracted until I came out of my room myself. It took me another twenty minutes to finally convince myself to leave my room, and at that point I was too exhausted to keep myself warm anymore, so the cold breeze blowing through New York hit me in full force. I slipped a hoodie on, grabbed my backpack, and took a deep breath before opening the door.

Peter was sitting at the counter while Mom washed the dishes from breakfast this morning. She was back to talking loud, and he was listening with a smile on his face. My door closed and his eyes immediately darted to me. “Hey, Y/N.”

“Hey, Pete. Is it okay if we’re in the living room?”

Mom glanced between the two of us and tried to hide her little smile, but at least one of us caught it. “Yeah, of course. I’ll be in the office if you need anything.”

He must’ve noticed my bloodshot eyes; he couldn’t stop staring. “Is that my hoodie?”

Shit. Is it? I glanced down at the Midtown Tech logo and remembered getting drenched at the compound after the sprinklers unexpectedly came on. Then Peter gave me his hoodie. “Shit, yeah, it is.” I pulled on the sleeves to take it off, but he shook his head.

“Don’t worry about it, I have at least two more at home.” He pulled out his laptop and it was suddenly back to business. “Any ideas how we’re going to do this?”

We bounced ideas off of each other until we came to a rough draft, but it was getting later, and bad days always get worse at night.

“Shit, is it ten already?” Peter started gathering his things and stuffing them in his bag. “I told May I’d be home by ten, I hate being late.”

I pulled out my phone and sent May a quick text; we’ve had each other’s numbers since my first weekend at the compound. We lost track of time, he’s heading home now.

I figured. See you tomorrow :)

Peter stood up and started walking toward the door, and I followed him. I had spoken maybe twenty sentences the whole time (it’s a miracle we got this far in the project) but I couldn’t convince myself to say anything else before he left. And I wanted to. But I also wanted to cave in on myself — and we both know which option was winning that battle.

“Do you need a hug?” He basically had one foot out the door, but he turned around and asked me this.

“What?”

“Your heartbeat — it’s been off all day. And it still is right now, and — Do you need a hug?”

God, he was perfect. And I was so gone.

All I needed all day was a goddamn hug, and now he’s offering one, and tears started brimming in my eyes before I could even nod yes. He was so warm, and his voice flitted around in his chest, and I would’ve felt bad about getting tears on his shirt, except I didn’t care anymore. All I cared about was how the weight on my shoulders lifted when Peter Parker’s arms were wrapped around them.

“Are you going to be okay?” he mumbled in my hair. I only nodded again. “Okay.” He slowly loosened his grip, but not before he left a quick kiss on my head. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

Another nod. “See you tomorrow.”

///////

Peter was going crazy. Since we hadn’t found any footage that could clear Spider-Man’s name without incriminating Peter he wasn’t allowed out as his alter-ego. And he was literally climbing the walls of the compound.

I was blowing gusts of air at him, trying to knock him down from the ceiling. We had officially finished our project only twenty minutes before, so I pulled up the EDITH footage from London, trying to think of how to clear Spider-Man’s name.

And then it hit me.

“Oh my god.” I ran to the computer and started typing away furiously. “I think I figured it out.”

He came back to the ground. “Figured what out?”

“We can just use the audio file from the video. Then your face doesn’t have to be in it at all.”

I found the file and played it over the speakers.

“EDITH! Turn off the drones.”

“Should I execute all cancellation protocols?”

“Yes, execute them all.”

It was perfect. Exactly what we needed.

“Peter.” I turned to him with a huge smile on my face. “This can save Spider-Man.”

“This can save Spider-Man,” he repeated. “Shit, Y/N, you just saved Spider-Man.” He wrapped his arms around me tightly and lifted me in the air, his laugh ringing in my ear. “I can still be Spider-Man!”

I laughed along with him. He set me down after a minute, but we were still standing unbelievably close together. One minuscule step forward and my lips would be on his. His heart beat jumped, and so did mine, but he didn’t pull away. Neither of us pulled away.

His tilted his head and kissed my cheek (which I still freaked out over) and then took a step back.

“We have to call Pepper and tell her.”

“Yeah, yeah.” FRIDAY started the call and Pepper was over the moon.

“We’ll get a press conference set up for tomorrow, and I’ll work on a statement. Peter,” this was the sternest I had ever heard her - even more serious than when she was talking to Morgan, “I know this is all good news, but you have to wait to be Spider-Man still. All of this press has to die down first before you can go out in the open again, okay?”

“Yes, Mrs. Potts.”

“Okay. I’ll see you two bright and early tomorrow.”

She hung up and Peter hugged me again. This one was way more subdued than the last one. “Thank you, Y/N,” he mumbled into my neck.

“You’re welcome, Pete.”

//////////

The press conference went well, according to Rhodey. “I think most of them were relieved to know Spider-Man’s not actually a murderer.” Everyone was dying to have Spider-Man come out and answer questions, but Pepper insisted no questions were being taken at that time, or ever.

MJ called Peter after the press conference was released to the public, and they talked for what felt like forever. The second he got the call I went to the training room: to distract myself or actually train, well, it doesn’t matter because both were done.

A simulation droid was about to “kill” me, but red magic tore it apart at the last second.

“Thanks.”

“No problem. Are you okay?”

I shrugged. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because Peter’s been talking on the phone for the same time you’ve been in here.” Wanda gave me a knowing look. You forget that she can read minds because she’s not invasive about it, but she’s always there, holding the information to either back you up or tear you down.

I sighed. “He’s talking to MJ. And I know there’s a high possibility that they’ll get back together but a part of me is hoping they won’t.”

“So you can be with him instead.” I gave a small nod. “Don’t give up yet, Y/N. I see the way he looks at you. You might have more of a chance than you think.”

“She’s right, kid.”

I jumped in surprise. “How long have you been listening?”

Sam smiled from the observation deck of the training room. “Long enough. Boys are stupid, they need all the help they can get.”

“I’ve given him plenty of help already. Literally.”

“Haha, very funny.” He rolled his eyes. “You know what I mean. If it doesn’t work out with MJ, shoot your shot. I have a feeling you won’t be disappointed.” He winked before leaving, and Wanda followed suit.

I rolled my eyes before telling FRIDAY to pick another random simulation. “Make it a good one.” And, boy, did she. It was the hardest one yet, and all of my concentration was going into it. I was so focused I didn’t even notice Peter walk in until after I had won.

“Damn.”

I turned quickly to see him standing near the door, his hands in his pockets. “Hey. How’d it go?”

“It was okay. She saw the news.”

“But…”

“But it’s not happening. I-“ he looked down at the ground, “I can’t trust her. Not when she lost trust in me. And I- I think I’m interested in someone else.”

I nodded along. I tried to keep my heart as normal as possible but it was beating too hard from my adrenaline to be controllable; I’m almost positive Peter heard it jump at the news. “That’s understandable. Who’s the, uh, the someone else?” God, please be me.

Peter’s lips twitched up to a small smile. “You’ll find out eventually.” He stepped further into the room and relaxed a bit. “Want to do a round together?”

I wanted to. I really wanted to. But I was exhausted, and I think I pulled a muscle, and I could already feel bruises forming where I ungracefully fell on my side. So I just shook my head. “Some other time.”

My room had a bathroom attached to it, and that’s where I spent the next half hour, standing under the blazing hot water coming from the shower. Once I convinced myself to actually get out and change into pajamas, I grabbed my laptop and climbed into bed. I was going home tomorrow, I deserved a few hours of shuteye.

Then someone knocked on my door and ruined the whole ambiance.

“Oh, you’re - I was just - I’ll just go.”

“No, Peter, what’s up?”

He was standing there, hair damp from the shower, black t-shirt and flannel pajama pants on, looking hot as ever. “I was going to ask if you wanted to watch a movie, but you’re already in bed, so never mind.” He turned to walk away, and I almost let him because I was on-my-ass exhausted, but I didn’t. I couldn’t, not when he looked like that (soft, but also hot as fuck).

“Come on.” He turned, and I opened the door wider. “I was about to watch Gilmore Girls, but we can watch a movie if you want.” I pulled back the covers and left plenty of room for Peter to sit beside me.

“We can watch Gilmore Girls, I don’t mind.”

The second I pressed ‘play’ on the third episode was the second my eyes could barely stay open any longer. I tried so hard to watch Jess win Rory back, but sleep caught up with me and I let it win. I used Peter’s shoulder as a pillow and decided sleep was a battle I didn’t mind losing.

////////

I woke up to my alarm, but as quickly as my eyes opened, Peter’s arm pulled me closer to him. I was too tired to feel embarrassed or excited about the fact that Peter Parker was in my bed with an arm wrapped around me. All I wanted to was to turn off my alarm and go back to bed, but my dad was picking me and Peter up in two hours and I wanted to bully Sam into making me pancakes again.

“Let go, Peter,” I ended up mumbling, “I have to turn the alarm off.” He moved his arm off and I sat up and grabbed my phone. “I’m getting breakfast.”

It must’ve been my lucky day, because Sam and Bucky were in the kitchen. “‘Morning, sunshine. Sleep okay?” I looked at Sam with a hard glare, and he laughed. Of course he knew Peter was with me, FRIDAY knows everything.

I sat next to Bucky and thought of fluffy pancakes to ward off my burning hatred for Captain America. “Sam, how much do you love me?”

“Depends on what you’re willing to give me in exchange for the pancakes.”

Of course he already knew my move. Typical.

“I’ll delete half of the embarrassing footage of you saved in FRIDAY’s hard-drive.”

Sam looked at Bucky suddenly, extremely confused. “I thought that was done months ago.”

He just shrugged and drank his coffee. “Must not’ve gone deep enough. Good thing Y/N is here to catch it.”

Sam glanced between the two of us and sighed. “Okay, fine, I’ll make you some stupid pancakes.”

I smiled, then Bucky slipped me ten dollars under the counter and whispered, “Save me the footage.” I winked back.

“Can I have some too?” Peter, soft as hell, came into the kitchen and sat beside me. (His knee was brushing up against mine.)

“Only if you have something to offer.” Sam liked us, I know he did (that’s part of the embarrassing footage FRIDAY has saved) but he was usually a dick to us - anyone who wasn’t Bucky (and even then) - in the morning. It was always playful banter, but we knew not to step too far before eleven o’clock.

“I promise not to test out my new long-lasting webs on anything you own.”

“Deal.”

The pancakes were delicious (“hell yeah they were, I don’t mess around with pancakes”) but my dad was at the compound before we knew it, and it was time to face reality again.

“I saw the press conference,” Dad said when we sat down in the back, “and everything was very convincing. Congrats on getting to be Spider-Man again, Peter.”

He beamed. “Thanks, Mr. Y/L/N. Anything exciting happen at the hospital recently?”

They talked medical, while I sat back and listened to the engine. It covered up their hearts, but that didn’t matter, because both would’ve sent me right back to sleep. And it did.

We pulled up to Peter’s complex an hour and a half later. There were still plenty of daylight hours left, but we both left more homework to today than we would like to admit and neither of our parental figures would be pleased with that.

“See you tomorrow,” he said with a smile.

I smiled back, genuinely, (I was giving those out way more often now) and waved. “Bye.” Dad and I drove back and walked up to the apartment bumping shoulders. Our schedules didn’t line up very often because he was needed in the ER a lot of the time, but we always had a sort of silent understanding. He unlocked the door and let me in first, but when my eyes landed on the kitchen table, I stopped mid-step.

Blood. Everywhere. On the walls, on the floor, on Mom’s floral couch she claimed “added personality” to the living room. No one else was in the apartment, I could tell, but then it just raised more questions:

Who’s blood is everywhere?

Where the hell is Mom?

tags: @eridanuswave​ @vampirestrawberries​