#inkspinner fic

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

From the very beginning, up until the point we meet her in canon: a character study of Melinda May. A story that clings stubbornly to hope, and considers what it means to be a hero.

PART TWO: The Aftermath of Bahrain.

Coulson turned up at the checkout line with a tiny container of soup and an entire baguette, entirely too cheery about it. An old, somewhat hypocritical argument about nutrient intake still sprung to mind like breathing, but May couldn’t bring herself to start it. Coulson’s sideways glances kept getting more and more pointed. “If there’s anything,” he said later, earnestly, because they’d agreed a long time ago that saying certain things right out and sounding stupid was infinitely preferable to wasting both their time beating around the bush. “I know you have a thing, with being anything other than okay, but I…” “You have a savior complex,” May told him. She shifted the paper bag in her arms and wiped a rain-dampened palm off on her jeans, scowling at him. “Really? We’re doing this right now?” He sighed. “You’re not on your own.” May rolled her eyes. “Clearly.” “I’m here,” Coulson said, because he wasn’t done with the pointed, obvious statements yet, apparently. May didn't answer.

Read more on ao3.

[apocalyptichearts]

So, hi! I hope this message finds you well!

I know you might’ve moved on from the AoS fandom, but I’ve come from your TikTok, and I love your May & Daisy edits! The fics that accompany a few of them as well are simply glorious! And the captions are mini fics in and of themselves as well so they’re lovely (if heart wrenching at times) to read, too!

I was hoping, if you wouldn’t mind, could you rec some of your favourite May & Daisy fics? Doesn’t matter whether it’s complete or how long it is :)

Thank you for your time! And for your wonderful edits and works!

Have a nice day/night!

thank you so much for your kind words anon, they really do mean a lot :))

as for maydaisy fic recs, boy do i have some for you!!

now for the sake of not making this post too long here are some of my favourite maydaisy authors:

Book_freak I don't think we can talk about maydaisy fics without mentioning them; of they're 90 or so maydaisy fics, you're bound to find your cup of tea!!

PanicMoon15 for when you need a little fluff and lightheartedness. also, they're Baby Mine, Rest Your Head Close To My Heart series? a must read, no one does AU like they do.

cassiopluto for when you want something a little darker and want to read some insanely good writing <3

daisyqiaolianmay they have so many good fics to choose from and I think I mention The Framework later in this post, but others worth checking out are A Daisy By Any Other Name  and The Parts That Make A Whole Series!!

Inkquillery i can't express in words how beautiful her writing is, all of her maydaisy fics are such joys to read <33

marvelthismarvelthat would've ended up listing all their fics in the following section so I listed them here. they write so many cool concepts it's hard to summarize them, but each and every one is incredible

agentmmayy a lot of sweet philindaisy content as well as a handful of maydaisy angst bcus sometimes that's just what you need.

here are some more specific fics that I (obviously) love:

It’s a Long Road Out to Recovery From Here by PanicMoon15 I enjoy most fics that deal with their relationship post the season 2 finale, but this one is quite something else. the writing and the themes and the characterization and just omg I cannot stress how good this fic is!!

Hold Her Close by StillTryingToWrite I'm a sucker for character studies and introspections and this one is just so beautiful.

silent secret sacred ground by Inkspinner a post-coulson's s5 death fic that is just so sweet and so gentle and I lose my cool a little whenever I think about it.

In Kasias' arena, no one wins… by Axolotl7 read this so long ago but I remember it being just jawdroppingly tragic and such a cool concept. insanely vivid writing <3

Mother’s Day/Father’s Day Series by agentquakingskye philinda becoming grandparents?? yes please. this series is so fluffy and so happy and even if you aren't into daisy x sousa, i think it's still worth reading.

Exposure by agentquakingskye now this isn't maydaisy focused, but they do have quite a few scenes and honestly, I'll take any opportunity to recommend this fic because oh my god. life-changing, I'm telling you.

and if you're into AU's that deal with baby/younger daisy some of my favs are:

from your head down to your toes (and your tiny nose) by agentmmayy of all the "daisy getting turned into a baby somehow" fics, this one is my absolute favourite. sadly I think it was discontinued but I think it's worth reading the 18 chapters posted!

Just a Walk in the Park by Bdoyle1807 I remember lovinggg the dynamic between May and (a much younger) Daisy in this and I'm pretty sure I read it in one sitting so.

The Framework by daisyqiaolianmay such an interesting take on the whole Framework stuff, I can't recommend it enough.

honestly, despite going through my bookmarks pretty meticulously, I'm probably missing some I would absolutely recommend as well, but I hope you find something you like out of the ones listed :))

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

A story about many things, but mostly about the love between mothers and daughters, through the generations: born and chosen, lost and found.

The wind picked up, bright leaves sighing against the baby blue of a breakable sky. Daisy glanced across at May’s still profile. 

“I’ll walk with you?” 

May glanced at her -- was that a flicker of surprise? -- and nodded. 

Coulson didn’t say anything, as they got out of the car. She saw them exchange a glance, brief and loaded and steady, familiar; May took the lead, hiking up the hilly ground. The flowers in her hand were splotches of color, her dark jeans and old leather jacket standing out stark against well-tended green. Daisy fell into step at her shoulder. 

She’d known that May came here every once in a while. Not often. May hadn’t asked them to come along this time as much as she’d made it clear she didn’t mind if they did. 

Daisy had negotiated her way into getting May to delegate some of her workload for the first time a few years ago, when there wasn't time for anything and May was busily pretending she wasn’t running herself ragged, trying to do a million things at once. She’d ended up on the phone with a list of florists local to various states, who’d made knowing aaah sounds when she said she was speaking on behalf of Melinda May. Lilies and roses, arrangements she didn’t even have to specify; she’d been handed a scrap of paper at least twenty years old, May’s spiky handwriting unchanged and the specifics unthinking in a way that told Daisy this had been routine for a very long time. 

They came to a stop; Daisy's breath stuttered slowly out of her lungs, in spite of herself. 

Continue reading on ao3.

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

Since you reblogged the fic backstory post, I'd love to hear some backstory about either Melinda May: Let Me Speak or get out my machete and battle with time once again!

hi!!! aah i'm so sorry it's taken me so long to get to this, it has been ever-present in my brain but i just have not managed to sit down and get to it until now.

ooh, both fun, and both have the potential to get super long oh no... argh it's hard to pick. let's go with Let Me Speak for this one, mostly because i am absolutely failing to recall how any of get out my machete actually came about at this moment! gonna have to think on that...

okay, where do I start. Let Me Speak is fun because i honestly think i went about it in the most unhinged way possible — i hadn't watched any of AoS while it aired (except for like a snippet of one random probably rerun episode in a hotel room once — the only things i remember about it is it probably featured fitzsimmons?? and it was dubbed in thai, which trust me is not how you wanna watch ANYTHING that wasn't originally in the language XD). I was a mcu gal way before that but somehow never had any more than passing interest in Shield until i got bored one day and randomly watched some compilation on youtube — best of melinda may or something like that? there was the scene with daisy in season 3 i think, the your powers aren't what made you an agent- i did scene. and then i saw the infamous i love you speech from s5, and it was so much of what i'd been trying to articulate in my writing for years. i'd mostly been writing original fiction before that, with a main character i still love dearly, and may was basically HER EXACT DOUBLE, backstory, archetype, and broad-strokes-of-character-arc wise. except, you know, arguably written better, because i was and am still very much figuring out what i am doing lol. but it was just an instant WHAT IS THIS I NEED TO KNOW MORE. and i proceeded to pick apart all seven seasons of agents of shield, absolutely hell-bent on getting a grasp of this specific character's arc and story. there are still some storylines and bits of pieces of AoS i'm still slightly foggy on honestly, mostly because i flat-out skipped them in that initial hyperfocused binge and i just forgot to go back. *facepalms* it's really embarrassing actually. but i ended up falling in love with so many elements of the show along the way, even with my spotty, very biased watching. I'm still hoping to go and get through some arcs properly from beginning to end like a sane person, one of these days XD.

but anyway, i honestly can't remember what i had in mind for the project in the beginning, except for some vague strokes of wanting to write a tribute to may's general character arc and journey. i'd just come across dirgewithoutmusic's works (the amazing @/ink-splotch) at the time and i was AMAZED - the character-focused, analytical, empathic and transformative way she writes was unlike anything i'd ever seen. it was so intuitive to me in a way nothing else i'd ever read was, and i'd just never realized that was something one could do. i was (and still am) just absolutely determined to put everything i had into this thing i'd decided to do, just in the hopes of someday creating something so beautiful.

and then it turned into...... a whole thing. (it was gonna be QUICK. it took me TWO YEARS.) i started with early sketches of part one and then spent a lot of time with part two, because i had the clearest idea of where it would go. and then realized part one was too short and wasn't providing any of the context and background it needed to give part two any impact, and so went back and reworked it from scratch, only to arrive back at part two again and decide i didn't fully like the direction i'd initially taken it. so i rewrote that from scratch too, in many parts at least TWICE, before landing on my (by that point ancient) sketches for part three and sighing a lot before basically redoing it too. whiiiiiich.... is probably how i ended up with a deleted drafts doc that is very nearly the length of the final draft. oops.

what i find interesting about what Let Me Speak is that the parts of may's canonical story arc that are most important to me.... didn't actually end up making it in. her relationship with daisy and the way it grows throughout the series, robin (and everything about that storyline), the reclamation of the cavalry name at the end... all of these and more are the reason the study exists; in the beginning, i figured i'd end up incorporating it all, and then it just turned into a story of its own.

a lot of the themes and ideas are ones i was determined to build the story around from the beginning, and some just kind of presented themselves as i was writing. a couple (aka like half of part three XD) started as quandaries that i had to find a way to resolve. at some point i knew it was going to end just before the show began (there was supposed to be a post-series Academy epilogue that miiiiiight still make a late appearance someday....) and i did a lot of questioning about why i was putting so many words to a.... pre-story? but i think by the end one of the biggest points to the story is that it matters who you are. it matters what made you who you are, because you matter. agents of shield told an incredible story, but it wasn't a whole story, because the only whole stories are our actual lives, i think. one of my favorite things about fanfiction is the way we fill in those gaps with things that make those intrinsically incomplete stories a little more real, with tragedy and detail and mundanity and quiet, personal victory, and all the things that make up life. there's something so human and in that, and i think it's beautiful. with a little more time i think i'll get to the point where im really truly proud of the damn thing (i love it dearly, but at the moment every time i look back on Let Me Speak i just see either some absolutely mortifying typos i DIDN'T CATCH or all the things i wish i did differently), but in the meantime even with the rollercoaster ride it was, i love that i spent so much time with a project that comes down to a reminder that every part of the story is important. because our lives are important, and tragedy and regret and the wonderful things and terrible things and the tiny, seemingly unimportant details of living every day don't ever change that.

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

A story for the moment you realize things are going to be okay. Even if -- in that moment -- you didn't yet know you would be, too.

This was routine, in a lot of ways; they’d been here so many times together, so many different places. It made it feel a little less like the world had already ended, like the planet was cracked apart outside the window.

It was kinda a stupid question at this point, but Phil asked anyway. “You okay?”

May’s answering snort was soft, a little less sardonic than it might have been. After a long second, she nodded. “Been better, but.”

“It’s okay to not be, you know.”

She shook her head. “Pot, kettle.”

Phil huffed a slight laugh. May’s gaze flickered over to him, either looking for or seeing something no one else could see. Somewhere along the line, her shoulders had finally fallen into a sloping, exhausted line.

Read the rest on Ao3.

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

From the very beginning, up until the point we meet her in canon: a character study of Melinda May. A story that clings stubbornly to hope, and considers what it means to be a hero.

PART THREE: New York, And What Happened After

Until such time as the world ends, we will act as though it intends to spin on.  Something you can only learn after the end of the world: even as the dust settles, the sun rises on a new day.  When Steve Rogers was recovered from the ice, alive in a world nearly unrecognizable from the one he had known, Coulson stepped away from his vigil of the unconscious Captain only to send three solid minutes of whispered screaming in a voicemail to Melinda May. She held her phone an exasperated two inches away from her ear the following morning, staring dubiously over the heads of clustered agents at the newscaster that seemed to be screaming with near equal enthusiasm on a monitor a room over. 

New York was far from the beginning of the end. Unearthed with the sleeping super soldier was the Tesseract. Phase Two was born quietly.  May got a string of giddy texts and Coulson’s costume sketches in her email.

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[an-inky-fingered-lass]

illuminate the no's on their vacancy signs

A collection of non-chronological moments from a different sort of happy ending. Family feels, pointless fluff, and important conversations. Rated G.

Read on ao3.

chapter 1 -- strawberry-stealing squirrel

“Hey.” 

May blinked contentedly at him, lit up with warm lamplight. “Hm.” 

Coulson got into bed beside her, slow and aching. There was warmth in that too, somehow. May curled up, setting her head against his shoulder, her weight solid and still somehow light against his side. She wasn’t actually reading any more, just flipping idly through pages. 

There was moonlight fading gently through the curtains. It was like they could see all the world’s stars out on the porch, most nights -- but it was chilly out there on this one. The stars would still be there tomorrow.  

“You tired?” 

May’s voice was soft. She was in better shape than he was, these days, because of course she was, but the hot water bottle half-tangled in blankets said she ached, too. 

“Mm. A little.” 

Tired meant something kind of different, these days. It was the years weighing down his bones, the way everything was somehow going so much faster the more they slowed down. It was a good feeling, most days, the way certain kinds of melancholy wrap around you like a blanket. 

May hummed again. 

“How are you feeling?” 

That slight shift of her weight was surprise. May leaned over to put her book down before she answered, switching off the lamp. She still insisted on sleeping on the side by the door, still carried those old specialist reflexes; unlikely reaction times and the almost cat-like effortlessness to it. He’d lost most of that to those months of deterioration, years ago; but the vigilance, the automatic, constant analysis was still there. They still went people-watching every once in a while, mostly to watch the world go by and be judgy old people in peace (May zeroed in on every leather ensemble that passed and ran background checks on stores instead of people, these days). They’d fought their wars.

May moved slower these days, limped more days than she didn’t, but she could still take Yo-yo’s entire STRIKE team. She didn’t teach much any more, but Yo-yo still wheedled her out to do demonstrations every once in a while. She said it kept the youngsters in their place. 

Phil got to spend every day beside her steadiness, steadfast as the mountains, and that was as safe as he could ever ask to be. 

“A squirrel stole all the strawberries off the plant,” May stated, as she curled up beside him again. Coulson wrapped long arms around her as she huffed, one arm draped warm over his belly. “All three of them.” 

Phil jostled them both with a startled laugh. “That does not answer the question.” 

“I feel like the squirrel.” May told the darkness, and also him, prim and matter-of-fact. The drowsiness in her voice was getting thicker by the moment. “Like I stole something nice and I’m happy about it.” 

Phil was outright belly-laughing by then, trying to get the blanket untangled from around his ankles without having to sit up to tug at it. So much for philosophizing. May lifted her head in annoyance at all the jostling, dropped her cheek back on his chest once he paused to gasp for breath. 

“Ask me how I’m doing next time,” she muttered, mostly asleep already. “ Please. ” 

“Ohohoho, like hell. You, Melinda May, just told me you feel like a strawberry-stealing squirrel. I am never asking you anything other than how are you feeling ever again.” 

There was no answer. May could feign sleep as well as anyone -- better, actually, since she’d finally trained herself to stagger the length of each exhale so you couldn’t crack the rhythm by counting to it. Phil lay still for a long minute, grinning into the darkness, just listening to the quiet snuffle of her peaceful breathing.

She might actually just be asleep.

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

Jemma and May, and a story for a home and its memories; for lives lost and the still living, and for a different sort of joy than you ever imagined.

A story inspired by this snippet by @meanderings0ul.

They’d finally shared details of their plans once the team was all together, lights strung up all over the Lighthouse for New Year’s and the old base so much warmer than it had once been.

May had flown them out here two days later with nothing much more than a I know a place. She’d borrowed a jeep from a hangar whose elder occupants greeted her with startled recognition, tugged the keys from her pocket upon arrival and opened the door for them in silence.

The house had been dusty inside, in almost perfect condition otherwise. It had that quietly melancholy air of a house long since empty, the faint scuffs on the wood polish and memories of warmth that meant it had once been lived in, loved. It wasn’t until Jemma saw the absent way May leaned her hip against a cabinet that wouldn’t shut properly unless you shoved it just right, the way she watched them walk around more than she looked at the house, that it finally clicked.

Read the rest on Ao3.

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

illuminate the no's on their vacancy signs

A collection of ficlets set in the 'get out my machete and battle with time once again' universe. And yes, I'm realizing I definitely need a catchier name. Full series on Ao3.

chapter 3 -- as we lay our wars to rest

It was a restless night. 

Pines whipped, thunder crashing like someone was bowling with furniture on the roof of the world. May lay awake for a long time, listening to the rain, and thought about myths that bled just like they did, about the pieces this world would never be. 

It was hard to reconcile how small it was, in the grand scheme of things. The world. May had spent so much of her life flying over greens and blues and browns, looking down, but that had still been under the sky. You couldn’t see it the same way once you’d looked down from the other side.

Her dreams, when she finally fell asleep, were a jumble of familiarity. A warehouse, a little girl; but this was a girl with faraway eyes and trust in her hands-- and another girl, with rumpled blond hair and her father’s eyes, her mother’s nimble, curious fingers. It was an old home, not a warehouse, walls that were no longer hers but that she remembered loving. May dreamed of her cockpit, no splinters in her palms; peaceful evenings and threat she’d spent years comfortable in, safety she was learning. She awoke slowly, as dawn arrived, like her body hadn’t decided whether it had actually gotten any rest or not. 

It was an indecisive sort of morning. Melinda liked those even less than the bad ones; she’d spent years learning to live with those, live through them, and they didn’t come around often any more. The indecisive, thin unease was just annoying.  

Tai chi helped. There was a reason why she’d settled herself into routines, why she’d built them into herself and her time even when nothing much else in her life had been predictable. Phil did fine with less structure to his days, could unwind easily in that flexibility, but these had always been her hours, the first rays of sun crawling into a drowsy sky. 

It had brightened into a pale, breakable blue by the time Phil was up, the air cold and crisp and no longer so heavy with damp. There were pine needles scattered everywhere, a thick bed of leaves that swallowed up sound instead of crackling, but the storm had come and gone without doing any damage. 

May went out to coat her boots in mud after breakfast. There was a worn old trail out back that looped around on itself, that brought her back home if she just walked far enough. 

Phil had been gentler than he needed to be, that morning, patient enough for the both of them. He'd set the kettle like there were at least five people waiting for tea. It just wasn’t a day for talking, at least not yet, and there wasn’t any urgency to their days any more. She hadn’t known how to breathe without it, at first, but she’d had a handful of years now to ease into the relief of it. She was starting to be able to feel like they’d been doing this for a long time. 

May stepped back onto the wood of the porch with her pockets full of wild golden raspberries (she hadn’t been planning on going that way, but once she did she couldn’t just walk past the bushes). Her thigh was aching again, knees putting up a protest she was staunchly ignoring, but she felt steady for the first time that morning. 

She came through the front door to the sound of music. 

It was acoustic, earthy tones. Folky. Phil was sitting by his desk, but he’d gone still, probably forgotten all about whatever he’d been doing. She knew he’d heard her come in, but she leaned one shoulder against the wall and just listened, eyes on the window and the sunlight tumbling in. 

Their tastes in music were as wildly different as ever, but this was nice, whatever it was. Something about sunshine and the time that you have. 

May watched the curve of Phil’s shoulders, rubbed a gentle palm against the wood paneled walls. 

They had grandkids now. They’d get to watch them grow. 

She stepped across the floor as the song ended. 

Phil stood to meet her, eyes soft and damp, and she smiled at them, at him, at how easy the peaceable emotion still came to him, after everything. She would never have that. She didn’t mind. She was learning her own peace, laying down her arms without needing it to feel right. This was a choice, calmness and patience and birdsong in the birth of a new dawn. 

She was burying her wars in long walks home and raspberries in her pockets. There were ghosts to both their names, hanging around this little cabin, and they were welcome to stay as long as they needed, provided they held their peace.

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

May and Daisy, and building steadiness and security in the midst of it all.

Daisy let her shoulder sink sideways against the doorframe, staring unseeingly at the wall of cabinets and trying to shake a humming, dazed buzz from her brain. They were going to have to go through these, at some point. He’d taken care of most of his stuff beforehand, had had enough time for that kind of preparation, but there was still some minor stuff left, things that needed to go where they were going. 

May had made some headway already, weary and steady, working through those sleepless nights she probably thought no one had noticed. Probably. You could never be completely sure with May. 

Daisy prodded experimentally at the heavy, hollow ache in her chest and squeezed her eyes shut, shoving her shoulder harder against the wooden grain. She felt untethered, lost in some quiet, inarticulate way, but the ground was solid beneath her feet. Nothing in her was screaming to run. Not from this. 

“Hey.” 

Daisy blinked out of her stupor, twisting around to look over her shoulder. May had come up behind her, still save for the one hand worrying uncharacteristically at the edge of a sleeve. There was something soft about her like this, lacking the hard frame of her jacket and the extra inches from her boots. Daisy was still getting used to it. May looked more weary than ever, eyes still warm if you knew what to look for, unwary like it was the easiest thing in the world. Something in her expression made Daisy tilt her head in a question -- it looked like she was chewing over something, wrestling with something that didn’t have any harsh edges. 

A beat passed. May shifted her weight a little awkwardly and then held out an arm, an invitation. “Come here?” 

Daisy blinked again. “May?”

Read the rest on Ao3

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

May, Coulson, and Daisy, and moments from a day or two in the building of a new life. A story for learning to trust that the good things in your life are going to stick around, and for the days when even those good things are still a little bit hard.

May breathed out a long, slow exhale and nudged into park, staring sightlessly out the window. Her phone pinged with a text. Simmons, probably. Checking in. She wouldn’t trade what they had now for this world or any other, but she missed it, sometimes, the bustling base. Always having something to do, defensible walls.

The text was headed hi May. May stared at it for a long moment, keeping her palms wrapped around the steering wheel. She didn’t feel much like May, right then. Melinda, maybe. For once. Just a woman sitting in her car with an aching thigh and a switchblade in her pocket, feeling every single one of her fifty-two years. Exhausted with not doing a damn thing. She hadn't felt this way in so long.

She felt like Agent May, like she would never, ever be able to be anything else.

May shut her eyes hard and then opened them again. She muted the radio and pulled back onto the road, driving steadily towards home.

Read the rest on Ao3

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

The story of Melinda May and Andrew Garner, their beginnings and ends, and the life that was built in between.

Sometimes, heroes are monsters. 

Sometimes, monsters are heroes. 

Sometimes, they were both; sometimes, they are lost.

They were more. They were loved. 

Here’s how it began. 

A spy and a therapist walked into a bar— no, really. That probably wasn't quite how they expected their story to begin, either. 

They learned. They grew. They talked, they chose. 

A spy and a therapist built a life together. They knew the risks, and they built something beautiful. 

Long nights, stretches of silence— May taught Andrew about radio silence, once he got his clearance, about going dark, about protocols and contingencies, about — sometimes — all the things she’d already survived. She laughed about it, half-lit in golden evenings; scars rough and shiny and numerous and undisguised, certainty earned and sitting easy on her shoulders. 

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

New game: Share your three best fanworks. No thinking, just the three that instinctively occur to you. Then copy-paste this ask to anonymously share with as many people as you want.

Delayed response, I'm sorry! But my first ask, how exciting. Thank you so much!

(btw @ussjellyfish I'm such a huge fan of your writing. I keep meaning to leave some comments (I'm always terrible about getting to that!) and I promise I will eventually but I just had to take the opportunity to mention it. I'm just in love with the way you do dialogue and I reread a bunch of your stories literally all the time <3)

Okay! Hmm, favorites.

First one is definitely whistling static when the young learn to fly (Agents of SHIELD, part of what I call the peaceful retirement post-season 5 AU, philindaisy family feels, 5,898 words). I've written a lot this past... year-ish, maybe like 20% percent of which is posted (oops), and whistling static is maybe my favorite thing I've done so far. It makes me so happy every time I reread it, which says a lot -- I love my own work, most of the time, but I'm also relentlessly critical of everything I do and am very good at convincing myself it's all terrible -- but whistling static does so many things I really really wanted it to do and covers a lot of themes that are super important to me. The repercussions of spending decades of your life as a spy, finding your own kind of peace (when you believed you never would) and whole messy process of it, building your life into what you what it to be and believing that that matters, because it does. It's warm and introspective and bittersweet and ultimately hopeful, which is maybe my favorite combination of all time. There are a lot of things about it I'm really proud of. It was also such a joy to write.

The second one that comes to mind... there's another AoS AU I've been building on and off, that is very, very canon divergent and essentially explores a drastically different path May's life could have taken. There is still a mission that goes terribly wrong, a traumatic event that affects her deeply and changes the course of her life, but everything is different -- so the aftermath is, too. It's currently at 7000ish words, very sparsely plotted and self-indulgent but it's very important to me. It's... also unpublished, which might make this cheating? Oops. But it's a story about building and rebuilding your life, about how love is something you work on, something you choose over and over, and how maybe sometimes doing the brave thing means choosing your own happiness. Through the course of it May and Andrew eventually adopt a little girl together (and her name is Elaine! Lainey Garner-May. I may be unreasonably proud of that name. And it maaaaaay ring a bell to one or two of you? 👀). It's unconventional family feels, STRIKE Team Delta fun and just. Feels heavy. It's really special to me for a lot of reasons. I have...three? pieces I'm hoping to wrangle into completion and maaaaybe post soon. We will see. In the meantime... here's a sneak peak? (I couldn't resist!) _

“I’m fine,” May said, a little too deliberately. Laura hummed. 

“Mm. Something’s bugging you, though.” 

May paused. Her hands didn’t stop moving -- the glasses didn’t so much as clink -- but something in the air did, as though an atmosphere could hold its breath. 

Laura didn’t. Propping her hip lazily against the counter, she was complacently aware that she’d likely prove a right menace in the interrogation room at this point, by dint of sheer, tired immunity to all her agents’ unconscious intimidation and elicitation tactics. On either side of the table. 

May rolled her eyes tiredly. “Ever think about joining up, Laur?”

“Nope,” said Laura cheerfully. It was an old exchange. “Happy where I am, thank you. Nice dodge, by the way.” 

When May relaxed it was easier to remember that she couldn’t be trusted with seasoning of any kind, that she almost always pulled dishwashing duty because she actually liked doing it. Laura thought about the legend this woman had been turned into in her absence, the way the soft sweater she was wearing still permitted a full range of motion and hero sat so awkwardly on her, heavy and cumbersome like nothing she had chosen ever was.  _

(This AU is also how I found out that Laura Barton is one of my absolute favorite povs to write. She's so much fun.)

And the third one that comes to mind, weirdly, is this character study I wrote for Tonks and Lupin from Harry Potter ages ago, that is actually complete (rare for me) but that I never posted because it was heavily, heavily inspired by the incredible dirgewithoutmusic's scar tissue boys and patchwork kids. And also a really a huge mess. But it was my first venture into this sort of... fling-ideas-at-characters-to-see-what-sticks stream of consciousness writing style, and also the beginning of my, really sort of figuring out a writing style that's mine, rather than just whatever sounds vaguely okay. It also contains what's actually still one of my favorite bits I've ever written:

Tonks wove their fingers carefully together, and didn’t think of never letting go.  (Theirs was a spot of light in a time when such things were not to be taken for granted; if a moment was all they would have, she was not going to spend it wishing for more.)

But since that's not published either, I'm going to poke tentatively at be the stillness of the moon. (Also Agents of SHIELD, and an early, alternate draft of whistling static, 3,773 words.) This one was HARD to write (the doc got to around 13k words with scrapped drafts...) but I have a thing with writing rambling conversations, the kind that whisk over like three different topics and aren't quite linear but make sense, ring true and have a point to them, a destination -- I write a lot of that and I think this is one of the times I did it best. I'm also really proud of all the little details, the way I can sort of see it playing out. This was one of those stories I really watched like a movie in my head while I was trying to write it (or *cough* trying to sleep). It was an early draft of whistling static that I got so frustrated with I started again from scratch with the same themes and a different approach and pov, but I came back to it after months and actually liked it and so... it ended up getting posted. I was amazed by the response it got, too, it got some really, really lovely comments. I stressed over it a lot but I'm really glad I ended up sharing this one.

so that's... four... (oh dear) and WOW, this got long winded. I'm sorry, I get overexcited! And I think I may have defeated the purpose here a little. Whoops. I really need to actually share more stuff. I'm working on it! This was so much fun, though. Thanks so much for asking!! <3 <3

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

so i may or may not have accidentally faceplanted into a very, very niche crossover story.... it is bringing me a lot of joy, i dunno if it's actually going to work but it's absolutely going to be fun, and right at this moment i am mostly questioning marvel's ability to count because my dudes seriously

i'm calculating timelines and literally nothing makes sense what is this

(also, the thursday murder club series (yep that's the other half of the crossover) has been proving to be everything i've been craving in a book (even better, a SERIES!) since literally forever and i am frantically in love with the whole entire gang. making my way through the third book right now (and DAMN i've missed reading actual physical books), if you've read it come and scream with me i am FLAILING)

(the crossover, by the way, is an encounter between peggy carter and elizabeth best. if i can get it to work. and on the teeny, tiny chance someone might be interested in something like that. 👀)

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

looks like i finally found the story that's gonna make me cry while writing. it wasn't even PLANNED. i have like 5 other active wips and i started this one spontaneously last night instead of sleeping and now it's taken on a life of its own and i am 87% sure i am gonna shed actual tears by the time this is done.

also it's fic and it's aos fic and it's philindaisy and it is centered around grief and complicated emotions and family feels. because of course it is.