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preciouspeterbparker · 4 years ago

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i wish i were, part 3

part one

part two

summary: it’s getting harder to pretend that everything is okay.

word count: 4.2k

warnings: step- inc*st, smut, underage sex, suicidal ideation (oops), ANGST, depression, self-harm mention (doesn’t actually happen, just intrusive thoughts), it’s all mentioned very casually so if this is triggering for you please don’t read!! <3 , ambiguous ending

this is the last part y’all! thanks for going on this ride with me. this was my first multi-chap fic and it kinda gave me the confidence to know that i’m capable of writing longer stuff without it being super shitty lol. sorry that it’s taken me so long!!

love you all

- bloo

It's getting harder to pretend that everything is okay.

Peter hates to say it, fuck, the thought physically pains him, but he’s glad the school year’s almost over. He’s glad that it’s almost time for graduation, time for Tony to leave for the special summer program MIT invited him to participate in.

He just wants to stop feeling like this, never wants to feel like this ever again. He always feels heavy, weighed down, like his clothes are soaking wet. It’s a feeling that goes deep into his bones, leaving him cold, aching, and tired.

It’s a good thing there’s not really any work left to do for school, other than exams; Peter spends most of his time in bed, headphones on and staring at the wall, the one that separates his room from Tony’s.

He keeps hearing Pepper’s voice in his head. He thinks you hung the moon, babe. It’s so cute. The words make him burn inside, make him want to dig his fingers in and peel his skin back until the feeling spills out of him. Until his blood spill out, until he doesn’t have to deal with this anymore- Fuck-

That’s how his brain is working, now. The intrusive thoughts have reached new levels. Peter’s always had them, he’s been passively suicidal for most of his adolescence, but it seems that any minor inconvenience has him ready to end it all. But it makes sense, he supposes. He’s already hurting, already weary and withdrawn. It really wouldn’t take much to push him over the edge.

Too bad he doesn’t really want to die. He just wants everything to...stop. So that he doesn’t have to feel like this.

And because the universe is obviously enjoying fucking with him, the first thing he sees walking out of first period is Pepper walking down the hallway, a faded black t-shirt hanging from her shoulders, exposing the bright red of her bra straps.

Peter recognizes the garment immediately.

It’s the Black Sabbath shirt, the one he’d kept under his pillow for over a week. The one he’d spilled multiple loads of cum onto before finally putting it in his laundry and carefully slipping it back into Tony’s room once it had been washed.

And now Pepper’s wearing it. Which means Tony gave it to her.

Peter stops, freezes right there in the doorway of Mrs. Flannigan’s classroom. He blinks, staring blankly in the direction the blonde had gone. His classmates protest behind him, pushing forward until he snaps out of it. Taking a few stumbling steps to the side, he leans back against the wall.

He feels like he can’t breathe. Some kid walking down the hall looks at him funny, and he realizes that there are tears rolling down his cheeks. Hastily wiping them away, he slowly pushes himself off the wall and starts making a hasty exit to the bathroom, head down and eyes trained on the linoleum.

Then-

“Hey, Peter- Wait, Pete what’s wrong, what happened?”

Shuddering, barely able to contain the sob that threatens to rip its way out, Peter ignores Tony, just pushes past him and doesn’t stop moving until he��s locked in the private restroom.

With his back to the door, Peter slides down til his butt’s on the cold ground, arms wrapped around his knees as he tries to muffle his cries as he sits there, shaking.

He just wants it to stop.

***

Something’s up with Peter, and Tony has a sinking feeling that it’s got something to do with him. But he doesn’t know what he possibly could have done.

They’d had such a nice time celebrating his birthday. He even had a new photo in his wallet, a polaroid of him and Peter cheesing goofily into the camera. Looking at it brings a smile to his face.

He really does love his little brother. Though he was young, Tony can remember life before Richard and Peter came into their lives. He remembers being an only child as lonely hours spent trying to entertain himself while his mom was busy working, trying to support him as a single parent. He’d been ecstatic upon meeting Richard and finding out that he had a little boy, too, that he was going to get a brother.

Tony knows that he and Peter haven’t been spending as much time together as they usually do, but he just chalked it up to it being his senior year. He wanted to spend the time with his friends, with his girlfriend, making the best of their last bit of time together before everything changes.

Peter’s words from his birthday ring in his head. I don’t want you to...forget me. Maybe he’s feeling left behind?

He’s only got a little over a week left until graduation, and then a week after that he leaves for MIT. That’s not much time at all.

The teen resolves to make some more time in his schedule to spend with his younger brother. Rhodey and the guys and Pep can deal for a couple days.

***

Peter’s pulled out of the clusterfuck of ruminative thoughts that have kept him awake for the past week by the squeak of his bedroom door being opened. He blinks under the covers, instinctively curling in on himself. He’s been under here for hours, but he still feels so cold.

Tony’s voice comes through the small crack he’s created between the door and the jamb, one eye peeking inside. “Peter? Are you….” He pauses and clears his throat before continuing softly, “Are you okay?”

The lump under the covers that is Peter shifts a little. His voice is dull and monotone when he replies, as apathetic as he can muster. “...Just leave me alone, Tony.” So much for that. Even saying his brother’s name hurts, a lot more than he thought it would, making his voice crack pathetically. Peter pulls his hands up to his chest and tries to quell the sudden surge of emotion that rushes through him, stifling a whimper. Please just go away.

Of course, instead of listening for once in his fucking life, Tony opens the door further so that he can slip inside. It closes behind him with a soft click and he takes a tentative step towards the queen bed that’s pushed up against the walls in the corner of the dark bedroom. "Pete…" Peter can hear him softly pad over to the nightstand and flick on the small lamp sitting there. His breathing in the quiet room is near deafening to Peter. “I…” He hovers there for a minute before sighing and sitting at the foot of the bed. “I wish you’d tell me what’s wrong. So that I can… I just want to help, Pete.”

The silence stretches on uncomfortably between them and even under the covers, Peter can feel the worried gaze burning him alive.

His skin is crawling with how badly he wants to crawl out of the covers and into Tony’s lap, the way he would when they were younger and he was upset. He needs to get Tony out of here. He can’t-

Peter moves so that his head is exposed, but he looks down at the bed rather than the other teen. "No, it’s fine. I mean I-, I’m fine," Peter sniffles, blinking furiously in an attempt to will the tears away. Fuck. His- fuck, his throat is tight, he can't swallow. His mouth falls open, a shuddering breath escaping as the muscles in his throat spasm. "I get it, Tony. I promise I get it, I really do. I do. She's-"

Fuck. He must really be exhausted, he wasn’t supposed to say that, wasn’t supposed to let on the truth of why he’s upset. Peter's eyes flit around like he's on speed, darting from one focal point to another without him truly seeing anything. His voice is hoarse, thin. It's as small as he feels. Miniscule. Insignificant. He’s gonna ruin everything but he can’t make himself stop. "I mean, I can’t- I can't compete with-" The words come to an abrupt halt, his mouth snapping shut.

Tony nudges Peter’s foot with his knee. “What? Peter.” He bumps against Peter again until the younger boy looks up to make eye contact.

That stupid fucking crease forms between his older brother's eyebrows. Peter wants to slap him. Or kiss him. Mostly he wants to scream.

"Peter, what? Compete with who? Are you talking about Pepper? I know we haven’t been spending much time together, but I’m gonna fix that before I leave, I promise. I don’t want you to feel left behind, not at all but I still don’t get- What’s this got to do with -," Tony starts, placatingly. But there’s something in his eyes, in the barely there tremor in his voice- And Peter suddenly realizes that Tony knows, has to know at least a little bit.

He swears his vision flashes red for a second. "It has everything to do with her," Peter all but shrieks, nails digging crescent-shaped welts into his palms. He feels overwhelmed, trapped. Like a hermit crab without its shell- vulnerable, horribly exposed. It comes out without his consent, and so does his fucking stutter. Fuck it all. "And I know- I know- I know I'm fucked up, Tony, I know it, but I love you, the way that you love h-huh-her.”

He takes a shuddering breath, reeling from saying the words out loud for the first time. “I'm sss-suh-sick, and g-gross and you- I know I'm a fff-fuh-freak and nnn-now- now you’re gonna hate me!" Peter sobs, his entire body shaking as he works himself towards an anxiety attack, a panic attack, a heart attack, fucking something. “I can’t even fu-fu-fu-fucking talk-” There’s snot and tears running down his face, he’s upset himself so much he can’t get through a fucking sentence. He knows he’s making a fucking fool of himself. He’s so stupid, why did he ever think that anything could come from this. He just wants it all to stop, he wants Tony to leave so that he can figure out some way to fix this, to make it all go away-

Tony’s staring at him, mouth parted, dark eyes wide and concerned. "Baby, what- I could never hate you, babydoll." It’s like the nickname comes out instinctually, the sound of Peter’s stutter instantly taking him back to the way he would console Peter when they were much younger, pulling him into his arms and rocking him like his own little baby.

He climbs on the bed and burrows into the nest of blankets and pillows that Peter has created, but he stays sitting up. His arms wrap around his baby brother and pull him up into his lap so that he’s close to his chest, in spite of the younger’s attempts to squirm away. “Calm down, Pete.” Tony presses his lips to Peter’s head when his cries only increase, frowning at how hot the skin of his forehead is. “You’ve gotta calm down,” he soothes. “C’mon, it’ll get better once you calm down, baby, you know that.” One of his hands glides up and down Peter’s heaving back.

Gasping, Peter shakes his head. He buries his face in the space where Tony’s pec and arm meet, taking a shuddering breath through his mouth. He’s trying to calm down but it’s not working. “I’m so- I’m so ssss-sss-suh-sorry, Tuh-Tony!” He feels like he’s gonna pass out. Shifting a bit, he pulls his head back in an attempt to get some more air. They almost make eye contact but he hurriedly looks away. He’s ruined everything. Tony hasn’t reacted to his confession yet but Peter knows that it’s gonna be bad, it’s gonna be so bad when he does.

What’s he got left to lose?

Peter can't help himself; he leans in. The tips of their noses brush, and he pauses there for a moment. He can hear Tony's sharp intake of breath through his own heaving as they finally lock eyes. The look in Tony's chocolate depths is- Peter doesn’t really know. Tony's never looked at him like this before, no one has.

“Tony,” he whispers shakily, breath catching in his throat before closing the distance between them. Time stands still for a moment before something breaks, the tension snapping like a rubberband pulled too tight. Their mouths meet and Peter immediately whines at the feeling of Tony’s lips on his, body instinctively arching up against his brother’s, too lost in it to feel embarrassed of how easy he is to get worked up.

It’s...everything he ever dreamed of.

Tony’s hands move to cup his cheeks, and Peter’s own hands find their way into the other’s dark, wavy locks as their mouths move against each other. There’s a swipe of tongue across his bottom lip, timidly asking for entrance. The younger obliges immediately, letting the warm muscle slide into his mouth where it meets his own. It sends shivers down his spine and he keens when his tongue is sucked into the wet of Tony’s mouth. His dick begins to fill rapidly in his sweats, leaving him feeling lightheaded and a bit disoriented.

Peter’s never made out with anyone before, but this-

He thinks he understands what all of the hype is about, now.

They pull apart, both gasping for air. Tony moves his head slightly, taking heaving breaths that blow onto the exposed skin of Peter’s neck, and his entire body seizes. The elder brother pauses, eyes darkening, before he latches his mouth there and sucking, hard- Fuck, Peter swears he’s about to cum in his pants.

“Tony.” The name is all but ripped from his throat, ragged and wanton and filthy sounding. He didn’t know he could feel this good. There’s precum steadily leaking from the slit at the tip of his cock, and though he can’t see it at the moment, he’s sure there’s a wet spot staining the crotch of his pants.

More moist air on the sensitive skin of his neck, now slightly red from being rubbed by the stubble covering Tony’s chin. “Shit, Peter,” comes the eighteen year old’s wrecked gasp and his hips shift, nudging his own erection against Peter’s thigh. “Fuck, fuck.”

Peter feels like he’s losing his mind. “Tony, Tony lemme- Wanna touch you, please-,” he says, unable to put together a full sentence. The cock he’s been dreaming about for almost a year is within his reach and he doesn’t know how they got here, has no idea what’s going to happen after, but he’s so fucking close to getting what he’s wanted for so long but thought he could never have. His hands flutter restlessly near the front of his brother’s basketball shorts and the bulge that’s pressing insistently against the loose material.

“Yeah,” Tony gasps, shifting Peter out of his lap so that he can lie down on the bed on his side and then he pulls Peter down with him, facing each other. “Me too, can I…,” he trails off, the fingers of his right hand running down Peter’s body from his shoulder down to the sharp point of his hip bone.

All Peter can do is nod jerkily, already reaching to tug at the dark red fabric that’s wrapped around the older teen’s waist. He lets out a desperate, frustrated sound when they get caught, but Tony’s hands take over for him, so he pushes his own pants down to his knees instead. His dick hangs down heavily once it's free of its confines, and there’s a quiet thud as Tony’s slaps against the dark hairs smattered across his lower belly.

Looking at his big brother’s cock for the first time in the dim lighting makes Peter’s mouth water. He can make out the slight shadow of a vein running the length of it, and his tip is big, a drop of precum sitting there just waiting for him to lick at it. He’s bigger than Peter, in both length and girth. It’s perfect, something right out of his fantasies.

Tony rocks his hips forward and their erections rub against each other, prompting them to let out synchronous groans. “Holy shit,” Peter whines, his own hips stuttering as they start to rut against each other in earnest. They quickly get into a slightly stumbling rhythm. It feels so good, their cocks both so hot, so hard. He already knows this is going to be over before it really even starts but he couldn’t care less. “Tony, Tony, yes-”

The brunette all but growls. “That’s it, Petey. Fuck, your cock feels so good, I never- Shit,” Tony pants before spitting into his palm and wrapping his hand around both of their shafts. “Fucking hell-” His toes twitch against the inside of Peter’s ankle. “Pete-”

Peter’s movements get jerkier, his hips stuttering at the feeling of Tony’s wet hand, the way their dicks are sliding against one another. He’s so close, so fucking close. “Please,” he whimpers, fingers digging to Tony’s shoulders where he’s holding on in an attempt to ground himself. HIs tongue licks at his brother’s bottom lip. “Wanna cum, Tony, lemme cum-”

“Yeah, fuck, yes Peter, cum, cum for me-” Tony groans, the speed of his stroking increasing. The rhythm is jerky, and it’s so uncoordinated when combined with their frantic undulating, but it feels amazing.

“Tony, Tony, Tony,” Peter chants as his orgasm slams into him like a brick wall. His muscles lock up, and there are probably crescent-shaped welts in the skin of Tony’s shoulders and back. Thick, white ropes of cum shoot from his cock and make a mess in his brother’s hand. A whine escapes him as he grows more sensitive in Tony’s grasp.

The feeling of the warm liquid smearing over his erection is what does the older teen in. He crushes his mouth to Peter’s as he cums, fucking into his fist and rubbing against the other’s softening cock, licking lewdly into the wet of his mouth. “Pete,” he sighs, pulling away after he’s ridden out the wave of his orgasm.

“I love you,” Peter whispers contently, snuggling in and pressing a kiss to a freckle on Tony’s shoulder. This is everything he’s ever wanted, to be held in his big brother’s arms like this: like a lover. Maybe he was worried for nothing, maybe everything will be okay. Sure, they’ll have to hide it from everyone, especially Mom & Dad, but once they’re both in college… They have different last names, no one would ever have to know. They could be happy. Peter just wants to be happy, just wants this feeling to stay.

Tony shifts slightly and takes a deep breath, the puff of air ruffling Peter’s sweat-slick auburn curls. “Pete,” he says again, softly. “I love you too, I do.” He pauses, pulling back slightly and loosening his hold on the younger boy and rolling onto his back so that they’re both looking up at the ceiling. “But I-”

Peter freezes, the afterglow fading instantly. His heartbeat picks up, and there’s a slight ringing in his ears. He grips the sweat damp comforter in his hands, fingers twitching restlessly, stroking back and forth over the fabric in an attempt to soothe himself. No. No, no no, this isn’t- Tony- He can’t-

Another heavy sigh. “We can’t- We can’t do this again, Pete,” Tony says into the quiet of the night, still slightly out of breath from exertion. His voice is soft, gentle. He’s trying not to hurt Peter; Peter thinks that’s bullshit.

There’s a lead weight in his stomach. He feels like he’s drowning. He feels like he’s gonna be sick. He feels dirty. He feels-

He’s so tired of feeling.

Tony hesitates before pulling his shorts up and sliding out of the bed. He reaches out, brushing his fingers over Peter’s hand, jerks back when the younger immediately tenses and recoils from the touch. “I’m sorry,” he whispers before hastily making his way to the door, shutting it gently behind him.

“Just go, Tony,” he croaks before rolling over in the bed, away from the love of his life his brother.

Peter lays there for the rest of the night, unmoving, staring at the ceiling, tears running down the sides of his face, seeing nothing.

If only he could feel nothing, too.

***

“Where...where ya goin, Pete?”

Peter is putting clothes in a small duffel bag. He makes a mental note to remember to grab a new thing of toothpaste when he gets his toiletry bag together. “I’m, uh, gonna go stay with Ned. For a few days.” More like a few weeks, but he doesn’t need to tell Tony that.

It’s only been two days since they-

Peter’s already had enough. He can’t be here, he can’t skirt around the elephant that is his feelings towards Tony, can’t handle the awkwardness in the air as his stupid fucking brother tries to go on as if nothing ever happened. As if it meant nothing to him.

As if Peter meant nothing to him, means nothing to him.

Peter can...he can be okay with that. He has to be. But he can’t be here. He can’t.

“What about mom and da-” Tony cuts himself off, and Peter can tell that’s not what he is really trying to ask. Of course he’s so fucking disgusted, so fearful of someone else knowing, that he can’t even say it. No, what he really means is-

“I didn’t tell them I kissed you, Tony,” Peter hisses, tears burning in his eyes. He yanks the zipper of his bag closed, biting back a scream when it gets stuck for a second. “I’m not stupid. Why would I tell them what we did? I don’t want them to hate me, too. Don’t worry about what I told them, they said I could go.”

Maria and Richard are under the impression that Peter’s just stressed about his grades and going a little stir crazy. When they’d talked last night, Mom had frowned gently at him, mentioning how down he’d looked lately and letting him know that he was loved and cherished. Dad had actually been the one to suggest spending some time with Ned; maybe seeing his best friend would help pull Peter out of his funk.

If only they knew.

Tony gapes at him, an incredulous look on his face. “But what about Tuesday? You’re gonna miss my graduation? For what, to fuck around with Ned? Peter-”

Something in him snaps. He clenches his jaw, swallows harshly. Glares tearily at his brother. “Would you please just stop it?”

The taller boy sets his shoulders and crosses his arms, defiant. “I don’t want you to go.” His eyes are narrowed, searching Peter’s face. For what, the younger has no idea. Nor does he care.

“It doesn’t matter what you want, Tony,” he yells, glad that Mom and Dad are out at the grocery store, getting supplies for Tony’s graduation party. His voice cracks on his brother’s name. Always on his name. “Not anymore. I don’t- I know you don’t- Do you know how much it hurts me? To- to hear you? To know, to have to listen to-”

Tony’s mouth opens, but no words come out. “Hear us? You- you heard us? When?” His eyes are wide. He must realize exactly what Peter’s talking about, when he’s talking about, and he looks uncomfortable, vulnerable in a way that Peter’s never seen him before. Something ugly deep inside the younger teen feels satisfied for a moment before it deflates. He’s left feeling just as drained as before.

Tony continues, “Peter, I-” He cuts himself off, looks away.

Of course he can’t even come up with something to say.

“For fuck’s sake, Tony, you don’t have to explain everything to me!” It comes out as a sob. Peter feels like he’s a volcano; the words are erupting and he can’t do anything but allow it, powerless to stop them. “Nothing you say will make it better! I know you’re straight! I know it’s- that it’s wrong. I know Pepper is-,” he chokes, gasping. Why is this happening? Everything is going so fast. How is he freezing and on fire at the same time?

“She’s gorgeous and I’m just the path-th-thetic little br-brother who th-thinks you hung the moon.” Peter’s spluttering, flapping his hands at his sides as he tries to do something with the energy humming inside him. He wants out, he needs Tony to go so that he can finish packing. He has to get out of here.

Tony takes a step towards him. “No, Peter, how could you-”

Peter’s sniffling, eyes squeezed shut. His hands are clenched into fists at his sides, trembling. Why won’t Tony just leave him alone? He just wants to be alone. “I know I’m ugly and I- I bet you can’t w-w-wait to go to MIT, to go away from me!”

“Babydoll,” is what leaves Tony’s mouth, so soft Peter almost doesn’t hear it. His hands are shaking as they land on his younger brother’s cheeks. Warm tears are gently brushed away by his thumbs. “Pete.”

Brow furrowed, Peter slowly opens his eyes and blinks the tears back in order to look at his brother. Tony looks...scared? What does he have to be scared of?

Peter tries to pull away, out of Tony’s grasp but the older teen just clutches him tighter. “Tony- What? It’s fine, j-just stop! Let me go, I need to finish-”

Tony closes his eyes and crashes their lips together.

don’t hate me

@spidey-sins @silkystark @thegreenmetblue @snailshome @hp-nv-221b @lemondrop313

if you wanna be untagged lmk

#starker #tony x peter #tony stark x peter parker #starkercest #bloo writes bad things (tm)

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surveys-at-your-service · 3 years ago

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Survey #425

“evolution repressed by our backwards contest / breeding our torrential demise as we come to this edge”

Serious question, peanut butter or nutella? I think Nutella is a godsend, but I use peanut butter waaaaay more often. We don't even really buy Nutella because I will destroy the jar. Do you prefer baked potatoes or mashed potatoes? Baked. What is your oldest sibling’s middle name? Kathryn. I think. Do you like breadsticks? I just like bread, man. What are your favorite things to spend money on? Tattoos, uuuuugggghhhhh <3 Which would you rather have a new puppy or kitten? Neither, really. Most puppies drive me insane (even though they're cute as everliving fuck), and I don't want another cat. Mom actually talked about getting another, but I really just want my one boy. Roman would get SO jealous, anyway. I enjoy just having my baby. How old will you be on your next birthday? 26. Yikes. Do you ever feel self-conscious when you eat around other people? As "the fat one," I can be sometimes. I would say though that more often than not, it's sort of whatever to me because I'm a human that has to eat. When you opened your eyes this morning, what were your first thoughts? I thought I slept way later than I actually did. What is one thing in the room you’re in that reminds you of somebody? My stuffed meerkat Rebel. Jason got it for me for my first birthday that we were together. Could you ever be friends with somebody who was homophobic? Never again. I was once able to think "agree to disagree," but sometimes by doing so, you're siding with evil by not enforcing what is more than just a belief. It should come with being a human. Also given my own sexuality, it would be a slap in the face to me. Would you ever want to be a supermodel, or date one? Hell no. I'd date one though, if they were modest about their position. Honestly, have you ever made fun of somebody so bad they cried? Wow, no. Honestly, would you rather be complimented on your looks or intelligence? Quite frankly, nowadays, my appearance. I need it. My self-confidence is so far below "shit." Have you ever purchased a pregnancy test, for yourself or otherwise? Nope. You can get one thing, anything, for free right now. What do you pick? Why? Hm. I know I talk about it a lot, but it would still probably be a 40 gallon terrarium for Venus. She needs - and deserves - it. Honestly, have you ever danced naked? NOOOOOOOO. What was the first illegal thing that you did? Did you get caught? Downloaded music. My mom eventually found out, but didn't care much. What is the home page on the computer you’re on? Google. Do you like to write poetry? I do, but I haven't done it in a while. :/ Are your ears pierced? Yes. If so, were they pierced with a piercing gun, or with a sterile needle? Piercing gun. Which, by the way, do not do. There are many more risks with a piercing gun versus a needle by a professional. Do you wear makeup regularly? I never do. Did you eat cereal for breakfast today? No. I've been on a bagel kick lately. When was the last time you tripped over something? Last night, actually. The rug in the living room was slightly turned up, and I tripped in the dark. I didn't actually fall, thankfully. Any obsessive-compulsive tendencies? I'm diagnosed with OCD. I experience more ruminations and intrusive thoughts more than obsessive behaviors, though. Who was the last person you yelled at? Probably Mom. Why did you yell at them? I don't remember. Favorite type of apple? I like pink lady apples. I really enjoy any, so long as they're crisp. Ever seen live horse racing? No. To be totally honest, I don't really like the concept of it. Motivating a horse to run by hurting it doesn't exactly seem moral... How about live greyhound racing? No. What’s one thing, besides the obvious, that you couldn’t live without? The Internet, haha. Have you ever touched a giraffe? No. What does your mom call you? Britt. What stresses you out the most in life? I really don't think I could pick a top one. There are so many. Do you play any PC games? What is your favorite? Yeah. Y'all probably know WoW is my favorite. If you were pregnant, how would you tell the father? Well, that would depend on the circumstances. Did we want a baby? Was it a bad surprise, a happy surprise? I can't answer this with just one idea. What’s the hardest level you can play on Guitar Hero? I used to be able to slam out Expert easily with only very few songs I had to play on Hard, but now it's been YEARS. I've played less than once in a blue moon, and my skill's definitely faded some. It really depends on the song. What ever happened with you and your first boyfriend? He couldn't handle my depression anymore. What’s your favorite country song? "When The Stars Go Blue" by Tim McGraw, probably. What is the worst thing a former boyfriend/girlfriend has done to you? Fail to communicate what he was feeling with me and then make a dashing break for it very, very abruptly after three and a half years. It put me past a state of shock, but trauma with how no less than obsessed I was with him. What were you for Halloween last year? I didn't dress up. :/ I wish I had the money and motivation alike to. Are you feeling guilty for something? I always will. Are you usually quiet or loud? Quiet. How many hours do you spend on the computer a day? Like... uh... all of them, oof. What is the show that you watched when you were little, and you still do? Meerkat Manor. Do your siblings text you? Not really. Do you want a small or big wedding? Small. Have you ever searched for your own house on Google Earth? Not the house I currently live in, but I have before. Who is your ex dating/talking to? I don't know. Ever kissed someone who smokes? No. Does it take a lot for someone to annoy you? Frankly, no. Do you own your own computer? This laptop, anyway. Did you ever have to share a room with one of your siblings? Yes, with my younger sister as a kid and pre-teen. What noises in the room you’re in, do you hear at the moment? I hear the video I'm watching, as well as my fan. Have you ever dated someone with longer hair than yours? Yes. What’s the biggest upcoming event for you? Nothing. Not like that's a surprise. What do you typically order from Wendy’s? Son of the Baconator. @_@ Have you ever been given a lapdance by an actual stripper? No. Those are so awkward to me. What do you love most about yourself? I don't know these days. Have you ever received a hickey from the last person you kissed? No. What are you doing right now? This survey and re-watching John Wolfe play Outlast 2. What’s bothering you right now? I'm immensely nervous about tomorrow. I have my first (and I pray the fuck to God not only) session with my new personal trainer then, and I'm terrified by how my body and my mental fortitude is going to react. Y'all have no fucking idea JUST how out of shape I am, and the muscles in my legs seem basically non-existent by now. I have to do something about my health, though, and I'm determined to make this shit work. More than determined. I know the first day is going to be hard, but I need to do this more than I can explain. What was the last thing you drank? ... What great fucking timing, I have a can of Mountain Dew, lol... That's another thing that needs to change. I've gotta stop the emotional and boredom-eating and chill the fuck out with soda. Be honest, do you like people in general? Quite frankly, no. There are plenty of people I love and think are amazing, of course, but I think I lean towards humanity being too shitty to like "in general." Do you want your tongue pierced? I miss my snake eyes. :/ That was suuuuch a cute piercing. I just had to take it out for the safety of my teeth. I kept accidentally clamping down on one of the balls when eating, and it would cause tiny fractures. Do you change your phone background a lot? No. Have you ever made someone so mad that they broke something? No. Have you ever been strip searched? No. Do you have a funny last name? Does anyone make fun of it? It's not funny-sounding, no, I just think it's too manly for me to enjoy as part of my name. Ever have a drug overdose? What did you OD on exactly? Yes. Oddly enough, I don't remember what I OD'd on now... You'd think I would, given how extreme the situation was. It was some cold medicine. Do you get sick of people who call themselves bipolar all the time? I absolutely do. It's extremely insensitive to people like myself who legitimately suffer - and I do mean "suffer" - from the disorder. Describe your day so far in three words: Dull. Lazy. Anxious. What was the most stressful project you had so far/while in school? Probably my senior project and the presentation I had to do for it. I taught about the fallacies and misconceptions of snakes, and I made a PowerPoint and some drawings to color and crosswords for the special ed children. I was so, so very nervous, but I got through it fine and the kids seemed to enjoy it. I actually still have the recording. Choose one- Butterfinger, Milky Way, Snickers: MILKY WAY. FUCK I love those. Have you ever stepped in dog poop? UGH yes. What was the last thing you spent money on? My niece's birthday present. Have you ever slept in the same bed with the last person you kissed? Yeah. Is there a guy that knows a lot about you? I almost said "yes," but then I realized he doesn't know me at all anymore. I've changed so much, hopefully mostly for the better. He hasn't "known" me in many years. Is there someone you just can’t imagine your life without? It's terrifying to imagine my life without Mom; Sara, too. Do you prefer Starbucks coffee or small cafe coffee? I prefer no coffee. Would you ever consider getting a piercing in your septum? Nah. Do you enjoy being outdoors? If it's cool outside and I have somewhere to sit that's not the ground, yes. Do people tell you that you have an accent? Sometimes. Do you enjoy watching fireworks on the 4th of July? They're pretty, but I don't support their usage by this point in my life. They're a fire hazard, triggering to some vets with PTSD, and beyond terrifying for animals. What’re some unspeakable subjects for you? I get most heated about child molestation. You do not fucking touch a child like that. I don't even write any of my bajillion evil guys committing it in RP because I just can't stomach it. Even when my little sister (a children's social worker) is telling Mom about some stuff she sees at work, I have to not be present, 'cuz that shit isn't rare. It's nauseating. Is there anyone you would take a bullet for? A good number of people, honestly. Do you enjoy tanning? Hell no, I avoid the sun and heat at like all costs. Are you a virgin? This is going to sound weird, but I actually don't know, but I lean towards no. Who’s your celebrity crush? mARK EDWARD FISCHFUCK Did or do you get good grades in English class? I was always excellent in English. What part of your body are you self-conscious about? My stomach. But I'm self-conscious about everything else, too. Are you expected to help fix Thanksgiving dinner? No. Everyone knows I can't cook worth a damn. Have you ever lost anyone close to cancer? Truly close, no. Unless you include pets, actually. Then a few. :/ Do you personally know anyone who is transgender? Yep. When was the last time you got a shot? Earlier this year for Covid. Get your fucking vaccine, btw. :^)

#survey #surveys #random questions #lyrics: ''altaer" by 3teeth

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gumnut-logic · 4 years ago

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We’ll Be Home For Christmas 5.1

Title: We’ll be home for Christmas

Day Five – Here on Tracy Island – Part 1 Prologue | 1.1 | 1.2 | 2.1 | 2.2 | 2.3 | 3.1 | 3.2 | 3.3 | 3.4 | 3.5 | 4.1 | 4.2 | 4.3 | 4.4 | 4.5 | 4.6 | 5.1

Author: Gumnut

20 Jun 2020

Fandom: Thunderbirds Are Go 2015/ Thunderbirds TOS

Rating: Teen

Summary: The boys can’t fly home for Christmas, so they have to find another way.

Word count: 3313

Spoilers & warnings: language and so, so much fluff. Science!Gordon. Artist!Virgil, Minor various ships, mostly background.

Timeline: Christmas Season 3, I have also kinda ignored the main storyline of Season 3. The boys needed a break, so I gave them one. Post season 3B, before Season 3C cos I started this fic before we saw it.

Author’s note: For @scattergraph. This is my 2019 TAG Secret Santa fic :D

No, I haven’t forgotten about this fic, and yes, it hit the six month mark about two weeks ago. I started writing this 8 Dec 2019. I’m nearly there.

Landmark, though. It is now officially my longest Thunderbirds fic, overtaking Gentle Rain today at around 60,000 words, depending on which word processing program it is sitting in. Never expected it to be this long.

This chapter pretty much wrote itself. It is almost like a role call of the five brothers and their states of mind. So a little bit of all the bros in this. I hope you enjoy.

Many thanks to @i-am-chidorixblossom @scribbles97 and @onereyofstarlight for reading through various bits, fielding my many wibblies, and for all their wonderful support.

Disclaimer: Mine? You’ve got to be kidding. Money? Don’t have any, don’t bother.

-o-o-o-

Day Five: Here on Tracy Island

Virgil woke late the next morning. It was a pleasant awakening, slipping from deep sleep to doze to a peaceful warmth beneath the covers. His room was dark. Darker than his cabin on A Little Lightning and with decidedly less sway.

He lay there for a while, enjoying the lack of need to get up and do anything and the absence of pain. He had slept the sleep of the dead and was thoroughly rested. There was something to be said about sleeping in your own bed at home that no holiday anywhere could provide.

But honestly, he wasn’t one to sit and do nothing for long, his brain kicking into gear while he lay there, listing off things waiting to be done. A visit to Two to reassure himself she had been checked over and was ready should she be needed. Not that he didn’t trust his family, it was just for his own peace of mind.

He should be able to get away with it so long as he didn’t spend too much time down there.

It took him a full half an hour of random rumination to realise that it was Christmas Day.

Oh shit.

The clock said eleven am.

His family...

He sat up abruptly and was thoroughly reminded of how stupid such a move was.

Oh, for the love of...

He grunted and rolled over until his face was smothered in his pillow.

The medic in his brain listed off the reasons why he shouldn’t have done that and why he needed to be careful and, goddamnit, he was sick of this. It was only an appendix, for crying out loud.

Stupid surgery.

That could have been so much worse.

He was being a spoilt child.

He let out a breath into his pillow, its warmth wrapping around his face. Another week and he would be fine.

But now, it was eleven oh five on Christmas morning and he was holding his family up.

He clambered out of bed with minimal complaint from his body, into the shower, a shave and into his familiar red flannel, jeans and boots.

It was such a comfort to be home.

He blow-dried his hair, gelled it up and made himself presentable.

The man who stared at him from his bathroom mirror was one appendix less and a whole pile of experience more.

He hummed to himself, tasting the notes in his throat. He could feel the soft whale skin under his fingertips, hear the lap of the water, the breeze in his hair...

And the music.

His eyes were closed without permission, the imagery taking over his mind. His fingers tapped against the bathroom vanity marking out the beat and rhythm of what he was trying to say, the pictures warping into abstract and lack of understanding.

Salty and long spoken, the notes repeated.

He didn’t know how long he stood there under the bathroom light, eyes seeing another world somewhere below the ocean surface.

By the time he shook off the haze it was eleven forty-five.

Almost lunchtime.

Alan would be foaming at the bit.

He pushed himself away from the sink and killed the light. Walking carefully across his room, he shook himself, rolling his shoulders. Get it together, Virgil. Your family is waiting for you.

Out through the door, down the corridor and, screw the stairs, he was taking the elevator.

It swallowed him whole.

-o-o-o-

Gordon had been up since before the sun. It was a sign that he was home. A session in the pool brought familiarity into the equation. There was definitely a difference between swimming in the pool versus the ocean and it had nothing to do with water salinity.

The ocean was beautiful and he adored it. But the pool sported no threat, no need to monitor his surroundings beyond the presence of a mischievous brother or two, leaving him to be able to focus on his stroke and let his mind wander.

The pleasant warmth of well used muscles pulling him forward through the water, simple thought processing...and considering the last few days, there were a lot of thoughts awaiting examination.

Some he had managed while piloting A Little Lightning on the home stretch, but there were still more needing answers and tactical decisions.

Sam. Mel. Scott. John. Virgil.

As far as he knew, Scott was still planning on inviting the neighbours over today. That would place Sam within reach of the apparently resistant Virgil.

He understood where both men were coming from. Virgil needed time and Sam was just a ball of eager energy.

Gordon was stuck between the two.

Push came to shove, he would side with Virgil regardless. He had too. But he really didn’t want to be divisive. If Virgil would talk just a little, it would help not only Sam and himself, but it might assuage the ball of worried energy that was Scott.

His arms sliced through water until he reached the end of the lane, his body automatically flipping and turning into the push off surge in the opposite direction. Air, splash and his hands slicing through the water again.

Okay, he would admit that he was worried himself. At first it was just amazing. His brother could sing to whales! A breakthrough. But yesterday he witnessed exactly how spaced Virgil became when singing and everything screamed wary. Humpback whales were beautiful creatures, but so big and so possibly unintentionally dangerous.

He couldn’t let Virgil anywhere near a whale alone. It just wasn’t safe. There was so much they didn’t know and the urge to protect his gentle brother just swelled in his heart.

They needed to investigate further. Find out exactly what was going on. Make sure his brother was safe. That it didn’t affect any water rescues.

They couldn’t afford to have Virgil spacing out in the ocean at random. As it was, Gordon wasn’t going to let Virgil anywhere near the ocean during rescues for the foreseeable future. He could stay up in Two.

Safe.

Whale song could travel around the globe.

His native realm had become a hazard for his big brother and that was unacceptable.

They had to find out what was going on.

John and Eos had made a good start, but Sam and himself needed to investigate further and soon.

Virgil needed to cooperate for his own safety.

Gordon broke his stroke, pushed himself to the side of the pool and rested his head on the concrete a moment, letting his body float randomly.

Blood pumped through his ears, his heart still running at exercise rate.

He needed to convince Virgil.

Somehow.

-o-o-o-

Scott revelled in the early dawn light. His feet pounded on his wonderfully familiar route around the Island. A trek he hadn’t laid eyes on for a week.

His runners crunched volcanic gravel beneath them.

The sun was just rising on Christmas Day, the beautiful weather hanging strong, the sea a stretch of glass disappearing off into the horizon. His current trajectory pointed him directly south where he knew beyond the glass lay Raoul Island. A single spot in a sea of blue, so similar to the even tinier spot that was Tracy Island.

Same sea of blue.

A pokey tree appeared on the side of the track, its red flowers quite glorious in the morning sun, and he found himself grinning. Sure, he knew the correct name of the pōhutukawa tree, but Alan’s name was so much easier to pronounce and it made Mel laugh.

His legs took the strain as he jogged up the rapidly steepening trail.

If he was honest with himself, the whole no strings attached thing was a lie. He found himself thinking about the woman more the longer they were away from Raoul.

And they only left yesterday.

As soon as the sun was high enough in the sky to be polite, he would be contacting Raoul with his invitation to her, Sam and Liam. It wasn’t the only time he had invited people to the Island, they weren’t entirely hermits, but it was rare and the first time in a long time.

And he was so looking forward to it.

Penny and Parker were due after breakfast as was the tradition. As soon as everyone was awake, they would have their present opening party, always a major family event. More for the company and laughter than the presents themselves.

He could almost hear Gordon declaring it ‘Tracy style’ complete with the arm movements to compliment the claim.

But Mel...it was like he was excited to show her the Island, perhaps because he knew she would be very interested in the ecosystem that had developed here since their father had begun repairing it over a decade ago.

And he was staring at it right now as he followed the path around the back of the Island. Pokey trees, palms and ferns were everywhere a foothold was available. Scott knew very little about their ecosystem beyond the need to keep it safe. Gordon and Virgil were the ones who knew most about it among the brothers. Gordon focussed on the sea and Virgil sometimes helped out with animal numbers and photography for the scientific group.

But Mel hadn’t been here since Dad...

He grunted and hurdled a rock he hurdled every morning as the slope inverted and started heading down. The view was stunning.

Despite the glass of the ocean, the swell still crashed on the back cliffs of the Island, jagged volcanic rock resistant to the relentless pounding.

Hopefully she would consent to the visit even though it was late notice.

He did have a Thunderbird, after all.

-o-o-o-

John hadn’t slept much. He never did when something was on his mind. His everything drove him to find a solution, particularly when a brother was involved.

Eos never slept, so she was the perfect insomnia companion.

There was also the factor that he was home, but he really wasn’t.

He was missing Five.

Now he was back on the Island, everything was screaming at him to go home.

Not that he didn’t like the Island, quite the opposite. The Island contained his brothers, his grandmother, Kayo, his family and he adored his family.

But the stars were calling to him. His body ached to feel the release from gravity. He wanted his home.

He ignored it.

His body needed gravity. It was an undeniable fact. It had evolved under the pressure exerted by the planet and while his mind adored the stars and the lack of gravity, nature demanded its return under the ‘use it or lose it’ mandate of life on Earth.

So, tired, but awake anyway as the sun hit the front of the villa, John made his way down to the pool where he found Gordon, as expected, in the water, but unexpectedly, not swimming. His head was lying on one arm at the edge of the pool, his body floating lazily behind.

John dropped his towel on a lounger and, bare footed to the edge next to his brother. Folding himself into a seated position he dropped his feet to dangle in the cool water.

“Gordon?”

“Hmm?” His head rose a little blearily. “Oh, John, hey.”

“Merry Christmas.”

“Huh? What, oh, Merry Christmas, John.”

A frown. “You okay?”

Gordon flexed his shoulders. “Yeah, just thinking.”

“Virgil?”

“Yeah.”

John sighed. “Same. But you do know he’s okay?”

“Yeah, just thinking it through.”

John pushed himself into the water and couldn’t help a relieved sigh as the water took away so many of the effects of gravity, cradling his body. “Swim with me?”

Brown eyes turned to him and John saw a reflection of his own worry in their depths. “Sure.” Gordon pushed off from the edge, his movements graceful despite his distraction.

John moved to the lane next to Gordon’s preferred and lined up beside his fish brother. Gordon shot him a brief but grateful smile before pushing off the end in a careless surge into stroke. He was metres ahead before John had even shifted into form.

Typical.

Show off.

But he couldn’t help but smile as he pushed off the edge himself, automatically moving into a strong but leisurely stroke in warm up.

Swimming denied verbal communication, but it wasn’t needed, the two of them just keeping each other company.

By the fifth lap, John started pushing himself, putting his body through the exercise needed to keep it healthy. He had no delusions of keeping up with Gordon. He just paced himself as his body needed it. Twenty laps in, he eased up a little and checked on his brother.

Gordon was still going. John brought himself to a halt, treading water, muscles pleasantly buzzing.

“Hey, John.” The astronaut startled, turning in place to find Scott standing on the edge of the pool. His running gear appeared well used, sweat stains prominent, and he was still breathing heavily. “Just letting you know that I’m going to be taking One out in about half an hour.”

“You going to get Mel and Sam?” Gordon was suddenly beside him. It was a sign of how tired John actually was that his younger brother startled him almost as much as Scott had a moment earlier.

“Yeah.”

“Can I come with?”

“Don’t you want to be here for when Penny arrives?”

John arched an eyebrow in Gordon’s direction. The fish had been looking forward to Christmas for that very reason. Before Virgil’s illness, it had been Penelope this, Penelope that. Apparently, he had the ‘best’ gift lined up for their first Christmas as a couple. Whether or not that was still going ahead considering recent events, John had no idea. Gordon hadn’t mentioned it since Virgil fell ill.

“I thought you had the fastest plane on the planet, Scotty.”

Their eldest brother snorted. “Plane, yes, younger brother, no.”

“Hey, I can be fast.” A strawberry blond frown. “Regardless, I need to speak to Sam.”

Scott eyed him a moment. “Virgil?”

Gordon sighed. “Yeah, Virgil. Gotta handle this delicately.”

Scott’s lips thinned. “Okay, then you better be ready in thirty because that’s when I’m leaving.”

The fish was already climbing out of the pool. Wet footprints marked the concrete as he strode to his towel.

Blue eyes turned to John. “You okay? You look tired.”

John let water run through his fingers. “I am, but I’ll live.”

Voice quiet. “Virgil?”

A single nod, voice equally quiet. “Virgil. Eos, Gordon and I will work it out. We just need time.” And patience. Admittedly, he didn’t have much of that where his brothers’ health was concerned. He could fake it, but it didn’t mean he felt it.

Scott’s expression was thoughtful. “I know you will do your best. Don’t forget to look after yourself.”

A groan. This was why Virgil was always adamant that he was fine. I single hint of something wrong and their biggest brother was all over them, his concern obvious. “I’m fine, Scott.”

That earned him a grunt and John actually struggled not to smile at his brother’s exasperation. John swam to the pool edge and pushed himself out of the water. A wave in the direction of the rising sun’s reflection. “The pool is all yours, dear brother.”

Scott eyed him. “Thank you.”

The morning breeze cooled John enough to raise goose pimples on his arms. Before he could reach for his towel, Scott was handing it to him.

Ever the big brother. It was John’s turn to eye him back. “Thank you.”

Scott smiled at him, a definite smirk on those lips. He knew exactly what John was thinking and had likely done it on purpose. “Anytime.”

Hmmm. “Merry Christmas, Scott.”

Those blue eyes widened as his big brother obviously realised that despite all the preparations underway, despite the tree they had stacked with presents the night before, he had still managed to forget the significance of the day.

It was John’s turn to smirk.

But Scott recovered quickly, tilting his head, a small smile on his lips. “Merry Christmas, John.”

With that he turned and headed off into the house.

-o-o-o-

Alan loved to sleep in. He shared this love with his second eldest brother. Getting up early sucked big time and he had no coffee addiction to help him.

But there was one day of the year when you could witness the youngest Tracy out of bed, while not early, at least a decent time where breakfast could still be called breakfast and not lunch or even brunch.

Christmas Day.

Alan adored the day. Presents, food and family, what more could a guy ask for?

So, eight am found him stumbling down the stairs to the kitchen in search of the second and third items on the list. He found Grandma at the kitchen table eating her fruit and yoghurt.

Alan made no effort to be quiet, but she didn’t appear to realise he was there, staring out across the lagoon. “Grandma?”

She dropped her spoon with a clatter as it hit the bowl. “Alan!” She clutched her hand to her chest, gasping. “You frightened me. Gave my old heart a kick in the pants.”

“Sorry, Grandma. Are you okay?”

“This time. Though I wouldn’t recommend doing it too often.” She held out an arm. “C’mere and give me a Christmas hug.”

Now that was something he was quite happy to do. Grandma hugs were always appreciated. “Merry Christmas, Grandma.” He held her tight.

“Merry Christmas, honey. Are you hungry?”

Uh, that was always a loaded question and there were important indicators related to that. “Where is everyone?” He had expected to find at least John down here. His space brother would eat his breakfast staring out into the lagoon and follow it with work on his tablet just to be around family in his own way. But not today.

“Scott and Gordon have gone to Raoul to collect Ms Fisher and that scientist friend of Gordon’s.”

“Sam?”

“I guess. They were both in quite a hurry to leave.”

That set Alan grinning. “I think Scott likes Mel.”

An arched eyebrow. “I thought she liked Virgil.”

A snort accompanied the grin. “I don’t think she is Virgil’s kind of girl.”

Of course, that was the very moment Kayo decided to enter the kitchen. She had obviously been on a run, dressed in shorts and a high cut top.

“Who’s Virgil’s kind of girl?”

Alan’s eyes widened. “Um.”

Green narrowed at him. “What are you up to, Alan?”

“Nothing!” He held out his hands. “What did I do?”

“I’m more concerned with what you are going to do.”

“Suspicious, much? I’m going to eat breakfast, that’s what.”

She continued to eye him. “No practical jokes today.”

“I wasn’t planning on it. Gee, you’d think I was Gordy or something.”

“Gordon will be contained by Lady Penelope. You, however, are not.”

“And what? That makes me some kind of prank genius?”

“Genius, no, annoyance, yes.”

“Hey, Merry Christmas, Kayo. How about a little of the spirit?”

She glared and him and grunted before turning away and stalking off.

“What’s up her skirt?”

“Alan!”

“Well, you saw her. I didn’t do anything!”

Grandma was quiet a moment. “She has things on her mind.”

“When doesn’t she?”

“Let her be.”

“I didn’t do anything!”

Grandma sighed. “Things will work themselves out for the best.”

Alan stared at his grandmother. What on Earth was going on? Did everyone know something that he didn’t. He sighed. Wouldn’t be the first time. “I’m going grab some breakfast.”

“Yes, dear.” And Grandma was staring out at the lagoon again.

What the-?

Alan grabbed the refrigerator door and flung it open, his eyes raking its contents. Perhaps food would fix things.

A glance at Grandma found that she hadn’t moved.

There was definitely something going on.

-o-o-o-

End Day 5 Part 1

#thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds fanfiction #thunderbirds #Virgil Tracy #Gordon Tracy #Scott Tracy #John Tracy #Alan Tracy #Grandma Tracy #kermadec fic

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matteredloyaltyaa · 4 years ago

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@yukikorogashi asked: 💞💖💘💕 tigger bounces in with these 👀

positivity meme -- slow, still accepting

Send 💞 and my muse will say something nice about your muse

The house had grown silent in the late hours of the night, Arthur burning the midnight oil as he was prone to do. Mind running a mile a minute, and not really getting much from late night television, he opted to sit in the office across from Itsuki’s bedroom. At the thought, he found himself glancing toward the slightly ajar bedroom door, letting in a dim bit of light from the one he kept on in the hall for her. Aside from a small conversation about her day and a request for a story from his own, it seemed like she had fallen asleep pretty easily once he had started talking.

He was never sure if he should take that as a compliment or not when it happened, but at least ONE of them was getting some much needed rest.

As he could feel his thoughts starting to circle, he let out a small sigh from his nose as he shifted to pull a familiar book from one of the shelves. The pages were starting to become worn with use, Arthur about halfway into his current journal. He flipped open to the current page, a partly complete sketch of their newest addition to the household: an old collie that Itsuki had affectionately named Mochi. As far as he was aware, the old guy was asleep on a chair in the living room.

Arthur huffed lightly out of his nose at the thought, turning to the blank page and started to scribble down some thoughts.

Itsuki’s growing in so many ways every day. It honestly surprises me sometimes.

I wasn’t the only one who question my decision to adopt a kid at first. Hosea had cast me that uncertain look when I first mentioned it, and the social worker...well, I could never really get a read on them, but somehow I managed to impress someone because here we are.

She’s healthy, hasn’t lost mind or limb. I figure I’m doing something right.

I know I’m not around as much as I wish I was, and Hosea’s been a great help in keeping an eye on her. Teaching her things in that special way he has, which is probably better for her than whatever I can give. Still, I catch the odd eye or word from him about spending more time with her, which I’m trying to do. It must be working, she certainly hasn’t come to hate me or resent me being home when I am. Yet.

Still, I love that kid. The odd nights she opens that bedroom door of mine to tell me about a nightmare or storm outside and we have to stay up a little later until she can sleep again, the way she races to the truck when I pull up to the school (even during the times where I know she’s had to wait for me,) it’s all something I never thought I’d see in my life or know it to be something I would miss if it disappeared.

I want nothing more than to see her happy, and she’s always the brightest person in the room when she is. If I can help with that, that’s all I want.

Though, maybe what’s best for her is me getting some sleep so I’m not spacey and distracted with her tomorrow.

Send 💖 and my muse will say something nice about you, the mun

“Could’ve certainly picked a worse night for this,” Arthur commented, casting a glance upwards.

The sun had dipped below the horizon, the sky cast in a blanket of stars as the orange glow of the fire he had built cast him and his companion in a warm light. A rabbit was slowly roasting over the flames, something he had hunted earlier for the coming night. Thankfully, he had been getting better with a bow. It had saved him the embarrassment of picking out shell casings from the meat in front of her, at the very least. He dropped his gaze back down, watching the fire for a few moments before he glanced toward her.

“I’ve certainly had worse company ‘round a fire, too. Some folks are more likely t’ greet you with a barrel of a gun shoved against the back of your head, but...nah, y’ don’t seem the type. I know you been fightin’ things in different ways, though. Kid’s always goin’ on ‘bout how STRONG y’ are, and I can see why. Life...life’s got a funny way ‘f workin’ things out. Lots ‘f good things happenin’ out there, yet there’s a lotta bad happenin’ t’ folk who don’t deserve it. Whatever good’s out there, I know it’s due t’ come your way. Hell, I’d give ya some of mine--lord knows I ain’t done anythin’ t’ deserve it.”

He let out a vaguely humorous huff, glancing back to the fire for a moment before meeting her gaze once again.

“Guess what I’m tryin’ t’ say is that there’s a lot of people out there who are on your side. Can’t get too far in life without people y’ can trust, and you’ve proved time and again that you’re one of those who can be that for someone, and it’s a fool who don’t see that and won’t return it. Y’ deserve more than y’ get, much as that might not mean much from someone like me. Y’ got a lotta fight in y’, and you’ve never had a point a gun t’ prove it. Folks see that.”

Send 💘 and the mun will say something nice about your muse

I remember seeing Itsuki for the first time all those years ago, and jokingly I was like “who’s lost child is this?” lol

However, I can honestly say with my whole heart that I am so glad to have been introduced to her character. However, I can’t say much to how she is portrayed on her blog, as I am...completely unfamiliar from the media she is from. (And considering some of the horror stories I’ve heard about the fandom, I’m very content with hers being the only blog I follow from it lol.) Yet, I feel like I’ve known her character for so long through how often she’s appeared on my blogs and all the relationships I’ve built with her through my own characters. Good, bad, everything.

Itsuki is such a strong character in not just physical prowess, but strength of will and mind too. No matter what blog I am on, I can almost always trust her to be this force of optimism and child-like joy and curiosity. Even on a blog of mine starring a certain baptist, even in the face of someone who wouldn’t appreciate her for who she is, somehow Itsuki still manages to handle that in a way that is both absolutely a joy to write with and great to play off of.

I know I’ve said it before, but often I do find myself thinking about how a character would interact with her when I am making a blog. Not only is it me trying to make room for interaction, but it is also good for general character development. She has become such a staple on my blogs, which honestly rarely happens and for as long as it has with her.

Send 💕 and the mun will say something nice about you, the mun

Becka!!

Much like you wrote in this section for me, I am also sorry this took so long because I also wanted to make sure everything sounded right. Especially after coming off a long semester of university, I’ve been trying to come back into my writing. Lol Honestly, what can I say about you that I haven’t said a million times? I always say this, yet I know it bares repeating because I know everything I feel about you to be wholly the truth. You are such a great friend, and even when you’re not feeling like you are, or you are in the middle of a falling out, or stuck ruminating on something that didn’t work out with someone, I know for a fact that you have done your absolute best in that friendship. I know you have done nothing but show me support, love, and a deep kindness since the day I met you and I know I can say absolutely that you are one of my best friends.

Hell, I know even my family asks about you sometimes because I know I’ve mentioned having our late night talks often enough. Lol I know you have helped me through so much, even in things you may not even be aware of. Being able to write with you, knowing that you’re out there doing you and being awesome, it’s everything I could ask for in a friend. It’s 3 am while I’m writing this so idk if I’m rambling like mad here, but I have a lot of feelings for you. Lol Mostly, I’m just grateful. That you exist, that we’re as close as we are, for the conversations we do have. I love you a TON, and I hope you know that. I ALWAYS want you to know that, even in the deepest darkest pits you may fall in.

I am always happy to see you, to talk with you, to write with you. I love you, and you’re always in my thoughts and I hope nothing but the best for you and I’m always so excited and happy when I do see that happening for you.

#failed: rory has died . || ooc .#meet you at the gate . || closed modern au – rollingsnowsmasher.#how many days ? || main verse .#/// long post #[Everything under the readmore is unformatted since Tumblr messes with the readmore when I do lol #but yeah sorry for the wait on this Becka!]

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mooksie01 · 5 years ago

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With Teammates Like These, Who Needs Friends (4/5)

Chapter Summary: It turns out that the only thing worse than a tense first date in an airship... is an awkward first date in a haunted dust mine.

Or: In which Clover feels like a moron, Elm causes problems, and nobody knows how to deal with a crush.

Warnings: More swearing, canon-typical combat, SPOILERS for V7C3, light angst

AO3 Link: [X]

Link to First Chapter: [X]

Notes: THIS IS A REPOST. Tumblr basically blanked my first attempt at posting this a few hours ago. Hopefully this one will actually show up.

Long chapter today to make up for the short one yesterday! I hope you all enjoy!

Please like, reblog, and comment if you like this chapter, and thank you so much to all of you who have been! Your support means the world!

(Just to preface, I haven't edited this chapter as thoroughly as I usually do, as I'm currently in the process of packing to go back to college tomorrow. I might come back later and give it another run-over when I have time, but for now, I'm sorry if there are any major mistakes or awkward spots in the chapter!)

---

Walking through the abandoned dust mines with Qrow, Clover can’t help but be… a little distracted.

Up until now, Clover had only ever seen the other man move in a manner so instinctively disconnected and introverted that he’d just assumed that that was how Qrow always was. Now, though, he sees that he was wrong before; beside him, Qrow marches forward, back straight, shoulders carefully held lax in preparation for any possible conflict, head high, and eyes shining with a startling clarity and determination that takes Clover’s breath away.

In short, he’s a vision and it’s a herculean task not to stare.

Still, Clover is a soldier first and foremost, and he doesn’t allow himself to be sucked in so much that he might lose focus on the mission.

After a few long moments punctuated by nothing but his team’s routine check-ins, Qrow speaks up, “Gotta say, ’m still not really used to working with other huntsmen in the field.”

Clover glances at him out of the corner of his eye, mentally jumping hurdles in an attempt to figure out what the best route to steer this conversation in would be. He decides to tread lightly--nothing too personal. “But you were on a team before, weren’t you?” he asks, as though he doesn’t already know. That should be safe.

Qrow sighs softly and his gaze darts to the ground.

Fuck.

Just kill him already.

“Long time ago…” Qrow’s voice comes out sounding gruffer than usual, “I’ve just found working alone tends to be for the best.”

Clover’s heart constricts in his chest. What is he supposed to do?! He’s already upset Qrow (twice, now!), how is he supposed to avoid doing it again?! He doesn’t want him to shut himself off from the Ace Ops just because Clover can’t stop sticking his foot in his mouth! Should he comfort him? He seems like he needs comfort. Fuck, he has to respond. What can he say?!

“Well, I think that’s a shame,” he blurts out, and immediately wants to punch himself.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, he is saved from having to ruminate over his social missteps when Qrow suddenly pitches forward, his foot catching on the uneven terrain of the cave floor underneath them.

Clover dives after him, seizing him by one arm and grunting with the unexpected strain of having to pull his partner back to his feet, then moves one hand to clasp his shoulder and make sure he’s steady. He is unsure if he has his skill or his semblance to thank for the feat, but he is grateful nonetheless to whichever it is.

He determinedly does not think about how this is the second time today that he has gotten the opportunity to hold Qrow close. Because that would be weird.

Once Qrow is standing again, they stare at each other for what feels like a long time, but is probably only a split-second. Clover feels like tiny nevermores are making a mess of his insides the longer he looks into Qrow’s eyes.

Then, those incredibly nice-looking eyes narrow into a slight glare and Qrow takes a firm step back. Rather than think about what he’s messed up this time, Clover decides that now would be a perfect time to report in to his team.

“Alpha, here. Give me an update.”

Qrow falls into step behind him as they proceed forward. Once again, the minutes pass mostly in silence but for the intermittent interruptions of their comms. Unlike Squads Bravo and Charlie, they see no sign of any sentinels or the target itself, but Clover has a feeling that they will soon enough.

His comm buzzes in his ear and makes a soft beeping noise, a signal that someone is contacting him through the Ace Ops’ private channel. Clover is about to answer aloud, but stops when a quiet series of taps and drags echoes down the line. It takes him a second to realize he’s being spoken to through morse code. His heart starts racing. They almost never use morse code in the field. Has something gone wrong?

He listens closely.

“ .... --- .-- … / -.-- --- ..- .-. / -... .. .-. -.. “

HOWS YOUR BIRD

He takes a deep breath in and steadily lets it out through his nose. Now is not the time to figure out if it’s possible to throttle someone through a comm line. Instead, he tries to discreetly raise a hand to his ear and respond:

“ .. -- / --. --- .. -. --. / - --- / ..-. .. .-. . / -.-- --- ..- “

IM GOING TO FIRE YOU

“Who are we firing?”

Clover startles, whipping his head around to look at Qrow. The other man stares impassively at him, a single eyebrow raised. Clover swallows hard because oh no, he’s hot. “Nobody. Well, Elm, probably.”

“What did she do?” Qrow asks, quickening his pace half a step until he is walking shoulder-to-shoulder with Clover again.

“Fooling around on comms during a mission. Don’t worry about it.” Clover stops walking, turning to face Qrow, who takes the hint and also comes to a halt. “How do you know morse code?”

Qrow shrugs, folding his arms over his chest. “Just a useful skill for a huntsman to have, isn’t it?”

Clover scrutinizes Qrow for a long moment, detecting that there’s something more to that. Unfortunately, though, he’s not Robyn, and he doesn’t know Qrow well enough yet to pick up on any tells he may have, so he just nods and they continue walking.

“Must’ve been something real interesting,” Qrow says after a few more minutes spent in silence, “to get you to blush like that.”

Clover’s steps falter. His face grows hot as he stares after Qrow’s retreating back.

Fuck.

He isn’t allowed to stew in his embarrassment for long, as their target suddenly phases through the cavern wall and appears right in front of them. Before Clover can even react, Qrow has already drawn his weapon and started shooting one-handed at the geist.

While Qrow keeps the creature busy, Clover shakes himself out of his stupor and speaks into his comm, “This is Alpha! We’ve engaged the target!” He pulls Kingfisher from his belt. “All squads head towards our position!” He extends the pole, and casts out the line, hoping to catch the geist by its ribs and haul it in before it can reach any materials to build a body out of. Unfortunately, his shot misses, the hook clattering to the ground just as the target darts into a giant chunk of ice sitting on the cavern floor.

Pieces of rock and ice begin to float into the air around them, pulled unrelentingly into the geist’s orbit. Clover curses under his breath and rushes forward, hoping to snag the geist and pull it out of its half-formed body before it can finish construction….

...Only to hear Qrow’s panic-filled voice echo from behind him, “Wait, stop!”

Clover looks up just in time to see a large metal beam tumble from the ceiling above. He raises his arms and takes a stumbling step back as it crashes into the ground just a few feet in front of him.

When the dust settles, he peers down into the hole it had made, taking the target with it.

Dammit.

He knows for certain that that beam would’ve done some serious damage if not for Qrow’s warning. He probably wouldn’t have died, but he certainly would’ve been out of commission for more than a little while.

Still, the target got away, and as Qrow runs to stand beside him, he reports in to the rest of the teams, “Target escaped. Last seen headed east.”

He shoots a sideways glance at Qrow, who is staring contemplatively down into the chasm, a strange light in his eyes that Clover can’t quite comprehend.

He looks back into the seemingly-bottomless darkness. Kicks a medium-sized stone into the newly-made pit in an attempt to get a rough estimate of how deep it goes. “Thanks for the call-out,” he says, suddenly remembering that he should probably express his gratitude toward Qrow for saving him an awful lot of injured leave. He props a hand on his hip and shifts his weight as the rock lands below. “That could’ve been bad.”

Qrow sighs heavily next to him, “I wouldn’t thank me….”

Clover is taken aback at the sheer amount of self-loathing and shame loaded into those four little words. He looks at Qrow. The other man is firmly avoiding his gaze, and the strange quality that Clover had noticed in his eyes earlier now registers in the back of his mind as guilt.

This… was not the Qrow Branwen that Clover had thought he’d be dealing with. Just a few hours ago, he couldn’t fathom a world in which such a famous huntsman would be anything less than confident and secure in himself, but it is becoming increasingly clear that that assumption couldn’t have been more wrong, as the intense self-contempt Clover hears seems to settle within a well-worn place in Qrow’s face and voice.

Qrow angles his upper body away a bit more so Clover can no longer see his expression. “My semblance brings Misfortune. Sometimes… I can’t keep it under control.” His voice gets weaker at the end of the sentence. His fists clench weakly at his sides.

Clover’s chest seizes with some unnamed emotion.

Stupid, stupid, stupid. Of course Qrow had been upset this morning--his semblance was literally bad luck and here Clover had been, walking around with a bunch of good luck charms and making luck-based puns.

Reviewing the events of the past hours, more and more pieces fall into place. Qrow’s sudden shift in mood from playful to downtrodden after they’d run into each other, how he’d repeatedly downplayed his hurt feelings as “dramatics,” the way he’d said on the airship that he “couldn’t blame” Clover for--for what?

He remembers the way Qrow had gestured to his ensemble earlier. His world tilts on its axis.

Oh, Brothers, Qrow thought that Clover already knew his semblance and had been wearing all of his charms as some sort of twisted precautionary measure. To ward off him. A human person with thoughts and feelings.

Stupid, stupid, so stupid.

He shakes his brain’s attempts at self-punishment away. What’s more important at the moment is that he now knows what’s wrong, and that he can fix it, and Clover decides in this moment, a million thoughts running through his head, that he no longer cares about the other Ace Ops’ teasing. If hanging around Qrow from here on out is what it will take to boost this gorgeous man’s self-confidence, then that’s what Clover will do.

“That so?” Clover asks, as though he hasn’t been rethinking every single one of their interactions up to this point. When Qrow turns to look at him, eyes wide with shock, having obviously expected a far worse reaction, Clover flashes him the most reassuring smile in his repertoire (and that’s saying something, since he has a lot of reassuring smiles saved up at this point). “Well, hey,” he says, purposefully making a show of glancing casually at his scroll’s screen and extending Kingfisher, “don’t beat yourself up about it.”

(He hopes desperately that this remark comes off as encouraging, rather than callous.)

He pulls down what’s left of the metal beam that had almost crushed him, resulting in a small-scale landslide that just-so-happens to give them a way down with which to follow the target.

He turns to face Qrow, making direct eye contact with the other man, who seems to have frozen in place.

And hey.

“My semblance is good fortune….”

If he can get in a little flirting while he’s hanging around the aforementioned gorgeous man?

“...lucky you, huh?” He gives the other a wink as he speaks. Qrow’s eyes widen. Clover raises his eyebrows and turns away, watching Qrow until the last possible moment.

Well, that’s neither here nor there.

---

More Notes: And there we go! Only one chapter left in this part of the series! I'm glad everyone seems to be liking it so far, and I'm so, so thankful to those of you who have been so kind and supportive in the comments. You're all amazing! Lots of love, fair game rights <3

#rwby #qrow branwen #clover ebi #fair game #qrowver #lucky charms #luckbirds #elm ederne #rwby volume 7 #rwby7 #rwby v7 #rwby fanfiction #rwby spoilers #pining #angst

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aka-willow · 4 years ago

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Ghosts

gif

Words: 1668

Characters: Willow Wren, Peter Parker

Prompt/Tag:

“I didn’t know you could do that.”

“No one can know about this.”

Summary: Willow finds out who Peter is

Timeline: February 2016

Song: Beautiful Ghosts - Taylor Swift

A/N: this is going to be the last update for a bit! i’m working on the next arc and need to write it all before I start posting chapters to make sure the plot all works :) in the meantime, comment predictions or something? would love to know thots/thoughts. also asjdfhalsjdfh the code here is based on one my friends and I used back in the hackr days it was so stupid but also like... iconic

—————————————————————————–

I almost didn’t see him, that night in February as I soared high above the city, letting steam off. Someone was sitting on top of a building under construction, as they stared down at the street below. Red and blue sweatshirt. It baffled me because there was no way anyone should be able to get up there, and they didn’t look like a city worker. Plus, working construction alone at this time of night?

I descended just a little and wondered if I should put a mask on or just improvise. No mask. Whatever they’re doing up there, it’s something. Which means they won’t snitch. I landed on the other side of the roof, out of view, and tried to think of what to do next. Wings in. Close my fists. Easy steps.

“Hey?” Something nearly hit me, and I ducked just in time just as a ball of something splatted on the radiator behind me.

The voice took me by surprise, and I jumped, stumbling back against the HVAC units on the roof. “Jesus, dude,” I said. “I just wanted to know how you got up here. You scared me.”

“Willow?”

Oh, fuck. I recognized the voice, and the figure pulled off the homemade mask he was wearing. “Peter?” I asked. “What are you doing here? I-I didn’t know you could do that.”

“What… what… what are you doing here?” His voice got higher as he spoke, struggling to piece together the question.

“How did you even know someone was here? And what are you wearing?”

He patted his outfit self consciously and tucked his mask into his pocket. “Um. It’s a suit.”

“It’s a hoodie.” We stared at each other in silence for a moment, both of us without words. As the moon came out from behind a cloud, I noticed he had blood on his face. “What happened, man?”

“Um… I… tripped? I tripped.”

“I already used that excuse last month,” I said quietly, my mind racing. “Okay. No one can know about this—”

“Don’t tell anyone about this,” Peter pleaded at the same time. “Please. Not even Ned.”

I drew a shaky breath and sat down on the roof. The air stirred unnaturally, and I clenched my fists, even more, trying to steady myself as I hugged my knees into my chest. “Peter,” I said, staring at the ground. “Uh… there’s a lot I haven’t told you.”

He sat down next to me, leaning against a beam. “Me too.”

Neither of us wanted to talk first—I didn’t even know where to start, or how to start. How much do I say? How do I explain all this? Do I let him go first? Maybe he should go first. Just so I know—

“Um… remember a few months ago when I texted you and asked if we could hang really late that one night?” Peter started, jumping into it. “Yeah. That was when that started. I think the bite I got… changed me somehow.”

“You sure it’s not just puberty?” I asked, trying to make a joke, even though it sounded so stupid as soon as it left my mouth.

He laughed nervously. “Uh… I’m sure. I-I started sticking to the walls and ceiling,” he said. “Um… and I got stronger? Do things I was never able to do before. And it’s like my senses are dialed to a ten now, all the time.”

I can relate to that. “All from the bite?” I asked. “So, is that how you got up here? Wait, what was that stuff—"

“Web fluid,” he said. “I made it myself.” He rolled up his sleeve and showed me a device that extended onto his palm. “It’s really strong… you know… like…”

“… spider string… no… silk,” I finished. “Holy shit. And the suit?”

Even in the dark, I saw his face redden as he looked down sheepishly. “I’ve been helping people. Trying to help people. But I’m not very good at it yet. But Willow, you can’t tell anyone about this. My aunt would freak and—”

“Relax,” I said. “I’m not telling anyone.”

“Right. Cause you’re…”

“Here as well.”

“How?”

I sighed. “Peter… uh… what I’m about to tell you… you have to promise not to freak out and just… let me finish. Okay?” What’s the game plan here, Willow?

“I’m not going to freak out,” he said. “I promise. I mean, I just told you I’m Spider-Man—”

“Spider-Man?” I interrupted. “Is that what you’re going with?”

“Yeah?”

“What, like an alter ego?”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know. I guess I just never thought about that sort of thing before. Alter egos, I mean.” I picked at a hangnail and tried to decide what I was going to tell him. The truth? Part of the truth? Do I lie? I can’t lie, he just told me his secret. So, this was what he was hiding. “Um… I was born…” Why is this so hard? I stood up and paused one more time. “Promise me you won’t freak out?”

“Promise.”

I slowly extended my wings, not taking my eyes off my shoes, feeling sick, and as if I were overheating even in the cold. There’s no coming back from this. You can’t take this back. “…I was born like this.” I finally gained the courage to look up and search his face. He was curious and surprised, with his mouth opened and eyebrows lowered, but not weirded out. Of course, he’s not. He’s Peter. “And when I was six, I was taken to a place called the Facility. It was government-run, up until… HYDRA took over the project,” I said in an exhale, barely saying the word HYDRA.

“Oh. That’s bad, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. Um… they did a bunch of experiments on us there until I ran away last fall. And then I came here, to New York City. And met you guys.”

“I had no idea… how did you… is that why you always wore a jacket inside?”

I nodded and swallowed. “The thing is… they had us do stuff there… back at the Facility… things that I couldn’t control.” I gestured to my head. “They did… brainwashing? I hurt people, Peter. Lots, I think.”

“But you couldn’t help that. If they brainwashed you…”

I know. But I don’t know what’s brainwashing anymore and what’s just me. There it was. Both of our secrets out in the open, months of speculation put to rest. “Did you know?”

“I mean, after what you said to me that night, I knew something… wait does Kate know? Is that why she…?”

I nodded. “Not all of it. But enough. That night Marty died… she saw. It scared her. She said that…” I swallowed again, this time feeling the growing lump in my throat. I tried to push it away. “She said that she was scared. That I scared her. But maybe she was right.”

“No, Willow, you’re not scary.”

“You don’t know what I’ve done. Whatever you’re thinking, I promise it’s worse.”

“I don’t believe that.”

Neither did Marty.

We talked longer, late into the night. He explained how he had been developing the web fluid in chemistry class. I told him bits and pieces about what Marty had found and who had come after him. I told him that HYDRA was still looking for me, and that others were as well. “If they come for me, if I disappear,” I said. “Now you know. If that happens…”

“It won’t,” Peter said, his eyes wide. “It won’t happen.”

“But if it does, if anyone you don’t know asks about me… you have to tell me. Anyone. Government, SHIELD, HYDRA, police…”

“Police?”

“Just… please.” We devised a code to text to each other, something that even if I were being surveilled wouldn’t get picked up on. “What’s something you’d never say?” I asked.

“I don’t know… something like… are you going to the game tonight? Sports?”

“All right,” I said. “Texting that means we need to meet as soon as possible, in person. This roof can be the meetup spot. I’ll text back yes to confirm that I got the message, and then ask the time to meet before the game. Pick a time two hours after you want to meet and a random meeting location. So, if we said MSST at six at night, it would be here at four. And make sure to turn your phone off.”

“Are you sure all this is necessary?” Peter asked. “I mean, it’s cool, it’s like spy stuff, but…”

“Marty died,” I reminded him, feeling the familiar anger as I ruminated on the injustice of it all. I never asked for this. Marty never asked for this. And now Peter… “I’m not losing anyone else because of me,” I said. “If someone comes asking about me, that’s a code red. So, text me something like will you be at decathlon on Saturday?”

“We… don’t meet on Saturdays.”

“Exactly. And I’ll know to get the hell out.”

Peter tapped his fist against the palm of his other hand as he thought. “Okay. Same goes for me.”

“Deal.”

Peter told me more about his new abilities as the night wore on, about the people he had saved in our neighborhoods. He seemed so excited to be able to share it with someone. I tried to give him a few pointers so that I wouldn’t get beat up so bad next time he confronted someone, and Peter asked me about what it was like to fly. For a moment, I was softened, a little piece of my heart worming its way out of the shell I had built around it in the last few months, before I pushed it back in, where it belonged. Opening up to Peter helped, but I was now more worried than ever. Worried about him, and myself. Mostly him. I can’t afford this. I have to finish this mission I’m on. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.

#ww writing #peter parker #willow wren

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writcraft · 6 years ago

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Rec List #1 Theme: 2018 Favourites (Non-Drarry)

One of my fandom resolutions is to rec more in 2019. I’m going to post rec lists for some of my favourite HP fics divided up by theme/content/ship or whatever I fancy throughout the year, aiming for one rec list a month with two in January. I thought I would kick off 2019 with two lists of 2018 favourites. This first one excludes Drarry because I’ve read mostly Drarry this year and limiting myself to ten recs per list would be impossible if I included all the Drarry I’ve enjoyed within a list of just ten. The second list will be my favourite Drarry fics of 2018, then I’ll move on to other themes for the remaining months.

Usual caveats for recs apply. This is by no means an exhaustive list, I could have recced many more. I’ve read and enjoyed a whole raft of terrific stories and this rec list is simply based on my personal tastes which may not be everybody else’s cuppa. Please heed the content warnings the author has flagged on AO3 in each case, some of these fics contain darker content and I haven’t listed out any warnings in my recs and summaries.

#1. A Radical Change in (Self) Perception by AnyaElizabeth

Severus Snape/Harry Potter | 57,114

Harry should know better than to touch museum exhibits, especially in a magical museum. Now he's in trouble...

My Rec: I haven’t read a huge amount of body swap fics and I can’t remember the last body swap Snarry I read, and I was so intrigued by how the author would handle this premise. I devoured the whole 50,000+ words in one sitting I was so engaged by this charming story. The body swap forced Harry and Severus to spend more time together but it did so much more than that - it enabled them to better understand one another and also themselves, when they saw each other through a different lens. The writing is terrific and if you’re a Snarry shipper this one is guaranteed to give you all the warm and fuzzies. A great addition to the wonderful Snarry fanfic that has posted throughout 2018.

#2. Hallo Spaceboy by @shiftylinguini

James Potter/Teddy Lupin | 10,075

“If this mirror could talk,” James remembers declaring, already one drink down and trying to tidy up his ridiculous costume eyeliner, “it would say we look bloody amazing.”

Teddy’s arm was warm when he wrapped it around James’s shoulder, pulling him closer.

“We always do, love.” Teddy tugged on a long curl of James’s hair before tucking it behind his ear, then smoothing the whole lot of it back. “We’re the fittest blokes at the party, us.”

James’d had to give up on the eyeliner after that; he was grinning too hard, flushed and happy and basking in Teddy’s attention (fit blokes, we’re fit blokes, that’s us), and he couldn't bloody stop.

Or: James kissed Teddy last night. This may or may not be the end of the world.

My Rec: A thoroughly charming fic featuring trans James waking up in the morning and coming to terms with a kiss with his best mate Teddy Lupin the night before. I loved the quietness of this story, the way James being trans was part of it but not the primary focus. James feeding bread to the ducks on a grotty park bench is honestly such a beautiful, persistent and soothing image, and I loved the whole story from start to finish. It’s got lovely, warm coming of age vibes to it and I felt James’ conflict and fears come through so well in the telling of this story. Wonderfully written.

#3. Of Reckoning and Ruin by @half-light-01

Severus Snape, Albus Dumbledore | 10,585

"And it is the eternal rule that drops of blood spilled on the ground demand yet more blood."

One year after Lily Potter's death, Severus Snape's Dark Mark comes to life. Caught between a creature that wants him dead, and a Headmaster who needs him alive, the young Hogwarts professor is forced to reckon with his past and negotiate his future.

My Rec: I discovered this terrific fic at the end of this year and boy oh boy am I glad I did. The relationship between Severus and Albus is, in my view, one of the most complex and fascinating of the Harry Potter series. This story explores the darker sides we see of Dumbledore in canon through his interactions with Snape, but most of all it is a complex and fascinating character study of Severus, his grief, his guilt, his inner turmoil. The author really gets into the grit of both characters without flinching away from it and the creature in the story gives it a very unsettling quality which forces us to question who can be trusted, if anyone. A really engaging, well told story with a deft handling of complex characters.

#4. my heart beat a tattoo on my ribs by @candybarrnerd / icarusinflight

Ginny Weasley/Luna Lovegood | 7,403

Ginny can't understand why anyone would want to mark themselves by choice but she still agrees to go with Harry when he says he wants a tattoo.

My Rec: I loved this beautiful story of tattoo artist Luna and a Ginny still processing the trauma and grief of war. The friendship between Ginny and Harry is wonderfully crafted and the dull ache of grief that grips Ginny is beautifully handled - it’s softly done and never overwrought and the story is ultimately one of healing and hope. A really terrific, sexy read and one I’ll definitely return to again.

#5. Distortion by DorthyAnn (JenniferMarie)

Harry Potter Centric (see AO3 for more detail) | 8,924

Harry wakes in darkness. A darkness that goes on and on without end. He can’t see or feel, he doesn’t know what’s happened. All he can do is hold on, replaying his memories to keep him sane. Until it’s over. Until he can go home again.

My Rec: This is horror as I love it the most. A strange, unsettling, superbly written story which grapples with identity, perception of self, loss of identity and evokes a creepy, oppressive sense of things going horribly awry. The Potterverse is so rich with details of magic and potions which can be used to alter ones own perception of themselves and the rest of the world, and the author uses the magic of canon in a deft and eerie way to create a gripping, unnerving tale of psychological horror.

#6. Soft Touch by perverse_idyll

Severus Snape/Harry Potter | 15,167

Harry's love life has been dismal, and he finds himself checking into a therapeutic massage clinic just to get off - the same clinic to which Snape had been delivered three years earlier for physical therapy.

My Rec: Perverse Idyll is one of those authors whose fics I read and they stay with me for a long time after. One of the first Snarry authors I properly discovered on the journals, Perverse Idyll and I see Snape somewhat differently at times (although the meta conversations that results in are always an absolute privilege and pleasure) but I think that’s one of the things I find so compelling whenever I read PI’s fic. Perverse Idyll takes Snape to places I struggle to as a writer, and I find him absolutely captivating. He never loses his sharpness, his bitterness or his moral ambiguity and there is nothing more compelling than reading an unapologetically brittle Snape from the deft hand of a terrific writer who knows the character inside out and has formed deep, intricate views about his complexities and motivations and lets all his flaws sing instead of silencing or softening them in an attempt to make him more palatable. This is such an electric, sensual, sexy story with tension ramped up to the max. Brilliant.

#7. Rooftop Ruminations by @thealmostrhetoricalquestion

Pansy Parkinson/Ginny Weasley | 12,209

Ginny barely registered the evening. The musician, whose bow wrung sounds from the strings with a casual, carefree elegance that Ginny would have usually envied, was just a blur in front of her face. The steps she took to the Rialto Bridge once everyone was ready felt too light and airy, and Luna’s hand in hers was just a wisp of citrus-scented silk. The night grew cooler and Ginny didn’t feel it. Simpering crush, Daphne had said. Pansy had a simpering crush. The words bobbed to the surface of her thoughts and pinched at her wrists and looped around her ears. She kept glancing at Pansy in her velvet skirt and towering heels, and she kept not knowing what to feel.

She wasn’t sure who she wanted Pansy’s crush to be on, and she hated that she didn’t know.

My Rec: This is such a gorgeous piece of writing. The scene setting is so immersive and wistful somehow, there’s a quietness to the pace of the story and the telling of it that made it such a wonderful read. I found myself completely engaged by the unfolding of the story, the richness of the details and descriptions sprinkled throughout, the handling of Ginny’s grief, the sparks and flickers of her feelings as she explores her growing attraction to Pansy and past feelings for Luna. I highly recommend this beautifully told story.

#8. The Frame by mindabbles

Sirius Black/James Sirius Potter | 11,703

What are the ethical implications of falling for a person you're named after? How about the logistical complications of falling for someone who shouldn’t be alive? James would rather, he finds, not look too closely at either, not when Sirius makes him forget anyone else exists.

My Rec: I left a prompt for Next Gen Fest involving time travel and James Sirius meeting his namesake and I was so excited when I saw it had been claimed. This fic was absolutely terrific. The idea of the portrait / painting being suspended on the wall mirrors this moment of James Sirius and Sirius suspended in time and I love that the author chose to end the story when they did, leaving things open and ambiguous but in a way that still felt very satisfying. Sirius and James are brilliantly characterised and there are wonderful doses of humour throughout what is a fairly tragic premise. The sex is hot enough to burn and the story has a gentle hopefulness which left me feeling really warm and content, despite the openness of the ending. We see James Sirius and Sirius in this one, suspended moment, as one might view a painting or photograph. Brilliantly written, with nods to Jeddy and Wolfstar too. I loved it.

#9. Games People Play by kelly_chambliss

Minerva McGonagall/Severus Snape | 5,610

Life is not easy when you are Severus Snape or Remus Lupin. But sometimes, there are compensations.

My Rec: I fell in love with this fic when it posted anon and for this year’s HP Crossgenfest and I wasn’t surprised when the author was revealed to be the immensely talented Kelly, one of my favourite writers of the older women in the Potterverse with a brilliant grasp of Minerva and Severus as characters. The story weaves Remus into the narrative and as ever Kelly’s prose is delightful, the use of second person working particularly well for this story with its shifting POVs. Severus displays moments of his surly, jealous, childish self but also appears a much reformed man although Kelly expertly retains a level of ambiguity around his true motivations in a fully-fleshed out, rich story of human complexity and the ways in which our past informs our perception of the present. If you only ever read one author writing Minerva McGonagall again, read Kelly. Although we are in the heads of Remus and Severus, it is smart, perceptive Minerva who is the star of the show. Wonderful.

#10. Summer’s End by Barry_Manilows_Wardrobe

Albus Dumbledore/Gellert Grindelwald | 9,505

Gellert was the embodiment of summer: sunlit hair, warm skin beneath Albus's hands, and a smile that made Albus feel hot down to his very bones. But all summers must come to an end.

My Rec: This story is utterly breathtaking. The writing is so confident and rich and the characters and their doomed love beautifully rendered. I read the fic with a lump in my throat, a gorgeously angsty, evocative tale of loving too much, too young, of powerful, intelligent wizards losing themselves in one another and the heat of an irrevocable passion which pulls them towards one another before everything breaks apart. At times the writing is so lyrical and poetic, I had to go back and read several phrases over and over, to really take them in. An absolutely stunning tale of lost love and the path that his past sets Albus on as he sets about preparing Harry for his future trials. Captivating, from start to finish.

#recs #writ recs #harry potter #harry potter fic #harry potter fic recs

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myfandomrambles · 6 years ago

Note

Do you have reasoning/evidence for your Septimus Heap ND headcanons? If you don't feel like explaining it that's fine, I just like seeing the reasons people have certain hcs (and I really like yours!)

Yeah!

I have whole posts on Septimus and Marcia if you want to check those out.

Well umm, hope you like this cuz this is pretty long. I super love these books, and I have thoughts lol. (Also: Projection? In my HCs? It's more likely than you think)

Jenna: ADHD & Anxiety

ADHD:

she is generally very restless. Jenna never really is into just chilling with stuff. Often being the one to initiate doing things. Likes to stay busy even if it’s just walking through the halls of her palace or tending to the horses.

she can hyperfocus on things sometimes. We can see this when she’ll focus on things, like Maricas shoes in book one and kind of zone out when they walk and the stars outside her window. In the second book, she remembers the bones in the skeleton and is able to just do it all in one go.

She gets distracted easily normally though bouncing between doing things. And gets bored when people talk around her. Like sometimes being the second one to get annoyed with Stanley.

Hyperfixations. Like the Dragon Boat for a while, the Queen's’ Room and other things.

Usually pretty hi energy. And has pretty large outbursts with her emotions even when trying to keep them under control. Kind of goes along I think with her kind of being described as one of the boys and a lot like her brothers in comparison to other kids. (I got called a tomboy a lot for my not liking sitting still and yes please I will play in the mud lol)

She stims some and doesn’t like not being able to. Comes up when she is trying to be unemotional or is told to play Queen.

Some impulsive behaviour. But even sometimes with more silly stuff as well.

Anxiety: In the later books, we see she can start to ruminate on things. On top of that, she starts to be a bit more cautious about things. Stuff that reminds her of previous stress is more powerful, not to the extent of PTSD like symptoms but it is noticeable. She also experiences anxiety in the run-up to having to make large decisions becoming more overwhelmed. I also think we see in the last to books some sympathy with sep who used to confuse her with his anxiety (like in Syren)

Mandy Marwick: C-PTSD & Selective Mutism

C-PTSD:

Hypervigilant all the time. Down to the way he sleeps.

Has identity confusion, kind of picking up new personalities around where he is. Reckless to his own detriment. Easily agitated. Struggles to form relationship really thrive where he can have more simple relationships.

Also just like the young army, like Septimus he can sometimes slip back into the cations in relation to the young army.

Checks out possible dissociation may be related. He also shuts down in general in response to his emotions turning stress inward. He can even check out as a bit of a survival tool. This helps when he goes to see the Port Witch Coven.

Selective Mutism: He is just literally selectively mute, can talk but doesn’t under most circumstances. Doesn’t talk much, some people haven’t ever heard him talk. Being the most talkative with Septimus and then when necessary. And in Todd Hunter he is more talkative it seems especially with his boyfriend Sam Heap.

Nicko Heap: PTSD & Depression

Well with this I’m mostly looking post-House of Foryx. It’s explicitly stated he is very different from when he left, never goes completely back but overtime is able to adjust back to home.

He had a lot of trouble reintegrating to things. Has become more passive in a sense, I think slowing down unable to do things and interact with his family the way he used to. Describes being tired, so I think fatigue could be present.

Struggles to enjoy anything like he used to, even though he still likes boats he doesn’t get the same excitement we see in the early books more searching for peace.

His relationship with Snorri also is strained for a bit because they both feel so disconnected from everything. Preoccupied thoughts with the trauma too.

Sarah Heap: Anxiety and Depression

I think her anxiety is brought on when her very specific way of life in the Ramblings is disturbed and a mother of 7 is turned into really only being mother to 1 kid (Jenna) and even the kid still in the same general lace is essentially never been her kid and is mostly raised by someone else. This disruption caused this I believe. Flyte really describes this and we see it worsen anytime her kids is missing for long periods of time.

Ruminates on her kids and what they might be doing. was shown to be irritable but in a way more reminiscent of anxious breakdown then anger when fighting with Silas. Obsessively, mothers, the duck Jenna brings back. Struggles anytime things she tries to use to manage stress (like her garden)

Depression: Shown to be very emotional often crying and showing signs of despair. Sometimes feels a bit secondary and useless/helpless when her skills around herbal medicine are not applicable and she really has the pertinent info to her kids' problems. This triggers hopelessness.

Has trouble keeping things clean, borderline hoarding behaviour. Observed in her sitting room.

Isolates from others. Seeming to only see her own family rarely out of her control, but when there is not a major problem like an illness or siege she tends to stay away from most people.

Simon Heap: BPD

BPD:

Deeply insecure needing outside validation and hates rejection and abandonment. This fear tears him up and fuels his worse choices.

Dangerous/Risky behaviour is common. I think his ability to hold his breath underwater is a Darke skill we see used in the port and later in the Todd Hunter books. But to have this and other of his Darke skill they would be practised. We also see this in being willing to do bad dangerous things like pick fights with extraordinary wizards, neutral things like ride his horse way to fast. use half a flyte charm and use magic that is dangerous/draining/Darke for himself to protect the castle.

Unstable identity looks for a new one a few times when the perception of perfect wizard falls he become full-blown dark wizard breaking ties with his family, this breaks moves to the port tries to be something else but still not really a heap again, then alchemy apprentice and reunites become a family man (later even having his son). This also can be unstable goals after his fixated one is broken.

Volatile and hot relationships. Even his consistent relationship with lucy can be read as dramatic and volatile

Very dramatic emotional reactions, big mood swings. Also very reactive emotional states. Including anger

Is capable of long term planning to get his goal but still acts impulsively very often when his emotion are rilled up. Like joining Dom Daniel in the first place as a huge example.

Depressive symptoms and moods

Splits on people. Jenna, his Parents, and Septimus. Even picking a fight with Sleuth and his horse to some extent.

Lucy is his favourite person

Snorri Snorrelssen: Anxiety

Anxiety:

She definitely ruminates on things and can get stuck in one thought pattern.

She also scripts and will plan out what she is going to do

really doesn't like it when life doesn't go as planned, the seen in sally Mullins is so relatable TBH my poor girl.

Shows similar worsening problems with communicating and interacting after the house of Foryx to Nicko. Seeming even more disconnected and stressed out, Snorri even seeks to return home.

Ullr is a comfort animal. Having the magic ability of synching thoughts, but more commonly she plays off her cat to feel more in control and power. Even just his warmth and presence. She is very sad when they are separated but tells Ullr to work with Jenna.

Is on edge a whole lot in connection to being able to see hidden ghosts. Feels like she has to constantly watch everything she is doing.

Syrah Syara: C-PTSD & Dissociation

C-PTSD: experience distress at reminders of her trauma. Relates well to sep but not the others. Shows clear signs of anxiety even when not possessed. Definitely shows feelings of helpless earned from her captivity. Has breakdowns.

Dissociation is way more of just a fan theory. I think her memories are not totally gone but a factor of dissociation. This might be more projection but I think the possession played a role in this with trauma. When the stuff with the syren and all of that happen her mind tried to deal with it all by dissociating. So I think it is possible she could remember the stuff. Also just she is relatable so yeah.

Silas: Dyslexia

This headcanon wasn’t mine originally I stolzed it from the great @septimusheapheadcanons In this post

Umm so yeah! That’s the things I think, Hope you liked it?

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sgnolivia · 6 years ago

Text

weird flex— are you okay??

two days into maybe-olivia’s eat-pray-love-crush-enemy-skulls pillage of cleveland, she’s struck by a migraine so searing that she has enough presence of mind to google psnn hesd dyig strook e ? before she’s left twitching in a trash heap behind starbucks.

it’s still light out when her brain stops trying to design, manufacture, and detonate it’s own atomic bomb. maybe-olivia isn’t sure if it’s been three hours or three days. the double chocolate chip frappe she bought t-minus five to blackout (ha!) has solidified on her pants. she can taste seafoam under her tongue.

she stares up at the sky in muted exhaustion.

god, it’s me, she thinks. i would like to invoke my right to choose.

perhaps if the zygote tube had been pro-choice, none of this would be fucking happening.

the lizard takes over all executive functioning at that point, forcibly ejecting her from the drivers seat. when she blinks down at her shirt it’s neon green and has a fun i love chicago! written across a black skyline.

maybe-olivia wonders if she saw the blue bedroom and doesn’t remember it. hopefully the lizard wrote it in the unicorn book.

not that it matters. what’s another forgotten thing in the grand scheme of it all? it’s a fifty-fifty shot she’ll remember anything she’s written in the notebook, anyway. her memory is half a step above melted swiss cheese.

from that point on, every decision is like russian roulette with a gun that’s fully loaded. maybe-olivia has no fucking idea what’s going to set her spinning into a migraine or send her flying off the realm of human existence or remind her, hey, she fucking loves macaroons. it’s a lot of calculated risks and maybe-olivia discovers that she’s very bad at math.

it goes on like this for an indeterminable amount of time.

she tries to balance her world-wide assassination tour with her brain’s need to self-destruct every seventy-three seconds. it is difficult.

after the act of dying her hair a soft brown sends her tripping into a panic attack, shivering violently and puking all over the nice bathroom of the vacation home she’s squatting in, maybe-olivia decides this isn’t working.

the unicorn notebook is full, so maybe-olivia unpacks the glittery purple one she bought to replace it. the pen that lights up was lost somewhere in bolivia so she has to settle for a fatter pen that holds four different wells of ink. she feels traitorous for liking it more than its predecessor.

option 1:

die.

honestly, this is the easiest and most cost-effective route. at this point she’s ninety-five percent sentient machine gun. there wouldn’t be much lost. blackout was set to be decommissioned after operation foxtrot anyway. maybe-olivia would just be finishing what was set into motion a long time ago.

she switches the pen into the blue inkwell and sets up a t-chart.

pros:

no more migraines.

won’t wake up in romanian hostel.

stop randomly puking.

permanently get rid of lizard.

cons:

maybe-oliva sits back in the chair. this list is marginally harder.

agency is exhausting and confusing. some days she’s completely post-verbal and other days she can only speak argentinian spanish, despite having no memories related to argentina. some days she physically can’t wake her body up for more than six minutes at a time. most days she throws up everything she tries to eat.

maybe-olivia wishes she was strapped back into her holding cell in the unnamed facility, twelve floors below the earth.

this transforms her body into a wet chihuahua. it takes four hours to pull her bones back inside her skin and another two just to get off the floor.

jesus, she thinks, and adds keep bones in skin to the pros list.

she ruminates on her death for a bit, losing time to daydreaming about the endless sleep that might await her. none of her training covered the afterlife so this is as much a guess as everything else in her life. maybe it’s an endless blank void. maybe it’s burning in a pit. maybe it’s a another shot. maybe-olivia hopes not. she doesn’t know if her spirit can handle another go-round of this.

but, her brain lizard pipes up, then they would win!

maybe-olivia growls out loud and pointedly tells it to shut the fuck up even if she begrudgingly admits that it has a point.

if she dies, then director howard lives.

this alights something hot deep in her gut. it feels like she has to puke and run fourteen miles at the same time. there’s no way in hell marcus fucking howard gets to live over her. fuck that. fuck that.

and really, doesn’t she deserve that? doesn’t she deserve the right to drag howard out of his villa safehouse, shove a piece of rubber in his mouth, break all his fingers, and ask what her real goddamn name is?

project sisyphyus has been trying to kill her— the real her— for eleven fucking years and they still haven’t gotten it done. she wins, they lose. they’ll have to try harder.

she writes fuck that in the scrawling, bunched together lettering she’s beginning to associate with her own personal handwriting. it’s nice. it feels like she owns something.

fuck that.

if they want me dead, they better fucking find me.

option 2:

get it the fuck together

there are no cons to this. she doesn’t need a t-chart.

getting it together proves to be a con all on it’s own. her brain is a glorified vegetable but it’s all she’s got. it’s not like she can swap it out for a new one. it needs serious repairs though, and short of hooking her scalp up to a car battery, maybe-olivia isn’t sure how to go about this.

google is, though.

and google doesn’t care if she has to look something up four times an hour. it points her towards helpful websites. searching how do i get my memories back and following it with who the fuck am i six times in half as many hours points her to a self-help thread which leads her to a diagnosis forum. she has acute brain trauma, post-traumatic stress disorder, dissociative episodes, panic attacks, and sometimes seizures. also, maybe arthritis. she has to ask google what dissociation means.

maybe-olivia is struck with the overwhelming knowledge that other people know what she’s going through. there are other people who fell head first out of a plane with no parachute and have been hurtling towards the ground for as long as they can remember. sure, they haven’t been tortured and brainwashed and denied the basic human rights that are allocated pretty much across the board but she doesn’t care. she feels connected to these people who live half outside of their skin, wondering the earth like zombies chewed up in the garbage disposal.

they teach coping strategies. ways to fake normal existence so that it seems like they’re living in the same reality as everyone else. how to breathe when her lungs collapse. how to avoid physical contact in day-to-day situations.

a lot of them gently suggest finding creative outlets for her feelings. she tries writing but after penning an expansive four page letter in cantonese only to suddenly forget how to read cantonese, she gives that up.

she decides she isn’t really ready to sift through her emotions. her bodies fucked up instincts are enough without trying to decide if she’s depressed, furious, or anxious on top of it.

google assures her that recovery happens in stages and at her own pace. if you aren’t ready today, try a little bit more tomorrow.

her brain still jerks her around like it’s the worlds most aggressive dog owner and she’s the runt of a teacup poodle’s litter, but it works to her advantage. no one can track her if even she has no idea where she’s going next. the targets come in migraines, in hallucinations, in dissociative fits, but they come and maybe-olivia dutifully follows, even if she can’t remember doing it. it’s admittedly a reckless strategy but if there’s a part of her that isn’t a screaming disaster then she hasn’t recovered that part yet.

she reviews her notebooks every few days, now. they look like they’ve been written by at least four people, one of them being a small child. there’s a variety of languages, handwriting styles, codes, and small illustrations. one page just says fuck licorice in increasingly bold font, fiercely underlined and surrounded by aggressive exclamation points.

it doesn’t do much except reaffirm that she has the minimal amount of control required to be a human being, but that’s okay.

a lot of her problems sort themselves out once a helpful blog post points out that she’s eating about a third of what’s required of adult women. this is mostly because she constantly throws up anything that tastes more flavorful than wheat bread but also because she’s never really had to feed herself before. hunger is just another loud, shrieking signal her body sends at her to inform her that something’s wrong, but it sends fifty of those a minute. how’s she supposed to know where the problem is?

a steady combination of pedialyte, muscle milk, and a bottle of gummy vitamins becomes the solution. she has to set alarms to remind herself to drink them and it isn’t ideal, but it keeps her caloric intake up, and solves the arthritis issue.

it also makes it easier to actually keep the memories she recovers which is a huge win.

that doesn’t mean things are smooth by anyone’s standards, including her own. random things still absolutely kneecap her— a dad yelling at his son, a lawn mower starting up outside the motel, her own abilities blinding her first thing in the morning. but every incapaciting moment gives a clue.

a car backfires on the road and maybe-olivia darts behind a minivan, seeing both the tan metal under her hand and white sand beaches.

239948S462569W

maybe-olivia has never infiltrated a fully-staffed enemy facility on her own before. that’s alright. it can be a learning experience for everyone.

#tw; memory loss #tw; slight gore #tw; severe suicide ideation #t; recovery #t; 1 month post lizard #p; weird flex

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letsdiscoverkitty · 6 years ago

Note

Why do you think you relapsed at Bristol Kitty? X

This has been on my mind all day (since I read your message) and has led me to doing lots of thinking.

It’s funny though, during my whole admission not one person asked me this question or helped me to explore WHY I relapsed. Granted that during my first 6 weeks I did not want to talk about uni or anything, but when I felt my mind easing a little and tried to reach out for support it wasn’t there and so I closed that lid and haven’t dared to open it since. My automatic reply has become “It was a bit too much stress/pressure and I wasn’t happy” which yes is true but is only the surface level.

I will put this under a read more as it may be long and triggering:

Firstly, looking back on it I was not in a place mentally or physically to be making such huge changes in my life again (past changes like going to York Uni and New Zealand also triggered relapses). I was itching to move out, I was literally bouncing off of the walls and hated it at home, but I was still very much stuck in Anorexia. Neither was I a healthy weight (the deal with my team at the time was that I would go to Bristol but had to engage with services straight away and commit to weight gain). These two things together meant that I was still extremely rigid, followed xy rules, and was pretty much still very intrenched in the anorexic thinking.

Accommodation: Unfortunately the accommodation I picked did not help the situation. It was in the city centre which was perfect however it was mostly made up of post grads and international students, meaning that it was very isolating and fed into my depression and social anxiety from the off.

I tried to be social and meet people, I was even voted onto the JCR board but even that didn’t help. I took on far too much and there was so little interaction with people whilst living there that I spiralled quickly.

The course:- Before even leaving for Uni, I felt behind. A combination of being out of education for a while and having not studied A level Biology meant that I felt that I needed to work harder and harder than everyone else.- My perfectionism was in its element; I put huge/near impossible unrelenting standards on myself and am extremely self-critical. Both of these traits were only exasperated by the course.- The course itself felt like 3 uni courses at the same time. One lecture we would be studying the cardiac system in physiology, the next antagonism in pharmacology and then in the human dissection rooms with Neuroscience identifying specimens. The variety was great however each area expected you to be experts in their field; so it often felt like you were having to work triply hard. - We had coursework every single week that was marked and went towards our final grade - this led to me finding it hard to STOP working (something I have struggled with a lot in the past as well)- The course itself was A LOT of hours (I seem to remember one week was something like 26 contact hours) and they expected you to do at least 1 hour for every hour contact time. Again, feeding into my perfectionism and my harsh self critic. - I then found with time that all this stress and pressure and all the working long hours and never feeling like anything was ever good enough, I didn’t enjoy any of it. I wasn’t happy. And that’s when things started to really go downhill. - I started to question everything as I began to see (or not see) that I had no idea where I was going with this degree or whether I actually wanted to be doing it. It felt like everyone had a rough path ahead of them, some sort of goal for studying neuroscience but I had nothing. I felt no connection with it.

Responsibility: I think there was a part of me that was terrified of moving out again and having to be an adult. Now I love living independently however anorexia also loves it. I personally find spending money on myself difficult and things like food shopping became even harder. This links with me not being in a place where I was ready to make such a huge change as I was stuck eating the same foods day in and day out with little to no flexibility. Yes I had gained some weight but my thinking was still so stuck. Then to throw in having to spend money on food and pay for everything else that comes with being an adult, idk part of me felt like I didn’t deserve or need these things. That it was a waste of money, that I was already x in debt with student loans now, how dare I be spending money on food and on myself. I logged all my in-goings and outgoings exactly; I had both a spreadsheet for theoretical and actual spendings as well as a budget book that I put everything I spent into.

I felt very disconnected from the people around me. There I was, 22, and I was surrounded by 18/19 year olds (and yes there were older people too but the majority were v young) and they were all going out drinking and partying (I wasn’t even invited, so there was no chance to even say yes/no) and tbh they were just so bloody immature. I didnt’ really find anyone I was close with and what with feeling alienated in my accommodation, to also feel that way on my course was horrible. I felt like I was such a burden to the people I would sit with because I was tagging along. I didn’t think that anyone liked me or wanted me to be there. They would be chatting about that night or planning on going out or talking about the nights gone by and I would just sit there copying down notes and not even able to join in.

I was really unhappyMy depression took quite a spiral and I was questioning why I was doing the course, why I was living where I was, and would ruminate over all my past mistakes and errors, tearing apart each day every night planning on how I could be better, work harder, push myself more to even attempt to be good enough in some aspect.

I suspect that I could keep going but I think this kind of sums it up?

#personal #Anonymous #asks

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lifeinahole27 · 7 years ago

Text

CS ff: “Wait for the Moonrise” (6/10) (au)

Summary: Emma doesn’t remember who she was before she was found in the woods, but she knows that she has a few close friends, a good job, and a loyal cat that greets her every day when she gets home from work. What she doesn’t know, however, is that her past is about to catch up to her in the strangest of ways. She learns quickly that not everything is as it seems, not even her cat.

Rating: E

Content warnings: smutty smut, brief mentions of the loss of a hand

Chapter specific content warnings: Sexual situations at the end of the chapter. Winkity wink.

A/N: Will add notes when I’m feeling better. Love to you all, and much much much thanks to all who’ve helped. Please go heap love on @clockadile for her absolutely gorgeous pieces for this chapter, and for all the other ones. <3

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5

Catch it on Ao3 or FFN! And catch @clockadile‘s artwork HERE!

The first three days after Killian changes back into Cat, Emma can barely even look at him. This was her house pet. This was the animal that she told everything to. And now, well, now he’s also this man? But that’s impossible. Magic doesn’t exist. And she tells herself this over and over, and yet…

And yet, she saw him transform right in front of her. She watched Killian become Cat, leaving behind a pile of clothes. There was no illusion or trick to it. It just happened.

After that little display, she’s unable to even sit by him without feeling a slight sense of panic and a whole lot of awkward. She has no idea how to act around him. Normally, she would talk about all of the feelings jumbled inside of her to Cat to get them out in the open, but now she sits quietly and stiffly on the couch, feeding him when she knows she should be feeding him and otherwise trying to pretend he doesn’t exist.

She could kick him out, but it’s officially negative degrees out there during some of the nights and she just cannot bring herself to do it.

What’s worse is she can’t talk to him about it. She can’t talk to Cat about her feelings and she can’t talk to Killian to find out what she should be doing. The whole thing leaves her an emotional mess, and it’s only by faking illness that she gets out of talking about anything with her coworkers or Regina.

Killian – Cat – whatever she should call him, goes on like nothing has happened, like their whole lives haven’t been rocked. As if impatient with her inability to look at him or touch him, Cat gets fed up one night and headbutts her chin, standing on her lap and bracing his paw in the center of her chest. She looks down at him, her eyes a little panicked, and he seems to understand.

Emma doesn’t know how she knows that, but looking into those same eyes (Jesus, how did she not figure it out sooner?) she can just tell that he’s trying to calm her down. It’s like he knows what she’s going through without her even saying it out loud.

“I don’t know, Killian,” she grumbles out, looking back down at the point of contact between them. He trills out a question, and she looks back to his eyes. He nods, just a little, and sits back down on her thighs.

He’ll wait forever, she thinks, and it’s that thought alone that finally makes her move her hand to stroke down his back. He blinks at her, a quiet purr emanating from him at the gesture.

It’s still weird, knowing that this man was just sleeping on her couch a matter of days ago, but they can get through this one day at a time.

As if knowing there are new boundaries, Cat goes back to sleeping on the blanket she had refolded in the corner. He seems to sulk the first few times he goes to it, having gotten accustomed to his spot on the bed and the easy affection she gave him before. But night after night he climbs atop the pillow and curls into a ball, falling asleep before she ever tucks herself in for the night.

At least she knows exactly why he was always turning away when she changed.

The rest of the month crawls by, with Cat being a cat and Emma being a little more reserved than she’s used to being. She hates that she second-guesses every interaction now. Also, there are truly times when Cat doesn’t seem like he’s Killian, which doesn’t help her sanity. Maybe it’s all been some weird dream. Maybe Will really did slip her drugs. As Cat goes skidding across the kitchen floor for the third time in pursuit of a hair tie, she really wonders about her own mind and what she saw and if Killian was real.

Other times, he watches television with her, raptly paying attention to the documentary she turns on about tall ships. He asks her questions in the forms of trills and chatters. He meows to greet her when she comes home from work. He’s much more Killian at times, and much more Cat at others.

She recalls him saying something about next month, and she remembers him being concerned about the phases of the moon, so Emma prepares for what she thinks will be a repeat performance. She researches when the full moon will be and makes sure to wake up each day leading up to it with the mind-frame that it might happen, but not sure exactly when he’ll transform again. It just so happens that she’s off the day it finally does happen, and he’s on her couch in preparation for the change.

Emma already has a pair of sweatpants sitting out for him, along with a pair of boxers and a t-shirt and a pair of socks. Again, none of it matches, but she’s only going to be able to stand him being naked for so long when she’s this keyed up. Just as the magical cloud begins to overtake him again, Emma throws his blanket over him so he’ll be covered when he’s human.

She misses; the blanket ends up over his chest and head, leaving the bottom half of him woefully exposed, and she groans and rolls her eyes, standing up from where she’d been perched on the coffee table and stalking to the kitchen to get a glass of water. How is this her fucking life?

Killian groans from the couch, clearing his throat and coughing up what very well might be a hairball before she hears him shifting around.

“I’m decent, love,” he calls out, giving her the okay to come back in. She takes her time, though, and pours him a glass of water while she’s in there before returning to the living room.

“Okay, so you’re not crazy. I’m not crazy. Explain.” She’s demanding it, even as she hands over the glass of water. He mutters his thanks as he gulps it down, but he’s in no rush to talk, it seems.

“I’ll just pop in the kitchen for some more water and then perhaps we’ll have a chat,” he says offhandedly. He even goes so far as to stand, just about to take a step before Emma stands as well and blocks his path.

“No,” she says firmly, handing him her glass of water instead. “Explain. Now.”

“Very well, then,” he says, handing her the empty one and taking the glass from her hand before he sits back down on the couch. “As you may have figured, I’m only human during the full moon. I get the day before and the day after, and then I transform back when the moon sets.”

“Why?”

“Because those are the conditions of the spell that brought me here.” He’s quiet for a moment, sipping this glass of water slower as he ruminates. “I’m sorry for not saying so sooner. I would’ve told you, but I was honestly hoping it wouldn’t take more than one transformation to convince you of your origins.”

“What else can you tell me?” she questions, and it feels a lot like an interrogation, but he’s not putting up a fight. Instead, he tilts his head to the side and considers her for a moment before answering.

“This profession you’ve chosen certainly suits you, love.” His smile appears briefly before he returns to the matter at hand. “The terms of my condition include that I get you to remember your upbringing, your past life. That you choose to return with me of your own will. When you do, my spell will be broken and I’ll remain human.”

“So, all I have to do is remember a bunch of stuff that I don’t have proof it actually happened?”

“Swan, you have seen me change from cat to man, and back again. Why not try something new, darling? It’s called trust.”

She purses her lips, not really wanting to give into this insanity, but not having much of a choice in the face of his words. “What will happen when your spell thing is broken?”

“Well, assuming you remember where you’re from and the start of your life, then I take you home to Misthaven where you can finally be reunited with your family.”

“And how do I remember?”

He chuckles, but it seems to be mostly driven by nerves instead of humor. Along with the laugh, he also lifts a hand to rub behind his ear, and the whole picture is actually a little endearing. Emma does her best not to smile at the display and kind of nudges him for an answer.

“Well, the only thing that works for breaking curses or spells where we come from is True Love’s Kiss, but that’s not going to work.”

“Yeah, no kidding,” she mutters, and Killian narrows his eyes at her with a small twist of his lips.

“It’s partly because I doubt you’d kiss me at all, but also because you’ve uh,” he coughs suddenly, as if choking on what he was about to say. “That is, you don’t remember…” He trails off again, clearly struggling to say whatever it is.

“I don’t remember what?”

“That you uh, that you loved me.”

She’s not sure she hears him correctly, to be honest. Because he’s mentioned that he knew her parents and yadda yadda yadda, but all of a sudden, he’s throwing out the fact that she was apparently in love with him? Seriously?

“Wait, wait. You mean I’m in love with the guy that supposedly deserted my mythical king and queen parents? What kind of warped fairy tale is this?”

“Let’s just forget about that for right now. You’ve already established the unlikelihood of a kiss. I’ve already established the unlikelihood that it’d work. Let’s move on, shall we?”

“I’m not just gonna walk away from that one, buddy.”

“Emma, can we not? We can return to it later if you truly wish, but I’m in need of a shower and food and about a barrel more of water. Please?” He looks like he’s about five seconds from dropping to his knees and begging, so Emma relents.

“Fine. Later. Go take a shower. I’ll have food waiting, and more water.”

“Thank you, Swan.” He hauls himself up from the couch, languidly stretching once he’s on his feet, before sauntering off to the bathroom. His actions even look like Cat’s, now that she knows what similarities to look for.

He doesn’t waste any time when he comes back out, settling down at the kitchen table with little preamble. “I have a proposition for you, Swan. We obviously know what won’t work, so why don’t we just spend this time together? You can ask me almost any question you’d like, and share only the information that you want to with me in return.” As he says ‘almost’ he hides his left arm under the table again, hiding where his hand should be. She wonders about how he lost that, and if it was missing when they were supposedly in love, but it’s clearly off limits for the time being.

“I’ve heard worse ideas,” she remarks as she places a peanut butter and jelly sandwich in front of him. It could’ve been fancier, but she didn’t know when this would happen, or even if it would, so she hasn’t been grocery shopping again and she ate all the snacks she brought home for him ages ago.

The question game starts before he’s even finished half the sandwich. Emma decides to take full advantage of it, even trying not to flinch when he explains that his mother passed away when he was very young and his father was lost at sea, resulting in him living in the palace while his older brother continued on through the navy.

“So, we grew up together?”

“We did. You went to your princess lessons every day while I lingered in the war room and practiced sword fighting with the guards.”

She mutters something about princess lessons as she gets up to gather their plates. They continue on through the day, with Killian helping her with laundry and cleaning the kitchen after dinner, and as they set up the couch for the night together, he regales her with history lessons on this Misthaven they’re supposedly from. He doesn’t talk much about who they were as people, just the surface facts.

That’s something she wants to correct, but has a feeling he’s not going to budge on it, just as he flinched every time he thought she was bringing up their personal relationship. Soon enough she’s bound to get him to talk about it, but she’s willing to shelve the discussion for another day.

In the morning, she tells Killian that she’s going grocery shopping and asks if there’s anything specific he wants her to pick up. With her list in hand, she’s happy to escape for a little bit. It’s not that she’s uncomfortable with him, but there’s only so long she can take his eyes watching her every movement as if he expects her to miraculously turn into whoever he wants her to be that gets to be a burden. Emma is honestly a little shocked that he didn’t ask to come with her, but also relieved. She has no idea how she would explain him to anyone they might bump into.

It takes the length of the grocery store visit for her to come up with even more questions. They’re all mundane: how many countries are there in this other world? How big is Misthaven? Do they have any enemies? What’s the military situation like? If he was changed by a spell, what other magical things are out there?

After crossing off the grocery list, she writes down her questions so she doesn’t forget them, and she eagerly returns home to share with Killian and see what his answers are.

It turns out there are no countries, there are kingdoms. And there are many. Some are far away, some are right next door, and there are some he's never tried to visit due to stories he's heard. Misthaven, they decide as they mull over a map, it slightly bigger than the state of Ohio. “That’s absurd,” she tells Killian as they stare at the map.

“Not all the kingdoms are so big. Plus, the villages are spread so far that much of it ends up being forest. Hence, why we call it the Enchanted Forest.”

“Is this place you’re from as big as Earth?”

“I’ve no way to answer that, love. Astronomy isn’t as advanced as it is here. We use the stars to guide our ships, but little is known compared to this mister NASA.”

“It’s just NASA. It’s not a person, it’s an organization.”

“Right, well, I still don’t know. Clearly, our languages are the same. We have regional dialects and accents like you’ve explained you have here. English and Latin are the most common languages in Misthaven, but we all learned Greek in the Royal Navy.”

“You know Greek?”

He smiles, nodding as he clicks around in fascination on Google Earth.

Emma will admit at any time that she originally wanted him to talk so she could find the holes in his stories, and while she knows he’s withheld information from her, he’s yet to outright lie. He’s also taken the opportunity a couple times to pass on a question she asks, citing her readiness for the truth as his reasoning. She doesn’t know what that means, but she lets it go for the moment. Some questions truly seem to haunt him, and she thinks she can understand his need to hide his demons.

“If I might ask, Emma, what happened after you arrived here?”

“I’ve always been here,” Emma says, almost detached from her own voice. It doesn’t feel genuine like the first time she insisted she’d always been here.

“You haven’t, but that’s okay. Tell me what you can remember of your twenty-fifth birthday.”

“Ah! Twenty-five. Apparently, the year that Graham and Regina took me out and I decided that drinking an entire bottle of tequila was a badge of honor that I needed to earn. I don’t remember anything from that night.”

He frowns when she says this, clearly displeased with her answer. “And the day after?”

“I don’t… You know, I don’t actually remember it all too well. There was something about the woods, and I think I was in the hospital for a couple days after I hit my head or something.” It’s Emma’s turn to frown as she reaches into the back of her memories for those moments and comes up with nothing but dredges. She snorts, rubbing her eyes and realizing that it’s much later than she intended to stay up when she glances at the clock. “I’m sure my therapist would have something to say about repressing my memories again.”

“You told me more than that, shortly after you brought me in, about being barefoot and alone in the woods. Emma, look at me, do you remember any of that? What were you wearing?”

He reaches for her hand, and Emma snatches it back haughtily. “I already told you what I remember. That’s enough for tonight. I have work in the morning. Goodnight.” She stands, her chair scraping the floor noisily when she rises.

“Emma – Swan, wait. I’m sorry.” He doesn’t try touching her this time. Just holds his hand up in a gesture she’s become all too familiar with. “Thank you for sharing and I’m sorry for upsetting you. Tomorrow, you may ask something you’ve wanted to know that I’ve been reluctant to answer in return. Fair trade?”

She pretends to consider it for a moment before nodding. “Fine. Fair trade. Goodnight, Killian.” She doesn’t fall asleep right away, instead thinking about Killian and everything he’s already shared with her. There’s a quality to his voice that almost makes her calmer, so she’s mad that she was upset by his questions at all.

When she wakes up, she showers quickly before going over the appliances with Killian again. “If anything goes wrong,” she tells him seriously, “you pick up this phone and hit the one key and it’ll speed dial to the station. Got it?”

Killian nods, reassuring her that he would be fine on his own for a couple hours.

After spending the last two days in the bubble of her and Killian, it’s unsettling being at work instead of being at home with him. She has more questions that she’s sure he would answer, and then there’s the freebie he’s given her. She doesn’t know which to choose though. Does she ask about their supposed relationship? Does she ask about what he’s been doing these three years he claims she’s been missing? Does she ask about why he left her parents? Does she ask about her parents? There are too many choices, and she mostly spends her boring office shift narrowing them down.

“Tell me about your brother,” she demands, as soon as she’s walked in the door. There’s clearly a whole hidden story just waiting to be heard, and she doesn’t want to waste any time.

Killian nearly drops the plate he was carrying from the kitchen, looking startled enough that she’s sure if he were Cat that he’d be all puffed out, tail twice its normal size at the sheer audacity of her to surprise him like that.

“Starting right off with our deal then,” he comments as he finishes setting their places. “At least let me get dinner on the table and then I might need a finger or two of rum to get me talking.”

“What is all this?”

“I made orange glazed chicken. I roasted the potatoes that you had in the cupboard, and there are carrots and green beans in the pan with the chicken, as well.”

She’s floored by this, of course, because she would never even dream of trying to make anything that requires a glaze and he’s just learned how to use an electric freaking oven in the last day. “And how did you learn how to make that?”

“It was on the moving picture screen. And then I went to that contraption again and managed to search for the recipe, and here we are!”

“You worked the TV, the internet, and the stove all in one day. And you didn’t burn down my apartment. Huh.” She’s definitely impressed, but still, he has a question to answer. “Okay, we eat, I’ll clean the kitchen after, and you’ll tell me about your brother. Deal?”

He sighs, and it’s a little annoyed and a bit in defeat, so she smiles in triumph as she hangs up all her winter gear and helps him bring out the hot serving dishes.

The food is phenomenal, as it turns out, much better than Emma would’ve been able to make it had she the ambition to make such a dish. But instead of focusing on her meager cooking skills, she thinks instead about what Killian might tell her tonight.

He isn’t the one to bring it up after dinner is through. He helps Emma take the dishes to the kitchen, placing them on the counter for her to wash before helping her store the leftovers. Emma knows he won’t bring it up on his own. It’s up to her to indicate when she wants him to talk. It’s for that reason alone that she waits until the kitchen is clean and Killian looks as relaxed as he ever gets.

She makes sure the TV stays turned off, and only lights one of the smaller lamps instead of turning on the overhead. She does, in fact, give him two fingers worth of rum in a tumbler, placing it on a coaster on the coffee table in front of him when she asks.

“So, you have a brother.”

He still hunches up in tension even though he knew it was coming, rolling his head from side to side, slowly, in an attempt to loosen up. “Liam,” he says, but the single word sounds rusty, like he’s not spoken his brother’s name out loud for a very long time. “He thinks I’m dead.”

Of all the things she was expecting him to say, that definitely didn’t make the list.

“Look, Swan, there’s a lot I still need to tell you, but you’ll probably be in need of wine before I can begin. And I’ll be needing more rum.” As if to prove his point, he knocks back the liquid she just poured and holds out the glass for more.

With a hard look at him, she stands again to fill their drinks, placing both of them on the table before settling back onto her end of the couch. “Okay, now what haven’t you been telling me?”

“I’m a pirate. Have been since shortly after you went missing. It turned me into a totally different person than the one you once knew, and even the one that’s sitting here now. I hardly recognize my actions for the last three years besides being a necessity in order to find you.” There’s such pain in his voice, she wonders again how much of his time spent as Cat is actually him, and resolves to ask him when she gets a chance.

Both of them pause when they realize Emma’s hand is resting on his arm in comfort. Haltingly, she pulls it back, joining her hands in her lap to keep them occupied. He tilts his head back on the couch for a minute, his eyes closed, and focuses his breathing.

“After you were gone, my brother and I had an argument, and I can’t be sure of his involvement in the fact that I was suspended, but I am sure it didn’t help. He stood there silently while your father placed his judgement, and while I think your mother tried to stop or lessen the punishment, it didn’t work. I think…” He trails off, opening his eyes but keeping them trained on the ceiling for the time being. “Your mother and father were always polar opposites with me. David believes in tough love, and Snow wants everyone to be given their best chances, and somehow it worked for a long time, until it didn’t.”

“My mother’s name is Snow?”

“Oh, haven’t I mentioned, love? You’re the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming. Well, King Charming. Congratulations on excellent parentage.”

Emma opens her mouth, but nothing comes out. Nope. There’s not a word that comes to mind for her to adequately be able to respond to that statement. “We’ll come back to that. Maybe it’ll… I don’t know, shake something loose. Let’s keep going.”

“After my suspension was handed to me, I holed up in my room for a couple days, made the plan to steal Liam’s favorite ship, and decided that the easiest way to get what I needed was to take it. And along the way, I took some jewels, gold, rum, and…” His eyes widen when he stops, and he looks over at her for some reason, but he doesn’t continue.

“What?”

“Nothing. It’s nothing. The point is, I decided that their methods were too slow, and I needed to find you as quickly as possible. Obviously, although it’s incredibly petty of me to say so right now, I was able to get to you faster than they were.”

“I feel like it connects, so I’ll just ask. How did you lose your hand?”

“Ah, I made the wrong enemy along the way. I would’ve been here sooner if not for this little mishap.”

“I’m not gonna ask what a tragedy would be if that’s a ‘little mishap.’”

“Tragedy is the fact that I lied after a run-in with one of the merchant ships from Misthaven and told them to report Killian Jones as being dead, and that the ship was formally being sailed by Captain Hook.”

She absolutely does not mean to laugh. She really doesn’t. But it just sort of… happens?

Killian is telling her this tale about how he told everyone he’s dead, and she’s clapping her hands over her mouth to stop the chortling laugh that’s just erupted from her. She doesn’t blame him for looking horrified by her reaction.

“I’m sorry,” she swallows it all down, taking a healthy sip from her wine to calm down. “When you’re done, because I’m sure this is bound to get worse, I’ll make it all better by explaining who Captain Hook is in this land.” This time when she pats his arm in comfort, it’s on purpose, and she keeps the contact light and brief.

“Right. Noted,” he says, shaking his head while his face morphs back to confusion, and then resignation that he’d have to continue his tale. “Where was I? Oh yes, I told the merchant ship to deliver the message that I was dead,” and here he gives her a pointed look, but the previous humor has helped to dissipate a bit of the gloom surrounding him. He still looks unhappy, but he doesn’t look like he’s reliving it all like he was before.

“I was incredibly selfish. I made it easier on me, because I stopped getting messages from your mother to come back, to come home. She stopped sending me messages on my birthday,” he trails off, takes another breath to center himself. “Liam, your parents, anyone who ever knew or cared about me before now thinks I’m dead. Except for you, and that’s only because you don’t remember who I am.”

“That’s all now, though. Why do I feel like there’s more to this story?”

“Because there’s always more to every story, Swan. Even now, there are things you’re still hiding from me. But you may not even know it. As for me, there are more details that I’m omitting at the moment, but we’ll come around to those eventually. You asked for a tale about my brother, and I’m doing my best to give it to you.”

“Then tell me more. You have to have at least one good story about him, right?”

“I don’t know if I do. Liam was never around much when I was growing up. He left for the navy shortly after me mum died, and returned only briefly to get me settled into the castle. He never came home for anything – just sent letters and messages on my birthdays and for holidays. Meanwhile, the palace staff was raising me, teaching me to be as noble as possible. I worked on chores in the kitchen. I learned my reading and writing almost by your side. But you’d go and get your princess lessons and I would go learn to be a gentleman, taking directives from this staff member, and commands from others. I only got a gruff congratulation when I started my naval career, and otherwise I would go months at a time without hearing from him again.”

Emma focuses on the vocal inflections, noticing how he softens up when he talks about her, and then his words become sharp again when he talks about his upbringing. “None of that could’ve been easy on you,” she comments. He might claim her memories are a lie, that she grew up with parents and love in her life, but all Emma knows is the pain of abandonment and loneliness as she was returned to group homes all her childhood.

“He loves me – loved me, I know that. But he couldn’t see that I needed my brother there during some of those moments. And by the time he did try to be my brother, it was too late, in my mind. I did nothing but take orders my whole life, Swan. You were the only one who never tried to tell me what to do, and if you did, it was only because you were looking out for our best interests.”

Again, she has nothing to say in response, but it brings a blush to her cheeks at his wonderment mixed with affection. “Want it to be my turn? That was a lot to give, so I guess it’s fair to answer one for you in return.”

“I’d like that,” he admits, sipping from his glass for a second while he either collects his thoughts or tries to re-bury his past. “What’s your favorite thing to do outside these walls? I know you work, and you spend a questionable amount of time with your cat, so what do you do for fun?”

“Oh.” Emma hums for a second. “Well, I go out with Regina sometimes, although last time we did that wasn’t really that much fun.” He looks like he’s about to interject, and Emma rushes on to continue since she remembers the last time they went out very vividly. “Graham used to come out with us more, but we’ve all been working so much lately that we haven’t been going out much at all.”

“Graham?”

“Humbert. He’s the sheriff. Nice guy. He and Regina used to have a thing, but then they decided to stop, and I think he’s sleeping with one of the girls that works at the hospital. Regina just started seeing a bartender. It’s like a soap opera around here. It’s the only really exciting thing,” she admits. “Well, it was, until it turned out that my cat is really a mysterious, brooding ex-sailor from another world.”

“Pirate,” he says offhandedly before continuing. “That name actually sounds familiar, but I can’t place it.” He waves it away after a second and gives her a hard look. “Now, Swan, tell me about Captain Hook.”

It takes another glass of wine and rum, and a Google search for him to understand, and he groans and grumbles for at least ten minutes, but still they sit and talk afterwards. The previous tension is all but gone, and the night closes in around them as they talk about all topics they’ve marked as safe. They talk about Emma’s theatrical life, and Killian shares some safe-territory stories from his home. Neither of them even try to veer into the rocky subjects again, choosing to spend the last night of Killian’s human time in a temperate state.

Emma is reluctant to go to bed that night, knowing that when she goes to sleep, there’s a chance that she’ll wake up to a cat instead of a man, and not entirely happy with the idea anymore. She loves Cat, and loves the quiet affection he gives her when she needs it most, but she’s also enjoyed herself these last couple days. She tries not to think too hard about what that might mean, and instead chooses to refill his tumbler with a last splash of rum while she sips the last dredges of her wine.

“How about one more question? It’s clear that we weren’t able to save your memories this time, Swan, but one more question won’t hurt.”

“I mean, it could, if you wanted it to,” she says, and her lopsided grin is equal parts ‘you asked for that one’ and ‘yeah, I am kind of flirting with you.’ He blinks a couple times before turning his attention back to his glass and chuckling as he swirls the contents.

“Oh, Swan, the things you do to a man,” he sighs out. “Fine, one simple question, following the same rules that we’ve already established.”

A hundred questions that she’s apparently not allowed to ask all flood her brain very suddenly, but she pushes them all to the side in order to find one that will leave them both in this contented state. She’s not sure where the question she settles on comes from, only knows that she’s been staring with unfocused eyes on a painting she hung up about two years ago, where a small valley of flowers reaches up towards the sun.

“Where was your happy place?”

“That question’s a bit more complex than either of us are equipped for, love.”

She looks over at him, seeing that same sad smile she’s caught a few times, though this time he’s looking down at the swirling liquid in his glass rather than at her. “Fine, where did you go to get away from life when you were growing up?”

“The meadow,” he answers, not even a heartbeat of hesitation. “It’s this flower field we discovered within the palace boundaries. It certainly doesn’t look like it belongs within the borders of a castle. Small rolling hills, surrounded on three sides by trees that were already taller than we were. And there were wildflowers from one end of this clearing to the other.” He trails off, letting the image of that meadow stretch forever, her eyes no longer trained on the painting but on the man at the other end of her couch.

His eyes are closed as he describes it, and it’s only when she sees the tumbler shift that she realizes that he’s actually fallen asleep, his hand relaxing and losing grip. She snatches it before it can fall and places it back on the coffee table. She encourages him to stretch out with gentle words and helping hands, and then she covers him with the blanket before cleaning up their drinks and turning out the lights.

It’s no surprise that Emma dreams of the meadow of flowers as soon as she falls asleep, but everything is starkly familiar. It’s not the painting on her wall; it’s the exact image that Killian was describing to her. It’s the same meadow that she’s seen in her dreams countless times.

This time, when the voice calls out to her from a distance, she can feel the recognition of it down to the marrow of her bones. She turns to find him there, among the flowers, a smile of amusement belying the admonishing tone he uses to tell her to stop confusing the flowers. And then there are the eyes, those eyes…

Killian’s eyes…

And Emma wakes with a start. She hops out of bed and heads straight to the couch to tell Killian what she’s just realized, but it’s too late. With a start, she looks outside again and sees the sun is already up, and where she expected Killian, it’s now just Cat.

“Oh, hey. I’m sorry. I meant to wake up before it was time,” she tells him. He nods in understanding, accepting the scratches she bestows upon his chin and behind his ears. “Next time,” she assures him, before wandering off to the kitchen to get their breakfasts ready.

Over the next month, things change a lot for their day-to-day routines. Mostly, it’s because things go back to the way they were. They go back to an easy relationship between cat and human, where they take naps on the couch again, and she resumes petting him. Judging by the way he purrs and flops onto his back, she thinks he approves.

She also starts talking to him again, much like she did when she first brought him inside. She skips the affectionate cooing that she definitely did in at the start, but she tells him about her days at work and now has zero issue admonishing him for climbing the curtains when she’s working at her computer.

After a week, a cold front moves in and her apartment is colder than she ever remembers it being. At the end of the day, Cat climbs onto his bed in the corner, but he still looks cold, so Emma figures there’s only one solution.

“Come on, Cat. You can sleep up here. It’s too cold to sleep over there. But just don’t make it weird, okay?”

He surveys her for a moment more before uncurling and slinking to the bed, and she has to repeat the request and pat the comforter to coerce him up. With a deft leap, he lands on the mattress, slowly wandering up to take his place beside her pillow. She gives him a reassuring pat on the head before burrowing under the blankets, both of them giving a sigh of comfort when they’re settled in.

In the morning, she’s confused for a second when she can’t find him, wondering if he woke up before her, and then feels more than she hears the muted purr. There, beneath the blankets, Cat has wriggled under until he’s even with her hip, toasty warm with the combined body heat and covers.

“What did I say about making it weird?” she asks him, peering down to where the sunlight just barely hits. In response, he purrs louder and gives one slow blink before stretching and extracting himself. He gives a little huff as he makes it to the edge and jumps down, turning an expectant look on Emma before he wanders to the door. “So demanding,” she says, slipping from under the covers to follow him after tying on a warm robe and putting on a pair of slippers.

For all the time she’s had the calendar on her desk, she’s never paid much attention to it. Now, however, she has the date before the full moon marked with a subtle asterisk, and she crosses off each day leading to it with anticipation. At least she knows when to expect Cat’s change this time.

She’s looking forward to seeing him again, Emma realizes. It’s strange to think that two months ago she was utterly freaked out by the idea that her Cat became a man, and now it’s a natural part of her month. Sort of like her period, but much less awful. She spends way too long thinking of the way he uses his hand as an extension of his speech, and the way he smiles at her when pleased with what she’s told him. And she tries not to think about the way her stomach leaps when he gives her that really intense look, like he’s seeing to the very center of her soul, like he knows her darkest fantasies come true, but she fails.

It’s been too long since she’s gone out and been with someone. She still makes regularly scheduled nights out with Regina, but she stops trying to pick anyone up or go home with anyone, because it’s weird when Killian is home waiting for her. He’s a cat, but it’s still strange.

There’s also the distinct way he talks about their upbringing, and about the two of them together. He may have claimed that they were once in love, but it’s clear that there’s something still there. He still has some kind of feelings for her. He wouldn’t trip up so often when she asks questions that revolve around their lives together if he didn’t.

It’s all about testing the waters, she decides, so while he’s still asleep, and still a cat, she heads out to grocery shop for their “weekend” together. Who cares if it’s the middle of the week? Having Killian transform is a little like the Friday through Monday break, and she’s happy to spend the entire time with him this round.

She makes it back just as Killian is emerging from the bathroom in his mismatched clothing, and even with the brightly patterned sleep pants she found last week, he still looks like a calendar model as he ambles over to the couch.

“Good evening, love,” he greets, and her heart beats just a little faster at the thought of her crazy idea, but she’s going to try to sleep with him. That’s the plan, anyway.

-x-

It’s strange to think that just two months ago, Killian was doing his best to convince Emma that he wasn’t a lunatic standing naked in the middle of her apartment. Last month, she was at least prepared for his change and embraced it fairly quickly. This time, she’s not only ready, but she’s making them dinner for the night. Much like the night he made them dinner last time around, she pulls out all the stops, making sure to set the table for the two of them and pour them each a generous glass of wine.

As he’s caught in conversation with her about the last month he’s missed, he skips the shower right away. It can wait, especially when Emma is as enchanting as she is. Her laugh is a little freer than it’s been, and she catches him staring more times than he can keep track of. He just can’t seem to keep his eyes off of her.

As a result of the mood, the wine, and the easy banter, Killian eases back into a persona he’s kept close guarded the last two times he changed. He’s offering more innuendo than he has previously, and his tongue keeps finding its way to the corner of his mouth – a telltale sign of his flirtatious mood. Emma, for her part, keeps touching his arm, her fingers playing with the sleeve of his shirt from time to time in a tantalizing manner.

“We’ll talk all night if you wish, Swan, but I need to shower. I’ll be right back,” he tells her before draining the last of his glass and letting his fingers slide over her shoulder as he passes. He looks back to find her watching him, her tongue slipping out to wet her lips before she smiles at him.

He blasts the water on cold for just a moment, just enough to calm him down and get his blood back to the appropriate places before he turns it back to warm to actually make use of the shower. He moves quickly through making himself presentable, and exiting the bathroom to find Emma waiting for him in the living room.

“Tell me what I was like back there,” Emma says quietly. He’s barely been sitting on her couch for a full minute before she asks. Killian smiles as he runs a hand through his hair, pushing it back as it dries, as he lounges back into the cushions with his arm stretched over the back of the couch.

“You’re headstrong, always, your highness,” he emphasizes.

“Killian,” she admonishes.

“Emma,” he corrects in jest. “You’re headstrong and stubborn, but very free-willed. Your parents never entertained the idea of arranging your marriage, but also because you walked up to them at age ten and demanded that – “ he cuts off, suddenly, and Emma leans towards him.

“That what? What did I tell them?”

“That uh, you were going to marry me.” He pauses for a second, scratching behind his ear with his index finger as he flushes. He waves his own thoughts away after a second, deciding that it’s better to continue on at this point than dwell on the fact that she was actually supposed to. “They promptly told you that you could marry whomever you’d like, to which you stomped back out of the room to find me.”

She slides a little closer to him, not really conscious of the proximity as she reaches her hand out and runs her fingertips along his jaw as she tries to spark her memory. “And did I marry you?”

“Alas, no,” Killian sighs out, his voice lowered and his eyes fluttering at the sensation of her touch. “You couldn’t locate the priest so you decided it could wait for another day.”

She drops her hand, chuckling at her own antics.

“I sound very determined.”

“Aye, you were. You are,” he insists. “I do so wish you could remember yourself, Emma.”

A sigh, this time from her, full of the exasperation she feels as she throws herself back into the corner of the couch. “Me too.” She stretches her legs, her feet landing in Killian’s lap. Their positioning is dangerous, as her previous touch already has him on edge, but her foot purposely moves against his groin, and he can all but feet his pupils dilate in desire.

His gaze fixes on the coffee table, and he sees she’s brought her wine glass in, and the bottle sits mostly empty next to it. By no means should so much be missing, but Emma gives a little more purpose to her movements, and Killian can no longer focus on the wine or anything in the room besides the temptress doing her best to give him an erection.

Time becomes an abstract concept as Killian suddenly finds Emma in his lap, her hands framing his face as she presses her lips to his. If this was all, if this was exactly what she expected, then he might consider continuing. As it is, Emma begins moving, her hips starting a slow rhythm that sings through his blood as his heart beats double time. With much regret, he pulls her back, especially when a particularly delicious swipe of her tongue gives him a stark reminder of how much wine she’s consumed in the short time he’s been gone.

“No, Swan, I won’t be giving you what you want tonight.”

“And why not?” There’s the haughty princess he knows, in voice alone.

“Because you’re clearly too drunk to be thinking straight, and I’m still too much of a gentleman to take advantage of you.

She doesn’t listen, at first, continuing her gentle nibble of his bottom lip, her hands sliding into his still-damp hair as she feels his cock stirring in his lap.

“It doesn’t feel like you want to stop.”

“I’m only human, love.”

“I can make you feel good, and I bet you can make me feel good in return,” she purrs against his cheek.

He hums low, wanting nothing more than to pull her closer, to kiss his way down her body and taste her, take her, expose her for the first time in years to his hungry eyes. She sighs, though, and all he can smell is the wine on her breath, and with a heavy sigh of his own, he knows it’s time to stop. But one more kiss can’t kill either of them, right?

With his hand anchored in her hair, he pulls her in for one last long, deep kiss. He lets his tongue familiarly tangle with hers, lets her body melt against his, and then he guides her far enough away for him to think clearly again.

“You’re going to bed, Emma. Alone,” he adds before she can say anything else.

Her eyes ice over immediately, and she scrambles to her feet with frustration and anger clear on her face. “Yes, alone,” comes the enunciated response. “Enjoy the couch, Killian.”

The door slams just a moment later, and he drops his chin to his chest, wondering how long her ire over this will last. It’s still way too early to sleep, so he quietly moves around the living room, somewhat snooping through the items he finds. The artwork on the walls is befitting of a princess, whether she realizes it or not.

He rifles through the small accumulation of books she’s gathered over the time here, pulling out a few hopefuls and settling onto the couch to peruse each one before sticking with a singular novel. He’s almost halfway through it before he finally turns in, anxiously feeling the time slipping through his fingers and hoping the next day will improve.

Whatever he was hoping for, it’s all for naught. She ignores his quiet greeting, going straight to the kitchen to make coffee, keeping her robe pulled tight around her as if to block out interaction. He waits patiently for her to collect her coffee and come to the living room, but even after she pours herself a mug, she takes that and a package of her beloved Pop Tarts, grabs her computer from the desk, and goes back to the bedroom with another slam of the door.

He takes that as his cue to go about his own business, but he helps himself to the pot of coffee she made before pouring himself a bowl of cereal. He spends the morning and part of the early afternoon reading the rest of the novel he’d picked up the day before, and only twice ponders knocking on the door she’s kept closed the whole time.

There’s a miniature war over his emotions. There are three factions that he can identify. The first insists he was right to do what he did, and thus is stubbornly turning up his chin at her childish behavior. The second misses the woman that he last saw over three years ago as he slipped from her bed to get her breakfast. The last misses this Emma, the one who chews with her mouth open when she’s excited about something and swears worse than any of his sailors ever did. It’s a miracle that he doesn’t go and pick the lock just to alleviate the second and third parts.

Instead, he bides his time, and isn’t the least bit surprised when she exits her room halfway through the day and announces she’s heading out. He only calls out for her to be safe, not even looking up from the second book he started lest she burn him with her gaze.

Still, she slams the door on her way out, and he lets the silence close around him once more, only moving when his stomach growls and he decides lunch is in order.

At dinner time, he reheats the leftovers, leaving the pan in the oven for Emma’s return. But when she doesn’t come home after almost an hour, he resigns himself to pulling out the food and leaving it on the counter to cool while he cleans up the kitchen.

He turns on the television to distract himself, flipping restlessly through the channels of things he doesn’t understand and jokes he doesn’t get, finally landing on the history channel and a documentary of some sort about alien interference. It sounds like absolute bollocks, but it’s entertaining.

The sun goes down and he turns on lamps throughout the apartment, hoping that Emma will return soon.

It’s not until long after he’s turned off those same lights and gone to bed that the door opens, Emma finally having abandoned her technique of making as much noise as she can as she sneaks in. He still marks her progress through the apartment, even with his eyes closed, hearing her breath hitch once before she closes herself in the bathroom.

Maybe, just maybe, the next day will finally be a good one.

It’s not exactly the wake up he hoped for, with Emma slamming every door she passes through until she stomps into the kitchen. Again.

“I’m going to work,” she calls out as the coffee pot starts up.

Off the couch he goes, still trying to wipe the sleep from his eyes as he goes to assess the damage. “I thought you took the day off?”

“Something came up,” she says. She’s lying. She may have the ability to call out others when they’re lying, but she’s terrible at it herself.

“Whatever you need to do, Emma.”

She looks at him then, her face the picture of anger and hurt, and he has no idea how to smooth this over any more than he’s already tried. She wants to be angry with him for pulling away the other night, and he knows that no amount of words will convince her otherwise.

The day passes as slowly as the last one, and Killian almost resigns himself to spending it alone again, a whole wasted transformation under his belt, but Emma is home just after dinner time. He opens his mouth to let her know there’s a plate for her in the oven, but she barely looks at him for a second before heading towards the bathroom. She peels off her shirt before she even gets through the door, leaving him with a lingering glance of her back, only interrupted by the clasp of her shortened corset.

He can’t help but scowl as she slams the door to the lavatory, especially when the water turns on and he has a fairly good idea of what she’s about to do. He stretches out, rolling to face the back of the couch and attempting to burrow under the pillow, but it doesn’t stop the next sound from reaching his ears.

She’s soft at first, just light sighs here and there, just loud enough to be heard over the running water. But as she continues, she gets bolder, and she gets louder. He tries not imagining whatever she’s doing in there, but it’s impossible when she moans out his name, and he sucks in a deep breath just trying to keep calm.

He sits up, patient enough to wait for her to exit, but already straining in the castoff sweatpants. He dips his hand beneath the waistband, giving himself a few slow strokes to ease the arousal a bit. He squeezes the base of his cock when she comes, hoping to hold back his own even as she really plays it up with the acoustics on her side. He pulls his hand out just before she exits the bathroom a few minutes later. Her hair is damp and braided, the plait pulled over her shoulder. Instead of dressing or slipping on her robe, Emma stands there in nothing but her towel, her body flush from the water and the release, he’s sure.

The pose he’s left himself in gives her full view of the tent at his crotch, but he lets the rest of his body relax into the cushions as he lounges back. With her eyes locked on his erection, he reaches down to touch himself again through the fabric of the bottoms. She takes one slow step forward, but Killian moves before she can take another one. He’s up off the couch, crowding her against the doorway to her bedroom wrapping his hand around her braid and his blunted wrist goes to her lower back to pull her closer, to pull her against the obvious signs of what she’s doing to him. She moans at the contact, her eyes fluttering a bit as the lust washes through her. Killian bites his lip, considering what to do with her, and decides he can’t wait another minute – certainly can’t wait another month – to have her taste on his tongue once more.

He guides them towards her bed, easing his fingers from around her hair to find the seam in the towel. Unwrapping it from her body is simple, and he suspects she didn’t have it tucked very carefully to begin with, which means she was still planning on enticing him after her little show in the shower was over. He grins, letting his tongue play in the corner of his mouth as he keeps her gaze, even when the towel drops to the floor.

“Hop up,” he commands, indicating with his chin that he wants her up on the bed. She bristles a little, and he chuckles low that for once he’s not the one looking like an angry cat. “Oh, Swan. Just trust me on this, yeah?”

She still scowls for a second before doing as she’s asked, and that’s when he looks his fill. She’s definitely gained muscle in her time here.

Where once the hair between her legs grew freely, she now has it groomed down to a singular patch, and while it’s utterly different than anything he’s experienced, it’s still entrancing.

“You’ve only got a couple more hours, so unless you want to stand there just staring at me – “ she starts to taunt him again, but he stops her when his hand wraps around her ankle. He pulls a little, spreading her legs apart gently as he glances up the length of her body. Her breasts are still absolutely perfect, and he soaks up the unrepentant expression on her face.

He kneels on the bed, bracing himself up on the elbow of his left arm as he trails his fingers up the inside of her thigh. Her muscles twitch and jump in anticipation, and he makes sure to look up and meet her eyes again as he sinks two fingers into her. Her breathing speeds up and she bites her lip, now suddenly quiet in her pleasure.

“Oh no, Swan. I want to hear what I’m doing to you,” he says as he crooks his fingers up to find the spot that will make her see heaven itself. “You had no problem while you were putting on your little act.” When he succeeds in hitting the right spot, she arches her back, gasping in delight and requesting he do it again.

And he does, but when he does it this time, he adds the pressure of his tongue to her clit so she moans, loud and clear, her voice filling his ears in the sweetest of ways. He approaches this with two types of knowledge: one is what he already knows of what Emma likes, and the other is what he’s learned in their three years apart. He detests that he has knowledge of pleasuring other women that aren’t the one in front of him, but he watched her bring home a man not two weeks after she took him in, so there’s no telling if she’s done the same in the past. He hasn’t worked up the courage to ask.

He loves her, he still bloody loves her after all these years and after these last two months of absolute nonsense with her, and it’s with that thought in mind that makes him double his efforts. He speeds up the thrust of his fingers, he varies the pressure and movements of his tongue and lips, and he listens as her sounds get higher and higher until her thighs clench around his head to hold him in place while her hands grip tightly at his hair.

Had she not done what she did with the shower, he maybe would’ve eased back, pulled away, confessed that he still feels for her as he did three years ago, but she did tease him earlier, so he doesn’t. Where she assumes he’s slowing for the purpose of drawing away, he merely slows until her thighs relax and her legs drop back to the bed. His breath washes over her, and she shivers at the sensation.

“Swan,” he says softly, drawing her eyes down to him. As she looks down her body, he smiles, the hint of what’s to come playing at the corner of his lips. With no further explanation, he closes his mouth over her again, sucking hard on her clit for a moment to jolt her system. She must accept her fate quickly because other than a surprised shout, she holds him in place, her hips canting off the mattress in an attempt to meet him thrust for thrust.

He moans, pressing his erection further into the mattress to relieve some of the pressure he’s feeling, and not the least bit surprised when he feels her clenching around his fingers again so soon when he didn’t give her a chance to come down from the first time.

Emma calls his name, her voice the perfect example of ecstasy as she praises him again and again, riding his face from below while her climax seems to stretch on forever. He’s certainly not complaining, especially when her nails rake against his scalp and he can no longer hold his own pleasure back, lost as he is in finally tasting and feeling her again. He’ll have to find that other pair of lost and found bottoms she brought up for him, now that he’s had his own release in these ones, but it was worth it.

She falls back against the mattress, boneless and sated, her skin once again flush and her braid flung over the pillow beside her. “You were marvelous,” Emma breathes out, her smile wide and happy as she beckons him up to her level. The words, those words, are the same she used, and he stares at her a second longer trying to puzzle out how to unlock the mysteries and memories that have been stored so deeply inside.

It takes one more insistent look and hand gesture for him to move, and when he’s within range, she pulls him down to kiss him. He gingerly rests between her open thighs, careful not to brush against her sensitive skin or press himself too much against the now-cool patch on the inside of the sweatpants he’s still wearing.

“You?” she asks when she pauses to again catch her breath.

“Already finished, love. I’ll just hop into the shower to clean up and maybe, now that you’re not cross with me anymore, I can hold you for the last few hours I’ll be human for this cycle.”

Her face falls, not in disappointment this time but because they did waste an extraordinary amount of time in disagreement. He doesn’t regret giving in to her tactics, but he is glad that it finally smoothed the way for her to give him that same look she gave him the other night, the one that tells him that she has the desire to learn where she came from.

“Go ahead and clean up,” she says with a gentle nudge to his shoulder. “I’ll be waiting.” When she smiles at him, he can’t help but smile back, nodding and reassuring her that he’ll be back in no time.

He keeps his word, only spending enough time to make sure he’s free of sweat and bodily fluids before grabbing a towel from the linen closet. He scrubs it over his hair to catch what moisture gathered and towels the rest of his body off before walking back to the bedroom.

Emma is already in bed when he walks in, and he can just catch the straps of a camisole from the way she’s sitting with her knees up and her arms wrapped around them. She looks up when he enters, her eyes widening and her mouth falling open the tiniest bit at the sight of him.

“Don’t start with that look, Swan. There’s not enough time and I think I’ve already given you twice as much to think about before the next time,” he says nonchalantly, even though he’s quite a bit pleased with her reaction. He heads straight for the closet and the other stowaway clothes she keeps there for him and slides on a fresh pair of what she’s told him are pajama bottoms before he comes back to the bed.

She scoots over when he approaches, leaving the second half of the bed open to him and pulling back the covers for them both to climb under. This alone is monumental, as it’s the first time he’ll be sleeping in her bed as a human. He can feel the telltale exhaustion creeping up, and he sighs deeply as he settles in.

“Next time, we’ll talk more. I promise,” Emma says quietly as she burrows in facing him.

“Aye, Swan. We will,” he agrees before yawning wide. He places his hand palm up between their pillows and Emma considers it for only a moment before placing hers on top. A few hours later when he wakes up again, it’s her hand holding his paw and he’s sneezing fur from his nose once more. Whatever the cat equivalent of groaning is, he makes that noise before stretching out the now-less familiar bones and heading off to use his cat box.

Three months have already come and gone, and he’s acutely aware that he is halfway through his time limit. Next month, he won’t let a minute of it go to waste.

Chapter 7

#cs ff #cs ff au #captain swan ff #csbb #csbb 2017 #sarah writes ff #wait for the moonrise #enchanted forest/modern au

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