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songmingisthighs · 4 years ago

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[19.06] mafia!hongjoong × reader

⇀ you were interested in hongjoong, a notorious leader of a very successful mafia organization. sadly he didn't see you that way. if only he knew the true you before making a rash judgement

⇁ tw : mafia life, angst, mentions of black market activities, death, violence, dark stuff. read at your own risk.

⇁ disclaimer : the author does not support any and all criminal/illegal acts. the narrative written in this story is purely fiction out of the author’s imagination. the things written here does not portray real mafia life nor is the author aware of how the mafia life is like. the author is a hermit loser.

The door to Hongjoong's office opened and in walked his right hand, with a teasing smirk on his face. Hongjoong looked up from the paperwork on his desk and looked up to the man with a raised eyebrow, "what are you smirking at?" he questioned.

Seonghwa nodded his head towards the door, "there's someone here for you," he said whilst holding onto his laughter. Hongjoong shifted his gaze from his friend to the door and then back to him again, "who?" "your girlfriend," Seonghwa teased.

Before Hongjoong could throw anything at him, though, Seonghwa had run off, laughing heartily.

Not long after, you came into his office with a wide smile. As per usual, you were dressed to impress, head to toe with a black and white vintage channel mini skirt and blazer, adorned with a channel necklace and earrings. As you walked in, Wooyoung, one of Hongjoong's trusted men, looked at your passing figure with mouth hanging low and a starstruck look on his face. But you didn't care, you only had eyes for Hongjoong.

It has been roughly five months since you started dropping into Hongjoong's office. Your dad, an equally highly successful head of the mafia from where you're from, wanted you to get married to expand his business and make more allies. He gave you several options but you were immediately intrigued by Hongjoong, one of the mafia heads he made a partnership with by providing him with weapons. The comprehensive file your dad gave you did Hongjoong no justice so you decided to get to know him for real.

Unluckily, Hongjoong is very secretive and protective of himself and his family (re: his brothers; his most trusted men in the mafia). He had been betrayed so many times before and his thirst for revenge both became his strength and downfall. While he managed to build a highly acclaimed mafia organization at such a young age, he closed off everyone who he deemed not worthy of his attention even after only seeing them for less than five minutes.

Sadly, that included you. You weren't the only one who got a comprehensive file on the other, he too had one of you. A straight-A student from Wharton with hobbies consisting of horseback riding and charity? He wondered whether you were preparing to take over your dad's mafia or to steal the Crown of England and be its ruler.

Hongjoong tried his best to hold in a groan of annoyance but even so, some still escaped him and you heard it. Though you were used to it so you just ignored him.

"Hi, Joong," you grinned widely at him, walking in and putting a medium-sized box of cake on his desk after closing his door. "Don't call me Joong," he grumbled.

In all honesty, your bubblegum personality sickened him. He knows for a fact that no one is that happy-go-lucky and excited and has rainbows shooting out of their asses 24/7. So there has to be something you were hiding from him.

You only chuckled at his response, "You're a sourpuss, you know that? You're gonna have wrinkles before you hit thirty if you keep frowning all the time like that," you said as you focused yourself on opening the cake box.

Inside it was the cake you made for him. All the times you visited him, you never made him something from scratch. You were trained to be the head of a mafia organization one day, not in the kitchen. So that cake was the very first thing you made and you were beyond proud of yourself.

"Look," Hongjoong exhaled sharply, starting to get annoyed even before you did anything, "You came at a bad time, I need to get a hundred thousand things done before tonight, in case you didn't realize, my organization is-" "in the brink of war with Stray Kids, I know, I've read the reports," you simply said, hands moving to cut the cake in front of you to hand to him.

"I have connections with the leader's soft spot, the foreigner one, I can make a deal that would help your case if you would jus-"

"NO!!!!" he yelled out, slamming his hands onto his desk, startling you so much that you accidentally dropped your knife and stepped back a little.

Maybe it was the stress of having to deal with things alone, or maybe it's just him finally snapping from overthinking about you, but one thing's for sure is that he had had enough. He needed to put you in your place.

"You may be your daddy's little princess back home, all dressed in white and pink and lace, showered with Channels, Tiffanys and your hoity-toity prestigious Wharton degree. But here, you're nothing, got me? You understood nothing about having to work your ass off to get the recognition and rewards you deserve, you had your daddy behind you this whole time and that's very convenient for you. But don't come here and act like you know shit, okay? Our worlds are different, you came from a cotton candy palace, I came from the ditch, your opinion means less than shit to me," he spat out so quickly, he didn't realize that your expression changed to something that he had never seen before.

Your eyes were blank and glazed, lips slightly quivering and chest heaving.

Hongjoong thought that he had really put you in your place and he was about to celebrate the fact that he might finally drove you away when you opened your mouth.

"Cotton candy palace? Not understanding having to work my ass off?" you choked out.

At first, Hongjoong thought you were gonna cry. But a sadistic, maniacal laugh resonated in the room from where you were doubled over, holding onto your stomach.

It was Hongjoong's turn to be stunned into silence.

"Oh my god, I thought you were smarter than that," you muttered as you calmed down, wiping tears from the corner of your eyes, "you think that this is who I am?" you asked with a raised eyebrow at him.

Hongjoong was confused about whether or not he should speak. It was the first time anyone had ever stunned Hongjoong and Hongjoong didn't know what to do.

"I was born from a girl who was en route to be sold in a human trafficking ring, I came out premature and was about to be sold to a satanic cult as their sacrifice but my 'dad' 'rescued' me. I was stored in a facility with thirty other children, we were trained to be assassins since before we could walk, brainwashed with ideals that ruined our brains. One by one, each year some of us were taken out if we show a lack of improvement or no promise," as you talked, you took off your earrings and necklace and put them on Hongjoong's desk.

While you ran a hand through your messy hair, you stared into him deeply, "I was seven when I first killed someone, my last competition. She was two years older than me and she was sold by her parents for coke money, or as the warden told us. We were reminded every day of how worthless we are so we wouldn't rebel and escape. But even in despair, I wanted something more. That's where daddy came in. He was impressed with me and he took me in as his daughter, telling people one of his whores were pregnant with me to assure my legitimacy. I was schooled in my own private red room. I had to fight for my right as a human being, I made deals with my dad to be able to go out with bodyguard escorts for only an hour every month,"

Hongjoong's eyes followed your hands that gripped onto the edge of your skirt, "did your little binder wrote that I went on my first official mission when I was just twelve? My dad cut the ballet lesson that I trade in for 120 hours of combat training short to gear me up, put me in a room of adult men and sent me off to plant an active bomb in 5 minutes in an air vent of the headquarters of his rival, crazy, right?" you chuckled humorlessly whilst ripping your skirt off to reveal your black shorts inside, a knife and a gun holstered on your thighs were revealed, making Hongjoond's eyes widened.

He never would have imagined someone like you to carry weapons under your very girly outfit. Or to even have such a traumatizing backstory.

"My whole appearance is compensation for my very dark upbringing, I wanted to hide it all. My dad told me I was stupid, that I belonged in the dark, dark world. But when I went to Wharton, I tried to change myself. I thought that I might be able to be the person I wanna be by marrying someone my dad approved so I don't have to take over wholly, I could just be the voice by the side, lending my skills and help the organization indirectly,"

You looked down at your heels clad feet for a second, letting your toes point and moving them from left to right to see what it looks like.

At this point, Hongjoong felt bad for having blown up at you. You had only wanted to spend time with him and even if he didn't want to see you, he could've said it nicely. Hongjoong never felt like this before, it was very weird for him.

He was about to walk over to you when you suddenly took your heels off in a flash and threw them both at Hongjoong so hard that it embedded deep into the wall on either side of his face.

Your usual smile was replaced with a frown, the eyes that usually twinkled showed nothing but darkness. He barely recognized you and he was on edge about it.

"You made your standing with me perfectly clear, Kim Hongjoong, while my dad is one to stop things before they become an issue, I like to see how things unravel," you smirked at him.

"What do you mean by that?" he asked, not being able to process anything.

"It means that your partnership with my dad is off, good luck finding a new weapons supplier," you spat out before turning around to leave the room, leaving traces of yourself behind at his office.

Hongjoong wanted to call after you, try to make things better somehow. But his head still couldn't even wrap around the shocking information you had just revealed.

Not long after you left, Yeosang came in but stopped at the door, scanning the room that was littered with remnants of you. "What the fuck happened here? Did a hooker tried to kill you!?" he asked, still confused at the situation.

When Yeosang looked up, he saw Hongjoong in a way he had never seen him before.

Nervous.

"I-I- I think I just forged a war between us and the largest mafia weapons manufacturer on the eastern hemisphere," he uttered out.

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thatlavenderblue · 3 years ago

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When I started learning about mental health in 2020 because I felt very depressed, I found no reason for me to feel that way. I thought depression had something to do with trauma and since I thought I didn't have any, i was very confused about my mental health.

Turns out : 1- it was autistic burnout from years of not being diagnosed and using no accommodations to help with sensory overload etc. 2- I do have a lot of trauma, childhood trauma. The sneaky type. I thought trauma could only be violent events happening such as a loved one dying or being abused. I have a lot of childhood trauma because I was undiagnosed and I had to cope with my autism alone.

Now, my childhood feels incredibly bitter sweet. I realised I would have been so much happier if I knew. It would have saved up so much time for me and my family. I wouldn't have spent hours arguing with my parents because of something they couldn't understand. If I knew I could have coped in a much healthier way instead of reflecting my trauma on my little sister. I'm so sorry for her, I hope she'll be alright. All those times where I was overwhelmed and I told her to stop doing what she was doing because the noise felt horrible to me. I was unable to explain her why so i was always rude to her. I feel like I was always restraining her. ''Stop tapping on the table'', ''stop singing'', ''if you want to do that, go to your room because I need a silent environment''. Because I didn't know what sensory overload was, I was just pushing her away and keeping her from doing what she wanted to do. My life stepped over hers because I didn't know. Saying that makes me feel sick, and even if sometimes I can't stand her, I am crying while writing this because nobody deserved to be rejected that way.

I still feel like my parents are giving me way more attention than my sister because I have special needs. They're not aware of my autism yet but I feel like everything is made for me and not for her. Sometimes me and my dad argue over the smallest things during dinner and I know it's annoying for my sister and my mom. They just finish eating quietly and leave while we keep arguing. I hope my sister knew I didn't mean to push her out like that. I hope she doesn't feel abandoned by our parents, and I hope they gave us equal attention and I just didn't notice. I feel great remorse about my childhood. I repressed others and I repressed myself. I needed to set boundaries but I never did. When I had the courage to tell my parents I wanted them to do or stop doing something, they wouldn't listen. I wish I could have told them how important it was to me. I would have silent meltdowns in my room because I didn't wanted to bother them.

The joy I am experiencing while discovering who I am is inherently linked to the grief I feel while I unpack more than a decade of trauma. I am grieving for the childhood I never had, and the childhood I took away from my sister. I hope one day I'll be able to talk to her about that. I feel so guilty. We never really bonded because of that. I mean we did but there is more times where we are alone in our rooms than times where we actually talk together.

I hope you are having a great day, thank you for reading about me. This post was originally meant to talk about the different kind of traumatic events I experienced but I forgot about it and talked about my sister. I think it it important to talk about the was undiagnosed autism can affect the people surrounding us. I might do a part 2 about undiagnosed childhood and the trauma linked to it.

#autism #autistic #actually autistic #neurodivergent #autistic culture #autistic community #actually autism #autistic experiences #autistic trauma #childhood trauma #undiagnosed autism #autistic life

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oneoftheprettynerds · 4 years ago

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Just My Type: Dark!Steve x Reader (Mob AU)

Chapter 2 in the Lipstick and Crayons Series.

Chapter 1: Welcome to the Darkside

Main Masterlist

A/N: This chapter is 2K words more than the last chapter and I’ve second guessed every single line in this one. This story is getting a lot of traction guys and I’m equal parts happy and scared. Thank you for the nice comments, they do encourage me. Also I’m just ranting feel free to skip this note haha. Your support in any form: like, comment or reblog is appreciated greatly. Also you can dm if you want to be friends, God knows I need those. Hopefully, this chap was worth the wait. Also, I made a poster for this on the main masterlist so check that out, it might be foreshadowing dome plot.

Warning: Eventual Non-Con, Sickening Threats, Mob Themes, Violence, Death, Manipulation, a mild mental breakdown, Cheap Tricks later.

Genres + Characters: Mob AU, Single Parents AU, Steve Rogers x Reader.

Summary: Steve can't ever repay you for what you did. After meeting you, Steve believes his broken family is the missing piece in the puzzle of your own wrecked one. Indebting the crime lord to you has been the biggest mistake of your life, cause now you can't get rid of him, no matter what. Loyalty and favours go a long way in the mob.

Chapter 2: Just My Type

It had almost been a week since the incident and you had barely gotten a wink of sleep. When you drove back to your house that night, Steve surprisingly didn’t argue as you had expected. After that friend of his whispered something in his ears, you only assumed he was needed elsewhere and you couldn’t be more thankful for that. They escorted you to your car and Steve thanked you with a strained smile, words genuine but eyes calculating. You didn’t even wonder what went inside his head. You were thankful for the peace and quiet of your own car, content to just get out of the area and into your humble abode.

After you put the already asleep Grace to bed, you couldn’t bring yourself to get out of her room. You just sat on the floor beside the bed, hand intertwined with hers as you rested your head beside her tummy on the mattress.

Your adrenaline wore off and your limbs ached as your thoughts finally settled into place, the gravity of the catastrophe a few hours prior hitting you. Tears made their way down your cheeks as you realized that you both could have very well died tonight.

One bullet could have sealed each of your lives and you were basically defenseless had Steve not saved you against the creeping assaulter. You couldn’t commend yourself for even defending yourself against one attacker, the guilt of killing someone harboring in your tired head. Your quiet whimpers eventually wore you out, while Grace’s shallow breaths lulled you to sleep.

You didn’t manage to sleep for long though, every time your eyes closed, horrific images flashed in your mind. A blood curdling scream here, heaps of dead bodies there, with distant exploding sounds all around. You could see men clad in black holding guns to Grace’s head and whensoever you woke up, you just wondered how much more creative your mind could get, making these visuals so realistic.

When 8 AM rolled in, you didn’t wake Grace up even though it was Monday and you had work. You got up, changed into a long tee after a shower and called your office and then her daycare. You knew you would have a hard time going back to your normal life, to become trusting enough to leave her alone.

Your assumption about yourself was right. You took almost the entire week off, which your boss generously allowed you to after hearing your traumatic experience, which soon made the city news headlines. All your colleagues checked on you, almost once in the five day break you took, and sweetly enough offered to bring you anything you needed.

It was kind of them, but none of them could bring you what your heart genuinely craved: peace and assurance that you and Grace would be safe.

Even though Saturdays were off, you did go to work to see what you missed and where to start on again. You went in because you knew that the random spurt of resolution you got in the bathroom to collect your life, wouldn’t last.

To ease back into your normal life, you gathered your guts, called a babysitter and left home. You couldn’t bring yourself to leave Grace at the daycare just yet. One of your good friends offered to come in to the office and help you, even on the weekend and you were quite grateful to him.

When you both decided to take lunch in the nearby dining place, you both got to talking, the conversation obviously originating from ‘How have you been?’ and ‘Is Grace okay?’. You reminisced about how you used a photobooth to hide, grotesquely and uncomfortably chuckling when you remembered Sarah calling you her mom and how her dad saved you all.

You deliberately left the part where you killed someone and Steve shot someone too. You hadn’t come to terms with it yet and you stiffly restricted your mind whenever it tried to go down that lane.

He sensed how the conversation was becoming tense and distressing for you and briskly redirected the topic.

“I hope the dad was hot though?” He wiggled his eyes creepily and you snorted at his vulgarity, light for the first time in days.

“He was easy on the eyes; I will admit that.” You played along, recalling your girlfriends and how you used to ogle people.

“Don’t be a homewrecker though, I don’t support cheating.” He said nonchalantly, checking his phone as a notification bell rang off.

“He’s a widower.”

His eyes snapped up and met yours as his head tilted in confusion. “That’s a strange fact to know about someone you met for a few minutes.”

Steve’s even stranger comment about his dead wife popped in your mind and before you could stop yourself, you blurted that out as well.

“He even said and I quote, ‘She deserved what she got.’” He put his phone down, weirdly amused.

“Ooh Creepy! Do you think he is one of those husbands who kill their wives and bury them in the backyard? The podcasts always say that the psychopaths are visually handsome and charming. And his statement was quite vague and spooky.” He continued munching, and you felt that now Aiden was really paying attention unlike before.

“Steve did have a gun while searching for Sarah, come to think of it.” You drank your tea and awaited his response. What you did not expect was his eyes to widen and worry to cloud his features.

“Um Widower Steve with a toddler Sarah? At the place where The Vices attacked?” He mumbled, grabbing his phone and doing God knows what on it. Your eyebrows furrowed and before you could ask him what was up with his antics, he resumed.

“This is a long shot but I really hope your Steve didn’t look like this.” He positioned the phone in your vision, and you could already tell it was Steve by the sapphire blue of his eyes piercing through the screen into your soul. The picture was a month or two old, his hair was much longer when you met him than in the photo.

“This is him.” Your eyes met Aiden’s and worry visibly took over his features as his forehead creased and jaw tense.

He looked around the restaurant, finding it empty in the afternoon. He leaned and whispered, “This Steve of yours is dangerous.”

You interrupted Aiden, even though you already knew Steve was, the sight of his armed men still fresh in your head, and inquired, “Why do you say so?”

“It’s just like the fictional stories we hear from our parents, except here, in this city of ours, every myth holds true. There are really powerful men, untouchable by law, who reign the city silently and live luxuriously. Every shady, under the table deal you’ve heard of, transpires. Illegal trades, fraud schemes and bounty hunters are not fictional, they exist here. These men kill whatever hinders them and trust me, you don’t want to be the deer caught in their Jaguar’s headlights.”

Ice froze in your veins again, resembling the fear you felt that night but now because of your deemed ‘savior’. You convinced yourself that you had not wronged him in any way, instead had saved his daughter’s life.

“Are you in contact with him? If you are, distance yourself cleverly, don't block him immediately.”

“No, we just parted ways near my car, he thanked me for Sarah and was called away. It’s almost been a week and he hasn’t reached out if that’s what you mean. We didn’t exchange contacts and I don’t think I even told him my full name.” You explained yourself as if you were on the witness stand in court, trying to convince yourself more than Aiden.

“Pray that he doesn’t remember you more than that, if at all. I’m being totally honest here in telling you this, I’m genuinely worried for you and Grace. You are smart but he is powerful. He has unimaginable resources and if you become more than a speck of dust on his windshield, you are screwed. There is no exaggeration here.” You took his words to your heart and swore to be careful, if not for yourself then for Grace.

The rest of the day went by and you found yourself dwelling on and worrying about Aiden’s words. At least he put it out there as it was. Heeding his advice, you did google Steve on your phone, finally finding him in the topmost news headline when you added ‘Buck’ in the search bar as well.

‘With 38 lawsuits pending against businessman Steve Rogers, the filers have lost all hope in prosecuting him. All cases are being drawn out for indefinite periods of time by the Chief Justice Bruce……’

Aiden was right.

Businessmen was code for illegal mob heads. Cases being stretched on meant he was, in fact, invincible, at least to the common man’s fists.

You flickered through several titles, each one more surprising than the last. He was believed to be involved in the carnival attack, alleged for three hit and run cases that he didn’t lose but the witnesses swore they saw him driving and was also rumored to have brought in quintals of drugs just last week, but the packets just evaporated into thin air and there was no proof of their existence in the first place even on incessant searching.

Every crime of his made you shudder and you mentally thanked Aiden for pulling you out of your oblivion. Your mind raced and heart palpated and you cursed yourself for being so drastically unaware even after living here for almost four years. Technically speaking, Steve and you were even, him saving your life and you saving his daughter’s. No logical reason came to your mind for him contacting you ever.

You wished as Aiden said and assured yourself that your paths would never cross again, Steve not having reached out in a week, so hopefully never again.

That thought went out the window when you reached home to find a box awaiting you. Hannah, the babysitter you had called, informed you it came around 5 in the evening and was exclusively to be opened by you today.

Your mind raced as you paid the babysitter, your hands sweaty as you tried not to think about the gift and its sender. There was an apparently clear answer to who mailed it but you refused to accept that, courtesy of Aiden.

The box was of the height of Grace, it was black with red hearts painted across it; some red roses also sparingly adorned it. You opened the lid and found tons of red tissues and a multi-flower bouquet adorned with mostly red roses and a few purple and pink flowers.

Because of your frequent gardening in your backyard, you knew all the flowers’ meanings. To sum it all up, red flowers, especially roses were used for courting someone. Pink meant admiration, purple for beauty and you knew the ‘violet’ flowers were for loyalty.

As your nerves increased tenfold, you willed yourself to get it over with and empty out the box first, ignoring the little card in your bouquet, saving the ‘best’ for last. You find a mini bouquet inside but unlike yours, it had chocolates of every kind. You did read its card and cringed when it was for Grace, bothered not by the deed but by the doer.

Further inside were some animal plushies, face masks, perfumes, scented body lotions and shampoos. Your head hurt thinking about the ‘single mother care package’ delivered to you by someone you refused to acknowledge.

As Grace sat in her playpen occupied, you dared to pick your card and read its message, your heart beating unrealistically fast for someone who refused to accept the cruciality of her situation.

I can’t thank you enough in this lifetime for saving my little princess. The gift of your help is more than anything money could ever buy for me. Please accept this invitation of mine for dinner tomorrow night, 7PM at La Bonne Nuit, as a symbol of my sincere gratitude for everything you’ve done. I’ll gets the kids covered and pick you up, you just be ready and look as amazing you always do. Sincerely, Steve Rogers

You stilled as you read it over and over again.

An invitation, your ass. Even in writing his authority portrayed, there was no question and hope for you coming, he just stated that you’d come. Looking pretty as always? You just met him once, in the middle of a calamity, covered in dirt and blood.

All the red roses and gifts screamed his romantic interest but you illusioned yourself into thinking they meant gratitude. You wouldn’t be able to digest it all otherwise.

Knowing what you knew now about Steve, you understood there was no denying the dinner tomorrow. You had to get out of his clutches and distance yourself, but as Aiden had so rightfully said, cleverly.

That night you laid in bed mulling over your next course of actions. You had called the gift shop to return the unwarranted presents you received but they said it was non refundable and anonymous to trace. You bitterly snorted in their face, they put a card with Steve’s name on it for heaven’s sake!

You didn’t flinch even when you realized you never gave Steve your address, neither for mailing stuff nor for picking you up. There was no number given to call him and thank or to call him and deny. The bastard had planned it all out, and you felt like you were driving in a one way lane, going deeper into the tunnel. Somewhere among your all-relentless fretting, you managed to finally sleep.

When the doorbell rang, your eyebrows furrowed. It was just 6 PM and you weren’t expecting anybody else except for Steve. You had already begun getting ready, having developed a habit of keeping an extra margin of time now having a toddler. You still had to assemble Grace’s essential backpack, fill it with her meds and bottles.

While still putting on your diamond earring, you made your way to the door, unlocking it to find a redhead grinning at you. Before you could interact with her, a small body clung to your legs and you looked down to find the azure eyed kid that put you in this mess, Sarah, smiling up at you.

“Mama! You look pwetty!” She looked up in awe and now aware that she didn’t have a mother, you were even more so coerced into accepting this title rather than telling the kid that 'you are semi orphaned'.

“I’m Wanda, Sarah’s nanny. Mr. Rogers told me to pick her friend, Grace, up for the night?” So, this was what Steve meant. Bringing Sarah was proof enough of her legitimacy, but behind her you saw ‘Buck’ salute you from the driver’s seat of the black car. One of these days, you needed to learn his real name.

You invited Wanda inside and Sarah ran to Grace immediately, grabbing and whining while asking Grace to give her some popcorn she was munching on, her fist generously full.

In your open plan kitchen, you grabbed two plastic bowls, filled them with each with the tub of popcorn that sat in the microwave and handed each toddler one, fortunately quietening Sarah. Sarah obeyed Grace, in first thanking you, their ‘mama’ and then following her to her open playpen.

You faced Wanda again who sat on a barstool and kept on beaming. If your annoyance at her amusement showed, she sure didn’t let it falter the smile.

“Mr. Rogers told me you’d worry about your daughter, but I assure you she’d be in more than capable hands.” All you could focus on was how self-reassured she was. “I’ve served him for almost two years, the last family I served, I was there for 8 years and before them, I was employed for 3. I know the general bedtime and snacks, all I need from you is information about her allergies.”

You nodded and told her about Grace, her meds and what all you packed. When you got to know that her family owned the daycare Grace went to, you were finally somewhat convinced. After seeing them off, it was about fifteen minutes later, that the devil disguised in Prada showed up at your door.

You grabbed your purse and your keys. Wiping your sweaty palms on your dress, you opened the door. Steve stood there, a smirk lodging on his handsome face. His blue, three-piece suit perfectly paired with his cerulean eyes was impressive to say the least.

He was dressed to kill, and it appeared as if you were his first victim.

As your eyes took him in from top to bottom, his did the same lazily, taking their time, resting at certain places for longer period than others.

“You look stunning.”

You knew you did. You wore one of your more expensive dresses when you found out La Bonne Nuit to be one of the few seven-star hotels in the country. In hindsight, if you’d have dressed worse, maybe he’d have left you alone.

“Thank you.”

“Shall we?” He offered you his hand and you obliged with your palm in his. Your other hand pulled the doorknob while you stepped out, all alarms already set-in place. He waited while you locked and put the keys in and when you were done, with a soft kiss along your knuckles, he pulled you along.

The act surprised you, your stomach turning and your gut wrenching and you wondered if you’d be able to process the food after all, with your upset digestive system.

Like a proper gentleman, he opened the door for you and when you settled, he took his position at the driver’s seat. The silence was painful for you, your overthinking finally filling ideas in your head that you avoided contemplating about all day, focusing on Grace.

He was relaxed though; his humming was proof enough.

Mid way through, your thoughts were rudely interrupted when a hand housed itself on your knee. You glanced to find Steve’s palm slightly rubbing your knee. If it was meant to be assuring, you certainly didn’t feel like it.

You frowned and looked up to Steve who still had the arrogant smirk on his face, eyes straight ahead on the road, giving no indication of his inappropriate touching.

You wanted to swat his hand away but a brainwave dashed through your head and a disturbing thought made you halt, that whether he carried guns to restaurants as well, since carnivals were no big deal.

You ignored his hand and continued looking outside, pretending to ignore it as well as he did. Your scowl was a huge giveaway though.

You didn’t know that, but when your eyes found their way out, his finally rested on your face, the smirk growing even more.

Thankfully, apart from the incongruous touching, the dinner went okay-ish. The food and wine were impeccable, perfect even, the restaurant on the hotel’s top floors was so picturesque. You tried to savor your one-time experience there, knowing you’d no way be able to come back there.

Well, you tried to relish as much as you could while your mind still sat there, wary of the human in front of you. If you’d ignore your journey here, Steve was nothing short of a true gentleman, often making you wonder if you had imagined his hand on you.

This ‘friendly’ date you were having was probably one of the best you have had, he had left no expenses. He appeared to be interested in your work, about your childhood and about Grace’s but you swiftly avoided his questions about her father. He was growing a tad bit too comfortable for your liking and you still refused to entertain the idea that this was a ‘date’ date.

When you were finally onto dessert, the last course of your meal, your table was shadowed by the broad frame of a brunette and his date. He clapped Steve’s shoulder and Steve rose to hug him, you awkwardly smiled.

“It’s been far too long since you’ve been here, Cap. Why don’t you and your gorgeous date stop by my penthouse for a bit? We could finally go over the papers you sent me, in person?” He winked, they discussed something more and then went away, his date bowing and trailing after him as well.

Steve claimed his seat again, and finally told you about the interrupter. “That was my good friend, Tony Stark, always in a hurry. I’ll introduce you to him when we meet him later.”

“I think I’ll be heading home; you need not worry about my introduction, I hardly think we’ll ever run into each other again.” His eyes narrowed and you clarified, “Me and Mr. Stark, I meant.”

That’s good, don’t associate yourself with more of his kind.

“He was so kind in inviting you though, it would be rude to refuse.”

“It’s already late, Steve. And I’ve never left Grace alone for a night yet. What if she’s antsy? What if she is bothered? What if she feels unsafe? She's only used to very few people, and after last week, I-” You had started the sentence hoping to use Grace as an excuse but every word of yours succeeded in making you more apprehensive.

The carnival night flashed in your mind, along with the nightmares and you started panicking even more. Your hands clammy, your dessert spoon fell in your lap as sought your phone in your purse, hoping to call Wanda for an update. You felt like a terrible mother, who left her child with a stranger, only a week after she suffered trauma, just to go on a date with a mobster.

Steve reached across the table and grabbed your fidgety hands and as you wriggled to get your hands free, he softly called your name. Voice stern but vocals gentle. Your blurry eyes snapped to meet his while he guided you to breathe deeply, in and out.

His firm hold convinced you to listen to him, you’d never free yourself of them otherwise.

When you had calmed a bit, he withdrew his hands and fetched his phone. Your thoughts slowed down, and you wondered if anyone here was judging you. Your little scene, mercifully, went unnoticed by the other affluent people dining here.

Steve handed you his phone where four colored frames rested, the screen showing you Grace and Sarah cuddled in a frilly, pink four poster where Wanda sat too, her lips moving.

The feed was live and the screen muted, both the toddlers’ eyes fluttering close slowly, on the bridge of sleep.

You handed the phone back to Steve and drank your water while he rubbed circles on the back of one of your hands. You never freaked out like you did right now, always collected and never giving into anxiety. What had happened to you?

Well, In your defense, you had never experienced a disaster either.

“The kids are safe; I’m never putting either of them in harm’s way ever again.”

Your mind did catch the plural in his statement but you promised yourself you would not let it get that far and continued drinking your water, emptying the entire glass.

“The HD image you just saw was by cameras Tony recently developed. His technology is amazing, I’ll take you to his lab sometime.” You appreciated his attempt to redirect the topic but you also focused on how tech-savvy his friends were as well.

You hummed and agreed, trying to be ambiguous with your answer.

When you finished your dessert, you hoped he’d forget about his ‘friend’ Tony but to no avail.

“His penthouse is two floors above. He owns this hotel as well in case you didn’t notice.” He led you to the elevator as you recalled the Starks Group logo you saw earlier sometime.

Some AI named Jarvis opened the elevator doors for you in the living room of Tony’s penthouse. It was even more magnificent than the restaurant earlier, the place illuminated by several hues of different colours. Steve chuckled and strung you along, introducing you to a ginger-head named Pepper, who was Tony’s date earlier and went to search for his acquaintance.

She offered you wine but you politely declined, opting for water instead. She brought your glass to you from the extravagant kitchen and you both sat on the barstool there instead of the living room. Too anxious to say the wrong thing, you stayed quiet until her voice filled the deafening silence.

“So, Steve almost never brings dates around. You two serious?” She questioned, leaning towards you, waiting for some gossip, no doubt.

“Oh no! We aren’t dating. He just invited me for a friendly dinner. We merely met the other week.” You deliberately left out the part where there was bombing by crime families and attack on the common man.

“Honey, in the mob life, you don’t just introduce random people to the fam.”

Oh, she wasn’t being shy about the whole mob ordeal. It seemed weird to hear it from her, since you and Steve hadn’t used the word yet. Maybe he figured you already knew considering the circumstances you met in or how famous he was.

“We really aren’t romantically involved. This dinner was just a gesture of gratitude if I’m being truthful.”

She chuckled, as if you were a kid making stories and quizzed, “Gratitude for what?”

You trapped yourself into that one. You didn’t know how to answer her and your brain downright blanked. Surprisingly,, Steve came to your rescue and two voices interposed your conversation.

Steve called your name and as you turned to the men, he continued, “She’s the one who saved Sarah the other night. You know the story, Wilson probably got it printed.”

“Impressive, really. Hey, I’m Tony and I see you’ve already met Pepper, my fiancée.” He shook your hand and kissed your knuckles, much like Steve did earlier in the day. You bowed, smiled and mumbled a ‘nice to meet you as well’. They escorted you to the elevator and Tony continued.

“Well, it’s not everyday Steve brings brave and extraordinarily attractive women around. Welcome to the family, sweetie. She’s a keeper, Cap.” He winked while saying the last sentence and before you could correct him, Steve ushered you inside the elevator, bro-hugging him. As the doors closed, Pepper winked at you from behind Tony and a shudder ran through you.

Okay you had to make it clear, get on the same page.

As the elevator music filled the silence, you started, “Steve, look we aren’t-”, “I served in the army, that’s why Tony calls me Cap, short for captain.” And crudely got interrupted.

“I never wanted to get into the army, I thought people were fools to sacrifice the one life they got. But I went to make my mother’s dream a reality, I really loved her, you know? Sarah is named after her, my mother.”

His voice broke at the end and as much as you wanted to redirect onto your former topic, you couldn’t. This amiability of yours would be the death of you.

“She died alone in her bed; I was dispatched too far away to even make it back for her funeral.” He mumbled but you heard him clear as a sunny day, and he leaned back onto the wall for support while you awkwardly rubbed his shoulder to return the support he provided earlier during your mental breakdown.

He closed his eyes and gathered himself, taking deep breaths. As the elevator dinged, his eyes opened and he gave you a strained smile.

The car ride to his mansion was painfully silent, his mind too sidetracked to focus on harassing you again. With all that you went through today, you almost forgot about that.

His mansion was enormous, twenty guards stood outside and even more patrolled the lawn. He took you inside his house, the interior even more detailed and scenic than Tony’s temporary residence.

You just concentrated on swiftly getting Grace and Uber-ing back. As Steve showed you earlier, Grace and Sarah hugged and slept and it was a meticulous task to untangle their limbs without waking either of them up andnd get Grace with her back-pack. You thanked Wanda on the way out, hoping to avoid Steve but somehow he stood outside before you, leaning on his sleek black car. He opened the door for you before you could refuse the ride. You settled with Grace in the backseat itself, trying to be smart.

He just summoned one of his guards to drive and sat alongside you in the back. You didn’t let the annoyance at his clinginess show though. You just focused on Grace who drooled over your shoulder.

Hopefully, there won’t be any point of exposure to him ever again, your circles didn’t match, both social and professional. Your Venn diagrams didn’t overlap anywhere. This should be reason enough to avoid meeting ever again.

He didn’t try anything even this ride around. You doubted it was hardly because of the toddler or because of the driver. He did as he pleased, if he wanted to he could very well grope you. Luckily, he wasn't in the mood.

When you reached your dwelling, you stepped out hastily, thanking him in a whisper. You fumbled to get your keys out, but since everything you held slowed you down, he caught up with you without even trying.

He took and held Grace’s bag while you drew the keys out, Grace still on your hip. He handed you the bag back, “So this is it, I guess?”

“Yeah, tonight was a total delight. Thanks for the dinner and everything, really.” You put up your best façade, hoping to convince him.

“It was, thanks to you. The company matters the most.”

You awkwardly chuckled and you sensed him leaning in, his eyes flickering shut. Your eyes closed as you turned your head to avoid him, so that his lips would peck your cheek.

They never came.

Your eyes opened to find his and he chuckled, leaning in once again swiftly, catching you off guard this time. He didn’t meet your lips though, he kissed the corner of your mouth, lips overlapping for a fraction of skin.

“In due time, baby.” He stepped back and strolled to his car leisurely, content in his own world.

You opened your door and slammed it shut, the peck feeling wrong on so many levels. It felt more sensual than a lover’s kiss, leaving room for intimacy and longing.

Your thoughts ran a hundred kilometers an hour, the most absurd but nauseatingly true being, this was a date and it was not your last encounter.

Steve smirked outside in his car, the dinner an absolute success in his opinion. Tonight just made him feel that you both were more than compatible for each other. You needing him during your mental breakdown, him relaxing under your shy touch, Tony’s approval, not that important though, and your anxiety for Grace was the best part, because he, more often than he’d like to admit, fussed about Sarah the same way, agonizing and fretting her well being.

A text lit up his black screen and his grin widened even more if possible.

‘The Stark cameras are up and working, Sir.’

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boop-le-snoot · 4 years ago

Text

BUTT-DIAL? NO, BOOTY CALL | tony stark

explicit, 5,4k words. wrong number text, family shame & wedding drama that isn't even his and a ruined first date. despite the implications of the situation, both reader and tony are very entertained. meet-ugly series, part three.

[no y/n, no "you", no name, no reader description - race/age/body type neutral, she/her pronouns]

💚 masterlist ☀️ taglist & faq 💚

Another sunny day spent wasted in a conference room full of boring, old, conceited chairmen. Tony Stark vehemently refused to commiserate with them, their boring speeches and blunt, straightforward thinking. Sitting through a meeting was like walking on nails barefoot: painful, pointless. Mind-numbing.

His phone beeped loudly and he reached into his pocket, pretending to not see Pepper's disapproving look. Both of them knew he was hoping for a sudden Assemble call - that would surely get him out of the meeting - but as much as he hoped, they never struck at the right time.

Except, this time it wasn't a call for assistance, and neither it was an automated spam message with Pizza Hut promo codes. Tony's eyebrows drew close and his lips upturned as he read and re-read the obvious rant written on his screen, typing up his answer before he managed to resist the morbid curiosity that was fueled by his boredom.

Whoever it was, they were justifiably angry and the whole situation was almost too comical to be true, except he'd known people exactly like the runaway bride, selfish, greedy and stupid. He totally understood the woman's desire to just go and load up on tequila shots somewhere - so he bid her a haste farewell, all the while snickering to himself.

"It's Rogers," Tony offered in the way of explanation to a glaring Pepper, locking his phone away and settling in to continue pretending he was listening as another old, crusty white man offered his input on topics he was too much of a dinosaur to even really know about.

He couldn't stop thinking about the incident over the days, the story making him snort more times than he could count as the memory randomly crossed his mind in the lab, at the coffee pot or during dinner. So when a message came through from that very same number, the smirk snuck up onto his face before he even read its contents.

A brief crash course in memes from Parker had turned out to be more useful than ever. Irritating Rogers with pictures got old very fast, however, in moments Tony got rendered speechless they proved to be the perfect substitute for trying to articulate all his thoughts on the matter.

Celebrity appearance, she said? More likely than one would think. The engineer had nearly doubled over in a fit of laughter when she'd texted him that; obviously, the woman had no clue who she was texting with and he decided to further indulge in his curiosity by asking for her name: Friday did the rest.

A phone number and a name, ten minutes, and all her social media were free for him to stalk. Investigate- uh, observe. With little effort, Tony found both her and her brother, the unlucky groom, and the runaway bride and even her step-dad. On paper, they all looked like average middle-class families. Nothing seemed amiss.

It didn't mean anything, but Tony caught himself thinking about the woman. Perhaps it might have been the mischievous gleem in her eyes that was easily spotted in every picture or perhaps the raunchy sense of humour not much different from his own. Pretty, witty and smart - what's there not to like?

"So that's why you've been going around, smiling like a middle-schooler with a crush," Natasha's voice whisper-shouted in Tony's ear as the spy discreetly peered over his shoulder into his phone. He had the chat pulled up, debating on starting a casual conversation-

"Jesus Christ, Romanoff, somebody needs to put a bell on you," Tony snapped, startled, pressing the button to lock his phone immediately.

"Uhuh," The redhead replied, side-eyeing a snickering Barnes. "Who is she?"

Tony rubbed his face, feeling the beginnings of a blush starting to creep in. He felt like he was caught doing something he wasn't supposed to and the rest of the team acting like children wasn't helping the matter. "I got a butt-dial text about some wedding drama. Some chick's brother's fiance was fucking her own stepdad and ditched the wedding for her old man."

Stunned silence settled briefly into the room as Romanoff's eyes widened and Barnes choked on his orange juice. Serves him right, Tony thought, and continued his coffee-making process in quiet irritation.

"Wait, wait, hold on," Wilson half-laughed half-yelled. "You gotta spill the tea, man, this sounds too good to be true. Stories like that just don't fall into your hands."

With a sigh, he recounted the woman's story and read the texts aloud, silencing his snickering enough to be able to keep a straight face - but not for long, Rogers decided it was the time for another one of his Captain America Is Disappointed In You speeches and Tony himself couldn't even disagree.

Now that he thought about it, he came off as a kind of asshole. She and her family was going through something traumatic and he went and treated it like free entertainment. Which, to be fair, it was, but she didn't deserve to be treated like a circus clown. She actually seemed like a good sister and friend.

"Just text her," Natasha rolled her eyes at him, grabbing the coffee pot out of his frozen hand. "You're not Steve, you can keep a decent conversation via text."

Being compared to Steve and his pre-historic messaging habits really did a number on Tony's ego; the eyeroll he gave Romanoff was truly out of this world, all but teleporting him to his lab where he tried to find a way to approach the woman without coming off as incredibly creepy, as if the fact that he'd stalked her on social media didn't already put him firmly into the weirdo category.

Most likely, Tony would have spent many many days on overthinking before just grabbing one of his suits to make a truly impressive landing on her small balcony downtown; thankfully, fate had intervened and saved him from making another epic mistake. He'd made a note to ask Thor about it sometime, settling down with his tablet and popcorn bowl to watch TV on the team's movie night.

Or, more precisely, Tony settled in to watch the drama unfold as the various members of the team fought tooth and nail for the film that they wanted to watch. He never cared about it much, dozing off halfway through most of them - his teammates had the worst taste in movies - so he didn't bother joining the scuffle except when it was Peter's turn to pick. For obvious reasons.

"If you can't decide I'm gonna have someone else pick a movie," Natasha rolled her eyes, equally fed up with fully grown adults acting like spoiled toddlers.

With a stutter of his breath, Tony's hand reached for his phone as he had an Idea.

Seconds tickled as the "typing..." bubble appeared and disappeared multiple times. She must think he's just a thirsty frat boy; Tony's brow furrowed, but the curiosity was far too strong in him. Something about her vibe, her feisty nature captivated him and kept him thinking about her.

The agreement came as a surprise. In the two minutes the woman had spent thinking up her answer, Tony prepared himself to be rebuffed gently, or, worst case, be called a creep. But no - she agreed, but not before vehemently insisting that if he would end up being a creepy serial killer, she would haunt his ass for the remainder of his life.

Friday couldn't come soon enough. Tony spent most of the day loitering between his lab and the penthouse, glancing at his phone every now and then to make sure she wouldn't cancel on him last minute. The engineer wanted to see the witty, no-filter-having woman in the flesh.

And see her, he did. He'd pulled up in front of the hole-in-the wall Ramen&Bar place Clint had been raving about weeks prior - contrary to popular belief, Tony was perfectly fine with going to places that didn't have Michelin stars - and leaned against the door of his Audi R8, eyes immediately taking note of the figure calmly walking down the street, head tilted down where she was typing up a reply to him.

Tony smirked as she lifted her face up to see him, mouth immediately falling open. The shock was obvious; it lasted mere seconds until her shoulders dropped and she sighed almost... In disappointment. He frowned.

"I jinxed it, didn't I? Here's my celebrity appearance," The laugh was a little nervous and quite sardonic. "Hi, Tony, nice to finally see you."

He smiled, unsure, quipping back easily. "Let's face it, I'm not the worst famous Tony out there." Opening the door of the building for the woman, she stepped in eagerly enough, eyes immediately falling on the bartender and the few dimly lit tables in the back.

"Not by any means," She turned towards him, walking backwards. Tony met her stare; it was just like he'd imagined it to be, curious, mischievous and a little daring. She didn't even attempt to play subtle, raking over him from head to toe. "Not at all, I think," She gave another teasing smile, finally turning around, addressing the bartender and rattling off her order without as much as looking at the menu.

Tony couldn't stop staring. He was aware it was creepy, she was aware of his clever brown eyes barely paying attention to their surroundings or the beer or the food. The woman just quirked an eyebrow every time she caught him. His curiosity couldn't wait any more. "Why aren't you freaking out?" He blurted out, cursing himself out almost immediately after the words left his mouth.

"My almost-sister-in-law was fucking her own stepdad," The woman deadpanned. "I ran out of fucks to give, sorry." She thoughtfully chewed her food, briefly looking to the side. "Not to sound like an asshole, but don't you have enough people fawning over you? Doesn't it get old?"

Tony nodded, choosing to stay silent on the matter besides offering an amicable, "That's valid."

The mischief lit up again in her eyes. "You look taller on TV," She snorted, immediately falling into a fit of laughter at his face full of outrage. He sputtered, muttering something about audacity of some people, which made her only laugh harder. "Here's a pro tip from my 4'11 bestie: when someone calls you short, you snarl at them and say you're fun-sized. She swears by it," The woman remarked conversationally, grinning a two hundred watt smile.

Tony was glad at least someone was enjoying their little... Date. "And you know all about fun, don't you?" He aimed for grumpy; it came out as teasing. His famous smirk made a return appearance as he watched her throat bob.

The atmosphere between them had changed at some point; the same old routine of teasing and dancing around each other, but this time, Tony all but purred in satisfaction, finally meeting someone who was an even match to his wit and charm.

"I do," She replied with that cocky confidence, her devil eyes lighting up, lingering on his face. "Got a problem with that?"

The plate was pushed away, napkin falling into the food carelessly as he gestured for the waiter to bring the check. "As a scientist, I cannot confirm whether a theory is true until I have direct evidence," The bullshit flowed easily from his mouth, but the woman appeared to be amused by it - for a change. "M'fraid I'm gonna need that evidence," His fingers drummed on the table, impatiently, inches away from her hand.

"Of course, Mr. Stark," Her voice dropped, she was fully aware of what she was doing by calling him that. That, and those deep, magnetic eyes made Tony's trousers feel a little too tight for comfort.

His phone rang loudly, dissipating the atmosphere they had created with a shrill noise. Captain Cockblock struck again.

Fumbling fingers, Tony tapped the green icon, shooting an apologetic look to the woman. "Rogers, there better be another alien invasion or I'm revoking your phone privileges," The woman chortled, taking a sip of her beer, trying hard not to seem like she was listening in and failing spectacularly at it. "Today, out of all days? Can't Strange fill in for me?" The engineer palmed his face, running a hand through his neatly done-up hair. It would be covered in soot and sweat in an hour anyways. "Fine, I'll be there in twenty minutes. Romanoff better be hauling Barton's lazy ass out of Bed-Stuy." With a frown, Tony poked the red icon and stuffed the phone back in his pocket, looking for all and all, like an angry adolescent.

The woman, however, didn't indicate any signs of displeasure. Her hand timidly reached out for his, giving it a brief squeeze. "Go, save the world, Mr. Stark," Her smile was sympathetic. They both stood up at the same time, Tony watching her incredulously as the woman untied a scrap of red fabric from around her neck and placed it around his wrist, tying the fabric with a loose but, frankly, pretty knot. "I like that bandanna, would be a shame if you didn't return it," She explained, shrugging her shoulders.

Tony snorted, fondly rolling his eyes, before beelining for the door, activating his Iron Man suit on the way out. Turning around before take off, he noticed her throw a couple of crumpled bills to the server who was too busy ogling him.

He forgot to pay for dinner, Tony realized as he made his way to the other part of the city. Well, fuck, he would definitely have to see her again.

---

An alien invasion during her first good date in ages - scribble, scribble, sigh. She couldn't do much more than that - just as she thought her string of bad luck had ended, the world turned around and flipped her a juicy bird, all but laughing straight in her face. Like that already wasn't enough, oh no, she groused as she spied the debris and random abandoned cars on her way home - it looked like some portion of the battle had been close to her home and only the sheer mental exhaustion that resulted from her life being turned upside down during the last month prevented her from having a full-on freak-out in the middle of the eerily quiet street.

Truly, the fucks she had to give had been expired.

The gloomy mood was interrupted by a cry - for help or of outrage, she didn't know, but the kindness in her, the very values she'd been raised with didn't allow her just to walk by, and with another resigned sigh, she tucked the nice blouse she'd put on for the date under her warm sweater and set off in the direction of the sound, finding the culprit in little under a couple of minutes.

Freeing the trapped civilian wasn't easy but, thankfully, neither it required super-strength or any kind of heavy machinery. The man thanked her and with him in tow, both of them set off to inspect nearby nooks and crannies. Logic won that day - if there's was one person, there could be more.

Hours later, sweaty, sore and bruised, the woman greedily chugged the water bottle someone had passed onto her as the amount of medics and firefighters had finally reached the threshold of when her help wasn't needed anymore. While her date and his colleagues fought whatever nasty that thought NYC was a sandbox battleground for their amusement, the woman found herself helping out with retrieval & evacuation of the civilians that didn't make it out of the neighborhood before the heat of the fight reached it. There were no deaths registered as of then and deep inside, she felt proud, knowing that she had contributed to the statistic at least a little.

Her phone was dying, her body was covered in dirt and scratches from head to toe and the bruises were beginning to ache. Tony's worry-worting was cute but the tiredness overcame her, making her brain sluggish and her demeanor short, so she hastily pocketed the phone, trailing over to the closest man in uniform she could spot.

"Sir?" She addressed him, eyeing the unfamiliar logo on his jacket. "Can I go, please?" She pointed to the yellow tape surrounding the makeshift medical station.

"I'm going to have to see your ID first," He replied apologetically, tapping away on his tablet.

With a sigh, she dug through her purse, giving it to him and using the brief moment of respite to smooth back her hair and dust off her clothing. There was a cloud of concrete and dirt surrounding her.

"I'm afraid I can't let you go just yet, Mr. Stark left strict instructions for you to be picked up by him personally," The agent gave the ID back with a suspicious glint in his eye.

"Oh c'mon," The annoyed whine escaped her lips before she registered it. "It was our first date," She offered to the puzzled agent, only succeeding in making him lean back and inspect her with a raised eyebrow. "Bye," She replied none too kindly, walking off to find a place to sit down.

The time passed in a strange way. The aches and pains and exhaustion made it stop, and if someone would have asked her, she wouldn't know how much of it has passed until her eyes reluctantly cracked open at the sound of a familiar voice, coming to see a pair of expensive shoes covered in dust. At least she wasn't the only one that looked like she'd taken a roll through someone's gritty attic.

"Morning, you Tasmanian Devil," Tony sounded jovial, all things considered.

"Hello to you too, Tin Can," The woman greeted him on par, without missing a beat.

"Now, now," He offered her his hand, which she took gratefully, before pulling her to her feet. "I come with peace offerings. Your building is under quarantine and I've got a perfectly good bed and a shower with thirty settings on it at my place. Whatcha say?"

She only pretended to think about it. Her reply was haste. "I don't make a habit of going into strange dudes' towers but I'll make an exception this once." A shower and a bed sounded heavenly.

Finally getting the chance to look at him, Tony appeared to be unhurt but equally exhausted and dirty. A few scrapes on his face and arms, he was missing his blazer, and had a weary tone to his face. Some parts of his Iron Suit were still on him - like the chest plate - but besides that, he was whole. The red of the bandanna she gave him was equally dirty but still neatly tied around his wrist, just like she left it.

"How's your relationship with heights?" He asked her and all she could do was blink, watching curiously as his body was enveloped by the red and gold, crawling over his skin like a swarm of shiny termites. That was all the warning she got before the metal arms - quite literally - sweeped her off her feet. "Faster this way," She could hear the nonchalant shrug in the metallic voice coming from the helmet. "Now hold on."

Awe and fear culminated inside the woman but the weariness had long since surpassed comfortable levels and all she did was give a weak nod and close her eyes as Tony lifted off, gusts of wind making her skin break out in goosebumps and her hair stand up wildly on her head. During the short trip her eyes fluttered open only once just to close back up immediately - all she saw were clouds, white and fluffy, like marshmallows, and the shining beacons of NYC skyscrapers somewhere far away.

The paralyzing anxiety fully dissipated only when her feet found purchase on the tiled floors, Tony's arms never ceasing to support her swaying frame until the breaths she took were her own and not the result of her fluttering heart and muted panic. "You with me, Wonder Woman?"

"Yes, Weird Science," She mumbled. "Thanks for the heads up," The annoyance had to find a way out and that it did.

"You're welcome," The cocky smirk returned to Tony's face as his suit receded, leaving him barefoot, dirty jeans and a torn tee. He stretched with a sweet groan, gesturing towards the door. "Friday will direct you towards the showers. Feel free to grab a t-shirt from the closet."

The woman nodded, too awestruck by the man and his hospitality, eyes darting all over the tastefully decorated room, the expensive knick-knacks scattered everywhere, the absolutely enormous sloppily made bed. Tony Stark liked to live luxuriously - even the shower was a state of the art technological wonder.

Dirty pants and dusty blouse went flying somewhere in the back of the bathroom as the woman stood up on her tippy toes, reaching for the sky, stretching her sore muscles. The glass wall of the shower had began to fog up from the hot water. The knock went barely noticed by the woman who jumped as Tony's voice startled her out of her daydream.

"Forgot I ran out of towels here..." He trailed off, voice dropping as he spotted her only in her underwear. She turned, responding with a lopsided grin, spying the stack of fluffy grey in his arms, the arc reactor in the middle of his bare chest. He smirked, "Damn. Can I join you?" Giving her what only could be described as a respectful once-over.

Tired as she was, her sense of humour and wit didn't go down for a much needed nap just yet. "I don't know, you tell me. Can you?" Turning back around, the woman made a short show of unclasping her bra and tossing it in the general vicinity of her dirty clothing pile. She'd worn a cute matching set of undies that day and the fact didn't go over Tony's head, she was sure.

The door clicked shut just as she raised her face to the stream of water, feeling calmer with each second, muscles relaxing themselves as the hot stream washed away the dirt and the dust off her body.

"And I thought this evening was ruined," Tony's voice insinuated from behind her. A hand reached for the soap, his body heat scorching compared to the steaming water. He stayed just a few inches away, enough to feel him, enough for her body to respond and crave more. "It's nice to be wrong for a change. Refreshing."

The woman hummed, reaching up to run her fingers through her wet, knotted hair. "First decent evening in ages. I wasn't gonna let some uninvited Predator knock-offs ruin it for me," She was more than a little peeved at the space invaders interrupting her nice date. Tony was a great conversationalist, it was easy to talk to him and he had a brilliant sense of humour. Not to mention the obvious, he was easy on the eyes.

"That's the spirit," The voice was closer now, almost in her ear. Even though her eyes were closed, the woman was aware he was reaching for something, letting him butt her hands out of the way to lather her hair, scrubbing at her scalp meticulously, until the sounds that left her mouth bordered on embarrassing. Once that was done, Tony moved onto her body, running his hands over her back, the outside of her hips. "M'not stepping over, am I?" He asked quietly, touch faltering every time he brushed over a scrape or a bruise.

"No, you're doing great, Tony," It wasn't exactly conventional - sharing a very intimate shower after an interrupted first date, but then again, nothing about this man was conventional and her life had already been turned upside down no less than twice recently. The woman didn't lie, the gentle, caring touch felt soothing.

Arching her back, she lifted her arms to repay him with the same, raking her fingers through his hair, leaning into the shudder that ran throughout his body. It was nice to bask in whatever they had going on, so the motion to face him was almost reluctant. Water droplets stuck to his eyelashes and his eyes were tired but not in a way that suggested he'd kick her out first chance.

Their kiss was sweet, slow, like they already were familiar with each other in a special way. The woman tugged on his lip with her teeth - such was her character - and he pressed closer to her, raising a hand to hold the side of her face. In muted curiosity, she couldn't help but wonder if there ever had been someone that waited for him once his battles were over.

Tony's eyelashes, the very same that had no business being this long on a man, fluttered against her cheek as they stood under the shower, letting water wash away the day.

"I've always wanted to kiss in the rain, like they do in the movies. This is the closest I've gotten," She whispered, gently kneading the arch of his shoulders. "Feels better than it looks, to be honest."

Tony snorted, reaching for the knob to turn it off. "Cheesy," He teased her, wrapping a warm, fluffy towel around her body. Both people made quick work of drying themselves, exiting the fogged up bathroom, making way into the bedroom, padding soft on the carpet and falling down on the bed carelessly.

"I'm the queen of cheesy one-liners," The woman raised her eyebrows, scooting under the sheets next to Tony who opened his arms wide, a smirk on his face. She didn't give him the chance to reply, slotting her lips over his instead and groaning as their heated bodies once again rested against each other.

She ran her hands over Tony's defined pecs, glossing over the arc reactor, raked nails over his tummy, eating up the sighs leaving his mouth at the gesture. He was a beautiful man, she wasn't going to lie to herself. The warmth that settled low in her belly grew, spreading throughout her limbs and temporarily overshadowing the exhaustion.

The engineer, too, was quite excited - his erection poked her hip - and content to be steered to her wishes by the hand in his hair. Groans and sighs left his moist, parted lips as his eagerness bled into his hands, grip firm and steady on the panting woman's hips.

Adrenaline did something to her body, caused it to ache sweetly, a hunger to be satisfied only by a lover's touch. And touch she did; her mouth tasted him, alternating sucking gentle marks onto his throat and nibbling on the skin stretched thinly over his collarbones. Tony's sighs grew in depth and volume with every silent action of worship.

No inch of his body was left untouched, the woman was an all-hands-on-deck kind of lover, happily making her way down until soft lips wrapped around the crown of his cock, making his hips arch into it, hands fisted in the soft white sheets. "You devil," Tony gasped out, limbs turning to jelly, watching the woman all but devour his cock.

She popped off minutely, a trail of sticky saliva running down her chin, sticking to his glistening cock. "The power of Christ compels me?" With a smirk, her tongue trailed from his balls to the very tip, paying extra attention to the frenulum, making Tony shudder and gasp out an embarrassed laugh.

"Uh-uh," Stripped of his usual snark, he was but a man at her mercy.

"It's not very compelling," The predatory stretch of her lips widened as she took mercy on him, giving his cock a few slow tugs with her hand. Her mouth, her hand and his cock were dripping. "Gonna let me do all the legwork, Mr. Stark?" She sat up straighter, inadvertently drawing his eyes to the apex of her thighs where the woman's sex glistened in the dim light, lips swollen and inviting.

It sounded like she was mocking him, teasing him, egging him into a lustful frenzy none of them had the energy for but craved anyway. Tony Stark wasn't the one to back down from a fair challenge so he relented, flipping them over with ease, landing between her spread legs, eyes drawn to the momentary bounce of her breasts. Tony wasted no time in suckling a hard nipple into his mouth, humming in response to her choked-off moan of surprise.

"Tony," Her body arched into his touch, tender skin hot under the callouses on his fingertips.

"Yes, demon, dear?" A lopsided grin and laughter in his eyes preceded the wet stripe Tony licked down to her navel. "Wasn't there something about not telling demons your name? Guess you have power over me now," He trailed off cheekily, soft breaths puffing over her mound.

The woman bit her lip, peering down to rake a hand through Tony's hair, snagging a fistful to gently steer him towards her pussy. Tony's smile was one of satisfaction as he obediently followed her silent order, nosing along the line of her cunt, dipping his tongue to run slow, sloppy lines through the soaked folds.

"Fuck," She mumbled, spreading her legs without shame. "Yeah, right there," Her fingers turned white at the agility of Tony's tongue on her clit. He was swift and relentless in pursuit of the spots that made her moan and clench around nothing. The moisture of her sex soaked his goatee but he couldn't care less.

He growled when she attempted to withdraw, wrapping his muscular arms around her thighs to keep her still for his pleasure, wringing noises that increased in volume with every stroke of his tongue on her sex.

"Tony- please, Tony, I'm gonna-" The warning was brief; her back arched as a broken moan found its way past her moist, parted lips, her pussy spasmed, dripping all over his face and the sheets.

The engineer hid his smile against her thigh, discreetly wiping the obscene amounts of moisture she produced. It wasn't very long until her hands, slightly shaky, were tugging him upwards to meet his face in a rushed, graceless kiss. There was an equal lack of finesse in the glide of his erection along her sex.

"Okay?" He mumbled into her ear, lining himself up with her fluttering cunt.

"Please," She gasped, her hands pushing his hips onto her, eagerly lifting up to accept the sweet intrusion.

There was a quiet stutter in both of their breathing, hearts thudding against their ribs as he finally bottomed out, the thickness of him nestled snugly inside the rippling muscle. The pace he started out was agonizingly slow and inexplicably sweet, neither of them wanting to end their coupling prematurely but not being able to hold back the need that consumed them both.

"Fuck, you're so good to me," Tony's mumbling was overshadowed by the slick sounds coming from the place they were joined. "Gonna fill up this pretty pussy."

The woman keened at the idea, digging her nails into his ass, pulling him further into her.

"You'd like that?" He picked up the pace, blunt tip of his cock catching up with the tail end of her previous orgasm and re-lighting the fire in her belly anew.

"Yeah, Tony, please," No trace of the previous coyness in her voice, the woman was more than ready to beg, murder and steal to feel the man come undone in her arms.

It didn't take long, not with the adrenaline making their blood sing and the chemistry they shared. The brutal pace of Tony's hips quickly grew sloppy and erratic, the tightening of her inner muscles egging him on. He chased his release with deep, powerful thrusts that had the bedsheets rustle pitifully and beads of clear swear drip down his forehead.

As soon as her body arched once more, Tony let go of his control, slotting himself deeply into her spasming heat, cock throbbing as he painted her insides white with his seed, groaning incomprehensible compliments and profanities through his teeth. Chest heaving, the engineer couldn't do much more but let himself carefully fall onto her chest, aftershocks making him twitch when the woman began running a gentle hand through his hair.

"We're doing this again," He decided, still breathless but already a step ahead. She laughed.

Tony Stark taglist: @pilloclock @mikariell95 @letsby @sleep-i-ness @toomanyrobins @mostly-marvel-musings @persephonehemingway @downeyreads @schemefrenzy @lillsxd @slothspaghettiwrites @bluecrazedandbeautiful

#bun writes #tony stark smut #tony stark fluff #tony stark x reader #tony stark x you #tony stark x y/n

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causeiwanttoandican · 4 years ago

Text

The Times

Prince William’s close friends on what makes him tick — and why he’s not trapped

March 20 2021, 6:00pm

As the world devours the Harry and Meghan interview, what’s going on with the brother who was left behind? He’s embracing his destiny, William’s close friends tell the Sunday Times royal correspondent, Roya Nikkhah

Next month Prince William will celebrate his tenth wedding anniversary — the day he became a duke and embarked on the most formative decade of his life. Back then, the tentative 28-year-old newlywed was not ready to devote himself entirely to royal duties. A decade on, he is in a very different position.

The job of being the heir to the heir to the throne, of finding a balance between life and duty, is difficult at the best of times. These are not the best of times. In their bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey this month the Duke and Duchess of Sussex accused the royal family and the institution around it of racism and callous disregard for a suicidal newcomer, among many other damning charges. Harry the spare also declared that William was trapped within “the system … My brother can’t leave that system, but I have.”

In the immediate aftermath of the interview William was “reeling”, a source close to the duke says. “His head is all over the place on it.” Four days after the Sussexes had their say, he hit back during an engagement with the Duchess of Cambridge at a school in east London. Asked about accusations of racism, William retorted with restrained fury: “We’re very much not a racist family.” He also confirmed that he hadn’t spoken to Harry yet, “but will do”. By the weekend it emerged they had “been in contact”.

William is thought to have been less than thrilled a few days later when that conversation made global headlines after the American presenter Gayle King, a close friend of the Sussexes, revealed live on air that it had not been an easy chat: “I did actually call them to see how they were feeling,” she told viewers. “Harry has talked to his brother and he had talked to his father too. The word I was given was that those conversations were not productive.” The intervention prompted a senior royal source to say that “none of the households will be giving a running commentary on private conversations”.

A close friend of both brothers says Harry’s “trapped” comment was “way off the mark”, insisting that William does not see it that way. “He has a path set for him and he’s completely accepting of his role. He is very much his grandmother’s grandson in that respect of duty and service.”

When the Queen turned 90 nearly five years ago William admitted “the challenge” that “occupies a lot of thinking space” is how to “modernise and develop” the royal family, and make it “relevant in the next 20 years’ time”. Twenty years now seems like a very long time. In the hours and days after the Oprah broadcast, William was at the heart of all discussions with the Queen and the Prince of Wales about how to respond to the Sussexes. He was keen that the issue of race should be acknowledged in the Queen’s statement as an area of particular concern that “will be addressed”.

William has always railed against being a “ribbon-cutter royal” and the issues he champions — mental health, battling racism in football, homelessness and his ramped-up eco-warrior role — are a window into where the future King William V will take the House of Windsor. A friend says: “He’s a small-c conservative. He values tradition and the need to go around the country, but he realises he can make a difference beyond traditional royal duties.”

Today royal popularity is, to put it mildly, in a state of flux, but William’s strategy has been working. Post-Oprah, he ranks just below the Queen at the top of a YouGov poll of royals. Not so long ago such a position looked like a long shot, when the “workshy Wills” and “reluctant royal” tags plagued him and he was clocking up fewer days of royal work than his nonagenarian grandparents. Pictures of him hitting the ski slopes and clubs of Swiss resort Verbier in March 2017, missing a Commonwealth service that even the Duke of York flew back for, didn’t help.

After the lasting PR gold dust of the Cambridges’ 2011 wedding and the births of Prince George and Princess Charlotte, it was the first public nosedive for William, who was still working as an air ambulance pilot. “That pissed him off,” a friend says. “He was leaving home at 5.30am, getting home after dark and saving lives in between, but people were still being critical of his commitment to his [other] job.” William was based at Cambridge airport with East Anglian Air Ambulance for two years, where he was on call for “some very sad, dark moments”, often working “on very traumatic jobs involving children”. He later acknowledged that “after I had my own children … the relation between the job and the personal life was what really took me over the edge, and I started feeling things that I have never felt before”. But it was a job he loved, because of “working in a team … that’s something that my other job doesn’t necessarily do. You are more out there on your own.”

A former royal aide says: “Immediately after their wedding he had a very clear idea of the pace at which he wanted to take things.” William was adamant he wouldn’t curtail his day jobs, first as an RAF search and rescue helicopter pilot in Anglesey and then with the air ambulance. “If you’re not careful, duty can weigh you down an awful lot at an early age,” he said, insisting he didn’t “lie awake waiting or hoping” to be king. He delayed full-time royal duties until the autumn of 2017, when, acknowledging the Cambridges’ future required more time at “monarchy HQ”, they moved from Norfolk to London and George started school.

He’d had to fight his corner for the air ambulance role. A source close to William reveals “there were lots of raised eyebrows in the Palace when he wanted to do that. While the Queen and his father backed him, some senior courtiers questioned whether it was becoming of a future king to be doing a middle-class role, hanging out with ordinary people. They thought he wouldn’t stick it out, he’d find it boring, or was doing it out of stubbornness to put off royal duties. He was pretty bloody-minded about it, and determined that other people’s expectations in the media or the system shouldn’t get in the way of his own values.” In the wake of Harry and Meghan’s interview much has been speculated about the extent to which royal life is dictated by Palace officials, but it is clear that William has managed to forge his own path. Who knows how high those senior courtiers’ eyebrows rose in 2019, when William spent three weeks shadowing the spooks of MI5, MI6 and GCHQ to learn how they combat terrorism. He insisted on being called “Will” and lunching in the canteen every day.

Those closest to the duke say his resistance to the idea of full-time royal duties stemmed not only from a desire to achieve something for himself but also from a fear of the impact on his family life. Miguel Head worked alongside the prince for ten years until 2018, as William, Kate and Harry’s communications secretary and later as William’s private secretary. “In his role everyone’s going to tell you you’re marvellous,” Head says. “The RAF and air ambulance jobs were about knowing what his abilities were, what he was good at in his own right. Without that he’d still be hankering for something that was his own.” After children came along he says William developed a “visceral determination to give them a life of consistency and privacy that were missing for large parts of his own childhood”.

Another close aide says the plan enabling the Cambridges to have a few years of “normal” married life, away from the full-time glare of the royal spotlight, paid dividends: “For years, the battles around privacy and paparazzi intrusion were all-consuming. He wanted to know, could we build them a credible plan allowing them a family life while slowly increasing the profile of official life? It took years to get there, but the success of that plan allowed him to be confident and content in his role. He’s not worried about his kids’ privacy any more and he has been able to be the kind of dad he wants to be.”

“Marriage maketh the man,” a friend says. “Catherine’s groundedness has been the critical anchor. And where his relationship with the media was once all fury and frustration, he now understands using the power of modern media, so the public feel they’re getting enough access.”

The children’s birthdays are marked with photographs — often taken by the Duchess of Cambridge — and there has been a noticeable increase in their public appearances of late. While not “officially” staged, William was happy to let George and Charlotte be photographed at their first Aston Villa match with Mum and Dad in 2019. Pandemic set pieces have shown the family clapping for the NHS on the steps of Anmer Hall, their Norfolk home, and, before Christmas, their first red-carpet appearance together for an evening at the panto with key workers and their children.

As they celebrate their anniversary on April 29, friends who joined the Cambridges on their wedding day tell me the partnership’s equal footing is key to its success. “They’ve got a solid relationship and she gives him confidence,” one says. “There is no jealousy, no friction, they are happy for each other’s successes.” In private William talks as passionately about Kate’s work as his own campaigns, and takes pride in her growing confidence on the public stage.

William has said his grandmother’s approach to being head of state is to take “more of a passive role. She’s above politics and is very much away from it.” He doesn’t plan to meddle in party politics, but he was not happy about the unenviable position the government put the Queen in with the 2019 proroguing of parliament, which was later ruled to be unlawful and forced an apology from Boris Johnson to the monarch. Constitutionally the Queen had no alternative other than to act on the advice of her government, but in William’s reign there will be “more private, robust challenging of advice”. His last three private secretaries — Christian Jones, Simon Case, now the cabinet secretary, and Head — had all worked in government departments, helping William to keep his finger on the political pulse. The new incumbent, the Whitehall heavyweight Jean-Christophe Gray, who served as David Cameron’s spokesman, continues in that vein.

The former Conservative leader Lord Hague of Richmond was last year appointed as chairman of the Royal Foundation to develop William’s work on mental health, the environment and a raft of new support programmes for key workers. “People internationally and nationally respect his credibility and knowledge on these issues,” Hague says. “He’s very persuasive. You only see that behind the scenes. He knows what he wants and he goes out to get it.”

Charlie Mayhew, chief executive of the conservation charity Tusk, has known William since he was 20. In 2005 Tusk and Centrepoint, the homelessness charity championed by Princess Diana, were the first patronages William took on. “In those early years I kept having to pinch myself to remember how young he was,” Mayhew says. “He was much more mature than his age and very aware of his destiny coming down the track. He had a sincerity, but never without wicked humour. His teasing is merciless.”

William knows some people see his passion for conservation as a posh man’s part-time hobby, but Mayhew says the duke’s “genuine and huge knowledge” undermines that view. “He’ll call and WhatsApp to flag up something that I haven’t even seen in the conservation space. He can be impatient to get things done.” Last year William launched the Earthshot prize, a £50 million Nobel-style environmental award to galvanise solutions to global problems over the next decade. He believes “conservation and the environment … shouldn’t be a luxury, it’s a necessity”, Mayhew says. “That’s the drum he wants to beat. He’s got a megaphone and wants to use it in the most constructive way. He speaks for that next generation and I think they can relate to it.”

A turning point for William was his 2015 official visit to China, one of the world’s largest consumers of ivory, where he met President Xi and condemned the illegal wildlife trade as a “vicious form of criminality”. Unlike his father, who has refused to visit the People’s Republic over its human rights record and treatment of Tibet, William’s view was that despite the UK’s fractious relationship with China, “we’ve got to engage”.

“It was very political, raising the illegal wildlife trade in China. I’m sure the diplomats were having all sort of nightmares in advance,” says Mayhew, who joined the duke in China. “But he was gathering greater confidence that he had the ability to be a mouthpiece for the issue.” Mayhew reveals that while William was visiting Japan before China, he still hadn’t secured a meeting with Xi. “But when the Chinese saw all the high-level meetings he was having in Japan, they changed their minds and Xi made time for him.” Later that year, as Xi began a UK state visit, William appeared on Chinese television condemning the ivory trade. Two years later China banned the trade.

In 2018 he spent months prepping for his most high-stakes overseas visit yet, to Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories that summer. Navigating the diplomatic tightrope walk between Jerusalem and the West Bank, he visited a Palestinian refugee camp in Ramallah. As he travelled back to Jerusalem, he changed his speech for a reception with young Israelis and Palestinians to strengthen his solidarity with the latter: “My message tonight is that you have not been forgotten … The United Kingdom stands with you.” It was a bold move, but both sides hailed his visit a success and the officials breathed a sigh of relief. To the delight of the travelling press pack, William’s engagements on the final day were brought forward, allowing the diplomat duke and president of the Football Association to land back in the UK in time to watch England’s World Cup tie.

Ask him if he’s a peacemaker and William will laugh, saying Kate is the mediator. But according to a source close to William and Harry, his bridge-building skills were deployed in the lead-up to Harry and Meghan’s wedding in 2018, when tensions in the Kensington Palace household, then still shared by the brothers, were running high: “Every time there was a drama, or a member of staff on the verge of quitting, William would personally try and sort it out.”

As the brothers clashed more over the substance and style of their work, and the family hierarchy that William is a stickler for but Harry is less keen on, a split was inevitable. When they finally divided their households in March 2019, it had been a long time coming. But he never thought that a year later his brother would up sticks for America.

The pair went for a long walk to clear the air after the “Sandringham summit” when the Megxit deal was hammered out, but did not part shores as friends. What upset William the most was Harry and Meghan’s surprise launch of their “Sussex Royal” website before the summit, which featured their blueprint wish list of a part-time, commercial royal future. Later, when the Queen decreed they could no longer use “royal” in their future ventures, their website hit back with this bold statement: “While there is not any jurisdiction by The Monarchy … over the use of the word ‘Royal’ overseas, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use ‘Sussex Royal’ … or … ‘Royal’ …” Both “the content and that it’s still online is staggering”, a senior royal source says. “That was it for William, he felt they’d blindsided the Queen in such an insulting and disrespectful way,” says a source close to him, who reveals it was still at the forefront of William’s mind at the Commonwealth Day service one year ago. It was the Sussexes’ final engagement as working royals, and the froideur between them and the rest of the family was unmistakable.

It is a year since the Sussexes left for California and William misses Harry. “Once he got over the anger of how things happened, he was left with the absence of his brother,” an aide says. “They shared everything about their lives, an office, a foundation, meetings together most days and there was a lot of fun along the way. He’ll miss it for ever.” A close friend says William “definitely feels the pressure now it’s all on him — his future looks different because of his brother’s choices, it’s not easy.” Another friend says: “It’s still raw. He’s very upset by what’s happened, though absolutely intent that he and Harry’s relationship will heal in time.”

After lobbing bombs in his Oprah interview, Harry said: “I love William to bits … We’ve been through hell together … we have a shared experience … The relationship is space at the moment, and time heals all things, hopefully.” Harry would be wise not to set his stopwatch.

The first test will come this summer, when the brothers could be reunited for a series of family engagements including the Duke of Edinburgh’s 100th birthday and the Queen’s birthday parade in June. In July they are scheduled to unveil a statue of their mother at Kensington Palace, marking what would have been Diana’s 60th birthday, an emotionally charged occasion with the world watching.

While a chasm has opened up between the brothers, William has grown closer to the Queen and Prince Charles. He has helped them to navigate their way through Megxit, Prince Andrew’s removal from public life following the Jeffrey Epstein scandal and, now, the Oprah controversy. “That has changed the way the Queen sees him and values his input,” a courtier says. William also feels his relationship with his grandmother has “massively improved” in recent years and their views are “more aligned than ever”.

Friends say there has also been a “renaissance” in William and Charles’s relationship. “As the years passed there were strains imposed by the system — money, work, competition, Diana,” one says. “Part of William’s evolution is that as he has become closer to his father, he sees their similarities. At William’s wedding there was a gag in one of the speeches that he was more like his father than he’d ever admit, which made a lot of us laugh. As their respective destinies get closer, it weighs more heavily on them and strengthens the bond. The rift with Harry has also brought them closer.”

William is said to hate “flummery”, though the role of future king comes with plenty of bowing and scraping. But in 2017, for the first time publicly, he didn’t get his way. As a new parent worried about rising teenage suicide rates, he had spent a year convening a Cyberbullying Taskforce with big cheeses from tech and social media giants including Facebook, Snapchat, Apple, Google and Twitter. He wanted them to adopt industry-wide guidelines creating safer online spaces for children. According to William the meetings at Kensington Palace got “fruity” and the tech giants didn’t come close to the change he wanted. He was furious.

Tessy Ojo, chief executive of the Diana Award youth charity, sat on the taskforce. “He was deeply disappointed,” she says. “He didn’t come into it as ‘the duke’, he gave emotional pleas as a father.” William has since publicly condemned social media giants for their “false choice of profits over values” and privately offered support to the family of Molly Russell, who took her life at 14 after viewing images of self-harm online. Ojo believes it is William’s “lived experience of the fragility of life that guides the work he does”.

It also shapes the way he and Kate are raising their family. William has said he is determined that the grandchildren Diana never knew should “know who she was and that she existed”. He “constantly” talks to his children “about Granny Diana” at bedtime, so that they know “there are two grandmothers in their lives”. Earlier this month on Mother’s Day, Kensington Palace’s social media feeds published George, Charlotte and Louis’s cards paying tribute to “Granny Diana”, revealing it is an annual ritual for the Cambridge children. After a difficult few weeks for William, a line in Charlotte’s card provided poignant insight into how he is feeling: “Papa is missing you.”

He is on course to be a more modern monarch than any before him, but William is still a creature of habit at heart. He has the same tight circle of friends from his schooldays, one of whom says that, with William, “it’s all about trust and loyalty”. He plays five-a-side football in his Villa socks when he can, goes to the Chelsea Harbour Club gym he went to as a child with his mother and has a “smart casual” public uniform of chinos, jacket, blue shirt and no tie.

“William’s not trying to be down with the kids,” a friend says. “He never wants to be painted as irrelevant or dull, though he’s allergic to being compared to celebrities. The public doesn’t always get to see his funny side, but otherwise he’s the same in private as in public. He once said, ‘I’ll be in the public eye all my life. I can’t hide who I am because I’ll be found out.’ ”

In 2019, during a visit to a youth homelessness charity supporting LGBT people, William was asked how he would feel if one of his children was gay. “Absolutely fine,” he replied. “I fully support whatever decision they make, but it does worry me from a parent’s point of view how many barriers, hateful words, persecution and discrimination might come.” Such a personal exchange was a radical departure from royal engagement small talk. But William, the first in his family to be photographed for the cover of a gay magazine, had personally put the issue on the agenda.

As president of Bafta he gave the academy a diplomatic dressing down in his speech at last year’s ceremony, expressing his “frustration” over the lack of diversity: “In 2020, and not for the first time in the last few years, we find ourselves talking again about the need to do more to ensure diversity in the sector and in the awards process — that simply cannot be right in this day and age.” The 2021 nominees announced this month suggest his words hit home.

William “thinks the public look to him to keep royal work looking modern”, a confidante says. “The Queen and Prince of Wales are providing continuity and stability. He’s carving out his own relationship with diverse communities. He sees it all as a way of doing things now that will help a smooth transition when the time comes.”

Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, as a former frontline worker himself, William has led the royal charge supporting key workers. “Now, more than ever, he knows what his role in public life is, and he sees the value in it,” a close aide says. Chatting to NHS workers in January, William said: “Something that I noticed from my brief spell flying the air ambulance … is that when you see so much death and so much bereavement, it does impact how you see the world … as a … darker, blacker place.” Soon after the first lockdown was announced, the Cambridges’ Royal Foundation launched Our Frontline, a round-the-clock mental health and bereavement service for key workers.

Miguel Head says the future King William will continue to campaign on his big issues: “I can’t see him backing away from causes he’s passionate about. And while he’s not someone who loves ceremony, he knows the importance of it. When he gets the top job he won’t do away with it all. He’s mindful the monarchy represents something timeless that’s above all of us, and many people like the magic and theatre of it.”

Roya Nikkhah

Roya is royal correspondent at The Sunday Times. Over more than a decade she has covered royal events for the BBC, interviewed the Prince of Wales and Prince Harry and presented the films Prince William, Monarch in the Making and Meghan and Harry: The Baby Years.

#William #TeamQueen #TeamWilliam #TeamCambridge

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dogbearinggifts · 5 years ago

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What are your thoughts on tua S2? Did you feel like the characters grew? What did you like? What did you not? I’m interested in your perspective. Your analysis are super thoughtful and interesting!

Aw, thanks, Anon!

Overall, I really enjoyed S2 and thought it was a solid follow-up to S1. I do have my quibbles about it, so I think (for ease of reference and because my thoughts are a little scattered today) I’ll list some of my personal highlights (in no particular order) before getting into what I didn’t like as much.

Big spoilers ahead.

Allison. I thought they handled her storyline especially well. Of all the siblings, I think she had the most difficult obstacles placed in her way (not only is she a Black woman landing in 1961 Dallas, but she’s a Black woman landing in 1961 Dallas who can’t even speak in her own defense for a year) and they sugarcoated exactly none of it. The writers pulled no punches when showing what civil rights protesters went through, which just made their nonviolent response all the more breathtaking. Allison’s fear and anger during those scenes were palpable even as she kept them hidden. But along with that horror, we see the kindness and warmth of the Dallas Black community, the women who take her in simply because she needs their help, and her love for Ray, perhaps heretofore THE most thoughtful husband ever portrayed on screen. I loved him, and I loved him and Allison together. While I understand and respect his choice to stay in 1963, I wish they’d gotten more time together. They both deserved it.

Vanya. We got to see how much the baggage from her past affected her by glimpsing what she might be like if it were taken away. It’s an interesting philosophical question, and it was explored well, in my opinion. She finds it easier to love and be loved, and she stands up for herself more readily—but she also doesn’t hesitate to use powers she can’t quite control and threatens Five without fully realizing how dire her threat is (or how it might dredge up traumatic memories she doesn’t know exist). The moment where Ben finds her curled up, fully convinced she’s a monster, was heartbreaking. I loved watching her find happiness with Sissy, even if that was fleeting (and dear god, Sissy deserved her happy ending with Vanya, dammit, I don’t care if it would fuck up the timeline). Her patience and sweetness with Harlan were just beautiful. And the way she used the confidence she gained during her amnesia to fully come into her own not to exact revenge on her siblings, but to save them, was fucking phenomenal.

The humor. There was a lot more humor this season, and it was awesome. So many iconic scenes—Olga Foroga, Luther babysitting two homicidal Fives, Elliot awkwardly lecturing his guests on the history of Jello, “NEW TIMELINE NEW ME,” “Your vagina needs glasses,” AJ the fish gobbling up the cigarette bubbles, Five getting to say “fuck”….this season was a lot funnier than the previous one, and I think that was one of its strengths.

Klaus’ cult. It was played for laughs, which I both expected and thought was the best way to handle it. He didn’t want to start a new religion with himself at the center; he just wanted to not get thrown out of any more diners, but Destiny’s Children had other ideas. The “I too am a fraud!” scene was hilarious and tickled the question of whether or not a religion founded on false pretenses can still help those within it find meaning.

Luther. Getting him away from his dad, his siblings, and the Academy was exactly what he needed to become the pure of heart and dumb of ass genius we always knew he was, but his first major step in that direction was heartbreaking. We all knew he’d be rejected once he got to the Academy. We all knew Reginald would rip his heart out and stomp on it in his admittedly fashionable shoes. It gets Luther out on his own and forces him to become his own person apart from his dad, but that doesn’t make it any easier to watch. He got the positive character development he needed, but the catalyst was tragic.

Diego. We see, for the first time, exactly how Reginald kept him in line—not with meds or with PTSD-inducing torture, but with words. Even when he knows Diego as little more than a stranger, Reginald is able to rip off his skin and fling it in his face with a single diatribe; and even at 30, with years away from his dad, Diego is left unable to speak, feeling as if all of his accomplishments up to that point were the work of a dumb kid who thought he was smarter and more capable than he actually was.

Luther and Diego sharing a braincell. Luther has bad ideas. Diego has bad ideas. When they put their bad ideas together, they get terrible ideas. I loved watching them work together as a team, rather than being at each others’ throats for most of the season, even if I’m left hoping Olga Foroga had a pleasant and quiet day after that phone call.

Reginald. At first glance, it may look like the writers were trying to make him likable so they could parade him around as your average abusive-parent-with-a-soft-side. But it’s more nuanced than that. Abusive parents (and abusers in general) often fly under the radar because they fool outsiders into thinking they’re good people. They’re active in their communities. They give to charity. They have friends who attest to their virtue, significant others who think they’re the greatest. And that’s what we see with Reginald. We see him as the rest of the world did: an intelligent, eccentric man with a sharp sense of humor who cared deeply about scientific advancement. That’s how he evaded suspicion—because there were stories from years past of lively parties at his mansion, of what a gentleman he was to Grace and of how he did everything he could to save little Pogo. But those stories would all have come from people he considered his equals. When he’s with people he considers his inferiors—aka, the Umbrella kids—he’s openly condescending and demeaning. We get to see how he fooled the world, and it is chilling.

Elliot. He deserved better, and you can ship him with any one of the Hargreeves kids and get the cutest thing ever.

The Swedes. They said so much while speaking very little.

Ben. He got more personality and screen time, and it was glorious. His love of his family and resentment toward Klaus practically leapt off the screen. The way he says “I’ve missed you all…so much” once they’ve all left was one of those right-in-the-feels moments; and watching him get so much of what he’s wanted for years when he possesses Klaus was beautiful.

Now, as for things I took issue with….

Ben. I understand why they ended his arc the way they did. I get that they were probably afraid the Klaus/Ben dynamic would grow stale if they didn’t change it somehow and wanted to give him a larger role in S3. His death(???) was heartbreaking and extremely well-done. But it also wasn’t foreshadowed. We never got any sense of what ghosts in the TUA ‘verse are, so the fact they can be destroyed by a ton of sound-turned-energy or by going too far into someone’s psyche or whatever happened….it’s not that it doesn’t make sense so much as there’s not enough evidence to determine whether or not it makes sense. It feels like the writers just kinda made that up so they’d have a reason to change Ben’s relationship dynamics, but if that’s the case, couldn’t they have done it another way? Couldn’t they have made it so the immense energy or psychic woo-woo or whatever gave him a power-up instead of destroying him? Vanya transferred some of her energy into Harlan and brought him back to life. Couldn’t something similar have happened with Ben? And if it tied him to Vanya as well as to Klaus, great! More fodder for angst and humor! (”Vannyyyyyyyy, stop hogging Ben!” “You got him for 17 years, Klaus, you can part with him for 20 minutes.” “Guys, don’t I get a say in this?”) I’m glad they didn’t write him out of the series entirely, but I still wish they’d kept him and all the character development he’d gotten throughout S2.

Episode 10. It looks like they tried to cram half a season’s worth of developments into 45 minutes. Twenty minutes in, I’d already said “Wait what the fuck” half a dozen times. A lot of those moments were explained later on, and I was able to make enough inferences to fill in any lingering plot holes, but…still. Too much stuff, too little time. E9 was a perfectly satisfying ending to the season. Yes, it leaves the siblings stranded in 1963, but they could’ve tied up those loose ends in the S3 premiere.

Lila. She’s an incredibly fun character, but her arc is kind of a mess. Most of that is due to E10, and I do feel that more time to let her arc breathe would’ve worked wonders, but I’m left feeling like her turn from “Handler is the best mom ever and I lurve Diego too” to “KILL DIEGO AND HIS EVIL FAMILY” to “Handler is a bad mom and Diego is right” happened too quickly.

The Commission. Okay, so, the Handler announces the entire Board has been killed, and she’s stepping in as director even though everyone appears to know she’s been demoted (and demoted pretty severely—she went from having an office bigger than some apartments to being a case management drone). There’s suspicion and lots of it. But then, La Resistance is….ten or so people in a single room? And when she calls the temps agents to her side, thousands of them show up ready and willing to fight and die? I dunno. Just seems like there should’ve been more splintering going on there. Again, I think they needed more time to tie everything up.

Aside from those complaints, I loved the season. I set aside most of a day to binge it, and I do not regret that decision at all.

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disappearinginq · 3 years ago

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Kacey and Jamie Dutton and also JJ and John B :))

ooo, playing dirty now, eh? My answer in four parts: Kayce Dutton from Yellowstone:

First impression "You're the pretty one - and wow - a lot of people just die around you"

Impression now "Ooo, look at you - the youngest AND the peacemaker and despite you being the one with the most issues, but holy MOTHER OF GOD, DOES TROUBLE FOLLOW YOU"

Favorite moment Hmm. Toss up. I love Kayce, so pretty much every scene with him is a favorite, but probably between him snickering under his breath when Jamie is being Jamie with the tribal police and Rainwater in season 1 and Jamie had to come and pick him up. I mostly like it because Kayce is a very solemn character until then, and while you get that he loves his family, he's not a generally happy person in life right now; and season 4 episode 2 when Kayce trails his father out to the hot springs and lectures him on "If you die on the way home, i am not burying you out here, I'm taking you to the family plot so I can sit on your grave and tell you I told you so".

Idea for a story This is going to count for Jamie too - a fic when they're both younger but post Evelyn's death and before Jamie leaves for college, they go out riding to get Kayce's mind off the funeral and the memory of his mom dying in his arms, except (because it's me) Jamie gets injured and Kayce has to deal with the trauma of having a loved one almost die in front of him again.

Unpopular opinion That he and Jamie are the only Dutton siblings who actually seem to like each other; and while Kayce is an awesome character and I love him, he does not think things through most of the time

Favorite relationship :-D Him and Jamie, and probably him and Tate. I would've liked to see him and Lee a bit more

Favorite headcanon That Kayce had to join the military to figure out that his childhood falls under "traumatic" and "emotionally and physically abusive" Jamie Dutton from Yellowstone:

First impression Wes Bentley! YAY! Followed shortly by "you're the smart one, and I will love you - it is decided"

Impression now I think finding out that he's adopted was the best thing that could've happened to Jamie - between deciding that it was part of the reason why John always treated him different, and knowing now that John was never going to let him run the ranch (even though he's the only one who seems to have a clue how it's run on all fronts, not just cows and horses), and I just want him to have a good life with his chosen family. I like that as the super smart one with the most "fancy" to him, he still likes being in the bunkhouse, he doesn't treat the "help" like anything other than equal people, he likes doing the day to day, and I think he would prefer running a ranch over being a lawyer. And to me, that's really cemented in there when he buys his own place and his bio dad tells him to get 4 wheelers instead of horses and Jamie looks a little crushed and is like "it's not ranching without horses".

Favorite moment Oooo, hmmm. Probably in the fourth episode of season 4 when Kayce comes to him for help tracking down the info for the guy who put the hit on the Duttons and Kayce tells him "I love you" and Jamie says it back, looking a little stunned that Kayce still feels like they're family. Runner ups: when he is introduced and tells the state to fuck off for trying to declare eminent domain against the Yellowstone, and that if they want to build, build up; and when he meets his kid.

Idea for a story Same as the one for Kayce; possibly one where I try and decide what John did to him to make him the only Dutton kid convinced John would kill him if he messed up.

Unpopular opinion If we're going to rank bad things that characters on the Yellowstone have committed, Jamie falls into the 'least bad' category. I mean, I think Kayce killed four people in the first two episodes. Beth (I love her, but she is a deeply flawed human wrecking ball who is a modern Antigone and as selfish as they come) ruins peoples' lives for funsies. Rip kills people and throws them off the side of cliffs. The entirety of the bunk house lynches people (more than once). Don't get me wrong - I am totally onboard for 99% of their actions. I just think it's kinda unfair to say Jamie is the worst for something he did when he was a kid, and for being the only one who feels guilty for the one person he killed. (wow. that's a lot of murder in a family).

Favorite relationship Him and Kayce. I love them. And I have a sneaky suspicion that I will love Jamie and his son, because Jamie looks so disbelievingly happy when the mom hands the baby to him.

Favorite headcanon Either John did something horrific, or Jamie witnessed something horrific that made Jamie think/understand that Jamie was expendable and that he is truly afraid for his life around John, because Jamie doesn't stand up to his dad at all and physically runs from him when John is angry. John B. from Outer Banks

First impression "You're a himbo"

Impression now "You're definitely a himbo. But goddamn, you're simultaneously the luckiest and unluckiest sonofabitch alive."

Favorite moment Any time where he succeeds wildly at not dying just through sheer squirrel-y-ness and dumb luck - like stealing the cruiser from Shoupe. Also possibly the scene in season 1 when he yeets himself on the bike over the chain and lands in the street.

Idea for a story Hmm. Possibly one where he finds out Big John is still alive and just flips shit over everything he has had to do in the last three months to stay alive without his dad.

Unpopular opinion John B can kinda be a shit friend when it comes to picking between the girl or his friends. (but hey - he comes through when it matters)

Favorite relationship Even though I just said he was a shit friend, my favorite relationship is between him and JJ. Because part of what I say probably makes him a shit friend is him just taking JJ for granted - like "Of course JJ is gonna manage to steal his dad's boat so I can flee to Mexico with my girlfriend" because he's known JJ for so long and knows him so well that it's a "Well, duh" moment for him. Because John B is the only one who seems to know JJ is actually stupid smart.

Favorite headcanon John B has decided, even if he does become rich, if his friends don't leave the Cut, neither does he. JJ Maybank from Outer Banks:

First impression "Why hello...."

Impression now The dumbest smart person ever to be written on TV. Yeah, he doesn't know the difference between French and Spanish, but that kid with all of 90 seconds of planning, comes up with a successful prison break for his bestie, and the only thing that really goes wrong is he breaks the wrong person out. With maybe a minute, he comes up with a plan for 5 teenagers to take over an entire tanker ship from adults with guns. And he SUCCEEDS. Except for Rafe, who is the only one to give the Scooby Gang the credit they deserve and gets super suspicious.

Favorite moment Do not ask me why, but it is still the first episode when he gets flipped off the front of the Pogue at high speed and when he bobs to the surface just goes "I think my heels touched my head" as he floats there, and I just...crack up every time I watch it. Second favorite: season 2 when they're in the shipping container and he tells Kie that the only lifer asperation he has is to be a surfer down in South America and live on the beach eating what he can catch. That boy sounds so...wisftul, like he knows it's a pipe dream, even though it's just to be poor somewhere else.

Idea for a story "How JJ First Meets the Pogues" - each time how JJ first meets all of the Pogues, because it's never said who gets them together, JJ or John B, and I like to be contradictory and say it was JJ who found them all.

Unpopular opinion Ummm....is there an unpopular opinion about JJ? I'm not a fan of the woobie-fied view of him in a lot of the fandom where he's just this passive character who needs someone to come and save him. No. JJ is a storm with skin.

Favorite relationship Him and John B - they're brothers without the DNA, and I love that they can get angry at one another and fight and still 100% still be besties.

Favorite headcanon The reason why he hates the cops and doesn't trust them is because CPS has been called on him many, many times, and every time, they return him to his dad where it's worse than before.

#outer banks #jj maybank #john b routledge #outer banks on netflix #yellowstone tv #yellowstone #kayce dutton #jamie dutton #games we play #asks answered

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dangermousie · 4 years ago

Text

2020 End of Year Post - kdrama edition

You can find my 2020 cdrama post here: dangermousie.tumblr.com/post/638449659546845184/2020-end-of-year-post-cdrama-edition

This is only going to cover kdramas that aired in 2020; if it originally aired another year, it’s not on this list.

It’s been a pretty lackluster kdrama year. There are probably only 5 kdramas I truly loved and only three of them I was really obsessed over. Better luck in 2021!

DRAMAS WATCHED

(In order of liking from least to most as opposed to pure quality; I am including if I’ve seen enough to make up my mind; yes I realize that’s inaccurate, but that’s my list)

42 Born Again - so bad, so incoherent, so insane, I have no idea why the leads signed up for it (and unlike some of the other watchers, I think it was awful from the very start.) There is literally nothing about this drama that makes sense.

41 Love with Flaws - a bunch of people who should be tried under the Geneva Convention.

40 Sweet Munchies - Jung Il Woo proves his inability to pick a functional script.

39 Meow the Secret Boy - if you ever wanted to bang a cat, this drama is for you. Not being a furry, however...

38 Do Do Sol Sol La Sol - I lost braincells just typing out this title.

37 When I Was the Most Beautiful - the only way it’s not the dumbest, most pointless melo of 2020 is because Born Again considerately came out the same year.

36 Woman of 9.9 Billion - if you want to watch an artsy French movie about miserable people, but only badly made, boy do I have a drama for you.

35 Lies after Lies - screams after screams.

34 Backstreet Rookie - people were up in arms about various problematic plots. I am a survivor of many plots much more problematic but even I couldn’t survive how utterly boring and annoying this drama was and how utterly irritating the leads were. This has taken Ji Chang Wook off my top favorites into “should I even check his latest Lovestruck in the City? Probably not” territory almost single-handedly (Melt Me helped, to be fair.)

33 Men Are Men - boring is boring.

32 Dinner Mate - two beautiful boring people eat out a lot.

31 Was It Love - no it wasn’t.

30 Alice - Joo Won in the shower can make up for a multitude of sins but not plot nonsense of such magnitude. When you find yourself thinking it would be better if he hooked up with the alternate universe version of his mother because at least then something entertaining would happen, you know it’s bad.

29 More than Friends - started out OK, then made me hate basically everyone and kept going.

28 Start-Up - honestly, it’s probably more decent than its place here, but the toxic and batshit fandom for it (the worst this year) made me feel like breaking out in hives any time it’s even mentioned.

27 The Spies who Loved Me - how to take a good cast and waste it.

26 Private Lives - it was good but it never took off with its concept and spent more time on the incoherent plot than the OTP which was its one strength. It’s a decent drama but coming after Heartless City and My Beautiful Bride from the same writer, it’s a disappointment.

25 Record of Youth - as high as it is due to Park Bo Gum hard carrying this entire awful drama on his shoulders and doing it so well I finished it. Alas, while he is in one drama (and that drama is great), the rest of the characters and the entirety of the script are a pointless useless mess.

24 Do You Like Brahms - excellent first third, mediocre middle, and terrible last third. I don’t know what musical term applies to this? Diminuendo, I think.

23 I’ll Go to You When the Weather is Nice - nice and mellow but nothing much happens.

22 Forest - mainly for Park Hae Jin’s excellent and frequently naked bod.

21 The Ballot - I didn’t love it as much as everyone did but it was well-made.

20 Hyena - more romance and less weird law stuff would make it better.

19 365 Repeat the Year - surprisingly solid.

18 The Game Towards Zero - see 365.

17 When My Love Blooms - very old fashioned, very lovely.

16 Chocolate - also very old fashioned and very lovely but also with Yoon Kye Sang performing medical procedures bleeding and shirtless. MMM.

15 (tie) Secret Royal Inspector - a fun if run of the mill sageuk.

15 Find Me In Your Memory - best melo this year.

14 Mystic Pop Up Bar - surprisingly good even though I wasn’t planning to check it out.

13 Where Your Eyes Linger - came out of nowhere but was tender and hopeful and lovely.

12 Itaewon Class - Park Seo Joon hard carries a drama that is already excellent. Love it.

11 Psychopath Diary - Yoon Shi Yoon is such a treat in a hilarious, cynical, dark comedy.

10 Kairos - more like ouroboros.

9 Queen Love and War - in a year where sageuks are very rare, this was solid and surprisingly moving and shippy.

8 The King Eternal Monarch - people didn’t like it but I did. It’s no masterpiece and both the leads and the writers have better dramas, but it was a lovely romantic fairy tale for me.

7 Mr. Queen - sharp, hilarious, and some of my favorite actors.

6 Psycho But It’s OK - healing, sharp cinematography and even sharper chemistry.

5 Crash Landing on You - the last ep pissed me off so much this drama is dead to me but I loved it so much until then I can’t place it lower in good conscience.

4 Train - who knew I would go this hard for an OCN drama or that OCN would do romance so well? But this time-travel mystery romance is just incredible and I shipped the OTP and rooted for the characters and loved every last bit of it.

3 Run On - this is the drama Record of Youth wanted to be but failed. Smart and lived in, you feel like you are peeking at real people, but also even four episodes in, I am so invested in the main characters separately and together, and care for them so much, it’s a little frightening.

1 (tie) Tale of the Nine Tailed - my perfect fantasy romance. I liked it better than Goblin, yeah I said it.

1 Flower of Evil - all the tropes I love in one incredible package. I would rewatch episodes waiting for new ones trying to puzzle the story and to stay withdrawal but it works just as well on rewatch. Lee Jun Ki brings his trademark tortured intensity and for once, both his leading lady and his script back him up and are worthy of that. It’s perfect.

FAVORITE DRAMA

It’s a tie between Tale of the Nine Tailed and Flower of Evil but if I had to pick just one, FoE, because it had me seriously obsessed and guessing about the protagonist and gave me the narrative tropes I love so much and an OTP that statisfied all my hurt/comfort kinks and then some.

WORST DRAMA

Born Again - honestly, this is so bonkers it almost becomes good but alas...

FAVORITE MALE CHARACTER

Do Hyun Soo/Baek Hee Sung, Flower of Evil - he is so messed up, so on edge, so traumatized. Yet capable of so much warmth and caring even as he himself doesn’t realize his humanity. FoE is basically a story of a man pushed and punished by the world for his entire life who, because of one woman, finds a safe place and peace and slowly comes to life without realizing it, and watching his desperation to keep this small bit of normalcy is so heartbreaking and exciting all at once. Plus, you start the drama thinking he’s a psychopathic serial killer and end it (if you are me) thinking he must be protected at all costs and if anyone even looks at him wrong they must suffer, and that’s quite a change!

FAVORITE FEMALE CHARACTER

Nam Ji Ah, Tale of the Nine Tailed - she is so funny and tough and smart and loving and amazing that I will totally buy that a literal demi-god will do anything and everything for her and love her for literal eternity.

NEEDS TO BE MURDERED

Dad in Record of Youth - yes in a year with serial killers and supernatural demons, I picked a normal character from a mediocre drama. It’s his everyday awfulness to his family that hits so hard and I am sad he never got his comeuppance.

FAVORITE SHIP

Ji Ah x Yeon - a fearless reporter and an immortal demi-god who’s been hoping for his human beloved to reincarnate. A really rare set-up where the OTP is equally ride or die, so compatible and completely BAMF. I got why he waited for her for that long and then fell in love with her all over again. Perfection.

Runner up: Flower of Evil - he is so messed up he literally does not believe he is capable of love or empathy, but he falls in love with her anyway and so utterly she permeates his entire life. She is tough as nails and only believes what she sees and is the sole person who believes in him against the world. She loves him but he needs her. She needs him but he loves her. They are amazing.

FAVORITE SECONDARY OTP

Seo Dan x Gu Seung Jun, Crash Landing on You, North Korean x Conman were so good I shipped them harder than the main OTP and the end of that storyline pissed me off so much I dumped the drama and didn’t finish it for months (and it’s still dead to me.)

NOTP

Record of Youth - it started out and they didn’t have much chemistry but the dialogues were interesting and I thought the chemistry would grow. It didn’t and deteriorated, their dialogues became boring and relationship had zero development (about as much as the supposed female lead.) I think we were supposed to feel bad they broke up and they were going for a bittersweet open ending, instead I found myself happy about the break up of two incompatible, chemistry-less people and hoping for the love of God they never get back together.

FAVORITE SCENE

Yeon and the bridge of knives, Tale of the Nine Tailed - Yeon choosing to undergo the creeptastic bridge of knives for a chance to save Ji Ah, who at that point he is not aware is the reincarnation of his Joseon love because, as he says, he doesn’t care if she is or isn’t, it just would be more horrible to have her die than to undergo the horrific torture he is undergoing, and then the sequence with his catching her, her weeping over him and the fact that she is the original Joseon girl revealed and all the bandaging and his watching her sleep and all that loveliness, is everything for yours truly.

Runner up: Hyun Soo having that break-down at the cliff at the end of ep 15 of Flower of Evil as Ji Won desperately tries to convince him she is alive and he finally stumbles to her.

Runner runner up (it’s my list, I will do what I want): Do Won preparing to blow his brains out to give a chance to Seo Kyung to live in Train.

BIGGEST CRUSH

Seon-Gyeom, Run On. Yeah, I know. Im Siwan is tiny, delicate featured and has a runner’s build, none of which are things that normally appeal to me. But his character is so odd, so honest, so unflinching in pursuing what he thinks is right, so incapable of self-pity despite plenty of reasons for it, and so ridiculously attractive when he smiles, I don’t even care.

BEST SCENE STEALER CHARACTER

Kim Bum, TotNT - I started out being annoyed by him and ended up looking forward to his scenes and being distraught by his ending.

NEEDS A SEQUEL

Honestly, none. I was fine with all the endings. I wouldn’t mind seeing post-end life of Tale of the Nine Tailed characters or the OTP settling into their literal new world in Train, but I am good.

TROPE THAT NEEDS TO DIE

Time jump that solves all the problems off screen or alternatively years pass and everyone is frozen - something that kdramas need to learn and need to learn badly. See Record of Youth, Brahms and Start Up.

FAVORITE TROPE WE’VE SEEN A LOT OF

Men who are ride or die for their OTP - this was a great year for this - the male leads of four of my five dramas were beyond anything on that scale (only exception is Run On because it’s still too early to tell there.) Yes PLEASE.

BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT

This was a banner year for that what with Start Up, Do You Like Brahms, Record of Youth, and Private Lives all starting out well and nosediving off the cliff but winner is Crash Landing on You. I loved it so much for bulk of its run but the last episode pissed me off so much I deleted all my files and called it a day.

BIGGEST GOOD SURPRISE

Flower of Evil - I had no expectations of this drama and wasn’t even planning on watching it despite liking both the lead actors because yet another “look at evil serial killer be evil” drama with no romance was not my thing. Luckily someone convinced me there might be some romance and I peeked curiously. Honestly, their promo campaign was the most misleading and dumbest thing ever.

Runner up Psycho but it’s OK - I have never liked Kim Soo Hyun in anything before and the drama premise seemed WTF but it was shockingly good and KSH totally blew me away.

Hardest Working Lead

Yoon Shi Yoon - he starred in two (!!!) dramas in 2020 playing three characters and not only were both these dramas awesome in a lackluster year, but if it wasn’t for the fact that I knew it was the same actor and the fact that the characters shared a face, I would have never believed that they were played by the same actor. So good!

2020 DRAMAS I HAVEN’T SEEN THAT I MOST WANT TO WATCH

None. Covid Year gave me PLENTY of time

BEST NON-2020 DRAMA I’VE WATCHED IN 2020

My Beautiful Bride and Deserving of the Name - I was obsessed with both of them and honestly, they were much better than the bulk of 2020 kdramas I watched.

MOST ANTICIPATED IN 2021

The Moon That Rises in the Day, Hong Chun Gi, Joseon Exorcist, Island, Frightening Cohabitation, Snowdrop.

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crossdressingdeath · 4 years ago

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Seeing your post about how JYL has a 'ranking system' in her head when it comes to WWX and JC hits so hard, but honestly, the more I read into the Jiang family dynamics, the more I agree. JYL obviously loves WWX, but I don't know if she's capable of putting him above JC. And we see her defending him, and she obviously gives her life for him, but she was also reacting in the moment. Not to speak lightly of her sacrifice of course, but I just feel like there are certain limits to how 1/7

far she's actually willing to go for him. I was initially one of JYL's staunch defenders, and always said that, unlike JC, she didn't have the same amount of political power as him, wasn't in a position to do anything about the Wens, ect. But...I'm starting to question if that's really true. JYL may not have had much direct political power herself, but she was the sister of a sect leader, and even if JC was unwilling to help, JYL had just married into the richest and most powerful sect 2/7

at the time. It was a love marriage, JZX adored her and would've done anything for her if she'd just bothered to ask him for it. Madam Jin also cared for her and respected her, and between her and JZX, had JYL actually bothered to tell them anything, I'm sure they would have been able to sort something out. Or she could have had it as a condition of her marriage - I'm not marrying into the sect that's trying to kill my brother unless you tell your father to stop. Had it been reversed and 3/7

The Lans were calling for JYL and JC’s deaths, no way in hell WWX would’ve just married into the sect, regardless of LWJ’s involvement. Instead she just doesn’t really do anything. We see no proof that she ever tried to see WWX after the wedding dress incident, which — god I instantly saw it as a sweet gesture, but now it just bothers me, because your brother is living in squalor, and you decide to show if the expensive dress that you’ll be 4/7

wearing when marrying into the sect that's trying to kill him, you bring along one bowl of soup for him, and don't even try to explain WHY you're marrying into said sect. Beyond that, we don't see a single moment up until her death where JYL actually seems concerned about WWX, puts in effort to try to see him - she doesn't even ask him how he's doing the one time she does come to see him. When we compare that to how WQ treats WN, yeah, she's outwardly not as loving or sweet, but she 5/7

goes to the ends of the earth for her brother, even going as far as to betray her sect and risk WRH's wrath because he asks her to. And now we come back to that ranking system you mentioned before - yeah, it really does seem like JYL places her blood family first, which definitely hurts, but in comparison, despite only knowing him for a shorter amount of time, WQ truly grows to think of WWX as a second brother. And she treats him as such, at an equal level with WN - after JZX dies 6/7

WQ doesn't attack WWX for what happened. She doesn't try to come up with a way to sacrifice WWX instead and let WN survive in his stead. She and WN, two people who have become WWX's family, both give their lives to protect both him and the rest of their remaining family members. And it's just frustrating to think that the one member of WWX's adopted family who we all thought treated him like an actual brother, might not have really been on his side after all. 7/7

Yes! To start with the wedding dress thing, because it drives me nuts when people treat that like some super sweet act of love: JYL shows up in the Burial Mounds with no money, no sign of having tried to talk the sects around, no news outside of her own, no food beyond a couple bowls of soup (one of which she gives to the guy who can’t eat), and doesn’t so much as ask WWX if he’s okay. She literally came all that way to have a family meal, ask WWX to name the future nephew it’s becoming increasingly clear he’ll never meet, and tell him about her impending marriage into the family that’s currently doing everything in its power to destroy WWX’s life. Like, if you think about it that entire visit is such a slap in the face; “Here’s a bowl of soup while the people under your protection are starving, oh by the way I’m going to marry the son of the guy actively trying to get you killed, okay bye”. All you can say in regards to her helping WWX is that she does potentially manage to persuade JZX to invite him to JL’s one month celebration, but if memory serves the novel never actually specifies whose idea that was and it was JZX who decided to go get WWX after JGY told him about seeing JZXun heading in the direction of the Burial Mounds. And even then JZX does the same thing JYL does; sees WWX outnumbered and surrounded and tells him to stand down. At least in JZX’s case you could argue that the actual fighting hadn’t broken out and JZX probably trusted in his authority to be able to sort the situation out so long as WWX wasn’t actually acting aggressive (or defensive, rather), and he’s also physically strong enough that he may well have been able to intervene if the cultivators had attacked. JYL, when she does the same thing, has no authority and no physical power to defend WWX with. And yeah, both JZX and Madam Jin adore JYL, and neither of them seem super fond of JGS (JZX respects his father, but I don’t get the sense he loves him); if JYL had asked them for help it’s entirely possible they would’ve started at least circulating her version of events and demanding a proper investigation into what happened. But there’s no mention of her so much as trying, and she doesn’t offer to ask them when she visits WWX.

And yeah, compare WQ to JYL and it’s... well. WQ is so quick to offer WWX her love and care? She’s harsh, but she loves him and views him and WN on such equal footing that she and WN willingly hand themselves over to the Jins for WWX’s sake without her so much as bringing up the possibility of saving WN instead. There’s no ranking for WQ; WWX and WN are her brothers, and she loves them, and she’d do anything to protect them. When it becomes clear she can’t save WN (like hell the sects would let him live, and by this point it’s pretty clear that WWX won’t be able to protect them forever) she throws her whole weight behind defending the brother she thinks she might still be able to save, even if it means bringing WN with her to die. WQ knows WWX for... a year or two? Maybe? The timeline is a little hazy. Not long compared to JYL, anyway. And yet she’s willing to walk all the way to Lanling to die in the hope of saving him. It’s for her whole family, yes, but she makes a point of including him. Basically, I think this fandom needs more stuff wherein the Jiangs and Wens survive and the Wens are fully like “Our brother now, you don’t deserve him”.

The thing with JYL is... she loves WWX, she genuinely does, but he is never going to be first for her. To the point where she outright enables JC’s abuse, in places; she always expects WWX to be the one to grin and bear it. Hell, one of their first conversations involves JYL cheerily allowing WWX to cover up JC locking him out of his bedroom and scaring him out into the woods by threatening to set dogs on him! Let me rephrase that: she allows a traumatized nine-year-old to hide the fact that the kid her dad expects him to share a room with locked him out of said room on his FIRST NIGHT and threatened him with his LITERALLY WORST FEAR, and as far as we know makes no attempt to tell JFM herself. To keep JC out of trouble. That is such a thing! WWX was scared to the point of running away and JFM expects him to share a room with the person responsible for that and JYL goes along with him promising not to tell JFM so that JC won’t get in trouble! And from that day forwards everything is just “Boys will be boys” to her. Like, let me put it this way. Before LWJ (and arguably the Wens before that, although WWX saw himself more as protector than protected there) JYL was the person WWX trusted to protect and care for and comfort him above all others, yeah? She’s the one he thinks of as having his back? He doesn’t tell her about JC trying to kill him. JC tries to kill WWX three times before JYL’s death, and WWX doesn’t say a word to her about any of them. You could argue that he doesn’t want to involve her, but... JYL pretty clearly takes JC’s side every time JC starts having a go at WWX. When he chases him out of their room, when he starts snapping about how annoying WWX is, when he stabs WWX... She never outright says it, but there really does come a point where by staying neutral you’re siding with the aggressor, and she reaches that point a lot. Hell, the stabbing is one of those aforementioned near-murders! JC stabbed him! According to WWX (who downplays serious injuries, he never exaggerates them) he had to hold his guts in! WWX is talking about a pretty fucking serious injury (and JYL grew up in a cultivation sect, I don’t believe for a second she doesn’t at least know what constitutes a serious injury) while JC whines about a broken arm like it’s worse than having to physically hold your guts in until you can reach a doctor and JYL acts like those are equal! JC could easily have killed WWX and has enough training with the sword to know better than to go for a blow like that in a staged fight and JYL doesn’t even suggest he should apologise.

Honestly? The more I think about JYL the more it pisses me off that she’s treated like WWX’s best sister more than WQ is. Imagine WQ seeing one brother stab the other in the gut and take the former’s side because the latter broke the former’s arm. Imagine WQ so much as considering allowing a child to cover up the kid he’s supposed to share a room with locking him out and scaring him into running away. She wouldn’t! Because WQ sees her brothers as equals. She won’t pick WN over WWX just because they’re blood siblings; she loves them both, and will choose based on who she thinks is in the right. And she wouldn’t just stay neutral to avoid rocking the boat, oh no. If WQ heard WWX say that WN stabbed him and did enough damage that he had to hold his guts in... oh boy would WN have a bad day. The thing with JYL is that she seems like a good sister in comparison to the rest of the Jiangs; stick canon JYL into a family that genuinely loves WWX and sees him as equal to their other children, and she would not look anywhere near as good.

#mdzs #lotus sister #i still love jyl but... well #she's not actually a good sister to wwx despite being the only jiang to claim him as family #she looks good in comparison to the rest of the jiangs #but i'd pick wq over her any day #anon #asks

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brockkboeserr · 5 years ago

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how to mend a broken heart: step one - rafe cameron

Breaking Rafe Cameron’s bones didn’t work, but your plan to break his heart did. You falling for him too and having your heart shatter as collateral was an unexpected side effect. Ever the schemer, JJ’s come up with a new five step plan to mend what was broken.

co-authored with my love, freya @rekrappeter

pairing: Rafe Cameron x reader, unrequited!JJ x reader

warnings: angst, starting a relationship under false pretences, drinking and drug use

word count: 2.5k

a/n: and here’s step one, listen to the part two playlist on the series masterlist for maximum effect :). please please please leave us feedback, freya and i read every comment and cry, love you guys so much!!

“This is ridiculous, Pope,” you pouted, arms crossed over your chest as you leaned against him on John B’s sofa. You were pointedly ignoring JJ, equal parts furious for his part in your heartbreak and frustrated that he had tried to kiss you. The you of only a few months ago would have probably died for JJ to confess, the thought of pressing your lips together used to make you dizzy. Now, you were angry, and annoyed, and sad, and you wanted nothing more than to return to under the comforter where you had made your home for the past week as you cried.

“I have to agree,” Kie piped up from her spot at the kitchen table, “two weeks ago we were plotting to break his heart and now you want us to believe you’re interested in fixing things?”

“Look,” JJ started, screwing his eyes closed for a split second to gather his thoughts, “I don’t give a flying fuck about Rafe Cameron, but I care about you, y/n. You’re my best friend and I hate how the last plan panned out, but I want to make it up to you.” His eyes were focused on you, ignoring the other pogues staring at him.

Your lip wobbled as you avoided his stare, “You made it pretty clear how you felt about me on that beach, JJ.”

JJ sucked in a deep breath, looking at Pope for some silent advice but his friend gave him a doubtful look. He glanced at you again, noting your legs curling into your chest and how your eyes were raw and puffed. He hated that it was his fault that you were like this. “y/n,” JJ sighed, he closed the space between your bodies, kneeling down on the floor in front of you and gathering your hands in his larger ones, “You know me, you know me more than anyone in this room. You know I’m a little bit stupid, that I don’t think everything through, that I’m a liability sometimes..”

“And the rest,” Kie chimed in, but closed her lips when JJ shot an annoyed glare in her direction.

“You’re not stupid,” slipped out before you could stop it, years of reassuring the volatile blond before you having conditioned you to respond, “but you hurt me, and then you used my feelings for you against me.”

“That’s not-” he sighed, stopping himself before he could run his mouth again, knowing that of all times, you would not be impressed with his impatience. He looked around at your friends again, “Look, we can talk about that night in more detail later, just know that I’ve actually thought this thing through and I want to help you. Even Pope thinks it’s not a terrible idea.”

You turned to look at Pope sitting beside you, expecting him to deny JJ’s claim, but Pope nodded slightly in acknowledgement, causing you to sigh. “Alright, hit me.”

JJ smiled, crooked teeth on display, before letting go of your hands to get up and cross over to the forgotten chalkboard, spinning it around to reveal his five-step plan to mend your broken heart. You rolled your eyes at the childish doodles around the list, including but not limited to several broken hearts, one of which had a bandaid closing the gap between the two halves. You scanned the five steps he outlined, confused by what was written. You were about to question the last step, when he dramatically stepped forward, holding his arms wide open.

“Step one: tell the truth, see it through.”

You were standing outside on the back porch, leaning against the railing like you had so many weeks ago when the first plan had begun. JJ was leaning on the railing beside you, and the silence was starting to drive you mad.

“So,” you stated simply, eyes scanning the horizon. There was a light breeze that rustled your hair around your shoulders and JJ found himself looking at your side profile as you looked out.

“So,” he repeated uselessly, fidgeting with his hands.

“You said we could talk about that night in detail later, well it’s later and you need to start talking,” you told him.

He sighed, uncomfortably shifting his weight from his left foot to his right and back, “I didn’t tell you I love you just because of what we have, i-it’s different. You read all those shitty online stories about best friends becoming lovers and it comes with so much complications-”

“And I’m not worth that?” you ask, crossing your arms in front of your chest.

“N-no, that’s not what I meant,” JJ spluttered out, “My mom left, my dad’s… well you know about that, and fuck, y/n, you’re all I have left. If it didn’t work out and I lost you…”

“Well, look how that turned out,” you snapped, “you nearly lost me anyway.”

“Nearly?” He asked, the slight lilt of hope shining through his voice.

You looked up, eyes rolled to the sky, “you’re my best friend, J, and I don’t want to lose you anymore than you want to lose me.” A smile tugged at the corner of JJ’s lips, but you raised your hand to stop him from grinning, “I’m not saying I forgive you for what you did, what I’m saying is that I’m not going to let Rafe Cameron come between us, no matter how I feel about him.”

“Okay…” JJ trailed off.

“And that goes both ways. If we’re doing this, you can’t argue with me over my feelings for him anymore. I’m telling you now, I love Rafe a-and if this works, I’m going to be with him.”

JJ tried to hide the grimace that graced his face but he failed miserably, making you groan in annoyance. “No, y/n, I promise. I’ll try, I’ll try my god damn hardest if it means I still have you in my life because I don’t know what I’d do if you weren’t in it.”

“You’d probably be stuck in jail.” You giggled, and JJ lit up at the sound. He hadn’t heard you laugh in at least a week, if not longer and it filled the hole in his chest a little.

“Probably,” he shrugged, offering his hand to you with the intention of starting your secret handshake, but you pulled on his arm and pulled him in for a brief hug.

“I haven’t forgiven you yet,” you told him sternly as you pulled away, poking his chest, “you’re going to have to earn it.”

“Noted.”

Finding Rafe was easy.

It was nearing sundown and you had a strong feeling you knew exactly where he would be. There was something soothing, calming, about watching the sun set over the cliffedge where he had confided in you about his mom. You spotted him when you pulled up, sitting on the hood of his truck. The fading sunlight cast a glow against his face that had you shielding your eyes as you approached. Your heart skipped a beat at the sight of him for the first time in a week. You had gone from seeing him every day, wrapped in his arms to nothing, not even a cursory text or notification.

Getting Rafe to hear you out was harder.

The utter look of betrayal that mirrored his expression only a week ago greeted you when he turned around. You felt your heart clench at the knowledge that your actions were responsible for such loathing in his eyes. That you had been the one to hurt him and cause him pain. You hadn’t seen him look this devastated since that day that you had sat on his lap and held his face in your hands as he shared the most traumatic event of his life with you. Without realizing, your eyes had filled with tears, the tip of your nose burning at the sensation.

“What are you doing here?” he asked harshly, “I thought I told you to never speak to me again.”

You close your eyes and tilt your head up to keep the tears from spilling, “I know, I just. I wanted to tell you the truth, all of it.” You want to explain to him, really explain to him, until he understands that while it had started out with poor intentions you had really fallen in love with him. That he owned your entire heart, held it in his hands, and controlled its fate.

“JJ painted a pretty accurate portrait of it all, I think.” He replied, tone still unpleasant. Your stomach dropped, you knew he would be upset and angry, but a small part of you had hoped he would be open to listening to you.

“Just hear me out, please listen to me. You can tell me to fuck off after I’m done, and I’ll leave you alone.” You say, completely genuine. If he really wanted nothing to do with you, you would respect that. It would hurt like hell, but you would understand. You could only imagine if the roles had been reversed, if Topper or Kelce had cornered you and told you the entire thing had just been some bet to break your heart.

When Rafe didn’t reply, you slowly closed the gap between you, lifting yourself up onto his truck, you felt him stiffen beside you and let out an exhale of annoyance. “You know what, y/n? I can’t even look at you right now.”

“I-I understand that, Rafe, but this week has been one of, if not, the worst week of my life-”

Rafe scoffed, cutting you off, and his hands balled into fists on his lap. “You don’t have the right to shove that in my face, I fell in love with a girl that was playing me. I thought you were different but you’re exactly like those other pogues. You’re no better than who you thought I was.” You feel the white hot guilt spread across your body uncomfortably as you consider his words. When this had all started, you never thought you would succeed at actually breaking his heart, didn’t really even consider that he had one. More importantly, you never thought you would succeed at crushing your own heart in the process.

“What I did, what we did as a group, was wrong and I know that now but I got so caught up in the whole island feud that I wasn’t thinking right,” you sighed, “I never thought I’d get you to fall in love with me, I thought it was something I’d do for a week and then give up, but-”

“But you succeeded.” He states simply, arms crossed as he cuts off your rambling.

“But I fell in love with you, Rafe. The whole thing backfired, and I ended up breaking my own heart in the process.” You can hear the desperation taking over your tone of voice, recognizing his closed off body language as an indication that this conversation was about to be over before it had really begun.

“That’s really great, y/n, thanks for the insight.” Rafe retorted, rolling his eyes and jumping from the bonnet. His tone was raw and hateful, and it felt like a knife pushing through your chest as he walked away from you, again.

You followed him, protesting for him to stop but he wasn’t listening. He opened the driver’s door, and you mustered up the courage to slam it shut with all your force, making him swing his head to look at you bewildered. Tears were brimming in the corner of his eyes, his chest heaving heavily with every breath he took. “What more do you want from me, y/n? I listened, I processed, and the only thing I got from that was that you didn’t even apologize for what you did!”

Watching the tears slide down his cheeks made you speechless, you did truly break his heart. “I-I thought…” You mumbled, and he shook his head in disappointment.

“I thought you were different, you did a great job playing someone you’re not.” He’s looking at you and it’s like he’s seeing you for the first time and doesn’t like what is in front of him. You shrink a little under his heated gaze, so similar to that first night you spent together but yet millions of miles of distance between then and now.

“Rafe, you don’t understand. When I was with you, that was the real me. Yo-you fell in love with me,” you whispered, taking a step closer to him and reaching for his hand but he pulled it away. “Just know, that every moment we spent together, I fell deeper in love with you.”

Rafe Cameron has never been loved before. No one has ever told him how much they loved him for who he was. His own family found it an effort to love him, and looking at you right now, declaring your love for him with tears streaming down your cheeks, he couldn’t help but think that maybe not being loved was a good thing. You never had to deal with the heartache and unexpected complications that came to giving yourself to someone. The only time he experienced true love was when you were lying underneath him, the softest smile on your face and you kissed the palm of his hand, in that moment, he felt on top of the world. But his world came shattering down when JJ Maybank found him that day. He wasn’t sure if he could survive another heartbreak.

“Have a good life, y/l/n,” he muttered without sparing you another glance, successfully navigating his way into the driver side of his vehicle as you stood uselessly beside it, tears falling from your eyes.

You stood there watching as he drove away, not moving from your spot until the truck had turned the corner, disappearing from your sight entirely. Rubbing away at your eyes and at the tear tracks on your cheeks, you were despondent at the prospect of Rafe Cameron never forgiving you and having walked out of your life for good this time. Fuck this plan, fuck the other plan, you thought angrily to yourself, walking back to your car. And especially fuck JJ Maybank, as you drove away from the cliffside that had meant so much to you. You found yourself wishing, not for the first time and likely not for the last time, that you had listened to Pope in the first place and never gone through with the stupid bet in the first place. Sure you would have never known Rafe’s love, but you also would have never known this heartbreak.

htbah taglist (link in the series masterlist!!):

@solllaris�� @drewswannabegirl @starrystarkey93 @httpstarkey @sweetlysilent @drewstarkey @dontjinx-it @ultranikilove @spencereidbasis @meaganjm @starlightstarkey @thortheestallion @jiaraendgame @idocarealot @tempestuousjj @pink-meringues @dpaccione @arianabrashierstuff @softstarkey @loveylangdon @xenagzb @teenwaywardasgardian @prejudic3 @nxsmss @canibeoneofthepogues @outerbanksbro @obx-direction-sos @nqbmf @digniteas @annedub @colorful-queen-of-the-roses @yesp0ny @loveniallandharryonedirection @fantasticpsychicfanfish @girls-breaking-hearts @beautyandthebleh @casper17 @mozz-are-lla @parkershoco @unfortunatekiwitrash @loverofmineluke @slutforjjmaybank @skiesofthesketchy @httpstarkey @sugarcoatedcalum @amorisxx @trinnwazheree @stargazingstarkey @obx-saltlife @juliarose21 @hyperactive2411 @mcarignan @feyrecauldron-blessed @sportygal55 @popcrone818 @wtfkie @raekenliar @letsgotothehop @walkingtothesun @outerbanksbro @summerkaulitz @glux64 @itslilithsstuff @kaitieskidmore1 @mycowatemyhw @poguepunk @routledgebaby @teenwolfobx @pancakefancake @princessnnylzays @onlygetaway @hoodpankow @shawnswife2004 @glittercoveredsouls @fangirlvoice

rodeo rafe babies who said they were interested:

@royalmerchant @outerbankslut @honeyycheek @jellyfishbeansontoast @ilovejjmaybank @kindahavefeelingskindaheartless @girlsru1eboysdroo1 @https-luna @butgilinsky @rae131415

diverdcwn everything taglist:

@velyssaraptor @danicarosaline @copper-boom @x-lulu @prejudic3 @downbytheouterbanks @ilovejjmaybank @bricksatanakinswindow @jellyfishbeansontoast @sunwardsss @rudyypankow @im-a-stranger-thing @alexa-playafricabytoto @hoodpankow @sortagaysortahigh @socialwriter @euphoricheyward @anxietyandtacos @diverrdown @stargazingstarkey @rafej-cambanks @stfukie

#rafe cameron x reader #rafe cameron x you #rafe cameron imagine #rafe cameron fanfiction #rafe obx #rafe x you #rafe x reader #rafe x y/n #rafe cameron x y/n #rafe imagine #rafe fanfiction #rafe cameron #rafe cameron angst #rafe cameron series #freyby writes #diverdcwn writes #htmabh

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pearl-star · 4 years ago

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Two Way Link

When Marinette cracks and gets akumatized, it’s not what she’s expecting. Hawkmoth is equally confused and more worried than she is. Turns out the mindlink is a two way streak, and her earrings make the link even stronger. Needless to say, some secrets got revealed.

Marinette had allowed herself to imagine herself as an akuma before. It was kind of hard not to when their class started bets for if Marinette or Adrien would get akumatized first. It also didn’t help after seeing Chat Noir’s akumazation first hand. If she ever got akumatized, Hawkmoth wouldn’t win. Oh No. The world would be in ruins. So if it wasn’t already an obvious goal, Marinette made it her mission to never even let a butterfly touch her. Of course she’s only human, and when she’s sleep deprived and dealing with a lot of extra stress her emotions run rampant. Not only did she deal with both night and day akumas for the past week, she also had extra work planning the fundraising events and the school trip. Include all her requests from her friends for different things and her regular school work, Marinette was already at her breaking point. Top it off with a couple idiotic stories from Rossi while the girl would slip in comments dissing the bluenette, and you got the recipe for a perfect akuma victim.

Marinette wasn’t even in the right headspace to try to hold off her emotions. She simply nursed her large cup of coffee, that may or may not be the 6th cup of the day, as she stewed in her seat. Why was her class a bunch of idiots? Like Marinette cared for them still, don’t get her wrong, but they hanged off her every word like it was air. Why didn’t they get curious and do a little research of their own? It would have saved everyone the trouble. And Adrien’s dumb high road advice would do more harm than good. He’s worried about Lila getting akumatized? Try the whole class when the truth gets out. Of course, Marientte had almost been akumatized because of Lila. Maybe she should have slipped that into her conversation with Adrien. That might have changed his mind. It didn’t matter much now though. She had just begun to speak normally around him. He might think that Marinette was lying about it to make him see her way, and that wasn’t a risk she was willing to take.

No one even noticed the butterfly coming into the room. It was only noticed when it landed on the coffee cup that Marinette held and the glowing mask appeared on her face. Very quickly, the class turned around and stared at their class rep. Marinette merely blinked a few times before groaning. “Really!? Come on! I was doing so good until now. Okay, you know what, fine. You want to akumatized me? Whatever. Just put the butterfly somewhere other than my coffee. I need that if I’m going to make it through today. You’re to blame for this, by the way. You couldn’t have just stopped with the akumas for the day could you. I mean one a day is bad enough. Why did you have to do two in one day? And at, like, 2am dude? Really?” Hawkmoth was just confused as the rest of her class. Marinette’s face scrunched up before her jaw dropped. “WAIT! GABRIEL AGRESTE!? YOU’RE HAWKMOTH!!?” The class paused before freaking out. Hawkmoth paled. He didn’t even get time to do his monologue before the girl started to speak out at him. As he started to reading deeper into her thoughts, he realized something. “You’re… Ladybug?” He was honestly surprised that this clumsy girl could possibly be Ladybug. Marinette just scowled. “Oh stop. I can feel your judgment from here. It’s a secret identity for a reason. Of course I’ll act differently with magical jewelry. Except, you don’t act too different than you do in real life. Maybe treat your son better, will you? He needs to have a backbone for when Rossi and Cholé drape themselves over him.” Cholé gasped and Lila tried to turn the tale but Marinette continued.

“I’ll give Cholé the benefit of the doubt since she had been childhood friends with him, but what Lila’s doing is bordering of sexual harassment. And you employed her as a model too. Like do you even care about you own son’s mental well-being?” Gabriel made the mistake of thinking about Lila and Marinette’s face shifted from shock to neutral. “Okay, so you made her spy on Adrien and report back to you as well as cause akumas. Got it. And that’s an interesting fact about her willingly getting akuamtized. Too bad my class has become too ignorant to realize that every word she says is nothing more than bull crap.” Hawkmoth, Gabriel, should have tried to rein her in. However when he tried it, magic was interfering. It was something that Nooroo had warned him about once before when he expressed the desire to akumatized Ladybug or Chat Noir. They would naturally have more resistance to him, especially Ladybug since her powers balanced for good and becoming evil would take drastic measures. Before he could try to act, the girl spoke again. “Oh, it’s nice to know that you at least let Nooroo talk. Seriously, I forgot about that whole Sandboy fiasco for a second. You couldn’t have at least allowed Nooroo to enjoy his whatever number cycle in peace. You had to traumatize so many people by creating their nightmares.” No one noticed as Adrien slipped away to transform.

Plagg flew out of his pocket and had the audacity to be laughing. “What is so funny?!” He demanded. Marinette was akumatized! Not only that, but she was Ladybug. Ladybug was akumatized and the akuma won’t be purified. Nor would any of the damage be reversed. Not to mention that his own dad was apparently Hawkmoth. Plagg caught his breath and was able to speak. “I’m sorry, but it’s too funny! This love square you guys had going on was great entertainment already. Top that with what Spots is doing and it’s gold.” Adrien decided to ignore what Plagg was saying for now and transform instead. While he was doing that, Marinette decided to discover something very important: what Gabriel’s motivation was.

Marinette clamped a hand to her mouth as she pulled the memory from his mind. Then that shock turned to hot rage. “ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?” ALL THIS TIME YOU HAVE KEPT YOUR WIFE IN A GLASS COFFIN IN YOUR FUCKING BASEMENT LAIR?!?” Hawkmoth actually flinched from the raw power and anger she emanated. He made the mistake of recalling the peacock miraculous, setting the girl off on another tangent. “AND YOU’RE ALLOWING NATHALIE TO USE A BROKEN MIRACULOUS?!? Wow! Just, Wow!” Maybe if he detransformed and left now, he wouldn’t have to face the girl’s wrath. Nooroo’s powers allowed them to feel the strength of a person’s emotions. Marinette Dupain-Cheng’s emotions showed that even without powers or a miraculous, she would kill him with her bare hands. If he was told a day before that she would be capable of murder, he would never have believed it. Now though, he was scared.

It was at that time that Chat Noir decided to bust in. He was both shocked and impressed that Marinette was still holding out. Maybe if he destroyed the object now she won’t be transformed. Of course would that negatively effect her somehow? Before he could ponder it longer, the girl in question acted first. “You better meet me in front of your mansion and give me both the butterfly and peacock miraculous. You also better fire Rossi and put a restraining order on her so she can’t touch Adrien again. Otherwise this cup will be replaced with your neck.” Marinette crushed the cup with her hand and the butterfly flew out. Standing up, she called on her transformation before her kwami could protest. She swiped the akuma out from the air and looked around. The whole class was quite. Lila didn’t even try to say anything, and in fact she shrunk under her stare. “Alrighty then. Time to go kitty.” She walked calmly out of the room, ignoring everything that just had happened. Chat paused before following her.

Back in his lair, Gabriel detransformed from shock. Nooroo tried to hide his smirk. Wordlessly, he went back into the main part of his house and approached Natalie. She looked confused. “What’s wrong? I thought you were finally akuamtizing Miss Dupain-Cheng?” Gabriel just shook his head and held his hand out. He was slightly shaking. “Just give me the peacock miraculous. Turns out, she’s a lot more dangerous than expected.” Natalie wanted to question her boss, but he seemed to be in shock. She did as asked and followed him as he walked out the front doors of the mansion. Outside was a smiling Ladybug and a concerned Chat Noir. Ladybug’s smile looked dangerous, like she was giving a warning. When Gabriel willingly handed over both miraculouses, Ladybug laughed. A dangerous sweetness dripping out. “Thank you! Also you better be honest with what you’re wife was doing with the miraculous when the police question you. I’ll see if the damage can be undone without the potential for ending the world. Oh also I will be taking your son away. He deserves better parents and I’m sure that mine will spoil him. Chat you take his assistant, I’ll grab him. It’s time to drop them off.” Chat grabbed Natalie and had her over his shoulder before she could react. Ladybug did the same to Gabriel, ensuring that neither could make a grab for their miraculouses.

A lot of things happened on that day. Hawkmoth and Mayura were announced to be defeated. Gabriel confessed to having Lila work for him both as a spy and as a willing accomplish for Hawkmoth. Adrien’s mom was brought to a hospital and Master Fu repaired the peacock miraculous and reversed the damage done to both her and Natalie. Lila was taken off to serve time in juvie and the two adults went to jail. Adrien was not to blame and was unofficially adopted by Marinette’s parents, which resulted in him spending a lot of time at the bakery. Adrien’s mom and Gabriel both revealed how she was forced into the marriage and forced to use the miraculous against her will. She got a divorce and ensured that Adrien got therapy. He was able to quit modeling and even got a restraining order against Lila just in case. He revealed himself to Marinette after a month and they decided to date. Her class did everything to make it up to the bluenette, but she merely shrugged at their words. She could care less now. They only wanted her to be their friend again because she was Ladybug. She and Chat announced their retirement to Paris two weeks after Hawkmoth’s defeat, although she still got to see Tikki and Plagg. It seemed like getting akumatized was the best thing that had happened to her.

#ml crack #miraculous fanfiction #miraculous ladybug fanfic #miraculous marinette #miraculous lb #crack fic #akumatized #marinette dupen chang #mlb #ml ladybug

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missfangirll · 4 years ago

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Hi! I saw the prompt post. Idk if you’re into kid fics, feel free to ignore! I would love Shen Wei/ Yunlan, established relationship, with a lil kid =) Thank you!

Since I have never ever written a kid fic, all my first attempts turned rather silly, so I had to change the situation a bit.

I had to make the kid a bit older (imagine her about 13) and throw them into a situation where they could be super-dads 😁

I hope you like it regardless. 😊

A million thanks to @mllorei for pushing me to write a proper ending. Title is taken from the song "Superheroes” by The Script.

Learning to fly

“Hello, is this Chief Zhao I’m talking to? I couldn't reach Professor Shen, that’s why I’m calling you instead. It’s about Jia.”

Zhao Yunlan had to hold onto the edge of his desk. With only this one sentence the school secretary had said, a myriad of scenarios whirled through his brain, one more horrible than the other.

“Yes”, he managed, “speaking. Did something happen to my daughter?”

There was a pause on the line that made his knees buckle. Eventually he heard: “How fast can you be here?”

Zhao Yunlan didn’t even bother to answer. He ended the call, flung the file he had read before on the sofa and sprinted out of his office, through the bullpen and was out of the door before anyone of his team could as much as blink.

The ride to Jia’s school was the worst seventeen minutes of his life. He tried to call Shen Wei a dozen times, but to no avail, and finally sent him a voice message. The answering silence was almost too much to bear, his mind racing and his hands sweaty.

When he arrived at the school, he just left the jeep at the entrance – they hopefully would recognize it as an SID vehicle – and sprinted up the stairs to the principal’s office.

Upon entering the corridor he almost fainted with relief. Outside the office, on a wooden chair sat his daughter; a grim expression on her face, eyes red, her black hair an angry cloud around her head. Her t-shirt – her favourite, the superhero one – had a large dirt stain on the shoulder. Next to her Zhao Yunlan noticed three more students, looking equally mangled. All four turned their heads when he entered, the boys staring curiously at him, while Jia’s face lit up in visible relief. He smiled at her, and before he could knock on the door, it opened and the school’s principal appeared, seemingly stressed and thoroughly furious. He glared at Zhao Yunlan and waved him in, nodding at Jia to follow.

When they both had sat down, he took a meaningful breath and looked accusingly at Zhao Yunlan.

“Chief Zhao”, he began. “I am well aware of the fact that our government has made an effort to welcome all Dixingren here in Haixing, and show them they are”, he made a dramatic pause and cleared his throat, “accepted here, but this”, he waved a hand at Jia, “is too much. I won’t accept this!”

Zhao Yunlan raised an eyebrow. “First of all, I would appreciate it if you didn’t call my kid an ‘it’.” He sat up straighter. “And secondly, I have no idea what you are talking about.”

Jia, who hadn’t said anything, looked down at her lap. Zhao Yunlan reached over, taking one of her hands in his, brushing his thumb over her knuckles.

The principal inhaled meaningfully, probably in order to continue his tirade, but Zhao Yunlan just fixed the other man with a death glare that he normally reserved for unwilling suspects. “Just tell me what happened. Slowly.”

The principal huffed indignantly and looked condescendingly at Jia, who still hadn’t moved. “That...kid of yours”, he said grandly, “has endangered and traumatized other students.” Zhao Yunlan raised an eyebrow, but stayed silent and motioned him to go on. “She has used her powers on them! She could have killed them! She is to be expelled, I am not –”

Zhao Yunlan silenced him with a wave of his hand, turned to the girl and gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. “You tell me.”

Jia inhaled shakily and looked at him, balled fists, barely holding back tears. “They were bullying A-Yao again”, she said angrily. “I just wanted to help him, Baba. I told them to stop, but they laughed at me. And then they asked what I wanted to do, and then one of them shoved me, and….” She took a shaky breath. “And then I made a shield, like Da showed me. They kept hitting it and it kinda…backfired?” She was close to crying again and Zhao Yunlan stroked her head. “It’s alright, darling, you didn’t do anything wrong”, he assured her.

At that, the principal bristled and loudly cleared his throat. “Excuse me,” he began, but before he could say anything more, the air next to his desk began to sizzle, a portal flickering into existence. Before it had fully materialized, Shen Wei stepped through it so hurriedly that he almost collided with the desk, while the teacher next to him squealed in shock and pressed a hand to his mouth.

Shen Wei shot Zhao Yunlan an alarmed look, then let his eyes wander over his daughter, taking in her tousled hair and red eyes and frowned. “I received your message”, he explained shortly, “and came as soon as I did. What is so urgent?”

The principal apparently saw a chance to save his case. “Your daughter,” he pointed a finger at the girl, “has used her…magic”, he spat out the word with visible disgust, “on other students and almost killed them! This kind of –“ He interrupted himself suddenly, because Shen Wei had taken a step closer, looming over the smaller man with a withering glare. In the following silence, he turned around and raised a questioning eyebrow at Zhao Yunlan, who just shrugged. “She protected someone with a shield and the recoil hit them when they kept throwing punches”, he explained.

Shen Wei turned back to the principal, a dangerous glint in his eyes. “You call me here for an emergency, just to tell me that my daughter heroically saved another student from some bullies – which would have been your obligation – and you want to punish her for it?” Before the other man could get a word in, he continued, ice in his voice. “Isn’t it more likely that you are…biased in that situation because of my daughter’s heritage?” He took another step closer. “Because of my heritage?”

The principal shrunk further into his chair, shaking his head furiously. “No, Hei Pao Shi, no, I would never –“ Shen Wei interrupted him. “Then I take it we are finished with this matter. I expect you to punish the bullies that almost hurt my daughter.” The man wilted further, but didn’t object as Shen Wei took his daughter’s hand and nodded to Zhao Yunlan, who had grinned silently at the exchange. With his free hand, he waved a portal into existence and the three of them stepped through.

When they emerged in their living room, Shen Wei turned around, pulling the girl in a tight embrace. Pressing her face into his chest, she couldn't suppress the sobs anymore. Zhao Yunlan stepped closer and hugged both of them from the other side, soothingly stroking Jia’s hair.

“Hey, darling, it’s alright. Shh, you’re safe now.” She hitched a breath and nuzzled into her father’s chest. “Of course I'm safe, I..I...I could have kicked their asses!"

He grinned. “You did! I am proud of you. You stood up for a friend, that’s what superheroes do, right?”

Jia snuffled and wiped her nose at Shen Wei’s shirt, tightening her arms around him. He smiled affectionately at her, his hand reaching for Zhao Yunlan’s waist to pull him closer into the hug. When the girl pulled away to look up at him, he met her gaze.

"But… but Da, I… I used my powers. And you told me not to. I..."

"It's okay. You didn't do anything wrong here, sweetheart." With Shen Wei stroking her back, Jia snuggled back into the embrace and let out a sigh.

After Jia had changed – and Zhao Yunlan had remembered the jeep still in the school parking lot and sheepishly had asked his husband to portal him there to get it –, they sat down for an early dinner. Jia was still tucked under Zhao Yunlan’s arm, while Shen Wei filled her bowl with her favourite pieces.

When she dug in, they smiled at each other over her head and Zhao Yunlan leaned in to press a kiss to his husband’s lips.

“You know, Hei Pao Shi, that was really hot how you crushed the principal”, he whispered loudly against Shen Wei’s cheek.

“Yunlan!”

“Eww!”

Zhao Yunlan laughed at the outraged expression on both their faces and pressed a kiss to his daughter’s hair, then one to Shen Wei’s nose.

“I love you both, you know? So much.”

#guardian #shen wei #zhao yunlan #weilan #fluff #guardian fic #my writing #queenfriday17 #kid fic

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