#it took probably a full minute to get from frozens to hair products

[doesnotloveyou]

local wal-mart smells like fried chicken and pipes the smell into the parking lot. i wander around the intimates section looking at cheap bras while carrying a cold chunk of cheese. i buy a shirt and three days later wonder why i smell like a deep fat fryer

[whoopsieintheuniverse]

Wash Day

Illumi x (gender neutral) reader

Warnings: Awkwardness, Illumi being Illumi

In one of the rare moments of him being out of his room, Milluki was almost ran over by his big brother, Illumi.

“Illu-nii? What are you doing?” Milluki asked.

Illumi stopped and turned on his heel. Milluki noted the stack of hair care products in his arms. Combs, brushes, conditioner, shampoos, and clips were piled high and threatened to spill on the floor.

Illumi blinked and regarded his brother, slightly startled that Milluki was out of his room.

“It’s my wash day. Y/N is washing my hair.”

Milluki scrunched his nose.

“Y/N?” The new butler? Why do you want a butler to wash your hair?” Milluki asked. Illumi shrugged and readjusted his grip on his supplies before walking away.

The Butler’s Quarters was as busy as it normally was. Members of staff came and went on errands, and Y/N noted the rhythmic creaks of the doors as they opened and shut throughout the building. Advancing from an apprentice to a full-fledged butler was a task not many were able to accomplish, and Y/N couldn’t deny the swell of pride in their chest that grew with each passing hour. Y/N was just on their way to make their mid-day rounds when the phone rang. Each butler in the main room looked up on high alert as Gotoh answered the phone; a call from the main house usually meant an immediate order from the Zoldyck family. Y/N held their breath as Gotoh put the phone to his ear.

“Gotoh speaking. Yes, sir. Yes. No, sir, I don’t think that will be a problem at all. I will send them immediately. Yes, sir. Thank you.”

Y/N watched as the phone reconnected with the hook. They turned on their heel to leave, but was stopped by Gotoh’s voice.

“Stop right there. Y/N, you’re needed in the main house. I suggest you hurry,” Gotoh said.

Y/N frowned. Only butlers with seniority were allowed to enter and work in the main house. Gotoh noticed the younger butler’s hesitance and sighed.

“You’ll need to get a move on. I wouldn’t want to keep the family waiting,” Gotoh said.

“Yes, sir! I’m just wondering.... did I do something wrong? Which family member called for me?” Y/N asked. Y/N felt a lump in their throat form as Gotoh’s lips form a stern line across his face.

“Y/N. Please hurry to the main house. Master Illumi is waiting.”

................................................................................................................................

Y/N took a breath as they came to the large door of the main house of the Zoldyck estate. The door loomed over them -- tall, dark, and solid -- and Y/N wondered about the inhabitants. As a new butler, Y/N had never seen their employers, but the power and reputation of the Zoldyck name was enough to instill fear and respect into anyone. Taking another breath, Y/N set their jaw and reached out ang grasped the door knocker.

Sweat beaded down Y/N’s brow as the door opened. The interior was dark, and hesitantly, Y/N stepped in. The foyer was massive, with walls arching and towering over Y/N as they walked further into the house.

“Hello? Master Zoldyck? It’s Y/N. I heard you called for me,” Y/N called out. Footsteps tapped from down the hallway. Y/N froze in their spot; out of the shadows, the hem of a gown grazed the floor. Y/N dropped their gaze to the floor.

“Illumi, dear, are you sure this is the one? They’re just a butler. I’m sure whatever you want can be done without them complicating matters.”

Y/N felt themselves flinch a little at the voice. They had never seen the Zoldyck matriarch, but Y/N had definitely heard stories from their time as an apprentice. It was never a good idea to look at Kikyo without invitation.

“Yes, mother, I’m quite sure.” Y/N closed their eyes. The voice was unmistakable: Illumi Zoldyck. Y/N clenched their fists; what could they have done to attract the attention of the Zoldyck’s oldest son? Y/ ground their teeth, racking their brain through the months of training they had undergone. Had they messed up anywhere? Forgotten manners? Had they overstepped some boundary, crossed some line? Y/N’s thoughts were interrupted by a finger on their chin.

“You’ll look when I’m speaking to you. Did you even hear me?” Illumi asked.

“I’m terribly sorry, sir!” Y/N said, bowing low. They heard a scoff above them.

“Enough of that. Follow me to the washroom.” With that, Y/N watched as Illumi turned on his heel with a swish of hair.

................................................................................................................................

The washroom that Illumi lead Y/N to was massive. Y/N stood and marveled at the design: the centerpiece was a bathtub set deep into the floor, flanked with towels and a glass pitcher. Marble countertops held oils and soaps, and a soft light from overhead bathed the bathroom in a soft, golden glow. As Y/N stood back and took in the sight, their thoughts were interrupted by the sound of running water.

“Are you done looking? I suppose I could wait a little longer, but I am getting impatient,” Illumi said. Y/N watched as he started to unlace his shirt, and quickly looked down as Illumi’s clothes started falling to the floor. Y/N was frozen in place as they heard water slosh in the bathtub.

“On the counter, there’s shampoo and a conditioning oil. Bring it over here.”

“I’m sorry, sir....what exactly am I doing here?”

Illumi turned and looked over his shoulder, a small frown etched on his face.

“Well, at the moment, you’re standing there. You should be bringing the shampoo and conditioning oil, though,” Illumi stated.

Y/N fumbled over to the counter and grabbed the supplies before creeping slowly to the bathtub.

“And now, sir?” they asked.

Illumi said nothing, opting to slide closer to the edge of the tub. One of his arms draped over the side, and the other came up gather his hair in his grip. Y/N watched as Illumi wrung his hair out before tossing it over the edge.

“There you are. You’ll want to condition it first, rinse with cold water, then you can shampoo it,” Illumi said.

Y/N looked at Illumi as if he had gone mad.

Illumi turned around, noticing that Y/N had not moved. He tilted his head and regarded them, the corners of his mouth pulling once again pulling downwards.

“What’s the problem now?” Illumi asked.

Y/N folded their arms across their chest and thrust their chin in the air.

“Sir, with all due respect, I don’t think this is appropriate. I don’t know why I’m here, and I really don’t know why I’m helping you bathe. I’d like to go, now, sir,” Y/N said.

“I don’t understand what the problem is,” Illumi hummed. “Mother and Father always bathe together.”

“I- Sir! Master and Mistress Zoldyck are married.”

“Yes, they are. What is your point?”

Y/N huffed and ran a hand through their hair.

“Sir. We’re not married.”

Illumi sunk down further into the bath, hair still cascading over the side.

“I’m aware we aren’t married yet, but practicing shouldn’t hurt. Now, if you’re done, I would like my hair washed.”

Y/N shook their head and made their way closer to Illumi. They took his hair in their hands and worked their fingers through it. Then, Y/N took the conditioner and started to massage it into the ends Illumi’s hair. With each pass of Y/N’s hand, Illumi’s body seemed to relax further into the water. Soon, Illumi’s eyes slipped closed, and Y/N worked in silence for about five minutes before their fingers froze on Illumi’s head.

Illumi opened his eyes and huffed.

“Y/N. Why did you stop?” Illumi asked.

Y/N sat frozen; hands still tangled in Illumi’s mane.

“Sir...did you say we weren’t married ‘yet’?”

“Yes. Are you still on that? I thought I made myself perfectly clear. This is all practice for when I do marry you. I wanted to see how it was to bathe with another person, and I have to say, besides you stopping all the time, it isn’t a bad experience. This will probably be a regular occurrence when we’re wed,” Illumi explained.

Y/N retracted their hands and stood up.

“Master Zoldyck, I am a butler! It is my honor to serve you and your family, but this is an entirely different service you’re talking about. I’m not even permitted to have personal relationships per your family’s instructions, so I’m sorry, sir, but-”

“That’s enough,” Illumi interrupted. “I’m courting you and I plan on marrying you. That’s final. Mother’s been hounding me for ages to find a partner. You’ve already proven yourself to be strong enough, and I’m sure with more training you’ll be decent enough as far as Zoldyck standards are. You also don’t piss me off, which is important.”

“But Master Zol-”

Illumi put up a hand to silence Y/N and continued.

“As far as that silly little matter of you being a butler and not allowed relationships, it’s no problem. Don’t even worry about it. I’m taking care of it all, and that includes telling Mother and Father. All you need to worry about is me, really. Now,” Illumi said as he motioned toward the other side of the bath, “Go get the pitcher. I need to rinse.”

Part Two Here: courting-customs

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[wanderinginksplot]

Hiya, I was wondering if I could please request 3 (Echo) with B+O (Injury/sickness recovery + first kiss)? I don’t really mind who’s in recovery or whether it’s 501st echo/bad batch echo, I just thought these prompts would lead nicely into a confession between our two main characters; also I just want to say I love your writing!! ❤️

Aww, thank you so much for the request and for being so kind, Anon! Sorry this took forever, but I’ve been stuck in an idea block for a week or two, and I ended up writing about four different versions of this. You’re very sweet, but you probably shouldn’t be nice to me, because apparently, it makes me write one-shots that are way too long. So here’s a 2700 word one-shot...

Also! It ended up being a tad spicy toward the end. Nothing anywhere close to M-rating, but more than I usually write in one-shots.

Echo + Injury/Sickness Recovery + First Kiss

The first time you met Echo, you didn't like him very much.

You were in the medbay for a sickness that was taking Coruscant by storm, hitting nat-born GAR members especially hard. As a nat-born intelligence officer, you had been ordered to the GAR's main medbay, which had been sub-divided into large bays full of cots. Almost every cot was filled with GAR personnel who needed treatment for the same sickness.

It wouldn't have been bad if you had been able to take the meds right away and start the healing process, but you had been on a dangerous mission and fought the sickness off for longer than you should have. It had worked and you had survived your mission, but you were severely dehydrated. The medics - all clone troopers, by that point - had ordered you to stay until you were fully healed and they could get your fluid levels back where they should have been. Faced with no other options, you had agreed.

And then the 501st had arrived. 

Through your IV, you had gotten through half a bag of a liquid you preferred not to think too hard about. The medics promised that your meds would be kicking in soon, and you would feel much better before the day was over. For the moment, you felt nauseated and every part of your body ached, especially your head.

When the troopers came in, their white armor painted with blue accents in various styles, they were so loud that the rest of the medbay went quiet. 

One of the medics, his hair shaved short to show off a set of intricate tattoos, hurried up to them as he pulled off his gloves. You could hear his hissed question from your bed on the other side of the large room. "What are you idiots doing here?"

One of the men beamed at him. "We're in trouble!"

You scoffed to yourself. You had no difficulty believing they had gotten on someone's bad side. 

The tattooed medic rubbed his temples. "Hardcase… what did you guys do now?"

You had heard stories about the rowdy 501st from other operatives. They were supposed to be a nightmare to work alongside, all explosions and heroics without any grasp of subtlety. 

One of the other men stepped forward and seemed to be offering an explanation, but he did it in a voice pitched low enough that you couldn't hear him. You were grateful for that, and did your best to fall asleep.

It wasn't to be, however, as one of the 501st made his way down the row of beds in your direction. He chatted with some of the other patients, laughing loudly at their responses. By the time he reached you, you could have cheerfully put a blaster to the 5 tattooed on his temple.

"And how are you doing today?" the trooper belted out. 

"In a lot of pain, actually," you snapped at him, a visceral response to the effect his voice had on your roiling stomach. "Can you please talk more quietly?"

There. A please. You were being polite.

"If I'm quiet, does that mean I can stay over here with you, pretty lady?" he asked with a wink, settling onto the foot of your bed.

You eyed him stonily. You felt revolting from the effects of the sickness, and you were wearing a GAR-issued medical gown besides. ‘Pretty’ was an attempt at flattery, and not even a believable one.

"Fives," the medic with the head tattoos admonished, stepping up to your bedside as well. "Stop. She doesn't feel well and she doesn't need you hanging around, making it worse."

"Me?" Fives asked, sounding both shocked and offended. "We both know I only make things better, Kix."

You sighed and wished with your whole soul that they would both go away. You just wanted to sleep.

"Besides," Fives continued, "We were ordered to help in the medbay. You wouldn't want me to disobey orders, would you?"

From the look on Kix's face, he had lined up a scathing retort that you were dying to hear, but you needed to make a brief announcement. "If this conversation continues right here, I am going to vomit."

You had never seen two grown men move so quickly. You would have smiled if you didn't feel so rotten. 

"Echo," Kix called softly with a worried glance in your direction, beckoning yet another trooper over.

This one had no tattoos, but you vaguely recognized him as the only trooper you hadn't been able to overhear earlier.

"Get Fives away from here," Kix ordered. "Keep him productive and occupied, but don't let him talk."

Echo nodded and gave you an apologetic nod. "I'm sorry about him," he said, indicating Fives, who looked deeply offended.

"Please," was the only response you could muster, cradling your head delicately in your hands. From the bit of your peripheral vision that wasn’t blocked by your palms, you watched his shoulders slump slightly as he towed his brother away. When you finally fell asleep, your dreams were full of Echo’s disappointed face along with strong feelings of guilt.

The second time you met him was only a few hours later. You were having fever dreams. The medication had apparently worn off and no one had noticed. In your dreams, you had called a medic over a dozen times, but you always woke to find that you hadn’t said a thing, and fell asleep again before you could.

It was one of these shallow, fitful dreams that Echo interrupted. “Hey. Hey! Shhh, you’re having a nightmare. Wake up.”

Thoroughly confused by the world of the surrounding medbay, you squinted up at him. “Echo?” He nodded and you launched right into the speech you had prepared in your sleep. “I’m sorry I was rude earlier. I just… my head hurt, and you guys are loud, and-”

“You don’t have anything to apologize for,” Echo assured you, crouching by your bedside to put himself on your level. “The 501st - and Fives in particular - is very loud. It’s our best quality.”

You snorted at that and Echo’s kind face broke into a warm smile. “You should get back to sleep. It’s really late. Or early. I’m not sure which, but everyone else is asleep, and you should be, too.”

“I think I need some meds, actually,” you admitted. “I feel like death.”

Echo frowned and reached up to brush his fingers over your forehead, flinching back almost immediately. “Kriff, you’re burning up! Hang on, let me grab a medic for you.”

You nodded, but grabbed his wrist before he could leave, “If you bring me some water, I’ll love you forever.”

It was just a childish hyperbole, something you and your family had said whenever you had asked for a favor, particularly a minor one. Echo didn’t seem to have the same connection with it, based on the way he had frozen in place and was staring at you with wide eyes that flashed between your face and your grip on his wrist.

Clearing your throat, you released him and corrected yourself. “I mean, please? I’m very thirsty.”

Echo turned around a moment later and you sighed, hoping your hot face looked like the flush of a fever.

You were half-drowsing when Echo came back with Kix in tow. You jumped a bit when Kix said your name, and Echo was quick to soothe you. “Easy, easy. It’s just us.”

He handed you the biggest glass of water you had ever seen and retreated halfway across the medbay before you had chugged half of it.

The next day, you were actually feeling better. Granted, ‘better’ was a relative term, but you didn’t actively want to die any more, and that was something. The only thing messing up your day was the lingering awkwardness between you and Echo. Every time his circuit around the room took him past your cot, he would avoid your eyes. 

From your calculations, he looped around the gigantic medbay room every six minutes or so. On his next lap past, you softly asked, “Echo?”

You had meant to be subtle and quiet, but you were still a bit less hydrated than you should have been, and it came out as a horrifying croak. If someone had called your name in that voice, you would have immediately run away, but Echo just turned slightly and looked your direction.

“I’m sorry for last night,” you apologized.

“You already said that,” Echo reminded you gently. “The 501st is loud. I understand why you weren’t happy with us.”

“Not about that,” you forced out, half-wishing you could just let him think you had been delirious with fever and thus not responsible for anything you had said or done. “I mean that I’m sorry for saying the whole love you forever thing. It was a joke, but I feel like it landed poorly.”

“There’s no need, really,” Echo told you. He smiled then, a small sad smile. “We clones don’t get to see much good in the universe. Not with this war going on. Even though you were joking, it was nice to hear something like that.”

You stared at him, trying to keep the poker face the GAR had hired you for.

“Besides,” Echo said with a laugh, “if you want to see how a bad joke really sounds, hang out with Fives for a few minutes. You’ll have plenty of opportunity to see the difference!”

You chuckled at that and the smile he gave lit his whole face as he continued his patrol. You watched Echo leave, thinking hard. It was ironic that this was the conversation where your heart had melted just a touch. It wasn’t love, not yet, but this third exchange left feelings that were inappropriate considering that you had known him for less than a day.

That night, you couldn’t sleep, betrayed by all of the napping you had done during the day. Echo was patrolling the room again and noticed you on his fourth lap.

He crouched by your bedside once again. “Can’t sleep?”

“Nope,” you admitted with a sigh. “Can you?”

Echo frowned. “I can, but I’m on watch right now.”

“On watch,” you repeated skeptically. “For what?”

“Someone has to make sure the patients are doing okay while the medics sleep,” he explained. “It’s a very important job.”

“Your brothers are all playing sabacc in the corner,” you pointed out. “Go join them. Or, better yet, get some sleep. I haven’t seen you take a break yet.”

“You were unconscious for over half of the day,” Echo reminded you. “I could have been on break then.”

“You weren’t,” you told him confidently. “Because you wouldn’t have known that I slept the whole time.”

Echo frowned. “You’re too smart to work for the army.”

“Intelligence officer,” you explained simply. 

Lifting his eyebrows in exaggerated shock, Echo leapt to his feet and gave a dramatic salute. You pretended to aim a kick in his direction and you both dissolved into muffled giggles in an attempt not to wake any of the other patients.

“If you won’t try to sleep, at least sit down?” you requested, indicating the foot of your cot as you struggled to sit up so you could move out of his way. “You’re stressing me out. I can’t be expected to get better if I’m stressed.”

“We can’t have that,” Echo teased. He helped you sit up before he did anything else, but the awkwardness of the position left him hauling you up by your armpits. You were thankful that you had found the strength to walk to the sonic shower that day, at least. “Not like I can get sick from you, anyway.”

Echo sat talking with you for hours, even after his brothers had all drifted off at their sabacc table. Before you fell asleep again, he brought you another giant glass of water. You accepted it with a smile. “Thank you, I really appreciate it.”

He nodded and left so you could get some sleep. By the time you had finished the glass, he was on the other side of the medbay and couldn’t hear you mutter, “Love you forever.”

For the next few days, Echo lived by your bedside. The conversations you had made you laugh so hard that you went into the occasional coughing fit and got the evil eye from Kix. So, you were less pleased than you had expected to be when Kix told you that you could be discharged the following day.

That night, you couldn’t sleep. Getting your sleep pattern back under control was going to be the biggest struggle, you reflected, staring at the massive beams supporting the ceiling.

“Excuse me, ma’am,” Echo teased, walking up. “Shouldn’t you be asleep?”

You waved a hand around dramatically. “I’m trying to commit these beautiful surroundings to memory. If I’m leaving tomorrow, I’ll need to remember the enchanting way the dust clings to that wall over there.”

Suddenly serious, Echo asked, “You’re leaving tomorrow?”

You nodded, and couldn’t tell if it was your imagination, or if he really looked disappointed. Still, he mustered a smile. “I’m glad.”

With a falsely offended gasp, you replied, “You’re glad I’m leaving? That’s rude!”

“No, I mean-!” Echo sputtered, grimacing at you when you started to laugh. “I’m glad you’re getting better. Even if you’re just as mean as the day I met you.”

“Yeah, I’m terrible,” you agreed with a grin. 

“You are not,” he countered immediately. “You’re sweet and funny and- I’ll miss you. Selfish, huh?”

“I’ll miss you, too,” you admitted. “I guess we’re both selfish. But, hey, you’ll finally get some sleep now!”

“I suppose I will,” Echo said with the ghost of his usual smile. “At least we can have one last overnight conversation. Unless you’re too tired?”

You rolled your eyes at him. “Sit down, Echo.”

The two of you talked for hours that night. The medbay steadily got more silent and your eyes began to ache. Try as you might, you were still recovering from your illness and the point came when you couldn’t fight it off any longer. You fell into a light doze as Echo was talking.

You were dimly aware as he finished his sentence and waited for a response, but you couldn’t make yourself say anything. Echo gave an amused sounding hum and stood from your cot. You immediately missed his warmth, but felt like he was still standing by you.

Soft lips pressed against your forehead and left as Echo started to move away. “What was that cop-out bantha dung?” you asked blearily. 

Echo jumped a bit and stared down at you, but you were half-asleep, impulsive, and you knew what you wanted. You sat up to grab his shoulders and brought him back down to you, kissing him with as much fervor as an extremely tired person could muster.

He kissed you back, opening his mouth to release an almost-soundless groan, and you were suddenly wide awake. With both of you actively participating in your embrace, it didn’t take long for the pair of you to get carried away. 

When you finally broke apart, it was only because someone had cleared their throat sharply. 

Echo pulled back, bracing on his forearms to look up at Kix while you peered at the medic from under Echo’s chest. When had he gotten on top of you? His hip brushed against your upper thigh and you abruptly didn’t care anymore.

“I take it you’re well enough to be released from here?” Kix asked, a raised brow accentuating his smirk. 

You glanced around to find that half of the medbay was awake and staring at you and Echo with expressions ranging from bleary bewilderment to amused approval. Some of Echo’s brothers were awake as well, though their faces ran heavily to outright shock.

“Uh, yeah. I’m ready to go home,” you agreed, glancing up at Echo. “Wanna come with me?”

Echo nodded and glanced up at Kix. The medic shrugged and looked at the ceiling. “No, I have no idea where Echo went. He worked several around the chrono shifts and then he disappeared. I assume he went to get some well-deserved rest. Sign here.”

The last part was directed at you and you obligingly scrawled your name on the datapad he was holding out in your direction. 

“Your personal effects are in the front room,” Kix informed you. “Drink some water now and then, would you?”

“Of course, thanks,” you said absently, attention already stolen away by the fascinating blush creeping up Echo’s cheeks. You slipped out from under him and grabbed his hand to tow him behind you. “C’mon. You’re gonna love my apartment.”

---

A/N - ahh, why did this end up being such a novel? Sorry about that! If you want to read similar works, check out my masterlist or make a request based on this post (or make something up and I’ll do my best!). Thanks for reading!

[captainxsassafras]

Showered in Love

E voila! My first piece of filth (hopefully of many, regardless of how long it takes my dumb ass to write it!)! I have no excuses, no reason other than I just want to take care of one (1) beautiful, dumb birdbrain. In whatever way possible. But we all came here to be horny, so horny it is! 🤣🤣🤣

But seriously, I hope you enjoy this entirely self-indulgent smut! I tried to keep the reader pretty neutral physicaly and focus more on the feeling, but please let me know if you notice anything there I might have missed or that I could improve on! Ask or dm, just please be respectful and polite! I'm new so I'm sure I have ways I could improve and I'm open to editing/updating to make it more inclusive! 💗

Warnings: explicit, handjob, shower sex, very subby Keigo, nipple play, body worship (?), real tender smut, comfort sex

And here you go! Tagging some people who might be interested!

@queensynderella @heyitswhiplash @lovekeigo @keilemlucent @keiqos

It had been a hard day.

Not for you. Your day had been ordinary in every sense. Nothing alarming or even really exciting had interrupted the normal scheme of your work schedule. You had arrived home a bit tired, but in an innocuously pleasant mood and put an easy to make casserole in the oven before working on the various little chores that helped keep the apartment clean.

You had been in the middle of moving the laundry from the washer to the dryer when he’d come in.

He had used the window.

That wasn’t ominous by itself. He used the window more often than not. The large window with the spacious balcony had been a must have when the two of you had bought the place and was a much more frequent feature of take off than the intended front door to the place. You probably would have been more concerned if he’d actually used that door.

Ok, that wasn’t true. You were just making morbid mental jokes to ease your own tension.

You weren’t scared.

You were worried.

You were sad.

You were hurting.

Because… he was.

An anxious little ball was twisting knots in your stomach. Crinkles marked the edges of your eyes as you turned off the oven and stood at the counter, contemplating his arrival.

He didn’t call out to you when he came in.

That should have been the first clue.

Keigo always called out to you when he arrived home unless he knew you were already asleep. It amazed you that he was constantly excited to see you when he got home. The light in his eyes traveled across his entire voice and even lightened his voice, taking his normal boyish sarcasm and lifting it to almost child-like wonder. The happy way he greeted you made your heart dance like a butterfly every single time.

But he didn’t this time.

He’d surprised you. You’d nearly jumped out of your skin when he first walked by. Silent as a ghost, you’d only noticed the movement out of the very corner of your eye and adrenaline had shot through your veins. You whipped around into a low stance, ready to fight God and the universe if they were attacking you in your own home. But God was nowhere to be found.

Keigo had stood, frozen to the spot, looking at you with blank eyes and an uncomprehending expression. It felt like the world had stopped. Not in a figurative, emotional sense. He had just been so still that you weren’t sure the world hadn’t stopped with him. You stood, unmoving and waiting for Keigo to move. Say hello. Give you a hug. Anything.

He didn’t.

And you knew something was wrong.

“Kei,” you’d breathed, moving to rush over to him and engulf him in your arms.

“Dove.”

You stopped.

The strangled, heavy sound of his voice sent a shiver down your back even now. God, it grated on your heart. Simultaneously beaten by an unspeakable harshness and weighed down by all the abyssal truths you knew he carried like Atlas.

Without another word he’d passed by, red wings trailing on the floor behind him in evidence of his exhaustion. That was… different.

The click of the bathroom door closing had broke your heart to pieces.

The sound of the shower starting was normally soothing, but today it was just another layer to the tension that had swept into the apartment on crimson wings.

And now he had been in there for twenty minutes.

Keigo was not a long shower person. Didn’t like wasting water. Which was a convenient excuse to shower together, but also how he really felt about it. He was just too impatient and showering wasn’t one of those things he liked to devote his sparse time to.

But he was still in there.

With pursed lips, you took the casserole from the oven and found a spot in the fridge. Another night. The dryer was started and before you could let the hurt surrounding Keigo scare you off, you went to him.

The bathroom door opened noiselessly to your touch. A waft of steam wet your face and you could feel the intense heat of the room within seconds. A purring, mechanic whirr from the fan masked the sound of the door closing, but you were sure Keigo knew you were in there. His feathers wouldn’t have missed the vibrations of the door, even dampened by the buffer of the water.

You were quiet as you undressed. Eyeing his clothes piled randomly across the floor, you went to the cabinet in the corner and brought out something you’d been saving for a treat. Tender eyes flicked to Keigo.

A spike of worry knotted your chest.

He hadn’t moved since you’d entered the bathroom.

He was just standing, water colliding with his bare skin and streaming down his frame to join the small pool at his feet. You wished you could fully appreciate the sight of his naked body. You wished you felt better about being able to see drop after drop caress every plane and curve of his skin. He was so gorgeous.

But your heart wasn’t in the heated looks you wanted to send.

You entered the shower slowly, taking care not to slip on slick tiles. The extra treat was deposited on the shelf full of soap, shampoo, and other hygiene products.

He was so warm as you slipped your arms around his torso and molded your body into the curve of his back. Your hands clasped, pulling him close. And for a moment you just stood, as close physically as you possibly could be. It didn’t feel like enough. His mind was far away still, lost in the echoes of some terrible, terrible secret he could never tell you. Soft cadences of breathe left you drowning in the feeling of him, letting your mind drift away from the thoughts of those secrets and bringing your own worries back to the very real man held so closely before you.

Keigo often complained about his lack of height and how he wished he had more back muscle, but you loved the lean, corded muscles. They were perfect to you. You also loved the fact that you could lay your head perfectly into the curve at the back of his neck and murmur into his ear.

“Hey there, feathers.”

He pooled into your touch and the tension drained away with those wandering rivulets of water. It wasn’t completely gone but the edge was softened. It was a butter knife now, useful but it wasn’t going to cut you for getting too close.

“Dooove.”

This time, when his voice came out strangled it was less… heartbreaking.

“Yes, love?”

No answer. Maybe he needed a bit of help.

“Do you need something.”

A single, slow nod.

You breathed into the feel of him. “Do you need me to take care of you?”

Oh god. The tiniest, strangled whimper kissed your ears as Keigo nodded again, leaning back into your frame. The shower-wet feathers of his wings pressed themselves into your body. You could feel them against every warm, vulnerable inch of flesh. A quick shift left your wandering fingers trailing downward across his abdomen dangerously. Feathers ruffling against your body had you biting your lip and holding back a moan. Those fingers found the wet, curled hairs that framed his groin and the moan ripped free, settling on the weight of anticipation. The feathers on his wings positively shivered while you traced the tight swoops of those golden curls. You knew them well, but still loved twirling your hands through them. A bit more wiry than the hair on his head, they were still surprisingly soft and springy. Keigo assured you he loved your own curls, but the downy feel of his never ceased to make you the slightest bit jealous.

Wet flashes of red spun out the corners of your eyes as his wings shuddered and shifted against the onslaught of your hands teasing through Keigo’s hair. He cried out as your left hand reached up to card through the wet hair on his head. You matched the twirling of each hand, one at his brow and one at his groin and groaned loudly into the crook of his neck. His feathers were dancing against your skin.

Fortunately, you weren’t the only one making noise.

Pain mixed with pleasure as you kneaded your bottom lip. You reveled in the sweet, sweet noises that left Keigo’s throat with each tender swirl of your hand. They were soft, high, and so very needy. So very perfect.

“Keigo.” You placed gentle kisses into the space behind his ear. “I’m here to help, to take care of you. But I need to know what you need.” More kisses. “Do you want me to wrap you up in a blanket and feed you your favorite food? Or do you need to fuck this out?”

A moan escaped that was dangerously close to a whine.

“Ohhh, I love it when you cry for me, babe. But I need your words right now.”

“Fucking.” His words were full of heat and light with breathlessness.

“Ok, love. What kind? Fuck me senseless?” You paused, waiting for a reaction. Nothing notable. Your tongue found your lips as you considered your next words and the actions they might lead to. “Do I need to take care of my good boy?”

He went still. The sound that echoed across the empty bathroom tiles was the stuff of fantasy. You felt yourself clench and knew at that moment exactly what he needed.

“Mm, ok.” You moved away and delighted in the way Keigo’s entire body followed, trying to sink back into your hold. “I’ve got you. Let me take care of you, love.”

And he stayed where he was, so still you couldn’t believe it save for the heaving of his chest and nearly imperceptible trembling of his wings. You placed a kiss to the edge of his feathers and reached blindly behind you to grab the treat from before.

He sighed into the contact.

It wasn’t anything quite that special. Just a body wash that you knew Keigo particularly liked. The smell always had him burying his head in whatever piece of skin was available, to fold himself in the scent. It had been backordered for several months and you’d gotten your hands on it as a surprise for your lover. You’d planned to bring it out on some sort of special, happy day, but today it seemed like the perfect little surprise to pamper him with.

Covering your hands with the gel, you encompassed him again and started with washing his shoulders. Gentle hands smoothed over hot skin and worked at the tight muscles.

A gasp ran through his body when the smell reached him.

“Dove, you’re spoiling me.”

Hands slid to his back, carefully avoiding the sodden wings. Those got a special treatment and didn’t take well to body wash. Not friends with the mundane, human hygiene products.

“And?” You nearly sang. His tight ass was next and you knelt behind him to take your time carefully washing down each leg. Every curve and crevice was gently attended to. He whined as you swept your hands within touch of each area he wanted you to stroke most. Naturally, you pulled away as soon as it seemed like you might actually touch him there. Deep melodious laughter filled the spaces between his high, endless keening. You could tell the moment he felt your breath smoothing over the supple curve of his ass. The resounding whines cut off abruptly and the intense, broad heaves of his chest quickened and almost fluttered.

You hovered.

He stopped breathing entirely.

You began to stand and as you did, you placed a sweet, yet scorching kiss to the soft plane of each beautiful, taut, trembling ass cheek.

That earned you a whiny, desperate laugh. The chuckle choked off as soon as you melded into his body again, hands sliding around to cup his pecs.

You breathed into his ear and with each gentle word, your hands swept across his chest in ever tightening circles, slowly closing in on the sweet little jewels at the center. “If I’m taking care of you, it’s my job to spoil you. Don’t you think?” Tender fingers found his nipples, already pert and ready, and rolled the little buds in soapy circles.

His moans strangled and stuttered. Grasping hands reached back, clawing at something, anything, to hold to. He needed an anchor. He needed grounding in the midst of every bit of mind-numbing pleasure roiling and writhing through his weary nerves. He found your hips and clung like a man drowning, gasping for air and up to his head in a river of luxuriant ecstasy. He never wanted to surface again. He would drown in this flood of euphoria if you’d let him.

You slowed with his nipples when you felt his hips begin to make messy, haphazard, not-quite thrusts into thin air.

You knew without a doubt that your beautiful bird could and would cum right here without a single bit of direct stimulation to his cock. He was so worked up, you could see clearly in your mind the moment he’d burst, spreading hot cum all over from just the endless, maddening rolling of his nipples. It made you clench and squeeze like mad just to think of it.

But that wasn’t quite what you wanted. And you could tell it wasn’t quite what Keigo needed. Ok, you thought it wasn’t the right thing for him, but you felt like you had a pretty good grip on what this wonderful man needed at the moment. And he had put his trust in you. He had given over to you the gift of taking care of him. He had surrendered the responsibility of deciding himself what he needed and given that to you. You would never betray that trust by doing something you didn’t think was to his direct and utmost benefit. Or to his highest pleasure.

Your boy trusted you and you were going to take care of him thoroughly.

Previous conversations and past experience had revealed that, while the nipple orgasms were overwhelming and utterly consumed him with rolling, trembling waves pleasure, they weren’t as wholly sating as direct stimulation. They left him boneless and weak, but not finished.

You wanted him absolutely wrung out.

Those half thrusts quickened and you left his nipples alone.

He was too overwhelmed to even complain.

“Good boy.” Wandering hands ventured south. “My sweet, wonderful good boy.”

His head lolled back and wings twitched weakly at the feeling of your fingers in his curls again. However, you didn’t linger in those cute little whirls of hair for long. You had a prize to find.

And find it you did.

He was so hard you couldn’t help but bite your lip in excitement. Deep, reaching breaths wracked his torso as your hands moved down his cock at a torturous pace. As it was, several seconds passes before you found your way to the very tip. God, he was leaking. Mapping out the contours of his gorgeous, aching cock, you felt around the head and spent the time to rub at the slit as slowly as possible. Back and forth, over and over, relishing the tiny, twitchy thrusts that accompanied the motion.

A long, shaky, drawn-out whine from Keigo filled your head and you nearly lost it as the feeling of a fresh spurt of precum met your thumb.

“Oh, oh. My precious, precious boy. You like that so much, don’t you?”

“Yee-eeees!” Without warning, his hips canted forward just the slightest creating friction across the tip.

Oh, that was enough. He was ready to burst and deserved the reward of a full-force orgasm. What a magnificent, wonderful man. And he was all yours to equally ruin and cherish with each maddening stroke.

Without warning, you began the move your hands up and down the length of his cock.

Keigo’s reaction was instant. The long, never-ending whines raised in pitch and shortened, creating a rhythm in time with your stroking. His breathing became chaotic, devolving into a staccato mess of sharp, desperate gasps and bone-deep, shuddering exhales that reached into your core and drove you wild. And through it all, his wings pitched in erratic, arrhythmic twitches he couldn’t even begin to control. Starting at the top, where you nibbled and teased the sensitive skin connecting back to wing, they ruffled and writhed in waves all the way down to the feathers at the very tips.

It was a wonder to watch, but your attention was soon drawn back to his face. You could only see the edges standing behind him, but you knew your bird and you knew what he looked like when he was lost like this. His faces were rapturous. Brow scrunched, eyebrows tilted up. If his eyes were open, they’d be lifted skyward like he was praying to some unknown god of divine ecstasy. If they were closed, the corners would be crinkled. Every now and then, they’d crinkle even more, squeezing tight as he was undone by his own body. His head was angled back, leaning against your shoulder. He was too encompassed by the feel of your hands on his cock to keep his head up. But that was ok. More than ok. He didn’t need to keep himself up. That’s what you were here for.

His mouth was hanging open. That you could see. Soft, lush lips slack and loosing the melodic aria of fucked out whines to cascade around you like a filthy sonnet.

Those adorable, overwhelmed whines reverberated through Keigo and into your frame, consuming your mind with the sensuous joy of utterly ruining the gorgeous man leaning against you. The one struggling not to fuck himself into your hands. He was so good.

“C’mon, big boy, move for me.”

And he did, like the perfect man he was.

God, you loved to see him fuck himself senseless into your hands. You loved seeing him drive himself to that ultimate high while you got to coo praise into his ear and feel the way he throbbed and thrust with each tender, adoring word.

One of your hands left his dick and returned to torture his nipple.

God, you almost came right there.

Everything synced.

The stroking of your hand across the length of his aching cock, the squeezing of his sensitive, budded nipple, the endless, rasping circle of reaching breaths. The instant your hand found that pretty little bud, the thrusting of his hips shifted into a circular, full torso roll. They undulated in an involuntary, uninhibited dance of fucked out delirium. And the uncontrolled twitching of his wings changed to match, exactly, the rhythm of his hips. They beat in overwhelmed circles perfectly in sync with the smooth, svelte, seeking roll of Keigo’s hips into the tight grip of your hand.

And then he was lost.

He shattered. He was consumed.

A thousand pieces of brilliant, fiery, piercing pleasure shot through him and wrapped around his very center. A glorious flood overtook his senses and it was all he could do to stay upright with each roiling wave stronger than the last. Hot, white cum shot out and coated the shower wall and floor, rope after rope arcing with the crest of each radiant spike of pleasure.

As for you?

You came almost in unison, the orgasm a pleasant surprise. When Keigo came, his wings went utterly wild; shivering, shaking, twisting, ruffling, writhing. The sudden friction of unexpected stimulation combined with the height of desire you achieved from driving Keigo to Nirvana pushed you over that knife’s edge into a slow, deep, yet surprisingly powerful orgasm.

And there the two of you were, both glued to each other, hips undulating in a carnal dance of mind-numbing orgasm until finally, finally the two of you slowly began the careful descent from bliss. You buried your face in his neck and focused on the sensual feeling of two bodies moving against each other, labored breaths adding extra friction in the aftermath. Warm, milky cum gushed over your hand. Keigo’s cock was still oozing and his hips still jerking in tiny, uncoordinated rolls.

Humming into his skin, you relaxed into the cool down. That was so fucking sexy.

You let go of his softening dick before he could accidentally overstim himself. Not tonight.

However, you couldn’t help but keep your hand on his nipple, twisting and peeking down to see how his hips jolted weakly with each tweak of the perky bud.

You clenched as you caught sight of his softened cock spurting little bursts of seed with each tweak.

After a minute or so, you let up. It was time to let him come down.

But you didn’t let go of him. Instead you wrapped your hands tight around him, reveling in the feel of his breath slowing. A final, deep, shuddering exhale had him leaning back against you, completely boneless in your tender arms.

“Dove.” Keigo’s head turned and he leaned his forehead against yours. “Thank you,” he breathed against your skin.

“Mmm, don’t mention it.” Tired arms squeezed a little tighter in their embrace. “You all good? Or do you need to be fucked up a little bit more?”

His chuckle danced through both of your bodies. “I’m good, lovebird. You got me real good.” He wiggled around to face you. It was his turn to circle you in his arms, pull you close, bask in the way you molded to his body, melting into his hold. He kissed your hair and the two of your stayed that way for a while, spent and sated and utterly content together.

Keigo broke your silence, low voice weaving through the sound of the shower and caressing your ears.

“You know what I am good for though?” He paused, but didn’t wait for a real response. Which was good, because you hadn’t planned on anything beyond a wordless grunt. “You, me, some delivery, no clothes, and the fluffiest blankets we own.”

You hummed into his neck.

“Lights down low, we eat some food, then we snuggle together as close as two people can without fucking.”

A peal of laughter caught the tired edges of your voice. “Ah, you almost made that sweet.”

He spluttered. “That was super sweet!”

“Almost.”

“Entirely.”

“Mmm.” You dipped your head without warning and took his sensitive nipple into your mouth, pulling at it lightly with your teeth.

Keigo’s entire body spasmed, still sensitive in the wake of his earlier orgasm. His dick twitched against your torso as he groaned deep down inside his throat.

“Careful, babybird, or I’ll ruin you again.”

He whined at the pet name and crushed your body even closer.

Looks like he wasn’t as fucked out as he thought.

Your lips twitched in a small smile as you grabbed his ass, pulling him almost unbearably tight against you, and continued teasing his nipple with your teeth. Grinding slowly on his hardening cock, you drowned yourself in the sublime sound of his resounding moans.

[moonbeambucky]

Hey Neighbor (Part 11)

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Reader Word Count: 3245 Warnings: fluff

Summary: You had a plan and then life came along with one of its own. With your future almost derailed you worked hard to get yourself back on track and finally everything seemed to be going right… that is, until your new neighbor moved in.

A/N: A huge thank you to my wonderful beta Sam @buckyofthemyscira​​ Feedback is always appreciated!

PART 10 | HEY NEIGHBOR MASTERLIST

It was cold. No, that was a massive understatement. It was freezing. It was the type of weather that caused a chill to settle in your bones before you had even stepped outside, and you definitely did not want to be outside. Not when the mere action of standing outside for more than one second caused your face to burn from the frigid winds.

You forgo style, bundling up in the thickest jacket you have with gloves, scarves and a hat. You were sweating under all your layers but it was better than freezing. Thankfully the wine bar you were meeting Wanda at was only a few more frozen steps away.

It’s warm in the small restaurant, packed with people looking to escape the cold just as you were. Wanda waves at you from a table and you questioned how she was even seated before you had shown up, considering the crowd this seemed like the type of place that wants your whole party available before seating.

“The owner is Sokovian,” she smiled, shrugging her shoulders proudly. “And we’re going to order the paprikash.”

There was no arguing with Wanda, though you did choose the other menu item you would be sharing. You liked tapas and sharing so you could have a bit of everything but what you wanted the most right now was some wine.

Time seemed to move by so slowly at the hospital today and you really couldn’t wait to get out. It was Saturday night but only you and Wanda were available to hang out and you didn’t mind that at all, in fact you really wanted to speak with her.

“So I wanted to talk to you…” You took a dramatic pause, taking a sip of wine for courage. “...about Bucky.”

Wanda’s eyes widened with intrigue as she leaned closer, a smile spreading across her face as she was ready to listen.

“That kiss on New Year’s was…”

Her hands shook with glee. “Oh my god I knew it!”

Your face scrunched with confusion. “What do you know?”

“You and Bucky! I knew this would happen. I called it and ahh I’m so excited.”

“Slow down there,” you chuckled, motioning your hands for her to settle down. “Wan, what I’m trying to say is that kiss was incredible.”

“Aaaannnnd?” Her mouth hung open wide with a smile.

“Wanda, this isn’t about Bucky!” Her expression dropped into a frown, she pouted as she took a large sip of wine. “Kissing him was amazing, seriously, he’s a fantastic kisser but kissing him made me realize how much I miss being kissed.”

When you first began college you were casually dating someone, wanting to enjoy life as a young student in New York. Then your world turned upside down. Working full time and going to school left you without a lot of free time and putting yourself out there to meet new people seemed more intimidating the longer you put it off. It was easy to just convince yourself that you didn’t have the time to devote to a relationship and everything was fine up until recently.

Wanda was right in a way, Bucky had a big impact on your life. Your friendship with him led to the larger friend group and soon you began to see things for how they looked on the surface. Everyone was in a relationship except you and Bucky, and you knew his opinions on dating.

Bucky’s kiss sparked so much inside you and ever since you’ve been trying to reconcile the feelings that you can’t let go of, longing and loneliness. Bittersweet thoughts plague your mind as you think about how much of a gentleman Steve is, placing his jacket over Peggy’s shoulders when she was cold, or how Sam knows just the way to get Wanda to burst out with joyful laughter; or Natasha and Clint and how they know each other so well as best friend’s do, their hearts filled to the brim with love.

You wanted all of that but truthfully you would settle for a fraction of affection. Maybe it was time to finally download some apps, go out a bit more and meet someone. It was a scary thought, too scary for the moment, but thankfully the wine helped distract you.

By your second glass you felt nice and cozy with warmth spreading across your cheeks. You eyed the last crostini, staring back at Wanda with a big hopeful expression because it was so delicious. She waved an approval, laughing as you cheered under your breath before grabbing it and taking a bite.

“So you’re going for it?” she asked, nodding to your phone on the table and the visible Tinder logo.

Wiping the corner of your mouth with your napkin first you answered, “Yes? I don’t know. I want to be but...”

Wanda grabbed your phone and tapped on the screen, much to your horror. “Look, there’s no harm in downloading the app, okay? That’s step one, easy. I won’t force you to sign up but you really should.”

“I’m scared Wan. What if no one likes me? What if I don’t have anything to say to someone and can’t hold a conversation? They’ll think I’m as boring as burnt toast and it’s gonna make me shut out the world forever.”

The wine comforted you again as you finished the glass, setting it down on the table and finding Wanda’s sympathetic eyes staring back at you.

“Y/N, you are not boring. You’re developing an organization with Tony freakin’ Stark! You’re a hardworking, kick ass social worker who saves lives– ”

“Wanda I– ”

“Don’t interrupt me while I’m hyping my best friend!” She said firmly while pointing her finger in your face. “You’re the glue to our whole group of friends. You’re an amazing, talented, beautiful, kind person and anyone that doesn’t see that isn't worth your time.”

Your lips had slowly pulled into a smile the more she went on. Leave it to Wanda to always have your back and know just what to say.

“Love you Wan, thank you. Okay, I’m gonna maybe try and make a profile by the end of this weekend…. Or next weekend.”

She laughed, rolling her eyes. “In the meanwhile you could always knock on Bucky’s door if you really wanted to.” Her brows rose mischievously.

“If I didn’t think it would ruin our friendship I would absolutely make out with Bucky every second of every free moment I had. Wanda, I swear you have no idea what those lips can do.”

Talking about Bucky suddenly made you feel a lot warmer and Wanda didn’t miss the large lump you swallowed as you took a drink. She smirked, holding back a comment she could have made. Instead the check arrived, saving you from any further embarrassment.

That night you stared at the app on your phone, contemplating whether you should make a profile or not. Craning your neck around you looked at the wall you shared with Bucky.

You hadn’t seen him much since the kiss on New Year’s, and your anxiety made you wonder if you had already ruined things. It was a silly thought. You shared a kiss, nothing more and as you are well aware, Bucky does not grow emotional attachments like that.

Opening your phone to your messages, you wrote a quick hello but then realizing it was a Saturday night you deleted your text without sending. There was no noise coming from next door meaning he was probably out, and the idea of interrupting him if he was with someone (which was a big possibility) made you feel really uncomfortable.

Tomorrow would be a new day, you can text him then when he’s alone.

You woke up with ambitions to be productive but the steady fall of snow that began to cover the city made you change your mind. Today was not a day to do anything despite needing to. You bundled yourself up in your comforter and made breakfast, carefully setting the bowl of cereal down on the coffee table as you tucked your feet into your blanket burrito.

Scrolling through Instagram you saw Bucky had posted a story from early in the morning, a black and white video of the snow coming down which reminded you to message him. You replied to his post, asking what he was doing up so early, then sending a secondary message realizing he might not have been up early but still awake.

Then your nerves got the best of you, thinking if that was in fact the case then you were probably disturbing him with all the messages you were sending now. You sent a final text, apologizing for bothering him, which probably made it all worse.

You shook your head, tossing your phone beside you as scrolled aimlessly to find something good to watch so you could distract yourself. Thirty minutes into a movie you heard a knock at your door.

Still bundled up, you shuffled towards your door, looking through the door and were surprised to see Bucky standing there.

“Hey,” you said, smiling as you opened the door.

He was wearing a dark blue sweatshirt and light grey sweatpants. His hair was loose and looking a little bit wild, as if he had only combed it through with his fingers.

“Are you okay?”

“Me? Yeah, I’m fine. What’s goin’ on?”

Bucky looked relieved, dragging a few fingers down his temple. “I messaged you back and I don’t know… you didn’t respond so I thought… well I don’t know what I thought but I’m glad you’re alright.”

A soft smile pulled at his lips as he stared back at you which set your mind at ease. “Did I wake you earlier?”

“Nah, I was up. Couldn’t really sleep last night.”

“That sucks. I kinda wanted to sleep all day since it’s so gross outside but I know it’ll mess me up for tomorrow so I’m just being a potato.”

Bucky chuckled, giving your “outfit” a once over as he seemed to approve. “So, what do potatoes do?”

“Well this potato is finally watching Back to the Future.”

Bucky blinked rapidly, his mouth falling open with bewilderment as he stared at you. “What do you mean finally? You’ve never seen Back to the Future?” he asked, with a hint of exasperation in his tone.

“I mean…” you looked everywhere but at Bucky, pressing your lips together as you tried to break the news to him gently, “I’ve seen clips here and there and I know things about it… Doc Brown, the DeLorean, flux capacitor...”

Every word broke Bucky’s heart. “You’ve never seen Back to the Future?” he repeated.

“Wrong, I’ve seen about thirty minutes of Back to the Future.” You laughed as Bucky threw his hands up in shock. “Do you want to watch it with me?”

Bucky gladly accepted your invitation, locking up his place before he went into yours.

He muttered under his breath, still in disbelief that you haven’t seen this movie as he made himself comfortable on your couch. “The score! Do you know about the score and how amazing it is?!”

“I can’t wait for you to tell me,” you winked, anticipating an earful of musical knowledge. “Can I get you anything?”

“Nah, I’m good.” A chill ran down his spine that he tried to shrug off. “Maybe a blanket? Oh wait.”

He turned around to pull the fuzzy blanket over himself but it definitely wasn’t thick or large enough to keep him warm in this weather. The only real blanket you had was currently wrapped around your body so you wanted to share.

You took it off your shoulders and sat beside Bucky, removing the fuzzy blanket so you could drape your own across both of you. Then you placed the fuzzy blanket on top of that to add an extra layer of warmth.

You smiled looking at Bucky as you asked if he was ready to watch the movie though your eyes drifted to those lips of his, perfectly pink and so much softer than you imagined. The memory of your kiss makes your heart stutter and it takes a moment for you to realize you need to press play and not think about kissing him.

It doesn’t help that you’ve shuffled closer to each other. It’s for warmth, nothing more. Bucky tried his best not to distract you from watching but he was squirming in his seat, itching to talk about the music.

“See how the score begins softly? You hardly notice the drums. Then everything gets stronger, the drums, the horns, and as Doc spots the car coming down the empty street the score amps up even more signaling the danger. It’s fantastic!”

You didn’t say anything, you couldn’t. Somehow Bucky’s passion for his work had stunned you into silence and all you could do was nod, smiling so genuinely your cheeks began to hurt as you listened to him. Bucky may not realize the way he glows when he talks about music but you see it, he’s shimmering brighter than snow in sunlight.

It was nice to spend a lazy Sunday with Bucky, two potatoes that continued to watch movies and order in food when you were hungry. Plans with everyone for the following weekend were brought up but not once did he mention the New Year’s party. Not that you expected him to. It was nice not having the kiss awkwardly hang over your friendship.

“Blanket warm. I don’t want to leave,” he whined before getting up.

You walked him to the door, stealing a quick look at the way the sweatpants hugged his ass. Clearing your throat in an awkward cough you wished him goodnight, “I’ll try not to sit on my phone the next time you text me.”

Bucky leaned in to hug you goodbye but his lips made a detour, feeling them press against the soft skin of your cheek.

“G-goodnight Y/N.”

You stood in your doorway, waiting to let the breath out that you hadn’t realized you were holding in until after he closed his door. It’s nothing, just a friendly kiss on the cheek, nothing more than that.

“Hi Mr. Napoli.” You smiled as you approached the older man in his hospital bed. “I spoke with your son and he said he’s on his way.”

You had to repeat yourself louder a few times for him to understand but he gave you a gummy smile when he finally did. He had come into the hospital late last night after falling in his apartment and breaking his hip. Living alone had apparently become more difficult over the last few months so you’ve prepared options to discuss with his family when they arrive.

As Mr. Napoli continued to speak with you, your ears perked up at a loud conversation. Looking up for a moment you caught the gaze of a man staring at you as he stood over the bed of another man. He was tall and slim, dressed nicely in a suit under a wool peacoat. His hair was dark and slicked back though it was cropped short on the sides, with stubble peppering his face and neck.

He smiled, nodding as if to convey an apology for the noise he and his friend made. You felt your cheeks pulling the corner of your lips slightly but focused your attention back to Mr. Napoli.

“Miss, can I have more water?”

“Of course, let me ask,” you replied.

Scanning the area you checked for any nurses that might be around. Unable to find any that weren’t in the middle of something, you told Mr. Napoli you’d be right back with it. The ER kept the refreshments for the patients in a locked room so you walked towards the nurses’ desk in hopes someone there could help you.

“Thanks Stacie.” You smiled back as she needed to call the doctor to make sure this wouldn’t interfere with Mr. Napoli’s pre-surgical prep.

As you turned to step away from the desk you nearly walked into a body. Gasping, it took you a moment to realize it was the man from before.

“Sorry about that,” he said, chuckling lightly. “I wanted to apologize about before. Hope my buddy and I weren’t interrupting your work.” His tone was soft with a heavy New York accent.

“That’s alright, you didn’t,” you said, studying his features up close. His eyes were much darker than you realized, like deep chasms that were full of mystery. Pale pink lips pulled into a smile as he extended his hand towards you.

“I’m Billy.”

You shook his hand, able to tell right away that he was the type of guy that takes pride in taking care of himself. His hand was lotion soft, not a strand of hair was out of place and his skin looked so flawless you were a little jealous.

His gaze fell to your ID badge. “So, Y/N. How long have you been in social work?”

“So eager getting to know me, Billy?”

Billy shut his eyes as a smile crept across his face. “I can’t help it, I’m very observant.”

Your lips pulled into a smirk as you stared at him skeptically until Stacie called your name. She told you to wait a moment as she got the okay to give Mr. Napoli some water. Turning back to Billy you noticed his stance was taller and stiff.

He raised his hand to salute. “Former Lieutenant William Russo, US Marine Corps.”

“I get it now. You’re not just a creep that reads people’s name tags.” Your smirk gave way to a tiny smile and Billy relaxed.

Through a laugh he replied, “I try not to be.”

His smile was pretty, making his whole face light up, those eyes sparkling like onyx gems. Your attention was turned away for a moment as Stacie handed you a plastic pink pitcher full of water.

“Well, I have to get this drink back to my patient. It was nice to meet you.”

As you began to walk away you heard Billy’s footsteps rapidly catching up behind you.

“Wait, Y/N.” You turned to find him digging out something from his pocket. “Maybe I could take you out for a drink one day?”

He handed you a sleek black card which you put in your pocket. “Goodbye Mr. Russo,” you said, giving him a tiny salute that made him smile again.

Later that evening as you were getting your coat on in preparation to leave you felt something digging in your hip. You remembered Billy’s card from earlier, pulling it out now to finally read it.

The card was as dark as his eyes and in bold white text was the name of the company, ANVIL. Beneath it was his name and title, CEO. No wonder he dressed so well. His number was staring back at you.

You thought back to your conversation with Wanda, maybe you should go for this. You were still too scared to make a profile on Tinder, worried about what strangers might think of you but after meeting a gorgeous man that actually wants to take you out it gave you some renewed confidence.

Not wanting to seem too eager (or desperate) you waited two days before texting Billy. A day of back and forth texting led to plans to go out. Your heart raced with anxiety; maybe you weren’t ready after all.

PART 12

[igotbulletproof-insomnia]

Adopting Bangtan 08

01 previous

Supermarket Sweep

You were never going grocery shopping with seven kids ever again in your life.

The chaos. The absolute chaos was something that you somehow never expected. You actually thought that shopping with all seven kids would be the most efficient way to accomplish the task. Sit Kookie in the cart and let him “help” you by picking out the area to shop and hold the bags while you pick the vegetables. Send Yoongi and Namjoon to buy the snacks because they were the most sensible of all of the children and wouldn't have you spending way more money than necessary. Let Taehyung and Jimin retrieve the bread and the milk. Let Seokjin pick the meat because he was surprisingly talented at the job. And then everyone was supposed to meet you back at the shopping cart, still located in produce, so that you could pay and you all could go home. It should have taken thirty minutes, tops.

Instead, you found yourself chasing Taehyung around the store while Jimin kept an eye on Jungkook and you really, really hoped that he didn’t grab the most expensive apples on display, but you have the feeling that he would — because of course, he would. Prices didn’t seem to exist to any of the younger kids.

Instead, Jin was throwing a fit because all of the meats on display were apparently complete rubbish and he refused to let you spend money on anything but the most expensive cuts of beef so you “just have to��� make another stop at the actual butcher’s shop. Granted, if Jimin spent all of your money on asparagus, your family would be eating vegetarian this week.

Instead, as soon as you managed to grab Taehyung, who apparently just wanted to replace Jungkook as your shopping partner, Namjoon appeared with a reasonable request for more variety in tea for the house. Which opened up a whole new can of worms as Taehyung realized he can ask for things too. This had him running back to Jimin and the shopping cart with a grin on his face, demanding that they find the snack aisle because you were going to buy them extra snacks if they asked, and Jimin’s face lit up with a smile so bright that dammit, it was going to be hard to explain what a budget was and why it wasn’t a good idea to exceed it.

(and yeah, you checked. Jimin grabbed the most expensive radish and lettuce he could find, and you were going to have to break out the vegetarian cookbook.)

(except for the bananas. It seemed Jungkook picked up the bananas)

Thankfully, Yoongi — lovely, beautiful, blessed Yoongi — had been returning to the shopping cart with his arms full of a variety of snacks, all low in price but high in popularity at home. He took one look at the chaos of whining and fussing children, rolled his eyes heavenwards, and took control.

“You get one.”

His tone left no room for argument; even you stood straight and stopped making a scene. Yoongi led the group back to the snack aisle and replaced everything he picked and let the others run wild. Together, you watched the others pick out snacks and place them, one by one, into the shopping cart.

“... They’re going to blow the snack budget like this,” you commented idly.

“I know.”

“That’s why you put the rest back, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“And these snacks aren’t going to last as long as they usually do, will they?”

“Not at all.”

“Thank goodness you’re so smart,” you ruffled his hair. “This is why I keep you around.”

“You keep me around because you don’t want me living by myself and I save you from going broke.” Yoongi’s tone was as matter of fact as ever and you couldn’t help but grin.

“Like I said, smart kid.”

Yoongi grinned back. You liked the fact that these kids didn’t take you too seriously. You had a good balance of deference, respect, and playfulness with all of them, even if you weren’t sure who actually ran the household most of the time. “Go pick you something, Yoon. You don’t have anything for yourself.”

“You can’t afford what I want.”

“I probably can’t afford what anyone wants, they aren’t paying attention to the prices.” And indeed, Taehyung and Jimin, your babies with the most expensive tastes, were debating the merits of two snacks that were way outside of the price range you would normally consider. But again, Jimin’s smile was so broad that you were reluctant to tell him no and watch that fearful, nervous look fall back into place. You would talk to him about budgets and restrictions another time. “I’ll make it work, don’t worry about it right now.”

With a grateful smile, Yoongi asked you to grab the snack he wanted, placed just out of his reach on a top shelf. It wasn’t priced too far out of budget, but it was different from the things he normally selected for your busy household of eight. You made a mental note to pay attention to how much Yoongi enjoyed the snack and check the stores for similar ones. The kid did so much and asked for so little, it would be nice to do this one thing for him.

“Wait a moment…” you frowned, counting off. “Where’s Hoseok?” Immediately all of the children quieted down, looking to each other as if to confirm that yes, someone was missing.

“Wasn’t he supposed to go with Jin-hyung?” asked Namjoon.

“No, I thought he was keeping Jimin and Taetae company?”

“Oh my God, you lost Hoseok.” That accusing tone came from Taehyung, and you watched Jimin’s face go from lightweight confused to completely devastated. You hated it, had suspicion that he was wondering if you would eventually do the same thing to him, if you would get bored or disappointed or angry and cast him off, lose him in a store or at a park like Hoseok explained happened to him, like all of Jimin’s previous parents did to him.

“Okay, boys,” you shouted, uncaring of the stares you attracted. The boys startled, but gave you their full attention, which was one hundred percent more than you’d had the entire grocery trip. You continued to speak firmly, and could tell the show of authority did more to calm their panic than the shouting. You decided that they needed to focus on something other than their lost brother. “This is what we’re going to do: Namjoon, you’re going to take Taetae and Jimin and get the bread, milk, and all the dairy stuff like I told you before, okay? Add eggs to that list. Yoongi, go get the paper products. Get the brands we used to get, not the ones we used last time, they’re cheaper and sturdier. Seokjin, we’ll go to the butcher’s if we have the budget when we finish here, but I promised we could have meat for dinner, so take Kookie and find something, okay?” All of the boys nodded at their assignment. “Good. Yoongi, Joonie, find Jin when you’ve got your things. Seokjin, when you’ve finished, wait for me in produce. You all understand? I’m going to go find Hoseok. He probably got distracted and can’t find us.” Hoseok had a habit of doing that. He often got lost among the chaos, because while everyone was being loud and boisterous, Hoseok was often quiet and did the things that went unnoticed. If you assigned dairy, meat, and snacks, then Hoseok probably went off to grab paper towels or rice or something you needed at home but forgot about. You wouldn’t be surprised if he came to the store with the list Yoongi and Jin never felt the need to write.

So the kids separated, worried and mumbling to each other, but occupied with their tasks. They were trusting in your ability, in your promise to locate their missing brother before you all went home. Whether these kids were abandoned by their parents (or maybe ran away from home, Seokjin never discussed why he chose to stay with his former teacher) , you found them and chose to take care of them. It was understandable that they would be worried. Up until now you had probably seemed like some sort of savior to them. Maybe not infallible, and definitely not… whatever it was that made other adults seem parental, but you had taken care of them, kept track of them, and protected them. Losing one of them had probably shaken their hearts.

It didn’t take long before you Hoseok as you predicted, standing in the frozen section, a piece of paper and pen in his hands. He bit his tongue as he read through it, humming to himself and ticking off items. A hand basket sat at his feet, overfilled with supplies.

“I’m pretty sure you should have an actual shopping cart for that,” you told him. Hoseok startled, jumping nearly a foot in the air and shouting in surprise. The petty, upset parent part of you feels satisfied for it, like Hoseok got what he deserved for scaring you the way he did. The more rational part of your brain is just glad that you were right and he hadn’t been kidnapped. Casually, you looked over the basket. “I didn’t even think about checking the spice cabinet. You’re a clever kid.”

“I just wanted to be helpful,” Hoseok replied with a shrug.

“It would have been helpful if you told me where you were going.”

“... I didn’t do that?” Hoseok’s eyes went big and wandered left and right. He seemed to be making himself smaller, pulling his arms close and leaning away from you.

“No, you didn’t.”

“I… oh.”

“We got very scared,” you explained. “We thought you got lost. The other boys were panicking.”

“I didn’t mean to scare you, I just… everyone else got an assignment and I didn’t, so…”

“So you thought I wouldn’t notice if you disappeared for a bit.” You nodded and ignored Hoseok’s flinch when you crouched down to his level. He wasn’t terribly short, he was actually almost as tall as your shoulder, but it was always easier to have these sorts of talks when you weren’t looming over him. “It’s okay, I’m not mad about you shopping on your own. I’m actually really glad that you took initiative to do something helpful. But you did scare me. I didn’t know what happened to you. I didn’t know if you got lost or ran away or if someone stole you from me. I’m glad I know you well enough to assume you brought your own list, but I was still afraid of being wrong. I really, really don’t know what I would do if you went missing, Hoseok. I haven’t had you for long, but my heart would hurt. I care about you that much, okay? So please, communicate. Tell me when you’re going to wander away, and tell me where you’re going so that I know you are safe.” Hoseok nodded fervently, most likely an effort to convince you he was sincere and wouldn’t disappear on you again. You opened your arms for a hug, You opened your arms for a hug, partially to comfort yourself, but mostly to soothe Hoseok. He looked like he might burst into tears and needed the comfort.

“Okay, good.” You squeezed the kid tight, your hold unrelenting until you felt the kid push away. “Alright, let me see that list of yours.” Together, you and Hoseok went through his list, and you were amazed that he was so thorough. Apparently the kid started taking stock as soon as you mentioned the intent to go to the grocery store earlier in the week. Hoseok noticed that you had a habit of leaving something out and he thought that making a list would be helpful. When you decided that you were going to take all of the kids with you, he decided to just hold on to the list himself.

“From now on, you’re making grocery lists,” you decided as you made your way back to Jin. “Maybe even all of the lists if you’re this organized. What do you think of that?”

Hoseok grinned, obviously proud of himself. “I think that sounds awesome!” He cheered. “Is this like how Yoongi gets to be in charge of the budget and Jin is in charge of the kitchen and Joonie is in charge of all of us?”

“Kind of yes, something like that,” you said. “Because obviously I’ll lose my head otherwise.”

“I’m sure we’ll keep track of your head too if you want.”

“Ah, why are all of my kids so snarky? I don’t deserve this,” you cried, hugging Hoseok more tightly to your waist. “All I do is give them love and a home, and they pay me back in sass.”

“But you love us, right?” Hoseok asked. His voice was a little softer than before, and you saw it for the genuine question that it was, not the joke that it would have been had it come from Jin, Joon, or Yoon.

“Of course,” you told him. “Don’t you doubt that for a second.”

When you went searching for the rest of the kids, you found them standing by Jin with the shopping cart, all lined up on the side of the aisle and eerily quiet. Even Jungkook in the shopping cart was holding his hands in his lap, eyes down cast.

“Do I want to know what happened here?”

“No,” was the resounding answer.

“Okay, good.” You shake off your curiosity. Whether that was because you trusted Seokjin or because you were afraid of the answer, you were undecided. “Hoseok, do you want to delegate tasks? We have a few more things on your list, right?” Hoseok noded, and set about sending his brothers off in pairs to retrieve the remaining items on his checklist. After the two sets had wandered off, Hoseok looked up again.

“Could you…?”

“Seokjinnie, you good by yourself?”

“I’ll have Kookie with me, it will be great.” Jin shrugged and you rolled your eyes.

“We’ll still meet over in produce when you’re finished, okay?”

Jin huffed his frustration at the meat selection. “I think we’re just having fish tonight. Is that fine with you?”

“If it’s okay with your brothers, it’s okay with me.”

“They’ll be fine with it,” Seokjin declared. His tone said he was still very irritated with whatever happened while you were gone.

“Get some cheaper produce when you’re finished, please.”

“Sure thing,” Seokjin agreed absently, wandering further up the aisle.

“Holler if you need me,”

“I will.”

“Just don’t scare everyone when you do.”

“Now you’re just taking away my fun.”

After all of that, you spent another fifteen minutes in the store. The trip to the butcher’s shop was put off for the following night, and you all made the unanimous decision to eat ramen and kimchi for dinner. You were also very loud about never bringing seven kids grocery shopping ever again.

That was, until two weeks later when Jimin’s adorable pout convinced you that they would be on their absolute bestest behavior (spoiler alert: they weren’t).

To find more of my child-bangtan fics, select the "Collecting Strays" tag at the bottom of this page ^_^

[blazichu]

Mystery March Day 13: Relax

I misremembered this one as ‘rest’ which kind of colored the tone/content, but I still dig it.

--

It started with a death curse.

Or, well, maybe it wasn’t a death curse specifically-- Vivi didn’t pretend to be an expert, but she knew how it made her feel, even from a distance, and from that she could extrapolate that it was bad news.

The point remained: there was a curse being levied, and the two people who might have any indication what it did reacted harshly to it. Those reactions, however, were on polar opposite ends of the spectrum. While Mystery bristled and visibly weighed his options, Lewis decided on a more proactive approach. In an unerring, deceptively fast glide, he made his way toward the caster and seized their raised hand by the wrist.

Startled by the unexpected contact and the skeletal phantom suddenly looming over them, they immediately lost their concentration-- and, for good reason, went into a panic. They tried to backpedal. When they only made it a step away, they tried to wrench the arm away.

Lewis’s grip on it tightened, and he rumbled something inaudible from their distance.

The spell in their hand popped-- exactly like a soap bubble, in spite of the fact that it didn’t technically exist yet-- and Lewis flinched in its wake, hair flickering wildly for half a second. Just as quickly as the disruption came on, though, his demeanor and form settled; he raised his free hand to gesture lackadaisically.

“Still dead. Imagine that.” He leaned in, as if to confide in the caster, but the phantasmal force behind his words carried them across the gap between himself and the rest of the group, “Be grateful it was me tonight; if you raise this hand again, toward any of them,” His grip tightened, and they renewed their struggling, teeth grit against the pressure on their wrist, “It’s the first thing you’re going to lose. Do I make myself clear?”

Something must have passed between the two, because Lewis dropped their hand, sending them skittering backwards blindly. He straightened up to his full height-- plus an extra couple of inches, due to his lack of contact with the ground-- and made as if to follow. The caster whirled around and booked it as fast as they could.

For several seconds, he stayed put-- tracking their progress until he deemed them too far away to bother with-- and then turned to rejoin the group, absently flexing the hand that had interrupted the curse. He looked completely unruffled, though, admittedly, it was pretty hard to judge when the only metric was a skull with resting bitch face.

It was off-putting, if Vivi was honest-- not the skull, but drastic behavioral shift. Lewis had always been loathe to use his stature to his advantage; he may have loomed, but it was always an accident, and on the rare occasion he’d seen fit to intimidate someone, it had always disturbed him after the fact. Maybe he was just leaning into the fact that it was hard to be a reassuring presence when one was very obviously dead, but it was hardly an isolated phenomena.

She still loved him dearly, but times like this, she worried for him.

Belatedly, Vivi realized that Arthur had frozen up somewhere in the middle of things. Lewis, as he drew nearer, seemed to notice the same thing, sighed, and gave him an absent pat on the shoulder.

And that was that.

Until later that night, when midway through a discussion on Scottish folklore, Lewis fell asleep at the table.

Thinking nothing of the sudden silence, Vivi stabbed a couple more penne, giving Lewis a few more seconds to consider his stance on kelpies. When there was no answer forthcoming, though, she glanced over, and immediately dropped her fork.

“You’re seeing this too, right?” Arthur asked, bemused.

Bizarrely, even though there was no gentle rise-and-fall of the chest, it was immediately obvious that Lewis was asleep, and nothing more sinister. And if there was something more sinister than dead Vivi wasn’t sure she wanted to know what it was.

She scooted forward in her seat, leaning over her plate to get a better look without uprooting herself.

“I… didn’t realize that was an option.” She said after a moment passed. Then, with the blunt end of her knife, she nudged Lewis’s jaw. Arthur fussed at her for it, which was fortunate, because Lewis didn’t wake up to do it himself. She set it down and frowned, “Think we should be worried?”

“Uh, yeah?”

Vivi hummed to herself and stood up, moving to shake Lewis’s shoulder; skull still resting on his arms, he didn’t stir in the slightest. Chewing thoughtfully on her lip, she looked at Arthur. “I realize now’s not the time, but how do you s’pose his skull’s staying in place if he’s not actively keeping it there?”

Arthur, who’d gotten to his feet the same time Vivi had, flicked both of his hands up in something that wasn’t quite disbelief, “You’re right, it’s not the time.”

He made a circuit of the table, and the slumbering ghost thereupon, then came to a halt at Vivi’s other side. “He… looks fine? There’s nothing up with his anchor, anyway, so…?”

Vivi nodded, thoughts racing-- and then, both as a test and in search of answers, hollered, “Mystery!”

Nothing from sleeping spooky, but after a moment, Mystery appeared, grumbling all the while.

“You bellowed?” He asked, face twisting in displeasure as he padded onto the wooden floorboards.

With a wide wave, Vivi gestured in Lewis’s general direction, “Do you know anything about that?”

“I believe that’s your boyfriend.” He said, irritation creeping into his tone, “Should I identify Arthur for you, too, while I’m here?”

“We think something’s wrong.” The Arthur in question cut in, before they could get off track, “He’s, uh, asleep? Probably?”

Mystery shot him a look over his glasses, “He’s what.”

He offered a much more subdued wave toward the still form at the table.

Perhaps realizing that, through all the shouting and sassing Lewis hadn’t said a word, Mystery tensed minutely and trotted over. As the others before him, he nudged the ghost. And, as the others before him, he received a complete lack of response.

“That’s… unusual.” He said, somewhat unnecessarily, and propped himself up on his hind legs, front braced against the edge of the chair. It took a bit of craning, but he managed to nose his way against Lewis’s chest and prod at the golden heart sandwiched between its owner and the table.

That, finally, got a rise out of Lewis. He made a soft, inhuman noise akin to whine and flapped the nearest hand, as if to shoo Mystery away. As subdued a response as it was, neither Vivi or Arthur had expected anything, and it was enough to make one start, and the other jump.

Snout scrunched in thought, Mystery hopped down from his perch, “It seems you were correct, he’s asleep.”

In a silent bid for more information, Vivi turned her palms upward.

“I don’t know what you want me to say. My best guess is that it’s a product of the spell he intercepted earlier, but, as that’s the only variable at play here, that seems rather obvious.” His cocked his head, deliberating, “I suppose we could try to agitate his anchor, if you’re that worried, but he doesn’t seem distressed. Personally, I don’t see the harm in letting him sleep it off.”

At that, Vivi gave a short, wry laugh, “Well lookit that, Artie, you managed to stay up longer than a dead guy.”

Arthur stuck his tongue out and made his way back to his place at the table, eyes briefly resting on Lewis’s slouched form. “Should we move him somewhere else? You know how he gets when I fall asleep at my desk.”

“I think it’s less that he objects to the tabletop, and more that you should go to bed before you get to that point.” Vivi said, flopping back into her chair, “Kinda funny that he passed out here though, after all the talks you guys have had. What do you think, is it gonna take magic backlash to beat your all-nighter-recovery record?”

–

It took another two days for Lewis to wake up. There was some debate as to whether or not that technically broke Arthur’s record; Arthur was relatively certain he’d never taken that long to bounce back from a tinkering binge, and Vivi begged to differ. Mystery wisely stayed out of it.

Up to that point, they’d just resigned themselves to having haunted decor on the table while daily life went on around him, so it was a welcome surprise when Lewis showed signs of waking.

Vivi eyed him from over the edge of her laptop’s screen as she collated her research into parasomnia. He briefly buried his face deeper into the crook of his arm, then sat up and pressed the heel of one hand into an eye socket. As his open eye landed on Vivi, he blinked, dropped his hand, then glanced to the empty seat across from her.

She grinned at him and, without thinking, announced, “He lives!”

It was followed by a confused beat of silence and then a sheepish, “Oh shit, sorry.”

Lewis simply stared at her, uncomprehending.

“How’re you feeling? That was a pretty serious nap, but I guess that’s the worst you can do to someone who’s already dead, huh?”

“A nap?” He echoed, voice distorted either from sleep or confusion.

Vivi turned in her seat to gesture to the brightly-lit kitchen window. “I was trying to be nice, but I could try something more festive, like ‘short coma’.”

“Vivi. Since when do ghosts sleep?”

She shrugged, “Since two nights ago? Mystery thought there was a way to wake you up, but if a curse is anything like the flu, you were better off sleeping through it.”

“Oh,” Lewis said, voice unusually soft, “Right, the spellcaster. That shouldn’t have done anything, though…?”

Vivi shot him a sideways look, and gestured widely to the table. “You tell me, boo.”

Lewis did no such thing. Instead, he got up and floated away, body language troubled.

--

Things went back to normal relatively quickly thereafter.

On this particular night, Vivi was still pulling together notes for their next case, and frequently called out random trivia about bog bodies to whoever was available to hear it. Mystery would have been underfoot in the kitchen, had its other occupant not been hovering a good six inches in the air, floating around or through him in an effort to ignore his well-meaning nagging, whilst cleaning up for the day.

And then there was Arthur, who had disappeared after dinner. He had the next day off, which was a double-edged sword-- more often than not, he took it as an excuse to stay up until dawn and then crash.

There was a loud clang from down the hallway, and Lewis automatically turned to consult the nearest clock. Simultaneously, Vivi’s eyes flicked down to the digital display on her laptop. 1 am already. She saved her work and stretched, deciding her fifteen remaining tabs could wait.

While she shut things down for the night, Lewis tucked a new towel into the oven’s handle and started toward the hall, goal clear in mind.

Vivi stared after him and, after some thought, did a little skip-hop closer to catch his arm. “Maybe you should try to get some sleep, too.”

“I… don’t need to sleep.” He said, in the tones of one who’d been made to explain something very simple to someone who should know better.

“Not technically, no, but you can.” Vivi tilted her head as she considered whether or not to voice her next thought. “I get that you didn’t really have a choice in the matter before, but you-- after you woke up, you seemed a lot happier, and it made me think. We sleep because our bodies need it, yeah, but it’s important for us mentally, too. Even if you’re dead, you’re still a dead human-- what if you’ve just been cranky because you don’t have a body to tell you you’re tired?”

Lewis was quiet for several long seconds, and then sighed, “If it’ll make you feel better, I’ll try.”

A slow smile worked its way across Vivi’s face, and, with some doing, she craned high enough to press a kiss to his cheekbone. With a gentle bump of his temple against hers, Lewis floated off-- and, as he left, Vivi caught a single word muttered into the darkness:

“’Cranky’?”

–

Though she’d told herself she didn’t have any specific expectations, Vivi found herself slightly disappointed when she spent the night alone. At first, she assumed it meant Lewis had decided against resting after all, but when her alarm went off and she made to start fumbling around in the kitchen, she realized what had happened: for whatever reason, he’d decided to sleep on the couch. She told herself not to speculate why; he had to have his reasons, and there was no point in humoring the wriggling doubts when she’d just be able to ask.

She was a little surprised, though, when her futzing with the coffee pot failed to disturb him. Maybe he was just that tired. It wasn’t unthinkable; if her theory held any weight, he’d only slept three nights over the course of a year.

With the coffee brewing and toaster at work, Vivi wandered over and braced an elbow on the back of the couch. As before, it only took a glance to recognize that Lewis was asleep; unlike before, his anchor was in plain view to confirm it, dusted a mellow gold that didn’t pulse so much as draw in and out, keeping the same pace as the low, even breathing of true sleep.

It seemed he’d curled around it out of habit, protecting it even in unconsciousness.

Vivi lingered a bit longer, without any particular reason for doing so; thoughts came and went, and she didn’t try to hold onto any of them. It was soothing leaning there, absently matching her breathing to the lazy thrum of Lewis’s anchor.

Then the toaster went off and she started upright, slapping her cheeks in anticipation for the day ahead.

She never asked why he chose the couch, and he never offered her an answer.

---

Something about that brief respite must have convinced Lewis that he was better off taking the occasional nap, because he didn’t speak a word of protest from there on out. And as he accepted it, the less Vivi worried for him; he’d never been unrecognizable-- not counting, you know-- but he started acting more and more like himself, rather than the new, spooky version where you had to squint to make out his original personality.

That wasn’t the only benefit, either. Arthur might have foregone sleep for his own sake, ignoring any number of pointed reminders while he worked, but this discovery seemed to change things. If it got too late and he realized Lewis was still hovering around, he’d shut things down on his own and shoo the ghost off to bed, using himself as an example.

It was an incredibly sweet gesture, but Vivi had a suspicion that Lewis might have engineered the chain of events in the first place; he may have urged Arthur to sleep in the past, but he only started loitering when he realized he could make himself the impetus to follow through. But at the same time, the longer this went on, the gentler the reminders became, the more it turned into something he considered ‘for Arthur’s benefit’ and less a naughty, if mutually beneficial, game.

The compromise didn’t always mean they slept at a decent hour, or even went to bed properly, but it did mean that they slept every night, at least for a little bit, and that was better than the alternative.

(It also meant that Vivi got up one morning, further into this arrangement, and found them asleep on the couch: Arthur’s good arm dangling off the edge, Lewis half-sunken into the back of said couch, loosely curled around his anchor-- but also, as a consequence of where he was laying, Arthur. If it hadn’t been for the phantasmal tail his lower body melded into, ‘cute’ was all it would have been, but as things stood, that also bumped it into the ‘fascinating’ camp.

She hadn’t forgotten the fact that his skull stayed firmly in place while he slept, so this unconscious modification was an object of intrigue for her.)

“It’s because you weren’t getting your beauty sleep,” Vivi joked, then moved her hands in a rainbow’s arc and put on the ‘I am interacting with a young child’ voice, “And we all know real beauty is on the inside.”

Lewis sighed a laugh, but didn’t argue. In fact, after a moment’s thought, he said, “It’s strange. Obviously I know I’m dead, but I didn’t realize how awful it was to feel like a ghost until I felt like a person again.”

And to that Vivi hummed, unsure what to say, thoughts racing.

Then there was Thursday.

On one particular Thursday, where Arthur couldn’t stay asleep and Vivi had an especially early shift, the commotion throughout the kitchen roused Lewis from wherever he’d settled the previous night. Nothing unusual there, and Vivi would hardly begrudge his help as she blearily went about putting breakfast together.

There were no footsteps as he rounded the corner-- there never were, regardless of whether he walked or floated-- but something was audibly off when he greeted them.

Vivi waved without looking over, intent as she was on the coffee pot.

It would have taken her a few more minutes to notice, if it hadn’t been for Arthur’s uncertain, “Uh, Vivi…?”

She glanced up, and then automatically followed the pointed tilt of Arthur’s head, failing to process the look on his face until several seconds after the fact.

Where he’d emerged from the hallway, Lewis was shooing off a Deadbeat that seemed determined to get in his face. Frankly, it was hard to blame the Deadbeat; as soon as what she was seeing clicked, Vivi bounded across the kitchen and got in his face herself, reaching up as far as she could. Her hand brushed his cheek. Not his cheekbone, his cheek-- and despite herself, she felt tears welling up.

“Vivi?” He asked, and there was no overt reverberation. As dark-- as dead-- as his eyes may have been, his concerned gaze on her was a balm she hadn’t known she needed, and she gave up on holding back the sniffles as she flung her arms around his neck.

She’d known. She’d known he was still there, even in his roughest moments, and now she had him back.

[stellawella97]

Atelephobia: The Fear of Never Being Good Enough (Shane/Gender Neutral Farmer) - Chapter 1/3

Just posted 1/3 of my first Stardew Valley fanfic!

Read it below or over @ AO3

Summary:

Shane has got 99 problems but never did he think the entire world losing its colour would be one of them.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It started off as just any other normal day in Shane’s life.

The chickens clucked noisily outside, the cows joining in their song occasionally with their loud chorus of moo’s. None of these sounds woke Shane up in the slightest - he heard them every day and he’d grown so accustomed to the noise, he figured he’d still be able to continue sleeping even if his bedroom floor caved in beneath his bed.

The slightly battered alarm clock sitting on Shane’s bedside table began its shrill ringing at 6:30am sharp. Shane tended to run by a strict ‘5 more minutes’ rule when it came to waking up in the morning however. Refusing to open his eyes till he absolutely had to, Shane managed to turn off the alarm clock by swatting aimlessly with his hand till it met with cold metal and the ringing stopped.

He tried to fall back asleep for those precious extra 5 minutes of peace before he had to leave for his soul-sucking job at JojaMart. However, memories of the night before began to flood back into his mind. Shane had been up in the mountains late at night, drinking again. He faintly remembered seeing the hermit (Linus, was it?) entering his tent, a plastic bag that was stuffed to the brim with what looked like half-eaten food grasped tightly in his hands.

Shane had drunk a couple cans of beer before he decided to enter the mines nearby. It had been dark and full of strange noises neither human nor animal could make but Shane had managed to make it down several floors with a pickaxe he’d found at the mine entrance in his drunken state. As to why he’d chosen to do this, Shane had no idea whatsoever.

He didn’t remember much else except for the sound of a creature speaking in a garbled ancient language, a warm tingling sensation that filled his entire body, and finally the sharp pain that shot through his head as he finally keeled over from the amount of alcohol in his system, smashing his head against the rocky terrain. Oddly enough, his head didn’t hurt at all this morning. Doctor Harvey must’ve patched him up real good this time. Or maybe Marnie had. Who’d even brought him back to the house?

Just as he was beginning to wonder if he was actually found with trousers on this time, Shane heard the sound of the front door slamming shut. Marnie must have gone out to feed the animals. Shane was just about to roll over onto his side to continue his reminiscing when it began to dawn on him that he’d probably been in bed for more than just 5 minutes.

Shane quickly sat up in bed and grabbed the alarm clock. It was now 7:10am! He couldn’t risk Morris docking his pay again this month - he had to get to JojaMart quick. He jumped out of bed and had just put his leg through a pair of jeans when he noticed that it’d turned from blue to gray. When had that happened? He remembered wearing this exact pair of jeans just two days ago and he certainly hadn’t ever bought gray ones before.

It was then that he realized - everything had turned gray from his walls, to the cushion placed in front of the television set, to the alarm clock, and even his own skin.

I’ve finally done it, haven’t I? I died in those fucking mines last night and now, I’m in some kind of Hell?

The thought ran through Shane’s mind as he spun around, inspecting everything in his room for any sign of colour. This was to no avail. Even his favourite pair of boxers was gray with slightly darker gray hearts dotting it. In a moment of pure desperation, Shane decided to pinch himself as hard as he could on his arm in an attempt to find out if he was in fact still alive. He was.

Rubbing the sore patch of skin on his arm, Shane decided that he didn’t have time to waste standing here and waiting to see if the world around him would get its colour back. If he was still alive, he needed to get to work pronto. He quickly pulled on his ratty, old JojaMart jacket that still did its job and ran out of the house, only just remembering to shut his bedroom door behind him because he just didn’t think he could deal with Marnie yelling at him again about the mess of empty beer cans and pizza boxes in there.

Shane ran through town, almost knocking over Abigail who had just left Pierre’s General Store with a flute in her hands. It worried him to no end that even her usually bright purple of her hair (She must dye it, right?) was now a dull gray, but Shane had no time to be stressing about that now. He’d just have to wait till during his break or after work.

Once he’d arrived at JojaMart, Shane immediately went to the employees office to clock in and change into the uniform. He took a moment to glance at his reflection in the mirror and sighed as he noted that the usually bright blue uniform was just as unflattering as always in a gray shade. He walked out onto the shop floor and began stocking the shelves, determined to just get through the day now.

However, he must’ve done something to offend Yoba because Shane’s shift did not go well at all. He’d first managed to trip over his own feet and crashed straight into the display of limited edition shrimp-flavoured Joja Cola that he’d been hard at work stacking up for over an hour. As Shane was stomping angrily back onto the shop floor with a bucket of soapy water and a mop in his hands, he’d then bumped into Pam who’d screamed in rage when she discovered her brand-new jumpsuit was now soaked. Even though he’d apologized profusely to Pam, Shane still had to sit through an hour and a half of Morris’s lectures as well as had his paycheck docked for the day to reimburse Pam for the damages.

Just as he thought his day couldn’t get any worse however, Shane was just about to clock out for his lunch break when Morris asked him to help Sam unload the delivery trucks that had just arrived with a new shipment of powdered butter, gluten pucks and Carbo Cones. This meant he had to endure almost an hour’s worth of listening to Sam go on and on about how awesome some indie band in Grampleton was - which on some days, was fine. Just not today, for Yoba’s sake. Instead of putting up a fuss however (Morris wouldn’t care anyway), Shane simply gritted his teeth and headed out to the back of JojaMart.

It wasn’t till 2pm that Shane finally managed to clock out for his break. He flopped down onto a seat at a small round metal table in the employee’s break room and stared at the silently humming vending machine in the corner of the room. The vending machine sold only JojaMart products, all of them disgusting and overly sweet - Shane had tried each one. At first, he wondered to himself ‘Wasn’t that vending machine blue before?” before it dawned on him for the second time that day that he hadn’t been able to see colours all day. As crazy as it sounded, he’d just been so distracted with work that he hadn’t had time to notice.

Shane leaned back in his seat and crossed his arms, biting his lower lip in concentration. How had this happened? Had something happened to him in the mines? Maybe he should pay Doctor Harvey a visit after work, he would know what to do.

“Knock knock!,” a familiar voice suddenly came from the direction of the door. Shane, who had been staring blankly at a spot on the table, looked up to see who had managed to sneak into the break room in surprise but flinched almost immediately, bringing a hand up to shield his eyes from the sudden burst of colour amongst the gray. Once his eyes had adjusted, Shane saw that the voice belonged to the new farmer that had recently moved into the farm out of the town. They were now standing by the door, their hands clasped behind their back.

He must’ve been staring at the farmer for just a moment too long because they’d then asked “Shane? Are you okay? with an eyebrow raised questioningly. Shane cleared his throat and stood up from his chair, moving to stand in front of the vending machine. It was hard to tell what he was looking at when all the cans were the same gray colour, but he pretended to be deciding which drink he was going to buy to buy himself some time. His heart was beating so fast in his chest, Shane began to wonder if he was about to pass out.

Why’s the farmer the only one who’s in colour? Why of all people has it got to be them?!

Just as he thought of something smart to say, Shane heard the sound of the break room door opening again. He spun around to find the farmer already halfway out the door. However, the farmer noticed at the last moment that Shane had finally turned around and was now looking at them. They hesitated for a moment before saying with a shy smile tracing their lips “I’ve gotta go now but...I’ll be stopping by the Stardrop Saloon tomorrow night, I hope I’ll see you there there?”

“I-I’ll see you there!,” Shane blurted out, feeling his cheeks begin to heat up. The farmer flashed him a warm smile before shutting the door behind them. Shane fell back into his seat and buried his face in his hands, mentally screaming at himself for two main reasons. One, he had sounded way too excited at the prospect of seeing the farmer again. Two, had the farmer just subtly invited him on a date? And did he just...agree to it? What was going on today?!

Not once did he stop to wonder why the farmer hadn’t turned gray like everything else, himself included.

Shane managed to breeze through the second half of his shift at JojaMart without any further mishaps, and had made it all the way back home with his head high up in the clouds. He popped a frozen pizza he’d stolen from JojaMart’s freezers into the oven and entered his bedroom, kicking his shoes off at the door.

He was just wondering if people still brought their date flowers in these modern days when he noticed a small slip of paper that was being held in place beneath a small stone that was smooth to the touch. Written on the paper in a barely legible script were the words ‘Lost your ability to see colour, huh? If you want it back, meet me at the mines tonight at 11pm’.

Shane looked around his room and decided to check the windows. They were locked. Whoever had delivered this note must’ve come in from the front door but Marnie who had been home all day would have said something to him if someone had come looking for him. She hadn’t though, so they must have snuck in without her seeing. Now he knew how they got in, there was still one question left unanswered:

Who sent me this note?

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Author Notes:

Part 2 will be up sometime later this week so stay tuned for that.

If you'd like my work and would like to support me, please consider donating to my Ko-fi @ https://ko-fi.com/stellawella97 where I am offering custom fanfic commissions for a cup of coffee! It'd really help me out. Thank you <3

[avis-writeshq]

Yamaguchi Tadashi x Reader: I’m Tired

Requested: No

Pairing: (3rd Year)Yamaguchi Tadashi x Fem!Reader

Summary: ‘I'm tired of being the “strong one” and the “friendly one” and the “happy one”.’ – c l a r i s s a //

Warnings: Angst, name calling/bullying, might be a trigger warning, fluff and trash writing

Other: Established relationship between Yamaguchi and Reader J istg yama’s character is all over the place I’m sorry ;-; have a comfort fic because my blog might be shadow banned who knows

Word count: 1.8k                                                                                            

 Things you probably wanna know, for all you ‘x reader’ illiterates:

(Y/N): Your Name

(H/C): Hair Colour / Color

(E/C): Eye Colour / Color

(N/N): Nickname

“(Y/N)-chan, do you mind doing the after school chores for me?” Etsudo asked sweetly, smiling at you with her big green eyes.

 You bit your lip as you thought about your answer. ‘Don’t, you have that assignment to do, remember? And what about picking up the groceries for tonight’s dinner? You even promised Yamaguchi that you’d walk home with him. Oh yeah, and how about when you promised Aneko that you’d help her out with that assignment she’s behind with? Say no, (Y/N), say no, say-’

 “Sure, no problem!” You plastered a fake smile onto your face. “Uh, is there a particular reason you can’t do it today?”

 “I just wanted to do other things, ya know?” She smirked, “Thank you, (Y/N)-chan!”

 With that final remark, she skipped out of the classroom, her curly blonde hair bounding tauntingly as she did. You let out a small groan, wiping your face with your hand. It’s fine. You can clean up pretty quickly so it should be fine.

 It wasn’t fine. Etsudo apparently hid all of the cleaning supplies so cleaning up took double the time than it should have making you late to meeting up with your boyfriend as well as picking up the groceries for tonight’s dinner. You bolted out of the class room as quick as you could so that you could meet Tadashi at a somewhat reasonable time. Finally spotting him at the school gates, you let out a breath of relief to see that he hasn’t left without you.

 “(Y/N)! I was wondering where you were. Did something happen?” Concern was on his features as he looked you up and down.

 Calming your breathing, you faked a smile. “Yeah, everything is okay. I was just put on unexpected cleaning duty. It’ no big deal. Sorry you had to wait for me.”

 “Ah, don’t worry about it, (Y/N)! I didn’t wait long, it’s okay! But you usually finish cleaning duty fairly quickly…?”

 “Oh… I had to get some more cleaning products. We ran out,” You lied, “Anyway, let’s go! Do you mind if we stop by the grocery store real quick? I need to pick up some vegetables.”

 “Of course! Are you cooking dinner again tonight?”

 You shrugged, lacing your hand together with his. “My parents are still out of the country and I’m too broke for take-out. Sorry, we don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

 “No, no, it’s fine! I was just concerned,” He scratched the back of his neck sheepishly, “if you want, you can stay over for dinner?”

 “I don’t want to be a bother… besides, I have an assignment to work on. Not to mention the fact that I have to help Aneko with her project-”

 Yamaguchi let out a soft sigh, squeezing your hand gently. “Don’t forget about yourself as well, alright?”

 A small smile graced your stressed features. “Thank you, Tadashi. Damn, I won in the boyfriend lottery, didn’t I?”

 The boy’s cheeks flushed red in embarrassment. “W-Well, then you’re the perfect girlfriend!”

 Your smile faltered for a second but you laughed it off. “Agree to disagree.”

 “(Y/N)!”

 ***

You come to school the next morning with bags under your eyes after pulling an all-nighter. Aneko had called you for a good three hours after dinner and you helped her with her assignment with only a small five minute break. By the time the call was over, it was almost 10 o’clock at night and you still needed to work on an essay for a Japanese history class. By the time you went to bed, it was already past 4 in the morning.

 Dragging your feet into the classroom, you rubbed your eyes tiredly as you slumped in your chair, beginning to take the books out of your bag. That was when you noticed the monstrosity that was drawn on your desk.

 ‘SLUT’

 ‘WHORE’

 ‘TRY-HARD’  

 Drawn out and scribbled messily all over your desk in permanent marker, you couldn’t help but feel tears trickle in the corners of your eyes. Letting out a breath and blinking them away, you forced a smile onto your face. It was at that moment the teacher entered the classroom, her eyes zeroing in on your marker stained desk. Walking over to your desk, her eyes were full of pity as she asked if you were alright.

 “I’m okay,” you lied, the smile still on your face. “Is it alright if I get some cleaning supplies to clean it up after school?”

 She eyed you with concern and disbelief on her face. “We’ll find whoever did this, alright?” She turned her attention to the class who were all staring at you. “This is not only destruction of school property, but this is rude and disrespectful. If you know who did this, please come forward.”

 Silence echoed in your ears and you quickly shook your head. “It’s alright, Sensei, it’s not a big deal. I’ll just clean it up later.”

 “(L/N)-san, this is serious-”

 “It’s okay, no harm done,” you reassured, the class still staring at you, “As long as we can clean it up, right?”

 “Alright… if you’re sure. This is still unacceptable behaviour.”

 With that, she moved to the front of the class and began her lesson. Your smile faltered before falling into a frown as you opened up your textbook and notebook, trying your best to concentrate on your note taking and not on the vile words on your desk.

 You’re fine, right? There wasn’t any truth to their words… right? You weren’t any of those things. You just had to stay strong. If you ignore them, they’ll leave you alone, won’t they? That’s what everyone says, isn’t it? If you ignore it, it’ll go away… right?

 The day continued and even though you were both mentally and physically drained, the day seemed to go on as if nothing happened. Yamaguchi wasn’t aware of anything happening – after all, you didn’t want to bother him, especially because he was busy with his own things including being the captain of the volleyball club. He already had enough on his place as it is. He didn’t need to be bothered or pestered by a situation you could handle yourself.

 Lunch rolled around and that was when the second incident happened. You had just left the classroom and you were going to the bathroom to ‘freshen up’, mostly because of the desk problem. The words were big and bold in front of your face and you knew you had to get rid of the words as soon as possible.

 Pushing the bathroom door open, you were instantly met with Etsudo’s smirking face.

 “I see you got my little note?”

 “I don’t understand why you’re so smug about it,” you responded, “when they find out who did it you’re going to get your consequences.”

 She scoffed, “it’s not a big deal. You said it yourself, didn’t you? You’ll just clean it up later.”

 You grit your teeth at her words. “Why are you targeting me anyway? I didn’t do anything to you!”

 “I don’t like your attitude.”

 A harsh slap resounded around the bathroom walls, and you clutched your cheek in pain. “What- What the heck was that for?!”

 “You’ve been acting all high and mighty and for what? Because you’re dating the captain of the volleyball team?”

 “What are you talking about?” You demanded, tears prickling in your eyes from both physical and emotional pain. “You’re the one targeting me for no damn reason! I don’t care if you’re jealous or if you’re insecure about yourself! This isn’t how you should treat other people!”

 “I’m not the one who pretends to be nice all the time. You’re two-faced, and a liar. If anything, you’re the bad guy.” Her smirk only grew as she watched your expression turn slack.

 “I put effort into being nice. Unlike you, I don’t want any unneeded drama,” you snapped.

 Etsudo rolled her eyes. “You really are naïve, aren’t you, (Y/N)-chan? Can’t you see? You’re a nobody trying to be a somebody. Just step aside and stop causing problems.”

 With another cold hearted glare, she pushed past you and out of the restroom, leaving you to your own devices and to your own feelings. You were frozen as her words and accusations washed over you and a new wave of tears threatened to spill from the corners of your eyes. This wasn’t fair… you weren’t any of those things! You weren’t looking for attention and you weren’t two-faced. You don’t even realise that your tears were already flowing down your cheeks until you felt them in your mouth. Furiously wiping them away, you locked yourself into a stall.

 ***

You skip the following class after lunch and returned to the lesson with an icepack on the cheek where Etsudo had slapped you. The teacher didn’t seem to care when you walked into the classroom and continued on with his lesson, droning on about the importance of the Muromachi Period in Japan.

 School ended with you staying over time to clear your desk. Reading the messages on the desk just made tears build up even more – all the emotions you were hiding and bottling inside of you were ready to burst.

 ‘SLUT’

 ‘WHORE’

 ‘TRY-HARD’

 Even though the words were blurred because of your constant scrubbing, they were burned into all corners of your mind. You sniffed, rubbing at your eyes with the back of your hand as the tears continued to spill.

 “Stop crying,” you muttered to yourself, “stop-”

 “(Y/N)? What’s wrong? Why are you crying?”

 The cloth in your hand fell to the table as you spun around, only to see a very concerned Yamaguchi Tadashi at your classroom door.

 “Dashi, I- I’m sorry, I didn’t…”

 “Hey, it’s okay, come here,” He said gently, opening his arms wide. “What’s wrong, baby?”

 As soon as he asked that question, you turned into a blubbering mess, tears running freely down your cheek and onto his shirt as you buried your face into his chest.

 “I- I’m so tired, Dashi…” You whimpered, “I’m tired of pretending I’m okay… I’m not-” you hiccupped, swallowing the lump in your throat, “I’m not the perfect girlfriend and – and – you deserve better!”

 “That’s not true,” He frowned at your words, “(Y/N), you’re the best girlfriend I could ever ask for! You’re kind, smart, selfless…”

 “Stop lying,” you whispered, “don’t lie to me, Tadashi…”

 “I’m not lying, my love, I would never, you know that,” His hands traced circles on your back. “We’ll talk to the teachers tomorrow, alright? Do you want to go home?”

 “I have to clean up that mess.”

 “I’ll help you then. The sooner we finish the sooner we can go home and cuddle.” He grinned at your, pressing a kiss to your forehead. “I’m in love with you, okay? Never forget that.”

This literally hurt to write aha if there’s something that I’m good at, it’s conveying feelings into writing hehe

 As usual, here’s the tag list and the copyright disclaimer!

 Copyright Disclaimer:

All characters except for the reader and my OC’s (listed below) are the work of Haruichi Furudate (古館春一). This is not part of the canon work by any means. I do not claim ownership over the characters or the Haikyuu storyline and plot. Without Furudate Sensei’s work, myself as well as many other writers are unable to create these stories.

 My OC’s:

Fukuhara Aneko (福原あねこ)

Emiko Etsudo (えつどうえみこ)

[the-creative-lounge-blog]

Third Shift Kakashi - A Lounge Round Robin Story

In this modern AU in-server event for November, Loungers tell the tale of Kakashi's night shift at a convenience store/gas station one sentence at a time.

What is a round robin story? A round robin story is a story that is written by multiple people. Participants take turns contributing a sentence. The last sentence is sent to the next person, who adds their sentence, and then the process repeats through an established amount of time (our event lasted one week).

Participants in Third Shift Kakashi were contacted via DM with the last sentence, and they replied with one new sentence.

Often, round robin stories don’t make sense and they’re meant to make us laugh. To ensure this, a ridiculous topic was chosen from among the MANY fantastic plot bunnies that are Kakashi Lounge-originals:

Third shift Kakashi: Our favorite tired ninja dork punches in at 10pm to begin his third shift at the 7-11 (or Speedway, Circle K, Kwik Trip, or your country's equivalent of a 24-hour gas station/convenience store). Strange things happen during his nightshift but participants decide what those things are. The Slurpee machine gains sentience. Ōtsutsuki aliens land in the parking lot. Cheeto-fingers Obito tries to steal jerky. Deidara tries to use a fake ID to buy beer. Granny Chiyo comes in and pays with pennies. Any and all of these are believable occurrences from 10pm-6am, and more. The weirder, the better.

The only rules were to keep it rated T, and no romantic pairings.

This dumpster fire masterpiece of a round robin story was written by: @maiikawriter, @fleuraison7, Kitera_Matar, /vastments, @mouseymightymarvellous, @thetoxicstrawberry, @myaekingheart, @mallml, @nibbler747, @syusukewrites, @asiriyep, @azuzel23, @tenzosnewleaf, and @hkandiu (all contributed sentences are in italics and each are double-spaced) with opening and closing paragraphs written by @ohayohimawari:

Kakashi sighed as he punched in twelve minutes late to his shift. He’d been late enough times to warrant a written warning from management, but that threat was nothing compared to what he experienced during his overnight shifts at Konoha’s 24/7 convenience store. He pulled his book out of his back pocket with more hope than expectation that he’d actually find time to read amidst the strange things that occurred between 10 pm and 6 am. 

Yukiko and her lover were just getting around to second base and ready to confess their love in this chapter when he’d had to leave for work.

Kakashi pocketed the worn Icha Icha volume reluctantly, hoping for a quiet shift so that he could dive into it again later, and took his prepared bag to head out to his workplace.

Kakashi walked through the store, prepared bag in hand, Icha Icha in his pocket, and sighed as he saw the repeat customer hovering by the front counter.

“No, Naruto, we still haven’t received the limited edition Gutsy Shinobi ramen cups; I told you I’ll call you if we get them.”

Kakashi never heard Naruto’s reply, because his voice was suddenly drowned out by the deep growl of engines pulling into the station, and any hope he had for an uneventful shift was dashed just as quickly as Naruto’s chance of indulging in the delicious goodness of Gutsy Shinobi ramen with the arrival of the Akatsuki Biker Gang.

The group of delinquents strolled into the store as if they owned the place, all sporting matching black leather jackets with red cloud patches on the shoulders and back--an omen that things were about to go south very quickly.

Without seeming to lift his eyes from his book, Kakashi sighed to himself as he watched them clumsily stuff candy bars and Slim Jims under their jackets... were the Akatsuki having an initiation night?

Should he bother confronting them?  The long expired Slim Jims they were about to partake in might be punishment enough.

Kakashi put on his best fake customer service smile and didn't say anything - whatever they were stealing, he wasn't paid enough to care.

He sighed. ‘Sir, if you lick the candy bars one more time it’s a week ban. Not so funny when you can’t get those stale nachos, huh?’

Just to prove his point, and maybe because he was feeling a bit exasperated by now, Kakashi carefully unwrapped a candy bar of his own and inhaled the whole thing in two seconds beneath his mask - leaving the visitor stunned, staring wide-eyed with new appreciation at the silver-haired man’s obvious authority on the subject of candy-bar licking.

"Ew," Naruto reminded Kakashi of his presence at the same time that Deidara tried to sneak a six-pack of Budweiser beneath his shirt, so he changed tack to deal with the Akatsuki Biker Gang because he wanted to keep his loyal customers.

Although, 'loyal customers' was a bit of a stretch at times; yes, they frequented the place often, but more often than not they also gave him quite the headache.

He was too tired for this shit at this hour of the day. 

Kakashi did what he was best at - feigning boredom and being unaffected by what was happening in the hope that the problem solved itself.

Kakashi pulled out his beloved Icha Icha and proceeded to hide behind the vivid orange cover as he ignored the problem happening in front of him.

The Akatsuki biker gang couldn’t be so easily ignored, as Hidan proved when he snatched the orange book from Kakashi’s hand.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Kakashi said pleasantly, his best customer service smile sharp as blades under his mask, “but that’s not for sale.”

Hidan squinted and flipped the book sideways in a gesture that made Kakashi think he had never held a book before, let alone read one, and Kakashi’s eyes flicked to the closed-circuit camera in the corner as he contemplated forgoing his service training in order to retrieve it, but stopped when he noticed the suspicious red smudges that the man’s fingertips left behind on the cover of his cherished Icha Icha.

It was too bright to be anything ominous - in fact, it matched the same shade as the cherry-flavored Slurpee they offered - but Kakashi wasn’t about to let Hidan slide on stealing a mouthful of frozen delight, or marring his favorite book, so he growled, “You owe me two dollars for the drink and a new copy of Icha-Icha.”

"Two dollars!--look, I'd pay ya, but my partner's a real Stooge [sic] with the purse strings... how 'bout I make it up to you in the stock room instead, if you know what I mean?" the gray-haired religious fetishist suggested with a waggle of eyebrows.

Kakashi considered the offer as it would lessen his shift duties and afford more time to read, however, just then his, Naruto’s, and every head belonging to the Akatsuki biker gang turned to the main entrance when the cheerful ding sounded announcing the arrival of another repeat customer, Granny Chiyo, with her fists full of scratch-off lottery tickets.

Granny Chiyo, was a legend not just for being the bad-ass take no names grandmother of one of the more dangerous Akatsuki gang members, but also for being thrifty.  She slammed the scratch off lottery tickets on the counter, and reached into her jacket and pulled out Kakashi's most dreaded item - the jar of pennies.

She placed the jar on the counter with a loud clunk before reaching inside and pulling out pennies one by one, counting them on the counter under her breath. "This will only take a moment" she assured him, "I want to be precise!"

Kakashi took in the mayhem around him with a glazed 100-meter stare.  There'd been worse nights, right? No machetes yet, right? All he needed was to make it to break time and have a smoke. 10 minutes.. Kakashi inhaled deeply and cleared his throat 'Take ALL the time you need Ma'am.'  He shouldn't get involved right? He needed to man the till, right?

Kakashi smiled at Chiyo who was determined to pay for her weird collection of knickknacks with a gajillion pennies, but couldn't help glancing at the security camera that showed an energetic teenager mid-dance battle with the local biker gang; the only thing more bizarre would be Gai showing up to join them and to be honest he wouldn't be surprised.

The universe was not about to pass over an opportunity like that; if Kakashi had learned anything in his long years, it was that the best way to handle the sudden burst of GREEN and NOISE that assaulted his senses (out of seemingly nowhere) was to remain calm and tip a casual “Yo” to his rival while keeping an eye on Chiyo, the teenager, the biker gang, and the dance battle all at once... Gai would probably join the dance battle in a few minutes anyway.

Because, hello my dear, he wasn't going to leave his dignity in pieces. Better dead than ridiculous ... Although maybe ...?

He ran a hand through his already unruly hair as he rolled his shoulders, getting ready for whatever lay ahead; a quick glance at the clock confirmed his shift still had a long ways to go.

There was no time to relax when the biker gang was already making a move on some products, thinking he wouldn’t notice.

Kakashi decided that losing his job over a bunch of tough dudes acting like broke teenagers wasn't worth it, so he strode over to them first; maybe Gai would help him if they got violent - not that Kakashi would need help with that though.

And that was when it all exploded as Gai joined the dance battle causing them to knock over a display onto the Akatsuki teenage biker gang who exploded in rage causing both the aged Chiyo and Naruto to get knocked to the ground.

Kakashi in panic rushed to Naruto almost running over the old Chiyo and got out his flute then started to bang in on poor knocked-out Naruto's head, the Akatsuki teenage biker gang all nodded as they understood that it was an extremely necessary step of Cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

Gai—either unconcerned, not noticing the damage, or convinced that anything can be solved with the power of dance—dropped to the ground in an impressive worm, once more pulling the attention of the Akatsuki members.

Instigated by the impromptu dance party, the eccentric masked Akatsuki member jumped up onto a tower of canned diet Coke and started beat boxing, and Kakashi could only watch in horror as Gai’s worm morphed into break dancing.

Kakashi sighed and rubbed his tired eyes from behind the counter as he watched Gai break dance down the snack aisle to the rhythm of the masked man's beatboxing, onlookers pumping their fists and cheering as another Akatsuki gang member started to rap about how "art is an explosion."

'What the hell,' was the thought that echoed through Kakashi's aching head with increasing volume; what the hell indeed?--and as he ripped off his red vest  and leapt to the top of the counter, the crowd, one by one, turned toward him and fell silent: the cheering onlookers, the masked beat-boxer, the pony-tailed blond... until, at last, the only sound and movement was the frenzied tricking of Gai as the spandex-clad man danced on, unaware.

As he crouched on the counter he wasn’t sure if he wanted to go through with this - but desperate times called for desperate measures.  He grabbed a Slim Jim and held it up as a mic.  There was only one song that would shut them up.

Kakashi started the song softly, but got louder with each word, one hand leading the dance as he ever so slightly got closer to the crowd and then- 3am really was the witching hour, huh? - the crowd joined his dance and with each Ey macarena they were inching a little closer towards the exit in perfect synchrony.

Just then, Naruto regained consciousness and after blinking several times at the chaotic crowd, exclaimed, “What happened to the old lady that was here?”

Kakashi dropped the Slim Jim mic at these words, and glanced where Chiyo had once stood only to find a list of her purchases and her payment-the jar of pennies-waiting to be counted. He ran a hand down his face, noticed the mess below the dripping slurpee machine, spied Deidara passed out in a corner with empty beer cans around him, Kisame and Itachi not-so-secretly pocketing sunglasses, while Hidan sang and Gai danced on with abandon.

Irritably grabbing the mop for what would not be the last time that night, Kakashi unceremoniously stepped over Naruto.

Kakashi briefly considered whether or not this job was really worth the $7.25 per hour it paid him, before surreptitiously mopping himself within a meter of Itachi and Kisame, who he surprised with a heavy “Thwack!” of the mop handle across the backs of both their legs, causing them each to drop a pair of sunglasses and clap their hands across their backsides to smooth the stinging sensation.

He laughed devilishly, enjoying the momentary respite  from the craziness of the shift and the antics of his so-called customers; was anyone actually buying anything tonight?

No matter, they didn’t need to, as long as they would get out.

But they just wouldn't get out, so Kakashi had to take more drastic measures - the fire alarm would get him into trouble with his employer, faking a power failure seemed like a safe option though, so he went over to the power box, turned off the main switch and listened with a deep satisfaction to the surprised screams and commotions in the shop.

“Lights are out,” Kakashi stated obviously, walking carefully back towards the register, “so if everybody could put any unpurchased items down and carefully head towards the still illuminated exit signs, that would be greatly appreciated.”

There was a moment of silence, followed by murmuring, and then the faint crumpling sound of what was either plastic encased items being set aside, or even more likely, being concealed in pockets.

While Kakashi knew that letting customers get away with stealing would come back to haunt him if and when his boss found out, at this rate he quite frankly couldn't even care--and besides, with all the lights off, he doubted the security cameras would pick up anything anyway.

As the subdued miscreants groped blindly to the door, illuminated only by the impassive green of the EXIT sign, Kakashi breathed a sigh of relief that his shift was finally winding down--that is, until the resounding BOOM that echoed from the front parking lot.

The screech of tires, the thundering bass, it was a sound he was only too familiar with -  it could only be one man.

Finally, finally the whole bunch was gone, only to be replaced by the loudest most obnoxious person he could think of, but Killer B was a regular and as such Kakashi had to endure his bad rapping.

Kakashi threw his head back and softly yeeted with fingers pointed skywards "Pew, pew pew! Fxxx my life!"

As the giant strode inside, clapped his hands on the countertop at the register and whooped “Yo! Bakayaro! Konoyaro! Kakashi, better watch me, can’t copy me, yeeeahhh!” the shopkeep wondered where this cheerful monster had been earlier, when so many folks were acting the fool (no doubt Killer Bee would have assisted him in wiping the floor with two or five of the previous visitors); “Bee, my man, you have no idea the kind of night I’ve been having...”

Unfortunately for Kakashi, Bee had become distracted by a motion sensor dancing sunflower, and took its song as a challenge for a mini rap battle.

"Yo, this flower's got moves! Look at it swaying while I spit some rad tunes!" Bee enthused and all Kakashi could manage in reply was a tired "You should've seen the dance battle earlier."

Lifting up his sunglasses to peer more closely at Kakashi's face--how was he able to see with those on in the middle of the night? the silveret wondered--B  yelled concernedly, "Yo man, feeling tired? Uninspired? Say no more! Let's hit the door!" and, heedless of Kakashi's terrified recoil, scooped the smaller man up under his arm and boogied them to his ride, parked across three spaces in the parking lot.

“What is the meaning of this?” The assistant shift supervisor, Danzo, showed up at the door, with Konoha’s 24/7 general manager, Hiruzen, right behind him. 

“Um—” Kakashi began, and ended because there was no explaining it. 

“You’re fi—” 

“I quit!” Kakashi shouted, silencing Danzo. 

Bee brandished a peace sign while Kakashi offered a much ruder gesture and the pair took off in search of an after party, or a nap. 

Just then, Naruto-whom everyone forgot about-stepped out from behind an endcap of ramen cups. “Does this mean you’re hiring?” 

Hiruzen smiled, “I’ll get you an application.”

The End

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[nosleepuntilvacation]

Hi! I've got another Mettaton×reader request for you, if you don't mind. The setting is that Mettaton gets badly damaged, and of course his crush is worried sick. They insist on helping Alphys with the repairs, even if it's small things like handing her the right tool or something. The repairs take a week or two, and the crush just camps over at Alphys' lab the whole time. But anyway! The scenario I want you to actually write is when Mettaton is finally rebooted and wakes up. (cont.)

(cont.) So when Mettaton comes to, his crush is sitting next to whatever table/bed/thing he’s laying on. They go “Thank god!” and probably tear up a bit, smiling like a fool. Mettaton is like, touched that they’ve waited for him like that. When he asks about it, the crush gets all flustered. Mettaton ofc teases them, and as the conversation/banter goes on they accidentally mention at some point that they helped Alphys with the repairs… Que more flustering and eventually (cont. IM SORRY)

(cont.) eventually they end up telling him how much he means to them. In their nervousness, they get a bit rambly and end up confessing their romantic feelings to him. Then they hang their head and don’t look up again until Mettaton tells that he feels the same. Then they’re both awkward and happy and they smooch and stuff. // Sorry if this long, 3-ask explanation is unclear and sorry this is so dramatic. Thank you for considering this.             

…this has been sitting in my inbox for over a year hasn’t it

dishonor on me, dishonor on my miltank, etc. etc. etc.

But I guess it’s better late than never…?

Below the cut: A Storm Leads to a Rainbow

(TW: Discussions and descriptions of a car accident, and the emotional and physical injuries resulting from it; brief mention of alcohol)

Two synthetic eyes open, and their owner groans, clutching his forehead. “Ugh… what happened?”

He looks in his immediate line of sight. The space-printed sheets on the bed he currently occupies, the posters displaying different franchises he likes (his own included), the star-shaped stickers on the ceiling… yep, this is definitely his guest room in Alphys’ place.

“But why–?” He reaches down and touches his hip. Just as he suspected, his charging cable is plugged securely into there. He barely has enough time to register this before he hears a familiar voice.

“Mettaton? Thank god!”

He sits up and looks over towards the source of the voice…

…and he promptly sees you sitting in one of his pink beanbag chairs, smiling like a weight had just been lifted away. And was he seeing things, or were those tears in your eyes?

“[Y/N]? I wasn’t expecting to see you here, sweetheart.” He smirks a bit. “Have you appointed yourself the president of my fan club? I’ll have you know that you’re competing with me for that position.”

“Heh…” To you, the sound of his voice is exactly what you need right now. You pull out your phone and open your text message program. “Just gonna let Alphys know you’re awake. She’s off jogging with Papyrus.”

After a few chuckles at his own joke, his smile soon becomes more genuine. “Thank you for thinking of me, though.”

“Of course.” You put your phone away after sending a message, and your smile becomes a little more sad as you try to ward off the rock forming in your throat. “When I heard about what had happened to you, I was so worried, and I couldn’t just…” You take a few deep breaths to keep the dam from bursting.

At this point, he can’t help but frown. “If you don’t mind me asking… what did happen to me, anyway? The last thing I remember was Bryan and I driving home, and before I knew it, our car tipped sideways. My whole body was in pain, I heard Bryan calling Alphys… and then I blacked out.” His hand clenches the mattress. “Is Bryan okay, by the way?”

“Yes. He had to visit the ER, but he wasn’t hurt too badly, and they let him go home after a few days. Anyway…”

After swallowing your nerves, you begin to explain the full story.

A little over a week ago, you had been visiting Alphys and Undyne and watching a movie with them. At one point in the movie, Alphys received a panicked phone call from Bryan, an orange mammal monster who seemed to be Mettaton’s frenemy of sorts. The two had been driving together to their respective homes after a production at the local theater when a drunk driver veered into their lane and crashed into Bryan’s car. When Alphys headed out to help, the scene indeed looked grisly, with roadside assistance having to help put the car upright again - and it was clear that at least half of the car would need repairs. Paramedics were helping Bryan into an ambulance…

“…and when she brought you back, I almost couldn’t look.” You shudder. “You looked like something chewed you up and spit you back out again!”

With a sneer, Mettaton folds his arms. “Oh, come on. I don’t taste that bad! Ask anyone who’s ever had one of my world-famous face steaks!” He taps his chin in thought. “Although, maybe I shouldn’t have made them so expensive at first…”

You chuckle nervously; at the time, you definitely wouldn’t have laughed if someone had made that joke, but now that Mettaton’s awake, the whole thing feels a little easier to put in the past.

“Honestly, though…” His expression softens into concern. “…my body looked that bad when Alphys brought me in?” He holds his hands in front of his face and wiggles his fingers, before peeking under the blankets and presumably checking his feet in a similar way. Next, he grabs a handheld mirror from the nightstand and studies his face, brushing his hair out of one of his eyes.

“Yeah…” You wipe away a few tears forming near your eyes. “If Alphys and I hadn’t fixed you up right away…” A shudder takes over your spine; you’re still not entirely sure how all the intricacies of his body work, and this was one situation where experimenting was not an option.

For a moment, Mettaton is silent…

…only to give you an odd look.

“Wait a minute… you helped Alphys with the repairs?”

“Uh–! Well!” Oh god, does he already know what you think of him? “She did most of the big work! I was just there to help hold you still, or to get her the right tools, or to keep an eye on you to make sure you were still stable while she was out getting more supplies and stuff. Undyne helped, too, when she wasn’t at work. Alphys and I took turns watching over you the first couple of nights, while you were still in somewhat critical condition…”

Mettaton blinks. “You even stayed over?”

“Y-yeah… I haven’t actually been home since I heard about the crash.”

By now, you can feel the floodgates open, tears rolling down your face as you explain yourself.

“I wanted to help Alphys as much as I could… I was so scared. You could have died if we hadn’t done enough in time, and if I hadn’t helped and you ended up dying… I don’t know if I could ever forgive myself if that happened. Especially because you’re my friend, and, well…”

Despite the more reasonable side of your mind not feeling ready to say it, your emotions are in full force right now, and you just blurt it out before you can stop yourself.

“I don’t know when it started, but I really wanted to tell you I love you.”

And with that, you lower your head and finally allow yourself to let out some quiet sobs as the many emotions of the past several days swamp over you: relief from knowing that Mettaton is most likely okay now, fear and sadness from the fact that he probably wouldn’t have made it if Alphys hadn’t gotten there in time, and that hard-to-describe sensation of knowing that, in the heat of the moment, you just confessed your romantic feelings towards your longtime crush. Your body and mind are just frozen like a slow computer as you try to quell this maelstrom of emotions.

It gets to the point where you can barely register it as Mettaton whispers your name and gently takes hold of your hand.

“Shh… everything’s going to be okay, darling. It was horrifying, and I was scared, too… but I feel so much better now.” A smooth thumb strokes the top of your hand as he continues. “In fact… as of late, I’ve realized that I’m in love with you, too.”

“R-really…?” You finally look up; despite your likely looking like an emotional wreck right now, Mettaton doesn’t seem to judge you for it, instead smiling.

“Absolutely, sweetheart. I’ve wanted to tell you for a little while; you’ve been such a wonderful friend to me. And knowing that you would go this far to help save my life… honestly, I’d do the same for you.”

A cheerful laugh escapes your throat; you’re not sure what to say, but you still manage a “Thank you…”

“And thank you, beautiful.”

For a few moments, neither of you are sure of what else to say amidst the glow of relief and new love, but eventually, Mettaton has a thought.

“Darling, when all of this has blown over a little more… would you, perhaps, like to go on a date with me? I can show you a few of my favorite places in town, and you can show me your favorites, if you’d like.”

“Sure.” There are still a few tears, but they come from a much happier place now. It’ll probably take a little while for everyone’s fears to disappear completely, but what’s important is that everyone is safe right now, and a potential tragedy has been averted.

Before you know it, you wrap your arms around Mettaton in a big hug, which he soon returns in kind before leaning in close to your face. He stops himself and looks into your eyes as if asking for permission, and when you smile and nod, he presses his lips to yours. It’s not the smoothest of kisses, but most first kisses typically aren’t.

Either way, you’re definitely not complaining.

You’re so lost in the kiss that you don’t hear the sound of the front door opening and closing in the other room, nor do you hear the sound of footsteps. Shortly afterwards, though, a small eep does get your attention.

The two of you break off the kiss and look towards the doorway, where Alphys is standing, still in her jogging outfit, with wide eyes.

“Oh! Uh… am I interrupting something?”

As you wave hello to Alphys, Mettaton gently smiles. “Alphys, darling, I’m so glad to see you. And don’t worry; I think everything’s going to be just fine.”

Alphys returns the smile. “Yeah… I’m so glad you’re awake. I’ll probably want to keep an eye on you for the next day or two, though. Just to make sure I didn’t miss anything.”

“That’s all right. As long as I have everyone cheering for me, I can absolutely manage this!”

You gently squeeze his hand, and he smiles at you.

After a second or two, Alphys pulls out her phone. “So, uh, want to order some pizza or something? I can shower while we wait for it to get here.”

Mettaton rests a hand on his soul casing. “Darling, I haven’t eaten in days, so that sounds absolutely perfect right now.”

“That sounds good to me too,” you say with a nod.

“Great! Let me open the app…”

As you all begin to figure out what you want, you can already picture the delicious taste of the food in your mind. Not only that, you can also picture some of the exciting, lovely things in your and Mettaton’s future… a future that you helped to secure for him.

Sometimes, even a harsh rainstorm can leave behind a beautiful rainbow.

[queerebrum]

Your Problem Now

y’know this was supposed to be 1k words. That is my goal for ficlets. And yet, here we are!! Enjoy your 1.7k of Sterrish (Stiles x Derek x Parrish) relationship reflection and sickfic fluff, @wolfflock​ & the rest of you that encouraged this.

--

Jordan had just finished putting on his belt when his phone rang on the nightstand. He glanced first at the alarm clock for the time and then back to the phone. Whoever was calling him, it wasn’t Derek, who was usually awake but not yet willing to socialize at this time of day, and it certainly wasn’t Stiles, who was unbearable if woken before 8am.

He reached for the phone and stared at the caller ID with a raised eyebrow. Answering it with a hard swallow he said, “Good morning, Sheriff.”

Calls from the Sheriff were always awkward. Calls from the Sheriff before 7am were downright terrifying. “Jordan, you’re off today,” Noah said, leaving no room for argument.

Jordan blinked a few times. “Okay. Did I do something wrong?” he asked, carefully reviewing memories of the last few days of his shift.

“No. Stiles is sick and I’ve decided that if you’re going to date my eighteen year old son the least you can do is be the one to deal with him when he’s sick.” There was a brief pause. “Or, y’know, the two to deal with him. I’ll let you call Derek. I’m surprised he’s not already at my door, supernatural senses and all.”

Jordan nodded, still frozen in the middle of his bedroom with the phone pressed to his ear. He decided against pointing out to Noah that he too was technically supernatural, and that Derek’s senses weren’t that enhanced. Instead of arguing anything – arguing with either Stilinski was an exhausting and often pointless process – he just said, “I’ll be over as soon as I can.”

“I’m taking one of your sick days for this.” Noah said, his tone lighter.

Jordan laughed at that. “Sure thing, Sheriff.”

--

‘Stiles is sick I guess? Sheriff says it’s our job to take care of him. See you there?’

Derek yawned and reread the text from Jordan. He grabbed for his half-full cup of coffee and took another long pull, letting the warm, bitter taste settle against his tongue as he mulled over the words.

He had many questions about the content of the text, but the number of question marks seemed to indicate that Jordan too was unsure of exactly what was going on. Derek briefly ran through what he’d planned to get done today.

Which really was nothing he couldn’t put off, because he spent his days as an independently-wealthy 20-something reading books and staring at a blank laptop screen trying to write literally anything that someone might want to read. Sometimes he sat through werewolf council conference calls, which was his duty as the pack Second. Those weren’t really all that more exciting than staring at a blank computer screen, though.

‘Should I bring anything?’ He sent back.

Jordan’s response was: ‘I’m already at Target. What do you know about human illness anyway? :P’ Derek glared at the phone, but Jordan was right. He sat back in his chair, finishing the cup of coffee and climbing to his feet to grab another one from the pot.

Being a werewolf, he knew the coffee was probably just a placebo effect at this point. Both Stiles and Jordan were well aware that waiting until after Derek had his second cup of coffee to interact was the suggested course of action most mornings. It was probably a good thing they didn’t all live together. (Yet.)

Jordan was an early riser, Stiles needed to sleep in, and Derek was a bear (or...a wolf) until he’d had two cups of liquid happiness. It made Derek wonder what their future would look like. Finishing his second cup, he headed to his bedroom with a smile on his face.

It didn’t really matter what his future looked like, as long as he had Jordan and Stiles.

--

Jordan expected Derek to have beaten him to the Stilinski house, with his overprotective werewolf instincts, but he was surprised to find the driveway empty aside from the old blue Jeep. He pulled up behind it and got out, carrying the bag of odds and ends he’d picked up from Target on the way.

The Sheriff hadn’t said what kind of sick Stiles was, so Jordan had no choice but to pick up a variety of things: cough drops, dayquil, pepto bismol, a box of tissues, several cans of chicken noodle soup and three of the big gatorade bottles. Once, Jordan had purchased a movie, and the look of abject horror on Stiles’s face when he realized Jordan had spent actual money on something like that had dissuaded him from making such mistakes again.

(“Where are we supposed to get movies then?” “The internet, Jord.”)

He carried his bag of supplies - double bagged with the weight of the gatorade and cans of soup - up to the front door and tried the handle. He was surprised to find it unlocked but well, he had told Noah he’d be there as soon as he could. That, and, even sick, he knew better than to underestimate Stiles. He may be human, but that didn’t make him helpless.

“Stiles?” Jordan called, realizing as he entered that he actually had no idea how Noah knew Stiles was sick. It was only just now coming up on 8am, which meant that given normal circumstances, Stiles would still be asleep.

The loud sound of a nose being blown upstairs gave Jordan his answer. Whatever kind of sick Stiles was had probably woken him up. “Ub here.” Stiles called, miserably.

Jordan tried not to laugh as he kicked off his shoes and headed up the stairs, pushing open Stiles’s bedroom door. “A little birdy told me you weren’t feeling well.” He said, dropping onto the corner of the bed. “And...forced me into using a sick day?”

Stiles looked awful. He was even paler than usual, moles looking especially dark against the sickly pallor of his skin. His nose was red and irritated, and he kept sniffling every few minutes. He coughed a few times before he spoke too, small, coughs that seemed to more relieve a tickle than actually dislodge something from his lungs. “My dad called you?”

Jordan took off his jacket and tossed it somewhere in the direction of Stiles’s computer chair before sitting down on the edge of the bed. “Your dad decided that you needed company, I guess.” Jordan couldn’t help the smile that came to his lips as Stiles, seemingly magnetized, fell forward to rest his head on Jordan’s shoulder. Jordan wrapped his arms around Stiles’s body, stroking one hand along his back. “Did he call Derek?” Stiles asked, somewhat muffled between the stuffy nose and his face pressed into Jordan’s shirt.

“No, he told me I could do that. Even made a joke about Derek already knowing you were sick because of werewolf instincts.” Jordan traced the knobs of Stiles’s spine, pressing a kiss to the side of his head. “He’ll be over soon. I think I texted him during his first cup of coffee.” That reminded him. “Did you wake up sick?”

Stiles nodded, halfheartedly, still not lifting his head. “I started coughing in the middle of the night. Woke dad ub.”

Stiles leaned away after he finished speaking, as if saying the word ‘cough’ had manifested the very action itself, tucking his face into the corner of his elbow and letting out a string of bark-like noises that Jordan was now sure didn’t seem productive in the slightest. Sometime in the middle of it, there were footsteps on the stairs, and Jordan glanced back over his shoulder to smile at Derek, whose face was pinched in concern.

“Oh hey–” “–Der, nice of you–” “–to join us.” Stiles managed between coughs, eventually flopping back onto the bed with one of his arms thrown over his eyes. “Fuck.”

Derek had similarly divested himself of his jacket, and he squeezed Jordan on the shoulder briefly as he made his way over to the other side of the bed. Jordan glanced up and smiled, Derek leaning in for a brief, comfortable kiss.

Sometimes, it still mystified Jordan that he was here. He watched Derek sit down on the opposite side of Stiles’s bed, lean over and rest his ear against Stiles’s chest. Jordan felt his smile widen, watching the careful way Derek rested his other arm along Stiles’s, twining their fingers together as he listened.

After a minute, he sat up. “Just wheezy. I think you’ll live.”

Jordan had to bite back a laugh at the malice in the glance Stiles gave Derek when he lifted his arm. “Okay you two.” Jordan nudged Derek’s shoulder with his own. “Be nice, he’s sick.”

“You’re no fun,” Derek teased, but his smile was bright.

Even Stiles’s face had shifted into a smile, and Jordan felt one of his hands – warmer than Stiles usually ran – slid into his own. “I’m glad you’re here.” Stiles said, his eyes heavy-lidded. “I’m gonna go back to sleep though, It’s still so fucking early.”

Jordan lifted Stiles’s hand to his own lips to press a kiss into it. “I brought medicine. You should take something and then you can nap.” He stood up, wandering to where he’d dropped the bag. He rifled through it to find the dayquil and the cough suppressant, tossing one of the Gatorade’s over his shoulder with the full confidence that his werewolf boyfriend would catch it.

He turned around to see Derek crack the gatorade and pass it off to Stiles, who drank from it while Jordan fought with the packaging on the medicine.

And fought.

And fought.

The damn blister packs were supposed to be childproof not hellhound proof.

Derek was snickering into Stiles’s shoulder, Stiles petting Derek’s hair and biting his lip to hold in his own chuckling. Jordan finally tossed the pack at Derek. “Here, you open it then.”

Derek, ever the show off, flicked out a claw and sliced into the packaging – and directly into the liquid capsule, watching orange-red liquid slide down his finger, sending Jordan into a laughing fit and Stiles into yet another coughing fit.

Several minutes later, Derek’s hands were clean, Stiles had been adequately medicated, and they were all snuggled down into Stiles’s bed for what Jordan suspected would be the first of several naps today. Stiles was on his side, his back pressed along the length of Derek’s chest. Jordan faced Stiles, one if his arms tucked over both of his boyfriends, and his forehead pressed against the sleepy humans.

“Love you.” Stiles murmured quietly. Derek whispered it against the back of Stiles’s neck and reached over to squeeze Jordan’s side. Jordan grinned, more thankful than he could have predicted for the day off.

“Love you both.”

[soudam-appreciation]

A Special Kind Of Lamp? (3)

TW:: this chapter contains depression and brief/vague mentions of s*icide. Stay safe loves!

. . .

Gundham knew he should get up. His mother had left hours ago for her job, and he felt hunger gnawing at his stomach. Heaving a sigh, he rolled his feet off the edge of his bed and let his body follow. He sat there for a moment, on the floor. The random assortment of objects that lay scattered across his room did not make his position any more comfortable. He contemplated sitting here all day doing nothing, or maybe cleaning up the mess that had been gathering for months, or perhaps even taking a shower (since gods know he could use one). Groaning, he decided against all of those things and stood, trudging out of his darkened cave without even putting on pants.

He glided down the stairs, kicking up a cloud of dust and animal fur with every sullen step. Like a ghost, he wandered through his household, barely registering the pristine condition of the place. Winding his way around the bright Victorian style living spaces, he reached his destination.

He rifled through the pantry, then the fridge, grabbing a single can of soda. Then, opening the freezer, he removed a bag of frozen tater tots and an entire tub of ice cream. Dropping them on the countertop quickly, and shaking the cold from his hands, he pushed the freezer shut with his sockless foot. Not bothering to get a plate, he pulled a spoon from a drawer somewhere and a towel from another and wrapped up the bag of frozen tots. Picking up his items, he began to leave. However, as he took a few steps, he caught a glimpse of a note on the countertop.

"Happy 21st birthday, love!" the note read. "I know you haven't felt right lately, but I thought maybe today you could go out around town! I've left some money for you, in case you want to go out and get anything!"

Gundham sighed. It was sweet of her, for certain, but he didn't know if it was alright to take her money. He certainly had enough of his own, for the time being. But then, on the other hand, was it now expected of him? Was he supposed to go out and about because his mother had both suggested and paid for it?

Lifting his frozen items, he tromped into the main living room and sat on their plush rose sofa. He opened the bag of tots, popping one into his mouth as he contemplated.

He must have spent around 20 minutes munching the solid, ice-cold chunks of potato before halfheartedly making up his mind. Standing, he briefly wondered if that meant his mind was, in fact, not made up, but he brushed that aside and wandered back to the kitchen. When the leftover frozen goods were replaced in the freezer, he scooped the money and note from the counter. Now that life down here was back to the norm, he retraced his earlier steps and returned to his room.

He switched on the light, wincing at how utterly disgusting everything looked when one could see it. The room was quickly returned to darkness.

Snatching a pair of jeans and a ratty band tee from his closet, he changed quickly and tugged on his boots. He didn't want to bother with a shower, he knew he'd lose all energy far too soon. Cold, stiff fingers ran through his greasy, tangled hair, and he considered a hairbrush. No, too much. He had to get outside, spend whatever money he had been given, and return. No need to look nice.

Shoving his arms into a dark jacket that smelled slightly of mildew and was probably a size or two too small, he trotted back down the grand staircase. He grabbed his (majorly unused) car keys from a dish by the door, checked to make certain his phone and the money were both stuffed into his pockets, and opened the door.

The light shining in his face almost made him shriek, but he caught himself and threw his arm before his eyes instead. A sudden and steady hiss pushed from his lungs, and it took far too long for him to snap out of his haze.

When he lowered his shield, he glanced at the too-bright world and rows of houses. He also caught the eye of a small group of children that had probably been playing in the street, before they noticed him. He took a moment longer to understand why he must seem so strange, and why the children were likely staring. To test his suspicion, he bared his teeth and hissed once more, this time at the kids. They scattered, screaming.

Of course, how were they to know he wasn't a vampire?

Already feeling far too strange after this interaction, he stepped fully outside. The warmth of the sun washed over him, and the soft scent of flowers drifted in the breeze. He took a long, deep breath, and closed the door behind him.

He hadn't driven in so long he wasn't sure he remembered how. After a few failed attempts at reversing, thankfully none of which ending in property damage, he finally got out of the garage. Gundham was on the road again.

For the first several minutes, Gundham's average car speed was around 10 mph. He wasn't sure he could keep the car in control if h went much faster, and he had forgotten his wallet and ID at home.

After he had been out and about for about half an hour, the sun was becoming more bearable and he could finally get nearer to the speed limit. He pulled into a parking lot at the local superstore, ending this extra-long car trip with the world's worst parking job. Whispering an apology to whoever may need to park near to him, he locked the vehicle and wove his way into the store.

Entering the building felt like an enormous undertaking. He had to get in, exhaust as much of the money as he could, and get out. Unfortunately, this also meant he had to force himself through aisle after aisle of bright lights and items he had no need for.

He spent twenty minutes simply looking for things to buy, eventually encountering the pet section. Looking only briefly, a deep unease and upset coiled in his chest. His hamsters were the only part of him that he had taken above excellent care of, and even then they had not lived past a few years. He hadn't managed to breed them at that time, and the absence of his always-present companions dampened his spirits considerably.

He pushed on, reminding himself that this was not about his Devas. This was about buying what he could and going home.

Scooping up some shampoo, he wormed through personal care and clothing aisles, ignoring nearly everything on the shelves. He made a beeline for the electronics aisle, certain he could pick something up for a fairly high amount. Unfortunately, he wasn't precisely sure where that was and got turned around quite quickly.

Somehow, he ended up in a deserted and dusty section of the store. The rows of shelves seemed nearly empty, despite being stocked full. The graphics on the packages were mostly faded as if they were quite old compared to the other items in the building. Glancing around for a hint of where he had found himself, a sign hanging above the aisles caught Gundham's eye. Upon it was printed, Old and Discontinued Stock.

Intrigued, he continued through the packed shelves, passing rows of what seemed to be ancient exercise equipment. Rows and rows of items advertising their 'as seen on TV' status in bold red (or rather, pink) spiked bubbles filled his line of sight, and remembering stupid infomercials from his slightly younger years almost made him smile out of sheer annoyance.

As he turned a corner, a slightly different item brought his attention. In large, curly letters, the banner across the front of the box crossed an image of a fairly nondescript lamp, sporting the words LoveLight™. He approached, sliding one box off of the shelf. Turning it around, he hoped to read what exactly it was supposed to do on the back of the box. Fortunately for him, that is exactly where such a description was found.

It seemed to claim something about... connecting soulmates? He wasn't sure how well it could work, but he thought he might as well buy it anyways. It was right about the amount he needed to max out the gift from his mother and return home. He didn't care much about what color the lampshade was, so he carried to the checkout the box he was already holding.

. . .

Tromping up the stairs, he dumped the bag of lamp onto his overcrowded desk. He groaned as a few stray papers slid to the floor. They gathered around the edge, adding to the steep piles of clothes and garbage that littered the area. 

He threw himself onto his bed, wrapping his favorite comforter around himself. Today had been longer than expected, and he was exhausted from his excursion, even if it was only an hour and a half. Pulling out his phone, he opened YouTube and began the first video in his feed. He didn't even try to focus as his eyes drifted shut, and sleep overtook him.

. . .

When he stirred, it was long past dark. He groaned, twisting his body sluggishly to be freed from his cocoon-like prison of the blanket. Propping himself up on his elbows, he tried to blink the sleep from his eyes. When this attempt was unsuccessful, Gundham rolled back over and tried to return to sleep. 

Unfortunately, his blankets were still too tight, and he was made painfully aware of two things. The first was how hot it was; the second was how badly he needed to pee. 

He squirmed yet more, struggling to free his arms. When he had at last accomplished this, he slowly peeled the comforter away layer by layer, until he was sitting fully clothed, shoes and all, on his bed. He tugged off his boots, exhaustion numbing his fingers, and slowly began to make his way to the bathroom. 

. . .

Sitting on the edge of his bed, he yawned and looked for something to do. The night was often when he was "productive", but tonight he still felt ready to collapse in on himself, like a dying star. What a worthless waste of space he was. 

Tonight was certainly not the first night he felt ready to give up. This was, in fact, a near-daily occurrence. However, he knew that his mother would be left alone and that he, too, was far too afraid of what lay beyond, so he instead searched for an occupation for his hands.

He settled upon the plastic bag that contained the boxed “soulmate lamp”. Lifting it, he noted that it felt a bit heavier than before, but attributed this to his cold and tired limbs. Once the box was freed from its thin plastic containment, he searched for an opening.

He examined it, locating the circular sticker that secured the cardboard. Picking at the edges with his overgrown nails, he managed to peel up the side (with great difficulty). The packaging from there was not too difficult to decipher, though it still caused mild annoyance.

Only when the lamp sat undisturbed atop his bedside table did he begin to feel the stirrings of excitement. Before, it had merely been a vessel for assuaging boredom and returning home as quickly as possible, but now it seemed to radiate a faint... hope.

He plugged it in, wincing as the bright light flicked on. Snatching the instructions from their perch beside the lamp, Gundham wrestled with the folded paper to find the directions to dimming the damned thing.

Said directions were fairly simple to find, so when he had saved his eyes from the caustic sheen, he began the calibration process.

The process was long and bothersome, it seemed. First was simple, imputing the kinds of personal information every internet-connected device needs. Each answer was written against the shade with the "specialized" pen, and submission was accompanied by a pleasant blip sound. Then came the long series of questions that needed answering, a process by which the lamp was to determine one's soulmate. This step took the greatest time of the setup, costing him nearly an hour total. If he had had anything else to do, he simply would have given up.

Finally, however, the setup was complete, and he was alerted to this by another small electronic noise. Gundham tossed aside the instructions, groaning audibly as a loading circlet began rotating against the shade. He replaced the pen in its slot at the lamp's base and leaned back against his plush comforter. The loading process took several minutes, as it ran through the extensive database of other questionnaires (or so he assumed, this was never stated in the instructions). It took quite a few minutes, long enough for him to begin to drift off to sleep.

He was awakened by yet another blip sound, this one likely stating that the final stage was complete! He bolted upright, watching the shade warily for any signs of writing.

And then, something appeared.

A hasty message scrawled in sloppy and nearly unintelligible print. It seemed rushed, letters running together on the mesh shade.

"Hi! I just got this thing and I'm super excited to talk to you!!!"

It worked.

He blinked, quietly astonished, amazed that such a device could do much of anything at all. As he sat in the dark, bewildered, another message began to appear.

"I can't wait til you get these. I'm so excited to talk to you!!"

He shook his head, strands of grimy dual-colored hair falling out of place. His chest felt tight, the sensation of someone other than his mother even speaking to him so foreign. Even if the messages did sound as if they were written by a child.

"Hey again! I hope your getting these!"

Fists tightened against wrinkled sheets. Gundham felt his stomach churn, yearning for another message.

"Today was fun! I got to hang at the Skate park! What did you do today?"

Tears pricked at his eyes, the sweetness and innocence in each message rushing over him.

"I don't have many friends. I think when we get to meet we'll be real good friends! Right?"

A lump formed in his throat, and he swallowed hard.

"Good morning! I hope you respond soon!"

One single tear dropped from his face, hitting his exposed skin.

"Hey, just seein if youre ok! I had a weird day today :("

They kept coming, messages appearing faster and faster. Was it a backlog? Were these old messages? Gundham wasn't sure.

"Guess what today is? It's my birthday! I'm 14!! How old are you?"

The tears kept coming too, streams of salty liquid flowing freely across his cheeks. He couldn't have stopped it if he tried.

"I wonder what kinds a things you like?"

Messages appeared faster and faster, quickly filling available space across the lampshade.

"I hope ya feel alright today! I still can't wait to talk to you. :)"

Gundham's vision blurred, too much to see the individual messages. Hundreds of letters blurred to nothing but glowing gold clouds, soft light filling, and obscuring, his vision.

The years of isolation began to crumble. He had tried so hard to harden his heart, to erase this feeling of crushing loneliness, and the facade he had so tirelessly built with shaking and scarred hands had started cracking from the pain. He hadn't understood how much he craved this, how desperately he had needed someone to talk to. For someone to ask if he was ok.

His body shook with sobs, ribs splintering under the pressure of the world as golden light flooded his room. Messages poured in, the light now nothing less than a glowing orb in his eyes, but he couldn't look away. He watched as more and more scribbled notes filled his mind, the emptiness usually stored in his chest now replaced with intense hurt. Love was what he needed, friends and company and care were the things he desired so desperately, the things he had never allowed himself to want.

The light began to fade, the most recent messages having used their allotted minutes. He sniffed, scrubbing tears from his eyes with harsh hands, and squinted at the lamp. Choking, he continued to press against his eyes. Perhaps if he tried, he could stop the next wave.

He caught another flicker of light, quickly leaning back toward the device to read whatever was there. Then he watched as, in real time, more words scrawled across the shade.

"Just wanted to say I still love you."

His last chance at holding back was ruined, and again he began to weep. Pushing away just enough to reach for the pen, he grabbed it with shaking fingers and raised it to the shade. Slowly, he pressed the tip against the mesh fabric and began to write.

"I'm so sorry."

[stebeans]

She-Ra Inspired Actor AU - IV

Cast List (so far):

Taylor Cruz - Adora/She-Ra

Maya Sanchez - Catra

Jessica Cho - Glimmer

Marcus Patterson - Bow

Mei Lin - Frosta

Alexandria - Scorpia

Emmaline Lee-Scott - Queen Angela 

Jacqueline Emery Grey - Shadow Weaver

Taylor did not run. Ever. It was against her very nature. She never ran to catch a bus that was just departing, she used to stroll into class minutes after the late bell and she’d bet her past gym teachers were now probably grey in the hair from all the stress she had caused in gym class...

But now.

Now she was practically sprinting in a dead run across the studio lot towards the brick building one of the passing assistants had pointed out. Ha! If Mr. Brody, her seventh grade gym teacher, could see her now he’d probably be crying tears of joy seeing as he was always pushing her towards to join the track team. Something about her body build, lithe and toned, had made him believe she could be the next Usain Bolt. It was a pipe dream. No one could ever be the next Usain Bolt unless there was some sort of cloning device. And as if she would be caught dead wearing those gym shorts.

If only her damn alarm clock went off when it should have, Taylor wouldn’t be tearing like a bat out of hell. Apparently some time during the night she had knocked her phone charge loose from the flimsy wall outlet of her crappy apartment resulting a dead battery that never got charged. To make matters worse her beat-up Prius had chosen today of all days to finally break down forcing her to spring for an Uber she could barely afford. Taylor had sat in traffic on the I-105 for hours, her leg bouncing with anxiety and internally debating if she should just fuck it and continue on foot because anything was better than the painful crawl of the worst-known traffic in LA. She would know, being a born native and all.

Taylor cursed her string of bad luck that had resulted her in being late for the first cast meet/table read. She had spent endless nights and every waking second between shifts at the restaurant and a popular juice bar, studying the script front to back, since it had been dropped off at her door a few weeks back.  She had wanted to come prepared. To prove everyone that she wasn’t a risky choice. A mistake. A liability. Taylor was going to be the best damn She-Ra the world has ever known.

Her sneakers squeaked against the linoleum flooring as she skidded into the building, eyes squinting against the brightness of the fluorescent lights. Damn. Not only was she late but now she was sweaty. Ugh, Taylor could feel her damp t-shirt clinging to her back from underneath her signature leather jacket. She slowed to a stop just before the door, huffing and puffing, ignoring the nagging voice pointing out just how out of shape she was. She shot a glance down at her worn leather wristwatch, ten minutes late, not too bad but not great for a first impression. It took a minute to fix herself up as best as she could but at least she didn’t look like a hot mess. Grasping the door handle, Taylor could hear the muffled yet elated chatter beyond the door and without wasting another second she pulled the door open.

The view before her surprised her a little. The room was full of people, both cast and crew Taylor surmised with the handful of people staring intently at their clipboards as they made little notes in the margins. People hung out in little groups, making small conversations with shy smiles and nervous glances. Despite the awkward tension that hung in the air (typical for a first time cast meet) the room didn’t seem as stuffy and unwelcoming as the table reads she had attended in the past. It was usually full of pretentious lead actors already attempting to exert their dominance and one or two fellow male co-stars acting chummy with her.

Just as she was about to step forward to make her entrance a round of laughter erupted near the back of the room, rising above the idle chatter and garnering a few curious looks. Her gaze wandered over to the cheerful group, taking in the small group that somehow was making so much commotion. A short Asian girl had her head tilted back, roaring with laughter and it wasn’t until the taller black male had doubled over clutching his stomach, he was laughing so hard, did she catch the familiar wild mane of hair and wiry stature. Her mouth dropped open, her mind going blank and despite the distance she immediately— and inadvertently—caught Maya’s eyes from across the room. There was no mistake that Maya had recognized her the same time she did and it was quite unfortunate that Maya had been mid-sip when they had caught each other gazes because the girl had practically snorted water out of her nose in disbelief.

It would’ve been quite comical for Taylor had she not been internally panicking and all she could think about was Maya. And that she was here. At the cast meet for She-Ra. Maya. Here. With her. It had been a couple months since she last saw the girl and while she was banking on the shot she wouldn’t run into her again ever since the chemistry test from hell, Taylor knew better that while LA was a large city filled with hundreds of thousands of people, the chances of meeting one another in an audition was quite high. The Hollywood world wasn’t as large as everyone made it out to be.

Caught off guard and shocked beyond belief, Taylor stayed frozen at the doorway. Her mind just barely registering what was happening as Maya descended into a fit of forced hacks and haphazard coughs. Taylor winced slightly at the choking sounds and unwanted attention Maya was receiving. If people weren’t paying attention before, they were now as a few of them gathered around her, worry etching their faces. Yikes, that was one way to stand out at cast meet, Taylor supposed.

Taylor watched Maya wave off their concern with a watery smile and flimsy thumbs up before meeting her eyes once again, as if confirming she wasn’t just imagining things. Taylor didn’t blame her. She too had done a double-take because what were the freaking chances they would meet again? Especially during the table read for She-Ra considering their chemistry test from hell for said production?

Despite the shock, confusion and lingering guilt from how Taylor had last left things, she couldn’t pull her gaze away. It surprised how fast the incredulous look was wiped away from Maya’s face. Now Taylor couldn’t read her. She didn’t look happy because yeah, she was kind of a bitch the last time they talked but she didn’t seem un-happy. Sort of indifferent? Which honestly, Taylor could work with that. She squared her shoulders. She was going to woman-up, approach Maya and apologize. Maybe she’ll convince her to have a re-do introduction. A blank slate. It was of course for the best considering they would now be cast mates for the foreseeable future. It would be the professional thing to do.

She was going to rip off the band-aid and set aside her ego for once. Taylor inhaled deeply took a step forward only to be almost immediately deterred by an arm wrapping around her shoulders. “Taylor!” The Director greeted with a cheer. “So glad you made it! Now that our star is here we should get started, I bet everyone is excited to finally get the ball rolling, I know I am!” The Director clapped her hands until everyone’s attention was on her. “Okay everyone gather around, gather around!” She called out, corralling the occupants to the front of the room, where Taylor now noticed was clear of any furniture and spacious enough for the Director to instruct everyone to form a wide circle.

Oh no. If Taylor was right – and from the round object the Director was rolling in her hands – she was. Taylor felt a wave of dread fill her. She hated theatre games. Despised them actually. Some people thought it was a fun and brilliant way to break the ice between actors but Taylor hated it with a passion, almost as much as she hated running. She didn’t have the natural charisma or friendly disposition to easily befriend people. It would take more than some theatre game to warm her up to others and usually people didn’t have the patience or care to get to know her, already passing judgement in the first few minutes they meet her.

It shouldn’t surprise Taylor that Maya’s eyes lit up at the sight of the foam baseball, with how eager the Latina found everything. Unable to hold back the eye roll as Maya strolled towards the front of the room, hauling her new friends along with her with a cheery glint in her eyes. Apparently that was all it took because the rest of the room began to converge to the front, languidly following after Maya. Funnily, Taylor slipped through the crowd in the opposite direction towards the tables. “Looks like we got our first volunteer!” The Director announced joyfully and Taylor watched as Maya easily caught the ball in her hand, squeezing and examining the colourful foam ball.  

Taylor took her sweet time, randomly choosing one of the free seats left and slowly pulling her shoulder bag from where it hung limply at her side. It was obviously well-used, the weather so worn it was soft to the touch but despite it, it was Taylor’s most prized possession. The shoulder bag was a gift from her grandmother, her first true fan, a believer in her talents and pillar of support from anything from her floundering career in acting to her love life, or lack thereof in this case. Carefully placing the bag on the table, Taylor ran a hand over the flap for good luck. It wouldn’t compete against her grandmother’s unwavering tone as she wished her good luck or the following warmth of her loving embrace but it was the next best thing. Pretending her shoes needed re-tying, which actually wasn’t that far from the truth after nearly losing one on her jog over, Taylor took her sweet time in an attempt to prolong the inevitable.

The chatter within the room rose to an excitable level that had Taylor grimacing. After milking as much time as she could, Taylor straightened and glanced at the circle of her cast mates. She met Maya’s challenging gaze from across the room where the other actress was confidently tossing the ball in the air with a single hand, her eyes never once straying away from Taylor’s. Fine. If Maya wants to play, she’ll play. If that was how it was going to be. Taylor shrugged her leather jacket off with jerky movements, draping it across the back of the chair and strolling to the group where she planted herself directly across from Maya, meeting her challenging stare with one of her own.

As the ball was thrown at her with the speed and projection of a freaking rocket, Taylor barely had the time or reaction to bring her hands up before it whipped her in the face, her hands stinging despite the foam filling of the ball. So. Turns out she was wrong and Maya wasn’t feeling quite so indifferent after all. Feeling a dozen or so expectant eyes on her, Taylor nearly dropped the ball with how sweaty her palms had gotten. In front of a camera Taylor had no issues with her confidence. She could act the hell out of her character, she could play the dumb blonde, the air head cheerleader, the golden child of a popular tv series but when the cameras were put away and it was just her, no script, no fake persona, Taylor was as vulnerable as a baby bird. “Um, hi?” She gulped, feeling her throat dry up like the Sahara Desert.

The Director smiled encouragingly. “Why don’t you tell us who you are, something about yourself, who you will be playing in the show and a little fun fact if you will?”

“Right.” Taylor gulped. “Right. Well…I’m Taylor Cruz.” There was a chorus of friendly “hello Taylor’s” that helped ease her nervousness. “I will be playing Adora and I guess She-Ra by extension. I’m nineteen and a fun fact about me is uhh…” Taylor forced herself to think but with everyone’s focus on her she drew a blank. “I umm, I know all the words to ‘Baby Got Back’…”

Her “fun fact” was met with silence and Taylor could feel her cheeks warm up rapidly. A snort of laughter broke the quietness and Taylor’s eyes narrowed at Maya who grinned at her stupidly, waving off her uncontained laughter. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” She apologized between pursed lips, failing to hold back her laugh. “It’s just…it was so unexpected.” The rest of the crew joined in a light chuckle and a towering woman beside her clapped her on the shoulder that nearly sent her flying.

Taylor could’ve sworn her cheeks were on fire and she wanted nothing more for the floor to swallow her whole. “It’s not something I’m proud of.” She added not wanting to give the room of strangers the wrong impression but nonetheless her comment elicited another round of good-natured laughter.

“Well I guess that means we will have to plan a karaoke night soon.” The man next to Maya said cheerfully, who Taylor would later learn to be Marcus.

Everyone nodded encouragingly and even Maya sent her a grin that looked less mocking and more in amusement. She glanced at the director, the obvious leader in this torture game, shooting her a what now?look, hoping that she would understand. “That’s great Taylor, I’m sure we’ll get you on stage soon enough. I bet everyone is looking forward to hearing you sing.” A whoop and a joyous ‘hell yeah!’ cut in that had everyone chuckling anew. “Why don’t you toss the ball to someone and they will repeat your name before they introduce themselves. We’ll continue the process until everyone has had a chance. Anyone who messes up a name will be severely punished.” The Director teased, giving Taylor the go ahead which Taylor was too happily relinquish the pressure to the next unfortunate person.

Taylor lifted the foam ball, all the ready to throw it back at Maya but she overlooked one crucial fact. She didn’t own one athletic bone in her body and while the intended target had been Maya, she nearly taken out the eye of another woman standing two person’s down from her mark. Taylor attempted to play it cool, as if that was who she was aiming for all along but by the raised eyebrow from Maya she could surmise she wasn’t as successful in the ruse. Thankfully everyone else seemed to have not noticed and was more than happy to get the theatre game started.

While Taylor had cursed her luck during her intro, she was relieved that she had gone first. A few people had jumbled up the order of the names or had outright gotten them wrong and were forced to do pushups while everyone booed and teased mercilessly. One pushup would already be…pushing the limit, pun not intended, for Taylor.

It was funny cause in the end the last person to be introduced was Maya, who caught the wavering ball before it smacked into Jessica – or Jess as she preferred – with relative ease. “Hi it’s nice meeting everyone.” She greeted the group shyly and of freaking course, repeated all the names in the room without issues. “My name is Maya Sanchez and I am seventeen years old. I just graduated high school and my fun fact is that my first love is softball and we have been going steady for ten years now.”

If Maya hadn’t surrendered the fact or if Taylor hadn’t seen her pick up the uniform from the floor the first time they met, it was obvious with the way Maya handled the ball with ease, tossing it up from hand to hand, adding spin so the rainbow coloured ball blurred in a magnitude of colours in the air. “Oh! That’s cool!” Marcus remarked. “Are you any good?”

Maya smiled sheepishly, raising one shoulder in a half-hearted shrug. “I’m alright.” She replied and Taylor had a feeling that she was being too modest for her own good.  

As anxious as she was at the beginning of the ice-breaker game, the ball tossing and questions did its intended job as Taylor could feel the tension release from her shoulders. Admittedly it had been a fun and efficient way to get to meet her new co-stars and the production team. It wasn’t as terrible as she had thought and she even chatted with Alexandria, the tall giant of a woman with long black hair that fell past her broad shoulders, who would be playing Scorpia. She also happened to be super kind which was highlighted when a few people had trouble completing their set of pushups as punishment, Alexandria had dropped to floor and had completed the penalties on their behalf without breaking a sweat that had Taylor slightly, just slightlyjealous.

If it weren’t for her easy smile and kindness, Taylor already knew she would like Alexandria. The woman was unapologetically herself. Where many actresses in Hollywood fought to be tall and skinny, Alexandra looked like she could easily out bench press the guys in the room. She was strong and she was kind, something that was quite rare in Hollywood and Taylor had already made a silent vow to start hitting the gym more regularly. She wasn’t going to cut it as She-Ra with her noodle arms. Maybe she would even ask Alexandria for some tips.

The team was now gathered around the tables. Finally they were going to get down to business and back into Taylor’s comfort zone. Plus she couldn’t wait to jump into her new role. Pulling her well-used copy of the script where all her lines were highlighted with little handwritten notes and questions that she had for the production team. She had made sure she had studied the script as best she could in preparation for the day. The first page was filled with notes, mostly about questions about the stunt work. This role as Adora was going to be Taylor’s most challenging and vigorous yet and to be honest she was more than a little nervous.

The opening scene was mostly action filled and of course being the title character, Taylor had first honor of opening the show.  It was tricky when you were the first person to read at the very first table-read. It all fell on the first reader to set the tone. Was she going to play it cool and comfortable and just read her lines normally? That may send the wrong idea as she didn’t want to come off as lazy or unexcited about her role. But if she went hard, she might look too enthused and everyone was going to be forced to match her intensity. She had internally struggled on how she was going to play her role today but after the ice-breaker game everyone seemingly eager and radiating with excitement, Taylor went with her gut feeling. “Hey Princess.” She growled, trying to make herself sound intimidating. “You lookin’ at me?”

Luckily Andrew (playing Kyle) and Brianna (playing Lonnie) were all too happy to play up their readings too and soon they had set the tone for the table read. The first act was flying by as they had skipped through the action scenes and the introduction of Catra came all too soon. Taylor could feel her palms clam up as she played with the edges of her script.

“Hey Adora…how’s it hanging?” Maya chirped in now, her voice deep and teasing.

Taylor was taken aback as soon as Maya read her first line and nearly missed her cue.  Was Maya’s voice always so raspy? Shaking her head clear, Taylor had forced her eyes up, dismissing her script. She had this part all memorized already. “Catra.” She grunted out in annoyance. “Do you really show up late and let us do all the hard parts? That is low.” Taylor admonished, eyes on Maya who stared back with an excited glint in her eyes. “Even for you.” Taylor finished off.

“Awwww.” Maya cooed lowly, her eyes not leaving Taylor’s. Apparently Taylor wasn’t the only one who had memorize her lines. “You know nothing’s too low for me.” She said before letting out a high pitched cackle that had the cast and crew sharing amused smiles. “Now come on. You look stupid hanging down there.” Maya said, adding a hint of reverence instead of admonishment that Taylor had been imagining on her solo read-throughs.

The two had disregarded their scripts and had ignored the rest of the room as they exchanged lines, playing off one another and Taylor could feel herself ease into her role as Adora. From the corner of Taylor’s eyes she could see the Director and Producer exchange a proud smile. They weren’t the only ones who felt the chemistry. It was quite ironic really given how they didn’t really get along in real life. If only the others knew what had truly happened before today.

Taylor couldn’t remember laughing so hard at a table-read before. When it had come to the confrontation between Queen Angela and her daughter Glimmer in the throne room. Jessica Cho, who Taylor had overheard was mostly in the voice-acting scene and the beautiful and revered actress Emmaline Lee-Scott who played the Brightmoon Queen, were just so natural with one another despite just meeting for the first time today. They had read their lines so perfectly with just the right amount of huffing, scolding and annoyance of a typical mother-daughter dispute that had the whole room in stitches. It was a welcomed follow up from her read-through with Jacqueline Emery Grey who would be playing the role of Shadow Weaver. Jacqueline was just as famous as Emmaline Lee-Scott and playing opposite of her, even for a short moment was enough to leave Taylor star struck. She was glad for the break so she could calm her racing heart and gather herself again.

It had taken nearly all day but the first table read was a success. By the end everyone had eased into their roles and it seemed the Casting Director was now fully committed to the cast. They had all played off one another and the energy in the room was high and full of potential. It was the first time in a long while that Taylor was genuinely excited to go to work. The department heads was thanking everyone for the day and were handing out the upcoming schedule while Taylor was shoving her belongings in her bag. She followed Maya’s movements, watching the other girl slip on her backpack and waving off her new friends Jess and Marcus. They were the last of the stragglers and Taylor decided that it was now or never.

“Hey! Umm Maya? Can I talk to you real quick?” Taylor approached hesitantly, shoving her hands into her pockets.

Maya looked uncertain but nonetheless she nodded. “Sure. I have time. My mom is a little late. Traffic, you know?”

Taylor nodded gravely, grasping onto the lifeline Maya was throwing. “Oh I know. Kind of one of the reasons I was late. So much for a good impression.” She shrugged.

“Eh, I think you did alright Cruz.” Maya said with a small smile.

“I umm… I thought you were pretty great today too.” Taylor praised. “We make a pretty good team.”

“Yeah, we do.” Maya agreed easily. “Near-death experience aside.” She joked with a wry grin. “I had a lot of fun today.”

Sucking in a deep breath Taylor turned to face Maya head on. “Listen. About before. I just…wanted to apologize. I was being rude and I took it out on you. You didn’t deserve any of that and…I’m sorry.”

Taylor fought the urge to fidget underneath Maya’s calculating gaze. After a moment that had Taylor sweating Maya seemed to recognize her sincerity cause she broke into a soft smile. “Thanks Taylor. It means a lot and I accept your apology. I also wanted to thank you.”

Puzzled, Taylor was taken aback. “Thank me? For what?”

“For the first time we met. In the audition room? You stood up for me when that other actress was giving me a hard time and I never got to properly thank you for that. I was super nervous if that wasn’t apparent.” Oh, it definitely was. “And I knew it was a long shot but it’s rare to see any roles for people of colour. I just took a chance, however slim it is.”

“Well I’m glad it paid off.” Taylor stated. “I’m looking forward to working with you Maya Sanchez.”

“Same here Cruz.” Maya replied with her easy-going grin.

An old sedan pulled up to the curb and Maya waved happily at her mother. “Well that’s my ride. My mom’s going to want to hear a play-by-play.”

“Your mom sounds pretty cool.”

“She has her moments.” Maya smiled warmly. “Hiya Mama.” She greeted as soon as she opened the passenger door.

“Maya! How was your day? You have to tell me everything. Is this a new friend? Mija don’t be rude, introduce us unless you are embarrassed of your mother?”

“Of course not Mama.” Maya replied with a teasing roll of her eyes. “Mama, this is my co-star Taylor Cruz. She will be playing She-Ra. Taylor this is my mom, Gabriella.”

Taylor stepped forward, hunching half-way through the passenger seat to offer Maya’s mom a hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you Mrs. Sanchez.”

She could sense Maya’s mother analyzing her, her eyes were sharp just like her daughter. The critical scrutiny must’ve ran in the Sanchez family. Taylor sweated under her gaze, knowing she looked out of place with her multiple piercings. Never had she been so nervous meeting a mother before. After a moment that felt like forever Maya’s mother clasped her hand in a firm handshake. “It’s Gabriella, my dear but aren’t you a sweetheart. Do you need a ride home Taylor?”

It was then Taylor remembered her beat-up car sitting uselessly on the side street back home. She had been so caught up with the events of the day she had forgotten to call for an Uber. The ride home was probably going to eat a good chunk of her savings too. “I took an Uber this morning. I just need to track one down –”

“Oh that won’t do! Take a seat Taylor we can drop you off home.”

“Mrs. Cruz, I mean Gabriella,” Taylor corrected when the older woman shot her a look. “I appreciate the offer but –”

Maya laughed, cutting Taylor off again. “It’ll save us some time if you just give up now and get in the car. My mom won’t take no for an answer. It’s in our culture. It’s best if you don’t offend my mother by saying no to her hospitality.”

“Of course not!” Taylor stuttered, unable to wrap her head around what was happening. She was used to fending for herself and none of her co-stars had ever cared if she made it home or not before, let alone her mother when she had been her manager. “Thank you for offering. I guess I’ll take you up on it. But I can help pay for the gas? I’m just a little out of LA, it’ll be a drive.”

“Nonsense my dear. It’ll be nice getting to know one of Maya’s new friends.”

She stared helplessly at Maya who shrugged and motioned to the car. “Come on Cruz. Let’s get you home.”

The ride was a only a little bit awkward. Fortunately Gabriella was able to fill in the silence with questions about the day, sounding just as enthusiastic as if she was starring the show also. Taylor had sat mostly in silence, answering questions only when Gabriella had attempted to pull her into the conversation but the older Sanchez had quickly learned that Taylor was more content with just listening in. Taylor was leaning her head against the glass window, watching the city skyline pass by and thinking about the day and what was to come. Things were finally looking up. Her co-stars were pretty cool and friendly, the production team was proud of the show they were making and she was on friendlier terms with Maya. They weren’t buddy-buddy but at least she was able to clear the air. Maybe they would never be friends but they both knew that they were good for the show and Taylor couldn’t wait to get started.

[coraxaviary]

Sister-in-Arms | CHAPTER 3: Mess

(Part I, Run the Gauntlet)

Summary: June is thrown into the fray, and meets some of the company.

Word Count: 5.1K

AO3 | Masterlist | Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

Author’s Note: This chapter is unbeta-ed! I apologize for any gross mistakes.

Warnings: Minor canon-typical profanity and slurs.

Taglist: @keoghans​​ @papercinders​​ @junojelli​​ (ask to be added)

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“So, why?” came a voice behind June. It was Lipton.

“Why did I join the Army, sir?” June stalled, not wanting to have to explain yet again the full-context history of her personal past.

“Yeah, why? A woman like you – you could marry, settle down, have kids,” he said, boots crunching in the coarse dirt. “Isn’t that nicer than slogging around with a bunch of men?”

June had wondered that at some point, too. Why did she have to be different, so ambitious? Why couldn’t she just have met a nice guy and lived somewhere on the California coast: no job to worry about, maybe just two or three children and a kitchen to cook in. She’d have tea with friends or something, have a content life with a husband, and live quietly. No newspaper articles nationally decrying her and her class as products of the radicalized communist youth. No men calling her names. And certainly no physical pain and pushing her body to the limit.

She was no stranger to inordinate challenges.

Only her and a few others in the class had been less connected to politics, but they’d been top of their classes anyway and somehow worked their way up to get Senatorial nominations after being mutually made aware of the girl’s class that year. She’d seen the article in the San Francisco Sun and applied the following month. June had been working as a secretary assistant at the local district office. It took hounding and convincing. Some other girls from less progressive areas had to pull teeth and do favors to get that nomination. She wasn’t exactly sour about it, though. Anyone who had the grit to withstand the West Point treatment had to have the commitment to get in.

She couldn’t help it. June was just how she was. She had tried to reason with herself the year she went to West Point. Why did she have to make her mother so upset? She was selfish, putting her own astronomical ambitions above her own family’s stability. Financially, they had barely been able to afford West Point for the first year. Thankfully, the Depression didn’t hit them particularly hard, but the real strain had been the conflict between June and her mother.

June tried to organize her thoughts. She’d always been like this, she realized, always reaching for some impossible point far in the distance and getting as close as possible – pulling herself along the broken road of life by her own bootstraps. She got some satisfaction out of doing things. But it had to be alone. She’d broken her high school’s 10,000-meter track record on her own. She’d gotten into West Point on her own merit and by her own networking. West Point itself had sabotaged her efforts by forcing her class to graduate a year early, but June had done as much as she could by herself. It was exhausting sometimes, June knew. The loneliness was almost crushing at times.

But once she wanted to do something, she had to do it. Failure was not an option, or else she’d implode on herself. Failure was not the way June did things. She would not fail now. But she’d give Lipton the simple answer.

“I wanted to be with the best,” she said. “I want to fight for our country.” She left it at that. Is that so offensive? That a woman feels patriotism too? she wanted to say, but that would have been bordering on disrespectful to her new fellow trainee.

Lipton fell silent and the mess hall grew in the distance as they neared the building. The din of men talking loudly overtook the crunching sand. “I suppose not. Why not a nurse?” he persisted.

“If you saw men killing themselves because they were denied health clearance to enlist, wouldn’t you feel at least a little motivated to try and fight if you were able?”

He mulled this over. “I suppose,” he said, not sounding very convinced. June sighed, and the three of them stopped in front of the door, where light spilled out from inside the building and some vague smell of cooking wafted out.

Lipton got in line, then Coates, and then June dropped to the back of the group, already feeling like a burden. With Coates starting to seem very concerned over the reactions June elicited from the other men, June felt like she was being babysat by him. He was constantly looking out in other directions. June would have liked to think he was naturally cautious, but she also had a suspicion that Sink assigned Coates to tour her around base because Sink knew Coates would watch her back.

June took in the crowded mess hall. It was almost overstuffed: absolutely exploding with raucous conversation and occasional bursts of laughter. Men moved between tables and benches, which were sandwiched so close to each other that the walking aisles between tables were about the width of one man. It was a sea of soldier trainees from wall to wall.

A few men roughly pushed by to get out the door or to put their trays to the side when they were done. June reflexively ducked her head down in hopes that no one would specifically notice her. No one did, for the time, and men flowed by June as if she was a rock in a river.

June held onto some futile hope that no one would notice her right away. Things were looking up for the few seconds it took for the chow line to move down, but June didn’t relax. Coates handed her a tray, and she moved down, getting a single serving of whatever they had made that day. June didn’t really pay attention: she’d seen the sign and the information went out the other ear. She was too hyper-focused on her surroundings, looking out into the crowd for potentially hostile faces.

Coates turned around to check on her, and June met his look with a stressed, darting look. Lipton had disappeared, probably to eat with his friends, and June wondered if Coates would leave her too and find his men – HQ Company, she remembered.

He cast a glance around the room, eyes snagging on a certain cluster of tables near the right side. He’d found whoever he was looking for, and June felt a nervous ice-cold feeling wash down her spine. He was leaving now. This was where she forged her independence. In the midst of the ocean of men – taller, menacing, threatening, and hostile – she would have to find a seat and do it on her own.

“You a broad?” came an unfamiliar voice, and the frozen feeling of panic came over June with renewed intensity. Her head swiveled up, back and forth rapidly, trying to find the owner of the voice. “Or just a John wearing lipstick?” June turned around and was met with the close stare of a recruit, leaning in.

A smile grew on his face slowly as his eyes took in June’s unamused poker face.

“I’ll be damned,” someone else said close by, and June felt a nudge on her arm from someone else. She jerked away, and leaned in the opposite direction from them, shoulder touching Coates’s back, who was already turned around. June looked pleadingly at Coates, and he looked to identify who was harassing her.

“What are you doing here?” said the same voice again, and June shrunk back, clutching her tray but unable to leave the scene. She had to eat, find a seat somewhere, but more and more recruits were being alerted to her presence.

June had stayed silent, but it was getting increasingly harder. Like before, the attention spread quickly, and soon she felt the mess hall become quieter and quieter until after another minute, the noise level had been halved. June glanced above the shoulders of the nearest men, and found eyes directed towards the small gathering in front of the mess hall.

Her heart was in her throat, and the press of more and more attention was starting to make her sweat. She bit her lip, being stared down by multiple men. She only had two options: run or eat. She intended to eat, because it seemed that this was the way she’d have to elicit eventual acceptance.

“Shiiiiiiit, out of those ODs you’d be a knockout,” said yet another unfamiliar voice. June cringed. “We could find out–” he was cut off by another voice.

“What’s going on here?” said a new soldier, pushing through the crowd. Apparently he had some authority, because the men yielded slightly more easily when he elbowed men to the side. He was tall, dark-haired. Heavy five-o-clock shadow. June eyed his patches. An officer. She straightened, and so did the men next to her, including Coates.

He directed a long, perplexed look at June. He looked quizzically at a soldier next to him, who shrugged in turn.

“Who are you?” he asked, looking down at June.

She internally sighed. The men were going to have a kick out of this. She couldn’t salute, so she just stood and firmly spoke.

“Diedtrich, June. Private, sir.”

Near-silence had come over the mess hall, save for constant shifting, the sounds of the kitchen – which had also dulled – and the occasional scrape of silverware or glass.

A slightly condescending smile came onto his face as he nodded, looking as if he found the situation entertaining. He looked as if he was going to try to hold back a laugh. June looked at him seriously, never breaking eye contact – her most valuable West Point skill. June felt the eyes of the entire hall on the pair of them, wondering what she was going to do next. It felt as if the room was waiting for something to happen. Clearly this was a man who many of the men knew. They held the staring contest for a couple more seconds, and his mocking expression fell away slightly as he seemed to realize something.

“Damn, Private,” he said, breaking the silence, comprehending some mysterious fact. “Easy Company?”

“Yes, sir,” said June.

The man ran a hand through his hair, exhaling powerfully.

“Well, uh…” he said, clearly at a loss for words. The weird, slightly disoriented half-smile came back. “Welcome to Easy, Diedtrich.” He started to turn away, going back to whatever table he was at, then turned around as if he’d forgotten something.

“I’m uh, Lieutenant Nixon. Lewis Nixon,” he added, looking down at June’s hands holding her tray, evidently not free for a handshake. “See you later,” he said, turning and disappearing for the last time.

“Sir,” June muttered, a beat too late when the crowd had already coalesced where Nixon had been standing a moment before.

The quietness of the room was unnerving. June looked about, taking in the various forms of confusion displayed on the faces around her. There was a great deal of muttering, and the atmosphere of the room took on a slightly louder tone, gaining decibels as June stood awkwardly in the center of the crowd.

June looked down at her food, which was quickly cooling. She didn’t necessarily mind, because it was almost stifling in the mess hall filled with bodies, the kitchen radiating heat, and trapped sun-warmed air. She looked at Coates, who was looking at her. She raised an eyebrow, wondering if he had any comment to offer. He shook his head tiredly.

The exchange drew a few hoots – Coates, you know her? – and June cursed herself for dragging this innocent man along in the wake of her troublemaking presence. Coates nodded to a nearby table where one half was free, and June squeezed through the press of bodies, careful not to get food on anyone, which at this point was a major achievement; with her luck, she’d have already spilled something or dropped the tray. He sat down across from her, and June set her head in her hands, waiting for the attention to fade away.

June did remember one thing, though, as the men whirled around her like a hurricane. She quickly located her napkin and dipped it into her water glass, and scrubbed off her lipstick without checking her appearance in any reflections. Her hands itched for a mirror to hold whenever she touched her face, but she stowed the ingrained desire somewhere out of mind, and got to eating the food, trying to distract herself from the continuous looks being directed her way.

Coates watched her carefully, and picked up his fork. June tried to ignore the feeling of guilt she now felt when she looked at Coates. She pushed the food around on her plate after eating about half, feeling too nervous to try and consume the rest; she hadn’t eaten since that morning, but the nerves of the situation were making her stomach contract. She hoped she didn’t throw up later. She needed the protein.

June remembered the sign telling her to finish everything on the plate, and she tried to swallow a few more bites. After eating calmly for a few minutes, the attention had dispersed except for the stares. She wouldn’t be able to do anything unnoticed, so she waited for Coates to finish his food before following him like a lost child.

On the way to the exit, a passing soldier hit the bottom of her tray upwards with a glancing blow. Luckily, her dishes stayed on the tray, but her fork and knife flew off. June stood without turning around silently, while another quiet lull blanketed the room. An annoying tingle of heat started in her cheeks, and her heart pounded harder than when she’d finished a sprint, picking up speed when it had just calmed down to a sub-normal pace. Her ears heated. She breathed hard for a couple of exhales and bit the side of her mouth.

He’s just tryna get a rise, she told herself. Coates waited nonchalantly by the doorway, watching her to see what she did. June was glad. Him helping her would turn into something worse, and she’d possibly be seen as someone even weaker.

“There you go, babe!” someone yelled from far behind her. Scattered laughter drifted up from the hall.

She bent down and took her time collecting the silverware, trying to conceal the shake in her hands. She turned around, dumped the contents of her tray in the washbin, and without another backward glance, walked out with the eyes of the entire mess hall on her back, again.

“Yeah, go get her, Coates!” someone said from inside. Within a few seconds, he was again by her side.

June grew more furious and upset by the second, walking wherever her feet were taking her – far away from the mess hall, out beyond the paths and between the barracks, passing billet after billet, picking up speed. The evening air cooled her face, and she went faster and faster. She heard feet crunching on the dirt behind her, and she walked even more rapidly, hoping to lose him.

“Private!” called Coates, and June immediately slowed for the NCO. She wiped roughly at her eyes, dragging her fingers under them, stretching out her skin and massaging circles into her temple, hard.

“Yes, sir?” she said, turning around. They were caught between two billets, and she hoped both were empty.

Coates looked as if he wanted to say something else, but he decided against it, rubbing the back of his neck and kicking at the dirt with one boot.

June wondered what he thought of her at this point. Some weak, delusional woman trying to fulfill some fantasy of a man’s world? Maybe. That’s what it seemed most of the men thought. She didn’t fault them. That was almost exactly what she was doing.

“I think this is where we part, Private,” said Coates after a long pause. June knew this was coming, so she took it with a nod. “I’ve served my purpose for the day,” he continued. “I work at Battalion HQ, so you know where to find me.”

“Yes, sir,” June said, overwhelmed by guilt yet again. She needed to say something, apologize maybe, but Coates talked on.

“Make sure you get back to the billet at twenty-two hundred,” he said. “You have free time until then, and then lights out. I don’t think you need guidance on the rest of the schedule. I hear your CO is… particularly demanding.”

June nodded, not wanting to say goodbye even though she was probably being too melodramatic about it. He was, after all, never going to be more than a number of yards away at the Battalion HQ. But to June, it was as good as miles. She’d probably never have a reason to enter HQ soon, unless Sink saw fit to talk to her or release her from base.

“You have an uphill fight, Diedtrich,” he said, leaning back against the billet and looking southwards, towards the rising mountain that arched above the camp, brushing the fault of the skies..

“Thank you,” June said suddenly. Coates looked at her, eyes widening. “Thank you, Sergeant, for sacrificing your day. Without you I would have been alone.”

He nodded, surprised. “It wasn’t any problem, Diedtrich. I got a free day out of it, as far as I’m concerned. Away from Sink and all the top brass, anyway,” he said, cracking a smile. “Brighten up, Diedtrich. You have Sink on your side, even if he doesn’t look it. If he saw something in you, there’s hope yet.”

June pondered the words. “Thanks, sir.”

“Go light on the smoking,” he said in response, easing off the wall and starting to turn back onto the path that would lead to the HQ billet. “Good luck, Private Diedtrich.”

“Goodbye, sir,” June said, wishing she could say more. Her gratitude vastly outstripped the brief words she’d gotten out. But it seemed that the final goodbye was sufficient, so she watched Coates’s retreating back until he disappeared around a corner. Her first ally was gone, and June tried to settle into the familiar loneliness that was her default these days. It fit, much to her relief, like an old, worn jacket.

She checked her watch. It was half-past seven. She looked out onto the empty, darkening field. The track around it was inviting. Her final conversation with Coates had made her rage almost completely dissipate, but she needed the outlet, even more than a smoke.

She set off for the track, intending to go around for an hour or two. When she stopped, though, she’d been going at it for two, walking and running away her thoughts until it was her and the pounding pavement and her blistering feet.

♤

June reported back to her billet thirty minutes before 2200. Light streamed through the crack in the door, and she stopped outside, listening to the voices. It would have been nice, if only her disturbance wasn’t going to destroy whatever peaceful comraderie had been developing before she arrived. Again, June was a burdensome intrusion on the lives of soldiers just trying to learn to fight. She had calmed down after the blissful emptiness of the run, and she opened the top few buttons of her ODs, flapping the chest a little to encourage ventilation. She waited for longer than necessary, then nudged the door open a few inches, watching the small view the door permitted.

Some of the men were having a rather loud conversation about something.

“No, I swear that’s her stuff,” someone protested loudly near the door. “Who else would be joining this billet?”

“Nix says she’s in Easy,” another voice added. “Of course she’s in here.”

“Hey, that’s Lieutenant Nixon to you, Perco.”

“Come on, it could be someone else. Volunteers are coming in each day,” said someone else. “We can’t assume–”

“Let’s ask Lip,” someone said. June stiffened, suddenly alert. “What were you doing in here before she came out–”

June opened the door before Lipton could respond, and looked at the men who had apparently been gossiping about her. The billet fell silent, and thirteen pairs of eyes snapped to June. She’d schooled her face into the customary one, again. When she’d be able to relax around these men who were supposed to have her back, she didn’t know; she didn’t know if it would ever occur. She pushed the discouraging thought of her mind and kept it carefully empty, gathering information quickly; she also quelled her reaction to the smell of the barracks. It should have been expected, but the wood, smoke, and sweat hit June all the same with unpleasant surprise.

Lipton was sitting on a bed to the immediate right of June, in the first row nearest to the doorway, looking rather tired of June already. Some faces she almost recognized from the incident outside the billet that afternoon, but she didn’t know their names. And then there was Guarnere, fifth row down to the left, almost exactly across from June’s empty bed, with an unlit cigarette between his fingers, and a deadly expression daring June to look a little longer.

Almost every bed was filled except for two or three near the center of the billet, and there was a man on or near each taken bed. June’s cheeks heated again under the scrutiny – something she couldn’t help – and she made a beeline towards the bed where she’d laid her things down previously. There was no more privacy, not even a semblance of one. June looked down her nose at the man sitting on the bed nearest to hers, vaguely aware that there was a fine line between making an impression that was unyielding and one that was bitchy.

She figured the men were going to call her one anyway, so she erred on the side of strictness. She said nothing, just lowered her eyelids into a mockery of passive calmness and silently took in one face at a time, praying that they didn’t hear her blood pounding deafeningly, and the miniscule tremor in her muscles as she locked them into place.

She figured she didn’t have to introduce herself. Everyone already knew who she was. As she got halfway to her bed, Lipton cleared his throat pointedly. June turned around.

“You want to uh…” he waved a hand, “introduce yourself, Private?” Lipton asked haltingly.

June cast another gaze over the rest of the billet. She saw no other alternative.

“Uh, hello,” she started, pausing and mentally cursing herself – way to make an awkward introduction even more awkward. “I’m June Diedtrich,” she said without tone.

No one said anything in response. Her statement seemed to echo in the empty air, caught in the energy of unsaid thoughts. June watched a few men exchange glances with each other. With considerable effort, she unglued herself from her stationary position and resumed her walk to her bed: fourth on the right.

When she got there, she sat down on the side next to the empty bed, feeling as if she’d exerted herself more in the five-second journey than her exercise in the past few hours. She felt simultaneously light-headed and heavier burdened, and she sat silently without making eye contact with anyone. Gradually, the men started talking again, but nowhere near as loud as before June had entered.

She waited and waited for the right time, and convinced herself she had to do it. After a few more minutes, she knew she couldn’t wait any longer, and further stalling would only be willful hesitance on her part. Just get it over with, she thought, and she started on the first few buttons, opening her ODs to the PT gear underneath. She tried to muffle the button snaps as best she could, but there was no avoiding the looks.

June fixed a murderous glare somewhere in the distance between two other bunks opposite the room – refusing to look at anyone – and undid the belt, slipping off the OD jacket quickly and setting it on the bed next to her. The conversation in the room had died down again, and she was once again the center of attention. She huffed quietly, and began undoing the buttons on the pants.

Some subtle shifts in her periphery told June that some men were trying to turn away slightly or direct their eyes elsewhere. She knew most of them still wanted to look, maybe if only for the novelty of a woman doing the same routine that they had been going through for about a month or two. She got the pants over her hips and thighs by standing slightly, and sitting back down for the rest, shucking the whole article off after pulling the bottoms out from her boots. She threw the pants down on her bed with probably more force than necessary, feeling the satisfying crinkle of fabric when it hit the jacket.

June stood up to readjust her shorts, fiddling with the tie. She looked up, feeling like she had to at some point. About half the men were openly staring and about half were acting like they weren’t when she knew they had been. She hadn’t even had to strip down to her undergarments and she felt debilitatingly embarrassed.

She packed up the ODs and laid them in her trunk, the amount of air hitting her legs feeling unnaturally inappropriate. She’d never been this unclothed in front of anyone before, other than at the beach or when she’d had to get clothing tailored, very rarely. She had no time to prepare for the unsettling exposure. She’d been thrown into it, and today was a day of firsts.

No one made any comment or whistled, to June’s minor relief. She figured that in a smaller setting, men were less inclined to single themselves out. It was the nameless mob she had to worry about, or at least she hoped.

There was another thing June had to do before bed. She unhooked her rifle from its hook above the bed, and heard more than a few hushed mutters. At least she was confident in this procedure: at West Point, the girls had learned how to disassemble, clean, and reassemble their weapons: essential Academy stuff. They had practiced with something similar to the M-1 Garand, which was what June weighed in her hands.

Someone beside her made a sound, and June turned to find the nearest man looking reasonably nervous at June’s handling of the gun. She scoffed, looking briefly at him, and then turned back to her rifle, sliding the bolt open and checking the chamber before she flipped it over on her bed and set to taking the trigger assembly out. She subsequently laid out all the parts as she deconstructed the gun, little by little. She was a little rusty, but back at the Academy, she’d mastered the skill, and the fine movements were coming back to her. She got up to retrieve some tools and a towel from her trunk, and cleaned the parts before slotting them back together.

There was nothing June could do about the mood of disbelief emanating from most of the nearby men, but she finally snapped the trigger guard back into place and played with the safety a few times to finish. She wiped her hands off and gave the bolt a few satisfied pumps. June knew a clean gun was Army standard, and that they were expected to regularly clean them. She knew no one expected her to already know. She was quietly smug, basking in the brilliance of proving the others wrong. It was a special type of fulfillment.

“Where’d you learn to do that?” came a voice from June’s left. It was the man next to her, sitting cross-legged on his bed, looking at her gun intently.

June gave something that was almost a smile, but then buried it under indifference, remembering her need for respect. Friendliness was not an option.

“West Point,” she said, turning to hang the rifle up again. There was a long silence – something that was growing very frequent in the billet.

“Bullshit,” came a voice from the other side – the second-to-last row on the left. “West Point doesn’t accept girls.”

June shrugged, trying desperately to sell an image of nonchalance. “Guess they decided to.”

“You been living in a hole, Skip?” said her bed neighbor. “It was all over the news. They have girls now,” he said.

Skip scrunched his eyebrows together, taken aback. “The hell. Why?” he said.

Most of the men shrugged. Lipton looked at June without saying anything.

“Where ya from?” asked a new voice from beyond Skip. Why anyone was interested in knowing was beyond June, but she answered.

“San Francisco.”

A few heads turned to a bed near the back. The man on it looked around, annoyed. “What?” he said.

“Lieb, aren’t you from San Francisco?”

“Kinda,” he said, mildly irritated, as if sharing a city of origin would somehow contaminate him with the association of June. “Family moved down to Oakland later.”

There were a few nods. June knew all the men were showing restraint. Normally they’d probably be talking freely.

“I’m Skinny, by the way,” said the man nearest to June. He didn’t offer a handshake, but there was something close to a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. It was there for sympathy. “You already know Lip, I guess, but…” He slapped the shoulder of the guy between him and Lipton. “Introduce yourself. She’s gonna have to know for drills, unless you wanna run an extra mile for her mistakes.”

June did not want to be reminded of the impending marches and group drills, and especially group punishment.

The man rolled his eyes. “I’m Alex Penkala.”

“Carwood Lipton,” said Lipton.

“Martin,” said the man with the thousand-yard stare across from Lipton. And the sequence ran down the left row.

“Grant.”

“Perconte.”

“White.”

Everyone looked at Guarnere. “Come on, Bill,” said Lipton when Guarnere didn’t say anything.

“We’ve met,” he growled.

“Roe,” said the dark-haired man next from Guarnere after an awkwardly long pause.

“Skip,” said the next.

“Malarkey,” said the man who asked her where she was from.

The last man on the right column started after Malarkey. “Tipper.”

“Liebgott.”

“Hanson.”

June looked around, trying hastily to remember all the names. There were too many, and she blinked. She was never great with names. Maybe the quirk of their nicknames would help somewhat.

She sighed. This was already hard, and they hadn’t even gotten physical yet.

“We have a few more minutes, and then lights out,” said Lipton over the billet. “I don’t know about you, but I feel a night march in my bones,” he warned, and the men groaned. Some of them threw malicious glances at June, as if it was her fault.

As June would find out, it was nearly impossible for anything to not be her fault. Their CO was demanding, as Coates had heard. In fact, Sobel was much more than demanding. He was, in June’s eyes, the devil incarnate.

.

[thepulta]

It took three excruciating days for the Tundra to reach Port Prosper. The first few hours as they pulled away from the dock and set their knots ploughing through the wilderness Westlie sat on the bed with her eyes closed listening to the sound of the engine. There was some soft chatter from the crew, footsteps; the hiss of a steam gasket. When the engine shifted ever so slightly to the left her bed creaked and she made a note in her mind. More footsteps, more steam. A breeze whistled around the hull and Westlie felt them correct course to adjust for it. At some point she almost fell asleep and came back to consciousness as footsteps echoed down the hallway and entered the room. Whomever it was paused for a moment at the doorway - no doubt looking at her stone-still sitting frame - and then rustled through their belongings before walking out again.

The silence after that was unnerving and Westlie opened her eyes with the urge to check over her shoulder.

She’d been placed in the corner, the farthest from the door - and darkest part of the room. There were a few bookshelves with dusty, out of date books it seemed. A few spiders - the regular kind. Nothing too out of the ordinary or worthy of interest. There might be time to read the books later, possibly. She scrolled the titles; The Properties of Bioluminescence in Agaricomycetes? Riveting. Westlie sighed and moved her carpetbag to the bed, noticing a matchbox and candlestub on a nearby shelf. She struck it and gently blew on the soft flickering light, blinking after few moments as she became entranced by the fresh flame.

It was habit to check inventory and she placed everything from her trunk onto the bed, recording it in her mind. There wasn’t much; a change of petticoats, a few walking skirts, a longer evening skirt. Westlie had a few dresses but she’d left them; too much space to pack and impractical in the first place. A few pairs of breeches, her regular vest, a jacket, and several undershirts. A small box of grooming products. She placed the photo of her family face down on the bed, snapping the box of earrings shut and placing it on top. There was The Navigator’s Fine Handbook along with a book of numerical calculations and a trashy penny fiction Morgan had gotten for her in Brabazon. Westlie couldn’t remember if she packed that for sentimental value or because it was actually entertaining. The trunk was nearly empty when she pulled out a thin gold chain and empty locket - a fifteenth birthday gift and the only thing Westlie could remember her mother giving her - she placed it beside the photo, and then set down a pair of slim but sturdy leather gloves.

Westlie surveyed the pile, hands on her hips, quietly noting each mend and fold. This would work. This was practical. (Obviously. That was why she packed them. She planned this, even if she’d been drunk on sheer force of will for the past three days.) If she needed anything else, she could purchase it in Port Prosper - or wherever Fitzroy planned to go. She folded the carpetbag first, tucking it into the corner of the trunk, then carefully folding and placing each article in its own proper place. She hid the photo at the very bottom along with the earrings, hesitating with a wry look at the locket. She really didn’t need it. Why did she bring it? It was empty. She sighed, shrugging and tucking it in with the photograph, making a mental note to never look in that corner of the trunk. There was a sense of finality as she closed and locked it and she stared at the truck, half wanting to open it up and check everything was there again.

Pettycoats, skirts, pants, vests, books, photo, books, gloves, locket, earrings. Pettycoats, skirts, pants, books, vest, jacket, shirts, gloves, locket, earrings. Was that right? Did she have everything? Fuck. Westlie reached to open it, hesitated, called herself an idiot, opened it, and pulled out the Navigator’s Handbook; she shut the truck without looking and forced herself to lie down on the bed, flipping to a page and scanning it without really reading.

She tried pretending to herself for thirty minutes before kicking off her boots and sliding under the covers, pulling the sheet tight around her. It was so quiet.

It wasn’t even silent in the ship; she could hear the gentle pumping of the engine. The crew walked down the hallway every so often and she could hear one of them humming. There was her soft breathing in the room, and the creak of the engine as it adjusted course ever so slightly. That was what she liked about them; never quiet, living, throbbing. It reminded her of the shop at midnight; she was generally annoyed when she was ordered to go in that late, but occasionally when the house was too big and her room was too big, she would slip through the alleys and let herself in the back. The taste of hours and coffee would wrap around her and she felt everything else drop away in the deep, claustrophobic stillness. She’d light a candle on the desk and watch it for hours. Like a moth, she followed the flame until it dripped into a nub, slumping in on itself, stuttering out with a soft hiss and leaving her in darkness. Occasionally she fell asleep, and depending on how long she’d been there, wake up with a headache several times worse than a hangover and frizzier hair than usual.

She’d still never felt this empty, like there was an icy hole in her chest, squeezing and gnawing away. What was this feeling? If it was fear, it was a different kind. For her, fear was an icy paralysis that anger helped burn away. It tended to leave her frozen in place, afraid to run, afraid to push forward. But she had everything she needed with her - she literally just checked. Everything else in that house could fuck itself. So why was that hole so empty? Why did it squeeze and burn? Did she just miss... the familiarity, the city? Westlie curled tighter around herself, choking back a sob. Fuck, she was a full-grown woman. Why-?

She snorted, refusing to question the emotion any further, just burrowing deeper, letting it slowly eat her up inside until she choked again, one tear trickling down, then two. Fuck it, nobody was going to be in here for hours. She had nothing to hide either, she was a grown-ass woman and she could cry if she wanted to.

And somehow that was what broke the flood gates, her shoulders silently shaking hard enough she heard the bed creak. Westlie covered her mouth with part of the sheet so she wouldn’t hyperventilate as the tears spilled down her cheeks. For the anger, she thought, sullenly, as she tried to hide in the pillow. For fucking everything. For that goddamn, gaping hole that ached like a bitch. It didn’t hurt, it wasn’t pain, but it just ached with a deep unfulfilled yearning. Something empty crying desperately for something to fill it. At some point hours later, between her pillow wet with tears and the sounds of the crew shuffling softly into their quarters, she fell asleep.

-=-

She felt better in the morning. She usually did. And she was hungry. Westlie paused mid-stretch in bed, remembering the crew a few feet yonder and settling for a slightly more dignified roll of the shoulders as she straightened up. There was a soft turquoise-purple glow through the cabin windows, casting a diaphanous sheen over everything. All of the crew - minus a boy who couldn’t be over 14 - were already up and gone. How long had she slept?

Westlie slid upright and laced her boots, pulling things together with practiced habit and an authority she didn’t really feel. Her routine was always the same. Wake up, get dressed, put up her hair, open the shop. And there was some variation, but even now she could feel the itch. Have to flip the sign. Have to do the books. Have to finish whatever the secretary didn’t do.

Poor Mary. Westlie allowed herself a little laugh that sounded small within the room. There was some shipment of hours expected to arrive today but the bank required a 36hr notice before a withdraw greater than 3000 sovereigns and she’d possibly, maybe or maybe not intentionally have forgotten to give that written notice within her application craze. The Captains wouldn’t get paid. There was also supposed to be a shipment of Polythreme mugs delivered to some estranged aunt who lived on the outskirts of town. Ordinarily it was the sort of job Westlie would have to see to herself due to the sheer trouble of finding someone who’d listen to cups screaming god-awful bloody murder for two hours. But of course, no more. Ah, she could never go back to London. Mary would skin her alive.

Westlie straightened and brushed off her vest, reaching up with instinctual practice to pull out the hairpins she’d forgotten to remove the night before. How many times had she done this with a hangover? How many times had Morgan teasingly grabbed her from behind when she did it with her eyes closed? Westlie pulled her loose curls over her shoulder, combing it with her fingers while staring blankly at the wall. She could envision her hair clearly, frizzy curls framing her face; pale London-skin broken by sharp brown eyes. With her hair down she was almost pretty, according to Morgan (who was obviously, always pretty). Westlie smiled at the memory as she put her hair up. Morgan was always pretty though; she knew how to turn heads. Westlie had missed that class somewhere along the line; and the ache inside her twisted for a moment.

The rest of the day was quiet. The crew tended to ignore her and Westlie found she welcomed it. The ache returned periodically and she felt found herself lurking about the ship, trying to avoid contact with anyone who looked like they would talk to her while giving herself enough preoccupation to not die of boredom. Her hands itched. Usually she’d be writing angry letters to creditors at this point. Was it surprising that was one of the first things Arthur taught her to do? Probably not.

                   Dear So-and-So,

           It is my regretful duty to inform you there is a charge of (several hundred to several thousand) sovereigns at Fairweather Co.. If your cargo has not arrived for sale, please be aware the amount is still due by (some ridiculous date, usually within the week). If further charges must be accrued on your account, inform us in writing at (either the shop where Westlie had to manage it, or the house, if it was a large sum and Arthur had to chew them out personally) by (some ridiculous date, usually within two days). If the charges are not rectified by this date, Fairweather Co. will begin to charge an interest of (anywhere from 5-25%) on your account.

                    Appreciation for your patronage,

                           Arthur Faire,

                    Fairweather Co., pp. Westlie Faire

Ugh. She had her name on so many of those letters. Over the years her signature shrank from a diligent alert beneath her father’s to a barely distinguishable scrawl next to the date. Of course she still got some dirty looks because she had to deliver them occasionally. She’d gotten good at putting on her best ‘I’m just the messenger’ face - similar to now, actually as she stood lurking in the cab. It was a blank face with sharp enough eyes she still looked engaged enough not to be incourteous. The Navigator and First Mate worked around her, charting occasionally and shifting dials ever so slightly. Westlie looped her hands behind her back and watched the edge of islands crawl by through the windows.

-=-

She didn’t cry that night, but she woke up bolt upright in a fevered sweat from a dream she couldn’t remember ready to scream Morgan’s name. She couldn’t get back to sleep. Westlie got dressed and spent the rest of the night in the map room reading.

-=-

The map room proved to be the greatest comfort of the whole trip. Westlie skipped breakfast and took her lunch back to the room, splitting her time between watching the islands roll by and practicing charting Port Prosper to miscellaneous places. It wasn’t difficult, but remembering all the steps took time, especially with the winds and nuances of the Reach Fitzroy said they mostly operated in. Westlie tried to remember the letter she received and immediately burnt a few days before. The Pyrrhus was a Pellinore; an agreement to meet in Port Prosper rather than boarding straightaway in London; a mutual distaste for a certain cunt of a man.  The only engine she’d piloted had been a Bedivere since they comprised most of the Faireweather fleet, but the Pellinores were close enough. She remembered the layout from books and a few test rooms; their rotation stocky and nuanced, like driving a brick wall around a rock. They were good sturdy ships.

The ache returned and Westlie grimaced, looking out the window.

Didn’t know how to pilot a Pellinore, hadn’t officially flown in years. She didn’t deserve this escape, did she. She remembered writing letters furiously a week ago to every half-competent captain in port - she knew who they were, unsurprisingly, since she handled a fair portion of their sales. It was a straightforward letter because she was good at writing succinctly: I request to be taken as a crewmember (no position, no pay; fuck, it could have been 5 sovereigns a month and she’d have taken it) if you have an open position. The letters were not the difficult part. Westlie tapped a pen against the table as she stared out the window, willing herself back to her books but too diverted to stop.

She’d had five interviews that evening after all of her letters. Every single one she froze up. She remembered the amused looks of the captains and it made her shiver; the pen tapped harder against the table. It was something about the judgement; the way they walked in and scanned her. She wasn’t there to fight them either, she knew that, it was to get a job and be helpful and a good crewmember. That was what she wanted to say - possibly in more words. But she couldn’t soothe herself enough to get the words out and each question ended with a stilted messy answer. Where are you from? How much can you lift? Stupid questions.

Fitzroy was the last captain and at that point she was somehow almost comatose, close to tears, and burning with anger at herself at the same time. She barely remembered shaking his hand. It was probably a shitty handshake. Westlie shuddered quietly. They sat down across from each other and she found herself staring at the table, suddenly fixated on the horrifying potential future of walking back into that house, scrounging for a list of new captains the next day, and also ordering several dozen cans of gasoline, because that was what she’d been ordered to do. She couldn’t. She couldn’t.

Fitzroy broke her out of it by clearing his throat and Westlie had to meet his gaze. It was stern, but almost impassively gentle. She remembered wondering what he was hiding because only good actors had that kind of face; but he seemed honest. She was too much of a mess to worry about it. He pulled her letter out of his coat pocket and turned it over, sliding the empty backside across the table. “I assume you know how to navigate?”

“Yes, sir.” Well she got that out.

He dug a bit deeper for a pen and passed it to her. “I’m going to New Winchester. How long will it take me? Stop off at the Circus on the way.”

Something she knew. Westlie took the pen like she was floating in the Reach and he’d offered a rope. The numbers recalled themselves unbidden. “Wind?”

“Calm.”

“Pull?”

“Assume none.”

“Hold?”

“Pellinore. Full. A good bit of power in her.”

She hunched over the sheet of paper. Westlie barely remembered writing; it was all a furious blur, double-checking, closing her eyes and trying to remember the rate of acceleration for a Pellinore. ‘Good bit of power.’ What the fuck did ‘good bit of power’ mean? She rounded up in case he’d be offended by a lower number. Westlie straightened as she neared the end, checking the distance, trying to recall each number in the manual. She’d really spent too much time reading it hadn’t she; it was supposed to be a reference. She did want to fly though; obsessions that turned into careers were normal, weren’t they?

Checking one last time, she slid the letter and handed the pen back over to Fitzroy, holding her breath as he looked through it. It felt like a lifetime before he folded it up and tucked it away again, giving Westlie an approving sort of nod. She waited.

After a unholy pregnant minute he sighed and leaned forward, placing clasped hands on the table and staring directly at her soul. “Miss Faire, I assume you know a reputation preceeds you.”

Icy fear fully encased Westlie’s heart and possibly stabbed it. No, no, no, please.

“However, a lack of education is not part of it.” His eyes narrowed and Westlie wondered if she should politely excuse herself to throw up in the corner. “Miss Faire, why do you want to leave London?”

Westlie had helplessly cleared her throat and her current self audibly groaned in the map room. Why did she want to leave? Because she would be stuck in that nightmare shop all her life? Because everything around her was tainted and evil and hideous? “I- I can’t stay here.”

Fitzroy leaned back in his chair, eyeing her. The bar swirled around them, a blend of scents and colors; someone sang a drunken sky-song. Something about bleeding crystals and sharp-edged lovers. Several more people joined in for the chorus, and around them clicked glasses and thumps of well-drunk whiskey. Please, Westlie wanted to whisper. Please. I’ll be better. I’m afraid. I’ve never done this before.

After several minutes that felt like hours, Fitzroy straightened up, his face relaxed of scrutiny. Please. “During my last trip, I encountered some... situations that lost me my first mate. If that’s acceptable to you, it will require navigating, along with regular maintenance duties and oversight of most ship functions, as well as keeping track of the cargo - although I’ll help with those duties. It pays standard. But I do warn you,” his gaze sharpened, and she could read past it into the distrust of her name. “it’s not easy.”

“I’ll learn anything.” Westlie leaned forward into the challenge, somewhat forgetting not to act desperate; the iciness thawed a little in hope. Her current self found a slight offense in that Fitzroy thought she had just been lounging around the Faire household her whole life. “I learn quickly- sir.”

“Then I don’t see why this won’t work out well for the both of us, Miss Faire.” Fitzroy tipped his cap to her as he got up, and he left without looking back, leaving Westlie overwhelmed enough she sat there for several minutes, trying to comprehend it. That was it. She had a job. She had a job. She had to pack. Holy shit she had to pack.

She possibly drank some other sucker’s shot as she walked out the door, too out of it to notice the screech of indignation behind her. Westlie could remember walking down the street trying to head back to the shop, but her mind was in a million places. She missed her turn, doubled back, missed it again, and finally decided to turn three lefts into a right. She remembered organizing things in her head, trying to ask Fitzroy when to leave, about Port Prosper, about New Winchester, when a yell caught her attention and she jerked back to reality with Mary in front of her nose waving a stack of papers, almost close enough to smack her.

Oh, that cunt.

“What? I’m on my way back to the shop. You had to accost me?”

“Says the one who apparently can’t see in front of her nose. Hello. I need these by tomorrow! Arthur needs to sign and date them before they go to the ministry. You know it’s the 24th.”

“Oh really. I hadn’t checked.” I hate you so much.

“Of course you didn’t. You never check.” Mary scoffed, pulling out a tin of rouge and looking down to pat her cheeks. “I have to tell you every month and every month it’s ‘Yes, Mary’, ‘I’ll remember, Mary’, ‘Stop reminding me, Mary’. If you just did them the night before I wouldn’t have to worry about it and you wouldn’t cause your father so much trouble.” Westlie had possibly never hated anyone more than at that moment. ... a lie, but stars it felt true right then.

Instead of fucking decking her stupid face and goddamn fucking rouge tin Westlie settled for snatching the paperwork from under her arm. “Have a good evening, Mary.”

Mary scoffed in her direction as Westlie beelined away. “Do it on time next time!”

Westlie came so close to shouting ‘Saucy cunt!’ in the middle of a busy street she bit her tongue, but coincidentally the anger was back, and it burned an enthusiastic hole in her heart. She was so close. Current-Westlie closed her eyes, remembering the taste of victory as she tossed the paperwork on a shelf for Mary to find unfinished the next day. What had changed? She was more than victorious now, she was free. Why did that feel so hollow now?

Maybe it was Fitzroy’s piercing gaze that looked right through you. He’d obviously disliked Arthur, even though he’d traded a shipment of hours with them a month before and Westlie could remember him very occasionally coming through once every few years or so. Maybe it was her fear? Why? Why would he hire her anyway? Who wanted a first mate who could barely answer why she wanted to leave?

Westlie groaned and buried her head in her arms. She stayed like that for a moment before absently digging through her bun to pull out the hairpins and run her hands through it. She was so fucked. She was more than fucked. She’d always been alone, but this-

Fuck. That feeling was loneliness wasn’t it.

Westlie closed The Navigator’s Handbook and slid it away to the other side of the desk so she could mope in peace. She’d always been alone, she knew that. If she had problems, she generally had to solve them. Occasionally Morgan offered helpful suggestions, or soon after the problem just went missing (??) That was it though; she never had time for friends. Arthur was a prick, Relia was useless. The secretaries were increasingly young and increasingly insufferable as Westlie got older. It was the same now, she just didn’t even have Morgan. Every inch she gained she scraped for. Every injustice she had to fight through. Why was she lonely now?

Westlie looked up out the window and tried to stop thinking and just forget. The turquoise hue had turned a soft purple and the wind had grown stronger. The engine hummed. Without thinking Westlie started putting her hair back, pulling it away from her face like she was used to. When had she started to wear her hair back anyway? She couldn’t actually remember. Morgan always wore it down; it was part of her ‘fuck authority’ phase and she just never grew out of it. But then again, she looked good with a braid. Westlie just couldn’t imagine it not being up.

Sighing, she dismissed all her thoughts, pushed the last pin in, and reached over to pull the handbook back in front her. Review. One more time. Prosper to Titania.

-=-

She woke up drenched in sweat again but not near-screaming at least. Westlie threw off the covers, panting at how hot the fucking bed, the air, the room was. Fuck it was so hot. How hadn’t they all suffocated in their sleep? It felt like hours until she was cool enough to crawl back under the covers. When she finally did, she was so tired she fell asleep within five minutes and this time it was dreamless.

-=-

Westlie lurked in the cab again as they approached the Albion Relay. The Captain was a begrudging man, but thanks to her previous payment, he didn’t comment. She noted the dials as they approached, watching the Navigator swing them closer to the giant steel beams and rotund, threatening-looking encasings of stone; the hissing and clicking of the dock as it enclosed about them. He was quite skillful. Westlie took notes at the side thrusts of the engine, the subtle swings as he brought them in line. It all depended on the weight of the cargo, the engine power, the ship. Good things to know.

She considered asking the Captain how much cargo they had in the hold and thought better of it.

Getting through the relay was painless. Almost too easy. Westlie watched the Navigator until he seemed to be getting nervous from her stares, and they approached close enough to Port Prosper to warrant her making sure her books were sequestered away. That was simple though, she didn’t have many, and so she waited on her bunk, staring again at The Properties of Bioluminescence in Agaricomycetes. Thank the stars she wasn’t bored enough to read that though.

Once they docked, a burly fellow from the crew was tasked to carry her trunk. She took a hotel recommendation from the Captain and then she was on the docks. She found herself glancing between the engines, hoping to get a glance of the Pyrrhus, but she didn’t see it, and soon her and her trunk were deposited in the middle of The Humble Shroom’s lobby. The woman at the counter was a prick. The footman was not, however, and she tipped him several pennies.

By the time Westlie was in her room and half-settled she was desperate to sleep but she was coherent enough to scribble a short note to Fitzroy:

                  Captain Fitzroy,

         [Westlie hesitated over the short opening, considered starting again, checked herself, and left it.] I’ve just arrived in Port Prosper and remain settled until your arrival at the Humble Shroom. I’m looking forward to meeting again [Was that proper??? They’d already met???] and assisting with departure at your convenience.

                 Warm regards,

                 Westlie Faire, [She hesitated again.] First Mate

That was polite and informative, wasn’t it? Westlie internally panicked for the next five minutes, stared at it for another five, then gave up, folded it, and requested one of the hotel messengers to keep an eye on the docks and deliver it when applicable. Then she slept.

-=-

When Westlie woke up the next morning, it was like breathing perfume; no dreams, no crying, just sleep. A soft green light shown in from the edges of the window, and she could hear the city humming to life around her. Someone, somewhere down the street was playing a fiddle. Westlie rolled over and cuddled her pillow, allowing herself the luxury of a warm, contented smile on her face. Maybe she’d died and gone to heaven. Seemed possible. She drifted off to sleep again for a few more minutes, pulling awake slowly as the light shining around the corners of the curtain grew stronger.

Maybe there was a library in Prosper somewhere; she could read until Fitzroy summoned her. She found herself smiling sleepily, thoughtfully as she settled in front of the vanity with a comb and paid more attention to her hair than she had in a few months. It went slowly - and painfully - but after a few hundred strokes Westlie could actually say it was managed. She felt a little like a child playing dress-up as she pulled it over her shoulder and put on her cap. The hat sunk far lower over her eyes than normal - not propped up by the bun. She was usually tugging it down, forcing strands of hair to stay tucked within it. Westlie rolled her eyes at herself and tossed it off, leaning back in the chair and sinking into its deepest recesses, smiling.

Maybe later she’d worry about studying; maybe later memories would come back unbidden but right now- now this was bliss. She almost fell asleep again slouched in the chair but got jerked back to reality by a knock on the door. “Breakfast!”

Oh right, there was breakfast downstairs. “Thank you!”

The footman was already moving down the hall, giving quick little knocks and getting varied responses. Westlie was pretty sure there was a grumbled ‘fuck you!’ mixed in somewhere.

Did she want breakfast? She stared at her slumped figure in the mirror, hair cascading. No, she’d grab something later. Westlie cocked her head noting each movement. Morgan usually described her eyes as ‘sharp’; they were quick and biting. “You’ll kill me with that stare, Wes.” Westlie rolled her eyes because Morgan didn’t hesitate, just threw her arms around her neck with a grin. “We need to celebrate! Let’s go to the pub.”

Westlie smiled at the ensuing drunken memory and focused back on her eyes. They weren’t biting at all now, they were soft and warm. Her mouth barely remembered what smiling felt like, but now there was a gentle sparkle and Westlie grinned back at her reflection. Funny how it felt like her face, but it seemed so different at the same time; it was like seeing a familiar strnager. She straightened in the chair, moving out of habit to pull her hair up and Westlie found herself watching the mirror, arms frozen, hesitating. She wasn’t going to the shop today. God forbid she ever set foot in that hellhole again. If... if she wanted- Westlie spelled out her thoughts carefully, slowly placing the comb on the table and watching her reflection like it would start moving without her- she could do whatever she wanted. She was a skyfarer now.

Westlie stared at herself.

She did have a sewing kit in her personals. The thought of sawing off thick hair with tiny thread scissors might have horrified anyone with any sort of sense but Westlie pulled them out like a sword. Plopping back by the vanity, she took a deep breath, and stabbed them shut somewhere close to mid-neck. Half a curl of red hair fell into her lap. Westlie tightened her mouth in to a thin line, took another breath and kept slicing. It felt like hours and her fingers ached when she was actually done. She found herself trying to even out both sides so her hair ended up more by her chin than mid-neck, but fuck it. She stared at the ensuing result in the mirror.

It framed her face; she could give it that. Her eyes were deep and earnest, mouth set in a firm, straight line. She looked like she’d just sawed off a limb.

Which, technically, she kind of had.

A deep pang of fear hit her and Westlie pointedly started sweeping up the bits of curls rather than look at the massacre she’d just wrought on her head. Thankfully most of the hair fell on the chair; it was easy to gather, and the other bits were small enough they weren’t noticeable, or luckily, blended with the carpet. She wondered if she should have made a wig as she threw two good handfuls in the garbage bin. Still looking away, Westlie got dressed, sticking to her routine as best she could with her hair slipping and falling into her eyes. New habits, she tried to mumble to herself. New job, new life, new habits. Don’t piss anyone off, don’t boil over. ...New habits.

She buttoned her vest, tempted, but terrified to look in the mirror again. She repeated the mantra, tucking her hair behind her ears and willing it to stay in place. After adjusting her collar for the third time she finally felt at loss as she finished dressing. She knew smashing the habit would ache; that was why she wanted it gone. This was going to be New Westlie who didn’t work for Fairweather, who didn’t give a shit if her hair was supposed to be up or down. It had to be this way - for her own good. New Westlie also knew how to work through fear, Westlie told herself, and she could stare at her own goddamn face. New Westlie stalked over to the vanity and stared intently at her reflection before she could be a little bitch about it.

Frizzy red hair stared back, awkwardly parted to the side - probably the result of her trying to keep it out of her eyes while doing up her boots - and determined eyes. It’s a new life, Westlie reminded herself, taking in a breath. You are First Officer Westlie Faire, you have nobody, you rely on nobody. You work hard. You need to repay Fitzroy.

She took a breath, closing her eyes and gently pushing away the sting of loneliness lurking at those words. It was easier than she expected.

You are First Officer Westlie Faire. Her reflection stared back at her, more earnest now, believing it. She willed herself to take it all in, to swallow it, believe it; leave everything else behind. She had to accept the loneliness. Nobody loves you. You can’t rely on anyone. You have nobody; you are nobody. You have a temper at the worst times and can't speak when you need to.

But you do finish things. New Westlie bit her lip, trying to reassure her reflection. She swept a few stray stubs of hair to the floor. You... are determined. You are brave. You will do what it takes to get the job done. You will not give up. Fitzroy... She hesitated, almost biting her tongue as she wondered if the pep talk had gone too far and she was shamelessly puffing herself up. New Westlie placed those thoughts aside. Maybe she didn't deserve it. But she could pretend for now; she'd earn it. ...Fitzroy made the right decision. 

She stared back at the mirror. The eyes were haunted and afraid, but resolute; that was the look Westlie was used to seeing in them and her reflection felt more familiar. Fitzroy had definitely made the wrong decision. She was talking to a goddamn mirror. Westlie got the urge to laugh. She faced herself again, less haunted, more resolute.

You are First Officer Westlie Faire. New Westlie took a deep breath and tried to pour every ounce of positive insistence she could into the message. You have nobody, but you are determined. You will never have anybody, but you are persistent. You will learn, and you will overcome. You can prove anything you set your mind to. Nobody can stop you. Fitzroy made the right decision.

She was going to be alright. She'd make it work.

Westlie slipped a pen into her pocket, took one last glance at the vanity, and struck out to find the library.