#interesting too that she apparently has enough photos of Michael on her phone for an album

[ingravinoveritas]

Oh my God, Georgia...

[prouvaireafterdark]

Petrichor

aka the long-awaited Sad Buffy Fic™️ 🐶 This got smuttier than I’d planned, but what else is new lmao

Also: Canon compliance? Don’t know her (I also don’t fully understand the schematics of Alex’s house, but let’s just pretend I do).

Also on AO3!

(Oh, and Happy Season Four Renewal!)

***

“Your dog’s a little weird, dude.”

Alex sighs. “Yeah, I know.”

Outside, his beagle Buffy has been frantically running around and barking at the air for the last thirty minutes. There’s not a squirrel or bird in sight.

“Is she always like this?” Kyle asks, turning away from the window that faces Alex’s backyard to look at him.

“No, usually she’s pretty mellow,” Alex says, passing him a cup of coffee. He takes a sip from his own mug to stall before he finally admits, “She only gets like this when it rains.”

“Huh,” Kyle says, considering it for a moment before he adds, “Layla always hated the rain. Remember when we used to have to bribe her with peanut butter to get her to go on walks if it was too cloudy?”

Alex remembers. Kyle’s childhood German shepherd was usually fearless, but put her near any liquid that wasn’t in her water dish and she’d run with her tail between her legs.

If only it were that simple with Buffy.

“It’s not the rain that’s making her do that,” he explains, looking down into his mug. “Well, I guess it is, but not—not like you’re probably thinking.”

Kyle processes that a moment before he speaks up.

“Are you gonna tell me what’s up, or am I gonna have to guess?”

Alex sighs again. “She misses Michael.”

Kyle looks skeptical. “How do you know?”

Because I miss him too, is on the tip of his tongue, but Alex hesitates. As melancholic as the rain makes him, he’s not interested in spilling his guts over it.

“Because Michael smells like rain,” he says instead. “It’s an alien biology thing, apparently, but you probably would know more about that than I do.”

“Oh my god,” Kyle says, eyes wide and sympathetic. “Are you saying she’s looking for him out there right now?”

Alex nods. “She’ll give up in about an hour, but, yeah. She smells rain and she thinks he’s home.”

“That is so fucking sad.”

“I know,” he sighs, and turns around to go find a seat on the couch.

“Like, Sarah McLachlan in those ASPCA commercials level sad,” Kyle continues as he follows him, taking a seat on the other side of the couch. “Wait, did you guys adopt her together? Like, as a couple?”

Alex considers how to answer that. “No. We were together—I guess as much as we ever were—when I got her, and he went with me to pick her up from the shelter, but she’s not—he didn’t adopt her with me. He was just around a lot when I first brought her home.”

“Mmm, I see,” Kyle says, understanding. “Maybe you should call him.”

“What?” Alex asks.

“You know, invite him over,” Kyle says, like it’s obvious. “Ask if he wants to come play with her a little.”

“What?” Alex asks again, looking at him like he’s grown a second head.

“Look, I may not be a veterinarian, but you don’t need years of specialized training to see that your dog misses her dad,” Kyle says.

Alex raises an incredulous eyebrow.

“Well, her other dad,” he amends a moment later.

Alex shakes his head. “He’s not—That’s ridiculous.“

“Is it? He was here when she was a puppy, man,” Kyle counters. “They’ve clearly got a strong bond if she’s missing him that bad.”

Alex knows he’s right, but… he can’t just call Michael and ask if he wants to come play with Buffy.

Sure, he and Michael have been on good terms lately—great, even, now that they have a common goal and have learned how to actually communicate without having two totally different conversations.

But, months ago now, Michael asked him to stay away. He told Alex he didn’t want to be with him anymore, that it hurt too much, and Alex understands that, really he does, and he’s been trying so hard to maintain the boundaries Michael wants while still being there for him any way he can.

And if he invites Michael over right now, it won’t be because it’s something Michael needs from him. It’ll be because it’s a miserable, rainy day, and Alex and his adorably stupid dog miss him.

And if Alex is being honest with himself… he doesn’t know what he’ll do if he calls Michael and Michael says no. Not right now, not when Michael’s absence in his life, in his home, feels like an ugly, gaping wound.

“Just think about it,” Kyle says. “You never know, maybe he’s been missing her too.”

When Kyle leaves an hour later, Alex registers the quiet and realizes Buffy’s stopped barking. Finally, he thinks, until he goes to the back door and sees her slumped up against the glass, looking absolutely fucking miserable.

“Fuck,” he says, with feeling.

He opens the door and scoops her up off the ground. She’s a little wet from the start of the drizzle, but once she rests her head on his shoulder and huffs despondently he can’t bear to put her back down. He takes her over to the couch and draws the blanket around the both of them, hoping he can cheer her up with enough kisses and pats.

With the smell of Michael so thick in the air, he’s not surprised it doesn’t work.

He stays there with her until hunger beckons him toward the kitchen to make both of them dinner. When Buffy won’t touch her kibble, Alex scoops some leftover grilled chicken, rice, and veggies from his own plate into her bowl. It works, thankfully, but when she’s done she curls up on the floor with a sigh and Alex’s heart breaks just looking at her.

He ends up lying down on the floor next to her, his head cushioned by a pillow he dragged off the couch. The rain really starts coming down outside then, and Buffy starts to whine.

“I know, baby girl,” he says, curling more tightly around her. “I miss him too.”

He’s not sure how long he stays there before his phone buzzes in his pocket. He fishes it out to see a text from Kyle.

Did you call him yet?

Alex sighs and rolls onto his back, his hip aching with the movement. He stares at the ceiling for a long moment, weighing the pros and cons, until Buffy huffs a huge, sad sigh again and he just can’t fucking stand it anymore.

“Fuck it,” he says to himself and takes out his phone again.

He doesn’t end up calling Michael. Instead, he texts him a picture of Buffy without a caption.

His phone vibrates a minute later.

Aww, why’s my girl look so sad?

Alex isn’t proud of the noise he makes when he reads that. He types his response, then deletes it, and then types it again. Nerves coil tight in his stomach when he sends it.

Kyle seems to think she misses her other dad. Wanna come over?

Alex drops his phone on his chest so he doesn’t stare at it. It’s another long, long minute before his phone buzzes again. He takes a breath before he reaches for it.

Michael’s reply is just three words.

On my way

Buffy barely lifts her head up off the floor when there’s a knock at the front door. Alex walks down the hall to answer it, massaging the tight muscles in his right thigh as he goes. He straightens up when he reaches the door and opens it to find Michael standing there, looking gorgeous as ever in a dark green flannel that’s unbuttoned practically to the middle of his chest, his curls a little damp from the rain.

“Hey,” Alex smiles, stepping aside to let Michael in. “Thanks for coming.”

“How could I say no to that cute face?” he replies, but the way Michael looks him over as he says it makes Alex wonder whether he’s actually talking about Buffy.

He doesn’t have long to ponder that particular nugget of information, though, because once Michael’s voice carries into the house, Alex hears the frantic sound of Buffy’s nails scraping his hardwood floors. Michael gasps a little theatrically when Buffy rounds the corner, barking as she barrels toward him at full speed down the hallway.

“Hi, baby girl,” he coos, crouching down to her level.

When she’s finally in front of him, she spins in excited circles at his feet, barking and panting while Michael pets her everywhere he can reach. It takes her a minute, but eventually she stops moving long enough to prop herself up on Michael’s knee so she can alternate between licking his chin and staring up at him with abject love and affection, her tongue lolling out of the side of her mouth.

It’s the happiest Alex has seen her in—God, he can’t even remember. He’d feel a little put out about it if he didn’t understand it on a deeply visceral level. When she looks up at Alex as if to say Look! He’s back! Alex can’t help but bend down to pet her too.

For his part, Michael seems similarly affected. “Oh, I know, baby, I missed you too, I missed you too,” he’s saying with a wide smile. His eyes are wet when he looks at Alex and Alex’s throat grows tight with feeling.

Did Michael need this as much as Buffy did? Alex wonders when Michael breaks eye contact.

“Oh god, uh, Alex?” Michael says suddenly, pulling him from his thoughts. “I think she had an accident.”

Alex spots the small puddle beneath her when Michael gets his hands under her arms and lifts her up onto her back legs.

“Shit, I’m sorry, hang on,” Alex says, making for the kitchen. “Make sure she doesn’t step in it!” he calls back on the way. He grabs the paper towels and some cleaner from the cabinet under the sink and heads back into the living room. “Sorry, she’s just excited,” he explains when he gets there.

“So I gathered,” Michael says, but there’s no hint of annoyance in his voice or on his face.

Alex cleans the mess quickly, and by the time he’s thrown out the used paper towels and washed his hands thoroughly Michael’s found himself on the couch in Alex’s living room. He’s lying back against the couch with Buffy on his chest, scratching right behind her hears as he talks to her.  

Seeing them like that reminds him of the first week they brought her home. He has a photo of the two of them sleeping on the couch together, her tiny head stuffed under his chin, and Alex’s heart aches remembering it. He wishes he’d been strong enough to tell Michael what he wanted. Maybe if he had, Michael wouldn’t be rebounding from his short-lived relationship with Maria and Alex and Buffy wouldn’t both be missing him so fucking bad all the time.

“Alex?”

“Yeah?” Alex asks, realizing he’s been standing there in silence for a few minutes.

“You okay?” Michael asks as he gives him an assessing look, his hand paused on Buffy’s back.

Alex realizes this is the first time in a long time that anyone’s asked him that.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” he lies, on instinct more than anything else. “You want something to drink?”

“I’d love a beer,” he says, and Alex welcomes the opportunity for a tactical retreat.

“You got it.”

He collects himself in the kitchen while he grabs two beers from the fridge, uncapping them before he walks back into the living room. Alex hands Michael his beer on his way to sit down on the other end of the couch.  

“Thanks,” Michael smiles as he takes the bottle Alex offers. Buffy sniffs the bottle when he goes to take a sip, but Michael holds it out of reach and explains, “No, this isn’t for puppies.”

Alex can’t help but laugh as he props his left elbow on the back of the couch to watch them.

Michael takes a long pull from the bottle and then sets it down on the end table next to him so he can keep petting Buffy uninterrupted.

“She really did miss me, huh?” Michael wonders aloud, as if the very idea that someone would is novel or unbelievable.

“Of course she did,” Alex says, placing his beer on the coffee table and scooting closer so he can pet her with his right hand. He doesn’t quite realize until it’s too late that he’s put himself right next to Michael, his right bicep almost brushing Alex’s chest. He studiously keeps his eyes on Buffy as he adds, “She loves you.”

Out of the corner of Alex’s eye, he sees Michael’s mouth turn up in a soft smile. “I love her too.”

They chat idly while Buffy soaks up Michael’s attention—Michael tells Alex all about a new experiment he’s working on with Liz that has exciting implications for something Alex would need at least two astrophysics degrees to understand, and Alex shares that he’s been keeping himself busy with music again, much to Michael’s delight.

After years of going back and forth between fucking Michael and fighting with him, it’s nice to just talk to him for a change.

The conversation makes its way back around to Buffy when she shuffles her way up Michael’s chest to fit her nose right under his chin, her eyes drifting shut for a nap. When Michael laughs and drops a kiss on the soft patch of fur between her eyes, Alex’s finds the strength to take Kyle’s advice.

“Look, I, um,” Alex starts, shifting on the couch, “I was actually thinking maybe you could… come around sometimes. To play with her.”

“What, like visitation?” Michael asks with an eyebrow raised. “I get joint custody on the weekends?”

Alex can’t help but laugh. “You make it sound like she’s our kid.”

And, wow, he should not have vocalized that thought because as soon as the words are out of his mouth Alex is hit by a whole fucking wave of feelings he does not have the time nor the ability to unpack right now, and by the look of it so is Michael.

“Hey, you’re the one who called me her dad,” Michael points out, a second too late for it to sound completely casual.

“Technically, Kyle did,” Alex flushes, but gestures to where Buffy is snuggled into his neck, finally at peace. “But look at her. She misses you.”

“Just her, huh?” Michael asks, so quietly that for a second Alex thinks he’s imagined it, but then Michael’s hand slides down from the back of Buffy’s neck to cover Alex’s own where it’s resting on her back.

Alex’s mouth goes dry. He chances a look at Michael, and what a fucking mistake that is because Michael’s honey-gold eyes are staring right at him and Alex forgets how to breathe.

“You miss me, too, Alex?” Michael asks, something that sounds a little like hope in his voice.

Alex looks at Michael for a moment, his head and heart at war the way they always are when it comes to him.

“Yeah,” Alex finally admits, a bone-deep exhaustion hitting him as the confession crosses his lips. “I do.”

Michael nods, processing that. “I miss you too,” he says after a long minute, his thumb stroking over the back of Alex’s hand, and Alex fights against the urge to pull his hand away because this doesn’t just feel important, it feels fucking monumental, but how can he even think with Michael touching him like that?

“Stop,” Alex begs softly. “Please. If you don’t mean it, or if you’re not ready, I need you to stop.”

When Michael doesn’t say anything, Alex closes his eyes, the inside of his bottom lip caught tight between his teeth to keep from losing it. He’s felt like he’s on the edge of something all day and Michael sitting here, teasing him with the offer of more, it’s just too much.

Alex feels Michael let go of his hand, feels Buffy disappear from under his palm, hears his leather couch squeak under Michael’s shifting weight and fuck how has he fucked this up already, he’s barely even said anything—

Alex flinches when he feels the warmth of Michael’s palm against his cheek.

“Alex,” he whispers. “Open your eyes.”

Alex does, swallowing hard as he meets Michael’s gaze, his eyes shining with tears.

“I mean it,” Michael tells him, his expression sincere.

“You do?” he asks hesitantly.

“Of course, I do,” Michael says, leaning in to gently knock their foreheads together. Alex’s heart aches at Michael’s closeness, the familiarity with which Michael touches him. He never thought he’d get to experience it again. “God, Alex, I miss you so much I can’t breathe sometimes, I—”

Alex closes the distance between them without a second thought, finding Michael’s lips as warm and soft as he remembers. He pulls back a second later to apologize for cutting Michael off, for moving too quickly when he’s not even sure what exactly Michael wants, but Michael just makes a hurt noise low in his throat and follows after him for another taste, and then another.

Michael presses further and further into his space until Alex’s back hits the couch cushions with a soft thud, the top of his head brushing the armrest. Alex pulls away from Michael’s mouth with a slick sound, and as he gasps for air, Michael attaches his lips to a tender spot beneath his jaw and sucks, igniting a fire low in Alex’s belly that threatens to consume him.

He can feel himself getting hard as Michael worms his way even closer. He guides Alex’s left leg to rest against the back of the couch as he settles his solid weight between his thighs, continuing to pepper his throat with wet, sucking kisses all the while. It’s not until Michael dips his tongue into the hollow of his throat that Alex’s hips lurch upward of their own accord, seeking the kind of relief only Michael can give him.

“Michael,” Alex moans, eyes slipping closed as his restless fingers weave into Michael’s curls.

Michael hums his response and slips his hands under Alex’s ass, encouraging him to grind their cocks together through the fabric of their jeans. It’s rough and hot, too much and not nearly enough, and along with his spiking pleasure comes the daunting thought that they’re moving too fast—that they’re about to make the same mistake they always do.

“Fuck, wait, we should—“ he begins to protest, but Michael interrupts him, groaning unhappily against the neckline of his t-shirt before he lifts his head to look at him. Alex’s eyes skip down to Michael’s mouth automatically, that tempting shade of pink making it very hard to remember what he was thinking two seconds ago.

“Don’t tell me what we should do,” Michael begs him, drawing Alex’s attention back up his face, to where his eyes are wide and more than a little desperate. “What do you want?”

Alex stares at him as that question hits his ears, a “What I want doesn’t matter” already on the tip of his tongue before his brain even catches up with him. He’s spent so long carrying those words in his head and in his heart that he barely notices their weight anymore—not until it’s Michael staring back at him and offering him everything he’s ever dreamed of.

This time’s no different, and Michael must see it on his face because the look in his eyes softens along with his voice as he asks again, “What do you want, Alex?” He reaches up to cup the side of his face, his thumb brushing featherlight across his cheekbone. “I’ll give you anything.”

Alex swallows roughly, his eyes burning with tears he can barely hold back.

“You,” he answers, perhaps more honest than he’s ever been. His voice trembles as he adds, “I just want you.”

A brittle smile breaks out on Michael’s face, his eyes shining in the lamplight before they flutter closed as he leans back down to kiss him again, slow and deep and wet.

Heat starts to simmer between between them once again, the soft press of Michael’s mouth and the tease of his tongue driving all other thought from Alex’s mind. Michael works his hands slowly under his t-shirt and Alex hardly notices it happening until Michael rolls his thumb over one of his nipples, sending a jolt of pleasure straight to his groin.

Alex groans and shivers at the sensation, using his prosthetic—planted firmly on the floor now—for any traction he can get to press his hips up into Michael’s lap.

Michael smirks against his mouth, and Alex can’t help but catch Michael’s full bottom lip between his teeth in retaliation, making Michael whimper so sweetly that Alex lets him go and soothes the bite with his tongue almost immediately.

Michael gives him one last kiss before he pushes Alex’s shirt as far up his chest as it can go and dips down to latch his mouth over his right nipple. Alex sighs and drops his head back against the cushions, his cock thickening even further as Michael teases it into a hard bud with his lips and teeth and tongue, playing with the other between his thumb and forefinger. He tugs it between his teeth and Alex gasps, arching his back and pressing his chest more firmly against Michael’s mouth.

After a few more minutes of teasing, Michael starts a slow slide downward, trailing wet kisses along the way as he charts a path down Alex’s belly toward the wiry hair peeking out above his belt.

“You want my mouth, ‘Lex?” Michael asks before dragging his tongue along the sensitive skin just above the waistband of his jeans.

Alex’s stomach clenches as he pictures it—Michael going down on him with singleminded focus, looking up at him beneath his lashes as he sucks on the head before taking him deeper, sinking down until the tip of his cock is snug inside his throat. He’s always looked so good with his head between Alex’s thighs.

His cock throbs painfully at the thought, desperate for Michael’s attention, but there’s something else on Alex’s mind right now, something he wants with a ferocity he can’t quite put into words.

“I do,” he says, softly tugging Michael’s hair to get his attention. “Up here.”

Michael stares at him a moment before he gets it, confusion fading as a fond smile takes its place. He slithers up Alex’s body until he can hover over his face.

“You want me to kiss you when I make you come?” Michael asks him, rubbing his nose along Alex’s cheek.

Alex nods, not trusting his voice.

Michael presses a soft, almost reverent kiss to his cheek.

“I can work with that,” he says, moving closer to his mouth. He kisses him again, not more than a peck, before he sits up and leans back, resting his weight on his knees between Alex’s spread thighs.

Alex mourns the loss of warmth, but he soon forgets it as Michael strips his flannel off his back and tosses it haphazardly behind him, revealing his toned chest and stomach. His mouth runs dry just looking at him and he quickly follows suit, yanking his bunched up t-shirt over his head and letting it fall gracelessly to the floor.

He starts on his jeans next, but Michael’s hands bat his out of the way, one cupping his cock through the denim while the other undoes his belt with practiced efficiency. He teases his crown with the tip of his finger for a torturous moment before Alex groans and he gets with the program, tugging Alex’s jeans and underwear down his hips just far enough to free his cock.

The relief Alex feels at no longer being so constricted is instantaneous, and Michael takes full advantage of the situation, curling his fingers around his shaft and thumbing through the moisture glistening at the tip. He spreads it down the length of him as he starts to jerk him off, not firm or quick enough to make him come, but enough to make the pleasure that’s been building inside him since they started this flare hot and insistent.

Alex catches his bottom lip between his teeth to keep from crying out as his hips twitch upward, fucking his cock into Michael’s grip. When he tears his gaze away from where Michael is playing with him, he sees honey-brown eyes staring back at him.

“What?” Alex asks, flushing under Michael’s attention.

“Nothing,” Michael smiles, shaking his head. “You’re just really fucking pretty like this.”

Alex scoffs at that, but it only makes Michael more insistent.

“You are,” he says defiantly, squeezing his cock a little on the upstroke. Alex tries to bite back the moan building in his throat, but it’s easier said than done. “I mean, you’re always pretty, but when I’ve got my hands on you? Shit, ‘Lex. You don’t know what you do to me.”

“Oh yeah?” he shoots back, eyes drifting south toward the dark spot slowly bleeding through the front of Michael’s jeans. “Why don’t you show me?”

Michael rises to the challenge, letting go of Alex’s cock and getting to work on his ridiculous belt buckle. He shoves his own jeans and underwear down his thighs as quick as he can and seconds later Alex feels Michael caging him in as he covers his body with his own, pressing up into his space to kiss him just like Alex had asked him to.

He feels Michael’s cock poking into his belly, smearing precome against his skin, and Alex hooks his leg around him to bring him closer until their cocks are trapped between them. Alex breaks the kiss for just a moment, just long enough to lick his palm before he slips his hand down his belly to wrap his fingers around them both, making a tight, wet channel for them to fuck into. The sticky mix of spit and precome isn’t nearly as smooth as lube, but it’ll do.

“Uh, fuck,” Michael groans against his mouth as he begins to rock his hips forward in a slow, steady grind. “Been a while since we did it like this, huh?”

Alex hums in agreement as memories of the two of them in the back of Michael’s truck, rutting together on a makeshift mattress that smelled faintly of weed, flash through his mind. A lot’s changed since then, but the drag of Michael’s cock against his still feels just as good.

Michael starts to thrust in earnest then, and Alex’s burns with every slide of his cock against him, with every eager kiss Michael presses to his mouth. His heart is pounding against his ribs and blood is rushing in his ears, nearly but not quite loud enough to drown out all the perfect little sounds Michael keeps making in the back of his throat.

It’s not long before it all overwhelms him and Alex shudders as he comes, his balls drawing up tight and cock pulsing hot and wet between them. He gasps into Michael’s mouth, too far gone to remember how to kiss properly as his pleasure washes over him, inexorable as the ebb and flow of the rising tide and strong enough to pull him under.

Michael follows him a moment later, moaning sharply against Alex’s cheek as he spills over his fist, adding to the mess Alex made. Alex jerks him through it, milking him for all he’s worth until he hides his face in Alex’s neck and starts to whimper, overstimulated. Alex lets him go then and focuses on catching his breath as the last of his pleasure fades.

Michael’s the first to move, bumping his way back toward Alex’s mouth to kiss him again, lips raw and slick where they brush against his mouth. Alex cradles his cheek with his clean palm to hold him there as they trade kisses, neither one of them quite ready to break the spell that drew them back together. Alex loses himself to it, so much so that he barely registers the quiet patter of claws against wood drawing nearer until Buffy hops her front paws up onto the edge of the couch and starts to lick his cheek.

Alex makes a rather undignified noise at the sensation of Buffy’s tongue on his face—not to mention the smell of her breath—and Michael laughs against his mouth before he pulls away to look at her.

“I’m sorry, princess, were we ignoring you?” Michael coos, and Alex isn’t proud of the way Michael’s low, rasping voice makes his spent cock twitch.

Michael reaches over the edge of the couch, feeling around on the floor for a moment, until Alex hears a sharp squeak. Buffy barks happily, lowering down on her front legs and wagging her tail, and Michael throws one of her brightly colored toys as far as he can across the room.

“That ought to buy us 30 seconds,” Michael says, leaning up between Alex’s spread thighs. Michael’s bare chest shines as he reaches over for the box of tissues sitting on the coffee table, sticky with sweat and come. He grabs a few for himself and then offers Alex the box.

Once they’re as clean as they’re going to get, Michael zips up his jeans and gathers their dirty tissues to throw them out. Alex likewise tucks himself away and sits up on the couch, nervously awaiting Michael’s return.

He’s just reaching for his shirt on the floor when Michael comes back, his head cocked to the side as he looks at him curiously.

“What are you doing?” Michael asks, the corner of his lips pulling up into a lopsided smile. Alex gives him a questioning look, but Michael only steps closer and plants his hand on Alex’s chest, pushing him gently to lie back down. “I’m not done with you yet,” Michael explains.

Alex raises an eyebrow, but Michael just settles on his chest once more, tucked between Alex’s body and the back of the couch. He throws one leg over Alex’s thigh and his arm wraps around his waist, his chaotic mop of curls tickling Alex’s nose as he shifts to get comfortable.

The silence between them as they lie there is nice, simple in a way things rarely are for them.

That is, until Alex’s mind starts running away from him, age-old doubts and fears plaguing his thoughts. He loves Michael more than anything, but was falling back into bed so soon a mistake? Can they really make it work this time?

“Stop thinking,” Michael mumbles against his collarbone.

“Sorry,” Alex apologizes with a sigh, dropping a kiss into his curls. “I just…”

“Hm?” Michael prompts him when he doesn’t continue.

Alex takes a breath before he says, “I just can’t believe we just had sex on my couch without actually talking things out first.”

“Really?” Michael asks, leaning up to look at him incredulously. “You can’t believe that?”

“Okay, that’s fair,” Alex concedes with a laugh. “I just meant—I don’t know. I thought the next time we did this, we would be a real couple.”

That’s the wrong thing to say, apparently, because Michael’s face falls a little, his eyes sliding down to stare intently at Alex’s collarbone. He doesn’t pull away from him though, not yet, which Alex hopes means he hasn’t completely fucked this up.

“Who says we’re not?” Michael asks slowly, chancing a look back up at Alex’s face. Alex isn’t sure what he finds there, but it reassures him enough to joke, “I mean, we have shared custody of a fur baby remember? That sounds pretty serious to me.”

Alex laughs at that, his eyes warm and fond and maybe just a little misty.

“I love you,” he says, the words spilling out of him before he can contain them.

His heart seizes in his chest a little at the unexpected admission, but it’s worth it to see the joy on Michael’s face as he presses in close and whispers those words right back at him.

The next time it rains in Roswell, Alex wakes slowly to the sounds of soft laughter, rustling sheets, and raindrops tapping away at the roof overhead. He drifts in that space between sleeping and waking for a few moments, warm and content.

Buffy barks suddenly, pulling Alex firmly into the land of the living. He cracks open an eyelid to see Michael sitting up in bed and a very happy beagle demanding belly scratches on the comforter in front of him.

“Shh, daddy’s sleeping,” Michael scolds gently, and Alex’s heart feels so fucking full.

He rubs the sleep from his eyes and sits up, the movement drawing Michael’s attention.

“Shit, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you,” Michael says, casting a rueful smile over his shoulder.

Alex smiles and shakes his head, shifting closer so he can rest his head on Michael’s shoulder and pull him back against his chest. He rests his right palm over Michael’s heart, his fingertips dragging lightly through his chest hair.

“Never apologize for being here when I wake up,” Alex says, pressing a kiss to the back of his neck. Michael ducks his head and smiles, his hand coming to rest over Alex’s on his chest.

Alex closes his eyes and breathes deep, the heady scent of petrichor filling his lungs.

Maybe rainy days aren’t so bad.

[echo-bleu]

NEXT!

I know your fave is still Complicated Truths, but I’m also working on Hands and the sequel to setting fire, so I’ll give you three :)

He joins Michael back down in the open office space, at Michael's new desk.

Complicated Truths

“You alright?” he asks, when Michael doesn't even turn toward him.

“I saw a man get killed today,” Michael drawls out. “I lied to a federal agent. I was shot at. I found out you−” he trails off with a vague gesture.

“Or as we call it, Thursday at the Agency,” Alex shrugs with a smile. He won't belittle what Michael has been through today, because it is a lot. But what Michael needs right now isn't self-pity, or even a listening ear. He needs to get his mind of the work until his brain has had time to process things.

Sequel to setting fire to our insides (for fun):

“Manes,” Alex murmurs into the phone. He hates how weak his voice sounds. He tries to sit up, to free his airway at little more, but it only succeeds in making him breathless.

“Alex! Where are you? Rosa keeps asking about you. She's worried.”

Alex frowns. Rosa has been texting him, and he's probably taking far too long to answer for her tastes. He hasn't found the energy to really look at his phone in days, and he can't remember the last time he talked to her. Or to Liz, for that matter.

“I'm...busy,” he lies.

Only...only he can't lie about this, can he? Not forever. If Rosa is in fact worried, it's only a matter of time before either of the Ortecho sisters insist on seeing him. They'll turn up at the house soon enough whatever he does. And besides, does he really want to lie?

Liz, Maria and Rosa were once his best friends. Where has that gone?

our hands clasped so tight 

Michael slips out of the reunion after less than an hour. He slipped out after helping Isobel to get something to eat and made it back late, so he only got to glimpse Alex on the other side of the room, while Isobel drags him around to talk to people he barely remembers and pretend to be interested in their life.

The music is too loud, and he didn't remember the lighting being this bad. His skin is crawling when he makes it to the corridor outside the gym, where at last things quiet down. He taps his fists together repeatedly, trying to get rid of the ickiness. His head hurts.

He sees the projector before he sees Alex. He's the one who set it up earlier, but he didn't know what Isobel wanted it for. It's projecting photos of them as teenagers, apparently. Michael doesn't know where Isobel got all those pictures, but he recognizes Alex, his hair going down to his chin, pre-emo, laughing on his skateboard.

And underneath, the real, physical Alex, his right pant leg rolled up to reveal his prosthesis, giving the photo an undecipherable look.

“Nostalgia's a bitch, uh?” Michael leans on the doorframe.

[rambling-at-midnight]

Don’t You Believe Me?

Request: Could you write a klaus imagine where it’s a couple years post-canon. the reader has been pining for him for ages but swallows it cus they don’t believe he returns their feelings. when he tells them that he loves them they’re just like “lmao sure” cus all of their friends and partners have left them and no one has ever loved them enough to stay so they don’t believe him. They aren’t like sad about it either, just resigned and making light of it to deal with how much it hurts to not be wanted.

Pairing: Klaus x Reader (Oneshot)

“He’s probably lying, though,” you mutter to yourself, chewing on your thumbnail as you pace around your small room, bare feet sinking into Emily’s plush carpet with every step. Your phone is in your hand, screen glowing as it displays the nine-word text that’s causing you so much anxiety. When the screen dims, you tap it again. You just need to look at the text in order to get a feel for it.

“What does he have to gain from lying to you?” your roommate, Emily, asks from where she’s laying on her stomach on her bed. Her hair is curled perfectly and her clothes are fashionable and look cute. You don’t know how she does it. You always look terrible no matter how hard you try and your hair can’t hold a curl to save your life. It’s especially impressive considering how just yesterday she’d been bawling her eyes out.

“He could humiliate me!” you exclaim, your voice loud. Someone in the hall down yells to shut up, which in turn makes other people yell at them, until everyone’s yelling and then it lapses into stony, brooding silence. You hiss, “He could be saying it to stand me up or something!”

“Y/N, we’re not in middle school anymore,” Emily responds. “Trust me, no one’s going to be putting in this much effort in order to stand you up.”

“I don’t know,” you say, your phone screen dimming once more. You tap the screen and accidentally on the new message, which means now Charles will be able to see that you’ve opened up the text. “Shit!” You drop your phone like a hot potato. The offending text glares up at you: You know, you’re actually rly cute. Wanna meet up?

“Haven’t you guys been talking for, like, weeks?” Emily asks, blowing a large bubble and sending her friend a SnapChat. “Yeah, trust me, guys like that lose interest after three days on average.” She should know; she did an actual study on the habits of boys and girls when talking to people on instant messaging, and if the male isn’t interested he apparently gives up after three days. You guess she hadn’t studied how many guys cheat on their girlfriends or she wouldn’t have started dating her boyfriend, but she hardly looks worse for the wear.

“What about the outliers?” you ask miserably. Charles is active on Instagram right now, which means he’s probably waiting for your response. He’s seen that you’ve seen it. He might be getting annoyed that you’re taking too long. He might be laughing with his friends about how they’re guessing you’re freaking out.

“The most extreme outlier was a week, Y/N,” Emily says not-so-patiently. She’s normally pretty good at handling you when you’re like this, but recently she found out her boyfriend’s been cheating on her, and she had to pull an allnighter last night to study for her Calculus quiz. Now she’s plotting her revenge on the cheating Michael. “Trust me. Nobody even finds that all that entertaining, anyway. You’re not going to get stood up.”

Your phone screen hasn’t even turned off before you decide, “No, I’m canceling it. Nope. Nope. I’m blocking him.”

“Y/N!” Emily jerks her head up to look at you, brown eyes widening with horror, but you’ve already done it. Her voice is surprisingly shrill when she exclaims againn, “Y/N!”

“Shut up!” somebody yells again, followed by multiple people shushing them.

“Oh, jeez,” you say, your hands shaking as you shove your phone in your pocket. “Nope, nope, nope. Did not like that.”

“You’re pathetic,” Emily sighs, shaking her head. “He was cute. He seemed sweet. You’re just being crazy.”

“I’m sorry, are you standing up for boys in general now?” you ask, putting your hands on your hips. “Last time I checked, your boyfriend’s a douche.”

“First of all, no, I wasn’t talking about all boys, just Charles. He seemed nice. Second of all,” Emily glares at you, “low blow, dude.”

“Sorry,” you groan, dragging a hand down your face. “I’m just… not good at this.”

“You just need to get over him,” Emily says, standing up. She puts a perfectly manicured hand on your arm and crinkles her brow at you. “Trust me. Pining over Klaus for eternity isn’t going to make you feel any better. Rebound dudes are the absolute best to date, because everything they do feels so crazy amazing!” She’s already got her rebound dude from Michael picked out.

“I know,” you insist, folding your arms. “I’m getting over him. It’s just… I had a bad feeling about Charles,” you invent wildly.

Emily crosses her arms and raises one skeptical eyebrow. “Mmm-hmm, sure.”

“What about you?” you ask, sitting down heavily on your bed and wiping your phone screen on your jean pants. “What are you thinking for Michael?”

“Honestly, I was thinking about cutting three inches off my hair and posting a selfie with the caption ‘Not gonna miss those three inches, Mike’.” Emily flips her hair over her shoulder and sends another photo to a friend. “What do you think?”

You laugh. “That sounds really funny. I’ll be the first to like it.”

“Honestly, now I think about it, why’d I stay with a guy that barely hits four inches?” she muses, tapping her chin with her pointer finger.

“I believe I asked you that when you started dating him,” you mutter. “And you responded that he was sweet.”

“Character is out,” Emily decides. “The length of the dick is all that matters now, as long as he’s not a total asshole and, like, a wifebeater.”

“As you do,” you nod.

It was the whole ‘your boyfriend’s a douche’ comment, you’re sure of it.

Emily has moved out of the room you shared together.

It’s not like you weren’t expecting it, either; since when has anyone ever wanted anything to do with you? Your own parents abandoned you and when you tried to track them down, they had another little girl and were not interested in talking to you. The rare times you’ve gotten a boyfriend he’d dumped you quickly, unable to handle your fears of abandonment.

Even the goddamn cat you adopted from the shelter ran away.

So no. You’re the opposite of a magnet. Nobody ever wants to be with you. They don’t even want to be in the same room as you.

Your phone buzzes. It’s Klaus Hargreeves, your oldest friend, and you’re trying to calculate how long it’ll be until he leaves you too. Everyone else has. It’s only a matter of time.

Klaus: Hey, Y/N, wanna come over? I’ve got a surprise for you!

Honestly, you’re surprised he’s texted you. He hasn’t in the last three days, which frankly isn’t very unusual for him, but your anxieties are in overdrive and have been since coming home and seeing the ‘Goodbye’ note on the door.

‘Y/N, I’m going to be living with some other friends for the rest of the semester.’

Translation: I’m finally ditching you for my better friends.

‘No hard feelings, right?’

Translation: I’m trying to be as polite as possible, don’t get mad at me for ditching you, you loser.

‘I’ll still see you around!’

Translation: But only in passing; don’t try to talk to me in public.

‘—Emily’

Translation: You were super fucking annoying. Thank God I’m out.

Within seconds, you text Klaus back, saying, What time? And what sort of surprise?

You good to come over like rn?

You don’t have any other classes for the rest of the day, and though you have an essay to write, you can do it when you come home later or tomorrow.

Yeah, sure, I’m on my way, you text back and slip on a pair of shoes before hurrying out the door. On the bright side, you won’t be able to get into any loud conversations and get yelled at anymore. You’re pretty sure the rest of the hall hates you and Emily for occasionally shrieking the most.

Come to my bedroom when you get here ;), Klaus sends you, and you have to stifle a grin. Maybe his teasing is what made you fall for him initially, and the way he’s so carefree. It hurts a little bit, though, whenever he makes a joke about being with you. You know you’re not even an option, but still.

Like Emily had said. You need to get over Klaus. Maybe you should have told him you had to write the essay, but…

It’s too late now for that. Plus, Klaus may get annoyed if you cancel plans with him and not want to hang out with you later on.

The Umbrella Academy mansion is quiet when you push open the doors. Grace must be cleaning elsewhere, and Pogo must be doing… whatever Pogo does when he’s not taking care of the kids. You barely even notice your extravagant surroundings anymore; far too used to them after visiting Klaus whenever you’re worried he’s OD’d on drugs or whenever he’s a little less high and wants to hang out.

Nothing’s changed when you see Klaus’s room. Well, things have definitely changed; there are balloons around the doorway like he’s celebrating something, but that’s just Klaus fashion. For all you know, he could be celebrating something—maybe this is his anniversary of getting addicted to drugs or something like that. Something like that would kill you a little bit to see happen, as it would kill all his siblings, but Klaus is just like that.

And you really do love him.

You push open the door cautiously, half-expecting him to throw something at you as a prank, but all that greets you is Klaus standing in the middle of his room, exclaiming happily upon seeing you.

“Hey, Y/N!”

You can’t respond. You have to take it all in for a second.

For one thing, his curtains aren’t drawn for once to keep the sun from hurting his hangover headache. For another thing, he’s shaved and cut his hair a little bit. The last thing that really stands out to you is that he’s wearing color. In all your life, you’ve never seen Klaus wear any color apart from that pink feather boa, but he’s wearing a tie-dye tank top and loose green cargo pants.

You laugh a little hesitantly, stepping into the room and looking around. He’s certainly seemed to embrace the color; confetti’s everywhere. “What’s going on, Klaus?”

“I’m sober,” he beams, holding up his arms. “Ta-da!”

You’re speechless.

“I know it’s taken me a long time,” he continues, “and I’m really glad you’ve helped me through all the years. But I’m sober and I’m planning on staying sober for the rest of my life. Ben’s helping me realize that I can’t just drink away my problems, you know?”

“Are you serious?” you manage to squeak out.

Klaus nods.

You squeal and launch yourself across the room, latching onto Klaus like a koala. “Klaus, I cannot believe it! Why didn’t you tell me you were getting sober?”

“I didn’t wanna let you down if I couldn’t,” he mutters, squeezing you so tightly you can’t breathe for a second. “And I was planning something.”

“What?” You pull away from him, already regretting the hug because it just made you love being in his arms more. Spending time with somebody probably isn’t the best way to get over them.

“Well, I’ve been wanting to do this for a while, but I knew I wasn’t gonna be able to until I was sober.” Klaus sits down on his bed, pulling you down with him, and looks in your eyes seriously. It’s unnerving. You’ve never really seen Klaus serious. “Y/N…” He swallows. “Please don’t say anything until I’m done, okay? I just need to get something off my chest.”

You nod. Oh God, is he going to tell me he’s murdered someone? Can you honestly keep a secret like that for him? You nod, squeezing his hands tightly.

“Y/N, I’ve loved you for a long time,” he says, blushing a bit but refusing to look away from you. “I wanted to get sober for you. I want to have a future with you. You’re my best friend and you make me laugh. You’re supportive and kind. I know that people have left you before, but I promise I won’t. I don’t know if you feel the same way, but if you do…” He squeezes your hands for a second. “I’d love to spend the rest of my life with you.”

You want to vomit.

He’s really making fun of you in this way? When he knows how sensitive you are about being abandoned? When he’s probably the only person who knows about your parents and relationship struggles throughout your life?

You swallow around a lump in your throat and croak out a laugh. “Ha, good one, Klaus.” You stand up, avoiding his eyes. “I’m happy you’re sober, though.” You start to turn away, saying, “I have an essay to—”

Klaus grabs your hand gently and spins you around. “Y/N, I’m not making fun of you. I really do love you.”

“Yep, mmhmm, sure,” you say, nodding too quickly, clenching your jaw too tightly. “I know. I’m sorry; I’m not really in the mood for jokes right now; I’m stressed out about this essay that’s due—”

“Y/N, don’t you believe me?” Klaus asks, staring at you. He’d honestly not expected it to go like this—he’s sober; isn’t life supposed to start going right?

You wrench your arm out of his grip. “Sorry, Klaus, I really have to go. I’ll talk to you later.”

“No, you won’t,” Klaus mutters as you escape the room. He’d imagined that going in a million different ways except that one. “Shit!”

“Go chase after her,” Ben instructs. “We both knew she wouldn’t believe you. At first.”

Umbrella Academy Taglist:

@fentanvl @deathswretch @lightningidiot @five-hg @iamsnek666@ameliatrh @ihatecheesyusernames @dora-the-grownup @emilyt0314 @idklol707

Forever Taglist:

@lemirabitur @annymcervantes

Guys, take a look at the prompt list on my page—I’d love to take requests for them; it’ll be fun writing practice!

[vagrantblvrd]

Off the Beaten Path (1/1)

Summary: Michael inherited the old house from the crazy side of his family.

“Harsh.”

He snorts and looks to the side where he can just makes out the hazy outline of a human figure. It wavers, shifting in and out of focus and the spot it occupies looks like someone went into a photo editing program and went to town on the blur filter. Felt like it needed more pizzazz and tossed in some film grain for the hell of it.

“Fuck off,” he says, turning back to the idiot in the backward baseball cap who doesn’t know the half of it.

Notes: I started this before they announced Achievement Haunters, so, you know. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

AO3

Michael inherited the old house from the crazy side of his family.

“Harsh.”

He snorts and looks to the side where he can just makes out the hazy outline of a human figure. It wavers, shifting in and out of focus and the spot it occupies looks like someone went into a photo editing program and went to town on the blur filter. Felt like it needed more pizzazz and tossed in some film grain for the hell of it.

“Fuck off,” he says, turning back to the idiot in the backward baseball cap who doesn’t know the half of it.

It’s a nice house though. Turn of the century two-story building built on several acres of land butting up against a sprawling forest.

Quiet, peaceful, and fucking haunted.

These lonely spirits wandering the mortal plane because they can’t seem to find their way to the next world or some bullshit.

Fucking annoying about it, too.

The younger ones walking the halls at night, making unearthly noises and knocking shit over like a bunch of cats.

The older ones are content to drift along in silence unless there’s something they want.

In that case, Michael can expect a ghostly face peeking through the shower curtains to ask him if he could  make them toast because they miss the smell. A freezing presence at the side of his bed at night wondering if it would be too much trouble for him to turn the radio on to a talk show, and on and on.

They’re the harmless kind for the most part. Just lonely and tired of being forgotten, like to have someone acknowledge their existence, and unfortunately for them, that someone happens to be Michael.

They tend to be indistinct blurs at the edge of his vision. Some look like ghostly – fucking ha - versions of normal people.

Most of them prefer to manifest the way they looked in life. Whole and unmarred by the manner of their death, and others just don’t care enough to try. Shamble along with their injuries on display, no doubt as to the method of their death. Something bout the land here that draws them in, offers them peace they can’t find anywhere else until they move on or fade away.

“Well, I mean,” the guy - Ryan? - apparently isn’t going to let this go. “That’s a harsh thing to say, isn’t it?”

The house was converted into a bed and breakfast years ago. This curious thing a few miles out from the nearby town, and it sees a steady flow of guests around the year. Tourists and people passing through who don’t quite know where they’re going as long as it’s as far away from where they started as they can get.

And, of course, fucking ghost hunters like Ryan and his buddies.

Team of idiots with fancy little cameras and gadgets and completely unaware of the ghosts around them.

Babbling nonsense as they check for readings, hold out their devices meant to help them communicate with ghosts by scanning through radio stations or some bullshit.

Michael’s seen it all before, people who think of ghost hunting as a hobby. Something they do when they have vacation time saved up and nowhere else to go. The ones who believe in things like ghosts and the supernatural, want to make a living of of it.

Have themselves a following on the internet because they’ve managed to hit that sweet spot between unnecessarily serious and genuinely entertaining. Present their research and findings in a way that isn’t mildly condescending or mocking, and it’s strangely refreshing.

“Look, buddy,” Michael says, wondering what Ryan would do if he knew little Addison over there is pulling faces at him. “I love my family, okay? But there are some goddamned loonies in the family tree. I’m sure you’ll figure it out for yourself when you look into things because it’s not a secret.”

Several members of his family have been committed in the past. Ones from the side of the family that passed on their ability to see spirits on to Michael. Had him thinking there was something seriously wrong with him for the longest time before his dad sent him to stay with his grandmother for the summer when he was a kid.

It made Michael’s life growing up interesting, to be sure. His grandmother watching him to see if his imaginary friends when he was a kid might be more than that.

Ready to swoop in the moment he showed signs of noticing the creepy cat that phased through walls at her house.

Pale gray tabby with a sweet meow and eyes that glowed even when there wasn’t a light on it. (And if you looked a little closer you could see its skeleton just beneath the pattern of its fur.)

Ryan frowns, taking notes in the notepad he’s carrying. Not a phone or a tablet, but an honest to God notepad.

“It, uh,” he says, sheepish note to his voice when he notices the look Michael’s giving him. “The ghosts mess with the electronics.”

That’s a good point, Michael supposes.

It took some time before he was able to strike a truce with the ghosts that inhabit the house and its grounds. Bargained with them to leave his gaming setup and other electronics alone if he kept them in one room. Gave them the rest of the place to roam to their heart’s content.

There were still incidents here and there, but he wasn’t making the drive out to the nearby town to replace things on a monthly basis anymore. Giving the store employee and helpless shrug like he didn’t know why they all happened to mysteriously break on him the same way each time.

“Alright,” Michael says, and looks over to where one of Ryan’s friends is fussing with a camera.

Ryan clears his throat and scurries away, and Michael has no idea what to make of it, so he gives Addison a look when she eyes the camera thoughtfully.

“Don’t fucking do it,” he warns, taking care to pitch his voice too low to be overheard by the ghost hunters. “They’ll be gone by the end of the week anyway.”

Addison pouts at him. All big pale eyes and downturned mouth and poor little thing, but she’s been haunting this place for decades. A downright terror when ghost hunters show up, running amok with the others who get a kick out of fucking with the poor bastards.

“Seriously,” Michael says, and looks over to where Ryan and his friend are checking the camera over and talking quietly. “Let them have their fun.”

Addison sighs, and when Michael looks back at her, she’s gone.

========

Ryan’s friends are assholes, but thankfully they’re Michael’s kind of assholes.

Idiots who should really know better than to go messing around with things they don’t understand, but what the fuck does Michael know, right?

Gavin and Jeremy tend to stick together when they can. Gavin handling the majority of the camerawork with Jeremy not so subtly flexing his muscles at him as he carts around camera gear and other equipment like a pack mule.

He gets this little smile on his face as Gavin tells Jeremy what he’s doing and why when he sets the cameras up. All intent and this, hanging off his every word.

And Gavin. Idiot keeps darting little looks at Jeremy, and it’s kind of hilarious watching the two of them dance around each other.

Geoff and Jack have set up in a room off the dining room. Turned it into small command center with cables running everywhere as they plan out their week here. Where the ghost hotspots are, establishing shots and other shit Michael doesn’t even bother trying to understand while Ryan troubleshoots everything.

Runs all over the damn place whenever someone hits a snag, or their gear goes on the fritz. He looks a little harried when their paths cross, but the annoyed grumbling doesn’t seem to go anywhere, and the others take it in stride.

Lindsay, though.

Goddamn, Michael doesn’t even know where to start with her.

Terrifying, would be good, because she keeps finding reasons to send Gavin and Jeremy off somewhere together. Off to town for that scenic little drive, just the two of them, or into the woods to film scenes for the dramatizations they do.

This little glint in her eye that has Michael staying the hell away from her because she keeps giving him these thoughtful little looks, and he wants exactly none of that.

Not when he keeps bumping into Ryan, and Michael’s dumb heart does this little flip whenever he laughs at Michael’s shitty jokes.

When he so much as breathes, really, but that could be the history of heart trouble in Michael’s family. (In which case he’d vastly prefer that to facing up to the fact he has a goddamned crush on the asshole.)

His dumb heart aside, he likes them because they keep to the few rules Michael set out for them. The ones meant to keep them safe while they’re out here.

It’s easy to get lost in the woods around here, and he doesn't trust them to be able to find their way back.

The caves at the edge of the forest aren’t safe, so of course local kids get lost in them all the time. Lose their bearings and get turned around, and again, Michael doesn’t trust these idiots out there. Tells them if they want to explore the damn things to head into town and hire a guide

A few rickety bridges over the winding river that cuts through the mountains and weaves through the forest that the county’s promises to get around to fixing one of these days.

It’s surprisingly refreshing not to have to call into town to get a crew out here to rescue them from themselves,

Michael appreciates the fact that he hasn’t needed to call emergency services to rescue them from themselves because the paperwork involved is a goddamned nightmare.

========

Caroline likes to sit on the porch swing in the mornings to watch the sunrise.

She looks like she’s in her twenties, hair twisted into a messy bun and wears a pioneer dress. There’s something sad about her, the way she watches the other ghosts, like she’s looking for someone. Hoping they’ll show up here one day.

Michael joins her sometimes, sits on the other end of the swing and gives it a little push to get it started. When Caroline’s having a good day, she keeps it moving.

Today seems to be one of those days, this slight curve to her mouth when he slides a look at her.

Michael’s got a Red Bull because he didn’t sleep well the night before and it made more sense to his sleep-deprived brain than coffee.

Some kind of brain-addled logic in there, but when the ghosts are excited at the chance to fuck with a new batch of ghost hunters it gets noisy.

Or.

Not noisy, just.

Chaotic?

The careless ones slipping into his dreams. Emotions bleeding over and Michael’s mind unable to filter their thoughts and emotions from his. Everything getting jumbled together until he’d woken up feeling this heartrending despair that no one visited his grave anymore before his brain had kicked back in.

So.

Yeah.

It’ll calm down in a day or two after the ghosts get used to Ryan and his friends being here.

Caroline twists around when the front door opens. Slight frown on her face as she looks at whoever came outside before her form flickers and she disappears.

Shy as fuck, Caroline.

Took over a month before she showed herself to him, and even longer before she told him her name. Showed up in his dreams, pretty, young thing with sandy blonde hair and warm brown eyes and this voice he can’t quite remember no matter how hard he tries

Sweet and shy and sad and she’s one of his favorites.

“Oh,” he hears, and turns to see Ryan hovering behind him, looking surprised to find him out here. “I didn't expect to see anyone up this early.”

The rest of Ryan’s groups is still asleep. They had a long night of it hunting for signs of the ghosts rumored to haunt the place, completely unaware of the curious audience they’d attracted with their ridiculous antics.

Someone has to set the food out for everyone, get the coffee brewing, and since this is Michael’s place? Makes sense it would be him.

Still, Ryan’s a decent guy, and Michael’s not a complete asshole.

“You can join me if you want,” he offers. “I don’t bite.”

Ryan gives him an odd look, and a moment later takes a seat on the swing beside him. Takes in the scenery, colors bleeding into the world as the sun climbs over the mountains.

They sit in companionable silence for a few minutes, lingering tension from Michael’s dreams fading as he revels in what his senses are telling him. Little things that help ground him in the here and now.

Cool breeze brushing his cheek. The slight motion of the swing and it rocks gently, sounds of the others starting to move around inside the house. Ryan’s solid presence beside him and the warmth of his body heat, sound of his breathing.

“So,” Ryan says, wry twist to his lips like he knows he’s not smooth. “How’d you end up out here?”

As far as opening gambits go, Michael’s heard worse.

From what he’s seen, Ryan’s a giant dork. The way his friends treat him – good-natured teasing, and amused little grins at his reactions when they mess with him help confirm that assessment.

That, and he’s just.

Dorky.

This quality Michael can’t put into words, one of those things you just know.

Michael shrugs, clutching his Red Bull like it’s the only thing keeping him sane. (Which is funny, because it tastes like shit, but it’s also infusing him with precious caffeine, so.)

“Hell if I know,” Michael says, and shrugs at the look Ryan gives him. “I was working as an electrician back in Jersey, and then my grandmother left me this place when she died.”

There’s a bit more to the story, things related to his ability to see ghosties and ghoulies and a promise he made when was a kid too dumb to know better. That fucking ghost cat rubbing up against his fingers, and his grandmother shaking her head, fond little smile on her face.

But it’s not like Michael can tell him that, not with his family history and the way he gets weird looks for living out here on his own as it is. (Like there aren’t people through here all the time anyway looking for a place to rest before going on their way.)

“I came out here to settle the paperwork and just never left.”

Ryan slides a look at him like he knows Michael isn’t giving him the full explanation, but thankfully doesn’t press him on it.

“You don’t strike me as a loner,” he says, because the place is pretty isolated.

The closest town is five or so miles to the east, and the nearest city of any size is an easy twenty or so past that.

Lot of forests and mountains and a scattering of rivers and lakes in between that’s a far cry from his life prior to this. (Michael’s first year here was certainly an experience, that’s for damn sure.)

Michael shrugs because he’s not, really.

But there are people through here all the time and the ghosts are always there. Like to poke their heads into his business, and generally make nuisances of themselves.

“Well, I mean,” Michael says, grins at the hint of color on Ryan’s cheeks as he imitates him. “There’s this thing called the internet these days. Lets me stay in contact with my friends and family, and phones are pretty great too. Also, cars and airplanes exist, which is also pretty neat.”

Ryan laughs, rubbing a hand over his face like he’d forgotten Michael isn’t living in some Victorian novel out here. Has high-speed internet and all the shiny things people tend to have in their fancy cities.

“Right, okay,” he mumbles, something endearing about it. “Forget I said anything.”

Michael shrugs and goes back to watching the sunrise and doesn’t think about how nice it is to share it with someone with a heartbeat for once.

========

Michael leaves Ryan and his buddies alone for the most part. Lets them shoot footage in the attic and down in the cellar basement. Points them towards the old hunting shack in the woods a quarter mile away where local legend says jealous suit murdered a young couple after following them there.

Laughs a little at the exited looks it gets him from some of them, the wide-eyed dread from the others.

Ryan shoots him a look, and Michael shrugs because as far as he knows no one’s been murdered out here. Just kids with their campfire stories that spun out of control over time, gained a life of their own.

“Be careful out there,” Michael warns. “Bears and all.”

Gavin squawks at that, hand gripping the sleeve of Jeremy’s jacket.

“Bears?”

Michael’s chuckle might be a little bit mean as he pretends to think about it. He likes these idiots, doesn’t see a reason why he shouldn’t give them a hard time while they’re here.

“Mountain lions, too.”

There have been sightings of both in recent years, but they tend to stick to places up north. Better hunting grounds and the like.

Less people to bother them, too.

Ryan rolls his eyes and goes over to help them pack up their gear for the trek out to the shack.

“You’re terrible,” he says, but there’s amusement in his voice and something like a smile on his face, so Michael doesn’t take it personally.

========

The week goes by fast, Ryan and his friends excited about the little blurs and blobs they catch on camera. The so-called conversations they have using that dumb little gadget.

Cold spots they run into in the attic and down in the cellar because the ghosts like to play games with people like them. Have their fun where they can, and always careful not to go to far with things.

If the ghost hunters are respectful – not necessarily polite because a fair amount of the ghosts around the place are assholes, but respectful – they’ll give them little things like that.

Use up some of their energy to manifest themselves more fully. Knock something over, become visible. Follow along behind them and place a hand on their skin to give them a chill.

All the things ghost hunting shows claim to have seen and experienced and he loves the way they seem so damn delighted with all of it.

“So you guys got what you wanted, huh.”

Ryan nods, sweet little smile on his face as he shows Michael footage they filmed in the second floor bathroom.

Claire’s favorite spot in the house because it has the best acoustics in the place and she was a singer.

“It’s amazing,” he says, pointing out the faint blur that could be anything, but Michael can see the long, flowing hair and sundress Claire prefers. “Clearest footage we’ve ever gotten.”

Michael hums, wondering if the other locations they’ve visited were actually haunted or just wishful thinking on their part.

“How’d you get caught up in all this anyway?” Michael asks.

Ryan doesn’t seem the type to believe in ghosts and the like.

Too pragmatic.

But, he’s here now. Has been gallivanting around the country with them for a while now, and doesn’t show signs of stopping anytime soon.

Ryan shrugs, pulling his hat off to run a hand through his hair before setting it back on his head.

“Hell if I know,” he says, giving Michael a crooked little grin. “I didn’t really believe in it much when I was a kid. My grandmother loved telling us kids ghost stories and it all seemed pretty impossible? But I got an apartment in college in this old building, probably built a hundred years ago or so, and things just...happened. Things I couldn’t find logical explanations for. Enough that I got curious, did some reading.”

There’s more to it than that, Michael can tell, but he lets it slide the way Ryan did with his half-assed explanation before.

“And then you ran into these guys,” Michael says, gesturing to where the others are huddled around the kitchen table going over footage and what they plan to do for their last few days here.

Ryan smiles, soft and stupidly fond of his friends. A motley bunch to be sure, loud and raucous and more than just a bunch of people who happen to work together from the way they act.

“Hey,” Ryan says, fidgeting with the tablet he’s holding, like he’s struggling to say something but can’t fine the words. Ends up settling for an awkward smile instead. “Uh, thanks for letting us film here.”

Michael glances at Ryan, and feels himself smile because it’s not like it was a hardship, really.

Of all the idiots who’ve come here looking to find ghosts, Ryan and the others have been the least annoying by far.

“You’re welcome, I guess,” he says. “I hope your fans like the episode.”

========

Lindsay catches him in the kitchen the morning they’re slated to leave.

This little smile on her face as she pours herself a mug of coffee and watches him.

“You need something?”

Lindsay’s smile widens as she takes a sip of her coffee. Dainty as all hell, and she never breaks eye-contact, which.

Terrifying.

Absolutely terrifying.

“Alright,” Michael says, slowly, as he tries to make it look like he’s not fleeing the room. “Enjoy your coffee.”

He bumps into Ryan in the doorway. Feels hands on his arm, his shoulder, when he stumbles, and a very solid chest pressed against his before they separate. (Hears Lindsay fucking laughing somewhere behind him.

“Oh my God, I’m sorry,” Ryan’s babbling, cheeks flushed s he belatedly lets go of Michael. “I’m like a zombie in the morning.”

“Uh,” Michael says, flailing for a response. “Same.”

Fuck.

Fuck.

Lindsay is full-on cackling now, and Michael is dying of mortification.

Ignores the flickers at the edge of his vision as curious ghosts poke their heads in to see what the ruckus is all about.

“What?” Ryan asks, confused little laugh in there.

Michael shakes his head and holds up his mug of coffee as explanation.

Ryan laughs again, this adorably dorky thing Michael likes way too damn much.

“Yeah,” Michael says, because words are still hard. “I’ve uh. Things to do?”

And then he flees, Lindsay’s demented cackling in his ears, and Ryan’s smile on his mind and stupid, stupid, stupid.

========

“So, uh,” Ryan says, sidling up to Michael. “This is probably kind out of the blue and everything? But.”

Michael looks up from his phone and smiles at the idiot. He looks like nervous as hell, fidgeting with his hat and looking hunted.

It’s been a few hours since they did that little dance in the kitchen, and Ryan and the others are are all packed up. Ready to head to their next destination before going back home to edit everything together for their upcoming season.

He can hear the others yelling to each other to make sure they haven’t left anything behind, last-second checks and general bickering.

“Hey,” Michael says, “everything okay?”

Ryan doesn’t quite wince, his face just does this thing.

Ryan looks around, like he’s checking to make sure they aren’t being watched and looks back at Michael.

“Lindsay,” Ryan says, and bites his lip. “Uh. Lindsay told me to get my shit together, so.”

Michael doesn’t know her that well, but she does seem like the kind of person who’d say something like that.

“Okay?” Michael says, and Ryan’s nervousness must be catching because Michael’s heart is doing all kinds of things in his chest and he feels like more of an idiot than he usually does.

Ryan sighs, and hands Michael a business card.

“Uh...”

A business card.

Not exactly what he was expecting given how nervous Ryan is, but it’s not like he know the guy all that well.

“I figured,” Ryan says, awkward little smile on his face. “It would be a bit presumptuous of me to just come out and ask for your number, so.”

Ryan’s cheeks are this fascinating pink quickly shading to red as Michael stares at him.

“My cell number is on there,” Ryan says, hopeful lilt to his voice at the end, eyebrows going up in the world’s least subtle hint because apparently he didn’t quite succeed at getting his shit in order.

Michael laughs, because the two of them are idiots, aren’t they?

“What a coincidence,” he says, before Ryan can take Michael laughing in his face as a bad sign. He holds up his phone. “I was trying to work up the courage to ask you for yours.”

Wrestling with the notion that they were barely more than strangers at this point. that Ryan wouldn’t be interested in keeping a long distance relationship going for someone he’d just met. Trying to convince him he should try anyway because he like Ryan a whole hell of a lot.

Ryan looks gobsmacked.

“What?”

Michael rolls his eyes and makes a show of entering putting Ryan’s number in his phone, and feeling a little stupidly reckless snaps a picture of him to use as a contact picture.

It’s fucking terrible, Ryan still looking utterly bewildered and confused by this turn of events, and Michael loves it.

“God, that’s awful,” Michael says, and shows Ryan so he can see for himself. “You look like an idiot.”

Ryan shoots Michael a wounded look.

“Hey,” he says, this note to his voice like he can’t believe Michael didn’t shut him down or punch him in the face for hitting on him in the middle of nowhere.

Michael grins at him, and his dumb heart does this little somersault when Ryan smiles back, all soft and shy and sweet and goddamn, they’re so dumb.

“I don’t have a business card to give you,” Michael says, because who the fuck does that? “So I hope this is acceptable.”

Ryan looks confused, but Michael’s already typing on his phone. A moment later Ryan’s phone goes off with a new message notification.

“Nice,” Ryan says, when he checks it, because it’s a happy little smiley face, because Michael likes to stick with the classics and all in these kinds of situations. (Or maybe he didn’t want to start things off by sending Ryan an emoji flipping him the bird. Doesn’t want to send mixed signals.)

Someone starts honking the horn of that van they rented, and Ryan groans because it’s a pattern. Sounds vaguely like a top fifty hit from a few years ago and it’s an amazing display of skill.

“Wow,” Michael says, and very carefully does not laugh at Ryan’s suffering.

“Yeah,” he sighs, reluctant smile pulling at his mouth. “Yeah.”

Rather than stare at each other awkwardly, Michael gets to his feet and walks Ryan to the driveway. Grins at the enthusiastic greeting the two of them get. Ryan’s friends laughing and cheering when they realize he hasn’t been brutally rejected, and the ghosts -

There’s a small crowd of them lined up by the edge of the driveway watching them.

All of them seem amused, this faint sound of laughter the air when they see how close Michael and Ryan are standing.

“Guess this is goodbye,” Ryan says, and like the idiot he is holds his hand out like he expects Michael to shake it.

Michael rolls his eyes and pulls him in for a hug, figures it’s not going to offend Ryan’s delicate sensibilities or give his asshole friends too much ammunition to use against him.

“Call me you fuck,” Michael tells him, and tightens his arms around him when he feels Ryan’s laughter rumbling through his chest.

========

The two of them talk a couple of times a week to start with. After a little troubleshooting on his end Michael gets his webcam sorted out and they add Skyping to their routine.

That turns out to be the worst because there’s a slight time difference, and Ryan usually Skypes him before bed. Looks all soft and sleepy in worn t-shirts, hair a mess and this dopey little smile when he sees Michael.

It’s.

Not a normal relationship they’re working on here, but it’s nice.

Really fucking nice, especially when Ryan texts him random shit if he thinks Michael will appreciate it or calls when he just misses Michael’s voice. (Michael returning the favor there are hundreds of miles between them, and the house gets lonely even with the ghosts and occasional guests for company.)

A few months after Ryan and his buddies came out to film, the episode goes up on YouTube and Michael watches it with Ryan being a nervous Nellie in the Skype window.

Worried Michael's going to offended at something they did, hate him forever or some shit.

But, you know, he doesn’t because it’s fucking good. Their theories about some of the ghosts are completely wrong. Tend towards Hollywood melodrama because that’s what people have come to expect with their ghost stories, murder and intrigue and crimes of passion. Overlook the small tragedies of life, bad luck and unfortunate circumstances and what loneliness can do to someone.

Still, their version of events make for good stories and are sure to get them more views which will be good for them. (It’s not like the ghosts are going to begrudge them that.)

The segments where they interview him about the house’s history paint him in a favorable light. Somehow manage not to make him look like he’s a raging asshole, which has got to be some kind of miracle.

“Did you like it?” Ryan asks, fretting over Michael's reaction.

“Eh,” Michael says, like he’s not going to send links to his family to watch. Isn’t going to set up a viewing for the ghosts, cobble something together they can watch without frying anything because they're definitely going to get a kick out of it. “It’s not terrible.”

Ryan sighs, so very put upon, but there’s a smile playing at the corners of his mouth and his body language is all relief.

“It’s great you idiot,” Michael tells him, and it’s not being biased on his part.

The comments are mostly favorable so far, and sure, there will be the usual assholes, but no one listens to them anyway, so who the fuck cares what they have to say? (That is Michael being biased, but really Fuck off with that shit.)

Ryan clears his throat, this thing he tends to do when he’s about to go all bashful, awkward dork on Michael.

“Uh,” Ryan says, and he’s fussing with his webcam, making these teeny, tiny adjustments like it’s out of focus when it absolutely is not. “So. We’ve got this season wrapped up.”

Michael nods, because Ryan’s been keeping him updated on that in between everything else.

“And,” Ryan continues. “We get a break before we start working on the next season. I just need to see to some shit here and then, you know.”

Michael has a feeling he does know, dumb heart sitting up and taking notice in case it needs to engage in thrilling acrobatics bullshit again.

“Ryan?”

Ryan’s giving him this look, like words are hard and he’s shit at them, but Michael knows fucking well what he’s trying to say here.

“I mean,” Michael says, fighting a smile. “I don’t usually take reservations like this, but I guess I can make an exception just this once.”

Ryan snorts, and Michael's smile breaks free.

“How kind of you,” Ryan says, stupid smile on his face. “I’d appreciate it if you would. I was thinking a week, maybe longer.”

That sounds doable. (Sounds goddamned incredible, honestly.)

“Hey, no problem,” Michael says, just to see the exasperation on Ryan’s face, that little sigh he does when Michael’s giving him shit.

“You’re the worst,” Ryan says, sounding like he means the opposite, which is a mutual thing, really.

Still, Michael can’t let that one go, can he.

“Yeah? Big man telling me that over a Skype call,” Michael says, can’t seem to stop the laughter leaking into his voice. “Too chicken to say it to me in person?”

Ryan opens his mouth for a retort, and blinks when he realizes he can when he gets out here.

“Holy shit,” Ryan says, laughing like an idiot. “I’m going to?”

Least effective threat Michael's ever heard, but this is Ryan he’s talking about, so.

“Yeah,” Michael says, so damn fond of this idiot. “You really are.”

A little bit longer and they’ll get to see each other again in person. No crappy phone reception, no laggy internet connection. Just the two of them and this house with all its ghosts and whatever guests decide they need a vacation right then.

Super romantic and all, and Michael cannot fucking wait.

[crimeshowtrash]

Merry Kiss My Ass

Wow what a cutie.

Ficmas Day 6

Jennifer Jareau x Reader

It just so happened to be that the first snowfall of the year occurred early Christmas morning. When they all woke up the snow was perfect for having a snowball fight, and both JJ and Y/N’s kids took note of that, before begging their mothers to go play in the snow after they finished opening presents. JJ and Y/N easily gave into their kids demands, just thankful that their kids got along. They were both scared that their kids wouldn’t get along, and had waited ages before introducing them to each other. Thankfully all went well and Henry and Michael got along swimmingly with Y/N’s kids, Joseph and Jessica. Jessica was the youngest of all the kids and both Henry and Michael were very protective of her, which had taken both JJ and Y/N by surprise.

That morning JJ and Y/N were both woken up earlier than they would have liked. Apparently, Jessica woke up first and went to her brothers to wake everyone up so that they could see what Santa had brought them this year. Henry was twelve and had already figured out that Santa did not exist but played into the ruse to keep his younger siblings happy. They all went downstairs, with Y/N and JJ still rubbing the sleep out of their eyes, exhausted due to their own Christmas celebration which had ocurred in their bedroom the night prior. They were all wearing matching pajamas, in a black and red plaid pattern, that Y/N had found at Macy’s during Black Friday.

The kids all opened their presents one by one, while Y/N took out her phone so that they could treasure these moments forever. Jessica was the first one, as she was the youngest. She opened her present to find that Santa had granted her wish and brought her soccer ball, so that she could learn soccer from her new step-mom. She loved JJ so much and wanted to be exactly like her. Although Y/N prayed that she didn’t follow Jayje’s career path. Joseph had gotten a new football jersey, he supported the Eagles like his step-mom did. JJ had a soft spot for the Eagles, having grown up in Pennsylvania her entire life. Michael had gotten a leather baseball glove, having grown out of his old vinyl one. And Henry had gotten a new basketball, his old one kept on losing air. They had also each gotten smaller gift items such as candy and clothes, but the kids were much more interested in their main presents. Not long after the presents had been opened, talk of the snowball fight had started up again.

“Can we have a snowball fight?” quipped up Jessica. Her older brothers always got her to ask because she was the youngest and the only girl, which usually lead to JJ and Y/N giving into her demands.

JJ and Y/N gave each other a knowing glance and nodded before JJ said, “but only if you guys go change. You should all be wearing layers”.

The kids eagerly ran up the stairs so that the long awaited snowball fight could soon commence. JJ and Y/N headed upstairs as well so they could partake in the fight with their kids. Everyone was downstairs and ready within ten minutes. When Y/N opened the door, they all headed outside before they teamed up.

“I call mom” shouted out Jessica, before she ran up to JJ.

“I can’t believe my own daughter has abandoned me” yelled out Y/N in mock outrage. Jessica rolled her eyes and giggled at her “silly” mommy. The teams ended up being JJ, Jessica, and Michael vs Y/N, Joseph and Henry. Both the teams were given five minutes to make as many snowballs as possible, before the war started.

“READY, SET, GO” yelled out Henry.

Immediately snowballs started flying every which way. The snow was still fluffy enough that when it smacked against the kids no one would get hurt. The boys pelted the snowballs as hard as they could in an attempt to knock the other team’s players down. The snow seeped through the layers that everyone had on, but the game continued.

“Nananabooboo” cried out Jessica, when her snowball finally hit Joseph in the face.

“Ha, I got you” shouted Michael when he flung a snowball and it hit Henry’s chest.

“You’ll never get me” yelled JJ as she dodged yet another one of the snowballs that Y/N had cast her way.

Y/N glared at JJ, getting way too into the snowball fight than she had anticipated. She made a vow to hit Jayje at least once that day.

Slowly but surely the speed of the game was dying off. Everyone was freezing, their extremities numb. The flying snowballs slowed down. Jessica had gotten distracted and started making snow angels on the small patch of fresh snow by the driveway. She had dragged Henry into making snow angels with her, the twelve year old had a massive soft spot for his younger sister. Joseph and Michael had gotten bored of the fight, and started making a snow fort. But Y/N and JJ’s concentration never wavered. They continued to pelt snowballs, hoping to catch the other off guard.

Finally, after what seemed like years in the frigid weather, Y/N had managed to lob a massive snowball in JJ’s direction. JJ, whose attention faltered as she looked over at the fort that Michael had been asking her to see, was pelted in the back of the head with the snowball. She stumbled, scrambling in an attempt to catch her footing, before she fell face forward in a pile of snow.

“I WON, DID YOU SEE ME? I WON!” shouted Y/N, jumping up and down with joy.

JJ, still shocked, not expecting to be caught off guard threw a look of unbelief Y/N’s way. Although she was not ecstatic over the loss, she smiled at her wife who was still giddy with excitement over the win.

The kids all rolled their eyes at their mom’s antics before going back to playing in the snow.

“You won, we get it. Now let’s get out of the cold. We should be in the warmth, it’s Christmas for god’s sake” said JJ, pushing herself off of the ground and dusting off the snow.

“MERRY KISS MY ASS” yelled out Y/N still running on the high from her win.

JJ rolled her eyes at her childlike wife, before she ushered the kids into the house. When Y/N finally entered their home, the kids were all upstairs changing and JJ was waiting for her wife downstairs on the sofa.

“Can you believe I won against an actual FBI agent?” asked Y/N, teasing her gorgeous wife.

JJ simply smiled before saying, “come on, we still haven’t opened our presents”. She handed Y/N a red and green gift bag.

“Jayje, I thought you gave me my present last night?” joked Y/N, before she let out a smirk.

“Just open the present you doof” said JJ, hoping that her wife would enjoy the present JJ spent weeks scouring for.

Y/N complied, and took out the tissue paper before she let out a gasp. JJ had gotten her a new tripod, her old one had given out after years of use. Y/N was a nature and wildlife photographer and having an uneven and wobbly tripod was not the most effective way to take photos.

“JJ, you didn’t have to do that!” claimed Y/N, as she gave her wonderful wife a hug.

“Come on, you’ve needed a new one for ages. Especially with your shoot in Alaska coming up soon” said JJ.

“Okay fine, here’s your gift babe” replied Y/N, as she grabbed the very last gift bag from underneath the Christmas tree and handed it to JJ.

JJ’s eyes widened as she opened the gift.  It was a massive amount of goodies to help her relax. There were lush bath bombs, bath salts, a bath pillow, and even more goodies. Along with that there was a voucher for a deep treatment massage at spa in DC. JJ was always tense, it came with her job, which is why massages and baths were a very common occurrence in their household. Most nights, Y/N would give JJ a massage before they slept to help her fall asleep, although more often than not the massage would end in sex and they ended up dozing off in a post-orgasmic bliss.

“Y/N, thank you so much. I love you” said JJ

“I love you to Jayje” responded Y/N.

Y/N scooted closer to JJ so that they were cuddling. She wrapped her arms around JJ’s petite frame, as she rested her head in the crook of JJ’s neck. The two sat on the couch, waiting for their children to come downstairs so that they could enjoy the rest of the day watching movies, drinking hot chocolate, and watching the snow as it continued to fall on the cold December day.

Taglist - @bitchinprentiss @anisha-r @estompe @lookwhatyoumademequeue @chocok22 @cherry-loves-fanfic @dakotapaigelove @ssa-aaronhotchner

MASTERLIST

A/N This is my first JJ fic so I hope ya’ll enjoy! Let me know if you want to be included in the taglist. Also please leave love if you enjoyed it!

[junker-town]

Women were playing football in the 1930s — then came the backlash

Photo by Ivan Dmitri/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

How the growing popularity of women’s football in the 1930s was met with widespread efforts to keep girls off the gridiron

“A fortnight ago in Los Angeles, those romantics who still believe in nursery rhymes and the dignity of womanhood got a rude shock,” LIFE Magazine brayed in a November 1939 issue. The shock in question came from a new Southern Californian league of what papers around the country had taken to calling “girl gridders”: women playing tackle football, apparently without sugar, spice and everything nice. In the case of the Stars, the Amazons and the Rinky Dinks (really), they were playing in front of thousands.

Take halfback Shirley Payne of the Stars, who had made her name outrunning Mickey Rooney (yes, that Mickey Rooney) during a 1938 halftime exhibition game against his team, the MGM Wildcats; that co-ed matchup was billed as groundbreaking. Or the Amazons’ Lois Roberts, who punted 50 yards barefoot.

“Strangely enough, they played good football,” wrote a man (probably) in the same spread, still concluding that “it would be better for girls to stick to swimming, tennis and softball.”

Photo by Peter Stackpole/Life Magazine/The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images

From a 1939 spread in LIFE magazine on women playing football in Southern California

Members of that league, which also became the topic of a widely distributed newsreel, were just the most visible members of a rapidly growing class of girl and women football players.

Alabama’s Luverne Wise got an honorable mention for the all-state team for her performance at kicker and quarterback; her senior year, she said her dream was to “get a job coaching a girls’ football team.” Esther Burnham, a 14-year-old, played center for her Connecticut high school team — when a local paper asked why, she explained that she did it “for excitement.” Seventeen-year-old Texan Juanita McCrury was kicking extra points for her high school. Sacramento’s junior college organized a women’s team. 1938 John Barrymore vehicle Hold That Coed even featured a “girl gridder” played by comedian Joan Davis. Her punchline? “Let me take the ball — no Southern gentleman would think of tackling a lady!”

Photo by Ivan Dmitri/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

A pair of defenders tackle the ballcarrier during a game of women’s football circa 1940.

Judging by the breathless coverage around these examples (examples that almost certainly represent only a fraction of the total number of girls and women playing), girls’ enthusiasm for football was still clearly deemed unusual. But it was also having enough of an impact that institutions around the country were taking measures to keep girls off the gridiron — or at least from playing the same game the boys were.

Spalding tried to divert the interest of potential women football players (and open up a new revenue stream) by distributing a pamphlet of rules for “American Football For Women” in late 1939, “a safe game for all classes of women to play because there is no tackling or blocking or any other feature permitted that would be injurious to them.”

It was essentially two-hand touch, the kind had already been adapted for “powderpuff” games around the country (like one 1940 matchup at the University of South Carolina for which each participating co-ed’s phone number was listed in the program). If you made intentional contact, there was a 25 yard penalty; there were no kick-offs, and you weren’t allowed to catch punts. Each drive automatically started on the 40 yard line — a bigger handicap than was included in the touch rules Spalding released simultaneously as a safer alternative for young boys. Be sure to buy those “official women’s football breast protectors,” though!

Photo by Ivan Dmitri/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

Players gather on the sidelines for a game of women’s football circa 1940.

Despite the fact that this version of football was about as innocuous as a game of badminton, the editors of Youth Leaders Digest — an industry publication that counted executives from parks departments, Boys and Girls Clubs, the YMCA, Boy Scouts and more among its contributing editors — were concerned. (Perhaps they hadn’t read the rules themselves.) “Do you think ‘a kick in the stomach’ or a ‘blow on the breasts’ or maybe a short journey into the unconscious carries with it any type of character building our high school or college girls need?” they asked, quoting the LIFE feature.

It seemed like a rhetorical question, but apparently the editorial garnered an immediate and unusual response — mostly in staunch agreement with its disbelief that any girl or woman would ever even imagine playing football.

“Girls’ football is here — whether as a passing fad or permanent exploitation, no one yet knows,” wrote University of Michigan professor Elmer D. Mitchell in the Journal of Health and Physical Education. “But even if girls’ football is a passing fad, this editorial will have served some usefulness if it can hurry the idea along to a quick end...stop women’s football in every way you can! Do not give it a chance to grow!” His reasoning: if football is hard for men, it will be impossible for women; women don’t actually want to play; oh, and — they’re ugly when they do.

From the director of health education for the YWCA: “We urge each one of you to protest in your communities the spread of such an insidious thing as this.” From the supervisor of P.E. in New Jersey public schools: “‘Ridiculous’ is the word for it.” A New York doctor compared the LIFE spread to the fall of the Roman Empire. OSU coach Francis Schmidt: “No one in his right mind would propose such a thing.” The superintendent of the Los Angeles parks and recreation department — so, in the same city where women playing football were attracting massive publicity and thousands of fans — announced that they would no longer permit the use of their facilities for girls’ football: “It is quite obvious that football (regardless of rules) is wholly unsuited to the physiological and anatomical limitations of girls.”

The head of the Bethlehem, Pennsylvania parks & recreation department might have come the closest to getting the point, while also missing it completely: “I think the typical American girl today is a girl who is quite feminine, who has charm and poise and is really a woman. A mannish tomboy type of girl should not be set up as an example of American womanhood; and I do think that if our girls started playing football, there would probably be created a new type of women for our girls to emulate.”

Naturally, Spalding responded with what might have been the equivalent of “...did you click the link?” “Under no circumstances would A.G. Spalding & Bros lower themselves in allowing...rules that even verged on the type of football that has had so much publicity,” replied a Spalding staffer. “We most heartily agree with your attitude in connection with a football game where women would have the clothes torn off of them [Ed. Note: ???], or would be subjected to various forms of injury; even the viewing of such a game would be unsightly.”

But it was too late: Spalding’s rules, as combined with the images presented in the LIFE spread, provoked vehement rejection of the mere idea of women playing football, and subsequent bans for girls in football across the country — many by statewide school athletic associations. Pennsylvania and Texas were among the first to legislate girls’ participation; as girls kept trying to play — despite the renewed resistance they faced as a result of gaining the tiniest foothold in the sport — new mandates kept being put in place to stop them.

Photo by Peter Stackpole/Life Magazine/The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images

From a 1939 LIFE magazine spread about women playing football in Southern California

A Massachusetts girl named Myrtle Chick kept showing up to her high school football team’s practice, only to get turned away despite universal acknowledgement that she was one of the school’s best athletes, according to a 1941 Boston Globe feature. “The girls among Myrtle’s senior classmates are her staunchest supporters,” wrote the Globe. “‘She’ll show them if they’ll only give her a chance,’ say the young women.”

There had been women football players prior to those who rose to minor acclaim in the late 1930s, and there would be more after them. But the institutional rejection of women’s participation in football at this particular juncture illustrates an important point: women have only ever gotten banned from sports after first playing them. The idea that women are incapable of equal participation is only ever made explicit after they have….equally participated.

Even more stark is the fundamental contradiction of conventional narratives around women’s participation in sports, particularly the idea that as women play, they “open doors” for those who might come next — that all it takes is one brave soul to go “first,” and then the systemic sexism is cured. The relatively insignificant amount of success and visibility the women football players of the 1930s had earned actually provoked a stifling reaction and explicit mandates banning them from the sport — just about the furthest thing from a clear path for the next generation.

Obviously, not a great deal has changed for women in football since: players are still covered as local novelties in the exact same ways, and all-women teams are mostly ignored. Despite that, many women still channel the audacious spirit of early players like Chick. She told the Globe that since they wouldn’t let her play, she was going to try to form a girls’ team — and if she succeeded, had no qualms about “trying to book a game against those stuck-up boys.”

[bowserbabe]

So @nightlocktime wants to know how the convention went. So, basically it was crazy.

On Thursday we realized how far it was to walk from the hotel to the convention. But I wanted to go ahead and check in and wander about. So we walked the 100 miles from the hotel to the convention center in the thousand degree heat and got all registered or whatever. Except apparently I checked in wrong, which we didn’t fix until Friday. But it didn’t matter. We walked around the dealer room a bit and I got Chandler Riggs’ autograph. He didn’t put my name on it though, and his hair is too long, but ya know whatever. As far as I know that was the only day he was there? I didn’t see him again anyway.

(I think that’s right? I might have seen him on Friday. But I thought it was Thursday. Thursday and Friday were very similar convention-wise to me.)

Friday was slightly more conventiony. I think that’s the day I was like “Did I really check in right?” and they were like no, you’re an idiot, here is all your Capaldi swag (aka autograph and photo op tickets). And a nifty... thingy that goes on a lanyard. I have a picture, I’ll add it if I can figure out how to from my phone. Or I’ll pull it off my phone. I’LL MANAGE SOMEHOW.

And then we went and saw Michael Cudlitz talk about a bunch of things I haven’t seen. IMDB says I’ve actually seen him in a bunch of things, but mostly he talked about Band of Brothers and Walking Dead (oddly enough). I think I took some pictures, I’ll have to look. I haven’t looked through any of that stuff yet. I don’t think we did anything else on Friday? Most of the big name people hadn’t shown up yet.

And then SATURDAY. Saturday was exciting because I knew I would be seeing Peter soon. Saturday I ended up with some time to myself because my friend dropped me off and then parked the car back at the hotel and then walked. Because he’s a beast. So I got autographs. I think I got... um... Pom Klementieff, Michael Cudlitz, Ralph Macchio, William Zabka... were there other people there? At some point we went and watched Power Rangers Amy Jo Johnson and Jason David Frank. And then... it was photo op time, I think. Peter + Karen photo op, and then just Peter. I pretty much just stood there and tried to make my face look decent.

Then autograph time! Karen was... still taking pictures? so she was late for doing autographs. They have these little tiny lines for people to stand in and so it doesn’t take much to fill them up. And they don’t want people making the lines longer because it interferes with foot traffic. So they just stand there and don’t let anyone else get in line until the line starts to move. Which actually just means we all mill about near the line but not in it, hoping we can get in before everyone else. I sort of just did circles around Dante-and-Jay-from-Clerks’ tables until I could get in line.

Karen was nice, I don’t remember really what I said, hopefully it wasn’t terrible. Then PETER AUTOGRAPH TIME. I got up there and he signed my picture and my friend started talking to him but he was still putting little star-like dots all over my picture and I probably just stood there with heart eyes, although I did argue that Twelve was amazing from the very beginning and did not take any getting used to (which is what my friend was saying) and Peter probably signed something to my friend but I was probably busy heart-eyeing and trying to not say anything stupid.

Oh yeah, the lady taking the autograph tickets scared me. Because there were two levels of autographs (level 1 was on pictures they had there, and then level 2 was on anything else) and she was saying personalizations were level 2 instead of 1. And I was like... BUT I NEED PETER TO WRITE MY NAME (but I only said that in my head) and she was like, no no, the tickets are fine, you get personalization with that. And I was okay. This... this story was not as exciting as thought it was going to be.

And then we ran upstairs to see Karen’s panel. They were like NO VIDEO AND NO PHOTOGRAPHY so I didn’t take any, but other people did. Jerks. I haven’t looked, maybe there’s stuff on youtube. Supposedly the Supercon people recorded everything and will put it on youtube? I dunno. Karen was pretty great. She’s a lot like Amy, at least in terms of getting excited and dealing with strange questions and things. And I think that was the end of Saturday.

Sunday we went over super early (well, like... 8 or so, the convention center didn’t open until 8:30 I think) and as soon as they let us in, we went up and got in line / sat outside the room Peter was going to be talking in. We were... 4th and 5th in line, I think. A ton of people eventually showed up. I meant to take pictures but I forgot. They eventually let us in so we went up and sat on the front row in the center section over to the side where they had people lining up to ask questions. So that he would be looking in my direction most of the time. >.> I was going to ask a question but that ended up not happening. Whatever.

They did a like 15 minute thing first where they talked about Twelve and things and had the cosplayers get up on stage and show off their... selves, and then we realized that Peter was up there with them (it took me a minute to notice, which is sad because I was kind of expecting it) and then that segued into Peter’s panel.

PETER. UNF.

I tried to record a lot of it but I don’t know how it turned out. Apparently I’m crap at using my camera because I haven’t used it for anything real in several years. Also I had bought a telephoto / zoom / whatever lens with no automatic focus, and apparently I’m bad at manual focus, but hopefully I got some stuff. I’ll look tonight. (Looks like they might be uploading stuff to youtube currently? Nothing I care about yet, but who knows.) It blew through my memory cards, so I have like 2 twenty minute segments and then a bunch of random pictures at the end. Whatever. I’ll look.

I wanted him to talk about Jenna but mostly he just told the story of her showing up at work wearing a mask of someone he’d been teasing would be her replacement. Which I already heard somewhere...? It’s probably on my tumblr. Tumblr should allow for better categorizing.

Then they did the Karate Kid panel so we stuck around for that. At the end of that the three of them did a quick autograph signing so I got that, and then we ran downstairs for more photos. I may have spent too much money on photos.

After that we ran over to Peter’s autograph line which was non-existant at the moment and got in it. I got a poster signed (this one) and my friend got his photo op picture signed. Peter looked at it and sort of made a confused/amused noise and said something about it being unfortunate. My friend had him write a little thought bubble above himself and a few other little things and then signed it like normal.

And then we were done? Except I missed the Power Rangers part which was on... Saturday, I guess? Probably after Karen’s panel. They were super busy the entire time with a pretty long line. I made my friend get in line for Jason David Frank because his line was getting crazier and then I ran off and got Martin Kove to sign a picture. He was like “You want a ‘sweep the leg’?” and I said yes, and he was like “We’ll throw in a ‘no mercy’ too.“ Which amused me. So I go back and Jason’s line hasn’t moved, but meanwhile Amy Jo Johnson has no one in her VIP line (I suspect more from crowdedness than lack of interest, it was hard to tell who was in which line when) and my friend is like “Green ranger? Pfffft. I’m gonna go get her signature.” So I stay in line and he runs through and gets her autograph and then I’m like... well, obviously I should do the same thing. So he stays in line and I go get a Flashpoint picture (I never actually watched Power Rangers) and she signs it and says something about “No joy” which she writes on it (I do internal heart eyes becuase I love Flashpoint) and then I would guess starts to write “Kimberly” because oddly enough that’s what she was mostly signing, then realizes, and does this weird K into a J thing sort of so that it says Jules instead, except it looks really weird. But I’m happy with it because it’s funny to me. And then Jason finally shows up and I get his autograph, and then we run away to dinner.

I THINK THAT’S IT. This was too long and I’m gonna edit out the parts about the photo ops. But then... posting.

I FORGOT. ABOUT. RICKY.

Ricky Whittle is amazing. I went up to get an autograph and ended up getting my autograph plus two hugs and he kissed my cheek. I would have gone through that line again. And again. >.>

We saw him talk as well. I think before Power Rangers? He talked a lot about American Gods which I haven’t seen yet, and some about The 100 episodes I haven’t seen yet. So a lot of stuff I haven’t seen yet. But he’s a hottie even with his current silly haircut and he’s all muscular and British and unf. Just lakjfklahfkalshfkljshf. I’ve been trying to limit photo ops to big stuff (So far just David Tennant, Lana, and Peter (with a Karen thrown in)) but I wish I had gotten one with him. I was looking through the pictures on flickr and they’re just like... crazy. Unf.

Okay, that should be everything. For real this time.

[metawitches]

So, that was a lively episode, y’all. There were deaths, rebirths, saviors proclaimed, religions explained, siblings revealed, lightning shooting from hands (told ya), medical comas induced, romances consummated and Liz still had time to identify the rare Libyan flower in Maria’s necklace.

And Ophiuchus came up again, which is very intriguing, since Noah used it to describe Max and himself, not himself and Rosa. Michael and Alex may be cosmic soulmates, but according to Noah, he and Max are also in a cosmic relationship. I think he was meant to be Max’s handler.

Max needs a Watcher or a Whitelighter. Use whatever title you want, but since female  prodigies always have them, the Roswell “Savior” can survive having one, too. He desperately needs guidance. It’s not clear that he can survive without it, based on his own actions.

The CW came through with good news, after the show left us with that cliffhanger last night. Roswell, New Mexico has been renewed for season 2. If you’ve been waiting to check the show out until you were sure it would continue, you’re all set. The entire season should be on Netflix next week.

Recap

Liz’s voiceover:

“When I committed my life to science, I stopped believing in magic, in fairytales with happy endings, in gods and in ghosts. But then, I met a demon, a creature who could possess an innocent. So, I can’t help but ask: If the devil is real, what else walks amongst us?”

Michael and Max are right where we left them at the end of episode 12. Michael is holding the syringe with the antidote while Max points his gun at Michael. Michael wants to give the antidote to Noah and finally get some answers about their families and home world. Max threatens to shoot Michael if he takes another step toward Noah.

Michael tells Max that he just found his mother, but she was brutally murdered by Jesse Manes as soon as he met her. Max pulls out his shallow sympathy and refuses to reconsider. Michael knows that Noah isn’t really who he’s looking for, but he’s the only option available. He starts crying as he explains to Max how much it would mean to him to get these answers, and his plan for them both to keep Noah under control.

Max answers with violence and a pronouncement, of course. He shoots the syringe out of Michael’s hand and says that Michael is his family. That’s all HE needs to know. Max needs Noah dead. Now.

Michael screams that he doesn’t care what Max needs and sends him flying through the French doors onto the patio, unconscious. We started the season in roughly the same way, with Michael sending Max flying into a desk in the police station because he unilaterally decided to heal Liz and reveal their secret. Michael was especially angry then because it was Max’s rule that they shouldn’t use their powers or tell anyone their secret, then he broke it and risked everything.

Here we are again, in virtually the same situation. Max has made a decision and won’t compromise. This time, it’s of vital importance to Michael and time is running out. This time, Michael has a chance to stop Max, and he takes it. But that means that he doesn’t have Max’s help dealing with Noah.

  He takes Max’s gun and tries to lead Noah out at gunpoint. Noah tells Michael that the antidote he stole is in the cave with his pod. Noah lurches, then falls on the floor, conveniently landing next to the broken syringe. When Michael reaches down to lift Noah up, Noah grabs the glass from the syringe and uses it to stab Michael in the neck. While Michael bleeds out, Noah picks up the other end of the syringe and sucks a few drops of the antidote out. It’s enough to keep him going, for now. He leaves Max and Michael unconscious.

Note: As usual, Noah doesn’t toy with Michael the way he does with Isobel and Max. Not even one snide remark. Michael asks him a question, and he gives Michael a straight answer. He stabs Michael, then stands and watches him while he drinks what’s left of the antidote. He barely looks at Max, even as he’s stepping over him. Michael is the one he’s worried about. He can hurt Michael, but maybe he can’t lie to him, the way he can to Isobel and Max? Does he watch Michael to make sure the wound isn’t fatal, or to guard against Michael waking up and jumping him, or both?

Also, Noah was faking being so close to death. He was still healthy enough to get rid of Michael, the strongest and smartest of the trio. He was just biding his time, seeing how far that scenario would go, before he got himself free.

Meanwhile, back at the Wild Pony, Racist Hank takes advantage of Max’s absence to check out Liz as she walks in the door. Liz doesn’t notice and goes straight to the booth where Maria’s sitting, wearing a cozy cardigan and drinking alone. Liz says she had a rough night and wants some best friend time. She notices Maria’s necklace on the table and picks it up to look at it, asking when Mimi gave it to Maria. Maria says she took it off of her own neck and put it on Maria’s the day of high school graduation.

Liz gives us a good look at the purple flower in the pendant, telling Maria that it’s a rare plant that only grows in the Libyan desert. The yellow powder that takes away the aliens’ power is the pollen of this flower. The necklace is a DeLuca family heirloom that protects them from evil. It’s always reminded Maria of the long line of strong women she comes from. Since Michael fixed it, the necklace reminds her of his various body parts…

Liz figures out that Maria is into Michael, and that they slept together. OMG, she didn’t figure out what Michael and Maria were doing together in the desert that night in Texas either? I guess that proves she and Max are meant to be together.

Liz gets excited for Maria, but Maria cuts her off, telling her that Alex is in love with Michael. Since Michael is Alex’s High School Museum Guy, he’s off limits to Maria FOREVER according to the Roswell friend code. Liz is stunned. She really thought it was okay to date whoever she wanted, as long as they weren’t with someone else at that very moment. Sorry, Cam.

She asks if Maria has talked to Alex about how she feels. Of course not. Maria just feels guilty for being interested in a guy Alex has treated badly for ten years and who he broke up with. Alex apparently isn’t required to feel guilt.

Liz counsels Maria not to feel bad, because you can’t help who you fall in love with. “If we could choose, we wouldn’t fall at all and what’s the fun in that? You can’t be guilty of something you can’t control.” Maria nods her head in understanding, but still looks sad.

She knows that as a woman threatening the happiness of a male-male couple, things will go badly for her with the fandom, and she remembers Clexa. She’s not sure she’s up for that kind of pain being sent her way for something that’s not her fault. Michael is, after all, a bisexual adult who can choose which lover he wants to be with, and most people move on from their high school partners by their late 20s.

  Alex finds Kyle going through security footage from the hard drives he salvaged from Caulfield. He’s found the footage of his father being pushed into N-38’s cell. Alex calls N-38, the alien who gave Jim a brain tumor, the monster who killed Kyle’s father. Kyle shows Alex more of the footage. Jesse Manes pushed Jim Valenti into N-38’s cell, then locked him in. Jesse Manes is the monster who killed Kyle’s father.

Jesse returns to town in the wake of the destruction of the Caulfield facility. Flint meets him and apologizes for the loss. Jesse isn’t too upset. The alien specimens (in other words, Michael’s family) were almost used up anyway, their research is backed up, and they keep the bomb off site, so there wasn’t much harm done. He’s more concerned that the intruders survived the explosion. Flint is shocked by the way Jesse talks about Alex, who’s family. Jesse says they’ll deal with Alex eventually. He needs to take care of Kyle right now.

  Liz goes home to the diner and calls Max to let him know that Noah’s handprint faded, so she can’t feel him anymore. She plans to grab some food and milkshakes to bring back to Max’s place.

Liz must assume that Max is done disposing of Noah’s body and cleaning up the blood. Or maybe she plans to help while the milkshakes wait in the freezer. Sounds like a romantic evening to me. 😜😱👽😳

  But wait- the diner door unlocks itself- Noah has let himself in, and he wants a cherry cola! He and Liz move toward each other, meeting at a counter where a large kitchen knife sits. Noah uses his power to pull the knife over to himself. He looks at photos of Rosa pinned up on the wall, and says even though Liz looks like her sister, they’re nothing alike. Rosa was hope and fire but Liz is jaded and guilty. Liz locks herself in the walk-in freezer.

Liz still has a vial of the anti-alien pollen in her jeans pocket, so she devises a clever plan to trick Noah into the freezer, where she scatters the yellow powder. She barely blocks the lock on the freezer, making Noah think he’s overcome her when he psychically removes the barrier. He even says, “I thought you were the smart sister.” The powder takes away his powers, so Liz gets away and locks him inside the freezer.

She baited him into following her into the trap she’d laid for him.

Max wakes up and finds Michael, who’s still unconscious. He heals Michael, drawing on the house’s electricity and causing the power to go out. He’s still retching in the corner, from the energy drain, when Isobel arrives. He tells her that they have to take off before Michael wakes up, presumably so they can kill Noah without Michael’s interference.

Max and Liz talk on the phone while Max is in the car. She tells him to come collect Noah from the fridge. Noah hurls threats and insults about Liz and Arturo through the freezer door. He tells her that she hardly knew Rosa, but her sister told him her secrets. Rosa blackmailed their mother into leaving, by threatening to tell Arturo about Mrs Ortecho’s affair with Jim and that Rosa was Jim’s daughter.

Oh right, that’s new information for Liz.

With that big revelation, Noah pops open the freezer door, tells Liz that Rosa will always be “Mine!” instead of hers, takes the knife back from Liz and stabs her in the abdomen, then races outside, after Liz throws yellow cumin powder in his eyes to trick him again.

Noah’s just so much fun. How many great entrances did he just make, in that one short diner scene, 3? If we can keep Noah next season, I promise to do less complaining about Max.

But what did Noah go to the diner for? The cherry coke and a snack? Just to terrorize Liz and provoke Max some more? To look at photos of Rosa? He didn’t ask Liz for anything and he could have easily killed her with any of his powers, but he didn’t.

Isobel and Max are still in the car. Isobel looks intense. Liz calls to say Noah escaped. She thinks his next stop will be to kill someone, to regain his strength. Isobel says she knows where he’d go, based on her wifely intuition.

Noah goes to the most obvious place, the Wild Pony, where he’s killed to recharge himself 14 other times. He puts his glowing hand on Racist Hank, who thinks Noah is Mexican. He doesn’t have his hand on Hank for long, so Noah might not have drank him dry. But Noah is in a bad way and a bad mood, so there’s a good chance that we lose Hank tonight.

Poor Wyatt, he’s lost his soulmate. Never forget. 😜🤓 # Justice for Hank

Liz called Kyle to tend to her stab wound, except she didn’t tell him that’s what she needed from him. He didn’t bring his medical bag and has to use a needle and thread to sew her up. He also mentions that he was followed on the way there and it took a while to lose the stalker.

  Noah’s waiting for Max and Isobel at the turquoise mine, having buzzed home for a shower and change of clothes after his Racist Hank snack. He clearly believes that to look good is to feel good, which leads to success, and he’s a success oriented guy.

He’s sitting on a log drinking Starbucks. Isobel silently gets out of the car and joins him, ignoring Max’s questions. Max doesn’t figure out that Noah’s been controlling her until he sees them speak in unison.

Always quick on the uptake, Max figures out that Noah had Isobel bring him to the mine, so he pulls out his gun and fires at Noah. Noah is faster than a speeding bullet and deflects the bullet away from himself, while taunting Max for his abysmal skill level with his alien powers. Then he ties Max’s intestines into a knot using telekinesis.

“The whole duel to the death at high noon thing is fun, man, but any redneck can work a gun. I prefer to get creative.”

Thank you, Noah, that’s exactly my point. Max is nearly a one trick pony.

Liz confesses to Kyle that Noah told her Rosa was a Valenti. She’s disturbed that Rosa knew, but never told her. Kyle hesitates, then says that maybe Rosa just never found the right time to tell Liz, letting her know that he also knows the truth. Liz figures out that Kyle lost a sister, too.

Michael runs into his trailer to change out of his bloody clothes. Alex is there waiting for him, uninvited. He asks Michael what happened. Michael just says that it’s not his own blood (some of it it is). Alex is there because he needed to talk to Michael, but it’s a bad time.

Alex starts to talk anyway. He’s probably been practicing his speech in his head and wants to get it out. He apologizes for leaving Michael behind when he enlisted, but he admits that after what Jesse did to Michael, he wanted to leave and to be the kind of person who won battles. It felt good at the time, but now, when he looks in the mirror, he doesn’t even see himself. He sees his father, and he feels like he’s still fighting his father’s battles.

At that moment, Michael gets a telepathic vision that Max and Isobel are in trouble. He tells Alex to come back tomorrow and they can talk more, then rushes out the door.

Michael has his own family battles to fight and can’t save Alex from himself or his family. Alex needs to save himself, maybe with Flint.

Max wakes up in the cave and finds Isobel unconscious next to him. Noah is melting down vats of silver. He tells Max that Isobel will be out for a while, since being possessed depletes her body. “But, she likes it rough sometimes.” Max: “I am going to kill you.”

Noah calmly flicks his hand and physically subdues Max. Max asks why Noah doesn’t kill them, what he plans to use them for. Noah pauses for a moment, with a thoughtful look on his face, as if he’s deciding which direction to takes his answers in. He stays turned away from Max when he answers:

Noah: “The alighting. They’re coming for us, Maximo. I’d hoped we could go as a family, but… plans change.”

He looks sad during this pause, like there’s more to his plans changing than just the trio’s lack of cooperation. Was he psychically connected to the aliens at Caulfield? Could he hear them through all their years of torture, but he wasn’t strong enough to help them alone, and the trio couldn’t be risked? Did he hope to rescue them eventually, then hear them die? What if Noah has been acting under the orders of his superiors at Caulfield all of these years? He might have been ordered to stay alive and close to the trio, no matter what. The other aliens wouldn’t care how many humans he had to kill to save his own life or to keep the trio safe, while he hid in plain sight.

Max: “What’s the alighting? Who are they?”

Noah: ” I told you. When we left, our home was ravaged by war. They are the ones who are victorious. Whichever side won, they’d never just leave us here. They’d never leave you here… You’re the savior. Now that you’re all grown up, they’ll come. Maybe not this year, or the next, but it doesn’t matter. I’ve had my fun with the three of you. Now it’s time to put you back in the pods, so when they come, I’ll be waiting to trade you for a ride home.”

Max tells Noah that he’s wrong, Max isn’t a savior. Noah responds that Max thinks like a human, only using a small portion of his brain’s potential and thinking he only has one kind of power.

Noah: “Unlock your mind, and you could be a god.”

Max still denies the truth. Noah becomes desperate. He grabs the front of Max’s shirt and yells at him.

Noah: “Come on! All those books, and you haven’t figured religion out? You haven’t guessed who those stories are really about? Strange creatures with familiar features, coming down from the heavens, parting the seas, striking people down with bolts of lightning.”

It seems obvious that Noah means that the gods and prophets from all the religions were aliens, which isn’t a new idea, but Max still just looks at him with a blank face. Noah puts his glowing hand on Max’s chest and says that he’s giving Max a heart attack. The others will want Max alive, but he doesn’t have to be very alive.

He’s clearly hoping to provoke Max into using new powers, but instead, Michael arrives and uses his mind to throw Noah across the cave. Michael runs over to Max, who tells Michael that he’s not strong enough. He asks Michael to hold off Noah, then runs outside. Noah is starting to recover and stares at Michael.

Outside, there’s a thunderstorm. Max runs onto a hill, then lifts up each hand, drawing a lightning bolt into each one. He’s finally put together what Noah said about powers, Gods and lightning bolts. Noah must be so relieved.

In fact, he is. He runs out of the cave, laughing. He yells, “We are Ophiuchus, Max. The man and the serpent, the serpent and the man.” He point to Max when he says serpent, and himself when he says man. “They’re not killing each other. They are one.” He gets an emotional, teary eyed look on his face. In the cave, Isobel’s eyes pop open. Michael is unconscious, and stays that way, protected or isolated from these shenanigans.

Max turns toward Noah and throws a lightning bolt at his chest. Noah stands still, with his arms thrown out to the side and his head thrown back, as if he’s ready to receive it. He does nothing to fight it or avoid it. If this isn’t something Noah wanted, his response goes completely against the character we’ve seen since it was revealed that he’s an alien, who’ll do anything to stay alive.

The lightning bolt extends between them like a serpent. The clothing on Noah’s chest burns away to reveal lightning fractals forming, but he doesn’t get burned. He stays conscious and rises into the air.

Noah enters the psychic space with Isobel. He asks her if it’s over, and she says yes. She tells him that she never told him she’s an alien (“her secret”) because she doesn’t love him and he’s not her person. She gives him back her wedding rings. Noah sadly, but calmly accepts this. Then he says, “Take care of her, Isobel.”

Isobel and Michael run outside. Max turns off the lightning and lets Noah fall to the ground. Max is thrilled with his own power.

Kyle stops at a gun supermart because the combination of alien uprising and being stalked by Jesse Manes have put him over the edge, so he wants to feel safer. The message is quite clearly that the gun dealer is very wrong in his willingness to sell the obviously upset Kyle a gun. I’m not going to argue with this. In case it’s not clear, the showrunner has given interviews stating that this is the point of the scene.

It’s interesting then, that she chose Kyle as the subject of her message. Calm, non-violent, always rational Kyle, who just happens to be Mexican-American.

We get nothing from the writers about the issues with Quick Draw Max, the white Alpha male and source of the majority of the violence on this show, excessively using his gun (and his power). But Cam, a woman, gets fired for pulling the trigger on her gun twice while off duty (obviously she can’t be trusted to treat her gun with the proper respect), and we’re told it’s scary that the Mexican-American doctor could buy a gun when he’s feeling unsafe.

Nevermind that Sheriff Mom likely has several Kyle could borrow, so why is he at the gun store anyway?

There are three people in Roswell who would make me feel unsafe: Max, Wyatt and Jesse. Now possibly Noah. But he’s killing to survive, not for the reasons the other three kill. Kyle and Cam have never done anything that would make me feel unsafe (since Kyle’s been an adult).

The trio are back in the cave. We aren’t shown what they did with Noah. I don’t think he’s in one of the pods, so I assume he’s in a shallow grave outside the cave. Looking forward to either zombie Noah or true vampire Noah. Just please, please give me the classic shot of his hand sticking up out of his grave as the opening shot of season 2.

Isobel tells her brothers about her last conversation with Noah. Turns out she does love him, so now she’s feeling weird about having her last words to him be a lie. Max is all jittery and jumpy, like he’s on drugs. He says some unhelpful blather to Isobel. She tells them that Noah’s last words were, “Take care of her,” and Isobel doesn’t know what he meant. Michael says, “A lot of answers died with Noah.” Michael and Isobel are sitting next to each other, in shock and somewhere in the grieving process.

Max ignores their feelings and says that Noah was evil, so it’s a win that he’s dead. Their past doesn’t matter and has nothing to do with them. Michael rolls his eyes at Max, so Max tells him to quit being obsessed with the past. He picks up Michael’s damaged left hand, and heals it, before Michael can stop him. Michael tells him no, very explicitly, but Max fixes his hand anyway, because Max has decided and he’s the savior. Michael worries that people will notice, but Max just says, “This is Roswell,” and walks out of the cave.

I guess Max has total control of the town, so it doesn’t matter.

As they are about to remind us, when Max heals someone, they absorb his emotions (echoes). For the next several days to a week, Michael will be flying high on Max’s current over-excited emotional state, his habit of denial and his need to oversimplify everything. He’ll also be able to psychically feel Max’s feelings even more powerfully than he already was. Keep all of this in mind for the rest of the episode.

Max must have spent the night walking home from the turquoise mine, because when Liz gets to his house the next morning, he’s just getting home, by way of walking across the fields outside of his house. Liz sees the destruction the fights caused to the house and starts to panic, but then she sees Max coming. She and Max do the thing where they run to each other across a long distance and end up in each other’s arms, then kiss.

Gag. Me.

Julie Plec directed this episode. If that sequence wasn’t done as some kind of fan service, the way Damon and Elena’s kiss in the rain was, or to show us that there’s something very wrong with Max and Liz right now, then I don’t know if there’s any hope for this show. That was just bad. Max murdered his brother-in-law last night. Liz was traumatized, again. Jubilation is a strange response.

Damon and Elena Max and Liz are overcome with lust and barely make it to the bedroom for their first time together. Max pauses when he sees the bandage on Liz’s abdomen, but he listens to her when she tells him to keep going, instead of stopping to heal her. I guess Liz likes it painful and rough, too.

Then she tells him to put his healing hand on the spot where her bullet wound was, so HE CAN FEEL WHAT SHE FEELS. Her turn into the Giving Tree is complete. If he’s going to use his hand, why not let him heal the wound? Trust me, it hurts when a man lays on your stomach and you have an injury there. Been there, done that, found another position.

Actually, it took me a while after writing the first draft of this recap, but I finally realized why she won’t even tell Max anything about the wound. She didn’t mention it the night before, either. It’s a stab wound from Noah, which was sewn up by Kyle. She’s currently doubly marked by other men. Max would go insane with anger and jealousy and probably pee all over her, or worse, to mark her a s his, then kill Kyle too, if he knew what happened. Sooner or later, a guy like Max wants to create a permanent mark of his own. Just sayin’.

Also?? After another shot of the glowing hand, Liz becomes a little Max zombie again for the next week. He wasn’t influenced by her feelings the last time. She was influenced by his.

They have epic, first time, glowing hand sex in Max’s bed.

Isobel and Michael spend the morning searching for Noah’s cave. She worries that loving Noah means she’s bad, too. Michael tells her that she’s not. He says, “We’re only defined by what we can control. Love is out of control. Love is the worst thing that ever happened to me, and I was in a spaceship crash.”

Isobel tells him that her relationship troubles are now worse than the flimsy closet he’s been in because of Alex.

Michael: “He knows everything. His family is involved in the conspiracy that tortured and killed the other aliens. He’s tangled up in all these terrible memories in my life and I love him. I probably always will. But lately, that love just hurts. Coming back to him, it always feels like a crash landing.”

Isobel tells him that maybe they should start looking forward, like Max said. Then she sees the cave opening.

The cave is filled with candles and books, just like Max had in the trio’s cave while Isobel was in the pod. They find Noah’s pod, covered with a blanket. Rosa Ortecho’s perfectly preserved body is inside the pod.

Now that Max and Liz are done, Liz jumps up and gets ready to leave. Max tries to get her to stay, but she won’t. She has to visit Rosa’s grave, right away. It can’t wait. He gets a text from Isobel, and Liz tells him to go to her, because Isobel has been through enough.

What just happened? That was clearly supposed to be the most epic sex ever, and it was their first time, but then Liz couldn’t wait to get out of there? And the best excuse she had was that her dead sister was waiting for her?

Jesse Manes finds Kyle back at the Project Shepherd bunker, working on the surveillance tapes. Kyle stands up and turns around to say something, but jesse shoots him in the chest before he has a chance to get it out. Jesse tells him to say hello to his dad. He leaves Kyle on the floor to bleed out and puts his gun down to have a celebratory sip of whiskey.

Kyle jumps up from behind and hits Jesse in the head with something rectangular and hard that I’m sure is kept around just for these occasions. While Jesse falls down, Kyle takes his gun.

Kyle is also clutching his chest. It turns out that he decided not to buy a gun, so New Mexico is safe from random crazed doctors for another day. Instead, he bought a bulletproof vest. Good thing Jesse didn’t go for the head shot.

Kyle and Jesse have a back and forth about who killed who and who covered up what. Jim wanted to shut down the Alien Guantanamo, even though he knew Rosa was killed by an alien. Jesse wanted to expose the aliens and start an intergalactic war. He’s starting to warm up into his villain monologue about his dream of becoming Will Smith or Darth Vader when Kyle jabs a syringe into his neck and yells that it’s barbiturates. Jesse will now be entering a medically induced coma, but Kyle will be sure to take good care of him once they get to the hospital. He has ethics as a doctor, after all.

The syringe is mightier than the sword, y’all.

Isobel and Michael called Max in to consult about Liz’s sister, so he’s in the cave now, too. They come up with some theories for how Noah got Rosa’s body from the morgue to the pod and Max gets angry. Michael and Isobel don’t want to tell Liz, but Max can’t keep a secret this big.

Don’t choke on the irony, kids. Michael and Isobel kept their secrets from their people forever, no matter the consequences, based on Max’s orders. Max can’t keep a secret from Liz for a second, because he’s special.

Max starts quoting Noah, just like Noah probably planned, wondering if he can unlock his potential to be the kind of savior who brings back the dead. Isobel buys into his dream, but Michael stops them. He doesn’t believe they can bring back a girl who’s been dead for 10 years. He says they should take some time to be normal and happy now, then make a proper burial plan for Rosa. They all seem to agree to the plan and leave the cave, but Max takes one last lingering look at the pod.

Michael goes straight to the Wild Pony. He judges his welcome by asking Maria if the bar is open or closed. She accepts his proposal that they spend time together by saying that they’re open. They passionately kiss several times, then just hold each other for a moment. Maria says that they really need to talk. Michael says that they will, but he really needs to settle himself by playing the guitar for a while first. Maria continues counting money at the bar while Michael plays acoustic guitar nearby.

Liz brings a red rose to Rosa’s grave and speaks out loud to her. As she begins, an acoustic cover of Dido’s Here with Me, the original Roswell series’ theme song, begins to play.

Liz tells Rosa that she’s in love with Max, even though Rosa told her to keep a cage around her heart. And even though she feels guilty for loving him because of what he did to Rosa. She knows Max loves her too. She wishes Rosa had lived long enough to feel the kind of love she has with Max and to let her heart out of its cage. She especially wishes She could still talk to Rosa for real.

While Liz speaks to Rosa, Max has gone back to Noah’s cave to bring Rosa back to life. He takes her burned body from the pod and lays her on the ground, then puts his hand at the base of her neck. He turns on his power and starts putting energy into her.

As Liz is saying she wishes Rosa was still alive, she feels something go wrong with Max and runs to her car.

Isobel sits in her house and concentrates on using telekinesis for the first time. She successfully smashes a framed photo of herself with Noah.

Alex waits outside of Michael’s trailer to continue the talk he tried to start the day before.

Michael keeps playing guitar. Maria notices that his hand is healed.

Max strains to heal Rosa.

Michael and Isobel, who notice whenever anything is wrong with their siblings, even when they are at the caves, continue like nothing is wrong.

Liz arrives at Noah’s cavesite, parks, and calls for Max. She hears someone call back to her and turns to see Rosa. We see the same distance shot of Liz and Rosa running toward each other, then embracing, as was used earlier for Max and Liz. Where it felt overdone and unearned for the first couple, it feels completely right for Rosa and Liz. I get chills every time I watch it. Every time.

The Dido cover is still playing.

Liz looks at Rosa and says, “How? I don’t understand?” Rosa replies, “Don’t be afraid. I’m here, okay? I’m here. It’s gonna be okay.”

Then Rosa looks at Liz with tears in her eyes and Liz asks where Max is.

Liz runs into the cave entrance and sees Max lying on the ground with his eyes open and his arms spread wide, apparently dead. She cries over his body.

Commentary

Amber Midthunder/Rosa Ortecho has been promoted to series regular for season 2. Can’t wait to see more of her and her relationships with everyone.

Carina talks about Kyle’s gun store scene:

TVLINE | I have to say, I was a little disturbed by Kyle’s darker turn this week. Are we saying goodbye to the Kyle we knew and loved? Carina Adly MacKenzie: “I was so proud of Michael Trevino in that scene, which we shot in a real gun store in a mall in Santa Fe. That scene was actually the most important one in the whole episode. We knew we were running long, so we didn’t have enough time to shoot everything we wanted, and people kept suggesting that we cut that scene. I just sort of said, “Hey, listen, we’re done suggesting that we cut that scene. Suggest something else.” There are a lot of guns on the show, a lot of casual-seeming gun fights, because we’re talking about cowboys and cops in New Mexico. I wanted to say something about how easy it is to get your hands on a gun in New Mexico when you’re clearly in a state of distress.”

I feel bad for Alex, because I don’t like to see people hurting, but I don’t blame Michael for moving on. If you go back and watch the season over again, you’ll be reminded that Michael has very good reasons for turning to Maria. He opened his heart to Alex over and over again and Alex shut him out, over and over, often with cruel words and actions. No matter how much two people love each other, love isn’t always enough. Sometimes, the obstacles in the relationship are just too much for even the strongest love to overcome. Some of the greatest real life love stories of all time have ended with the couple apart.

I might as well say it now- Michael is Harry Potter. Not literally, obvs. But he’s the important kid who was hidden so deeply that it looked like he was forgotten, so that enemies wouldn’t bother with him. Maybe one reason Noah wants to pump up Max’s ego and have him show off his powers is because Jesse’s paying attention to Michael lately. He needs the attention shifted away from Michael, toward Max and Isobel instead. Plus this increases Max’s powers so he’s a better protector.

St Max of the Handgun

Max tries to solve every problem, no matter how small, large or inappropriate, with his gun. This makes for an obnoxious, dull character, whether it’s a hero or a villain. He’s a blunt weapon of destruction, a peacemaker bomb, not a philosopher. In fact, he actively discourages everyone around him from thinking and questioning.

If Max is a savior, it’s of the political variety, and he’s meant to rule as a military dictator and front man, to stop the dissent that’s causing continuous war. More likely, he’s the terminator, and Noah is his handler. Noah understands exactly how to motivate Max and exactly what his capabilities are. He can get Max to do whatever he wants, even when he’s in poor health and on autopilot. No one who’s that easily manipulated will make a great leader.

OMG, THEY KILLED MAX!

LOL. Don’t get too worked up. Within moments of the episode ending, Carina was pointing out that they foreshadowed Max’s death in episode 2, when he told Liz that things never end well for the guy who can work miracles with his hands. The thing is, those guys also have a habit of coming back from the dead after a few days.

In the scene from episode 2, So Much for the Afterglow, which takes place in a church, Liz has just confessed that she no longer believes in God. She asks if Max does. He replies, “I read a lot of religious texts. Like, all of them. The stories don’t generally end well for guys like me. You know, men who work miracles with their hands tend to die bloody.” Liz says that she asked him to meet him there, where she’s just lit a candle for Rosa, because of his hands. She wants him to use the connection they share because he healed her to show her his memories of her sister.

He shows her the memories, but goes further than he planned, and she sees his memory that includes “fraudulent zodiac” written on Rosa’s hand. Liz doesn’t know what that memory means and asks Maria about it. Maria tells Liz that Rosa wrote those words on her hands a few hours before she died, and the season long mystery begins, which includes figuring out exactly how the aliens were involved in Rosa’s death

This episode brings us full circle from that moment in episode 2 in so many ways, not least because in the seemingly throwaway scene before it, Isobel is worried that Max is troubled about something and holding it in. Noah offers to talk to him, but Isobel shoots him down and approaches Michael instead. That scene now takes on layers of meaning. Noah must have been monitoring Max through Isobel all along, and finding excuses to be around him.

Ophiuchus

Fraudulent zodiac refers to Ophiuchus, Noah’s alias, which he brought up again this episode (more on that later). How much does Rosa know about the meaning of the alias and all of Noah’s secrets? Fraudulent zodiac could still be seen on her hand in the pod.

Max refers to himself as a savior in episode 2, then pretends to be just a guy from Roswell with severe control issues, then a God, then a savior who doesn’t want to live in the past and won’t let his siblings do so either, even if they did lose a close family member moments or hours before, then he decides to just go all out on the savior thing.

He’s been very consistent, all season long, with the idea that everyone has to act normal, unless he decides that he wants to use his powers for something. All of his rules have a Max exclusion. Since Max is a bonehead, this exclusion usually means trouble. I know I’m supposed to be all “OMG, Max sacrificed himself for Rosa and Liz!” But, while he was trying to do something nice for Liz, he died because was drunk on his own power and got carried away:

“He kind of feels like a god, and he makes the rash decision without remembering that he had a heart attack earlier that day; he’s not as strong as he feels.”

After watching how cruel he was to Michael when he’d just lost his mother and wanted to get answers to the questions that had plagued him his entire life, Max still gets no sympathy from me.

I hope no one who reads Metawitches regularly was too surprised that Rosa came back, since we’ve been talking about that for weeks now. The way Noah spoke about her in the present tense in the last few episodes was a dead giveaway, if you hadn’t figured it out before that. I didn’t correctly guess the twist that brought her back, so I’ll probably be wrong about how Max will come back, too, but, honestly, sometimes I have more fun making up alternate versions than I do watching the show. As is obvious, we have a love/hate relationship.

Max compared himself to Jesus in episode 2 and in this episode Noah told Max that he’s a God and the Savior. Just what Max’s ego needed. OMG. Then Max went and proved he’s Zeus or Thor-like by pulling the lightning out of the sky, and shooting it from his hands, as expected. It took a lot of lightning to take out Noah, who tried to tell Max that they’re bound together as Ophiuchus and the serpent.

Let’s review who Ophiuchus and the serpent are. When Noah as Isobel was platonically courting Rosa, he signed his love notes as Ophiuchus, which is a constellation and considered in some systems to be the 13th sign of the zodiac (November 30-December 18ish). The night she died, Rosa wrote “fraudulent zodiac” on her hand, which refers to both a Third Eye Blind song and Ophiuchus the astrological sign/constellation.

Mythologically, Ophiuchus is the serpent bearer, an image of a man holding a large snake who’s wrapped around his body. The man is generally described as struggling with the snake, but there is one myth that turns the snake into the man’s legs and another which has the man learning about healing herbs from the snake. Because of the association with snake venom, Ophiuchus is associated with poisons, medications and healers. As Kyle showed in this episode, a medication and a poison are only differentiated by the dose given and the skill of the healer.

There are two interesting stories about Ophiuchus and the serpent that might apply to Max and Noah. One is that they will struggle together forever, because their powers are equal. The other is this one (from wiki):

According to Roman era mythography, the figure represents the healer Asclepius, who learned the secrets of keeping death at bay after observing one serpent bringing another healing herbs. 

This would suggest that Max and Noah are immortal. Maybe Michael and Isobel as well, since Noah frequently lumps the three together as being valuable to their people, and all three had super premium pods, plus they aged very slowly in the pods.

But, more importantly, we just saw Kyle, a healer, put Jesse Manes into a coma, using poison, a deliberate reminder of Ophiuchus, in the same episode when Noah brought the serpent bearer up. It took only a few drops of the antidote to bring Noah back, which I expected, because he’s so strong. Then Max pelted Noah with energy until he was overloaded.

I don’t think that Max and Noah are dead. They are both in deep alien comas. All of the energy Max threw at Noah could be what he needed to heal him from the damage he sustained in the crash and during his 60 years in the pod. He could be dormant right now because he’s healing.

Max is probably very depleted, but basically unkillable. He just needs to suck some energy out of some people. Non-fatally, of course.

Or Isobel and Michael will discover their healing powers and bring him back. In the books, the aliens all have the same powers. Since Noah started showing off his multiple powers, I’ve wondered if the show was going to ultimately go in that direction. Given Michael’s increasing telepathy and and Isobel’s new telekinesis, it looks like that’s what they’re doing. They all just practiced whatever power came to them first and easiest, and left it at that, because that’s what Max told them to do. But in reality, they all have all the powers, they just need to practice. Noah is the snake that was supposed to teach the trio how to use them.

Maria’s Pollen Pendant

Noah said that aliens have been coming to earth for a long time, so it probably shouldn’t be surprising that Maria’s family would know of a way to stop them that’s native to northern Africa. But it does bring up some questions: How many people know about this pollen’s power against aliens? Is Maria’s family from that part of Libya? Is there or was there an alien stronghold in Libya? Did Mimi’s dementia start after she gave Maria the necklace? Is Maria part alien and the necklace suppresses most of her powers (except her psychic powers)? Did Isobel pass out when she tried to get inside Maria’s mind because of the pendant?

  Images courtesy of The CW.

Roswell, New Mexico Season 1 Episode 13: Recovering The Satellites Recap So, that was a lively episode, y'all. There were deaths, rebirths, saviors proclaimed, religions explained, siblings revealed, lightning shooting from hands (told ya), medical comas induced, romances consummated and Liz still had time to identify the rare Libyan flower in Maria's necklace.

[cosmosogler]

starting late because i was watching a video essay. worth it. well, “late” as in 11:40 instead of like 11:30.

today i...? i woke up on time basically. i don’t remember what i was dreaming about any more. maybe i could start writing that down. i could.

i think i goofed off online for a while and then went downstairs because i desired salsa. dad had left to pick up mother from the car repair shop. i KNOW i did something in that time span but i really don’t remember at all. 

just as i was grabbing the chips they returned with donuts. so i had... salsa and a chocolate donut. i’m cool.

while i was nibbling on my brunch i went through all the mysterious discs i had found both in my closet and on my shelves. none of them were labeled so i had to put each one into mom’s computer to figure out what it was, and then label it and put it in a case instead of laying around in envelopes. target’s old photo service is gone and the viewing software isn’t compatible with newer computers so i thought i had lost all those images, but i found a workaround (after i had emailed customer service... of course). i also labeled all the leftover photo envelopes. that saved me a lot of time later when i didn’t have the chair or desk.

when i finished with that i made plans to get some supplies with mother around 5. then i tidied up my to-do jar and cleaned the bathroom entirely. like it’s sparkling. the disinfectant made me lightheaded though so i had to spray and then leave the fan on for 5 minutes while i did other things outside the bathroom, and then wipe, and then spray again... i also fixed up the cleaning supply closet a little bit. i need dad’s help to fix the sink i think. not sure how to proceed with that. it’s not clogged, but it’s draining slow. i don’t know what my sister does with that sink but there is constantly hair all over it.

after that i still felt restless and agitated so i organized my entire bookmarks bar. i kind of just dumped everything into what looked like the right folder... i’m going to have to go through each folder individually later and check for broken links, or things i can group together so that one folder isn’t overwhelmingly large. and i’ll definitely need to start actually looking in the folders when i’m bored and need something to do. ha ha...

i downloaded a couple new songs from oc remix and updated my ipod as well. and fixed some of my albums that were acting weird on the menu. half of one of them was marked as a compilation and the other half was not. 

then it was just after 5 so i bullied mom out of the house. we went to michaels and i got some rubber bands and photo albums. mom got some replacement stuff for her kitchen shelves. when she actually does the replacements i’ll be able to finish that project.

i also convinced her to stop for noodles for dinner. i called home to see what dad and my brother wanted... dad ended up snapping at my brother super loud. it was loud on the phone and i knew he was in a different room. my brother ended the conversation very quickly after that when previously he had been a little more interested in the menu. i know the feel.

so when i got home i shoveled pasta in my mouth (and managed to eat it all!!) and took my albums upstairs. i was pleased to find that i had bought exactly as many albums as i had envelopes, when at the store i had had to guess from memory. unfortunately some of the envelopes were so sparse that i could put two sets in one album. so i have two albums left over in case i come across any more loose pictures.

and i read for a while. i shouldn’t have... my eyes REALLY hurt and i was grinding my teeth super hard again today. it’s hard to want to use my reading glasses when i use the computer... it feels like it’s just out of the range i would hold a book at so the glasses aren’t quite what i need. but it would probably be better than just using my eyes vanilla style. 

i am again avoiding doing emotional work by keeping myself super busy with projects. at least my living space looks super nice. but i am running out of useful ways to procrastinate. 

i noticed today when i put on a previously tight shirt that it was... not tight at all. it fits me like it used to in high school. and i might actually need a belt for these shorts. it’s weird. i took a quick look in the mirror and i do look more like how i look in my head. very bizarre. i kind of hope i don’t gain the weight back after the surgery. i don’t see why i would, but, i am nervous about it anyway. i’m not thin by any measure ‘cause i got a pudding bod, but the weight loss since my condition started is very noticeable by now. it hasn’t really leveled off either.

i try not to think about my weight/appearance too much because i think if i thought about it every day i would never be satisfied with myself. at least, i would consciously be not satisfied and it would bother me. so i just don’t look at myself much. but a lot of people who know me have been all, “you look good!” and “you’ve really lost weight, huh?” and it’s like... ok, thanks for thinking i look “good,” as in “better,” because i wasn’t good before apparently. but also, thanks for not paying attention to the fact that i don’t FEEL good at all. that’s why it’s a disease or disorder. like cool, i’m glad that my horrible gallbladder malfunction makes it easier for you to look at me. i haven’t been able to eat regular meals in six months, but you know, losing weight is more important than a functional digestive system. i wish there was a comment i could make that would like, slap them on the wrist verbally when they pull out the “you look good”s. 

i dunno, my outfit or hair are things i have more control over. and i understand telling someone that you like they way they look, or pointing out a beautiful tree so that others can also appreciate its beauty. it’s not comments on appearance that are inherently... insensitive. but if your family member has had a chronic illness for the better part of a year and the best you can pull out is “at least you lost weight!”, then maybe something is wrong? 

ehhh. i also organized my jewelry into a single case (and earring frog). and a little bag for all my hair clips. i will be ready for any seasonal theme in grad school now. i even found a spoopy skeleton necklace and cannibalized an old chain to fix the exo necklace i bought at the concert with my sister. the trinket is fairly lowkey so i might be able to convince myself to wear it.

ok, it is hitting 12:20. i’ve been writing for a while. i don’t really want to go to bed... i am profoundly bored. well, not bored, i’ve been keeping busy enough and doing things when i have the energy. i guess a better thing to put my finger on would be “profoundly lonely.” i basically just dump everything i have to say on asher. i have trouble leaving him alone for more than a few hours. my sister’s always at work or school (both are full time) and my brother... i’ve found that he doesn’t really have a lot to say to me. it’s really hard to talk to him unless i’ve got some cousins around to diffract some of the attention. joking around with him has been a little fraught since those holocaust “jokes” last year. and if we’re not joking around, we don’t really have a solid language to communicate with. i can only make so many puns. 

and my best puns are only when i am possessed by the spirit of terrible, terrible jokes. otherwise they get kinda forced even when i have a large vocabulary to work with. but the spirit is on and off, i can’t do that on command.

it’s my bedtime. it’s hard to sleep when you’re... (lonely) (depressed) (restless) (sore) too tired to sleep.

[closure4cobain]

Setting the stage (x_x) part2

A few hours before Courtney arrived at the hotel she gave an interview to Select magazine. During the interview Courtney Love brought out a box of rohypnol and placed it on the table in front of the journalist. She then popped several of the pills. Rohypnol is considered a "date rape drug" as side effects from ingestion include incapacitation and anterograde amnesia. The prescription was in Courtney's name.            March 3, 1994 Kurt Cobain overdosed at his hotel in Rome, found unresponsive, and was admitted to the hospital. Kurt was rushed to the Umberto I Polyclinic Hospital, and had his stomach pumped. He was in a coma then transferred to Rome American Hospital, where he regained consciousness later.      When awake and able to express what took place, Cobain was adamant that this was not a suicide attempt. That he simply wrote Courtney a letter (regarding a divorce he was seeking), gathered their money and was going to leave.. next thing he knew, he is in a hospital with  tubes in his nose and he is being told he almost died. Cobain had called his attorney Rosemary Carroll and asked for her to draw up divorce papers two days prior to this event.

As a matter of fact, her story changed a few times about the time of morning she found Kurt unresponsive. Was it 4:30 am or 5:30 am? (Love awoke the next morning at about 5:30, Cobain was lying on the floor near the bed in a coma.  Between 6:00-6:30 A.M., The Excelsior front desk employees receive a frantic call from Love summoning an ambulance for an unconscious Kurt.) Courtney stated they had both went to bed, he wanted to make love but she was too tired, and telling Kurt no made Kurt upset, so he got up, and took a large amount of pills and alcohol after she had went back to sleep.  Then she woke, and found him unresponsive. (Time of finding him is sketchy) she also had a full face of make up freshly applied- as seen from a photo taken when she was in the back of the ambulance. Lipstick looking every bit of just applied. (View photo of Love with fresh make-up at 6:30a.m after apparently trying to revive her husband. In 1994, the paparazzi wasn’t hunting down the Cobain’s in Rome. Tom Grant has proved that Courtney Love made that phone call from her hotel room.)

we have Kurt taking Rohypnol (Flunitrazepam) which was Courtney’s prescription of pills, with alcohol. Rohypnol can’t be tasted, or smelled in a drink. There was also found to be a pediatric anesthesia (chlorylhydrate) in Kurt’s system.(reported, and released by the media in 1994)        Courtney said he took 50-60 pills. That would mean Kurt had to unwrap each pill,(they are individually wrapped) thus clearly a suicide. YET the Doctor that treated Kurt, Dr Galletta said Kurt did NOT ingest that amount of pills, and  he was familiar with suicide attempts, and the overdose was NOT a suicide attempt. He stated Kurt was not, and did not seem suicidal at all. What do we have? 1. Kurt gave Courtney a letter that said he wanted a divorce 2. Kurt ends up in a coma from ingesting Courtney’s Rophynol 3. Courtney doesn’t give a clear time she found him 4. Courtney has time to get her make up on after finding Kurt 5. Courtney lies about how many pills Kurt took 6. Courtney, and Kurt & friends say it was an accident. 7.Courtney tells the press after his April 94 death it was his first suicide attempt. 8.Courtney destroys the letter Kurt gave her in Rome. 9. Michael “Cali” DeWitt was present at the hotel in Rome Later Detective Tom Grant, and Dylan Carlson find more of Courtney’s Rohypnol between the mattresses at Kurt’s home in Seattle. Kurt had diazepam in his blood, along with heroine(at the time of his death April 1994) It would be interesting to know if there was Rohypnol in his system too. It wasn’t a suicide attempt. It was in my opinion attempted murder. ———-making it appear as a suicide by overdose if he died . It’s just happens that Kurt woke up a few days later. Perhaps – speculation on my part – but perhaps drugging/overdosing wasn’t going to be enough. Someone made sure the next month, April 1994, that he wouldn’t wake up. Rarely does anyone wake up from a lethal dose of heroin, and a gunshot would to the head. Next March 18th incident. see part 3

[voluntarydemise]

The 100 S3 Hiatus Diary

Once again, let me present to you a chronicle of our fandom’s most glorious hiatus moments. In truest hyperbole fashion we did not scale back after last year’s already impressive BS recordings. Here’s all the drama we managed to fit into the 257 days between the Season 3 finale on May 19, 2016 and the Season 4 premiere on February 1, 2017:

FYI: Entries are mostly focused on the Twitter fandom unless otherwise noted. Also beware, this diary deliberately generalises from the loud few to the many. 

Day 2: Emma Caulfield of EW writes a *love letter* bashing Bellamy into a verb and adjective. Half of the fandom cackles, other half is ready to “bellamy” her. 

Day 3: Ongoing belittling of Jasper’s PTSD in tandem with outrage from same people that show didn’t depict enough PTSD victims.

Day 6: #GiveBellamyBlakeABoyfriend circulates and is amusingly shared by lovers and haters.

Day 7: Kass Morgan is confronted with fandom members defacing and even burning her books. Because we are classy.

Day 10: Tumblr heats up when Johnny Depp beating Amber Heard gets compared to how Bellamy treats Clarke. Because bisexuality. Oh yes.

Day 11: Devon zings Harry Styles - and popstars in general - for trying to act. Somewhere Shawn Mendes cries a tear. 

Day 12: The Fandom-is-Broken article hits. Outrage everywhere, while our fandom is like “yup, sounds about right”. 

Day 15: Bob at Phoenix con says Bellamy wouldn’t have sided with Pike had Clarke returned earlier. Somehow he gets hate for that. Still unclear why. Most likely for no reason at all. 

Day 16: More Phoenix con: Bob utters word “YET”, causes avalanche. Emma Caulfield tweets her and Bob’s are besties now. Fandom responds in typical forgiving ways. 

Day 18: Tumblr has Brollexa gaining traction among BCers, the polyamorous turn it into Clexamy. Not appreciated by the CL fandom. Devon tweet-deletes, shits on cast members for making money off cons instead of donating to charity.

Day 21: Eliza and Bob get nominated for Teenchoice TV Chemistry. Disgust in CL fandom as entertaining as surprise in BC fandom. 

Day 23: Fan at Oz Comic Con asks Eliza about Chemistry nomination and gets booed. Bob speaks slloooowwwhhhuuurr to the iddiiiooootttss on twitter. Most likely entirely unrelated. 

Day 24: Eliza gets called fake/lost/drunk by BC fandom for voicing opinions about Bellarke. Beware of having opinions about ships.

Day 25: Bob replies to hate tweet. Backfires into him getting criticised for passive aggressively focusing on negativity only. 

Day 26: First hiatus hack! Eliza’s instagram. Leads to Alycia unfollowing her. Fandom entertained for a while. Plus the gem of someone comparing Lexa’s death to the Orlando shooting.

Day 28: Alycia cancels Brazil con. In a roundabout way it’s Bob’s fault.

Day 31: On the shipping front Bob  & Shampoo compete against Lexa & Bullet. Because why not. 

Day 33: Somehow BC fandom hits jackpot by criticising both Adina and Mike on same day. For not being pro-BC enough. Adina! Mike! 

Day 35: Layne Morgan attacks Ben Batemen for elevating himself to lgbt+ spokesperson. Fanbase first stunned, then divided. 

Day 37: Second hiatus hack! Layne’s phone. Apparently private numbers get leaked, some idiots message Jason’s wife.

Day 41: Third hiatus hack! (@)emiliascara hacks into Marcus Catsaras’ (Alycia’s boyfriend) icloud, finds footage of him cheating. Catsaras deletes his twitter/fb accounts. Because hell has no fury like a riled-up CL fandom.

Day 42: Lindsey jumps in to fight hackers, (@)morleydebnam jokes about hacking Lindsey.

Day 44: Hacker exposed as guy from Toronto (Michael Brand/Bahramian). 

Day 46: CL fandom overruns and impressively wins 9 of 11 E!Online polls. Still peeved over other fandoms bonding and voting against them. 

Day 48: Jarod speaks up after Alton Sterling shooting. Ends with him getting attacked over *representation* issues. 

Day 52: Eliza vs Alycia in Radiotimes quarter finals. Which fosters minor drama.

Day 56: Layne officially disinvited from clexacon. 

Day 57: Some panelists boycott clexacon after Layne’s exit. Meanwhile the gullible have a clickbait-freakout over O killing Bellamy. 

Day 58: Ben Bateman steps back from clexacon allies panel. (@)riserellamy makes it their mission to get all Arryn-haters blocked by Bob. 

Day 59: Eliza talks freely and excessively about Lexa and Clexa at Brazil Con. BC fandom really wishes she wouldn’t. 

Day 60: From the fanfic policing front: Author gets such harsh attacks for writing Lexamy they pull the fic. 

Day 61: S3 DVD is out! Deleted scenes reheat old rage. While Ricky retweets shade about him not being in the bloopers.

Day 62: #OlicityMafiaExposedClexaParty happens. CL fandom first fandom ever to cheat in a poll. 

Day 64: She said “ship”.

Day 65: Whole fandom aflame over the shit/ship debacle. Shit memes everywhere. Aaron doesn’t give a SHIT. Eliza probably avoids her mentions. Tumblr births Bellarke Drags. The best of days.

Day 66: clexasources promotes WB survey asking people to criticise show. Eliza shall be saved by cancellation. 

Day 67: ELSchaaf claims Eliza speaks condescendingly of Bellarke because she’s threatened by Bob’s popularity. Fandom appalled. In conjunction CLs figure out ELSchaaf is involved with Unity Days. 

Day 68: ELSchaaf on tumblr rampage, invites haters to call her names at con in person. Unity Days reacts swiftly and removes ELSchaaf. 

Day 70: Bellarke Shit necklace sparks controversy. 

Day 73: Wizard Con: Marie says Clarke has *nappy* hair which Eliza laughs at. Racism outrage in some fandom corners. 

Day 75: Jason’s SDCC talk about bi-Clarke getting “with everyone” resurfaces. Not the most well received. clexasources deactivates after Bob+Eliza photo post leads to attacks by followers.  

Day 78: Supposed insider troll Jason Blue stirs up rumour drama of Octavia dying. 

Day 82: Bellarke fanart repurposed as Braven fanart. Bob-birthday charity criticised for being organised by a BC shipper. 

Day 84: Pedowitz stands behind show at TCAs, does neither criticise nor cancel it on the spot, as some had hoped. 

Day 103: Fanfic policing, part 2: Bellamy goes down on Clarke in the commander’s throne. People - ignorant of the concept of *fanfiction* - are mad. 

Day 106: Eliza posts candid pic with guy-boy-friend. Apparently this makes her a lesser lgbt+ ally. 

Day 111: Fanfic’s blowjobgate! Briller&Harper fic on kinkmemes ignites long and nasty Bellarke fanfic community wars. Who gets to and with whom and with how many is not the author’s choice alone. 

Day 125: Tumblr aflame over Bellamy hating Aurora Blake, with usual shades of misogyny and racism. 

Day 130: HYPE article about ADC at Copenhagen Con calls out fans for slightly inappropriate fan behavior. More inappropriate fan behavior in reaction leads to article edits. 

Day 132: Kim retweets Fa Panini’s cute Becho fanart. BC fandom takes that as confirmation of things to come. Mild panic. 

Day 135: A clearly mangled and misrepresented SDCC comment about Clarke and love interest in S4 causes freakout. Because fandom will forever step into all clickbait traps willingly. 

Day 144: The usual bi-monthly kerfuffle about Clarke being forgotten as bi-rep in article. 

Day 145: Layne Morgan sick of TV bi girls ending up with men. Not that stats have discredited this stereotype at all. 

Day 155: Supposed insider troll Jason Blue claims insider cancellation knowledge. Insider arguments quickly debunked. 

Day 159: Photoshopped Variety tweet circulates, claiming show cancellation. Mo Ryan refutes it. 

Day 165: Lindsey stumbles into sexypilgrim drama. Apologises later for wishing people would get involved in causes beyond online outrage. 

Day 166: Press day! Drama day! Fandom-uneducated Nadia voices “Luna is stronger than Lexa”. She may forever feel the consequences. 

Day 167: Nadia tweets “Fiction”, deletes account. #NadiaDeactivatedParty follows. Eliza and later Arryn claim account is fake. Fandom thinks Eliza would rather lie than defend Nadia and her anti-Lexa statement. 

Day 170: Meanwhile in the fanfic warzone: “Bellamy rapes Lexa” gets countered with “Lexa castrates Bellamy”. 

Day 190: Bob reaches annual patience-for-twitter threshold, carries out annual twitter deactivation. States he was made to join. Fandom: lol, ok, see you in a bit. 

Day 199: Bellarke and Clexa both in same Hottest-Ships-of-the-Year list. But fandom can’t share nice things. 

Day 201: Guess who’s back on twitter, guys?

Day 216: BC-shipping jewellery artist called out for making money off Clexa art. Not allowed in the age of receipts. 

Day 219: In spirit of Christmas, Aaron issues Lexa apology. Fandom - less spirited - counters it’s 9 months too late, and never enough. 

Day 221: Katie affirms in slightly too bitter way that show is more than just Clexa. Bad move, girl.

Day 222: (@)bellamysbriller - whom Katie retweeted the day before - is exposed for catfishing and bullying. 

Day 228: More jewellery controversies, as jewellery donations to charities can only come from people who’ve never made controversial statements. 

Day 233: clexaspoilers surfaces, claims access to screeners, reveals Clexa parts. Fandom calls it baiting to make them watch, even though account claims now they DON’T have to watch. 

Day 238: BC fandom gets high on SHE HAS BELLAMY, and actually manages to trend for once. Stunning friends and foes alike.

Day 241: Unity Days report of Lindsey supposedly saying Bellarke is boring. Lindsey gets attacked and goes on twitter detox. BC fandom to blame.

Day 243: Fourth hiatus hack! Ricky’s phone. Beware of Ricky nudes. 

Day 245: Alycia’s management removes The 100 from “known for” section on IMDB. BCers shocked, CLs shrug. 

Day 248: BCers think 600 cookies might be helpful for show renewal. Laughs and eyerolls all around.

Day 249: S4 poster arrives. Cast, writers and fans partake in a who’s-who guessing game with silhouettes. Body shaming leads to #titsoutforeliza, someone leaks S4 callsheets and Funko whitewashes Raven and Bellamy. A busy day.

Day 252: CLs set up White House petition to get Jason fired. A single signature last we checked. 

Day 257: Final hiatus day: (@)the100leaked pops up to generously leak part of the Season 4 finale script and cause mass hysteria. Tadaaaaa! 

And that’s it! See you all next hiatus! Just kidding. I accept more entries, if you can link me to the evidence.

[optimisticheartbarbarian-blog]

Undertale dating. Write only if you are serious! Oksana. Age 25 My new photos and sexy videos here >>>

Name: Oksana Age: 25 Country: Ukraine City: Kiev Marital status: never been married Children: none Height: 5'6" - 168 cm Weight: 117 lb - 53 kg Eye color: blue Hair color: dark brown Body type: slim Religion: Christian Education: university Smoke: no Drink: no English level: basic Occupation: Office Manager

Oksana Undertale dating

Provide your criteria (gender, age, location, sexual orientation, interests, etc.), and search for dates and partners on your own as well as receive them from Match. The Guardian. Retrieved 2010-12-08.. The most appealing kind of email to send is friendly, funny and flattering. Rather than jumping into a new relationship to avoid being alone, give yourself a chance to explore life on your own terms. There’s the terrifying possibility one of your friends or co-workers will stumble upon your profile and see who you present as romantically. (Or if you’re me, the chance your younger sister will stumble upon your profile when you’re home for the holidays.) That’s why you see so many people essentially give up and put “lol I’m not good at writing dating bios” where their witty personal statement should be. Zoosk has a totally free, extremely comprehensive membership that anyone can sign up for and that will give you the opportunity to try out the entire app before whipping out your wallet. Me being 50 I won’t settle for the chase if it isn’t mutual it’s one sided.you not only have to be emotionally ready but time ready as well to make anything work. You. Get out what you put in and if you can’t put in your time it’s toast. The principal modern radiocarbon standard is N.I.S.T (National Institute of Standards and Technology. I gave him a book on a topic he’s expressed interest in several times, he thanked me and gave me a hug and a kiss on the cheek. CONS One of the biggest drawbacks could be that users cannot themselves search and browse for matches.

Greater Manchester News How the church is working with experts to help survivors of sexual abuse Survivors will be able to access funding for specialist therapists and a faith-based support group. If you’re into horseback riding but you’re also into partying on the weekend, include photos of both. Putting false information about yourself is really easy because online dating sites do not verify the information. Ask New Question Anonymous Answered 63w ago Almost all of the dating apps show users from around your area but you may not know if that user is still active. Your answers are an important part of the matchmaking process and being honest gives you the best chance of meeting someone compatible. Increasingly, state licensing boards post online the names and general description of the offense of mental health professionals found guilty of an ethics charge. However, making time for both your romance and your friendships is vital to maintaining balance, happiness and healthiness. These apps may not be super popular yet, but apps like these (ones that use mobile platforms to facilitate in-person connections) could easily end up being the future of online dating. Setting a limit of one or two hours for your date gives the other person some space, doesn't crowd them from the beginning.

The feminists are going to hate me on this one, but I think “I am woman, hear me roar” has done us a disservice in the dating department. That’s because talking on the phone can serve as a gut-check, giving you a blind glimpse into her personality before wasting your time, money, spirit or heart on a date that is bound to go sour. “If you have met someone on a dating app, the usual protocol is to first text and then talk on the phone before asking someone on a date. In addition to the detrimental effects of upholding limited views of relationships and sexual and romantic desires, stereotypes also lead to framing social problems in a problematic way. While Match has reams of cards and thank-you notes hung around its headquarters for every wedding and child it helped create, it also hears from plenty of users who have had bad dates and blame the company. “Part of dating is the up and down,” she says. “We live with all that psychology, and they’ll have to, too. I have thick hair, I usually get it cut very short, then let it grow out for months, then go short again--and he's a master at cutting my hair into different short styles that grow out super well with minimum styling effort on my part. I will be honest I don't get how it's more chillax or cautious to not call himself your boyfriend but what's important is that what you have makes you happy, not how you label it. The goal of an email is to get her to read the whole thing and want to reply with something other than “I’m going to have my big bad bouncer friend come over to your house an smash your face in you piece of crap!”.

Undertale dating

I hope the ending would be more well written because since the beginning of the story everything was great! However, since then, people’s expectations have changed regarding what they expect from products like hair mousse and defining curls has taken precedence. We will not be able to provide support for the functionality of such products or services. 6. TERMINATION WITHOUT PREJUDICE TO ANY OTHER RIGHTS. WP Dating.com may terminate this EULA if you fail to comply with any term or condition of this EULA. Read More Advice John Aiken Letting go of past relationship hurts One of the most important things you can do before jumping into the world of dating is to make sure you've let go of the past. Apparently, these badges are supposed to indicate how active you are on the site and they’re used to decorate your profile, but outside of that, they have no other use. Plus, we offer more features, it's free to respond to emails, we have the Color Code Personality Test, more members with photos, and more.

Men are attracted to confident women who get the concept of “interdependence.” Interdependence requires that you’re both independent and dependent; that means you create sacred space for your relationship as well as sacred space for your work, passions and friends. They met last year in the Celebrity Big Brother house, stared a showmance and left in a relationship. To make the area less cluttered you can sort conversations to first show those that are contain unread messages (the default setting), recent conversations, members nearby, or favorites. If we’re only in love with a list of qualities, well, then our love will drift to anyone who has those qualities. There is no standard time scale to run through these progressions, but the speed at which the situation in the couple wants it to be. Although Facebook imports and uses information derived from your Facebook account, it does not post anything on your feed. That’s game was so hard!” Literally every other message is the standard “hey” “how are you” “how is your week?” messages. But date feels weird at65 i be in november for me If ladys feel and need it more power to theme Its never to late I am ok i had planty in my life beffore I still dress stylist and act young becouse i have yo g brain Every one is defrent I had good looking boyfriends now i dont wan old men next to me Maybe companion friend but not sex.

European dating site

Thoughts of having to make eye contact with my date and being in a public place start to take over and fuel the bully as well. She has been featured in campaigns by a number of major brands including Tommy Hilfiger, Michael Kors and Chanel. The remaining four girlfriends are Michelle Cannes, Barbara Schternvart, Helena Wankstein and Katie Zhan. Our website matches up singles locally, so it's never a hassle to make the transition from online dating to dating in person. If you would prefer to find singles in your local area, join sports teams, organizations, or any recreational activities you enjoy. Types of military discounts include discounts for active duty military, veterans, retired military personnel, and military spouses or dependents.

Teens dating

The somehow arrives in the form of a contest--the grand prize: a date with Tad Hamilton--and the someday is now. The question is whether these gentlemen will be satisfied to wait for a hypothetical conversation early if the influx of female profiles will be enough to get them to use the application. What's not: Not everyone is super-active on Facebook, so you might not be able to see what your friends are up to. I haven’t had any major problems with the app, but I have met some pretty cool people, so don’t sleep on bumble ya’ll. I worry that if I don’t change how I feel when he does decide to date I won’t be able to stay his friend and I will loose him. To put it in perspective, I’m so quiet and shy I have no one to explain this too other than this thread of replies that someone may or may not read. That night at the bar resembled one of those “roundtable” discussions you see on an American Sunday morning political show such as Meet The Press.

Dating together

Now that they are heading to different colleges, they are going to share a memorable goodbye kiss. Th. Valentine's Day Slacking 2014 Sarah and her handsome husband, Tim, are preparing to enjoy a romantic date at a fancy restaurant to celebrate their love for Valentine's Day. Just 3-4 to put in my purse or in my pocket and refer to when we start looking like that elderly couple in the restaurant that remains in silence throughout the meal. This ties in with the shift towards spending less time on the internet and quickly moving to real world interactions. But Western publishers are still apprehensive because of past failures and the large up-front script translation cost with an unsure audience. Salsa Lessons This happy couple has always wanted to go salsa dancing, but they've never been able to find the time. As others have said the best you could hope for is to get fired and if it cost them the client the firm might even sue you. We are involved in the process of long distance matchmaking and we will use a variety of methods to facilitate that end.

[canaryatlaw]

ok. so today was pretty chill. I woke up at like 9:30 I think, got dressed and walked to Jess’ place because we had some (cosplay) shopping to do. got there and we went to the salvation army’s smaller store, she really only needed a tie and I didn’t need anything pressing so we found that fairly easily. We were discussing cosplays for WW Chicago because I realized/remembered that Tom Welling and Michael Rosenbaum are gonna be there as well and I’m obviously dying to meet them. and considering guest schedules and everything we’re switching plans up a little bit. currently Matt Ryan is listed as only being there Saturday and Sunday, so we’re gonna do the one for the photo op on Sunday (you’ll die laughing when you see it, I promise) and then Sunday I can do my thrown together Lois Lane cosplay which is literally just going to be a blazer, shirt, and skirt out of my closet lol being that I own a ton of business clothes already, and of course with a few added touches to make it more obvious. And this would mean I can save 3x10 Sara for Portland in a few weeks where Caity is actually going to be present so that works even better. I’m still trying to figure out if/what I might cosplay for HVFF NJ the day before Portland, it’s gonna be a crazy weekend and I’m not gonna have a whole lot of space to pack things, so we’ll see how it turns out. So yeah, got those are figured out, then went to Target to grab a few things, I only needed eggs and some heavy cream randomly enough lol, then we went to taco bell for food because we hadn’t really eaten yet so that was enjoyable. Afterwards we went back to Jess’ place so she could park her car by her apartment and grab her laptop, then we walked to my apartment from there. We had been discussing how it looks like they’re auditioning a new love interest for Alex on Supergirl which we’d be very interested in, but Jess never watched season 3, so we decided we’d start watching it today, and ended up making it through the mid-season finale episode. We skipped a lot of the episode on Mars because it was just kind of unnecessary and not particularly interesting, but we watched the rest of all the other ones. Again, Midvale is easily the best episode in the series, which is honestly like really sad because it has like none of the actual main actors in it besides short clips at the beginning and end. I really have to give it up to the actresses that portrayed young Kara and young Alex, not only were they the spitting image of their older counterpart, but they did such a good job bringing the emotion and really becoming the heart of the episode. For the rest of the season, well, Ruby and Sam are really the highlights, J’onn and his father are pretty good too but the main plot generally kinda sucks, not that that’s a surprise at this point. Apparently ubereats was running a promotion for free delivery from 2-5 pm so sometime after 4 we thought we’d take advantage of that, ended up getting food from a place called the golden corral because they do all day breakfast and I really wanted a waffle. And not gonna lie, now that I know I can order a waffle from my phone and have it delivered to me in under an hour is like, possibly too much power that I should have lol. So we ate our food and continued to watch Supergirl, then when we finished the mid-season finale episode we went to go get ice cream. We’re planning on going to the renaissance fair tomorrow which I’ve never been too, so that should be fun, we were trying to plan costumes and such so hopefully those will turn out well. Jess went home after that, I returned to my apartment and watched more of “Zumbo’s Just Desserts” which is like, the perfect level of absurdity to balance out my game of thrones nights and alternating between the two. I’m almost at the end of it though, the only I finished with tonight only had 3 contestants left, so just two more episodes. I was so pleased though because in one of the episodes I watched tonight there was this douche who was the last guy remaining in the competition and he was soooooo full of himself and was like, insulting his competitors to the camera and saying lots of just super shitty things like “I know I’m gonna win because I’m better than her” and shit like that so I was SO happy when it all blew up in his face and he got send home, BUH-BYE NOW. so I enjoyed that. And yeah, I finished that up for the night and then started getting ready for bed. NICKZANO (the cat) is doing quite well for herself, she seems very interested in sinks and can often be found sitting in them for reasons I can’t seem to figure out, but she’s still being very friendly and cuddly and just sweet in general so I have no complaints. And yeah, that’s about it for today. My eyes would like to be closed now, so I think I am going to do so now. Goodnight babes. Happy weekend.

[theprattleronline-blog]

You Hate Taylor Swift, and That’s Okay

Sage Kelley

You Hate Taylor Swift, and That’s Okay

I heard Taylor Swift’s new song the other day “Look What You Made Me Do”. The production was sparse and clean, keeping a dark sound throughout. The lyrics followed, brisk, straightforward, and pseudo-edgy, the “Look at how dark I’ve become” facade. It’s not necessarily catchy, and the vocals become a bit awkward in timing. The chorus sounds too similar to pop of the early 90’s, and the overall focus seems a bit too early-two-thousands Hot Topic. Then, the bomb hits. Or what Swift would like to consider said bomb.

Taylor Swift answers a call. “I’m sorry. The old Taylor can’t come to the phone right now. Why? Oh, cause she’s dead.”

Dramatic drop.

I gasped, then followed with laughter. Gut busting laughter. Chuckles. “This can’t be serious?” I thought.

Apparently the internet felt the same. Despite having over 245 million views on Youtube and being number one on Billboard’s Top 100, people don’t seem to be too happy about Swift’s new “gritty” single. There are various posts on social media mocking the intensity, claiming her sell-out status, and calling her a snake. 

I'll be honest, I don’t usually keep an eye (or ear) on Swift. I get the situation. A naive country singer sells out and becomes a pop-star. She occasionally speaks out for social issues. She dates a plethora of famous men. Seems fairly cookie cutter to me. But, after a few minutes of internet crowdsourcing, I realized: people absolutely hate Taylor Swift. Articles upon articles, posts upon posts, people tearing down Swift for various reasons. This peaked my interest. How could a pop-star be so polarizing? How could some innocent blonde from Pennsylvania have record breaking singles and tours, yet be so collectively hated? I journeyed down the rabbit hole that is the Taylor Swift Chronicles and learned, it’s totally okay to hate Taylor Swift. In fact, I might have a bit of disdain towards her now as well. 

Swift’s music is a bit of a toss up. I understand that some see her as a sellout. She came onto the country music scene with hits like “Teardrops On My Guitar” and sold herself as a little country girl, lost in the post-pubescent world of love. Then she switched up her style a bit, becoming more mainstream. She dropped the country twang and acoustic guitar for synth beats and electronic drums, eventually growing into a pop artist with her 2014 album 1989. The album sold 1,287,000 copies in a week. Taylor may have sold out by switching genres, but it paid off. Her music is catchy. It may all focus around the same idea of “innocent little me hurt by a boy” but she seems self aware in that aspect. It’s what sells, and I certainly can’t hate her for wanting money, to an extent. Pop is pop, and if done without the intent of being “Popular”, and more with the intent of using the genre as an artistic platform (Prince and Michael Jackson) then it can create for amazing music. But, if only done to earn radio play, it becomes monotonous and braindead. As her last few singles show, it seems as if she’s making music for the latter. 

But wait, there’s more.

Taylor Swift’s new tour has created an issue with Ticketmaster. In order to get a better chance at tickets, you have to participate in “boost activities” including: buying merchandise, preordering the new album, promoting her on social media, and watching various videos. This is not a joke. Swift wants more money in order for fans to buy expensive tickets that will ultimately spike the overall price of leftover tickets. That is selling out. That is money hungry. Taylor’s net worth is 280 million as of August, 2017. The concept not only reeks of desperation, but seems like a bit of a “screw you” to dedicated fans. Okay, so she’s a sellout. A bad sellout. So why does everyone call her a snake?

Her most popular instance of being a snake (i.e. being two-faced and deceptive in order to maintain her image) was her feud with Kim Kardashian-West and Kanye West last year. Now, Taylor was a victim when Kanye interrupted her VMA award in 2009. She was gracious when she accepted Kanye’s apology for the interruption and awarded him with the MTV Video Vanguard Award in 2015. Then Kanye dropped the line “I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex. Why? I made that bitch famous” on his cleverly named track “Famous.” Apparently, Taylor stated that she was fine with the lyric and thought it was humorous. Kim Kardashian-West went to Snapchat to post a video of Kanye talking to Taylor about the lyric. In the video, after Kanye reads her the line, Taylor says “It’s like a compliment,” and “I’m really glad that you had the respect to call and tell me about it. That’s really nice.” You can hear that it is her voice over the phone.

Here’s the snake part: Once the lyric stirred up controversy amongst Swift fans, Taylor did a complete turn-around, having her publicist state that Kanye did not ask for approval and she cautioned him on his song being seen as misogynistic. She then went to make a Grammy speech stating “There are going to be people along the way who will try to undercut your success or take credit for your accomplishments or your fame.” She completely backtracked on everything, and despite proof of her acceptance, lied about disliking the line. 

Swift then released countless songs, “Look What You Made Me Do” included, that seem to be jabs toward Kanye. There are countless other stories of her being two-faced. Taylor Swift is willing to do whatever it takes to uphold her long-lost reputation as America’s Sweetheart. She went back and forth with her ideals in order to stay with the consensus opinion. 

In 2015 Taylor Swift filed a lawsuit against DJ David Mueller for allegedly lifting her skirt. She went on a women’s rights kick, and eventually won the lawsuit and charged Mueller a single dollar. A symbolic dollar to show that woman shouldn’t be objectified and gaslit to feel as if sexual harassment was their fault. Awesome. I can’t say anything negative about the case, and it strikes a point in Swift’s “okay with me” category, but what followed became a bit unsettling.

At this point, with her fame and fanbase, Swift began using her popularity to share opinions on women’s rights. She can easily sway opinions, and was becoming a strong leader amongst a generation. Then the election happened. Donald Trump was, well, making blatant misogynistic statements. Swift became silent. Maybe she was working on her new album, diving deep into her artistic work. But it’s not hard to send a single tweet, or post a picture that displayed her opinion. Why didn’t Taylor continue her fight for women and take a stand? How many people would be informed and moved by her opinion? She has 85.5 million followers on Twitter. And in an equally severe, but more concentrated case, when Neo-nazis began using Swift in their propaganda, she stayed silent. She has still yet to make a statement on politics, and though she posted a photo of her at a voting booth, she never said who she voted for. Surely, can give her the benefit of the doubt, but being silent usually means negative things. As someone that had spoken so clearly about her opinions before, being silent can only mean that she was afraid. She had an extremely symbolic lawsuit against sexual harassment, but didn’t speak out about the notorious groper who was clearly en route to becoming the leader of the country? This warrants a few snake emojis.

After the Kanye lyric gained negative attention, she pulled back on her approval because it’ll make her seem misogynistic. Then, she disclosed her political views because, regardless of her stance, such would provoke negative attention. Now, wants fans to spend money, simply for a chance to get her concert tickets. And finally, she continues to make enemies with other stars in order to feed her “gritty” song concepts. People like drama; naturally they’ll listen to songs about drama.

Everything lines up to one conclusion: Taylor Swift is a sellout. She’s willing to change her views, denounce her friends, and rip-off her fans to maintain her image. She takes the moral high-ground until it alienates her fanbase, and with this, she doesn’t stand for anything with concrete footing. She changed her sound to become more pop-oriented. I can’t necessarily bash this idea, for most musicians usually do the same (I’m looking at you, Maroon 5). If you’re not making enough money in your genre, switch. This isn’t uncommon in the music world, and will continue to happen after Swift. Artists will do whatever it takes to stay relevant. Some, like Kanye, use negative publicity as a means of becoming infamous. Taylor does the opposite. The victim, even in her music. She has and always will be the “wronged”. It’s all an act. It’s all to get people talking. No one needs to spend time reading countless articles about a pop singer. I’m not very happy that I just did so for hours. 

You can hate Taylor Swift’s desperation for attention and money, that’s fine. Or you can ignore these things and just like her music, that’s also fine. It’s all pretty catchy anyway. But if there’s one thing I will say, her new music is terrible, and regardless of her persona, she’s still a musician, and that’s all that matters. 

-

Illustration by Hua Chen

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The Age of ‘Not Helping’

Somewhere, someone first wrote Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt. We are pretty sure it wasnt Mark Twain. It may have been Abraham Lincoln. It may have been somebody misremembering a biblical proverb, or the author of a book of rhymes for children. A Minnesota newspaper attributed it to Empeco. Wizard of Oz author L. Frank Baum may have come up with it. Whoever it was, they had a point.

2016 was an exciting time for the global far right and their stateside cheerleaders. Voters in the UK opted to separate from the European Union, which some feared would perilously weaken the alliance. Marine Le Pen, a French nationalist, was mounting a serious play for her countrys presidency. In Germany, in the Netherlands, in Hungary, and in Austria, far right seemed poised to break into the mainstream.

Fast forward six months into 2017, and that storyline seems to have reached its raveled end. Le Pen was defeated by a 39-year-old ingenue. Germanys Angela Merkels post looks safer for Germany than it did at the turn of the year. And in Great Britain, conservative Prime Minister Theresa May, human cautionary tale, called a snap election in an attempt to strengthen her power as the country heads into Brexit talks. This week, that effort backfired. May is now facing a hung parliament.

Many factors have contributed to this swing to the left. One of those reasons is Donald Trumps unpopularity, and his seeming inability, for even a second, to stop reminding people how much they hate him.

For an average person, the consequences of foolish speech only serve to embarrass the fool, or the fools girlfriend. But for politically active public figures, from celebrities who dabble all the way up to the Oval Office, foolish speech is more damaging. It gives ones opponents ammunition and turns off people who could have become allies.

Public figures have always been tripping over their own proverbial dicks, but, thanks to social media and an ethos that values the act of speaking up over the contents of speech, broadcasting ones foolishness has never been more seductive. Nor has it been easier for other people to notice that idiocy, expand its reach, and demand apologies from the poor fools tasked with PR cleanup.

Lena Dunham started her career as a shining star of young filmmaking talent, but recently has made more headlines for embodying a caricature of culturally walled-off safe space millennial liberalism. The most recent headache shes caused her ideological brethren occurred in December, when she told listeners to her podcast that she hadnt had an abortion, but wished she would have. She then apologized on Instagram by saying that she was merely playing a character. During the presidential campaign, she backed Hillary Clinton and vowed to move to Canada if Trump was elected, and then did not move to Canada. Last week, she posted a photo of herself wearing a body-length blaze orange sleeping bag, which somehow is supposed to fight gun violence, or something. If she didnt already exist, conservatives would invent her.

When Kathy Griffin posted a photo of herself hoisting a fake severed Donald Trump head the other week, all she accomplished was aiding producers at Fox & Friends struggling to find news stories to chase that did not have to do with Trumps ineptitude. She gave a party without ideas a break from weaving their own ropes. Her subsequent apology and press conference about bullying Streisand Effect-ed her into the right wing news cycle and Donald Trump Jrs conspiratory-nuts Twitter timeline. Not helping.

Bill Maher, in his long career, has found himself creating grief for his supposed ideological brethren, recently saying the N-word in conversation with Senator Ben Sasse. Sean Penn annoys the piss out of some on the left. So does Susan Sarandon. Actor Matt McGorrys over-the-top feminist dude wokeness is frequent fodder for ridicule among many all-female text circles. Not Helping.

Steve Harvey is a classic Not Helper. Sarah Palin has a similar opportunism streak, often inserting herself into discussions to add nothing but another thing to make those shes trying to help look bad. Maxine Waters, as beloved as shes become by some, is viewed by others as a corrupt grandstanding opportunist, tossing irresponsible accusations before enough evidence exists to back them up. Speaking of Maxine Waters: Bill OReilly. Not helping. Ann Coulter and Piers Morgan, while quick to speak up, often seem to do so without first considering whether theyre doing good or making a mess for somebody else to clean up.

In other cases, whether or not speaking up is helping or not isnt as clear.

Hillary Clinton stepped back from public life after her electoral defeat last fall. But now shes back, and shes exactly the same as ever. Sure, some superficial elements have changed– her purple pantsuit of defeat hasnt been brought out of retirement yet–her message is the one shes been delivering for her entire career in the public eye. Never let anybody silence your voice, she told graduates of Medgar Evers College in New York City this week.

Clintons months-long return to the limelight hasnt been smooth, nor has it always been welcome. Why cant the Clintons just go away? lamented the New York Post back in April. Weeks later, New York Daily News columnist Gersh Kuntzman urged Hillary Clinton to shut the f— up and go away! Two weeks later, Boston Globe columnist Adriana Cohen asked How can we move on together if Hillary Clinton wont go away? And on Friday, Vanity Fair joined the dogpile, running a story headlined Can Hillary Clinton please go quietly into the night?

If Hillary Clinton delivers a speech alone in a forest and theres no op-ed columnists around to tell her to fuck off, is she still hurting America?

Two weeks ago, Clinton delivered the commencement address at her alma mater Wellesley College. During that speech, she sharply criticized President Trump. The Republican National Committee tried to raise funds off Clintons speech immediately. After months of bumbling, gridlock, and failure, they finally had something pure that would fire up their supporters that didnt involve them highlighting their own inability to govern. On one hand, telling a woman to shut up for no reason sounds pretty sexist. On the other, Hillary Clinton declaring that she will not sit down or shut up was the best thing that happened to Republicans that week.

At the same time Clinton was urging graduates in New York City to keep speaking up, in Washington, DC, former FBI director James Comey was speaking under oath before a Senate committee. The committee was interested in figuring out whether President Donald Trump had attempted to obstruct an FBI investigation into the ties between various agents of the Trump campaign and Russian efforts to influence the American election. Trump, it seemed, couldnt resist speaking up about Michael Flynn, about wanting certain behaviors out of an FBI director. According to Comeys testimony, each time the president spoke up to Comey about FBI business, he just made things worse.

Say what you will about Donald Trump, the man has never, not once in his 70-year-life, shut the fuck up. A recording of him bragging about sexually assaulting women in an apparent attempt to convince Billy Bush that he was a cool and good guy incinerated the career of Bush and nearly tanked his campaign. There was that Obama-was-born-in-Kenya nonsense. Then-candidate Trump congratulated himself after 49 people were murdered in a terrorist attack in Orlando a year ago. He crowed about the UKs decision to pull out of the EU, last August tweeting with characteristic bombast that They will soon be calling me MR. BREXIT! After London was attacked by terrorists last weekend, President Mr. Brexit attacked Londons mayor and called for a travel ban on Twitter.

But a person can only talk so much shit before stepping in it, and Not Helper-In-Chief Trumps inability to shut up is a problem for people who get too close to him.

The Presidents twitter habit has cost him credibility, and his aides their dignity as they scramble to control a White House message thats about as streamlined as an untethered firehose on full blast. It may have forever ruined his childrens ability to function as business leaders; its tarnished his daughters image so much that she or somebody close to her has taken to planting positive stories about her in supermarket tabloids owned by Trump family allies.

Every day presents a new opportunity for Donald Trump to shut up. And every day, Donald Trump lets that opportunity pass him buy, reminding people the world over that they do not like him. To paraphrase dead #MAGA-land darling Pepe the Frog, tweeting feels good, man. But its not helping Trumps cause beyond Trumps own desire to express himself. His ego is screwing things up for people who should be his allies. Mr. Brexit indeed.

If Hillary Clinton needs to go quietly into the night to best serve her cause, Donald Trump needs to have his phone chucked into the Lincoln Memorials snail-infested reflecting pool, and be kept at least a golf course-length away from the nearest microphone.

Yesterday, during a press conference alongside Romanian President Klaus Iohannis, Trump again displayed his famous restraint, barking out that James Comey had lied during his Senate testimony and that hed testify to that effect under oath.

Somewhere, the author of that quote about proving ones foolishness by speaking up rolled over in his grave.

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