#its been rustling my jimmies lately | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

siriuslyshewrote · 5 years ago

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To Build A Home

Bonnie Gold x Reader

Bonnie Gold x Reader

Warnings - angst city, graphic descriptions of Bonnies death, etc. Swearing too.

There is a house built out of stone

It was a normal morning at the campsite - the early dawn light peeking through the cracks in the thin curtains that were pulled across the windows, the birds singing their usual morning song, the crackling of the fire just audible outside the vardo. It was mornings like these that were your favourite, even though you had grown up in houses, then grand manors when the Shelby Company became rich, it was this vardo that you adored the most, though perhaps that was to do with its inhabitant.

Bonnie was sat behind you, on the bed, combing through your hair (that smelt strongly of woodsmoke, after a night of sitting around the fire). It was something he had always loved to do, ever since you started dating, around three years ago now, and it was something you loved too. There was something of a domestic bliss about it, and it reminded you a little of John and Esme, how they were. The thought was both sad and nostalgic.

You were both in a comfortable silence, too tired to speak, really, though your mind was whirring fast, as usual. You’d known you were pregnant for a few days, and it was partially why you were hiding out several miles from Small Heath, at the campsite, lest Polly or Lizzie figure it out. You weren’t so sure how to feel about it yet, and it was why you hadn’t told Bonnie. You were sure it would make everything so much more complicated. Later, you’d wish that you had come out with it there and then, told him. Perhaps, somehow, that would make things end up different.

Bonnie hummed a tune that you had played him on your gramophone a few days ago, proclaiming that you wanted that to be the song at your wedding. He had laughed at that, swirling you around to dance.

Wooden floors, walls and window sills

“You still like that song then, Bon?” You leant back, looking up at his face with a grin.

“I better hadn’t I? If we’re having it at our wedding.” His eyes sparkled. You couldn’t paint, but even if you could, you doubted you could capture the way his eyes looked at that moment - mischievous and soft and loving.

“You better hurry up and propose then.” You laughed, jokingly.

“You know I’d propose today if I thought you’d say yes.” He grinned, wrapping his arms around you in a cuddle.

“It’s not me you have to worry about saying yes. It’s my family.” You replied. “Maybe we should just elope. That’d be great.”

“Wouldn’t you want Pol there? Or Tommy and the others?”

You sighed.

“Yeah, I suppose. It would just be easier, is all.”

You furrowed your eyebrows , as you thought again about the pregnancy. You knew it would be so much easier to tell your family if you were already married. But Bonnie was right. It just wouldn’t be the same without them there - it wasn’t how Shelby weddings went.

His fingers danced across your forehead, smoothing out the crease that had formed there.

“What’re you worried about, ves’tacha?” His voice was concerned, and that was enough for your pregnancy hormones to make you want to cry. He would be ecstatic to have a baby, you knew that. But you didn’t know if you were, and that was what was preventing you from telling him.

“I...” You began. Do it now. Tell him. “Well, I-“

And that was when the gunshot rang through the camp, echoing in the vast silent space.

Tables and chairs worn by all of the dust

You both sat up so quickly you felt dizzy, a glance shared between the both of you.

“What the fuck?” You breathed, as you ran towards the steps, coming to a fast halt when you saw Abarama (the man who had quickly become a father figure to you) lying on the ground, his shoulder already drenched in dark red blood. Nausea struck you, as you froze, Bonnie dashing beside you, his gun in hand, his eyes wild and frantic, scanning around the area. For the first time since you met, Bonnie didn’t know what to do.

This is a place where I don't feel alone

“Hello, hello, we are the Billy Boys.”

The singing was eerie and terrifying, the men’s voices echoing through the most for a few seconds, until they appeared, so many of them, that immediately your stomach sank. Silently, Bonnie pulled you behind him, and you gripped onto his hand so tightly it would have been purple, if you looked. But your eyes were focusing on these strange men, ones you were sure you’d never met before. The Billy Boys were known to your family, of course they were, but you’d never had any problems with them. Until now, that was.

“We’re up to our knees in Fenian blood.”

You had an urge that was screaming for you to run, to get away from all of this, but you stayed frozen, as Bonnie raised his gun. You wanted to tell him that it would be of no use, not against all of them. You were sure you were going to be dead in only a few minutes. It just killed you that Bonnie would be going down with you. Your eyes filled with unwanted tears. You’d never been in a situation like this before - there was always Tommy or Arthur, or hell, even Finn, and they always had a plan, and you were always safe, but this time, it didn’t feel as such.

“Don’t tell them who you fucking are.” Bonnie murmured so quietly that it barely reached your ears. You squeezed his hand in affirmation, as you found your other hand subconsciously reaching for your stomach. The word Shelby would only sign your death warrant.

“Surrender or you’ll die.”

What was there to do except stand there and wait for them to approach?

“We are the Brighton Derry Billy Boys.”

It was only then you noticed what they dragged along with them, like some sick reenactment of the Bible. The wooden cross was the only sound, dragging along the leaves and sticks and mud, for a few seconds.

“Drop the peashooter, son.” The man, at the front of the crowd, spoke, as he almost strolled closer, so casual that for a moment you could believe that perhaps they didn’t want to harm.

Bonnie’s shoulders were tense, as he hesitated, before dropping the gun. The only weapon you had hit the ground without even a rustle of leaves. His hand squeezed yours thrice - a signal that meant everything would be okay, though the gesture felt like a lie now. You both knew that nothing would be okay. But that was Bonnie. He would be your protector and comforter until the end. No. Not the end.

The men dragged the cross right past you both without a second glance.

This is a place where I feel at home

“A broken broom stops all Gyspy curses, Mr Gold.” The man spoke again, directing his speech to Aberama. How had they known you were here? How had they known his name? Who the fuck had given the Golds up?

Aberama cried out in pain, as they hit him with an object, and Bonnie visibly flinched, his jaw set, one of his fists clenched so tightly his nails must have been digging in. You closed your eyes, praying this would somehow be a sick dream.

“Who the fuck are you?” Bonnie spat.

“Did you not hear my song? These gentlemen are the Billy Boys. And me?”

'Cause, I built a home

You wanted to push yourself in front of Bonnie, as the man came closer, stooping down to pick up the gun that was just dropped, but all your limbs were frozen like ice.

“I’m Jimmy.”

You saw the gun swing, like a baseball bat, into the side of Bonnies cheek, heard the sickening crunch of bones, as he crumpled like paper to the ground. You fell beside him, hands trying to grasp at his face, trying to help in the only way you could, the damp soil cold against your legs.

“Bon.” You whispered, eyes wide as he looked up at you with those eyes, those goddamn eyes, that you had so adored only ten minutes ago, but were now filled with so much pain that it almost physically hurt you.

For you

“Mouth broke so you can’t talk. But you don’t need to.”

The blood covered all of his face, sickeningly, as he tried to push you away from him, tried to save you from whatever was happening - because he didn’t know himself. The pained noises made you want to weep.

“Your body will be the lesson.”

“No!” You exclaimed, fear so thick in your voice that it shook, as you threw yourself in front of him, because that was Bonnie. That was the boy who had held you whilst you cried after John, who had taught you to love, who you were sure was the person you were supposed to be with forever.

For me

Jimmy kicked you aside like a piece of litter, his boot meeting with your face so harshly that you fell to the ground, the soil mixing with the blood from your nose, you lips, split from the impact, though it could be nothing compared to what they were doing to Bonnie. You pushed yourself up on shaky hands, tears, blood and mud mixing together.

“Stop! Please!” They hit Bonnie again, and you tried to dive for him, to shield him with your body because that was all you had left to help him with, but soon you were like Aberama, held down with someone foot so harshly you could barely move.

You could only watch as Bonnie became unconscious , could only plead and sob as they dragged him towards the cross, your fingers digging into the dirt, your body still trying to move. It was too late.

Until it disappeared

The gunshot rang.

And that was when you began to scream, guttural ones that tore at your vocal cords like knives. Because Bonnie was gone. And nothing could ever be the same again.

*************************************************From me

From you

You sat in Polly’s living room, dazed, half unsure how you even got here. Like the movies Ada loved to go see, the scenes you had seen repeated over and over in your mind, like they were branded there. The tea she had given you was still clutched in your hands, but it was cold now.

The door opened. You barely registered it.

“Y/N.”

Tommy was stood there, hands in his pockets, and you looked away, trying to contain the emotions that spun around you like a storm. Flashes of memories between you and Bonnie appeared in your mind, but everytike you remembered his grinning face it was marred by the macabre horrors you had seen ... how long ago was it? Hours, minutes, seconds. It all felt the same.

And now, it's time to leave and turn to dust

“I’m sorry.” Tommy’s voice was quiet.

“You’re sorry?” You looked up at him, bloodshot eyes, a twisted expression. “You’re fucking sorry?”

“Love-“ Polly’s voice sounded from beside you, her hands going to comfort you. Like you had tried to comfort Bon.

“Bonnie is fucking dead! And all you have to say is sorry?” Your voice was raw and loud, as you stood, the teacup dripping from your hands, spilling all over the carpet.

Tommy’s eyes, the piercing blue, showed no emotion, though you knew it was there.

“He died for your cause! He died because of you! If you had never .. started this fucking hell of a gang, he would still be here! Don’t you see that! So would John, and how many others?”

Out in the garden where we planted the seeds

Tears were dripping down your face, as you stopped only a few centimetres from your brother.

“Y/N/N, I-“

“Bonnie’s gone.” You sobbed, falling into his arms, as they tightened around you. You didn’t know if you hated him or loved him, but you needed a hug from him right now. “And it’s all our fault.”

*************************************************

There is a tree as old as me

The sun was warm, the summer heat hotter than you had ever known it, as you sat on the steps of the brightly painted vardo. Flies buzzed around a little, as you watched children run around, laughing raucously, barefoot in the meadow. The steps creaked beside you, and you looked up to see Esme, holding her not-so-little-now toddler in her arms, a soft smile on her face, hand smoothing over your hair.

Out of all the women in your family, it had been Esme who you had always gotten along with best, and so it was to no surprise to your family members that after Bonnie passed you went to living with Esme, and John’s kids, in the vardo’s that you had come to know and love so much with Bonnie. Besides - you had both gone through the same thing - watched the person you loved killed.

Branches were sewn by the color of green

“How you doing, kid?” She sat beside you, looking out at the countryside like you.

“It’s been a year. And it still hurts just as much.” You whispered. “Does it ever get easier?”

“It’ll always hurt. John...” She trailed off, before taking a deep breath. “I still miss John every day. I always will. You’ll always miss Bonnie too. But it gets better. It starts to hurt less. Those memories you have... the ones that hurt you, they start to get replaced with the good ones you had together.”

“It’s still in my head. I see it every night.”

She squeezed your free hand.

“It’ll get better. You’ve just got to ... wait out the storm.”

Ground had arose and passed it's knees

You smiled sadly at her.

“I hope that storm stops soon.”

“It will. Besides.” She spoke, reaching towards the bundle in your arms. “You’ve got this little one. He’ll help you.”

You smiled at the sleeping baby in your arms, the tufts of curly hair that sprouted from his hair. He had his eyes, when he opened them, the ones you had vowed to paint, once upon a time. He looked exactly like his father, did little Bonnie.

“Yeah. He will.” You said softly.

I held on as tightly as you held onto me

#bonnie gold x reader #bonnie gold #bonnie gold imagines #bonnie gold imagine #peaky blinder headcanon #peaky blinders headcanon #peaky blinder fanfic #peaky blinders imagines #peaky blinders fanfic #peaky blinders #tommy shelby

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hattywatch · 5 years ago

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J. Vesey - The Importance of Teamwork

Request #1: If you’re still up to doing any jimmy content could you maybe do a college jimmy best friends to lovers blurb of him taking care of you while at a party and like making sure you don’t have too much to drink but still letting you have fun. Maybe even him walking you home or something cute like that

Request #2: Can you do a harvard vesey imagine where you meet in one of your classes. Fast forward you’re dating him, you cheer at all his games and he invites you to all fam events, by graduation you two move in together in nyc. Thnx!!

A/N: This is very on brand (tm) for me. it is 19 pages and about Jimmy Vesey. I worked with the two requests above, which are SO OLD. I’m sorry but it is COMPLETE :) As always, thank you to my babies, @hockeyandtaylorswift and @xolilyxo for being cute and lovely and encouraging <3 Additionally, I am aware Jimmy was 21 the summer of his junior year and that he went to worlds that summer, but this is fiction- thank you for your suspended disbelief.

“Teams of 4, due in two weeks!” Professor Blanch shouts as the first wave of students make their way to the door.

Why any professor felt the need to assign a group anything at one of America’s most prestigious universities was just beyond you, especially before a coffee. You wait for your friend, Mallory, to finish scribbling into her planner.

“I’m starving, write faster,” you tug at her hood, but she finishes up her sentence anyway.

“We need to find two more friends for this assignment,” Mallory drops her planner into her purse and closes her laptop, following you out the door and into the courtyard.

“No new friends,” you say it loud enough that the boy behind you hears, and he slides forward in between you and Mallory, wrapping his arm around her waist, “What about an old friend?”

“Tom, no, you suck at group projects.” Despite her vitriol, she lets him leave his arm wrapped around her. Mallory and Tom dated in middle school, it was cute and short lived, but they’ve stayed close, the way you can when you date at the tender age of 13.

“I do! However, I came prepared,” he looks past you, and Tom has been running his mouth for so long, you failed to realize the boy standing to your left, just a step or two behind you.

“Jimmy’s wicked smart," Tom nods at his friend over your head.

Yeah, Jimmy’s wicked something that’s for sure. Your mind doesn’t immediately jump to smart, more like handsome, but the longer you stare, you’d venture to say he's probably wicked awkward too.

“Jimmy, don’t let him slide by on his good looks,” Mallory pushes Tom with her shoulder, “He’s gotta use that brain of his sometime."

Jimmy laughs. It makes you laugh too, because it seems like he's trying to hold in the sound before it makes its way out into the open; a burst of a chuckle left in the chilly air.

"Tom doesn't have a brain. But he's a good wingman so I keep him around," Jimmy's no longer a step behind the group and it appears you and Mallory have found your foursome.

"We're going to get food, but I'm making the executive decision that we're a team now. Tom, make a group text and well figure out a time to meet. See you guys later," you tug Mallory towards the dining hall and wave goodbye to the boys.

"At least we know we'll pass now," Mallory plops her tray down on the table across from you, "Tom's friend, Timmy? He's like a fuckin' genius apparently."

"Jimmy," you make out through your sandwich.

"Right. Is Tom looking really good these days? Or is it just me?" Mallory looks thoughtful for a moment before she digs into her burger, "I'm going to give him another shot, I think." You nod, you liked Tom, and you know for a fact he's always had a soft spot for Mal.

"You should." She smiles at you over her french fries and just like that it's decided. You're going to get Mal her man.

______

Everyone decides it's best to work in Jimmy's dorm, his roommate is never there, so he has reign of the common room most weekends.

You text Mal as you cross Elm Yard and she's running late as usual. She tells you she'll be there soon, which means she isn't even vertical yet.

Stopping outside of Weld, you take a second before you call Jimmy. Weld is beautiful and you wish your dorm was there instead of Canaday, but at least your roommates are great so you can't complain much.

Jimmy answers the phone and says he'll meet you at the entrance; you wait for him patiently. The weather is beautiful, so you don't mind; a mild day, warm enough that a sweatshirt was sufficient.

"Hey, sorry," he huffs out a breath and moves to the side so you can enter the hall and start climbing the stairs. "I realized it was kind of a mess up there, I was cleaning a little when you called." You nod, understanding how college boys tend to be.

After three flights you're getting a little winded, "Jesus, your dorm on the roof?"

"It's actually on the first floor, I'm just trying to help you get your cardio up," he says it so dry and matter-of-fact that you're sure he's serious; you're about to turn around and slap him. When you whip your head around to give him a death glare, he's got mirth in his eyes and you can tell he's kidding.

"I almost slapped you." You face forward and keep trudging up the stairs." He tugs your sweatshirt as you start to climb to the fifth floor. "I was a little worried. Thought you might push me down the stairs. This is me though, four."

He unlocks the door and lets you in. It's actually pretty tidy, which means he shoved all the mess away in his bedroom. You know, because you've done the same thing when you were expecting people in your dorm.

"Tom's not here yet?" You look around before plopping your backpack onto the floor next to a plush looking couch.

"He was here, but he decided to go get us all breakfast. So he'll be back in a bit." Jimmy sits in the arm chair and motions for you to sit on the couch before he kicks his feet up onto the table.

"Tom thought of that all on his own? That was nice of him." You're skeptical because while Tom has always been a very good friend, he's not really a thoughtful planner. Jimmy looks skittish, but leans forward and drops his feet down to the floor.

"Can I tell you a secret?" He drops his voice conspiratorially.

You lean in, butt on the edge of the couch and nod solemnly, "You can."

"He really likes Mallory. We talked about it last night and he wanted an idea that wasn't too pushy or over the top to start out, so breakfast and coffee is what we came up with."

Your heart kind of swells a little in your chest, because that's adorable: two bros plotting how to be semi-romantic. It also helps to know Tom's feelings; it makes your life a little easier to know he's interested.

You decide right there that you genuinely like Jimmy. He's a good guy to help his friend out and he seems respectful about the whole thing, so it's really serving to put him in your good graces.

"Should we start without them? Mal's running late too- because of who she is as a person," Jimmy huffs a breath out of his nose in what you assume is a vaguely amused response.

"Absolutely not; Tom's love life is not coming before this. It's 25% of our grade." He's right, really. You don't want to do extra work because Mal can't be bothered to be awake before 11 am on a Saturday.

"So, while we wait... " You're feeling a little awkward, sat in Jimmy's space when you barely know anything about him, but you don't want to be pushy and chatter his ear off either.

"I'm Jimmy, I'm from Massachusetts and my major is economics," he stands up and waves, like the professors make you do on the first day of your freshman classes and it makes you laugh.

"Okay, I'm (y/n), and I'm also from here and my major is government… and I like long walks on the beach?" He smiles dopey at you and you notice his sweatshirt for the first time.

"Oh, do you play on the team?" The crimson Harvard Hockey emblem splashed across his broad chest.

His face gets rosy, but he looks proud when he answers, "Yeah, I do."

That's when Tom walks into the common room, Mal and the rustle of bags tagging along behind him. "Don't be shy Vesey. He'll probably be captain next year!"

"We should come see a game! School spirit, ya know?" Mal says in between sips of her coffee. Jimmy nods, but his face gets impossibly rosier and you can see the color drip down his neck.

"Yeah, that'd be cool," Jimmy smiles and clears his books off of the coffee table to make way for breakfast. "After this we need to get started. I have practice tonight."

_______

The hot chocolate burns your tongue a little but it's worth it, "a part of the experience," Jimmy had insisted. He did not mention how freezing you'd be sitting a few rows off the ice, patiently waiting for Mal to show up with gloves and hats, her habitual lateness being useful, for once.

It's still early before the game and the teams take the ice for warm ups. You go down to the front and press your free hand against the cold glass. When you see Jimmy you bang your palm against it, your ring clanking shrilly and turning Jimmy's head.

He waves and skates over, spraying ice on the glass and getting you to duck even though it isn't high enough to make it over the boards.

"Hey, you came." It's the closest Jimmy gets to excited. You've been hanging out with him more, especially since you two have joined forces to get Mal and Tom together, and you know it's high praise, despite the steady tone his voice maintains.

"I did. You gotta score a goal now," he raises his eyebrows and they disappear under his helmet. "To impress me, obviously,” shrugging you continue, “I mean, you drag me out here on a Friday night, better make it worth my while."

"You wouldn't know a good play if it danced around in front of you naked in Dobby's tea cozy," he smiles, an actual wide smile that's so rare, but this is why you and Jimmy became such fast friends. He teases you as much as you tease him, not to mention that dry sarcasm. It gets right into your chest and endears him to you. What a nerd.

"I've been doing research!" You shout as he laughs before popping his mouth guard back in and skating away towards his teammates who are clearly missing him in warm ups.

"Stop flirting and take some of this shit from me before I drop it," Mallory bowls into you, Tom hot on her tail holding two steaming cups from Dunkin. She really came in handy today, her arms are laden with hats and gloves and two blankets. You take your share and leave her with only one blanket, so she and Tom are forced to snuggle up together.

"Not everyone has to flirt with every male they see, Mallory. Don't project." She rolls her eyes as she pulls on her own hat and gloves and takes her drink from Tom.

The game is quick. As soon as the puck drops you can tell tensions are high. Cornell put together a really good team this year, you know this because you really have been doing research. You and Jimmy get lunch together a lot and hang out, with or without Mal and Tom, at least once a week. It only seems fair that you look into his biggest passion.

You think you read somewhere that games like this are referred to as "chippy." You're thankful when the first period ends and you can finally take a whooshing breath.

Tom must hear you, "This is sort of a rough game for it to be your first. We kind of have a thing with Cornell," he grimaces. Jimmy had told you as much, but you didn't think you'd be so worried seeing him wiz around in the ice, hardly dodging bodily harm.

"It's fun though," you say, because it's the truth. It's doubly enjoyable since you have a stake in the outcome, and can only hope you'll all be out celebrating come the end of the game.

The second period flies by as fast as the first and before you know it it's halfway through the third. Cornell has been up by 1 most of the game, but a rogue shot at Harvard's goalie finds Jimmy in the corner and he carries it up the ice and through Cornell's defensemen and shelfs it over the goalie's shoulder. He points over at you with his stick and a laugh bubbles out of your chest at the theatrics, but you clap and cheer with the rest of the building.

If Mal and Tom send a sidelong look your way, it is promptly ignored in favor of your formerly hot chocolate.

Apparently Cornell's defenseman considers this goal to be a personal affront, because he finds Jimmy celebrating behind the net and slams him against the boards. The home crowd makes their displeasure known and the ref sends him to the box for unsportsmanlike conduct.

Apparently two minutes isn't enough for him to cool off, since he finds Jimmy seconds after his next face-off and drops his gloves. The crowd is on their feet at once.

You've known Jimmy for almost the entire semester at this point, but you definitely haven't seen this side of him quite yet. He's furious, left hand wound in the shoulder of the d-man's jersey, right hand doing more damage than the opposing player expected. Jimmy is big compared to you, tall and lean towering over you, but he's slight when stacked up against a lot of the other players on the ice, slimmer and more wiry in build.

Despite the weight advantage of Cornell in this particular brawl, Jimmy is the one left standing at the end. You join the crowd in shouting his name. Two syllables, VE-SEY VE-SEY, over and over again until the refs eject them both from the game with less than 4 minutes remaining in the period. At least it's all tied up as Jimmy skates to the tunnel, helmet off and mouth still running.

They win of course. Bolstered by the adrenaline that a good bout of fisticuffs brings, the captain nets one with a minute left putting Harvard up by one. Cornell fails to tie it again before the end of the third.

You all wait around in the entrance of the rink, it feels good to strip out of the winter wear and be a normal temperature again. A bunch of the team passes through, bags over their shoulders and hair still damp from the post-game shower.

Jimmy is one of the last few out, he's talking lowly but animatedly to- who Tom identifies as- the team's captain. When he sees you all standing around waiting he nods his goodbyes to his captain and walks towards you. Under his eye you can just make out some discoloration which will surely be an impressive bruise tomorrow.

You hold out a fist for Jimmy to bump, "I may not know much, but good game. That was awesome, Vesey." He bumps your fist but wrinkles his nose at you. He hates when girls call him by his last name. "Reminds me of my coach," he had told you one night after he was gently rebuffed by a pretty redhead at the bar.

" 's a good game to be your first," he continues after thanking Tom and Mal for coming as well. You all walk outside to your cars, Mal and Tom walking slightly ahead of you and Jimmy- laden with his heavy hockey bag. They're walking close and talking softly to each other.

You bump Jimmy's arm with your shoulder and point up ahead at them, raising your eyebrows and smiling. He looks ahead and nods proudly at you, throwing an elbow back your way, comrades in arms.

Tom and Jimmy do a little bro handshake when they get back to their cars and decide to hit up a bar across town, Tom and Mal hop in and promise to get a table so Jimmy has time to return his bag to his dorm first.

You wait for Jimmy to shove the heavy duffle into his trunk before he turns around. "Did they drive you here? You need a ride?"

"No, I'm parked over there," you jerk your thumb behind you," I just wanted to make sure you got to your car okay and weren't concussed," you give him a sideways smile and he rolls his eyes at you.

"I scored you a goal just like you asked and this is the respect I get? Sad.” You shrug but start walking backwards to your car as Jimmy clicks his key fob to unlock his doors. “I’ll pick you up at your place? You deserve to celebrate. I’ll be DD tonight.” Jimmy places his hand over his heart and tilts his head sideways.

“Knew this friendship would pan out for me eventually.” You flip him off, but follow him to his dorm anyway.

________

It’s really lucky that Tom and Mal went ahead to get a table because the place is packed. As you and Jimmy flash your IDs (albeit fakes) to the bouncer, he walks ahead of you, breaking up the crowd so you can get through, his hand trails behind him for you to hold onto so you don’t get separated. You take it and squeeze it in thanks. He leads you over to where Mal and Tom have already secured a table.

They’re cozied up next to each other, so you slide into the inside of the booth and Jimmy sits beside you. The boys talk over the game and you don't miss the way Tom relaxes, leaning back against the booth with his arm around Mal. It feels like a job well done.

"Jim?" He breaks his conversation with Tom to look over at you, "I'll pay for drinks if you go to the bar?" You offer, hopeful that you won't have to bully your way through the crowd to the bartender.

"I thought you were DD tonight?" He looks at you sideways, but takes your card anyway.

"We can probably call a cab and leave my car here?" He smiles at the idea of a loose night out with his friends and agrees, "Alright, I got next round then."

You don't miss the whack Mal gives Tom. It's definitely not as sly as she thinks it is. "I'll get us another round too," the men make their way to the bar through the thick crowd and Mal turns on you.

"You and Jimmy look cute together," leave it to Mal to drop a bomb like that and go back to sipping her drink like it was the most natural thing in the world.

"Stop, we're friends," you warn her gently. "And the focus right now is you and Tom." You take the time to follow her eye line to the boys, waiting patiently at the bar for their drinks.

You're still looking when a petite brunette makes her way over to him and taps him on the shoulder. He spins around and glances down to see who the offender is and his eyes shine with recognition as he hugs her hello.

Without being dishonest, your heart drops a little bit. She's really pretty; petite and well dressed. Mal catches your eyebrows, knit into a furrow as you chew on your cheek. "You just said you didn't like him."

It's more defensive than you want it to sound when you assure her, "I didn't- I don't" you stammer, knowing she's trapped you, "It's just, we're all here together- it's a friends night. I don't know. It's stupid."

Tom starts making his way back with another round for him and Mal, but Jimmy sips his beer and nods along to whatever she's saying before the bartender places a basket of fries on the counter and Jimmy dips down to hug her again and points over to where you're sitting before he picks up both drinks in one large hand, the fries in the other and starts back to the table.

He plops everything down onto the table between the two of you and swings his right arm over your shoulders before grabbing a fry and shoving it in his mouth. Mallory kicks you under the table.

"Who was that, Jim," a deep sip of your drink has you closing your eyes and doing your best to ignore just about everything going on at the table: Jimmy's arm around you, Mallory's meddlesome line of questioning, and Tom's moon eyes at her every word.

"Oh- uh," he shoves another 3 fries into his mouth. Mal clears her throat, a tactic she uses when she doesn't want to repeat herself but wants an answer. "She's, ah. She's an ex. I was trying to be nice. It didn't end well, but it's been a while."

You pick up a fry, aiming for nonchalance, "Sorry to hear that. She's cute."

Jimmy straight up snorts, "Yeah, she knows it too. We dated for a while, but she cheated on me. I found out eventually. It sucked."

You nod, because what else are you supposed to say, it does suck. He's right. What you're not expecting is when his arm tightens around you and he says, "I told her I was here with my girlfriend, so if you catch her looking, maybe just be… girlfriend-y?"

Slapping your palm to your face, you can only hear as Mal snorts and Tom straight up laughs.

"C'mon. You're pretty. I want her to at least be a little jealous," he raises his eyebrows in question and his orbital bone is already looking a little shadowed, so you nod and move closer, dropping your head onto his shoulder.

"Thanks, I owe you one." His arm wrapped around you tightens again and the weird thing is that your heart does that same inside your chest.

______

After the cab drops you off at Weld, Jimmy insists on getting you back to your dorm safe and sound. You're both a little worse for the wear, but you're emboldened to swing your arm around his waist, mostly to keep steady, but a little because you secretly hope he'll call you pretty again.

Jimmy's telling you some dumb story about the hijinx he got up to in high school and you're warm down to your toes. It's probably the beer, but it's likely the company too.

"...so then, I tried to jump onto the ice but he put tape on the bottom of my skates and ya know, without the edges I just fell right on my face. It was so embarrassing. The girl I liked was there, my grandma was there. It was awful." His arm is hooked around you too and you're doubled over hysterical.

"You deserved that!" You shout, slapping your thigh. Your voice echoes back in the courtyard and you don't mean to be so loud, but you're happy and having a good time and the semester is finally rolling to an end and you have found a new best friend in Jimmy and everything is just looking sparkly and happy through your beer goggles.

"Oh! We're here. I didn't realize we were so close," you want to read into his tone, but you're probably just drunk and hopeful. It's been a while since you've dated, laser focused on graduating for these past three years. With junior year quickly coming to an end you're starting to think that you may have missed out on something.

Standing in front of your building with Jimmy makes you feel a little hopeful, though.

"We're going to be messes in the morning," you mumble it into his side.

"Yeah, I'll call you when I wake up. Maybe we can grab some breakfast." He walks you up the steps and you don't quite want to scurry up to bed yet.

"Sounds good. Thanks for inviting me… us. Thanks for having us.. at the game.. tonight. And for my goal," you struggle through and he looks amused, right eye blooming purple now under the dim lights.

"Any time," he wraps you up in a hug and leaves you on the steps.

When you get up to your room and wash your face you decide to send him a text.

Let me know when you're safe back at Weld.

Because that's the kind of caring shit friends do.

______

The semester ends in a flurry a month later. Finals find you and Jimmy pulling all nighters in the library.

He helps. He is a fuckin' genius and his input is welcome when it comes to the stack of papers you have to submit. It isn't all one sided; his government class has been kicking his ass and you complement him there, filling in his knowledge gaps.

When you receive a text after his last final that simply says

FREEDOM

you laugh at first, telling him your last final starts in 20 minutes, before a sad sort of dread fills your belly.

You and Jimmy have grown so close this semester you're petrified that the summer will throw you back to casual acquaintances and that's a frightening prospect.

Mal got you to spill the beans to her last weekend. One last outing before the semester ends. She pumped you full of spiked seltzer and got you to wax lyrical about how smart Jimmy is and how your heart flutters when he skates over to the glass to say hi before a game starts- a tradition now, since they haven't lost a game since he's started doing it.

So when he's standing outside of your building, holding two iced coffees dripping condensation in the midday balmy heat, you're elated.

"Finally," he hands you one of the coffees and starts heading towards your dorm room.

Sipping your coffee you stay silent most of the walk before you decide to question the act, "Do you need something? Why are you being so nice?"

He feigns a pained expression and dramatically throws his free hand over his chest. "Ouch."

"I happen to know you're not ready to move out yet, so I cleared the day to help you and this is the thanks I get.”

It would be so nice if he'd just confess his love to you so you could stop dissecting every word he says, but it doesn't seem like that's going to happen any time soon, so you'll take what you can get- in the way of a really awesome friend who's willing to help you pack.

After you get back to your dorm, he's a dynamo, he says it's because of all the last minute packing for hockey camp, but the fact remains that between the two of you your stuff is ready to go after a few short hours. It looks sad, everything in boxes and ready to be stuffed into your little sedan. The only saving grace is that Jimmy orders pizza halfway through for both of your rumbling stomachs.

As you eat pizza on the floor sat atop the only two pillows you have, Jimmy pauses and clears his throat, calling your attention up, away from your pepperoni.

"So, my family has this summer home down at the cape. I was thinking one week I'd do, like, a friends party? You interested?"

Actual cemented plans would be exciting but this is definitely the right direction, so you nod and shove more pizza into your face, as does Jimmy.

______

He gets the call 3 weeks into summer. You've been texting daily and he face timed you once or twice when he was skating around with his little cousins, but when the notification comes through before 10am you're actually concerned that something is wrong.

"Hey, everything okay? You answer quickly, rolling onto your back and adjusting your hat to block out the bright summer sun. It's a beach day for sure.

"They made me captain. Coach just called."

You almost shriek in delight but then remember all of the other people lying on the peaceful beach, "That's incredible Jimmy! Congratulations. I'm so proud of you; you really earned it."

He brushes the praise off with a quick thank you and barrels on, "So to celebrate I'm going to do that party I told you about, at the summer house? Are you still in? I'm thinking next week?"

You're obviously so in, and you tell him you can't wait. He hurries off the phone so he can call his mom and dad with the good news and your heart jumps that you merited the first call. Not a big deal.

______

You, Jimmy, Mal, and Tom get there two days before everyone else. It feels cool, like you're old married couples on vacation together… except none of that is true, you and Jimmy just reaching legal drinking age this summer.

You spend the Wednesday settling in, picking bedrooms you know you'll lose once the next handful of Jimmy's guests arrive on Friday night. Mal already said you guys could share once that happens; Tom and Jimmy make the same pact. Jimmy insisting that the "core four" should get to sleep in real beds and not be relegated to couches or the cool hardwood floors.

The cape is gorgeous and after you pick rooms and get changed everyone heads to the beach and spends the day exactly how college students should behave during the warm summer; rotating between drinking in the sand, dozing in the sun, and cooling off in the ocean. It's glorious. By the time night falls you're all well and truly ready to crash.

Thursday finds the four of you in the supermarket, trying to figure out how much food a handful of hockey players and their girlfriends will eat over the course of two days.

"Listen, if they need more than this they can run to the store," Jimmy's cart is piled high with hotdogs, hamburgers and the like. You manage to slip in a bag of those ice pops in the plastic tube that make you think of summers as a kid and he doesn't catch it until checkout.

"Who's the six year old?" He looks at Tom but you raise your hand. Jimmy drops it onto the conveyor belt, "Okay, if it's for you." Mal gushes out an "aww," but you ignore her, as does Jimmy, and you move to the end of the belt to start bagging.

Friday morning you wake up early and start getting the house ready for the party. Jimmy saunters into the kitchen in a pair of boxers and you're happy you're pulling the meat from the freezer to defrost, because your ears are definitely getting hot.

His skin is tinged red on his chest from all of the summer sun; his face and shoulders sporting new freckles. When he starts talking, it's only polite to look over at him, so you try to keep your gaze north of his thighs, thick from hockey, and upwards from his toned stomach where his boxers sag too much to be good for your health, and slightly higher than his chest, since you don't have your sunglasses on like you did at the beach for inconspicuous staring.

"Did you see Tom? He's not in his room." You shake your head no, "He hasn't come out here that I've seen."

Jimmy peeks out the kitchen window, "All the cars are still here."

The thought hits you both at the same time as you slide across the kitchen floor, bare feet slapping against the hardwood straight to Mal's room.

Waiting outside the door you catch your breath and gently knock, "Mal?" You get no answer so you try again a little louder, "Mal?!"

You hear what you're sure is more than one person fumbling around behind the door and glancing over at Jimmy's amused face, you can bet he hears it too.

"Shit, yeah- don't! Uh, don't come in! I'm not dressed!" She tries to play it off, but you suddenly remember the way she batted her eyes after Jimmy bought your ice pops yesterday, so you decide to give her a little of her own medicine.

"Oh, you're not? Is Tom not dressed either?" Jimmy laughs, loud and clear and your heart practically bursts. You get fuzzy in your brain when he thinks you're funny; he's usually so reserved.

Mal's sigh can be heard through the door, "No he's not." Jimmy claps and you decide you've given her enough shit for now.

"We'll all talk about this when you guys are decent. Take your time." You fist bump Jimmy on your way back to the kitchen, "Mission accomplished."

______

"Slow down, champ." He says it with a laugh, so all you can do is smile back at him and continue to drink from the red solo cup in your hand.

"Why don't you hit a fucking cup, Captain? We're losing." He takes the cup from you before you can finish it, though.

"I will, just let me drink this real quick." He’d be infuriating if you were on the opposite side of the table. The way he shoots the stupid little ball while he's still draining the drink in his hand and it splashes gently in the beer it finds in the other teams rack, but right now you're on his side of the table and you love him for it.

“Let’s gooooo!” You jump up and down slapping high fives onto him, his hands aren’t even up, but it’s your third game in a row and you’re really excited.

“It’s your shot, c’mon you lush.” You hit the cup too and the other team begrudgingly rolls the balls back to your side of the table. When you both succeed in sinking the balls back to back again, the game is over and you jump up into his waiting arms. It’s the highlight of your evening.

The party slowly winds down, most of the others heading back into the beach house and crashing on the various makeshift beds. Jimmy wanders inside, but returns quickly with two bottles of water before he sits down next to you.

You sit, side by side, feet slipped into the water over the side of the dock.

“Hey,” he shifts his shoulder up. Your head, resting heavily on him, moves with it. You pick up your head and look up at him. “Yes?” He looks soft and tipsy under the moonlight, and even though it's breezy on the water, there's warmth radiating from your chest out to the rest of your body. You’re too tired to think about it, the sunny day finally catching up to you.

“Let’s go inside; I’m tired,” he pulls his feet back up and stands before you can, holding out a hand to help you up, which you take and pop up next to him.

You don't think about sleeping arrangements until you walk past your room for the past two days and remember that you're supposed to be sleeping in Mal's tonight. Her door is closed and she's wrapped a scrunchie around the handle. Awesome. Tom's room across the hall is locked up, so you know it's been claimed like yours was when a few of the players arrived this afternoon.

You follow behind Jimmy and knock on the still-open door of his master suite.

"Uh, Mal obviously forgot our plan to share." You pout, upset at the idea of having to sleep on the floor after spending the past two days in the plush guest bed. You lean heavily against the door jamb and hope you don't have to ask.

"I mean, she's still sharing, technically. Just not with you," Jimmy takes off his baseball cap and bends the brim in his hands, avoiding eye contact.

You really don't want to sleep on the floor and you've had just enough to drink that you decide you're not going to wait for Jimmy to stumble onto the idea himself.

"Can I stay in here with you?" It comes out soft- he doesn't look up right away and you're not entirely sure that he heard you until he drops his hat on the dresser and plants his hands on his hips, looking over at you.

"Did you think I'd let you end up on the floor somewhere? C'mon (y/n), get real," he has a soft smile on his face as he shakes his head and you finally step into the room.

You sit on the bed and it seems a little surreal. Jimmy says he's going to change in the bathroom. You hear the door close behind him and after a second he starts laughing.

There isn't much time to wonder why he's laughing. He comes out of the bathroom, still in his swim trunks, but with his freckled chest on display. Slightly distracted by his state of undress, it takes a second for you to see what's hanging from his hand.

Your duffle bag.

"Mal left a note," he holds it up in his other hand, "it's folded and says your name, so I didn't read it," he hands you the paper and you open it against your better judgement.

"What's it say?" You really want this conversation to be over, or for him to put a shirt on, or both. Both would be good.

Mal's bubbly handwriting just says "You're welcome," punctuated with a smiley face and a heart above her name. You hate her. It's official.

"It literally just says 'you're welcome,' nothing important." Jimmy's face gets red and it paints down his neck and onto his collar bones.

"Can I use the bathroom? I just want to sleep I'm so tired." He says yes and steps out of your way; you take the duffle bag and close the door behind you.

A quick tear through the bag reveals that you have brought very little in the way of pajamas. A short, old pair of yoga shorts and a threadbare tank top that has definitely seen better days. You dig through again hoping something better will magically appear but it doesn't, so you change into what you have and hope exhaustion carries you off to sleep before you can be too self conscious about your attire.

The light is still on when you exit the bathroom and drop your bag onto the floor next to the bed. Jimmy's already lying down scrolling through his phone and when you peel the covers back you peek that he's still naked from the waist up and your heart trips in your chest. It doesn't help that he's got on these ridiculous Gryffindor sleep pants and you just want to suffocate him in kisses.

"Can I turn out the light?" Your voice is soft again, nervous that the moment is too delicate and will break if you're not careful.

"Yeah, I'm good," Jimmy's voice sounds rough, which doesn't really help matters, but you don't want to think about that as you switch off the lights and lie on your side, facing away from him with as much space in between you as possible. You know you won’t be able to fall asleep for a while so you open up a crossword app on your phone and start a new puzzle.

It’s a minute before you can feel a breath on your neck. “What are you doing, why is it so bright in here?”

He must have rolled closer because you can feel the heat radiating off of him and onto you. “I’m doing a crossword. It helps me sleep.” You roll onto your back and the light from your phone illuminates Jimmy’s face and he squints against it.

“Can I help? I’m not tired yet.”

“Number 16 across, ‘wide receiver’s pattern?”

“Route? Does it fit?”

You type it in and nod, and he shifts closer to you so he can see the board. The crossword is a nice distraction from the fact that you are literally sharing a pillow and that you can feel his pajama pants against your bare leg. You keep reading out clues and he’s actually really good at this and you just want to kiss his dumb, nerd face.

It’s a good thing he’s moved onto poking at your screen, because as he rolls onto his side to face you and get a better view of your phone, you’re sure he'd notice you staring at his exposed collarbones and wide shoulders.

You hand your phone over, your arms tired from holding it up. Jimmy takes it and decides to lay flat on his back. Immediately missing the warmth, you huff and roll onto your side, sleepy and comfortable, tucked into Jimmy’s shoulder.

“You’re not sly, babe.” You jerk, ripping your eyes from all the smooth skin pulled tight over the muscle in his chest.

“Wha- what am I not sly about?” The only thing you can think of is to jump immediately on the defensive, Jimmy doesn’t even look away from number 22-down.

“What are we doing here?” he hits the home button on your phone and closes the app turning his head towards you, nose-to-nose. The direct eye contact is overwhelming, especially since there’s barely any distance between the two of you now, cuddled close after sharing the phone.

“We’re… sleeping?” you chance placing your hand gently on his arm, needing something to ground you for this conversation.

“We are not sleeping, (y/n).” You’re so nervous, breath coming quick and wispy. He knows, oh my God, he knows, how embarrassing, our friendship is ruined, everything is over. The doubts race through your mind, but he lays his big hand on your waist, pulling you a little closer.

You shake your head, “We aren’t,” your voice is small, timid in the dark.

“Can I just-?” His hand snakes from your waist, up your back, leaving chills where it trails, to the smooth skin of your neck. You nod, more furiously than you want to, anything that would have qualified as calm is long gone with the way his heat is seeping into your skin, bodies pressed together, but still so terrified and shy.

You don’t even know what you’re nodding yes to, but it’s Jimmy. He “can just” do anything he wants. He’s so, so smart, and funny, and sweet. Unsure of why you’ve been denying this for so long, he’s showing obvious, undeniable interest, you make a mental note to tell Mal she was right, you are cute together.

It takes him a moment, but he leans in, tilting his head at the last second and kissing you. It’s soft at first, barely brushing lips, with his thumb on your jaw, like you’d ever try to move away. Quickly you get frustrated, so much wasted time, you could have been doing this for months now. You back away and he’s a little breathless, looking up at the ceiling. You’re uncomfortable on your side, arm going numb; boldly you crawl on top of him, straddling his waist.

“Oh,-” he’s surprised before you lean down and start sucking on the tendon in his neck, hands roaming all over the freckled skin you couldn’t look away from hours before.

His words come out broken, and you take it as a victory, pushing your hips back and grinding down gently, “I didn’t- wha-, Jesus Christ.” You give him a break and stop circling your hips, “Use your words, Captain.”

“I wasn’t even sure if you were interested. Why didn't you tell me?” You don’t think he actually wants you to answer, he pulls you back down and his hands go to the bottom of your tank top, tucking underneath and resting on the bare skin of your waist. You don't want to let him get away with it, so you grumble into the kiss, "You didn't say anything either."

You back away because he’s so hard and you can feel him through your shorts and you’re tired of denying yourself the things that you want for some imagined, nonsense reasons. So, you lie back on your side, running your palm up and down Jimmy’s erection, hoping he’d stop you if he felt like it was going to far.

He sighs and puts his hand over yours, stopping the movement and you’re instantly mortified; you’ll probably just die here of embarrassment, but he pipes up, “I didn’t- didn’t bring any condoms. Didn’t know I had a shot.”

The laugh that bubbles up isn’t one you can quell, “It’s okay, we have time for that. Let’s just touch.” He lets go of your hand and lets you continue softly jerking him off. Becoming bold, he slides his pajamas down so there’s less material between you. It’s still not enough and you want to feel the silky skin you know is there, so you creep up into his ear and ask, while slipping the tips of your fingers under the elastic band on his waist, “Please, can I?”

You’ve hardly said please before he tips his hips up and pulls his boxer-briefs down to give you better access. He lets you tug, experimenting with pressure to determine what he likes best.

If asked, not that you'd cop to thinking about it at any length, you would have thought Jimmy would be quiet in bed- stoic and silent, like he usually is. You’re delighted to find out he’s so responsive- talkative and downright chatty. You never have to guess what he likes because he lets out moans and whispers your name like it was created just to fall from his lips in the dark.

He finally grabs your hand and pulls you off of his throbbing cock, “I need a break, I’m going to explode.” You’re annoyed for a second, because, yeah hello- that’s what you’re trying for here. But then he rolls you over onto your back and hovers above you and you’re not so annoyed anymore.

It’s not your first time, but by the time he gets your shorts off, sucks his fingers into his mouth, and gently dips a finger inside you, it may as well be. Nothing in your past has prepared you for the way Jimmy pays attention to you, two fingers in your pussy and his mouth attached to your nipple where he’s tugged the front of your tank top down.

It’s minutes before you come, muscles clenching around his pumping fingers, hands balled into tight fists behind his shoulders. You’re panting out his name, the distant worry that someone in another room may hear you exists before you orgasm, but it peaks and you couldn’t give two damns about anyone who isn’t Jimmy right now. You pull him down and kiss him hard on the mouth.

"Wow. Okay, your turn," he looks delighted at how you wiggle out from under him and push him against the headboard, crawling down to his pelvis. The look slips straight off if his face, replaced by closed eyes and a slack jaw when you take him in your mouth.

You're sleepy and overcome with the lust you feel for Jimmy; it almost seems like a hazy dream, too perfect to be true. Big hands wound in your hair as Jimmy gently supports you bobbing up and down on him, a steady stream of praise leaving his lips, "Baby, please. My god, so good- so pretty -like you so much."

It's the moan you let out around his cock that gets him, has him trying to pull you off, sputtering explanations and apologies as you try your best to let him finish in your mouth. You swallow him down, drunk with the high of what you've just done, a thick film of nerves slowly coating the two of you as you lie side by side in the king bed.

"My parents usually sleep in here," is what he comes up with, breathless and sweaty, pulling you close with one arm.

"OH MY GOD!" You slap your hand down over his mouth, but you can feel the grin that lingers under your hand. "Jimmy, you're the worst."

"Yeah, but you like me. How embarrassing for you." His grin hasn't waned and you're wearing a matching one.

"It is. It's awful," you yawn loud and as much as you'd like to lie in the afterglow, but you're physically and emotionally exhausted after that whirlwind. Jimmy's eyes are looking a little droopy too, so you lay a soft kiss in the center of his chest and snuggle in for the night, his chin resting on the top of your head.

______

In the end, everyone played a part.

It's Mal who finds you in the morning, squealing for Tom in delight of their handiwork.

It's Tom who slides into the room in his socks and high fives Jimmy for "finally manning up."

It's Mal who helps you pick out an outfit for when you officially meet his family at a cousin's wedding, diverting your gaze with warm cheeks after they invite you to their summer home in the cape.

It's Tom who helps Jimmy select an apartment in New York after graduation when Jimmy signs with The Rangers.

It's Jimmy who picks the ring he holds when he drops down on one knee to ask you to have him as your husband.

And it's you that nods yes, dropping down to wrap your arms around his neck and crying into his neck, promising you'll love him forever.

#jimmy vesey imagine #jimmy vesey fic #new york rangers fic #new york rangers imagine #buffalo sabres fic #buffalo sabres imagine #that feels weird i hate it #hockey fic #hockey imagine #nhl fic #nhl imagine #requested #writing #rpf

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willows-adventures-in-words · 4 years ago

Text

I’ve finally completely finished a side project I’ve been working on off-and-on for a little more than a month. I’m proud of this and the one person that’s read it says it turned out really good.

The Last of Us: prologue word count: 5489 content warning (even though I would think it’s obvious): character death ________________________

The only sound in the house was the ticking of the clock. And the soft sound of the rustle of the fabric of the couch as Sarah readjusted herself. It was late at night, almost midnight, and she had fallen asleep waited for her dad to come home from work. He'd been gone all day only leaving a note on the fridge telling her he'd be home late. But even so she waited up for him. It was his birthday after all.

The sound of the front door opened followed immediately by a voice breaking the silence in the dark living room. “Tommy I-” The door closed as Joel continued speaking on his phone. “Tommy. Tommy listen to me; He is the contractor.” He paused for just a second and spoke back up in a hushed voice when he noticed Sarah asleep on the couch. “He's the contractor, okay? I can't lose this job.” There was a brief pause. “I-I understa...” Tommy started to interrupt him but then Joel spoke up. “Let's talk about this in the morning, okay?” He switched on the little table light next to the couch startling his daughter awake. “We'll talk about it in the morning.” Sarah let out a yawn. “Alright, goodnight.” Joel then dropped his phone on the coffee table in front of the couch.

“Hey,” Sarah greeted him as she started to move from her position.

Joel dropped his keys on the table next to his phone as he motioned for her to move. “Scoot.”

Sarah shuffled to the center of the couch making room for her dad to sit down, which he then did. “Fun day at work, huh?” she asked as Joel tiredly ran a hand over his face.

After readjusting his position, Joel rested his temple lightly against his hand and let out a sigh. “What are you still doing up? It's late.”

With momentary panic, Sarah twisted back to look at the clock hanging on the wall behind the couch. “Oh crud, what time is it?” The clock read 11:50.

“It's way past your bedtime.”

Turning to her dad, Sarah told him, “But it's still today,” before turning and moving off the couch and ducking down to grab something she hid between the couch and the hutch that sat next to it.

“Honey please not right now. I do not have the energy for this.”

“Here.” Sarah held out a small box to him even before she was fully on her feet.

Joel turned his attention to her and the gift. “What's this?” he asked as he reached over and accepted the item.

“Your birthday,” Sarah stated as she sat down facing him; eager to see what he'd think. Joel glanced over at her with a smile before flipping open the lid of the box. A watch. “You kept complaining about your broken watch...” He removed the watch from its case and, leaning forward, set the container on the table. ��So, I figured, you know. You like it?”

Leaning back in the couch Joel clasped it on his wrist. He paused as he stared down at the watch. With a slight shake of the head he told her, “Honey, this is...” Lifting the watch to his ear.

“What?”

He tapped the face of the watch. “It's nice but I- I think it's stuck. It's not-”

“What? No, no no no.” Sarah didn't notice the smirk on Joel's face as she grabbed his arm pulling it closer to check the watch. Once she noticed the second hand ticking she shoved his arm back at him. “Oh, ha ha,” she said as she turned away and laid down on the couch, with her head resting on the opposite arm rest. Despite his antics she was still amused but wasn't going to admit it.

He gave his gift another once over. It was a really nice watch. Then, with amusement evident in his voice he asked, “Where did you get the money for this?”

Without missing a beat, Sarah stated, “Drugs.” She looked back to him. “I sell hardcore drugs.”

“Oh, good.” Joel reached forward and picked up the tv remote. “You can start helping out with the mortgage then.” Joel turned on the television.

“Tsk. Yeah, you wish.”

Joel got up from the couch. It was an hour and a half after he had gotten home and Sarah had finally fallen asleep a short time ago. He tilted her knees up and turned her slightly so he could lift her up in his arms. Her head rested against his shoulder as he carried her. Joel took her upstairs and down the hall to her room. Laying her down on her side and he gently brushed a strand of hair out of her face. “Good night baby girl.” He said this softly before he turned to leave the room; pausing briefly at her door he looked back with a soft smile before closing the door, carefully so as not to wake her.

The sound of the phone by her bedside woke her up. Propping herself on her elbow, Sarah reached over and picked it up answering with a hello. “Sarah, honey, I need you to get your daddy on the phone.”

“Uncle Tommy, what time is it?” She stammered a bit, confused and a bit concerned.

“I need to talk to your dad now. There's some-”

Suddenly the line was cut off. “Uncle Tommy? Hello?” When there wasn't a response aside from the beeping she put the phone back on its port. Sitting up she swung her legs over the side of her bed. She pushed herself to her feet before rubbing the sleep from her eyes. “What was that all about?” she wondered aloud as she started to her bedroom door to look for her dad. “Dad?” she called out after leaving her room. There was no response though.

After reaching the bathroom door, which was at the end of the hall from her room, she glanced over and saw light coming from her dad's room. Maybe he was watching tv and didn't hear her. Sarah called out to him again as she started over to his room. The door was cracked open and she could indeed hear the tv on. It sounded like the news. Pushing the door open she asked, “You in here?” She glanced about the room. The TV and ceiling fan were on, bed was a mess but empty. “Where the heck are you..?”

Sarah wondered in the room as the the lady on the news caught her attention. “We've received reports that victims afflicted with the infection show signs of increased aggression and-” she paused as a man hurried over to the other men behind her and started speaking.

“We need to move everybody out of here now. There's a gas leak. Hey! Move!” He shouted the last part to some of the others.

“There seems to be some commotion coming from behi-”

The man from before interrupted and yelled over to her. “Lady get the hell outta here right-” He was cut off as an explosion went off behind them cutting the video feed bringing static to the TV.

“Uh... what was that?” Sarah questioned. Though barely finished the thought when an explosion was heard. She jerked her attention out the window and saw the last bit of fire and the plume of smoke in the air. Staring out the window it took her a moment to recover. But once she did she turned and hurried out of the room. “Dad?!” she called out more panicked than she was before.

The little night light illuminated the stairs as Sarah started downstairs. “What is goin' on?” She could hear police sirens even before they passed by the front of their house. Sarah paused momentarily to watch the three police cars speed by. Once the sound of there sirens past she could hear the sound of dogs barking outside. Walking through the living room to the dining room she stopped as she heard her dad's phone buzzing. Looking over she spotted it on the extra counter-top in the kitchen. “There's his phone.” Her bare feet were chilled as she stepped onto the tiled floor of the kitchen. Picking up the phone she took note of the missed notifications. “Eight missed calls. Where the hell are you? Call me. On my way.” The two texts were from her uncle and she assumed the calls were too. She set the phone down. What was going on?

She noticed the double doors to their den were open. Maybe her dad was there? Sarah was about to call out again when suddenly, one of the dogs that were barking outside let out a whine and fell silent. With a gasp, Sarah hugged herself. She was on edge as she continued towards the open doors. Pushing them open the rest of the way she slowly made her way inside. She glanced around then jumped when someone ran inside from the open slider than quickly turned and closed the door behind them. He was panting heavily. She relaxed a little once she realized it was her dad. “There you are.”

Joel quickly looked over at the sound of her voice. “Sarah. Are you okay?” He bumped against the rolling chair at the desk. He sent a quick glance to the desk next to him before he looked back to Sarah. The second she told him 'yeah', Joel turned to the desk and quickly opened one of the drawers and removed a box setting it on the desk and opened it. “Has anyone come in here?” he asked her with a quick look to his daughter before turned back to the gun case.

“No. Who would come in here?” Sarah asked as she stepped closer. She watched him as he removed the handgun and started to load the ammunition.

“Don't go near the doors. Just...” He sounded panicked. Everything he'd been saying held a sense of panic to it. “Just stand back...”

Sarah was already unnerved and the way her dad was talking and acting was making her a little afraid. And it showed in her voice as she spoke. “Dad, you're kinda freaking me out.” Though she did as she was told and stepped back towards more of the middle of the room, she asked, “What's going on?”

“It's the Coopers. Somethin' ain't right with 'em. I th- I think they're sick.”

“What kind of sick?” She barely finished her question when there was a bang on the glass sliding door Joel had come in from earlier. Sarah let out a startled gasp and took a couple steps back.

“Jesus.” Joel jerked back, gun in hand, and turned his attention to the door. The bloodied man outside hit the door again. “Jimmy!”

“Dad?”

Joel quickly moved over to his daughter. “Honey, c'mere. C'mere.” He protectively kept one arm back by her as she ducked behind him. The man, Jimmy, banged against the glass again. “Jimmy- Jimmy just stay back!” He banged against it again this time the glass shattered and he stumbled and fell inside. “Jimmy I am warning you.”

Sarah whispered, “Oh my god...” As Jimmy scrambled to his feet and charged at them.

“Don't!” Joel shouted in a last attempt to get through to him. Jimmy was barely a foot away from them when Joel pulled the the trigger. Sarah cried out behind him. Blood splattered and Jimmy went down. He writhed for a second before he was still.

Joel started to back up, ushering his daughter to do the same. “Go.” He grabbed Sarah by the wrist and turned around. “Go.” Joel pulled her from the room while she stared in shock at their dead neighbor. He brought them to a stop in the dining room. Joel tucked the handgun in his jeans.

“You... You shot him...”

“Sarah.” Joel rested his hands on her shoulders.

“I saw him this mornin'.”

“Listen to me; there is something bad going on. We have got to get outta here. Do you understand me?”

She sniffled and paused for a second before nodding. “Yeah.”

Headlights shone through the windows. Joel looked up. “Tommy. C'mon.” He took her by the hand. Sarah sent a glance back to the den. “C'mon,” he said again as he coaxed her towards the front door.

“Okay.” She quickly hurried along only to send one more look back as they were reaching the door.

They were barely outside when Tommy spoke up. “Where the hell you been?” He walked around the front of his SUV towards them as they stepped off their deck and headed to his vehicle. “You have any idea what's goin' on out there?”

“I got some notion,” Joel told him.

“Holy shit. You got blood all over you.”

Joel opened the back door of the SUV. “C'mon baby. Go on in there.” Though she didn't need to be told as she was already climbing in. As he shut the door behind her he told his brother, “It ain't mine. Let's just get outta here.”

“They're saying that half the people in the city have lost their minds,” Tommy told him as Joel opened the passenger side door.

“Can we just please go?” Joel said as he got in the car shutting the door behind him.

Tommy continued talking as he headed back around to the drivers side. “Some sort of parasite or somethin'.” Getting in the car he shut the door then turned to his brother and asked, “You gonna tell me what happened?”

“Later.”

That was good enough for him as he started the car back up. “Hey, Sarah,” he started as he backed the car out of Joel's driveway. “How you holdin' up honey?”

“I'm fine.” Once he was done backing up she scootched to the middle seat and rested a hand on the side of her dad's seat. “Can we hear what's on the radio?”

Tommy started driving down the road. “Yeah, sure thing,” he told her as he reached to the dash to turn it on.

“Thanks.”

He fiddled with the dials for a bit before giving up. “No cellphone. No radio. Yeah, we're doin' great. Minute ago newsman wouldn't shut up.”

“They say where to go?” Joel asked.

“He said, ah... Army's puttin' up road blocks on the highway. No gettin' into Travis County.”

“That means we need to get the hell out,” Joel stated. Police sirens were heard as they approached a T intersection. “Take 71.”

“71,” Tommy said it at the same time as Joel, “that's where I'm headed.” He waited for the cops to pass by before heading in the direction they came from.

Sarah spoke up and asked, “Did they say how many were dead?” Joel looked back at her.

“Probably a lot,” Tommy told her. “Found this one family all mangled inside their house.”

Joel turned his attention to him and grabbed his arm. “Tommy.” A warning telling him to stop.

Tommy quickly looked over then glanced back at Sarah. “Right.” He turned back to the road. “Sorry.”

They traveled in silence for a moment before they spotted a car crashed into a street light. “Jesus Christ, how did this happen?”

Pulling onto the dirt road next to the accident, Tommy spoke up. “They got no clue. But we ain't the only town. At first they were saying it was just the South. Now they're going on about the East Coast, the West Coast...” He stopped when he saw a barn house on fire a distance ahead of them. “Holy hell. That's Louis' farm. I hope that son of a bitch made it out.”

Sarah shuffled over to the window and pressed her hands against it as she stared out at the fire as they drove by. “I'm sure he did,” Joel told him. It was an attempt to being a little positive. Since being a doom thinker, or even thinking realistically given the circumstance, with Sarah present was not something he wanted to do. Not right now.

“...Are we sick?” Sarah asked still looking out at the burning building.

“No, of course not,” Joel told her.

“How do you know?”

This time it was Tommy that spoke up. “They said it's just ah, people in the city,” he tried to reassure her. “We're good.”

Sarah turned back to the front. “Didn't Jimmy work in the city?”

There was a slight pause. “That's right he did.”

“We're fine. Trust me,” Joel told her.

“Alright.” She said this softly. She wanted to believe it.

They drove for a bit longer before Tommy slowed slightly as he saw a family on the side of the road. “Let's see what they need.”

Joel turned to him and demanded, “What the hell do you think your doin'? Keep drivin'.”

Tommy sent a look over to his brother. “They got a kid, Joel.”

“So do we,” Joel ground out.

“But we have room,” Sarah spoke up.

The man on the road side waved his arms to get their attention. “Keep drivin', Tommy,” Joel told him. Tommy reluctantly complied. They could hear the man call for them stop. “You ain't seen what I seen. Someone else 'll come along.”

Sarah twisted back in her seat and watched them grow smaller as they got farther away. “... We shoulda helped them.” It fell quiet in the car after that.

It was only a couple minutes later, as they started down hill, that the medical center came into view. Then the sound of a siren sounded as an ambulance pulled out onto the road and flew past them. Sarah watched as it drove by. “Oh, this is bad.” Sarah turned her attention back to the front. There was a line of cars far beyond what they could see. “Everyone and their mother had the same damn idea.”

Joel sighed. “Well... we could just backtrack and-” He stopped as the driver of the car in front of them got out of his vehicle and started hollering at the people stopped farther down. Suddenly, someone wearing a hospital gown charged out of the brush by the road and slammed the man against his car before throwing him to the ground and attacking him. “Holy shit.” It was said under Joel's breath as the scene unfolded. Someone else ran over, also wearing a gown, and clambered inside the car attacking the passenger. “Turn us around. Tommy.” Joel shook his brothers shoulder and shouted his name when one of the attackers started towards their vehicle.

That snapped him out of his shocked state. “Holy shit!” he exclaimed as he quickly switched his SUV in reverse and backing up. Just as he stepped on the gas the man hit against the back drivers side window startling Sarah. “What the fuck just happened – did you see that?” The road they were now on led into the city.

“Yes. I saw it.” Tommy cursed under his breath. Joel pointed off the their left. “Turn here. Turn here.”

Tommy took a sharp turn causing his passengers to brace themselves. Except the road they turned onto had dozens of people running in their direction. Afraid. He slowed down and inched his way forward trying to get through them. “Come on people. Move.”

“What are they running from?” Sarah questioned. She was wary; bordering on afraid. The people were crying out, terrified.

“Get us outta here.”

“I'm tryin',” Tommy told his brother before slamming on his breaks to stop himself from hitting someone.

“We can't stop here Tommy,” Joel stated.

“I can't fuckin' drive through 'em Joel!”

“Then back up then!”

“They're behind me too!”

The amount of people dwindled and the gap between the crashed camper and buildings on the other side was open. “There. There!” Joel shouted as he pointed out the opening.

“Hold on!” Tommy started through the gap. A couple stragglers jumped out of the way of his vehicle. He turned so they were back on the road and about to cross an intersection.

Sarah gasped and shouted, “Look out!” Joel and Tommy had just enough time to look over as a truck came barreling down the road slamming into them.

Joel woke to his daughter shaking his arm and calling quietly out to him. “What..?” There was also the sound of chaos. Opening his eyes the first thing he saw was a crashed truck with two occupants; one dead and the other violently attacking them. Their own vehicle was on its side. “Get back, baby. Get back.” Joel readjusted his position, bracing his hands against the top of the vehicle and lifted his leg, and kicked hard against the already cracked windshield. And again. He grunted in frustration before he kicked it again, this time shattering and knocking it out of the SUV.

Pushing himself up on his elbow, Joel shifted his position before crawling out amongst the people fleeing the chaos. Climbing to his feet, he leaned for a second against the knocked over vehicle before it sounded like someone shouted something before he saw, just in time, the mad man running at him. Joel got pushed back against the SUV by the growling and grunting man. Pressing his forearm against his chest, Joel tried to keep him at a distance while with his other hand deflecting his attempts to hit him. Then suddenly Tommy ran over and slammed a brick in the crazed man face. He was dead as he hit the ground. A look of shocked relief crossed Joel's face. His eyes caught Tommy's as his brother looked back to him before they heard Sarah call out.

Joel quickly ducked down to the front of the vehicle. “I'm here, baby, I'm here. Come on gimme your hand.” She quickly scrambled over and grabbed his hand stumbling slightly as she exited the vehicle. Sarah let out a gasp as she put pressure on her leg and fell against her dad. “What is it?” Joel asked, concerned.

“My leg hurts,” she told him, out of breath and in pain.

Joel slouched slightly to look her in the face. “How bad?”

“Pretty bad.”

“We're gonna need to run,” Tommy called over as he backed away from acting as a lookout.

Turning to where Tommy was watching, Joel muttered, “Oh my god.” Reaching back he grabbed his gun from where he'd tucked it away to earlier and handed it to his brother. “You keep us safe,” he told him. “Come on baby,” he said as he scooped his daughter up in his arms. “Now hold on tight.”

“Okay,” she managed as Joel ran down the street following after Tommy.

There were shouts and screams around them as they ran. The crazed, infected people ran at them dragging people to the ground. Swarming over the ones that stumbled or tripped and fell. “Daddy, I'm scared.”

Tommy shouted to Joel to watch out. Joel took a second to acknowledge the incoming threat who instead went after someone who was drug down by another. “Keep your eyes closed honey,” he said in response to his daughters fear.

A car was seen crashing into the gas station up ahead causing an explosion. Joel held Sarah closer as he and Tommy started down another road. There was a building on fire with people starting to shamble out. “Those people are on fire...”

“Don't look, Sarah. Just keep looking at me baby.” If she wasn't going to shut her eyes the best he could do was try to keep her focused on him instead of the chaos around them.

Tommy came to a stop in front of a fire truck that was stopped blocking the road. He glanced about for a second before pointing over to the front of the truck where there was a gap. “Over there!” They continued on. Tommy, however, jerked to a halt as a couple cars crashed into each other.

Joel continued talking to his daughter. Continued to try to reassure her. “We're gonna get outta this. I promise.”

As they started to approach the theater at the end of the street they could clearly see the fire emitting from a car before it exploded. Tommy shouted back to Joel, “Get back! There's too many of 'em.” Tommy quickly spotted another path and waved them over. “This way! Through the alley!” he called over as he hurried to the alley and pushed open the iron gate holding it open for his brother.

Joel ran through the open door and past his brother. Once the alley opened up more, Joel noticed movement in his peripheral. He acted quickly. Turning, he dropped Sarah's legs and raised his now free arm to block their incoming assailant with his forearm; much like he's done before. His attacker flailed and hit him in the back before Tommy kicked the man back causing him to fall to the ground. Tommy rushed over, stepped on his chest, and shot him in the head. “He's dead,” he told Joel.

“Jesus,” Joel muttered under his breath. Quickly, he scooped Sarah back up in his arms and followed after his brother. “We're almost there. We're almost there, baby.” Her grip tightened slightly.

They kept moving down the zigzag of the alley. They spotted a fenced wall with three infected men on the other side trying to get through. But according to Tommy they were succeeding, though Joel couldn't see where and wasn't about to stop to look. The alley ended on the next turn. Ahead of them was a dead end. There were a couple large dumpsters and to their right there looked to be outdoor seating for a restaurant. “C'mon!” Tommy ran up the few steps towards the side-door to the diner. “Joel! Move it!” The second Joel got inside with Sarah, Tommy turned to swing the door closed. But the three guys from behind the fence reached the door and stuck their arms through. They were pushing and swinging their arms around trying to grab him. “Get to the highway!”

Joel turned to face him. “What?” He didn't want to leave him in the midst of this.

“Go,” he insisted. “You got Sarah! I can out run 'em!”

“Uncle Tommy!” There was fear in her voice. She's seen enough; she didn't want him to be left behind. She didn't want him to die.

Joel hesitated for a second. Before he concluded that he was right. He had to worry about Sarah. And Tommy was quick. ...But so were the crazed infected people. “I will meet you there.” He told him this with the tone that said 'you better be there.'

“Hurry!” Tommy called after them as Joel moved through the restaurant to get to he front doors.

Sarah was on the verge of tears as Joel pushed through the door. “Daddy, we can't leave him.”

“He's gonna be fine,” he tried to reassure her. They stepped out to a parking area. There was a wall surrounding the property. Part of the smaller portion of the wall was broken and easy to pass through. Joel crossed the parking lot trying to ignore the man getting mauled by one of the infected people. They were on a dirt path that wound towards the highway. “We're almost there.”

They could hear the infected man behind them. “They're gettin' closer.”

A tipped over ambulance laid on the side of the path. As they passed by Joel saw a paramedic crawling out, grunting and groaning in that non-normal way. He hurried onward up the hill. They were getting closer. He could hear them. Were they going to make?

Suddenly, there was gunfire from an automatic weapon. Sarah hid her face in Joel's shoulder as she screamed out and Joel twisted away trying to keep her out of harms way and held her closer. There was a light flashing at them. Joel looked over once the gunfire ended. There stood a soldier. Turning back to his daughter he said, “It's okay, baby.” She lifted her head. “We're safe. We're safe.” He was out of breathe. All that running and finally, finally they were going to be okay. “Hey!” he called out to the soldier. “We need help.”

“Stop!” The man lifted a hand signaling for them to stop.

“Please.” Joel started a slow, worn approach. “It's my daughter. I think her legs broken.”

The soldier pointed his gun at them. “Stop right there!”

Joel froze. “Okay...” He took a couple slow steps back. “We're not si-sick.”

He spoke into his radio. “Got a couple of civilians in the outer perimeter. Please advise.”

“Daddy, what about Uncle Tommy?” Sarah asked her dad though not looking away from the other man.

Joel sent a quick glance to her, wary of what was going on, before turning his attention to her and saying, “We're gonna get you to safety and go back for him. Okay?” She looked up at him for a moment but when the soldier spoke again they both turned their attention back to him.

“Sir, there's a little girl.” Joel tensed slightly. “But...” The soldier gave a slight sigh. “Yes Sir.”

“Listen, buddy, we've just been through hell.” There was a tenseness to his voice as well. Though it held a bit of desperation as he continued. “Okay, we just need-” He abruptly cut his sentence short as the soldier lifted his rifle. “Oh, shit.” Just as he started to turn away the soldier opened fire. They both cried out and Joel unintentionally dropped his daughter and they went tumbling down the hill.

Joel groaned as he rolled onto his back, a hand to his side. He scrunched himself up slightly as the soldier came down he hill. The light on the rifle blinding him as he looked up. He pleaded with him. “Please, don't.”

Suddenly a shot fired and the soldier's head jerked as blood splattered. Joel watched in shock as he fell to the ground. He lifted his gaze to see Tommy walking over. Tommy gave him a quick nod before he stopped in his tracks; his eyes looked past Joel. “Oh no...”

That's when Joel heard it. The crying. Joel twisted back to look. “Sarah!” Quickly, he crawled over on hands and knees to his crying daughters side. Sarah had her hands pressed to her bloody side. “Move your hands baby.” But she wasn't. He took one of them and she immediately reached up to him with her other. Her gasping cries. Her fear and pain. “I know, baby. I know...” Joel pressed his hands to her wound. “Listen to me. I know this hurts, baby.” She grabbed onto his arm. “You're gonna be okay, baby. Stay with me.” Sarah needed help. Help he couldn't give her. He needed to get her help. “Alright. I'm gonna pick you up.” She cried out. “I know baby. I know it hurts.” Joel looked to Tommy, desperate. “Come on, baby. Please.” Tommy slowly slumped down to his knees. “I know, baby. I know.” Why was he giving up? They had to help Sarah. They... Suddenly there was silence.

Joel looked down to his daughter. “Sarah...” Her eyes were open, but she was quiet. He gripped her hand. “Baby...” He rocked her in his arms. “Don't do this to me, baby. Don't do this to me, baby girl. Come on...” Lowering his head, broken sobs wrecked through him. “No. no...” Joel pulled her close and held onto to her. “Oh no, no, no... Please.” He sat, holding her, rocking back and forth. “Oh, God. Please, please, don't do this. Please, God...”

Joel stopped talking then. He just cried, holding his daughter's body.

#the Last of Us #Joel Miller #Sarah Miller #Tommy Miller #My writing

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shortyscartooncorner · 5 years ago

Photo

Say hello to the Webcomic I’ve been working on as of late as a side project of my super project, Furnace. Its a unworldly horrorish comic about odd if not terrible things happening to people. If that concept rustles your jimmies feel free to give it a read! You can read it here at, https://www.webtoons.com/en/challenge/please-help-me-im-broken/list?title_no=405959

and https://tapas.io/series/Please-Help-Me-Im-Broken

#horror #comic #webcomic #webcomics #cartoon #cartoons #Shorty's Cartoon Corner

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roaminginspiration · 5 years ago

Text

The Empty Space Next to Me

chap 1 (x) / chap 2 (x) / chap 3 (x) / chap 4 (x) / chap 5 (x) / chap 6 (x) / chap 8 (x) / chap 9 (x) / chap 10 (x)

Chapter 7

One day Steve is working behind the house, sorting out old furniture and gardening equipment. Farther away, close to an oak tree, he catches sight of a gravestone, rather new and carefully maintained amidst the unkempt meadow.

He pus down the boxes and walks over to it. There are three-day-old white lilies lying on the top edge, and a small pot of flowers on each side. Standing in front of it, he reads the epitaph on the marble stone: “Robert Miller — Beloved Husband”.

Small footsteps make the grass rustle behind him. Katherine is standing by his side with a stern expression. He stands still while feeling her presence, always perceptible and adequate.

“Eliza was among the Dusted,” she begins, gazing at the grave. “Her husband waited for her. He never left the house, not a single day, hoping that someday she would return. They don’t have any children. Only this mansion, and Riley. He died 8 months before the Second Snap.”

His jaw clenches and he feels a slight lump in the throat. He heard many sad stories when he ran the therapy group during the five-year period, but this one affects him particularly. Perhaps because he has grown fond of Eliza; perhaps because her sad story isn’t so different from his. He understands why Katherine said there were many sadder stories.

“When Eliza came back to this empty mansion, she thought it would be good to make it a guesthouse, fill it with life and company after it was silent and empty for so long.”

Her eyes shift to look at him and she notices the hurt on his face, the compassion in his eyes. And it leaves her stunned.

____________________________

A couple of days later, on a bright but mild day as he is finishing painting the last layer on the porch railings, Katherine steps out of the house. She stands in the middle of the porch and smiles at him. She is wearing black jeans with a long-sleeved top.

“Just had a talk with Eliza. I told her you had your afternoon free.”

He puts the pot of paint down on the square of fabric on the ground to avoid stains. “We’re going somewhere?”

Her smile widens and her head nods in the direction of the Chevy. “Just come and find out.”

And they get in the car.

After a ten-minute drive, they reach a big property with the airs of a ranch. Shortly after stepping out of the car, they are warmly greeted by a couple in their late fifties.

“Phil. Lorna. This is Steve. He works with me at Eliza’s.”

“Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you.” One says with a strong Southern accent while the other beams.

He shakes their hands before putting them in his pockets.

“Well, you know the way, Katherine. Just let us know if you need anything.”

The woman leans in to kiss her cheek and they resume their chores. Next, Katherine takes him the opposite way to the large barn further down.

The large door is open and she takes the lead to walk inside.

She greets Jimmy, the young stable-boy in his twenties. He eyes Steve over his shoulder before answering hi.

“We’re at the Dawsons,” Steve says softly.

She turns around to flash a smile before heading in a routinely manner to one of the stables while he stands in the middle of the barn aisle.

“There, girl.” He hears her say. And she steps out a few seconds later, gently holding the bridle to take the animal out. A majestic golden brown horse with ebony hair.

Her hand softly strokes its face. “This is Marquis,” she says, not taking her eyes off of it.

Sensing his hesitation, she tilts her head in his direction. “You’ve ever been around horses?”

“Not really.”

She smiles and strokes the horse again. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

She lets the reins hanging and goes to pick up the bucket filled with carrots. She gets two pieces and opens her palm for the horse to eat. He watches her, fascinated by the gentleness she displays, and the ease with which she does it.

“I thought we could find you a friend and go for a ride,” she says. “All you have to do is choose the girl you want.”

He chuckles nervously. “It usually takes me long to choose.”

She grins. “Good! Horses need time, too. First, you need to bond.”

He clears his throat nervously and begins to wander along the aisle, looking into each stable. He eventually stops in front of the stall door where a slender black horse is drinking water. It turns around and eyes him, just as intently as he is gazing at the animal.

Katherine comes by his side.

“Black horse?” she asks.

“Well, they don’t come in navy blue,” he answers with a grin. She smirks back.

“Fiona is quite gentle, although sometimes stubborn.”

He couldn’t have made a better pick.

Katherine holds up the bucket of carrots for him to collect from.

“Hold your arm out a little without being pushy. Let her decide if she’ll take it.”

He follows her instructions. The horse takes a couple of steps back then slowly comes closer to the stall door with the same guarded demeanor. Its lips brush against his palm and pick up the carrots.

Katherine smiles. She reaches down for his hand and gently presses it on the horse’s face. His palm feel the smooth coat of the animal, but every nerve on the back of his hand feel her soft skin lying on top. Her fingers fall between his as her hand gently guides his caress. He is holding his breath, his mind saturated by nothing but the ruling awareness of their physical touch.

“Yeah. You got this,” she murmurs and her hand delicately pulls away.

The horse lets out a gentle neigh of approval. Steve laughs gently, exhilarated by this experience in every aspect. He turns to look at her.

“Let’s get started,” she says, and he loves the promise of what is to come.

After more than thirty minutes Fiona warms up enough to him not to brush him away whenever he attempts to climb up.

“Are you settled?” she asks from the ground.

He looks at her with a slightly apprehensive wince. “Kat, are you sure about this?”

She smirks. “Relax and trust me.”

She takes hold of the reins. He watches as she gently leads his horse and walks a big circle.

After a few minutes of acclimation, she hands it over to him and gets on Marquis. She makes it turn around with startling easiness to walk along next to him.

“How did you know you’d be good at it?” he asks her.

The corner of her lips curls up. “I didn’t. But when you don’t remember anything about who you are and what you can do, you take it you might as well try everything.”

They trot and eventually quicken the pace to mild galloping. Her face lights up with excitement as the strands of hair fly in the wind. She has never looked so free and unhindered. He has never seen her so beautiful. Joy suits her.

________________________________

A couple of days later, the mind filled with the exhilarating memories of his first horseback ride, Steve is sitting on the front porch staircase along with Katherine, enjoying the sunny day. Riley has been regularly interrupting their small talks whenever she has successfully fetched the tennis ball he throws.

She does it again for an nth time but pauses and turns around, hearing an imminent arrival. It's Jake. He pulls the car over and comes out: his eyes immediately fall upon them. He briefly pets Riley and walks over to them with a wide smile.

Katherine frowns in surprise, not the least expecting his visit.

She stands up and he quickly captures her lips for a peck. She laughs nervously, self-conscious about the presence of a third party.

“What are you doing here?” she asks as he greets Steve with a nod.

“I took the afternoon off and thought we could do something.”

She scratches her temple. “I have some things to finish. Why didn’t you call me before?”

“Wanted to surprise you. That is all.”

Steve goes back inside the house.

Riley is wagging her tail expectantly, waiting for Steve to throw the tennis ball. He does but it takes a bit of will not to accidentally throw it a little farther to the left where a certain someone is standing.

Jake’s body language changes slightly as he puts his hands in his pockets. “I came across Jimmy and he said you came to do some horseback riding…with Steve. I thought that when you would want to do it with someone else, you’d take me.”

She presses her hand on his chest. “Steve and I work together, and he’s from the city. I thought this was fitting,” she explains casually, then her intent gaze falls on him. “I didn’t know it mattered so much to you.”

Jake pinches the bridge of his nose and chuckles nervously, letting out a sigh he was holding in the process. He puts his hands around her waist and shakes his head. “You’re right — I get it. Maybe next time you’ll invite me…no pressure of course.”

He flashes the wide, beaming smile she finds adorable.

They go together inside so he can greet Eliza. She’s sitting in the couch while Steve is measuring the window in the kitchen.

Jake turns to face Katherine again. “So, how about a little getaway? Maybe we could go hunting again. You were amazing.”

He looks enthusiastically to Eliza and Steve. “You wouldn’t believe. She was so good — better than all my hunting buddies. Her hand didn’t shake…”

“That was just one time,” Katherine comments sheepishly but her voice is barely audible under Jake’s passionate speech who doesn’t seem to pick up. She glances over at Steve with a noticeably uneasy expression.

“…steady arm and gaze,” he carries on. “Bullseye on the first shot.”

“Jake,” she says softly. Steve puts the measuring tape down and walks over to the counter, eyes fixed on her.

Jake smiles. “I’m telling you, born to kill.”

“Enough!” She exclaims.

Jake freezes and heavy silence falls on the room and settles. He furrows his brows, confused, concerned and apologetic although he cannot tell what he said wrong. Steve and Eliza exchange a glance. Jake reaches over to hold her arm but she pulls away and makes her way to the backroom. He follows her but comes out a minute later with a disconcerted expression before walking out of the house.

Dinner goes normally. Kat takes part in the conversation and smiles; but he notices the long minutes during which she doesn’t say a single word and how quickly her grin drops. He sees her downcast eyes and it seems he can read the thoughts that are in her mind. He knows her too well not to realize she is upset, no matter how subtle it may look.

Later on, after undressing and going to bed, his mind still with Katherine, an idea comes to him.

He takes his cellphone and quickly presses the call button.

“Hi, Buck. I’m gonna need a favor.”

________________________________

A couple of days later, Steve is on his way back from town where he went to buy pots of floor wax and wood. As the Chevy drives down the muddy road, he finds a shiny, expensive SUV parked. He parks the Chevy behind it, gets out to collect the equipment lying in the back of the truck, eyes glancing at the unknown car.

He puts everything at the foot of the stairs and goes in. He walks into the living room and, to his surprise, find Bucky sitting silently in the couch, and Sam, sprawling beside him, while sipping a glass of lemonade. Eliza, sitting in her armchair, is eyeing them intently.

“It looks like we have guests,” Katherine says, appearing from the kitchen.

“What are you doing here?” Steve asks. He turns to Kat. “They’re my friends and teammates.”

Katherine probes them in a new light. “So you…,” she begins, pointing at them, then herself.

“I know how puzzling it feels,” Bucky speaks softly. “I’ve been there. I recovered my memory only a few years ago. I was brainwashed.”

Katherine blinks with an unconcealed puzzled expression.

“OKAY,” Sam exclaims loudly, rising to his feet. He walks over to her and points a thumb over his shoulder, where James is sitting. “This is Bucky, the ice-breaker of the team as you’ve figured. I’m Sam Wilson.”

She politely shakes his hand as her eyes quickly flicker in Bucky’s direction then back to him. “Oh, Sam…,” she repeats as she puts a face on a name she has heard before.

Steve is watching from his spot, slightly tense.

Sam is looking at her closely. He gulps down a little and his eyes are gleaming subtly. “Wow,” he simply says, stopping himself.

She doesn’t say a word, seeming to read the next words he didn’t voice aloud. Then she turns to James. “It’s nice to meet you too, Bucky,” she adds.

A few minutes later, she takes Eliza upstairs.

“What are you doing here?” Steve asks again.

Sam smirks cockily. “When you said handyman, I had to come all the way here to see it with my two eyeballs.”

“Yeah, I was pretty curious, too.” Bucky echoes quietly.

Wilson eyes him up and down. “I mean, look at you. You have adopted the lumberjack look, completely.”

“Well, they only have checked shirts available around here,” he jokes coolly.

“We’re only here for a short while anyway,” Bucky says reassuringly.

“Yep. Just long enough to evaluate a look at your housework,” Sam says. His eyes scan the room., and he pouts appreciatively. “The house is still standing for one.”

Steve rolls his eyes and chuckle. He has to admit, it’s good to see them.

Less than an hour later, Steve and Bucky are taking a walk around the house. They have a little catch-up where they have small talks and exchange banters.

As they finally return and stand to look at the house and its quiet, peaceful surroundings, Bucky says while staring musingly.

“Yeah, it’s a great place.”

Steve turns to him. “What are you thinking?”

A smile tugs at his best friend’s lips. He nods to himself, taking in the scenery, then looks at him. “That I understand why you would decide to stay here for good.”

He frowns, shakes his head, ready to retort. But Bucky stops him. “It’s ok, Steve. You, more than anyone, deserve a life without war. You’ve earned it.”

“You too, Buck.”

James snorts sadly. “Not me. Not yet. I still have a lot to make up for.”

______________________________

It is nearly the end of the afternoon when Sam and Steve are talking to the porch. Like a diligent right-hand man, he reports on the Avengers business. So far, all fine —not that he doubted it. The usual minor incidents that do not require his presence.

They walk over to the SUV. Sam opens the back door, reaches for a closed box and holds it up.

“Here. The favor you asked Bucky.”

His chest swells a little as he delicately takes the box in his hand.

Katherine and Bucky come out of the house and stand on the porch, in deep conversation, much to Steve’s surprise. They have been talking for nearly an hour. It seems that where Natasha never really managed to bond with James (probably due to their rough common history), Katherine found something to connect with him. She naturally walked to him as she felt he was the one who was fit to understand her situation the best.

It is time to part. Kat shakes Sam’s hand warmly, while her handshake with James lasts a little longer, as they exchange a deep, meaningful glance; her eyes filled with gratitude, understanding and benevolence.

Steve hugs them both and moves the Chevy away. The SUV disappears down the path.

In the evening, he walks down the hall upstairs and knocks on her bedroom door.

“How are you?” he asks.

She knows what he means. “Quite good, actually. It was interesting to meet them. And insightful.”

He nods in relief.

“Kat,” he begins. “I thought I should give you this.”

He holds the box that he asked for. She eyes it curiously. She takes it, removes the lid and unwraps the tissue paper.

“Pointe shoes?” she comments with an arched eyebrow.

In other circumstances, it would hurt to have to part with them, but now he feels nothing but grateful content knowing they return to their rightful owners.

“They’re yours, actually.” Her fingers gently brush the silken fabric. “You once said that you were scared of the Black Widow. But that’s not all she was. She was far more than that.”

Her pupils widen, covering the green of her eyes with deep black. “I could dance?”

He smiles warmly. His heart swells as he reminisces the time she allowed him to watch her dance. It was on a rainy November day in the Compound. A wonderful sight. He recalls how her body gracefully swirled with the music, both with discipline and beauty, how her body seemed to soar to the sky in every jump, how her feet landed on the wooden floor in a muffled sound. Precision allied with finesse. She danced along with the music until she became the music. An enchanting melody — he remembers thinking he had never seen her so beautiful.

“Oh yes, you could!” he attests, with a burst of soft laughter. “A truly talented ballerina.”

Katherine stares at the worn shoes like a treasure. Her eyes fill up with tears. She swallows it down, though; locks it away. He sees how there is still so much of Natasha in Katherine.

She puts the box down on the piece of furniture besides her and springs into his arms. He welcomes it with joyful surprise. She holds him tight in her arms.

When she eventually pulls away, she gazes at him with a smile.

“Thank you, Steve.”

He feels pride and content as he knows he has just made Katherine the most beautiful gift, and honored the memory of Natasha Romanoff in the best possible way.

#romanogers #Steve Rogers #Natasha Romanoff #Black Widow #captain america #stevenat #fanfic #writing #the empty space next to me #inneedofinspiration #steve x natasha #capwidow #captasha

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unproduciblesmackdown · 5 years ago

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let's see those Prime Numbers for the ask meme

2) favorite albums?

well i was Ready for kesha’s album Warrior to come out in iiii think it was the end of 2012 or early 2013?? i snuck out to that tour in dc that summer also. totally solid album and it was fun to have something so fun during a totally Not Fun period lol. i was also pretty into owl city at the exact same time lmao, that’s Blatantly for when you’re depressed lol...and i also eventually saw that guy on tour when a new album came out in 2015, and that was fun too, and was Enjoying Myself a factor in the tipping point of “ah jeez i gots 2 get outta here” that i had in the next month? maybe! and uhhh i listened a lot to the phoenix te amo album. that one wasnt tied to anything at all but i have heard it So much. super short and also rock solid and relistenable. and then here we are and the bmc obcr is a gift to the world b/c a) it exists and b) Cuz It All Slaps and c) it’s so fun to either sing or dance along, or cry along if it’s the agtikbi reprise and d) lgw... and e) all the eternal, well-mixed wroland vocals

3) favorite memes?

oh god lmao idk......real earlier 10s stuff was the I Say Hey he-man meme, and the “that really rustles my jimmies” meme which was real underrated......there’s been plenty of Memes where i’ve been like “this one is funny to me Every Time” but of course now looking back on it it’s like. what’s a meme??? Vine

(skipping 5 & 11 cuz that’s the Entirety of someone else’s ask and i don’t wanna just have to scrap theirs completely and i’ll get to it next!!)

11) favorite fanarts?

you know what, there’s continuously been a ton of amazing fanart where i’m like, i’m so glad i’m seeing this, & this is Artistic Fuel, and marge simpson anime has really been just this Standout Experience lmao like......idk for as Inspiring as it is, there’s only a couple things i’ve drawn that are Directly inspired, but i just flip for it all the time and like, it’s supremely expressive and like, comics that aren’t chronological but more like a Collage Of a Moment / Concept which i think is super cool and also i love when stuff reminds me that it doesn’t have to look ~super cleaned up~ to look great.

13) favorite people you know?

oh god this one really got out of control lol i started like, talking about everyone ever from this past decade. so for Convenience i’m interpreting this as “people *i* know, but they don’t know me” so that i can cheat and say will roland, voted person of the year 2019. by extension, essential supporting crew who helped us reach this point, like john simpkins or joe iconis. leave it at that!! it’s 5am and you know i’m not lying. who knew where going “wow, This guy” in late 2018 would have so much Value.

17) a fandom you wish more people were in/you had more people to talk to about?

oof hmm.......amnesia tdd didn’t really have a “fandom” even though it obviously got a lot of attention, it’dve been fun if it had though lol. it’s tricky to answer this one cuz i always prefer like, smaller fandoms and/or finding the Niche or some other way of just like, interacting with a small corner of things, so i’m never like wow god damn wish i’d been absolutely in the thick of it with this thing. i’ve been in Corners n Niches and it’s been fine by me, really

19) a fandom that you had the best time in?

HMM lol.........marble hornets sure was fun but like, a lot of that was just the content itself and not necessarily The Fan Experience, tho i sure got a lot out of it in a ton of ways. i mean tbh that’s true of each thing i’ve really Gotten Into majorly, i go hard af and then walk out the other side with these #connections or #experiences like whoa where’d these come from lol!! but really like, overall, i’m probably having the best time right now. the “fandom” is basically just our agenda lmao but like i said i’m always having the best time when it’s a pretty niche deal, And the sheer variety of Contents n Characters to draw from here is super nice, and the fact that it’s like, oh yeah and i’m finally recognizing this should’ve-been-obvious entire Passionne i’ve had since always, and that’s great too, and like, also just having the Variety Of Live / Current Unfoldings that go down.....like, everyone havin fun with the Joe Iconis Xmas Xtrav was entirely great. and just the Engagement level is basically the best, cuz like there’s the times where maybe i’ll get a zillion notes and that’s definitely fun in its own way but i always enjoy just the way smaller amount of ppl who are Particularly Enthusiastic, and like, there’s times where like, maybe i’m *technically* in this larger circle of ppl but like, totally more of like a Tangent or peripheral to that circle or whatever lol........this feels like a really solid balance of like, being sorta in this orbit of people in a chill way, but also definitely the direct interactions Existing, which is always important lol but hasn’t always been a constant throughout my Fandom Experiences at all

23) who were you at the beginning of this decade?

2009-2010 was a real distinct year lol i was in my second year of college in the middle of my teens, when i’d hardly really been getting to Explore My Interests Freely up to that point and still wasn’t, but all of a sudden it’s like goddamn i have to figure out my major???? and i’m like, obviously in the middle of only just now Really getting to figure out my identity in this deeper and more genuine way, thanks to being lucky enough to Live On Campus and be away from home like, 2/3 of the year, but i was just like, oh god i’m in Stress Hell now all the time cuz like. i’m trying to figure out my whole thing and what my ~Career~ should be and i just have no idea but am like, trying super hard all the time lol it was not successful and i was just really stressed about it all the time. i was def quieter back then.....pretty lonely at the time, i did not get into mh and gain the presence of any Online Friends until late 2010, and i hadn’t yet been sort of accepted by a small faction of theatre people via my roommate’s connections.....i wasn’t at all Out yet, and was def In Progress of figuring it all out.....i didn’t have nearly the Self-Esteem i have now lmao, it was Not a great time and in a lot of ways ‘09-’10 was the start of a downturn into Worse Than Usual Times, though in Other ways it was definitely an upturn lol like. the latter related to stuff that was important to me / who i am, the former tied to the situations i was in and the godawful morale that resulted

29) a time when the worst case scenario happened but you pulled through?

well by the end of 2012 i had my Wrath Parent deluxe mad at me big time, AND i was stuck at home all of thee time with that (not at all hours but. every day.) it was terrible!!! tf was going on in 2013, cuz that shit was definitely like, a gross blur of a lot of indistinct misery. and then, relatedly, when it was so shitty in 2015 that i was like fantastic, i am so officially sick of this i’m outta here. i revisited some Misery Posts from that period lately for someone stranger on twitter’s project or something, and boy i was having a bad time Summer Of ‘15 lol, things not getting better at home And a job that was so shitty that it was like..................bye. lol. and then i spent a year living out of a minivan. which was real lucky in ways b/c like. infinitely better than if i had not had that minivan. and when that broke down i was also then lucky enough to have this friend who was relatively nearby who’d also been willing to just like, set me up to Not have to ask the lgbt center where that trans-friendly forest zone a couple cities over was. nothing as dramatic as it could’ve been, fortunately

31) a time you were scared?

hmmm when leaving The Parents Home overnight, that was intimidating. bit of completely jumping into the unknown there, and also like, when you spend your lifetime assuming that Someone’s Arbitrary Wrath will be uponst you always, it’s hard to shake that sense of dread and doom, like ah jeez i am really potentially bringing hell on myself here........and like i mentioned with Start Of The Decade, there was just a ton of fear there all the time lol, trying to figure out virtually overnight The Whole Of Who I Am And What I Want when i’d only just even gotten to start......also i wanna say i maybe came out in 2011?? and i sort of also felt obligated to come out to my parents also (plus i think i was giving them like, one last chance to surprise me and be decent and kind of Grow Up themselves even tho i was the like, 16 y.o.) which yknow, kids you do not have to come out to anyone at all. someone was talking the other day abt how they didn’t think lgbtq “discourse” had evolved as much as you’d hope over the past decade, but idk about that, it's only a little bit of a wildly complex topic, and for starters Online Trans “Discourse” of a decade back was wayyyyyy in a vastly different place than it is now, leaps and strides really. so the way to ~really~ do it was presented kind of more rigidly i think. anyways i did it via email and was incredibly stressed to even open the reply a couple days later lol......which ended up being really weird and vague, and then there was a phone call where no one brought it up, and the only result was increased ire and resentment :( ........and then there was still like, cops encounters! near or not-as-bad-as-they-could’ve-been vehicular collisions! but tbh generally my reaction to the latter was underwhelming, except for one particular time when i was a passenger and also tense af for the rest of the ride. that’s it for Immediate fear really lol......oh wait one time i was at this decent sized Convention Panel Event and when i’m nervous i can Only talk more (it’s possible!!) and i snuck into line for the q&a and Right when i got to the mic (intimidating) they were like oop we’re low on time, lightning round!! :’] that was obviously more just a crapton of l’anxiete

37) a fashion that fell out of style that you wish would make a resurgence?

were Gladiator sandals this decade? the strappy deals that like, went up the ankles / calves? that was in fashion for a year or two and i’m into it. i like sandals and that kind of drama

41) something you learned a lot that not a lot of other people might know about?

i don’t know that i learned way a lot of anything that’s real in-depth knowledge and niche lore.........i have learned Nothing

43) an important relationship (of any kind) you had?

i had???? lmao well either way let’s say current relationships count and like, pretty much everyone in my Sphere i value a lot! i never like, have or have had a ~close~ ring of ppl around me lol like i thought it was lucky if i talked to someone Every Day (and not at all the Usual thing) and now it’s more likely that i talk to two people every day and maybe that sounds sarcastic but it’s not at all lol. i know my social stats aren’t impressive but i so appreciate what i get to enjoy and have. and other Connections might be way more like, we are friendly acquaintances, we talk on rare occasions, we haven’t talked at all in ages, we talk but only to trade cute pics of cats, Etc etc, but i seriously do appreciate all of everyone who’s cool who i get to interact with in any way and like, be in each other’s spheres and Not just like, absolutely on nobody’s radar. also obviously soph you are here in that list in case i wasn’t implying it good enough lol it is 5am and god knows deciphering what i say at any time can be its own challenge.....ur Epic Highs and Lows of bmc 3.0 is so good lmao

#hell yeah tysm now also i should go for Passing Outs #(where you pass out like knocking out)#thank you Three Other Asks i see and appreciate it as well #oh wait shit four!!!#lol #it's 5:20am bed time bitch all day hit the hay #i forget what i say here i've been on and off doing whatever for the past 5 hrs obviously lmao #nothingunrealistic1

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jincherie · 6 years ago

Text

some fic recs

we love a good proverbial nutte(tm) over some quality fiction in this house!!! here are some fics that have been rustling my jimmies lately!!! [under the cut bc it got a bit long!!]

➤ by @the-protractor-writes

— by its cover | hoseok [ao3]

↳ ‘Your annoying little brother Jimin accepts a dare and summons a demon into your living room. There are multiple problems with this. 1) Demons are the most hated species on earth. 2) That demon happens to be Jung Hoseok, the most popular guy on campus 3) The fact that Jung Hoseok is a demon is his biggest secret and 4) Jung Hoseok hates your guts. You’re in for a wild ride. Demon!Hoseok, magic-university!au and enemies-to-lovers!au’

— a kiss to save a life | seokjin [ao3]

↳ ‘Being retainer to Prince of the Forest, Kim Seokjin is an exhausting job- he’s selfish, he’s impulsive and just has a knack for getting himself in trouble.

But when an adventure out in the human realm leads to Seokjin falling in love with a human woman and he makes a deal that threatens your entire kingdom, it’s time to start asking yourself: How far are you willing to go for your prince?Fairy prince!Jin x reader. Loosely inspired by the Little Mermaid but with a few extra twists ;)’

— schemes and tricks to win her heart | taehyung [ao3]

↳ ‘Rich company heir Kim Seokjin has a plan to win the heart of the girl of his dreams, and you, his little brother’s best friend, are dragged along for the ride. His younger brother objects, of course. Bestfriend!Taehyung and Chaebol!Jin’

➤ by @chimchimsauce

— sanctuary | jimin

↳ ‘YN is a young girl, bright and ambitious, but due to her busy schedule, she’s been unable to make any real friends. When an ad for Saint Mary’s Sanctuary catches her attention, she never expected her life to be changed by a certain hybrid named Jimin.’

— det cep xenu | jimin

↳ ‘Det Cep Xenu: noun// fiction// A fictional or otherwise illogical phenomenon that occurs in reality. Soulmate AU’

➤ by @ salade [ao3]

— call an uber? | ot7 [on current hiatus!]

↳ ‘Your normal life with a normal, yet inconsistent job gets drastically changed when your dreams come true. Sounds boring right? What happens when all of this occurs, but you're still doing your job AND getting a large sum for it? Now there's something to think about, and it's definitely not what you're thinking.’

➤ by @ naidoo [ao3]

— everything you are | namjoon?

↳ ‘When Kim Namjoon is in a coma and becomes your patient you learn quickly that not all things - or people - are as they seem. Confronted with his attention seeking girlfriend who cares more about the numbers of likes and clicks and how often she makes a front page than she cares about him you start realizing what a lonely life he leads.’

➤ by @ ms_writer [ao3]

— seven for the price of one | yoongi (+ ot7) [m]

↳ ‘You always knew that dating Min Yoongi meant having his six friends as well. If you ever had dinner together, you were aware of the fact that you had to buy six plates of food more. If you tried to surprise him with a movie night, you knew you had to make space for the six other on the couch.

What you didn't know was that when Min Yoongi wasn't in the mood to have sex, another one of his friends could give you a hand.’

➤ by @countrysundae

— when the planets align | yoongi, jimin, jungkook

↳ ‘In which you are plucked from Earth to be the next warrior in some intergalactic game of titans. You've been training for two years now. Why are all these awkward boys coming out of the wood work now? You have to stay focused and survive not only for yourself, but, the fate of your planet and everyone on it. You can't get distracted from your feelings. Not now.’

!! - sidenote: i am so whipped for this!!!

➤ by @ faery_kth [ao3]

— lueur de lune | (almost) ot7

↳ ‘your recent move has caused a lot of stress and you decide to take a stroll by the little lake behind your house only to find the moon and her fallen star’

!! - sidenote: i am also so very whipped for this one!!!

➤ by @ valkook [ao3]

— three pints full | jimin, jungkook, yoongi

↳ ‘You're assigned to a frightening case, a body is found in the bitter unforgiving terrain of Montana with strange bite marks, far from home and the warmth of Vegas. More casualties and victims are discovered with the same marks in your home turf. Your bravery, wit, and life will be tested.But what happens when you fall for the very killers you're hunting?

Oh, and their also your neighbors.’

!! - sidenote: !!!!!!! ugh im so far up this fics ass

➤ by @ syubkatsu [ao3]

— my housemates, the deadly sins | ot7

↳ ‘Your life went downhill as soon as you entered university. During the first year, you got so stressed that you were diagnosed with anxiety and depression. Halfway through your second year, your parents had gotten into a horrible accident and passed away. Now you were alone, a beautiful new home coming under your possession. Once your grandmother's, you had inherited it from your mother's side. That meant you never needed to handle the rent; all you needed to deal with now was your inner turmoil with no help whatsoever. or so you thought..’

➤ by @ xuhei [ao3]

— poles apart | taehyung

↳ ‘message from: nams ; knew I could count on you to be normal. have you and taehyung got anywhere yet? / message to: nams ; what do you mean? the two of us are friends. you and jimin are gonna get somewhere before i ever get anywhere with taehyung / message from: nams - ‘pzziza lads’ ; aha! i knew you liked him! / message from: nams ; sent that on the wrong chat but you’re right if you thought that was to you’

➤ by @ agentlemanshat [ao3]

— potions, magic, and otherworldly charmers | all (oneshots?)

↳ ‘So this is my excuse for writing that sweet sweet magic content I've wanted from Bangtan and never could get because what are the chances that BTS just suddenly comes out with a concept where Jungkook has to dress like a furry and Namjoon like a witch from a Tumblr aesthetic blog. Smh’

➤ by @ citronblue [ao3]

— the magic shop | namjoon, jin, jungkook

↳ ‘BTS Love Yourself: Tear Prompt #7 Magic Shop: “It’s okay to trust me. This is a Magic Shop that will console you.”You have never experienced true love, so out of a whim, you decided to write a wish to be granted by the Magic Shop. It’s a club run by seven students at your college and they are known to be able to grant any wish, besides money, to come true. Your wish grantors turn out to be Park Jimin and Kim Namjoon, two figures whom you absolutely detest. What happens when you finally learn the truth that every wish comes at a cost? (Greek mythology related)’

➤ by @ schluemr [wattpad]

— kitties and cupcakes | jimin

↳ ‘Y/n...can I bite you?" / Hybrid au, Reader adopts a stray hybrid cat and he helps her out at the bakery she owns’

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edsbev · 6 years ago

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can we just talk about the whole window climbing thing? it’s so soft. Eddie being half asleep with his back facing the window, and then Richie climbs in (clumsily, so he makes a lil noise) and Eddie just turns with his eyes still closed and says calls for him with grabby hands. And Richie says ‘hi, baby’ kisses Eddies forehead and lets him curl up in his chest. “I love you, bubba.” followed by “I love you too, lovebug.” And then they’re both asleep. S O F T

ok so i wrote a lil thing for this but its not rlly like ur message at all im sorryfhjds i just love this trope and i dont think ive rlly written anything thats focused on it before?? so heres this sappy garbage that was supposed to be like 500 words and ended up being 1.9k lmao (also a bit of this is nsfw not rlly but just a warning)

Eddie doesn’t always hear it,when Richie comes through the window, but still he knows the action better thananything, by a distinct set of sounds.

There is a soft thud atfirst, of Richie’s palm meeting the glass, and then the scraping of woodagainst wood, of the window being moved up in its frame. Sometimes rattling as Richie struggles with the weight. There is a beat afterthat - once the window is lifted enough for Richie to stick his hand under itand push it up the rest of the way - where he pulls his hand away. And in thatbeat comes a rush of music from outside. Summer nights bring the chirps ofinsects, a car or two humming as it crawls along the road. Autumn nights bringa wind that rattles the frame and rustle the trees. Spring nights bring theflap of bird wings and hooting of owls.

All nights bring a little gruntfrom Richie’s throat as he slides the window right up until he can crawlthrough it. And sometimes that is followed with laughter, as he tumbles ontoEddie’s floor. Or Eddie’s name sung sweetly, teasingly from Richie’s lips as hesticks his head in through the opened window. Or a groan that escapes withouthim being for it. Or nothing at all.

Tonight, it is winter, and themusic is an orchestra of heavy rain hitting the roof and the road and the soggygrass. And it’s so loud that Eddie can’t make out anything else. Lies on hisside in his bed, his back to the window, his face half buried in his pillow.With one eye open he sees a rectangle of moonlight spill into his dark, quietroom, paint silver over the carpet. And then a dark shape, shadowing over thatlight, in the vague shape of Richie hunched over and squeezing himself throughthe gap. And then tumbling onto the floor.

The bed shakes and mattress dipsas Richie leaps onto it. Landing on his knees by Eddie’s side, his hand holdinghim up planted on Eddie’s spare pillow. When Eddie rolls over, he comes face toface with the image of Richie leaning over him, eyes bright and grin wide.Looking raggedy and breathless, with shadows cutting over his face and his haircurling over his forehead.

“Hey,” Eddie says,with a smile. When he breathes in, Richie smells damp, of rain and the bitterair outside.

“Hey,” Richie says,and leans down further for a kiss. And that’s when Eddie feels something cold and wet driponto the corner of his eye, and slide down toward his ear, like a tear.

“Holy shit, Richie,”Eddie yelps - in a way that’s more like he’s swallowing down a yelp, because heneeds to be quiet. He gets a hand onto Richie chest and pushes him away.“You’re dripping wet you fucking idiot.”

Richie lets himself be pushed,stumbling off the bed and onto his feet with a laugh. “Please let me kissyou,” he says, no less cheerful and breathless.

Eddie sits up, and now thatRichie is standing right where the moonlight hits him, Eddie can see the wayRichie’s wet hair sticks to his face, his skin shiny and damp when it catchesin the light. His jeans look plastered to his skin and the shoulders of hisdenim jacket are so soaked through they’re black.

“You walk here?” Eddieasks, as a joke.

“Ran,” Richie replies.

“Fuck off, you’resuch an idiot,” Eddie says, though there’s a tinge of affection to it,because Richie is still grinning at him, looking almost eager and excited.Happy. Eddie would think he’s drunk only he didn’t smell any alcohol on himwhen he was close. Just that sweet scent of rain. “You have a car, youknow.”

“Yeah but I’m grounded, youknow,” Richie repeats in the same know-it-all tone. He cocks hiseyebrow, the corner of his mouth, in a teasing “what? you asked forit” when Eddie looks offended at the mockery. “Now how about thatsmooch. I didn’t run all the way here just to look at you. Not that that’d beterrible–”

“Get out of those wetclothes and I’ll think about.”

“I like where this isgoing,” Richie says, and starts to peel off his jacket.

Eddie laughs.

It’s always been this way. Well,not always always. But throughout all the time that’s mattered, Richiehas been climbing in through Eddie’s window.

When they were twelve, andRichie was sticking out a sticky hand for Eddie to shake. And Eddie was saying“my name is Eddie,” and Richie was saying “my name isRichie,” and one week later Richie fell from Eddie’s window sill ontoEddie’s floor purely because he was curious if he could actually climb throughit and Eddie screamed because he thought a burglar had broken in.

When they were fourteen and bestfriends and Richie would crawl in through the window because he was bored. Andthey’d play cards on the bedroom floor and Richie would laugh and push hisglasses up his nose over and over and talk about girls in a way that soundedmore like he was just reciting words he had heard and not saying anything he’dthought of himself.

When they were sixteen and onthe verge of dating and Richie’s toes would find the carpet late at night,shutting the dark out behind him. And they’d spend the nights lying side byside in Eddie’s bed, painfully aware of each other’s presence. Careful not totouch but so desperately wanting to. Their legs and arms and ankles alwaysmysteriously draped over each other in the morning. Eddie never knew why Richiecame in, then, because he doubted so late at night that Richie was just bored,and that was usually why Richie would climb through his window. But then Eddiefound his nerve one night when he’d rolled over in bed and found Richie awake,looking at him sleepily beneath heavy eyelids - and Eddie realised he’d caughtRichie staring at the back of his head, as he so often stared at the back of Richie’shead, gaze tracing over Richie’s curls. And so he’d leaned over and pressedhis lips against Richie’s, and Richie kissed him back in a gentle way, like it was a dream he didn’t want to wake up from, and Eddie realised thatRichie came over because he just wanted to be close to him, just as Eddie hadwanted to be close to Richie.

When they were eighteen and inlove but too young to truly know it and Richie would sweep into Eddie’s roompast midnight with an eagerness that was not so much excited as it wasdesperate. Eddie would sit up and Richie was already there, kneeling in frontof him on the bed, a hand cupping Eddie’s cheek. “Eddie,” hewould breathe, with their noses bumping and lips so close every breath Richietook sent a thrill up Eddie’s spine and Richie’s gaze glued to Eddie’s mouth.“I’ve been thinking about you.” He’d say it in the same way someonemight say “I want you.”

Eddie’s own gaze was glued toRichie’s mouth. He’d reply, “I’ve been thinking about you too.”

And Richie would kiss him. AndRichie would push Eddie gently onto his back and kiss him. Kiss slowlydown his jaw, kiss hot and wanting down Eddie’s neck, until little gaspswere escaping Eddie’s throat and Richie was sucking at Eddie’s skin with agroan. And they’d continue until they were both undressed and Eddie wasscraping his nails down Richie’s back and biting his lip to hold back a sob andRichie was rocking into him and biting down on Eddie’s shoulder to hold back aslew of swears that would escape anyway.

And through it all Eddie wouldnotice that in his rush Richie had left the window open. And he’d feel a senseof freedom in it, being able to feel the night air on his face, and see thestars in the sky, before Richie would kiss the side of his mouth and holdEddie’s chin so he could look into his eyes. Like whatever was, is, betweenthem - this all-encompassing feeling of…feeling - didn’t need to behidden.

They’re still eighteen now. Butthey’re verging on nineteen very quickly, and maybe soon they’ll move out. Intoa house that’s their own, no parents to ground them because ‘if you’re under myroof you’re under my rules".

“I think these jeans arepermanently stuck on me,” Richie says, still trying to jimmy out of hiswet clothing. His jacket and shirt are off, chest bare, but he actually hasn’tbothered to go so far as to unbutton his pants. Just gave them one look andgave up. “This is how I’ll have to live now. With jeans for legs. You cancall me Jean-Boy.”

“Oh my god,” Eddielaughs, climbing out of bed. He stands in front of Richie, tilts his head up togive his boyfriend a grin as he tucks his fingers into the waistband of hisjeans. “Do I really have to do everything for you, Jean-Boy?”

In a house that’s their own,they can have the windows open all the time. Even on rainy nights like this.Because their house won’t be here, in Derry. It’ll be somewhere where theynever have to hide.

Richie smiles down at him. Hishair is already starting to dry and frizz and curl. Eddie feels a suddenfondness for him and his frizzy hair but he doesn’t feel like reaching up toRichie’s mouth so he just plants a soft kiss below Richie’s bare collarbone.

When he looks back up again, hesees a flash of Richie’s grin before Richie is ducking down and pressing a kissto the corner of Eddie’s eye. Then his cheek. Then below Eddie’s ear. Then hisjaw. Then, then, then.

“Oooh, my EddieSpaghetti,” Richie croons as Eddie giggles at all the soft littlekisses. “He’d do anything for me. He loovess me.”

“Wow, you got me,”Eddie says. He struggles with the buttons of Richie’s jeans for a moment beforepopping them open. “Now help me get these jeans off so we can go to bed. Iwanna be little spoon this time because I always get a shit night sleep whenyou’re little spoon.”

In a house that’s their own,Richie won’t have to climb in over the window sill and creep over the carpet,run all the way over here in the rain just because he wants to sleep with Eddiecurled up by his side.

“Yeah, yeah,whatever,” Richie grumbles. Together they manage to unstick Richie’s dampjeans from his damp legs and peel them right off over his feet. Then theystumble over into Eddie’s bed, laughing, Eddie shushing Richie when he gets tooloud, reminding him of his mother downstairs. Richie slots himself againstEddie’s back and smothers his laughter into Eddie’s neck. Then noses there affectionately. Then falls asleep with his lips pressed to Eddie’s shoulder and his body warm and dry. And there’s a contentedness to it that makes Eddie think that Richie wholeheartedly believes that running all the way here against the rain is worth it. Not that he’d ever admit it in a way that isn’t disguised as a joke - that he’d brave cold nights and hot summer days and the climb up to the second storey and the wrestle with Eddie’s window just to be pressed up against Eddie like this. But Eddie knows.

Eddie will miss it.

#reddie #ask #writing #mine #why is everything i write the same #dfgghhjjkk #Anonymous #yall can take this trope from my cold dead hands idc that its been done to death !!!!!#also i might have actually written somethin abt this before i cant remember #all my writing blurs together bc. its all the same like i said lmao #but im pretty sure i havent??#idk idk

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totaltozier · 7 years ago

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Always Been You - Richie Tozier x Reader

REQUEST: fuck idk if you write for IT that much but if you do could you write an imagine where richie is mean to the reader and she’s like “we used to be okay when we were young” and he’s like “that’s before you got fucking hot” or something. and if you don’t write for IT you can def do this as a mike wheeler imagine

NOTE: OKAY SO I actually had a fckn blast writing this so I pray that you love it as much as I do!!!!! It’s really long but its great I swear! And yes I do IT imagines too if requested!

WORD COUNT: 2448 (don’t let this number scare you!)

WARNING: just some swearing because well, its Richie Tozier we’re talking about here.

PLOT: Richie is secretly in love with you but he’s a dick at showing it.

Richie had been your best friend for as long as you could remember. It was the second day of kindergarten when he had approached you. You were sitting on the swings alone on the playground and he had just walked up and started talking about who knows what until the bell rang to head back inside. Ever since, Richie had continued to talk about anything and everything to anyone who would listen.

Over the years there were countless playdates, riding bikes around the neighbourhood until the streetlights came on, hiding in your backyard treehouse until your mom insisted it was time for Richie to go home and get some sleep. You two were inseparable, always by each other’s side. Eventually you welcomed new friends into your lives, a few other kids with no friends themselves, often called loners or freaks. After a while you started to call yourselves the losers club, a name that fit but in a good way.

Despite all the new friends, it was always you and Richie who would still be sitting around in your treehouse after everyone had gone home for dinner, just the two of you circling the neighbourhood on your bikes after everyone else’s legs were too tired and decided to leave. It was you who Richie always came to when his parents were gone again or his house was too loud or too quiet that he couldn’t he couldn’t stand it anymore. It was your window that he was crawling through late at night when he couldn’t sleep. It was always you.

Until for some reason, it wasn’t anymore.

“Hey Y/N, I’m hungry as hell, can you get us more snacks?” Eddie asked. The club was sitting around in your backyard not doing much other than talking about random stuff.

“Ya sure, Richie can you give me a hand?” You asked, standing up and heading to the backdoor.

“You’ve got two hands, try using them” Richie stated, his eyebrows furrowed.

“Um, okay then…” You mumbled.

Bev stood up. “I’ll help you out, Y/N!” The two of you went inside to the kitchen and rummaged around for some snacks.

“Do you think Eddie would want Tostitos or Ruffles?” Bev asked you, holding up one in each hand.

“Since when is Richie so rude?” You blurted out, bothered by Richie’s tone outside.

Bev shrugged. “Richie’s always been rude, have you not heard that trash mouth of his?”

“Okay, yeah he’s always been rude but he hasn’t always been rude to me” you responded.

Bev poured the chips into a bowl. “I don’t know, Y/N. Boys are just dumb, I guess.”

“Then why are we friends with so many?” You asked back jokingly.

Bev laughed picking up the snacks she had prepared and turned towards the door.

Back outside, Eddie and Richie were telling some elaborate story about some crazy event that apparently happened last weekend.

“And then that asswipe came out of nowhere! Practically launching themselves over the bushes!” Eddie exclaimed, acting it out as he spoke.

“And so obviously that piece of shit fucker had it coming when I decked him in the face he started weeping like the cry baby his is! And that’s why those two weren’t at school on Monday.” Richie finished explaining.

You set the snacks down on the ground in front of everyone. “No, it wasn’t,” you added, “Jimmy wasn’t at school on Monday because his sister was in the hospital, Mr. Roberts said it himself during first period.” You explained.

“Shut the fuck up, Y/N. As if you would know!” Richie spat back.

You had no idea why Richie was being like this. Sure, he always had a foul tongue but you were never at the other end of it. The afternoon went on and soon one by one everyone had headed off back home until it was just you and Richie left alone like always.

“What’s up with you today?’ You asked. “You seem off.”

“I’m fine” Richie snapped.

Your face held a frown. “Are things bad at home again?” You asked gently.

“I said everything is fine, Y/N. Back off” he said, picking up his bike off of the grass. “I’ll see you later.” And with that, Richie was pedalling away, far out of reach.

Now it was just you, left alone. A feeling you hadn’t truly felt before.

As the weeks went on, school came to an end and summer vacation had finally arrived. Things were still weird between you and Richie. You hardly spent any time alone anymore and you couldn’t help but wonder if everything was okay for him. The club was always hanging out together trying new activities other than the regular sitting around in your backyard.

Today’s activity was going to the quarry to swim and jump off the rocks. You guys hadn’t been to the quarry for the last two summers so you were excited to go back again.

Everyone had ridden their bikes and once you had reached the quarry, you all hopped off and let your bikes fall to the ground without a care.

Closer to the edge, Bev was the first one to take of her clothes, ready to jump in. “Are you all just going to stand there or are you going to go swimming?” She asked as she made a run for the edge and jumped off into the water below.

You ran to the edge and looked down at Bev in the water as she resurfaced. “How cold is it?” You yelled down.

“Not cold at all!” Bev replied.

You took a few steps back and started to take off your clothes, first your shirt than your shorts.

“Holy fuck” Richie gasped, just loud enough for you to hear.

You looked up to see him staring right at you. “What’s wrong?” You asked looking down at your body. “Does my swim suit not match?” You said confused.

Richie blushed and quickly looked away. “Nothing. I didn’t say anything.” He insisted. He threw off his shirt as fast as he could before running to the edge and jumping off.

You waited a few seconds before following him into the water. You hit the water, the height being just enough to make it splash sting before resurfacing. You looked back up at the cliff and watched as Eddie and Bill jumped off together.

All of a sudden the water started splashing around Eddie and you could hear him crying out. “My shorts! My shorts!” he said as he hit around the water.

“Shut the fuck up!” Richie yelled from beside you.

“I can’t find my shorts!” Eddie cried again. Everyone began laughing and you could see Bill reaching out in the water in front of him, picking up Eddie’s shorts and waving them in the air.

“Oh, you m-mean these?” Bill asked joking around. He quickly swam away from Eddie and the smaller boy yelled out after him to give them back.

Everyone was having a fun time in the water, swimming around and enjoying themselves. Eventually Mike had an idea to play chicken. You chose to be a spectator at first, watching as Bill was on Mike’s shoulders and Bev on Stan’s. You, Eddie, Ben, and Richie cheered them on, you rooting for Bev. You could hear Richie yelling for Bev to ‘beat that son of a bitch’ from beside you.

Ultimately after a few minutes, Bev had managed to knock Bill off of Mike and into the water. You volunteered to go next as you climbed onto Bev’s shoulders. Richie decided that he would fight you and chose Mike as his base. Eddie counted down, yelling ‘fight!’ as loud as he could.

Bev brought you close to Richie and you reached your arms out as he tried to knock you down. Minutes passed and you were sure that you were going to win until Richie practically punched you in the neck, shoving you off of Bev and into the water.

Your resurfaced as fast as you could, rubbing your nect where you had been hit. “What the fuck, Richie?” you yelled.

“What? I knocked you off fair and square!” Richie said back, confused as to why you were mad.

“You didn’t have to fucking punch me in the throat!” You exclaimed. You could hear everyone around you go silent. Now you were the one with the trash mouth. “What the hell is wrong with you lately?” You yelled as you started to swim away, wanting to get out of the water. “I can’t fucking breathe.”

You made your way to the rocks and climbed your way out of the water and back up to your clothes. Back in the water, everyone was running their mouths at Richie.

“What the heck happened?” Bev asked, confused as ever.

Richie closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “I didn’t mean to punch her, I swear.” He said. “She ducked down as I was about to push her chest, I swear! I would never hurt her like that on purpose!” Richie claimed.

“Well, I think you already have…” Eddie said solemnly.

Richie sighed, knowing that he had fucked things up with you. “I’ll go now.” He said before turning to swim to the rocks where you had just climbed out.

You had wrapped yourself in your towel and sat down on a nearby log trying to steady your breathing when you heard the bushes start to rustle. Richie appeared from behind them, water dripping from his hair onto his body. He picked up his bag and pulled out his towel, wrapping it around himself before approaching you.

“Can we talk for a minute?” He asked as he stood in front of you.

You rolled your eyes and ignored him.

“I’ll take that as a yes” he said and sat down next to you on the log. “I’m really sorry, Y/N, I really am. I would never mean to hurt you like that. I had got caught up in the moment and acted too fast, I would never hurt you intentionally.” Richie pleaded.

You turned to face him and crossed your arms across your chest. “Okay so you didn’t mean to hurt me physically but you meant to hurt me emotionally all those other times though?” You asked with a biting tone.

Richie scrunched up his face in confusion. “What are you talking about?”

“You’ve been nothing but shit to me for the past month, Richie!” You exclaimed. “You snap at me, you’ve been rude to me when I’ve done nothing wrong to you, and you won’t shut that goddamn trash mouth of yours ever!”

Richie sat there, knowing exactly what you meant and looked down away from you not saying anything.

“You basically won’t talk to me anymore and act like you hate me!” You added. “I miss the way things used to be. We used to be okay when we were young. Better than okay. We used to be great when we were young.” You sighed.

Richie was playing with the corner of his towel. “Yeah that was before you got hot.” He chuffed under his breath.

“What?” you asked.

“You’re fucking hot okay?” Richie blurted. “We used to be great but then you grew up and look so fucking good now and I don’t know to act around you anymore, okay?!” He practically shouted.

Your jaw dropped open. “You think I’m hot?” You asked him, confused as ever.

Richie looked away and into the woods. “Nah, you’re better than hot, you’re beautiful.” He said. “But I’m an idiot who has been such an asshole to you lately so I don’t blame you if you hate me for the rest of eternity or whatever.”

You placed your hand on Richie’s leg, making him turn to look at you. “I don’t hate you, okay?”

“You don’t?” Richie asked with a frown on his face.

“You’re my best friend, I could never hate you. So, yeah you’ve been a real douche the past few weeks but I’ll forgive you if you just admit that you’re in love with me and you’ll never be a douche again.” You said with a smile.

Richie scoffed. “I am not in love with you!” He blushed, trying to play it cool.

“Okay fine, you’re not forgiven then” you joked.

“Okay, okay, okay!” Richie pleaded. “I’ll only say I’m in love with you if you admit that you’ve always been in love with me!” He conditioned with a smirk.

“I have not been in love with you!” You insisted, knowing that you weren’t telling the truth.

“Come one, Y/N. How could you not be in love with all of this?” Richie smirked gesturing to his whole body.

“Shut up!” You laughed, your face turning a bright pink.

“Just admit you love me back, Y/N! You love me! You love Richie Tozier!” He sing songed.

“Okay, fine!” You exclaimed. “I’m in love with Richie Tozier, always have been.” You admitted.

“I knew it!” Richie shouted, jumping up with joy. “I love Y/N L/N and she loves me back!” He shouted at the top of his lungs.

“Shut the fuck up!” You heard Eddie yell from down below, still in the water.

You both laughed with each other. “See, I miss this. I miss being this way with each other” You said.

Richie sat back down beside you. “I miss it too. I promise that it won’t go away again, okay?” he said.

“Okay.” You said with a smile. Richie reached for your hand and held it in his.

“I really want to kiss you right now.” He whispered just loud enough for you to hear.

“I really want you to kiss me” You whispered back. Within a second Richie had put his lips on yours kissing you with such a passion that you could tell had been building up for a long time. After a moment, you two pulled apart and rested your foreheads against each other. You couldn’t help but smile really big.

“Get a fucking room!” Eddie shouted from the water below.

“You know what would be great?” You asked Richie.

“If we went back down there and annoyed the fuck out of Eddie?” Richie answered.

“Exactly.” You answered. You stood up and threw your towel down and Richie followed suit. You grabbed his hand standing back from the edge. You both looked at each other and nodded silently before running towards the edge and jumping off into the water below.

As soon as you resurfaced from the water, you could already see Richie splashing and attacking Eddie as the smaller boy laughed. Things were back to how they used to be. Actually, they were even better than before.

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dlamp-dictator · 7 years ago

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Allen’s Rambling: Playing a Fighting Game for Story (Under Night In-Birth)

Recently, I got my hands on Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late[st], or UNIEST for short, a fighting game I’ve been looking forward to playing for almost half a year now. I know Dragonball Fighter Z is the fighting game that everyone cares about at the moment, but this is a game I’ve been wanting a little more... and DBFZ has too many problems with its... everything as a fighting game (a lacking tutorial, a tragically basic challenge mode, not explaining tools for high-level play within the game, etc.). So, I feel like talking about UNIEST for a bit while I’m taking a break from its Chronicle Mode, give my first impressions and all that now that I’ve only got about 7 prologues left to get through. Hopefully I won’t Ramble on about this, but... we’ll see. Yeah too late, I rambled, as usual... jeez, saying that phrase tends screws me over way to much and gives me a butt load of editing to do. But anyway, here goes.

Expanding and Explain the Lore

I like how Chronicle Mode gives us much more context to the arcade mode. It’s sort of the reverse of how Guilty Gear Xrd did it’s arcade and story modes. Rather than the Arcade mode being the prologue to the story mode, the story mode explains what is going on in everyone’s arcade mode, with each new prologue giving more and more context to each character and the setting overall. Every character has their own little prologue selection that goes on for about 3 to 4 chapters that explains their motives and past, with each prologue in itself being about 1 to 2 hours long depending on your reading speed. The only exception at this point seems to be Vatista, who is moreso giving exposition to the lore of the world in her prologue chapters. That’s harmless overall given her role in the story is more of an observer than an actual character moving the plot, and her own Arcade mode being her finally going out and observing things.

While the game was coming out I often found myself jokingly thinking that the world of UNIEST was going to be some extension of the Nasuverse given the inclusion of Sion as a character. Though I was joking at the time it really feels like Nasu had his hand in this series in terms of writing, as I see some of the same issues I had when playing Fate/Extella.

I have two major issues with the game as far as its story mode and writing is concerned: the pacing, and the localization.

Pacing

This is where most of the Nasuverse comparisons come from. Now to be fair to UNIEST, “bad pacing” is kind of a subjective critique nowadays due to it being thrown out far too much for its own good (my own posts and critiques not helping), so I’ll say that the pacing just feels slow to me personally. I feel like there’s too much idle chatter going on with people talking about things that aren’t important to the plot. For an example, in Orie’s prologue she’s talking to her friend/partner Lex about moving to Kanzakai, the location of the game. They discuss a bit about the mission, Orie goes into thought about her opinions of it, we learn a lot about Orie’s personality and nature when she isn’t in Licht Kreis Mode and slaying Voids, and so on. This is fine, but sometimes it felt like their friendly conversations about sweets, fashion, what restaurant to eat at, and adjusting to Japanese customs felt more like padding at times than characterization. This is all fine on paper, as it expands on both Orie and Lex’s personality, and it does lead to some interested interactions with Wagner when she appears, but for me it just feel like it drags. The main takeaways from Orie’s prologue is that she’s going to Kanzakai on an undercover/infiltration mission to learn about Amnesia and Paradox, work as something close to Wagner’s probation officer and make sure she doesn’t go to wild, and show off her personality when she isn’t in Licht Kreis Mode. The extra bits just feel unneeded to an extent. You could just skip to the restaurant scene after Orie and Lex get to Kanzakai, cut out half the dialogue about cakes and uniforms, and things would flow a little better. Though... that’s just my own opinion.

I think a better prologue that did this sort of small talk/tangent thing well was Yuzuriha’s and Wagner’s. In Yurzuriha’s prologue we learn that she’s reluctantly the In-Birth Guardian of Kanzakai due to her older sister losing her powers on her first day of the job, and that while she knows that big things are going down in the city and is knowledgeable the Hallow Night, she’d rather just do nothing to draw attention to herself and keeps the peace by slowly crushing any rising powers making a ruckus. We also learn about the formation of Bankikai and #BestBoy Ogre. The writing goes into its usual smaller conversations and small talk, but it works a lot better in this case. Yuzuriha going on and explaining the Hallow Night in depth to Ogre makes since due to her wanting to make sure he understands that forming organizations will only worsen the situation as rising powers clash and only give rise to more Voids and more In-Births to create an endless cycle. It also shows that as knowledgeable as she is about it, Yuzuriha doesn’t give a damn about what goes on in the Hallow Night outside of keeping the peace and is only explaining things to Ogre because she doesn’t want to deal with him later... and she only had a broom to fight with at the time. On Ogre’s end, he was the type of character to make small talk, flirt, and go on long, hammy spiels about his goals, which constantly annoyed Yuzuriha, but it played well with the tone of the scenes and honestly made Ogre very endearing.

Speaking of endearing characters, the writing style of the prologues also helped Wagner’s character well too. She’s the newest playable character that I was personally interested in learning about. Wagner’s name actually came up several times in the the arcade modes of the previous game. From what we knew she was a mix of a merciless Templar that slaughtered anyone and everyone under the name of Licht Kreis, a wildcard that was Licht Kreis’s ace in the hole, and someone that Orie either feared, despised, or saw as a rival of some kind. The main takeaways from her prologue is that she is on probation after “overdoing it” in a past mission and has to live in Japan to cool her head with two attendants managing/confiscating her sword and shield, and while she personally views Orie as a rival Orie herself just sees her as a dangerous person that’s a pain to deal with. Those were the takeways, but the prologue does a lot to humanize Wagner and make her an interesting character. When not in Licht Kreis Mode she’s actually very endearing, being someone that knows little about society outside of battle. She struggles with academics due to her not liking the structure of Japanese schools, but slowly loving the more social aspect of it. She has a slight dependence on her attendants for more social activities. She’s a horrible actor to the point that her undercover backstory was that of being a shelter rich girl so she didn’t have to force herself to act in anyway and blow her cover. It’s all humanizing stuff from someone that was hyped up as a fiery, brutal killer of Voids throughout the series. She’s just... a socially awkward rich girl outside of battle, and it’s pretty enduring.

And just before I move on to talk about the localization I’ll just say that Carmine and Enkidu’s prologues could had easily been two chapters instead of three. The long conversations and small talk were just... out of character for those two, Carmine especially, though he is a lot more likable to me now, and Enkidu might just be my favorite character story-wise for his simplicity and how he bounces off Chaos and Hilda in Amnesia.

Now then...

The Localization

The localization... is terrible.

No, I’m not kidding, this is some godawful localizing. Spell check apparently didn’t even exist when translating this script. Seriously, take a shot everytime you see a spelling or grammar error. Actually, don’t do that, you’ll die before you finish the first prologue. I mean... jeez, I know mistakes happen, and my own writings tend to be riddled with grammar issues here and there, but the amount I’m seeing here is just inexcusable. The misspellings especially. Serious, was spell check a thing when they translated this? Especially since there’s no dub every moment of grammar errors and misspellings seems more egregious. Reading these cutscenes and visual novel moments are a pain when I have to figure out what a character is actually saying. Which brings me to another issue.

There’s no dub, and that rustles my jimmies something fierce.

I don’t care how controversial it is for me to talk about this anymore. I don’t care how little the FGC cares for dubs and stories in fighting games. I don’t care about EVO, NorCal, SoCal, or anything other bull excuse used for a proper lacking localization. I kept my mouth shut about this when it came to Blazblue and Guilty Gear outside of some grumbles and general reactive whining, but now I’m actually pissed. There was no excuse this time for lacking a dub here, especially with the large window of time between the JP and NA release dates.

For those that are curious, it was about 6 months. I remember Arc System saying something to the effect of having to delay Blazblue Central Fiction by about 6 month if they were to dub it. Six months... and this game has much less story stuff going on than in Blazblue. I remember people saying that BBCF needed to come out sooner so people outside of Japan could train for EVO. Folks, anyone that gives a damn about fighting games on a competitive level will import unless the time gap is a week’s difference or less. Period. Everyone else will either just do local tournaments, or is playing casually by extension of the more series side of the FGC. And frankly, EVO tends to be dominated by Japanese players anyway, so... I’m narrowing my eyes when I hear things like that. When this game had such a large time gap I think most of us figured it was for a dub, especially with Dragonball Fighter Z coming out just barely a month beforehand. However... no such luck, this game was basically delayed, had a poor release time, and I’m willing to bet money it was so this game could flop and they’d have an excuse to probably not dub Cross Tag Battle due to low interest in what would be one fourth of that game’s rooster (technically one eighth, but that’s a Rambling for another day).

Ugh, but I won’t whine about that any further, continuing to type this is only making me angrier... moving on.

Themes of Under Night

Now what kind of writer would I be if I didn’t at least try to talk about the narrative themes of UNIEST’s story? I’ll be honest. I’m having a hard time thinking of its themes. Not that it doesn’t have any mind you, but... I can’t really place my finger on it yet. Maybe it’s because I haven’t completed Chronicle Mode yet, but there is a theme in this game’s story.

And it’s probably something really Japanese.

I’m not just saying that because this is a Japanese Anime Fighting Game, but... the story is constantly drilling in how peaceful Japan is despite how combative the Hallow Night is by nature. Wald and Enkidu are constantly going on about how they feel out of play being warriors in such peaceful times. Carmine talks about how hard it is to be a street punk picking fights in modern times. Orie and Wagner are bring up how peaceful and different Japan is compared to the warzones they’ve been in while in Licht Kreis. The list goes on, but the fact that this story takes place in a peaceful country like Japan is drilled into you. I still have quite a few characters to finish in terms of prologues, but... there’s something, some kind of commentary on peace and violence. Chaos heavily stresses that Amnesia never goes too far to kill people in these modern times in Enkidu’s prologue, Gordeu remarks how fights aren’t to the death despite the tension between warring groups.

There’s... something here, but I can’t put my finger on it, probably due to my Western origins and beliefs. I’m sure if I talked about this with my Xenny might be able to piece together something since he’s learning the language and I get the feeling the theme might be lost in translation somewhere, but... for now, it’s all speculation until I finish the prologues.

As a game overall, this is a huge improvement to the original Under Night. There’s an in depth tutorial mode, there’s a Mission Mode to learn combos, there’s an network mode that’s leagues better than DBFZ at this point in terms of structure and netcode. If anyone in the FGC felt a little burnt by how Dragonball Fighter Z handled things like the tutorial and challenge mode and just generally not providing things for high-level play, I highly recommend giving UNIEST a shot, especially if you’re interested in Blazblue Cross Tag Battle.

Lastly, I would a moment of silence for Ogre, who has a great character design, interesting personality, had the coolest name for a special ability (Gate of Hades), but will never be playable due to... plot reasons. Farewell playboy fedora man, I would had definitely subbed you if you were playable.

#under night in birth #your dictator is speaking

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birb-hoe · 7 years ago

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The Night Stalker.

A short horror story I wrote based on this piece of artwork created by the amazingly talented @dappermouth!

I grew up living in a small town, population… I’d say about 15000 roughly. Give or take a few people. The whole place had a very bright and mellow charm about it growing up, everyone was slightly reserved but polite. I guess everybody just liked to keep to themselves. Despite the rumbling of small earthquakes now and then and the common deer collisions with cars it’s very peaceful most of the time. The town is enveloped in a very beautiful scenery, so I can thank mother nature for giving me a good home. We were surrounded by tall mountains which would be washed with an orange glow from the sunset on a clear days evening, and west of the town was a big forest that panned out to a big lake.

I used to go swimming in the lake during every day of spring and summer as a kid, which was probably my favourite thing to do, sometimes with my classmates and my best friend Jimmy as well. The best part had to be when I would sit at the deep end and let my legs dangle over the edge, that’s where the all the stringy moss would brush against the bottom of my feet. My parents always told me to come back when it started to get dark because of two reasons, the first being general safety for your child as parents do. The second being the town curfew. This pretty much applied to everyone who lived in the town but the rule was made clear regularly in school and community centre meetings; Never go outside when the sun has set.

For a long time during my childhood I never really understood why the rule was there, or how none of the grown ups would talk about it. The only other rule they really enforced was to drive slow to shorten road accidents with the wildlife, but that’s understandable. My mother would tell me tales about this creature that lurks around the streets at night called the Night Stalker, and that it would eat all the naughty kids that disobeyed their parents. For the longest time it gave me chills and was definitely some good nightmare fuel for a while, but like most childhood things you grow out of that stuff eventually. It wasn’t until I was about 12 years old that I started getting curious about this curfew and what it really meant.

It all started one day when this girl called Nancy in my maths class didn’t show up, which was weird because she never missed a day of school, or even turned up late for that matter. None of the other kids really knew what was going on until a few days later when the head teacher announced to everyone that Nancy had drowned in the lake. Apparently she tried to go swimming at night without any arm bands, and because of her carelessness she couldn’t stay afloat. At first I didn’t think of it much because only a handful of people would go missing every year, so it wasn’t that big of a deal. But the more I thought about it the more it didn’t make any sense.

For starters, Nancy would never break any rules whether it was school rules or the curfew. Not even the grown ups would go out at night. Also she was a great swimmer, I’ve swam with her in the lake a few times and she could swim far out to the deep end and back again without breaking a sweat. I’ve never seen her use arm bands or pool floaties ever. The only thing she really did apart from swimming and doing homework was have sleepovers with her best friend Beth so the whole thing was very confusing. I tried talking to her about Nancy and what happened but she wouldn’t speak about it, which made sense because she just lost a friend.

I asked around some of Beth’s close friends to find out more but all I got from them was that Nancy sneaked out of her home to have a ‘super secret sleepover’ that they were planning, but never showed up. Which was odd considering Nancy and Beth lived only 2 blocks away. One thing that I did find unsettling was overhearing some of the older teenagers talking about it, apparently one of them saw the body when it was being pulled out of the lake. They said that the body was completely crushed and broken like it was hit by a car or truck, which is weird because the town never really gets that much traffic. Over the following weeks I contemplated the whole thing over and over in my head, everything was a blur because my mind was always somewhere else.

Eventually I told Jimmy about everything that I overheard and the thoughts I was having, and we ended up talking about it for hours. He theorised that Nancy’s death was somehow connected to the town’s curfew, which I was sceptical about at first but made sense the more I thought it over. Soon we hatched a plan during lunch break to figure out what really happened. I invited him to a sleep over at my place the following Sunday, my mother made lasagne and we stayed up watching cartoons. After going to bed at 9pm we slept for roughly 5 hours until we were sure that my parents were asleep. Jimmy had set an alarm on his watch so he could wake me up. We got dressed into our outdoor clothes and grabbed some flash lights that he had packed the day before and I pulled back the curtains, slowly opened the window and quietly jumped into one of the hedges below. Jimmy soon followed and we both turned on our flash lights.

The sky was an eerie dark blue and all of our surroundings were caked in a thick fog, we could barely see 5 yards ahead of us. Everything was completely silent, no birds chirping or insects buzzing. It was like we were the only two people in town. We decided to walk down the path way towards the blocks near Beth’s place to see if we could get a clue. The town seemed so ghostly and chilling, quite the opposite of the bright and mellow feeling you get during the day time. Every step I took was amplified by the deafening silence that cloaked the streets, even breathing seemed like a soft shout with every exhale. After about an hour of walking around the town we realised that we were nowhere near Beth’s place, Jimmy exclaimed that we were obviously lost and that we should keep walking around.

After a few more minutes we eventually made it to a small four way intersection around the centre of the town, the traffic lights softly glowing through the fog as if my eyes defocused everything I could see. I was trailing the light of my torch around the path when I noticed something rustling in a nearby bush. The sound was crisp and clear as both myself and Jimmy jerked our heads to whatever that sound was. We stared at the bush as it continued to rustle for another minute before something crept out if it. It was a cat, black and white with silver whiskers and eyes as blue as the sky itself. I immediately started to follow the cat so I could pet it, but it had no intention of slowing down whatsoever.

I followed it into an alleyway and behind a bin and started stroking its head as it started to purr. “Dude, come back I can barely see you!” Jimmy yelled, his voice echoing through the alley. I didn’t bother to turn round, or even respond. That was the last thing he ever said to me. In the distance a soft and subtle rumbling noise made the ground rumble. The rumbling grew louder and louder, faster and faster as the ground started to shake more violently. I held the cat in fear and buried my face into it’s fur as I had no idea what was happening. The rumbling got louder and closer until a blood-curdling scream pierced through the rumbles, followed by a crippling crackling slam, and then silence.

I let go of the cat as it ran off further into the alleyway and disappeared round the corner, my whole body still trembling with fear. All I could hear was the thumping of my heart pounding throughout my head and the heavy exhausted breathing escaping my lungs. I slowly turned round to see that I dropped my torch near the entrance of the alleyway so I walked over and picked it up. It flickered and died on me, cursing under my breath from the stress I placed the torch in my back pocket and stared at the ground in shock. Once my eyes were focused again, I noticed the beam of a torch was pointing at my chest. For a split second I was filled with joy, as if everything would be alright. But when I looked up, my body went cold and my hair stood up on end to what I saw in front of me.

A deer, with legs as tall as a truck and body as big as a house, with eyes glowing like headlights, antlers covered in stringy moss dripping with water, standing in front of the mangled crushed body of my friend Jimmy. The Night Stalker. It stared right at me, right into my eyes, as if our vision was locked together in a stalemate. My body was frozen with fear, cold tears running down my eyes and mouth wide open. I wanted to scream, but nothing would come out. For what seemed like an eternity the creature eventually turned its head away, grabbed Jimmy’s body with it’s mouth, and walked away.

Then everything faded to black. I was found unconscious in the alleyway the next morning by some of the locals and was immediately taken to hospital where I woke up. The months were a blur after that. I never really went outside any more, or even went to school. I did all my homework in my room, curtains closed and bedside lamp always kept on. My parents eventually told me the truth about the curfew, and the Night Stalker.

The town has been cursed for decades. Nobody knows how long, but the same event takes place every night. For every deer that is struck dead in the town, the spirits of the deceased deer comes out when it’s dark and takes a life in return. Those who venture out when it’s dark are crushed like a car and their bodies taken to the lake where they sink to the bottom, to be later fished out by the locals in the following days. That’s how the town used to dispose of deer corpses during the 1900′s. I still have nightmares to this day, every time I close my eyes all I see is theirs staring back at me. I don’t think I’ll ever leave my home. I don’t think the nightmares will stop…

#story #creepypasta #short story #horror #birb-hoe #dappermouth #artists on tumblr #thriller #dark #creepy

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