#just tell me where my parcel is goddamn

[guroseinsei]

i hate calling, srsly hate it cause i have to plan out a whole script of what to say. but id rather shake in my boots and stutter on the fucking phone than wait 24 TO 48 HOURS FOR CUSTOMER CARE TO GET BACK TO ME BECAUSE THEN I NEED TO KEEP CHECKING MY EMAIL UNTIL THEY DO!!!!!!!

[novelconcepts]

💕 taivan in a game / after an injury

💕 kissing somewhere other than lips

If Van Palmer had a dollar for every injury sustained in goal, she wouldn't need a scholarship to get out of this shithole town. Injuries are part and parcel, she'll tell anyone who asks. Injuries are even fun.

It's true--in the aftermath. After the body has healed, and all she has left is a bruise or a scar, and a story. The fun part is in reliving the narrative, not the pain.

The pain sucks pretty bad, all things considered.

She leans back against the wall, an ice pack held to her eye. Every so often, she has to remind herself to move it; the thing about catching a ball with your face is it tends to black both eyes. And bust up your nose. And fatten your lip.

"You're a fucking mess," Taissa says. "No more than ten minutes on that eye, remember."

"This ain't my first rodeo," Van says, though it's the worst injury she's sustained in quite some time. Getting bonked on the noggin is nothing. Stopping a corner kick with the bulk of her face is...worse.

She moves the pack dutifully to her right eye, resetting her internal clock. Ten minutes, and then her nose can have a turn. It's a great game of pin-the-ice-on-the-goalie, aiming, as always, to dodge frostbite.

"At least we won," says Tai. Van gives her a bleary grin.

"I'd have told people we won either way. It being true just makes this hardcore, instead of humiliating."

"It can be both," Tai says. She, too, is sitting against the wall. The rest of the team has long hit the showers, making loud noises about a post-game trip to Muriel's. Tai has every right to join them. She doesn't have a probable concussion.

"Hardcore," Van repeats. She lowers the ice, gingerly grazing her top lip with one finger. Yup. That'll make talking stupid for a few days. At least she didn't lose any fucking teeth. "Chicks dig hardcore."

"Do they," says Tai flatly, though her smile betrays her amusement. She's always like this when Van pokes her. Doesn't want to admit a goddamn thing, but no one would smile like that if Van were wrong.

"I'm told," she says thickly, "chicks dig goalies in particular. Since we are--"

"Concussed?"

"Awesome." Van dabs at her nose. No longer bleeding. That's nice. "Come on, you have to admit it was cool. Look at me, I'm a walking war hero."

Taissa does look at her. For the first time, she turns her shoulders off the wall and just: looks. Her eyes are inscrutable. She's still smiling, but it's faint, almost distracted.

"What?" Van asks suspiciously. "I know I look like a train hit me, but it was a cool train. I--hey, what are you doing?"

"Shh," Tai says, sounding more confident than she looks. She looks deeply terrified, one hand braced against Van's cheek. Terrified, and like she's made a decision she can't take back, and: hey. Here she comes, right into Van's personal bubble, her lips grazing just beneath Van's left eye.

Van closes on instinct, and receives a second kiss for her trouble, this time on the lid. Taissa shifts her angle, her mouth lingering lightly beneath Van's right eye next. Then the right lid. Then, bewilderingly, the tip of Van's nose.

"Not broken," Tai says softly. Van's eyes are still closed. She's a little afraid to pry them open, afraid the blurred image of Taissa Turner will vanish into hallucinatory smoke.

"Not broken," she breathes. "Just a little busted."

"Worth it?" Tai asks. Her hand falls away. Van's skin tingles where she's been kissed--both eyes, both cheeks, her nose. Her mouth is dry. She's grateful and miserable at the same time, that Tai hasn't kissed her there too.

"Yeah," she says. "Yeah. Super worth it."

Taissa hefts the ice pack and presses it firmly against Van's mouth. "Good. You're still a fucking mess."

Van grins.

[rogalion]

Skew-T graphs will be the death of me

hi if you thought i’d strictly post art here well you’re DEAD WRONG and i am an UNHINGED METEOROLOGY MAJOR so here we fucking go hellsite

before i even get to the behemoth that is a Skew-T I have to talk about the previous lab I did so let’s talk about SOUNDINGS from a RADIOSONDE.

Every day at 0000UTC and 1200UTC here in the united states if a NWS station has enough helium and/or budget to do so they launch a WEATHER BALLOON. 

ATTACHED TO THESE IS A VERY IMPORTANT STYROFOAM BOX called a RADIOSONDE. They collect all the data as the balloon goes up including pressure, altitude, wind speed, temperature, dew point depression, a lot of important things. The data they collect is collectively called a SOUNDING and the raw data looks like this: 

72235 TTAA 67121 72235 99000 21017 19009 00089 ///// ///// 92761 16015 19531 85482 14650 20036 70094 05873 21528 50576 12560 25060 40742 25746 25061 30944 42759 24566 25064 49769 25586 20209 54583 25588 15390 61181 26582 10638 67979 26553 88119 67779 24568 77176 26099 41116 31313 58208 81106 51515 10164 00000 10194 19530 20031= and so on there are like two other parts that look a lot like this.

I’m not gonna tell you how we decode these but basically at required pressure levels such as 1000, 925, 850, 700 hPA, etc. it tells us the temperature, dew point depression, altitude in geopotential meters/decameters, wind direction, and wind speed. The next two parts say the same stuff but at more levels and are more specific.

ALL THAT SHIT gets put on THIS FUCKER.

THIS IS CALLED A SKEW-T DIAGRAM.

i have to plot DATA on THIS for my lab due TOMORROW which is already late because I missed two crucial days in class due to mental health and my dog being sick so I’ve been taking notes on them ALL WEEKEND.

I love data as much as the next STEM major who loves data, but which dumbass decided that we were gonna make a menace of a graph that tries to fit as much information in a single goddamn thing as possible? I have no clue. Here’s what you get to know about this.

The horizontal lines with labels in the middle of them reading numbers like 1000, 950, 900, in intervals of 50 and using hectoPascal units are ISOBARS. These are lines of constant pressure and in meteorology we use these because pressure levels are far more relevant than altitude, and how high or low they are moves around so it’d get even more confusing even quicker if we actually used height (which we do but not right now I have enough on my plate).

The diagonal orange lines with the positive slope (so they point like [ / ] ) are called ISOTHERMS. If you’re already catching on you’ll figure these are lines of constant temperature which in this diagram is in degrees Celsius labeled I think within the respective isotherm here. The labeling schemes are not actually standardized which makes me want to strangle someone but I better get over that fast because there’s a lot of shit like that in meteorology. USUALLY they’re labeled at the bottom of the chart but not here because fuck me i guess.

Those are the easy ones. NOW I GET TO TALK ABOUT ADIABATS.

oh my god are they even. where the fuck are my dry adiabats. OH GOD I HAVE TO SQUINT

The very faint orange lines in the background that like, fuck, how do I describe them. The faint orange lines that look like they’re perpendicular to the isotherms (they are not) but are actually curved like the bottom half of the letter C are called DRY ADIABATS. These are lines of CONSTANT POTENTIAL TEMPERATURE. What the fuck does that mean? GOOD QUESTION. 

Dry Adiabats indicate the rate of change of the temperature of a parcel of dry air rising or descending adiabatically, meaning with no loss (or gain) of heat by the parcel. For each multiple of 10 degrees C, that Dry Adiabat shares its label with the respective Isotherm reflecting the temperature of its point of intersection with the 1000 hPA isobar. If your eyes glazed over and you didn’t understand a word I just said, that’s fine. Me neither.

So what’s constant potential temperature? It’s constant temperature we THINK it is. So that line could, potentially, represent that temperature. Maybe. I love science.

The green lines that make a really stretched out S sometimes, I don’t know how to describe these, these are called SATURATION ADIABATS, or MOIST ADIABATS, or SATURATION PSEUDO-ADIABATS. Nothing is standardized and I am suffering immeasurably. They represent lines of constant equivalent potential temperature. What the fuck does THAT mean? 

GOOD QUESTION! They represent the rate of change in temperature of a rising parcel of saturated air, assuming all condensed water vapor is liquid and falls out as the parcel rises (this is known as the pseudo-adiabatic assumption). Before you ask, I don’t know either. Pseudo-adiabatic dude just trust me.

Saturation Adiabats are labeled with the celsius temperature value of its point of intersection with the 1000 hPa isobar, and they share that label with the dry adiabats and isotherms.

Finally, the dashed lines with the positive slope are called SATURATION MIXING-RATIO LINES. AKA: HUMIDITY MIXING-RATIO LINES. They represent constant values of water vapor capacity, meaning the number of grams of water per kg of dry air required to saturate said air at a particular temperature and pressure. They’re confusingly and terrifyingly labeled at the bottom of the diagram with a range of 0.1 g/kg to 40g/kg in parts of water vapor per 1000 parts of dry air. Because the vapor capacity of air varies non-linearly with temperature, the intervals for labeling these are NOT uniform.

Congrats that’s all the lines, here’s a image that tells you that quicker and better:

oh yeah and on the right side Wind is plotted somewhere just like it is in any other weather station plot with the flags and the staff in the direction the wind is coming from etc. etc. yeah. 

I wrote this while procrastinating on this exact assignment I had to decode a sounding and now I have to plot the temperature and dew point lines on one of these fuckers see y’all later for another stupid weather rant wahoo if im wrong on anything I’m sorry mostly to myself because that means I’m about to fail this lab bye bye

[lightofraye]

All right.

I've largely kept quiet on this, aside from, I think, reblogging at seeing JDM speak up for Jared. Oh and I believe mentioning how stupid that TikTok was.

Celebrities are not exempt from being gossiped about. Even in other countries where there may be stricter laws to protect celebrities from invasive paparazzi (there's a reason why Shania Twain raised her son in Switzerland!), celebrities are gossiped about. It's part and parcel of the fame.

It sucks. It happens.

Even royal families, politicians, and other famous folk will be gossiped about. (And the tragedy of Princess Diana...)

What many a blogger and I do is just talk. Speculate. Maybe make fun of some sections of the fandom, point out the toxicity of the fandom, and overall talk about our favorites. Or whatever. We'll also try to debunk a ton of nonsense (hi Misha, you born liar).

Not one celebrity is above criticism. Not one.

Not the princes, sons of Princess Diana. Not Jensen. Not Jared. Not Misha. Not... hell, Dwayne The Rock Johnson. Not Glen Powell. Nobody is above gossip!

Hell, I'm pretty sure my neighbors probably gossip about my family. I certainly talk about others when it comes up. Gossip about friends. Life. It's how we connect and find like-minded people.

But keep in mind... there's a difference between speculating with decent evidence to make said speculation seem probable (like what I do) and then there's outright fucking lies, as those girls did with the TikTok video against Jared. (And Misha about his bullshit regarding the plane.)

It turned out those girls completely lied about the whole story. It went viral enough that Hellers went nuts and tried to use it as proof of what a "bad person Jared is". It caught the attention of no less than three well-known names in Hollywood--Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Billy Burke, and Jim Michaels.

No one went chasing after these well-known names to get them to comment. They saw it all over Twitter and were annoyed enough to speak up! Jared didn't ask them to speak. He didn't have to.

They spoke up for Jared because he's well-known and well-liked in the industry. There has been endless praise for his achievement of work-life balance in Hollywood. Most sets would be working 16+ hour days. Jared succeeded in bringing that down to, what, 11, 12 hours? It meant people had a fucking life. Of course he impressed Hollywood enough to get a holding deal with a major broadcaster (CBS). And folks, it's way better with CBS than it would be with any of the streaming services right now. CBS is booming and leading in scripted shows.

Has Jared made missteps in the past? Yes. His fans actually acknowledge, actually have said they wished he hadn't done XYZ. (Doxxing in particular, they agreed, it was bad.) Yes, Jared was drunk and got into some kind of fight. He made his amends, kept to the agreement that the courts imposed upon him. And apparently attended the wedding of the person he got into a fight with! It's been years since he's done anything bad!

Meanwhile... Misha... christ. Orgasm sounds at CCS. Using the r word and his defenders trying to say "He's from a different time where that was acceptable (no it fucking wasn't no it never was)". Or the f word--he isn't queer, he cannot touch that goddamned word, back the fuck off Misha Collins. And the lies about the plane incident. (Again, repeatedly debunked by no less than three different bloggers with links to the original stories!)

Even Jensen has said some things in the past that have made me facepalm. Antis are right to call him out on it.

The difference though? I haven't seen any anti-Jensens deliberately tag him in, tell him to go kill himself, that they hope he commits suicide, or other vile things. Meanwhile I see Hellers and anti-Jareds do that to the extreme. When they were making comments in hoping that the cancellation of Walker would lead to Jared committing suicide.

It's not the same. Period.

We write gossip and speculation. We don't go to other blogs or twitters or other social medias and harass them, throw death threats at their faves. We don't incite violence. (I'm looking at you, Misha.)

None of us condone Jared's past bad behavior. The difference is, he's grown. He's owned up to it. He hasn't done anything in several years. His reaction to Prequelgate was absolutely understandable, as one story cites from Jensen that he saw Jared tried to call and text him before he gave up and tweeted. Jensen knew he fucked up. So spare me the defense of that.

Basically this is a very long essay to tl;dr: Jared learned and is doing better as a person. He didn't deserve that TikTok video trying to paint him as a bad person.

Period.

Not to defend Jensen or the rest of the SPN cast, but if they’re going to be called out why isn’t Gen also expected to come to Jared’s defense from all the constant slandering and hate online? Is she afraid of being harassed and bullied by Hellers too?

Honestly, why would she do that? The moment she would post that message, she would be slaughtered because it's her husband! She would be considered biased. If it was my husband, id tread carefully before acting and exposing my family any further. Also, Im glad Jared got defended (mostly because it was an evil lie to cast on the internet) but how stupid it is that celebrities need to go on Twitter and say he is a good tipper? I dont blame the ones that didnt vouch for him, I get it, the situation by itself is ridiculous and it shouldnt even have started in the first place. This is the scum of the fandom, right there, trying to harm a man's image for the sake of what, anyway?

[erensproudsimp]

Chef D'œuvre

Jean kirstein x Reader

⚠ Sexual Content Ahead ⚠

Content Warnings:Fluff, Sex on a canvas, established relationship, teasing Jean hehe, dirty talk, ultimate smut + this isn't proofread

Summary: Restraining Jean from touching you the whole day, a candle light dinner in the evening leading to sex on a canvas? The idea of Jean as an artist is just so hot.

Word count:4.1k

Fanart is by artworkbyzuli on insta

Cross-posted on ao3

Colorful tainted tiles, the smell of fresh paint hovering in the air, early hours of sunshine filtering from the beige curtains to fall on his face highlighting his features as his eyes concentrated on the canvas. Blanc frames waiting to be hued with a meaning or not. Teeth clenching, his jawline apparent, he looked like a Greek God, his brush being his weapon, almost out of this world. Shirt glued on his body like a second skin layer bringing out his honed muscled body, Jean truly was a work of art spreading his magnificence on cloth and paper. Standing by the door frame in his shirt two times bigger than your figure, you admired your boyfriend, his back facing you, drowned in his own world of aesthetic in his studio.

Tiptoeing to him, you wrapped your arms around his torso, your cheek pressed on his back catching him off-guard. You took a quick whiff of him. Sandalwood with a faint citrus.

"Woah there, good morning baby, did you have a good night sleep?" Jean's hoarse voice almost made your legs lose their balance. His free hand caressing your arms, you hummed as a simple yes still intoxicated by his scent.

"I'm going to go prepare breakfast, I'll call for you when I'm done." Jean gave you a quick forehead kiss before you left the room.

Cracking some eggs in the pan, you connected your phone to the speaker in the house to play some music while you proceeded to put fruits in the blender to make smoothies. Swaying your body to the music at the same time lip-syncing to the words, you spread butter on slices of bread unaware of Jean's presence behind you. The man crossed his arms, leaning on the wall he admired your actions which were nothing but alluring to him.

What made it even more hot to him was the fact that you were wearing his shirt. At first in the studio, he didn't realise but now that he noticed, he couldn't help but smirk to himself. He took in the way his shirt was practically floating on you, the flashbacks of last night suddenly raced through his mind. The way you were moaning his name, grabbing the sheets tightly as you let him take control of you made him take a deep breath before he approached you.

Now it was his turn to return you the hug from earlier. Surprised by him, he didn't leave you a second to react to his abrupt act of affection, he moved your hair to the side to plant a kiss on your neck making you shiver. His arms tightened around you just as his kisses went deeper all through your neck.

"y/n," his hot breath unsteady.

"Je-Jean, the eggs are gonna burn," you breathed.

"The only thing burning right now is my urge to fuck you right on this counter," Jean whispered in your ear almost making you lose your thinking pattern.

"Jean, I'm serious," you tried to wingle from his grasp to save your omelettes and placed them on two separate plates.

Jean looked at you disappointedly as though a puppy who had just lost its toy.

"Aww don't look at me like that, gimme a kiss, come on," you opened your arms, encouraging him to come to you.

Gladly he did and locked his lips in an instant.

"Jump," Jean demanded in between the makeout and you, of course, obeyed.

Your legs around his hips, sloppy lips fighting for dominance, Jean pressed your ass on the kitchen island. His arms snaking up and down your thighs, giving them a light squeeze here and there.

"Your legs are pretty, but they would be prettier on my shoulders hmm," his voice laced with a passion so hot like molten lava.

Your insides now ignited with flame, you pushed your hips into his by closing in your legs wrapped around him. Hard. Mischievousness coursed through your mind as you wanted to tease him for making you flushed.

"Want my legs over you? well catch them if you can," with that said, you jumped off the kitchen island freeing yourself from his clutches to run away from him.

"Hey! Get back here! I'm not done with you! " Jean called after you, laughing as he chased you down the corridors. A soft genuine laugh emitting from him when you threw pillows from the sofas at him to halt his movements only for him to catch the items and throw it back at you like a snowball fight.

A grin plastered on your face when you finally got tired of the running and collapsed on the floor with Jean kneeling beside you equally euphoric. The happiness was mainly because he felt so much at peace seeing your smile.

"Got ya," he breathed from exhaustion, encircling his arms around your waist and pulling you close so that he could rest his chin on your shoulder.

"You're so warm," Jean nuzzled his nose into your neck.

"Speaking of warmth, our food's getting cold in the kitchen, hurry up we need to eat," you mentioned.

"The only thing I want to eat right now is you-" you cut him off with your index finger pressed on his soft lips.

"Jean, I swear to god, let's go," you pushed him from back because he was trying to grab your ass, however, you receded.

"Your hands were so small on my back, but I'd prefer them jerking my dic-" again you shut him up by shoving toast bread in his mouth to save you from further embarrassment.

"Y/n baby, I need you so bad right now," he said swallowing that bread hard as your eyes widen.

From the look in his eyes, you could tell that this man was sexually frustrated, certainly because of your actions earlier but you didn't expect him to be so thirsty.

For a brief moment, a thought came up to you, basically telling you to refuse his current wishes to make him further agitated just so that you ravish the feeling of him taking the pent-up anger out harder on you later. Perfect plan, you internally agreed to yourself.

"Oh you need me badly? How about you show me that at night, okay?"a light smirk stretching the corner of your mouth.

" Y/n, I need you now, like right now, I can't wait till night or anything," Jean whined. How cute.

"Aww, you're that desperate baby? You can't hold yourself back? I thought you were tougher than this,"you cooed.

" Y/n, I can see damn well what you're trying to do, so stop messing with me please, "Jean reached out to grab your face only for you to pull back. Not going to lie that did hurt you when you saw the disappointed look on his face, yet, oddly that made you feel and realise the control you had over him and goddamn this felt good.

"Okay then, how about a little bit of challenge for you? If you manage to keep your hands off me the entire day and that includes any sort of contact, I'll make a surprise for you tonight as a reward. And if you lose then no sex for you until the next day baby. Deal?"

"Now that's going to be hard as hell but your surprises never fail to entertain me so deal."

"That was quick of you," you commented shaking his hand as a way of signing the contract.

"I just know that you're going to do something remarkable that will blow my mind so I'm simply looking forward to it."

His hopes were ridiculously high for the reward and luckily you already had something in mind for tonight.

After breakfast, Jean wasted no time to rush into his studio to keep you out of his sight. That was going to be a little too easy for him to win in this way. Not that you didn't want him to win, you couldn't help but want to push him to his limits. While you were scavenging your mind for the perfect way to catch him off guard, you heard a knock at the door. Outside was the postman with a package which seemed to be a delivery of one of the various things you kept buying online.

Taking the parcel inside, you opened it to find something that made you smiled evilly. It was a black transparent two pieces lingerie with lace straps. Not a second was wasted for you to change into that. To hide your plans, you wore a bathrobe and tiptoed to the studio.

Inside, Jean clearly concentrated on drawing when you creaked open the door, his attention now on you.

"Y/n why are you wearing a bathrobe in the middle of the da- oh-"

Right at that moment, you removed the robe letting it fall to your feet to unveil the marvel that was hidden inside of it.

Jean's breath hitched in his throat.

"You have no idea how badly I want to scream right now,"his pencil falling out of his hand, he covered his face with his hand and took a step back from you. He rubbed his temples as he inhaled deeply.

"Fuck y/n, why are you doing this to me?"he looked at you from up to down as though he was eating you up with his eyes, capturing every inch of what he's seeing and burning it into his memory.

"Do you like what you see?" your hands on your hips as you leaned on the wall.

"You have no idea."

You chucked and approached him slowly.

"If only I could touch you right now, you have no idea of what I'd do to you," Jean put his hands into the pockets of his pants to try to contain himself from not jumping on you like a hungry wolf who hasn't eaten in weeks.

Clacking your black heels on the cold tiles, your hands meticulously moving on your hips, you diminished the distance between you two. One foot difference. Jean licked his teeth from inside closed mouth and opened it slightly to let out hot breath, sustaining the proximity but you could see the intensity in his eyes.

"I can't stop staring, please y/n, "

"Where's the fun in that? I wanted to see you all hopeless for me and you're doing a pretty good job resisting," your finger pointing at his growing bulge.

Blowing air from his mouth, his hands on his hips, he walked to and fro.

"Is this the surprise you were telling me about in the morning?"

"Of course not, the surprise is bigger than this. I just wanted to give you a little sneak peak thought since I love you so much and don't want to kill you with a heart attack," you giggled twirling a strand of your hair. His eyes went big.

"If that's the case, you better prepare yourself for tonight because you seriously don't know what I'm going to do to you," Jean licked his lips.

"Can't wait," you blew him a kiss while you strolled out of the room, his eyes still fixated on the lingerie.

Not only did what happened turned you on, but it also motivated you to start the preparations for Jean to wreck you till you couldn't walk. Changing into pajamas for comfort, you took out scented candles of your preference and placed them on the nightstands and dressing table in the bedroom.

Jean's POV

'What the hell was y/n even thinking pulling that move on me? '

Sighing deeply I looked at my boner.

"Now what am I going to do of you? Jerk off to the memory of y/n in that black lingerie?"

On second thought, that doesn't sound bad, except for the fact that he was in an art studio.

Gosh, was he not turned when he first saw you in that. The way the cloth surrounded your soft breasts, decorating them to be perhaps the most flawless thing he'd ever seen or the way your stance screamed if confidence. He couldn't decide which of them were hotter.

The little ribbons on the strap did nothing but make you more erotic. How did you even manage to look that good, is a mystery that he will never discover.

"I really got the best of the best for me huh," Jean smiled to himself.

His art failed in front of you. Null and void. In his eyes you were the definition of what a beauty goddess was, hence proving that beauty indeed lied in the eyes of the beholder. Despite your imperfections which nonetheless still made you impeccable, Jean always attempted in copying your sublimity yet in vain.

Without a doubt, you were the best Muse he's ever had in his life. One day hoping that he would finally do you justice and be able to recreate his image of you in his mind on cloth, Jean kept trying albeit failing each time. However, he would absolutely never give up.

Collecting himself from the recent impact, he picked up his pencil from the ground and as much as he wanted to concentrate on his drawing of you, he couldn't prevent himself from picturing you from back then. You were beyond gorgeous. Maybe, that exactly was the inspiration he needed.

"I need to take a bath," Jean said to himself. Luckily there were two bathrooms in the house, as he wouldn't want to interrupt you while you were busy making whatever surprise.

To be honest, Jean was as impatient as you and full on ready to be taken by surprise by you.

Your POV

"Okay I've cleaned the room spotless, scented it, changed the sheets of the bed, took out towels and now time to bring the big thing,"you checked off everything on your mentally made-up list before you could continue.

Rushing to the wardrobe, you took out the art supplies required for the sex painting. Canva isn't the comfiest option for sex but you knew that it will all be worth the work at the end.

You honestly couldn't wait to see Jean's reaction to this.

Since the mattress can get a little colorful, you didn't want to run the risk of ruining the bedding either, you rather placed the sheet of canva on the carpeted floor that was still easy to the body. Laying down a cloth, that you taped so that it wouldn't dislocated when things get moving, on top of which you placed the canva and towels around it as well as a trail of towels towards the bathroom so that clean up of the post-art would be rendered easier.

"Okay now that everything is settled, let's go take a bath and prep myself up," you muttered to yourself, locking the door from the inside so that Jean wouldn't accidentally enter it.

-Time skip-

A private dinner in your dwelling makes for an magical evening. Silk sheet on the table, napkins neatly pleated on the white plates surrounded by tableware. Incorporating flower petals, slow romantic harmonious music, and low lighting to create the right atmosphere you as well added string lights for an added touch of enchantment. Aphrodisiac food was the obvious choice, you thought, placing down the lobster in the middle. Wine in glasses twinkling to the fairy lights for a further sizzle.

Not long until Jean made his appearance in a suit, top buttons of his shirt loose while you were in a black dress lighting the scented candles.

"Hey babe," his throaty voice called.

Turning around, you saw him, his hands in his pockets walking towards you. His large body towering yours.

"You look hot," he complimented looking down on you.

"So do you," you giggled bopping his nose.

Pulling a chair, Jean signaled you to sit as he pushed the chair then going to his seat facing you.

The empty wine glasses were delicately filled with the red alcohol, each of you raising your goblet for a cheers.

" Cheers to my pretty boyfriend."

"Cheers to my future wife," Jean smirked as you were busy turning fifty shades of red.

In comfortable silence, except for the clinking of utensils, both of you ate.

"Main course is done for, now time for dessert, "he said standing from his chair to yours. Lift you off the ground swiftly, he walked you to the bedroom in bridal style.

"huh? HUH? Jean what are you doing?"

"Taking my dessert to eat, what else?" he replied kissing you. His kiss was a fever. Hot. Sluggish.

Opening the door to disclose the surprise, his eyes went wide until it hit him. The canva and towels on the ground, paint orderly laid on the bed.

"I was thinking the house needed some more decorations, so why not spice things up by creating this masterpiece and hanging it in the living room for everyone to see? " innocently you smiled at him.

"Hahaha y/n! You're amazing!" rosy cheeks, eyes twinkling with admiration and affection he twirled your body in air, "wait then that means that the whole day you preventing me from touching you was pointless," his expression now slightly frowned.

"I mean, yeah, I mean, I just wanted to see you desperate for me," you fumbled with your words.

"Bad girl. After this I will have to punish you for making me suffer for nothing," Jean put you down.

You didn't know whether to feel anticipation or fear knowing that this man was going to wreck you.

"Why are you acting coy all of a sudden? Weren't you the one to act like a whore? " with the cockiest smirk ever Jean said.

His hands previously placed gently on your hips began to tighten. The press only fueled your rapid beating of your heart. Tilting your head towards his face by lifting it with one finger on your chin, he locked eye contact with you.

Lust filled his irises. Skilfully, he unzipped your dress and pulled it off your skin. Skin that desired to be touched so badly. Skin that burned under his fingertips that grazed the surface. Under the clothes exposed the black lingerie that got Jean worked up since morning.

Even though he already saw you in it, it nevertheless felt like the first time. The same adoration that held his gape seemed to be worshiping your body.

"May I take your bra off? " Jean asked. You nodded, Jean elatedly removed it.

"Look at these perfect tits. Belonging and made only for me," cupping them in his hands, he growled against your neck.

Your mind going blanc and empty, you were left speechless. Only ravishing him. His presence. His hot breath fanning on you. As much as you wanted to take this slowly, you couldn't stop yourself from craving to feel him buried deep inside of you.

Your hand slightly sliding over his growing bulge, earning a hiss and restrained moan from him.

"No. You're not going to be the one to tease me anymore. It's my turn," biting your collarbone, he declared making you leap in his arms.

Feeling self-conscious that you were the only one in undergarment, you unbuttoned his shirt and ripped it off him while he was sloppily making out with you.

Grabbing your thighs, he insinuate for you to jump. Chest to chest, he then threw you on the bed making it sink under your weight. He was finally freed from his restraints of not laying a hand on you.

His body hovering yours, he kissed you passionately. He's never kissed you like this before. Maybe you should restrain him more often.

Jean swallowed your gasp when unknowingly his hand went down your stomach to press on your clothed clit.

"Huh? You like that?" laughs "yeah you like that don't you," he breathed his finger circling around the bud. Your response was a moan and your breath quickening. Your reaction turned Jean on more than he already was.

Going down on you, he sucked your soaked underwear, the room filled with slurping sounds. He gripped your hips by wrapping his big arms around it to prevent you from squirming away. You were practically a moaning mess. Aggressively, he ripped it off you, continuing to lick through your folds.

"Jea-Jean I think I'm going to c-cum," you manage to utter.

"Heh, not yet princess, we got so much more do," he wiped his mouth that was coated with your juices and licked the liquid off his fingers. You looked at him with pleading eyes as you were yearning for a release.

Legs trembling, you raised your body to be able to sit while Jean grabbed the body-safe paint and put a fair amount on the cloth.

"Come here my lady," he said as he picked you to lay your body gently on the canva, paint on your back.

Jean took off his pants and underwear, his hard dick slapping on his stomach whilst you were making yourself comfortable.

A brush in his one hand and a palette in another, he sauirted some paint on the flat item.

Impatience began to overcome you as you begged him to come to you.

"Wait a moment more babe, I'm just making the perfect colour," Jean finished his sentence by approaching you.

Jean maintained eye-contact with you, the brush gliding over your soft skin leaving colors behind its track. Chills ran down your skin after each stroke. Drowning in bliss, Jean slowly ran the tool down your belly to an inch higher up your pussy. You were waiting for him to pass the paint through your core but instead he stopped his actions making you internally more annoyed.

"I'm not going to let you get off so easily after what you did to me," Jean murmured.

Cold. Squeezing the paint tubes, Jean splat paint on your body, mainly on your stomach. He leaned forward and pressed his body against yours to spread the paint.

Lining his dick right outside your entrance, he thrusted in without warning. Your back arching, you let out a moan. His hands rushing behind your back, he hugged your body as he gave you time to adjust to him.

"Mmmm, fits perfectly. Look at how good you take me, yeah you see that? "Jean moaned in your ear.

" It's okay, you can move,"you bit back a groan because Jean didn't leave you a second before pumping in and out of you.

" I can't believe you're mine, all mine, no one but me knows how good you feel, just me,"Jean panted in your ears," listen to my moans, you he-ear how goo-od you're making me feel? "

"AH-yes Jean, yes," you purred.

His forehead rested on yours, mouth connected, swallowing each other's breath and sounds.

" Go faster Jeaann." This made him slow down instead of doing as you wanted.

"Oh? you want me to go faster? Go-o ahead, beg for it. Tell me how bad you need me," Jean's stroked your insides with long and slow thrusts.

"Pl-please Jean, need you so badly, you make me feel so good so take all your anger out on me bu-ut please make me cum alongside with you!"

"Lift your ass, my queen,"Jean satisfied with your answer commanded, which you did as he ordered as he pounded deeper into you mixing the paint on the canva.

"Look at you, such a good girl."

It wasn't long until Jean filled your insides with his hot seed making you scream his name loudly. Right before you could come that Jean could tell by the shaking of your breath, he lifted your body off the masterpiece so that your ejaculation wouldn't ruin it.

In his arms, you came so hard, your liquids dripping down Jean's skin.

"Y/n, I don't think you realised that but what you just did was so hot," Jean admired you.

"Also, thank you for fulfilling my fantasies as an artist," he thanked you kissing your cheeks fondly.

Walking on the towel leading to the bathroom, he put you inside the bathtub, opening the tap to let the container fill with hot water. While it was doing so, Jean got in with you between his legs and head on his chest heaving up and down.

Jean took some shampoo in his hand, and massaged your scalps with you basking. Heavenly was a word too light to describe the feeling. You were basically in paradise.

"In round two I'm not planning on going gentle now so just bite the pillow and take it," Jean sputtered against your hair.

[cosmicoceanfic]

2.2k, available on AO3

Dean and Cas jog down the stairs of the Bunker, duffle bags in hand. Sam notices that they seem a little looser in the way they walk, which is a relief. Both Dean and Cas have been holed up in their respective rooms for the past few weeks. It’s good that their trip to bury God’s book for Jack worked out for them.

“Hey, Sammy.”

“Hello, Sam.”

“Hey, guys.” Sam smiles, closing his book and standing. “How was your trip?”

“Went alright.” Dean dumps his duffle bag on a chair. “Cas and I got married. Taught him how to change a tire.”

Sam drops the book. It lands on the ground with a heavy thud. “You what?”

“Taught him how to change a tire,” Dean says, a little slower this time.

“No, not that one, the other- you got married?”

“Yeah.”

“The tire changing exercise was helpful.” Cas drops his duffle bag as well. “Especially since I will be continuing to use my truck.”

Sam can’t tell if they’re actually, legitimately fucking with him or not. “You weren’t even a couple when you left!”

“Then we were,” Cas says. “And then we were married.”

“How long was it between getting together and getting married?”

“Bout, hm.” Dean turns to Cas. “Three days?”

“It was on the third day, yes.”

Sam gapes at them.

“Why?” he manages.

Dean shrugs.

“Mostly we thought it’d be funny,” he says.

Sam doesn’t even have an answer to that.

“Aw, buck up, Sammy,” Dean tells him. “It’s almost like you’re not happy for us.”

There’s a slight apprehensive edge to his tone that snaps Sam out of his reverie. “Of course I’m-“ he moves around the table and hugs Dean, who allows it, and then Cas, who brightly returns it. “Congratulations, guys. Long time coming, I guess.”

“Thanks, man.” Dean claps his hands together, which Sam sees now has a faint glint of gold to it. “I’m hungry. Cas, you hungry?”

“I am almost always hungry.”

“Part and parcel of being human, buddy.” Dean gives him a clap on the shoulder. “C’mon. I’ll make us sandwiches.”

Sam watches, still feeling somewhat bewildered, happiness for them somewhere rolling around in that haze, as the two head out of the room, linking hands as they turn towards the hallway.

This isn’t the whole truth, naturally.

This is the reality:

For three weeks, Cas and Dean had hardly spoken, too uncomfortable, too awkward, until Jack had asked them for help, and if there was anything they could not ignore, it was their son coming to him when he needed them.

The trip to bury the book in a remote corner of the country had changed things, softened them, slowly but surely, until after five days, Dean plucked up his courage.

“Cas?” Dean had said as they walked into their motel room for the evening. Cas had looked at him, blinking sleepy eyes, patient.

“I love you,” he’d told him, steeling himself for whatever it was that came next.

“I know,” Cas had answered.

Dean had stared before he could get out “did you just Han Solo me?”

A soft, almost bashful expression crept across Cas’s face, shrugging his shoulders.

Dean gaped.

“Son of a bitch,” he’d said, and lunged in for a kiss.

Three days later, after slow and less slow kisses, linked hands as they drove on back roads, curling up in the same bed, exhausted from the road, Dean left to go get coffee for him and Cas when he stumbled across a pawnshop.

It was a gut decision. The sort you make without thinking through the implications, because it just feels right in the moment, and how could it be anything else later?

It caused more low level panic, however, after the two cheap gold rings had been purchased. He looked down at them in the little plastic baggy they’d given him at the pawnshop.

It’s a lot, he’d thought. It’s a lot, really fast. And he could already picture the look on Sam’s face when they came home, contorted in that specific expression he got when he’s pissy about being confused, the you left for one week and you came back-

Dean closed his fist around the bag before he shoved it in his pocket, stopping by the little donut shop and picking up two coffees and a couple crullers. When he got back to the motel, Cas was in one of his last clean tee shirts and toweling off his hair.

“Got these,” Dean said, putting them on the little piece of furniture the TV rested on. This was a bad idea. He was already acutely aware of what a bad fucking idea this was. His stomach wouldn’t stop clenching. “Little sign in the window says it’s one of the best restaurant in the area according to the newspaper. Course, it could be a really shit newspaper, so-“

“Why are you nervous?” Cas squinted at him as he sat on the edge of the bed to pull on his socks. “What’s going on?”

“I’m not nervous.”

“Is there something supernatural in town that requires our attention?”

“No.” Dean had spent his whole goddamn life successfully bluffing his way out of situations and Cas could see he’s nervous at the drop of a pin. “How can you tell I’m nervous?”

He looked almost exasperated. “I know you. I know when you’re nervous.”

He did, didn’t he?

Hell, even if it wasn’t too late to back out now, he wouldn’t want to.

“Don’t freak out,” he said.

“I’m not freaking out.”

“Okay, well.” He sat down on the ground. Kneeling would be… too far. Too much. He was going to have to do this in a way that made sense or he was gonna panic. “Don’t… start freaking out.”

Cas leaned forwards, resting his elbows on his knees.

“Tell me what’s going on,” he’d said clearly. “And I will not start freaking out.”

Dean got distracted just looking at his face for a few seconds, which had to be in the top ten dumbass Dean Winchester moments, but when Cas’s eyebrows went even further up his forehead he cleared his throat and started fumbling in his pockets.

“Do, uh.” He held out the bag to Cas, who took them with a vaguely baffled expression. “Do you want to wear these?”

Cas stared down at them, bewildered.

“Are these what I’m assuming they are?” he asked slowly.

“Um. I mean, I can’t read your mind, Cas, but-“ Cas gave him a very particular look. “Yes. Yes, those are… what you think they are.”

Cas turned them over in his hands. “Oh.”

“We don’t need to do the whole… shebang. We could just wear them. Unless you wanted to do the whole shebang.”

“I don’t know about ‘shebang’.” Cas did finger quotes while still holding onto the rings and Dean kind of wanted a do over where he did this better just looking at him make them. “It feels like it’s very fast and a long time coming, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah, well.” Dean looked down at his hands. “Look, I’m not good at this. You had this whole speech and it was… really good and I’m not. I’m not good at making those speeches. But it’s just… been you, man, it’s been you for a really long time. And it’s the kind of thing where your gut is to say it was always gonna be you, but it wasn’t, right? It wasn’t always gonna be us, Chuck said as much, so that makes it… better, doesn’t it? It makes it better cause we did it ourselves. Even when we didn’t know we were working at it together, we were working at it together. And I’m so glad it was you. Of course I’m so glad it was you. And I want to be doing this with you for as much forever as we get, so. It just… made sense, even though it kinda makes… no sense. I want to do all this with you anyway. The rings, they’re just… they’re just giving it a clearer name than it had before. And if you don’t want that, then it’s fine, because I’ll be here with or without them.”

A heavy silence hung in the air. Dean stared with a little determination at his hands, waiting.

“It was a nice speech,” Cas said, sounding a little choked.

“S’okay.”

“No. It was nice.” Dean finally looked up to see Cas looking a little amused, eyes wet. “Take the compliment, Dean.”

Dean swallowed. “Okay.”

Cas gently turned the bag over in his hand, pulling it up and lightly tipping them out into his palm. He held it out to Dean, who slowly took one of them. They sat there, both holding onto their rings.

“Last chance to take it back,” Cas whispered.

Dean coughed out a bark of laughter. “You first.”

Cas made a similar noise. He quietly slid his ring on at the same time Dean slid on his. He stared at his hand, tilting it this way and that. The gold glinted a little.

“Hey,” he mumbled, unable to keep the slightly giddy grin off his face. “Look at that.”

“Yeah.” A hand slipped into his field of vision as Cas linked theirs together. Dean stares at them, gold against gold. “Look at that.” Cas squeezed it. “Did you ever think someday you’d…”

“No.” Dean swallowed, looking up at him, still grinning. “No, I figured I’d be dead by now.”

Even a joke about his death didn’t seem to be enough to tamp down Cas’s grin. “I’m very glad you’re not.”

“Yeah. Me, too.” Not just for this. Dean had a lot of reasons to be grateful to be alive these days, more than he’d ever expected. But this? This was number one right now.

“We can do the shebang if you want.” Cas couldn’t seem to pry his eyes off their joined hands, either. “I don’t… know much of what’s required for such things. But we can do it, if you want.”

“Can we just… see how it goes?” He winced. “I mean, see how it goes like, see how we feel about that, not like, see how this goes, I’m, I’m really clear on how solid I am about-“

“Yes. I know.” Cas stood and pulled Dean up with him. He was about to groan about how fast he pulled him up when Cas lightly tugged him forwards and kissed him, which is about the only thing that would have made Dean let go of his hand. “It’s only wise to take at least some part of this slow.”

He wouldn’t always, he thought. He kinda liked the idea of a big party with all their friends and maybe Sam officiating, even though he’d never stop hearing about it. But everything that had happened had happened in the space of a few days and he just needed… more than that few days to process it.

“Did you want my last name?” Dean had asked.

“Of course I want your last name. I don’t have a last name.” Cas looked thoughtful. “I think we should tell Sam we did it because it was funny.”

Dean kissed him again. “I’m so glad I married you.” It did funny things to his stomach just to say it.

“You didn’t marry me.” Dean rarely got to see Cas’s face like this, split open with a grin so wide his nose scrunches up. “You threw a ring at me.”

“Handed you. I handed you a ring.”

“It felt like throwing.”

“Give it back, you son of a bitch, I’ll do it again-“

“No-“ Cas laughed. “No, don’t you dare. I liked it how it was.”

“What are you giving me shit for, then?”

“You have found,” he said, still smiling wide. “A way for me to say I will give you shit forever.”

Dean swallowed.

“Awesome,” he manages.

“Your coffee’s getting cold and it’s presumably good coffee. Let’s reheat it and get on the road.”

Dean had taken his hand, then, linking their fingers up.

This is back to the present:

Dean and Cas are sitting in the kitchen at the little table. Cas is reading the newspaper while Dean eats his sandwich. Nobody eats faster than Cas, he thinks, not a person in the world, and the thought makes him suddenly, irrationally fond.

“You’re looking at me,” Cas says without looking up from the newspaper.

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“I dunno. Just am, I guess.” He gives him what he knows has to be a slightly dopey grin. Cas looks amused and returns his attention to the paper. Dean keeps watching him for another few moments.

“Husband,” he says finally.

“Hm?”

“Husband. That’s you. You’re my husband.”

Cas does look up then with a soft smile. “You’re my husband,” he replies, and kisses him gently. “Would you like to go find a movie to watch?”

“Sure.”

The two of them stand and walk out, hands linked, a quiet joy permeating the air between them, a high key contentment radiating off of them for all to see.

[lulu-zodiac]

Title: You'll Know All I Haven't Said

Pairing: Castiel/Dean Winchester

Tags: Fluff, First Kiss, Pining, AU

Summary: Cas has always had an unnerving knack for knowing what Dean wants the most, even before Dean knows it himself.

If you want to be added to my fic tag list, let me know! <3

.

Cas always gives the best presents.

Dean knows it’s something to do with his unnervingly observant nature, the way he’s so tuned into the people around him. Or maybe just Dean. The thought makes something unfurl in Dean’s stomach that’s feels a bit like fear, or anticipation maybe. It happens a lot when he thinks of Cas, these days. Which is a lot, if Dean is being totally honest. Cas is his best friend, has been since they were both eight years old, so it’s normal that he occupies a lot of space in Dean’s head. It’s just that these days – sometimes it’s so much that it scares Dean, just a little. Because he knows there isn’t much time left where Cas will be a daily fixture of his life; next fall, they’re both heading off to college and everything’s going to be different.

That’s why, Dean tells himself, he’s spent so much time trying to think of what to give Cas this Christmas. It’s hard to top Cas’s gift-giving skills. He has always had an unnerving knack for somehow knowing exactly what Dean wants, even before Dean knows it himself. Not that Dean would tell him, but all his most treasured gifts over the years have all been from Cas. A wonky, handmade wooden impala car Cas made in his Dad’s workshop when he was twelve. Zeppelin concert tickets the Christmas they were both fifteen. Last year, an anthology of Neruda with Cas’s scrawling writing on the opening page, which Dean has read more than the poems the book contains (not that he’d admit that to Cas).

The only problem with Cas being so amazing at choosing gifts is that Dean always feels under pressure to match Cas’s presents, give him something that he’ll treasure as much as Dean treasures the gifts Cas gives him. And the thing is, Cas is hard to buy for, hard to read, a lot of the time. Even though Dean spends more time with Cas than anyone else, and spends even more time thinking about Cas, he’s never quite sure what’s going on in his head. And that makes it difficult, because Dean so wants to make this last Christmas before they both go their separate ways special.

The thought of not being around Cas every day makes his whole chest ache, so Dean tries not to do it. But sometimes it just creeps up on him and it’s like having a bucket of ice water poured over him, a constant knife in his chest that twists deeper and deeper as it gets closer to the time he knows they’ll have to say goodbye. It’s not just about parting ways – Dean knows there’s no way he and Cas won’t stay best friends. But it's like there's also something that Dean's always been waiting for that might not get to happen, that graduating and leaving for college might get in the way of, and even though Dean has no idea what it is he’s waiting for, the idea that it might get pushed aside, might never happen, is somehow unbearable.

After a week of agonising over options, it’s finally Christmas Eve and Dean is standing on Cas’s doorstep, breath clouding out in front of him in the frosty air. There’s small parcel in the pocket of his leather jacket that he fiddles with nervously as he waits, feeling the bumps of his own bad gift-wrapping skills. His stomach flips over inexplicably when the hall lights flicker on there’s the sound of keys in the lock.

“Dean,” Cas smiles, quiet but sincere, and stands back to let Dean in. Dean is hit, as he is not infrequently these days, by how good-looking Cas has become. He’s not built but he’s lean, strong-looking, with a kind of grace about the way he carries himself. Tonight, he’s wearing an indigo knitted sweater that he got in a thrift store with Dean last year, and it makes the blue of his gaze feel infinite as it sweeps over Dean, familiar and warm.

“Hey,” Dean smiles stupidly, suddenly feeling self-conscious as he steps into the hallway. It’s warm and smells faintly of incense and home-baking, but they don’t linger, heading straight up the stairs to Cas’s room as usual.

“Very festive,” Dean remarks as Cas closes the door behind them, noting the multi-coloured fairy lights Cas has strewn around the window, glowing softly and casting the room into muted colours. Dean secretly prefers Cas’s room to his; he’s spent so much time in it over the years that it feels just as much like home, maybe even a little more because it has Cas in it.

“Thanks,” Cas is standing by the door, arms folded across his chest as he watches Dean inspect his bookshelf, run his fingertip along the spines. “There’s a new one there for you, if you want it.” His expression is uncharacteristically unreadable. Not that Cas is easy to read – not by any stretch of the imagination. But Dean’s spent a long time mapping out his different expressions and mannerisms, and it’s not often these days that he’s faced with one he can’t place at all. This one is not unfamiliar, though. It’s one he’s noticed playing across Cas’s features increasingly often in recent months, generally when he glances up and catches Cas off guard. It’s an expression that niggles away at the back of Dean’s mind when he’s trying to get to sleep at night, gets under his skin.

Dean looks reluctantly away from Cas and back to the shelves, eyeing them more closely. His hand pauses on an unfamiliar hardback, Bluebeard by Vonnegut. “This?”

“If you want it,” Cas says, and Dean thinks he detects a note of apprehension beneath the warmth, a kind of distraction, as though he’s thinking about something else, which is a sharp contrast to his often unnerving focus that’s usually directed Dean’s way.

“Thanks,” Dean takes the book of the shelf and flips through the pages, catches a few flashes of Cas’s dextrous scrawl.

“Don’t – don’t read my notes now,” Cas crosses the room, takes the book from Dean’s hands and closes it. “Not when I’m here.”

Dean eyes him curiously. One of his favourite things about Cas lending him books all the time is getting to read Cas’s private thoughts filling the margins. “Is this my Christmas present? Not like you to forgo the fancy paper and the chance to upstage my gift-wrapping skills.”

A smile pulls at the corner of Cas’s mouth, his eyes crinkle with quiet amusement even though the nervousness doesn’t dissipate, Dean notes. “No, it’s not your present.”

“Then where is it?” Dean asks, glancing around the room – but there’s no sight of a gift. Just the soft glow of the fairy lights and Cas’s notebooks on his desk, a couple of jumpers hanging over the back of his chair, the little cactus Dean gave him for his birthday two years ago sitting stoutly on his bedside table.

“You’re very demanding,” Cas admonishes, handing the book back to Dean and crossing the room to sit down on one end of the window seat, curling up like a cat. There’s a twinkle of amusement in his blue gaze, but he pulls the sleeves of his jumper down over his hands, something Dean knows he only does when he’s nervous. The thought makes a pang of nerves curl through Dean too, although he doesn’t know why, doesn’t know why it feels like they’re waiting for something.

“Well, you’re very mysterious,” Dean counters, flopping down on the other end of the window-seat and pushing one of his socked feet playfully at Cas’s. “And unnervingly good at presents, which is why I’m so particularly demanding today. I’m expecting great things. How is that you always seem to know exactly what I want?”

“I very much hope that’s true this year,” Cas says, quiet in a way that makes Dean catch his breath, inexplicably nervous too. He’s looking down, still fiddling with the stray thread from the cuff of his jumper. His expression is uncharacteristically vulnerable in the soft light, messy dark hair and wide eyes so blue that they make Dean’s heart fumble a beat in his chest when Cas suddenly looks up, holds Dean’s gaze. It’s very quiet, the space between them. Dean feels very aware of his heart, doesn’t know why it’s suddenly going quite so fast. “You go first,” Cas says, low, eyes intent and full of something, and it takes Dean a moment to remember what they’re talking about.

“Oh – yeah, okay,” he stutters, feeling his cheeks flush as he fumbles in the pocket of his jacket and pulls out the package he’d wrapped earlier. “Look – don’t get too excited. You know I’m not great at presents, but I wanted to do something special, because you know –” he breaks off, trying to push down the sudden sharpness in his chest, “This might be the last Christmas we spend together, and I don’t want you to go forgetting me when you’re off being all genius at some school I’d never be able to get into.” He thrusts the present unceremoniously at Cas. “Badly wrapped as usual, sorry,” he adds, as an afterthought.

“Dean,” Cas is holding the wrapped present, but he’s not looking at it. He’s looking at Dean with the kind of familiar, earnest sincerity that makes Dean’s heart ache, that he’s going to miss so much. “There is no chance of me ever forgetting you,” Cas says slowly, and the something in his gaze deepens, turning into something that makes Dean feel simultaneously as though he wants to look away and never look away again. The space between them suddenly feels intimate, theirs. Just the two of them, the way Dean always aches for when it’s not.

“Thanks,” Dean says, gathering himself, but his voice sounds unsteady to his own ears, like he suddenly feels. Off-kilter, dizzy, like they’re both spinning into orbit. “Okay, okay, open the goddamn present already,” Dean mumbles, awkward, because he doesn’t know what he’ll do if Cas keeps looking at him like that, and he’s afraid of how much he wants to find out.

Cas looks at him a beat longer, before dropping his attention to the present, unwrapping it carefully with his long, dextrous fingers. There’s a moment when he pulls the leather-bound album out of the shell of wrapping where Dean feels hot all over, embarrassed by his own sentiment. He digs his nails into his palm, watches as Cas opens it and goes still, reading Dean’s inscription. There’s a long pause, and then he turns the first page, and then the next and the next, looking at the photos of him and Dean that Dean has collected from over the years: the two of them togged up in winter coats and red welly boots, making snow-angels in Dean’s back garden; Cas aged ten with a tearstained face, watching as Dean puts a band-aid on his grazed knee; both of them on their first day of middle school, Cas moody with pins all over his jacket and scruffy converse sneakers, Dean grinning with his letterman; Cas, windswept and smiling two summers ago, lying on a sandy beach and gazing up at Dean with that a hint of that something Dean can’t get out of his head now.

Cas finally looks up at him, eyes so blue it hurts to look at them. “Thank you, Dean,” his voice is slightly hoarse. “This –” he breaks off, swallows, turning the album over in his hands. “This must have taken you ages.”

“Don’t mention it,” Dean mumbles gruffly, cheeks heating up. His heart is racing, and he wants to change the subject, take the focus away from how intimate the present suddenly feels now that Cas is holding all their memories in his hands. “Anyway, enough of that. I’m glad you like it, but you know I can’t handle chick flick moments. Come on, your turn. Where’s mine?”

The unreadable look is back on Cas’s face with more intensity, combined with something Dean definitely recognises as nervousness now. Cas’s chest is rising and falling more rapidly, eyes wider than usual, cheeks slightly flushed as he holds Dean’s gaze, almost like he’s steeling himself for something. “Okay,” he says, seemingly more to himself than to Dean. Okay, close your eyes.”

“What?” Dean blinks.

“Close them,” Cas says, with slightly more authority, but Dean can see the way Cas’s fingers are trembling where he’s still holding all of their memories, their whole friendship in his hands. Cas glances down at it unreadably, like it’s suddenly fragile, and then back at Dean. He swallows, repeats, “Dean,” quietly imploring.

Dean closes his eyes. Cas’s gaze and the fairy lights all fade into to soft shadow. Vision gone, Dean suddenly feels very aware of the proximity between them, the almost imperceptible warmth of Cas beside him, the way their thighs are pressed lightly together. Dean has a sudden urge to nudge his closer to Cas’s, to close all the gaps and feel how warm Cas really is. He breathes in, suddenly breathless, and is overwhelmed by the smell of Cas’s skin, familiar and musky, a hint of the patchouli incense he always burns when he’s working. The smell of home. Dean’s heart is suddenly racing so hard it hurts. “Cas?”

Cas is silent. There’s a pause that might be a single heartbeat or the whole last ten years, and then there’s warm, tentative pressure against Dean’s mouth. Cas’s lips, silken soft and hot, brushing tenderly, slowly, against his. Cas’s hands cupping his face, rough and warm and trembling, holding him still as the world spins away into nothing. Cas’s breath, gentle and unsteady against Dean’s mouth, punctuating the kiss.

Dean’s eyes fly open, and the first thing he sees is blue. Deep, exhilarating blue. Like the sky at that moment just between dusk and darkness. And then he’s drowning. He ducks forward and captures Cas’s mouth again with his, stomach somersaulting at the stifled sound Cas makes, like he thought Dean wouldn’t do this, wouldn’t want this. The heat unfurling deep Dean’s chest intensifies at the way Cas’s hands grab at the front of Dean’s shirt, clumsy and desperate, the way Cas shifts closer, all warmth. Cas’s mouth is hot and wet and perfect, tongue twining with Dean’s as they kiss, pressing so close together that their noses nudge together, that Dean’s not sure who’s heartbeat belongs to who anymore.

When they break apart for breath, Cas’s cheeks are flushed and his eyes are dark and shining. He’s so beautiful Dean aches with it.

“Merry Christmas, Dean,” Cas says, voice low and heavy in a way that makes arousal curl through Dean. His eyes are full of quiet happiness, and that something that Dean hasn’t been able to get out of his head for months. It’s wonderful to finally know what it is, to know that it is this. Dean feels like he’s floating.

“Merry Christmas,” Dean echoes, dazedly, and his voice sounds as rough as Cas’s. He shakes his head, smiling in disbelief. “I told you that you always know what I want before I do,” he pauses, “Though, amazing as all the others were, I think this present might just top the list.” Dean is vaguely aware that he’s grinning giddily, heart still pounding.

“I wasn’t sure you’d like it,” Cas admits, looking down, and Dean catches a hint of the nervousness Cas was full of earlier, that makes sense now. Dean feels a rush of warmth for him at the courage it must have taken to cross that line, to take a whole ten years of friendship in his hands and do what Dean never had the courage for.

“Hey,” Dean reaches out, twines their hands together. It’s reassuring the way he can feel Cas trembling a bit too, reminding him they’re both in this together, it’s just the two of them, the way Dean likes it best. “Cas. It’s the best present I’ve ever had,” he says, honestly. Cas looks up and smiles at him, brighter than the lights above them, than anything Dean’s ever known – and Dean suddenly has to rethink his words, because Cas looking at him like that, so full of love and happiness, is better than anything Dean could ever have imagined.

.

[7wanderingpaws]

Captain Bucheon 04

Warnings: language, suggestive

Word count: 4.6K

story masterlist masterlist

tags: @wooya1224 @to-all-the-stories-i-love @jennxx3 @realllllrica (let me know if you want to be un/tagged)​

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<-- Previous - Next -->

Fourth: Painful memories

Baekhyun seemed like a distant dream when you awoke the next day. Everything that happened, starting with your obliviousness to his presence at the field all the way to the moment you slapped him and poured your emotions out; they all felt like they never happened. 

It was your throat, raw and sore from screaming, that indicated last night happened. You woke up tired, feeling your nose clogged and head heavy. As if constantly haunting you, behind closed eyes you saw his; they were looking at you, troubled and wavering. Baekhyun was at your mercy last night. And you were merciless.

One of the painful memories was exceptionally difficult to erase from your mind. Baekhyun's words, that he uttered one year ago in his office, were haunting you and making you believe that things could have been different if you were not lying to him.

I would have waited for you.

Those words were running around in front of your eyes, each word snaking itself in confusing circles creating slight dizziness. Would he have really waited, though?

Groaning, you turned to your other side spotting Yuyeon’s sleeping figure. She wasn’t in the room when you arrived last night, enabling you to cry to your heart's content, which you did. You cried yourself to sleep and now, here was the result. Swollen eyes, headache and a sore throat.

Your phone that was safely tucked under your pillow gave a short vibration, indicating a message. You were waiting for it; it was the last working day after all. Weekend was coming up and you couldn’t wait to get the necessary free time to do your school work and recover from shouting at Byun Baekhyun.

You checked the text message and you planned your day ahead accordingly.

Unknown number

Parcel delivery for the weekend by Sunday 23:30. Bucheon Christian University main gate’s security house.

You frowned, mulling over the destination. Until now, it was always an apartment building and, with the new found information that the messages could have possible secondary destinations encoded, you grew a little uneasy. If issues occurred, would there be another option to deliver the parcel to?

><

There was a hustle going on in Baekhyun’s department that day. Several robberies, crimes and attacks and every officer was preoccupied with suffering victims begging for help and justice.

He also had a couple of cases to deal with, yet he kept zoning out. He barely got a wink of sleep and now he needed to be at his best when he would have much rather stayed home and let himself think through stuff. Not that he didn’t have a whole year to think.

“Knock knock, coffee delivery!” 

Park Chanyeol, the number one detective and also Baekhyun’s close friend, walked in, a cup of steaming coffee in his hand. “What’s up Captain?”

“Thanks,” murmured Baekhyun when Chanyeol handed him the mug. “Any news on the case?” he asked, ignoring his friend’s question completely.

Chanyeol crashed on the chair opposite him with a sigh. “Nope,” he replied. “No solid updates. No leads. The attack was sudden and we can’t seem to find a trace of the target.”

Baekhyun sighed. “Two young women have been attacked so far. They were in their mid-twenties.”

“Actually, both of them were in their final year of university,” added Chanyeol with a serious tone.

“That could be a solid lead,” murmured Baekhyun even though his mind was wandering off again. He was quick to zone out on his friend who continued describing the crime scenes, thinking out loud but Baekhyun was already on a completely different page.

You were just seventeen… and he was so heartless. He could vividly remember the actual happenings in his office. He was sitting just where he was seated now, behind his big table full of paperwork and computer while you were becoming smaller and smaller under his smoldering gaze. 

Baekhyun was extremely mad that day. He couldn’t remember the last time he was that mad. Not even the forever annoying Siamsa could annoy him to those bits and he was slowly realizing that it must have been because he liked you much more than he had let himself believe. You betraying his trust, seeing him as a fool and doing stupid stuff behind his back were the exact things he despised in humans. Yet, you did all of them. And one year later, here he was, with you on his mind.

He cringed inwardly when he remembered the harsh words he told you.

You were stupid enough to get caught.

You can be goddamn sure I wouldn’t talk to a KID.

It was a grave mistake to talk to you.

He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose with his fingers, not even catching Chanyeol abruptly stopping his talk. Baekhyun was way too brutal with you. He groaned out loud when he remembered another horrible thing he said. I’m breaking up with you if it wasn’t obvious enough. Plus, I’m arresting you…

“Are you okay? You really seem out of it today.” Chanyeol seemed concerned and even a little perplexed as Baekhyun rarely showed this kind of behavior in front him, let alone showing it at his workplace. In the office, Baekhyun was the one to be scared of, to be respected and bowed to. This Baekhyun seemed like if Chanyeol pushed him with his finger, he'd crumble.

“I'm fine,” muttered back the captain with a throaty voice.

Chanyeol pursed his lips, unsure how to ask what had been on his mind since he entered the office. Instead of wanting to deal with a serious talk, a cheeky glint lit up in his eyes. “Perhaps you met her again?”

“Her?” Baekhyun frowned with a down-ward tilt on his lips.

Chanyeol wiggled his eyebrows as he stretched on the chair. “You know who!” he took a breath and with his deep voice, started to sing:

She looked incredible Just turned 17 I guess my friends are right She's out of my league So what am I to do? She's too good to be true

Baekhyun couldn't help himself when he heard the lyrics his friend correlated with you. They couldn't have been more accurate and despite him being in a bad mood, the idea made him laugh under his nose as he looked on the floor. “Actually, I did. And I got slapped,” he revealed somehow proudly as he let himself sit on his chair, enjoying the astonished look on Chanyeol's face.

“No way!” he straightened up in his seat, leaning forward so he could get a better look at his friend. “She slapped you? Damn, this girl is feisty. She keeps beating up our captain!” he laughed out loud, consumed by the images of you, the young woman in her late teenage years, slapping someone of Baekhyun's calibre.

“Yeah, well, she's always been fearless.” he shrugged, frowning out of a sudden. “I screwed that girl up pretty badly, Chan, but that's no news.”

Chanyeol went quiet for a minute, fully aware of Baekhyun's emotions and the way the past events had been eating him up. “How is she doing these days?”

Baekhyun shrugged. “I guess well? She's lost some weight, but,” he sighed and proceeded to talk about the event that he witnessed with the boys sexually harassing you.

“The kids these days can't keep it in their pants,” cackled Chanyeol in disbelief but Baekhyun was far from entertained. His jaw was locked, the skin pulsing with tension at the mere idea of last night.

“If they ever as much as think about her I swear to god-”

“Whoa, hold on, Baek. You know you can't just get involved.”

“What do you mean I can't just get involved? They were harassing her, and I'm a cop.”

“I think your rage is more fueled because it's about Nari. As much as you seek justice, you shouldn't let your emotions take the better out of you. Besides, people might get suspicious-”

“Chanyeol, what the fuck?” snapped Baekhyun angrily. “If she were any woman I'd do the same.”

“You would not punch in order to protect just any woman.”

“Yes, I would-”

“No, you would do the smart talk and intimidate them with your power and  authority. But you punched the kid, Baek.”

Baekhyun sighed in agitation, his hand coming yet again up to his face, tiredly rubbing at the skin. “So what should I have done? I myself am confused about my emotions but I know I care about her a lot.”

“Of course you care about her. You drank straight up one month after she found out about your fake boyfriend identity and you broke up.”

Baekhyun rolled his eyes, hating the way Chanyeol was so blunt with his words. “Either way, she still hates me.”

“Would you fight for her if she ever gave you a chance?” asked Chanyeol quietly, his fingers nipping at his lower lip in thought.

Baekhyun opened his mouth, ready to answer way too quickly before he stopped himself. He was frozen when he realized the answer that so naturally came to him. Would he fight for you if you ever decided to build the bridges again? He definitely would have one year ago when he came to your high school to see you.

“You're hesitating,” stated Chanyeol and pursed his lips. “I think you're scared, too, captain.”

Baekhyun scoffed but Chanyeol cut him off: “You would hate losing her again. And she is a fragile kid, scarred by everything that happened to her. She could be even more vulnerable with you. Remember that.”

><

“Where are you going?” asked Yuyeon, confused, when you were putting on your black jeans and a black hoodie. The helmet for the scooter was already tucked under your arm, ready to leave for the Saturday night. Time was ticking in your brain and you grew quite anxious about possible bad outcomes of this delivery if you wouldn't leave right away.

“Work,” you shrugged, “will get this done and then I will be free,” you smiled, a little strained but Yuyeon only gave you a suspicious side glance.

“You never work on the weekends! This employer is already playing with you and telling you to work even when it's not your official hours,” she frowned deeply, looking like a sulking child.

You sighed and suppressed the need to roll your eyes. “Okay, mum, I'll be back in time, no worries.”

“You better be! I won't fuss about wanting to go to a club when you're oh so busy.”

“I promise we can go next Friday!” you shouted, opening the door to put on your shoes.

She grumbled in response and you laughed to yourself, slamming the doors behind you when you slid your feet into your boots. Making sure they were tied well, you rushed out into the chilly evening, making your way to the mini-scooter Chul borrowed you so you could get the job done easier.

Bucheon Christian University was a little further away from your campus, so you made sure you followed the map carefully once you got the box from the apartment you usually got it from. The apartment itself was a high-rise, family friendly building and, just like the previous times, this box was also very light in your arms despite it being a little bigger. You had a spare rope under the seat of the scooter, so you tied it securely so it wouldn't fall when you had it between your feet.

As you were reaching the destination, you realized your palms were becoming more sweaty. Your heartbeat, usually quiet, was now gently beating in your ears, letting you know the stress levels were rising.

“You arrived at your destination,” said the GPS when you passed a big entrance that was leading into a small campus with white buildings that seemed too out of the place. Wanting to get the job done quickly, you searched with eager eyes for a little building that would be the security office, getting off the scooter and untying the delivery.

Seeing a box-like metal security office for the car park barrier you swallowed harshly, walking up to it. There were no signs of life inside, the lights out and the barriers probably working on auto mode. For other people, it must have looked ridiculous - you walking with a bigger box towards the security office but you could only hope no one would see your face which was the reason why you were reluctant to take the helmet off.

You were walking up to what you deemed the correct destination, but you couldn't help the uneasy feeling. There is no need, you insisted in your mind, because this was the correct destination. You would put the box down in front of the doors and just leave. Yes. That was correct.

Despite your weak reassurances, you kept looking around making sure you weren’t missing another spot. Your heartbeat was still gently pumping in your ears, reminding you that this was a little more stressful than the previous outings.

As you reached the doors to the security office, you put the box down more to the side as the doors were directly in front of the road for the cars. Feeling the relief of accomplishing another day of delivery, you turned around and started walking back towards the scooter, the tension slowly but surely easing up. You looked back several times to make sure the box was still there and with that you sat on the scooter and rode away, excited that you didn’t miss out on the night just yet.

If Yuyeon would be up for fun, you could finally go and be reckless!

><

Baekhyun was about to turn off the lights and call it a night at 9pm when a loud set of knocks disturbed his peace. Thinking it was his friends who wanted to give him a surprise visit, he swiftly opened the door only to be surprised when he spotted a ball of pink.

“The hell are you doing here?” he snapped, not moving to let the uninvited guest in.

Siamsa, or, to Baekhyun, Sooah, rolled her eyes as she stepped closer. “Well, hi to you, handsome. I’ll tell you if you let me in.”

“Well, I don’t want to know,” he replied in an even voice. “So that makes it easier. Bye-“

“Wait!” she exclaimed quickly and made a step in, wanting to prevent him from slamming the door shut in her face. “It’s about your ex.”

He didn’t want to admit it; but his heart jumped at the mention of you. Sooah never cared enough about Baekhyun’s other exes before her. Unfortunately for you, you came after her and Siamsa, the kpop sensation, was not processing it well. “If you’re gonna talk bullshit, I’ll spare myself the time-“

“If you want to protect her, you should listen,” she sing-sang nonchalantly, playing with the ends of her long hair. It was dyed blond and made her seem innocent which she was far from.

“And how would you know what’s up with Nari? You’ve already done so much shit in the past! What makes you think I’ll believe you?”

Sooah shrugged, pretending to be unbothered. “Well, I care about your well-being, Baekhyun. I know you care about her. I know the break-up was brutal. You locked up her brother-“

Baekhyun was fast to grab her by her wrist and yank her inside, quickly kicking the door shut. Sooah had a satisfied smirk on her face when she took in his distressed expression. “How. Do. You. Know. That.”

“Mhmm, so hot,” she whispered with a wink, mocking him. “I always liked how manly you are, my little one-“

“Listen,” he cut her off angrily, the nickname making him shudder inwardly, “I don’t care about your fucking games. I’m way past you and all your stupid shit. But I swear to god, if you do something to Nari-“

“You seem to have luck on girls who do stupid shit,” she mimicked him as she stood closer, making sure her breath fanned his chin. “Nari seems to go from one trouble to another. One day she might as well end up like her brother,” she laughed to herself.

“How do you know about her brother?” he asked again in a low tone, trying hard to ignore the anger he felt whenever she mentioned you.

Sooah pulled a fake thinking face, tapping her slender finger with perfect nail art on her chin. “For starters, don’t underestimate my honesty, Baekhyun. I know more than you think. I really care about you, you know,” she mumbled the last sentence and dared to reach up with her hand, touching his cheek gently. “Me messing up by protecting my identity - you were too harsh with me back then, sweetie.”

Baekhyun sighed, closing his eyes for a moment before opening them and moving his face away from her touch. She was bringing up the past and he didn’t like it; he didn’t want to dive in it. Sooah was a great manipulator and he didn’t want to fall down the guilt rabbit hole when he knew he did the right thing in the past. “We are done with that talk.”

“I was never done with that talk,” she was fast to protest. “You were. I still want you.” When she moved to stand closer to him, Baekhyun quickly stood back and away from her. “Baekhyun!”

“Tell me what you know about Lee Nari and then leave!”

“I want something in return,” she rebutted quickly, even confidently, but the desperation on her face was speaking volumes. “And I’ll tell you all I know.”

He grit his jaw, hard. “I swear to god, Sooah, stop testing me-“

“It’s noona for you,” she murmured with a sharp gaze that kept flickering over his features. He always looked good, but judging from his outfit, she knew he was preparing to sleep. That hoodie would soon be taken off and those plaid pants too. Her mind swirled just at the thought of it.

“We are done with that too—“

“You can’t fight the age difference, baby,” she purred and stepped closer. She enjoyed seeing his internal conflict. Despite being a harsh captain, she knew which buttons to push for him to submit, although she didn’t like that it involved you. She hated that the only way she could talk to Baekhyun was if she mentioned your name.

Baekhyun sighed again, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Ok. Speak. Otherwise I’m throwing you out.”

Sooah burst out into laughter, quickly hiding her laminated teeth and scrunched up nose behind her hand. “You manhandling me wouldn’t be the first time, Captain,” she said in a low, sensual tone as she trailed her long fingernail over his chest. She could have sworn it was more toned than the last time she had the pleasure of touching it. “And you know how much I like it.” When she saw him closing his eyes in exasperation, she trailed the finger upwards to his prominent collarbones before she took the side of his neck in her palm, running her thumb over the pulse point. “God, I miss you so much. Like, so, so much, my sweetie.” She knew she was testing the limits. She also knew an angry Baekhyun was anything but good news. She refused to spare him, though. “Your girlfriend is a bad girl. She’ll easily become a criminal if she continues doing the bad stuff.”

Baekhyun snapped his eyes open. “Is she up to something these days?” he asked almost breathily.

Her fingers traveled to the nape of his neck and she buried them in the hair, lightly scratching at the skin. Baekhyun was fighting the shuddering feeling, hoping his body wouldn’t betray him.

“Oh, yes. When isn’t she up to something,” she mumbled thoughtfully, her hawk eyes taking note of Baekhyun’s slight blush. He was getting affected with her ministrations and she stepped closer to him. He didn’t move away.

“What is it?” he hummed when her other hand massages his chest in small circles. “What is it that she is doing?”

Sooah had a mischievous glint in her eyes as she bit her bottom lip in triumph. “Give me a kiss and I’ll tell you-“

“No games!” snapped Baekhyun angrily, his eyes stormy as he glared at her.

“Then you won’t find out!”

“Sooah!”

“Just a magic word and a little kiss is all I want, sweetie,” she whispered, enjoying his intent stare on her. “I promise that’s all I will want and you get to access all you need to know.”

“No,” he shook his head resolutely. “I don’t care.”

“You care so fucking much about her,” it was her turn to spit now, gradually getting infuriated with his reluctance to submit to her. “Or do you want me to, perhaps…” she trailed off, puckering her lips, feigning thinking, “tell everyone in her school you dated her as an underaged kid?”

That was it for Baekhyun. Something snapped within him and he made a threatening step towards his ex, who didn’t even budge at his abruptness. “I dare you to say a single word that would harm her reputation, Sooah. I dare you to. She already went through so much shit because of me and her family.”

Sooah was smirking as she watched the captain's troubled, but hard face. It hurt her, but she wasn’t the most emotionally literate person; she was selfish and sometimes enjoyed suffering of others. That was how a very bad product of the entertainment industry looked like. Whether she would admit it was questionable. Sooah would never give Baekhyun up when her emotions for him were so deep, when the man was desirable so much. It was always a given that he was a one of a kind man and she always wanted everything that was one of a kind.

“What a good man you are, Byun Baekhyun,” she hummed, her eyes focused on his lips. “Caring about a child so much. A child who lied to you from the very first start.”

“Whatever the hell you are trying to do here, leave it,” gritted Baekhyun eventually. “And tell me what she is up to.”

“I already told you what’s the price!” she whined, making Baekhyun frown. “A kiss. On the lips.” With her finger, she tapped her lower lip, excitement cursing through her when she saw Baekhyun eyeing her mouth. “And then the secrets are all yours.”

It was tempting; not the kiss, but the reward. Baekhyun’s mind was racing with possibilities, with outcomes. Then he became worried. He knew how twisted Sooah could be, and were she to talk in front of your school about your relationship, you’d most probably never forgive him for letting it happen and he himself would be in huge trouble. Maybe that thought was even stronger than his need to know whether you were in trouble or not.

To make Baekhyun’s pondering a little easier, Sooah boldly pressed her palm against his toned stomach, the muscles instantly flexing upon her intrusive touch. Sooah knew Baekhyun was a very sensitive man; a single tingle on his neck could turn him on, the lightest of scratches could make him stand up proud. She knew he had to be affected by her minimal ministrations. She knew him perfectly. Touching up the ridges around the muscles, she let her hand slide lower to his abdomen before reaching to cup his—

Baekhyun slapped her hand away with a growl and pressed her against the door. “One fucking kiss and you’ll spill everything,” he breathed. She couldn’t even react before he pressed his lips harshly against hers, the texture of her lip gloss attaching to his lips. Sooah groaned, arms instantly hugging his neck. Her long finger nails scratched his nape and Baekhyun’s will was becoming weaker. 

The familiar scent of her strong, sweet perfume wafted over his senses, reminding him that this was not the woman he cared about anymore. Her eager tongue pushed his lips apart and was fast to battle with his own. The way she kissed him was nothing but desperate, needy, a call for attention. He hated it. The last time he kissed a woman— a girl was a year ago and her lips were the sweetest thing he’d ever tasted. Despite her being brave with him, her kisses were shy, careful, kitten-like and Baekhyun accidentally groaned at the thought of that. 

He pressed his lips harsher against this woman’s while imaging an innocent girl behind his eyelids. His hands were pressed against the door but he wanted to touch so bad. He only got to touch her once and not the way he would have liked, and now he had to fight the urge to let his hands slide around the curves, to outline her behind while her chest would be pressed against his.

He was quickly reminded that the body pressing against him was indeed not Lee Nari. Sooah had a slim physique with a flat chest and a big space between her thighs. He loved it once, but not anymore.

Before Sooah could cup his private part again he broke the kiss, desperately needing some air and needing to snap out of his deep fantasy. Blinking several times, he got to see the face that went through so many changes with plastic surgery and when she smiled at him with swollen lips, he realized how unreal this woman was. Unreal and unfaithful.

“What is Lee Nari doing ?” he breathed, the question coming out in a low murmur, his lips visibly swollen.

The spark that was in Sooah’s eyes left, quickly interchanged with hate and betrayal. “Is this what you ask me right after you kissed me?” she shrieked, causing Baekhyun to flinch. “You just had your tongue in my mouth and you dare to say a little girl’s name afterwards?”

Sooah wasn't wrong about you being a little girl. She was older by fourteen years after all; she saw you as a complete kid. Which made Sooah feel even more devastated and enraged; Baekhyun dated someone so incredibly young, half of her age. It made her feel like she couldn't compare.

“I’m not going to ask you any more. You got what you wanted. Get out of my flat if you don’t do anything useful,” replied Baekhuyn with a hard glare.

“She is delivering drugs,” snapped Sooah and Baekhyun was shocked to find tears in her eyes as she spoke. “That’s who she is now, Baekhyun. She is delivering illegal stuff on a scooter and she doesn’t even have a driving license.”

It felt like someone poured a scorching hot water over him. You and drugs? And you didn’t have a driving license while driving a vehicle? So many thoughts raced through his mind, so many questions left unanswered. What the hell were you up to? “And you know this how?”

Sooah shrugged. “None of your damn business.”

“It is if it involves Nari.”

Sooah scoffed mockingly. “Then sleep with me.”

“You need help, Sooah,” replied Baekhyun somehow compassionately after a moment of silence. Taking the singer’s arm in his, he turned her and opened the door so he could push her out to the corridor. “And immediately. You’re sick in your head. Treat your obsession and then we can still be friends maybe.”

“You’re a heartless bastard, Baekhyun,” whispered Sooah, not turning around. “You better watch out for the university festival. Your girlfriend will be my puppet.”

She started walking with purposeful steps towards the elevator, not looking back and not noticing the way Baekhyun’s face fell with dread.

But the girl had been hurt enough.

><><><><><><><><

A/N: thank you for reading! I had lots of fun with this chapter! Let me know your thoughts, there is so much happening over here >.<

Lyrics credit: McFly - That Girl

[40sbarnes]

Medici: Spymasters of Florence

Chapter 14: Fortune Favours The Bold

its not the longest chapter but goddamn its soft <3 i hope you enjoy this its basically just fluff lolll 

tag list: @brynthebulldozer​ @mythicalamphitrite​ @nana035 @valravnsraven @hannahhistorian92 @not-thatweird (it won’t tag idkwhy sorry!) @isaac-lahey-is-bae @angrygardendeer @unstoppable-xavi

pairings; slowburn lorenzo x reader, platonic francesco x reader

Lorenzo fell into stride beside you, his words still hanging in the night air.

"There's lot of things I haven't told you about myself, Medici," you grinned up at him, his brows raising at your words.

"Is that so?" His tongue poked the inside of his cheek as he thought of his next words. "Tell me another one."

Your face scrunched slightly in confusion, and he picked up on it immediately. "Indulge me, tell me another thing I don't know about you," he lifted his chin up, watching as the stars took their place in the sky. You looked to the side, bashful.

"Hmmm..." you trailed off, your eyes drifting to where Lorenzo was looking, letting the sound of your feet on the cobbled path fill the temporary silence, "I don't enjoy conversing with rich men," you smiled up as you watched the dots of light in the sky.

Lorenzo scoffed, his gaze falling on you once again. "You certainly didn't mind it tonight," he shot back.

"Untrue," the word was soft as it fell from your lips, "you don't have to enjoy a job to do it."

"Fair enough," he breathed out, "but surely you make an exception for bankers?" He tried, his shoulder brushing against yours as you walked together.

"Pazzi isn't one for conversation," you shook your head, continuing to tease Lorenzo, "his nephew however..."

"Oh come on, Bellondini, you can't despise my company that much," his ego was on the verge of bruising.

You just looked at him, trying not to laugh at his audacity.

"Y/n," his hand caught yours, and he stopped you both from walking, as his thumb brushed a gentle line against your fingers. Both your eyes were watching your hands. "Look, I am truly apologetic for the things I said, they were spoken with spite. I'm well aware you would never wish to be my friend, let alone my wife." His honesty took you by surprise, you glanced up at him, to find him already looking down at you.

"I thought we were saying things that we didn't already know," you attempted to joke, pushing his messy hair out of his eyes with your free hand, but his own met yours, holding it against his face.

"I'm serious. You are a remarkable woman, your lack of status does not weigh on you at all. It fills me with envy. For my status is all I am. All I could ever be," he admits, and you are frozen in place.

"You know your words hold false," your voice was quiet, you couldn't believe what he was saying.

"You, more than anyone, know them to be true," his lips smiled, but his eyes showed anything but happiness. You used your hand on his face to cup his cheek properly, forcing him to keep eye contact with you.

"You do not need me to inflate your head, Lorenzo, you know just how cunning you are. I mean, who else would have thought of such a fine way to utilise my skills?" You countered, and you watched a glint pass through his eyes.

"Anyone with half their right mind still in pla-" he began, but you cut off his pity party before he could eat his cake.

"Lorenzo. When will you realise that wealth and status aren't everything? I am remarkable because I am. As are you. Our blood doesn't define us," you were growing weary of this talk, and Lorenzo crying over being so rich.

"You think I'm remarkable?" He cocked a brow, and you let your hand fall from his face.

"Did I say that?" You acted as if deep in thought.

"I'm almost certain," Lorenzo simply nodded, his hold on your hand easing, until it faltered altogether and you both began walking again.

"I'm not," you grinned, "I certainly recall you saying something about how remarkable I am though..." you teased.

Lorenzo turned to you, a lopsided grin showing his teeth plastered across his face. He shook his head and focused back on the path in front of him.

It wasn't long before you were back in your room at the inn, out of your fancy gown and into one of Lorenzo's shirts. He hadn't mentioned it, but it was the least he could do as you had no other clothes with you, and would have to wear your own dress again tomorrow.

"Goodnight," you whispered, sliding under the covers and lying down.

"Goodnight, y/n," Lorenzo stood awkwardly beside the bed for a moment, unsure of what to do.

"Are you going to sleep?" You questioned, lifting up the blanket beside you for him to get in.

He didn't move. "You don't wish for me to sleep on the floor again?"

"As long as you stay on your side I have no qualms," you promised, turning over to face away from him.

The bed dipped slightly under his weight as he gingerly got in. You tried your very best not to laugh. Lorenzo de ‘Medici, womaniser, so awkward about sharing a bed for the night. He could be such a child at times.

"Besides," you spoke up again, "my dagger is never out of reach," you teased, lightening the tension.  Lorenzo scoffed, turning to lay on his side away from you. "Goodnight."

"Goodnight," you sighed, "again."

—-

You hadn't been travelling for long before you arrived at the same town as days before, where you'd acquired the dress. Lorenzo pulled on Callus' reigns to bring the horse to a stop.

"What ever is the matter?" You grumbled, you hadn't fully woken up and were hoping to get some distance covered today.

"Nothing. I just thought it an idea to get some food, we won't come across another town until midday and you will be starved by then," he hopped down off Callus, before putting out his hand for you.

"And you're immune to hunger?" You tilted your head, swinging your leg over the side, although not taking his hand.

Lorenzo rolled his eyes, shoving coins into your hand before grabbing it and pulling you down. "Just go get something."

"Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed," you huffed, although your eyes were already scanning the market for what you'd buy.

"Yeah, not your side," he smirked at you, and you just laughed, shaking your head slightly before headed towards a fruit stall that had caught your eye.

"Be back here in twenty!" He called after you. You waved at him without looking, agreeing to his terms.

And you stuck by them. In twenty minutes you were back where he'd said, a bag of food secured. But neither he nor Callus were there. Worry set in. Surely he wouldn't desert you? Surely?

You bit at your nail, looking around for him, until you saw Callus tied up outside a small store, a stranger brushing him. You moved towards him, trying to check him out before confronting him.

A hand rested on the small of your back before you could reach him. And you spun to see Lorenzo smiling down at you. "Everything alright?"

"Where were you?" You ignored his question, glancing to under his arm to see he was holding two parcels.

"Doing some shopping myself," he shrugged, before he guided you both to Callus. He thanked the man and gave him some coin before he started to secure the parcels to Callus. He took the bag of food off of you and tied it around the saddle.

"What's wrong?" Lorenzo asked when you still seemed off.

"Nothing, let’s go," you decided, and so you did.

—-

After another day and a bit of travelling, you had arrived home. Lorenzo had brought you just outside of town, before helping you down off Callus. You both stood beside the horse, Lorenzo reaching into his satchel to pull out a bag of coins.

"Your payment," he stated as if it wasn't obvious.

"Thank you," you almost felt awkward taking it, before you quickly ignored that feeling.

"And, uh, a small gift. To show my gratitude. And my regret of my previous words about... well you know," he sighed, his lack of composure was unsettling, but you didn't have to focus on it as he took the parcels off the saddle and handed them to you.

"Lorenzo, you needn't have-" you looked at the gifts in your hands. One of the parcels was thick, but soft, and the other was narrow and cold.

"I did," he assured you.

"Well, thank you," you looked up at him, not realising just how close you were standing apart.

Your eyes scanned each other's, before you took a step back. "What are they?" You broke the silence.

"I'm sure you'll figure out a way to find out," he grinned. You shook your head at his stupidity before reaching up to pull him into a quick embrace. It didn't last more than five seconds but he didn't need any longer to react, wrapping his arms around you for the short hug.

"Good luck with the vote," you bid him, it was happening in a matter of days. You had discussed it all on your journey, and you both decided that Pazzi would definitely be calling on you in the upcoming days, and unless something was to happen with him, you had no more business with Lorenzo until then.

He smiled at your words, looking to Callus before back at you.  "I cannot lose with you on my side."

[countessofbiscuit]

What are your Bobasoka headcanons? I've already gone through all of the (criminally little) fic on ao3 and I especially loved Smothered and Covered, and I saw the majority of the fics in the tag were gifted to you so I'm assuming you're the OG shipper. Feel free to essay if you like!!

Thanks for the ask and kind words about that fic :3 

Oh, Bobasoka … where to begin? It’s a pairing that’s been bumping around in exchange requests for a few years — I figure it’d be easy for anyone invested in Ahsoka’s relationship with the clones to be compelled by the idea. Lledra used to draw Boba and Ahsoka interacting, and it was probably a few panels of their incredible Destinies comic that set my Bobasoka wheels turning. I’m also drawn to them because their journeys traverse so much canon; there’s not just a sandbox to play in, but a whole goddamn stretch of beach, stretching far out into the horizon ...  (#AhsokaLives #BobaSurvived :D)

I have to lead with the proviso that almost everything I write/daydream about/headcanon has a groundsheet of Rexsoka. Ahsoka’s interest in Boba, in my head, is intimately tied up with her attraction to and/or relationship with Rex — or, at the bare minimum, her intimate fellowship with the clones. She went through puberty (maybe with heats!) surrounded by a literal army of handsome, roughly college-aged dudes; that must’ve been a heady mix of heaven and hell. If she didn’t quench her thirst before war’s end and her (eventual) separation from Rex, she’d probably be pretty dehydrated when stumbling across Boba. As for Boba’s attraction to Ahsoka, well ... she’s very pretty, she’s potentially useful, she’s not likely to skewer him in his sleep (+2) on account of being a Jedi (-1), and now she’s the one down on her luck; if he falls in bed with anyone, why not this girl who isn’t afraid of him and stares a lot at his lips?                         

And Boba is like a hot shipping potato — satisfying, hard to fuck up, goes well (read: makes for an intriguing story) with almost everyone. And I think it has everything to do with his liminality, something he shares with Ahsoka and probably recognizes.          

Their neither-this-nor-that-ness overlap in such interesting ways, and they each bring their identity issues to the table — Ahsoka as an on-again, off-again Jedi; Boba as a clone who isn’t a Clone™, a Mandalorian by birth and bearing, but not by the book. At different points in their stories, they identify as different things, and that would affect their headspace and color their view of the other. They wrestle with themselves and each other. Force-user and bounty hunter; privileged topsider and orphaned juvenile delinquent fugitive; GAR commander and outcast clone; Jedi and Mandalorian; Disillusioned veteran and disaffected army brat; Rebellion agent and Imperial contractor.

And as much conflict is baked into these dynamics, it also generates a certain magnetism; and I believe they recognize, on some level, their shared trauma and the symmetry in their experiences. Boba and Ahsoka both have happy childhoods with very little to distress or vex them (beyond the art, I do not jive with Age of Republic: Jango Fett, a Disney-canon comic that not only doubles-down on the Jango-wasn’t-Mando nonsense, but shows him being rather cavalier about Boba’s life); Geonosis happens and their adolescent lives are dominated by war (which is how they came to actively threaten each other as space!secondary-schoolers — whaaaaatf!); they are both dubiously (even wrongfully) imprisoned; and they both suffer alienation and incredible personal loss.  

Boba was set apart from the clones before he was even pulled him from the jar, othered and elevated from the beginning. He never bonded with brothers, he does not identify as a clone. And while there are examples of clones making overtures to him, canonically his relationship with them is fraught and probably made worse when he gets banged up in Republic Central at the tender age of eleven or twelve — and of course, Ahsoka is an accessory to this, the second chapter in his tragedy at the hands of the Jedi. He needed help (whether he wanted it or not), it was not given by clones or Jedi alike (hamstrung by bureaucracy, sure, but surely some other means of intervention might have been lobbied for?), and Boba becomes a right teenage disaster, well-balanced only in the sense that he has a chip on both shoulders.

(n.b. Putting my RepComm hat on for a second, I can’t help but sniffle-laugh at the idea that the Alphas watched him get thrown in a maximum-security slammer and were like “Ah, there he is, the feral vod’ika. First time, we’ll let the little snot earn his stripes. Second time, we’ll bust him out and send him on a tough love retreat with A’den or Jaing.”)

Ahsoka, meanwhile, is part-and-parcel of the institutions that Boba sets himself against, even after she too has been cast out by circumstances beyond her control. She grows up in a supportive Jedi community and then spends some seriously formative years with a whole slew of brothers — brothers that should have been Boba’s! 

Boba, on the other hand, is a great example of the proverb that a child who is not embraced by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth. (As he tells Hondo, “Why should I help anybody? I’ve got no one.”) 

The resentment that must create! But also, later, the quiet empathy too — maybe when Boba’s having one of his better days and Ahsoka’s obviously not. 

And all of the above is interesting enough, without also touching upon the wildcard that is Mandalore.

Boba’s relationship with Mandalore .... well, that’s contested in- and out-of-universe and I won’t allow myself to essay overmuch. I subscribe firmly to a Mandalorian Fetts construction of canon, even though Boba must be someone who struggles mightily with Mandalorian identity. He’s raised by a bona fide Mando, a solicitous, loving father who’d have no reason not to pass on his language and beliefs; but at the same time, it takes that village, and when Boba’s clan of two is shattered, he has no one else. The loss of his dad unmoors him from his only anchor to Mandalorian culture and clan.

If Boba had been close to the Cuy’val Dar, one would think he’d have turned to them rather than fall in with Jango’s criminal acquaintances; or maybe the bounty hunters just scooped him up first, and troubled lil’ Boba was shepherded through bereavement by folks who enabled and encouraged him to externalize his anger in a way that gave him a (false) feeling of agency and strength. 

Whatever the reasons, Boba does not repatriate himself to Mandalore (much to Fenn Shysa’s melodramatic dismay). He strikes me as a lapsed Mandalorian; he doesn’t exactly follow the creed besides wearing the armor (scavenged? his dad’s sans helmet? canon is confused on this point, but he doesn’t go Mando until the unfinished arcs at the end of TCW, either for lack of stature, lack of armor, or lack of enthusiasm). I feel like if someone rocked up to Boba in a cantina and had the balls to ask “hey, so you a Mandalorian?” Boba would be like “<ominously slow helmet tilt> who’s asking” and never give you a straight answer.

Meanwhile, Ahsoka gets a crash course on Mandalore from none other than someone who, at one point, belonged to a sect that wanted to expunge Jaster’s legacy from the galaxy — and at the very least, had reason to dislike clones. This isn’t the place to explore my Boba/Bo-Katan feelings, but know that they are fathomless, and I would pay good money to be a fly on the wall of that Kom’rk when Bo-Katan gives Ahsoka Mando History 101 with her own special sauce. Ahsoka is probably more up-to-speed on Mandalore than Boba, and at one point, she may even own more beskar than him! (n.b. After the crash, I think one of the first places Rex and Ahsoka bounce is just inside Mando space, to scope out the Sundari situation and maybe try to scramble a signal to Bo-Katan; she’d have the goodwill to at least get them back on their feet if she can’t help them lay low herself. For a variety of reasons worth maybe ficcing down the line, they aren’t successful.)

I don’t really have a concluding statement except, I just think Bobasoka’s neat :) They hit all my depressed-Millennial buttons.

Headcanon by bullet-point isn’t really my style, but this is tumblr so ... tl;dr:

They recognize a lot in each other, even if they’re slow to admit it, if ever. Boba’s a cagey bastard and Ahsoka doesn’t ever like him enough to be emotionally honest.

They bump into each other during Ahsoka’s walkabout(s) ‘cause Coruscant’s Underworld ain’t big enough for the two of them. Without Slave-1, Boba couchsurfs at Nyx Okami’s garage, but he does his laundry at Rafa’s. He might even borrow the Martez’s new, useful friend for a job or two. 

Ahsoka eventually matures enough to be sensitive about her use of the Force on and around clones, and she definitely doesn’t use it around Boba. Definitely not during sex.

Boba is privately weirded out every time Ahsoka uses Mando slang she picked up off the clones or the Nite Owls.

Boba absolutely kills Cad Bane in that shoot-out, keeps the hat, and lets Ahsoka have it. She shoves it out the airlock and uses it for target practice. 

So many great smut flavours! Hatesex. Acquaintances with benefits. “You’re traumatized and touch-starved and you look just like him/them, and I know how to be gentle and what to do, so maybe we could … ?” They’re both privately comfortable with their bodies and sexuality, but Boba’s got trust issues a parsec long and Ahsoka’s lost confidence; it’s always an awkward affair, but desperation wins out.

They exchange comm codes every time they run into each other, which is kind of pointless because they both use burners.

Ahsoka hitches a ride on Slave-1 more than once. There really is only one bed, so it’s either sleep upright, sleep in a pokey prisoner hold, or sleep with him.

For a few years, Boba can pass as a last-generation clone — the ones that got sold off in bulk units to slavers before Kamino sunk another three years’ food, board, and training into them. Boba pretends he doesn’t notice, easy to really, since he tells himself his helmet is his face. But occasionally, when Ahsoka can convince him there’s profit in it, he agrees to play sleeper agent and assists in liberating a few here and there. 

They don’t talk about Aurra Sing.

When an Imp really crosses him, Boba passes on intel to Ahsoka to ruin their day.

Once, when they’re both super skint, Ahsoka volunteers to get handed in to some relatively minor and out-of-the-way Imperial garrison, so Boba can collect, bust her out, and split the pot with her. It’s the closest she ever comes to telling him “I trust you” — and when he brushes the idea aside, citing something about risk, it’s the closest he ever comes to telling her “I love you.”

Boba sees Inquisitors as muscling in on his game. There are so many lousy Force-users around nowadays, it should be easy pickings, but Inquisitors get privileged information. So he makes sport out of misdirecting them, especially from Ahsoka. 

When he pisses her off, Ahsoka fantasizes about Bo-Katan taking Boba down a peg or two while she watches :)))

Boba experienced Ahsoka’s heat once, secondhand through a cabin wall. He thought he was being clever by shooting Rex up with some Nevoota stim pollen, locking him in with Ahsoka, and hijacking their locked ships. Longest three days of his life, limping on broken hyperdrives and shared fuel stores to the nearest waystation to a soundtrack of violent lovemaking : \

Bounty hunters invariably bump into spies and agents because they work in the same areas. The agents pretend to be bounty hunters, eccentric business people, sex workers, or a range of other things. Sometimes each party knows all about the other, but it’s only polite not to mention it. This happens to Ahsoka and Boba A LOT, especially once she becomes Fulcrum; rebel cells and Imperials often want the same people. Occasionally they exchange fire. A couple times Boba gets imprisoned in Ahsoka’s own brig. Once, Boba blows her cover and definitely lives to regret it. 

(this essay was originally punctuated with pics, but replies with images won’t show up tumblr tags so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯) 

[bloody-bee-tea]

Fond - Untamed Spring Fest 2020 Day 20

When Lan Xichen comes home, he finds Nie Mingjue on the couch, watching Jiang Cheng pace in the living room, clearly agitated about something.

“My heart,” Lan Xichen greets Jiang Cheng and pulls him into a kiss when he simply wants to pace past him.

It’s not enough to completely stop Jiang Cheng’s movement, but he does indulge Lan Xichen in his kiss for a few moments, before he goes right back to walking a path into the floor.

“My soul,” Lan Xichen greets Nie Mingjue next, with the same soft kiss as he greeted Jiang Cheng, but Nie Mingjue is a lot more pro-active, and pulls Lan Xichen down on the couch.

“What’s going on?” Lan Xichen wants to know as he snuggles into Nie Mingjue’s side, who very readily puts an arm around Lan Xichen’s middle.

“I’m not entirely sure,” Nie Mingjue admits with a small smile. “He was very excited for about two minutes and then he started to rant about the delivery services? I don’t think he’s very happy with them at the moment.

“Of course I’m not happy with them at the moment,” Jiang Cheng chimes in and throws his hands in the air. “One moment it’s like ‘your item will be delivered shortly’ and then suddenly it’s ‘your item is currently six stops away’ and then,” he goes on, seemingly without taking a breath, “suddenly it’s all ‘there are many more items the driver has to deliver’.”

Jiang Cheng stops his pacing only long enough to stab viciously at his phone and then turn the offending message on the screen towards Lan Xichen and Nie Mingjue in proof as if they could have actually not believed what Jiang Cheng just said.

“Okay,” Nie Mingjue very carefully says. “And what are you waiting for that is this urgent?” he then asks and Jiang Cheng levels him with a look so severe that Nie Mingjue shuts up immediately.

“Alright, then,” Nie Mingjue mutters and Lan Xichen brushes a soothing kiss over his cheek.

“Don’t take it to heart,” he quietly tells him. “Wanyin gets like that sometimes. He’s a very impatient person and he is definitely not taking this very well.”

“No need to be this mean,” Nie Mingjue huffs out and Lan Xichen snuggles closer.

“It’s nothing personal I promise you that,” he tells Nie Mingjue who still seems unconvinced so Lan Xichen gives him another quick kiss before he turns towards Jiang Cheng.

“Is it the game you ordered a few days back?” Lan Xichen asks and is entirely prepared for the glare he receives in return.

“See,” he says to Nie Mingjue in response who chuckles slightly.

“He really doesn’t take this well,” Nie Mingjue observes and Lan Xichen slides down further until he can pillow his head on Nie Mingjue’s chest and watch their boyfriend pace from a more comfortable position.

“Nope,” he cheerily says. “We’ll just have to wait this one out. I doubt his mood will improve before the deliver actually comes.”

“Is there anything we can do for him?” Nie Mingjue wants to know and Lan Xichen shrugs as best as he can in his position.

“Not really. Sometimes it helps if someone is around, because if the waiting goes on for too long even Jiang Cheng loses steam and then he needs someone to cuddle. But sometimes you really have to simply sit it out.”

Nie Mingjue hums at that and they watch Jiang Cheng in silence after that.

At least for a few minutes.

“Do you think his phone will survive the abuse?” Nie Mingjue whispers when Jiang Cheng angrily jabs at the screen again.

“I’m not so sure about that,” Lan Xichen says with worry, because Jiang Cheng seems to be using enough force to crack the screen.

“My heart,” he carefully calls out when Jiang Cheng continues his angry assault on the phone. “It’s not the phone’s fault.”

“Well, it is someone’s fault,” Jiang Cheng snaps back and then, as if someone flipped a switch, loses all of his steam. “Fuck,” he mutters and immediately Nie Mingjue and Lan Xichen both hold out a hand for him.

“Come here,” Nie Mingjue cajoles him when Jiang Cheng just stands dejectedly in the middle of their living room, but that jolts Jiang Cheng back into action.

He shuffles over—drags his feet over the floor as if he hasn’t been angrily stomping around for the last ten minutes—and allows Nie Mingjue and Lan Xichen to pull him on top of them.

Lan Xichen wants to move to the side so Jiang Cheng has a place in the middle, but Jiang Cheng doesn’t let him and instead curls up on their laps.

“I just got excited, okay?” Jiang Cheng mumbles and leans over to kiss Nie Mingjue. “I didn’t mean to be mean to you.”

“That’s okay,” Nie Mingjue says with a sigh.

“Same goes for you,” Jiang Cheng says and turns his head towards Lan Xichen, who leans in to kiss Jiang Cheng as well.

“I know, my heart,” he gives back and allows Jiang Cheng to cuddle closer.

“You want to tell us what you are waiting for?” Nie Mingjue then carefully asks, clearly ready to be at the wrong end of Jiang Cheng’s temper again, but Jiang Cheng simply shakes his head.

“It’s a surprise,” he mumbles and then closes his eyes, clearly content to drift off right where he is.

In the end, Jiang Cheng really dozes off on them, and Lan Xichen and Nie Mingjue share an amused glance over his head because as much as Jiang Cheng is quick to be riled up and get angry, he calms down just as fast too.

They decide to let Jiang Cheng rest for now, content to just cuddle like this, and they are only brought out of their light doze when the doorbell suddenly rings.

“Fucking finally,” Jiang Cheng mutters after he wakes up with a start, and he urgently gets up to scramble to the door.

It takes the delivery person almost a minute to arrive at the door and Lan Xichen fears that Jiang Cheng is going to vibrate right out of his skin, but then the exchange is made and Jiang Cheng has the long awaited parcel in his hands.

It’s rather small, Lan Xichen notes, right before it hits Nie Mingjue’s chest.

“For you,” Jiang Cheng says and he’s avoiding eye contact which means he’s definitely nervous about this.

“For me?” Nie Mingjue asks in confusion and carefully picks the parcel up.

He weighs it in his hands for a moment before he turns it around to look at it from all sides and Lan Xichen bites back a laugh, because he’s certain Nie Mingjue is only doing that to annoy Jiang Cheng.

“Would you just open it,” Jiang Cheng groans and flops down on the couch again.

“Alright, alright,” Nie Mingjue finally relents and gets started on opening the package.

It doesn’t take him long at all, and when he sees what’s inside Nie Mingjue freezes.

It’s enough to make Lan Xichen lean over to peer into the package as well.

Inside is a replica of the bracelets Jiang Cheng and Lan Xichen wear, and have been wearing ever since they got together.

“My heart,” Nie Mingjue eventually chokes out and tears his eyes away from the bracelet and looks at Jiang Cheng.

“It bothered you that you didn’t have one, don’t think I haven’t noticed,” Jiang Cheng grumbles out and Lan Xichen loves him so much he doesn’t know what to do with it sometimes.

Going by the fond look on Nie Mingjue’s face he has a similar problem.

“You said they don’t manufacture them anymore,” he whispers as he takes the bracelet out of the package and moves his fingers over it.

“They don’t,” Jiang Cheng says nonchalantly and Lan Xichen’s eyes snap towards him.

“What did you do?” he wants to know and slightly shakes his head when Nie Mingjue offers him the bracelet to put it on him.

“I might have called them,” Jiang Cheng says as he gets up and sits down on the table in front of them. “And they might have told me that they are not making them anymore and that they also don’t have a spare laying around anywhere,” he explains as he takes the bracelet out of Nie Mingjue’s hands and wraps it around his wrist.

“And then?” Nie Mingjue asks, as he admires the bracelet.

“And then I might have called Huaisang, who might have talked to Xuanyu who might have pulled a few strings and then a blueprint might have been handed over to Huaisang,” Jiang Cheng says as if that all means nothing and Lan Xichen is staring at him.

“How many favours do you owe Huaisang for that?” he then wants to know and Jiang Cheng shrugs.

“A lot?”

“You could have just chosen a different bracelet,” Nie Mingjue mutters, but he protectively puts his hand over the one on his wrist.

“Now where would be the fun in that?” Jiang Cheng asks them with a smirk and then yelps when Nie Mingjue fists the front of his shirt and pulls him onto his lap.

“I love you so damn much,” Nie Mingjue mutters before he drags Jiang Cheng into a deep kiss. “We got so goddamn lucky with you,” Nie Mingjue whispers against Jiang Cheng’s lips when they part and Lan Xichen has to agree with that.

Since he feels that simply voicing that isn’t enough Lan Xichen drags Jiang Cheng into a kiss as well.

“How did we ever deserve you?” he asks after they part and Jiang Cheng squirms on Nie Mingjue’s lap.

“Shut up,” he mumbles, but it’s only half-hearted at best and they all know it.

“Never,” Nie Mingjue immediately says and while the kisses haven’t managed to make Jiang Cheng blush, those words certainly do.

“You saps,” he complains but really, he doesn’t have any ground to stand on and Nie Mingjue makes that clear with a pointed look at the bracelet.

“Thank you,” Nie Mingjue seriously tells him and Jiang Cheng rolls his eyes.

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” he grumbles but he curls up in Nie Mingjue’s lap again.

Lan Xichen cuddles close again as well and somehow they all reach out for each other with the arm that has the bracelet on it.

Lan Xichen loves the sight of the same bracelet on all their wrists and he’s not sure they can ever thank Jiang Cheng enough for this, though they will certainly try.

Their amazing boyfriend deserves nothing less, after all.

{Buy me a kofi}

[psych0midget]

Author/Audiobook Narrator AU

Andrew has always had trouble sleeping. Insomnia used to drive him absolutely crazy. He was exhausted, but his mind wouldn’t stop wirring and replaying all the shitty things his eidetic memory wouldn’t let go of.

Surprisingly, things had started getting better when Bee suggested he tried audiobooks. He had scoffed, said it would be useless, said he hated having someone else’s voice in his head, said that he didn’t even listen to the audiobooks of his own books. And he was a writer, dammit.

But he had tried. He trusted Bee after all. And it had worked. It wasn’t something miraculous, he didn’t fall asleep in a matter of minutes like he’d been promised, but it soothed him. It made falling asleep easier, more like sliding into sleep than falling.

And so Andrew had started buying tons of audiobooks. He could’ve easily played the same audiobook over and over again, he didn’t really listen to the story. But he enjoyed listening to different voices.

Some of them were like ocean waves, rhythmically lulling him to sleep. Others were like rain, steady, a background noise that unknotted his muscles. Others were like an old car and others like fresh spring wind.

This is how he accidentally came across Abram. Or rather, Abram’s voice. It was like fire, warm and slightly raspy, like sitting in front of the fireplace with a blanket around his shoulders on a cold winter night.

The first time he listened to Abram, Andrew didn’t want to ever sleep again, he just wanted to listen to that voice over and over again. And yet he had fallen asleep like a log in a matter of minutes.

Thankfully, Abram had voiced a lot of books. So Andrew started listening to him while he was writing, while he was cooking, while he was showering - it was like always having someone around. And somehow that didn’t disturb him at all.

Andrew hated commuting. That’s why Wymack let him write from home and called him in only when they needed to discuss things over with the whole board.

Andrew hated commuting. And he especially hated when people did not hold on the straps while the bus weaved through the traffic and eventually collided with him.

The stranger that crashed into him was attractive. No, scratch that, he was drop dead gorgeous, Andrew wasn’t blind. The auburn curls, the icy blue eyes, the way his lips curled up in a smile to apologise for the inconvenience.

Andrew wasn’t blind, but he still stared him down. And if looks could kill, the stranger would be laying in a pool of blood right now. But the stranger still smiled at him.

Andrew grunted, got off the bus and walked the rest of the way to Wymack’s office, earplugs in and one of Abram’s audiobooks in his ears. 

Andrew had expected Wymack to tell him when his next book Cigarettes would be ready to be published, what cover it would have and things like that. He definitely hadn’t expected to find the stranger from the bus sitting next to Wymack.

He hadn’t expected Wymack to introduce them, saying that the redhead’s name was Neil Josten and he’d be voicing Andrew’s Cigarettes. And the stranger, Neil, flashed him another one of his killer smiles. 

Andrew didn’t even wait for Neil to open his mouth, he walked out of Wymack’s office, took the bus and got back home. He had no time to waste on audiobooks, soft auburn curls and- and nothing. He had to start planning out his next novel. 

Andrew hoped he’d never have to hear about Neil Josten until his book was published. Possibly he’d never have to see him and his goddamn smile AGAIN.

But as luck would have it, a couple days after his first meeting with Neil, Andrew received a text.

“Hi Andrew, it’s Neil. I asked Wymack to give me your number so I could ask you things about Cigarettes, the pronunciation of some names and so on.”

Andrew groaned.

Neil didn’t stop texting.

“It’s such a privilege to be allowed to read your books before everyone else, I’ve always been a fan of yours.”

“Woah, I really wasn’t expecting the twist at the end of chapter 11.”

“Fuck’s sake Andrew. This book is a masterpiece. I hope I can do it justice, I will surely do my best!”

“How is Jowen pronounced? J like in Jessica or J like a Y?”

Andrew was saddled with a fanboy. And yet, reluctantly, he started texting back. He told himself that he was doing it because he wanted the audiobook to be perfect and if that meant indulging Neil Josten well then so be it. But he’d never ever cared about the audiobooks of his own novels before. Hell, he’d never even listened to one of them.

But Neil kept on asking the right things. Seeing details Andrew never thought anyone would notice. Understanding his characters’ personalities, making witty comments here and there.

Before Andrew realised it, he was texting with Neil on a daily basis. And it wasn’t just work. It was a question about his cat, a stupid joke about Wymack’s retreating hairline, Neil telling him that his roommate Matt had burnt dinner. 

It had come to the point where Andrew almost dreaded the day his book would come out because - because as much as he loathed it, he’d grown used to Neil. And when this was over, Neil would disappear from his like like everyone else had done. 

The day Cigarettes came out, Andrew was quietly sipping coffee in the kitchen, trying to quench the sense of unease that had settled in his stomach. 

Someone knocked on the door. Andrew was sure it’d be Aaron asking him to babysit his twins because he had impossible shifts at the hospital and Andrew worked from home, he could keep an eye out for them and blah blah blah

Andrew was ready to slam the door on his brother’s face, but it was just the delivery man, handing him a small parcel.

A message written with a black marker of on the package. “I know you hate audiobooks, but please listen to it. Neil xx”

Andrew studied the cd inside the parcel like it was a nuclear bomb ready to explode. He hesitated for who knows how long, he didn’t even know why, mindlessly tracing the “xx” on the package with his thumb.

Eventually curiosity got the best of him, he insterted the cd in his old stereo and got around to doing the dishes he’d left in the sink.

The dish in his hands clattered to the floor and broke in a thousand pieces as soon as the audiobook started playing and the voice he knew better than his own filled the apartment. 

Abram. It was Abram. Neil Josten, the Neil Josten he’d been texting with for over three months, was Abram.

[I like to think that after some more pining and misunderstandings Neil and Andrew get together. One day Andrew asks Neil to move in with him because he has finished listening to all of Neil’s audiobooks and he can’t fall asleep without them. Eventually Neil does move in with him and when Andrew struggles falling asleep, he presses his lips to Andrew’s temple. And he starts telling him things, stories, whatever he can think of. And every time Andrew falls asleep in Neil’s arms]

[believerindaydreams]

Like the last one but with more Benny/Arcade fucking :) Arcade POV.

You have to admit, Benny Gecko's greed rubs off.

Before the Legion camp, before the courier, you wouldn't have dreamed of anything like this home for yourself. Pushing forty and still helping out at the Mormon Fort, when most doctors stay a few years before fleeing back to the security of the NCR, their conviction ebbed away in the face of frontier realities.

You'd stayed, because you hadn't had anywhere else to go; and because you thought you hadn't deserved better.

Marilyn had certainly done her best to prove that one.

But saving another life meant saving your own; and Benny is securely self-confident in ways that defy belief, smart enough to upend the Mojave, too stupid to be afraid of you. Somehow. For everything that you are, or could be.

Right now he's snoring with his head against your breastbone, as though he dreams you're safe.

"Benny, wake up. It isn't getting any warmer out here."

He keeps right on sleeping, and you shiver some in the twilight- no way of telling how late it is, even in North Vegas the light of the Strip will drown out the stars all night. There's a moon, but vague childhood memory doesn't help much there.

(Orion tried to drill that info into you, in case you ever needed it. Judah had been the one to catch the leather belt, leaving you afraid but untouched.)

You hug your lover closer, and the memory trickles away again.

It's not so bad being out here, at that. Cold makes your lover all the sweeter to hold, and the deprivation of hunger is muted by the knowledge that there's more than enough if you wanted, inside. Indulging in sentiment is a wildly different beast than real deprivation. The lab coat you wear so proudly will cover two, applied properly-

"Mmfth? Arcade, where the hell are we?"

"Besides your new swimming pool."

Benny grunts, stands up to stretch a kink out of his back. "Ugh. Wake me up next time, willya? Cool cats may sleep in alleys, but I'll settle for a bed."

So you go inside, where the rocket stove has built up a delicious warmth, going straight to the bone marrow; and that's good too.

Benny heads straight for the liquor cabinet, chuckles at the selection, settles for a beer- maybe that means something, maybe in forty years time you'll know all the tells like that. Desire quivering in your blood like drunkenness. The prospect of having a future to grow old in.

"I'll stock that up. The upstairs bartender at the Gomorrah keeps a few bottles of pre-war wines to grease the skids."

"Are they really?"

"I mean, I wouldn't lay money on that. But it isn't your average NCR two-buck rotgut at least."

He grins and twists the bottle cap off with practiced delicacy, pockets it and drinks while looking around with sharp practiced eyes. Assessing, appreciating, but something more mellow there too, a look that hasn't been his since the Tops turned into New Vegas' bureaucratic ground zero. He's spent too long protecting it, imaging ways it could be taken away, for him to be entirely comfortable there again.

You take an ice-cold Nuka from the fridge, and a rum, and start downing a sweet mixer. Here, maybe, it'll be different. Outside it's just Fiend territory, and the two of you know how to handle those. Even without the power armor left fragmented in the Divide.

Thoughts fragmenting a little, the liquor hitting fast. If you'd come to rely on that armor, believed in it as part of your identity, maybe the loss would have come harder; but you're not the same as your tools. It kept you safe when it mattered.

Benny is still hunting around the place, quick avid eyes hunting for secrets- he switches lights on and off, opens all the cupboard doors, chortles at the secret passage to the cellar workshop. "Finally, a place with enough storage space. Not bad."

He raises the beer to his lips, drinks; you succumb to temptation and kiss foam off his lips extemporaneously.

Lovers make poor confidants, you can hear yourself saying to the courier. This is harder than it looks. It's like playacting a romance, a performance soap bubble guaranteed to vanish with the sunrise.

And people are so very fragile in the Mojave. You press against the thin fabric of that ridiculous lucky suit, hoping that physical evidence will assuage you where sense and sensibility haven't.

"If you're going to be like that," Benny says, between applications of the bottle. "Let's find the bed. A place like this, I imagine it's a good one."

"Up the stairs to the left." Too much practice in disaster, to lose your tongue just because of a firm fondle around your rear.

Benny laughs again, and guides you up the stairs as if he's the one who knows the place.

Bed is a luxurious queen size, done up in bedding that was washed this week and not last century, courtesy of the last functioning laundromat in Freeside. Abraxo's strong scent a trifle mollified, by the confounding mystery of an electric fireplace that tastes of woodsmoke.

"...sweet rads, Arcade, you really pulled out all the stops."

"There are shutters, if you want to see the Strip." Bulletproof security gives way to the neon splurge of distant light. Benny exclaims in pleasure, sticks his head out the window to drop cigarette ash onto a corrugated iron awning.

"Sorry. Dying for a smoke, I figure it's better now than interrupting us later."

"No worries." It still smells wrong, but after the Legion camp, soldiers glaring at Benny for defiling their measured sanctity with irreverent chems, it's the kind of wrong that brings comfort in its wake.

"Any ideas on how you want to- ah- christen the bed?"

"Take me down and roll me out, cupcake, I don't mind how this swings. Your picnic, baby, your show."

Wow, offers the part of your brain that's rapidly succumbing to the effect of alcohol on an empty stomach. What a remarkably unhelpful statement.

Benny has one foot poised on a priceless rifle cabinet and his greased hair is fluttering slightly from the window breeze, and the whole picture does things to your circulatory system that under normal circumstances would have you reaching for a stimpak. "In that case, I'll just...start by undressing."

"Oh, a stripping routine?" Benny puffs out effortlessly, classier than anyone with his attire and general disposition should be allowed to look. "Right on, sugarlips."

For the love of water, he's taking a simple mechanical prelude to the actual fucking as if it's the sexiest thing in the Wasteland.

Only, the way his eyes follow you as you strip off the familiar filthy coat and undo shirt cuffs suggests it is. Off with the belt and packs, away with the shirt-

He rests two fingers on your shoulder, so lightly you wouldn't feel him if it wasn't bare. "You sure this is something you want to do right now, cupcake? All that booze?"

"Get in bed and find out." In as close an imitation of his incomprehensible slang as you can manage. It's not very good.

He stubs the cigarette out against the shutter, falls dramatically against the bed. "Go ahead and strip me then."

It's part and parcel of being a doctor that you can't do this simply, without a radio station in your head tuned to medical evaluation even as you slide off jacket and trousers, every inch of that lucky suit laid neatly on a chair. Scars here, unexplained tattoo there, the marks of a hard life in the Mojave laid out in history made flesh. It is very susceptible and very beautiful at once, heart-wringing for the wounds scabbed over and soothing for its persistence. Sex is always the balance between the purifying and the ludicrous, your busy mind likes to sate itself on diagnostic while the rest of you is caught up in passion. Just the way you're built. It doesn't hurt any.

Benny's a goddamn pillow princess and lazy in bed, but he helps remove your trousers this time, the two of you stripping each other to bare skin. His hands find your cock, already growing interested; you find his and find it to be disappointingly inert.

"Something wrong?"

" Hell, I'm probably just done in after that batch in the garden. Tell you what, a little Buffout, a little juicer, I should be right with you."

"...not like that." You will, possibly, never be able to tell when he lies, but this doesn't stack up to prior experience. Experiences. "What's wrong? Am I rushing you?"

"No, I don't think- maybe," Benny admits, chagrin written over his face. "This house, everything- it's too much. Fuck, this'll take some getting used to. Seven years running the Tops and I still think of a place like this as a luxury for my betters, you dig?" He squeezes lightly with one hand, strokes along your ribcage with the other.

"You don't have any betters." Sensation be damned when there's a philosophical point to be made. Difficult as that may be in his practiced grasp. "You deserve this as much as- ah- any one in the Mojave-"

"Whoa, kitten, you'll be bad for my limitless ego. It's just a matter of getting used to it, okay? We have time, we'll get there. But meanwhile I have a bottlecap says you need a special delivery even if I don't."

It takes a moment to disentangle thoughts of Marilyn from standard Vegas slang, and then another to try to muster a functional argument, and then there aren't any more moments, because your chronic patience does not carry through to the bedchamber and Benny knows that, hurrying you along until you're blacking out to bliss-

how long it is before you're cognizant again, you aren't sure. Long enough that Benny has had time to clean you off, that's thoughtful.

"I can't possibly let that go unreciprocated."

"Don't worry about it, cupcake. Keeping score is for teenagers."

"...if you can't get it up in the house, why not outside?" That has to be the alcohol talking. Or Benny's boyfriend. Or both.

"You mean a rematch by the pool? Not a bad idea from the fertile delta of Arcade's idea garden, I'll drink to that."

...whatever that means. Too many stairs to negotiate going back down. "I mean right here. On the bedroom awning."

"The one made of cast iron? With a clear line of sight for anyone prancing down the street? Two feet across to a hard fall on concrete?"

"...um."

Benny grins, grabs a fluffy pillow. "Baby, you know how to activate my danger kink like nothing else. Lead on, Macbeth."

He means Macduff, but never mind, the thought's there.

Intellectual quibbling can take a back seat to some extremely serious fucking, for once in a way.

[yikeswtfmate]

Strange Times || Ch. 1

main masterlist // Strange Times Series Masterlist // next part

Summary: Mickey Pearson sends Raymond to fetch his sister from the airport. He’s never met this woman, but he soon finds out she likes to play with her food first.

Pairing: Raymond (Charlie Hunnam - The Gentlemen, 2020) x Reader

Warnings: swearing; sexual themes; mentions of violence

A/N: Here it is my lovelies, the fic i’ve been telling you about with Charlie Hunnam’s character whom i fell in love with (it’s the beard....and the glasses....and the hair....and the suits......and the whole righthand to a drug lord thing maybe?). I’m still unsure about posting it here because it’s a different type of Reader that i’m used to write (maybe i’ll just switch her to an OC) and it’s not Bonky. So please let me know what you think and whether i should post the next parts as well (it’s already 5k long) but if you don’t like it, this is a “felt cute might delete later” type of situation so no harm no foul. And for those of you who haven’t seen the movie yet, slight spoliers ahead!

The office is quiet, save for the scratching of a pen on paper and the ticking of a clock that is starting to irritate Raymond to no end. He’s been meaning to either throw it out or switch it with the one that is in the living room, but he knows how his boss would not appreciate the disposal of a five thousand pound clock plated in gold. Raymond personally thinks it’s tacky, but it’s Mickey’s house after all, and he should be concentrating on sorting out the logistics for that shipment that’s supposed to go out to Italy anyway. He turns back to his laptop, intent on fulfilling his responsibilities for the day, when Mickey stops writing behind him and clears his throat, demanding his attention.

“Raymond, I need you to go to the airport tomorrow.”

Ray stands up from his chair at the desk and moves to the table in the middle of the receiving room. He’s learned all of Mickey’s tells during the ten years he’s been his righthand man, and when he stops sorting out his agenda to pour himself a cup of tea, Ray knows he needs to stand to attention.

“Any reason in particular?”

“I need you to pick up my sister and bring her to the estate.”

“Your sister?” Ray is utterly confused, mainly for the fact that this would be the very first time he’ll be meeting this woman.

He was aware that Mickey had a sister back in the States, but even though he knows every aspect of Mickey’s life inside and out, this elusive woman is his boss’ best kept secret. He’s unsure whether it’s just brotherly protectiveness, pure paranoia at the prospect of their enemies finding out there’s still another weak link next to Rosalind, or it’s simply the fact that Mickey doesn’t want to talk about his family back home.

He’s heard she’s been studying for a degree in business at Wharton, but he doesn’t know what to expect, for all the odd comments Mickey and Rosalind make about her when they think he’s not listening. One thing he’s completely certain of, however, is how much Mickey looks after her, considering the sizeable amounts of money that are going into her bank account every month.

Mickey raises an eyebrow over his teacup. “I don’t see why you’re acting as if you didn’t know I have a goddamn sister, Ray.”

Raymond shrugs, deciding that it’s best if he won’t tick off his boss at the moment. He’s been on edge ever since the whole debacle with Matthew Berger and Fletcher went down. Mickey’s decided to hold off his retirement plans until someone comes along with a better offer (preferably none of Lord George’s minions though), so he hasn’t only been stressed about maintaining the value of the goods, but also pissed off that he couldn’t just drink whiskey unperturbed all day in a countryside manor.

“I’ve sent you all the details you need. Don’t be late, I don’t want her left unsupervised for too long.”

Raymond nods, eager to go back to his laptop. It’s time for homework, and there’s nothing he love more than information.

“And Ray?” He turns back to Mickey, but the man’s just looking out the window, a thoughtful expression on his face. “Be careful.”

“Of course, boss. I’ll treat her like a princess.”

“It’s not her I’m worried about, you moron.” He says with a frown. “I meant you. She likes to play with her food first.”

*

The private jet should be a surprise, but when you’re in the line of business Raymond is in, he’s practically seen it all. The charcoal trench coat he’s wearing today is flapping in the whirl of wind so it’s a good thing he foregone the machine gun in favour of an inconspicuous handgun. He’s almost certain nothing would come up on their way from Heathrow to Oxfordshire, but he made sure David fully stocked the car before they left, just in case.

He’s waiting patiently in front of the car, lighting a cigarette, while he watches the airport’s employees fuss around the plane. The airstair is released and Ray stands up from leaning against the car. The smoke that he exhales blind him for a second, but he still needs to blink three more times to assure himself he’s not fucking hallucinating when a woman that he can only assume is Y/N Pearson steps off the plane. She drags a hand through her long curls, moving her head from side to side in what must only be slow motion. Her heels click on the pavement as she makes her way towards him, and Raymond smiles involuntarily.

“I see the money’s been treating you well, Raymond. Although I have to admit, I kind of miss the long hair.” She says before Ray can utter a word. She places a manicured finger under his chin, closing his mouth, kissing his cheek with a smack. “You don’t remember me, do you?” Her eyes are patient, as if exhausted after explaining a child the same exact thing for the past hour. “We’ve met fourteen years ago, when Mickey expanded the business to five farms. You were only an errand boy then, remember? Granted, I was only fourteen at that time, a gangly little thing with braces, of course you don’t remember me.”

Raymond’s mind flashes to a vague memory of a girl in a sequinted t-shirt, a choker that could only be worn with so much seriousness by a teenager, and boots with fur, mated in English mud. She blushed to the roots of her hair when he asked her if she knew by any chance where Mr Pearson was, having to deliver a parcel to him personally. She just pointed with a black fingernail towards her left and squeaked something unintelligible before ducking her head and running in the other direction.

“Ah, there he goes.” She sing-songs as she watches his eyes shift in recognition all over her, but there’s nothing left of her teenage self, having grown into her body, comfortable in her skin, confidence built up with precision and care, together with an appropriate, if rather extravagant fashion sense.

“I can’t believe how much you’ve grown.” He says, realising that he sounds like a cliché when she rolls her eyes.

“Right, that’s what happens in life, honey. Can we please go? We can exchange pleasantries in the car, this wind is ruining my hair.”

Raymond keeps the door open for her, nodding to David who just finished loading the trunk with her luggage and he hops in the backseat next to her.

“I hope we’re stopping for lunch on our way.” She warns. “I’m starving and I couldn’t eat anything since I woke up because of those stupid turbulences.”

“Mickey is expecting us to be there in an hour.” He responds cautiously.

“Mickey can go fuck himself. I want a pizza and I haven’t been to Zizzi in a long time, so you better take me there, Raymond, or I’ll just ask David to kindly move to the passenger seat.”

The man in question looks at Ray in the rear view mirror, awaiting instructions. Ray sighs and nods once again, now starting to realise why his boss felt the need to warn him in regard to his sister. He hopes he won’t have to deal with her for long after she’s safely delivered to Mickey, because for all her beauty, she’s starting to piss him off.

“Oh, don’t look so glum.” She chides, after a few minutes of him plainly ignoring her. “I’m good company, I promise. I’m just cranky because I’m hungry. I’m hangry, Ray. I just need you to feed me.” She flutters her eyelashes, and she rests her hand on his thigh, purposefully ticking him off.

Ray shifts in his seat, trying to put as much distance between them, to which she just scoffs and rolls her eyes. This woman is dangerous, and for all his sinful thoughts that have been going through his mind ever since he laid eyes on her, Ray has to remind himself that this is his boss’ little sister, little as in eleven years younger for fuck’s sake. He’s positively sure that if he even lays a finger on her, his balls would be cut off and fed to the hunting dogs.

They finally stop after a short silent trip, and he helps Y/N into the fairy lit restaurant, leaving David posted in front of the car. He hopes there will be no more trouble like last time, having had his share of adventures for the goddamn decade.

Holding a chair for her, Ray waits for Y/N to take off her coat, and now he suddenly feels the need to swallow hard, as he rakes his eyes over her body. She’s wearing a leather skirt that is too tight to possibly be comfortable, but long enough to almost meet her knee high boots; her sweater is thick, appropriate for the cold January weather in the south of England, yet Raymond can’t help but wonder if her nipples are as perfect as her lips. Speaking of which, they curl up in a patient yet satisfied smile, a raised eyebrow that wants to show him she’s merely allowing him to inspect her so blatantly.

After she orders her pizza and Ray asks for a glass of water, clearly showing his disapproval for this unexpected stop. He can feel a nudge on his shin and she smiles at him in a way that he can only describe as charitable.

“You know, I’ve had the biggest crush on you back then.” She says and Ray chokes on his water. “It’s true. You were this tall rugged man with long hair that I wouldn’t have known what to do with then, but would definitely know how to handle now.” She smirks, while Ray raises an eyebrow, silently asking her to stop talking. Mainly because his imagination is starting to go haywire. “The beard suits you. But I kept thinking about licking your jaw all the way here so it’s a shame really that I can’t now. Those were some long 8 hours, Ray, I had to occupy myself somehow.”

“Y/N, you should really stop talking.” Ray would give himself a pat on the back for all the restraint he’s showing at the moment. There’s nothing he would like more than to shove her in one of the bathroom stalls and have his way with her, and by the look in her eyes, she knows exactly what he’s thinking so she’s relentless.

“Why? Afraid Mickey would disapprove? I thought you were a big boy, Ray, who doesn’t have to ask permission.”

“It’s not about permission, and we both know it. Your brother would literally kill me if…”

His words are cut short by the waiter who’s bringing Y/N her food and brazenly ogles her down. Ray can feel his hands involuntarily clench into fists, his jaw set at the man who would not just fucking go and keeps offering her pepper, sauce, or his fucking cock for that matter, because it’s so fucking obvious that’s what he’d actually want to say. Y/N just smiles sweetly, humouring his clumsy flirting, and Ray is more than certain that she’s starting to form a habit of doing things just to piss him off. When she touches the waiter’s forearm, he growls lowly, directing their attention to him. She feigns surprise, but he can read her amusement, while the waiter seems to decide whether to apologise or take his chances and go off. Ray knows that his glasses might put people at ease, making him look approachable, friendly, easy-going at first, but he’s perfected the frown and posture to go with it that puts people immediately in their places. Not to mention that spending over a decade in the business would shape anyone in a ruthless brute if need arises.

“My girlfriend here would like to enjoy her food now, thank you. She doesn’t need anything else, mate, you can go.”

The waiter finally scampers off, and Ray knows he’ll regret saying anything before he turns back to Y/N. She’s smirking like a bloody Cheshire cat if he’s ever seen anyone actually doing it, satisfied beyond belief.

“Don’t.” He warns when she opens her mouth to make a smartass remark, but she raises her hands in surrender and proceeds to eat.

Another battle of restraint and patience, as this woman eats as if she’s in a bloody porn movie, and who the fuck can eat pizza seductively anyway, for fuck’s sake. Raymond takes a deep breath, fishing his phone out of his coat pocket and calls his boss, doing his best to ignore the moans, the finger sucking and the swirling tongue in front of him.

“Hey, boss. Got Y/N from the airport, we’ll just be a bit late.”

“She wanted to eat, didn’t she?” Mickey asks and Ray can hear the exasperation in his voice. Apparently his boss is well aware of his sister’s antics, but it would’ve been better if Raymond were better prepared for the full force of what this woman can get out of him in a short half an hour.

“Tell him to suck a bag of tiny dicks, I don’t need his judgment.” Y/N says between licking a side of her finger and plucking an olive off her slice.

“We’re in Uxbridge, hopefully we’ll be there in an hour or so.” Raymond notifies, choosing to ignore her again.

“Fine. Just…make sure she stays out of trouble. It can stick to her like a fly to shit.” And with that Mickey disconnects the call.

Raymond sighs and puts his phone back. There is an uneasy feeling flowing through him, his instinct telling him to run away in the other direction, to avoid interacting with Y/N at all cost until her return to the States, but there’s another part of him, more primal, more carnal that is drawn to her. He hates it, mainly because there is no logical reasoning behind it, and he’s a very cerebral person, and he can’t figure her out for the life of him. Maybe it’s just the fact that she’s probably the first woman to act like that with him, as if she doesn’t care about the consequences, doesn’t give a toss whether he’ll bite or not. She likes to play with her food first, were Mickey’s words, which make so much more sense now.

Raymond can’t put his finger on it, and although he can have his pick of women anywhere he’d step foot in – he is very much aware of how handsome he is, thank you very much –  there is something about Y/N that demands to be unlocked. Or maybe it’s just that her tits look really great in that sweater and it’s the whole “forbidden fruit” bullshit. Regardless, Ray just wants to drop her off and go back to London where he can drown himself in work so he can forget about her. Or maybe have a night out, pick someone at a bar and pretend it’s her, because he’s absolutely certain by this point that it’s just the novelty of Y/N that lures him in, and definitely not those eyes full of mischief.

***

Taglist: I haven’t tagged anyone in this, as I’m unsure whether you want to read something that’s not Bucky related. Let me know if you do! Toodles!

[cookinguptales]

A long post about having undiagnosed ADHD as a little girl. And how we all need to talk a hell of a lot more about Reaction Sensitive Dysphoria.

(cw: mental illness, childhood punishment, discussions of childhood self-harm & suicidal ideation)

When I was a little girl, I was a crybaby. I didn’t know why I’d cry all the time. I just did. Everything always felt catastrophic, even if it was just a disagreement over what to play with my friends. People called me manipulative. I got made fun of at school. I was sent to the school therapist. Hell, the only time I ever had to go to the principal’s office, I was in kindergarten and would not. stop. crying. I was literally sent to the principal’s office for crying too much.

(Note. How did I respond to that? I cried. A lot.)

Here are a few examples of things that made me feel like the world was ending:

Once I came home sobbing and my parents asked me what was wrong. Why was I crying? Because the other kids had called me a crybaby.

Once at daycare (around age six), some older boys were making effigies of their teachers out of play-doh and then smushing them and convinced me to join in. The minute I did, they told me that they were telling my teacher, which made me about lose my damn mind.

I was a voracious reader and often ran out of reading material. Once I sneaked some of my mother’s romance novels that she’d left in the bathroom for light reading. They were Very Adult. I was so scared she’d find out and scold me for reading sexually explicit books.

Now, my parents think these are kind of funny stories. They say that I was very cute. But in truth, I was a nervous wreck. My life was pretty good in most ways, but I’d have these moments that just felt like cascading catastrophes. Anytime someone criticized me or my work or my ideas, the sky would just come crashing down. I’d cry so hard I couldn’t breathe. I’d cry so hard I threw up. I grew out of the crying by about age nine, but that sickening feeling of failure never really left.

About 8 years ago, I was diagnosed with ADHD. Severe ADHD. I believe the doctor’s exact words were “I don’t even know how you graduated from high school”. They tried me on ADHD medicine but it made my heart go dokidoki so I just had to live with being unmedicated. I wasn’t told a lot about ADHD at that point, or how ADHD symptoms differ for women, so I just kind of assumed that it was just focus and that’s it. Brain fog wasn’t exactly new to me, what with my other illnesses, so I figured I’d just live with it.

But about a year ago, I learned about Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria, which is a fairly common symptom of ADHD that no one ever told me about in my goddamn life! It essentially means that when you are criticized (or perceive something as criticism) by others or by yourself, your brain goes into absolute hyperdrive. You go from zero to “everyone hates me and I deserve that and probably don’t deserve to live too because I am just the worst” over like. literally nothing. And it’s not just like a mental thing you can train yourself out of. It’s characterized by actual physical pain. Y’all, I have anxiety and depression and this is not the same thing. This is your whole body seizing up and your brain going into a maelstrom that’s fairly similar to a panic attack.

Here’s the less cute side to all of those stories:

I had very few friends, and the friends I did have thought I was annoying and manipulative. The more I cried, the more kids stayed away from me.

After the Play-Doh incident, I cried for days. Days. And I was scared of my teacher for weeks. My parents laughed it off as a cute child thing, but none of it was cute for me. The older boys forgot about it by the next day, but it haunted my interactions with that teacher for weeks. It interfered with my education. I was a nervous wreck at school. I was so scared that she would hate me. That I’d be singled out in class. That I’d fail and my whole education would be upended and I’d fail out of school and my parents would hate me too and my life would be over. That’s... a lot for a six year old.

Those romance novels? That was a closely guarded secret that I kept for years. For literal years, I was afraid she’d somehow find out that I’d read those books. I would think of it when I was nine, ten, eleven years old and my whole body would stiffen up. I’d occasionally throw up. I cried about what might happen if my parents ever found out. Would they hate me forever? Yes, probably. They’d never love me again. I was a bad child. I finally told my mom about it a few months ago. I was 29. A small part of me was still scared I’d get in trouble. (My mom laughed about it; she was just like ‘wow, I should have put those books up higher’.)

When I was six, I went to an aftercare at a neighbor’s house for a while. (This predated the other daycare.) One day, one of the kids at aftercare didn’t get off the bus. The lady asked if anyone knew where he was. Trying to be helpful, I said I thought I’d seen him on the bus. (And like -- I really did think I did. But I was six and six year olds are uhhh not smart.) Surprise! He’d actually left school early for a dr’s appt. But she thought he’d missed his bus stop and spent like an hour on the phone figuring out what happened. And y’all. When she realized he hadn’t been on that bus, she was furious. When my other neighbor picked me up for my mom that evening, the lady told her that I was a bad child who’d purposefully lied to scare her. She said I wasn’t allowed to come back. And ohhh guys. I begged my neighbor not to tell my mom. (She did.) And then I begged my mom not to tell my dad. She was honestly kind of alarmed at how vehement I was about dad not knowing. (I was like a shaking, sobbing mess.) She asked me what I thought would happen. idk. Maybe he’d hit me. (My parents never hit me.) Maybe he’d throw me out of the house. Maybe he’d never talk to me again. He’d definitely stop loving me. I was so bad. So, so bad. I was a bad child. No one would ever love me. I was a worthless, bad child.

In short, I was hysterical.

When my parents finally talked to me about it, it was less of a talk about consequences and more talking me off the fucking ledge. They weren’t that concerned about the actual incident; they figured out pretty quickly that I’d just made a mistake. A temporarily scary one, but a mistake all the same. (I basically never misbehaved, so they were kind of confused by the whole situation, honestly.) But they were very concerned about my reaction to it. I knew they loved me, right? I knew that they wouldn’t hurt me, right? Why did I think that was a possibility?

I didn’t know. I still don’t know. It wasn’t rational. It was just my brain exploding into a thousand tiny pieces.

This is not a memory my mom laughs about. I think it really genuinely disturbed her. She’s still angry at that aftercare neighbor for doing that to me. As an adult, I realize that the person who actually fucked up in that scenario was the boy’s mother, who didn’t call to alert aftercare that he wouldn’t be coming. (Funnily enough, that boy’s mother was my first grade teacher -- the one I was so terrified of. Small town. I guess I was scared of her hating me, too.) But as a child, this wasn’t just bad. It was catastrophic. I genuinely considered hurting myself. I was six years old and I considered hurting myself. Suicidal ideation is often part and parcel with RSD. I’ve had to deal with that since elementary school.

RSD is real and it’s terrifying and it’s not unusual in children with ADHD. It’s still a problem that I struggle with. I’ve had friends not answer texts for a while and my brain just. assumes that I said something wrong. And now they hate me. Because I’m a bad person. And my whole body will shake. I’ll sweat. My stomach will roll. My chest will literally hurt like I’m having a heart attack. I still have to blink back those tears. Sometimes I’ll go for a walk to distract myself and burn off all that energy. Sometimes I’ll write a post like this. Sometimes I’ll just lie in bed. Shaking. Trying very hard not to think about doing Bad Things. It’s hard to say how it’ll go until it goes.

(Note: I’m okay right now! I was just talking about this with dad yesterday so I’ve been thinking about it.)

And this is not my friends’ fault! Or my family’s fault. This is no one’s fault. It’s just... mental illness, I guess. It’s hard to predict. Sometimes I can have a calm and reasonable discussion about my faults (which I fully admit exist) and sometimes someone disagrees with me on whether a tv show is good and my brain shits itself. (I’m dumb and stupid and this person probably hates me now! Because I didn’t love Avatar! Why did I open my big mouth? Now our whole relationship is ruined and I ruined it because I am a dumb relationship-ruiner!) Obviously, it gets worse when my physical and mental state is already fragile. I have a lot of chronic physical and mental illnesses, so like... it happens. But it’s very hard to predict, very hard to control, and all you can do is really talk yourself through it when it happens. Breathe. Focus on what’s real and what’s not. Distract yourself. Be as kind to your brain as you can because it will not be kind back.

Talk to people who love you. Try, whenever possible, to be one of those people.

idk. I wish I had concrete advice to finish this off. But it’s more just like... please learn to see the signs, especially in small children. I had far too many strong emotions for a child to figure out on her own. I really could have used some help. It’s too late for my childhood, but not for the other kids who are struggling with similar issues right now.

And if you read this and see yourself in it, do me a solid and talk to your doctor? Your brain might thank you one day.

[thiswaycomessomethingwicked]

Hello! I'm pretty sure I saw you mention a while ago that you were disappointed by confessions of the fox, would you mind explaining why? I've seen mostly good things about it myself. If I misremembered then I'm sorry and I hope you have a good day :))

I think this is one of my less popular opinions. And I understand - we so rarely get historical fiction with trans folk as the titular character (indeed, we rarely get any fiction what that). So I get people’s desire to laud it. 

For me though? It fundamentally didn’t work as a book. As a story.  

Let me count the ways. (Apologies in advance for the length of this.)

First: If you’re trans-ing someone who was historically cis instead of seeking to find a real, historical trans or gender-nonconforming person, I have questions. 

Most of the questions can be summed up as: Why? 

I struggle with historical fiction that takes a cis person and re-imagines them as trans as if there aren’t already literal historical, real trans people out there whose stories can be told. It smacks as (unintended, well meaning) erasure of lived experiences. 

Jack Sheppard, to the best of our knowledge, was a cis dude. There were trans folk in London in the 1710s and ‘20s. You might have to dig a bit for them, but they’re there. Because trans folk have always been there. 

Second: Characterisation 

This is more personal taste, but I found Jack and his girlfriend Bess to be inexcusably boring. How a trans, thief and gaolbreaker in 1720s gin-soaked London can be written as boring is anyone’s guess. But he was. 

Jack had no real personality and I found his story to be uninteresting. Oh, he’s the world’s best thief and gaolbreaker, that’s nice. But on its own it isn’t enough.

He had few to no faults. Childhood trauma isn’t a personality. Nor is being trans. And the author relies heavily on gender + occupation (thief-ness) to equal personality. So it falls very flat.  

Bess, his girlfriend, is a mixed-race sex worker from the Fens (even though actual real-Bess was from Edgeware). She seems to only exist to demonstrate that Jack is good at sex. She also veers a little into the Mystical Woman of Colour Healer Who Aids The White Person on their Journey of Self Discovery trope. 

Neither Bess nor Jack undergo any real change in the book. They exist in a weird stasis and experience no development, despite living through some harrowing things. They’re wooden dolls who move through the story without really engaging with, or being influenced by, the things around them. 

The other “main” character is a modern Academic who “found” this supposed “manuscript” of Jack’s life and is annotating it. His story unfolds in the foot notes and it’s just so messy if not a bit contrived. It didn’t make sense. I think the author was trying to convey that the Academic was in a sort of dystopian future, but if that’s the case it didn’t work. And if that’s not the case, the entire inclusion of the Academic’s story served only to annoy and take me out of the reading experience. 

E.g. There’s a scene where the Academic is being taken to task by the Dean for playing stupid games on his phone during office hours and like honey, lapsed-historian/academic here, trust me the Dean doesn’t give a fuck what you do during your office hours so long as you’re in your office and students can come bother you about their poor marks. 

The manuscript is supposedly being sought after by this pharmaceutical company for nefarious reasons that never struck me as being entirely realistic/believable. Also, the university was spying on this non-tenured, slightly useless Academic as if he somehow mattered? Which made zero sense. Anyway, it was stupid and should have been ripped out of the final version. OR changed substantially. 

Jonathan Wild, the thief taker (main antagonist to Jack), is probably the only interesting person. 

Third: Lack of Follow Through, or, the Fabulism Was Not Used Well 

The book tries to blend in some fabulism to the world by giving Jack the ability to “hear” the thoughts of inanimate objects. This could have been fun and gone to some interesting places, but it failed to deliver. 

I personally found the shoe-horning in of “capitalism commodifies everything” to be sloppy and heavy handed. It was done with little grace and didn’t sit right given that we are dealing with the early modern period. Yes, you can use the past to critique our modern woes, but do it intelligently. Don’t slap modern points of view and understandings of things onto the past and expect them to make sense. 

Anyway, Jack spends the book hearing inanimate objects talk to him, asking him to “free” them, or something. And uh .. .it doesn’t go anywhere interesting after that. 

Also the correlation one can draw from these objects to, you know, slaves, is uncomfortable. Especially as it’s the cargo of the EIC ships that Jack hears. I don’t think it’s intended in any sort of malicious way, but the allusion is there and I always found it to be distinctly uncomfortable. 

Fourth: Misuse of Marxist Theory, or, More Heavy Handed Moralizing that Annoyed the Dear Reader because it wasn’t subtle and, more importantly, it wasn’t done intelligently. 

So, the author is an academic - studies 18th century lit. Which is readily apparent as his Academic (self-insert) character is, I believe, supposed to be a historian and uh ... you can tell that the author doesn’t know enough to wing that. E.g. How he interprets some of the laws and customs of the time. Instead of understanding the social, economic and, most importantly, environmental issues that gave birth to laws like “the corporation of the city of London owns the streets so you can’t muckrake” he chooses to understand them through a very 21st century lens (and a Marxist one at that. I know I’m perhaps a bit uncool for this, but I find the application of Marxist theory to the early modern period to be ... not useful). 

Do you know why, mid/late 17th century London passed these municipal laws? Because of the god damn fucking plague you numb nut. You absolute buffoon. It had nothing to do with “oh the City/government is evil and wants to own you” it had to do with the fact that no one cleaned the goddamn street. So the city took over doing it. 

Prior to this, in London, you were supposed to keep the street in front of your building clear of waste, debris, refuse etc. No one did this, of course. I live where it’s cold and snows a lot and people can barely shovel the 2 sq ft of sidewalk in front of their driveway in the winter. I dread the idea of an average homeowner being expected to keep the street clear and clean. 

Anyway, guess what dirty streets attract? Vermin. Guess what comes with vermin? Plague. Guess what happened in 1665/66? The great plague of London! 

17th century England might not have understood germ theory, but they did understand correlation. (Also, the population of London was doubling at the back half of the 17th century and streets needed to be reliably cleared for through-traffic reasons etc. etc.) 

ugh, sorry, that one in particular drove me up the wall. Not everything is a capitalist conspiracy. Especially when we’re talking about municipal by-laws from the 17th century. 

And I understand the temptation to read a lot of modern interpretation of words like “corporation” and “company” onto bodies that used these same words in 17th and 18th centuries. But the weight, meaning and connotation of “the worshipful company of merchant adventurers” is different from, I don’t know, “the tech company google” or whatever. The early 18th century is when we start seeing the birth of the stock market, of “venture companies” (i.e. merchant adventure companies), of a lot of the language and proto-iterations of what will grow to be economic institutions of our time. But it doesn’t mean they’re the same and that difference is important. Because Jack Sheppard is a man living in 1720 he’s not going to be having our modern 21st century critiques of capitalism because his engagement with the economic systems of his time would have been radically different to our own experiences. 

Fifth:  Unbelievable Top Surgery & Recovery 

So, Jack gets top surgery. In 1720s fever-ridden London. While quarantining in a brothel. 

And he lived! No infection! No tearing! He was up and about in a matter of days. I don’t remember if his nipples survived the operation or not but somehow Jack did. Without anesthetics! Or you know, any concept of hygiene. 

His Mystical Girlfriend Who Exists to Show How Good Jack is at Sex is also somehow Magically Very Literate and also Magically a Surgeon? and performs this surgery on Jack in the middle of a plague. 

The entire ordeal was so poorly handled in terms of believability that I literally set the book down and said “what the fucking fuck” to the empty room then drank wine before finishing the chapter. 

An aside, it is funny thinking about the quarantine chapters at this point. I read COTF when it first came out a few years ago. Sweet summer children, we none of us had any idea how to write quarantine scenes. 

That reminds me: the entire quarantine thing was presented as the government trying to control movement and take away people’s rights etc. instead of a very normal, typical response that cities had been enacting since 1350. Samuel Pepys, who lived through the 1665/66 epidemic, barely even notes the restrictions. He’s like just “hmmm I’d love to go to the pub but I also don’t want to die. so. *shrug*” 

At the time of the author’s writing, most of us in the western world had no idea how normal and day-to-day disease was for our ancestors and yes, sometimes there would be crackdowns to try and curb it if an epidemic hit. That was part and parcel of life. So again, Jack and Bess wouldn’t be like “ooooh we’re 21st century slightly libertarian lefitsts who think the government is doing this to control us and for nefarious purposes”. Much more likely, they would have been like Pepys and viewed it as nuisance, albeit a necessary one. 

Sixth: Overall Lack of Realism 

I think I’ve noted the big moments where I was like “no one in the early 18th century would think that I’m pretty certain”. This isn’t to say people didn’t grouse, complain about London government (and the king etc.), critique or question the world they lived in. They absolutely did! Regularly. With great verve and gusto, if the broadsheets are anything to go by. But their critiques, their complaints, suggestions for bettering life, are not the same as ours. Because how could they be? They lived in a different world, were responding to specific things, grew up hearing and believing certain things etc. 

Jack, aside from having minimal to no character, really did read like a modern slightly-libertarian leftist who was plunked into a novel that takes place three hundred years ago. 

In addition to unrealistic political views, his understanding of body, gender, sexuality and identity also read as incredibly modern. Now this is harder, because we have so few extant sources from that time on those who lived non-gender conforming lives, and from their point of view, so yes creative imagining and interpretation is the rule of the day for writing that. 

But, we do know how in general the average person engaged and understood gender and sexuality and that would, naturally, inform anyone whose experience was different. And that base line of “probably what a typical cis Englishman or woman felt about their body and identity” wasn’t present. At all. 

Indeed, gender engagement at that time was interesting. The concept of the body, the role of the physical body, how it was interpreted is absolutely fascinating and the author could have done some really cool things with that. But he didn’t. He went for slapping a modern interpretation onto the past. 

At this point, write a dystopian novel and make Jack a fictional character. That probably would have gone over better, for me at least. The conceit can remain the same: It’s the year 4056 and an Academic found a manuscript from the year 3045 when the Dystopia Was a Thing - and go from there. 

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I think part of what made this very popular and why people seem so taken with it is that it reads smart. It reads like someone who has immersed themselves in that world etc. because of the slang and language used. 

Yet, for me, as someone who has studied this period extensively, especially queerness in London in the late 17th and early 18th centuries, it read flat and unrealistic. 

I was initially very enthused when I started it. There are some posts to that effect on my blog. But it very quickly went south. It tries very hard to be Radical and Smart and Subversive and Critiquing Everything and so I think it fails at the fundamental thing it should be doing: telling a good story. 

(Note: The book does try and address racism in London at this time. It also felt a bit forced. And Jack seemed to have no prejudices or preconceived notions about Indian and Black folk which isn’t realistic. Like, it might make him #Problematic but my dude, you’re writing a man born in 1702. He’s going to have some iffy views. That can be challenged! Absolutely. But they still would have existed.) 

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Thank you for the ask! I again apologize for the length of the reply.