#my queue has been flipping out in my absence

[neiptune]

all over me

(gojo x female reader)

wc: 2k

warnings: angst, you won't find any comfort here my friends

There's only one place Satoru usually stops by in Shibuya and although he's prayed he would so many times, he certainly doesn't expect to find you in it

Sweat runs down Satoru’s back as he takes one hand out of his pocket to push up dark sunglasses, annoyance taking shape in the creases between his furrowed brows. He should’ve went for the cashmere jumper instead of the wool sweater but then again, he can’t quite remember the last time he had made a good decision. Not that he would ever allow anyone to know.

People are buzzing around Shibuya as usual and he has to offer more than one gentle smile to strangers profusely apologizing for bumping into him on their way to god knows what, god knows where. As he finally makes it out of Takeshita street the mob decreases in density at last, giving him the chance to take a deep breath: sometimes the drainage smell can rise to the surface and make the simple experience of taking a walk excruciating, but today Shibuya smells just right. Smoke coming from yakitori restaurants mixes interestengly well with the strong smell of fermented soybeans scattered in colorful stands and the sweet, fruity scent coming from the magnolia trees blossoming among shops and sidewalks.

Satoru comes to a halt right in front of it, old habits die hard after all. As usual, the Aoyama flower market teahouse comes with a consistent queue outside its pretty building. It’s a Tuesday afternoon and under normal circumstances he’d have to wait around 50 minutes to get inside but he’s, well, him, and he’s known for two things: dashing charm and generous tips. Sunglasses are graciously pushed over his forehead, lazy half-smile a blinding crescent moon as the lady in charge of the queue, name list in her hand, bows and motions him towards the entrance right away. There was a time when you would’ve rolled your eyes, with a sarcastic huff and a barely muttered you are shameless. When he was with you, Satoru had only been allowed to work his magic once: every other time, you had always forced him to respect the queue. Sure enough, each time, he complied. And that was the magic you worked.

He’s not bothered by the smell anymore, way too sweet for his taste. But every blossom, branch and flower still has your laugh embedded in it, so it’s alright, really. He wonders if this is still your favorite place to hide away in, where you’d catch up with your friends on rainy days, sit all alone with a book whenever you needed a break from reality, snap selfies of you two nestled between hues of an impossible amount of pretty flowers. Red, pink, green, orange, white, their scent lingering on you for him to savor it for hours on end, the way you’d jokingly push him away when he’d try to nuzzle his face in the crook of your neck for the millionth time. Satoru gets a kick out of the way ill stitched wounds tear apart and resume their bleeding whenever he steps foot in this place, pain crashing over him in waves, the emptiness of his chest taking the shape of your absence all over again through a carving so painful not even the strongest sorcerer feels powerful enough to bear. But it’s only right. He doesn’t deserve smooth edges and being the strongest unfortunately means he survives the process every single time.

“Toru?” a timid whisper, one he’d recognize everywhere regardless of having been left without that voice for over two years now.

And sure enough you’re there, actually there, sitting at your own glass table with plants sprouting from underneath it, a giant plate of your usual order in front of you, mocking him, because apparently nothing has changed besides your absence in his life. He’s hated french toast ever since.

Satoru approaches your table, patiently ignoring the way his stomach has flipped at the familiarity of your voice paired with the nickname.

“Hey” he hasn’t seen you in so long, and this is all he can come up with. But it must mean something, finding you here at last after endless wanderings and cups of tea he doesn’t even like and flower parfaits and rose jellies. It must mean something, the fact that you invite him to sit, smile every bit as warm as he remembered.

“How have you been?” you ask right after he places his order, a hot mojito even in the middle of the afternoon, because he can’t hold his liquor and definitely can’t do this while sober.

“Good, busy. You know how it is” he grins with a slight shrug of the shoulders.

“I know how it is” your lips curl in a soft smile as you drag a forkful of french toast through syrup.

“You look great, by the way. Shorter hair suits you”

The way you shift nervously in your seat as you let out a uh, thanks signals your discomfort so he leans back ever so slightly, gives you space, hopes to be smart enough to reassess a lead he doesn’t actually have. With each sputter, his heart seems to be articulating all the words he’s been aching to say out loud for the past two years. I miss you. Come back. I’ll do better. Please. Please. Please.

And you know him well enough to sense that, whatever it is, it’s coming. So you brace yourself the best you can, with a deep breath and tense muscles, ankles crossed underneath the table pressing painfully to each other, toes curled in your sneakers.

“Let’s get dinner tonight” his slender fingers are closed tightly around the glass, in sharp contrast with the casualness of his pitch. The deep sigh you let out is a flag red enough but, frankly, he refuses to go down without a fight. What should he fear at this point? Humiliation? He’s been without you long enough to figure there’s nothing worse. He’ll handle humiliation.

“Satoru” the name rolls off your tongue as a warning but you can’t ignore the way your heart squeezes a little at the sound of it. You haven’t said that name out loud in forever and it still tastes every bit as sweet and dangerous as it did back then.

“What?” he challenges, impatient “it’s just dinner”

“I have to be home for dinner”

“Why?”

He’s not a dumb man, he knows what you’re about to say. Regardless, he needs to hear it before the glass shatters in his very hand.

“Don’t do this” you let out a shaky breath as you put your fork down, suddenly unable to stomach a single other bite.

“There’s someone” Satoru does his best not to make it sound like an accusation because it really isn’t. It couldn’t be, he wouldn’t dare.

Your gaze meets his and it’s hard to remind yourself that you’re a different person now that you’ve been away from his magnetic field long enough. Leaving came with the terrifying, inevitable need to learn how to be, who to be, on your own. You had been with him for so long it had been excruciating to find out, during those first months, you couldn’t remember how to be whole without the stupid amount of his cologne stinking up the small bathroom of your studio apartment, his chin resting on your shoulder, his fingers gently massaging shampoo in your scalp, his good mornings. His his his. Everything was a reminder of how much you had given and the unbearable, sweet time each piece was taking to travel back to you and try to fit in its original spot.

But they did, in the end. Most of them, anyway. Little by little, each part crawled back and you had to patiently pick them up and find a place to gently push them in. They didn’t fit with each other as well as they did in the beginning, he had made a miserable, imperfect puzzle out of you: one with pieces fitting with the wrong ones well enough not to make the subtle cracks noticeable to everyone else. You’d been left with a version of yourself you had to get to know from the start and the process had been so painful, so exhausting, you’d sworn you’d never risk any of that ever again.

Still, it doesn’t mean you don’t miss it. What you had was a kind of love that, to this day, you deem unrepeatable. Being with Satoru felt like knowing exactly where you were meant to be in the world: it was powerful and overwhelming, all consuming, a feeling strong enough to match the strongest there was. The beauty of it was that it was a balanced exchange coming from both sides, constantly created between you two in equal measure.

You’ve made peace with the thought that it won’t be possible to feel that way with someone that isn’t him, no even now that you’re in love and fairly happy, not even now that you’re free. Satoru is still there, all over you. But as much as you’re certain he’d still move heaven and hell and every other world or dimension available to make you happy, to keep you safe, it’s too late. It will always be too late.

“Yes” your reply is as dry as your throat.

Satoru remains silent, eyes focused on the glass of ice water in front of you, condensation dripping down onto the tabletop and forming a small puddle underneath it. The place is so fancy and yet cold drinks don’t come with coasters, it’s ridiculous.

“Does it compare?” the question comes out light, void of anger or bitterness. He wonders if you’ll still be fooled, even after so much time apart. Because no matter the way his whole being ached and burned and radiated with the disarming love he had for you, there was always a small, almost imperceptible part of Gojo Satoru he had always kept to himself. The same one that ruined everything, in the end.

“It doesn’t” you speak truthfully “but I’m happy”

He hums, pensive.

“I sure wonder what that feels like”

You shut your eyes for a second. It didn’t end with smoke and gunpowder, explosive fights, cheating or lying: you were too in love with each other to let any of that get in the way. It ended simply because he never thought it could end.

“It feels right” you push the knife a little deeper, not enough to tear him apart entirely but surely enough to make him feel it. And oh, does he feel it.

“Right”, Satoru repeats the word mockingly “I guess that means he’s the one. Better marry him fast”

The derision in his tone is just too much for you to bear. He’s still so good at pushing all your buttons until you snap, until you’re angry enough to forget the childish desire to safeguard his feelings. Why would he deserve such grace after everything he’d put you through?

“Don’t worry your pretty little head about it, Satoru. He’s already asked and I already said yes”

For a moment, he thinks there must be a curse concealed somewhere around the crowded teashop, somewhere between leaves and branches and colorful flowers. Because why else would everything be still alive, breathing, moving? How are people chatting mindlessly around him, how is the sudden, light rain still falling outside? Why isn’t everything motionless or at least slowly crumbling in on itself?

The strongest always needs a fragment to hold onto, something only his that can be worn like armor. Memories nag mercilessly at the back of his mind: the day he’d met you, a few seconds of playful banter enough to make him grin and drop a nonchalant well, this is going way too smoothly to not let it be a date. How he’d always make sure to get up at dawn whenever you spent the night wrapped in silk sheets, rushing to make breakfast and brew coffee because he simply couldn’t risk you collecting your clothes and vanishing from his apartment while he was asleep. The way you’d convinced him to try out a skincare routine, giggling as you carefully massaged clay masks and serums and your favorite moisturizer into his skin. All the times you’d waited for him to come home, movies watched on his couch, late night hushed conversations about the future, how you’d rolled your eyes with a coy smile at his m’gonna marry you.

He meant every word, could’ve sworn he would’ve stopped breathing if left without your lips on his for too long. He meant it, Satoru just thought he had all the time in the world. Because you were his and he was yours, what on earth could’ve changed that?

So he’d stopped notifying you when missions would take too long, leaving you waiting for his return for days, sometimes weeks, not a call nor a reply to your texts. He became increasingly annoyed at the idea of having to hang out with your friends, because he was tired and just didn’t feel like leaving the house and maybe you should’ve stayed too: you hadn’t spent some time alone in a while after all. He’d started throwing around words and phrases you both hated: overreacting, attention-seeking, blowing this out of proportion, don’t ya think you’re being too sensitive?

He forgot birthdays, anniversaries, claimed he couldn’t refuse to go on that mission right on Christmas day, your gift left to collect dust, unopened on his bed. And when you started drifting away, he didn’t notice. Not until your suitcase was packed and your warmth was taken away from his suddenly too large, dull, dark apartment.

So right now he needs it, that fragment. Hadn’t you called him heartless, once? It’s best you keep believing that. You may even be right: there’s not enough left of his heart anyway. He sure hopes you’ll be treated right this time, he wants to wish for your happiness and he does. But the desire for whatever joy expects you to never surpass the one you felt when you were with him is stronger. He will always hold onto that selfishness because it will be all he’s left with while you’re out in the world without him, forever.

“You never even replied when I asked” his smile is bitter, incredulous.

“You never meant it”

Fragment or not, that’s a lie he wouldn’t dare speak out loud. He could never agree with what you just said because, in his life, Satoru never meant anything as much as he did when he rambled endlessly about making you his wife, perfect wedding venue, guest list and witnesses already on his mind. Ring sitting in his secret drawer, still there, to this day.

He gets up and your gaze softens as you watch him put his sunglasses on again, some cash tucked under his empty glass. Of course you still care for him, you always will. And it’s not like it doesn’t hurt, the way this encounter went.

“I hope you find it, too” you mutter with a strange taste in your mouth, one not even all the tea in the world could wash away.

“I will” he flashes you a smile “try to stick around with this one, hm?” doesn’t even give you the time to let the petty words sink in as he gives the two-finger salute and turns around to exit the shop. Eye for an eye.

Whilst wandering through a wet and still overwhelmingly bustling Shibuya, Gojo Satoru chuckles to himself until a broken, boisterous laugh crawls all the way up from his throat. Pedestrians turn their heads in his direction but that only makes him laugh harder. Because how could they get the irony? He’s only had two people in his life that he’s called best friends at some point, only two people he’s loved with every fiber of his being, and he has lost both.

That’s probably the one curse he’ll never be able to exorcise.

[retrowhatever]

The tumblr queue function is probably my favourite feature on any social media site: a love letter.

So I've got ADHD. And for me, one of the things that means is I go through periods when I am Very Online followed by periods where I am Very Not.

A problem I've had with social media in the past is that I feel like I'm not "keeping up". And I don't mean keeping up with new content being posted (because that too, but it's a separate problem) but rather that I am not posting content regularly enough to be worth following/interacting with. Especially when I return from my hermit phase, I'm so overwhelmed by having not posted anything in forever that it's really hard to start again.

I want to be clear here: I'm not trying to be an influencer or build a brand or anything like that, but both due to the nature of how many social media algorithms work and because I need constant positive affirmation like the little dopamine hit of having people like or upvote or retweet or reblog my silly little thoughts, it matters to me that I'm a consistent contributor to The Conversation(tm).

On the flip side, I don't want annoyingly spam people's feeds when I get newly obsessed with something and/or am using the internet to hide from real world responsibilities. So I'll just... not post things that I want to, because I'm worried about being Too Much. (Is this a silly thing to worry about on the internet? Yes, but I've also got anxiety and nearly had a full on panic attack this week when trying to decide which soap I should use while staying over at a friend's place, so worrying about silly things is kind of my MO.)

Enter: The Queue. I just shove everything I want to post in there (including this post!) and let tumblr automatically spit it out at a rate that is more reasonable, whether I'm going through a high-activity or low-activity time. It's magical. It's consistent. It's made engaging with content on tumblr so much less stressful for me than on any other social media site.

I try to keep my queue at around a week long, and adjust the number of posts per day to maintain that. So if I'm making lots of posts or reblogging lots of things, I might have it set to 7 posts per day. But if I go through a period like last week when I caught covid and didn't have the energy to do anything, even scroll tumblr, that might dwindle down to one post per day.

Regardless, when I come back, I have reblogs and replies and likes waiting for me! It makes me excited to start posting again! And it doesn't feel so overwhelming because even in my absence, my blog has been chugging away.

Another thing I like about it is that I'm usually reblogging things a few days later than all my mutuals. That means if someone missed a meme or cool piece of art the first time around, they might catch it on my reblog, which gives the post/creator more reach and longevity. It makes me feel like I'm contributing to the community.

Sometimes I do reblog or post stuff right away, usually links to a new fic I wrote and new art from friends that I really like. But like 95%+ of things on my tumblr have come through my queue, and I almost certainly wouldn't be as active on the site without it.

In conclusion: I am not British but damn do I love a good queue.

[orionshounds]

I’ve been knee deep in dsmp lore streams and I just want to ramble about it

Dream smp lore is so good, it’s so good!!! Not only is the story itself just fascinating, but how it’s presented so uniquely through the medium of minecraft of all things is just so cool. One of my favorite parts of the lore is seeing how everyone on the smp has their own “style” they present it in, and watching them find the way they find the most enjoyment in is so cool. Literally no two streamer’s lore stream quite like each others and it’s just incredible! It just speaks to the flexibility of roleplay as an artistic medium and really shows everyone’s individual personalities. 

Wilbur was dramatic as hell and wrote eloquent speeches. He started a drug operation under the guise as a country, and it lead to a revolution in which he was able to explore the spiral of a man who loses control of everything he had built. And after his arc and he wanted a break from the server? He created ghostbur, an amnesic comic relief with just enough touch of tragedy that he is still able to make heartbreaking monologues when he wants to.

Tommy is able to run around with his friends and cause as much chaos to his heart’s extent, but there is so much more than meets the eye. He is incredibly social and isn’t afraid to start conflict with a lot of people, bringing them into the roleplay. He doesn’t back down from storytelling either. His character goes through terrible situations and he fully explores the trauma that comes from those experiences. His character goes against the “stereotypical” trauma I see alot in media; instead of being shy or scared he’s reactionary, he’s angry, he’s violent, he’s depressed. I’m actually really impressed with the heavy subject matter this 17 year old teen has managed to portray (I’ve connected with it quite personally at certain points), while still being able to keep the light hearted fun that’s so intrinsic to his personality. 

Tubbo isn’t really interested in serious lore as much. Even in dire moments he tells jokes and just has fun. So, in his recent lore, he just streams as normal while putting mysterious writing on screen that he doesn’t acknowledge or have to explain, which I think is just a genius work around for him to participate in lore. He still has his dedicated lore streams sometimes, and when he is in the acting zone he has some of the most powerful moments out of everyone on the server.

Ranboo, while having stake in the greater smp lore, is much more character focused. He presents his lore through long monologues and fucking heart-wrenching voice acting. He loves working in themes of horror and causing a specific feeling in the viewer. So he chooses specific music as a themes for events/characters and creates visual queues in his overlays to draw out that desired reaction. He also values improve a LOT, if something unexpected comes up he just runs with it and he has made huge changes to his lore as early as 30 min before a stream.

Technoblade, while arguably one of the most powerful people on the server, prefers a more light-hearted yet dramatic approach to lore. When Dream was at his house looking for Tommy, Techno had no problem joking around and making fun of him for being homeless. He tore down an entire nation on the server and had so much fun doing it! He’s more of an antagonist than a true villain in my opinion. And lets not forget how dedicated he is to the game, he’s cracked at the craft. He spends hours grinding and creating farms on the smp, for amazing pay offs (his several vault reveals, the withers, etc), most of which weren’t even on stream!

Karl Jacobs is extremely social, so he created Tales from the smp as a way to involve TONS of people in lore while exploring the past and future of the server (it was also a way for viewers who weren’t that well versed in dsmp lore to join and not have to worry about it!). And through this premise, he took the opportunity to develop his own character on the smp; making an incredibly tragic story of a time traveler trying to save his home while slowly loosing his memories. Not to mention the beautifully shot cutscenes of the Inbetween and the Other Side. He includes so many people behind the scenes as well, collabing with other members on lore, hiring building teams and people to make intros and credit scenes, and promoting fanart and fansongs from the community!

Quackity explores his lore through heavily scripted events and amazingly shot cut scenes. While the way he expresses his lore comes at the cost of improv, the payoff of the visuals and story is well worth it! The shots he makes of the smp is downright gorgeous, no to mention he’s the first person to include irl footage in his lore (not counting facecams)! He’s not afraid of thoroughly examining his own character, being one of the only people I can think of that shows us “past events” leading up to something that has already happened.

Badboyhalo, Antfrost, Ponk, Skeppy, Captain Puffy, Punz, Awesamdude, Hannahxxrose all work together on shared lore and the payoff is amazing! By introducing the Egg, a constant antagonistic force that constantly pulls on character’s relationships with each other, everyone is able to stream together to battle for or against the egg! There’s also plenty of room for people to do individual lore that's more intimate to their respective character. They spend hours changing vines, putting up posters, slowly shaping the smp in a way that makes it exciting to watch streams to see just what has changed everyday. Because there’s so many people necessary to tell the egg’s story, it does comes at the cost of time (the egg has been around FOREVER). However, they all work together super hard and I just admire their commitment to the story they’re trying to tell!

And Sam! He has several different “Modes” his character is in (and an entirely separate character, Sam Nook) that he gets to explore lore with. He’s a terrifying warden, he’s a money motivated businessman, he’s a conflicted lover, he’s a traumatized victim of the egg, and just so much more. Through having so many different “roles” in the rp he gets to explore relationships and plotlines with a whole array of people. Not to mention he’s absolutely cracked at redstone and has some of the most impressive builds on the server.

And Puffy! So much of her lore is calling into question the morality of the server and really makes you step back and think critically about the characters. Her character also has, in my opinion, one of the most interesting relationships with Dream, the main antagonist of the entire server, which is just fascinating to watch unfold. Not to mention she’s one of the first people to start exploring the backstory of her character!

George doesn’t exactly do lore. In fact he’s slept through so much of it it’s become a meme. And you know what? That mad man took that and ran with it. He explains his absence in the story by having his character literally being asleep through it, creating mystery where there used to just be an absence. He’s able to goof off with his friends and have borderline nonsensical streams, then at the end sucker punch the audience emotionally by “waking up” and have the viewers question just what was real and what wasn’t?

The smp has the freedom for people who want more independent lore to be able to explore their character’s that way as well!

Hbomb, Connereatspants, and Purpled don’t have a lot of lore on the smp, generally only coming on to have fun with everyone, but when they do have their moments it unfolds in very interesting ways!

Sapnap, Eret, and Schlatt maybe aren’t as active as some other people, but when they are on they actively participate in lore and have lasting impacts on the story (Ex: Eret’s betrayal, Sapnap’s visit to dream in the prison, Schlatt becoming president).

Philza mostly does his own thing, improving the server or making some bomb ass builds. He has incredibly devastating roles in lore (killing wilbur, blowing up L’manberg for the final time, starting the syndicate with Techno), but he also has quieter moments that speak to the depth his character has, such as fishing with fundy or reminiscing about his dead son and how it went so wrong. Like Techno, he doesn’t like to take lore completely seriously, often laughing no matter what’s happening or teasing chat after something big goes down, but his character is solid with a lot of potential for future lore.

Foolish has only started on his character and its already super interesting. The hints at his dark past as a “god of death” and his current conflict with the egg are intriguing as fuck. Not to mention the MASSIVE builds he does for everyone, helping to progress their lore as well.

Fundy has a lot of freedom with his character to participate however much he wants in lore. While generally he’s a trickster who loves to prank people he has enough tragedy build into his backstory he’s able to break the viewer’s heart with a flip of a switch. Not to mention his recent, almost surreal, stream that explored his character’s disturbing dreams that may or may not predict the future.

Niki is very character driven, exploring her character's grief of losing her best friend and her anger of being ignored in the very country she helped create. She has incredibly emotional moments, and even though she’s on her own building an underground city she still participates in other lore via teaming with jack manifold or the syndicate.

Jack Manifold’s lore is VERY character focused, and while he’s described his story as a “B plot that occasionally intersects with the main plot”, the story he tells is still fascinating. Being pushed aside not taken seriously his whole life, his character develops into a fun cartoony-esque villain who begs to be taken seriously, that has the depth of a truly conflicted person who is torn between wanting revenge on everyone who’s done him wrong and just wanting a friend.

Last but not least, the man himself, Dream. The most fascinating thing about his lore is that absolutely none of it is from his pov. All we know about his character is only from what we see from everyone else’s povs, and in his case it leads to a very intimidating villain! Not to mention, mans owns the damn server and yet has made himself the main antagonist! He is the only character I consider a “true villain” on the smp. His voice acting and writing is downright sinister. I could write a fucking essay on how his character’s obsession with power has led him to the point he thinks himself an unstoppable god

Everyone on this server is stunning and I love all of them!!!!!

[thesassenachswiftie]

Lover - Chapter 12:”Death by a Thousand Cuts”

Read on AO3

Chapter 1 // Chapter 2 // Chapter 3 // Chapter 4 // Chapter 5 // Chapter 6 // Chapter 7 // Chapter 8 // Chapter 9 // Chapter 10 // Chapter 11

Summary: It's time for Jamie to leave to go to London.

"Saying goodbye is death by a thousand cuts Flashbacks waking me up I get drunk, but it's not enough 'Cause the morning comes and you're not my baby..."

Notes:Thanks for reading! We've had a grand few chapters of fluff and smut, but we're not off the angst train yet I'm sorry to say. We all knew this was coming, Jamie has to go back to his wee Christmas tree farm outside of London, leaving Claire on Long Island. At least they're still together! Just a short little chapter for them to say goodbye this week.

Chapter 12: “Death by a Thousand Cuts”

           Jamie and Claire spent the rest of the week cherishing every moment they had left together. Claire came straight back to the Murray farm every day after work and helped Jamie with whatever work he was doing on the farm, getting to know the Murray family in the process, and the couple spent late nights of love-making and promise-making in Jamie’s bed. Every moment they had left together was sacred. Their time, their wine, their spirits, their trust, there wasn’t a part of each other that they didn’t take up. By Friday night they were both sleep deprived and wept in each other’s arms, knowing it was their last night together. Usually, Jamie could quiet Claire’s fears with the touch of his hand, but that night their fears were shared. They fell asleep exhausted, puffy-eyed and wrapped in each other’s embrace, boarding up the windows of their love for the season, protecting it and keeping it safe.

Their final physical joining came the next morning; it was weepy, slow and indulgent. Claire gave Jamie everything she could: her heart, her hips, her body, her love--there wasn’t a part of her that he didn’t touch, and he gave as much to her. They kept as many points of contact between them as they could--hands were always on the other, their bodies facing each other always, making eye contact as they moved in rhythm with each other, savoring every sensation big and small. They lay in each other’s embrace afterwards, unable to let go. Easily convincing themselves that if they stayed in bed the day would never begin and Jamie wouldn’t have to leave. Eventually there was a knock at the door of the apartment. “Yes?!” Jamie grunted, well aware that it was likely his sister.

In fact, Jenny’s voice responded from the other side of the door “You two best be getting out of bed so ya can say goodbye ta yer family brathair! Dinna make me get a bucket of water to splash on you two! I’ve got a hearty breakfast prepared for ya and it’ll get cold if yer not down ta tha house in 10 minutes!”

“Aye Janet, I’m about ready, no need for a water bucket we’ll be down shortly.” Jamie shouted back.

Claire whimpered as Jamie peeled himself out of the bed to dress for breakfast.

“I know, mo nighean donn” he whispered, brushing a curl from her face and kissing her forehead. “I know.” Usually Jamie would have the perfect words to say to transform Claire’s mood, but all he could do was share in her pain, because it was his pain too. I can’t pretend that it’s ok when it’s not. He thought, trying to come up with something to say. There was no easy way to do this. Saying good-bye was death by a thousand cuts.

----------

           Claire had agreed over a family dinner earlier that week to drive Jamie to the airport, much to Jenny and Ian’s relief. Jamie was flying out from a small airport an hour North of the city and neither of the Murray’s felt inclined to lose half a Saturday when there was always work to do on the farm, in addition to minding the children off from school for the weekend. The Murray’s found that Claire was a helpful addition to the family, even in the short week she spent on their homestead. This was shown particularly when wee Janet threw a toy at Michael’s head causing him to gush blood, which in turn sent Jenny into a near panic. Claire used her medical expertise to clean and bandaged the wound, able to keep her cool despite the gory scene before her. She assured Jenny Michael would not need stitches, that heads just bled a lot, having many blood vessels to supply oxygen to the brain. Claire continued to check and dress the wound for Michael throughout the week, and Michael, having gotten over the initial shock and pain of the event, was now looking forward to having a ‘cool forehead scar like Harry Potter’. The event was a blessing in disguise for Claire and Jamie, because Jamie became assured that Claire had won Jenny over and wasted no time asking her if Claire could stay. Jenny agreed enthusiastically, thrilled to have a nurse on call as her children were inclined to taking risks and getting into small accidents.

           Claire couldn’t believe how her life had completely transformed in the space of a week. She had started her life as an only child, continued her upbringing with her single uncle after her parents’ untimely death, drifted into Frank’s arms in college only to find herself completely alone in a large, suburban McMansion. She had never had more than one or two people she could call family and now here she was, surrounded by the vibrancy and love of a large, chaotic brood. They were quick to embrace her as one of their own and Claire couldn’t believe she had lived her whole life without the feeling of family. She was elated to be included and was glad she had loved ones to surround herself with when Jamie was gone. She knew it wouldn’t be an easy season, but having people who loved Jamie just as much as she did close by was reassuring.

----------

           Jamie drove to the airport since Claire would be driving the whole way home alone. For the most part the drive was silent, save for the radio playing in the background. What station it was tuned to, neither of them could say, their thoughts were elsewhere. Everything there was to be said had already been said, and anything that was spoken would only lead to another deluge of tears. All they could do was hold hands, desperately trying to keep one another close, unable to let go just yet. The airport was so small that the security line extended into the lobby, unlike the winding queues Claire was used to seeing at JFK or LaGuardia. Claire waited in line with him for as long as she could, wishing desperately she could go through with him and part with him at the gate. This made for an awkward parting, where they let several people cut ahead of them in line as they said their final farewell.

           “Sassenach, you know this is a great love we have, one for the ages. If there were still bards in this world they’d sing a tale of our love. We’re strong enough to get through this.” Jamie assured her. He was holding her close and kissed her forehead softly through his tears.

           Claire was sobbing so hard she could hardly reply. All she could manage to choke out was “Jamie, I love you. I’ll always love you.”

           They embraced firmly, soaking each other’s shoulders with tears. They gave each other one last sloppy, passionate kiss, that lasted as long as it could before the person behind them in line cleared their throat loudly to encourage them to get on with it. They held hands as Jamie moved away to the security official. Claire stood outside the barrier until Jamie finally disappeared into the airport on the other side of security, glancing back as much as he could, giving a final wave as he rushed off to his gate in a final flash of red hair.

           Losing sight of him, Claire fled from the airport and back to the car, collapsing over the steering wheel she cried until she could cry no more, she had no idea how long she sobbed, meanwhile, texting Jamie final good-byes before he had to shut his phone off while the plane taxied. In their text, they made solid promises and paper thin plans to see each other soon. Jamie desperately wanted to come home for American Thanksgiving, but knowing that was when business really started to pick up for him, he didn’t know if he could allow his godfather and his hired hand to take over so much responsibility. Maybe she could come visit him, but she would have to take a few extra days off work and it was so hard to find qualified nurses to substitute for her in her absence. Jamie did promise he would see her at Christmas no matter what. He always took a red-eye Christmas Eve to visit his family over the winter holidays, unable to miss Christmas and Hogmanay with the Murray’s. Seeing the unbridled joy on his niece’s and nephew’s faces on Christmas morning was one of the greatest pleasures of Jamie’s life, at least until he met Claire. Now, he was ecstatic at the idea of sharing the experience of her, and Claire was looking forward to it as well. Usually she drove up to Boston to visit her Uncle Lamb and they had a humble dinner and small gift exchange. The Murray’s assured her she could invite Lamb and Claire was looking forward to her first experience of a large family Christmas.

           Eventually, Claire’s tears dried up, leaving only their sadness and she was able to see well enough to drive home. She took the long way home, not wanting to risk the speed of the expressway in her emotional state, and not ready to face an existence without Jamie upon her arrival home. Not having anyone else to talk to, Claire asked the traffic lights if it would be alright, and they responded with a silent reply of “I don’t know”. The tears were starting to flow again as Claire returned to Long Island again, and she decided to stop at her house to pack some of her things before returning to Jamie’s empty apartment. She sighed as she entered the foyer, the chandelier still flickering above her as she flipped the switch, somewhat comforted by the familiar emptiness of the space. She was used to this house being empty and devoid of love, she could live with the feeling there, she wasn’t sure if she could live with the feeling of being where Jamie once lived and breathed and moved and cooked and bathed and made love to her, constantly feeling he should be there doing those things.

           She spent hours packing, organizing and reorganizing her things, dressing in old clothes to see if she still liked them, anything to kill the time so she could prolong the inevitable. If she was there, she could still pretend Jamie was at his apartment, she could pretend everything was ok when it wasn’t. She remembered those first nights staying at the house after Frank left. He had given up on her like she was a bad drug, walked out never to return again, hired someone to pack his things, gone without a goodbye. His absence, though haunting brought with it a sense of relief. There was emptiness, but at least his stifling presence wasn’t filling the space. Frank had been intolerable in their final weeks; he was mistrusting, manipulative, condescending and controlling, even before Claire had acted on her desire for Jamie. She had been on her best behavior, trying to be the perfect future-wife to him. She gave him so much, but it wasn’t enough to win him over, to bring him back to the man she had fallen in love with. If anything, Frank’s distrust was a catalyst for her unfaithfulness. She remembered thinking damned if I do, damned if I don’t so I might as well. At that time, an empty home was a comfort to her--now, she knew that wouldn't be the case.

           The sky grew dark and Claire had filled her car up with boxes. Even if she had more to pack, she couldn’t have fit anymore and it was time to face the inevitable task of going home to an empty bed. On the drive back through a small town she saw Jamie everywhere, thinking of all the drives they had shared on those very roads, hand in hand, anticipating whatever would come next.

Once she arrived, she unloaded some of the boxes into the garage, where Jenny had cleared a space for her to store her belongings that wouldn’t fit in Jamie’s small apartment. There weren’t many boxes, just some trinkets and souvenirs from her travels with Uncle Lamb, and old photo albums and memorabilia from her parents that she kept tucked away. She left all the dishes and decorations at the house, Frank could decide what to do with them when he sold the place, she no longer had any interest in the relics of a cookie-cutter life she put together with Frank. The boxes filled with her clothes and shoes could wait until morning, she left those in the car and ascended the steps to Jamie’s apartment.

The ghost of his presence haunted the room, it was as if he had vanished into thin air. There were so many signs of him: his summer clothes were still in the closet, his unwashed glass on the kitchen counter, his sandals placed beside the door. The bedsheets still smelled like him. Everything smelled like him. This apartment, which in the past week had gone from his to ours, felt like it was no one’s now. Claire poured herself a healthy portion of whiskey and headed to the bed, taking the bottle with her. Her tear ducts had replenished themselves and she was crying again. She was torn between wanting to bury her face in Jamie’s pillow, and worried that the saltiness of her tears would dilute Jamie’s scent, the most tangible thing she had left of him. She spent the rest of the night crying herself to sleep and getting drunk, but it wasn’t enough; the morning came and he was still gone. Her dreams were restless, memories of him, flashbacks of their life together kept wandering in and out of her subconscious, occasionally waking her up to the devastating reminder that he wasn’t really there.

End Notes: I'm not making any promises about next week's chapter being on time. Posting on Friday was a self-imposed deadline, but 1. grades are due next week (I'm a teacher) and 2. the next chapter is really personal and emotionally difficult for me to write (but also a healthy cathartic thing). I may still post on schedue because my superintendent did reward us with an extra day off next week and there's a good chance that Thanksgiving dinner will be just my husband and I which will allow for more time for writing, but I just wanted to give you all a heads up in case it isn't ready. Happy Thanskgiving to all my US readers, stay safe!

[diyunho]

The Joker x Reader - “Ashes”

After The Joker’s daughter accidentally drowned, his relationship with Y/N fell apart: they were guilty of failing to protect what they loved, blaming each other and themselves to the point of no return. The sole palpable proof of Emma existence is her ashes encapsulated in glass pendants her parents wear and that’s hardly a memento able to help in such a difficult situation. Ashes are not meant to bring people together.

“Happy Birthday, Pumpkin Pie,” The Joker grumbles. “Here’s Charlie: I thought you would like to see him,” he places the purple hippo on Emma’s headstone.

Today his daughter would have been 4 years old. Instead of the usual party filled with laughter and presents he’s at “Eternal Peace” cemetery early in the morning for a different kind of festivity.

J never celebrated birthdays before yet once she showed up in his life the anniversary got a fresh new meaning: Y/N ensured that The King of Gotham was aware of how lucky they both were to have her. And he did learn to care about that tiny being he created who first called him something similar to “dada”, then a cute “da’y” and finally the word he craved to hear every single day until she was gone: “daddy.”

Being a father thought him a couple of things, but the most important was quite stunning: the index finger from his right hand wasn’t only meant for using a trigger; it was also his child’s soother.

Emma would keep it prisoner when she slept from an early age; of course all babies do it although in this case it didn’t go away once she got older.

And he misses that…

A lot.

Actually, he would give up on a robbery or anything that involves him holding a gun if she could clutch to his finger one more time.

That’s how much he misses The Princess.

“Sir, sorry to interrupt,” Frost gets him out of trance. “There’s movement at the South gate. We have to go…”

J snatches the plush animal and follows Jonny on a path behind the crypts when a woman walking on the alley leading to Emma’s grave catches his attention: although she has a red wig and sunglasses on, her disguise doesn’t fool him. It’s Y/N.

She’s carrying a small cake and intensely stares at the pavement, unaware of her surroundings.

The Joker can’t really tell what she’s doing once in front of the tomb, nevertheless he guesses she’s singing “Happy Birthday” while wiping the tears strolling down her cheeks.

He didn’t see Y/N in about 4 months. They went to the cabin by Moon Lake after Emma’s drowning and things were so rough he left immediately. She never followed, called or texted.

J didn’t either.

Why bother? They were guilty of failing to protect what they loved, blaming each other and themselves to the point of no return.

Today is extremely difficult to deal with, especially since the catalyst binding them vanished forever.

The sole palpable proof of Emma existence is her ashes encapsulated in glass pendants her parents wear and that’s hardly a memento able to help in such a difficult situation.

Ashes are not meant to bring people together.

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

After 2 Hours

“Hi,” The King of Gotham drags his feet on the porch and takes a sit on the chair next to yours.

“Hi…” you whisper, surprised to spot him after such a long absence.

Complete silence, then he utters:

“I’m here for the cake,” he points at the sweet treat resting on the wood table: vanilla- strawberry combo, your daughter’s favorite.

“Are you?”

“Yeah, I crave the taste…”

You lean over and cut two slices, sharing Emma’s birthday cake with her dad. It’s really painful to swallow the morsels knowing your baby can’t; it seems J is in the same boat.

“I can’t make anybody happy…” The Clown mumbles under his breath and the randomness of his statement makes you wonder what’s going on in his mind.

“Me neither… Sweet Pea was happy, wasn’t she? She was a happy kid…”

The Joker moves his plate towards you, hissing:

“She was and she would still be with us if instead of flirting you would have watched her!”  

“… … W- what?!...” you glare at him, astonished he has the nerve to pop up and hurt you in such a manner. “Since when talking to somebody is flirting?! Where were you, huh? Where were you??? In your goddamn office plotting more schemes in order to get more money because nothing is enough!” you raise your voice and burst out crying in the next second. “She was ours to protect, the only treasure that mattered! I just… I just took my eyes off her for a few moments, I had no idea my baby was drowning in that pool …” you keep sobbing at the horrible memory, heartbroken. “I could have save her…Why didn’t I…?…”

The Joker can’t understand what you’re saying anymore, yet he doesn’t reply to your accusations or remorseful confessions.

How could he?

He’s equally responsible for Emma’s demise but it’s easier to attack her mother.

You abruptly get up and rush inside the cottage, abandoning J to his own demons. He doesn’t know if he should bail or stay, thus he continues to gaze at the lake numb to everything.

Still… The quietness is becoming unbearable so he finally gathers the strength to stand up and search for you.

“Y/N?...” he shouts. “Where are you?”

Silly question since the cabin is a little area with a kitchen/living room combo, one bedroom and bathroom: easy to find what you’re looking for.

No response but the shower is on which queues him Y/N must be there.

The Joker approaches the bathtub, unwilling to remove the curtain and talk to you face to face.

“It was my fault too…” he admits a fact that tormented him since the accident. “I should have kept an eye on her… I couldn’t predict she’ll sneak out to play by the swimming pool… I would give away a fortune if I could fix it… Do you believe me?...”

You sniffle and cover your mouth, trying to avoid his trap: if you engage, he will probably bite more and that’s the last thing you need.

“I have Charlie in the car; I thought you might want him tonight,” J reveals the true purpose of his visit. “Drop him off tomorrow at 3pm, I’ll be at the warehouse on 17Th Street. You can’t have the toy, it belongs in her room…”

You hear his steps receding and gasp for air, completely crushed by despair: the agony of grief is stronger than any consolation a stupid purple hippo could offer.

But it was Emma’s favorite and The Joker is willing to share a token of what you both lost; now that you think about it… you really missed Charlie…

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

Next Day, 2:05pm

“Where’s everybody?” you mutter whilst entering the code at the gates. Usually there are at least 8 henchmen guarding the fence and no sign of them so far. You drive up the unpaved alley, curiously checking out the landscape: same trees, bushes and trucks you’re familiar with, except you can’t discern a single goon patrolling the perimeter.

You honk to get the crew’s assistance without any success and you wonder if The Joker tricked you; I mean, you should have seen it coming: he is probably attempting one of his convoluted strategies to punish you for the tragic past.

You stop in front of the building, intrigued to notice it appears deserted.

Suddenly, a powerful blast shakes the ground and you watch part of the roof collapsing on the north side; a few windows shatter also.

You jump out of the car, totally confused at the strange occurrence.

“Hello?” you yell. “J???”

There’s smoke coming out of the opened metal door and you hesitantly walk in the warehouse, coughing at the suffocating odor.

“J?...” you scream. “J!!!!!”

A faint knock in the distance prompts your attention.

“Y/N!!”

“J??” you run towards the source of the noise only to find him under rubble next to the south entrance. “Oh my God!” you kneel by his feet buried under bricks. “What happened?!” The Queen frantically removes debris as he groans in pain.

“Explosives, that’s what happened. Shit, I think I fucked up my legs!”

“Where are the guys??!!” you inquire, managing to free his feet enough for him to move.

“I gave them the day off,” The Joker’s explanation puzzles Y/N. “Hurry up, please!! Another detonation will follow shortly!”

“Jesus Christ!” you quicken the pace and push the last bricks out of the way. “Can you stand?”

J rolls on his side, unable to comply.

“No, you’ll have to haul me out of here!”

“Come on!” you place your hands under his underarms and start pulling. “The exit is right there!”

You huff while straining to get to safety as The Clown aims to aid by lifting his body off the ground as much as he can.

“Behind the truck!” he urges once you’re out of the premises and you barely have time to hide behind the vehicle when a second bang levels half of the construction.

“This didn’t go according to plan,” J admits in a low tone, panting a storm after the ordeal.

You asses his wounds, pressing on the ankle and he immediately growls.

“The bone’s fractured,” you wipe your sweaty forehead.  “What plan?”

“It’s actually your fault for all of this; I told you to swing by at 3 o’clock. You’re early!”

“Huh?”

“You were supposed to come when I told you then boom! Before you reached the building it would go up in flames: you would flip thinking that I’m dead and then I’ll show up and ask you to come back home. You would be so excited to see I’m alive you couldn’t refuse. Yet you ruined everything: you appeared out of nowhere, I panicked and messed up: you know I’m not good with this stuff!!”

You can’t even process the plot he’s throwing your way.

“What kind of plan…”

“I just told you I’m not good at this stuff,” he interrupts. “You know I’m not.”

You touch your chest, baffled at the ridiculous story.

“My pendant!” you exclaim when you realize the chain is not around your neck anymore. “It’s gone!” Y/N desperately searches the grass. “My baby, where’s my baby?” you part the green lawn on the verge of crying. “I can’t find my pendant! Maybe I dropped it the building,” you whimper and prepare to flee when J grabs your jeans, firmly holding on.

“Don’t go; the poles might cave in and whatever is left standing will squash you!!”

You don’t comprehend why he’s so worked up and his plea catches you off guard:

“Don’t go! I’ll give you half my ashes, ok?”

The Queen debates on The King’s proposal, conflicted by his candid offer.

After all, if ashes tear people apart, how come they can’t bring them back together?

Also read: MASTERLIST

https://diyunho.tumblr.com/post/153664676321/joker-x-reader-masterlist

You can also follow me on Ao3 and wattpad under the same blog name: DiYunho.

[blonde-toddy]

Random and Not So Random thoughts while watching Bridgerton: Season 1, Episode 6

It has taken me a while to do this. But I write this shit down so....

I wonder if they got busy in that carriage.

Probably.

Ok Clyvedon! Y'all are definitely not in the square anymore.

Aww Mrs. Colson. You're so proper and ready to show off and he's just trying to break that back in.

Gahh that place.

Ok Simon, go off!

Aw we're really just diverting there.

You really don't want to know Hyacinth.

Eloise is not here for the shits.

Oh, Colin. You fucking idiot. The one time Violet and Anthony are in agreement.

Colin you happy, dumb boy.

Brothels though?

Colin has a point. He is older than Daphne.

To be fair Colin and Daphne are both getting okie doked.

You horny mfs. I love it.

"You are already Duchess of all this." Yes please.

Ooooh that flip and the way he patted at her hips. They are too good.

Aw Daphne is trying to be proper and Simon is like "fuck all that."

Your Graces.

Jeffries dgaf about this damn honeymoon.

Oh Daphne, she just wants to show you around without YOUR commentary.

Redecorating? Didn't she say she did a bunch of improvements?

"A perfect Duchess." Ok you shady bitch.

Yeah that nursery shit is coming back.

All dressed up and no where to go.

"You're so far away." He wants his WIFE!

They have no chill and the staff don't know how to react.

Mrs. Colson absolutely does not approve.

Girl he hates that place. Gut it!

This man and the way he takes off gloves. Good fucking gawd.

Their poor staff.

I swear I swear I swear that man man is living, breathing, dripping seduction.

Well shit take it outside then.

Queue the rain.

Yes. Remove the wet clothes. ALLUM!!!!!

He is the king of playin with it. And I fucking love it.

"Do you like this?" Fuck yes! Talk. To. Me.

I wonder how many orgasms this man has caused.

"Tell me what you want." Keep talking, yes.

And by "you" she meant that dick.

"Does that hurt?" No boo, it sure doesn't.

But your ignorance on the subject does. Him taking advantage of your ignorance also does.

I love love love Simon but I'm having a harder time with his evasion now that they're actively getting busy.

She's bound to figure it out though, right?

Ahh they're still hot af to me.

Oh shit they're still going.

That picnic. Omfg. Flippin that ass like.....

Head on a ladder?!?!?! Get you some Daphne. Oh sweet Simon....

Sex on a ladder too.

They're really like "fuck the staff." And the staff is like "haha, keep fuckin."

Don't go there Mrs. Colson....

Welp.

That shoe dropping. Gawd yes.

Daphne really went from knowing ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to getting that Grade A like a beast.

Though Simon is obviously a withholder, the man is sexually attentive and attuned to her physical desires. He comes to please, indeed.

That tangle.

Ok, girl tell Rose your business.

I do love Rose. I want more of her.

"His physical inability to have children." Oh the sting of lies and ignorance.

"Difficult entanglement." Go head Rose.

Oh Colin, you fucked up lil buddy.

Hyacinth is a treasure.

I like that Violet does try to be supportive.

Penelope and her passive aggressive ass is saucy.

She's mad af.

The sisters do crack me up.

Penelope is dripping salt.

Oh Eloise. They really are putting you out there homie.

Awkward Marina.

Portia is mf hyped! She is all about that social climbing.

But she's gotta negotiate the bag before she pop tags on new Dresses.

Aw shit Marina caught Delacroix. Her French accent was a bit cartoonish.

Curious Eloise.

Oh children.

Oh poor oblivious Daphne. Simon, help your wife.

A fucking tie. Bitch they gotta kill them to eat them. Simon, again, help your wife. Tell your wife THINGS!

Y'all fucking dumb off all that sex and living in la la land apparently.

Well somebody liked his evil ass daddy.

Diplomatic Daphne.

Another sprinkle of kids....and pregnancy too.

I saw that longing look.

Aww she's worried he's hurt by being around children. If only you knew.

"I thought only of you." Really, mf?! As you keep up this lie.

She's so optimistic about her circumstances.

He's lucky he's beautiful. And that I pity him a bit. Because he's a motherfucker.

How did you get so lucky? Well you're lying to your wife and she doesn't know how sperm works sooooooo there's that.

What a beautiful expansive scene though.

Penelope is PISSED.

No belly yet.

Passive. Aggressive.

Oh this dinner is so awkward.

Portia you are not subtle at all.

Anthony is still CLEARLY not here for this engagement.

Oh is she about to snitch.

Well shit. She's kind of snitching.

Aww. He thinks your such a good friend, but hes got this.

You're sneaky and he's stupid.

Marina is hustling.

Eloping is always a grand idea. Colin you fucking dummy.

Marina is so relieved.

Aw where's Simon?

Sad Daphne is not a good look.

Grouchy workaholic Simon is not a good look either....but he does have a lot of responsibility in all fairness.

Mrs. Colson is so sick of Daphne.

Homegirl is just trying to find her footing. At least Rose stays supportive.

Have I said how much I love Rose?

Damn no one wants to talk to Daphne.

Aw she's befriended the pregnant lady with the screaming toddler.

I'm glad someone is finally explaining shit to Daphne. She can't grow if she don't know.

Too busy for his wife now......I'm not liking this vibe.

Aw she's trying to hash it out with Mrs. Colson.

Oooh she's looking for guidance about Simon.

He really hasn't told her shit about his life.

The power dynamic of their relationship is frustrating.

All this talk of being barren.....

She misses Simon's mama.

Strong seed got her thinking!

Penelope you sneaky, lying ass....what are you up to?

She has hope yet again. She about to expose her mother.

She ain't giving up.

Marina is damned and determined to marry Colin.

Oh Marina went there THERE.

You're gonna see your wife, Your Fucking Grace.

Stressy Simon is such a grouch.....but I'm not judging. I'm the same way.

But when they're affectionate, fuck.

He really just tossed her up on that desk like "Fuck work."

And he proceeded to fuckin work that mf thang.

How many people in the world are fucking like crazy right now because their significant others stay turned on by this show.

If I were not single, I would most definitely be pouncing on my partner ALL. THE. TIME.

Ok. Back to the show.

That was a mighty aggressive pull-out.

Relatable Simon. I too like foods after fucks.

Oh shit Daphne connecting the dots.

Rose out here saving the day like usual.

Well at least Daphne knows where babies come from now.

Everything is about to shatter, amrite?

She can't even hear a word he says. She feels so betrayed.

The piglet.

Dat ass though. And those shoulders.

Yeah that's gonna be a no tonight.

Oooh and now he wakes up without her.

She's fucking heartbroken.

The man she loves took away her choice with his deceit.

He allowed her to believe he was unable, not unwilling.

Would she have married him if he told the truth?

He was ready to die about the shit and still lied though.

All he ever had to do was tell her the whole fucking truth.

Everything this WOMAN knows about love and sex, she's learned from this man (and the real MVP Rose). He has literally taught her everything from the start of her sexual awakening. He knows better than anyone how ignorant she is regarding literally ANYTHING sexual in nature. I know he's insanely damaged, but this fucking hurts.

It's a unique feeling of unease and helplessness when you feel or realize you don't have agency over your own body.

An absence of the option to consent if you will.

I know this is a show, and I suppose it's doing its job because it's getting me deep into my thoughts and feelings. And I sure as a mf ENJOY THE FUCK out of watching them literally breathe in the same room with each other....among the many other things they do onscreen together. I guess I'm just heartbroken too. Shit. Plus y'all know I love tf out of my girl Daphne.

Ok back to the show again. This episode is fucking with my emotions.

Daphne is stewing!

But fuck if this isn't romantic as a mf.

These 2 fuck me up every time!

JPOLND - The End. That's this song. And this song is perfect.

Yes y'all! Rip them clothes off.

Daphne looks wild as hell. Carnal. She has a carnal look about her.

Ok bitch. Climb that mf tree then!

Is she anger-fucking him?!

Either way, he's loving it!!!

This song really is perfect.

Oh shit she's not letting up.

Fuck.

This shoe dropping?! Gawd NO!

She was literally like you took my choice so I took yours.

These fucking two.

He's hot with it for good reason for sure, but she is going in!

How the fuck could you think she knew how this worked when she didn't know what masturbation, let alone sex was until you got a hold of her?

YOU. PLAYED. ON. HER. IGNORANCE.

Maybe this conversation should have been had before y'all got naked.

They're both right in their own ways.

But they are absofuckinglutely wrong in so many of their own ways too.

He didn't ask for her pity and she didn't ask for his betrayal.

They are tearing me apart right now!

Big Sean said it best. "I guess drama makes for the best content."

I'm still rooting for them. I love growth and we still got 2 episodes left. They can't stay stuck like this, I'm sure.

Oh hey Whistledown.

Aww go to your friend.

Wtf is going on?

Are they all trying to kill me?

Aw fuck. Marina has been blasted by Whistledown. It's over.

Pure little Colin.

Oh Simon is heartbroken and Daphne.......she's desperate for a baby.

"Can the ends ever justify such wretched means?" That's a great question Whistledown. I'll have to get back to you on that.

I will close this with happiness because I refuse to accept this heartbreak.

[deweysdenouement]

House of Cards

a/n: this has lived in my mind rent free for longer than i care to admit but i only actually wrote it all tonight. somethin’ a little different. somethin’ likely not that good.

or: years after beatrice and bertrand leave vfd, beatrice and frank get trapped under a desk together during a bank robbery. mostly just them, cameos from bertrand, violet, and ernest + much discussion of kit and dewey

TW for guns and blood (nothing graphic, no death)

“Well,” Beatrice says brightly as a bullet flies over their heads and dislodges some beige coloured plaster in the wall. “This is no good.”

“I thought we were just amicable strangers in a queue,” Frank replies flatly, folded up like the origami swans on the tables at his hotel, trying to keep his body hidden under the desk. 

“Amicable strangers surviving a bank robbery together,” she says. “It brings people closer.”

“That’s never been my experience of the world,” Frank says, and it’s punctuated by another two shots, an effect she imagines he rather enjoys. “In my experience, when people get scared, they just leave.”

‘Well,” Beatrice says, as her heart breaks behind her ribs, “I am actually stuck here right now.”

“You haven’t changed,” he replies, and a hint of softness creeps into his voice. “I thought being a mother would force you to learn to actually listen to people.”

It’s a dig, and an accurate one at that, but they might be dead in a few minutes, so she leaves her arsenal of words she could throw back at him alone. Partly because she’s listening for the footsteps of the man keeping them all in here, partly because Frank looks more pitiful than annoyed.

“I have two children now,” she says softly. “So I should be doubly good at it.”

“I saw. Dewey kept the clipping from the birth announcement in the paper.”

“How is he?”

“You know Dewey,” Frank says, tone carefully even. “If there’s a silver lining, he’ll find it.”

Someone on the other side of the room starts to cry. A few scattered voices hush them.

“He’s not great,” Frank finishes. “So we should try to avoid dying here.”

“We’ll be fine,” Beatrice says easily. “They just want the money. We’ve got nothing to do with it.”

“Bad timing,” he murmurs.

“Because you’re stuck in a hostage situation, or because you’re stuck in a hostage situation with me?”

Frank smiles crookedly for the first time since they had noticed each other in the queue.

“Oh, the latter,” he says. “If I was stuck here with Bertrand? No complaints.”

“Bertrand could have talked that guy down by now,” she says glumly. “You could run off back to the hotel and avoid any awkward conversation at all.” 

“Don’t you always claim to be some genius with people?” Frank shifts slightly, and she hears the crack of his bones. They’re both getting older.

“I can’t even get toddlers to go to bed,” she says ruefully, and it feels more honest than she means it to. “You think I can stop a hostage situation with the power of love?”

“Well, it would be nice. I have a meeting in an hour.”

“I cannot believe you are worrying about work,” she hisses. “Are you gonna try telling him that?”

“I’ve never seen the emotional card work in the movies,” he says, and she thinks he might be joking with her again. “Who can know what’ll work?”

“I do feel very inclined to tell him I have a husband and two children,” Beatrice huffs, and slides down the smooth wood so she’s half resting on the small of her back. “If anything happens to me-”

“Don’t be dramatic,” he says sharply. His face is closed off again. “Nothing is happening to you.”

“Never knew you cared.” She grins at him, knocks her shoe against his. “Anyone else would have let me have my moment.”

“Kit would tell you to shut up,” he says. “Then threaten to run you over with her taxi.”

“That was definitely her thing.”

“It still is her thing,” Frank says. “We didn’t all stop existing when you left.”

“I know,” she says, a little ashamed. “How is she?”

“How much have you forgotten about us that you think Kit and I are talking about feelings?”

“Good point,” she says, and laughs a bit. “But you can tell, can’t you?”

“I guess,” he hums. “She’s pretty mad at you.”

“That’s fair.”

Footsteps move right past their desk, separated only by a thin slice of wood, and they both hold their breaths for a moment.

“She does miss you both though,” he carries on, and she thinks maybe he’s using Kit as a shield, that they’re not really talking about her anymore. “Probably more than she’s mad at you.”

“I guess you can’t know,” she says.

“I guess not.”

“I really am sorry,” Beatrice whispers. “And you can tell her that, if you want. I think a lot of people would have made our choice if they’d been able to.”

Being friends with Frank, she remembers, is a lot like building a house of cards. There’s a lot of fragile and strategic placing, and a wrong step usually means starting over. It’s a shame this isn’t really a good time to be hesitant.

“I would have,” he says eventually, and she breathes a sigh of relief. “But then VFD made the hotel too critical to their operations, even though we just wanted it to be a hotel. And then there’s my brothers. Obviously.”

“I didn’t know you wanted it to be normal,” she frowns.

“Told you you didn’t know everything,” he says, smiling weakly. “What better way to keep us where we were than monopolising our only source of income?”

“Not very noble,” she mutters, then, “Why do you always talk about it like you’re not a part of it?”

“Don’t start reading into things,” he huffs. “I look at most things from the outside.”

“Well, that’s because you have problems,” Beatrice quips teasingly, and she’s about to make an excellent joke when there’s another round of shots so close to her ear that for a second her head is full of ringing, and then Frank is groaning next to her.

When the ringing subsides and she hears the feet move away and sees the light shining through the holes in her desk, she scrambles over to Frank.

“Oh shit,” she says, when she sees blood on the floor. “Are you okay?”

“Oh yeah, feeling great,” Frank snaps, shifting so she can see the wound in his leg. It’s not deep, and he doesn’t look in any danger of dying, but it still makes her a little dizzy after a few years of mainly cleaning up baby food. “Not the first time.”

“When was the first time?” Beatrice asks, stripping off her cardigan to press it against his leg and trying to sound normal. “And why haven’t I heard this story?”

“Oh, it was meant for Ernest,” he says, and hisses when she applies pressure. “I kept up the ruse. Long story.”

“We have time,” she says.

“Not much,” he replies. “I heard police outside.”

As much as she would like to not be hiding from a man with a gun, Beatrice knows that when this is over, so is this conversation. They’re only trapped here together by freak coincidence and her pulling him down next to her when the first shots went off. He’ll be gone with the wind as soon as the doors open.

“Hey, Beatrice,” he says, snapping her out of her reverie. “Listen to me for a moment and don’t say anything.”

“Fine,” she says. “Don’t confess your feelings for me though.”

“Hah,” he snorts. “Well, if I do, it’s the blood loss.” 

“Making you reveal what you’ve felt all along,” she says brightly. “Come on now, before you pass out.”

“I’m not passing out,” he says stubbornly, and she believes this because she’s seen him go three days without sleeping before. “I just needed to tell you that if I die and you live-”

“Obviously not happening.”

“I said don’t say anything,” he grumbles. “If I don’t make it out of here and you do, I need you to tell my brothers-”

“That you love them? We know, Frank, maybe you should just show some affection sometimes.”

“Will you shut up?” Frank narrows his eyes at her. He’s a little pale and sweaty, but still as sharp as ever. “I need you to tell them one of them can take my place. If they want to. It’s probably easier than whatever they’ve got going on.”

“Well,” Beatrice says. “That’s insane.”

“I didn’t ask your opinion on it, I just asked you to do it,” Frank snaps. “Beatrice, for god’s sake, let a man bleed in peace.”

“You’re hilarious,” she says. “I don’t think you have it that easy though.”

“Your opinion isn’t really part of my life anymore,” he says bluntly, and closes his eyes. “I’d pass on a message for you.”

“Eh,” she says. “I think I’m kinda obvious now. I love my family, I want them to move on, I was very noble, blah blah.”

“Duly noted,” he replies. “You have fun with that.”

Then the doors break open, and there’s a cacophony of yelling, and when Beatrice peers over the top of the desk, she sees that the man who took them all hostage is in handcuffs.

“Told you we’d be fine,” she says. “I know you thought we were both done for, but you gotta learn to listen to me.”

Frank flips her off, and she helps him to his feet, slinging one skinny arm over her shoulder.

Outside, there are crowds of people all with their gloved hands over their mouths and some cheer as the little group of hostages trails out.

“Hi!” A little voice calls, and Beatrice looks down to see Violet toddling towards her at top speed, Bertrand hurrying behind her with Klaus in his arms.

“Oh,” he says slowly when he approaches, and sees Frank with her. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Frank says, making some vague attempt to look dignified despite barely being on his feet. “I hope you’re well.”

“Are you?” Bertrand asks, nonplussed. 

“What do you think?” Frank says flatly, and Beatrice nods subtly to the blood seeping down his leg so Bertrand will understand the sudden absence of a filter.

Before Bertrand can come up with any reasonable response to that (and she’s sure he could and she would admire him greatly for it), Ernest is swooping in, and it’s another punch to the gut of a familiar face even if it’s the exact same face.

“There you are,” Ernest says, pulling Frank off Beatrice to lean on him without a word to her. He looks dreadful, but she can’t tell if it’s the present stress or a new normal. “Dewey’s worried sick. Kit drove me here, that’s how dire things got.”

“Hi, Ernest,” Beatrice says. Bertrand stays wisely silent.

Ernest gives her the once-over.

“Thanks for helping,” he says shortly. “You probably shouldn’t come to the taxi.”

“Good call,” she says weakly. “Bye.”

It feels just as hard the second time.

“Bye,” Ernest says, and Frank raises a hand. “Okay, come on, you’re off work for at least a week.”

“It’s a graze,” Frank sighs, and then they’re both gone into the crowd, and Beatrice stands among the bustle of people with Bertrand’s hand on her shoulder and fresh blood drying on her dress.

[thathopelessromantic]

Crossing Lines

Fandom: Voltron: Legendary Defender Rating: Mature (implied sexual content + mild language) Pairing: Lance/Keith Note: The comeback no one expected with a series I thought was finished in 2018 and a fic I started in 2019 finally finished lol

There’s a nagging worry in the back of his head that this is not normal friends-with-benefits behavior, but it is easily drowned out by Lance’s sleepy smile when he shifts again to face Keith. He hides another wide yawn in his shoulder.

“Those kids wore you out, clearly.” Keith observes, trying to fight back his own yawn.

Lance smiles fondly. “It was fun to see them, to go back and be with everyone for a while. But I’m really glad you were here when I got home.”

AO3: (X) Part 1 of the series: (X)

Keith looks away from his computer as his phone buzzes against his leg. Pidge sits across the room at her desk, muttering to herself as she readjusts the device’s calibration – again. Their project was supposed to be at least 80 percent theoretical, but Keith knew the moment he was paired with Pidge that option was thrown out the window.

He flips his phone over just as it vibrates again. There’s a text from Shiro, asking him for the third time about a shirt Shiro insists Keith stole and Keith insists Shiro just lost, and a snapchat from Lance. Dismissing the text notification, he opens snapchat.

Most of the picture is just of a bright blue sky above him, but Lance’s face peeks out from the bottom, at an extremely unflattering angle. The selfie is taken at chest level while Lance looks down at the camera. His hair is pushed under a backwards baseball cap with frayed stitching along the edge and there is, what appears to be, a sparkly butterfly sticker on his cheek. Above his head it reads:

don’t blow up my apartment while im gone, mullet. i live there.

Shaking his head, he taps away the message. Pidge still appears absorbed in her tinkering and doesn’t notice as he takes a blurry picture of her.

we’re not that irresponsible

It only takes a few seconds for Lance to reply, no longer bothering with pictures and just texting back.

HA! but seriously, hunk’s been sending me worried messages all weekend

…Hunk had seemed particularly anxious the last time Keith emerged from Pidge’s room for a drink.

hm…like an hour ago pidge thought she had gotten the laser to work for real and did seem a little maniacal…

Lance replies with a supremely unimpressed expression, made, of course, all the more effective by the butterfly sticker. Keith snorts, but also half-heartedly wonders how easily he could get away with saving a screenshot of the selfie. He just saved one last night, of Lance cuddling with his parent’s dog ruined only slightly by the caption insinuating the dog had better breath than Keith, but he brushed it off with a lie about trying to lock his phone and taking the screenshot accidentally. He’s not sure if Lance believed him then, but he definitely wouldn’t believe it two times in a row.

Pidge loudly clears her throat across the room. Startled, Keith dismisses the message, and nearly drops his phone in the process. When he looks up, Pidge is looking at him over the rim of her glasses, with one brow raised.

“…Yes?”

“How’s that report coming, Keith?”

He glances back at his computer, at the three and a half pages he had finished of their ten-page report. “Fine.”

“Hm.” Pidge looks away, jotting down some other measurements on a pad besides her. “And how’s your boyfriend?”

“He’s not my-” Keith starts before he gives up with a heavy sigh. It’s a waste of breath with her. “Lance thinks we’re going to blow up the apartment. Well I guess actually Hunk does, and he turned to Lance for help.”

Pidge rolls her eyes, muttering something under her breath about worry-warts and ridiculous roommates. Keith smiles at the, somehow, simultaneously exasperated but fond tone she uses and turns back to his computer, tucking his phone under his leg again. But it takes a while to focus on anything other than blue eyes and familiar, silly banter.

It’s nearly three and a half hours later, though it hardly feels like it, when Hunk knocks at the door, tempting them out of the room and their work-stupors with the promise of pizza, the heady aroma already spilling out from the kitchen. They settle in the living room, Pidge and Hunk on the couch with Keith on the floor in front of them, legs stretched out under the coffee table. Pidge is still complaining around mouthfuls of burning cheese that they were almost done, if Hunk had just waited a little while longer, but Hunk turns on the sci-fi series they’ve been watching together and within ten minutes into the episode her complaints have turned into an analysis of how the character’s spacesuits work.

Keith relaxes against the couch as their familiar chatter falls around him. He’s a little lost in what is happening in the show, they’re further than he’s been able to get on his own, but it’s nice to share it with them anyways, especially with the way Hunk laughs triumphantly when he guesses the ridiculous plot twist twenty minutes early and Pidge keeps comparing the characters to people they know with frightening accuracy.

It only takes them an episode and a half to completely demolish the pizza, but when the third one starts up in the queue, no one bothers to reach for the remote. Full of good food and only half-paying attention to the show, Keith can feel himself being lulled to sleep right there on the living room floor. He fights against the urge as much as he can, but the last thing he remembers is the upbeat opening starting for the next episode, and then suddenly the episode is ending as he jerks awake, knocking his knee on the underside of the table, hard.

After his unfortunate waking, he extracts himself from under the table, gathering up dirty plates, despite Hunk’s protest, and taking them into the kitchen – the moving helps wake him up, even if his knee still hurts like a bitch. The stove clock reads 7:03. He slips through the living room as another episode is starting and goes to their bathroom.

As he’s washing his hands, his phone buzzes with another text. He opens the text as he exits the room. It’s a picture from Adam, Shiro’s fiancé, of Shiro sitting on the floor of what Keith is pretty sure is their laundry room, head buried in his hands. There’s a very dusty pile of something next to him.

The text says: we found his shirt.

Keith leaves the text conversation, trying not to laugh. Considering all the trouble Shiro gave him, Keith feels like he should be at least mildly annoyed by this instead of amused.

He turns the doorknob to the room in front of him and swings it open before he even realizes what he’s doing. He freezes, looking in at Lance’s dark, empty room. Distracted, he had apparently been moving through the apartment on autopilot – straight to Lance’s room. Feeling like he’s breaking some kind of unspoken rule, he takes a few steps in. Lance’s bed is still a mess of blankets and pillows, and there’s piles of books and discarded shoes covering his floor. He’s only been gone a few days, but his absence feels so prominent, especially like this, Keith can’t help but feel like something is wrong.

He’s texting Lance before he can think better of it.

when are you coming back again?

Lance’s response is almost instantaneous.

why? missing me that much already, mullet?

Yes, Keith’s head or heart, or maybe both, shout.

no just wondering how much longer we get to enjoy this peace and quiet he says instead.

whatever, asshole …….tomorrow night

Keith silently but firmly tells himself to stop being so damn happy about this news as he slips his phone back into his pocket. He takes one last look at Lance’s room before stepping back out into the hall and pulling the door closed behind him.

He just barely manages to fight the telling smile off his face before he gets back to the living room.

 Keith crashes at their apartment for the night, on the couch. Hunk and Pidge both try to convince him that he could take Lance’s bed and Lance wouldn’t care, but Keith is fairly certain he wouldn’t get much sleep if he was in Lance’s room – even if he would be alone – and insists the couch is fine. He wakes up once around 5 or 6 in the morning as Hunk is getting ready for his opening shift at a local diner but otherwise sleeps well until about 10:30. He wanders into the kitchen to start a pot of coffee before going to roust Pidge. He doesn’t mind mornings much, but he learned very soon into their friendship that Pidge is very firmly a “night owl,” and has no interest in trying to deny her nature. She’s lying upside down on her bed when he gets to her room, and somehow managed to kick all of her blankets off of the bed, except one, which looks dangerously close to suffocating her.

He stands in the doorway for a moment, just staring at her. “How do you even manage this?”

“Mmphf.” Sleeping Pidge replies, very firmly.

“Right.” Keith pauses. “I’ll come back when the coffee’s done, actually.”

With a little extra time, Keith hops in the shower. As soon as he opens the bottle of shampoo, he recognizes the familiar, fresh scent as Lance’s soap. He’s a little surprised Lance left his favorite soap behind, even if he was just going to his family home for a few days. He also isn’t sure what to do, looking around the shower space for other soap. There’s plenty, and surely none of them would care either way if he used a little soap but…

Is he totally over thinking this? Absolutely.

Does that realization help him make a decision about which soap to use? Absolutely not.

What feels like ages, but is hopefully only a few minutes, passes before he finally convinces himself to stop being ridiculous and just use the damn shampoo. He just grabbed Lance’s first, it was a coincidence and if Pidge noticed later…well, she would just have to accept that.

…Right.

He washes up quickly after wasting who knows how long second-guessing his soap choices and leaves the bathroom to the smell of coffee slowly starting to fill the apartment.

He has to break the nonexistent, unspoken rule his brain has built up in his mind a second time, and trespasses across Lance’s room to find some spare clothes he’s left behind for overnight stays. He pulls on some clean boxers and his jeans from yesterday, but after he’s pulled the worn Altea University shirt over his head, he realizes its Lance shirt, not his. There’s a small hole starting in the bottom hem and the white letters are fading and cracked from excessive wear. It was folded in his drawers, so Keith is like…ninety percent certain it’s clean, but it still smells like Lance’s cologne. Or maybe it’s his lotion or laundry soap or bodywash, but between whatever lingering scent Lance has left on his clothes and the smell of his shampoo still obvious in Keith’s damp hair, he suddenly feels overwhelmed.

He hates how much he hates that Lance is gone.

It’s just a couple of days. Why is he such a disaster? They’re friends. When was the last time he missed Hunk or Pidge this much when they were gone? Even with their friends with benefits arrangement, what made Lance that special to him?

Actually, that was a can of worms he wasn’t really prepared to open just yet.

Keith makes a hasty retreat – a calm, completely normal walk out of one room to another if anyone asks – back to the kitchen for coffee. He pours a generous amount for both Pidge and himself, before he returns to Pidge’s room to finally wake her. He’s not exactly eager to spend another full day working on this project, but he wants to get it done, and he officially really needs the distraction.

It takes another hour, even with the promise of coffee, to pull Pidge out of bed, and she insists on showering “to feel like a real person” before they can get back to work on their project.

Keith has gotten as far as turning his laptop back on and opening their report, rereading the last few paragraphs to remember where he left off, when Pidge returns to her room in some leggings and a baggy t-shirt Keith is pretty sure belongs to either Lance or Matt.

“How about food first?” she suggests.

It’s not exactly the distraction he was looking for, but he shuts his laptop anyways, pushing it off his lap before she even finishes her sentence.

 Sal’s is a small 24-hour diner just outside of Altea's central campus that makes it a popular place for both students and professors. Sunday morning, it is practically bursting at the seams, but it’s got good food for reasonable prices and Hunk, Lance, and Pidge had become regulars even before Hunk got a job in the kitchen. Within a few months of becoming friends, Keith had been invited along enough times that the waitstaff began to recognize him too.

Their wait for a table is reasonable, all things considered, and then Keith and Pidge have only been at the table for maybe three minutes before their waitress, Flora, drops drinks off at the table with a promise to be back for their orders in just a minute. Her long, red pony tail swings wildly behind her as she flits around the small space.

They hadn’t ordered anything, but Flora had been there for a long time and was used to their group stopping in, especially on weekend mornings when Hunk was working. But sitting on the table in front of them is two coffee mugs, and a tall glass of apple juice.

Keith and Pidge both stare at it for a moment, before looking to each other. Keith has a feeling the juice is making him feel a whole lot more…things than it is Pidge.

“I guess she just assumed?” Pidge finally says after a moment and goes back to the menu, as if she hadn’t memorized it within the first three months of their visits.

Keith pulls out his phone and takes a picture of the juice, sending it to Lance with a text:

from flora

Lance’s response comes in a few minutes later, interspersed with at least a dozen crying emojis.

i cant believe u traitors went to sal’s w/o me. tell flora i love her and one of u better drink that. we don’t let apple juice go to waste in this house

i am not telling her that. but i will drink the juice for u

Flora comes back to the table before Lance’s next reply comes in. “Just your usual’s today?”

Pidge hums and haws over the decision a few times, like she does every time they come, before agreeing to her usual order. Though she asks for fresh fruit as well today, just to mix it up.

He can feel his phone buzz against his leg almost the entire time Pidge is ordering. And again a few more times as he confirms that he would like his usual order as well. “But, Lance isn’t with us today so…nothing for him.” Keith adds awkwardly at the end.

Flora blinks at him a few times, surprised, before she snaps her fingers as if suddenly remembering something. “Right. I remember Hunk mentioning one of his roommates was out of town for a few days. Sorry guys, I’m just so used to your trio, or just you and him,” she says to Keith, thankfully not seeing the way Pidge wiggles her eyebrows and makes kissy-faces at him for the aside. “I’ll take that juice back for you.”

“Oh no, that’s fine.” Keith says, moving the glass closer to him. “It’s already poured, we’ll drink it.”

Flora arches a brow, but doesn’t argue with him. She promises their food will be out shortly and leaves the table.

“I can’t believe Lance didn’t request you deliver any messages to her for him, or insist we eat his chocolate chip pancakes in his honor too.” Pidge says once she’s gone.

Keith pulls out his phone, flipping it around to show Pidge the twelve messages he got while they were ordering. “Oh, I’m sure he did somewhere in there.”

 It’s hard to get back to work on a full stomach, but they power through it. Their shared determination to not have to worry about the project after today deters the usual urge to distract each other. Still, progress is slow, and they’re still working when Hunk comes home from work and peeks in to check on them. They pass on lunch when Hunk asks after his shower, and give non-committal answers to his questions about dinner plans.

Keith is entirely unaware of time and date and hell maybe even location by the time he drags himself through the conclusion but he is bordering on ecstatic when he finally saves the document for the last time and looks up from the computer only for Pidge to look up from her own work and meet his eye a few seconds later.

“Done?”

He nods, and she gives an excited “whoop!” stumbling off her desk chair to throw herself on the bed besides him. “So I just need to add in my input and double-check the details match up, right?”

He nods again, and she immediately scrolls to the top of the document to start reading. “Oh!” she jumps up again, grabbing her laptop from the desk and the notebook she was working in besides it. “Do you want to double check the equations and make sure the experiment outline matches the order you have everything in the paper?”

He is relatively confident in Pidge’s work, but he agrees, nonetheless, and the two settle against each other in the twin bed to finish their work.

 Keith isn’t sure when he dozes off, he doesn’t even really remember falling asleep, but when he wakes up, it’s dark in Pidge’s room. Both of their computers are on her desk and he’s alone in her bed. He sits up, half-heartedly feeling around the blankets for his phone to check the time.

“C’mon Mullet, you really had to move right then?”

Keith about jumps out of his skin at the unexpected voice, though he’d vehemently deny it if asked. Lance is sitting backwards in Pidge’s desk chair, pushed close to the door. He lowers his phone, smirking at Keith’s startled expression.

“I guess the deer-in-the-headlights look is fun too, but I was really going to enjoy lording the drooling-all-over-Pidge’s-sheets picture over you.” Lance teases.

Keith’s heart brain is doing some kind of stupid, fluttery thing over the boy across the room that he is pointedly ignoring.

“Shut up.” Keith mutters, even as he hastily wipes at his mouth. There’s nothing there. Asshole. He pushes himself off the bed. “What the hell are you doing here?”

Lance presses a hand to his chest in fake offense. “Really? You sleep through my grand return and when you finally bother to wake up, that’s how you greet me?”

Keith crosses the room, folding his arms over his chest and summoning the most unimpressed expression he can muster. “You know what I meant.”

Lance doesn’t seem deterred by the new height difference between them, or Keith’s attitude, crossing his arms over the back of the chair and batting his eyelashes up at him cheekily. He’s wearing the same baseball hat from the picture he sent Keith yesterday, but he’s got it on in the right direction this time, making him look minorly less like a douchebag. The baggy zip-up, which may very well be Hunk’s, over a t-shirt with the sleeves cut off, and sweatpants isn’t really helping though.

“When did you get back?” Keith askes instead of commenting on his poor outfit choices.

Lance shrugs. “A little after five. Pidge said you started to doze off around four.” He adds before Keith can ask. “Hunk made stir fry for dinner.”

Taking that to mean Lance was actually sent here to wake him up for dinner, rather than simply coming to terrorize him because he was bored, Keith steps around him to leave. A moment later Lance stumbles off the chair after him, complaining all the way.

“Hey,” Lance calls after him.

Keith is already rolling his eyes as he turns around, assuming Lance has a few more jabs he wants to get out before they get to the kitchen, so he is wholly unprepared for Lance to hook a finger in the collar of his shirt and pull him close.

“Is this my shirt?”

It takes all of his self-control not to fly away from Lance’s hold, though the heat rising rapidly to his cheeks is probably giving away his embarrassment all the same. “Maybe? I just grabbed something from your drawers after my shower this morning.”

Lance has a look in his eyes that Keith recognizes as usually meaning something dangerous is in store for him. He leans in closer, stopping just before the bill of his hat brushes the top of Keith’s head. “Did you use my shampoo too?”

“I think you’re a little too obsessed with your things for someone wearing someone else’s hoodie.”

“Well I think you missed me while I was gone.”

Keith isn’t entirely sure who moves first, but one second they’re staring each other down daring the other to give in and the next he’s shoved Lance’s baseball cap off his head, burying his fingers in Lance’s messy hair while Lance’s hands have dropped to his waist, pulling him close with a bruising grip. Their kiss is uncoordinated and messy. Keith is ninety percent certain he was not the only one missing someone a stupid amount this weekend. His back hits the wall, and he faintly registers Pidge yelling something about her room from the other side of the apartment.

Lance rucks up his shirt, warm hands brushing over his sides, and Keith is dangerously close to wrapping his legs around his hips and saying fuck dinner.

They finally break apart for air and Lance laughs against his throat, the sensation sending shivers down his back. “I knew you missed me.”

“And what?” Keith asks breathlessly. “You were ambivalent about it all? I don’t think so. Not kissing like that.”

Lance pulls back to look at him with a surprisingly soft look. “I just wanted to hear you admit it,” he teases.

Normally, Keith would have a comeback for that, probably, but now he’s distracted as he runs his fingers through Lance’s bangs. “You have blue hair.”

Just the tips of his hair that are dyed, actually, not his whole head, he’s still surprised by the change. It seems a little silly, but it still looks good on him.

Lance, not one to be deterred by much, winks at him, striking a pose. “Hot, right? Rachel did it.”

“Yeah, it looks good.”

That does give Lance pause and he blinks at Keith and his easy admission a few times. “Er, well…we should probably go eat now. If just to reassure Pidge we aren’t defiling her room.”

 Dinner is great, as usual when Hunk cooks, and they sit in the living room with another show on in the background, but they fill most of the time talking about Lance’s trip and gossip in their department that Keith is somehow always unaware of.

It is well after eleven before conversation begins to fade and they start to disperse around the apartment. Keith is, maybe a little, embarrassed about it, but he doesn’t bother to hide his intentions to stay with Lance rather than going back to his own apartment now that the project is done. For once, Pidge and Hunk leave them be with minimal suggestive looks.

Considering the brief tryst in the hallway earlier, Keith isn’t entirely sure what to expect when they finally retire to Lance’s room, but Lance doesn’t seem to be in a particular rush to do anything. Keith shimmies out of his jeans and drops into bed while Lance puts on some kind of moisturizer. He strips down to his boxers after and Keith can see new, blue markings up and down his arms before Lance turns the light off. Predictably, a moment later there’s a crash and Lance swears. Keith leans over to turn on the lamp next to the bed. Lance is leaning against the footboard, rubbing his shin.

“What did you knock over this time?”

Lance sticks out his tongue. “Don’t worry about it. Move over.” He says. He doesn’t wait before he climbs over the end of the bed and flops down, half on top of Keith.

“I would have moved if you let me,” Keith says into his shoulder.

Lance hums in consideration before he shifts on the mattress. Keith lets him maneuver him around the bed, mostly curious as to what he’s doing, until they end up on their sides, legs tangled together and arms around each other. Lance’s head is pressed against his chest, and his hands are, conveniently, on his ass.

“Lance-”

“Shh,” Lance interrupts immediately. “I had to go a whole weekend without even being able to see this ass, give me a moment to enjoy it.”

Keith laughs despite himself, rolling his eyes. “You are ridiculous.”

Lance wiggles against him, sighing contently. “You like it.”

“Whatever.”

Absentmindedly, Keith runs a hand against Lance’s back, trailing nonsense patterns against his warm skin. Eventually, he looks down, just to make sure Lance hasn’t actually fallen asleep like that, and sees the blue drawings on his arm again.

“What is all over you?”

Lance lets go of him to roll onto his back and show off his arms. “After Rachel dyed my hair, Nadia and Sylvio wanted to match, but Lisa, their mom, wasn’t really thrilled with the idea, so we found these tattoo markers at the dollar store and they were washable, so we went kind of crazy.” Lance shifts so his side is up where the black outline of a shark tattooed into his waist is now black and blue. “They also colored in my tattoo.”

“Did you draw these?”

“Haha,” Lance elbows him in the side half-heartedly. “I drew the rocket ship on my wrist, and the constellations on my shoulder, if they’re still there, are from Veronica, but everything else is from Nadia and Sylvio. Oh, and Luis,” Lance points to a…something near his elbow.

“A flower?” Keith guesses.

Lance snorts. “A lion, according to him.”

“Not the most artistically inclined I’m assuming?”

Lance shakes his head. “Not at all. Nadia’s pretty good though,” he turns over his arm to show off a dog on his forearm. “That’s pretty damn good for a seven-year-old drawing on a moving canvas with dollar-store markers.”

They just spent the last few hours talking about this weekend with Hunk and Pidge in the living room, but Keith can’t help but ask more questions about his family and what they did over the weekend. He brushes Lance’s hair out of his face, and Lance settles deeper into his arms, waving his hands in the air as he talks about the piñata he had to fill for the party by himself, that was bigger than the birthday boy, and the balloon mishaps that had his mother ready to call the whole thing off more than once.

There’s a nagging worry in the back of his head that this is not normal friends-with-benefits behavior, but it is easily drowned out by Lance’s sleepy smile when he shifts again to face Keith.

“Did you guys have fun this weekend?”

Keith shrugs one shoulder. “As much fun as you can have the weekend before a Kolivan deadline.”

Lance grimaces sympathetically. “You finished everything though, right?”

“I think so. We were just checking each other’s work before I fell asleep. If there was more to do, I doubt Pidge would have let me sleep for long.”

Lance hides a wide yawn in his shoulder. “That’s good,” he tries to say, only to break off half-way through into another yawn.

“Those kids wore you out, clearly.” Keith observes, trying to fight back his own yawn.

Lance smiles fondly. “It was fun to see them, to go back and be with everyone for a while. But I’m really glad you were here when I got home.”

The admittance is so quiet in the still room, and almost immediately drowned out by the way Keith’s pulse races, blood roaring in his ears.

Lance had closed his eyes, but he opens them again and looks up at him curiously. Keith knows he has to be able to hear the erratic beating of his heart. He wonders if Lance is even remotely aware of how many lines they’ve crossed in the period of their relationship, if he thinks at all about how little like fuck-buddies they behave when they spend nights wrapped in each other’s arms saying soft things and doing nothing else and if it affects him at all or if this is just how he is casually intimate with everyone. And he wonders why he hates that idea so much.

“Can I kiss you?” Keith asks. It’s usually Lance’s question, but for once, Keith can’t help but ask, ignoring, for now, how overwhelmed he is.

Surprisingly, Lance is quiet, and just nods his agreement, watching Keith with wide eyes.

The kiss now is nothing like the ones they shared before dinner, slow and gentle where the others were rushed and near-frantic. Keith wraps both arms around Lance’s waist, and Lance cradles his face with one hand, threading his other hand through Keith’s hair.

“Good night,” Keith whispers against his lips as they break apart feeling like he’s doing something unbelievably stupid even as the words come.

Lance presses one more quick, closed-mouth kiss against his lips. “Good night.”

Keith flips off the bedside table lamp, dousing them in darkness.

He isn’t sure how long they lay in the dark before Lance finally relaxes and falls asleep, but it feels like at least another hour before Keith admits to himself, he can’t sleep yet and carefully extracts himself from the bed. Lance makes a quiet noise of displeasure in his sleep, but easily stretches out, taking up the empty space and doesn’t wake up.

Keith goes out into the hallway, thinking he’ll just go to the living room and calm down but a light shines through the crack of Pidge’s closed door and he finds himself drawn there instead. He knocks once and Pidge opens the door immediately, looking around the hall almost alarmed.

“Keith? What’s wrong? It’s almost four in the morn-”

“Pidge, I think I love him.” Keith interrupts. “I think I’m in love.”

[softaxmonstax]

9 & 12 with shownu?

ok so that’s. 9) clothes giving out (buttons, seams, etc) and 12) kinky trying on old/tight clothes. 

here is the prompt list. sorry it took me a while, im just a perfectionist lmao

so w/ 9. sorry to make these connected but . theyre gonna be in the same universe where ki n shownu are. not officially married or even engaged but theyre close.

9.

it wasn’t like hyunwoo didn’t know he needed new work pants.

his current ones are (were?) threadbare--they’re fast fashion, and kihyun scolded him about it, but it was what he could afford when he entered the workforce and, well, if they still work, why get new ones?--and each day he squeezes into them, that little pinch of softness, his “dad-bod chub” (thanks, jooheon) poking out a slight bit more and more. and he thinks, man, i really gotta get new work slacks.

and that’s how it goes for--a while. a While. a lot longer than he’d like to admit. he wakes up, sheds his forgiving comfy pajamas for his fast fashion cotton-blend size 32 slacks, and thinks: god these are tight. i need new ones, i need to size up, i  have a budget now i can even get nice tailored trousers, that’ll make kihyun quit bitching me out too, about how i dress.

and, well. when he thought it each morning, it just became a part of his morning, and he stopped really thinking about it, as something he has to do in the future. its on his to-do list, like flipping his mattress, proposing to kihyun, and cleaning out the gutters on his house. he’ll get to it.

except before he gets to it he bursts out of his slacks. 

kihyun isn’t there--and he feels some kind of way about that, his absence and also the idea of his presence--because he leaves for work earlier. so it’s just shownu, all alone, struggle-wiggling into his slacks and thinking, like he has for the past six months (or maybe more), “i really gotta get better fitting slacks”, without really thinking about how much tighter his pants have gotten since he first thought about it. 

so he’s alone, pulling at the belt-loops on his slacks, yanking at the fasteners and having to lie down and suck in to get the button into its hole. and the progression has been so slow and gradual that shownu doesnt even think of how he went from fitting them perfectly to . desperately needing to go up a size or two. it just happened, and happened so slowly and naturally it seemed like any other new development in his life.

so when his last clean pair of work slacks busts its button off--he’d had to lie down to button it, lie down and suck in as much as he could, and he didnt even think abt it bc he’d had to do that so often for so long that it doesn’t feel like a new development--he’s not prepared, he’s super surprised, and at that point he ends up calling in sick to work because . he’s gotta take some time to process. 

12) im gonna post abt this later im putting it in my queue! i jst wanted to post this now lol 

[mrslittletall]

Prompt: I know you are in there somewhere fight Fandom: Dark Souls Characters: Artorias the Abysswalker, Dragon Slayer Ornstein Word Count: 1.577 AO3-Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15153839/chapters/39038302 Warning: Graphic depictions of violence, Major Character Death

Written for @badthingshappenbingo

Summary: Ornstein follows Artorias on his mission to Oolacile and is faced with a horrible decision, when he realizes, that his friend has been corrupted by the abyss.

(Author's note: It is time for the most angsty one of the prompts. Prepare your handkerchiefs for it is time to cry and suffer.) I have ideas for the purple marked prompts but you can still send them in to getting their position in the queue up. Also, I am still searching for a whumper for “Hiding an Injury”, so here is your chance.

Ornstein hadn't been able to shake this bad feeling away. After Artorias had left for his mission in Oolacile, he felt like something was wrong, very wrong. Ciaran must have felt it too, cause the woman had disappeared one night only leaving a note that she would have an eye on Artorias. But Ornstein still couldn't find any rest, so he abandoned his post, his duties and his silver knights to follow Artorias to Oolacile, even though he knew it would get him into great trouble.

And there he was now, standing in an arena, hardly able to believe his own eyes.

“Artorias?”, he asked, unsure if the raging figure in front of him really was his friend. “It is you, right? My eyes aren't doing tricks on me, correct?”

Instead of answering, Artorias howled and opened with a jumping attack. Ornstein managed to evade it at the last moment, a slight shock in him that Artorias would attack him. He clutched his spear in both hands, taking in a defensive stance.

“Artorias, don't you recognize me? It's me, Ornstein.”, he said with a pleading tone in his voice. As a response, Artorias swung his sword in his signature spinning move. Ornstein managed to avoid this attack too, he knew how deadly it could be. Artorias had never used it in a duel against him, knowing how devastating it would be if one day Ornstein wouldn't be able to evade it. His spear still tightly clutching, it felt like his knuckles were already going white beneath his gauntlets, Ornstein took a few steps backwards, as the wolf knight had to straighten up because of the attack's momentum.

Artorias took a few steps forward or more, he limped forward. Still walking backwards, Ornstein could see in what a bad state he was. He wasn't even holding his sword in the left hand, the whole arm dangled uselessly downwards, he had the sword in his right hand instead and didn't even had his shield with him. And where in the world was Sif? Ornstein could see the black sludge coming from him. Corrupted, he thought, taken by the abyss.

His armour clanked as Ornstein's back hit the arena wall. Artorias took this as opportunity to start another attack, Ornstein recognized the stance as the sword thrust. He didn't had any trouble to evade it, the distinct shape of the arena hindered that he could get cornered. Artorias immediately followed with another attack and this time Ornstein raised his spear to parry the swing.

If Artorias really had been taken by the abyss, he would have no choice. Ornstein felt a lump forming in his throat at the thought. He swallowed, it was a hot and dry feel, while the thoughts crossed his mind. Then I need to kill him.

He shivered at the thought. For now, he hadn't fought back, hadn't tried to hurt Artorias, simply evaded and parried his attacks. No, he couldn't do it. Artorias was his comrade, his friend, there had to be another way. He needed to snap him out of this rage. With a determined look at his face, Ornstein stepped back to evade another attack and swung his spear to parry the next blow of the sword.

“Artorias, you need to snap out of it.”, he said, pressing his spear against the sword, on which Artorias had laid a lot of force. Ornstein knew, if Artorias would have used his left hand, he wouldn't had any trouble to shove his spear aside and probably severe his arm in the process. “This is not who you are. You are Artorias, one of the four knights of Gwyn, one of Anor Londo's heroes who fought in the dragon war. You have a wolf companion named Sif.” Ornstein could feel that he would lose the battle of force, Artorias was close to push his weapon aside. He decided to pull back himself. The sudden absence of force made Artorias' sword collide heavily with the ground.

“Remember, who you are.”, Ornstein screamed over the noise. “Where is the Artorias that loved to bake cookies and would surprise us with them when we least expected it?”

The wolf knight only answered with another howl and started an attack that consisted of several successive flips. Absolute deadly if you got caught in it, Ornstein had to be on his toes to evade all three of them, but when Artorias got up after the finished attack, he had another chance.

“Artorias, please, don't you hear me?”, he said, his voice had a pleading tone in it. “You would always go feed the stray cats and dogs in Anor Londo, remember?”

Artorias turned his head and stared directly at Ornstein. Ornstein felt a chill running down his spine, the face of the wolf knight couldn't even been made out anymore.. it just looked like a black abyss.

“You were knitting all of us scarfs for the winter, remember?”, Ornstein said, feeling tears welling up in his eyes. There was no response.

“Fine.”, Ornstein said, sniffling a bit. “If I have to beat you out of this, so shall it be.” He readied his spear and started an attack, expecting Artorias to evade it, but the wolf knight just stayed where he was and Ornstein's spear connected with armour and flesh. He could make out blood that seeped from the fresh injury and Ornstein pulled his spear back immediately.

“Artorias, I am so sorry, I didn't want to... I was hoping...” What exactly? That Artorias would snap out of it by him fighting back? Staring at the bloodied blade of his spear, Ornstein didn't notice the sword coming down and a sharp pain in his left arm told him, that he hadn't evaded the blow in time. He could feel blood pouring out of the wound, the arm feeling limp, probably broken from the sheer force. “At least we are even now.”, Ornstein murmured and took his spear in his right hand alone.

Ornstein knew by heart how Artorias fought and the same should be true for Artorias and while the wolf knight used all his familiar attacks, he left himself wide open for Ornstein's own. Ornstein winced every time a blow connected with the wolf knight. After a while Artorias staggered back. “Artorias, are you back?”, Ornstein asked. “Have I finally beat some sense into you...?”

No answer. Instead, the darkness of the Abyss surrounded Artorias while he howled, Ornstein wasn't sure if it was in pain or in rage. Both probably.

“I know you are still in there somewhere.”, Ornstein screamed. “Artorias, please fight. Where is your unbreakable will of still you are so famous for?”

The black fog cleared around Artorias. Ornstein didn't knew if it was an illusion, but it looked like Artorias would glow with darkness. He took a few step backwards as the wolf knight limped forwards, adjusting his sword.

“It is of no use, right?”, Ornstein said, the tears which were welling up in his eyes starting to fall. “You have no clue who you are anymore, right?” He shivered. He didn't want to do this. He didn't want to kill his friend. But I have too, were all he could think about.

Artorias readied a jump attack. This would be his chance. Ornstein had to do it now or he would never be able to scrape together the will for this atrocious act. He didn't move, he didn't try to avoid, instead shortly before Artorias attack connected with him, he jerked his spear up and pierced it through the chest of the wolf knight, having activated the special lightning powers within it. A thing he normally wouldn't do in any of their duels. He heard Artorias scream, a sound that would haunt him in his nightmares.

Blood and goo seeped out from Artorias, he could hear him wheeze. Ornstein yanked the spear out of the wound, which made more blood splatter, from Artorias chest and mouth. The wolf knight collapsed to the ground.

“Oh, Artorias, I am so sorry.”, Ornstein whispered, kneeling down beside his friend. “I wish there would have been another way. Why didn't you hear me?”

He could hardly believe it when he heard the faint whisper of Artorias voice. “Ornstein?”, he said.

“I am here, don't talk. It isn't too late. Maybe we can still fix you up!”, Ornstein frantically started to rummage around his belongings, he must have a divine blessing somewhere.

“Ornstein, it's too late.” A cough and a wheeze. “I am already consumed... by the dark.. the abyss.” Another cough, Ornstein could feel how a weak hand hold out to his own. “I am so sorry, please, all of you, forgive me. For I have availed nothing.”

Ornstein shivered, feeling the tears streaming out of his eyes, clutching the hand of his friend with his own.

“Thank you... that at least... I can die.. as myself... with a friend at my side.” The hand of Artorias got limp. Ornstein shivered, the salty taste of tears on his lips, he felt like screaming, but instead, he just collapsed on the ground, feeling empty, as if some void had swallowed his heart.

He could feel a hand on his shoulder and raised his head a little, enough to make out Ciaran's mask.

“Ciaran... what have I done?”, he asked.

“What you had to.” (Author's note: I used some of the cut Artorias dialogue for this. From the moment I saw this prompt I wanted to use Ornstein and Artorias for it. The fic was inspired by this video.)

[lifelighttheauthor]

Teaching Kids About Successes and Failures - Confessions of a Proud Dad

The first few years of my son's existence had been more difficult than what they ought have been. The first two years of his lifestyles noticed a very disagreeable scenario at domestic between Mum and Dad earlier than they split. The subsequent few years weren't lots better; Dad used to be absent most of the time and Mum's struggles had been getting the higher of her.

By the age of 5, this was once a very scared younger boy with no self-confidence and a terrible self-esteem. Up to that factor it used to be a ways less complicated for me to bypass this, as to well known it additionally intended acknowledging the painful truth of my contribution in the direction of my little boys fears. The different tough phase was once having sincerely no concept how to flip the state of affairs around.

Since then, I've made turning the scenario round to be my quantity one priority, and as such have viewed surprising changes. The primary approach I have been the use of is in reality to take manipulate of some of the experiences he has the place he is dealing with a difficult situation, so as to ease him into it at a price I understand he can be successful at. After every achievement, his development is then bolstered via bringing every success to his awareness.

"When you commenced you have been too scared to let go of my hand, but seem at how some distance you simply swam on your own!" I'd remind him excitedly every week because he started out swimming training this year. "Only a few months returned you ought to barely examine 'dog' and 'cat' - now you can study nearly all the avenue signs! Look at how proper you are now due to the fact of all the exercise you've got been doing!" I'd have a good time with him every day on the way to school.

On every occasion, to begin with he used to be reluctant to renowned his achievements, nearly as if the empowering feeling it would carry him used to be fearfully unfamiliar. It would typically take a few minutes to sink in, earlier than his demeanour regularly modified as his self assurance slowly rose to the surface.

I even made a addiction of taking pictures of all the things to do he had been making growth in as well, printing them out as small posters captioned by way of "I'm properly at... " or "I like... " observed by using the exercise he was once doing in the photo. Those snap shots are on each wall of the residence now, so that he can see them each and every single day (they additionally supply him some thing to practise reading).

My private favored is a image of him striking from a bar by way of each fingers at a 'gravity drop' trip at Canberra's Questacon Science Museum. This 'ride' is a bit intimidating for human beings of all ages, however for my son, it used to be too terrifying to go thru with the first time he attempted.

After ready in the queue for half of an hour staring at the human beings in the front of him drop down this frightening slide, he gave up and got here again to me, crying with disgrace that he used to be too scared to take the plunge. After some other hour or so of subtly working up his self assurance with him, I eventually managed to persuade him to provide it one greater go. He used to be nevertheless simply as terrified as the first attempt, solely this time he pushed himself all the way, and 'let go' of the bar to drop down the slide. (Search youtube.com for 'questacon slide' if you'll like to see precisely what this journey is all about)

When he reached the bottom, his expression indicated a bit of uncertainty about how he must sense about the entire experience. The reward and excited party he received from his Dad about how courageous he used to be for overcoming his concern then again will be continually captured in the image of him dangling from that bar, with the caption studying "I'm proper at being brave." From that second onwards, I assume he eventually realized that bravery is no longer the absence of fear, however the capability to act in the face of it, and simply 'let go'. And let me inform you, given how full of concern this little boy has been, bravery is very tons some thing he has managed to master.

[the-real-xmonster]

The Cup of China Queue

Anonymous said:

Hi! I’m new to FS, and after the CoC I’m thinking I became a fan at simultaneously the best and worst time. I’m starting to understand fans’ pique at the scoring; I thought Wakaba Higuchi would get gold for sure. Zagitova is definitely talented, but for her to get higher PCS than Higuchi, with an unbalanced program and an under-rotated 3Lz? I… feel slighted on Wakaba’s behalf. Meanwhile, do you think Brian’s absence might have contributed to Javi’s disappointing performances?

I totally understand your concern. Sadly, I have to say that questionable scoring is an unavoidable part of figure skating, and it tends to get worse in an Olympic season. The technical panel at CoC, though, was easily one of the worst in recent memory. I’m used to tech panels being strict with one skater and not so much with some others - I don’t like it, but it is still somewhat understandable. What I cannot understand and cannot accept is the way the CoC panel made such bogus calls as counting Mai’s 3F, clearly executed in the 2nd half, at the 2:02 mark, as being in the 1st half and denying her the 10% bonus, calling wrong edge on Gabby’s correct flip while ignoring her flutz. It was incompetency, pure and simple.

Now, Alina’s score, her PCS on its own was not too outrageous, though I would definitely have lowered her PE and CO. It was far from her best performance, and as you mentioned, her program’s structure is clearly unbalanced. I have no issue with backloading jumps as a tactic to raise TES, but if the composition suffers as a result, that lack of quality should be reflected in lower CO.

Wakaba, on the other hand, was criminally underscored in PCS. I’d say on PE and CO she deserved at least 9.0 for her FS and near 9.0 for her SP. On IN, too, comparatively, that she got a lower score than Alina in that area for the FS was just incomprehensible to me.

Javier, well, I feel really bad for him, though I’m entirely unsure what was going on behind the scene that could have led to such a disastrous showing. Could be he was overthinking things, could be he was stressed out about the looming Olympics, could be, as you said, he was uneasy because Brian was not around, could be a combination of everything. But I remember thinking that Javier didn’t look very sure of himself at ACI earlier in the season either, and that was a competition both Brian and Tracy attended, so if I have to hazard a guess, I’d say Javi was dealing with more problems than just Brian’s absence at CoC. I hope he will sort out whatever it is that’s nagging him and bounce back in Grenoble next week.   

Anonymous said:

Hi! If you feel up to answering this (sorry if it’s a bother) what do you think about Wakaba’s and Zagitova’s scores in Cup of China? Also do you think Mai Mihara has chances of making it to the GP Final? I’d like to see her there. Thank you.

For their PCS, see my answer above. For TES, I’d have called UR on at least 2 more of Alina’s jumps (in addition to the 3Lz that got called).

3Lo:

and 3S:

Which, all other things being equal, would have lowered her FS score by at least 4.48 points and meant that she’d have finished behind Wakaba for sure.

By the way, to the anon who asked if Alina has under-rotated jumps: yes, she does, and no, you’re not being too strict.

As for Mai, I’d like to think she has a chance to qualify for the Final, too, and I believe that she deserves to, really (if the technical panel at CoC did their job right, she should’ve earned a Bronze at least). I am, to be honest, not too optimistic about her chance though, seeing that her next GP is in France and the lineup includes Kaetlyn Osmond, Maria Sotskova, and, Alina again…

But I will keep believing in Mai. She’s a fighter, our girl is.

Anonymous said:

Do you know why Wakaba’s step sequence wasn’t lv4?

Anonymous said:

would you be able to shed some light why wakaba only got a level3 stsq? :/

To begin with, Wakaba’s StSq design is still rather conservative in terms of technical difficulty. I have only looked carefully at her FS StSq since it’s the more complex of the two she does this season and what I was able to count is: 2 rockers, 2 brackets, 2 twizzles, 2 choctaws (each pair in CW and CCW), 2 loops both CCW and 1 counter CCW. This planned content by itself is not enough to clear the complexity requirement for level 4: she has 11 difficult turns and steps, but does not meet the feature of 5 pairs executed in both directions.

In addition to that, her edges are not the best during step sequence, though she’s steadily improving and has made a lot of progress this season. I’d say this one bracket for example might have been invalidated:

See how her exit edge was flat and the curve was not immediately clear? I think one of her rockers earlier in the sequence had the same issue, but the camera angle was not good enough for me to verify. So yeah, this is definitely an area she needs to work on. But as I said, she is, and she’s getting better :)

[dorightbyrinley]

Parenting  is spooky

I'm sacrificing nap time for this. Is that wise? Probably not.. But I'll deal with the consequences later!

So today is my all time favorite Holiday, Halloween! *queue spooky scary skeletons* In celebration of this spooktacular time, I've created a list of things that have frightened me as a parent thus far. So here goes!

Diaper rash: We experienced this for the first time last week. It started out with a little bit of irritation, but took less than 48 hours to spiral out of control. I mean, that shit spread like wildfire. Alex and I tried every diaper rash cream under the flipping sun, but to no avail. I wound up calling our family doctor to book an appointment and was lucky enough to score one for the following day. The doc prescribed Rin an anti-fungal cream, and the rash started clearing up within hours. Hallelujah!

The absence of poop: This one is absolutely nerve wracking. One day without poop: Fine. Two: Okay.. Four: Uhh.. Eight: How have your insides not exploded yet?!  Like, where the heck do they store it all? And seriously, I didn’t even know it was possible to so obsessed with another person’s bowel movements. I definitely get way too excited when this kid takes a dump, literally cheering and clapping. It’s sad, really.

The soft spot: Although they say babies are more resilient than you think, I’m still terrified of accidentally giving my daughter brain damage via the soft spot. You see, Alex and I are not perfect parents, but we’ve made it this far without turning her brain into scrambled eggs! Knock on wood.. I mean, don't get me wrong, there's been a couple of incidents where one of us has bumped her head on the bedroom door or the side of the tub, but who hasn't? Don't make me say her name, dammit..

I totally could have listed ten more things.. But Rin is screaming at me.. So I should probably go. Goodnight guys, and happy Halloween! 

[bevioletskies]

20 questions [8/20]

characters: peter/gamora, guardians-centric

fandom: avengers academy/marvel cinematic universe

summary: wasp has a new competition in store for the students of avengers academy, and there’s money involved. so obviously, peter and gamora have to pretend to be a couple in order to win. wait, what?

chapter preview: peter and gamora argue and make up (aka the usual), gamora has a bit of an epiphany, and someone goes missing.

word count: 4804 | total word count: 118k

a/n: the ending of this one makes me happysad every time i read it over, tbh

ao3 | previously | next | masterpost

Janet van Dyne, as the hundreds of students, SHIELD agents, and faculty had learned (sometimes the hard way), was not a girl to be messed with. She wasn’t the strongest, the fastest, or the most skilled of students on campus, but God help you should you get in her way, or even worse, mess with any of her friends.

It had started off as a perfectly normal Sunday morning, of course. She woke up feeling peppy as always, and made her way into the dorm cafeteria/lounge, where Clint and Kate were hovering over the coffee machine, looking desperate, but otherwise dead to the world. She pulled out her green juice from the communal fridge, cracked open the lid with a satisfying pop, and then took a swig, right as she opened Twitter. She then promptly spat it out at the first trending topic she saw, nearly spraying Cosmo and Lucky in the process, who were just innocently sitting on the floor at the Hawkeyes’ feet.

“KAMALA!” she hollered, causing the Hawkeyes to jump. “WE HAVE A SOCIAL MEDIA EMERGENCY!”

Ms. Marvel came dashing in, sliding across the linoleum on her socks, precariously tipping over in the process and nearly braining herself on the doorframe. “What is it, Jan?”

“Why am I seeing this weird, tell-all Twitlonger from some SHIELD agent being DMed to me by hundreds of people?” She stuck her phone in Kamala’s face. “Who is this guy, and why is he saying mean things about Peter?”

“Let me see, girls,” Peggy Carter said, strolling briskly into the kitchen with the no-nonsense attitude that every girl in the Academy revered. She took the phone from Janet and scrolled through the article, frowning. “I can’t say he stands out to me, I wouldn’t remember his face even if I’d met him. He’s rather generically good-looking, wouldn’t you say?”

“He said something about Peter punching him in the face for looking at Gamora,” Janet said. “That doesn’t sound like something he’d do.”

“What’s this about Quill and Gamora?” Natasha sauntered over from the fruit salad station, her eyes narrowed in suspicion. After Peggy showed her the post, her mouth twisted unpleasantly, considering. She wouldn’t put it past Quill and the other Guardians to attempt a long-con to make money, even if it meant a little bad publicity to get into the news. She reasoned that Gamora was the one with a strong moral compass, someone who understood the need to save lives the most after taking so many, and she wouldn’t have taken Natasha’s money regardless. Still, it didn’t clear the suspicions she’d had from the beginning. Maybe this wasn’t the most important secret she had to sniff out on the entirety of the Academy campus (the timefog was definitely a more pressing matter), but it was something Natasha knew she had to look into further.

______

Waking up next to Gamora a second time was decidedly less pleasant than the first, as Peter had been unceremoniously kicked in the gut. With a rather comical shout, he went tumbling out the bed and landed elbow-first on the floor.

Her head popped up over the side of the bed a moment later. “You okay, Quill?” she said, concerned.

“Never better,” Peter groaned, stumbling to his feet. “What happened?”

Her eyes flickered away from him a moment, guilty. “Nightmare,” she murmured. “It won’t happen again.”

He decided not to push it - it was definitely not a topic to be discussed in their game or any context, really, unless she was ready - instead electing to mumble about needing to pee and walking to the bathroom to give her space. When he got back, she was already dressed, her hair braided, face composed once again. She was on her phone, presumably checking her messages and making sure the Guardians hadn’t killed anyone - or each other - in their absence.

“Mantis says there are lots of photos and videos of us online,” Gamora said, turning to face the wall as Peter began stripping down. “They’re referring to us as the ‘hottest new superhero couple’.”

“Alright, I like it,” Peter said as he buttoned up his shirt. “We could definitely be the most attractive superhero couple ever.”

“Always so modest,” she commented dryly, turning back around as he finished adjusting his belt buckle. As she moved to get up, her phone went off with a text notification. “Wait, Janet says there’s a weird Twitter post about us.”

He sat down to do up his shoelaces, distracted by the need to finish dressing. “Yeah, yeah, read it.”

“It says, ‘Star-Lord is a possessive psychopath. He and his girlfriend came to my workplace for some Guardians business, and when I checked them in, I apparently took too long looking over her ID and he lost it. He grabbed me, pulled me out from behind my desk, and punched me in the face repeatedly. It took two security guards to pull him off me, and he kept yelling at me about trying to steal his girlfriend.’” Gamora blinked. “What the hell,” she said flatly.

“It’s that damn Number Five,” Peter said, fists clenched. “My nickname for him,” he added at Gamora’s confused expression. “He’s probably mad he got called out for being a creep, even though I was super non-confrontational about it.”

“And now he’s making people think you’re an over-possessive, violent boyfriend, how is that okay?” she exclaimed. “An untrue slight against you, you’re just going to let that go?”

“If it becomes a problem, we’ll deal with it,” he shrugged, and there was that nonchalant quality of Peter’s that frustrated Gamora so often. It wasn’t just in situations like this, it was on missions, on jobs, where he told everyone he would “figure it out when we get there”, or “wait until we know more”.

“Your talent for improvisation will only take you so far,” she informed him, getting to her feet. “We might need to make a counter statement when we get back. I’ll text Pepper.”

“You do that,” Peter sighed, frustrated. This day was already starting out on a sour note compared to the near-perfect time they had yesterday. He hoped it could only go up from here.

______

Breakfast downstairs was an...interesting affair. The elderly couple from yesterday was there once again, having a petty argument about using the wrong kind of knife for jam, when they spotted Gamora and gestured for her and Peter to join them. They shared stories of their favourite dates and anniversaries, which made the two smile, until they asked how long Peter and Gamora had been together.

“We’ve known each other for a couple years, but we’ve only been dating about four months, almost five,” Peter said, glancing over at a slightly defensive-looking Gamora. The couple motioned for him to elaborate. “I don’t know if civilians heard about the fight us Guardians had back at that time, but my father turned out to be pretty evil and we had to take him out. It was in that moment that I realized I had a giant crush on Gamora, and I didn’t want to lose out on telling her before some other crazy bad guy took us down.”

It still made her uneasy to hear or tell this story, no matter how many times it was spoken aloud. A lie rooted a little too deeply into truth, and Gamora could almost forget that it didn’t actually happen.

After Peter continued to make up stories during the duration of breakfast, the pair headed out to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a place that Mantis had listed and Pepper had recommended. “There’s lots of amazing stuff in there, but I think Gamora would especially love the Arms and Armor section,” she had said, handing them a stack of brochures.

The car ride was uneasy, to say the least. Gamora wasn’t sure why she was so annoyed this time, in all honesty. It wasn’t like this was the most stubborn either of them had been, nor the most dire issue they’d ever gotten into an argument over. And yet, it bothered her that Peter wasn’t planning on doing anything about this. For a guy who cares so much about being called Star-Lord, he doesn’t seem worried about being seen as a violent boyfriend, she thought, glancing over at him. He was humming mindlessly along with the radio, some pop song that played on rotation every two hours. She was uncertain about why he hadn’t switched to an oldies station, but the atmosphere felt too tense for her to ask.

The moment they got out of the car, it was like a switch had flipped. Peter took her hand and guided them to the museum entrance, where they were taken to the front of the queue and let in almost immediately the moment they showed their Academy passes. “Perks of being a hero,” Peter said to her in a sotto voice, slightly concerned that the civilians would overhear and complain. “Where should we start?”

Once they got going, it seemed as if things were back to normal. Gamora found that she was enjoying herself, not just in the Arms and Armor exhibit (though it was definitely her favourite), but in observing the art and furniture of the other exhibits that taught her a great deal of Terran history that she’d been unaware of until now. Peter also seemed to have relaxed a little bit, offering colourful commentary, joking around with her, his hand warm in hers. They seemed so used to it now that she felt as if they would continue to accidentally hold hands after the ruse was up. Or maybe it was just her, unused to the sort of intimacy Peter probably received in spades.

Brave individuals approached them and asked for a photo or for a moment to simply thank them, while the shyer members of the public stared at them from afar, attempting to be discreet in taking videos or photos, only to quickly turn away when eye contact was made. Even one woman blurted out that she thought they looked good together, before turning red in the face and dashing away, clutching at her companion and muttering about how embarrassing she was.

They took a break for lunch when both Peter and his stomach began to complain, tucking themselves away into the American Wing Café for a quick bite. “You alright?” Peter said cautiously, moments after they’d settled in.

“Are you asking after something specific?” Gamora said, tilting her head as she observed Peter practically inhaling his sandwich. “Because if you think I’m still irritated, you’d be correct.”

“I’m just surprised it bothers you so much,” Peter said, frowning. The effect was ruined by bits of lettuce falling out of his mouth. “I get you being worried about Thanos coming to kill me, like, me specifically, but this is just one post making up stories that barely anyone’s listening to. What’s the big deal?”

“You put stock into your reputation but this doesn’t worry you at all. Why?” she countered, leaning back and crossing one leg over the other. “I understand fighting for people to call you Star-Lord, since it holds both notoriety and sentiment, but what about fighting against being seen as a possessive, unreasonable lover?”

“The public have already gotten over it five minutes after it was posted, and I’m pretty sure any girls I’d be interested in from this point on would be smart enough to know it isn’t true,” Peter shrugged, licking his fingers. “Like, you know I’m not that guy. And hell, you were more physically threatening to him than me, we both know it, so who cares?”

Gamora exhaled slowly. “I guess it bothers me,” she admitted. “Not because you aren’t doing anything about it - I’ve come to expect little effort from you on things like this - but because...I don’t like the idea of people seeing you in a negative light.”

Peter smiled softly, reaching across the table to put his hand over hers. She saw a camera phone flash out of the corner of her eye, but instead of turning towards the culprit, her eyes fixated on Peter’s face instead, the signature warmth in his eyes a comforting sight. “That’s awesome of you - no, really - but that kind of stuff doesn’t really get to me. I care more about what you guys think of me than some random people from the public. And I know what kind of guy I am. So that’s all that matters.”

Smiling back, she felt the tension in her muscles dissipate. Contrary to popular belief, she did not enjoy fighting with Peter. “We should get going,” she said. “I want to look at the swords again.”

______

“I am Groot.”

“I know you’re bored, hold on a second - ”

“I AM GROOT!”

“Hey, now, don’t talk to me like that, watch your d’ast language, kid.” Rocket climbed out from underneath the table, where he had accidentally dropped his wrench. He was working on some weaponry that wasn’t all too critical, but since Peter and Gamora were taking their sweet time bringing supplies back in favour of a “romantic” weekend trip, he didn’t have what he needed to continue doing repairs on the Milano. It also meant he was looking after Groot even more than usual, as the other two would usually take him while Rocket was working. “Now, whaddaya want?”

“I am Groot.” His little wooden fingers pointed in the direction of the sleeping quarters.

“I don’t think she’s even on the ship, Groot. Haven’t seen her since dinner last night.” Rocket rummaged through the mess of wires he’d uncovered from one of the cooling units. It was a miracle the thing hadn’t blown to bits with the way they were tangled up.

“I am Groot.”

“Why would I be worried? Nebula’s probably just skulking in a corner somewhere and hissing at anyone who gets too close.”

“I am Groot!”

“What? How did you even get into my communicator, it’s password-protected.” Rocket leapt over to the coffee table, where his holo-tab was sitting, unlocked. He scrolled through his messages for a moment before looking back over at Groot. “Shit, you’re right. We gotta tell the others.”

“Wha’s going on, rat?” Yondu emerged from his room, looking around blearily. He got a suspiciously high amount of naps in for a guy who was supposedly failing a decent amount of his classes and needed to catch up. Then again, the naps were probably what kept him away from homework in the first place.

“Nebula’s somehow off-planet, she’s been spotted on some cluster near the Kyln,” Rocket said, shoving all of his work onto the floor in favour of his tablet, now projecting a map of Nebula’s rumoured location onto its surface. “We should tell Gamora, we aren’t equipped to handle this without her.”

“Shit,” Yondu yawned, scratching himself. “We really gonna interrupt her and Quill’s date night? They should be on their way to that light thing that bug-girl picked for ‘em.”

“There’s more pressing matters than Quill and Gamora getting all kissy-faced, alright? D’you have any idea how much trouble we’re gonna be in if Patch Man finds out we somehow lost Nebula? How did she even find a spaceship - Milano’s busted, quinjets ain’t built for space travel - ” Rocket started mumbling absent-mindedly to himself as his claws flew over the keyboard, attempting to plot a course for Nebula’s location.

Groot went running down the hall of the Milano, extending his arms to knock on Drax’s and Mantis’s doors. “I am Groot, I am Groot!”

Drax came out first, daggers in hand, ready for a fight. “What is it, small Groot?”

Mantis poked her head out from behind her door. She had earbuds in, listening to a playlist Peter had made for her, and spoke even louder than usual. “What has happened?!”

“We gotta cut in on Quill and Gamora’s love trip - Nebula’s missing,” Rocket called from the kitchen, where he was inexplicably rummaging for cutlery. “Can someone contact them already? Don’t have all day, it’s already getting dark out!”

“Rocket, while I understand the need to recover Nebula, what are we supposed to do about it? There are no functioning spaceships on this base,” Drax said patiently, lowering his daggers slowly in mild disappointment.

“We’ll figure it out,” Rocket snarled. “Now get to it!”

______

“Is it bad I kinda just want to spend the rest of the day in here?” Peter asked, flopping down on the bed. He rolled around to cocoon himself in the thick duvet. “I don’t know what it is, but I’ve been kinda tired this whole trip. Not in a bad way, just like a ‘I’m-letting-myself-get-tired’ kinda way.”

“We don’t get much rest at the Academy, so being off-campus probably helps your body relax,” Gamora suggested. “We don’t have to go, then. We can just...stay in. Order more pizza, watch the lights from here.”

“You secretly like pizza, don’t you,” he teased, turning over to look at her.

“Didn’t think it was much of a secret,” she replied, smiling as she set down her bag and her phone. “I adhere to a strict diet to maintain my physicality, but I enjoy indulging every once in awhile.”

“Pizza it is,” he cheered, reaching for his phone. To his surprise, less than a minute later, Gamora crawled in next to him, having apparently already changed into her pajamas in record time. She’d taken out her braids, leaving her hair slightly crinkled and messy, looking more unkempt than he’d ever seen her, but just as pretty as ever. It was good to see her so at ease.

“And maybe a movie?” she suggested, almost shyly.

He nodded more vigorously than he meant to. Gamora’s large chocolate brown eyes were kind of mesmerizing up close. “Yeah, yeah, of course.”

______

Despite still being grounded, the Milano had delved into chaos, what with Rocket leaping about as quickly as he could to gather parts, Mantis and Drax attempting to flesh out Rocket’s flight path plan, Groot bouncing up and down on the kitchen counter in anticipation, and...well, Yondu was sitting on the couch, observing.

He was in charge of contacting Peter, though he wasn’t sure if he wanted to do it just yet. Not because of him being away with Gamora, though that did play a minor role, but because...was it really so crucial to get Nebula back? She left for a reason, a reason that everyone suspected but couldn’t confirm - Thanos. Going after Nebula likely meant confronting Thanos, and Yondu wasn’t in the mood for dying, not today.

Watching the others scramble around like their feet were on fire, you could never tell that Nebula constantly antagonized all of them, only being marginally nice to Gamora when it suited her. Gamora had insisted her sister wasn’t a lost cause, not yet, but it was telling when Nebula bolted the moment Gamora was gone as well. And they weren’t saying it out loud, but the way they were eyeing him? Yondu could tell the others were surprised he was still here when Peter wasn’t, either.

“We really that scared of Fury findin’ out?” Yondu called, tucking the holo-tab away, as if he’d done what he’d been instructed to do. “Maybe he’ll like it better now that she’s gone.”

“It’s not just Fury I’m worried about, you idiot. You wanna face Gamora when she gets back and finds out we didn’t tell her that her sister somehow disappeared off-planet to fight their evil daddy?!” A clang. “Ow.”

“I am Groot?”

“Yeah, I’m okay, thanks. So are you helpin’ or are you hinderin’? ‘Cause if you’re not helping, we could use some extra space.” Rocket’s arms were folded, his chin tipped upwards. Yondu supposed it would be more intimidating if Rocket wasn’t a mere 3 feet tall.

“Pretty sure Quill put Drax in charge, not you,” Yondu drawled, moving closer to stare him down.

“It would be wise of you to assist us, Yondu, unless you would like to have your toes removed.” Drax’s voice, usually jovial at best and monotonous at worst, was dangerously low, his blue eyes like ice.

“Yessir,” Yondu said sarcastically, though he moved over to the table to help. He wasn’t that much of an idiot.

______

“Just once, I’d like to watch a movie with no singing or dancing in it whatsoever,” Gamora sighed as the movie ended, her head moving to rest next to Peter’s shoulder. “I think you’re skewing my perception of Terran culture.”

“Twist and Shout is so good,” Peter said enthusiastically, turning to look at her. They were nearly nose-to-nose (well, Peter’s-nose-to-Gamora’s-forehead. She was uncharacteristically slouched over, her entire upper body pressed up against his). “I could totally be Ferris Bueller, right?”

“As long as you’re not expecting me to be Sloane,” Gamora said, patting his leg.

“I think you’re more like Jeanie,” he countered, leaning closer. “Did you see the way she took out the principal?”

She laughed softly, her hand coming to a stop on his knee. “Alright then, that helped me think of my next question. The Guardians, we think of each other like family. We fight, we argue, but we do it for each other. Do you see Nebula and I as your sisters?”

“No offense to Nebula, but she’s not exactly on the ‘ride-or-die’ level for me yet,” Peter chuckled, wrapping his arm around her shoulders. They were nearly cuddling at this point, body heat radiating off both of them at every spot they were touching. It made him vaguely wonder if there had been something in the pizza that had made Gamora unusually pliant, but even stranger, it wasn’t as odd to him as he thought. She was so comfortable around him now that it made him secretly feel pleased. He couldn’t imagine Gamora being able to snuggle up to anyone since she was a young, innocent girl, and now her arm was slung across his lap like it was nothing, his breath rustling her hair.

“And me?” There was a half-smile on her face, almost flirtatious. It reminded him of when they had stopped over on Knowhere, where Rocket, Drax, and Groot had gotten drunk, and he and Gamora had a moment that he held on to with a surprising fierceness.

“I, uh...I don’t think, that, uh, I think of you as my sister. First of all, it would make this whole fake relationship situation really weird,” he elaborated at her slightly baffled expression. “And you have some...qualities, that I like in girls.” He cursed inwardly at himself the moment the words left his mouth. What was he, some inexperienced ten-year old trying to flirt with his schoolyard crush? This was Gamora, someone that he’d been opening up to in the past few weeks in ways he’d never anticipated.

Thankfully, she didn’t prod further. “But I don’t dance, or quote movies you like, or find you funny,” Gamora said, teasing.

“Oh, you definitely dance.” Peter got to his feet, weaving their fingers together and pulling her up as well. “I think you’ve danced with me enough times to establish that you’re totally a dancer.”

He moved to press play on his Walkman, smiling as the gentle sounds of a chorus and strings flooded the room. Despite having the latest technology available to him soon after they’d landed on Terra, Peter had asked for songs he had discovered later on and truly loved to be put on tape. He liked the idea of continuing his mother’s Awesome Mixes, as if it was his way of responding to hers.

They slowly moved around the room, Gamora sighing as she always did but following his lead. She was slightly on her toes, as her feet were bare, taking away the height advantage her thick-heeled combat boots usually afforded her. Her face was closer than it usually was, and despite the fact they’d kissed just yesterday (was it really yesterday? It felt like decades ago), there was an intimacy present that she was unused to, the feeling of Peter’s breath against her nose that wasn’t too unpleasant.

He then ducked his head slightly, his mouth now practically in her hair, nestled comfortably against her ear. “You give your hand to me, and then you say hello,” he sang, his voice so soft that she nearly missed it. As they turned slowly around the generously-sized living room, she could see the lights from the show flickering in and out of view, bathing them in a warm glow. “And I can hardly speak, my heart is beating so…”

Peter opted to hum for the next few lines, but Gamora felt her face begin to warm. Their perceptions of music were so different. Gamora enjoyed her punk-rock, with lyrics about fighting against the establishment and navigating the hardships of life and death, but there was something so endearing and innocent about Peter’s connection to older songs. He was a modern man in many ways - his somewhat arrogant personality in contrast to his gentle, all-loving nature - but his heart beat in time to older music and movies that celebrated love and life.

She dared herself to look up at him, and there was that softness that she liked so much, a stark contrast from the steely-eyed confrontation they had earlier today and many times before. Their eyes locked as Peter picked up again. “...and longs to kiss your lips, and longs to hold you tight...to you, I’m just a friend...that’s all I’ve ever been…” He broke off to chuckle. “It’s weird, ‘cause this song is pretty slow, but they dance so quickly in the movie. I always thought it was perfect for just kind of...two-stepping...like this.”

Gamora let out a soft breath, unsure of what to say. A breeze whistled by from the open balcony door, disturbing her hair, but all she could see was how it made one of Peter’s curls flop over his forehead. She reached up to push it out of the way. “Do you have a question for me?” She wasn’t sure why she was whispering, or why her thumb lingered on his cheek longer than she’d meant to.

“Sure,” Peter smiled. “You know what I look for in a significant other. What do you look for in a guy?”

“Physically fit,” she said immediately. That was an easy one, she needed someone to keep up with her in training, combat, and...other things. “Disciplined, intelligent, level-headed.”

He chuckled softly. “You describing a life partner or a business partner?” His large hand pressed slightly closer on the small of her back, though the pads of his fingers were still gentle. “Afraid and shy, I let my chance go by, a chance that you might love me too…”

“Then I guess you could say I look for a person who could be by my side in all aspects of my life,” Gamora countered, though her voice remained quiet and even. “Someone to be on equal footing with.”

“Like someone who leads a team with you?” Peter asked, and her eyes widened in realization. Maybe…

“Maybe, exactly, like that,” Gamora breathed, her chin tipping upwards.

It was an unconscious choice by them both, an instinct, really, as they moved together. Gamora’s hands were now cupped in Peter’s, held delicately between their chests. Their bare feet, taking tiny, careful steps, now coming to a stop. Peter’s nose met the side of hers first, and it was so slow compared to the rushed kiss of yesterday, like they had all the time in the world…

“GAMORA! Gamora, are you there?!”

She jumped backwards, nearly stumbling over her own feet. Peter watched her, astonished. He’d never seen Gamora trip before, not without some sort of catalyst. Without giving him a second glance, she turned and walked into the bedroom, snatching up her tablet. “I’m here, Rocket, what’s wrong?” she said, her voice hoarse.

“Yondu was s’pposed to contact Quill but he decided to be a big blue idiot and do nothin’ - your sister, she’s gone! Off-planet, gone to hang out near the Kyln!”

“What?” Peter exclaimed, hurrying over immediately to stand near Gamora. “How’d she get off Earth? Does SHIELD - or Stark - have some space travel technology we don’t know about?”

“Can’t be too naive, Quill, their secrets got secrets. You guys gotta get back here immediately, ‘cause Fury doesn’t know yet and this ain’t something I wanna tell him!”

“We’ll leave right now,” Gamora promised, her voice level, though her mind was racing. “Don’t do anything rash until we’re back.”

She disappeared into the bathroom to start packing and get changed into her combat gear, leaving Peter to stand there, dumbly staring after her, the spell broken.

Oh, you’ll never know the one who loved you so.

a/n: i know i know, i did the cliché thing, though this whole fic is an excuse for me to deconstruct tropes and clichés so shh

the song they’re slow-dancing to can be found here, in reference to this scene from groundhog day.

[hermanwatts]

Sensor Sweep: Conan Companion, Star Trek, Necromancers, Stanley Mullen

New Release (Amazon): By Crom! At long last the definitive history of Conan the Barbarian paperbacks that fans have clamoured for. 107 pages with detailed chapters devoted to each of the mighty Cimmerian’s publishers. Heavily illustrated with many rare images. Plus complete cover galleries of every US and UK Conan title ever issued. In full colour. An indispensable aid to Conan collectors and completists everywhere. Featuring a specially written foreword by Conan comics legend Roy Thomas!

    Star Trek (Huffington Post): The LA Times recently ran a story about the Child Exploitation Section of the Toronto Sex Crimes Unit, which contained a mind-boggling statistic: of the more than 100 offenders the unit has arrested over the last four years, “all but one” has been “a hard-core Trekkie.” Blogger Ernest Miller thought this claim was improbable. “I could go to a science fiction convention,” he explained “and be less likely to find that 99+ percent of the attendees were hard-core Trekkies.” While there may be quibbling about the exact numbers, the Toronto detectives claim that the connection is undeniable.

    Review (Brain Leakage): That said, if you are looking for a great post-apocalyptic read, I want to draw your attention to the work of Jon Mollison. I read his A Moon Full of Stars recently, with the intent of dedicating a full-length ‘Pocky-clypse Now review to it soon. I do still plan on doing that. But I’m probably going to wait until after our daily news cycle looks a little less like the opening credits to the 2004 Dawn of the Dead remake.

Awards (Kairos): … And enjoy a hearty laugh at the incestuous wasteland the once-prestigious Hugo Awards have become.

Predictions that the Hugo field would degenerate into a circle jerk of olpdub purse puppies beloved by editors in New York–and pretty much no one else–have been realized ahead of schedule.

Here’s a partial list of this year’s finalists.

D&D (DMR Books): The Complete Book of Necromancers by Steve Kurtz was released in the spring of 1995, and came and went fairly quickly. Luckily a friend of mine snagged one shortly after it came out. Ostensibly the book was intended for the eyes of Dungeon Masters only, but of course we were hungry to add the new spells and powers to our player characters’ repertoires. Clark Ashton Smith is mentioned by name in the majority of the chapters of Necromancers. While Smith’s absence from Appendix N is conspicuous, Kurtz more than made up for the oversight.

Fiction (Digital Bibliophilia): Any book that opens Page One with a man being skewered by the broken mast of a sailing ship in the middle of a storm has to be good right? Well, I’m happy to say Oath of Blood by Arthur Frazier lives up to its gory opening scene and delivers a fantastic little novel about the clash of the Saxons, Normans and Vikings during the 11th century (1066 to be precise). Arthur Frazier was one of many pen names used by the prolific Kenneth Bulmer.

Gaming (Jeffro’s Space Gaming Blog): Charisma. It’s not just a dump stat, they say. But look, if you don’t have a lot of it, you’re going to be stuck in a career as an assassin. Which is kind of funny, actually. Of course if you were going to actually use that stat in an AD&D game, you’re going to have to flip to the middle of the combat section to find the reaction table. Why is it there right in the middle of sections detailing initiative and missile discharge? Evidently this something pretty important to consider when the players have initiative in a random encounter, right?

Fiction (Dark Worlds Quarterly): Another writer who has left a huge legacy with little recognition is Gardner Francis Cooper Fox (1911-1986). Fox began his career writing for Batman as early as 1939. (It was Fox who gave Bruce Wayne his “utility belt”.) During his decades long career with DC, he would work on such characters as The Flash, Hawkman and The Justice Society of America. He was there when Julius Schwartz revamped DC comics to meet the new “Comics Code”. He was there when DC invented its Multiverse.  Outside of DC, he would pen the first Sword & Sorcery comic called “Crom the Barbarian”.

Fiction (DMR Books): The book being advertised was Kinsmen of the Dragon by Stanley Mullen. I was completely unfamiliar with both the title and the author. A bit of research revealed that this book had never been reprinted since its publication in 1951, which explains why it’s so little-known today. In spite of (or perhaps because of) its obscurity, good condition copies are pricey, usually going for over $50, and signed copies are much more.

Fiction/Gaming Tie-in (Karavansara): Two nights in Arkham: Lovecraft purists often frown at Lovecraft-inspired fiction. The main charge raised by these people is, other writers are either too much like Lovecraft or not at all like him, often at the same time. The second most common accusation is that certain stories are too action-centered and adventure-oriented, filled with guns blazing and chanting cultists. They usually blame Lovecraft’s popularity with the gaming crowd as the main reason for these degenerate pastiches, in which Indiana Jones or Doc Savage seem to exert an influence stronger than Nyarlathotep’s.

Fiction (Mostly Old Books): he Fargo series tell the tales of early 20th Century adventurer and solider of fortune Neal Fargo. They aren’t Westerns as the covers suggest. In this installment Fargo is hired by a rich old blowhard to rescue some Mayan treasures and the excavation team, which includes his son, from the jungles of Central America.

Cinema (The Silver Key): 1917 had been in my “to watch” queue for a long time (aka, floating around in the back of my mind), and last night I watched it with my older daughter, a self-described “film buff” who wanted to see what the hype was all about. Two word review: Excellent film. It’s an intensely personal/soldier’s journey type of story, and also manages to convey the larger tragedy of the Great War.

Fiction (Sacnoth’s Scriptorium): The Inklings and the Mythos (Dale Nelson). So, I’ve now recovered the missing issue of MALLORN* containing Dale Nelson’s wide-ranging inquiry into possible connections between the Inklings and Lovecraft’s circle, “The Lovecraft Circle and the Inklings: The ‘Mythopoeic Gift’ of H. P. Lovecraft” (MALLORN 59, Winter 2018, pages 18-32). It’s a substantial piece, and in it Nelson raises such topics as the following: Did the two groups read or were they influenced by each other?

Fiction (Scott Oden): In the past few weeks, my sophomore novel, MEMNON (Medallion Press, 2006; Crossroad Press, 2018), has received a raft of four-and-five star ratings on Goodreads and a pair of excellent reviews — which, for a fourteen-year old novel is no mean feat.  Author Matt Larkin, in his review at Amazon, writes: “Evocative prose paints a living picture of the Classical world while the sudden, brutal violence serves to remind us never to look at history through rose-colored glasses.” While Scott Marlowe of Out of this World Reviews praises many things, including the battles: “I can only describe [them] as spectacular and right up there with some of the best battles I’ve had the pleasure to read in historical fiction (think Bernard Cornwell, surely one of the best of them all). Memnon gives Alexander such grief I imagine Alexander remembered their contests right up until his dying days.”

Fiction (Tentaculii): Lovecraft’s famous survey of supernatural literature was published in The Recluse in August 1927. Later in the same year Eino Railo published the history of the literary gothic in The Haunted Castle: A Study of the Elements of English Romanticism. A December 1927 review in the New York Evening Post suggests Railo’s book was published in time for the Christmas market and the January book-token crowd, and thus it appeared several months after Lovecraft’s circle had finished digesting his Supernatural Literature. Lovecraft refers to The Haunted Castle, a translation from the Finnish, in admiring terms in a later letter to Barlow and terms it a study of “the weird”.

History (Men of the West): Suddenly the war became fun. It became exciting, carnivalesque, tremendous. It became victorious and even safe. We awoke on the morning of Sunday, the 30th of July, with the feeling that the war was won — in spirit, if not in fact. Patton and the Third Army were away. At the 8th Corps, which held the western sector of the Normandy front, the G2 colonel said: “We’ve lost contact with the enemy.”

Fiction (Tentaculii): The second half of a forthcoming book, No Ghosts Need Apply: Gothic influences in criminal science, the detective and Doyle’s Holmesian Canon (October 2020), attempts to make the case that there are gothic traces in what are often assumed to be the ‘rationalist’ Sherlock Holmes stories. Sifting the extensive blurb for the book, one can eventually determine that the author suggests the following specific points… * intrigue and secret societies. . .

Fiction (M Porcius Blog): Let’s check out four stories by Mickey Spillane’s all-time favorite author, Fredric Brown, that first appeared in beautiful pulp magazines in 1942 and 1943, magazines that you can read at the universally beloved internet archive for free. “Etaoin Shrdlu” made its debut in Unknown Worlds in 1942.  The cover of Unknown may be boring, but the interior illustrations are quite fine, those by Frank Kramer for L. Sprague de Camp’s “The Undesired Princess” in particular.

Sensor Sweep: Conan Companion, Star Trek, Necromancers, Stanley Mullen published first on https://sixchexus.weebly.com/

[alexdmorgan30]

11 Ways to Heal a Broken Heart in Recovery

Heartbreak. At 14 or 54, we’ve all been there, but today we push through the pain, one-day-at-a-time, cold brew sober. And here’s what’s helping me now, because, despite what still feels like an endless volley of water balloons hitting concrete beneath my breastbone, the fibrillation is in my mind, not my chest cavity, and that scrappy muscle thumps on, still propping me upright each morning to face my new reality.1. Find that God of Your Understanding and Glom OnWhen I reached Step 3 with my sponsor, I got an assignment: flesh out your concept of a higher power, in writing. Lisa M. wanted detail, a God I could see and talk to, and grab by the elbow. And because I’m neither original nor progressive, I came up with a male God in human form — a cross between Santa Claus and Mr. T. to be exact. With a twinkle in his eye and a glint off his gold tooth, my HP is jolly and generous, strong and sexy, and funny as hell.And at this moment, when I’m finding myself on the sucky side of one-sided love, it’s not bad to have a real hunk who loves me for an HP. After an especially vicious salvo, when the heartbreak balloons start to leak out the eye sockets, I can HALT, remember the in-breath, and picture HP (and yes, predictably, I’m looking heavenward). Funny, his response is always the same: with bronzed torso and silver beard, forearms flexed and crossed over a white undershirt, the big man in the sky stares down at me, then starts nodding reassuringly. Suddenly, he flashes that easy smile and I know I’m good.2. Slam the SlogansH.A.L.T., Easy Does It, Turn It Over, Just for Today, Live and Let Live, This Too Shall Pass, When One Door Shuts Another Opens, Fear Is the Absence of Faith, The Elevator Is Broken - You’ll Have to Use the Steps. I’ve become something of a short-order chef when it comes to using a few well-chosen words to support my sobriety. Day and night, I sling slogans, flip affirmations, and call out quotes from famous dead people. I’ve scotched them to the inside of my kitchen cabinets, along with the 3rd, 6th, 7th and 11th step prayers. They are the comfort food my soul craves now. “Success is moving from failure to failure with no lack of enthusiasm.” - Winston Churchill. “If you want to be loved, love and do loving things.” - Ben Franklin. Words that nourish, as I’m waiting for the kettle to boil. Having well-chosen words highly visible in the kitchen (or as a screensaver) can be a real lifesaver!3. Phone TherapyAnd here’s a slogan I’m slamming hard today: “We drank alone, but we don’t stay sober alone.” The old timers carried quarters, and I make sure I leave home with my phone fully-charged. I listen to a morning meditation walking to the train, text three newcomers on the platform, compose a longer text to my sponsor in transit, then dial my best sober gal pal as I push through the turnstile on the final leg to work. I send silly GIFs to lift spirits, including mine, and add a trail of emoji butterflies, praying hands, and peace signs. By 8:00 a.m., the lonely in me already feels not so alone.4. Explore PodcastsRecovery Radio Network, Joe and Charlie, and the Alcoholics Anonymous Radio Show are three in my queue. On my lunch hour or driving upstate, I take 30-60 minutes to laugh, cry, and identify…5. Make a Gratitude ListMy first sober Christmas, going through a divorce with two kids still believing in Santa, the above-mentioned sober gal pal suggested I find ten things for which I was grateful, save them to my phone, and recite them like a mantra through the Twelve Days of Christmas. I did:1. My sobriety 2. My sons 3. AA program of recovery 4. AA fellowship 5. Food in my stomach 6. Roof over my head 7. Colombian coffee 8. My dog 9. My extended family 10. God (HP has since moved up to the #1 slot)It worked. I said no to nog that first Yuletide, and made merry for my sons instead. And counting off my blessings still works today, when I’m a shallow-breathing shell just going through the motions.6. Make an Extended Gratitude ListWhen the restless, irritable and discontent in me keeps spilling the glass half-full and this positive punch list isn’t getting me over the hump, I pour out ten more things to celebrate, like: my pre-war bathtub, which holds upwards of 60 gallons of bubble bath and the fact that I live within easy walking distance of two subway lines so I can always get into the city on weekends.7. Make Meetings“Meeting Makers Make It,” “Get Sober Feet,” “Carry the Body, the Mind Will Follow.” These three slogans in particular encouraged me as a newcomer, and I’m calling upon them now, in cardiac arrest, when my heart needs serious heartening. So I’m hitting my home group, and getting hugs from retirees with double-digit sobriety who pass fresh Kleenex and envelop in equanimous smiles. I’m also checking out other meetings across town, then going out for...8. Fellowship AfterwardsI’ve started tucking my Boggle into my handbag when I head out to my Friday night meeting. At the secretary’s report, I pull out the box, shake it, and invite anyone interested to a nearby diner for passable pie a la mode and a few rounds of a three-minute word game. Sometimes it’s Yahtzee. We roll the dice and down bottomless cups of bad coffee. Last week someone brought cards, and I lost badly at hearts (ha!). It’s good, wholesome fun, and by the time I hit my pillow, I’ve significantly pared down the number of waking hours I could have spent obsessing over-ahem-HIM.9. Self-CareSelf-care is somewhat self-defined. These days, after I’ve covered the basics—eat, sleep, bathe—I’m noodling what more I can do to support my mental, physical, and spiritual self. Prone to self-pity and self-indulgence just now, self-care is really urgent-care. So I ask: am I under-meditating and over-caffeinating? Am I speeding up at speed bumps? Am I four months behind in balancing my bank statement? Am I using money to buy what money can’t buy and damn the consequences? Am I treating every Monday like Cyber Monday and abusing the free delivery feature of Amazon Prime? Have I forgotten yoga and found red velvet cake in Costco’s freezer? Are my spot checks spotty lately because I just don’t want to cop to this alcoholic acting out, and instead keep blunting the full force of feeling??? Yes to all of the above. And this leads me back to Step 2: turn to top management for a takeover.Working Steps 2 and 3 is probably the most caring thing I’m doing for myself today: seeing the unmanageable, then seeing the way out. And also forgiving myself for these self-indulgent splurges. So what that I’ve added three pounds to my midline and three pairs of silver sandals to my shoe rack? The rent is paid, and my latchkey kids still let themselves in after school and seem content to eat my crockpot soup and call this home.10. Get on your Hobby HorseWhen was the last time you read “Chapter 6: Getting Active” in Living Sober, that handy paperback that’s not just for newcomers? This month I’ve been making good use of subsection 6B: “Activity not related to A.A.”The anonymous authors suggest “trying a new hobby” or “revisiting an old pastime, except you-know-what” (Yea, Amstel Light). Fat chance I’ll pick up cabinetmaking, leathercraft or macramé, but I am baking granola and simmering bone broths.I’m also revisiting my adolescence with amateur YouTube ballet routines by hammy-thighed figure skaters and dancing to Heavy D. music videos late into a Saturday night. I’m choosing happy music over sad, and tuning in to The Messiah, not Blue Christmas.I’m even considering “Starting on long neglected chores” like editing my nearly obsolete recipe binder, now that I’ve found Pinterest. And while I can’t claim to be going out of my way “Volunteering to do some useful service,” I am trying to be more useful on my job. And just as helping a newcomer find a meeting helps me, helping a kid graph algebraic equations makes me feel purposeful (when otherwise I feel like a mess).11. Become a card-carrying member of the “No Matter What Club”For God’s sake, whatever skillful or unskillful actions you end up taking during this time of triage, please don’t drink over him or her. They are not worth it. (And I’d put money down—money that I don’t have—on a bet that they’d agree with me.)Voila! My top eleven tips to help you over the hump of heartbreak! Take what you like and leave the rest.Have you had your heart broken in recovery? How did you heal? Let us know in the comments.

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