#it would definitely be one of like three films I go see ten times | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

supernovafics · 1 year ago

Text

series masterlist | last part

pairing: modern!actor!steve harrington x fem!reader

word count: 8.1k words

warnings: explicit language, angst, fluff, smut (18+)

summary: it’s ten months of texts, phone calls, voicemails, anything to make it feel like everything isn’t too different. and for the most part, it works. until you and steve finally see each other again

EPILOGUE | ❝𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝒉𝒐𝒎𝒆❞

You: How’s New York so far?

Steve: Good aside from Tom trying to force me to do more press stuff than what we initially agreed on and I’ve only been here three days

You: I kinda miss that british man

Steve: That truly offends me</3

You: I’m sorry<3

You: Okay very very important question

You: Empire State of Mind or Welcome to New York?

Steve: ????

You: You’re in New York for the next month so one of them has to be your signature song (and yes this is coming from the person that has only been to New York a handful of times. shut up don’t mention it)

Steve: Can I say no to both of them?

You: No.

Steve: Okay then

Steve: The Taylor Swift one

You: Solid answer

You: Now I will start your morning right every day you’re there by sending you lyrics from that song :)

Steve: Oh god

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

Steve: What was the name of that show we watched for almost five hours at your place that one night?

You: It sincerely hurts me that you forgot the name of Brooklyn Nine-Nine….

Steve: Yes, that’s it! I was thinking about this one episode we watched of it but I couldn’t remember the name

You: Are you about to watch it without me? (if the answer is yes that hurts me even more)

Steve: Yes I was… But now no way I would never watch it without you

You: A true friend. Thank you

Steve: Oh wait I’m just now realizing how late it is where you are. How are you even talking to me right now?

You: Yeah, it’s 2am but I can’t sleep. First day of real filming tomorrow. First day being AD. And yes all the pre-production stuff me and Jessie have been doing since we got to Spain two weeks ago has been perfectly leading to this moment, but now it just feels so fucking real and even though I know I’m not gonna mess up or anything I’m still nervous

Steve: You’re gonna do great and actually I think it’s impossible for you not to be really good at what you do

You: Thank you

Steve: I would suggest that I call you and we watch an episode of Brooklyn Nine-Nine to take your mind off things but you should sleep

You: No actually can we do that? I’m wide awake right now and I don’t think I’ll be able to fall asleep anytime soon

You: Also fun fact: I’m actually able to function better when I’m running on barely three hours of sleep

Steve: That’s a huge lie but okay

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

“… Please leave a message after the beep.”

You listened to the all-too familiar sound of the “beep” and then began speaking. “Okay, I know it’s like three in the morning in LA right now, so it completely makes sense why you didn’t answer. But, anyway, I just landed in London last night and now it’s morning and I’m at the coffee shop that you told me I should go to while I’m here.”

“It’s really, really great, and I hate how right you are about the tea being amazing, and it actually makes me change my mind about how much I dislike tea. Oh, also, I got my first ever British scone from here and it’s so good too. I think I’ll probably be spending every day at this place while I’m here for the next month.”

“And I know you raved a lot about the breakfast sandwiches here too, so I will try that tomorrow. I think you said that the bacon one was your favorite, but please confirm that because I can’t fully remember… Oh, wait, nevermind, it’s definitely the bacon because I do remember you saying that you miss it a lot.”

“I could bring you one back if you want? No, wait, actually, that wouldn’t make sense because even when I leave London, I’m still gonna be in Europe for three more months… Wait, I see that they sell coffee mugs here, though, so I could definitely bring you back that if you wanted me to? They have some cool options.”

“Alright, I think I’m just rambling at this point so let me shut up.” You let out a small laugh. “Okay, bye.”

Call Ended

You: *image attached*

You: Enjoy that picture of me being the most touristy tourist in the world :)

Steve: I can’t believe you’re doing the leaning tower of pisa pose thing

You: I had to. I couldn’t come here and not do it. It feels like tradition. A rite of passage, if you will

Steve: You’re such a dork

You: Joke’s on you because I fully take that as a compliment, so thank you

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

The feeling of your phone vibrating in the back pocket of the jeans you were wearing surprised you because you thought you had turned it off for the day. And then seeing Steve’s name take over your phone screen further surprised you, but you didn’t hesitate to answer the call.

“Hi,” You said. You were on a break for the first time that day, so the timing of his call was actually kind of perfect. “This is a pretty nice surprise.”

“Hey, how’s it going?” It felt really good actually hearing his voice for the first time in what felt like forever.

“Pretty good. I never thought I’d actually find myself truly missing LA, but now I kinda can’t wait to be back there in three weeks,” You answered, saying what had been on your mind for a while at this point. “How’s Vancouver?”

“Nice so far. It’s actually been snowing a lot, but I like it.”

“I hope you've been doing all of the snow and Winter activities; making snow angels, sledding down hills. Y’know, all the stuff they do in children’s Christmas movies.”

You almost immediately heard Steve laugh at your words. “The apartment I’m staying at here has a balcony, and last night after it stopped snowing I made a really small snowman.”

You smiled. “I love that. Please send me a picture of it.”

“Okay.”

Things became quiet for a moment, and it was a silence that easily felt comfortable and you didn’t mind it at all. Simply knowing that Steve was on the other end of the call felt like enough.

“This is a random thought, but we never usually talk on the phone. Mainly because our time zones are insanely different, so the timing is never right, and we’re either leaving each other voicemails or just texting, which is fine. But it’s really nice hearing your voice. It’s just… really comforting.” You let out a soft breath. “Where I am right now and where I’ve been the past five-ish months have become my makeshift “homes,” but talking to you actually feels like home, in a way… And I know exactly how disgustingly cheesy that sounds. Don’t say anything about it, or I will end this call.”

Steve laughed a bit. “No, I agree with you. We’ve talked about feeling lonely before, but even though we haven’t seen each other in what feels like a really long time, whenever we text and especially when we talk on the phone, it’s hard to feel lonely. It’s like all of these miles between us don’t really matter, which is nice. You’re my “home” too.”

You were quiet for a second, fully taking in his words and smiling at how happy they made you feel. It was the kind of happiness where you also kind of felt like crying.

You loved what you had been doing currently with your job and you wouldn’t have changed any of it, but you also really wished that you could see Steve right then; you would’ve killed for a hug.

“Okay, I think I should go before I start crying,” You said, only slightly joking with your words. “Also, I only have ten more minutes of my break, and I haven’t eaten since this morning.”

“Oh shit, I’m sorry.”

You shook your head even though he couldn’t see you. “No, don’t be sorry. Like I said, I really like when we can actually talk to each other. I like hearing your voice.”

“I like hearing yours too,” He told you and somehow it was easy to hear the smile in his tone. “Okay, I’m gonna hang up now. Go eat something.”

“Aye, aye captain,” You said with a small laugh. “Talk to you soon.”

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

You: I just watched the final cut of Fear of Lonesome with Jessie… Enjoy this picture of me currently bawling my eyes out at the ending

You: *image attached*

Steve: Sorry for making you cry?

You: It was worth it, honestly

Steve: You’re coming to the cast and crew screening next week right?

You: Of course. I will happily cry at this movie again :)

You: It’s kinda really fucked up how good of an actor you are

Steve: Thank you? At least I think that’s a compliment

You: It is<3

You: Anyway I’ll see you next week then

You: The first time in a really really long time. Holy shit

Steve: That feels a little weird to think about. But a good kind of weird

You: Yeah definitely the good kind

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

It was a moment that was ten months in the making.

Ten months of texts, voicemails, and sporadic phone calls. Ten months of being so far apart from one another, but doing so much to make it feel like you weren’t.

It was all leading here— seeing Steve in person at the small theater in West Hollywood that had been rented out for the night’s occasion. And when you saw him, talking to random members of the cast and crew, it didn’t exactly feel real, which made you not say anything.

Until he saw you and your eyes met and small smiles were quickly shared. You gave him a small nod before you got pulled into a conversation with someone.

He looked a little different, hair grown out a bit more and there was something minorly different about his stance, but overall he was still your Steve. Well, not technically yours, but close enough. You then wondered if he thought you looked any different. You personally felt a bit different, in a good way; like you’d become better over the past ten months, and in some ways, more of yourself.

It was almost amusing how, most of the time, the time seemed to move slowly over the past ten months, but now it was suddenly moving so much faster.

Everyone left the lobby area and started making their way inside the room that the screening would be happening in since it was scheduled to start in five minutes, but you and Steve lingered back, walking toward each other until there were only a few beats of space between you two.

You smiled at him again. “Hi.”

“Hi.” He stepped forward to close the rest of the distance between you and pull you in for a hug, but you stepped back.

“Oh, I don’t know if I’m allowed to hug you. Y’know given that you’re an engaged man and all.” You tried to be completely serious with your words but it was hard not to laugh at least a little bit.

According to many celebrity news outlets, Steve and his female costar of the limited series he’d been filming in Vancouver for the past five months were dating. It was a rumor that started about two months into filming, and there had been no confirmations about the said relationship but there were also no hard denials, so the speculations continued. And then there were even a handful of news outlets that went quite insane with their headlines and said that the two were secretly engaged. You both had laughed about it then when you sent that article to him, because the rumors were hilariously ridiculous, and you couldn’t not joke about it now.

“Ha ha,” He said, voice deadpan. “I didn’t even get to tell you, but Tom suggested that me and Lily actually start fake dating because, in addition to all of this giving so much more press to the show, it could also help me. If I’m dating someone it will fully “kill off the asshole image.” I immediately vetoed that idea, though.”

Although the asshole narrative that surrounded Steve still existed— not as prominent as it once was but it still lingered whenever his name was brought up by the media— it was hard to see him like that anymore.

You let out a laugh. “Of course Tom would suggest that.”

“Yeah, he’s…” Steve trailed off with a quick shake of his head. “Anyway, c’mere.”

You walked into his open arms that time, pushing up on your toes to circle your arms around his neck as his wrapped around your waist. Your eyes fell shut as he held you tight and it was then that the time felt like it started to move slow again.

“I have something for you,” You told him after a moment, words getting somewhat lost in his neck but he was still able to hear you. “A little gift. It’s in my car, I’ll give it to you after.”

“I also have something for you,” Steve whispered, and you opened your eyes at that.

You pulled back from the hug, still smiling at him. “Great minds, hm?”

He nodded and matched your smile with one of his own. Seeing him right then still didn’t entirely feel real just yet, so you went quiet once again and the two of you simply looked at each other.

During the past ten months you and him had talked pretty much all of the time, but there was something different about this moment. Feelings that you thought you had successfully pushed far away rushed right back to the surface.

“We should head inside,” He said, breaking the silence and pulling you out of your thoughts, which you were grateful for because you really didn’t want to think right then, especially not about that.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

You were the one that suggested Steve come back to your place and the small gift exchange happen there.

The screening felt as if it ended too soon and the inevitability of the night itself ending started to hang in the air. However, you couldn’t allow that to happen; you wanted this night to last as long as it could.

Steve agreed with your suggestion and thirty minutes after various goodbyes were said, the two of you were sitting on your couch as a frozen pizza that you’d just bought yesterday cooked in the oven because both of you were hungry.

You were already wearing the navy blue oversized crewneck he got you that had “Vancouver” embroidered in white across the front of it. It was comfortable and perfect, and a simple gift but also the best thing you’d received in a while.

“I hope you like this,” You said as you handed him the gift you’d gotten for him; a cream colored mug with the logo of a coffee shop in brown lettering on the side. “I know you said that you were okay with not getting a mug from that coffee shop in London, but I just really wanted to get you this one.”

Steve looked at the mug for a second and then at you, a smile on his face. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” You said and your fingers started mindlessly playing with the hem of your crewneck as you continued speaking. “I’ve missed you a lot this past year. I know we talked so often and everything, but being right here, in person, feels really nice.”

“I’ve missed you too,” He said softly before he placed the mug on the coffee table barely a few feet away and then met your eyes again. “There were so many times where I wanted to just drop everything and go see you. Rearrange plans or cancel some stupid press stuff and meet up with you. Even if it would only be for barely a day or whatever. I just always wanted to see you.”

You wanted to tell him how much you related to his words. You wanted to say how there were a countless amount of times where you had yearned to do the exact same thing. However, you couldn’t find the words to tell Steve any of that, so instead you only looked at him for a bit.

It was almost funny how many times you had become at a loss of words so far that night simply because of him. But it was as if the fact that you were suppressing so much made you unable to say pretty much anything. Because you were scared of where exactly your mind would go if you didn’t immediately shut down some of your thoughts that involved you and Steve, especially now that he was right here instead of thousands of miles away and no longer solely limited to the confines of your phone.

He was your friend. Best friend. And it had been so much easier to pretend that that was where you and him solely began and ended when you both were so far away from each other— when he wasn’t right in front of you and you weren’t so easily reminded of how close you two used to be in such a different way.

Those same revived feelings from earlier that night came right back again, and they practically increased tenfold because you found yourself wanting to kiss him so fucking badly. And, of course, there was a part of your mind that immediately told you just how bad of an idea that would be. However, at that moment, you became okay with all logical thinking being pushed out of the window.

In your mind it felt like you were moving in slow motion, scooting closer to him on the couch and sliding into his lap so that your legs were on either side of him, but in reality it was happening so much quicker. However, you stopped there before you did anything else.

You could see some confusion in his eyes and also something else that you couldn’t fully decipher, maybe he was contemplating things as much as you had been before you decided to take this sort of plunge.

That look was almost enough to wake you up and remind you of what had been agreed upon all those months ago, but it wasn’t enough to make you pull away from Steve. However, instead of sliding off of his lap or moving things further, you gave the metaphorical ball to him.

You let silence hang in the air as the two of you simply looked at each other and you gave him the opportunity to push you away. To tell you that there wasn’t any part of him that wanted this to happen. That he was so far past feeling anything like that toward you anymore. That he never even thought about it.

You would’ve been okay with any of those things happening because even though it would’ve hurt, it would actually make things a thousand times easier.

But, he didn’t do or say any of that. Instead, he closed the last bit of space between you two and slotted his lips against yours.

It was an immovable and obvious fact that you had missed him so much over the past ten months, but you now realized that you had missed this just as much. A soft kiss that almost immediately turned into something more with one of Steve’s hands coming up to cup your cheek and the other finding your hip to keep you steady. You couldn’t help but moan into his mouth when his tongue ran across your bottom lip making the kiss deeper, and your hands fisted themselves into his t-shirt to bring yourself impossibly closer to him.

For the time being, you effectively turned your mind off. You deliberately chose not to think about what this exactly meant or what it would come to mean. All you focused on in that moment was how fucking good doing this with Steve felt.

Your hands found the hem of your crewneck because you suddenly felt way too hot and you pulled away from Steve for a second so that you could slip it over your head, leaving you in just your black tank top and shorts.

You became so lost in the pure happiness of everything that was happening right then that you couldn’t hear anything except your heart pounding in your ears and the soft sounds Steve was managing to elicit from you due to the way he was squeezing your hips.

“The oven,” He mumbled against your lips, which slowly snapped you out of the haze you were in. “The oven is beeping.”

It was then that you heard the incessant noise; almost too loud and clear.

You abruptly pulled away from Steve and maneuvered off of his lap. “Oh, shit.”

He followed you into the kitchen as you opened up the oven and used a mitt to grab the circular pan the pizza was on and place it atop the stove.

“That was, um…” You trailed off not knowing exactly where you wanted to go with your words.

Steve shook his head. “It’s okay. We don’t have to talk about it.”

“I don’t regret what just happened,” You blurted out. They were the words that pretty much mimicked what was said after the first time you two ever had sex. But, instead of those words first coming from Steve they were coming from you. “And I don’t really know what that means, and I kinda don’t wanna think about what it means right now. I kinda just don’t wanna think at all right now. Sometimes I feel like I think way too much when it comes to us.”

He was quiet for a second before he nodded at you. “Okay.”

His hands found your hips and you were softly pressed against the side of the kitchen counter. You two shared a look that felt as if it was saying a million things, none of which you particularly wanted to decipher right then.

Before things could stay silent for too long, before you accidentally let your mind fall down a spiraling rabbit hole, you nodded a bit and mimicked Steve’s previous word. “Okay.”

His hands came up to cup your face before he leaned in to kiss you again. You didn’t waste a second to push yourself onto the counter and Steve’s lips found your neck, roughly kissing and nipping at the skin. Your hands started playing with the hem of his t-shirt before circling in the loops of his jeans and pulling him flush against you. When you felt his hardness press against your inner thigh, you took in a sharp breath and let out a soft moan. You were completely certain that you would’ve let him pull off your shorts and underwear and do whatever he wanted to do to you against your kitchen counter if you weren’t reminded of something else.

“The pizza?” You mumbled, a bit unable to form the question coherently because all you could really focus on was the feeling of Steve’s mouth against you.

He pulled away from your neck and met your eyes. “We can eat it after.”

He didn’t have to specify further for you to know exactly what he meant. You smiled and pressed a quick kiss against his lips. “Yeah, after sounds perfect.”

It became a blur of movements after those words fell from your lips. His hands found the backs of your thighs and he picked you up— the abruptness of the action made you simultaneously yelp and laugh as your arms came up to circle around his neck. You were carried to your bedroom and softly placed down against the unmade bed. Clothes were quickly shed until there was nothing between you and him.

No words were said in these rushed moments where hands and mouths roamed almost everywhere on each other's bodies; the brief looks shared and breathy noises coming from both of you were enough.

It was as if one mind was being shared or a song that only you two knew the words to was playing and both of you were singing along. Your hands were in his hair, softly pulling because the groans he’d let out were probably the hottest thing you’d ever heard. And his middle finger softly teased your clit as he whispered the filthiest things in your ear because he knew just how much that would make you lose it.

It had been almost a year but neither of you forgot these little things about one another and it almost felt like second nature to be with each other in this way. There wasn’t a hint of nervousness or awkwardness, and maybe that was saying a lot more than you wanted to admit.

You were positive that if you fully thought about what was happening right then, your mind wouldn’t hesitate to yell at you that this was a bad idea; that it would only make things complicated, and start you both back at square one.

However, it would also tell you that the times in your life where you felt your happiest and most comfortable mainly consisted of moments with Steve, and that was something that felt as if it would never change.

Therefore, when he slipped inside you with a low groan that you caught with your mouth and proceeded to make you come faster than you had in such a long time, it was hard to feel anything but completely happy.

Your legs wrapped around him, coaxing him deeper inside of you and soft “pleases” fell from your lips begging him to come. And after a particularly hard thrust, he let out a loud “Fuck” and came inside of you, and you couldn’t do anything but moan at the feeling of his cum painting your walls.

The weight of him crushed you in the most comforting way possible, and you tilted your head upward a bit to meet his lips in a soft and lazy kiss. The two of you stayed just like that for a while, coming down from your highs and letting your racing hearts return to normal. Your head fell back against your pillow, eyes closing, but you didn’t feel tired.

“When those articles about you and Lily dating started coming out, I knew exactly how ridiculous the rumors were because I feel like we have the kind of… friendship where you’d tell me if you were dating someone… But, there was still a small part of me that believed it for a second, and it was actually so hard to not feel a little sad about it.” Your words came out quiet, and you actually had no idea why you had just said all of that— perhaps that confession did not make for the best post-sex pillow talk conversation. But, for some reason, you wanted to say it.

It was a thought that had weighed on you all those months ago, and you knew that you couldn’t tell that to him then because of what it implied. And you weren’t entirely sure why and what made this moment different from then.

Steve was quiet for a bit and his face was buried in your neck as he softly spoke. “I don’t really know what to say to that.”

“It’s okay,” You whispered back. “You don’t have to say anything. It was dumb of me to feel that way about it.”

He rolled off of you and the feel of his warmth against you was something that you missed almost immediately. For a second you thought that maybe you ruined this moment, whatever it was, but then he said something.

“What are you doing this weekend?” He asked, and you were grateful for the randomness of the subject change.

You let out a breath that you didn't know you’d been holding and turned on your side to face him. “For once, absolutely nothing. It’ll probably be the last time I actually have nothing to do before the documentary I’m helping out on starts filming in a month, and I have to do some pre-production stuff for it soon.”

Work was honestly the only thing in your life that felt completely certain, so it always felt easy to talk about.

“You should come to New York. I’m going tomorrow, and I'll be there until the premiere here for the movie next week. I have to do some press stuff and have a few meetings. A bunch of boring stuff, but you should come for the weekend,” Steve said, one hand finding your bare hip and softly rubbing the skin. “To make the boring stuff a lot less boring.”

You couldn’t help but smile at that, and you nodded at him, quickly deciding not to think too heavily about your answer. “Okay.”

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

It was a little surprising that it wasn’t surprising how easy things fell back into that old place with you and Steve. Back to what sort of resembled the “arrangement” that had started during filming a year ago where you two pretty much acted like you were in a relationship, but neither of you would say the words or wholeheartedly acknowledge that fact.

There was a lot that you two would eventually have to talk about, but you decided that that would be a bridge that you’d cross once you were hours away from getting on your flight back to California. And it was a flight that kept changing because you didn’t want to leave New York just yet; you didn’t want to leave Steve yet.

So, your weekend trip extended days upon days until Wednesday came and it was agreed upon that you’d just go back to Los Angeles Friday morning when Steve was heading back there as well because that was the same day as the movie premiere.

You had a little work to do during those first few weekdays you were there, but you found it easy to respond to emails and make the phone calls you needed to from the comfort of Steve’s apartment, which was smaller than his place in LA but of course still massive and had a great view of Central Park. The dining room area became your makeshift “work from home” spot with your laptop at the table at pretty much all times. And while you did that, Steve was off doing press stuff for the movie, or he was in meetings; the things aside from filming that came along with being a famous actor.

And then when the day would change into the evening and then night, you two were together, doing everything that you both had desperately missed doing. You two still knew each other’s bodies so well, and it was as if that fact was only further and further proven every night.

It was hard not to be close to each other when for so long, you hadn’t been able to be, and because of that, things became a little different this time around in comparison to what the “arrangement” had been. There were little touches and affections— holding hands while sitting as close as you possibly could on the couch or Steve kissing you goodbye before he’d leave the apartment— that hadn’t happened before because of the lines that had been metaphorically drawn, but they felt pretty blurred now.

A sort of routine quickly and almost effortlessly formed and it gave you that glimpse into what you and him could be if the circumstances were slightly different. And it was hard not to admit that you completely adored what this “what if” looked like.

“We need snacks.” Your words were random and abrupt and Steve only looked at you amusingly.

It was Wednesday night, days before things would inevitably change, and you weren’t completely sure what they’d change into— if they’d go back to the normal you had created with Steve where the two of you were friends and nothing more, or if things changed into something else entirely. You still completely avoided thinking about it all, and it was pretty damn nice living in this fantasy world.

The two of you were on the couch in his living room. Your legs were draped over his lap and a blanket covered you both.

One of Steve’s hands was absentmindedly rubbing your leg beneath the blanket as he spoke. “There’s some stuff in the pantry.”

“If we’re about to spend the entire night watching The Hunger Games movies we need more than just the chips to keep us alive.”

His eyebrows furrowed at your words. “Am I underestimating how long these movies are?”

“You definitely are,” You said with a small laugh and pressed a quick kiss against his lips. You then pulled off the blanket that had been draped over the both of you and stood up from the couch. “I’ll go to the convenience store down the street.”

Steve got up as well. “I’ll come too.”

You quickly shook your head. “No way. It’s kinda insane how the paparazzi seem way more ruthless here. I think they’re always camping outside the building.”

Over the past few days, you had come to the conclusion that it was lucky that Steve lived in an apartment building because whenever you would leave and come back, no one could ever know that you were there for him. And you knew just how big of a field day they would have if they did know, especially because of the dating rumors that were still circling about him and Lily.

“Yeah, way too many famous people live here,” Steve said as he followed you into his bedroom.

Your small suitcase, that had only been meant for a weekend trip and was packed as such, was a haphazard mess in the corner. You slipped off the shorts you were wearing and pulled on a black pair of leggings.

“And yet, I’ve still not run into Paul Rudd on the elevator since I’ve been here,” You jokingly said and expected Steve to laugh, but instead he bypassed your statement.

“Wait, it’s raining. You sure you’re gonna be okay out there?”

You smiled at his slightly concerned face. “Okay, I know I’ve been living in LA for a long time now, but don’t worry I have in fact experienced rain before.”

Steve shook his head at you but still couldn’t help but laugh a little at your words. “Hold on.”

He almost immediately walked away, heading into his closet, before you could ask him what he was doing, and then returned moments later with a hoodie and umbrella.

“I was already planning to steal a hoodie, but thanks for the umbrella,” You told him with a smile as you put on the plain black hoodie. “What kind of candy do you want me to get?”

“Skittles.”

“Solid answer,” You responded with a nod.

The two of you headed toward the front door and you put on your shoes that were next to it. Once you were done, Steve handed you the umbrella. He then pulled the hood of the hoodie over your head and then leaned in to press a kiss on your nose. “Don’t meet Paul Rudd on the elevator.”

You laughed a bit. “I’m sorry, but I really, really hope I do.”

You didn’t meet Paul Rudd on the elevator, and you told Steve that with an over dramatic sad sigh when you came back from the store twenty minutes later, a bag full of junk food in hand, before you both settled back on the couch.

The two of you were only able to fully watch the first two Hunger Games movies before falling asleep an hour into the third one, around two in the morning. You half-woke up when the credits were rolling and then lightly poked Steve awake so that you two could go to his actual bed for the rest of the night.

“This is how it would be, y’know,” Steve said in the morning, words slightly getting lost in your hair.

The two of you were cuddled in his bed, your back pressed against his front and one of his arms draped over your waist. You had just finished having a half-awake discussion about what to do for breakfast before he said that he had to leave soon for the final day of press interviews for the movie, but he told you about a bagel place nearby that you’d probably like. And then the conversation shifted to a pinky promise agreement that you and him would finish the final two Hunger Games movies that night.

Things became quiet after that, with both of you savoring the last few minutes you could spend in bed, and you found his hand, intertwining it with yours and pulling it up to kiss the back of it.

You almost shifted around to face Steve after he abruptly said his previous words, but you felt too comfortable in your current position to do so. “How what would be?”

“You and me if we decided to be something real.”

“Steve,” You said softly and then decided to shift around so that you were looking at him. His hair was a little disheveled and he looked pretty tired, but he also looked so cute. If he hadn’t just abruptly pushed open the door to the conversation that you knew needed to happen, you were certain that you would’ve kissed him right then.

“I’m just saying...” He said as his shoulders upturned in a small shrug. “Also, I’m slightly kidding. This week has been really good, and I’m glad we got to have it, but I know things will go back to… normal soon. And that’s okay.”

Hearing him say that— confirming that things would just go back to how they were, a friendship where you both seemed to just lie about what you really wanted and how you felt— made you get hit with the sudden realization that you hated the thought of going back to that.

However, for some reason, you couldn’t find the words to tell him that right then, so instead you nodded at what he had just said and plastered on a fake smile. You made your voice sound as light as possible. “Yeah.”

He left the apartment forty-minutes later and you left it twenty minutes after that, deciding to go to the bagel place he suggested because you were hungry and also because you didn’t want to be alone in his apartment with only your confusing and contradicting thoughts to keep you company.

However, somehow as you walked aimlessly around Central Park— your bag with your plain cream cheese bagel in one hand and iced coffee in the other— that was when it felt like the dam broke, and your mind started spiraling because it finally felt impossible to keep avoiding and pushing your thoughts away. You were finally facing the bridge that you had told yourself you’d eventually have to cross, and in your head, you could see that the end of it was leading in two completely different directions. And you knew the exact direction you wanted to go in.

Your friendship with Steve was supposed to be more than enough. That was what you had told yourself that night at the wrap party to convince yourself that you were completely okay with only having a friendship with him.

But now, after these past five days of getting that glimpse into what something more could look like, you knew that just being friends really wasn’t enough, and it never would be. And although a part of you still felt a little scared to risk it all, there was an even bigger part of you that didn’t want to give this up anymore.

You couldn’t give up how completely and irrevocably happy Steve made you in more ways than just friendship. It was a mixture of the butterflies you’d get in your stomach whenever he would pull you close to him to press a soft kiss against your forehead or cheek and the wide smile you’d get on your face when he’d come back to the apartment after being gone for hours. It was also how he would look at you so adoringly when you would ramble about work stuff and how he could easily manage to convince you to stay in bed for “five more minutes;” five minutes that would always turn into at least ten but you never cared.

Steve Harrington made you the happiest you’d ever been and you suddenly became tired of continuously avoiding that fact.

It was a series of quick but definitely long overdue actions that happened next.

You found yourself sitting on a park bench with the thought of eating your bagel or drinking more of your coffee long forgotten for the time being, and instead they simply sat next to you, because there was something else you needed to do at that moment. You pulled out your phone and went to Steve’s contact, pressing the call button before you could think twice about it.

It went straight to voicemail, just like you knew it would because he always kept it off during interviews, so you waited for the way too familiar “beep” sound and then started speaking.

“Hi,” Your voice came out softer than you expected it to, so you cleared your throat. “I knew that you weren’t gonna answer, and I’m kinda glad that you didn’t because I just want to get all of this out all at once. So, stay tuned for a very long-winded ramble from me.” You let out a small laugh. “Um, anyway, these past five days that I’ve been here in New York with you have been so good, like insanely good, and I’ve been avoiding thinking about what would happen after this and what would exactly change between us. And I was completely okay with not thinking about any of that because it made it easier to just live in the moment and be happy with what we’ve been doing. But then this morning, you said that it’s okay that things will go back to normal soon and that finally made me think about everything, and I realized that I don’t want us to go back to “normal.” I actually kind of hate the thought of doing so.”

You stopped for a moment, gaze becoming fixated on a group of friends that had blankets spread out in the grass and were having a picnic not that far away from you, and then you looked at a couple that was walking down one of the paths holding hands.

After taking a quick breath, you kept going. “You’re so important to me, and our friendship is so important to me too… But I love you. I’m in love with you. And because of that, I can’t just be your friend. I want more, I want us to be something real; and that’s pretty much exactly what you said that night at my apartment almost a year ago. I’m so sorry that it’s taken me this long to realize just how fucking great we are together.”

Your hand that wasn’t holding your phone to your ear began absentmindedly playing with the hem of the sweatshirt you were wearing; it was the Vancouver crewneck he got for you.

“I want us to have days like this past week forever. And I know that this week has kind of been a fluke because, for the first time in a really long time, our schedules worked out pretty well. But we can make this work. I know we can. I was an idiot to say that we don’t make sense before because we do. Yes, our lives pull us in pretty different directions most of the time, and it sucks, but it's okay because it doesn’t change how I feel about you, and it never will. And I think that's the most important thing. It's why I know we, us, can actually work.”

You leaned back against the wooden bench and let out a breath. “Okay, wow, I’m so surprised that I haven’t been cut off yet… I’m currently sitting on a park bench in Central Park, and I got a bagel and coffee from the place you mentioned. I haven’t tried the bagel yet, but the coffee’s pretty good…” You trailed off with a shake of your head and then laughed a bit. “I have no idea why I’m telling you that right now. Um, anyway, I’m gonna stop talking now, and I’ll see you back at the apartment later. Bye.”

When you ended the call and pocketed your phone away, you felt an immediate weight lift off of your shoulders and you let out a contented sigh that turned into a small laugh.

You waited for a second, though, waited for something that resembled dread or regret to suddenly hit you, but it never did. And that was what let you know that what you’d just done was fully the right thing to do.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

Hours later, you still felt nothing but complete contentment with what you had done, leaving the minute and a half long voicemail that would, in fact, change everything. You wanted it to change everything.

After responding to a handful of work emails and then enduring an hour-long phone call with one of the Producer’s of the soon-to-be filming documentary, you were in the kitchen searching for some sort of a snack to eat. However, hearing the sound of the front door opening halted your rummaging.

“Hi,” You said, watching Steve enter the apartment and then close and lock the door behind him.

He met your eyes almost immediately. “I really loved that voicemail.”

You smiled at him, at how quickly he wanted to address the elephant in the room before it really even had a chance to enter. “Yeah?”

He didn’t hesitate to nod his head and he smiled back at you. “Yeah. I’m never deleting it.”

He looked so happy as he walked over to you where you were leaning against the kitchen island, and that look made your heart constrict in your chest.

“I love you,” It didn’t feel the tiniest bit scary to say the words right to him, they just felt so honest and undeniable. Your voice was soft and your arms came up to wrap around his neck, hands immediately finding home in the hair at the nape.

“Mm,” His eyes slipped shut as his arms circled around you, pulling you against him. “Say it again.”

Your mouth was right against his ear as you spoke. “I love you.”

He hummed again and then pulled back a bit, his nose brushed against yours and his lips did the same. It was all so teasing, like he wanted to take his absolute time with kissing you. However, now it didn’t have to be slow or drawn out because none of this was going to abruptly end; there was no expiration date apart of this like the arrangement you had a year ago.

“I love you too,” He said before finally slotting his lips against yours.

There was so much expressed in the soft kiss. It completely felt like the beginning of something new, something better, rather than simply a continuation of what you two had. The kiss was so certain and sure and it only further confirmed to you that everything happening was right and good and perfect. This was what you had wanted from the moment the two of you made that pinky promise during the wrap party; the one where you both said that you wouldn’t let your friendship end. Technically, it wasn’t being broken.

You pulled away when you started feeling lightheaded and you met Steve’s gaze as you allowed yourself to breathe for a bit. You were quiet for only a second.

“This will work,” You whispered.

Steve nodded and then pressed a kiss to your forehead. “Yeah, it will.”

The three simple words comforted you, they wrapped around you like a warm blanket, and you savored the feel of them. For the first time, probably ever, your overthinking mind felt sated; it couldn’t find anything wrong about this moment. You finally felt like you could breathe so goddamn easy because there was nothing to truly worry about, and you found yourself wanting to cry at that feeling, but you didn’t. Instead, you kissed Steve’s cheek and then his other one, and then his nose and forehead.

“This is random, but I’m really, really glad that I was forced to be your assistant.”

Steve laughed a bit at that. “Sometimes it doesn’t even really feel like that's where we started.” His hands found yours, intertwining them and giving them a light squeeze. “But, I’m so fucking glad that it was you.”

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

author’s note: i'm gonna miss these two<333 i hope yall enjoyed this series! its been a rollercoaster fr (a good one for the most part though lol) i might do lil blurbs for these two someday because i'm way too attached to them and i have some minor ideas of some things i'd wanna do involving them.... but that probably won't happen for a while because after somehow being able to put out chapters weekly for this i do in fact need a Break lmao but anyway thank you for reading and enjoying this series🫶🏾🫶🏾🫶🏾🫶🏾

#steve harrington x reader #steve harrington fic #steve harrington smut #steve harrington fluff #steve harrington x you #steve harrington imagine #steve harrington x fem!reader #steve harrington series #steve harrington x reader smut #steve harrington fanfiction #stranger things fic #stranger things fluff #stranger things imagine

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fairyniceyeah · 6 months ago

Text

💎🍚 I’m tryin’ to hold on

Title from Domino (SEVENTEEN)

Summary: Wonwoo and Seungcheol notice that Woozi isn't feeling well during a filming. While he manages to push through the aftermath gets worse.

CW: emeto

Sickie: Jihoon/Woozi

Caretakers: S.Coups/Seungcheol + Soonyoung/Hoshi + Joshua

Keeping track of twelve other people was about as hard as people imagined. Seungcheol could definitely attest to that. Ten minutes into a shooting break and absolute chaos had broken out.

It didn’t help that half of the group acted like children and the other half treated them like children. Maybe it was his own fault, really. He should have read the parenting books his brother had gifted him as a joke years ago. Well, more than the one or two he had actually read. Jeonghan had made fun of him for weeks after he had accidentally found out. At least Seungcheol had had the decency to not mention it when he found one of the books in Jeonghan’s backpack a few weeks later.

As he observed the field they were at, his gaze was immediately drawn to DK, Hoshi and Seungkwan who somehow decided that acting out a three man sword fight with wooden sticks was the greatest way to spend the break. Jeonghan, Jun and Dino were edging them on. Great. At least Jeonghan and Jun knew they would be in deep shit if something went wrong.

Mingyu, Vernon, Minghao and Joshua were also watching from a distance but acted like they were more focused on the buffet beside them. Alright, three and three and four that made ten. He himself was eleven. So he was still missing two members.

His question of the others whereabouts was half-answered when somebody tapped his shoulder and he came face to face with Wonwoo. The other rapper was frowning a bit, his nose scrunched up in worry.

“Everything okay, Wonwoo-yah?”, Seungcheol asked, already on high alert.

“I'm fine, hyung. I think something might be up with Jihoon-ah though”, Wonwoo answered.

Seungcheol looked around to spot their smallest member but he couldn’t find him. This was suspicious.

“He’s over there, sleeping, I think”, Wonwoo said and pointed in the direction of Seungkwan failing to block one of DK’s hits, which caused yelling about death and injury from the rest. Jesus Christ. Kindergarteners.

But as Seungcheol squinted a bit he saw where Wonwoo was actually pointing. Behind the group of members, there was a small silhouette sitting on the ground, leaning back against a tree. Woozi had his cap pulled into his face and seemed like he wasn’t at all bothered by the noise happening less than five meters away from him.

“He hasn’t eaten yet. And he didn’t try to strangle Hoshi when he came up with … that”, Wonwoo gestured at the renewed “fighting”, this time with Jeonghan instead of Seungkwan. “If he was just tired he would have told them to shut up.”

Seungcheol couldn’t help but agree. Their personal prickly hedgehog would never pass over an opportunity to yell at Hoshi (it was all in good spirit most of the time, actually Seungcheol wasn’t sure if they were even able to communicate under eighty decibel if off camera).

“I’ll go see what’s up”, the leader said, slowly making his way towards their producer but trying to stay as far as possible away from the group so he would not get dragged into any shenanigans. Or was asked to referee or something equally stupid.

He had managed to avoid the chaos, luckily, and sat down next to Woozi, leaning against the tree as well. The younger at first didn’t acknowledge his presence and when Seungcheol looked him over he saw his eyes were closed.

To his surprise, however, he was greeted by a short: “What do you want?”

Apparently the younger was awake and did not appreciate his company mustering him. Jihoon sounded annoyed and … down? Seungcheol wasn’t sure that was the right word to describe it but now he was really curious.

“Wonwoo said you haven’t eaten”, Seungcheol stated simply. It would be no use trying to get anything out of the younger - either he would tell the leader what was up or he would not. Mostly it was the latter.

“So?”, Woozi asked, clearly annoyed at having his precious loneliness disturbed by such stupid questions, “what’s it to you?”

“I’m worried”, Seungcheol shrugged, fingers pulling at the grass at his side. “You haven’t eaten and you haven’t yelled at Hoshi for that.” At the perfect timing the member led out a loud scream, jubilant apparently.

“You want me to yell at Soonyoung?”, Woozi asked perplexed, for the first time lifting his cap from his face. Seungcheol hoped it was just the shade and his natural paleness that made the producer look that white.

“Well, no. I just thought you would”, Seungcheol replied, suppressing a laugh.

“Yah! Hoshi, cut it out”, Jihoon called, wincing at what seemed to be the volume of his own voice. Maybe he had a headache? The producer tended to get bad headaches so Seungcheol wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case.

Hoshi stuck his tongue out at his dongsaeng, making a finger-heart and then proceeded to ignore him.

“Better?”, Jihoon asked, raising a judgmental eyebrow at Seungcheol. The leader could help but laugh a bit.

“Much”, he agreed, “but are you sure you’re okay? Again, you haven’t eaten and you look like you have a headache.”

Woozi sighed. “I may have a little headache, but it’s okay. I’m just not very hungry.”

“Why don’t you eat a little, hm? We have tons of rice, you like that”, Seungcheol coaxed him, “I’ll even pester Jeonghan or Wonwoo for painkillers if you want me to.”

The producer sighed again. “Okay, I’ll eat but only to stop you from annoying me. Just don’t tell the others, I’ll be fine.”

Seungcheol grinned. Mission “make-Woozi-eat” on the way to success. He jumped to his feet and reached out his hands to pull the younger up. Reluctantly Woozi reached up and dusted himself off before following Seungcheol to the buffet.

💎

Filming was finally done. Hallelujah. Seungcheol was admittedly very done with the day and he did look forward to relaxing at home. Well, that would have to wait. He really wanted to find out what was wrong with their tiny producer.

It had been clear to all of them that Woozi had been struggling throughout the later parts of the shoot, turning into a mix of tired and uncomfortably short-tempered towards everyone. Wonwoo had done a good job of keeping him in his sight at all times since Seungcheol and Woozi had been split into different teams. The leader had seen the quiet rapper try to talk to their dongsaeng but be brushed off.

Sadly, Seungcheol didn’t need to wait until they got home to find out what was wrong. He, Jeonghan, Jun and Mingyu were still looking over some footage from the filming with a manager when Dino and Vernon came running. The others had already been shooed to the cars and instructed to wait there for them.

“Coups-hyung, Coups-hyung!”, Dino called and came into a skidding halt in front of the group. They all turned to the two maknaes, who both looked equal parts worried and confused. Vernon was left panting and leaned into Jeonghan who was already fussing over them.

“What’s wrong, Dino-yah? Hansol-ah?”, Seungcheol asked, patiently waiting for them to catch their breath but also very anxious about what had sent them running.

“It’s Woozi-hyung”, Dino explained, a look of disgust on his face, “he just threw up.”

Shit.

Seungcheol had of course known something was wrong but something that bad he had not expected. But, well, that explained Jihoon’s earlier behavior though it left Seungcheol even more worried. If the producer was sick surely it would soon spread through the group soon enough. He already dreaded that.

“Wonwoo-hyung told us to get you”, Vernon added, “Shua and Hoshi-hyung are with him.”

Seungcheol would forever be grateful to Wonwoo, who knew that Seungcheol would be worried and knew that Woozi would probably want him rather than anybody else.

“You finish up here, Dino-yah can help you”, Seungcheol said pointedly, especially to Jeonghan who he knew was probably as ready to check on Woozi as Seungcheol himself was. But there was no point in crowding their dongsaeng, he would hate all the attention. “Hansol-ah, can you take me to them?”

Vernon nodded and with a quick apologetic bow to the manager and the production team, Seungcheol fell into a quick step beside his dongsaeng. “What exactly happened?”, he asked, chewing on his lip.

“I don’t know. We were standing around, waiting, playing games. I mean, Woozi-hyung didn’t participate much but he never really does and he seemed exhausted all day. One second we’re having fun, the next he turned around and just got sick all over the ground.”

The leader winced in sympathy. He didn’t doubt that if he wasn’t embarrassed now, Woozi would absolutely be when he recovered.

“It was chaos really, but Shua was with him immediately and Hoshi-hyung, after a moment of shock, too. Wonwoo-hyung managed to keep calm and took the others aside and asked us to get you. I don’t think Woozi-hyung would appreciate an audience”, Hansol continued.

“No, he would not”, Seungcheol sighed. In that moment they turned a corner to the cars and there Woozi was, sitting on the ground, leaning back against a car with Hoshi and Joshua on each side of him.

“Thank you for getting me. Go back to the others, Hansol-ah”, Seungcheol ordered lightly, glad that the younger followed his instruction without protests.

💎

As he came closer to the trio Seungcheol could see just how awful Woozi looked, his head resting against Hoshi’s shoulder, the older having an arm wrapped around him. Joshua was rubbing Woozi’s knee in a comforting gesture. There was a clear, and thankfully empty, plastic bag clutched in the producer's hands.

“Hi, Jihoon-ah”, Seungcheol said as he approached them and knelt down in front of his sick member, “I heard you’re not feeling so good?”

Woozi shook his head slightly, not looking up at Seungcheol at all. Still, the leader could see the tear tracks on his face. He felt terrible for his dongsaeng, knowing how much he valued his privacy and despised showing vulnerability. Getting sick while two-thirds of the group had been watching must have been terribly humiliating for him.

“I’m sorry, hyung”, Jihoon whispered. Seungcheol couldn’t help but wince at how awful his voice sounded. It seemed like vomiting had done a number on the younger’s throat already. “I … I didn’t think it was so bad until it suddenly was.”

“Don’t be sorry, Jihoon-ah”, Hoshi scolded, without any malice in his voice, “you’re sick, it happens.”

“Well, I don’t want to be sick”, Woozi grumbled, resembling a petulant and whiny child especially with his stature being dwarfed by Hoshi and Joshua. While the two were certainly not the tallest of the group, they were still much bigger than the producer they were sandwiching and who had curled up into a small ball of misery.

“I know you don’t”, Joshua placated him, “but you currently are and I’m sure you’ll feel better once home and laying down, hm?”

“I gu …”, Jihoon agreed but suddenly went quiet in the middle of his sentence, face tinting a bit greenish. Seungcheol could see how badly he didn’t want to be sick again though it was obvious it was inevitable. The harsh, forceful swallowing and the short breaths were a clear sign of impending vomiting.

“Shua, why don’t you go sort out everything so we can leave as soon as possible?”, the leader suggested, though it definitely was more of a command. Jihoon easily was overwhelmed with so many people around him when sick and while Joshua had seen him get sick before, Woozi would appreciate it if he left them alone.

Since they were trainees Seungcheol had always been the one Jihoon had sought out when sick (or at least when he couldn’t hide it anymore) and over the years he reluctantly allowed Hoshi to care for him too. Also that might have to do with the facts that a) Hoshi had a soft spot for the producer and b) Woozi had an even bigger soft spot for the dancer. And c) - while he never would admit it - since he was the youngest of the three leaders, Woozi was their baby and he trusted them more than anyone.

Luckily, Joshua seemed to know that and he quickly got up to leave, squeezing Seungcheol’s shoulder before vanishing. The leader scooted a bit closer to Woozi, who - now that it was only the three of them were left - had brought the bag to his mouth.

“It’s okay, Jihoon-ah”, Seungcheol soothed and Hoshi added: “Don’t worry, it’s just us.”

Apparently that was enough or maybe Woozi couldn’t hold it back anymore. He gagged dryly a few times and then with a disgusting sounding retch, sick spilled into the bag. Seungcheol had originally planned on just staying with them and not crowding Woozi, especially since Hoshi was already holding back his long, blond hair and rubbing his back, but he saw how much Woozi’s hands were trembling. Fearful that he would not be able to keep ahold of the bag and the consequences of that, Seungcheol reached over and helped hold open the bag - though he definitely would have loved doing anything but. The bites of rice from earlier were barely digested and looked the epitome of disgusting as they came back up.

Woozi’s retches and gagging were the only sound ringing through the silence, occasionally interrupted by Hoshi murmuring soft reassurances how Woozi was going to be okay and that he was doing great. Every wave of nausea seemed to force its way out of the producer, his back heaving with the effort. Seungcheol imagined that the poor younger man’s stomach muscles would probably be pretty sore tomorrow at the latest. The force of the illness seemed to overwhelm the small body; despite having bulked up a lot after working out for so long there was still a fragility to him. Tears were streaming down Woozi’s cheeks and Seungcheol hurt for him.

Suddenly everything was over and Woozi collapsed to the side, his head falling against Hoshi’s shoulder in a way that looked painful but didn’t seem to disturb the producer. It was then that Seungcheol was glad he was holding onto the bag because the rest of Woozi’s strength seemed to leave his body and his grip loosened.

Seungcheol moved the bag to the side and tied it off to be disposed of at a later point in time.

“Do we have water?”, Woozi rasped, letting Hoshi wipe his tears with the older man’s sleeve, “I’m thirsty.”

While it definitely was a good sign that Woozi showed signs of wanting to drink and staying hydrated, it probably wasn’t the best idea, considering he had just thrown up twice in the span of less than twenty minutes.

“I’ll text somebody …”, Seungcheol started but was distracted as Hoshi looked over at some point above his shoulder. When he turned around he saw Wonwoo walking towards them, a bottle of water, some wet wipes and a couple of trash bags in his hands. Impeccable timing. Wonwoo should definitely get the award of “dongsaeng of the month” and if there wasn’t one, Seungcheol would create it specifically for him.

While the rapper looked a bit awkward, a bit stressed, he just handed the items to the leader without hesitation. “I got you some supplies and the director insisted that I tell you he hopes that Woozi-ah feels better soon”, he said, scrunching up his nose again to keep his glasses from slipping, “uhm, manager-nim asks if you are ready to go back. We’ve shuffled the seating order a bit, so you three can go in one car alone. If you’re not ready, a manager will stay here with you until you are. The rest of us will go back soon nevertheless.”

Hoshi sighed and looked down at the sleepy producer in his arms, hand coming up to play with his hair. “What do you think, Hoon-ah? Ready to go back?”

“I doubt I will feel better soon”, Jihoon answered, meaning it doesn’t matter when I go I will feel awful no matter what and I’d prefer to be home soon. At least that’s what Seungcheol guessed from experience.

“Give us a few minutes until you all come back to the cars, Wonwoo-yah”, Seungcheol decided, “we’ll get him to drink something and into the car. Once we’re home I’ll come with them to their dorm.” He gestured at Hoshi and Woozi. “If Jeonghan and Seungkwan want to shower, tell them to go to one of the other dorms. Wait, you know what, tell them to go to a different dorm anyhow.”

“Alright”, Wonwoo said and hurried off, taking the bag of sick with him. Seungcheol appreciated it a lot, yet was also thankful that Jihoon didn't seem to notice. He could only imagine how much the younger would have hated to see somebody deal with that because of him.

“Alright”, Hoshi echoed, “try to take a few sips, slowly, so you don’t make yourself sick again.” Seungcheol opened one of the bottles and, still not trusting Woozi’s shaking hands, he tipped the bottle against his lips. Woozi took in a mouthful of water before signaling the leader to stop. For a moment both hip hop and dance leader were worried he was about to be sick again but the vocalist just swished the water in his mouth before leaning over to the side to spit it out.

“My mouth tastes awful”, Woozi complained. Fair enough, Seungcheol mused, knowing the younger hated that. Maybe they could find a breath mint for him somewhere. With thirteen members it was a guarantee that somebody would likely have the item you were looking for. But still, Woozi was thirsty so Seungcheol helped him take a few sips, slowly as Hoshi had advised.

When Seungcheol pulled the bottle away Woozi pouted a bit, clearly not happy.

“You can have more later when you were able to keep that down, okay?”, Suengcheol soothed.

“Fine.”

“Let’s clean you up a bit and then we’ll go sit in the car and we’ll be back home in no time”, Hoshi suggested and took a wet wipe from the box. For a moment Seungcheol was sure that Jihoon would protest the treatment but it was something about Soonyoung’s soft gaze that seemed to let the protests die on his tongue.

Hoshi gently wiped Woozi’s mouth - the rest of his face was clean enough and would have to wait for makeup remover - and his hands. Now that the immediate action had died down, Seungcheol dared to ask: “How is the headache?”

“Not so good”, Woozi mumbled, “I really want to sleep.”

“Soon”, Seungcheol promised, “let’s get you up and into the car. Are you ready to stand up?”

A nod. Hoshi quickly jumped to his feet, nearly losing his balance in his hurry, and went to open the car doors on the other side of where Woozi was still leaning back against the van. Seungcheol also got to his feet and reached down to help the producer to his feet for the second time that day. For a moment Woozi swayed and Seungcheol was prepared to lower him back to the ground but then he found his footing.

“Do you want the front seat or would you like to sit in the back with us?”, the leader asked as they walked around the front of the car, one of his arms wrapped around the smaller’s shoulders. While Woozi didn’t tend to get motion sick easily - unless he was already feeling unwell, which he was - he still might prefer the passenger seat to watch the outside.

“I don’t want to be alone”, Jihoon whispered, not looking up from the ground. Seungcheol rubbed his upper arm in comfort.

“You don’t have to be. Let’s sit you down, okay?”, Seungcheol answered and helped the younger step inside the van, where Woozi scooted through so he sat against the window on the opposite side to the door. Before Seungcheol could even question it, Hoshi had jumped into the seat beside him and started to fuss over the younger. Plastic bags were stuffed into a cup holder and a hand reached out to take Woozi’s.

Just as Seungcheol was about to enter himself the rest of the group approached to get into the other cars. They all were wearing looks of concern and since they all knew what had happened, the leader moved a bit away from their van to ask: “Does anybody have a breath mint? Peppermint? Something like that.”

Most of the group shook their heads but Seungkwan started to rifle through his bag until with a triumphant shout he held out one of these small metal cases containing mints. It probably had been some merch gift from an Europe tour and Seungcheol profoundly thanked him. The members quickly got into their respective cars and Seungcheol turned to do the same.

“Cheollie, wait”, Joshua called and he turned back around to find him, Wonwoo and Vernon shuffling from foot to foot in anticipation. “How is he?”

“Not good, still really nauseous. I don’t know what’s wrong but if it’s a stomach bug, we should probably quarantine their apartment so it hopefully doesn’t spread. I will stay with Jihoon-ah and Soonyoung-ah, Jeonghan and Seungkwan will have to deal with staying somewhere else.”

“I was with him too”, Joshua said softly, “I probably should join you.”

As loath as Seungcheol was to admit it, the other was right. He sighed. “I will ask Jihoon-ah if he is okay with you coming with us. Don’t take it personally, you know how he is.”

Joshua nodded and ushered the other two inside the car. The other van had already left.

Seungcheol poked his head into their car, smiling softly at Jihoon who was sitting with his eyes closed, looking mostly asleep.

“He’s awake”, Hoshi said, seeing the hesitation. At that Woozi opened his eyes.

“Hey, I got mints for you”, Seungcheol said, waving the box before giving it to Hoshi to pass it along, “would it be okay if Shua came with us? In case you have the flu we’d like to quarantine everybody who was in close contact with you.”

“I guess”, Jihoon agreed, not looking happy but also not like he hated the idea, “I don’t want anybody else to get sick.”

“Thank you, Hoon-ah”, Seungcheol said and waved Joshua over. Quickly both of them climbed into the back with Seungcheol directly behind the sick member and Joshua behind Hoshi. The driver had already entered the car while Seungcheol was out and so they soon left.

💎

The drive obviously was very hard for the sick man. Within minutes a bag was laying open on Woozi’s lap for quick access. While Woozi had his eyes closed, leaning against the window with Joshua’s hoodie as a cushion, and Hoshi held his hand again there was an uneasiness about him. It was clear that no matter what he did, which position he tried to rest in, he couldn’t get comfortable.

Jihoon held out a surprising thirty minutes, about half of their rather long drive, before his eyes shot open and he ripped his hand out of Hoshi’s soft grip to grab the bag. As soon as he had the bag in front of his mouth he was sick again. Having anticipated this, though not as sudden as it had come, Seungcheol leaned forward to gather his hair into his hands to hopefully spare it the mess. Soonyoung was rubbing Woozi’s thigh in comfort, again whispering comfort. Joshua, who had been listening to music before, turned to look outside the window, giving the younger some semblance of privacy.

As suddenly as it had started, the vomiting stopped and Jihoon gasped for breath.

“Can I take this?”, Hoshi asked tenderly, indicating the full bag. Jihoon nodded and let the older take it from him. Seungcheol let go of his hair but continued playing with it knowing Woozi secretly liked the sensation of somebody rubbing his head.

The younger sighed and slumped into his seat. Hoshi tied off the bag, put it into a second bag just to be safe, and then handed him one of the breath mints.

The energy in the van was low, exhausted, and it reflected as no further conversation took place.

💎

It seemed like finally Woozi was able to sleep, however, and Seungcheol already dreaded waking him the moment they pulled into their dorm's garage. And indeed, as gentle as they were, they didn’t receive much more than eyes sleepily blinking open before falling shut again.

They all knew how much Jihoon hated to be carried, shy of his body stature and the way he looked in comparison to other members even after all those years, but there was no way they would get him up to the dorm any other way. Luckily the others seemed to be in their dorms already and they needn’t fear meeting anybody on the way up.

So while Hoshi disposed of the bag of disgustingness and Joshua gathered most of their stuff, Seungcheol tried to lift Woozi into his arms despite having to stand ducked in the van. Finally, he managed to get a tight grip on the producer’s back and under his knees and with Joshua gently guiding him out backwards, Seungcheol stood cradling his dongsaeng to his chest.

“Let’s get him to bed”, Hoshi sighed, clearly very worried for his friend. The other two walked in front of Seungcheol, opening doors and pressing the elevator’s buttons. Woozi was deeply asleep against his chest, head resting on Seungcheol’s shoulder and he was even drooling a bit.

Once in the apartment, Hoshi pulled back the covers of Woozi’s bed so that Seungcheol could put him down. “Should we wake him to take some meds?”, Soonyoung asked quietly as they both watched the younger sleep for a moment.

“No”, Seungcheol decided, “let him sleep. We can change him out of his clothes and wipe his makeup off. If he happens to wake up during that we’ll see if he is up to taking anything but right now, I think, he should just rest. It’s just a matter of time until he is sick again, probably.”

Sadly, Seungcheol knew his last statement was likely very true. With all the hours spent at work, the long sleepless nights at the studio and Woozi’s less than amazing immune system, he was always down hard when he did finally admit to being sick.

“Yeah, you’re probably right”, Hoshi agreed, “I’ll get the make-up wipes from the bathroom and see if Shua-hyung needs help finding stuff. Get him out of these clothes?”

Seungcheol nodded and considering their size difference it was relatively easy to get Woozi out of his shirt and jeans, well, as easy as undressing a limp ragdoll who was still rather big and muscular. But just as Joshua and Soonyoung entered again, carrying supplies in their hands, Seungcheol was done. The producer felt warm to the touch, probably the beginning stages of a fever, so it was probably best to not overwhelm him with heat. So Seungcheol had only pulled a fresh T-shirt over his head, leaving him in that and his boxers.

Joshua spread an old towel on the ground beside Jihoon’s head and placed a bucket on it for further emergencies. Hoshi had rounded the bed and now perched on the bed to carefully wipe off the make-up.

As the cool cloth touched his skin, Woozi opened his eyes sleepily. He barely seemed awake and let Soonyoung do as he pleased or just didn’t seem to notice. The younger was definitely not awake enough to swallow any medication - but Seungcheol wasn't too worried about that.

“Hey Hoon-ah”, Seungcheol said and took his small hand in his bigger ones, “you can go back to sleep if you want.”

They luckily had gotten forehead thermometers during the pandemic so there was no need for him to be awake to take his temperature. Joshua had stepped around Seungcheol and the bucket to hold the device to Woozi’s forehead, who really didn’t seem awake enough to notice.

With a frown, Joshua showed Seungcheol the reading of 38.6°C, a moderate fever and higher than expected. Even if the reading might be a bit inaccurate, there was no way the younger wasn’t feverish. The glossy look in his eyes was enough evidence of that.

Woozi nodded slowly to Seungcheol's earlier statement and let his eyes fall shut.

“I’ll get a cool cloth”, Joshua whispered and left. When he returned, Hoshi and Seungcheol had pulled the blanket over the shivering producer and Hoshi gratefully took the cloth from Joshua’s hand to fold it over Woozi’s forehead.

There was nothing else to be done but wait how the illness further unfolded.

“Go rest in the living room or whatever”, Seungcheol said with a sigh, sitting back down on Jihoon’s bed. “I’ll stay with him tonight, no need for all of us to stay awake.”

“That’s a good idea”, Joshua agreed and pulled a rather reluctant Hoshi with him out of the door.

💎

As expected, the sickness wasn’t over then. During the night Seungcheol was up with Jihoon multiple times, consoling his overwhelmed, feverish dongsaeng. Woozi had never been good at being sick. He barely let Seungcheol leave his side to wash out the bucket when needed, clearly not wanting to be alone. At least he managed to drink some water, even if it later came back up, and managed to keep down the fever reducers for about long enough that they might start to work.

Morning found Seungcheol exhausted but Jihoon with a less high fever. Joshua forced Seungcheol to sleep during the day, only waking him for a late lunch, so that his sleep rhythm wasn’t completely wrecked. Jihoon had only gotten sick once during the morning but he still didn’t really feel up to eating.

They had managed to relocate him to the couch, the bucket still within easy reach and the rest of the afternoon was spent watching movies and trying to keep their unwell producer awake so he could sleep through the night and hopefully feel better the next morning. Hoshi had even managed to find a hot water bottle to soothe the sore stomach muscles.

At least they had not had schedules for that day.

Since the company rules were as such that nobody was allowed to work within twenty four hours after vomiting or a fever, Jihoon would have to stay home the next day as well but Seungcheol was fairly positive that he, Hoshi and Joshua could work around the schedule so that one of them would always be home with him just in case. None of them were feeling bad and so maybe, maybe it was just a single case of illness or maybe something Woozi had eaten.

💎

That thought held until Seungcheol woke up at four in the morning that day to sprint to the bathroom. Oh well…

Notes: This is my very first Seventeen fic, so please let me know if you liked it and if I characterized them right!

Masterlist links: Fairy's Full Masterlist Fairy's Masterlist - SEVENTEEN

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tobiasdrake · 1 day ago

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Digimon Adventure: Our War Game, epilogue

Well, we finished the movie but I wanted to take a moment to go over these epilogue slides. Especially for those fans who only know the OVA from its appearance in Digimon: The Movie, where the slides are skipped over so it can move on to adapt Hurricane Touchdown.

So, in the wake of near-nuclear annihilation how is everybody doing?

We close out Takeru and Yamato's story at the barbershop. It seems Sho has convinced Yamato to fucking do something about his scraggly-ass hair.

This somewhat bridges the gap between Our War Game and 02, where Yamato's hair is still a bit unkempt but no longer looks like a porcupine died on his head and he kept it as a hat.

Jou finished his entrance exams and looks like he's about to drop dead on the spot. Diablomon really fucked up this kid's day, and he still doesn't even know any of that even happened.

Speaking of people who have no idea what happened, Mimi is home from her Hawaii trip and everybody's got suntans. The Tachikawa family is as close as ever.

Hikari is still at that birthday party despite Taichi screaming at her multiple times to drop everything and come home. She has elected to invoke the rule of Go Fuck Yourself, a popular choice among women who've been treated rudely by domineering men.

She, too, remains blissfully unaware of the horrifying fate that nearly befell Tokyo today.

Yamato's grandma seems to be enjoying the peace and quiet since Yamato and Takeru ran off.

Nobody ate any of Yuuko's destroyed cake. Diablomon truly did get the last laugh in the end.

Koushiro finally gets to go home after what must have felt like ten years in Susumu's office.

The Digimon return to Gennai's secret mansion to continue... Whatever they're doing with their lives.

And this is the big one. Sora types out an email to Taichi that reads: "Dear Taichi. I'm sorry. Thank you for the present. Sora." Then we close on the true final shot of the film: A picture of Sora, smiling and wearing the hairclip that Taichi gave her.

As with Yamato's haircut, this also serves to bridge the gap between series as 02 will see Sora no longer covering her hair with headgear. The emotional landmine Taichi stepped on has finally been cleaned up.

So. How we feeling about this film.

Assessment: My biggest complaint is that not one of the show's three female characters got to actually do anything.

Half of the cast was written out, with only Taichi, Yamato, Koushiro, and Takeru having any significant roles - and Takeru's really stretching the definition of "significant" there. That's fine, but it does bug me that not one of the show's women apparently warranted any serious inclusion.

I think that's why they gave Yuuko so much screentime. To compensate for the fact that all three of the Chosen Children girls were excluded.

Diablomon is... pretty straightforward. It's a buggy Digimon made of bugs who eats data, and its eating of data causes more bugs. There's something simple and childlike about its demeanor right up to the end, but any sympathy I may have had for it vanished instantly with the reveal of the nuke.

That the nuke was not a reaction to Taichi and Koushiro but rather something it did right at the start of the film really gives it a lot of added menace that didn't seem present in its earlier stages. And yet it's not super clear if Diablomon even grasps the severity of what it's doing.

But it's unambiguously both aware of and complicit in the nuclear threat. That didn't just happen by accident as a result of a bug. The whole thing with the clock shows that Diablomon knows it launched a nuke and is making a horrifying game out of it.

Which is... All it really does. It doesn't feel like it's trying to destroy the world on purpose. It would have fired more than one nuke if that was what it wanted. It just feels like it's playing games. With extremely high stakes.

What an odd creature.

The stuff in Shimane with Yamato and Takeru was a lot of fun. XD More than I expected it to be. I kinda love the barbershop randos.

Sora and Taichi's drama seems like it's meant to be the emotional center of the film. This is what we open on, and it's what we close on. It's something we keep coming back to as the OVA progresses.

But it's also kinda flat due to Sora basically being a glorified cameo like Jou and the other girls. Without giving Sora any kind of active presence, there's not really anywhere it can go. All we can do is listen to Taichi wring his hands and complain about the drama they're having until his email arrives and it suddenly stops happening.

It's hard to do interesting interpersonal drama as a solo act.

I think the missile itself is the breakout star of this OVA. If there's one thing Our War Game is remembered for, it's... Well, actually, it's the debut of Omegamon. But if there's two things, then it's being the one where an evil Digimon tried to nuke Japan.

All in all... still a fun OVA. Now, there's nothing left between us and Adventure 02. The old guard are retiring to middle school. It's time for a new generation to take over.

#digimon #digimon adventure #revisiting digimon #revisiting digimon adventure

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tgmsunmontue · 8 months ago

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More than movie magic... 10/24

Hangster AU. Explicit (eventually). Jake is a Hollywood actor and Bradley is a stunt coordinator. Jake's about to make a few self-discoveries. So is Bradley.

ONE TWO THREE FOUR FIVE SIX SEVEN EIGHT NINE

PART TEN

Jake knows being annoyed with his mom is unreasonable, but a part of him also just can’t help it, she’s an annoying person hell-bent on making him do something he’s been putting off. God, he can never tell her that he’s had Bradley’s phone number for over a year, she’ll never let him live it down. It’s Wednesday morning now, so he has three days, assuming she doesn’t change her mind on the timeline. Now that he’s had two proper full-night’s sleep his brain feels less like it’s been put through a grinder and sat in pickle juice for days on end. He’s also feeling like he’s adjusting back to the right time after a couple of weeks skipping through time zones and continents for the promotional tour.

He’d spent a fair amount of time last night lying in bed mulling over the fact that Bradley has been here for over two weeks, has met both his parents and cousin Freddie and Uncle Andy. Not all of the cowhands have watched him grow up, but a few did. He’s definitely met all of the current ones more than once. His other aunts and uncle all live in surrounding farms and ranches, his parents ranch the main central point geographicalluy, which is why they had based so many of the key building developments here. So the chance of Bradley having met several more members of his extended family are alarmingly high. He has no idea what he was thinking when he suggested this ranch as a potential location.

He goes down to the kitchen, only to find it empty and he guesses the welcome wagon is well and clearly gone, now that he’s been home a whole twenty-four hours. Then his not-tired brain kicks in and he realizes that if his mom isn’t here then she’s likely in the mess hall, talking to people. He scrambles through getting dressed and then dithers over riding Blitzen or taking a car, but seeing his dad pottering around in the family stable decides it for him and by the time he steps into the stable his dad has already got Blitzen saddled up, is looking amused and no doubt his mom has talked his ear off.

“Good luck today,” his dad says, slapping his shoulder.

“Did mom tell you?” Jake asks, double checking the tightness and running his hands over Blitzen, stroking her nose so she can smell him and he smiles when she snorts and licks him.

“I meant with the first day of filming. But yes, the other thing too I guess.”

“Right. Okay. Yeah,” he says, sucks in a breath. “Thanks dad.”

It’s still early, not even seven, although he’s got makeup at eight, so he doesn’t have a heap of time, and now that he thinks more, he’s got work, which means his time to actually talk to Bradley before his mom’s ridiculous ultimatum isn’t actually three days, but more like a few hours of spare time, which isn’t very much all, because he doubts his free time and Bradley’s free time are going to overlap. The ride between his parents house and the main buildings isn’t even ten minutes at a walk, and he does take it at a walk, despite the urge to suddenly just ride away at speed. He’s not a teenager anymore, although no doubt his mother would argue differently.

Of course, when he leads Blitzen into the stable Bradley is there, brushing down Buttercup and talking to her under his breath and he doesn’t know whether to feel blessed or cursed. There is going to be the ghost of Bradley Bradshaw on his family ranch for years regardless of whether anything happens between them or not. He’s not prepared to see him, hasn’t thought about what he wants to say, what he can say. Fuck.

“You’re up early. Already gone for a ride huh?” Bradley asks, gesturing toward Blitzen with his head and Jake reaches for her and begins taking off the saddle and bridle, hanging it in one of the empty stalls.

“Just a short one. I miss it when I’m in Hollywood,” he admits.

“You seem pretty at home here…” Jake gives him a sharp look, wonders if he knows. It’s not exactly a secret, it’s even meant to be part of the promotional PR for the film, the whole city boy returned to his roots and finds romance while saving his family ranch. “I figure you grew up near here, everyone seems to know you.”

Jake blinks.

Somehow, despite being here for over two weeks, Bradley hasn’t made the connection that this is Jake’s home. He feels a little inkling of amusement and wonders if this is how his mom feels when she’s telling him that he’s smart and yet somehow a dumbass at the same time.

“What do you think of it?”

“The ranch?”

“Yeah,” Jake says, because that’ll do as a nice safe starting point.

“It’s like a well-oiled machine. I can’t begin to imagine what work needs to happen, but everyone seems to know what needs to be done and just gets on and does it. I didn’t realize we’d be filming on such a large working ranch, it’s pretty amazing to see.”

“And the land?”

“Well, I’m a city boy, grew up thinking nothing could beat the lights of Hollywood. But got to say the night sky out here is beautiful.”

“Hmm,” Jake hums, because he agrees, still enjoys going out camping just to get away from as much light pollution as possible and spend the time staring up at the night sky and a part of him wants to extend an invitation to Bradley to do that, wants to do that with him.

“I’ll let you get to breakfast, I’m heading out for my own early morning ride. I’ll see you later.”

“Yeah, sure. Enjoy your ride.”

He watches Bradley leave, is still watching him when Bradley turns his head to look back at him and instead of looking away Jake just raises his hand in a wave of acknowledgement.

Baby steps.

PART ELEVEN

#Hangster #Sereshaw #more than movie magic #Top Gun Maverick

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autumnmobile12 · 8 months ago

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"If you're too short to stare down your nose at someone, keep your chin down, your eyes up, and don't blink. It's not as threatening, but it will show you are not afraid." -Mai (probably)

...

In exploring various avenues to go about a Ghost Hunt/My Hero crossover, one of the more entertaining dynamics I think would be the interactions between Mai and Endeavor.

To put it bluntly, there is a strength behind Mai’s character that I don’t think we in the Ghost Hunt fandom give her near enough credit for, and that is the fact that on a fundamental level, Mai is fearless.

As per general anime protagonist behavior, she is almost exactly like Deku when it comes to doing what she perceives to be the right thing. Reckless, yes, and she is often running headlong into danger, but it’s important to remember Mai has also never been afraid to call anyone out on their bad behavior.

Within minutes of meeting Ayako, she called her out for talking down to her classmate, a classmate she was not even particularly close to.

She often calls out Masako and Naru both for their condescension and attitudes.

Takigawa was physically holding her back from going after the faculty at Rokuryou.

She called out Lin pretty quickly for his bullshit.

And she straight up yells at everyone in the very first case for their bickering and posturing even though she barely knew any of them.

In canon, Mai jumps at ghosts and she is easily unsettled/frightened, but even against Urado, she still has the inherent resolve to think, ‘Okay, you need to go.’

Also recall the fact that she has not hesitated to out Naru twice on minor secrets solely because he pissed her off. That whole bit in the Labyrinth case where she demands to know why he didn’t tell them the full reason why they were there and he just answers with how ‘some people don’t know when to keep their mouth shut.’ Yeah, he didn’t say that because he didn’t think she could keep the secret. Homeboy straight up knew she would weaponize that information if given the chance.

For all her compassion and the ‘good girl’ vibes we remember her for, Mai is petty af.

...

This is why I like writing Mai as an adult. Canonically as a teenager, she’s already formidable in her own way. As a young adult who’s dealt with Naru and company for a few years and has subsequently gotten used to the constant razzing and sass the whole group brings to the table (and let's be real, nobody in My Hero Academia would be prepared for the full force of SPR's combined sass,) adult Mai would be a force of nature.

So as intimidating as Endeavor is, I legitimately think Mai’s reaction to him would be a resolute, “I don’t care if he’s three times my size and on fire, nobody speaks that way in my presence and gets away with it. Hold my purse, hold my beer, time for a verbal ass-whooping.”

And then there’s Yasuhara saying, “Go off, sis,” and filming for posterity.

Speaking of SPR's favorite bespectacled fiend, Yasuhara has definitely hit on everyone in the top ten.

Yasuhara and Mai both have probably ended up in this situation, possibly at the same time and the end result is always the same:

Naru stepping in.

"What exactly is your plan here? Putting them down or harming them are your only two options right now, only one of which is the smart option. Unhand them. You're embarrassing everyone."

...

SPR really be the Animaniacs sibs to every Pro with an ego. Which is, like, 90% of Pros. And villains.

...

But yeah, general cattiness between Mai and Endeavor:

"I didn't see you there, Taniyama. Perhaps your lackluster and unremarkable costume was to blame."

"Not all of us are trying to signal that Gondor calls for aid."

#my hero academia #ghost hunt #mai taniyama #endeavor #crossover #character analysis #yasuhara osamu #boku no hero academia #bnha #mha #nostalgia anime #pro heroes #vs #shibuya psychic research #spr #naru #oliver davis #young adults

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wen-kexing-apologist · 1 year ago

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Hi....If you don't mind, can I ask, what are your top 10 (or top 7) favorite media (can be books/ manga/ anime/movies/tv series)? Why do you love them? Sorry if you've answered this question before......Thanks....

Thank you for the Ask! Typically I find these questions difficult because I consume a lot of content and I love so many things dearly, and I inevitably forget about things that I cherish and then feel bad about it. So here are 10 of my favorite pieces of media I’ve pulled from my mental list of all the things in the world that have made an impact on me, I’m going to do these in alphabetical order

180 Degrees Longitude Passes Through Us

I only saw this show recently but it is an absolutely gorgeous piece of media. I have a bit of a theater background and this show definitely reads like a stage play, in the dialogue, in the setting, in the way that Nike carries himself around the space as Inthawut. This is a perfect piece of media in my opinion. The performances are a masterclass in acting, the use of vertical lines that place barriers between the characters or that cage them in, the complicated dynamics between the characters, the throughlines of grief and pain and loneliness that just radiates out of the screen for every character in this story. I have been through some shit, let me tell you, but there was a ten second moment in the final episode of this show that sent me in to the worst emotional distress of my entire life for a totally innocuous, complete reasonable, and minimally tragic scene and for that it does deserve immense praise.

Big Eden

I am making up for forgetting to put Pike on my Favorite Characters list by remembering to put Big Eden on my favorite media list! I saw Big Eden for the first time in my freshman year of college. Back then I was not aware of, or at leas was not acknowledging my own queerness, and to find a film like this one just healed a part of my soul I didn’t know was wounded. When I say I watched this film back to back two or three times when I first saw it, I mean that this is one of if not the only film that I have immediately started from the beginning the second that the credits started rolling. I love this film for what it gave me, an older queer romance, non-existent homophobia, PIKE! Some of the greatest lines of all time, that to this day get reactions out of me, mainly:

“I just want things to be nice for him”

and

"Well, screw you, Henry Hart. I do know what love is. You are my family. And I'm sorry... I'm sorry if that's not good enough for you."

And

“Why can’t you see how much love there is that people want to pour on top of you? I can’t help thinking that your grandma and I didn’t do right by you somehow. I feel like maybe we taught you something wrong, because you won’t tell me who you are. Did we teach you shame? Did I teach you that? Because it would break my heart if I had,” (watch the scene here)

Don't let the stars go out at night, don't let the moon break your heart, indeed.

I Told Sunset About You and I Promised You The Moon

ITSAY/IPYTM is two parts of one continuous story and therefore counts as a single piece of media.

I just got done gushing about this show the other night, because for me it is a foundational piece of queer media. It is one of my favorite pieces of media, point blank, period. Queer characters are allowed to complex, three-dimensional, and frustrating. They are allowed to make mistakes, and hurt the people they care about in their quest to better understand themselves. They are human. And the emotional honesty and vulnerability that the script and the actors showed struck deep in to my experiences figuring out my own identity. It has some of the strongest characterization that I have ever seen in media. The actors commit to the craft, the production team clearly put love and care in to every aspect of this show, every frame of it. The director trusted the audience to understand what was happening and trust the actors to play with silence. There is so much silence in this show because the actors portray so much with just the way they move around the space, the way they carry themselves, the way they look at each other. It is a gorgeous, gorgeous piece of media. It took me three watchthroughs of I Told Sunset About You before I was able to form a single analytical thought about it, because the first time I saw this show my brain went fuzzy. This show rewired my brain and changed my DNA.

And as a side note, anyone that thinks that Billkin is a bad actor or a bad crier can kindly meet me outside the Denny’s parking lot at 3am because I will not stand for Billkin slander in my household. That man is absolutely demolished the role of Teh. The constant fidgeting, the way his whole body just screams out whatever he is feeling without him ever having to say a word.

Moonlight Chicken

I have talked numerous times about why this show remains my favorite, and a lot of that has to do with the community that I gained around me because of it. But stepping back to the piece itself, I love how much this show is really dedicated to the importance of community. To showing the different mindsets of three generations of queer people, the way they struggle and don’t. The conversations that happen around poverty, and disability, and grief. The way that Li Ming and Heart are screaming to be understood. The way Jim has been hurt too many times and how that makes him scared to start over with Wen. The way Aof was able to take this BL structure and transform it into the story whose primary focus is on how a queer elder keeps and cultivates a relationship with his queer nephew. Jim and Li Ming’s relationship is the focal point of this show and I am so grateful to have that. The acting is phenomenal, the lighting is incredible, and it is a very technically strong piece. I know that Aof tends to tell us sad gay stories, but by god am I in love with every single Aof show I have seen (GOBK(with Jojo), ATOTS, HCTM, BB, MLC)

Pushing Daisies

What a deeply deeply tragic story wrapped up in the shiniest paper! I will never get over the fact this show got canceled because it is one of the greatest of all time. I love that Lee Pace has acknowledged how queer this show is, and how intentional that was, even though it was not discussed at the time of its release. Like, fundamentally this is a show about a man named Ned and his partner Chuck who can never touch. I’ll talk about this a little later too, but I am just such a sucker for stories where people can’t touch each other. I love the angst in it, the wanting to, the need to be intimate, to comfort, to care for someone and just…not being able to hold them. I loved watching how Ned and Chuck navigated this issue, the kissing through plastic wrap, the dancing in beekeeper suits, them getting excited for winter cause it meant they could wear gloves and hold hands like any other couple.

This show is hilarious and funny and fast, with a really intriguing concept and an extremely clear vision and it did not deserve the end it got.

I heard it might be on HBO Max, not sure if that is still true, but if you can find you, and you haven’t seen it, you should absolutely watch it, and if you have seen it, this is your reminder to watch it again.

Sense8

Before I begin, I just want to say

FUCK

NETFLIX

Once again, another incredible show, with very interesting themes, and things to say was canceled before it’s time. I will die mad about the fact that Netflix did not give this show the room it deserved to tell the story THAT THEY PITCHED TO NETFLIX AS A FIVE SEASON ARC. This show was so good, it got my homophobic dad to watch the whole thing without even squirming at the gay sex (like he did when he watched Game of Thrones).

I love love love love love this show. I love the way it connects people from all over the world, I love that these random strangers become a family, I love what it says about every day people being important, having important skills, and how much that can vary from being a good actor, knowing chemistry, driving, and being a skilled martial artist. I love how sex positive this show was. I love the utilization of orgies to demonstrate the way these characters are all connected to each other. I loved the mystery behind it all, they way the function of this psyllium network got progressively more understandable to us as time went on in much the same way that the characters get used to it. I love the humanization of drug users, that it touches on the struggles of trans people, queer people, eldest daughters, poor people, etc etc etc; ON BODY AUTONOMY IN MEDICINE!!! I truly believe there is something for everyone in this show and even though I am mad we really only got a two hour filmed storyboard of general concepts the Wachowski sisters were planning on diving in to over the next three seasons, I do love with my whole heart, for the memes, that Nom’s mother gets over her transphobia as a result of one very good weed brownie.

Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom

I got in to these books after seeing the first season of Shadow and Bone on Netflix. Full disclosure, I did not read the Shadow and Bone trilogy, I will not read the Shadow and Bone trilogy, I do not care about the Shadow and Bone trilogy. This is a Crows Only household. Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom are very incredible heist books first of all. The main plot is compelling in and of itself, before you even add the characters in to it. And what phenomenal characters we have: Kaz, Inej, Jesper, Wylan, Matthias, NINA MY BELOVED. I’m glad they aged them up for the show, but it is very funny to me to think of a bunch of gremlin teenagers running around and taking down criminal empires for the sake of revenge...and coin. Leigh Bardugo is a disabled woman and I love that she gave Kaz her same disability because it means that we get a really authentic portrayal of disability. His cane is seen as important, he is never embarrassed by it, and his chronic pain is always highlighted. (can we also talk about how pissed Kaz was when Genya offered to fix his leg?). I love how contradictory he is, how much he loves Inej and wants to be with her, and wants to touch her, and the way his trauma and touch repulsion just constantly stops him from being physical able to do what he actually wants. Inej, who loves Kaz back, and sees the boy underneath the image of a monster he has crafted for himself, who has her own hang ups around touch and understands Kaz, but values herself enough to not pursue a relationship with him if he will not or cannot work on himself. Who grew claws with the knives she carries with her, who herself is a walking contradiction, deeply religious and also murderous, and so brave, and kind, and patient, and who I love with my whole heart.

Wylan, whose own father tried to have him killed because he was dyslexic. Jesper who has been hiding who he is because of what his power did to his mother, who is always the comedic relief while harboring pain, our favorite gambling addict, ADHD, gunslinger. Matthais who has to confront a lifetime’s worth of propaganda. Nina who is just an all around badass motherfucker, who is fat and sexy and brilliant. My favorite superspy <3

The Fall (2006) dir. Tarsem Singh

You really have to go looking for this film if you ever want to watch it, because it has almost entirely been wiped away, which sucks because it is one of my favorite movies. Why?

Because it is one of, if not the most visually stunning piece of media I have ever seen. The plot for this film is a stuntman (played by Lee Pace) falls, is injured, and hospitalized at the same time as a 5-year-old Romanian immigrant who fell and broke her arm picking oranges. Roy (the stuntman) starts telling Alexandria (the little girl) a story, to manipulate her in to doing things for him, like spying on people and stealing pain meds. The movie cuts between real life, present day, and this grandiose epic tale that he is telling. This was 150% a passion project on Tarsem’s part, he spent 30 million of his own money making this movie, for it to only make 3 million in theaters upon it’s release. It took four years to film and was filmed in 24 different locations.

I love the overarching story, and how the growing friendship Roy builds with this little girl literally saves his life. The cast of characters is certainly interesting, Charles Darwin is a character in Roy’s story, but by GOD is it just a great watch, hours of stunning cinematography, with incredible costumes. Would highly recommend watching this if you can find it.

The Magnus Archives

I love this podcast for many reasons. First, because I think it was absolutely brilliant to start this show off as almost an anthology, lulling the audience in to a false sense of security by having each early episode be completely unrelated to one another, until they aren’t. Until names start popping up in multiple tales, until monsters and ghosts and any number of other unexplained creepy things start showing up in other people’s stories. How slowly you start to realize everything is connected and always has been. That set up was just…beautifully handled. Second, I love what this show says about survival and fear. That the more we believe in fear, the more powerful it gets. I love how often the survivors of these tales come out the other side of these experiences by thinking of people that are important to them, people they love. When The Buried tried to get that spelunker trapped in the cave, it was the thought of finding her sister, of getting help for her sister that got her through the other side. When Martin is in The Lonely, it is his thoughts of Jon that get him through the other side. I love that the avatar of Death is kind. I love that the Boneturner just wants to build a garden. I love the experiences and the world that Johnathan Simms builds in every story, and that he is able to create so many different types of fears, a little something for everyone. I love the heart at the center of this show.

The Princess Bride

Again, another piece of media that is fast paced and full of quips, with a beautiful, ridiculous, hilarious story, and a solid emotional core. I was raised on this film, which is part of why I love it so much. You can see and feel how much fun the cast had making this film. To this day it is beloved, highly quotable, and poignant. Also a great fencing movie, but I’m biased on that end as a fencer myself. I don't have much more to say about this film because I think it is perfect and I have no notes, but I will say I love how much this film helped Mandy Patinkin process his own grief around the loss of his father.

#wka answers #180 degree longitude passes through us #180d #big eden #i told sunset about you #i promised you the moon #itsay #ipytm #moonlight chicken #mlc #pushing daisies #sense8 #six of crows #crooked kingdom #the fall #the fall (2006)#the magnus archives #tma #the princess bride

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darklydeliciousdesires · 7 months ago

Text

Sky Full of Stars - Chapter Nine.

Huge thanks to those of you still reading this! It's so strange when I come to post, as in the writing we are well into part three of the story and currently six years ahead of this time, and so much is different to how it was back here! I can't wait to share that with you all :)

Previous chapters - One Two Three Four Five Six Seven Eight

Tag list - In the comments

Words - 4,136

Warnings - 18+ content throughout. Minors DNI!

Waking up in her bed, for a second his brain tricked him into thinking she’d still be there, Adrien reaching to find nothing but an empty space. He sighed a little, looking at the time on his phone. Eight ten in the morning. It’d be one twenty-five in the afternoon in England, where she’d flown to three days before to begin filming, his own five-week stint in France to film Midnight in Paris beginning the following week.

His flight was two days from then, but he had a few commitments in the city planned prior to leaving, so had stayed at hers since his place was such a haul to get to and from. Five hours drive, or an hour and a half flight and then fifty minutes by car from Syracuse airport. It made sense to stay put.

One particular commitment he was looking forward to took place later that day, meeting someone he hadn’t seen since before Christmas, someone who when she glanced up from the table as he approached, looked a thousand times healthier than she had before.

“Homeslice!” Jen spoke warmly, standing to give him a huge hug after he’d placed his tea down.

“Hey you. God, you look amazing! It’s so good to see you,” he replied, kissing her cheek. And hell, she truly did. She had colour in her face, her eyes were bright, and her smile lit up the entire room. It was about a million miles away from the pale, heroin sick mess he remembered seeing in the hospital back in Pittsburgh. Also, she’d gained a few pounds in weight, and it suited her. She was still slight in frame, but definitely less scary thin than she had been.

She was dressed so differently too compared to on tour Jen, wearing a pair of grey skinny jeans and an ecru coloured sweater that sloped off one shoulder, the only thing remotely rock and roll about her look being the reveal of her half sleeve of tattoos, as well as a smudge of smoky eyeliner.

“Thanks, man. Got that fresh outta rehab glow!” Indeed, fresh out she was, leaving the facility the week before, staying a little longer than she’d originally intended in order to feel completely certain that she was strong enough in her tentative recovery to do so.

She’d been in regular contact with Jade, also talking to him a lot over the phone as well, the pair striking up a friendship, much to his girlfriend’s joy. It was important her favourite people got along well. Truly, what had happened had bonded them on a very special level, Jen knowing she could never, ever repay such.

Sitting down, her face crumpled a little, waving her hand dismissively as she began to sniff. “Ignore me. I’m okay, I’m alright. I’m just so grateful to you. You saved my life, man. That’s like, the biggest deal there is.”

“Hey, come on,” he spoke, grasping her hand, his face softening. “I did what anybody would have done, finding you like that.” Gracious as always. Jen squeezed his hand tightly before letting go, picking up her coffee as he continued. “So, how are you finding being out in the world again?”

“Difficult,” she confessed, widening her eyes a fraction. “I’ve learned so many coping tools now though, how to get through situations that would previously have made me use. Still, doesn’t stop me from missing it.”

“I meant to ask you over the phone, but I take it that it’s nixed you being able to take opioids for your back now, right?”

She nodded. “Yeah, I can’t even risk using anything derivative. It’s a slippery slope, man.”

He could well imagine. “Do you mind if I ask you why you turned to heroin? Tell me to butt out if you want. I tried to ask Jade if she had any ideas, but yeah. She shut it down immediately.”

She laughed softly, shaking her head. “She handled it about as well as I expected her to. Is she still blaming herself for not noticing?”

“Oh yeah,” he revealed, eyebrows fluttering upwards as he scratched his chin. Trying to tell her otherwise had fallen on deaf ears, as they both knew it would. For him at least, it was becoming a concern. Her coping mechanisms for distress were not healthy, and it worried him, how much she internalised what caused her pain.

“She needs not to. I was a sneaky son of a bitch with it, man. As for why, yeah, you can ask. You’re the one who found me OD’ing, I fucking owe you that much, Adrien.” Sipping her coffee, she took a breath, ready to tell all to who truly was the first person outside of her immediate family and therapy circle. He made it easy, though. Jade was right; he was a fantastic listener, as she’d discovered through tentatively getting to know him on tour and over the phone while in rehab.

“Taking the pain pills, it wasn’t all about my gnarled up back, dude. It’s like, I have all of this crazy energy constantly whirling, I always have. It’s why my dad - may he rest - was the first person who put a set of drumsticks in my hand when I was six. I was always tapping, tapping, tapping, y’know? Except dad happened to notice it with a natural rhythm.”

Adrien nodded, listening without interruption as she took it back much further than he was expecting.

“He thought it’d occupy me, learning to drum, burn out a little of my zany energy, and it did to a degree. But nothing ever stopped the noise in my head, which I’ve since learned has been me suffering from high functioning anxiety for pretty much most of my life, man. The therapist I saw in rehab really helped me identify it all, dug to the root cause. Smack eventually became my outlet for shutting my brain off so I could fucking sleep.

“I didn’t make it easy on myself, snorting blow as much as I was to shake the sluggish feeling I had. At first, I was just shooting up a few times a month, when being drunk or naturally exhausted didn’t work. It was the classic thinking of not seeing I had a problem, because it was only once in a while, y’know? Addicts, they ain’t always like those dudes from that movie Trainspotting. It can look different. This chick I met at the centre, she was a fucking CEO of a massive company, shooting up at the weekends to just feel all floaty and nice for the afternoon before returning to her life.

“She was like me, though. Not a longstanding user, but got more regular, and then she fucked up and took too much. I won’t be fucking up again, because I fucking love my life and having been so close to leaving it, it frightened the shit outta me, man. Again, I am so fucking sorry for putting you through that. I know I’ve told you a million times, but I gotta make my peace with it, that it was a guy who I barely knew as you were back then, my best friend’s boyfriend, no less, who found me.”

God, she was such a force. Her revelations made him see her in a completely different light to how he once had. She still had that energy about her, but it was tempered now, probably down to her finally receiving the correct treatment for her anxiety, he guessed. “I think you’re really something, just seeing you had a problem and dealing with it so head on. No hiding, no denial, just like, ‘yep, this is what’s wrong, and this is what I gotta do to fix it.’ That’s a really admirable trait.”

A shy smile danced across her mouth, Jen running her hand through her long, wavy hair. “If my shit needs fixing, then I’m not gonna run and hide from it. Can’t do that and not expect the inevitable implode.”

He looked a little uncomfortable for a second, in indecision whether to voice what was on his mind. Luckily for him, Jen read him like a book. “She does it, we both know that she does, and yeah. You ain’t the only one who wishes she didn’t.” Taking a deep breath, she puffed her cheeks out, smiling thinly. “To be fair to her, it’s a behaviour she’s fallen into without much checking from those closest to her. We all did, man. Us girls, I think from a very young age, we didn’t hold one another accountable for our shit, y’know?”

“No, I don’t,” he smiled, a little baffled. “Explain?”

“So, you know how young we all were when we first started out. We were seventeen when we cut our first album, except for Jess at sixteen. We were kids, still. Children! And we got thrown into the machine, these five babies who were catapulted to huge fame so damned early. Too early, man.

“With every person who praised us though, there were another five wanting to cut us down, from critics even to contemporaries in some cases. It bonded us so tightly, protecting one another from it. I think we took care of each other so damned much, that we never saw our flaws, or we let each other get away with it more than we should have. I'm not saying it’s anybody else’s fault other than our own, like me and my addiction, Katie being very aggressive when she sets her mind to it, or Jade being a control freak who internalises her pain, but yeah. It’s what we did.”

He remembered back to how he’d felt at seventeen, and then tried to apply how he would have coped if his fame had begun right there and then, going from a nobody to someone effectively shot out of a canon into such huge prominence. It made him shudder. No wonder they’d bonded so closely. “That actually makes a lot of sense, that you’d protect each other to that kind of degree. I worry about her still continuing to do it though, at almost thirty-two. I know I haven’t been on the scene long, but your friend? She means the world to me.”

A happy grin illuminated her mouth, reaching to cup his face momentarily with both hands. “You’re such a good fucking guy, Adrien. I’m glad she’s found you, because some of her exes...” she trailed off, letting out a long breath through gritted teeth. “Ivan was definitely the worst, because of what happened, but yeah. There were some straight up douchebags for a time. Of course, she blamed herself for all of it going wrong, because that’s her.” Pausing she fiddled with the handle of her coffee mug. “There’re things I could tell you, but you should probably hear it from her, y’know? Except...”

“Except she isn’t likely to tell me until she stops panicking that she’s gonna mess up what she has with me, too?” he offered, watching her nod deeply.

She pointed a well-manicured finger at him. “Bingo, dude. I mean, she does seem like she’s settling to the idea. Probably because she can see that you’re not a douchebag like the rest were. You don’t have any red flags she’s actively ignoring. In fact, the only thing she’s mentioned so far that’s negative is that you sometimes give her tummy ache with that big ole’ cervix banger you have between your legs!”

It was an unfortunate moment for him to finish his tea, snorting with laughter into the cup and almost choking. “Oh, god,” he groaned, wiping a hand down his face as he felt his cheeks warm a little. “You girls, shit. You all probably know much more about my junk than I’m comfortable with.”

She barked a laugh, thinking how adorable he was, how easily embarrassed he got. “Yeah, but it’s all good, man. All good!” Pausing, her smile crinkled her eyes, cocking her head. “She thinks you hang the moon and stars, my gal. She’s really in it with you.”

He nodded. “I do know, yeah. It's nice to hear it confirmed from one of the people closest to her, though. I haven’t ever met anybody like her. She’s so ridiculously lovely, so down to earth as well. One thing I really like about her is just how normal she is. There’s nothing pretentious about the woman. Just before Christmas, she mentioned that she was going out for lunch with her friend Tony while I was heading to an interview. I opened her apartment door and there’s Anthony fucking Bourdain standing there! Or the time I came downstairs shortly before she went away and she’d just chilling on the couch, drinking tea with Iggy Pop like it’s the most normal thing in the world.”

She shrugged lightly, playing with the little empty packet of sugar next to her coffee mug. “It is for her. She doesn’t see people’s fame; she just sees them.”

Of course, she did. It was what had drawn him to her so much when they first met. “That’s if she even knows who they are. I’m still not over the whole Dalai Lama thing. God, I nearly ruptured something when she told me about it!”

Throwing her head back, her laughed filled the space. “Ahh, shit, yeah, yeah. That was the best one I think she’s ever done! There I was, man, on the side of a dirt road in Kathmandu, crying with laughter at her.”

Their coffee date wrapped up shortly after, the pair moving to their next destination. They were heading to watch The Conversation, the film that Jade had taken a pause in touring from to film, and which had premiered in the US two days before, the lady herself attending the London premiere the previous evening. It was her first major role, playing Lydia Todd, a prolific serial killer confined to a psychiatric unit, starring across from Edward Norton, the FBI profiler tasked with conducting a series of interviews with her.

Adrien had been looking forward to it just as much as Jen, both taking a seat at the back, chatting quietly while they waited for the lights to dim. For the following ninety-seven minutes, they were glued to the screen, the performance of the woman they both adored absolutely flooring them. The way she played creepy, calculated, yet a little vulnerable wrapped up in a bow of somebody who was horrifically psychologically damaged was flawless.

“What we’re watching,” he leaned to whisper in Jen’s ear, “is the movie that’ll put our girl on the map.”

He wasn’t wrong. The critical acclaim Jade received in the weeks that followed had the industry buzzing, her name and status in the acting world elevated hugely. There she was, riding a huge wave of success, and he couldn’t be there to celebrate that with her by her side until March. He counted the weeks, then the days of Skype calls, phone conversations and hundreds of text messages keeping them both going, until before they knew it, she was jumping into his arms again.

“Oh, my life, I missed you even more this time around than the last!” she exclaimed, her bum being squeezed in his big hands as he carried her through her apartment, sharing kisses, thrilled to be wrapped around him again. “And I want to show you just how much, but I need a shower. I smell of armpits and plane.”

“Alright, I guess I’ll reluctantly put you down.”

It wasn’t for long, though. After washing and working shampoo from her hair, she was rinsing the conditioner out when she heard the bathroom door open. “Couldn’t wait, hmm?”

The shower door opened, his body pressing to hers, arms encircling her as his mouth buried against her neck. “Not even for another second.”

That hunger was matched, her arm winding back, hand sinking into the soft of his dark hair, hair she couldn’t believe had grown so much in two months. A sigh poured from her sensuous lips like wine as his hands gently squeezed her tits, nipples pinched to pebbles, his cock hardening against the small of her back.

Her skin skittered with the hum of reconnection as his hands lowered in an alluring glide over her wet skin, anticipation starting to melt down her spine. He didn’t leave her waiting on it for long, one hand descending to push into the heat of her folds, the other gently clutching beneath her jaw as he turned her head, leaning to plant a kiss of fire and honey upon her lips.

Tingly heat prickled as his fingers glided through her folds, the sweet dew of her pussy slicking against his touch, a shuddered breath fluttering from his mouth to hers as she quickly began to gush against his fingers. Their want spiralled like a tornado, kisses becoming more urgent, her body wracked with shivers as he rubbed tight circles over her clit, her walls stinging with the need to feel him inside her.

Turning, she wound her arms around his neck, Adrien lifting her, shunting her body against the tiles and without ceremony or warning, dropping her straight down onto his cock. He kissed the gasp the fell from her mouth, teeth nipping her lower lip, grunting low as her legs tightened around him. His fingers dug a hard clench beneath her thighs, driving up into her with force as the water cascaded down his back, lips sliding from hers to once again tease hot kisses against the column of her throat.

Panting against his mouth, she stared him in the eyes, nails dragging through his hair, fingers clenching to tug gently. “God, you turn me on so much. You’re so fucking gorgeous.”

Truly, he’d never felt as heavily coveted by a woman as he did the one who had completely captured his heart. She near constantly made him feel good about himself, not that he particularly suffered with confidence issues. It was always nice to hear how much he stirred her desire, though.

Rutting into her core hard, he groaned deep as his mouth found hers again, lost in the eye of her storm even though truly, he was the one driving it, all the love, longing and need for her mingling and sending him mindless. The blaze of him caught at her edges, sent sparks skittering within her blood, his hips driving like a piston against her.

It was too wild to last beyond pure, basic urgency, a heated fuck of primal need within the water and steam, sending them both soaring rapidly to their bliss. It ripped through her like a current, her nails clawing down his back, that feral edge toppling him as he spilled deep into her, teeth clamping upon the side of her neck. It glimmered through them gently in the wake of such intensity, tiny pin pricks suffusing, both panting hard as he set her back down to her feet, entwining as they kissed.

Once out, dry and dressed, they headed out for dinner, both catching up with one another properly.

“Seriously, do you have any idea how proud of you I am?” he began after they’d eaten, Jade moved to his side of the booth they’d been seated in, his arm draped around her shoulders. “Watching you as Lydia wasn’t like I was seeing you there. Jade was gone, it was all her, this complete other person.”

To receive such praise from her extremely accomplished boyfriend, a man whose talent was so renowned, it honestly bowled her over completely. “I was so nervous about it. I worried constantly that I’d overplayed her in some moments and fallen victim to underplaying in others. She was so complex, and I wanted to do the nuance of the character justice, so hearing you say that really does set me at ease.”

Kissing her head, he smiled widely. There was no bullshit with her, not false modesty. She honestly had fretted – and still was – over the performance that had earned her such critical acclaim. “You were amazing. I said to Jen that it was the movie that’d put you on the map, and I was right.”

Turning to him, she rested her forehead to his, nuzzling him softly. “I love you so much.”

“And I love you about a thousand times more, Moo.”

Crinkling her nose, she shook her head. “Not possible.”

“Yes, possible.” He kissed her softly, pointing at her. “Don’t argue with me.”

Laughing, she reached for her drink, leaning into him as she finished it, the simple happiness of that moment something she knew would be remembered for a long time. They headed back to her apartment after that, walking the twenty minutes hand in hand, enjoying the weather beginning to finally warm as winter made way for the imminent arrival of spring.

Once in her building, she checked her mailbox, Adrien telling her he’d forgotten to collect it for the last couple of days. As expected, it was full.

“Look at this!” she exclaimed, yanking the bundle out. “She’s nine months pregnant with post!” Her words made him laugh, finding himself playfully whacked upon the shoulder with the clutch of letters as they walked into the elevator.

Placing the letters down on the counter in the kitchen, she pulled a bottle of wine from the rack, Adrien disturbed from kissing the side of her neck by his phone ringing.

“It’s my dad, I’ll be in the lounge.”

She smiled, pouring a glass and placing it into his hand. “Okay, sexy mans. Tell him I said hi.”

He winked before turning, Jade pouring herself a glass before sorting through the pile. Invites to gala’s, functions, other celeb-type events all in the form of fancy cards sent in decadent looking envelopes, and amongst them, a handwritten one. The postmark stated Omaha, Jade frowning as she slid her thumb under the sealed join, trying to figure out who she knew in the Nebraskan city, the realisation suddenly hitting her when she took in the handwriting.

It was the neat scribe that had written three years' worth of lovely birthday and Christmas cards to her, from a woman whom she had been very fond of, once upon a time. What reason did Polina Kuznetsova have to contact her now, though?

“Dear Jade,

I am contacting you on behalf of my son, for of course he cannot. I truly do hope this letter finds you well. Ivan is doing great in prison; his father and I are very proud of his progress after being so very ashamed in the aftermath of the way he treated you. Please, do not think my words in this letter will ever condone what he did, for I do not, but you must understand a few things. The steroid use, it changed who he was. It did. You know that as well as I do. He was night and day in difference, the man he was when using and when he was not. He feels much remorse for how he treated you, and he wants for you to reach out and contact him. His details are included below.

You two made a wonderful couple, and he wishes to build something again with you in view to eventually reconnect and repair the damage he did upon his release. I think that you should consider this, I honestly do. He still loves you, and to be brutally honest, you both had blame in the relationship. You put your career before him time and again, and I cannot blame him for being hurt over that...”

She didn’t need to read the rest, the words from a woman who might have said she didn’t condone her son’s actions, but didn’t give a damn enough to even for one second consider what her letter would do to a woman who truly - not that she’d admit it - wasn’t over what had happened to her. Her words about the blame, too. It hit her like a knife to her chest...

“You never make time for me, Jade! Always this tour, or that movie! You on the move constantly, that’s why it happened! It was your fault that we...”

The panic of it, his voice in her head, everything she’d so tightly pushed down began to rise. It was too much. Her limbs felt light and tingly, the breath stolen from her lungs, turning to grab her bag. It was without stalling or thought that she ran from her home, back out into the New York night, needing to be alone as her emotions crashed within like a bomb.

It was beyond her completely that who she should have run to was the one she’d left behind in her apartment.

#adrien brody #adrien brody fanfiction #adrien brody smut #adrien brody fanfic #adrien brody fic #adrien brody x ofc #sky full of stars #adrien and jade

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olderthannetfic · 2 years ago

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audience question: what books/movies would you give (or have given) your kids to become their formative media? i'm interested to see what makes the cut 👀

I'd let them have access to my library. If it's a book, I'll let them figure out when they're ready to handle it.

(Works fine as long as you're a decent parent and answer questions that come up without being a weirdo about it and freaking them out so they never ask you anything again.)

For films and other things... hmm... it's tricky because all of the formative tings for me were the genre I'd call Weird Art Films About Weird Sex.

If my kid were shaping up to be that kind of weirdo at 14, maybe I'd leave some of these around, but I think it would be pretty intrusive to thrust them upon anybody outside of a film school seminar. Maybe Harold & Maude. My parents rented that when I was a tween. It made An Impression. It's rare for me to see something even two or three times, but Harold and Maude I've seen dozens.

I still think the opening to Harold and Maude is one of the best of any film:

youtube

You immediately know what kind of people both of these characters are and that this isn't going to be a simple comedy, dark or otherwise.

The first time I watched it, I knew nothing about the film and was surprised at both this and all of Harold's other antics. It's hilarious until it isn't. It's a movie about zest for life vs. wanting to die, and it walks an interesting line tonally. I remember rewatching it to show it to friends in college... and for the first time understanding that look Harold gets when he sees Maude's arm.

There was definitely media I loved pre-puberty, but the things I remember are all like Nancy Drew.

I consumed vast quantities of mystery, and it's probably why I'm a mystery novelist today, but I don't remember anything specific that feels formative in other ways. I wouldn't try to stop a kid from reading trash. I remember how infuriating it was to have adults constantly trying to make me read something "better" than Nancy Drew. But I wouldn't specifically hand my kid those or any of the other formulaic junk series (Sweet Valley High et al.). They'll find whichever ones are popular at the time just fine.

There's a very particular feeling of my brain lighting up that I remember mostly from my teen years. Those media made me quiver and have to pause the movie. I felt seen or maybe I felt too much to handle. That's the feeling I associate with formative media for me.

Here are the ones that instantly spring to mind even after all this time:

Velvet Goldmine - Music fan investigates the glam rockers of his youth, meditating on his sexual awakening and trying to solve the mystery of where one of them went. Ewan McGregor's tweet is the sequel. I will accept no other outcome.

Crash - James Spader at the peak of his beauty falls into the world of car crash fetishists who are dealing with the ennui of modern life and the alienation of the big city and technology by becoming perverts. Contains people going down on scars and tattoos, fetishy leg braces, and what teen me assumed was homoerotic subtext. (Spoiler: it was not subtext.)

Matador - A serial killer murders her victims like a bullfighter would; she stalks her favorite retired bullfighter who is also a serial killer. Antonio Banderas plays a dweeb like always in Spain. (The rest of Almodóvar's 80s and 90s movies were also favorites.)

Kissed - The fluffy necrophilia movie

The City of Lost Children - Less horny, but what is up with Miette and One's vibe? Visually a feast. Ten times the movie Amélie is. Sorry, not sorry.

Cemetery Man - Rupert Everett kills zombies in this bizarre Italian horror movie based on a comic book character drawn to look like Rupert Everett. My stepfather thought it looked like something I'd like and rented it for one of my birthday parties in high school. Around the time of the quasi necrophilia sex scene I realized 1. he'd chosen well and 2. he had clearly not read the back too carefully.

The Pillow Book - Japanese-Chinese novelist named after Sei Shonagon has a battle of literary wits with the publisher who blackmailed her father into sex with him. Involves a lot of calligraphy on naked men, including Ewan McGregor.

Sex, Lies & Videotape - Unfulfilled housewife has her world turned upside down when her shitty husband's college best friend comes to visit. This dude has become unable to be with women after a bad breakup and interviews and videotapes women discussing their masturbation habits for his own private use. Contains a famous and stupid quote about men falling in love with the people they sleep with and women becoming more and more attracted to the people they love, but the movie is far less gender normative than the character saying that.

Tesis - Uptight film student who pretends not to like violence decides to do a thesis on violence in Spanish media. Her advisor dies while watching a mysterious tape he got from somewhere. She steals it, finds out it's a snuff film, and investigates with the help of a creepy horror film nerd.

The best scene is when they're watching some violent shit she asked him for ("for her thesis") and she says "What kind of people watch this stuff?"

He answers: "You, for example."

That one I discovered when my roommate in Japan was watching it a couple of years after college. Many of these I saw in high school. That's the range where I remember things being particularly formative. Or maybe it's about what I'm open to at different points in my life: I think weird art films can still make me feel too much, but I don't always like that feeling, and I don't seek them out as much now.

Knife+Heart made me flash back to that era though. It's a neon-drenched period piece about a lesbian director of artsy gay male pornos investigating a serial killer targeting her actors. The sheer levels of meta insanity and horny murder scenes, my god!!!

Running through all of these are themes of ambiguous sexuality, often queer but also non-genitally-focused, massive quantities of voyeurism, meditations on what it means to be a fan, and a boatload of death=sex=death vibes.

That's not quite what you asked, but basically, my own formative media isn't something I'd share with just anyone. If people want to watch necrophilia-filled art films of the 90s, I think they need to choose that for themselves.

I guess all that access to Beatrix Potter and watching basically no TV other than Mystery! or Masterpiece Theater (i.e. UK costume dramas catering to a teaboo market and co-funded by the US) during my early childhood had an effect. So did going to schools where we studied Asian American history and read Dragonwings.

None of those media stand out. I'd share them with my kid, but one example is as good as another. Knives Out delivers substantially the same experience as most of them. Watching whatever anime is hot now will be as good as watching the anime I liked when I was young.

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swallowerofdharma · 5 months ago

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movie anon from yesterday coming in to say that i definitely want to know what your favourite movies are, doesn't matter if they are black and white. maybe looking at the list will inspire some confidence to recommend the movies i like too

It’s a bit scary, isn’t it, to share the films that mean something to you on the internet, instead of your two or three close friends you can have longer conversations with and know where you are coming from. For example, there is a very short film directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini called Che cosa sono le nuvole (What are clouds, 1967) which is one episode included in a broader project with other directors and a plethora of very well known artists and actors from that time period that you would have gone and seen as part of a film anthology. It’s just so brilliant, I have to see it again every once in a while. But how would other people take Ninetto Davoli’s blackface? Many times done callously or uncritically in the past, it’s a very good thing to criticize and being disappointed with. In this case, I would say that it is definitely not a mockery on Pasolini’s part, considering the characters are talking marionettes recreating the story of The Tragedy of Othello and the face of Jago-Totò is also painted, in green. And the relationship between Europe and Africa in the context of the process of decolonization that was taking place was too much part of the context and of utter relevance at the time, even for other segments of the anthology. One should also see his documentary film Appunti per un'Orestiade africana, for better measure Pasolini’s choices and his level of awareness in terms of representation. Che cosa sono le nuvole is all about representation after all, the complex relationships between characters, story, the author and the public. The marionettes develop a consciousness about the story they are telling as they are telling it without seemingly knowing what it means and why they are doing what they are doing, asking the puppeteer, who gives them rather unsatisfactory answers. Meanwhile the audience gets so angry at Othello and Jago that they intervene to save Desdemona in the end. The two “bad marionettes” get put in the trash and taken away to a landfill where they are able to see the sky for the first time. I think that I love it so much because in 20 minutes there is so much punch, emotion and eloquence, the music is perfect, the words outstanding, the tragic-comedic tone never overdone and the irony and deep sadness and mystery and beauty of life are so very well communicated. I don’t know if I have ever seen a perfect synthesis in film like this one or someone able to trust so much his audience while also knowing that misunderstanding and bad judgment and condemnation will also be inevitable parts of making art.

I like old films, the texture and the use of light and frame, more than cutting edge pacing and special effects. Color palette, music choices and audio effects and the presence of actors that I am able to withstand and tolerate if there are closeups of their faces also are details that usually make me love a movie or dislike it. And I especially like noir, mystery and cosmic horror vibes, although I am also very much into neorealism and melodrama. So here a brief list of my favorites: Wuthering Heights (1939), Kiss me deadly (1955), Luchino Visconti’s Ossessione (1943) and Rocco e i suoi fratelli (1970), The birds (1963), 8 1/2 (1963), Kwaidan (1964), Wild at heart (1990).

It’s a weird bunch and there are many other titles that are coming up in succession, but I am going with the ones that are imprinted more clearly in my mind: considering my very bad memory it means that they had a strong impact. Please if you want to share yours, let me know as well, even if they are titles that aren’t necessarily in the top ten of many cinephiles. I don’t consider myself one, I missed for lack of commitment or purposely ignored too many of the ones considered important. Thank you for these asks!

#movies ask

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grid-daisies · 3 hours ago

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Okay, now that my dog has gone outside and I have gotten comfy, I'm ready to talk about this movie.

My spoiler-free review:

Not gonna lie, I was originally not going to see this movie when I realized that 1. John Chu was going to be directing it and 2. it was going to be in two parts. I did not like In the Heights. Yes, there were great cinematographic shots, but he and Miranda had made so many changes to the plot and took away so many characters that it lost the impact it had in the stage musical. I was also concerned that they were trying to milk out the musical with two parts (because the movie industry seems to only understand how to beat dead horses lately) when the stage musical was about 3 hours, and could just be a long film. However, I got caught in the hype and decided to go see it anyway.

And Oh. my. god. This was easily not only one of the best musical adaptations I have ever seen but also one of the top ten films I have seen. I 1000% recommend this movie. They really did the musical justice in this first part. They added this beautiful depth to all of the characters, the setting, and the themes. The music was beautiful.

Cynthia Erivo did a fantastic job as Elphaba, simply loved her interpretation. I was a little skeptical about Ariana Grande (simply because she was pretty weak in Hairspray Live!) but she has obviously put in a lot of work and love into her role and was a fun Galinda/Glinda. I also felt the same about Johnathan Bailey, because I knew nothing about his musical experience. Still, he brought this flavor of playboy/rockstar to the role, alongside the needed sincerity and goodness Fieyro has deep down and I loved watching his every moment on screen. Great work from all three.

It was very obvious that this film was a product of love from the cast and crew. It was also so refreshing to not see any advertising in the movie. It allowed me to stay engaged in the film better.

There were a few spots in the middle where it did feel a little slow, and it would feel like a 3 hour movie, but those moments were few, and they hit a great pace with the main plot points. Not only that, the beginning and end were simply breathtaking (like seriously, I found myself breathless each time), which definitely helps leave a great impression if your middle is a little weak.

Under the read more, I'm going to provide more in depth thoughts about the movie and some of the themes. Obviously, spoilers ahead, but I will also be talking about colorism, ableism, colonialism, and systemic racism and xenophobia. Please be advised.

Quick Disclaimer: I have not seen the musical on stage before, so there may be elements and dialogue I have not seen that actually transfer to the movie.

Also! While I have been doing a lot of study into the effect of systemic exploitation on marginalized populations in terms of music and media, I am still a white woman who is working to educate myself and tear down my biases. If I say something that is actually incorrect, or you disagree, please let me know! I am trying to be genuine with my thoughts on this topic but I am by no means the top expert on it.

Okay! Let's start off with my general thoughts on the movie.

There's no other way to say this but: the first song/scene had me in a goddamn chokehold the whole time. Starting with Glinda's announcement about the death of the wicked witch and immediately diving with the flying monkeys into this swell of a first chord just pulled me in immediately. It fixed all the hate I had for that first chord for years when it was my alarm to wake up, lol. About halfway through the song, I realized my jaw was dropped. And then the last chords alongside the visual of the Munchkins burning a wooden figure of the wicked witch gave me chills. Oh my gosh everyone did an amazing job!

The ending was just as good! I realized as the credits were rolling that my heart was beating very fast because I had been so engaged in what was happening. I was very close to tears multiple times in that scene, when Elphaba makes the decision to step out on her own, when she sees her younger self in the glass as she's falling, her soaring into the clouds, just...all of it.

I'm really glad that cast a woman who actually uses a wheelchair to play NessaRose. It rubbed me the wrong way for years. I also like how there were these depictions of Nessa trying to advocate for herself and Elphaba trying to as well, only to be ignored by "well meaning" people who want to "help" her by pushing her around, and the two girls having to practically shout that she is capable of pushing herself. It also leads to this inciting incident where Elphaba is tasked with watching her sister because 1. her father obviously loves her more than Elphaba, and 2. there is probably some of that ableism tied into it of believing that Nessa is incapable of living on her own or taking care of herself because of her disability. I love that they didn't shy away from that. I am curious how they are going to handle that sticky plot point in Act 2 where Elphaba manages to "heal" Nessa. I wonder if they'll change it to something else.

I love that they added more background to Elphaba's childhood. Being raised by Dulcebear instead of her family added this new side of Elphaba that instantly connects her with Dr. Dillamond, because she was raised by an animal, and it thinks that makes the injustices against them much more obvious to her. Granted, I have never seen the musical on stage myself (that requires having money and time), but I do like that addition.

Again, I have not seen a staged version of the musical so maybe I miss some things, but I originally felt that this metaphor of Elphaba being a person of color (well, literally, but not in the way I mean it) was sometimes played in a heavy handed way that didn't sit well with me. In the film, I do feel they took some more naunce and care with the topic. Her phrase answering questions she had been asked felt very similar to how I've heard black women explain their skin color and racial identity to white people (especially white women)...

which leads me into another theme I want to talk about (one that us white woman love to use so much): performative activism. Galinda/Glinda is so apparently doing this throughout the whole movie. It's one of her character flaws, one that she eventually will break near the end of the entire musical. But her ignorance, and her biases still clearly shine through to the audience. She says she will help "fix" Elphaba's skin color, she initially lauds her roommate situation with Elphaba as an adversity she would "rise above". She takes issue with the fact that Dr. Dillamond doesn't pronounce her name correctly, even after her tells her that he physically can't pronounce her name correctly. She doesn't even care that deeply about Dr. Dillamond's removal until it's obvious that Elphaba and Fieyro have bonded over this problem, which she then publicly announces changing her name to Glinda in "solidarity" with Dr. Dillamond. All of this she had done for public approval, to be told she's "good", and is aghast when Elphaba initially disputes this view of her publicly. See she cares more about people caring that she's "good" instead of actually doing good, which is very evident in a lot of liberal activists of this day (especially white people, and white liberal women specifically). This sets up a foil to Elphaba, who tries to genuinely do good, despite being labeled as otherwise by Glinda, her classmates, and eventually all of Oz itself.

It also makes the one time Glinda breaks from this much more impactful. At the Ozzdust Ballroom, when she realizes how she had treated Elphaba and seeing that she did actually care what people thought and that she was hurt, she finally felt remorse. She then stepped away from the approval she so desperately craved to truly stand with Elphaba, and do good. Eventually, the others fall in line behind her which can be a testament to her influence but also hard for her to learn her lesson as she will spend the rest of the musical torn between seeming good and actually doing good, which in the end will leave her alone without her lover and her best friend (maybe also lover? but that's for another time)

Okay let's talk about the heaviest topics from the film: colonialism, xenophobia, and systemic exploitation.

So the story they tell in the Emerald City is that Oz was originally under the charge of these older forces (portrayed as Idina Mendzel and Kristen Chenoweth who are both wonderful) and that they wrote a magical book with a prophecy that the chosen one would be able to read it. Then the country falls into chaos, blah blah blah, the wizard arrives and supposedly can read the book, is the chosen one, and brings "peace" to the land.

However, there is obviously a very different truth to this matter.

One of the most obvious signs is between the 2nd and 3rd song, when Elphaba shows her power at Shiz for the first time. She knocks off the stone picture of Oz, which shatters on the ground. Behind it is a painting of three animals carrying spell books, which instantly was apparent to me thinking back that the animals were actually the elder powers. Dr. Dillamond also discusses how humans and animals used to coexist, and then something changed.

And after you learn the truth about the Wizard, you know why. You see, he makes a very great point about "the best way unify people is to make a common enemy". So here comes the Wizard on his balloon, landing in Oz, and takes control. And the animals are slowly marginalized. I do think it was gradual thinking back to it. In Elphaba's birth, animals are only nurses and midwives. There are no animal students in Shiz. And then it becomes really obvious with the hateful message on Dillamond's board, the secret meeting of the animals, and escalates very quickly to Dillamond being fired, the lion cub being introduced in a cage and nobody but Elphaba and Fieyro truly caring. Oz is the colonizer entering this world of opportunity, taking the power for himself through trickery and illusions, while slowly downgrading the power of those there first until they can be considered unworthy of equal or humane treatment. And they become "the enemy", the threat so that the people are distracted and unify to create more power for one person.

And then Elphaba discovers the truth and she says it plain and clear and when she said it, it was like a heavy beat of realization for the audience: "You have no true power". Just like the leaders of every system, they exploit those beneath them and distract them, trick them, or turn them into the enemy in order to gain more power for themselves. Which in turn happens to Elphaba. They exploit her power in order to painfully turn the monkeys into flighted monkeys, and then turn her into the big bad enemy when she tries to fix what she was tricked to do and refuses to side with the Wizard. Like they touched on this in the musical, but the film went so much deeper with this theme and I really am glad they did. Not to sound cliche, but this feels very needed now.

Anyway, it's 1 am and I think I've about said everything I thought of. If you have any ideas, or questions, or actually want to correct me or something, feel free to message me or hit my inbox. Just be nice please lol

#wicked #wicked 2024 spoilers #wicked spoilers #wicked 2024 #I hope this makes sense because I am getting VERY tired #the high is fading so I'm starting to crash

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jessthetea · 20 days ago

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If he’s the one liking her post, it doesn’t mean that they are still together. He still likes posts from his ex and I do think that he doesn’t want any speculation about it either, so we cannot be 100% sure, but I think that him liking her post does not mean that they are still together.

That is true that he does follow one of his exes and likes her posts and that we cannot be 100% sure but at the same time, let’s think about it. Why now liking a post from her after not acknowledging her and ignoring her on social media for almost 6 months? Why wait three days after her post and two days after his post about honesty on Halloween (a day after Halloween mind you) to just like it especially since he knew Liam? Why not comment on it and why didn’t he make a post of his own ( although I do understand people have their way of grieving/don’t like to post) You cannot tell me that he didn’t see her post the day of because Jamie lurks online all the time, because the day she posted that and his post the next morning is too perfectly timed. So it really would not make sense for him to wait nearly 4 days to like her post to me. We also have to remember that one time when she had posted a snowboarding video, and Jamie only liked it, and then two or three days later I believe “he came back and commented” and the comment doesn’t even sound like something he would say meaning that she’s the one that left the comment especially since she did it when he was filming ST like he is doing now. So it wouldn’t surprise me if she somehow got into his account and left a like because just like the other admin said she saw his tweet freaked out and liked her post from his account. This is the same woman who sent old pictures of him and her at the airport like they’re new to try to debunk the breakup rumors as well (Who else would have those photos? ) so we cannot put it past her. Now whether they still being together or not, from Jamie’s actions and Jess’s constant failed attempts, nine times out of ten they are not together hopefully. Something is definitely going on as to probably why Jamie can’t publicly announce the break up yet and it has Jess written all over it and it’s frustrating but yes without proof, we don’t know until something else happens. But that sudden like to her post is very sketchy.

#jess moloney #jamie bower #jamie campbell bower #asks #new tea

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scifrey · 2 years ago

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Cling Fast: Chapter Seven

By Losyark The Sandman (Netflix with some sprinkling of comics canon, and Gaiman Cinematic-Literary Universe canon) Dreamling (Hob Gadling x Dream of the Endless | Morpheus) Unfinished (tentatively 10 chapters) PG-13 (for now) Unbeta’d

Author's Note: Those of you who have been following along at home will note that Hob's co-owner of The New Inn is now named Patrick instead of Dennis. No reason for the change, except that there were too many 'D' names floating around and I was loosing track of who is who.

Hob wakes up with a splitting headache, but otherwise no other effects from his hangover. Except for the sinking feeling that comes with remembering that he screwed up his 1589 feast again.

Would it be pathetic to try a third time? Especially knowing now that Morpheus rarely eats, and when he can be persuaded to, it's never British fare.

Yeah, it would be pathetic.

Hob rolls onto his back and presses his hands to his face.

He doesn't remember drinking more when he got home, but he was definitely out of it when he hit the Dreaming. It felt more like somebody had slipped something into his water bottle, but he can't imagine that anyone on set would drug him. Besides, the fey food artist had kept an eye on it all day for him, and it wasn't until after they'd parted ways with a handshake that he really started to feel woozy.

When he turns to look at the clock, groaning and sandy-eyed, he finds a light dusting actual dream sand sprinkled on his bedside table, along with a glass of water and a bottle of paracetamol. The clock reads 4:13am, so Hob takes a pill, drinks half the bottle, and sweeps the sand onto his face.

One of these days, I'm going to scold that anthropomorphic personification of a concept for leaving his shit all over the place, Hob thinks. But not today. He sinks back into sleep, grateful for Morpheus' thoughtfulness, and spends the rest of the morning laying on his back in the grass of Fiddler's Green. He and Gilbert make shapes out of clouds, and chew on coriander stalks amid a bed of flowers that Hob calls foxgloves, but Gilbert corrects him and calls gillyflowers.

"Two very opposite things," Gilbert says gently, through the rustle of the wind through the boughs of a nearby copse of French willows. Hob is reminded what the fey food artist said, that flowers scream their secrets.

"Never got into floriography," Hob confesses to Gilbert. "You know, back when it was all the rage and people were sending each other bouquets that said 'meet me in the garden at midnight', or 'my father says I am never to see you again', or 'I want you to do me dirty seven ways from sunday.' Maybe I should."

Gilbert's laughter is in the babble of a brook. The dream doesn't elaborate though, because Hob's alarm rudely interrupts them. All thoughts of tracking down a book on flower language fly from his head as he drags himself through a quick shower, and races down the back stairs of the New Inn while the transpo van idles in the drive and honks obnoxiously.

Hob gets to wear a few different costumes today, which is nice. He was sweating to death in the black velvet. They're filming all the scenes that need to happen in the study today, which will all be woven into the ten different episodes, so Hob's in and out of the wardrobe trailer on the front drive constantly.

That's why he notices that someone's left the outside door to the solar standing open.

This is one of three doors to the solar, the one that leads directly out into the back garden, where his bench and apple tree still blessedly stand. The other two doors are off the kitchen, so the maids could bring El her afternoon indulgences directly, and another that was knocked into the outer wall of the withdrawing room.

While the door is open, the heavy curtains are still drawn to protect the fragile textiles within from sun damage.

Hob has been desperate to catch just a glimpse of the eden he'd built specifically for his wife. He's seen the photos on the postcards in the gift shop of course, but it's not the same thing. Those pictures have it dressed for the Edwardian era, to reflect the last time the house was occupied by a family.

But the set-dec team has re-dressed it according to the descriptions in El's diary, and the merchants receipts for the fabrics, flowers, and furniture. They'd even found notes on what kind of pottery and dishware El had kept in there, a screed in the loveletters between Eliza and Will as the maid raged over the ridiculousness of having special dishware that the mistress will only take her supper on when it's being served in the solar.

Hob sneaks over to the door, and cautiously pokes his face in. Nothing is moving in the cool dark of the room, and he can't hear anything, so he slips inside and closes the door behind him. Not all the way, though, in case someone has just stepped out and left it open on purpose. He doesn't want to be caught where he shouldn't be.

Shouldn't be, he snorts to himself. I built the damn place.

The cameras are all in the study, nobody is here but him, so Hob gives himself permission to react. He feels his face crumple, and bites his lips to keep in the noise trying to crawl out of his throat. The study is right on the other side of the brick wall. He doesn't want the crew to hear him, or they may make him leave, and he's not ready for that yet.

God's Wounds, thank you, Hob sends up the prayer, but he's not sure to whom. He’s not sure it matters. Thank you for letting me have this.

The glass is different. It's newer, clearer, smoother; clearly a later addition. The small diamond-shaped panes have been replaced by long, modern sheets. But the size of the frames are still the same, wide as Hob's full arm span and at least ten feet to the ceiling. The windows are separated by a single row of red brick, the frames black metal, a dark red drape pulled across each of them. And the roof, which in Hob's day was thatched, is presumably now also made of glass, as there are light canvas tarps pulled taught on a winding pulley where the solar meets the rest of the house.

The floors are piled with carpets, to dampen the echoes that the glass had created, so El could hear herself playing. The ones the production has provided are far too modern in design, but the camera isn't going to spend a lot of time pointed at the floor, so it doesn't matter.

What does matter is that the furniture is absolutely correct, and exactly where it used to be. The little cluster of a table and chairs, where El and Robyn used to do his numbers lessons together, where they'd snack on fruit and sweets while Hob was a docks, is in the corner by the door. On Sundays, when the three of them had just returned from church, Hob would sit on the bench under the apple tree with his pipe, and watch Eleanor pull Robyn into her lap at that table, and feed him bread pudding and tell him stories that would make him giggle and clap his hands.

Beside that, under the windows sits the long, skinny sofa. It has miniscule padding and none of the springs and memory foam of the modern version, but Hob fell asleep stretched out on it's welcoming yellow damask, listening to El pluck her way through a new piece she was learning more afternoons than he's ever napped on his current sofa. It's been recovered, but it's the same piece, because, when he runs his hand along the wooden arm rest, he can feel where Robyn scratched in an 'R' with a letter knife.

The brick wall opposite the windows is bare and exposed now, but there used to be a tapestry that, like the ones in the entry hall, have likely been removed for the sake of preservation. If they weren't thrown away or repurposed by the new family. They used to portray the bounties of the first Garden, every plant, and animal, every fruit and flower woven together in intricate, tiny detail. There had been black and red snake in the apple tree, and Hob had liked the little bugger immensely because he reminded Hob of his Stranger.

A furniture chest, what Hob would call a sideboard or a dish hutch today, stands against the bare brick. It's not the same one, that one had portraits of El's parents painted on the upper doors, but the style is similar enough that it's not distracting.

And at the other end of the solar, surrounded by massive potted ferns and an array of flowers that Hob had never paid much attention to, save for appreciating their perfume, is Eleanor's chair.

It's a grand, double-wide thing, with a matching footstool and only one arm, so El could play her lute comfortably without jamming her elbow against the side. He'd commissioned it specifically for this room and this purpose, having it covered in flaxen cloth-of-gold to match El's hair, and carved all over with little cherubs and their own heavenly instruments. It had been his wedding gift to her, and had lived first in the study, beside his desk, so they could spend their evenings together as he worked. But then he'd build this addition when he'd learned she was pregnant with Robyn, a thank you and a celebration, a little private Eden for Eve carrying Hob's new beginning, and new life.

And it's… it's all perfect.

Hob presses his hands against his chest, turning in circles to take everything in, emotion that he can't name pulling on his stomach and limbs like gravity. This place should be filled with laughter, and music, and sunlight. Instead the cool dark is as quiet as a tomb.

Hob gives into the pull of the earth and sinks onto El's foot stool, burying his face in the seat of the chair. She should be here. It should be her lap he rests his head on, like had so many evenings, where he'd perched on this exact same stool, back against her knees as she warbled in her thready, soft voice. Instead it's just fabric, and empty nothingness. Because his child killed her. His love killed her.

"Eleanor," Hob weeps, throat constricted. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry I couldn't save you… or our son. Either of them… I'm so sorry I didn't protect him…"

"Hot mic?" someone says from the corner, behind the plants.

"No, I turned it off to change," Hob murmurs, and then realizes with a start that he's not alone after all. He jolts upright, wiping at his face. Makeup is going to scold him again. "Christ! I—sorry! I didn't see you there."

"That's fine," the voice says, barely more than a whisper. "I sneak up on most people."

A short, voluptuous woman that Hob charitably would call extremely beige, steps out of the shadows. Her hair is beige, styled in a stringy, unwashed bun. Her skin is beige, the kind of milk-pale White that humans get in northern Europe. She's wearing a set of boring beige overalls. The only color comes from the handful of embroidered throw pillows she's carrying.

Set dec, Hob's mind supplies. She's probably the one who left the door open. They're staging this space to film.

"I'm sorry, I should go," Hob says. "It's just that the door was open and I—"

"You can stay," the woman says, moving to distribute the pillows on the sofa. "They don't need you on set right now."

"I must look ridiculous," Hob says, "Sitting here in a costume, mourning a—" he swallows hard. "A woman I never met. I just… you know, being here, I really feel what Sir Gadlen must have—"

"It's fine," the woman says, and steps up beside him to deposit the last throw pillow onto El's chair. "Grief gets its hooks into you in weird ways. People try to avoid despair, but it can be good for you. Helps you get it all out. So you go ahead and cry."

Hob thinks she's going to pat his shoulder, but she ends up cupping the back on his neck. Her palm is cold, and a bit uncomfortably damp to be honest, the kindness in her touch as she grants him this permission is what undoes Hob.

He tips forward, forehead pressed against the seat of the chair, arms wrapped around his middle, and howls.

He doesn't think he's cried this hard since Eleanor died, since her labors exhausted her, and even that challenging, stubborn spark that she'd always carried in her heart was extinguished. Since taking another breath became to taxing for her poor body, and as Hob petted her sweat-dampened hair back from her face, and kissed her temple, and told him how much he loved her, and begged her to just push, to just hold on, to just stay, please El, please, don't go, don't do this, don't leave me— Since poor wee John strangled in the womb, wrapped in his cord and stuck in his mother's body, dead before his first breath, went with her.

The set dec woman just crouches on the carpet beside him, rubbing his back soothingly, and making soft, encouraging sounds. She smelled revoltingly musky, which was the only thing that kept Hob for accepting the hug she was clearly offering. She'd probably spilled something on her overalls.

Hob sniffles and pulls a prop handkerchief from his sleeve to pat at his face. His head is throbbing, and he feels hollowed out.

But…but not in a bad way.

"Thank you," Hob says at length. "I think I… I really needed that."

"It was beautiful," the woman whispers.

Something in the way she says that is familiar.

“I know you," Hob says, looking up at the woman blearily. "How do I know you?"

"We used to drink together," the woman replies. She smiles sideways, like the expression is uncomfortable on her face and wants to flee immediately. "Years and years ago."

"Oh," Hob says, and thinks, It must have been the early 90s, when I spent most of days fucked up on coke. She looks good for her age. But then again, so do I.

"Thank you—" he says again, but then her walkie crackles to life, and Celia's voice comes through.

"Anyone got eyes on Doc Bob?"

"Got him," the woman replies into the mic. Hob jumps to his feet, patting at his face with a prop handkerchief he hastily pulls from his sleeve. The woman shoos him toward the door. "He's traveling, landing in five."

Bob squeezes her shoulder in thanks and jogs over to the door between the solar and the study, letting himself in.

It's not until after the makeup assistant has fixed his face, and they're part way through filming a scene where Glenn—now playing the part of the steward that robbed him blind—that Hob realizes he didn't get his old drinking buddy's name.

When they wrap for the day, Hob looks around for the beige woman, but she's nowhere to be found.

Tuesday rolls around again, and Hob has to beg off his usual meeting with Morpheus to sleep on camera. Hob's already been filmed tossing and turning on the narrow cot in the printer's shop (a corner of another BBC production's period drama set, while they were off for lunch), and groaning with exhaustion in a fetid boarding house bunk (a hastily slapped together set of plyboard and just-dried paint that still smelled strongly when his nose was next to it).

Now they've retrofitted the actual bed that he used to share with Eleanor with a bunch of modern supports to prevent the ancient frame from cracking under his weight, and a modern mattress disguised to look like a feather tick.

On the floors below him, Harriet is making herself comfortable on a bedroll by the bread oven, which as a kitchen maid she has to keep hot and ready at all hours; Glenn is in the servant's wing, enjoying a bed with a frame at least, but he'll still have to be up at dawn to begin his duties; and the graveyard shift skeleton crew are luxuriating in their campervans on the front drive. Robert Gadlen the Third gets to sleep until he damn well feels like it. Hob, however, has an alarm set for 8:00am so he can pop out to one of the campervans for a shower before reporting to wardrobe and makeup to begin a new day.

At least this shot is easy. All Hob has to do is stand alone in the bedroom, look into the camera mounted in the corner, remove his wrapper and cap, say a few lines, and crawl into bed. They'll then film him sleeping, and speed up the footage in post to provide a timelapse of his comfortable, cozy night's rest to juxtapose it against Harriet's and Glenn's restless one.

Hob gets the go-ahead from the crew manning the monitors outside over the walkie on the mantelpiece out of frame, claps loudly so sound can get a speed count and level on the boom mic that's mounted beside the camera, and then steps into the shot. The camera's red light blinks once, twice, three times, then glows steadily.

"For the master of the Elizabethan Manor, staggering to bed drunk and sleeping late was only for Saturdays and special occasions," he says, doffing his cap and hanging it on a peg driven into one of the posts by the head of the bed. "If he was a good god-fearing protestant, it was early to bed, and early to rise. Sunday mornings saw him, and his family, off to church or face a stiff fine. Work days for the Lord ended around sunset, no matter what time of year it was, unless he literally wanted to burn the midnight oil getting his accounts and correspondence up to date."

They had filmed that bit earlier in the afternoon, so now Hob peels off his wrapper, leaving him in only a tired old knee-length night shirt and his leather house slippers. Wardrobe had offered him a vest or pajama pants to wear under it, but Hob was quite comfortable. He'd worn something like this to bed for hundreds of years.

"But this particular lord," he gestures at himself, "has had a long day hunting, and riding, and I'd like to not waste candles needlessly. So, I'm off to count sheep. Sweet dreams."

Hob sits down on the side of the bed, swings his legs around, and pulls the blanket up to his chin. And then he screws his eyes shut because he's already had one emotional breakdown today, and he's not keen to have another by thinking too hard about how the canopy of his old bed has not changed.

"Clean take, Doc Bob," some AD or other says over the walkie talkie. "It's in the can. We're done."

"Sweet dreams," Hob calls back as a sign off.

"Same to you, Doc," the AD says, and the walkie goes quiet.

Hob peeks at the camera, with it's red eye. It's still recording as agreed, so Hob, exhausted and genuinely sleepy, sinks into the pillows and closes his eyes.

He dozes for a bit, and comes back to awareness in an exact replica of the room his sleeping body is currently in. It takes him a second to figure out what disturbed him, and then realizes it's the sink and shift of the mattress beside him. For a second, he's terrified that he's dreaming about Eleanor. That he's going to roll over and find her laying there, dead and horrid, half-decomposed and skull-grinning on her pillow.

But a gentle voice says, "No nightmare would dare."

Hob lets out a breath of relief, and wriggles onto his side to smile at Morpheus. He is laying down over the covers, head on the pillow, face-to-face with Hob.

Incoguously, there's a single flower laid on the blankets between them, a small white-and-yellow daffodil.

"Hello, stranger."

"Hello, Hob. This is not your bedroom."

"It used to be," he whispers. "I missed you these last few nights. What brings you here?"

"You," Morpheus says plainly. "It is Tuesday."

Hob laughs. "Well, yes, I do suppose it is. But as much fun as it may be, Morpheus, I'm not spooning you in my dead wife's bed."

"Spooning?"

Hob snorts. "You know, for a god of sleep who has probably either seen or crafted every wet dream that every teenaged boy has ever rued, you are a bit of a prude, my friend." It's easier to joke about it in the Dreaming, when he is asleep and the pain is safely tucked away in the Waking world.

"I know what spooning is," Morpheus says drily. "I was simply unaware that you desired it."

"Hey, you're the one who popped up here." He gestures at the Dreamscape of his old bedroom. "You know, We used to share the bed all the time," Hob says. "Even the queen slept with her lady's maid when they were here, did you know that? This sleeping alone lark is a relatively recent phenomenon for us humans."

Morpheus gifts him with one of those ridiculous self-satisfied, haughty smirks. "I'm unsure if you've been paying attention, my friend, but I am the god of sleep—"

"Oh, shut up," Hob sasses. "I'm supposed to be resting. You know what, I've changed my mind about the spooning. Either get out or c'mere and give me a cuddle."

Morpheus looks reluctant to take Hob's invitation as a serious one, which absolutely cannot be borne. The skinny bastard is still touch starved, no matter how much pre-scheduled hand-holding they do on any given Tuesday.

Hob reaches for Morpheus' shoulders, attempting to push him onto his other side and snug up behind him. Morpheus resists, clearly deciding that as a celestial deity, it's his right to be the big spoon. The daffodil ends up above their heads on the pillow as they wrestle playfully.

Hob, who secretly has no problems at all being cradled by his Stranger, eventually lets Morpheus win.

They settle that way, Morpheus' hand played against Hob's heart, and he's suddenly quite glad that his groin isn't pressed up against his friend's arse when a puff of Morpheu's breath against his nape gives Hob some terribly naughty ideas.

And some places that they touch that Hob is pretty sure a body can’t–Morpheus seems relaxed enough to loosen his hold on on his human-shaped corporation. There are extra limbs tangling sweetly with his feet, a dark mist spilling over his shoulder like heavy incense, tangible but foggily opaque, the glow of stars in Morpheus’ eyes reflecting back at Hob from the canopy of the bed. It’s sweet, that he feels safe enough around Hob to be himself.

"Hob Gadling," Morpheus says gently, "Are you well? Only your sleep has been tumultuous."

There's no point lying to Morpheus, especially here. "It's a lot. It's—" Hob starts, before interrupting himself with an unexpected hiccough of a sob. He's cried enough for today, though, so he swallows it back. "It's just so much harder than I thought it would be."

The confession shreds his throat. Shame crawls up his face, flushing his cheeks and making his ears tingle with the heat of the horrible blush. He curls in on himself, a miserable comma. Morpheus presses himself in one long line against Hob, probably trying to comfort but instead making Hob tense and hyperaware of every place that they touch.

"Hob…" Morpheus says again, worry tinging his voice. "I did not mean to push you into an situation that would cause distress."

"And you haven't!" Hob assures him. "At least not on purpose. I just… it's a lot, is all. I had a good cry today, and they’re right, you know. It does help with the–" he does the pulling-heart-out-of-chest-squish motion. “I hate every second of it, but I’m glad of it, you know? It’s good pain. It’s… pain I’ve put off feeling for too long. A goodbye that I’ve let linger for centuries.”

“Like a nightmare whose lesson you ignore, it will only continue to plague you until you listen,” Morpheus murmurs, and Hob can feel his lips movings against the collar of his nightshirt which is absolutely unfair.

“Yeah,” Hob agrees, swallowing hard and pretending that the dryness of his mouth is from the old building, and not his situation. “And I mean, I feel like I’ve been gutted, you know. All my insides scooped out. But that’s okay, because maybe it’s time for something new to take its place.”

You, Hob lets himself think, but doesn’t dare say out loud. I wouldn’t mind if the emptiness was filled with you.

Morpheus raises his free hand, and gestures into the air. Dream sand sparks into existence in an arc, but instead of falling onto them, it hovers there, swirling and pulsing. Like a snowglobe, the sand moves in the open space beside the bed, forming figures and landscapes.

"Shall I tell you a bedtime story to soothe you to a more peaceful slumber then, Hob Gadling?"

"Bedtime story?" Hob says, sitting up. "Wait, aren't I already asleep—"

The door to his chambers pushes open. Hob's sore and swollen heart leaps into his mouth at the noise.

"Bob?" Henrietta calls into the darkness. "Are you still awake? I was doing my video diary and I could hear your voice through the chimneys and I… what," she hisses, freezing a few steps inside with her eyes the size of saucers, "the absolute fuck."

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