#maybe he is a fashion disaster. maybe he married a girl half his age

[thomas-mvller]

34': Neuer! What a save! A cross into the Bayern box from the left is poorly dealt with and Pefok is able to get the ball down and fire on the turn. Neuer tips over in agile fashion, and the resulting corner is deflected behind for another, before that next one is cleared to safety. 90+2': Union work a late move onwards and Vertessen is in on the left. He fires across but Neuer saves excellently. It's then adjudged to be offside, yet still, what a great save. - Live commentary taken from 365 Scores

[ohholyfanfics]

Happens in Vegas|Niall Horan

Pairing: Niall Horan x Orginal Character 

Scarlett greeted everyone with a soft smile as she strolled through the pub doors, it was their first Friday day night gathering together. It was clear to safe that everyone had their fair share of quarantine changes, others indulged in self-care, while others happened to eat anything and everything before them. For Scarlett Ray Jenson not much had changed really from her ordinary day, expect her daily walks to the little coffee shop she learned to love. She had been blessed with a job that didn’t always require her presence in the office unless needed.

Scarlett had landed her dream job straight of her UNI, and she knew that a certain someone in the group was to thank. She obviously couldn’t thank the Irish man enough for pulling a few strings with one of his partners in helping her land editor as VOGUE. Niall James Horan wasn’t a fashion guy, no his interest laid in spreadsheets, and start-up companies. He was at the age of twenty-seven named one of the youngest -self-made millionaire. She had no doubt in her mind that his new partnership would land him the title billionaire by the end of his quarter.

“Welcome princess.” Deo chuckled softly as he passed her a drink. She couldn’t help the eye roll as she slipped off her office coat. It was slightly chilly for a spring day, yet not expected for London. “Coming from the office?”

“Hmm.,” she mumbled softly take a sip of her drink. The last thing on her mind was being cooped up in her home when she could actually be surrounded by humans for a few hours. “After this lockdown, I don’t see myself working for home for a good while.” She added as everyone was quick to agree.

The group was a few rounds in before Niall strolled through the crowded pub, his tie hung loosely from his neck as he expected the pint handed to him. He was definitely stressed and overworked. Scarlett eyed him with a certain level of curiosity but choosing to keep quiet. It was clear to the group, that even though Niall had been the one responsible for her career he wasn’t the most found of her.

Scarlett unlike the rest of them grew up ina privileged setting, one that Niall describes as ‘silver spoon’ she was used to the best of the best and nothing less of. Which was surprising when she hadn’t used her father’s influences to land her an editing job, but yet insisting on doing it on her own. Niall found it most interesting when she had explained her reasoning behind it all.

“I don’t want to live in the shadows of my parents' success. I want to make something out of myself.”

Maybe that was the reason why he had decided that she needed that help in landing her dream job. He also knew that she hadn’t applied to VOGUE though it is her dream. One night after a few too many pints Niall Horan found himself calling in for a favor that ultimately landed him in the girl’s wave of thankfulness jesters that had him a blushing disaster when she had shown up at his offices with a bottle of his favorite whiskey in toll.

“What are we discussing?” he asked as he avoided looking in her direction. It had been almost three months since he had last seen everyone, her included. Yet, if his newfound feelings discovered he wasn’t sure how’d he be feeling about seeing her for the first time since.

“Just how we all need a break.”

Niall raised his eyebrow at Rick waiting for him to continue on with his explanation. It was clear that they had a plan brewing and he wasn’t sure if he would be willing to participate. Running a business didn’t always allow him to venture into whatever plans the group had made, maybe its why he also chose to work a half days on Saturdays. Friday nights, were pub nights and he couldn’t dare miss ‘em unless absolutely necessary.

“Just quarantine was nice and all mate, but we need a break,” Deo spoke as Niall nodded his head knowing where he was coming from. “I mean our little Scarlett here has even been physically present at the office all week!”

His eyes twinkled at the information provided, it wasn’t a secret that she had proved to work best at home. Even though she had a perfectly amazing office back at VOGUE, Scarlett loved the peace and quiet at home as she brainstormed for whatever segment she was handed.

“Oh is that so?” he chuckled softly as their eyes meet briefly.  He watched in amusement as the Brit shrugged her shoulders.

“Need some human interaction.”

“Anyways, we decide that a trip is most certainly a possibility.” Deo finished off his train of thought as loud agreements and cheers were heard amongst the group. Niall had no doubt that this was alcohol-infused, but yet the idea of a holiday intrigued him.

“That’s not bad actually.”

“We’d obviously have to wait for things to settle down first,” Scarlett spoke as everyone nodded their heads. Obviously asking for time off after months at home won’t hit well everyone’s bosses, unless your Niall Horan. “Let’s give it a few weeks,” she added.

“Do we know the location?”

So many voices were speaking at once as Scarlett chuckled softly taken in everyone’s reasoning and their locations. It was hard to focus when she suddenly got an idea of her own. Scarlett had been asked to do a piece of vacation spot for the American magazine and she had a few ideas of her own.

“What about Vegas?” she asked as everyone quieted down. Niall looked at her with amusement, yet strongly found the idea promising. “We all love a few pints, and it’s Vegas. So much to do, we can get away with a few days in the song while enjoying one of the best places America has to offer.”

“I like the sound of that, plus aren’t you only a few hours away from California?”

“Yeah, I went down to Vegas a few months back actually.” she pointed out as the group nodded their head recalling her being flown out and missing a few pub nights.

“So it’s settled then Vegas?” Ricky asked as everyone nodded their heads at the idea. It was absolutely perfect, two paid weeks of vacation.

“You know what they say right?” Willy pipped up from beside Scarlett a wicked grin on his face in her direction. “What happens in Vegas stay’s in Vegas.” 

“Is that you tell us we can leave you there? Cause I most certainly won’t mind.” she countered back casuing Ricky to chuckle softly at her sassy reply. 

Willy scoffed slighlty as her response waving her off. “No, but watch you do something stupid.” he laughed. 

“Please Willy the chances are low..” she huffed. “Plus if anything you’re the one most likely to come out of this trip married to some stripper.” she mumbled as the group erupted in laughter. 

“She gotcha mate.” 

[inthebreadbinwrites]

losers getting married

Reddie

out of the losers, richie and eddie get married first.

it’s not a surprise, considering they’ve been together since sophomore year.

richie has been saying he’s going to marry eddie for years and eventually eddie starts saying it too.

it’s how it happens that’s a shock, even though it’s in the most richie and eddie way possible.

when they’re in college, they all decide to drive down to vegas for ben’s 21st birthday as he’s the youngest.

they all get piss drunk and that’s when reddie decides to get married.

both of them eye up the chapel when they walk past but eddie is the one who actually ‘proposes’.

“hey richie. let’s get married.” “fuck yeah eds!”

they pull all the others into the chapel and quickly set up their ceremony.

the losers are a bit shocked but go along with it, partly because of the alcohol and partly because richie and eddie are stubborn shits and will do it with or without them there.

they decide that stan and bev will be richie’s groomsmen and mike and ben will be eddie’s.

bill gets to chuck roses onto the floor as richie walks down the aisle.

their vows are a bit of a disaster. richie drunkenly cries in the middle of a metaphor comparing eddie to a bowl of spaghetti and eddie attempts to make your mom jokes.

they finally get through them though and they are married by an elvis impersonator.

he also offers to sing the song for their first dance, as long as it’s by elvis. he expects them to choose ‘can’t help falling in love’. they end up dancing to ‘hound dog’

richie’s wearing a hawaiian print button up and converse and eddie’s wearing a blazer and a tie that somehow ends up ties around his head.

when they wake up the next morning, both are surprisingly relaxed when they find out. they knew it would happen eventually.

they do end up buying new rings. they get matching gold ones with r + e engraved on the inside.

they look exactly the same, and they constantly mix the rings up.

on their fifteenth anniversary, they decide to renew their vows.

they choose to have a big ceremony this time, with their children involved.

this time around, they have full suits and they actually have prepared vows.

they still have their first dance to hound dog though.

they both agree that both times were perfect.

Benverly

ben and bev get together in their senior year of high school and have a fairly serious relationship throughout college.

they don’t get married straight after they graduate college, instead waiting until they have jobs to start discussing it.

at 28, they finally decide it’s the right time. ben has landed a job at an architecture firm after an internship and bev is working under a fashion designer.

even though they discuss it, ben wants to surprise her when he actually proposes.

he proposes on the 4th of july, during the firework display. it’s beautiful.

they have don’t have a very long engagement, only waiting eight months to tie the knot.

ben mostly lets bev plan it, although he steps in when things get wild.

(we are not serving weed brownies, bev!)

beverly makes her own dress and it’s truly beautiful.

it’s sleeveless and an almost golden off white color, with a lace back. she wears her hair down with some daisies weaves in.

ben wears a suit with a yellow tie.

bev has richie as her best man as well as stan and her friend kay as the rest of her wedding party.

ben has mike as his best man as well as bill and eddie serving as groomsmen.

they have mike and stan’s dog as the ring bearer and bev’s niece as the flower girl.

richie takes bev to a strip club for her bachelorette party although stan intervenes before things get too wild.

ben has a lowkey bachelor party at a fancy restaurant and then a broadway show, because he loves musicals.

the actual wedding is perfect and they have their first dance to ‘can’t take my eyes off of you’

Stanlon

stan and mike get together during their first year of college.

they have a very stable and loving relationship all the way through.

when they graduate mike brings up marriage.

stan says he doesn’t want to get married. his parents had a strained relationship and he always got the feeling that they were never really in love.

mike is hurt by this, because he always imagined he’d get married. before they died, his parents had been deeply in love and he always wished for a relationship like that.

they have their first major fight after that discussion and stan goes to stay with eddie and richie for a few days.

it’s not a break up by any means but stan still feels unsure about their strong relationship for the first time.

most of all, he just misses mike. it leads to him doing a lot of thinking and realizing that he wants to spend the rest of his life with him.

he goes back home and they have several long talks.

they decide that they’re not completely tabling the idea of marriage and if they both feel ready at some point, they’ll do it.

some point occurs at ben and bev’s wedding. stan can’t help but take in the beauty of the ceremony and the couple’s happiness. he realizes he wants that for him and mike.

he decides to propose around two months later and finally works up the courage to actually ask mike three months after he decides.

there’s a part of him that’s terrified mike will have changed his mind about marriage and that he’ll say no, but he knows he has to at least ask.

he takes mike to the old farm where they spent their teenage days slowly falling for each other, but not knowing it.

he proposes at sunset. he has a whole speech planned, but he ends up just speaking from the heart instead.

mike is well and truly shocked but he says yes, because it’s everything he’s wanted for ages.

they have a long engagement as stan takes forever to plan everything to perfection.

almost two years after ben and bev, they finally get married at the farm.

they have the ceremony at night and they both wear matching tuxes.

they put lights up around the trees and give the guests candles to hold. it’s absolutely stunning.

they have similar wedding parties to ben and bev’s wedding, with richie being stan’s best man and ben being mike’s.

they have the reception in a large tent outside. their first dance is to hey ya! by outkast. it’s stan’s guilty pleasure and one of mike’s favorite songs.

instead of a traditional wedding cake, they have guests bake small cakes and then have a small competition for the best cake.

richie gets upset when his (inappropriate) cake doesn’t win, although he quickly shuts up when eddie assures him he secretly had the best.

stan gets drunk at the reception and spends the night telling mike how much he loves him and how glad he is that they did this.

mike falls in love with him just a little bit more, even though he didn’t think that was possible.

Bill + Audra

bill is the last one to get married.

he has a string of relationships in his 20s that never really work out and he starts to think that maybe he’s just not destined for marriage.

he throws himself into his work as an author and screenplay writer.

that’s when he meets audra phillips.

he’s at the coffee shop where he always writes when he first meets her.

she’s a new barista there and she gives him a sweet smile when he walks in.

throughout the next two weeks they slowly start to talk and bill finds himself developing feelings.

after some prompting from his friends, he decides to ask her out.

before she says yes, she reveals that she’s fresh out of rehab.

bill doesn’t care, he finds her perfect no matter what.

after there first date, they develop somewhat of a whirlwind romance.

he wants to propose to her a month after they start dating but the losers manage to talk him out of it.

they manage to hold him off for around five months.

he proposes on their six month anniversary.

she accepts of course, because she’s as far gone for bill as he is for her.

they get married on their one year anniversary in an intimate ceremony on the beach.

bill can’t quite believe his luck as she walks down the aisle, in a beautiful short sleeve dress.

he finds himself tearing up and he doesn’t think he’s ever felt so intensely happy before.

if you’d told him a year and a half ago he’d be here today he would have laughed in your face but here he is, marrying the love of his life.

he stutters a bit during his vows but audra just gives his hands a comforting squeeze, smiling sweetly.

they honeymoon in england, audra’s home country.

bill constantly uses the word wife and smiles every time he says it.

[jlalafics]

Part Four of “Rent Control”

We’re at the end...sort of. I’m a little nervous about this part and will be hiding with Toddler J (actually we’ll watching The Great British Baking Show in bed).

Please enjoy and I’ll see you at the epilogue!

If you haven’t read the other parts, follow the links below:

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Summary: Katniss Everdeen has found the perfect home in San Francisco—great neighborhood, an easy commute and, best of all, it’s rent controlled. There’s only one problem; the landlord will only rent to a married couple.

Enter Peeta Mellark.

_____

Rent Control

Part Four

“Katniss! Get out here!”

Effie was getting impatient.

“I’m coming!”

Katniss stared at herself in the mirror, her hands dancing over the delicate fabric. Effie was right; the silhouette was still in fashion. Thanks to her mother, Daphne, and Effie, the gown fit perfectly to her body.

However, when she looked in the mirror, Katniss felt like a fraud.

A beautiful couture fraud—but a fraud, nonetheless.

“Come on! Come on! Come on!”

This time it was her mother.

With a sigh, Katniss stepped out of the Abernathy guest room and into the living room.

There was a collective sigh as the three older women gazed at her in all her bridal glory.

She turned to the mirror that Effie had placed in the room to take a real look at herself.

The gown was off-white, sleeveless, with a modest V-neckline. The skirt was made of tulle while the top half was a satin bodice with a tulle overlay. It suited her olive coloring, making her skin look even richer and her dark hair lustrous.

Her mother’s contribution was the periwinkle blue band on the gown’s waist so she would have her ‘something blue’ while the jeweled flower resting on one side of the band was from Daphne. It would be her ‘something new.’

“It’s missing something,” Effie said as she approached her. Reaching into her pocket, the woman pulled out an ornate pearl hair clip. “This was my mother’s. She wore it on her wedding day—” Effie swallowed shallowly before continuing. “—I wore it for mine.” She then arranged it so that it clipped back one side of Katniss’ long locks. “And, now you’ll wear it for yours. It’s your ‘something old and borrowed.’”

“Oh Effie.” Her hand went to the delicate clip. “I couldn’t possibly—”

Effie shook her head. “A long time ago, we found out that it would be difficult for us to have children.” She let out a shaky breath. “And, now it seems unlikely—but I’d like to think that if I had a girl, she’d be similar to you. I mean, you have Haymitch’s coloring and your scowls are very alike!”

Katniss wiped her eyes before giving Effie a smile in the mirror.

“I’d be honored to be your pretend daughter…even though you would have to had been around 17 when you had me!” Katniss replied.

Effie tapped at her nose. “Somewhere around that age.” She kissed Katniss’ cheek. “You look beautiful.”

Katniss looked at herself in the mirror; she did look beautiful—as radiant as the sun.

It wasn’t real though.

And, then she could no longer face her reflection.

++++++

Peeta knocked on the closed door of Johanna’s boutique, spying Katniss in the window. Giving him a drawn smile, she placed the till back into the register and rounded the counter to let him in.

He couldn’t put his finger on it, but something had shifted in their relationship. Katniss was different; it wasn’t that she was any less affectionate. When they were alone, they had more than their fill of passion—lately, maybe even more so.

That fire in Katniss, however, seemed to have dimmed since that first dinner with their families.

“Hey,” she greeted him as the door was opened and he walked in quickly. “Johanna just left and I’m finishing up.”

“Do you need help?” he offered.

“You just finished up next door,” Katniss responded. “You still want to help?”

“Of course—if it means we get some time to ourselves,” Peeta said. “What do you need? I can fold or arrange the shoe display…”

He gave her a playful grin and Katniss let out a laugh—it felt good to hear it. She had been off in her own world, at times, and Peeta wanted nothing more but to make her smile.

It wasn’t hard to admit that he lived and died for that smile.

“How about you wipe the mirrors in the dressing rooms and then run the dry mop through the floor?” she suggested instead. “Cleaning supplies are in the back.”

Before long, they fell into silence. Peeta could hear her arranging the hangers on the various racks in the store as he wiped down the mirrors.

“Katniss?” he found himself calling out.

The shuffling of hangers stopped. “Yes?”

“What’s going on with you?” Peeta knew that he was treading a thin line. There was no response. “I can feel it. You’re pushing me away. Not physically—” He placed the rag down and pushed himself onto a seat in the small dressing room. “It’s just that I wake up every morning and then we lock eyes…you used to give me this smile—a smile just for me. You don’t do that anymore…”

He looked down at his folded hands, waiting for her response.

However, there was only silence.

“I’m sorry.”

Peeta looked up to find Katniss in front of him, her gaze on his hunched figure.

“Did I do something wrong?” he asked her.

Katniss knelt in front of him, her hand going to the nape of his neck. “No, you didn’t do anything.” She pressed her forehead to his. “It’s just been hard with our parents, your brothers, Prim…the fact that we’re supposed to get pretend remarried in like three days. It’s a lot.”

“I miss you,” Peeta admitted. “I mean, you’re with me—in my arms, in our bed—but you’re also a thousand miles away.”

She bit her lip anxiously before looking into his eyes.

“I know that I’ve been distracted, but there’s been a lot on my mind,” she said. “This whole wedding…and our families being so bonded now…it’s become bigger than us.”

He nodded in understanding. “I just don’t want to lose…us.”

“Scoot over.” Peeta shifted to give her space on the seat. Instead, Katniss sat on his lap. “You haven’t lost me. I guess I miss what we had before all of this craziness. I miss waking up to quiet mornings, lounging in bed and binge watching something on Netflix, Farmers Markets…you know this is the first time in almost two weeks that it’s just been us.”

“It has, hasn’t it?”

Katniss wrapped her arms around his neck. “Right now, I’m part angry, part exhausted, part horny…”

“Why are you angry?” he asked.

“I just want to find Gale and punch him in the nuts,” she muttered. “Him and his dumbass mouth—”

“Find me an address and I’ll come along with you,” Peeta said and Katniss grinned. “As for being tired, Prim told me before I left for work that she’s going out with Johanna and my brothers tonight for some sightseeing. I can draw you a bath so you can get some of that tension out.” He pressed a kiss to her shoulder. “As for being horny…”

She shifted, straddling him, and Peeta groaned.

“I’m wearing these new linen pants,” Katniss started, her lips going to the side of his mouth. “They’re supposed to feel like I’m wearing nothing at all.” She moved along him and a sliver of heat ran up his spine. “What do you think?”

“How about you close that curtain and we make a comparison?” Peeta countered, his hands already reaching for the button on her waistband.

Katniss grinned. “Of course. Anything for a customer.”

++++++

“I hate you so much right now,” Johanna told Katniss the next morning.

Prim, who was shuffling through Katniss’ closet, turned to her sister and new friend.

“What did Katniss do?”

“You had sex in my store!” Johanna looked to Katniss, who looked down at the bridal magazine on her lap. “Don’t deny it! My morning lead just texted and asked why there’s handprints all over one of the dressing room mirrors! She says it looks like someone was trying to recreate that car sex scene in Titanic!”

“Glimmer is so dramatic,” Katniss replied. “It was not that bad.”

Johanna turned to her; arms crossed. “So, you don’t deny it?”

“No, I don’t.” Katniss closed the magazine before meeting her eyes. “It’s been weeks since Peeta and I have been alone. There are people in every nook and cranny of this building—and it was either against the mirror or on the seat. That cushion is disgusting!”

Johanna suddenly pulled her to her plush chest.

“I’m so proud…my little Katniss has finally done the dirty at work! It’s a milestone, you know.”

Katniss snorted. “Don’t get too excited. We did it at the coffee shop before all this craziness happened.”

“Gross!” Johanna grimaced. “Which roast was it on? I prefer no jizz in my coffee.”

“That was more than I needed to know,” Prim said. She met her sister’s eyes. “So, how are you doing? I know you and Peeta have agreed to continue on after…but this ceremony has kind of thrown a monkey wrench into your plans.”

“It has,” Katniss agreed. “But, what can we do?”

“I don’t know. How about admit that Peeta is stone cold in love with you?” Johanna said. “I mean, come on!”

“Love?” Katniss had a sudden interest in the bedspread. “We like each other, and we lust for one another, but love is a whole different spiral that we can’t get into.”

“Can’t or won’t?” Prim questioned. “I know you. Ever since that dipshit Gale broke up with you to sample what California had to offer, you’ve closed off. You were a romantic once—you followed a boy all the way to San Francisco—”

“And, what did that get me?” Katniss burst out.

“Open those pretty grey eyes, Katniss! It got you Peeta!” her sister countered. “And he is a hell of a lot better than Gale Hawthorne ever was for you.”

“I know.”

The bedspread was suddenly stained with tears.

“And it’s because we’ve stayed within the bounds of friendship. Anything else could be a disaster.” Katniss met her sister’s somber eyes. “And I’d rather have him everyday just as he is, than to not have him if it all falls apart.”

“Shit.” Johanna wrapped her arms around the Everdeen sisters. “This just became more complicated than a simple screw in my dressing room.”

++++++

“Where’s Katniss?” Peeta’s mother asked.

“She, Johanna, and Prim are having some girl time,” he informed her as they walked down the busy neighborhood, full of storefronts and restaurants.

“I think Katniss is going to be a great addition to the family,” Daphne told him, linking her arm through his. “She’ll be really good for you. She is really good for you.”

“Mom.” Peeta turned to her in e. “I want you to be happy for me because I am doing things for myself and I’m trying to prove that I can run a Mellark Bakery all on my own here. I don’t want you to be happy for me just off of who I married.”

“Peeta, I am happy for you,” his mother responded. “When we first arrived, there was a look in your eyes. I could see that you have come into your own. Katniss—she might not be all of the reason, but she is some of it. The Peeta I remember couldn’t even commit to a time to visit his mother and father.” She stopped and turned to him. “Now, he has committed himself to the love of his life.”

Love. There was that word again.

More and more the word played in his mind. It was the whispered word that escaped his lips whenever he woke up to see Katniss lying next to him.

“Thanks, Mom.” Peeta stopped to look around the busy street. “Where are we?”

“Your business proposal somehow made its way onto the breakfast tray that Effie and Haymitch gave your father and me this morning,” his mother said. “There was also a printout of this listing.”

Peeta looked up at the storefront. It was a two-story brick building with large display windows flagging the entrance door. It wasn’t much; but with a good layer of paint and from what he could see of the inside, a good layout and design for the interior, it could be something great.

“What do you think?” Peeta turned to his mother, who watched him in anticipation. “Do you think that this would be a good location for the first west coast Mellark Bakery?”

“It’s perfect,” he said in awe. “Good neighborhood, close to retail, and easily accessible.” Peeta grinned at his mother. “Who gave you the printout?”

“There’s only one person who would know where you kept your business proposal,” Daphne said, a small grin on her lips. “Consider this a wedding present.”

++++++

“Katniss!” Peeta slammed the door behind him. “Are you home?”

“Yes!” came the response from their room. “Are you alright?”

“I’m perfect! Wonderful even!”

The papers had been signed just this afternoon and he, Peeta Mellark, now owned his own bakery space. Yes, he would be paying his parents back until the end of time, but it would be all worth it to run his own business—and Katniss would have their space to design the best-looking bakery that San Francisco had ever seen.

Not to mention, he made a kickass cheese bun.

He froze in his tracks, sensing something…off. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing.”

He whipped around at her voice and the air left his body.

There Katniss stood in her wedding dress. She awkwardly held the skirt as she walked towards him.

“Effie and my mom did the final fitting,” Katniss explained. “What do you think?”

His mouth rose in a grin and Peeta reached for her hands, his eyes roaming the satin and tulle gown, before meeting her anxious eyes.

“You’re beautiful.” Katniss flushed at his words. “I thought I wasn’t supposed to see the bride in her gown.”

“Well, we’ve pretty much said ‘up yours’ to tradition,” she replied. “What’s a few minutes of you seeing me in this get-up?”

Peeta lifted her chin to look into her deep, slate eyes. When did he start caring for nothing but her happiness?

It might have been forever.

It probably would be forever—even when this charade ended, and they separated.

And, suddenly he ached.

“May I kiss the bride?” he asked, bringing her close.

Katniss nodded. “Of course.”

Their lips met, chastely at first, before his bride pressed forward to deepen the kiss.

He lost himself willingly to the taste of Katniss…an eternity could have passed—and he couldn’t give a flying fuck.

The knock came abruptly.

“Peeta! Get your ass out here!” It was Bran. “We’re meeting up at Beetee’s for beers!”

“I forgot that our parents demanded that we spend the night apart before the wedding,” Katniss said. “Prim and Johanna should be here any minute.”

“Of course,” he replied as they pulled apart.

Hesitantly, Peeta walked backward towards the door, his gaze on her.

She raised a brow at him. “What?”

“I don’t think I’ll ever forget the sight of you in that gown for the rest of my life.”

Peeta quickly turned to walk out the door before she could even respond.

++++++

Katniss couldn’t sleep.

Next to her, Prim and Johanna were knocked out. Her sister wore a tiara in her tangled locks while Johanna sported a hat with an outrageously large penis. A half-eaten tray of cookies baked by her in-laws laid between the two.

It was while watching The Wedding Date that they had drifted off. However, sleep did not come for her so Katniss remained awake, tense in the thoughts of tomorrow.

Getting up, Katniss reached for a sweater from the closet, carefully leaving the bedroom so she wouldn’t disturb her sister and friend.

She couldn’t breathe…she just needed to get out.

That’s how Katniss found herself walking down the stairs onto the main floor and into the backyard.

The sight before her almost brought her to her knees.

White chairs had already been set out for the ceremony; a good number of friends and neighbors were excited to attend. To each side of the apartment building, long buffet tables were set up as Annie’s staff would be arriving midday to set up for the reception. At the end of the right side was a singular table for the wedding cake.

It was unbelievable how it had all fallen together.

She continued down the aisle and towards the lush flower archway where the ceremony would take place. Haymitch had set up a platform before it so that Beetee, who had volunteered as officiant, would have a place to stand before them.

At the end of the aisle, Katniss settled on the steps of the platform, looking around.

It was exactly the kind wedding she had dreamt of—except in her dreams, she wasn’t drowning in guilt.

A breeze hit and she wrapped her sweater tighter around herself and let out a breath.

“How the hell did I get here?”

“I was about to ask myself the same question.”

Peeta.

He made his way down, smartly wearing a puffer jacket and not the flimsy crap that she had donned.

“Couldn’t sleep?” she asked as he joined her on the step.

“Nope.” Peeta looked out at the scene before him. “I couldn’t sleep after all the marriage advice our dads and Haymitch decided to give me…by the end, it was extremely graphic.”

“Gross.” Her head went to his shoulder. “So…tomorrow?”

“It’s after midnight so more like a few hours from now,” he replied.

“I wish it could’ve been different.”

The admission had come out suddenly.

“How?” he asked after a moment.

“Like we would have actually been dating and then you do the whole shebang—tell me how deeply you’re in love with me and get down on one knee.” She sighed. “Isn’t that how all love stories are supposed to happen?”

“I think love stories are what a couple makes of them,” Peeta said.

“And, how do you think our story would’ve gone?”

“I’m not sure.” He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “I just know that I would love you till there was no breath left in my body.”

Katniss swallowed the sob threatening to escape her lips.

“That’s all anyone could really ask for—someone till the end.”

“Ride or die,” Peeta agreed.

She snorted. “How very Fast and the Furious of you.”

Tell him.

The treacherous thought screamed in her brain, but her logical—fearful—thoughts fought it. Her heart couldn’t bear the thought that he might not feel the same, that they would hurt each other, and that she would lose him.

So instead, Katniss pulled away.

“I better go up. Prim and Johanna might sleep eat all your parents’ cookie and choke to death. That would be a real bummer on the wedding.”

Peeta nodded. “I’m just going to spend a few more minutes here.”

They reached for one another, their mouths meeting, and Katniss pressed everything she felt into that kiss—the happiness, the fear, the pain—but most of all, the love.

When they pulled apart, Peeta’s eyes were closed, a smile on his lips. “Wow.” He met her eyes. “I’ll see you at the end.”

Katniss stood. “I’ll see you at the end.”

Shakily, she made her way down the aisle and was halfway through when—

“Katniss?”

She whirled around to see Peeta staring at her.

“Sunset. It’s my favorite part of the day. Our families and friends would be there. I probably wouldn’t get down on one knee though—”

“Because you have a trick knee from a track injury,” she said. “And, your favorite color is that orange that happens to the sky at sunset. I wore—”

“You wore that dress on our first date because it resembled the color,” he finished for her. Her breath caught seeing that look in his eyes. “And, you looked beautiful—but well to me, you were always gorgeous, inside and out.”

Katniss managed a smile. “Goodnight, Peeta.”

“Sleep well, Katniss.”

But, for the rest of the night, sleep did not come.

++++++

“Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit…”

Katniss was getting married today.

Okay—not really married, but really recommitting herself in front of her friends and family.

Not to mention, the film and camera crew her parents hired.

Prim and Johanna had given her a few minutes to herself so that she could settle her nerves. Her hands moved over the skirt, smoothing non-existent wrinkles.

She made a picturesque bride; her makeup had been done perfectly, just some eyeliner, lipstick, and concealer because Effie had almost fainted at the dark circles under her eyes. Her mother and Daphne had sprayed and pinned the pearl clip into her hair before putting one more ‘protective’ layer of hairspray—a bird could crap on her head and the stuff would probably slide off from the slickness of her locks.

Johanna had given her a NuBra to wear and Katniss chuckled knowing that Peeta would have more than likely insisted on removing it.

There was a knock on the door. “Katniss, are you ready?”

It was her Dad.

She rushed to open the door and her father stepped in, looking rather dapper in his tuxedo.

“My God, sweetheart,” he breathed. “You’re a dream.”

Katniss looked at him nervously. “Really?”

“Okay, it’s kind of my nightmare. I’ve been dreading this moment for twenty-four years,” her dad admitted. “But your mother and I couldn’t be happier. You picked a good one.”

Katniss nodded in agreement. “I really did.”

Her father held out his arm. “You ready?”

Taking a deep breath, she took his arm. “Let’s do this.”

++++++

Stepping out into the backyard, Katniss let out a breath, a tremble rushing through her at seeing the number of guests.

Together, she and her father began their walk. Somewhere—violinists?—her mother’s influence she was sure, played ‘La vie en rose’ as they made their way down the silk carpet sprinkled with pale pink rose petals.

Her eyes went to the guests; Cinna had come all the way from New York while she saw that some of her parents’ colleagues had made their way over from Connecticut, as well. Closer to the front, Katniss saw Wiress—invited by Beetee as his date—who gave her a bright smile. Thresh, who stood next to Glimmer, was eyeing the pretty blonde.

Her eyes watered seeing Effie and Haymitch. Effie immediately burst into tears seeing Katniss in her gown and she thought how her landlord must be imagining what might have been for her and Haymitch—if life had been fair on them. Haymitch with his protective nature would have made an outstanding father and she had no doubts about Effie’s maternal instincts.

Katniss realized how much she had come to love them like family.

Then, there were the Odairs; Finnick looking dapper in his navy suit while Jack matched him perfectly with his own miniature version. Annie had recovered nicely from pregnancy, beautiful and glowing with Sarah and Rose in her arms.

Johanna and Prim were her bridesmaids, wearing sage green dresses and matching chignons. They both beamed seeing her. Bran and Alex made dashing groomsmen in their grey tuxedos, each swoonworthy in their own right.

Then, there was Peeta.

Katniss couldn’t help but tremble at the sight of him.

“You okay there?” Stephen asked his daughter, feeling her shiver.

“Yes, just more nervous than I thought,” she replied.

He chuckled softly, pressing a gentle kiss to her cheek.

“How can you be nervous when you have a man looking at you like that?”

And, yes—Peeta looked unbelievably handsome, wearing a suit matching the charcoal of her eyes.

However, it was the look in those blues of his—that earnest, full look that made her feel like she was floating on air.

Peeta stepped forward and her father embraced him before taking both their hands to clasp them between his own.

He looked between them. “Take care of each other.”

Quickly, her father joined his mother’s side.

Her eyes went to Peeta’s, who grasped her hand. “You okay?”

“Are we really doing this?” she asked as they stepped up the platform where Beetee waited.

“Whatever happens,” Peeta said, his eyes already knowing her thoughts. “I’m with you.”

Her hand went to cheek. “Just trust me.”

“Of course.” He turned to press a gentle kiss into her palm. “Always.”

They both turned to her guests.

“We have something to say,” Katniss began.

“Can’t this wait?” her mother asked.

“No…no…” They stepped down from the platform as Katniss shook her head. “We can’t.”

“What is going on?” Daphne said tightly. “Are you having second thoughts? It’s a little late for that. You two are already married.”

“No, Mom.” Peeta looked to her and she nodded. “We lied to you…to everyone. We’re not…actually…married.”

“You see,” Katniss started. “My lease was up at my last apartment and Peeta couldn’t afford his since his roommate was going to be leaving. Then, we both just happened to see this ad for this wonderful apartment—”

“Except that tenants had to be married and so we told them we were,” Peeta finished. “We made up this fake love story and took pictures at City Hall. And, it just snowballed when everyone showed up and you all planned this beautiful wedding.”

Katniss’ gaze went to Effie and Haymitch, their expressions unreadable, and she felt her heart squeeze in pain.

She and Peeta betrayed them and they would most likely never forgive them.

“And, we just couldn’t bear to hurt all of you,” she said. “Because we fell in love with you.”

Finnick furrowed his brow from his seat. “Me? Sorry guys, but I’m taken.”

Katniss choked back her laugh. “Not you! Well, kind of you and Annie…and just everyone.” Peeta squeezed her hand. “We grew to love every one of you and you became family to us. This building, all of you—you are home to us.”

“But, what about you two?” Her father asked. “You’re not in a relationship?”

“That’s kind of tricky.” Her eyes went to Peeta’s. “But the point is that the marriage was not real…we’re…not real.”

There was silence.

A long silence.

Somewhere there was the faint sound of an ambulance—probably coming just in case there was bloodshed.

“Bullshit.”

Katniss shot up in shock. “Excuse me?”

Annie looked her straight in the eyes.

“Bull. Shit.” She shifted, handing Sarah to Finnick, who had just made Jack cover his ears. “Hold on.” Annie adjusted Rose against her chest, undoing the buttons of her dress before guiding the baby to her nipple. “Okay, I’m ready to continue. It is absolute bullshit that you two aren’t honest-to-God in love!”

“Annie, I’m honestly having a hard time computing your words with your boob hanging out,” Katniss retorted.

“Well, I’m feeding my child, Katniss,” Annie argued. “Because I love her and that’s what you do for people you love. You take care of them—just like you and Peeta take care of each other.”

“You know…” She and Peeta turned to Beetee in front of the archway. “She does have a point.”

“You too?” Peeta replied incredulously.

“Actually, we all find it surprising that you’re not in love with one another,” Christopher informed them.

“We do like each other,” Peeta assured him.

Daphne shot up. “You’re lying!” She pointed an accusing finger at her son. “I know you, Peeta. I knew you were lying when you were eight and told me that the neighbors’ dog ate your father’s birthday cake and I know you’re lying now about not being in love with Katniss.”

“Mom, I think there’s a big difference between eight-year-old me and me now,” Peeta responded.

“You were a better liar before,” Bran pointed out with a smirk.

“It’s all over your adorable Mellark face,” Alex said.

Peeta turned to her, his complexion pink at his family’s blunt assessment of his feelings.

“You know I care for you, right?” he asked.

Katniss took his hand. “Of course, I do.”

Peeta started, his gaze on their joined hands and something shifted in his stare.

He suddenly shook his head, letting out a small laugh.

“I really am an idiot.” Peeta looked to her, his eyes warm. “Katniss, I am in love with you.”

Katniss felt her chest constrict at his words. “What?”

“I think about how after this you’re not going to be next to me when I wake up in the morning—”

“Aww,” Prim cooed.

“And, those nights when we’re in bed—”

“Yeah, nobody needs to hear the details,” Stephen interrupted.

“But the point is that I want you in my life,” Peeta said. “I want to be with you for as long as you’ll possibly have me.”

Katniss stood silent, her hand dropping from his grasp, as those last words fell from his lips.

“Katniss Everdeen!” Her mother stood from her seat. “Say something.”

Peeta loved her.

And then, as sudden as a flash of lightning, she realized what she wanted.

“Effie, Haymitch.” Katniss looked to her landlords, she and Peeta’s practically surrogate parents. “Do you forgive us?”

The couple look at one another, communicating silently, before turning to them as she held her breath.

“We do,” Haymitch said finally.

“However, you can only stay in your apartment…” Effie’s lips rose in a small smile. “…if you continue on with the ceremony.”

Katniss turned to Peeta, taking his hand once more. With her other hand, she lifted the skirt of her gown.

“What are you doing?” Peeta asked.

Slowly, Katniss knelt, going on one knee in this gown seemed impossible but she was making it happen, before him. “It’s sunset.” Her eyes went to everyone in front of them. “And, we’re with our family and friends…and I love you. So, Peeta, will you?”

After a moment, Peeta replied, a wide grin on his lips, “Get up here so we can finish this.”

Carefully, they got Katniss to her feet before joining Beetee in front of the archway.

Beetee looked between them. “You two realize that this isn’t an official ceremony, right?”

She and Peeta look to one another, before nodding at Beetee.

It was real enough for them.

 End of Part Four

  Next: One year later…

Right now, I’m a glass case of emotion.

I’ll see you at the epilogue.

-JLaLa

[sourwolfstories]

Hey! Can you rec some sterek soulmate! Fics pls? Thank you so much

Marked by Verya

The name of a person’s soulmate appears on their skin, in that person’s handwriting, at the age of twenty. Derek has been wondering for the past several years, what kind of name is Mieczyslaw?

Body Language by LadyMerlin

In an alternate universe, soulmates exist, and they can communicate with each other by writing on their own skin.

The catch? No one knows their soulmates’ name. It could literally be anyone under the sun, and Stiles just doesn’t have that kind of patience.

Ink Me by AsagiStilinski

Derek is never going to find his soulmate, because there’s no way in hell there exists a man named Mieczyslaw in Beacon Hills

Then Erica hires Stiles

Beat by Kalira

Derek’s heartsong isn’t quite normal, but he’s always loved the drumming beat that winds through his dreams. He didn’t expect to find that its origin, his other half, has been waiting right in front of him.

Accidents Happen by pyrrhical (anoyo)

Settling a soul bond was exactly as romantic as the movies made it seem: a simple kiss.

As it so happened, CPR worked, too.

Fate Thinks It’s Funny by AsagiStilinski

In a world where everyone has their soulmate’s first words to them printed on their wrists, Derek and Stiles end up with some of the worst: “Oh God please help” and “Derek” respectively

To be fair, their first meeting is almost as ridiculous as it sounds like it would be

Take My Mind, Take My Pain by LessonsFromMoths

Soulmate AU where you have a black stain where your soulmate is supposed to touch you for the first time and it turns to millions of colors once they do.Stiles was born with a very visible black palm on his cheek.

Three Marks by sanam

“And then there was pain again, but this time it was in only three places—his arm, below his clavicle, and next to his heart, all on the left side. It felt like the skin was being sliced apart, ripped open, flayed off—And suddenly it was done.Derek looked across the room and saw the boy on the floor, looking about as bad as Derek felt.”

Derek and Stiles learn that bonding is probably best done with ridiculous amounts of video games and maybe a little bit of time.

In Name Only by Cobrilee

In a world where no one finds out who their soulmate is until after they get married, Stiles concocts the perfect scheme: marry his long-time client, Derek Hale…

You know. Just to find out who he should be marrying.

There’s no way this could go wrong.

Yeah, Pass The Salt, Stiles by CallieB

Yeah, pass the salt, Stiles.

They’re not particularly inspiring words. Not like the long stream of goo spilling over Scotty’s arm. But somewhere, Stiles’ soulmate is out there, waiting to say them to him.

If only he could stop thinking about the mysterious hot stranger he met in the woods.

A Second Chance at First Impressions by Cobrilee

Derek grew up with the world’s most embarrassing soulmark, which is honestly not the best first impression his soulmate could make. Then he meets the guy, and all of a sudden the soulmark doesn’t matter quite so much after all.

spice up your life! by callunavulgari

“I said,” the girl drawls, setting her elbow down in a saucer of ketchup and grimacing. “That this whole soulmate thing is fucking stupid. You’re supposed to find someone based off of the music they’re listening to? How would you even know what was really stuck in your head and what was in theirs? It’s complete shit.”

Derek, who has had everything from Dancing Queen to the Barney theme song stuck in his head all night, winces, and says abruptly, “I think my soulmate is in middle school.”

Secondhand Soulmate by AnnoyinglyCute, Inell

Not always, not even most of the time, but sometimes – 24% of the time, statistically speaking – people meet their soulmates and live happily ever after.

THIS isn’t that story.

This is the story of Stiles Stilinski, whose soulmate died before he was born. This is the story of all the sorrows and heartache Stiles experienced, all the bullying and oppression from those who should know better but didn’t. This is also the story of the friendships Stiles made along the way, of the battles he fought – and won – and the love that endured through it all.

I Was Present While You Were Unconscious by CharWright5

Stiles had often thought about how he’d meet his soul mate, the literal muscular man of his dreams. He just didn’t ever imagine finding him on Facebook where a friend had shared a news article about a werewolf John Doe in a coma after a car wreck four hours out of town. And he also didn’t expect to bond and fall in love with the guy’s family before ever saying two words to him out loud.

Written in the Stars by Quixoticity

Derek Hale is a lucky guy. He’s got a great family, good friends, and a fulfilling job as a tattoo artist.

He’s also one of the twenty-five per cent of the population born with a soul mark.

He likes his life, but he’s waiting for his soul-match. The odds of meeting them aren’t great but hey, Derek’s a lucky guy. He has faith.

He can’t believe how good his luck really is when one day his soul-match wanders right into his studio, all long limbs and copper eyes. There’s just one problem: Stiles is there to get his soul mark covered up. Permanently.

94%, Dude by eeyore9990

The guy was really too young for the leather daddy aesthetic, but with the leather and the more-beard-than stubble and the eyebrows… Yeah, he was kinda working the hot grumpy leather daddy biker gang leader look.

And Stiles liked it.

***

For the prompt: Sterek soul mark fic wherein marks never match, they just line up perfectly to be a shape.

Marks and Mics by DLanaDHZ

Hale siblings Derek and Laura have been hired to run security for Stiles Stilinski’s music tour. Business as usual, except someone is trying really hard to prove they’re incapable and hurt Stiles. Derek finds himself curious about Stiles’ bitter attitude and a strange illness that plagues the singer. And on top of that, Derek’s soulmate remains elusive.

Worth Waiting For by yodasyoyo

Stiles slumps further in his desk chair, and stares disconsolately out of his bedroom window. Perhaps he should be celebrating. After all, this afternoon a soulmark appeared on his wrist revealing the name of his soulmate.

He has a soulmate.

Fuck. He scrubs one hand across his face.

This is a disaster.

Covered in Fur and (Your) Words by OverMyFreckledBody

People that said that the words on your skin - the first ones from your soulmate - didn’t matter or affect your life were big fat liars. Stiles is one hundred percent sure he wouldn’t have started creating costumes if it weren’t for the words What the hell kind of costume is that? on his arm. He’s also sure that if he never got into the hobby, he would never have met the man who said them.

Model Material by dobrien

Prompt: Soulmates AU where any tattoos one half of the soulmate pairing get show up on the other person’s body. Can be taken in any direction the author wants but no suicide etc.Model/Soulmate AU: Stiles finds out who his soulmate is and he’s willing to do what it takes to meet them, even if that means becoming a model for Alpha Fashion Magazine.

The Possibility of Silence and the Reality of Sound by crossroadswrite

Derek grew up knowing that soulmates are something to be cherished, so when he got a voice in his head, childish thoughts and flashes of color and objects, he’d excitedly jumped on his mother’s bed to tell her. She had smiled, ruffled his hair and told him how she was proud of him, even though Derek hadn’t really done anything.

I’m Lost In You by matildajones

He knows he should move but a part of him still feels paralyzed. He has clear feelings of not being able to move his body, of not being able to even blink.

“Oh my god,” Stiles says, and he clambers to his feet, feeling dizzy. He easily finds a mirror in the room and then the most gorgeous eyes stare back at him. They’re a sea-green instead of the normal brown that he’s used to.

He’s looking at his soulmate.

–

Stiles wakes up in his soulmate’s body, on his twenty-second birthday, with blurry memories of the past year. Derek doesn’t wake up at all.

There’s a cup with his name on it by hellodickspeight

The sight before him is breathtaking. Wide opened whiskey eyes searching above his head, pink lips slightly parted, tongue wetting them as he considers his choice, messy brown hair sticking in every direction, moles dotting a pale skin, Derek can’t wait to ask for his name.

A soulmate AU where people have the first name of their soulmates written on their body.

Of Soulmates, Pseudonyms and Misunderstandings by halcyon1993

Ever since he asked his mother one evening why she had his dad’s name tattooed on the inside of her left wrist, Derek has dreamed of finding his soulmate. There’s only one problem—the name that appears on his wrist on his eighteenth birthday is something he can’t even read.

Soul-Mark by PaigeRhiann

His wolf purrs happily because it has taken eighteen years and getting his family killed to finally discover the name of his promised. The person he’s destined to be with. Or, as Werewolves call it – Mate.

“Genim S.” He repeats

“That’s a really fucking weird name” Laura snorts, turning back to the movie.

“Yeah, it is” he nods.

Connected by readridinghood

After the death of his wife, Stiles finds himself left alone with their three children, struggling to keep from being sucked into a void of grief and despair that her death left him with. Knowing his children are safe in the pack’s arms under Derek’s watchful eyes, he struggles to regain his footing. What do you do when the world keeps tumbling over you and what you’ve thought of as fact no longer holds true? As the world comes back into focus, so does the love for Derek he thought he’d long since conquered and now with his eyes open, what he thought was the end of him, is only a new beginning.A decade after he fell in love with Stiles, countless days of keeping himself restrained while building a friendship with him, Derek finds out with absolute certainty that Stiles is his mate. You only mate once in your life, so how is it that Stiles was mated to Sophia, his wife and mother of his three children, the woman he is grieving the loss of at the same moment that Derek makes his discovery.

An Unpredictable Amount of Turtles by skoosiepants

Stiles says, “I have a five year plan. A five year plan to popularity that will tank the minute I meet this guy.”

“I feel like you’re exaggerating,” Scott says, but Scott has a katana-wielding badass waiting for him at the other end of the rainbow, and Stiles has terrariums.

Or—

A soulmate au with turtles and angst.

Soul McMates by distortedreality

The black script magically inked onto Stiles’ skin at birth declares that the first thing he’ll say to his soulmate is “welcome to McDonalds, how may I help you”.

Stiles’ life was clearly destined to be a fucking joke from the start.

Who’s the Loser Now? by Scavenger

Stiles just expects to run and swim, hopefully come at least third place, and then go home. The universe has other plans.

To Leave A Mark by Fanfiction_is_Literature

Stiles Stilinski was born with a strange mark on his skin that resembled a paw print. No one thought much about it since birthmarks weren’t rare, but Stiles started to notice it change as he got older.

Derek Hale was a rare werewolf: the kind with a soulmark on his skin. But as tragedy struck both him and his mate, his interest dwindled in finding him or her. That is, until he started to notice similar changes from his mark in a certain teenaged boy with an alarming amount of moles.

Or: The Soulmate AU where soulmates are rare and get tattoo-looking marks on their skins that describe their mate.

Sparks (Your Touch) by stilesanderek (minxxx)

Stiles has always dreamed of imprinting. Of touching someone for the first time and feeling his world changing right then and there. Of knowing that that person would love you and be with you until the day you die. And yet nothing could have prepared him for with whom he finally imprints.

Or in which when Stiles gets promoted to detective, he gets a new partner, Laura Hale, with whom he instantly becomes best friend and who he thinks is the most perfect person to step into his life, the only problem being that her brother Derek hates his guts.

Countdown by actingup

0000d 00h 00m 37s

He always imagined meeting his soul mate would take forever; that time would slow down and he would see them walking towards him, he would know without a doubt who it was. It might have been someone he’s seen before but never talked to, or it might be a complete stranger that he never would have guessed. He didn’t imagine it in front of about a hundred people, maybe two-hundred, at a Dolphin show.

soulmates tbh by bleep0bleep

“It’s been five months,” Derek says darkly. “Why am I still getting these proposals? You know these are probably all fake marks.”

Five months since the paparazzi had snapped that photo of him with the overzealous fan tugging at his shirt, five months since millions of people on the Internet realized that the birthmark revealed was in fact, the mark, five months Derek was inundated by claims from people who desperately wanted him to believe that they were his soul-mate.

Soulseeker by alisvolatpropiis

Sighing, Stiles reaches for Derek’s big hands, cradled in his broad lap, his skin lighting up even more at Derek’s touch. He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes, preparing himself to look for Derek’s soulmate. Whoever you are, he thinks, you better be worth him.

[jennycalendar]

2019 fic roundup

december was INSANE and i spent most of january dealing with the aftermath of Terrible Parents, but i am finally doing this! in nearly-february! good grief!

tagged by @catty-words​! always a delight, cori <3

Total 2019 Word Count: 541,906 Total 2019 Hits: 29,555 Other 2019 AO3 Stats: Kudos: 3,184; Comment threads: 787; Bookmarks: 509; Subscriptions: 223.

Total 2018 Word Count: 338,835 Total 2018 Hits: 22,374 Other 2018 AO3 Stats: Kudos: 2,192; Comment threads: 453; Bookmarks: 280; Subscriptions: 69.

links and titles to 2019 works (buckle up, folks.)

[btvs] imperfections (148,374 words) y’all know about the braveryverse already but i’ll bring up some good points: jenny and giles accidentally adopt the entire scooby gang. also faith gets some actual support and is actually eventually stable enough to date buffy. good times.

[btvs] deliberate obstruction (5,492 words) the one where jenny is petty as fuck and attempts to sabotage every single one of giles’s dates after their breakup. not her best look, but it was really fun to write jenny being Not Great. she deserves to have that option.

[btvs] arch-nemeses (2,171 words) who doesn’t love some of that good old-fashioned ripper au nonsense? particularly when it’s spike and ripper being confusing nemeses who sometimes drunkenly make out (jenny thinks this is very funny).

[btvs] sick day (3,097 words) written because someone should take care of giles, damnit! probably not jenny, tho. she’s not the best at it. lucky for her giles loves her so much.

[btvs] simpatico (10,096 words) sister fic to the grieving process! set circa btvs season six! jenny is connor’s awkward aunt! giles is a repressed disaster who’s still pining but refuses to admit it! 

[btvs] honesty’s the best policy (3,830 words) that one where giles and buffy are hit with a Truth Spell that means they say exactly what they’re thinking. is that all that bad for buffy? not too much. is it a little iffy when you’re a repressed watcher man who still haven’t told your girlfriend how much you love her? uh.

[btvs comics] i router, you giles (1,111 words) GOD this was written BEFORE i knew that giles and jenny were dating in the reboot comics and isn’t that a concept? a snarky-cute first meeting! ok not really that cute bc they just yell at each other a lot! but definitely snarky!

[btvs] transitional (3,152 words) good golly this is cute and i honestly forgot that i wrote it. which makes sense, bc there is a lot of stuff on this list. set in between season one and season two, in an attempt to bridge the giles/jenny gap between “awkwardly friendly coworkers” and “oh my god i think i like you”

[btvs] across the pond (5,323 words) FUN FACT this got nominated for a headline award and i’m SO PROUD OF THAT?! epistolary fic! giles leaves for england in s6 but without his wife! his wife is very mad and writes him VERY MANY LETTERS TO YELL AT HIM! perfect for those people who sometimes think “god, i wish jenny had been in s6 to yell at giles.” 

[btvs] very really married (66,987 words) giles and jenny got drunk-married in las vegas and are keeping the marriage going so they don’t look like terrible authority figures. giles does not want buffy to know about his fake wife. giles does not want his fake wife to know about his real slayer. giles has a lot of problems and it doesn’t help that he might be catching feelings. big mess.

[btvs] bad dreams (2,267 words) GILES/JENNY/ANYA IS BEST SHIP NEXT QUESTION

[btvs comics] an open mic enthusiast (2,250 words) yet another giles/jenny comic-reboot meet-cute written before i knew they were dating!!! this time: jenny gets to see giles playing guitar. repeatedly. because she keeps going back to watch him at the open mic.

[btvs comics] blindsided (2,024 words) my first (and definitely not last) giles/anya fic! a shorter version of a plot bunny i hope to chase down in 2020 (ahaha did i say that WHOOPS)

[btvs] uncharted (16,469 words) my jenny calendar day fic! also known as “jenny calendar has a guilt complex: a novella.” no prophecy dream outs jenny to the group -- but she tells them anyway. and blames herself. and breaks up with giles while she’s trying to Fix Things. absolute mess. (thank god there’s a happy ending, right?)

[btvs] on the mending of hearts (9,236 words) that giles/anya fic where giles shows up at anya’s failed wedding and sweeps her off her feet and they have sex in his hotel room! except uhhh there’s a lot more drama and crying and anya really just needs some cuddles, tbh.

[btvs] extracurricular activities (1,003 words) straight up this one BARELY counts as a 2019 fic. i wrote it back in 2016 and forgot about it and found it on my hard drive and wrote an ending to it. it’s tiny, but it’s cute! lots of early-relationship calendiles fluff, as is My Brand.

[btvs] cookie dough and boy talk (a remix) (3,976 words) dawn, but in the ripper au! she’s a precocious little bab and ripper babysits her and gets semi-adopted by joyce. it’s a thing.

[btvs] a history lesson (698 words) a brief ripper au interlude between jenny and dru. dru tries to point out that jenny and ripper are in love. jenny very unconvincingly denies it.

[btvs] faith, hope, and pancakes (3,236 words) ripper au, now with faith! and she gets to hang with college-age jenny! who is dating her idiot boyfriend ripper! the Most Fun of times.

[btvs] compromises (750 words) this....was supposed to be a three-sentence prompt but I Can’t Do That. giles and jenny discuss (read: jenny yells at giles about) giles attempting to attack angel on sight.

[btvs] valentine buzz (3,422 words) i wrote this in may lmao but i just REALLY WANTED to write fluffy braveryverse valentine’s day nonsense!!! lots of cuddles and kisses and softness abound in this fic.

[btvs] days in goodness spent (5,893 words) this fic's point was a little more abstract and a little less blunt than most of the rest of these, but i wanted to explore the concept of giles slowly going from idealizing jenny to genuinely loving her. i hope i did it justice.

[btvs] to have and to hold (7,861 words) giles and jenny get married in the braveryverse. that’s really all there is. also i posted this on my birthday (may 23rd) AND it is the 23rd fic on this list!!!! WILD!!!!!)

[btvs] saw her in the streetlight, making all the world bright (5,738 words) took me like a year and a half to write the first fic in the ripper au, lmao. in which jenny is a snarky eighteen-year-old, ripper is a snarky college dropout in a band, and neither of them are at ALL good at communicating. especially not ripper.

[btvs] perfect (1,465 words) ripper au: it’s revealed that jenny hasn’t had sex before. ripper handles this with his characteristic maturity and grace (just kidding lmao he FREAKS. but it’s bc he loves her.)

[btvs] respite (1,106 words) i wrote this after issue 5 of the reboot dropped bc i was very emotional about canon power couple giles and jenny. in retrospect, i gave giles’s emotional maturity WAY too much credit--esp. given what’s going on now--but it was still fun as heck to write.

[btvs] shouldn’t we be getting together (3,193 words) this fic’s existence is a combo of me reading a summer camp ya novel and liking the Aesthetic but not the Culture & me talking endlessly w/ @jackalopingintothevoid​ about ripper and jenny’s teenage dynamic. so many of these fics have her galaxy brain takes woven in and i KNOW she knows that. lov u, jack.

[btvs] fragmented (6,158 words) written because of that one time my brain was like “but what if jenny WAS haunting the school?” happy ending because it’s me and g/j deserve some kisses.

[btvs/hp crossover] buffy summers, muggle-born (22,070 words) i CAME BACK TO THIS in 2019 and wrote a few chapters and DROPPED IT LIKE A HOT POTATO. hopefully 2020 will bring me the courage to pick it up again!!!!!! who DOESN’T want a carelessly-mashed-together crossover where the scoobies and the golden trio are all going to hogwarts together for some reason????

[btvs] in bloom (8,452 words) this was SUPPOSED to be the end of the jenny-anya-tara trilogy. it was not. (more on that later.) this was also supposed to be a fic where giles and jenny get together. jenny and anya got together. writing things is wild sometimes.

[btvs] i still want to be your girl (35,165 words) straight up i am so proud of this fic! s7 au: jenny was chased out of town by angelus. giles does not know this. jenny has been working with angel in la, but left with faith to try and help defeat the first. giles is not the guy she remembers. (but jenny’s not exactly the lady giles remembers, either. so maybe things might work out.)

[btvs/leverage crossover] what’s in a name (4,421 words) sophie’s & jenny’s relationship to their names & identities always so totally fascinated me! this fic was my way of exploring that. (also i got to give giles and jenny a toddler. that was fun too.)

[btvs comics] live a little (6,700 words) i had so much fun coming up with a backstory for giles and jenny in the comics that i am kinda tempted to eventually try and do it again. this one was fun to write, tho.

[btvs] kind of like hydrogen peroxide (7,501 words) THIS was FUN. ripper au, but it explores both jenny’s longing for High School Normalcy AND ripper’s fucked-up relationship to magic. also senior prom is a thing.

[btvs] mending fences (6,093 words) sequel to the aforementioned epistolary fic! lots of first-person self-loathing from giles, but also a LOT of love for jenny and his kids. also the man really truly needs to stop repressing.

[btvs] her father’s daughter (1,982 words) 2020 will bring us another chapter of this fic i swear to GOD. literally there’s only one chapter up so i cannot even TALK about my plans for it but uhhh if you want giles and jenny and their three daughters pls feel free to go to that prologue and check it out.

[btvs] a thousand different ways we fell apart (4,888 words) the au fic to encompass all au fics! inspired by the comic reboot and me being like. christ. do they go through this ridiculous shit in EVERY universe? ....and then i wrote a fic where jenny was a space traveler looking through multiple universe to try and fix her marriage with giles. extra fun.

[btvs] no such roses (4,814 words) this one turned out a TINY bit rushed, but the concept of jenny bringing giles back from the dead is always something that i love exploring. i might come back and rewrite this, someday.

[btvs comics] no perfect choice (4,801 words) OOF. wrote this one after issue 8 dropped. a lot softer and more tender than what actually happened, tbh. maybe i will reread it again to make myself feel better about comic calendiles and their brutal split.

[btvs] family (3,545 words) wrote this one p early in the year and came up with an ending to it much later! ripper au: the story of how xander came to live with giles and leave his parents. angst-with-a-happy-ending abounds.

[btvs] a california january (2,206 words) jenny and giles attend a funeral together. that’s pretty much it. this is defs one of the best things i wrote this year, tho.

[btvs] how i survived my summer vacation (volume two) (25,027 words) swear to god this is gonna be the next thing i update. the braveryverse NEEDS to continue. it’s got married calendiles, for god’s sake.

[btvs] clear and impartial judgment (3,977 words) that fic i wrote when i got mad at a lack of resolution wrt helpless. like!!! giles drugged buffy!!! do we not get to talk about the psychological ramifications that would have on her???? (well. canon doesn’t. but i do.)

[btvs] sunshine ladies (10,188 words) THIS FIC WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN and i say that with incandescent love in my heart. i intended for the ‘verse to be giles/jenny, and then i intended it to be jenny/anya, and then i was like....jenny has two goddamn hands, and there’s foreshadowing here for endgame giles/jenny, and i wanna write some giles/anya. let’s fuckin go. (DEFINITELY writing another installment in 2020 about this iconic ot3 of mine.) 

[btvs] spirit-touched (4,769 words) the first smut i write and it’s calendiles ghost sex. i really think this is on brand for me, esp. considering that swath of asks in 2016ish where everyone wanted to know if ghosts could jack off. incredible.

[btvs] dear friend (28,865 words) this fic had such a rushed ending :( it’s a cute premise (you’ve got mail giles/jenny au!!!!!), but i lost interest halfway through, and as a writer i can rlly see that when i read it. another thing i might like to go back and rewrite at some point, tbh!

[btvs] familiar (2,034 words) AUGH i am SO proud of this fic. SO SO PROUD. it’s a concept i really can’t explain and the little twist at the end is something i really really like, so...just read it.

[miss fisher’s murder mysteries] unbearable (5,670 words) i need to write more mfmm in 2020 but the amount of good fic out there is deeply intimidating/delightful. this one was my little “what if it was phryne who thought jack was dead” and tbqh i had a lot of fun with it? bc pining phryne (who makes brief but extremely poignant appearances throughout the series) is an awkwardly, heart-meltingly sincere lady.

[ace attorney] man’s duty to society (544 words) wrote this as my first foray into aa fic while getting emo about miles edgeworth. would absolutely still die for that man.

[ace attorney] fancy running into you (5,887 words) lots of schmoopy narumitsu fluff! gregory edgeworth is alive! miles is trauma-free! phoenix is an artist! just!!! goodness!!!!!!!

[ace attorney] big sister (2,741 words) set in the same gregory-edgeworth-is-alive ‘verse: babey franziska comes to live with miles and his dad. she is a little impossible but miles kinda does love her.

[ace attorney] prince charming edgeworth and his incredible tux (8,042 words) this fic came from me being like “i want to write phoenix swooning over miles in a tuxedo and being like HE LOOKS LIKE A DISNEY PRINCE” and spiraled into something much longer!

[ace attorney] fate, choice, and everything in between (4,384 words) SOULMATE AU. nothing i love more than deconstructing soulmate aus. but like. in a romantic way. also phoenix and miles ARE soulmates and that is JUST facts.

Favorite Fic: I WROTE SO MUCH STUFF THO LIKE !?!??! how can one expect me to distill it to just one fic? i’ll make it my top threeL

a california january (I AM SO PROUD OF THIS FIC. it is soft and angsty and silly and devastating and tender. all the calendiles feels.)

i still want to be your girl (same mood!!! i’ve wanted to write this fic for literal years, and it’s one of those rare occasions where the picture in my head actually turned out BETTER when written out!)

sunshine ladies (this is like my giles/jenny/anya ship manifesto and it still makes me happy to think about them all co-running the magic box together and smooching a lot.)

Hardest Fic: OOF uh i went through a rocky period of writing when transitioning into college? no such roses and dear friend were hit the hardest by my insecurity & my desire to Finish Things rather than actually spend time on the craft. but i’m much more settled in now and my writing is DEFINITELY in an upward swing (as my newest fic -- as day follows night -- attests to quite nicely, imo)

Do You Plan to Take Prompts in 2020? always always yes! (i’m bad at following through with them, but am ALWAYS accepting them.)

What was the best thing about 2019? there were almost too many good things to COUNT, but i think all of them were made possible by me working extremely hard to get myself the FUCK out of my abusive parents’ house and into my first choice college!! i’m thriving, y’all.

What was the worst thing about 2019? realizing that both of my parents are fundamentally terrible people. that part kinda sucked.

Any last thoughts for 2019? i finally understand what it’s like to fall asleep feeling safe, and to notice the way the leaves change color, and to get excited about self-indulgent things like food and cuddly stuffed animals and my own fic and art. 2019 brought a lot of happiness into my life, and oh yeah also i’m in love! lots of cool stuff going on.

Goals for 2020

finish the latest braveryverse installment!

MORE ART JUST IN GENERAL. i love drawing, but there’s not a lot of free time for artsy celia when they prioritize writing so often!

write one of the many incredible longfic ideas that’s floating around in my head. it’s honestly probably only like two or three big ones, but at least DECIDE which one i’m gonna focus my energy on.

more giles/anya this year!

more giles/jenny/anya this year!

diversify! still gonna be writing about jenny forever, but like. it might be fun to write about a few new things here and there.

maybe some more ace attorney fic? maybe even some mfmm fic again? phryne and jack are never far from my heart.

not tagging anyone bc this is....january. but if you wanna do it, feel free!

[lizartgurl]

Suited Up (Young Justice Outsiders, OCs)

Willow Lance returns to high society, now with her girlfriend, and tries to get her parents to talk to each other. Bruce Wayne, however, may throw a huge damper on her night.

Word Count: 3132 

“Diggle,”

“Miss Lance. Welcome back,” The ex-navy seal-turned-bodyguard for Queen Industries smiled warmly as he opened the door, holding it wide open as I stepped out of the backseat, and then as I helped Serene out of the car.

For a moment, the cameras stopped flashing as the paparazzi scrambled to recognize either of us. They returned in full force, screaming my way. With Serene’s arm in mine, I ignored them, making my stride quick and purposeful as I led her into the venue.

The glass geometric dome was bordered with gardens, plants cleverly hiding the speakers for music and raffle announcements. On the far side of the room were tables, piled high with every rich delicacy you could think of, next to the bar, which led to the kitchen (and bathrooms).

The entrance, where we stood, was a grand staircase, which led down to the dance floor that made up the majority of the venue.

Much like the paparazzi outside, many people stopped what they were doing, eyes on us in silent wonder.

I could feel Serene’s grip on my arm tightening.

“You ready?” I asked her.

“So long as you are,” She laughed lightly.

By the time we’d reached the floor, the live orchestra had started back up again, and all the donors had gone back to their own business, except for the two middle-aged blondes who hurried to greet us.

“Willow,” Dinah gasped, hugging me tightly.

“You look stunning,” I told her. Dinah’s hair was pulled back in a sleek ponytail, and her slim, midnight-blue dress sparkled with a thousand glittery stars.

She smiled, wiping something from the corner of her eye with care not to smudge her eyeliner. “You too.”

“Hey chickadee,” Oliver hugged me too, “Glad you could make it.”

He glanced at Serene, “That you both could.”

I smiled at my girlfriend, sliding my arm around her. “Mom, Dad, I want you to meet my girlfriend, Serene. Serene, my parents, Dinah and Oliver.”

Dinah grasped Serene’s hands. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Serene.”

“You as well, Mrs. Lance.”

“Call me Dinah,” She insisted.

“How’s Olivia?” I asked.

“With Will and Lian for the evening,” Oliver grinned, “Why? Were you hoping to get away with babysitting duties? After that entrance?”

“Maybe,” I teased right back.

I could see it in their blue eyes, in their aching smiles. They had millions of questions pressing at their polite appearance, but I couldn’t get away with explaining everything now. It would have to wait for a quieter time, where we weren’t surrounded by the well-to-do of society.

“If you’ll excuse us for a moment,” I led Serene over to Emma, watching me with a huge smile to go with her brother’s trollish grin.

“Wow,” Emma couldn’t stop smiling, looking me up and down, “Just...Wow!”

“You like it?” Serene lifted my arm to give me a spin.

“I think you rock a suit better than any guy,” Emma shook her head.

“Even me?” Rick begged.

“Especially you, Mister Fashion Disaster,” Emma hummed in satisfaction.

“Why, if it isn’t Little Miss Willow!”

I winced, vaguely recognizing the creaky voices of Gretchen “Granny” Goode, of Goode World Studios, the same studios that produced the Logan twins’ show, and once upon a time, M’gann’s ancient favorite: “Hello Megan!”

“Good to see you, Mrs. Goode.”

She gave a hoot of laughter, “As if I haven’t heard that one before. And call me Granny, Willow. And that goes for all of you as well,” She pointedly eyed Richard, Emma, and Serene. Funny, I don’t recall giving her permission to call me by my first name.

“How’s the fundraising going, Granny?” Emma asked, handing Granny a glass from a passing waiter’s tray.

“Oh just wonderful! I only wish Bruce could be here, he always brings in such a haul,” Granny sighed melodramatically.

“He’ll be here. You know Bruce, fashionably late as always,” Rick promised her.

“As if any entrance he made could top Willow’s!” Granny held out her arms, as if she expected a hug from me.

“Thank you,” I nodded awkwardly, holding out my hand to Serene instead.

“Would you care to dance, my love?”

She smiled softly, eyes glittering and reflecting the lights, the bubbles from the champagne, everything in the room all at once. It felt like the whole world was contained in her eyes.

“I would love to.”

I swept her up with the swell of the music, both of us floating across the floor, lost in each other’s arms. And that’s how most of the evening was spent, dancing with my girlfriend to avoid awkward rich people who tried to claim some sort of connection with me in an effort to rebound off the attention I received from entering with Serene. We finally managed to catch Emma and Rick by the appetizer buffet after they’d successfully ditched Miss Goode, loudly laughing at inside jokes to drive away any intruders.

“Bruce is gonna kill me for being so rude,” Emma snorted into her small plate of shrimp.

“Nah, he’ll think it’s hilarious,” Rick said, now on the lookout for anyone making a beeline for our table.

“Dinah’ll be mad, but she won’t go as far as grounding.”

Serene shrugged, “My dad would be the one hiding from everybody.”

We all fell into laughter again, and I waved over the waiter for another flute of champagne.

“This is definitely the most fun I’ve ever had at a gala,” Emma sighed happily.

“Even more than when Mara, Livvy, and Stephanie stole all the cream puffs?”

“I was panicking for half the evening wondering where they were before we found them. Under the bar of all things.”

Richard shrugged. “Miss Serene, would you mind to terribly if I asked you to dance?”

“Oo, watch out, Will, Rick’s gonna steal your girl.”

“As long as you understand that I am taken,” Mister Richard,” Serene giggled, taking his offered hand.

Emma shrugged, the two of us alone at the table with four empty plates, and Carmine Falcone heading straight for us.

“Wanna dance?”

“Thought you’d never ask.” We ducked into the crowd, leaving Falcone scratching his head in our wake so that we were almost laughing too hard to joined in the foxtrot they were playing.

“You look so much happier nowadays,” Emma observed.

I nodded, “Serene says I’m even better now that I’ve started talking to you guys again.”

Emma tilted her head back and forth, “Well that, and you look so much better in a suit than you ever did in a dress.”

I snorted softly, “You sure?”

“Well, it could be a combination of that and you don’t look nearly half as awkward dancing with Serene as you did with Kaldur.

“That was seven years ago! And he was your boyfriend!” Emma giggled as I spun her.

“Are you happy with him?” My tone serious as Emma came back to land in my arms again.

Her face serious, but with a smile slowly etching into the corners of her mouth, Emma nodded. “I love him, Willow. And he loves me too. I see it every day.

“We’re thinking of getting married.”

“Married?” My voice squeaked, too late to stop us from running into six-foot-four Bruce Wayne, immovable and unfazed.

“Bruce,” Emma gave him a quick hug, “How is everything?”

“It’s all well, Emma, Barbara has things well in hand.”

His gaze looked up from his adopted daughter, focusing in on me now. “Miss Lance.”

“Mr. Wayne,” I folded my arms across my chest, as if he were Superman with the x-ray vision and could see right through me.

“I’m sorry to interrupt your dance, Emma, but I need to speak to Willow.”

“Alright,” I shrugged, and leaned back on my right leg.

“Alone, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“I do,” I growled, following him back by the bar. I glanced back over my shoulder, seeing Richard and Serene stopped by Emma, watching me retreat after Bruce.

“Two bourbons, please,” Bruce asked the bartender, taking a seat at the end of the bar, away from the gossiping drunks. A Batman-esque glare was enough to drive anyone else away.

My drink came, but I refused to drink it, watching Bruce drink his first.

“What do you want, Wayne?” I asked.

Bruce downed the last of his glass, but when he went to put it down, he winced and nursed an area by his ribs momentarily.

“Where have you been, Willow?” He asked with a grunt, struggling to breathe evenly.

“STAR Detroit. I’m surprised you don’t know that.” I huffed.

“When you left, you said you needed space. I decided to give you that, so long as you didn’t go crazy and burn down Lexcorp headquarters in Metropolis.”

I was surprised that he’d actually managed to stay in his own business for two years, but annoyed that he thought so little of me. Then again, my tantrums over the teams first few years didn’t give him much reason to.

“So, still in STAR Detroit. I assume with Doctor Silas Stone?”

I glared at him.

“He is the leading expert on alien technology, two fields you are uniquely familiar with. And after all, you are here with his daughter.”

“I thought you said you stayed out of my business.”

“I did, but I make it a point to background check anyone who the league trusts with alien technology such as a Father Box.”

I froze, hand around my glass.

“It was only decided last night. When Jeff returned from deep space after what happened on Rann over the summer, he brought with him a Box Diana and her team had captured from a fleet of parademons they’d fought.”

He held up his phone, showing me security footage one of the Leaguer’s off in space had recorded of a dark Father Box healing a parademon’s half-missing limb and repair the staff he was holding. I felt a surge of pride in my chest noting Doctor Adam Strange in the background, having master his jetpack and his laser gun as he fought alongside Alanna, daughter of his scientist friend.

Bruce only played the clip once, on silent, before hiding it back in his pocket. “When Steel and the Lanterns couldn’t figure out how to make it work, Kaldur decreed that it would go to STAR to be studied. Of course, with Strange in space and Dorado now managing the metahuman youth center, that leaves Doctor Stone. And you, as his brilliant underpaid internist.”

I sighed. “What do you want, Bruce?” I emphasized again. “How do you even know all this? Emma says you quit the League, and so did Ollie.”

“I had a hand in creating every piece of technology that the League uses. I modified everything on the Watchtower myself.

“But this isn’t just for me, Willow, it’s for the League, for Richard and Emma’s team, for all of us still trying to make the world a better place. We don’t know Stone like we know Strange, and we know he’s a little...irrational at times. Rationalizes too much, loses himself in his work. We need you to keep him on track, to keep him from using the Father Box in the wrong way, or at all.”

“What do you think I’ve been trying to do since I became his intern?” I snapped suddenly.

“Excuse me-” I spun about to tell whoever was interrupting us to buzz off, when I saw Ollie smiling at me.

“I’m sure you won’t begrudge me the opportunity to dance with my own daughter, Bruce. Would you?”

Bruce sighed heavily. “Think about it, Willow.” Without gracing Ollie with an answer, he left a sizable tip for the barkeep and disappeared into the crowd.

“What was that all about?” Oliver asked, offering his arm.

“Just Bruce being Bruce,” I sighed.

Oliver chuckled, bringing us into dance position for a waltz, “Figures.”

“Anyone else I should be worried about running into?” I asked, trying to remember the lady’s steps instead of the gentleman’s this time around.

“Well, Granny insisted on inviting Luthor, but he declined, insisting that his focus was needed on the UN’s efforts to eradicate meta-human trafficking.”

The short bark of laughter that painfully tore itself from my chest drew the attention of several other dancing couples for a second.

“You look happy, Willow.”

“I am happy.” I told him.

“I’m glad,” He smiled beneath his dopey goatee, eyes crinkled sadly.

“What about you? Are you and Dinah happy?” I asked.

“That...” He sighed, spinning me around. “That’s a tough question to answer, Willow.”

“Why’d you leave?” I asked, a sudden edge to my voice, “I could’ve told you and Bruce years ago that Luthor was going to make things harder for the League. The people love him too much, you’ve seen it.”

He nodded stoically. “But that doesn’t mean we stop trying, chickadee. When we told you and the team to stay behind in the cave, did you guys listen?”

“No,” I said. I stared down at my feet to make sure I was putting them in the right spots.

He smiled again. “You have a heart for good, and a smart head on your shoulders. You’re going to do whatever you need to make sure that people get the help that they need, in whatever way that may be.

“With the League, we were able to keep reaching people on a wider range, at least for a while. That tsunami in Rhelasia was the last straw for me, personally, and when Bruce offered a way to keep reaching those people, I had to take it.”

“So why didn’t you tell Mom?” I begged, “Olivia called me the night you left the League. She saw Dinah drinking, and she’s terrified that you two are going to get a divorce.”

Oliver’s face was slightly pale in the already white lightning of the dome.

“I’m not sure, chickadee,” Ollie sighed. “I love your mother, I always have. I don’t want to leave her, but she cares about you guys so much, I couldn’t ask her to betray Kaldur. At least until it was too late.”

I swallowed the lump in my throat. “Bruce seems to think you’re still working with the League,” I glared over at the bar, my face hot.

Oliver chuckled, “Bruce thinks a lot of things, not all of them true.”

I sighed, resting my head on his chest.

“What are you thinking now, chickadee?”

I pressed my lips together. “I’m just glad to have a dad again.”

The dance ended, and Oliver kissed my forehead. “I’d love another dance with you, but I think your gal pal is a little anxious to talk to you.” He attempted to grin, and gave me a little push toward Serene, who waited at a table with a glass of champagne and one solitary cream puff.

“May I?” I asked.

She slid the plate towards me with a giggle.

“I spoke with your mom, you know,” She nodded over my shoulder, and saw that Ollie had headed in Dinah’s direction. She stood on the edge of the dance floor, surveying everything while swirling her glass, which had a potent lipstick stain on the rim.

“Did she interrogate you or anything?” I asked.

Serene chuckled, “No, no, she was very nice. In fact, she told me a very fun story?”

“Oh?” I raised my eyebrow at her.

She nodded, smiling slyly. “It had Emma in it too, I think, about the time that she got sick and you tried to make her a pot of soup to make her feel better?”

I shoved the cream puff back her way, hungry no longer. “She swore she would never tell that story.”

Emma and Richard, having a drop too much to drink, danced past us, twirling elegantly. “She comes bearing soup!” Emma laughed.

“You’re all awful and you know I can cook much better now.”

“Yes, but can you make soup?” Richard wiggled his eyebrows before dancing off with his sister again.

Serene giggled, “Is that why you never make soup?”

“Come on,” I took her hand, “Let’s dance over there, there’s more room.” Serene laughed as I led her across the dance floor, and sure enough Emma and Richard followed us, but fortunately for me, not another word was spoken of soup for the rest of the evening.

-------

“She’s very happy,” Oliver said as he approached Dinah.

“I can tell,” Dinah said stiffly.

Oliver gently lifted the glass from her hand, letting a waiter take it away, before bringing his wife onto the dance floor. Though she didn’t resist, she seemed determined to stare at the floor, at the ceiling, at the bar, anywhere but at his face.

“I spoke to Serene. She’s a brilliant woman, and she loves Willow very much.”

“Dinah, we’ve been married for almost ten years now. When are we going to talk to each other?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” Dinah quipped.

“Dinah,” his hand left her back, coming up to hold her cheek, “I couldn’t ask you to leave the kids.”

“You could have told me what you were planning.”

“I could have, and I should have.”

“Then why didn’t you?”

It was Ollie’s turn to look away. Across the room, Willow and Serene were spinning around, and emma was probably recording it on her phone.

“It was Bruce’s idea, of course.”

“Since when do you listen to Bruce?” Dinah huffed.

“He had some pretty good reasons. He was asking each of his potential recruits one on one, and he didn’t want them to join just because of peer pressure. And he never said it outright, but I don’t think he wanted Kaldur to get wind of it either.”

“Why not? We don’t have the power to keep people from leaving the League.”

Oliver shrugged. “And this one’s more personal, but I didn’t want you knowing that I was leaving to drive us apart so soon.”

“Some good that did,” Oliver spun Dinah around, bringing her back around to land in his arms.

They stopped dancing.

Dinah gripped his lapels. “I...I know that you look out for the little guy. You always have. That’s why I fell for you in the first place.”

She held up one finger to keep him from interrupting, “I can’t leave the League. You’re right. I won’t abandon Kaldur when so much has already gone south for us.”

She glanced over at Willow and the others, “And second, you need to talk to me. No matter what, if we really love each other, we can’t be keeping things like this from each other.”

“Deal. Anything else you’d like to get off your chest, Pretty Bird?”

A wicked grin etched itself into Dinah’s mouth. “Oh, I can think of a few things, Mr. Green.”

[actuallylorelaigilmore]

Hey, I saw you were doing headcanon stuff! So, I have this like burgeoning headcanon that Josh x Donna's first daughter is wlw. I don't know if you build off of other people's headcanons, but this one has been with me for a long time, and you are such a talented writer and storyteller in general that I thought maybe you'd be interested in taking a crack out of this very specific headcanon?!? I've just been projecting a lot of brainpower towards it and I want to talk to someone else about it!

Okay, so first, all my future headcanons for TWW spring from this original post that’s gotten around a bit. I’ve written a tiny bit of kidfic using them as well so I decided to connect yours to mine because tbh I love this idea and heck yeah, at least one of their daughters should be queer :D that’s just way more fun than if they’re both straight.

So, given what I’d already sorted out for the future, here are my thoughts. There are oh so many ideas behind the cut because apparently I can’t sleep but I can create a bunch of people out of thin air.

Their eldest daughter, Brianna Joan, started insisting everyone call her ‘Jo’ when she was five. They were both surprised by her stubbornness on the matter, but Josh was secretly pleased since her middle name was a tribute to his sister. Donna assumed it was a phase she would grow out of, like a lot of kids when they’re young and establishing their independence. She didn’t–and Jo later believed it was the first hint that she was never meant to be the girly daughter they might have expected.

Charlotte inherited her mother’s grace under pressure, along with her dancer’s form and creative flexibility. While Jo had Donna’s sass and sense of humor, she shared her dad’s brown hair and eyes, constant need to be in motion, and impulsive streak. Josh liked to say Jo got his athletic prowess, too, but Donna always countered with ‘your what now?’ and made the girls laugh. Jo surpassed him in sports talent by junior high, thanks in no small part to coaching by Charlie’s not-so-little-anymore sister Deena.

Junior high and high school were rough, especially girl’s softball and basketball. The rumors and slurs about which girls were probably gay because they were a little too good on the court or the mound bothered her, especially when she got sick of her unruly hair and cut it off at fourteen and the kids started aiming them at her…but it was hard to do the right thing and stand up to them when she was starting to wonder if maybe they were right.

The first crush she developed on an older, female student that she actually admitted to herself was a crush happened a year later, when she was trying to survive her entrance into high school. She came out to her best friend at sixteen and felt bad that she didn’t tell her parents first, but her dad was still working with the White House occasionally during his “retirement,” and her mom was starting her campaign for Congress, and the last thing Jo wanted to do was make that harder.

It wasn’t like she thought they’d be upset, or disappointed in her, exactly. But a tiny part of her did have doubts, after a couple of her friends had come out to their liberal parents and hit a cruel wall of family double-standards. Surely Josh Lyman and Donna Moss, champions of progressive causes, wouldn’t be that way…she hoped.

Just to be safe, Jo told them the week after her mom won her Congressional campaign, when it would cause the least trouble if they did freak out. Donna wasn’t surprised, not even a little, and only shared her worries at night with Josh. She knew how hard it was to be a woman in the world, and it could only be more painful for their eldest facing additional discrimination on top of that. “We just have to love her even harder,” Donna whispered, “and hope it’ll be enough.”

Unlike his wife, Josh was–as always–oblivious. Jo coming out was big surprise, but one he was happy about. She trusted them enough to tell them, and include them in her confusing teenage life. Surely that meant they were on the right track. “And hey,” he offered up in the initial shock of her disclosure, “I can’t exactly blame her. Women…are great. I’m a big fan. Of them.”

Just like he did with all the girl’s activities over the years, from dance to soccer, Josh threw himself into being a parental ally until he annoyed Jo with his enthusiasm. PFLAG, marches, fundraisers, sponsoring local clubs…"which one of us is gay again?” she would mutter to her sister with an eyeroll sometimes, out of earshot of the DC dad with the rainbow t-shirt passing out mini flags.

She was grateful though, especially after she survived college, and law school, and volunteered at a nonprofit that exposed her to so many kids whose parents didn’t care if they lived or died, simply because of who they turned out to be. Josh started getting handmade cards for his birthday and Father’s Day every year, filled with Jo’s illegible handwriting–that, he knew, she definitely didn’t get from him–telling him how much she loved and appreciated him. He put them on the fridge next to the sketches her little sister sent, like they were both still in grade school. Donna teased him about that, but whenever their friends visited she was the first one to casually point them out.

In the family, Charlotte was the only one that ever gave Jo any grief about her sexuality. It was mostly sibling sniping, because Charlotte was quieter than her sister but even more competitive, and she was never quite able to catch up with the three year gap between them. Still, it made Jo uncomfortable in her late teens because she and her baby sister were always so close growing up, and she couldn’t tell if the snark was coming from someplace deeper. When Charlie was fifteen, she got a week’s suspension for breaking a boy’s nose after he called her valedictorian sister a slur she refused to repeat to anyone. Jo worried less after that, and the sarcastic comments never happened again.

Toby’s son Huck came out as bisexual in college, and Jo joined his twin sister in being his closest support system while he braced for his parents’ reactions. There was a lot of hugging, and some knowing looks between Toby and Josh when the kids weren’t paying attention, and Huck had to pay Jo twenty bucks because she promised it would go over fine and he was certain it would be a disaster. He never learned to love the Yankees but he shared his father’s temperament from an early age. He and Charlie dated briefly in their twenties, causing a minor scandal to ripple through the connected families.

CJ’s daughter Nora, who was like a distant cousin Jo never got to visit enough in sunny California, only allowed the family to use her full name. She got a lot of weird looks when strangers overheard, or friends found out how old-fashioned it was, but Jo liked to call her by it anyway when they chatted. She never got to meet her dad’s mentor, and she thought based on the stories she’d heard that he would be embarrassed but proud to learn that Claudia Jean named her firstborn Leonora after she left the White House.

Nora was the one who introduced Jo to her future wife, an architect based out of Sacramento with an independent streak and temper that secretly reminded Josh of one of his exes. Unlike him and Amy, Jo and her fiance were a happy fit, sharing similar political beliefs but no professional rivalry. They spent as much time at home swapping stories and advice about their demanding careers as they did on community activism. Jo mellowed out a little after they got married–”she’s so much like you,” Donna told Josh with a smile–and they moved five times in three years before buying a house and starting their attempts to have a family.

That was the first time Jo ever really surprised her mom, who cried when she found out they were expecting. “I thought…you never talked about wanting kids,” Donna said carefully, and Jo just grinned that bright grin that was so much like her father’s. “I needed some time,” she told her mom, “to figure out what I wanted. But I think that if I manage to be half as good at it as you were, I’ll be an amazing mom.”

Josh and Donna bantered anxiously in the waiting room while each of their eldest daughter’s three kids came into the world. Two she gave birth to, and one she didn’t. They spoiled them all the same.

And when Charlotte brought the Lyman-Moss legacy back to the White House, Jo’s youngest son got to hunt Easter Eggs on the lawn. He stood next to his aunt during the photo op, just one of a dozen kids surrounding the first female President of the United States.

[britonell]

This @inusecretsanta gift is for @animaniacal!

Successful Proposal

...BUT WAIT, it’s not just a single gif!

Because we want to know how he proposed, so…

DRABBLE TIME! WITH PICS! BUCKLE UP!

Be warned, for there are hints of naughtiness at the very end.

Alarms went off in his head as Inuyasha gripped the ring box. How had he gotten into this predicament? Well, it didn’t take a genius to figure out why this was happening: He was a terrible planner.

Kagome, his girlfriend of three years—had it already been three years?—had asked if he was doing anything during his Christmas break. That had been when the lightbulb on top of his head lit up. (Now Inuyasha wondered if that proverbial lightbulb had fallen and given him a concussion.) He had immediately booked a hotel room, and then promptly thanked his lucky stars because there had exactly been one room left due to a cancellation. Then he had gone ring shopping.

Inuyasha stared down at his girlfriend, who wore an adorably puzzled expression, and seriously contemplated if it had all been a mistake. Had he misread the signs? He was certain he hadn’t. After all, she had made comments in the past. Obvious comments that even he couldn’t miss.

More than once, they would walk past a retired couple taking a stroll in the park and Kagome, with that small smile he loved so much, would quietly say she looked forward to growing old together. Inuyasha usually stuttered and blushed, caught off guard by her soft-spoken words as much as her nonchalance, like there was no question they were in it for the long haul. Then there was that one time when she had inquired, while they lounged on the couch, what they would name their future kids.

Red-faced and stupefied, he vaguely remembered saying he didn’t care, as long as they didn’t name any kids after a certain half-brother…or that wolf who still wouldn’t stop flirting with her whenever they ran into him, god dammit.

“Inuyasha?” Kagome gently said his name, looking up at her boyfriend with wide eyes. Despite her high heeled winter boots, he still towered over her. A familiar surge of protectiveness swept through him and he resisted the urge to suddenly embrace her.

Stay on track, Inuyasha mentally berated himself. Just gotta say the words.

“Inuyasha? You OK?”

Then again, what if he had been reading the signs wrong? Because it seemed like the universe was telling him this was a terrible mistake.

The hotel had been less than ideal, to say the least. Granted, Kagome had marveled at the ornate tapestry and antique furniture in the hotel lobby, but that still meant the hotel was from a bygone era. The ancient elevator was slow and loud, so much so that Inuyasha opted to carry Kagome up the stairs in frustration, ignoring her squeals of protest. Their room, though larger than he had anticipated, wasn’t any better. Their windows faced the courtyard behind the hotel instead of the festive streets, the aging lock on the bathroom door was busted, and the walls were paper-thin, at least for his ears.

Fortunately, he had managed to hide his frustrations. Kagome loved the hotel, she claimed. She grew up in a shrine, so she of all people could appreciate a building’s history. Her gratitude was so earnest that Inuyasha almost wasn’t sure if she was only being kind for his sake. 

She probably appreciated his efforts to keep his temper in check. Oh, he had been tested. Like when he had overheard the two guys in the lobby argue whether the cute girl in the green coat and pink hat was a 9 or a 10. Donning a dreadful expression, Inuyasha had blocked their view and stared long and hard until they got the message and quickly left the lobby.

Dressed in her favorite green coat and pink hat, Kagome gasped in joy when they had found an authentic French bistro for lunch. Inuyasha thought he had actually done something right for once…until they finished ordering their food and his ears swiveled towards the harshly whispered words from the opposite side of the room.

“A surprise proposal?”

“It was an absolute disaster,” one of the women at the table explained before delicately sipping her tea. “We were all mortified. We all knew the instant it happened she would reject him.”

“You mean he did it in public?” The other woman asked, appearing shocked but unable to hide the sadistic glee in her eyes. “My goodness!”

“Oh yes, it was a terrible idea. He should’ve known better.”

Everything was white noise after that, which was why he missed their in-depth discussion about “manipulative boyfriends trying to save failing relationships with public proposals.” No, he heard nothing but “He should’ve known better” all throughout lunch. The words continued to haunt him after the sun had set and most of the tourists had left for their hotel or restaurant. Inuyasha didn’t know how long they had walked, but if Kagome hadn’t called out when she did they might have wandered for another hour.

“Inuyasha?”

His knuckles went white; his grip so tight he was surprised he hadn’t already crushed the ring box hidden in his pocket.

Just gotta say the words, Inuyasha chanted. Just gotta—

“He should’ve known better.”

“Are you sure you’re all right?” Kagome reached up and stroked his cheek. Despite the million things racing through his head, he still recognized the fingerless gloves she wore. He had bought them for her last year because she had mentioned her old ones had holes in them, not realizing she had already bought another pair. How many times had he done things without forethought and proper planning? It just never seemed like he was doing enough for someone as incredible as her.

Pretty and fashionable, popular yet studious, fiery, determined and utterly devoted to her family and friends; Kagome was perfect the way she was and she deserved everything.

What did he have to offer?

“If you’re not feeling well,” she started but Inuyasha nervously cleared his throat. Of course she would worry about him. She was selfless like that.

“C-close your eyes,” he said, more quietly than he intended.

“What was that?”

“J-just close your eyes, dammit!” he said, louder this time and supporting a blush that refused to clear.

She raised an eyebrow but silently acquiesced and closed her eyes.

God I could kiss her right now—STICK TO THE PLAN.

…he didn’t have a plan. Wait, why did he just ask her to close her eyes? What the hell was he doing!?

He pulled out the ring box and looked around. The street was deserted. This couldn’t be a public proposal if no one was around, right? He nervously eyed the ring box in his hand and brushed his thumb over the smooth red velvet.

Now or never, I guess.

“Uh…open…your mouth?” What?

She didn’t have to say anything to show her confusion. A small frown marred her brows, but she still followed his instruction.

He abruptly shoved the ring box in her mouth, paused to stare at the result of his impromptu decision, and whirled around to face the wall, silently shouting, “Why the hell did I just do that!?”

A moron, I’m a moron.

A salty scent and a muffled sniff made him freeze.

She was crying.

Oh crap, did I break her teeth!? Lingering doubts, previously swept into the dark recesses of his mind, mockingly emerged one after another. Maybe she doesn’t want to marry. Maybe I did read the signs wrong. What the hell was I thinking?

Hoping to repair the perceived damage he had just inflicted, he turned back around with his hands in the air.

“Ka-Kagome! I-I-I’m not forcing you! You don’t have to marrrrrmph!”

Perhaps he hadn’t messed up.

Any and all remaining worries were soundly erased when they returned to their hotel room--which was a feat in and of itself because she refused to detach from his torso--and then as soon as he closed the door she practically tore his clothes off. In fact, he had to remind her multiple times not to be so vocal until eventually giving up, opting to swallow her cries as he pulled her closer to him, his dog ears mercifully picking up only the sound of their bodies.

AN: I can see Inuyasha bumbling through a proposal yet somehow being successful. BTW, this postcard was the first version of the artwork.

[sophiescarlet]

my anime boston recap

i told a few people i’d write this, so here. warning, it’s long as fuck.

rebecca black - friday

while waiting for artists’ alley to open, i sat in a corner and watched people go by and saw a group cosplaying the main characters from the extremely underrecognized game the arcana, which was awesome and i totally would have asked for a picture but i’m way too shy. even though i’ve asked cosplayers for pictures before but i seem to have regressed in that sense...

i also saw (and this happened throughout the con) a bunch of hot, fit, really thin girls, which made me feel gay (as expected) but also really envious and sad and insecure about my body. cause i wish i looked more like them.

i also saw two girls cosplaying snow halation!honoka and kotori from love live, and the honoka had a giant honk nesoberi that i totally envy, and then right afterward a hate na heartbeat!eli and nozomi came around the corner and they were the coolest. i wish i’d had the guts to ask them for a picture too.

finally i went to artists’ alley and i got to buy a print from one of my favorite persona 5 fan artists but unfortunately she didn’t have the postcard set i wanted to buy. BUT right across was another fan artist whose stuff i really like so i bought a BUNCH of her prints - one of each of the p5 girls for me, and an extra makoto for my friend - and she came over to thank me and we chatted a little and it was nice. i am fucking determined to befriend some of these people and now at least one of them knows who i am.

i went to a panel on “fandom as coping” presented by a social worker which was really cool. she talked about how even though she’s a social worker, she still went through a severely suicidal period this past year and survived because of yuri on ice. i left partway through because then she turned it over to the audience to share our stories and i didn’t need to hear from a bunch of people talking about bad things that had happened to them.

the next thing i went to, after hanging around the vendors for a while, was tara platt’s (mitsuru and elizabeth from persona 3) q&a. she was really cool, and i actually managed to ask her a question, which was which one she preferred. (she said she can’t choose a favorite, but had more fun with elizabeth.)

i went to a presentation by sunrise, the studio that made love live among other things, but it was boring and i left early again because they were talking about gundam and other action stuff i don’t care about.

i’d planned on going to johnny yong bosch’s (makoto from free, kitamura from toradora, yu and adachi from p4) q&a, but it had a hella long line and it was obvious i wasn’t going to get in since the room wasn’t going to accommodate that many people. so i went over to a panel greg ayres (kaoru from ouran, nagisa from free, monokuma from the danganronpa anime) was doing on “it gets better.” come to find out he is openly bi! and is good friends with his ex who’s a trans woman and confronted her family about misgendering her! he is my new fav ngl and a far cry from hikaru’s va whom i met at tora-con a few years ago and was kind of an ego. it was a conversation sort of panel and we talked about a lot of stuff around queerness and bullying. i had to leave that one early too, but wished i could have stayed for the whole thing. also, there was a girl across the aisle from me who mentioned she was trans, and at one point i happened to catch her looking at me, and i think she was checking me out! sadly, i did not run into her again.

the reason i had to leave early was to get johnny’s autograph. he was really cool and i totes wish i could’ve gone to his q&a. since i don’t actually have any free! or toradora! or p4 merch, i had him sign my p3/p5 dancing game since it did at least come with p4 dancing as a free download. he took his daughter with him to the con which i find adorable though i have to wonder how bored she was sitting there for an hour and a half while he signed autographs.

katy perry - last friday night

at this point, i had a couple hours to kill, so i walked out to newbury comics in the hopes they’d have the bananarama vinyl reissues from the british record store day. they didn’t (though weirdly they did have the shakespears sister one), but they had kacey musgraves’ golden hour on sale, and i’ve been waffling on buying that for ages, so i finally snapped it up. then i went back to the mall where the con (sort of) was and got some godiva ice cream, which was even more overpriced than you’d expect but still very good.

so my last agenda item for the day was yuri lowenthal’s (makoto/minato from p3, yosuke from p4) q&a, which tara crashed because they’re married, which i love because it means that mitsuru is irl the canon waifu. once again i managed to ask a question, which was which p3 girl he’d like to have minato end up with, which made everyone laugh, and of course he said “i want to preserve my marriage, so either mitsuru or elizabeth.”

then i went home and felt like death.

i don’t know any songs that have “saturday morning” in the title

i took an uber to the con for saturday because the T was being replaced with a shuttle bus and i decided i’d rather pay $17 each way for a 15-minute trip than $2.50 each way for a 90-minute trip.

i went to a panel on “idols in anime” that was kind of interesting but i didn’t take much away from it, other than that i should maybe watch revue starlight. but then i went to a panel on “diversity in the magical girl genre” that was really cool. it was hosted by a queer latina woman and she talked about racial, gender, sexual, and ability diversity. it was interesting because she has a very negative view of yuuki yuuna, which i can certainly understand but don’t really share. but it was a great panel and i feel like i learned a lot. one neat idea she had was that what comes across as queerbaiting (or whatever-baiting) to western audiences can be really progressive representation in japan, and vice versa.

after that i went to another panel on “magical girl fashion” and literally got up and left because i couldn’t stand how wrong the presenter was.

i’d missed out both days on the free autograph passes for yuri and tara, so i went to their paid session, which to make a long story short was an absolute fucking disaster, and i ended up making a complaint, during which i cried in front of the con’s assistant director. so there’s something i can check off my bucket list. i also met the director, who came over to reassure me they were fixing things and said, “i keep saying i need a machete to take off people’s heads this year.” so obviously i immediately liked her! in the end, i did get their autographs (on the same p3d/p5d game) for fifty fucking dollars... i’d been expecting more like thirty. and they didn’t even personalize them. sad trombone noise. they were nice though.

then i rushed over to the free autographs and saw kara edwards (chihiro in the danganronpa anime) and had her autograph a wall scroll i’d bought from a vendor. i wish i could’ve gone to her q&a because she seemed sweet.

and right after THAT, i got in line for tara sands (a bunch of pokemon) and had her sign a manga volume i bought for my friend. she was also awesome and i really wish i could have gone to her q&a because we had this exchange:

me: this is for my friend who’s a huge bulbasaur fan

sands: oh, you’re such a good friend!

me: i know. and i won’t let them forget it.

sands: [laughs] that’s good! keep it up, i like your style!

i then went to greg’s q&a, which was fun. he mentioned that while recording the audio commentary for ouran, caitlin glass (haruhi) and todd haberkorn (hikaru) got really uncomfortable during one of the twincest scenes and started talking about anything else they could so they wouldn’t have to talk about the twincest, and in the commentary you can just hear greg laugh a little because he’d made himself laugh by thinking of saying “i just think it’s hot” but kept himself from saying it out loud. the hero we deserve tbh.

whigfield - saturday night (i actually don’t like that song btw)

at this point, it was time for the 18+ panels to start, so i went to one where yuri, tara platt, lisa ortiz (idk her), and billy kametz (same) did in-character readings of various scripts. they did a couple of star wars ones which obviously did nothing for me, except that tara did bb-8 in a christopher walken voice, which was fucking hysterical. the other one i remember was lisa doing a southern belle voice narrating the notebook, with yuri as sasuke (i think) as noah, and billy as lelouch (?) as ally. but the best one, of course, was the last one, which was the iocane powder scene from the princess bride, performed by yuri as spider-cop (iirc) as the sicilian and tara as elizabeth as westley. it was AMAZING.

then i went to greg’s 18+ panel where he recounted risqué stories like when his mom wanted to watch an anime where his character has anal sex. i remember it being hilarious but unfortunately don’t remember any specifics other than him affectionately calling his lawyer the C-word and a story about beating up an asshat in the o’hare airport after asshat broke a jigglypuff ornament his friend made him.

blondie - sunday girl

so having stayed out past 11:30 for greg’s panel the night before, and forgetting to take melatonin before bed... i actually couldn’t wake up sunday morning so didn’t end up going back to the con at all. which was really sad and disappointing as it meant i missed getting greg’s autograph, a panel on autism in anime fandom, and the voice actor roundtable panel, all of which i really wanted. so after finally getting up at 2:30pm i spent the rest of the day super depressed and mad at myself and just sad and disappointed.

the end.

[petestarebanks]

this turned into a lot of talking i’m drunk sorry

since i love talking about myself and i’m working on finishing all the random cider/alcoholic drinks in my fridge i appeciate @chitown-sounder for tagging me in this

1) How tall are you? I’m 5′7″ and I don’t have anything else to say about that. 

2) What Color And Style Is Your Hair? My hair is medium brown which is v boring I want to dye it like daaaaaaark brown in an attempt to match my fingernails and my wardrobe which are both slowly entering the shadow realm until I can finally take my rightful place as an all powerful witch of darkness where I belong. Lately I’ve been working on growing my hair back out, right now it’s just below the middle of my back bc a year and a half ago I decided I wanted to go back to the bob I had in senior year of high school. Generally speaking my hair is an awful mess.

3) What Color Are Your Eyes? Depending on the day/weather/my mood/the color of my shirt it varies between blues and greens and greys. I wish I was constantly crying so they could be green always. 

4) Do You Wear Glasses? Yeah and tbh people always ask me why I don’t wear contacts and like why the fuck would I? When I got glasses in the 10th grade (After 3 years of staring at a computer screen bc I got obsessed with writing and never wanted to leave the house I developed near-sightedness like a fuckin dope) I was hype af they somehow made my face look less round imo like honestly my glasses make me look older and less pudgy and I fuck with that shit. I, like my dawg Cody, also am getting new glasses in like a week or so (They’ll be in on the 11th and I’m reeeeady) and I got 2 pairs, one of which is the same rectangle shape I’ve always had and the other one is more fahionable and maybe I’ll like them??? I better bc they were expensive but they were literally buy one get one free so....... Idk they’re more round shaped I can’t wait to put new accessories on my face

5) Do You Have Braces? I never did and it’s funny I always had a fucked up dental situation ok my front 4 teeth on the top were shaped like |_|_/\_||_| it wasn’t a gap or anything my teeth were just angled like that??? Apparently there was a bone in my gum where it shouldn’t have been and it was keeping my teeth from growing right and so when I was like 8 they did a removal of all 4 teeth like - ya girl was in the third grade missing my 4 front teeth??????????? Embarrassing anyway they took out the teeth and when I went back a few months later to get the bone out there was literally no bone there? There was no explanation for it it just wasn’t there and my teeth grew back in perfect. My teeth aren’t perfect by any means like I have a severe overbite and my lower row has a small gap in the front and also I had a fuckin tooth that grew in the middle of the roof of my fucking mouth????????????????????????? Teeth are so weird anyway that tooth got taken out and I’m just here living with a semi-ok mouf now

6) What Is Your Fashion Sense? Whatever I feel like wearing when I get out of bed 15 mins before I’m supposed to be at work lmao whatever takes the least effort and still looks put together enough. There’s a lot of black and particularly black leggings bc they almost pass for dress pants which works for my job. Also a lot of camisoles paired with shawl/overshirt things idk what they’re called. And jean shorts whenever I’m not at work.

7) Do You Have Any Siblings? I have 4 step sibs and 3 sisters - my sister Candace is 28 and got married last year, we always argue about politics (we are on the same side but she is a realist and I’m a romantic) but we love each other even though she makes me cry from emotions and frustration. My step brother John is 27 and he’s always been a fuckin dickhead even when we were kids and they were just my neighbors and not my step sibs - yes my father is dating a woman who used to live across the street from us in the neighborhood I grew up in - He is v strong and has strong opinions, has a lot of tattoos and is a misogynist. My sister Jackie is 26 and is a human fucking landfill who I haven’t spoken directly to in 4 months bc she got mad at me when I showed concern about her boyfriend being abusive, then he did beat her ass and when I tried to talk to her about it she fuckin blocked me on Facebook. Oh yeah and she’s pregnant with his kid and won’t stop smoking cigars. Fucking landfill. My step sis Amanda is 23, always a good time even if she’s a super thot, she has 2 babies who I love more than anything and she lets men make a fool out of her more often than not. I love her. My step brother Chris is my fave step sib mainly bc he went from being an actual juvenile delinquent, arrested and then on parole at age 15 even, to being the first of his family to graduate high school on the same day as me, with a steady job and a wife and a baby and paying his own bills I’M SO PROUD OF HIM. My step sister Tory is 19 and she doesn’t have a real name she’s just Tory, is a bigger fuckin thot than Amanda literally this bitch is in the DM’s of every dude I know and I’m not shaming her like boo do whatever u wanna do but be better at it? Be a boss ass bitch and don’t let ppl make fun of u for being a human disaster?  My younger half-sister Dalaney (Literally, named after Dale Earnhardt thanks to my trash father lmao) is 11 and she lives with her mother in Minnesota. She comes to see us every summer and she is so fucking funny, she is a tomboy and she is a sassmaster just like the rest of us I love her sfm. 

8) What Kind Of Student Are You? I was an honors sudent, took AP classes and barely skirted by (But passed the final exams while my geek fuckin classmates sobbed bc they failed lmao) I graduated with a 4.89 so like, I was litty. I never studied bc why would i read the same thing twice? I also missed a day a week from 6th grade to graduation, bc I was “sick” but really I didn’t feel like going. My mom thought I was lactose intolerant bc I faked sick so much. One time Amanda and I let my mom drive us to school only to walk home (3 miles) and get stopped by a police officer 20 feet from my front door, he wanted to know why we weren’t at school and we lied and said we missed the bus but our moms were fine with us not going to school that day. That fuckin cop offered us a ride to school so we had no choice but to go to school after all that!!!! Then in senior year when my mom left me to live with Jackie I was literally missing 2-3 weeks at a time until the AP was like “If u miss 40 days of school this semester you will be considered a drop out” and I was like “Fuck” so I finished and graduated and never went to college because fuck the education system tbq fuckin h. 

9) What Are Your Favorite Subjects? Math, History, English, Human Geography. I loved learning, that was why I never wanted to be at school, everything was fucking boring but when I had the right teachers, in these subjects in particular, I actually wanted to be there. 

10) What Are Your Favorite TV Shows? I never watched TV until like the last year, I finally got a Netflix subscription and caught up on shit people have been raving about for years but I was completely late on - Shameless, Orange Is The New Black, American Horror Story, Bates Motel, How To Get Away With Murder, in particular. Otherwise I just watch sports. Literally the only reason I pay for cable is so I can watch sports. 

11) Favorite Books? BIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIITCH Scott WESTERFELD ANRD NEAL SHUSTERMAN. LIKE OK I’LL BE A HARRY POTTER STAN ALL MY LIFE. BUT. SCOTT WESTERFELD WROTE AN INGENIOUS SERIES ABOUT SOCIETAL STANDARDS OF BEAUTY (uglies/pretties/specials/extras) AND ALSO HIS VAMPIRE SERIES WHERE VAMPIRISM WAS TRANSMitted through sex and cats (peeps, the last days) WERE THE ONLY VAMPIRE BOOKS I EVER READ LMAOOOO. then, fucking neal. fucking neal shusterman changed my entire life for the better with a series about a future where the pro-life/prochoice battle turned into parents literally having the option of just, not dealing with their unruly teens anymore by having their body parts fucking dispersed to ppl who needed like new hearts, arms, etc (unwind/unwholly/unsouled/undivided) FUCKING ICONIC and also THE SERIES NEAL WROTE ABOUT KIDS WHO DIED AND WERE STUCK IN LIMBO BC THIS EVIL BITCH WOULDN’T LET THEM GO TO HEAVEN (everlost/everwild/everfound) GOD I LOVE BOOKS SO FUCKING MUCH OK. ALSO FOR MY NON-RELIGIOUS ASS EAST OF EDEN BY JOHN STEINBECK IS FUCKIN EVERYTHING. LIFE OF PI ALSO FUCK AND TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD BOOKS ARE GREAT.

12) Favorite Pastimes? If I’m not Netflix binging or watching sports or going to the movies with my friends or drinking with the one friend I have who I can drink with, I’m writing. I have literally 25 characters now I’m fucking trash but I love them all so much ok leave me alone. 

13) Any Regrets? Nah I think I’m the smartest most reasonable person on the planet so I think everything I do is right and not questionable at all lmao. 

14) What Is Your Dream Job? Huh. Hard to say. I’m doing something I love now, and my boss has been in the business for 20 years and his business pulls in 5 mil a year so like.......... I could stand to keep doing this for a long time. Honestly I’ve never had a direction in life so now that I found an occupation that I love I think this might be my dream job. 

15) Do You Want To Get Married? No lmao marriage is a patriarchal social construct and what’s the point? To legally be able to call someone mine? I don’t like people enough to want to spend my entire life with one. 

16) Do You Want To Have Kids? I never in my life want to give birth to a child. That shit is not for me. I have 5 nieces and nephews, a pregnant sister, and another sister who plans on having at least 2 someday. I don’t need no babies. I’ll be the cool vodka aunt who encourages my trash siblings’ kids to follow their hearts and encourages them to be gay if they’re feeling gay. I have always liked the idea of waiting until I’m like 40-45 and rich, and adopting a 10-12 y/o kid bc those kids never get adopted and I’ll just be the best parent to them. 

17) How Many Countries Have You Visited? I’ve never left the United States lmao. Fuck me right???????????????/

I have finished 3 bottles of beer/beer-like substance while writing this and the Rangers just fuckin lost go figure. I want @gingeronastick and @chrisarchers to do this and also whoever else feels like it ok ily babes

[chwrpg]

Welcome to CHW, Ellie!

A NOTE FROM ADMIN R: I adored this application. Talk about a job greatly done, you have definitely taken Chanel and expanded on her to the point that I have no doubts that you’re going to do her so much justice. As for your request for an faceclaim change, we will be accepting it but we do prefer that Chanel keeps the name that she has. 

OOC NAME/ALIAS, PREFERRED PRONOUNS, AGE & TIMEZONE: 

ellie, she/her, 23 & mst. 

DESIRED CHARACTER:

chanel horowitz

HOW ACTIVE WILL YOU BE?

seven — i’m currently working full time but i should be around for a few hours at least on most days unless i’m dead tired. 

DESCRIBE THE CHARACTER:

i’d compare chanel to an onion but that would be a grave mistake. not because it’s not true but because chanel would probably scream bloody murder and be extremely offended. she’d much rather be compared to the versatile collections of alexander mcqueen. but whatever the metaphor may be, the truth is that this girl has an endless number of layers to her. at first glance, chanel’s nothing more than just another socialite. vain, selfish, and air headed. she has nothing more than her daddy’s credit card to offer to the world. she doesn’t really do any harm but she doesn’t do any good either. her days spent by the pool or at the mall, living the life ‘she was born to live’ thanks to her daddy’s wealth. which, she is, but that doesn’t mean that’s the only thing she is. as self observed as she is, she does care about others and wants the best for those she cares about. take taissa for example. someone chanel took under her wing, wanting to help her out and teaching her ‘the ways of life’ or at least the social hierarchy. to be popular and beautiful, admired and envied by others — that’s what she wanted for her. shallow? maybe. out of the goodness of her heart? definitely. chanel’s priorities may not be in order but her intentions for the most part are usually noble. maybe there’s something in it for her at times but that doesn’t mean she’s not helping out someone else. 

she’s smart. not like elle woods smart but pretty darn close. her entire life she’s spent just cruising by in school because academics have never been her thing but if you were to look at her test scores and grades, she falls in the average section without even trying. instead of putting her time and effort into studying and trying to get better grades, she spent her time in high school trying to argue her way to getting a higher grade. which worked, because as ditzy as chanel may be, she’s not in any way stupid. her focus being half in the clouds and the other half retaining information she knows she may need but isn’t fully interested in. current events boring her, preferring to catch up on the latest celebrity gossip than on whatever’s going on with politics. her father wanting more from her, adding unnecessary pressure that could cause premature wrinkling. which would be a major faux-pas because the last thing she needs is to start worrying about aging early or badly, for that matter. which was why paris was the perfect getaway for her. it gave her a sense of direction, feeling as if she had something going in her life as she attended the best of events and met cute boys left and right. it was personally the greatest decision she had ever made, except her dad didn’t agree and she found herself back home. 

something she’s not too happy about. she feels grounded in a way. forced to go back to the usual when she could be doing so much more with her life. sure, getting an actual degree isn’t the worse thing in life but chanel has literally no idea what she wants to do and having to sit through lecture after lecture doesn’t make things easier. which is funny because if she took a step back and stopped living in the bubblegum type of world for a moment, she’d realized what she has a knack for and what she’s passionate about. as ironic as it is, what i could see chanel doing down the road would be the one things she’s given jasper crap about all these years — caring for the environment. though, then again, it could just be reality coming back to bite her in the ass for all the treehugger jokes. nonetheless, i see her passion and focus being in finding more ways to be eco-friendly in the world of fashion. just having this epiphany and accepting the reality that the world of fashion isn’t as great as it seems and that there are others who suffer because of it, ie, children, animals, underpaid laborers, etc.

though, in the meantime, chanel remains the same girl as always. stubborn like a boot, never accepting that the word ‘no’ does exist and that things don’t always go as she wants them to. she still loves the attention she receives from others. how girls envy her and boys want to be with her. she’s definitely childish, throwing mini tantrum’s and pouting when things don’t go her way. eager to life in her perfect and sheltered life, deep down probably expecting to be married off to some wealthy heir and become just another trophy wife if that means being able to continue with her luxurious lifestyle and not having to face the reality that there’s an entire world at her feet ready to be explored and conquered. something that terrifies her more than anything because why try something new when conforming to the everyday is perfectly safe and comfortable. 

SAMPLE WRITING:

it had ended. she was on her way home, jasper in the driver’s seat and they were headed toward the hills but that didn’t make any of it seem like less of a nightmare. like they had taken chanel out of her body and made her watch the catastrophic disaster that occurred from the sidelines. snapshots played through her mind as she replayed each decision she had made that night and how that had spiraled out of control. she should have known better, she should have taken the lack of invitation as a sign. after all, she was chanel horowitz and anyone who was anyone knew that a party wasn’t a party without the fashionista making an appearance. she was like the fairy godmother of parties, blessing them all from rags to fab. at least that’s what she liked to believe and by now people knew better than to question the young horowitz unless they were ready to lose an argument.

so chanel did as chanel does — prepping and pampering herself, she made sure to look flawless from head to toe before stepping out the door. if on a bad day, chanel looked like a solid hundred, she would have been damned if she wasn’t the best looking girl at that party. especially if her invite was oh so conveniently forgotten. which, by the way, what the hell? chanel wasn’t sure what she was more upset about; not being invited or the fact that she was bothered by it. after all, she’d gone to galas in paris, mingling with the creme de la creme, to be left out some small town party. it was so flipping insignificant and yet chanel felt .. hurt??

chanel inhaled deeply, letting the puff of air leave her lips as she leaned against the passenger window. using her arm as a pillow, she left the summer breeze brush against her. the cool wind soothing her as she felt herself starting to calm down. while her head still spun, she could feel her heartbeat start to return to its normal pace. sure, her face was sticky and stained with a face full of makeup that once was but no longer were tears streaming down her face as she sobbed. it was the first time she felt safe since she stepped foot in that damn party.

turning her head from the streets of illionis, her eyes narrowed on jasper as he drove. how jasper had managed to be her knight in shining armor was beyond her. he was the last person she would have ever imagined coming to her rescue. with the amount of bickering the two did and how chanel always had a snarky comment up her sleeve, she would have expected him to turn the other way and go save a dolphin or two. she couldn’t blame him for it either. ever since they’ve known each other all chanel had ever been to the older boy was a complete and utter brat. stubborn and capricious, if chanel had an opinion about jasper, she made sure he heard it loud and clear. but then again, chanel was the immature twelve year old, not jasper. the fact that he had rushed her into his car to get her home safely wasn’t surprising. saint jasper, always off saving the world. as much as she hated to admit it, chanel was thanking her lucky stars that he came along. stranded in the middle of god knows where, chanel was pretty sure she was going to die that night considering her luck.

a small smile cracking on her lips as she turned back her attention to the world around her. closing her eyes this time as she enjoyed the refreshing breeze. she was trying to let her mind drift from the events of the night. trying being the key word as she found herself reliving most of what had just happened. recalling the humiliation she felt when taissa decided to go ballistic on her. how much her friend’s words stung. while chanel was smart enough to know that alcohol had a big part with the blonde’s behavior, she couldn’t help but wonder if that really was the alcohol talking or taissa was speaking from her heart? regardless, that had put a huge damper on not only her mood but judgement. which was how and why she ended up in elton’s car in the first place. jack daniels being the ultimate deceiver, as she didn’t give the boy’s insistence on taking her home as a red flag. no, chanel’s common sense had been so blindly impaired that the first sign of danger she got from him was when pushed himself on her. how could she have been so stupid? to think that the only thing he wanted was to get her home. no, guys like him were only interested in the one thing chanel wasn’t ready to give up. and yet, no matter how hard she tried to push him off or how she kept saying no, his body was still pushing himself onto her and boozy lips were still trying to find hers.

if it hadn’t been for the fact that he was literally pushing her to the edge of the passenger side and chanel falling out of the car, who knows what would have happened. the possible thought of her being stuck in that car and things escalating sent shivers down her spine. she felt disgusting, inside and out. what she needed was a long, hot shower with a some type of scented exfoliator to get that swine off of her. never again would she trust anyone while having any amount of alcohol in her system. and while she was thankful that she had been able to get out of his car, the fact that her night had ended with a gun pressed to her head only unraveled her even more. how she felt her heart stop, time moving in milliseconds and chanel wondering if he’d actually pull the trigger. giving up everything she had on her not daring to test her sucky luck. it was like her perfect glass globe had been broken that night with everything that could go wrong actually growing wrong leaving the girl feeling helpless and hopeless. the slight relief that had washed over her suddenly gone as she grew overwhelmed once again. tears streaming down her face as she sat up, facing straight out the window as she brought her knees up to her chest and hugged herself. sobbing silently as all she wished was for the night to end before something else could go wrong.

ANYTHING ELSE?

1985. would it be possible to change her fc to bruna marquezine? this may be a weird question but if the fc change is approved, could i change her name to carlotta? i was just thinking since bruna is latina a latinx name could fit her better? if not it’s fine heh. thank you! (and sorry for the million questions).