#my roommate invited me to a movie on Wednesday and I turned him down

[insomniumstella]

An angsty prompt of roommate!bucky? Like just imagine you’re two idiots who are mutual pinning after each other, but obviously y’all don’t know that you’re in love. I might need some angst there....🥺👉👈

bucky x reader

warnings: some adult themes, a bit of angst, can’t think of any others

word count: 3,279

Monday

Their usually empty apartment is scattered with people tonight, soft sounds of music and chatter in the background.

“You didn’t tell me Barnes’s new girlfriend would be here.” Wanda and y/n are preparing drinks in the kitchen, because who wants to only drink straight vodka or beer. Other duties, such as setting up food in the living room were left to the remaining Avengers, and y/n sincerely hopes they can handle it because last time Sam tried opening a bag of chips he spilled them everywhere.

“She’s not his girlfriend.” She raises an eyebrow, finishing each Mojito with a sprig of mint “Besides, he forgot to tell me.” I do not have feelings for Bucky Barnes, she thinks after noticing Wanda’s apologetic look.

“Of course you don’t” She replies sarcastically, almost singing ‘of course’ for emphasis. Surprisingly the living room looks neat and peaceful when they come back, people sitting on every free space they were able to find, floor including.

“Might have to get you and Barnes a bigger apartment because this shoebox isn’t cutting it.” y/n dismisses Tony’s comment because this apartment is often empty anyways due to frequent missions. Still, it’s cozy; when Bucky suggested they live together, because it’s totally normal for two friends to do so, even if they can get separate places, y/n took up the decorating. While it was not necessarily fancy, multiple fairy lights, and about a million photos made the place feel inviting and safe. Bucky would agree too, having spent hours on the worn out couches, whether it was drinking with the boys or reading, something he recently took up. Steve removes his hand from the couch’s arm rest and nods his head as if saying come sit here, which y/n does, cozying up half on the arm rest, half against Steve’s body. He’s nursing a beer, and smiles at her when she finally settles.

“Truth or drink?” Natasha suggests, taking a shot of vodka straight from the bottle, using her Mojito as a chaser. Y/n turns her head to look at Bucky, whose eyes are burning holes in the side of her head, snickering when she turns her gaze to his new girl and notices her disgusted expression. Yeah, it’ll take her a while to get used to us. Sam’s up first to ask questions. He snatches the bottle out of Natasha’s hands, passing it to Tony, and thinks for a minute before asking  “Have you ever been in an orgy?”

“That’s one way to start the game.” Tony laughs before taking a shot. He doesn’t have to answer for others to know. “My sweet Natasha, who here do you think is packing the most?”

Somehow she has managed to find and open a bottle of tequila; it’s been a rough week for her. Taking a shot “Steve.” She answers. “Steve, when was the last time you had sex?”

“Do all of these have to be sexual?” He’s blushing hard; talking about things of this nature is still weird and uncomfortable for him, but so’s drinking hard liquor. “Two days ago.” There’s oohs and ahh’s filling the room, and y/n takes notice of how Steve leans into her, almost as if to escape people’s eyes on him.

“C’mon guys, Steve’s right, at least let’s ease into the sexual questions. Hey Bucky, who do you think is the sexiest person here?” That’s a good way for him to include his new girl more, y/n thinks, but to her surprise, Bucky’s taking the bottle of vodka from Tony and taking a shot. The teasing stares from Wanda, y/n tries ignoring for the rest of the game.

Tuesday

“Who do you think is it?” Natasha is still wandering about last night when Bucky decided to take a shot instead of answering who’s the sexiest. For a spy, she’s surprisingly unaware. It’s just the girls at the apartment, because y/n invited them over after James announced he’s going a date. It worked out kind of perfectly; girls nights are very important, yet neither of them can remember when was the last time it happened. Thanking the delivery guy and coming back into the living room with a pizza, y/n turns to Natasha.

“I think the real question is what made you think Steve’s packing the most, when our team has a literal God?” A deep crimson colour paints Natasha’s cheeks. She’s hangover from last night, so it’s one of the rare times anyone ever sees her blushing. y/n knows she’s got her; two days ago, after a mission gone wrong, she decided to sleep at the compound, and guess who was sneaking out of Steve’s room in the middle of the night? As the sun sets, the conversations get more open, and wine bottles, one by one, disappear from the fridge. It’s about 1am when Bucky comes home to find a messy apartment and his girl sleeping on the couch; Natasha and Wanda somehow managed to drunkenly call a taxi back to the compound. Not my girl, he corrects himself after the thought accidentally crosses his mind, I have a different girl, he thinks.

“You’re home.” y/n slurs, reaching her arms out to hug him.

“I’m home.” He chuckles, leaning down to pick her up, bridal style.

“Did you have fun?”

“Not as much as you, apparently.” He answers, walking up to her bedroom door, opening it, and gently places her on the bed. “You’ll have a lot to clean up tomorrow.” This is not true. Bucky Barnes will clean it up himself, the way y/n does after he has one too many. “Goodnight sleeping beauty.” And with a kiss on her forehead she’s out. Not my girl.

Wednesday

Winding down after a long day is one of life’s most simple pleasures, and with Halloween right around the corner, a spooky movie marathon was bound to happen.

“Beetlejuice or Hocus Pocus?”

“Neither of these names mean something to me?” Bucky’s answer sounds more like a question. Of course he wouldn’t know the names of the two classics, yes, life really has been rough on him, y/n thinks. She’s sitting on the couch with a bag of popcorn, legs comfortably placed on the coffee table, when Bucky comes out of the kitchen and puts their drinks down. “Also, you drink too much.” He points out her wine obsession.

Leaning her head on his shoulder after he sits down “You talk too much.” She answers. It feels weird to sit so close when he’s seeing someone, but hey, this is Bucky, the guy, she’s been living with and crushing on for months, she might as well enjoy this while she can. Besides he’s acting casual about it. Not, he’s not casual about it. From the inside at least, because yes, Bucky looks completely calm, reaching down to her lap to grab some popcorn from time to time, but his heart is skipping beats a little too much for his liking.

Maybe next time Steve’s staring at her with those love-filled eyes, I should just tell them to get a room? Bucky considers, this is too hard and at least that way, I won’t see her as much. He’s so still she wonders if he fell asleep, but the turning of his head assures he didn’t. His lips form a smile and she smiles back. I wish Bucky liked me back, like how Steve likes Natasha, y/n thinks to herself, they’re so cute together.

“I don’t like this Beetlejuice guy or whatever he is.”

“I think he’s charming in a way.” y/n lifts her legs from the table and places them over Bucky’s, so she’s sideways and looks up at him.

“You’re charming in a way.”

“Oh sergeant, thank you.”

“Said no one, ever.” Y/n laughs and playfully hits him with one of the many decorative pillows they have placed on the couch.

“You love me, Bucky Barnes.”

Oh you have no idea. That he doesn’t say.

Thursday

8am

Knife, gun, extra ammo; yes, pretty much everything she’d need she has on her. 

“Don’t die out there, pretty lady.”

“Okay, Birdman, shut it.” y/n teases as they both walk up to where Bucky’s standing. “This mission is like a piece of cake, right Buck?” But he doesn’t answer, lost somewhere in his own thoughts, face painted in worry. “You alright?” She asks when Sam goes to check on Cap, placing her hand on his shoulder. “This is an easy task.”

“It’s not the mission I’m thinking about.” He shrugs, but there’s no time for her to answer, because Steve is already opening the quinjet door, shouting at them to prepare for jumping.

8pm

“You’ve been quiet all day. If there’s anything, no matter how small, you know you can talk to me.” They’ve been hiding in some random bushes, the apparently quick and easy mission turning into something no one expected.

“Do you like Steve?” Bucky’s face is completely serious, no teasing eyes, no toothy grin he usually has when talking about guys with her.

“Of course I like Steve.” Like a brother or a friend. “This is what’s been bothering you?” y/n laughs, because it’s funny, surely he must know she likes Steve, otherwise why would they spend so much time together.

Yes, that’s what’s been bothering me. “No, just something that I thought of right now.” He manages to smile, but it’s the fakest smile y/n has seen on him yet. “Did you ask him?”

“Yeah.” y/n scrambles to get her phone out of her suit pocket. Of course she texted Steve, asking if they can pack up and go home already as the suspect they were after has not shown up all day.

“Cool.” It’s cool she asked him if he liked her back, James thinks, it’s for the better, “What’d he say?”

Unlocking it, y/n opens up the text messages app “He said yes, we should head back to the jet.”

Looks like they might be going on a first date tonight, Bucky takes a deep breath, that’s good, right?

Friday

Whatever has been bothering Bucky all day yesterday, y/n’s glad is gone. He walks into the meeting holding two trays of coffee, passing them out to those attending.

“Good morning.” He smiles at her, after sitting down and turns his head to look at Steve, who’s standing at the end of the table, ready to start the meeting. His hair is messy and he looks peaceful, a little too peaceful, considering last night’s failed mission. y/n laughs.

“Something you can say to all of us?” She shakes her head and they both share a look which makes Steve’s cheeks turn pink.

“Nothing, Captain.” They both know y/n is mocking him and Natasha, after overhearing her scream the word over and over in the gym’s locker room; the screams clearly cause by pleasure of them going at it.

Bucky shifts in his seat uncomfortably and speaks up “I think we should start, as me and Sam don’t have all day, right Sam?” Whatever Sam’s caught in the middle of, he’s not a fan.

“Actually, I’m not that busy to-“ He’s cut off by James.

“Well, I have a date so start talking lover boy.” He says casually, his words filling the room with an awkward silence, before Steve goes over the plan for their next mission.

Saturday

“Are you sure you don’t mind if a couple of my old college friend come over today?”

Every free Saturday they like to go grocery shopping together. Bucky’s attitude is much better than it was in the meeting yesterday, which is good, except y/n keeps sourly wondering if the reason for that is the date he had.

He picks up a carton of eggs “I’m eggcited!” And places them in the cart. “Butter than ever.” Bucky says putting butter in there too. They’re at a different aisle when y/n notices him reaching for a jar of jelly.

“Don’t you dare-“

“Just don’t be jelly if they’ll give me more attention than they’ll give you.” He laughs.

“I should have never used a single pun in the grocery store around you. Hey, mango annoy someone else.” y/n laughs back, pointing at the fruit. She drags him away before he can grab the olives and say you know olive you.

There’s not much time left to set everything up when they get back, but as Bucky once called them, they’re a super duo. Y/n’s reaching for the wine glasses when the doorbell rings, and before she can make her way to the door, Bucky’s already answering. If he wasn’t into y/n so much, and if he didn’t have a girlfriend, he’d definitely go for her friends, he thinks and scolds himself right after.

“So you must the boyfriend y/n has been telling us so much about?” Wait, this is confusing.

“I’m n-“ Y/n quickly interrupts him.

“Yes! Guys, meet James, a man who is very much real, and very much my boyfriend, right?” Her hand wraps around his waist and she’s looking up at him with the act along or I’ll kill you kind of eyes. This is going to be fun.

“Yes ladies, please come in, it’s nice to meet you.” He gives them his signature smile, and as they pile into the living room, y/n pulls him aside to whisper “They can’t know I’m single.” Maybe if he wasn’t so excited about pretending to be her boyfriend, he would have heard the fact, y/n is not dating Steve.

The evening is hard to describe, because yes, the girls somewhat miss each other, however y/n can’t help, but notice the jabs they take at her for being an Avenger, and their wondering eyes at Bucky. He, on the other hand, is doing a great, too great, of a job at being her boyfriend. Anything she needs, he get up to get her, his arm tightly wrapped around her waist, before he’s pulling her onto his lap completely and to top it all, the language he’s been using is driving y/n crazy. She knows he’s enjoying this very much, but the phrases like would you like some more wine, darling? or is my baby comfortable on my lap? are affecting her more than she’d admit.

“So tell us, y/n, how did you score a man like this? I mean the constant fighting you’re doing can’t be good for that body. Does it look like a cutting board underneath the clothes?” Okay, maybe Natasha was right about them being bitches the first and the only time she met them.

“Believe me, everything is smooth and tight there.” Bucky winks, hands resting on top of her thighs; that evening he tries to say the most provocative words to keep her busy from noticing the thick bulge forming in his pants. She’s so busy at enjoying their jealous faces, it works.

Sunday

It was the most beautiful morning October in New York had to offer yet. Last night was a lot; maybe it’s time y/n reconsiders finding new friends, because to say that was exhausting is underestimating. It’s almost like y/n is on autopilot, letting her feet take her wherever they want. For better or worse, she ends up at Bucky’s favourite breakfast spot, noticing him and his girlfriend through the window. She’s mad, stuffing her things into her purse, and storming out of here, yet James is weirdly unbothered, slowly sipping his coffee; he waves his hand at her to join him when he notices y/n outside. A big plate of waffles is bound to make anyone’s morning better; they don’t talk while they eat. It’s only when the waitress refills both of their coffee mugs that y/n speaks up. “So what happened?”

“Told her this was never going to work out.”

“I’m sorry.” She’s really not. This is one of the best thing to happen all week, and besides Bucky doesn’t look sad, so it’s not bad to feel happy about it, right? He doesn’t answer her. When the waitress comes up with their check, he quickly snatches it, so y/n doesn’t have an opportunity to pay, and they both put on their jackets before leaving.

“Would you mind if we go to the Central Park for a bit? I know we have to get to the compound by 12pm, but-“

“Yes, why not, I’m sure Steve won’t get mad.” Bucky forces a smile, he won’t because you’re dating? He thinks. This is y/n he’s thinking about, so why is it so hard to just straight up ask if she’s dating Steve or not. Could it be the fact, he’s too scared to heard the words, I am? Bucky doesn’t recognise where they’re going; y/n moves through many parts of Central Park before arriving at an area he’s never seen or been in before. It’s very secluded, but how has he never been there before still blows his mind. “I love the view here.”

“Me too.” Bucky isn’t talking about the park.

“Look, I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable last night, I should have told you, that they thought you were my boyfriend. I shouldn’t have been so scared to admit, that yes, I’m single, so what?” Wait what?

“What do you mean single?”

“Single, as in no boyfriend? Bucky, do you not know what single means?” y/n laughed. Oh, Bucky knew very well what that meant.

“So you’re not dating Steve?” He wanted to punch himself so hard at this very moment. What other parts of this has he missed, in fact, it totally wouldn’t of made sense for her to pretend Bucky was her boyfriend if she was dating Steve.

“No, I mean he is very attractive, but I don’t li-“ y/n turned her head to look at Bucky “why would you think I was dating Steve?” This was very confusing, however she couldn’t get excited just yet, so what that he thought she was dating Steve? It does not mean that’s the reason he never made a move on her; perhaps he didn’t even like her.

“The way you’re always touching, the looks you exchange. He’s practically undressing you with his eyes.”

“James, Steve is dating Natasha. Why else would she say she thought he was packing the most? Surely, she’s seen it.” They sat down on the only bench near by, y/n bringing her knee up to her chest out of nervousness. “Who do you think was the sexiest person in the room that night?” Bucky was avoiding her eyes.

“You.” Be a man James Barnes. “You’ve been the sexiest person in the room ever since we met.” He thought for a moment “That sounded better in my head, but you know what I mean.” Standing up, y/n pulls Bucky up with her; nerves always make her fidgety.

“Bucky, I like you.” He looks like he’s about to say something but y/n continues “I liked you being my fake boyfriend more than I should have.”

“To be honest, I was doing more than a fake boyfriend should have.” He chuckles. Taking his phone out of his jean pocket, Bucky dismisses Steve’s call, because whatever it is, can wait. “I like you too.” A comfortable silence falls between them, Bucky’s hands resting on y/n’s waist. In truth, the whole moment lasts about a couple seconds, but it feels like a lifetime to them both. Brushing the hair behind her ear, Bucky leans down and connects their lips together. It’s something worth waiting for; passionate, intense, and y/n cannot wait to run her hands through Bucky’s hair to bring him closer. “Perhaps next time they come visit, I’ll be your real boyfriend?” She does; lightly grabbing his hair she brings him closer.

“Perhaps you will.”

[kumkaniudaku]

Simple Syrup

You asked for Daveed smut and I tried to deliver. At least this one time. Enjoy!

Warning: Sexual Content. 18+. 

Daveed Diggs x Black!OC (Olivia Jenkins)(Yes, the MC/ OC is black. Representation is important.)

"Yo, open up!" Heavy fists beat against the door of Olivia's downtown apartment, making her roll her eyes. "I know you can hear me, girl! It's your favorite pop-up roommate!"

"You've been evicted, Diggs!"  

"I paid you rent, though!"

Turning the stove on low, Olivia shook her head as she wiped her hands on a dishtowel. Daveed always found a way to surprise her with his presence. He never texted before showing up at her door but frequently sported a backpack or suitcase full of clothes or Rafael for an extended stay. He and all his baggage were welcome anytime, with or without notice.

Stepping to the door, Olivia bit back a smile before responding. "I didn't receive any payments this month."

"I got it in my bag."

"Bag or bags?"

"Open the door to find out."

Daveed took a step back as the locks began to turn, waiting for Olivia's face to greet him with faux anger the way she did the last time he showed up out of nowhere and stayed for three weeks. Despite stopping by six months ago, it felt like a lifetime since he'd been in her company. Bi-weekly phone conversations weren't enough. He needed to be near Olivia while she watched whatever Housewives franchise had her attention for the month.

When the door opened to reveal the long hallway leading to her living area, Olivia stood with a hand on her hips and a grin on her face.

"Where is my money," she asked, shifting her weight from foot to foot. Just as she expected, he stood in the hallway with a suitcase that she knew cost a fortune to check at the airport and his worn Jansport full of junk and work.

Daveed laughed and bent to rifle through his backpack for a crumpled white envelope that he handed over with exaggerated purpose. "Here you go, Miss Jenkins. Sorry to be late on rent for, what, 8 months? I hope this is enough."

"Boy, you didn't really need to pay me. You're not on the lease."

"Good," he answered as he pretended to wipe sweat from his brow. "Because those are just Chick Fil A coupons."

Olivia stood with her mouth open as Daveed brushed her to roll his luggage to the first bedroom on the right.

He listened to her insult his "stupid face" and instruct him to hurry up while he scanned the room he had called home more times than he could count. All of Daveed's belongings were in the same place, with almost unnoticeable shifts to show that Olivia had cleaned once or twice. His favorite throw blanket was folded at the edge of the bed with his initials elegantly embroidered in the corner. The air smelled of the vanilla candle she kept on the nightstand next to a framed photo of the crew enjoying a roller coaster at Six Flags. His favorite trinket, Olivia's homecoming crown from undergrad, sat next to a single gold medal from Daveed's days competing in track and field. To him, it symbolized their bond from the beginning. To her, it was probably just a space to hide old items.

"Daveed, get in here! I need you to cut!"

All at once, Daveed's sense of self returned to center him in reality. He quickly kicked off his shoes once he remembered Olivia's rules and started off toward the kitchen to answer the call for his help.

Even with the windows open, he could smell savory and sweet aromas combining for a smell that reminded him of the holidays. However, the calendar placed them square in the middle of an excruciatingly hot summer. He could see the open bottle of BBQ sauce on the center island next to a mixing bowl full of things he couldn't recognize but knew they would taste great. Bushels of greens sat in a pot on the stove, boiling amid smoked meat and seasonings to complement the food cooking in the oven. Daveed felt excitement take hold of his face and forced the apples of his cheeks up toward his eyes. Olivia looked up from her task at the cutting board and smirked.

"I thought you were vegan now."

"My business is my business, Liv. We talked about this last week."

"We also talked about you heading directly to Toronto after your job in Atlanta and, yet, here you are." She studied Daveed's face for answers but found nothing but a growing smile. "Come over here and cut up these strawberries while I sauce the ribs."

Daveed followed directions without complaint, lazily strolling to the island and nudging Olivia away. He'd been her help in the kitchen before to open pesky jars or stir while she tended to the more time-intensive parts of the meal. On more than one occasion, he had fucked up, and each time she invited him back into her safe space with open arms.

"How's Rafa and the family," Olivia asked with her back turned while she bent to take a peek into the oven.

Daveed kept his eyes on her backside for a moment too long before answering. "Rafa's good. Amy sends her love and says that you are more than welcome for Friendsgiving this year. She volunteered you for pies."

"You volunteered me for pies, Daveed," Olivia corrected, knowing how much her friend loved her desserts. "What about my babies? Is Santiago the best big brother to Emelia?"

"He's...trying. But he did send a gift for the lady with the bald head. His words, not mine."

Olivia ran a hand across her tapered fade and chuckled. "I feel like he heard Rafael say that."

"No, Rafa calls you Thick Mr. Clean."

"Yeah, because that's what you said when you were drunk on New Years," Olivia accused as she gestured toward the cabinet housing her wine glasses. Daveed nodded before answering.

"I said it with love!"

"Mhmm, I'm sure."

Together they watched half a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc be transferred into the separate glasses, waiting for the moment they could take a sip. The last time they shared a drink, they ran through two 12- packs of beer with Rafael and ended up dancing with street performers in Times Square. She hadn't been able to stomach the smell of a Budweiser since then and fully transitioned to fruity notes and sparkling Rosé with Daveed occasionally coming along for the ride.

Taking another long sip from his glass, Daveed leaned against the island counter to watch Olivia stir a mixture for skillet cornbread.

"What's got you so stressed?"

Olivia shrugged but didn't look away from the bowl. "Nothing. I'm fine."

"The last time you cooked like this, you were writing your dissertation. And the time before that, it was your mom."

The room fell quiet outside of the spoon, ricocheting off the sides of the mixing bowl. After several seconds, Olivia took a deep breath and looked up at Daveed.

"Daddy's getting remarried. Omari and I are his best-kids," she laughed. "I'm not stressed. Just a bit...sad, I guess?"

Daveed understood the issue without needing more context. Five years ago, he was the one sitting beside Olivia on the floor of her brother's home office after the news came that their mother had in the hospital. He was there for the saddest funeral he'd ever experienced and the months of reconciliation that the family struggled through on the way to some sense of normalcy. The idea that her father had found love again was heartwarming, but Daveed knew the occasion was bringing up old feelings.

"Wanna talk about it?"

She shrugged again and moved the skillet to the oven. "There's nothing to talk about. I said I'm fine. I wish she was here, ya know, but I know she isn't upset. She always told us to move on once she's gone. She sure as hell would."

Daveed chuckled at the idea of Mrs. Jenkin's moving on in the afterlife. "She was funny like that. I remember when she met me for the first time and kept calling me Devante."

"Yes," Olvia exclaimed, a spark of joy returning to her eyes. "She'd call me and be like, that boy Devante is smart! Ask him if he can put me in a movie one day!"

Olivia's voice warped to imitate her mother as best as possible before she burst into laughter with Daveed.

"One of the last things she said to me was that I need to make sure you keep having fun. She didn't want you to stop enjoying life on account of her."

"Yeah…" Daveed watched Olivia down the wine in her glass with her eyes closed, waiting for her to continue her thought. "Well, you're doing a good job. We could work on your definition of fun, but solid effort so far."

"How can I do better? I'm open to criticism."  

Daveed kept his eyes on Olivia while he reached across her body to grab the wine bottle for the final drink. Her breath hitched while alcohol buzzed through her system, creating the perfect storm for sudden arousal. She fought her thoughts by shaking her head to recover.

"You can start by grabbing those strawberries and bringing them over to the stove."

"Don't skip the question." Daveed's smirk as he followed her to the other side of the counter made Oliva hot with embarrassment, but she kept a calm exterior. "Are you still having fun with me?"

"I always have fun with you, D, you know that. Who else is gonna play Bop It with me at 2 AM on a Wednesday? The question is, are you still having fun with me, superstar?"

"Don't start that. I come and stay at your house because I miss you, not because I can't find somewhere else to sleep. You're my person."

"For now," Olivia added as a rebuttal, ignoring the way her stomach flipped at hearing the way Daveed felt. "What happens when you get married? You're gonna have to go be a family man like Rafa. Then we'll only see each other on Friendsgiving and Christmas."

"We'll cross that bridge when we get to it."

"Hm." Olivia's short but skeptical laugh effectively ended the conversation. Still, Daveed had already made up his mind to return to the discussion later in the week. "So, how long are you here this time?"

Daveed used one of his large palms to push a few curls off his forehead in search of relief from the heat in the kitchen. "I was thinking a couple weeks. Three or four."

"That's longer than normal! I get to have my favorite guy here long enough to help me put wallpaper up in the guest bathroom?"

"Am I only muscle to you?"

"Of course, not," she answered with a sweet smile, making Daveed mirror her expression. "You're also a taste tester. Open up."

Before Daveed could object, Olivia swiped barbecue sauce across his bottom lip for his opinion. The tip of his tongue appeared to taste the tangy brown sauce, finding an explosion of flavor that reminded him how much he missed Olivia's cooking.

"What's the verdict," Olivia asked over her shoulder as she turned off the eye under her simple syrup mixture.

"Tangy and sweet. I'm not sure why you don't bottle this up for sale. My dad would love some."

"Meh, I like having it as a treat for the people I love. All my hobbies aren't for profit, my friend."

Daveed dramatically threw a hand across his chest and gasped. "Did Mean Ole Liv just imply that she loves me? I-I'm gobsmacked. Utterly shocked and eternally grateful."

"Diggs, you're pushing it," she laughed. "Come taste this syrup before I start on the lemonade."

From experience, Daveed knew what to expect. But he humored Olivia anyway if only to see pride light up her face when he told her how amazing the sweet mixture tasted. After washing his hands in the sink, he skimmed his middle and pointer fingers across the top of the syrup to pick up enough to coat his fingertips.

He eyed the liquid for a moment, watching it slowly trickle down the side of his long fingers while he thought of his next move. Olivia stood at the refrigerator with her back turned, humming a song from The Wiz. At the same time, she gathered ingredients for the beverage.

"Hey...hey, Liv." Daveed had already started to close the short gap between them and stood waiting for Olivia to respond to his call.

"Wha -" A sudden swipe of syrup across her bottom lip confused Olivia. "D, what is your problem?"

Stepping forward, Daveed took her chin in his to bring their lips inches apart. "Is it still cool if I taste?"

Olivia stared at Daveed without blinking, fighting her brain for a competent answer to his question. Instead, she nodded in a daze with her jaw slack. His fingers took gentle meandering paths across the peaks and valleys of her face before using his thumb to part her lips.

Daveed's first kiss was a tentative peck to test the waters. When he received no resistance, he pulled Olivia closer for full access to her mouth.

Neither of them expected to fall into the kiss so easily. Olivia didn't expect to melt into Daveed's body while he dictated the pace and intensity. Daveed didn't expect to feel an overwhelming desire to consume the one person that always felt so close but far away. He wanted to feel and taste every part of Olivia while he had the green light. She reveled in Daveed's attention, even if it was only for a moment.

Taking a step backward, Daveed used his knowledge of the kitchen to guide them back toward the stove. Their lips remained connected to taste the last bits of each other. Olivia was the first to break the lip lock and move her head upward, directing Daveed to choose a spot on her neck to explore.

The cold, sticky simple syrup came next, the thick glob landing on the center of her chest and sliding to her cleavage.

"I've thought about this a lot," Daveed spoke barely above a whisper as he used a finger to spread simple syrup across Olivia's chest. "Kinda wild to say, but I have."

"How long?"

"A year. Maybe two."

Olivia released a shaky gasp once Daveed's tongue began licking from the space between her breast to the base of her neck to catch the simple syrup. As quickly as it disappeared, he replaced the sugar mixture with another round at the juncture of her neck and shoulder. He groaned as the tart strawberry flavor mixed with the sweetness of the sugar and Olivia's skin. She grasped the back of his head for stability, allowing her eyes to flutter closed for a few seconds.

"How does it turn out? In your thoughts, I mean?"

Daveed paused to kiss Olivia's lips again and run his hands down her back. "Doesn't matter. We're here now, and I can't think of anything outside of how good you taste drenched in strawberry sauce."

"Simple syrup," Olivia answered, smiling as she sneakily dipped her finger into the pot behind Daveed. "It's simple syrup, and I haven't gotten a taste yet. Open your mouth."

They kept their eyes on each other while Daveed opened his mouth, waiting for whatever came next. Olivia took her time to coat his tongue in syrup, imagining how it would feel to experience the concoction from his mouth.

There started the mad scramble to get closer, taste more and touch longer. Separate but equal desires to completely consume the other person had the pair maneuvering around the kitchen. They remained attached at the lips until they reached the solid wood breakfast table near the large casement window. Daveed was the first to remove clothing, pulling his t-shirt over his head and tossing it somewhere behind him. A split-second decision had him rushing back to the stove to retrieve the syrup pot. He carefully placed it on the table while Olivia slid the straps of her summer dress down her arms to let the fabric pool at her waist. Daveed watched with a flirtatious smile, marveling at the expanse of her warm brown skin. Olivia returned the sentiment, letting her eyes rake over his broad chest and toned midsection.

One after the other, Daveed and Olivia added bits of syrup to different body parts to lick and suck the skin clean. A handful mistakenly dripped onto Olivia's thigh, and they watched the sticky liquid carry small chunks of strawberries to the inner portion of her leg.

Daveed regarded the sight with wonder before carefully dropping to one knee for a better look. He maintained eye contact with Olivia as he kissed his way to the sweetest spot, lingering in places that earned the most desirable response. The scratch of facial hair combined with his lips and tongue's soft, silkiness made Olivia keen for more. She could feel the blood rushing to pool at her inner thigh for a bruise that would leave evidence of a dream achieved. She smiled at the thought of seeing it when she was getting dressed and how her stomach might feel with butterflies from the memories.

Daveed mumbled praise after praise into the supple skin of Olivia's thigh before starting a journey back to her lips. When he returned, he slowly pushed the waistband of his sweats down his hips and legs.

"Oh," Olivia spoke, eyes wide while she fought the natural desire to let her gaze travel. "I...wow, okay. I feel like I'm violating you."

"I'm kind of asking you to," Daveed laughed as he stepped closer.

"This is so fucking weird. Are we really about to do this?"

"Only if you want. I mean, I want to, but we can stop whenever you say the word."

He was closer now, dropping kisses on her shoulders while he pressed their chests together to reduce the space between him.

Olivia's legs naturally hooked themselves around his waist at the same time that her arms circled his neck.

She leaned forward to speak against Daveed's lips with her eyes hooded in lust, "I want this."

Passion and the hint of strawberry coating their lips intensified the moment between Olivia and Daveed. He held her writhing hips steady while he stood on his toes to push forward. Simultaneous moans of pleasure rang out in the kitchen, surely gaining the attention of nearby neighbors.

Their hips bucked an even pace, repeatedly meeting to build tension in their bellies. Daveed felt the strain of each stroke in his thighs and calves but found the desire to fuck his friend on her kitchen table to override any other immediate discomfort.

"Are you a talker," Daveed asked randomly, making Olivia's eyes snap up from the action below her waist to focus her attention on him.

"What?"

"A talker. Do you like to talk during sex?" His question came between labored breaths and grunts holding a mixture of exertion and indescribable pleasure.

"Daveed, are you trying to have a conversation with me right now?"

"I mean, I like to - fuck - I...I like to talk sometimes. Is that cool?"

A high-pitched moan ripped through Olivia's throat before she could gather her senses to respond. "It's your c-call, Diggs. Just don't stop."

He followed directions without skipping a beat, digging into his strength to pick up speed when he sensed they could move to the next level. He peppered in filthy statements that stimulate Olivia's mind while driving into her with expert precision.

They held on to each other as they reached separate peaks with no regard for the climbing noise level.

"I wanna do this forever," Daveed whispered into Olivia's ear before nipping at the lobe.

"Not look into my eyes lovingly and write songs about me?"

Daveed chuckled and snapped his hips forward, earning a near-silent moan. "Can I use you calling me daddy on the hook?"

"You got a lot of work to do before that happens."

"I'll put in overtime."

Splaying his hand across Olivia's torso, Daveed pushed her to lay flat on the table before leaning to hover over her body. He used his waning energy to give her all the power in his hips, searching for a climax. When she thought she couldn't come anymore, Olivia felt her body jolt off the table once the pad of Daveed's thumb began rubbing tight circles on her clit. Daveed smiled at the reaction but felt it disappear as soon as his hips falter mid-stroke. He rushed to pull out of Olivia, fearing that if he stayed inside for a moment longer, he would expedite his journey to fatherhood.

Olivia helped his cause by curling her fingers around his length and joining his pumping effort while she propped her body up on her elbow. He came with a choppy moan and heavy breathing on her belly, his chest rising and falling rapidly in time with the stove's timer beeping for attention.

Both Olivia and Daveed dissolved into laughter.

"Please, don't let this dry on me. It's sexy now but a pain to get off later."

Daveed's laughter climbed to hysterics at Olivia's mention of the mess on her stomach before reaching across the table to grab napkins out of the centerpiece component.

"Sorry," he apologized sheepishly as he helped wipe her clean. "Condoms next time?" 

"Or my mouth."

Daveed stood shocked for a split second while Olivia worked to readjust her clothing and hurry to the stove. He followed her lead and pulled up his sweats before clearing the syrup pot and grabbing wipes to disinfect the surface.

The room was silent while they arranged hot dishes on the counter and privately grappled with having sex for the first time. A sense of "now what" hung in the air, which made Daveed more and more uncomfortable.

After plates were fixed, they chose opposite ends of the table to enjoy the meal.

"You know," Olivia started, laughing as she swallowed the last piece of cornbread on her plate. "That simple syrup recipe is my mom's. This whole meal was her favorite thing to cook, and I made it because I was really fuckin' sad and needed her nearby. Then you showed up."

Daveed's eyes snapped up from his plate. He wasn't sure what to say and remained silent in hopes that Olivia would elaborate.

"A couple weeks before she died, she told me that she would still be directing my love life from Heaven. She grabbed my hand and said, 'Dammit, Bean, I'm gone get you a man even if I gotta do it during bingo with the good Lord.'"

"You think she's up there winning the grand prize?"

Olivia shook her head. "I think she forfeited it to send you to me."

Her answer made Daveed still to watch Olivia's eyes meet his set from across the table. She reached a hand across the table with her palms facing upward, beckoning Daveed to place his palm in the center of hers.

"We have three weeks to figure this shit out," Daveed said, smiling before bringing Olivia's palm to rest on his cheek.

She looked at him for a minute to take in the way his eyes reflected the sun before using her head to gesture toward the pot still resting on the counter.

"And all night to finish off mama's recipe."

[mistymazzello]

Illicit Affairs | chapter 4

Joe Mazzello x Reader

summary-Y/N, a failing actress in New York City, is offered an internship as Joe Mazzello’s assistant on the set of a movie. Her seemingly small crush on her boss could get her into trouble, but what does she have to lose?

word count- 6.1k (i got a little carried away)

warnings- smut, unprotected sex, all that stuff. (by reading on you’re confirming that you’re 18+😳)

a/n- i promise this last week and i’m just now posting it and i’m SO SORRY. pls let me know what you think!

based on illicit affairs by taylor swift

September turned over to October, bringing cold weather and days that slowly became shorter. You were done trying to stop your feelings for Joe, there was no stopping how you tirelessly obsessed over him. It made it worse that it almost, almost felt like he was reciprocating. But still, not quite. 

Joe finally started lightening up on scheduling, giving everyone a few days off every now and then and not having extremely early call times. This meant you weren’t leaving the apartment at 6 in the morning and coming back at 8 anymore, leaving time for you to be around your roommates. Now, did you want that time? Not exactly.

Cameron had hardly spoken two words to you since everything that happened the previous month, leaving an awkward tension always hanging around the apartment. One morning, the sky completely gray, leaving the city shakingly cold, Cameron walked into the kitchen while you stood on the phone as you poured coffee.

You were talking to Julia, who had called you to ask if you had any time to do some of her busy work for her, which you weren’t necessarily sure if you did, but you agreed to anyway. The phone call ended with her making some Fleetwood Mac reference that you didn’t understand, but you laughed either way. You hung up and set your phone down as you slowly stirred your coffee, Cameron sitting on a stool on the other side of the counter.

“Was that the director?” She asked softly.

You looked up, slightly stunned. “Um, no. Producer.” You answered.

She furrowed her eyebrows. “What does he want?”

“She just has some things that she needs me to do today.” You said. It was weird that she all of the sudden was trying to talk to you.

“So you like working on the movie then?” She asked.

You blinked. Was she trying to actually talk to you? “Yeah, I love it. I think it’s great.”

She nodded. “You think the movie’s gonna be good?”

You could’ve smiled. This was the first conversation the two of you had in weeks. You had to admit, you missed your best friend. “Yeah, actually it looks really good. I’m excited for it.” 

You pulled another mug from the cupboard and poured the rest of the coffee you had made into it, sliding it across the counter to her. She accepted it, picking it up to wrap her hands around it.

“I’m sorry that I got so mad.” She said, looking into her mug. It was a little late for an apology, but still, you accepted.

“It’s okay. You were upset.” You shrugged. 

She nodded and took a long sip from her coffee, still never looking up to meet your eyes.

“So can we stop being weird now? I miss how things were.” You said, setting your own mug on the counter.

She laughed slightly. “Yes. I was hoping we could stop doing this.” She smiled.

You sighed in relief and finally, things were normal. How they were supposed to be. Things felt more in place than ever as you went to set that day. Today was supposedly going to be very easy, but you had a sneaking suspicion that you were going to be there rather late.

Just as you had suspected, before you knew it, the sky was turning dark. Joe finally called it a day at 8, much to everyone’s relief.

“Go get some sleep, kid.” He hit the back of your head with his clipboard playfully.

“First off, ow.” You laughed, holding your hand to the back of your head.

“Have a good night, Mr. Mazzello.” Beck spoke as he pulled his jacket on.

“You too, Mr. Beck.” He saluted him.

A loud sigh escaped your lips as you wistfully watched him walk away. Why did he have to be so nice to you?

Something you had noticed was how close this cast and crew was. You weren’t as involved in that closeness as you would have liked to be, but you figured it was because you were much younger than all of them, and you were just about at the bottom of the food chain in terms of power.

You saw a few cast members congregating near Joe, so you decided that you weren't going to interrupt to tell Joe goodbye, you figured you could just text him something about heading out instead.

A little ways away from you, Joe saw you waving bye to a few people and his heart sunk. Before thinking, he cut off one of the actors who was talking. “Hey, do you care if I invite Y/N?”

A few people turned around to look in your direction, luckily you had your back turned to them.

“The intern?” One of them asked.

Joe quickly realized how desperate he must have sounded asking like that. “Yeah,” He said, shrugging, “She’s nice, I think you guys would like her.”

He wasn’t lying about that. He knew everyone would like you, and you were nice. But he wanted to invite you because he desperately wanted to spend more time around you, specifically outside of work.

They all agreed, and the conversation moved forward about the bar that they were going to that night. Joe excused himself and jogged over to you, right as you were about to leave. 

You saw him coming out of the corner of your eye and you turned in his direction, smiling. “Hey, I was just about to go.”

Disregarding what you said, he asked, “Me and a few people from the cast are going out for drinks, do you wanna come?”

“Tonight?” You responded, a bit taken back. You were a little too excited to be receiving this offer, but you tried your hardest to conceal the smile that was already on your face.

“Yeah.” He said, “I think we’re just gonna uber there in like 20 minutes.”

You weren’t used to receiving invitations like this, especially since you left college. “Oh.” You said, trying not to sound like a complete spaz. 

“So if you wanna stick around, I can tell you when we’re leaving?” He said, his hands in his pockets as he rocked onto his toes.

“Yeah, sure.” You smiled, wringing your hands together. 

He nodded and looked at the ground. He could hardly believe the way he was acting right now, it reminded him of high school. He was acting like a complete idiot, all because of you. All because of that stupid smile on your face.

“Oh,” he remembered, “and don’t tell Beck. He’s not invited.” He winked before walking away. He really shouldn’t be picking favorites like this, but how could he help it when one of you was a stuck up asshole and the other one was as sweet as you were?

Regardless, you were glad he liked you. It gave you some sort of validation for your feelings, even though deep down, you knew that your crush on him was hopeless.

When you showed up to the bar, it was freezing outside, yet incredibly warm inside. By the time you were shedding your jacket, which was only seconds after sitting down, Joe had ordered shots for everyone, saying that you had to take them in honor of the 12 hour day you had just worked. There were about 11 or 12 of you, spread out between a few booths. The bar wasn’t terribly busy, taken that it was a Wednesday night, but still, this was New York City, so places were always bustling. You were sat by Julia and a few of the other girls, subconsciously clinging to Julias presence like she was your mom. You got talking with a few of them, all of them remarkably talkative. The girl across from you, Charlotte, who was probably the closest to your age out of everyone, began talking to you about the internship.

After you explained the whole situation about how you got the internship, conveniently leaving out the part about Cameron, you were about to ask her about how she had got casted, but she spoke first. “You know, everyone loves you. No offense if he’s your friend, but I think I speak for everyone when I say we prefer you over Beck.”

“Oh, god, he’s not my friend.” You laughed. “He hates me.”

“Oh my god,” Her eyes lit up “He hates me too! I’m always like, dude, you need to calm the fuck down.” She said, picking up her drink to take a sip.

“Me too! He always says I’m unprofessional.” You frowned.

“I think he has some personal issues he needs to sort out.” She said.

“Mommy issues.” Julia piped up before finishing off her glass.

The three of you laughed, the attention shifting swiftly over to the girl sitting next to Charlotte, Lola, who was whispering something in her ear. 

“Oh, god, Lola, don’t be gross.” She groaned.

Lola pulled away and grabbed her drink off the table then looked back at Charlotte. “Wish me luck.” She smiled.

You tilted your head slightly as she stood up from the table, walking slowly over to the bar. Wondering what she needed luck for, you tried not to stare as she approached the bar. You didn’t pay any mind to Joe, who was standing next to her, until she began to talk to him.

Your face flushed as you realized what she was doing. She was trying to flirt with Joe. It wasn’t until you looked back at the table until you realized that Charlotte and Julia were both looking at her, too.

Julia looked back and you exchanged a glance. “Is she...?”

“Trying to sleep with Joe? Yes.” Charlotte said, looking slightly disgusted.

You didn’t say anything as you looked into your drink, swirling the glass around as you contemplated your defeat. She was at least 7 or 8 years older than you, much closer to Joe’s age, an established actress, and much more in his league. All at once, you began to realize how stupid you were for ever thinking you and Joe had something between you. 

“She could get into big trouble for that.” Julia chided. “It’s in the contract that all of you signed. No relationships.”

“Does fucking count as a relationship?” Charlotte set her chin in her palm.

Julia chuckled. “No, I guess not, if it’s not ongoing.”

“Ah, then she has a chance.” Charlotte said, all three of you turning your attention back to the two of them.

Over at the bar, Joe's mind was scrambling. He wasn’t stupid, he knew what Lola was doing. He’d seen it a million times. He wanted to be nice, but he wanted to cut this off before it went any further and he had to reject her. He had been waiting for the right moment to approach you without making it seem like he was hitting on you. He genuinely just wanted to talk to you.

But, as the minutes passed, Lola was not taking any hints. She continued to talk, continued to touch his arm playfully, even though Joe was reciprocating none of it.

Julia ended up leaving within the next 30 minutes, saying something about how her partying days were far behind her. You and Charlotte stayed at the table, ordering drink after drink, giggling as you talked about your past relationships, it almost made you forget about what was going on across the room.

“I have you beat on the worst breakup.” She laughed. “A guy once broke up with me after I flew across the country to see him. On my birthday.”

You gasped dramatically. “No.”

“Yes.” She laughed. “Arguably the worst day of my life.”

The two of you sat, giggly and tipsy, for a few quiet moments. “Why didn’t I know you were so fun?” She asked “I feel like we’ve hardly ever talked before and we’re around each other everyday.”

You sighed. “I don’t know. I just feel like a bit of an outsider because I’m so much younger than everyone.” You opened up. If you didn’t have any alcohol in your system, you would have never said this to her.

“Aw,” She frowned “Like I said, Y/N, we all love you. Everyone always mentions how sweet you are.” 

“Really?” You smiled.

‘Yes, really. Especially Joe. He never shuts up about you.” She said. 

You looked into her dark eyes and tilted your head. “What? Really?” Your heart could’ve jumped out of your chest.

“Yeah, he’s always like ‘Oh, I’m gonna wait up for Y/N. Have you seen Y/N yet today? Y/N this, Y/N that” She imitated him, her hands waving around as she did a horrible impression of his voice.

You laughed a little, your smile never faltered. Was she telling the truth? Did he talk about you so much that she had noticed it?

You finally remembered the whole Lola thing, your eyes glancing over the bar. Now they were sitting down, she was leaning over to him, talking, as he took a drink. You sighed and looked back at Charlotte, who was downing the rest of her third or fourth drink.

“I should probably go pull her off of him.” She sighed, her eyes following yours over to the bar. “She’s drunk as fuck, she needs to go home and maybe try again when she’s not wasted.”

She gave you a pat on the head, making you smile, as she stood up. “I’ll see you on Saturday.” She said, giving your head one last pat before walking over to the bar. You watched as she came up behind Lola, resting her hand on her back and giving her a soft smile as she spoke to her. It was obvious that Lola was resisting, but Charlotte was persistent, and she eventually hopped off of her chair and followed her. The two of them waved to you as they walked out of the bar, you gave them a quick grin and waved back. You almost sighed in relief. You had finally made some friends.

Joe was now sitting by himself at the bar, and you alone at the table. As long as you didn’t try anything like Lola did, you didn’t think it would be weird if you went and sat by him. Maybe that was the alcohol talking, but you still got up and walked over to him, pulling the stool out to sit down next to him.

When he had originally heard the stool next to him move, he thought it was just another girl trying to talk to him, and he almost let out an exasperated sigh. But it wasn’t just another girl. It was you. Instead, he sighed in relief.

“Hey, kid.” He said, taking a drink from his beer.

“Hi.” You said, scooting the chair in.

“You have fun?” He asked, setting his beer down to turn to you.

“Mhm.” You nodded. “Charlotte’s so nice.”

“Good.” He gave you a closed mouth smile. “I’m glad.”

You realized that you had left your drink back at the table when you all of the sudden had nothing to do with your hands. Joe must have noticed at the same time, because just as you were about to order something, he beat you to it.

“Can we get two shots of fireball?” He asked.

“Oh god.” You set your face in your palm. 

“Don’t worry, you don’t have to drink it.” He said.

“What, you’re going to take both to try and impress me?” You giggled, setting your forearms on the counter.

He shook his head with a small laugh as the bartender handed them over. He set one in front of you and one in front of him.

“Okay.” He started. “Truth or drink.”

“Oh,” You smiled “I can do that.”

“Ladies first.” He smirked, crossing his arms as he looked at you. It almost felt like he was taunting you, his arms almost making you drool as they stretched out his shirt.

You smirked back. Only thinking for a quick moment, you knew what you wanted to ask. “When’s the last time you slept with someone?” You asked, a cocky look on your face. Even if you were crossing a line by asking that, you could hardly care. It felt hotter than it did when you had first gotten there, but that could be coming from the warm feeling in your cheeks from the alcohol. Or because you were blushing. He wasn’t going to answer something like that to you.

He tilted his head slightly, looking at the shot. “Last month?” He estimated. You were a little bit shocked that he answered, and that he didn’t hesitate to do so.

Your eyebrows must have been raised or your eyes must have been wide, because he asked, “What? Did you think I was gonna say 3 years ago?” 

“What? No,” You laughed “I just… who?” You asked, almost out of instinct. Almost out of jealousy.

“Nope. Not your turn.” He shook his head. He leaned closer to you, prompting you to lean closer to him. “If you had to have sex with one guy in this bar, right now, who would it be?” He said, his voice low, even though no one around would be able to hear anyways over the buzz of the crowd. 

You hummed in thought, turning away from him to look around you. “I think…” You started, turning back to lean forward into him “the bartender down at the other end is cute enough?” You lied.

Joe’s jaw clenched. He didn’t know what he expected, but he couldn’t help but be disappointed. Before he could respond, you cleared your throat, unbeknownst to him that you had noticed his reaction. 

“My turn.” You smiled. You went back and forth for a little while longer, desperately trying to ask a question to get the other person to drink, but nothing worked. The bar was loud, there were lots of people around, but still, you could only see each other. You could only feel the way his shoulder was rubbing against yours, you could only smell the whiskey on his breath and you could only think about how much you wanted him right now.

A few rounds later, it was Joe’s turn. He could feel the heat radiating from your face, and he thought your top was ridiculously low cut. Especially when you leaned over the bar. The way your knee would bump his was driving him crazy. It prompted him to come up with this question.

“What’s the oldest you’d be willing to sleep with?” He said, his expression straight and serious.

You reached to rub the back of your neck under your hair as you thought. Your heart began to quicken as you thought of all of the possible responses, until you finally settled on what happened to be one of the most risky answers. “Well,” You began, subconsciously leaning in so you were closer to his face, “How old are you?”

His jaw clenched again, but this time, not out of anger or jealousy. Out of lust and pent up desire.  “Oh,” He said, his hand which was already brushing your knee moved from his leg to ghost over the top of yours. “Is that how it is?” His hand came to rest on your thigh, and he slid it so it was just slightly underneath your skirt on the inside of your thigh. 

“Joe,” You breathed, closing your eyes as you clenched your thighs, trapping his fingertips. 

“Yes?” He spoke softly into your ear, his voice low and sharp.

“Please.” You pouted, still not opening your eyes. His hand was warm on your inner thigh, but not as hot as the heat radiating from under your panties, which you thought Joe could for sure feel.

Just like that, he ripped his hand away from you, earning a whine from your lips as you leaned your head back. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet, your eyes watched his hands intently. He pulled out a 50 and tossed it onto the bar, then stood up. He grabbed your wrist and pulled you off your chair. “Let’s go.” He grumbled, lightening his grip on your wrist to let his hand slide into yours. He practically pulled you out of the bar, and even though it was a cool fall night outside, you were still burning up.

He hailed a cab quickly as your head spun by how quickly things had turned. Even though both of you were as horny as you had ever been before, he still opened the taxi door for you. You climbed in, settling in the seat on the opposite side of the door before Joe climbed in, telling the driver his address quickly before moving to the middle seat to immediately grab your inner thigh roughly. Your hand wrapped around his bicep, you squeezed his arm to try and distract yourself from the wetness pooling in your underwear. His grip was deathly and his breathing was harsh as the two of you sat in heated silence. You had to physically try to stop yourself from making any further moves on him, opting to rest your forehead on his shoulder. In a moment of sweetness rather than lust, Joe kissed the top of your head lighty. Although the moment did make your heart melt, you still couldn’t focus on anything other than how badly you needed him.

“How far are we from your apartment?” You lifted your head up to whisper.

“Like 2 minutes.” He said. You let out a low, short groan. 

“I know, baby.” He whispered.

You had decided that this had been the longest two minutes of your life. Between the way Joe’s legs kept twitching, to how his hand was slowly moving up your thigh, riding your skirt up, you were almost on the verge of tears by the time you pulled up to Joe’s apartment. He handed the driver some money, mumbling something about keeping the change as the two of you climbed out.

He grabbed your hand and you both tried not to sprint into the apartment building. The elevator ride was almost as excruciating as the taxi. You couldn’t keep your hands off of each other, his hand moving from the small of your back to squeeze your ass, earning a sharp breath in from you.

He fumbled with the key as he tried to unlock his door as quickly as possible. As if you could get anymore impatient, you were 2 seconds away from ripping the key out of his hands and doing it yourself when he finally opened the door, grabbing you by the fabric of your shirt and pulling you inside. It was pitch black, the only light coming from the city lights outside the windows. Using the grip he had on your shirt to turn you towards him, he pulled you into him. He kissed you messily, slowly backing you up until your back hit the door. It was a mess of clashing teeth and tongue as you desperately kissed each other, all of the pent up desire coming out all at once. You wrapped your arms around his neck as you stood on your toes to kiss him, his hands moving from your hips to your ass. He slid one of his hands down to the underside of your thigh, lifting your leg up so your knee was at his side. He growled into your mouth and you could only manage a whimper, your mind scrambling for a single coherent thought. He lifted his leg slightly to rub against your core, his jeans creating a rough texture. Instinctually, you grinded against his thigh, but your movements were limited as he had you pinned against the door.

He broke away, moving his lips to bite your earlobe. You let out an exhausted moan, dipping your head back to hit the wooden door behind you. He lifted his leg higher at this, almost lifting you off your feet by your core. 

“Joe” You sobbed, your fingers pulling at his hair. You felt him smile against your neck.

He moved his head back up to kiss you again, this time his hands on both sides of your face. This kiss was slower, but just as passionate. He pulled you to the bedroom, not bothering to turn on any lights on his way there, opting to find his way in the dark. You already noticed that he had a habit of pulling you by the fabric of your shirt. Something you could definitely get used to.

Once you did make it to the bedroom, he wasted no time pushing you backwards onto the bed. Your back bounced against the mattress and you sat up on your elbows as he crawled on top of you, meeting your lips again. He grabbed both of your hands and held them for a second, then slowly moved them so they were pinned above your head. His grip wasn’t tight, but it was enough to keep you in place. 

He pulled away to hover inches above your face, both of you panting. “I’m gonna ask you this, and I’m only going to ask you this once.” He said darkly, his voice overcome by lust. 

You nodded eagerly, yet still staying silent.

“Do you want me to fuck you?” He asked deeply.

You nearly moaned at the tone of his voice. 

“Need to hear you say it, baby.” He growled.

“Yes” You cried, begging him to do something.

That must have been a tipping point for him, because he let go of your wrists and tugged at the hem of your skirt, pulling it along with your underwear down and off of your legs. He tossed them to the ground and grabbed you by both of your thighs, lowering himself so his head was in between them. 

He groaned as he looked at you, his grip slightly lightening as he admired how wet you already were. He placed a kiss to your lower thigh, looking back up at you. You were splayed out on his bed, your hair hanging in your face, your chest heaving. A sight he could get used to.

From there, he wasted no time diving in between your legs, licking your clit as he wrapped his arms tightly around your thighs, moving your legs so they were over his shoulders.

Your head was spinning as you slammed it back against a pillow on the unmade bed. You were hardly processing what was going on, your vision was blurry and your thoughts all bled together, the only thing you could feel was Joe.

You writhed underneath his touch, bucking your hips. His large hands laid over your stomach, holding you down. “Sit still.” He mumbled against you, the rumble of his voice pulsing through your entire body. You tried to still your hips, unable to stop them from twitching from pleasure. 

His fingertips dug into your thighs as he began holding you tighter and tighter. He only ever touched your clit, only using his tongue, but it was more than enough for you. One of your hands was tangled in his hair, and the other was holding onto the pillow under your head. In the distance, but still at an embarrassingly fast rate, you could feel your orgasm coming on. 

He must have sensed that you were close, or took a hint from the way you swirled your hips and pulled at his hair, because he smirked against you, then immediately pulled his head away.

“Joe” You whined, your grip on his hair loosening quickly.

He shook his head lightly, climbing back on top of you. He put his hands on either side of your head, and admired you under him for a second, even though you looked slightly disappointed. He leaned down to kiss you slowly, taking the feeling in.

As much as he would love to bask in that feeling and kiss you for the rest of eternity, he didn’t know how much longer he could take not fucking you. He pulled your shirt over your head without warning, leaving you in nothing but your bra.

Deciding that the ratio of clothes-taken-off was uneven, you reached for his belt buckle, grabbing him by the back of the neck with your other hand to pull him back down to kiss you. You fumbled with his belt buckle, trying to figure it out how to get it undone with your eyes closed.

Joe sighed into your mouth, pushing your hands away from his belt to do it himself. You giggled slightly, causing him to try and suppress a grin as you kissed. He took his belt off and you heard it hit the hardwood floor, followed by the sound of his pants unzipping. The thought of what you were about to get nearly made your eyes roll back in your head, the wetness spread across your inner thighs only growing.

You pulled the hem of his shirt up, breaking away from the kiss for only a second to allow him to pull it over his head, disregarding it with the rest of your clothes on the floor. Your fingers danced along the waist of his pants for a moment, then you slipped your hand inside. Joe was an extremely smooth kisser, but his rhythm was interrupted when you cupped him over his underwear, making him stifle his movements. You smirked and held him slightly tighter, making his arms nearly buckle as he groaned into you. 

He let your little power trip last for a few more seconds before he grabbed your wrist and pulled your hand away from him. He grabbed your other wrist with the same hand and then held your hands over your head. He let go, but you held your hands where they were as he pulled his pants and boxers off.

Normally, in a situation like this, one you had been in times and times before, you would feel vulnerable. Laying naked on someone else’s bed while they undress, completely and utterly at their demand. But, for some reason, you felt safe and taken care of. You felt so secure in his touches as he set his hand on your thigh, moving himself to settle in between your legs. 

He looked at you, your hands above your head as you looked back at him expectantly. He couldn’t help but pump himself a few times before finally lining himself up to your entrance. He reached up and set a hand by your head, the other holding his shaft. He stalled for a moment, taking time to look down at your pussy, sliding his tip up and down your slit. 

You lifted your hips expecting him to push himself inside of you. “Please.” You whispered. 

He looked back up at you, then leaned over you further, so his face was inches from yours. “Please what, baby?”

You reached up to set a hand on his broad shoulder which was flexed from holding himself up. “Please fuck me.” You begged. 

He chuckled lightly. “Aw, sweetheart, all you had to do was ask.” He smiled. He pushed himself into you, and months of tension suddenly came undone. 

He bottomed out, and your grip on his shoulder moved down to dig your nails into his shoulder blade. You shut your eyes and pushed your head further back into his pillow. “Oh my fucking god.” You staggered. 

Joe couldn’t find it in himself to move right away, basking in the feeling of filling you up. He had thought about this exact moment too many times to take it for granted. 

You took the liberty to move your own hips in a circle, causing him to grunt into your ear. He pulled out nearly all the way, then moved back in slowly. 

As much as he wanted to take his time with you, the girl he had been obsessed with for the last 3 months finally underneath him, he began to feel himself losing control. His pace quickened at an insane rate, making you want to cover your mouth to try and stifle the ungodly moans coming out of you. 

He lowered his head into your neck as he moved his hips against yours, making you lean your head back to expose your whole neck to him. 

You felt him bite you softly, making you yelp in surprise. Heart fluttering, your cheeks flushed as he kissed your neck harshly. He began to slam into you harder, moving your whole body with every thrust. Red marks began to form on his back where you had dug all of your nails into his lower back. 

His pace only got rougher and rougher as time went on, only making things more and more passionate. 

“Joe, oh my god, please don’t stop, please please please please.” You rambled out of bliss. The feeling of build-up from earlier made a return as he lifted himself up, his hands on either side of your head. 

He grabbed your thigh and held it up close to his hip, trying to find a better angle for you, he could tell you were close. He realized he had gotten that angle when you yelled out his name, arching your back into him, your voice broken and raspy. 

“You close baby?” He asked his tone unrecognizable from the one you normally knew. 

“Yes” You cried, grabbing into his hair unintentionally. 

He lifted your leg over his shoulder with a grunt, hitting an unimaginable spot. He grabbed your throat to force you to look at him and leaned over you, his nose nearly touching yours. “Come on, give it to me, Y/N.” He growled. 

Your vision went white as your orgasm hit you. Your jaw dropped open as he watched you come undone around him. Your whole body pulsed as you gasped for air. He let you come down from your high, riding it out roughly until your eyes fluttered open again. 

All at once, he pulled out of you and grabbed your ankle, yanking your leg off of his shoulder. He grabbed your hips and flipped you over onto your knees, then grabbed you by a fistful of your hair and pushed your head down into the mattress. He began slamming into you again, the aftershock of your orgasm not even close to being over yet. You couldn’t do anything but let the tears welling in your eyes spillover as you cried his name over and over. 

He pounded into you, his teeth gritted as he pushed your head further down into the bed. He knew he wasn’t going to last much longer, especially not with you like this. He yanked your hair up and pulled you close to him so he could talk into your ear. 

“Do you know,” He spat with gritted teeth “how long I’ve waited to fuck you like this?” He wrapped an arm around your body to rub circles on your clit, his other hand moving you grab you by the throat again. “Having to see you, every. Fucking. Day. And not being able to have you? I thought I was crazy, Y/N, crazy for wanting to do the things I wanted to do to you. Things like this. But now I can see,” He began losing control of his body, his rhythm slowing as he could feel himself about to come “the feeling was mutual.” 

He came inside of you as your second orgasm hit you out of nowhere, causing you to topple over as his movements slowed, your cum mixing with his. You moaned breathing in and out as he slowly came to a stop. “I’ve got you, baby, I’ve got you.” He sighed. 

“Fuck.” He breathed. You sniffed and let out one last sob before he pulled out, causing you to wince. The rest of your body collapsed onto the bed as you panted, trying to catch your breath. He fell onto the bed next to you, the only movement you were able to manage was moving your hands up to wipe the tears off of your face. 

Joe reached over and held you by the hip, pulling you to face him. He wrapped an arm around you to splay a hand in between your shoulder blades and moved the other to cup your cheek. His eyes moved from your eyes to your cheek. He stroked his thumb across your face to wipe the tears from your cheeks, your eyes fluttered shut under his touch. “Are you okay?” He spoke softly. 

“Mhm.” You hummed lightly. You pressed a hand against his chest and moved to set your forehead on his shoulder. He rolled onto his back and you laid your head against his chest as he wrapped his arms completely around you. 

Neither of you said anything, the room silent as your breathing slowly synced together. Joe couldn’t wipe his stupid, blissful smile off of his face as he rubbed your back lightly. 

You couldn’t think about anything other than his heartbeat under your ear. Not the contract you signed, not Lola or Beck, not how much money you had and not how Joe was your boss. You only thought about the heartbeat you heard and the boy who owned it. 

-

taglist- @im-an-adult-ish @almightygwil @draconiiian @roveyrove @drummah-in-a-rocknroll-band @lizgarxo @queenmylovely @lelifesaver @ghosttofcalum @freakibanana @coincidence-ithinknots-blog @pomjompish @sadhwstudent @pomjompish @darlingyourebeingabore

[spacestationdaedalus]

post-canon JM but make them vigilante monster hunters

never seen a single episode but i think this might be the plot of supernatural? idk i bugged the server with this and now other ppl have to see it.

tw for general monster-related horror and descriptions of it, and very very mild injury

ao3 link here!

...

It's late. Again.

She sighs, rubbing at her eyes until starbursts dance in her vision. If her lab manager knew she was in here at god, is it already 3? in the morning, he would probably have a fit. But it's not her fault her work has been so. Uncooperative. Realistically, she could be doing some of this at home, but the lab computer already has everything she needs, and it's so much easier to focus here.

Well. Most of the time.

Her water bottle is still half full, but she decides a walk to the vending machine at the end of the hall would do her some good. She can stretch her legs and get some caffeine at the same time. Best of both worlds.

Right then, a sound cuts through the air. It's a dull roar, crescendoing to a peak that it maintains for a handful of seconds before fading away. As jumpy as she gets this late, she hardly bats an eye as she digs her wallet out of her backpack. It's a common sound to hear in the building, one that you get used to quickly once you spend some time here. The university has a wind tunnel it uses for classes, as well as research. She's seen it before, used it first hand - even down in the basement of the building, the roar of the compressed air tank when the valve is switched practically shakes the foundation. That's how you tell the first years apart from everyone else. They're the ones who jump when they hear it, looking around in confusion, and sometimes fear. But it doesn't take long for it to become background noise.

She's more concerned about the fact that it's so late. Some poor graduate student, down in the basement in the middle of the night running the tunnel instead of sleeping. Or doing literally anything else. Unfortunately, she can relate.

The door shuts with a weighty slam behind her. The silence of the building is even sharper after the echo of the wind, and she fights down the urge to shudder. The hall is long, dark - the university installed motion activated lights in most of the buildings a few years back, and the effect they create as she walks down the hall is surprisingly eerie. The fluorescents flicker on with the faintest clicks and hums as she walks below them, boots clicking against the tile floor. She's a fast walker, always had been - and the incessant sound of her footfalls in the quiet somehow puts her even more on edge.

The pale light from the vending machine reflects against the linoleum in a way that could be inviting. In theory. But it's really more off-putting than anything else, like the sickly glow of a motel sign off of the interstate, flickering a destitute "no vacancy" into the night. The selection is slim, but she punches in the code for an overpriced iced coffee that feels cool and familiar in her hand.

The scream of the wind tunnel comes and goes again, louder, now that she's outside the lab. She can't help the unease creeping down her spine in the wake of its silence. On one hand, it's a comfort to know at least one other person is in the building with her. But even then, the still quiet it leaves behind is always worse, and it sends the hair on the back of her head standing at attention.

It only gets worse as she walks, and she fights the urge to look over her shoulder. Everyone knows the feeling - when you're a kid, and you sneak into the kitchen in the dead of night to get a drink, only to sprint back up to your room as soon as you can because you're so, so sure something is coming for you.

And now that she's thinking about it, she can't not think about it, which is as futile as it is frustrating. She tries to force it down along with the beating of her heart, but the fear simmers beneath the surface like a pot on the stove, two seconds from boiling over. She's already more than halfway back, just a few more seconds and she can slam the lab door shut behind her and feel almost safe.

The roar of the tunnel, again. She can't help the jump, this time, on edge as she is. Strange, they don't usually run it so many times in so few minutes-

A thought comes to her then, without warning, the way they do when you realize you've forgotten something important. She remembers the conversation with striking clarity - Ajay, her roommate, working on a big research project. He needed to test his prototype in the wind tunnel, and he'd lamented to her over dinner the other day that a replacement part they needed downstairs wouldn't arrive until next week. Which sucked, because he has a deadline for a paper submission coming up and needed more data-

Most of this is useless. But she remembers, now, better than anything she ever has, that the wind tunnel hasn't been working all week. The lab is closed, would be until Wednesday, until the new part comes in.

The roaring shriek comes again, pounding against her eardrums in a way it never has before. Oppressive. Almost hungry. It's closer, it's louder.

It's behind her.

She turns. As she chokes on her own heartbeat and sinking dread, she turns.

And something is behind her.

Thin and wrong, inky black and too many limbs. A long torso with a long head attached, crooked on its neck. Gaping white sockets where eyes would, should, be. It has no mouth, and yet she knows with absolute certainty that it was making that sound. A mocking imitation of something so familiar.

And she knows, an anchor sinking into pitch black water, that it's going to kill her.

blood blood i need blood your blood your face you

It's in her head, a voice with no mouth to speak it. She opens her own mouth to scream, but it's useless to her. Nothing comes out, not even air. Maybe she can run, she has to run, has to get away. But she can't bring herself to turn even a sliver from the nightmare in front of her. A deep, primal fear convincing her that the second she can't see that thing is the second it will get her. 

Maybe she can run, still, with her eyes on it. But one of her feet finds the other in her panic, and she falls to the floor. She thinks she feels a pain in her wrist, but it's dull and far away. Hardly a blip on the radar of fear fear oh my god what is that thing-

It's coming for her, all bending joints like limbs of a puppet, pulled by invisible strings, limping, creaking in unnatural steps and lunges. Its eyes never once leave her, glued to her in hungry determination. The roar comes again, but it's twisted and warped like scrap metal and just as jagged around the edges.

And then it stops. Not more than ten feet from her. Frozen. She doesn't breathe, she doesn't think she could if she wanted to.

"That's enough."

It's a man's voice, from behind her. She doesn't have it in her to turn around, to look away. But it doesn't matter. Whoever it is god she hopes it's a who and not a what steps up next to her, in front of her. It might not be accurate to say he's shielding her, but he's between her and it, and she doesn't feel relief, but she feels. Safer, somehow.

She's never seen him before. His hair is long, streaked with grey, half tied up in a bun at the back of his head. He's wearing a long dark coat over long dark pants, tucked into black combat boots. And that's really all she can see from the floor.

As he steps forward, the creature seems to recoil. It hisses, maybe, and then another sound follows. A sad remixing of its own imitating screech from before, not quite a howl but more of a cry. It sounds pained, almost, creaking and desperate. Limbs rear up, but amount to nothing. It's an uncoordinated movement as it falls back on something like haunches.

"I'm watching you, now. There's nowhere you can hide from me."

The man's voice sounds strange to her. There's a cracking, almost static quality to it. She has no idea what the man could possibly be doing, but it looks like it's working.

Until it isn't.

The thing writhes and shrieks again, louder. She can feel it down into her bones, scraping at her marrow, god she wants to throw up. The man in front of her staggers slightly. He mutters something like a curse under his breath, brings a hand to his head. The thing is moving again, shambling towards them. It looks weaker, shakier than before but no less threatening. No less horrifying. Maybe even more so, with the look of a sick, maimed animal as it staggers down the street.

She thinks she might be about to pass out with the sudden chill that overtakes her. But the fading of her vision never comes, and is that. Her breath? She can see it in the air in front of her, condensing like it does on cold winter mornings. With a blink she realizes there's a fog as well, come seemingly from nothing. It's thick and low-hanging, coating the floor of the hall and swirling upwards. It chills her exposed skin, goosebumps racing up and down her arms.

She assumes the thing must be doing this, a defense mechanism or something, but it's slower than before. Subdued. It's still making its way toward them, but it looks lost, like a fawn trying to walk on new legs.

Until another man comes from an adjoining hallway, and bashes its head in with a baseball bat.

It's a solid hit, and the thing goes down almost immediately. The man, the new one, gives another swing, and another, and a few more, for good measure. His bat is slick with something dark and oily. And then the thing is still.

It's quiet for a second, two, then-

"Excellent timing as always, dear." The staticy click of the first man's voice is gone. He sounds out of breath, even though he hardly moved.

The second man laughs, and the cold and the fog seems to fade with it. He's bigger than the first man, taller. He's wearing a bomber jacket over a nondescript t-shirt, fingerless gloves and jeans frayed at the edges. Like he just walked out of an action movie. Or a horror movie. With the thing laying at his feet, the second might be more fitting.

"That was cutting it a little close, Jon. We knew it was with the Stranger, that it could fight you off-"

"Yes, yes, thank you, Martin. That's what the bat is for, after all. The Lonely was probably a bit overkill, though."

"It's not overkill if we don't get ourselves maimed, Jon-"

The first man - Jon, apparently - turns to her then. His face is scarred, and dark shadows hang under oddly bright green eyes. But his gaze isn't unkind as he looks down at her.

"Sorry, are you alright? I was hoping we could take care of this when everyone was gone, but-" He laughs darkly. "Well, I was in university once, I should have known at least one student would still be here in the middle of the night, even on the weekend."

The man going by Martin walks over, as Jon extends a hand to help her up. She's lost all hope of her brain trying to process what's happening but step one can at least be get off the floor. But she can't even do that properly. The hand she raises is the same one she fell on, and the twinge from her wrist shoots up her arm almost immediately in a shout for attention.

It must show on her face too, because Jon makes a sound and then Martin's asking her, "Oh, are you hurt?"

"Uh, n-no, I mean…'s just, uh, my wrist. Kinda, fell on it funny." Her voice isn't exactly steady, but it's a far cry from where she was expecting it to be. At least she's orbiting the realm of comprehensible.

Martin crouches next to her. Up close she can see his face in more detail - his eyes are a slate grey, like the fog from before. But they're kind, wrinkled at the edges when he smiles softly at her. "Mind if I take a look?"

She's not exactly in a position to say no, so she gingerly holds her arm out. His hands are rough, calloused, but surprisingly gentle as they probe her wrist. She can't stop the trembling, now, completely unrelated to the pain.

"It's a sprain." Jon says, laced with certainty somewhere above her.

Martin sighs, long-suffering. "Thank you, Jon, I was getting to that."

"Just trying to help." She can't see him, but she can practically hear the cheeky smile tacked to the end of that sentence.

"As much as I hate saying it, he's right." Martin eyes her with something close to humor, like they're in on a joke together. He shrugs a backpack off of his shoulders, rummages through it with one hand. "I think we have some elastic bandages left for something like this…"

"Front pocket." Jon says again. He's moved closer to the thing, the corpse, it must be, now. He's turned away from her, and she can't see his face.

"Thank you, love."

"Of course."

"Um-" She cuts in suddenly, her nerves and panic getting the best of her. Martin looks up from her hand, and Jon turns back to glance at her.

"Sorry, uh, I just- what the fuck was that?"

"I'd tell you not to worry yourself over it, but I don't think that's much of an answer." Jon says, coming back towards them. He crouches down before he continues. "Let's just say this is...our day job."

"It is three in the morning, though."

"That would be the, colloquial use of the term, Martin."

"Just saying." With Martin in front of her she can actually see the cheeky grin, this time.

He uses the bandage to wrap her wrist. It smarts a bit, but the pressure helps. He's clearly adept enough to do this and talk at the same time, because he cuts in next. "We're here to make sure things like that-" he gestures with a nod of his head. "-don't hurt anyone."

Her mouth is full of sawdust. "W- what, like, monsters and shit?" She always did swear a lot when she was stressed.

"More or less."

"If it's any consolation," Jon says. "These things aren't exactly...common. You have to have a special kind of luck to run into something like this."

Yeah, luck.

He sighs, then. He looks tired. "I'm so sorry. If it means anything. This isn't the kind of thing you'll be able to just forget, or-"

"That's why we're here." Martin cuts in. He's finished with her wrist, neatly wrapped and held in place with little wire clips. "To try to stop stuff like this from happening, before it happens. Sorry we were late."

It's not a stretch to imagine what would have happened if they hadn't shown up even later, or not at all. But it's something she will try very, very hard not to think about.

She swallows. "I guess...thank you, then."

"Of course."

The adrenaline and sudden lack thereof leaves her with a jittery exhaustion deep in her core. But she has so many questions, how could she not-

A chill, and a rush of wind and waves hit her before she can get another word out. It's gone as quickly as it had come, so much so she thinks she imagined it. But suddenly, she's alone.

The men going by Jon and Martin and the misshapen corpse of that thing are gone. The hall is just as it had been before, dim lights and freshly polished tile. No sign of anything, or anyone. Except for her.

She knows with crushing certainty that it wasn't a dream. Couldn't be a dream. But she knows that's what people will tell her. So she says nothing. She says nothing, and hopes nothing ever leads her to cross paths with those two ever again.

[cpd5021]

Runaway

This one is getting posted early because I’ll be insanely busy tomorrow. Enjoy!!

Happy Wednesday!!! One week closer!! They’re finally back to filming and I am soooo excited! Thanks to  @joy-meathiel  for this prompt!!

“Alright, listen up everyone. We’ve got a problem.”

Not the best words to hear first thing in the morning, especially from Voight who really didn’t see much of anything as a threat. It was my second week back from New York, but my first official day back in the unit. The first week had been spent filling out countless amounts of paperwork and doing debriefings to get caught up on everything I had missed while I was away. To say I felt nervous was an understatement. Not only was this my first day back under Voight’s noticeably watchful eye, but it was also the first day back with Jay. Not that we hadn’t been hanging out for the last week, enjoying the Bartoli’s I was promised and catching up over beers at Molly’s or my place. But something about spending the whole day with him had my stomach swirling in a way I couldn’t understand. I pushed the thoughts aside and turned my attention back to Voight, who, to my surprise, was staring right at me with a concerned look on his face. I sent him a questioning look, my eyes darting quickly to meet Jay’s who looked just as puzzled by Voight’s intense stare, before turning back to Voight. 

“Sarge?” 

I pushed when it didn’t seem like he was going to elaborate. He crossed his arms over his chest and let out a sigh, his eyes never leaving mine.

“We’ve got to get you out of town for a bit. Word is there’s a target on your back.”

His words set a panic rising in my chest, along with an extreme confusion as to how I could be anyone’s target after being gone for so long. 

“Who? How?” 

I asked, standing and moving to lean against the front of my desk. He chose to ignore my question and instead turned to address the rest of the bullpen. 

“Upton is going to be out of commission for a while until we get a handle on this thing. I’m going to assign one of you to get her out of here and somewhere safe. You’re to stay put until you hear from me and only me, is that clear?”

The room nodded in agreement, their faces a mix of concern and confusion. I looked to Jay again and my stomach did another lurch when I saw him raise his hand. 

“I’ll get her out of here, I know somewhere that’s perfect to lay low in.”

Voight nodded in Jay’s direction and then pivoted to walk back into his office, I was hot on his heels, grabbing the door before he could close it. He sat in his chair and motioned for me to sit down. 

“You’re going to go wherever Halstead takes you and you’re not to contact anyone until you hear from me. Got it?”

I nodded in agreement but still pushed for more information. 

“What is this about Sarge?”

He leaned back in his chair, letting out a sigh as he rubbed at his face. 

“The thing about those lines you crossed Hailey...they were big players. Gael has people in every corner of this city and he’s not stupid. At first he was targeting Roja’s but he’s smart enough to figure out she was too new for those kinds of connections.”

My heart ached at the mention of Vanessa. My first night back, after Jay had picked me up from the airport, we headed back to my place. I had been able to tell from his demeanor as we approached my house that something was up, but nothing prepared me for the blow that came when we walked into my place and found it void of any trace of my roommate's presence. Jay had explained all about how Voight had sent Vanessa back to narcotics and she was in a major undercover op. How I would likely not hear from her for a while because she had gone dark for the coverup. And how it all had to do with Gael. I had broken down at the realization that my actions had put her at risk and that she had been forced to uproot herself from this life that she fit so well into. Jay had calmed me down enough to give me the letter she left, stating that none of this was my fault and she would be so pissed if she found out I blamed myself. Her written words had brought a smile to my face but it wasn’t enough to ease the guilt that had settled into my chest. I swallowed hard and brought myself back to the present, looking at Voight and feeling lost over the mess I had put everyone in. 

“We’ll figure this out and we’ll get ahead of it. But for now, I want you out of the picture.”

I nodded again, blinking back the tears that were threatening to gather. He motioned for me to leave and I did so, feeling defeated as I went to find Jay. When I found him in the locker room, he was tossing some of his things into a black duffel bag in his locker. I sighed and moved to do the same. 

“Where are we going?”

I asked, assuming he had some remote hotel in mind and cringing at the thought of spending any more time in a hotel bed after the last month and a half in New York. He glanced up at me then, a slight smirk on his face that faded when he saw my own face. 

“I know somewhere good. It won’t be so bad.”

His avoidance of a direct answer had my defenses going up. I straightened my back and turned to face him directly. 

“Jay?”

He smirked again, his face turning the slightest shade of pink under my stare. 

“Ontario…”

My eyes bugged out at his reply. He was insane if he thought I was leaving the country.

“Canada?” 

I managed to choke out, causing him to chuckle at my hoarse voice. 

“No, sorry. Wisconsin. My family has a cabin up there…”

He trailed off when I still didn’t relax. I wasn’t sold on the idea of even leaving the city let alone the state. 

“Jay...hiding out is one thing but I’m not running away. This is all my fault, I should stay to help clean it up.”

I hated the way my voice sounded utterly defeated as I tried to argue with him. I knew I wasn’t going to win this fight anyway between him and Voight, so it was probably best to just go along with the plan. It didn’t hurt to try though. 

“Hailey, the most important thing right now is to keep you safe. Voight will figure this out and you’ll be back before you know it.” 

He took a step towards me, placing his hand gently on my shoulder to reassure me. I sent him a half hearted smile and then finished gathering my things. 

*****

The four hour drive up to the cabin surprisingly wasn’t that bad, we stopped once for gas and some snacks but Jay made pretty good timing to get us here. When he pulled up the long driveway leading up to the quaint little cabin nestled back in the woods, I couldn’t help but let my jaw hang in amazement. The setting looked like something from a Hallmark Christmas movie and I suddenly felt even more nervous about this whole situation. Spending an unknown amount of time with Jay was one thing, but here? This was going to be interesting. He informed me that we could settle in at the cabin and then head back into town later for some groceries and other necessities. I hopped out of the truck and lugged my duffel bag from the back seat, my jaw still slack the more I took in. I followed him up the steps of the covered porch, noting the adorable swing hanging from the rafters and gasped when we entered the cabin. It was floor to ceiling pine and it smelled amazing despite sitting vacant for who knows how long. There was a small couch propped in front of a fireplace with a tiny TV mounted on the wall above. I doubted there was any cable service this far out but the huge collection of movies on the bookshelf in the corner of the room looked promising. A long, solid wood table was in the center of the cabin, a top one of those old fashioned braided rugs and the kitchen looked just the right size for preparing some cozy food. I noted a door down a short hallway that I presumed was the bathroom and a set of stairs that led up to a loft above us. Under any other circumstance, this would be the perfect vacation spot. But the current situation was still leaving a bad taste in my mouth. Jay moved beside me, taking my bag and trekking up the stairs to the loft. I followed after him, curious to see more. At the top of the landing I noted a huge king size bed with what looked like a handmade quilt on top. Way better than the hotel beds I had been picturing. I was so busy admiring the comfyness of the bed that I didn’t notice Jay had come to stand in front of me. 

“So, there’s only the one bed. But I’ll take the couch.”

He rubbed at his neck, looking suddenly uncomfortable. 

“Jay, it’s your cabin. I’ll take the couch.”

He smiled sheepishly at me, glancing back at the bed before turning back to face me, a blush covering his cheeks. 

“We’ll figure something out.”

We headed back down the stairs and Jay gave me a brief tour of the tiny cabin. There wasn’t much more to see than what I had already noted but I enjoyed listening to the way he pointed out all the little details as we went. This place held memories for him, that much was obvious. 

After the tour inside, we walked around the property for a bit. He told me how him and Will used to come up here all the time and how their dad was a big hunter. His eyes lit up when he talked about all the delicious cooking his mother would do in the tiny kitchen and the sight made me melt a little on the inside. After a while, we decided to head back into town before the sun went down. Even the quaint little grocery store was enough to warm my heart and I kept picturing myself in a Hallmark movie. I picked up a sweatshirt from the little tourist section of the store, earning a grin from Jay. I had a limited wardrobe from what I had grabbed from my locker so the added warmth of the sweatshirt looked inviting. 

Back at the cabin, I relaxed into the couch that was incredibly comfortable after Jay had shewed me out of the kitchen, telling me he was going to cook for us tonight. I blushed slightly at the way my mind travelled at the thought, but managed to hide it before he noticed. I pulled my new sweatshirt closer, feeling a sudden chill as the evening air cooled down outside. Jay noticed and suggested I go take a hot shower while he finished dinner. I couldn’t object to the thought of some hot water so I grabbed my bag from upstairs and headed into the bathroom. For such a tiny cabin, I was surprised at the size of the shower in this bathroom. It had been redone to look like one of those spa showers and it was definitely big enough for two people. I shook those thoughts from my head and stepped into the hot water, letting my body melt in the steam. Once I was done in the shower, I tugged my new sweatshirt back on along with a pair of black leggings I had thankfully stashed in my overnight back. As I opened the door, letting the steam from my shower swirl in the short hallway, my nose was instantly filled with the most amazing smells. I followed them out into the kitchen and paused at the sight before me. Jay stood over the stove, stirring something in a large pot while another boiled away beside him. I watched as he bent to pull a pan of garlic bread out of the oven, adding to the wonderful aromas in the cabin. I shuffled into the kitchen, catching his eye and causing him to smile my way. I noticed a light blush spread across his cheeks but he turned back to stir whatever concoction was in the pot. I stepped up beside him, glancing into the pan and noting what appeared to be a homemade marinara sauce. 

“I didn’t know you could cook.”

I teased, sending him a smirk when he scoffed my way.

“There’s lots of secret talents I have that you don’t know about.”

His innuendo caused me to blush and it was my turn to dip my head down. 

“And you said I was aloof…”

I countered, trying to ease the sudden tension in the room. He chuckled at my response before motioning for me to go sit at the table while he plated our food. We enjoyed the meal, paired with a glass of wine he must have had stashed at the cabin as it wasn’t something we picked up in town. After dinner, I battled him over the dishes and he eventually conceded, letting me wash them up. Although he remained right by my side, drying them as I went. Once that task was done, I returned to the couch and drew my knees up by my chest, the chill back in the air now that it was fully dark out. Jay noticed my shiver and moved over to the fire place, expertly working to start a fire that cast a dim glow around the room. Once again I had the feeling that I was in some romantic movie and had to remind myself that this was Jay and we weren’t like that.  

“Add skilled fire builder to my list of skills you’re learning about.”

Jay smirked as he sat on the couch beside me. He sat on the opposite end but the couch was small enough we still sat incredibly close. There was no way either one of us would sleep comfortably on this tiny thing, a fact I would point out later. We fell into an easier banter, sipping on some beers Jay had grabbed from town and for just a moment I had forgotten all about why we were actually here. It didn’t take long though for our banter to bring up a joke Vanessa had once told and my mood instantly changed. Jay picked up on the shift in my mood and reached a hand over to grab my shoulder. 

“Hailey...none of this is your fault.”

He tried to reassure me but we both knew that wasn’t the case. I sent him a half hearted smile at his attempt to make me feel better. 

“Jay...we both know all of this is my fault. I never should have done what I did. I screwed everything up.”

We fell into a silence for a moment as Jay pondered how to proceed. 

“Hailey...what happened, yea you crossed some lines. But I think you’ve beaten yourself up enough for it. What’s done is done and eventually this will all work out. Vanessa is a tough girl, she’ll be alright and you’ll hear from her again. I promise you she isn’t mad. She made me pinky promise to make sure you know that.”

I smiled genuinely at the thought of that exchange between the two of them and Jay seemed relieved to see my mood lighten. 

“And New York wasn’t all bad right? I mean, it sucked not having you here for multiple reasons but you’re back now.”

His words confused me a little and I was asking him what he meant before I could think better of it.

“Multiple reasons?”

It was Jay’s turn to blush again and he brought his beer bottle to his lips, obviously stalling his response. I drilled my eyes into the side of his face, letting him know I wasn’t going to drop it. 

“Well yea...I mean, you’re the best partner...and everyone missed you…”

He stammered out a reply but I could tell there was more he wasn’t saying. Suddenly all the feelings I had pushed down after he got shot were front and center and there was a tiny spark of hope rising inside of me that he might feel the same way too. 

“Did you miss me? Aside from being your partner I mean?”

I picked at the label on my bottle, suddenly losing the confidence I had when I asked the question. 

“Of course.”

His words came out so sure that it caused me to look up and meet his eyes. I saw something within them that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. 

“I missed you too Jay.”

 I admitted softly, my words barely above a whisper. 

“Can I ask you something?”

His question threw me off a little but I nodded my head, waiting for him to continue. 

“What did you want to say to me in the hospital room? Before my phone blew it. I’ve been wanting to ask you ever since but it never seemed like the right time. But now, we have pretty much unlimited time so….what was it?”

My heart pounded the second he reminded me of that day and what I had truly wanted to admit to him. The fact that he brought it up made me think even more that maybe he did feel the same way, even though I had never finished what I was going to tell him. 

“It doesn’t really matter.”

I whispered, trying to cop out of this situation. As much as I did love Jay, I wasn’t sure he felt the same way and I couldn’t risk losing him. 

“It does to me.”

His soft response had me looking up at him again, that unrecognizable look even stronger in his eyes now. I smiled at him shyly, my head still dipped down as I picked at the label even more. Suddenly, his hand was over mine, taking the empty bottle from my fingers and setting it on the table in front of us. 

“I had just realized something after you got shot. But that would have been a horrible time to tell you.”

I mumbled out my words, really wishing he would let this go.

“So tell me now.”

He pushed, causing my heart to beat even faster. The way he was looking at me made me think he knew exactly what I was going to say and I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. When I didn’t respond he started talking again, slower this time as if he wasn’t sure this was a good idea. 

“Well, when you got sent to New York...the first week was rough and I thought it was because I was missing you as my awesome partner. Adam...just not the same. But then I would go home and the first thing I wanted to do was tell you all about my day and listen to everything that happened with yours. And then I hated that we weren’t having the same days and that you were off on this big adventure, probably kicking ass and showing everyone else how awesome you are. I wanted to go grab a beer with you at Molly’s or stay home and watch stupid Office reruns on TV. I wanted to hear you laugh, to know that you were okay at the end of a rough day. I’d wake up in the morning and the first thing I’d think of is if you got your coffee...because we all know how that goes if you don’t. I wanted to pick you up and drive into work together, or at least have to fight you off of my pens when you forgot yours. Hailey I...I guess what I realized, when you were gone...is that I kinda fell in love with you. And maybe I’m totally off here and that’s not what you wanted to say to me and I’m probably ruining everything right now but I just needed you to know because it’s all I think about now. You’re all I think about now…”

He trailed off and I blinked away the tears that had gathered in my eyes. The sight seemed to alarm him and he shifted on the couch as if he was about to get up. My hand grabbed his arm, holding him in place as I shifted myself on the couch to face him better. I bore my eyes into his, hoping that he could see in them that I felt exactly the same way. I didn’t trust my voice to speak but I wanted to show him just how right he was. I placed my hand against his cheek, smiling back at him when his lip twitched up into a nervous smile. I closed the gap between us, bringing my lips to rest just above his so they touched when I finally spoke. 

“I love you too Jay.”

And with that I pressed my lips against his. He instantly returned the pressure, placing his own hands against my cheeks as the kiss deepened. Sparks ignited between us and I could feel my breathing coming in gasps as our tongues danced against each other. When we finally broke apart, our foreheads rested against each other and our eyes shared the same look of passion between them. Our lips crashed again and this time Jay was pulling me into his lap, his strong hands gripping my thighs as my arms wrapped around his neck. Without any effort whatsoever, he lifted me up and I could tell he was headed for the stairs. My life might be a huge mess, caused by my own doing, but for the next few hours...I was in one of those stupid romantic Hallmark movies.

[be-the-spark-flyboy]

Could Use Some Love

Call It What You Want (2/?)

Series masterlist

Pairing: Med student!Poe x Reader (college AU)

A/N: This got wayyyy out of hand, and i apologize for nothing. Also this took so long cos i came up with a plot, hated it, then changed the whole plot, hated it again and now i have no plot and im just gonna see where this takes me :( what is canon I don’t her

Chapter summary: Due a broken heater situation, you end up crashing at Rey, Finn and Poe’s residence.

Word count: ~2.7k

You’ve been having an absolutely horrible week. And it is Wednesday. Work had been piling up in your internship firm, as well as in college. You’d barely slept for a total of 3 hours in the last two days and needless to say, you were totally exhausted. You had barely gotten back from work when your supervisor had called you to dump more work on you. 

Great, another sleepless night.

Your tiny apartment was eerily quiet without your roommate Jessika. She told you she was staying over at her boyfriend's place for the night. It wasn’t the first time it had happened but, you hated staying alone in your apartment, especially at night.

The snow falling outside and the temperature rapidly falling in your own house did nothing to improve your mood. You pulled you knitted blanket tighter around yourself as another shiver racked through your body from the cold. Was the heater even working? It had been giving you problems for some time now, you were pretty sure it was already working way past its expectancy. You made a mental note to talk to your landlord about it, turning your attention back to your work.

Minutes pass and it only gets colder. Now it got to the point you couldn’t put your feet on the ground without recoiling. It wasn’t a good sign at all. You reach for your fuzzy slippers and pad across the room, still in your blanket, to the thermostat.

The thermostat display was working fine, but it seemed the heater wasn’t. After several minutes of walking back and forth to the heater and thermostat and several google searches later, you come to the conclusion that your heater was broken. And there was nothing you could do about it at this hour.

Your eyes well up from the frustration, a few tears falling. You try taking a few deep breaths to calm yourself, but the cold air only stings your lungs, reminding you of your predicament, mocking you. You go back to the couch, sitting cross-legged and rocking back and forth as you mind reels.

It was too cold for you to spend the night without a working heater. It was times like this that makes you want to smack yourself for not being able to make more friends. All you have is Jessika, who won’t be able to help you out right now, and Rey, who stayed with Finn and Poe in an apartment just nearby. You could ask Rey if you can crash on her couch for the night, but you felt like you were bothering her.

You had never been over to their place, despite knowing them for months now. Finn and Rey had invited you over a few times before but you always had some excuse to not go. You just weren’t that great with people, even if it was people you knew and care about. 

You honestly didn’t know why Rey tried so hard to stick around you. You never made it very easy for anyone to be your friend. Your naturally aloof nature had made sure of it. Jessika has been the only one who had stuck around since middle school, and when both of you ended up in the same college, you jumped at the chance to room with your best friend.

You rub your eyes, picking up your phone. The time shows 1 am as your finger hovers above the call button on Rey’s contact. Just do it you have no choice, you try to convince yourself as you hit the call button.

---

The doorbell rings you stuff a few extra clothing and your laptop in a bag, just as Rey had instructed. You go to open the door, wrapped up in an overcoat, and hoping you don’t look as much of a mess as you feel. But Finn catches sight of your puffy red-rimmed eyes and immediately pulls you into a hug. The warmth is welcoming after feeling cold for so long, and you gladly fall into the embrace.

Thankfully Rey was still awake when you called. The second she had picked up the phone, the tears started flowing freely as the stress of the whole week hit you at once. She had managed to calm you down until you sounded coherent enough to tell her what your problem was. Both Rey and Finn were both willing to let you take up the guestroom in their apartment for as long as you needed. Rey told you she was picking you up and Finn had insisted he come along since it wasn’t safe for the two of you to be alone in this weather. They had basically shut down any apologies you sent their way, insisting it wasn’t any trouble for them. 

“Rey’s waiting in the car,” Finn informs you. You sling your bag onto your shoulder. “You good to go?”

--- 

The first thing you noticed when you stepped into the ridiculously large living room, was the cityscape. Tiny lights twinkling in buildings as the snow fell, softer than feathers. It looked like a scene from the movies. 

You can’t help the woah that you breathe out at the sight before you. You’re aware of exactly how stupid you look standing there, mouth agape, but you can’t help it. The entire apartment looks gorgeous.

Rey giggles at your expression, dragging you along to the guest bedroom. Which, unsurprisingly, is almost as big as your entire apartment. Settling your things on the table, Rey sits on the bed, gesturing for you to take a seat as well.

“You better now?” She asks flinging an arm around your shoulder. “You can stay here as long as you like, don’t worry I’m not expecting you to pay me or anything.” She jokes. “You know you can ask me if you need anything, right?”

It’s an effort not to start sobbing at her kind words. You lean your head against her shoulder. “You’re too nice to me Rey, not everyone would do this for anyone.”

Rey chuckles, “Firstly, you’re not just anyone, you’re one of us now,” she pulls back, holding your face in her hands. “And secondly, you would do the exact same thing if our positions were reversed.” You just nod, too dumb to say anything.

“Finn and Poe stay upstairs. I haven’t Poe since morning, he locked himself in his room, studying for some test I think,” she engulfs you in a bear hug before getting up. “Just knock on my door if you need anything, I’m right next door. And there are some snacks in the kitchen if you’re hungry. I’ll see you in the morning, okay?”

---

It is 3 am and Poe, utterly exhausted after an entire day of cramming for his hematology test which was probably still going to kick his ass, finally pulls his headphones off his ears. He thinks he surely looks as tired as he feels. The whole room is a mess of books, notes and granola bar wrappers strewn around, an empty coffee pot and mug on the table. He tells himself he’d clean it up tomorrow, after getting some sleep and food in his system. His stomach growls, reminding him of his hunger again and he collects the coffee pot and the wrappers and sets off to the kitchen to get something to eat before heading to bed.

His phone lays forgotten on his bedside table. He doesn’t feel like picking it up, already anticipating the number of missed texts and calls he would've received from his girlfriend. Studying medicine was hard work and time-consuming. It was easier to just pretend like his phone didn’t exist sometimes rather than try to explain to Sarah why he needed the whole day to study. He’d deal with her wrath later.

Poe sighs heavily treading down the staircase. The living room is dark and empty as expected, but there’s light coming from the kitchen. A small part of him couldn’t help but feel thankful for that. He wasn’t scared of the dark per se, but the recent horror movie had led him to question some of his life decisions. Like whether it was worth being friends with Finn and Rey. He probably would’ve walked out of the theater within less than an hour if you weren’t there, holding his hand. The memory brings a smile to his face.

Imagine his surprise when he sees you. He expected to see Finn or Rey at the kitchen, but there you are sitting at the dining table, a frown on your face as you click away at your laptop.

Was he hallucinating?

—-

You are sitting cross-legged on one of the dining table chairs. Your laptop sat on the table, alongside a few detail plans spread out, as you edit your drawings. The table in the guest room wasn’t big enough to fit the large plan drawings. So you had moved to the dining table since everyone had already gone to sleep. 

You feel like you have stepped into an alternate universe where everything feels new to you. The view of the city through the full height glass window was just so breathtaking, but the large living room only feels emptier and somehow colder than your small apartment, even with a working heater. Regardless, you slowly slip into your own rhythm getting more accustomed to the almost eerie silence.

You startle when Poe calls out your name. “What are you doing here?” You look up and oh god he looks adorable. His hair is tousled and he pushes a few curls back from his face trying to tame it. He’s smiling at you, brown eyes sparkling, and it makes you feel all soft and warm inside and- and he just asked you a question. And you are just staring at him like a creep instead of answering.

“Oh, hey Poe!” You try not to cringe at yourself, hoping he hadn’t noticed you staring. Poe grimaces when you explain your whole heater situation to him.

“Well, I hope you’re comfortable,” he says. “Don’t mind me, I’ll be back in my room soon enough,” he smiles again, moving to walk past you. You hear him rummaging around in the kitchen for a few moments.

You mentally slap yourself, feeling like such an asshole. He has a girlfriend, for god’s sake. No matter how much Finn and Rey seemed to hate his girlfriend, you still feel guilty for thinking of Poe as anything other than a friend. You cuddled him in a movie theater, christ. You resist the urge to slap yourself on your forehead. What were you thinking?

For someone who just said ‘don’t mind me’, he makes it pretty hard to ignore his presence. He is back at the table and takes a seat, curiously frowning at the plan laid out before you. His cereal bowl is on the table before him, carefully placed away from the papers you had spread out. You continue your work, trying not to get too distracted by the man beside you. 

“What are you doing?” Poe asks you. So you explain to him the long-winded process of the schematic drawing before you and how you need to add in the changes marked out to the 3D model in your laptop. You’re pretty sure you are rambling halfway through it, but Poe seemed to be interested enough, occasionally asking you more questions here and there. Explaining your work becomes complaining about it and soon you find yourself exchanging internship horror stories with him.

Halfway through your conversation, you hear a patter of tiny footsteps and the cutest corgi you’ve ever seen emerges from the hall. Poe immediately perks up at its arrival scooping the ecstatic canine into his arms. “Buddy! Why aren’t you sleeping?” The corgi paws at his shirt, barking and licking his face. Poe laughs, scratching its fur, “I missed you too, buddy.” You can’t take your eyes off the scene unfolding before you, heart swelling at the interaction, you’re sure you’re making heart eyes at them.

Once the corgi calms down enough for Poe to comfortably hold it in his arms, he turns his attention back to you. “This is Beebee,” he introduces his corgi to you, “My son,” You laugh and Beebee tilts his head inquisitively, looking up at you with his sparkling brown eyes. Like father like son, you think.

The bowl of cereal lays forgotten on the table as the two of you continue chatting. Well, he does most of the talking as you continued on with your work, your attention mostly focused on Poe regardless. He absentmindedly pets Beebee, who is now dozing off on his lap.

“He’s a big baby, can’t live alone. Honestly, I think anyone would go insane if they lived here alone,” Poe concludes his story of how Finn had practically begged him and Rey to come to live with him. Poe is your senior by two years and had been staying in a dorm before Finn started college.

“Big baby huh? Says the one who can’t watch a demon on a screen without looking like he’s going to cry,” you snicker, bumping his shoulder with yours.

“They’re just really scary okay? I don’t how you can sleep after watching things like that,”. He grimaces, holding Beebee closer. “Great, now I’m thinking about demons,”

“Oh no! Quick, think about something else,”

“About what? Ask me something,”

“Um... okay, how did you meet Finn and Rey?” you ask him.

“Oh that’s a long story,” and so he begins the tale of how both his parents, Shara Bey and Kes, were in the Air Force where they met and fell in love and-

“Wait, are you giving me your entire biography?” You interrupt him.

“No no, it’s relevant, trust me,” he assures you before continuing. Queue the entrance of a new character named Han, who was their best friend and was married to Leia Organa, who would become his godmother-

“Wait, Leia Organa?” You gasp, “Senator Organa is your godmother?”

“Great so you’ve heard of her-” you don’t even let him finish his sentence again.

“Heard of her? I've been a huge fan since the time she crushed the Vader dude during that debate,” he chuckles before continuing.

The story takes a somber turn when he tells you that his mother passed away due to an illness when he was 8 years old. He quickly skims over that part before telling you about going to live with his godmother in an obscenely rich neighborhood, since his father was away too much due to his work. Leia’s son Ben, apparently, was the resident asshole of the place, who hated Poe for reasons unknown to him. So Poe had resorted to making friends with the two younger children living across the house instead.

It’s an endearing story, which could’ve been told with lesser detail, in half the time. But you would be lying if you said you didn’t enjoy listening to him talk.

It’s a miracle that you are almost done with your work. Its almost 4.30 am and it occurs to you that you’ve been keeping Poe for quite some time. You see him trying to stifle a yawn in between words as he tries to narrate the story of how Finn had broken his arm trying to sneak out of the house in the middle of the night. 

“Poe, don’t you have classes in the morning? Don’t you need to sleep?”

Poe feigns offense, “Am I boring you?”

“No,” you laughed. “I stay up all alone sometimes, and it gets very lonely, so thank you for keeping me company.” You answer sincerely. You are pretty sure Poe is beaming, but that could also be the side effect of not getting much sleep for days. Well at least you can sleep in tomorrow, and the guestroom bed looked really inviting. “But, you also really need to sleep,” 

“Well my classes only start after lunch tomorrow- I mean today, so I still have time to sleep,” he stifles another yawn with the back of his hand. “Actually, you’re right, I need to sleep,”

BB8 is asleep, snoring lightly on his lap when he finally relents. He scoops up the corgi in one hand and the mostly empty bowl of soggy cereal on the other, dropping it in the kitchen sink.

“Good night, or is it morning already?” He flashes you a grin that makes your insides flutter.

You chuckled, “See you later, Poe,”

You’re so fucked.

---

The Dameron taglist (open):

@writefightandflightclub​ @arkofblake​ @yougottakeeponkeepinon​ @multifandomlife22​ @skymerons​ @smol-peter-parker​ @rae-rae-patcha​ @demigod-dragonrider-schoolidol​ @spider-starry​ @hkmultifandom​

[akaiaowl]

Happy Stranger Things Day!!

It’s been 4 years since Stranger Things was first premiered on Netflix! (already?) This series is very close to my heart, since it managed to inspire me after 3 long years of writer’s block. To commemorate that, I’ll be posting the epilogue to my first fanfic on AO3: Reality in Motion (also known as RiM by some in the ST fandom). Here goes the summary and first chapter:

Reality in Motion

Modern College AU.

It hurt her to listen to the ruthless voice in her head, but, as much as she hated to admit it, El knew it was probably right. It had happened countless times before. Well, actually two. Two times in which El found herself feeling funny and giddy and hopeful about someone, only to be disappointed. It always ended that way. She was destined to be alone and it was probably for the best.

AKA: Socially awkward Jane Ives' first semester in college. Also AKA: Not your typical nice-boy-meets-drunk-girl-at-a-party Mileven fic (because of all the angst and slowwwww burn, be warned).

Chapter 1: Changes

Wednesday 29th, November 2017

If there was something El Ives put her mind to, she was sure to accomplish it. Always.

Well, most of the times.

As a matter of fact, today was one of the few rare exceptions to that rule. This, since Will Byers, El’s best friend, had managed to convince the otherwise socially awkward El to finally come with him that weekend to some party at a friend’s house.

They were both currently seating on the beige colored carpet of her dorm room, supposedly trying to be productive by getting their History 102 assignment done before the due date.

“Pleeease El! I’m about to beg you, it’s almost Christmas break and, for once, I’d like for you to come meet my friends and not stay locked up here again like a loser”, Will had been pouting at his friend for over two hours.

“Hey, I happen to like being a loser”, said El feigning indignation and scowling at her skinny best friend.

Will managed to hold back his smile at his oldest friend’s antics and maintained a serious expression for the sake of getting his point across. They’d been friends since the age of twelve and both knew just how determined the other could be. Holding each other’s stares defiantly in a silent challenge, neither of them wanted to give in.

As she stubbornly stared into Will’s lively brown eyes, El suddenly felt a wave of nostalgia wash over her. She had been having a few of those for a while now, especially whenever she thought back on their high school days on Hawkins High School. Actually, the biggest irony was thinking about how much she had looked forward to graduating and moving as far away as humanly possible from that hell hole she called hometown. Whereas, now, she couldn’t help feeling strangely homesick. As a matter of fact, lately, El was often ambushed by random flashbacks from her teenage years and usually found herself wishing she could somehow go back and do it all better.

She regretted everything, actually, except for her friendship with Will.

Their friendship was yet another reason El kept thinking back in nostalgia to her high school days: even though Will and her had managed to get accepted into their dream college together and even lived in neighboring dorm buildings, she felt him more distant than ever before. Worse than that, El was painfully aware that she was the reason of the increasing (figurative) distance in their friendship and she loathed herself for it. Now, more than ever, she hated herself for her apathetic and awkward personality. Why couldn’t she be a normal eighteen year old? Why couldn’t she just stop feeling so nervous around other people? Because of this she was finally managing to drive her best friend away, her partner in crime, after being the closest of friends for over half a decade.

For most of their first semester at college she had declined Will’s enthusiastic invitations to parties and any social events, preferring to skip them in favor of spending her afternoons in the solitude of her room either reading ahead or watching some movie or TV show. It was just easier that way, it seemed. El had never really been a social butterfly and she knew how much Will loved meeting and bonding with new people. So, she just figured that she could give him some space by making herself scarce.

However (and she’d never admit it out loud), as Will started spending less and less time with her and his invitations became rare occurrences, El began feeling terribly lonely (which was weird). She usually cherished her alone time, often glad she wasn’t out there fake smiling and making small talk, getting emotionally drained after overthinking and worrying over every tiny detail of her social interactions. Nonetheless, now, it just felt like a very different kind of loneliness.

El felt lonely in a bad way, a way she hadn’t felt for quite a long time: the kind of lonely she used to feel before meeting Joyce Byers and befriending her son, Will.

Finally, after glaring at Will some more, El lowered her gaze in defeat. Mostly because she missed spending more time with him, and also because she was a bit curious about going to a college party.

“Ok. Fine, I’ll go. BUT I’ll only stay until a reasonable hour and you better not be dragging me up there so I can be your designated driver”, answered El with an annoyed huff, hurling one of her fluffy pillows on Will’s general direction and feeling quite annoyed (mostly at her pathetic, abnormal self).

Her friend easily managed to catch the pillow midair and offered El a sympathetic smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. She knew he was worried about her spending so much time by herself – the fact that she had no roommate made it easier for her to just hide away for hours on end without any excuse.

“I’m only doing this for your own good El, you know I look out for you and it’s about time you start having a normal college experience and, you know, getting to know people. After all, the semester is almost over”.

--….--…--…---

Friday 1st, December 2017

El bit her lip as she stared at her reflection on the mirror critically. Was her top too revealing? Was her midsection looking gross and bloated? Should she put any make up on? Was her hair ok? Were jeans and sneakers too casual for the party?

Man, I badly needed a School of Life 101 crash course, El thought with a groan.

It was always on times like this that El really wished she had a roommate or a best friend who could actually give advice on these kinds of things. It was also on times like these that El regretted not learning about this stuff back on high school. Finally, after examining her reflection some more, she decided to change her sneakers in favor of her black leather boots and apply some lipstick to her dry lips.

Feeling quite nervous, she turned her phone screen on and was surprised to see several messages from Will.

8:02 pm U excited yet for your first college party?

8:03 pm Totally getting drunk as skunks 2nite.

8:46 pm Waiting for the guys, we’re coming to pick u up

9:29 pm On our way, expect a call in 15

9:44 pm Almost there

9:59 pm Ok, let’s go

*3 missed calls from MY FAVORITE PERSON IN THE WORLD*

10:03 pm Pick up the phone

10:11 pm We’re waiting downstairs

10:27 pm What the hell u doing? We’ve been here for ages

El was surprised to find out how long she had taken to get ready, her nervousness was really not helping. As quickly as possible, she grabbed her tiny purse and keys and made her way out. At that very moment, her phone screen lit up and the contact name Will had programmed for himself popped up.

*incoming call from MY FAVORITE PERSON IN THE WORLD*

Smiling, El answered.

“I’m sorry, I completely lost track of time, that’s all. I’m almost there”, she said breathlessly while making her way down the flight of stairs.

“No problem El, just making sure you were still up for it”, answered Will sympathetically.

“Wait. So did I actually have an option?” replied El only half joking.

She really was terribly nervous, like she always was whenever she had to face a new social situation.

Will laughed at her lame attempt at making a joke and was silent for a bit, maybe trying to empathize with his best friend’s nervousness.

El could hear Will’s friends talking loudly on the background:

“We need to hurry if we want to get wasted before the night ends, that’s kind of the point of tonight”, a loud male voice whined pathetically.

“Hey, I’m actually enjoying watching this show”, another male voice answered in fake annoyance.

“Booooooring”, someone else interjected.

“You’re too lame Wheeler”, the first voice teased.

The conversation on the background grew faint as El realized Will must have walked away from his friends to talk to her privately.

“Everything will be fine and you’ll have fun, you’ll see. If you feel uncomfortable or something you have us”, finally whispered Will before hanging up.

El had really tried to avoid meeting Will’s friends for a while now, feeling resentment and jealousy towards them because her best friend spent most of his time with them now and talked all the time about how fun and loyal they were.

It actually made sense that they spent time together since they were all taking science related careers and had most of their classes together – Will was an engineer major, like Lucas, while Dustin and Mike were physics majors.

It was silly, she knew.

Calm down El, it’s going to be ok, Will’s friends are probably as nice as him.

Finally, El got to her building’s common area. She saw four guys sprawled comfortably all over the beige couches, two of them were fighting over the remote and the other two were trying to watch whatever show was on TV.

They didn’t notice her presence until she started timidly approaching Will, who was gazing at the screen with mild interest. He was the first one of the group to notice her and his face was instantly filled with a broad smile.

“You’re finally here!” he exclaimed, startling everyone.

“Guys, this is El”, Will said loudly. Then, pointing at each of the guys next to him, he introduced them, “These are Lucas, Dustin and Mike”.

“Thanks for waiting”, El managed to smile at them without making eye contact. She hoped they didn’t notice her nervousness.

“No problem”, said the smallest one of them, Dustin, “honestly, we were all dying to finally meet you”.

“Yeah, we had a bet going on about Will’s friend being imaginary”, laughed Lucas.

Upon hearing that last comment, El snorted while trying to contain a laugh and turned to look at Will with amusement. Her friend merely shrugged.

“See how you make me look bad El?”

“Oh, it was only for the sake of making the bet more interesting”, answered El with a laugh, “it would have been no fun without the mystery, now would it?”

The guys smiled, amused, and the air significantly relaxed. She felt a tiny bit more comfortable, and the voice in her head repeating her own doubts and fears in a loop grew quiet for the first time that night.

“So, who won the bet?” asked Will, looking at his friends.

“Me”, said the tallest boy, Mike, smiling.

He was the only one who hadn’t spoken up yet, but she recognized his voice from her phone call with Will – he was the one who claimed to be enjoying the TV show while they waited for her to arrive.

Overcome by curiosity, El risked a glance up at him and was surprised to find him already looking at her, matching her interest. They made eye contact.

“So thank you for being real, I guess”, he said smiling kindly at her.

She quickly averted her gaze, not knowing what to do or how to respond, and tried to keep her upcoming blush from actually showing on her face. It wasn’t even a compliment, why was she reacting like this?

Social awkwardness truly sucked.

There was a short moment of silence, which was (thankfully) quickly broken by Lucas.

“Ok, let’s get going”, said Lucas enthusiastically as he strode to the nearest exit.

--….--…--…---

Saturday 2nd, December 2017

She’d drank too much, too soon.

Of course, the fact that Will kept refilling her red solo cup with mysterious mixes of liquor didn’t help at all. But she wasn’t complaining at all. All things considered, El found the whole experience quite interesting. Actually, she was pleased to realize that the alcohol numbed that voice that constantly reminded her of all her insecurities and flaws. She found this quite liberating.

She felt like she could do anything. Be anyone she wanted.

Will’s friends had left them to join a game of beer pong not so long ago, which had also helped El feel a whole lot more relaxed. Up until then, she had been too scared of acting like a weirdo around the guys and so she had barely talked.

For the first time in a long time, no worries or guilt lurked El’s mind.

As time went by, the music surrounding her stopped being too loud and the vibration of the bass on the floor actually made her lively in a way she had scarcely felt before. Before she knew it, her foot was tapping the floor to the beat of the unknown song. She tried to pay attention to whatever Will was saying (maybe a funny story about someone in one of his classes? What was that about a teacher?), but words kept jumbling around making it hard for her to understand anything at all.

My thought process is screwed up, El thought.

Suddenly, it occurred to her that that was the funniest, wittiest thing she had ever come up with, so she giggled uncontrollably.

Will smiled affectionately at the giggling girl beside him. He had really tried to be a good friend that night, staying with her the whole time – probably suspecting that if she got to feel too awkward, she’d escape the party.

“I loooooove you so much Willy Will”, said El hugging her friend, “do you know that?”

El’s ears suddenly caught onto a tune, alerting her of something.

Something quite urgent.

Do you recall, not long ago We would walk on the sidewalk? Innocent, remember? All we did was care for each other

“BYERS!!!! COME ON!” she exclaimed giddily, standing up clumsily and dragging her skinny best friend to the middle of the room, “IT’S OUR JAM!”

But the night was warm We were bold and young All around, the wind blows We would only hold on to let go

Will could only smile at her random behavior. He had never been a good dancer and he had not drank nearly as much as El had, so he just sort of awkwardly tried shuffling his feet and swaying his body to the catchy song.

“BLOW A KISS FIRE A GUN, WHEN YOU NEED SOMEONE TO LEAN ON”, El was screaming while swaying her hips wildly, her eyes were closed, “BLOW A KISS FIRE A GUN, ALL WE NEED IS SMEBODY TO LEAN ON”.

Will tried his hardest to keep up with El’s moves, but she was like a woman possessed, jumping around and twirling in every direction. It seemed that all those months of pent up energy – probably gathered after all those afternoons of voluntary isolation – were finally finding an outlet. After a couple of songs and happy to see his friend finally having fun, Will decided his job there was done.

“El. El! EL!!” he screamed to get her attention.

She faced him, smiling wildly. Her face shiny with sweat from the exertion and the warmth in the room. Will couldn’t help mirroring her grin.

“I just can’t keep up with you!” he said teasing her, “I’m gonna go find the guys”.

El stuck out her tongue at him and waved goodbye.

“YOU’RE SUCH A KID ELEVEN!” Will exclaimed as he headed to the other room, where he last saw his friends heading to.

--….--…--…---

Her feet were killing her.

El made her way to the nearest sitting space she could find, a couch on the left side of the room. She sat down for a minute in the crowded couch, slowly trying to move her toes so she didn’t feel them cramping anymore. She was currently sandwiched uncomfortably between a sleeping guy and a couple making out. She tried to ignore the snores and the sounds the couple were making.

She hadn’t seen Will or any of his friends for at least a couple of hours and she was not about to go wandering off looking for them. Will was probably drunk by now, maybe talking to the cute guy from their History 102 class that he always rambled on about. El smiled fondly, remembering how much of a hopeless romantic her best friend was.

She tried laying back on the couch and closing her tired eyes, but everything was too hot and her feet hurt too much. It was way too uncomfortable.

El glanced hopefully at the glass doors that led into the balcony. With any luck, there wouldn’t be anyone out there smoking.

She hated the smell of tobacco. It reminded her of him.

El shut her eyes tightly, desperately trying to chase away the memories that begged to be replayed on her mind, and massaged her throbbing temples. She tried to take a deep, calming breath and relax somehow, but the air felt too moist and everything smelled like alcohol and sweat. Suddenly, she was too aware of the extremely loud music and the annoying presence of the people around her. And there were too many people. Too many unfamiliar faces. Frustrated, El opened her eyes slowly, glancing around at the room full of strangers.

Dejection filled her thoroughly, tonight had been great so far and she just happened to ruin it by opening a door she had closed more than five years ago. She’d promised it would never haunt her, never hurt her again. But it was always there, lurking. It was always him, never allowing her to escape his choking grip.

Without even thinking about it, she had started walking on the opposite direction of the balcony, towards the main door of the house. As she stepped outside of the house, she couldn’t help noticing the wide brown door was ajar. El moved forward taking slow, deliberate steps, knowing her balance was far from being the most stable.

She glanced around quickly.

Sighing in relief at the fact that she had apparently managed to escape the smokers, El leaned on the nearest wall and stared off into the darkened streets and houses. Her body still felt light, but most the energy she had at the beginning of the night had ebbed away by now, leaving her exhausted. Soon enough, she noticed that the volume of the music and the noise from the house was once again bearable for her. However, without the loud (loud! loud!) music infecting her thoughts, she was left at the mercy of the familiar cold voice in her head: it was her own voice, but ruthless and emotionless, and it never tired of always repeating everything she didn’t want to hear.

She wondered what time it was, she was too lazy to get her phone out and check the time. Her fuzzy brain was making everything a lot harder.

“You ok?” a familiar voiced questioned.

El found herself staring up into the freckle-covered face of one of Will’s friends.

“Just tired and hot”, she replied, “it’s like a freaking oven in there”.

He just chuckled.

“Why are you out here?” she suddenly asked.

“Oh, just getting some air to clear my head”, the tall guy answered shrugging, “I am the lucky soul who gets to be the designated driver for tonight”.

El smiled in amusement.

His name is Mike, El suddenly remembered, her scattered, hazy thoughts becoming a tiny bit clearer.

“You know, I was convinced the only reason Will invited me here was so I’d have the honor of being the DD”.

They remained in a comfortable silence for a while, both staring off and busy with their own thoughts.

“Will is worried about you”, Mike stated after a while.

“I know”, El answered sadly, “it’s just hard for me, you know?”

Mike furrowed his brow in confusion.

“No matter how hard I try, it’s hard for me to feel comfortable or relaxed or even normal around new people or in new places”, she explained almost in a whisper.

“It’s ok to feel that way”, he said like it was the most natural thing in the world, his gaze showing empathy.

El snorted, fully aware that no, it was not okay to be such an introverted freak. She was not stupid. She knew it was a limitation, something that held her back from experiences and people and things she really wanted. She was all too aware that it was what isolated her from everyone and ultimately stood like a solid barrier, shielding her even from the ones she deeply cared about.

“I felt very lonely coming here at first”, Mike confessed smiling crookedly in her direction, “I consider myself a lucky guy, having Dustin as a roommate and meeting Lucas and Will on my first week here”.

“Will is an amazing friend”, El answered smiling, “and all of you seem like pretty cool guys”, she added honestly.

Mike blushed a bit and lowered his gaze, focusing on his wristwatch.

Who even owns a wristwatch these days?, wondered El with amusement as she glanced at him with the corner of her eye.

“Hey, it’s barely 1 am, how do you feel about going for a drive and coming back to pick up our friends’ drunken asses?” suddenly asked Mike.

Full story: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12840366/chapters/29318523

[theletterunread]

May Day, May Day, May Day

Last May, the world continued to fall apart, as it's been doing for many years – though at a noticeably accelerated pace. The coronavirus dictated everyone's life and kept me mostly in my apartment in Franklin Village, living a life that was just like my normal life, only moreso. I played video games (but for more hours at a time), watched movies (but more than usual), and read books (but longer books, like Ulysses and the last Karl Ove Knausgaard novel, that were too heavy to have carried around and read while commuting). I did a lot of new writing and got a few rejections for some old writing. Just as I had seven years earlier, I began to wish I had a piano – as my apartment’s previous tenant, singer-songwriter Rebecca Black, did – so I could pass my downtime creating something nice.

The May before that, my writing partner and I submitted writing samples through the WGA Staffing System in the hopes of being hired to write for a sitcom. This job board had been set up by the Writer’s Guild to help writers find work without the assistance of their agents, whom the WGA had instructed its members to fire following a dispute with the Association of Talent Agents. My writing partner and I were skeptical that anybody (least of all us) would be hired through this system – we figured staffing decisions would still be determined by Hollywood’s impenetrable cliquishness – but we knew there was nothing to be lost by giving it a try.

On a Thursday, we submitted applications to three shows. Two of them were cancelled by Saturday – almost as if our applications reminded the producers that they still had dead shows to clear out – and we never heard back from the third.

The May before that, a paralegal left the law firm I work at in Downtown LA because he’d found a job closer to his home in Long Beach. My boss took him out to lunch, after which he returned to the office to say his goodbyes. He thanked me for teaching him some filing skills, but I had trouble accepting the gratitude. Even after six years, I still felt like a pretender in the legal world, skeptical that I knew anything teachable.

Later that afternoon, my boss informed the rest of us that, at lunch, the paralegal had asked him, “Do you wanna smoke some weed?” My boss had declined, noting that it was noon on a Wednesday. Our receptionist said that he had recently made the same offer to her. But an associate attorney and I had never been offered the same opportunity even once in the six months we worked with him.

The May before that, my pianist friend passed through LA and we met for lunch in Westwood. He was the first peer whose hair I noticed was going grey. Mine had been turning for a few years already. Good for both of us.

When I returned home, I played The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, an acclaimed game which shares a lot of its DNA with one predecessor in particular: The Wind Waker. I was happy to see that game’s achievements respected by this new installment in the series because I still felt the exact same protectiveness of and identification with The Wind Waker that I had 14 years earlier, no matter that I was getting old and grey.

The May before that, I received a rejection letter from a literary magazine for a short story that I had submitted for publication 14 months earlier. I also received a rejection from a literary agent for a novel I’d written. Neither one upset me too much: the short story because I’d completely forgotten it was out in the world; the novel because the agent sent me back thoughtful notes, and I was touched that anyone would even take the time to read 75,000 words I’d written. Plus, it was easy to brush off literary set-backs. I had just had made my first business trip to Hollywood, and I was confident I’d soon be working as a sitcom writer.

The May before that, I got a sharp pain in my back anytime I breathed in deeply. The internet said it was probably a strain in one of my intercostal muscles, but couldn’t rule out pneumonia or something scarier. Not wanting a repeat of seven years earlier, when I’d ignored ankle pain and wound up in surgery, I visited a doctor. She diagnosed it as a strained intercostal muscle and wrote me a prescription for anti-inflammatories, which I never picked up.

Three days later, my friends and I were sharing interesting quotations over email (Tuesdays we shared poetry, Wednesdays paintings, and Thursdays quotations). The last contribution was from H.P. Lovecraft: “The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.”

The May before that, my roommates and I threw a party in our apartment. We invited 47 people and just about 47 people showed up. We had a great time until my landlord called me downstairs to show me that our front gate had been broken by one of our guests while departing. I esteemed my landlord so highly that there was little in life I hated more than disappointing him.

By the next morning, my roommates and I had determined who the culprit was, but we weren’t sure whether to ask him to pay up. While we weighed our options, I went to McCarren Park to attend a picnic hosted by a friend of mine from high school. I didn’t know any of the other guests, but I asked them whether, in my situation, they would reach out to the vandal and ask him to pay. They all said it was a tough call.

Ultimately, my roommates and I paid for the gate ourselves, swallowing the repair charge as the cost of hosting guests. As one of my roommates used to say when shrugging off his post-party hangovers, “You gotta pay the piper.”

The May before that, I wanted to resume playing the piano, so I made arrangements to buy an electric keyboard from a man who lived on the Upper East Side. I reached out to my only friend with a car – the same woman to whom I’d lost my virginity four years before – and asked if she would help me haul the equipment back to Bed-Stuy. She agreed on the condition that I would go with her to Rockaway Beach afterwards. Though the beach is my least favorite of all leisure destinations, I said sure and told her where to meet me.

She showed up to the Upper East Side without a car and without any understanding that I had expected her to bring a car. I had forgotten to ask for that, but it wouldn’t have made a difference: she hadn’t been vehicled for two years. I asked why she thought I would request her help with this chore, if not for her ability to bring a car. She asked why I hadn’t mentioned the car in my request, why I assumed she had one even though I had only seen her drive once, two years earlier, and where my gratitude was for her being willing to come out in 90-degree weather to help with such a tedious chore. Her rhetorical questions were better. We lugged the keyboard, its stand, its pedal, and a bunch of cords back to Brooklyn over two subway transfers and then went to the beach, where the temperature was about 40 degrees lower.

Even though the keyboard’s quality was affirmed by my (imminently greying) pianist friend when he came over for one of our parties, it didn’t scratch my itch the way a real piano would have. I kept it for three years until the speakers stopped working.

The May before that, I began working at a law firm in Midtown. I didn’t know how I landed the position, a phenomenon that’s repeated in every job I’ve got – or not got. Despite my supposed knowledge of film and TV, I’ve been turned down for writing jobs and even to work for Blockbuster. But I was hired to work at a venerable firm while knowing absolutely nothing about the law.

Between that respectable job and the largesse of my landlord, letting me live in Shangri-La for $600 per month, I spent my early-to-mid-twenties building unusual financial stability. I didn’t recognize it, though, and those were the years I was most worried about money. In the years before and since, financial anxiety was nothing; my worries were (are) about writing. And tidily, in that middle period, the creative side of life caused no concern.

The May before that, I graduated from NYU. More than any catastrophe I’ve lived through, that event created an atmosphere of the End of Days. Feelings of wistfulness and anxiety about casting off into the unknown were underscored by Collapse Into Now, the new R.E.M. album I was listening to repeatedly. It is a poignant record (though it wouldn’t be identified as such for another four months, it was secretly R.E.M.’s farewell album) but I was in an emotional state to be moved by any music. I couldn’t even join in the culture-wide mocking of Rebecca Black’s “Friday” that was going on; I found her earnestness unbearably touching.

At the end of the month, I moved into my new place in Bed-Stuy. My roommates and I had flipped for the apartment as soon as we saw it, not just because its competition wasn’t fierce – other prospective apartments had rat poison on the floor or 18-inch-high ceilings – but because it was spacious and cheap and distinctive, and because we liked the landlord. (And it went both ways: he told us that he had declined other possible tenants while waiting for our decision because, “I took a shine to you guys.”) And even though it was still a little strange to be sleeping and eating and showering in a new place, and even though a couple of teenagers had shouted at me while I was moving in – using what federal judges now call “racially charged language” – and even though I still had no idea how to shape a life outside of school, I felt better, because I was in My Home.

The May before that, I was finishing up a semester abroad in Ireland. At times during that spring, I compared myself to the freshman I’d been two and a half years earlier. I had been so naïve, so unworldly when I came to New York in 2007. Now, it was 2010 – a modern year, the dawn of a new decade – and I was 20 years old, living across the Atlantic. I had lived long enough to have a past, to have life behind me. I was a real person.

But if I ever had any specific examples of what made “Junior Year Me” more sophisticated than (or even different from) “Freshman Year Me,” I have completely forgotten them now. The two iterations are collapsed into one character in my mind. And when I see the numbers now, 20 as an age is much closer to the two decades before it than to the years that have come since, and 2010 looks like an absurdly miniscule year.

The May before that, I lost my virginity in a college dorm on 14th Street in Manhattan. It happened in the afternoon, after two failed attempts in prior evenings. The school year was winding down – when my girlfriend called to invite me over, I was packing up my dorm room, and when I arrived, her suitemate was in their common room, packing up her things – so there was no more room for error.

I recall looking at a digital clock, but I don’t recall what time it showed. Nor do I remember the weather, though I remember either being pleased that it was raining, or wishing that it were raining. For a redefining moment, it’s awfully hazy. The fog of war. I had to be reminded many, many years later that, after we finished, I offered a dirty joke that was extremely in and out of character: “I was packing boxes in my dorm, and then I came over here to pack boxes.”

Afterwards, I walked back to my dorm in the West Village. My friends and I had plans to watch a marathon of all of the videos we had filmed that year, and we did. It was several years before I told them where I had been earlier that day.

The May before that, I had an MRI on my ankle, which had been hurting for a year. After I left the hospital, I went to Blockbuster to interview for a summer job and absolutely bombed. I may have admitted that I only planned to keep the job until college resumed in September; I certainly volunteered that I knew nothing about high-traffic film genres like action or horror. When asked what movies I might recommend to customers, I offered artsy snoozers like Ed Wood.

Just as well that I was never offered a job, as the MRI showed that I had, “the ankle of a 70-year-old,” and arthroscopic surgery was scheduled. I spent the next two months first in a cast, then in a boot. I passed the summer making videos and uploading them to YouTube, thinking maybe I’d go viral, as I’d been hoping for two years. The most attention I got was from foot fetishists who liked when I showed my casted leg.

The May before that, my high school was shut down on what was supposed to have been my last real day of senior year. An AP Spanish Literature test and a band concert were scheduled for the day, after which I had no more obligations. But cafeteria workers coming in early in the morning spotted two masked men creeping through a hallway. The workers called the cops, the masked men fled, and the bomb squad was called in. School was closed for the day.

Had there been a bomb, this might be a disaster story known to lots of people of my generation. But there was no bomb, and it’s a story that even I forget most of the time. The general consensus was that the masked men were just students coming in early to set up some departing-senior stunt. They were never identified, though I was confident I knew who they were.

My test and my concert were rescheduled, so I had to keep going to school. The morning of the makeup AP exam, I told one of my classmates that I couldn’t help but wish we had been able to wrap up high school the week before, as anticipated. She cut me off and said, “You can’t even think about that.”

The May before that, YouTube penetrated mass consciousness. The notion of “going viral” was not known to us then, but it was still obvious how well the site could facilitate the spread of good work. I was certain that the videos my friends and I were making could be successful on there. We had so many funny ideas, it was inconceivable that not a single one of them would catch fire. Maybe not immediately, but it couldn’t take forever.

The May before that, Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith premiered. I disliked the previous movie, had forgotten the one before that, and was totally agnostic about the original trilogy, yet I convinced myself to be excited for this one: This is how a person interested in film should feel. My mom and I made plans to go as a treat after an afternoon laboring in the garden, and I invited a friend to come along.

My friend called back later in the day to ask if he could bring another kid from school to the movie. This other kid and I wound up growing closer in the last years of high school, but at the time, I still found him mean and unpredictable. I worried that he might laugh at me for still going to the movies with my mom, or worse, that he would act up in some distasteful way in front of her. My parents weren’t overly sensitive, but I was still haunted by a memory from a birthday party three years before: this kid seriously tasking my dad by telling an awful dirty joke. ("How do you circumcise a redneck?")

I lied to my friend and told him that the trip to the movies had been cancelled. Then I lied to my mom and told her that my friend had decided not to come. At the movie theater, I kept looking over my shoulder, worried that my friend might decide to come anyway (maybe even with the other kid), and I’d be caught. He didn’t, and the next day he asked if I still wanted to see the movie with him, so I watched Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith twice in two days.

The May before that, in Downtown LA (only a mile from the law firm where I’d be working 13 years later), Nintendo had a very successful presentation at the annual Electronic Entertainment Expo. At a time when its public reputation was shaky, Nintendo blew the roof off the Los Angeles Convention Center with a showcase of a new handheld, a new spokesman, and a new Legend of Zelda game. The previous entry, The Wind Waker, had drawn a lot of attention (mostly condemnation gradually giving way to praise) for its colorful, cel-shaded art style. This new game looked more subdued, realistic, and – in the parlance of the times – mature.

While I was excited by the new entry, I felt sad that it appeared to be such a blatant rejection of The Wind Waker, a game I had been defending against adolescent smears since before its release, a game I thought had proven itself to be a masterpiece. Yet here was Nintendo itself surrendering to the backlash and giving the haters exactly what they demanded. That wasn’t how the world was supposed to work, and I felt that I had been hung out to dry. These feelings were still with me more than a decade later when Breath of the Wild came along to close the circle.

The May before that, a blizzard hit Colorado. It was a spring snow, very wet and heavy, and it destroyed the plants that my mom had been adding to the yard since we moved in. She was in the house with my newborn brother, so my dad and I shoveled the walk. It was hard, slushy work, but I greatly preferred it to the lawn jobs and gardening I’d been doing over the preceding year. A private yard was supposedly one of the pleasures of living in a house rather than the apartments and condos we’d previously had, but it wasn’t worth the work that went into it. Visiting a public park or walking around the neighborhood was much more fun than sitting on your own boring lawn.

It wasn’t anything that would be relevant for eight years, and it wasn’t anything I was conscious of for longer than that, but I was developing a sense of what I dreamed would be My Home.

The May before that, my family was newly installed in our first house. Our old condo had been bought by a guy who ran an outdoor cinema over the summers, and he had given us three free passes. I went with two friends to see the second screening of the season, Airplane!

Before the show, one of my friends mentioned that he was going to be working that summer at his dad’s restaurant, and the other said he had been given a spot at his uncle’s factory (it made insulated water bottles). I felt left out, and wished that I could get work too. I wondered if there was a way I could leverage my knowing the man who ran the outdoor cinema into a job.

I remember that longing, yet I don’t remember how, two years later, I came to be working at the outdoor cinema. I have no record of who talked to whom and said what to get me that gig, the first of many positions I would get without knowing how. The job stayed on my resume until I went to work for the law firm in Midtown, but I’m not sure how useful it was. It wasn’t enough to get me in the fucking door at Blockbuster.

The May before that, R.E.M. released its 12th studio album, Reveal. I heard its lead single, “Imitation of Life,” while leaving the Albuquerque airport in a rented car, and was entranced. When we got back to Boulder, I asked my parents to buy a copy of the CD, beginning a fandom that hadn’t abated ten years later when I was listening to Collapse Into Now.

Four months after Reveal was released, the U.S was hit by the September 11th attacks, the first calamity of my life. I’ve never since looked at a copy of Reveal without thinking, “That was from the world before 9/11.” Directionless. And my ability to draw meaning from the eternal return has advanced no further.

[raybansandcoffee]

Adventure of a Lifetime: Chapter Twelve

First things first, I am so so so sorry about how long this has taken. I can’t thank you enough for your patience. I was diagnosed with influenza b, bronchitis, and a sinus infection at the beginning of November. I got sent home with an antibiotic and antiviral. I could not get better. So it was a second round of antibiotics and steroids after that. I spent 3.5 weeks sick. I have a couple of chronic health conditions that make my immune system suck so getting better from something like that may take the average person like 3-5 days. It takes 3-5 weeks for me. Most of that I was in bed and working in short spurts when I could function upright. Thankfully I work for myself so I could structure my life that way. I also did a little editing and writing on another story I was writing years ago about the Jonas Brothers to try and give some happy breaks in the day for a friend who is going through some unimaginable stuff with her family. My friend means the world to me and this story has always made her happy so if me writing more of it could give even a few moments of quiet while processing things it was worth it. So this took a backseat and I hate that. Thank you so much for sticking with me. To thank you this is a really long chapter. Over 12,500 words, so hopefully you enjoy it.

If you need a refresher or haven’t read first the first eleven chapters they are HERE.

As a warning there is a description of Charlie’s experience the weekend Sam and Michael die in this chapter. If you think this might be triggering to you emotionally you can skip over the email in this section. If you need someone to talk to after reading it please contact me. I’m always willing to listen and help you find resources if you need them.

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“Ava is Ellery’s best friend. I’ve told you about her. This is Jeremy, Ava’s Dad,” I answered. There was an awkward silence before Jeremy dropped my hand that was still behind my back and extended it to shake Alex and Max’s hands. 

“Hi, I’m Jeremy Renner. It’s nice to meet you both,” he said. I glanced over at him and he didn’t look like he had when he met anyone in my family. He wasn’t smiling his brightest smile, it was a more subdued smile. I mean I don’t blame him because he was meeting Alex for the first time and none of us had glowing reviews of her before her arrival. Well, hopefully, it was that. If it wasn’t it was because I had introduced him as Ava’s Dad, which was a truthful description of him but not a full description. It left out what he meant to me and the kids.

“Nice to meet you, Jeremy,” Max replied. Alex looked from Jeremy to me and back again. 

“You look familiar. Do I know you from somewhere?” Alex asked.

“I’ve maybe been in a movie you’ve seen before but other than that I don’t think so. I live in LA part-time but I don’t recognize you, so I’m going to go with it was probably a movie.”

“Mom, he’s Hawkeye in the Avengers movies that the twins love,” Savannah jumped in to add. 

“Oh of course. I thought maybe you were a friend from USC that I didn’t remember. Charlotte hung out with a lot of interesting people that I didn’t know very well.” 

“Charlotte?” I asked raising an eyebrow. “Since when do you call me Charlotte?” I knew when she called me Charlotte. It always meant a lecture was coming. She turned to look at me and I almost felt myself shrink back into the 18-year-old college student who was slightly afraid of my new roommate. I mean I eventually moved beyond being afraid of her all of the time and we became friends but that first like month of school was a nightmare. The rest was just mostly a nightmare because she was pregnant and hormonal. 

“I wasn’t sure if Ellery’s friends’ parents knew you as anything other than Charlotte.” The parents at the boys’ school all knew her as Alexandra. She forced her students to call her Dr. Barrett-Gladstone. Only a few select colleagues and friends called her Alex. 

“They mostly all know me as Charlie or don’t know me at all. You know usually that peopleing isn’t one of my greatest skills.” Jeremy started to laugh, his real normal laugh.

“You aren’t good at peopleing, really ever.” I punched him in the bicep and then shook my hand. 

“Ouch,” I mumbled. 

“You know better,” Jeremy said as he scrunched his face at me and I scrunched mine back. At this moment I wanted to kiss him, but I also wanted to live to see the lunch I knew was waiting in the kitchen so I didn’t. 

“Hey, you two.” THANK YOU, FRANKIE! My sister had perfect timing, coming over to hug Alex and Max so that this awkward moment could end. “Did you have a nice flight? Do you need me to help you get settled? Oh, you’ve met Jeremy right? He’s the absolute greatest.” She didn’t even pause to take a breath and let anyone answer. 

“Yes, we met Jeremy,” Alex answered very matter-of-factly. I saw Frankie’s chipper face soften. 

“Let me take you to get your luggage settled and everything. We’ve got you downstairs. There’s room for you and the boys. With Dad and Mandi being here plus Jeremy and Ava are staying here this weekend we had to do a little moving around. Sorry, you don’t have your normal room, Alex. I’ve got Frankie and Ryan in the suite above the garage because Carter is sleeping in the office. We are experiencing a little bit of sleep regression with Axel so I didn’t want any of the kids to stay in there with him.”

“Understandable,” Max said. “We are fine with the rooms in the basement. There’s a lot of space down there.” I went into the house with Frankie and Alex following me, thankfully Jeremy stayed to keep Max occupied knowing I’d need a moment alone with my sister and Alex. Judging by Alex’s facial expression through this entire conversation we were preparing ourselves for an uncomfortable conversation. We made small talk while we walked into the house, got their bags and headed down to the rooms I’d picked for them. I was a little nervous, it was the two rooms in the house that shared a bathroom, though to be honest there was another bathroom in the basement that had an outdoor entrance because of the hot tub. 

“So Jeremy isn’t just Ellery’s friend’s Dad is he?” Alex asked.

“No, he’s not. We are friends.” Frankie glared at me. “And we’ve been on one date.”

“He was the hot single dad who invited you over for a pool day?” I nodded. “And you felt that it was appropriate to hide his identity from me?”

“Well, based on experience I felt it was best to wait until there was a reason to tell you about him. There wasn’t really a reason until Wednesday. We went on our first date that night.”

“They also arrived home to all of us here,” Frankie said. “So she really hasn’t had a chance to tell you about it. But she really seems happy. Like super happy.”

“I am happy.”

“What do you mean based on experience?” I knew I shouldn’t have said that. I’m an incredibly honest person and sometimes, with Alex, honesty is not the best policy because it creates disagreements.

“Jeremy is an actor, musician, and producer. His life is very much based in the Hollywood scene you so openly despise. I’ve watched how you treated Savannah’s dad her entire life, you were hard on Michael for so long and honestly, you’re the only person who has ever asked me when I’m going to grow up and get a ‘real’ job as if my career isn’t real because it’s part of Hollywood. Jeremy’s career makes him a second-class citizen to you and I didn’t want the judgment about it until there was a reason to judge. He also doesn’t deserve your judgment.” She opened her mouth like she was going to speak and I held up my hand signaling that it wasn’t her turn yet. “He’s a great Dad, an incredible friend, and has been there for me through the hell I’ve been reliving the nightmare that this week is. He didn’t judge me, my kids or my life. He embraced us for the wild, crazy, feral family we are. He’s offered help to not just me but to my kids, my brother and your daughter. For the first time in a year, someone has made me actually enjoy my life beyond what is required of me. The last year of my life has been literal hell, he doesn’t judge a bit of my crazy and is trying to help me out of that hell. He is the first person in a year that doesn’t look at me with sad eyes, worry that I’m going to crack under the pressure, or judge my every single decision. He knows that I’m doing the best I can and wants to be here to help me do that. I couldn’t ask for a better person to have magically fallen in my lap.” Frankie smiled. 

“I’ve treated Savannah’s Dad like crap because he’s a piece of shit. He left me with that baby and didn’t look back.”

“Except the thing is he left you, he didn’t leave her. Did you know that he calls her every day? Or that he’s come to stay with us every other month for a long weekend since she moved so he could see her? Did you know that he sends me money every month to help pay for Savy’s part of the utilities? Did you know that he called me to ask if it was appropriate for him to come this weekend? She’d called to invite him because he is part of her support system and this is a hard weekend for all of us, including your daughter. You have done everything you could to sabotage the relationship between your daughter and her father because you are bitter that he left YOU. He didn’t want what had been a friends with benefits relationship to become an unhappy marriage just because you couldn’t figure out how to properly take birth control.” Frankie’s eyes bugged out of her head. I was fairly certain I saw steam escape from Alex’s ears. I’d never actually expressed my feelings on Alex’s treatment of Savannah’s Dad. It hadn’t been my place but her transferring her anger towards him to every other man who happened to work in Hollywood was my business.

“Tell me how you really feel, Charlotte.”

“I hate when you call me Charlotte. You do it in a condescending manner like I should use my grown-up name instead of still pretending I’m a kid and letting people call me Charlie or Chucky. You have spent every day of your life since you met me looking down your nose at me because I don’t behave properly, I didn’t see the value in the life I could’ve had if I'd opted for law school instead of music. I still dress like a kid and wear shorts that are too short and need to purge my wardrobe and dress appropriately for a woman of my age. Every man I’ve ever dated was a piece of trash or not good enough. You don’t get to do that to Jeremy because he doesn’t deserve that. He’s a good man. One person doesn’t mean an entire industry of people are trash. I mean you were a complete and utter bitch to Michael for the first six months that he and Sam were together. You never really got much better either. I don’t honestly even know why you feel like you need to be here. You were so harsh to both of them. They weren’t raising their kids right. They weren’t living life the way they needed to. They didn’t do the right things. You sent me a text message ranting about how you couldn’t believe that they were going out on a date to celebrate their anniversary instead of staying home with their three-week-old baby. Imagine if they had stayed home the destruction that could’ve happened? You had to judge them for wanting to celebrate how much they loved each other because you were jealous. But worst of all, you are still so angry that they left those kids in my clearly incapable hands when you were the obvious choice.” 

I was almost crying by now. I hadn’t brought up to anyone the text she sent me. She’d been surprised to find out I was watching the kids when she text me that night. I told her that I had them overnight so that Sam and Michael could celebrate, she felt it was so inappropriate, they needed to be home caring for their baby not allowing me to take care of them. I still wasn’t sure which way she felt, that I was incompetent with children and shouldn’t have them or that they were being irresponsible by having a life. Frankie came to stand beside me and grabbed my hand in hers squeezing it.

“You clearly have been harboring that anger for quite some time.” Alex was ticked but she was trying to stay calm. She always told me my temper was unattractive and part of the reason I was single, when I was in a relationship she claimed she didn’t know how Patrick put up with it. 

“You think? You’ve always acted like you were better than me. I’m fairly certain I got laid more freshman year than you did but only one of us ended up pregnant. So Miss Perfect, how do you explain that?”

“Alright you two, stop this arguing. Tensions are high. You’re both grieving this weekend and grief takes different forms. Clearly right now Charlie’s is anger and well, I don’t know what your form is Alex but either way you two need to stop. This is the absolute last thing that Sam would’ve wanted. For whatever reason, she loved you both and sometimes I question her sanity because you both drive me crazy occasionally.” To the rescue came Mandi. She was even laughing which was helping to break the tension a little bit. “Alex you were up early to fly here and had to wrangle the twins and that husband of yours through LAX which is always a stress-producing experience. Charlie, you are being defensive and we both know that’s not a good thing. You have guests in your house and a man who appears to be falling for you by the second waiting outside to finish decorating for dinner. Don’t blow it by showing him that your Italian temper can make you a wee bit of a bitch sometimes.” Now I was laughing. Alex smiled like she’d won. “Alex, wipe that smirk off your face. You aren’t free of guilt in this situation. You have harbored a grudge against people for what you perceive your ex to be and that’s not fair, especially to your friends and Jeremy. It’s going to be an emotionally charged weekend and we are only a few hours away from all of Sam’s family arriving in from Reno for dinner. So take a few minutes each to calm down, get your shit together and stop being bitches to each other. While we all know that Sam secretly enjoyed watching the debates between the two of you she’d hate to see you doing that this weekend. This weekend is about loving her, remembering her, and celebrating her, not about you two and this petty nonsense.”

“Fine,” I replied. “I’ve gotta go shower anyway.” I turned and walked out of the room. I heard Alex start to bitch about something only to be shut down by my stepmom and sister. I was still angry and still about two seconds away from crying. I was also thanking the vacation gods that the whole plan for Alex and her family to stay here for 10 days had been canceled by a speaking opportunity at a conference for Alex. I don’t think this would’ve been a great start to a 10-day vacation.

“You okay,” Jeremy asked when I made it to the bottom of the stairs. He was sitting on them and clearly had heard everything I’d just screamed at my friend. I shook my head no. “Let’s go upstairs. You can shower and vent. Ok?” I nodded. He took my hand and I helped him up off the stairs. We went up to my bedroom and as soon as the door shut the hyperventilating started as the tears streamed down my face. Jeremy pulled me into him hugging me tightly. “Breathe. Deep breaths.”

“I can’t…I can’t…I can’t breathe.” Without thinking twice about it he picked me up and carried me over to the bed and laid me down before laying beside me. He wrapped his arms and legs around me, his entire body enveloping mine like a burrito. I sobbed, openly for a while. I was finally able to start breathing deeply again. Eventually, the tears stopped and I just laid there trying to avoid thinking about the fact that I’d just had a panic attack. I knew having everyone in my house was going to be hard, but I didn’t imagine it like this. 

“Are you okay now?” I shook my head. “Still need to cry?”

“Maybe, but I need to shower more than that.”

“What happened?”

“I maybe exploded. It was like 18 years of pent up anger and anxiety that just erupted out of me like I was fucking Vesuvius and wanted to murder everything in my path. It was not my best moment but she can be such a flaming bitch sometimes. I am surprised I couldn’t remain composed a little bit longer.”

“Well from what I heard you clearly needed to say what you said. Do you feel better?”

“A little, though now I’m positive the rest of this weekend is going to fucking suck worse than it was already going to.”

“I’m here with you every step of the way.”

“I really am grateful for that. But I need to shower so you need to get out of here for a few steps of the way.” He laughed at me before leaning down to kiss me, a kiss I felt all the way to my toes. The anxiety that had just ripped through my body really wanted its drug of choice, which was sex but this was a completely inappropriate time for that. So instead I kissed him a little bit longer before kicking him out, turned on music and sat down at my laptop at the desk in my bedroom.

**********

To: Samantha Madigan

From: Charlotte De Luca

Subject: One Year…

Sam,

Today is the day I’ve been dreading.

I’ve never told you what that day was like for me. I was sure if there was a way that you could find out you’d already know. But it’s time that I tell you.

A year ago you were stolen from me. It’s been a year since I really knew what it felt like to breathe. I relive that night and day over and over and over again, mostly in the form of nightmares. I remember listening to you go through the instructions you’d written for me about Axel’s feeding schedule, sleep schedule, and the lecture about giving too much sugar to Ellery because the next day was a big day and she needed her sleep. The next day you’d be getting up, dragging me around town and planning the following weekend which was Axel’s big Welcome to the World party; a party that never happened, well at least not in the way you planned. Michael and Patrick were goofing off, telling you I knew how to take care of the kids and that you’d be late for your reservations. You did end up late but the restaurant of course was so excited to see you two and celebrate your 7th anniversary with you that you were seated anyway. 

The kids were perfect. Axel fell asleep on my chest on the couch that night. Ellery did eat too much candy, but she still slept like an angel, shockingly. I had gotten up to feed Axel when he started crying. You’d warned me about the middle of the night feedings. It was 2:08 when the knock that changed my life echoed through the apartment. I had Axel in my arms and went to the door. It had to be a drunk person at the wrong door, at least that’s what I thought. Then I looked through the peephole to see two LAPD officers. The knock woke Patrick up from his dead sleep in our bedroom. I opened the door as he came into the living room, he was just in his boxers and a little embarrassed by that when he realized I’d opened the door to two police officers. You’d have laughed at him. He turned so red. 

“Are you Miss Charlotte De Luca?” asked the officer with the darker hair. “I am,” I replied a little nervous. “May we come in, we need to talk to you in private,” the second officer said. I opened the door more as they came in and shut the door behind them. “Miss De Luca, there’s been an incident at 902 Walsh Boulevard this evening. We believe that right around midnight Mr. and Mrs. Fitzpatrick arrived home in the middle of a home invasion. Neighbors called 911 at 12:04 reporting gunshots. We arrived at the home at 12:11. There was no suspect in the home at the time and both Mr. and Mrs. Fitzpatrick had been shot multiple times. We pronounced them dead at the scene.” I don’t think Patrick has ever moved so fast. He took Axel from my arms as I dropped to the floor. The room filled with the most blood curdling scream, after enough of the nightmares I’ve discovered that the scream was mine and what woke Ellie up.

The officers told me that the home was still a crime scene and I wouldn’t be able to get inside until the next day. They were going to need me or a family member to go to the hospital at 9:00 in the morning to identify your bodies. I was listed as your emergency contact in both of your phones and on your medical records because you didn’t have family in LA. As soon as the police officers gave Patrick all of the information he’d need he packed up the kids’ stuff, got me changed, and we headed down to the parking garage. You’d left your Mercedes with us in case we needed to take the kids anywhere, that way we didn’t have to fuck with car seats. I hadn’t said a word since I stopped screaming. I remember hearing Patrick on the phone with my Dad. He explained what happened and that we were in the car headed to his house. By the time we arrived Frankie and Ryan were both there having left the kids with Stevie. 

I was numb, a feeling that honestly lasted for weeks. I still feel pretty numb most days. I didn’t sleep, I couldn’t. Every time I tried to close my eyes I imagined the police officers standing at my door. Dad spoke with the officer who had left his information with Patrick in the morning before sending us to the morgue. The police agreed to let us into the house to get things for the kids. Mandi and I got in the car with just enough time to arrive at the hospital at 9:00. Frankie had gone home to get the kids. Dad and Ryan were busy pulling up your latest will, your asset information, and anything else we’d need. Patrick went home to get me some clothes and make sure that everything your Mom and Dad would need when they got into LA was ready. 

I will never forget how cold the morgue felt. The police officer with the dark hair was there again. He went with Mandi and I to identify your body and Michael’s. I had tried to convince Mandi not to come with me but she didn’t want to leave my side. You didn’t look like yourself, even though I knew it was you. Your skin was ashen. The glow you always had was gone. You didn’t ooze sunshine and rainbows anymore. You were gone. So was Michael. They told me he had been shot more times than you. He tried to fight the intruder and they believed the intruder would be easier to find than it could’ve been because Michael was able to wrestle with him long enough that he was shot, they believed in the arm. It was likely that he would require medical attention and they were able to get enough DNA to identify him. Information was sent to every hospital on the west coast and every police department in the country. It was nice to hear though it brought no comfort as I stared down at your body. All I wanted to do was shake you awake. You had to just be sleeping, but you weren’t. 

What happened next is what haunts me, literally. I wake up most nights screaming when I get to this part. Mandi pulled up to your house, an officer at the end of the driveway stopped us and asked to see IDs. He radioed to another officer and then let us in. Your car was in the driveway, a door standing open where the intruder had opened it hoping to get it hot-wired to leave in it. He wasn’t able to and left on foot or in a getaway car, they weren’t sure. We walked in the front door to find LAPD employees everywhere. It was like a scene straight from Law and Order, I was waiting for Ice T to enter the room, it would’ve shown this was a joke because how obsessed you were with the show. There was no Ice T. There was blood everywhere, evidence markers, crime scene tape, and an obvious location as to where you and Michael had both died. Your perfectly white living room was covered in red blood. Everything was thrown around the room, the place had been ransacked before you came home. Mandi and I quickly threw items for the kids into bags so we could head back to her house. Before we left the second police officer wanted to question me again. They’d asked a few questions the night before but I hadn’t been very much help, the whole screaming uncontrollably thing was the problem. 

Once they were done Mandi put me back in the car and we headed back to Santa Barbara. We both were wishing we’d brought someone else with us because after everything we’d just seen neither of us was in any condition to drive. When we got back to the house I knew I had to sit Ellie down and let her know she wouldn't be going home. She’d wonder why were were at Nana and Papa’s. I do want to thank you for having her call them that as soon as she could talk, it made that transition in the last year much easier. Your Mom and Dad had arrived at the house, my Dad had sent his law firm’s plane to pick them up in Reno so that they didn’t have to drive. Alex, Savannah and Max were there as well, as was Stevie. Savannah, knowing that this portion was an adult thing, offered to watch all of the kids so that we could go through the will. 

Dad and Ryan gave a copy to each of us. It had just been updated two weeks prior after Axel was born. The first portion shocked everyone in the room, except me. You left the two most precious things in your world in my control. Your Mom was a little upset but understood that she and your Dad were in no condition to take on an infant. Alex was the one that made my Dad read it three times. Me getting the kids came as a shock to her. She assumed she would get them. There was a trust set up for me and each of the kids. Funds to maintain one of the houses through Axel’s 25th birthday. You essentially left everything to me and the kids. A few items, sentimental things like jewelry and other valuables, were left to your Mom, Dad, Alex, Savannah, Frankie, Stevie, and Mandi. Your wedding rings left to each of the kids. I wasn't able to say thank you for thinking of the loss my sister, Mom, and Mandi would experience. Frankie wears your diamond earrings for every special occasion. Mandi wears your emerald ring nearly every day. I don’t think Stevie has taken the necklace you left her off since the morning I was able to get everything from the house. She remembers buying that for you for the first Christmas you spent with her in London when you weren't able to get home. Savannah and I share the rest of it between us. I noticed this morning that she was wearing your favorite amethyst earrings. I’ll be wearing your sapphire earrings tonight, the something blue from your wedding. We all miss you. More than words can describe. Having these little momentos of you to carry with us helps.

As you know, I decided that it would be best for the kids and I to move to Tahoe. Leaving LA was the hardest thing I’ve experience other than losing you. I miss my family every day, but the kids are both thriving here. I’ve finally hit a creative streak now that Tony has moved to be here with us. I feel so much more at peace with him here. He and Savannah are a huge help, having them both has finally allowed me to slow down and heal. Your babies, our babies are my life. They are the reason I live and breathe. I will do everything to always take care of them, I hope you know that. They are the best gift life has given me, I just wish it hadn’t meant I had to give you up.

Tonight your family is arriving at the house with mine and Alex’s to celebrate you. To celebrate what would’ve been your 8th anniversary. Tomorrow the house will fill again with family and friends, evidently it’s possible there will be 80 fucking people here, I blame Alex. We will celebrate your life. Your funeral was a nightmare, as I’ve said before. Stevie did the best she could but she was getting so much conflicting information that it was just a nightmare. So tonight is dinner, the exact menu from your wedding. Tomorrow a casual event, a party. Don’t worry your rainbow lanterns are hung in a tent in the backyard. At the end of the evening I will walk into the part of the woods that you told me was your favorite and spread part of your ashes and Michael’s ashes so that you can live in that special place forever. 

I’ve already gotten into a fight with Alex, which shouldn’t come as a surprise. Emotions are high in this house right now. But I have a safety net, don’t worry. While Patrick and I broke up the morning after your funeral there is finally someone special in my life. Someone worthy of my time and maybe someday of my heart. Our Ellery made a friend at school named Ava. Ava comes with a single Dad named Jeremy. We’ve spent the last few weeks getting to know each other as the girls have spent summer days enjoying the sunshine and having a friend. Wednesday he and I went on our first date. He’s amazing. He just gets it. He’s not in the least bit terrified about the 18 wheeler of baggage the kids and I come with. He and Tony get along well. He’s already won over my entire family and Savy. You’d adore him. He’s funny, smart, a musician, and keeps me on my toes. Alex on the other hand isn’t so sure yet, he’s an actor so you know how that goes. Tell Michael that an Avenger helps tuck his kids in bed at night.

The police did end up catching the man. His trial starts in a few weeks. I am going to go home. This is the first time I’ve actually said that. This man needs to know what he stole. He needs to know the damage he’s done. Your two beautiful kids will grow up without their Mom and Dad. I will spend the rest of my life without my best friend. If I ever get married I’ll be short my maid of honor, and yes I actually consider that there someday might be a wedding in my life. There also might not be, who knows. Doing it without you won’t feel right. 

This has been the hardest year of my life. I miss you every second of every day. I don’t think I’ve felt like I could truly take a deep breath since the knock on my door happened. The nightmares haven’t lessened as time has gone by. I don’t know that there will ever be a day where I don’t wish I could pick up my phone and call you. Our business manager tried to convince me to stop paying for your email, you know how he is, fucking penny pincher. But I can’t. I want these to be here for me, for the kids, so that if somehow there is a way that you still get email in heaven that you will always know what is going on in my life. So that when I miss you too much to function that I can tell you about life. There are fewer days filled with tears than there were a year ago. But as you know, every tear drop is a waterfall. 

Love you forever and for always,

Charlie

**********

I wiped the tears that had slid down my cheeks while writing the email away, hit send, and stood up to go get in the shower. I put some music on so that I could get lost in the process of getting ready. I knew that I’d be up here long enough that I’d get out of all of the last-minute set up things. My sister could handle it and maybe Alex would get her shit together and help, though I wasn’t going to hold my breath for that, especially after I just chewed her out. I took my time getting ready, I don’t honestly think I’d devoted this much time to the way I looked for something in over a year. I finally understood what my friends with kids meant when they talked about never having time to do anything because of kids. Most of the time I was fairly sure I was covered in half of Axel’s breakfast and mascara from three days prior. 

“Hey you,” Jeremy said. I turned to see him leaning against the door frame. I’d been in here for over an hour now. “You have pink in your hair.”

“That I do. It’s not a permanent thing, but Sam loved me with pink hair. I thought it would be a nice thing to do for her. It’ll fade pretty easily,” I replied as I unclamped the curling iron from the piece of hair I had in it letting the curl fall. I put the curling iron down on the counter as he walked towards me. He kissed me softly.

“I like it. You look super cute.” He twirled a lock of my hair with it pastel pink ends with his fingers. “Are you feeling better?” 

“A little bit. I mean I probably shouldn’t have unleashed on Alex but today is not the day to fuck with me and to be so quick to judge you, I’m just not okay with it.”

“She wasn’t totally judging me. I mean she wasn’t being warm and receptive but you were already primed and ready for a fight. She probably could’ve replied that she thought I was amazing and you would’ve still been ready to fight her. I mean she deserved everything you said. Based on what you’ve told me the relationship the two of you have has always been a challenge and the loss of Samantha has made it even harder. She was the glue that held the three of you together, without her you’re both struggling. It’s understandable but it’s made even harder by the fact that both of you are strong women who don’t admit defeat well.”

“When did you get so smart?”

“Oldest of six kids, remember. I grew up with a bunch of sisters. I know how you all work but especially how you fight. You two love each other but you are different people, especially now than you were when you were freshman in college.”

“We absolutely are. I mean she has three kids, I’m raising Sam’s two-plus half parenting her child.”

“Have you ever thought that might be part of it?” he asked.

“I’ve always thought it was a possibility. I was around for a lot of Savannah’s firsts, some of which she missed. You know how close she and I are. I used to think it was similar to how my relationship with Tony was, I mean I’m a great sister. But it’s less like sisters. She comes to me with the stuff I go to Stevie or Mandi with. I can’t imagine if I had a kid and that happened. Like if someday Axel shows up to you to ask about girls.”

“If that happens you’ll be damn happy and so will I.”

“Why is that?” I asked.

“Because it means that I am still part of your life. And that you don’t have to have the birds and the bees talk with Axel.”

“True fucking story. I am so NOT prepared for that shit.” He sat down on the counter to keep me company while I finished my hair and makeup. He talked me through the crap going through my mind and put me at ease knowing that I’d make it downstairs just as guests were arriving. I went into the closet to get dressed. I pulled out a dress that I’d ordered online for tonight. It was a very bohemian look, something Sam would’ve picked out for me. I got it in black, which made it look a little more goth and maybe felt a little bit morbid for the situation. I knew everyone else was planning on wearing bright colors. I’d also ordered the dress in white, just in case I felt like I needed something lighter. I put on the bra I’d need to wear under it and stood in my closet staring at the two trying to pick which one I should wear. “Hey Jer, I need your opinion.”

“Yes...whoa. You are just in your lingerie.”

“Yeah, sorry. I can’t pick a color. Black or white.”

“What are your thoughts on the colors?”

“Well, for the most part, everyone is wearing bright colors tomorrow and probably tonight too, Ellie is wearing a white tunic top that looks like a little kid version of this dress. I know that it’s not meant to be a depressing night. It’s meant to be celebratory. So for that, I’m leaning towards the white.”

“And the black?” he asked.

“It’s my favorite color to wear when I’m getting dressed up. Sam and I were always the girls in black in LA when everyone else embraced color. It’s odd I know. She loved color. She wore color in her accessories and sometimes in her main clothing but when we were together she’d embrace black because my inner-goth child wasn’t ever going to wear all the colors she was. I like the idea of wearing the white so Ellie and I are dressed kind of similar, but I also feel a bit odd wearing white today since it would’ve been her day to wear white as we all celebrated her and Michael.”

“Go with the black. Your hair will make it seem less morbid and it might make your hair stand out. Then tomorrow you can wear something brighter. It is a somber day for you, no matter how hard you try to pretend it’s not.” I turned and looked at him. He was standing in front of me in the pants he’d had on earlier and no shirt because we’d both been in the middle of changing. 

“Thank you.”

“You’re asking a lot of me. I mean you’re standing in front of me in a bra and panties. I really want to ravage you right now but I also know that your phone is gonna start blowing up with notifications at the gate any second. You need to get into hostess mode.”

“Ravage me? What a vivid description.” He hugged me tight to him and kissed me. As we made skin-on-skin contact I felt my heartbeat race. All I wanted to do was climb into bed, get lost in his kisses and forget about what today meant. I wanted to avoid responsibility at all costs but knew I couldn’t. “I need to get dressed,” I mumbled as he rested his lips against my forehead. “If I don’t get dressed now we are never making it out of this room.”

“I know. Clothes now, Charlie. We can pick this up after everyone goes home.”

“Yes, yes we can.” I kissed him one more time before he walked out of the closet and I slid on the black dress. It was flowy with layers of silk, chiffon, and lace. The top was all lace across my shoulders and the small sleeves. The opaque fabric started at the perfect spot to show some cleavage but also leave something to the imagination. I stood staring at my shoes in my closet trying to decide what to wear. I hadn’t ever really been a fan of heels. My normal Vans would look a little off with something like this. I opted for my black combat boots. I knew somewhere in the universe Sam was smiling. She loved that I was often the person willing to wear skater shoes or combat boots with a dress instead of heels. Alex had made us wear long dresses for her wedding and bought these ridiculously high heels. Halfway through the pictures, Alex realized I had purchased a pair of Vans that matched the dress and had them on instead of the heels the rest of the bridesmaids were wearing. I was short enough she only noticed because I’d sat down and moved the dress. The combat boots would’ve made Sam happy. She loved that I danced to the beat of my own drummer. I grabbed a black leather jacket knowing that it would eventually get cooler outside and I’d need a jacket. 

When I walked into my bedroom I saw that Jeremy was sitting on the bed putting his shoes on. He had on a nice pair of dark gray pants with a white dress shirt underneath a black sweater. He smiled at me as I walked over to him. He hugged me to him, resting his head against my stomach. It was a nice, quiet moment until the inevitable alert went off on my phone. He reached to where it was sitting on the nightstand, not letting go of me completely and handed it to me. I looked to see it was the gate alert, Sam’s parents were here. I clicked letting them in. 

“Time to go face the music,” I said.

“I know,” he replied. He stood up and kissed me softly. “You’re gonna do great tonight, honey. If you need anything just give me a signal.”

“Did you decide what our signal was?” I asked.

“I didn’t.” 

“I have a feeling you’ll be able to sense it and tonight shouldn’t be bad. Tomorrow is gonna be the day that exhausts me.”

“I know, honey. But it’s gonna be okay.” We walked out of my bedroom holding hands. As soon as we got into the living room he squeezed my hand and then dropped it as we saw all of the kids in the room.

“Hi Charlie,” Ava said as she ran up to me and jumped into my arms so I could hug her. I slid her to my hip so we could talk.

“Hey, Ava. I’ve missed you, kiddo. Did you have fun visiting your Mommy?”

“I did. But I missed you guys. I’m really excited about the slumber party this weekend.”

“I am too.” Out of the corner of my eye. I caught Jeremy pull his iPhone out of his pocket and take a picture of the two of us together. Ellery came over and Jeremy picked her up. He wrangled the four of us into one photo and took a selfie. After the girls were down and running towards the door to say hi to Sam’s Mom and Dad he leaned over to kiss my cheek. I went to where Axel was playing on the floor and picked him up to take him to see Jane and Robert. “Did you have a good drive?” I asked.

“We did,” Jane replied.

“Speak for yourself. I still don’t know that I’m made to be a passenger,” Robert added causing me to laugh. Robert and Jane were both older than my parents, they’d waited until their late 30s to have Sam whereas Stevie and Vince got married the summer after college and Frankie came the first year of law school for my Dad. Robert had recently had to give up driving, he’d been diagnosed with Parkinson's several years ago and it was progressing to the point that driving had become more difficult for him. He’d been a gearhead since he was young and had always worked on cars. Giving up driving had been hard for him, I was almost glad Sam didn’t have to see her Dad give up that huge part of his identity to his disease. Jane was caring for him full-time though recently she had started to have a nurse come in for part of the day so she can get stuff done.

“Well, I’m glad you put up with being a passenger. Your grandkids miss you bunches.” I smiled as I spoke hoping for the best with tonight. Jane’s face lit up at Axel which put me at ease and made me very happy. She took him from my arms. So she could snuggle him as Ellie hugged her Grandfather. Alex approached all of us leaning in to hug and cheek kiss both Jane and Robert. I backed away and headed over to where my siblings, Jeremy, and Ryan were standing.

“You look like you need a drink,” Ryan said.

“Are you playing bartender because I absolutely do?”

“I mean I could but you have a full fucking bar outside.” I looked at him and signaled to go outside making the other three standing with us laugh. As soon as Ryan and I were at the bar he put his arm around me as I rested my head on my arms, on the bar. 

“This lady needs a shot of tequila and I’ll take one as well.”

“Make it two shots,” I said as I held up two fingers.

“Damn.” Ryan had always been a great friend. When my sister introduced me to him the first time I knew she’d met her match. “Your sister told me that you and Alex got into, I didn’t think it was two tequila shots worthy.”

“It’s more like ten but I’m hosting all of these people in my life and still trying to impress a new guy. Can’t get too wasted…too early. Watch out later once people are gone or tomorrow night. I started the weekend off with a fucking bang.” The bartender put three shots of tequila down on the bar.

“Well, cheers to your surviving the weekend.” I clinked shot glasses with Ryan, we tapped them against the top of the bar and threw them back. Before he’d even gotten done making his ‘tequila shot’ face I slammed the other. 

“Shots already,” Dad said as he walked into the tent. 

“It’s been a rough day,” I answered. He kissed my temple before ordering a drink for himself. I saw Jeremy come outside and smiled. 

“You’re stupid if you think you still need to impress him,” Ryan whispered. “I’m a guy. I can tell you with 100% certainty he is not only impressed with you, he’s blown away. You’re a fucking catch, Charlie.”

“Thanks, Ryan. You’re sort of obligated to say that.”

“Oh no, I’m not. You’re my sister-in-law. You know how I feel about my brother’s wife. Sister-in-law does not require unconditional love and support.” I started to laugh. Frankie and Ryan both struggled with his brother’s wife. She was judgmental of the way they parented their kids and the lifestyle they lived in LA. Ryan’s brother still lived in Massachusetts where they grew up and worked with their Dad. His wife was a stay-at-home Mom to their three kids who were roughly the same age as my nieces and nephew. She sold some weird ‘health and wellness product line’ that someone sold her on in a Facebook message and claimed she was going to be a billionaire someday. In reality, she spent more on the products than she was ever going to make. She constantly judged Frankie for not only working full-time but also that she’d decided to go to law school. “I love you because I love you, Charlie. You are an absolute badass and were one of the things that made marrying your sister seem like such a great idea. I mean in general your whole family was, but you are one of my favorite people on this planet.”

“Only because I am the Frankie whisperer.” My sister could be a little high-strung. I usually knew exactly what to say to make her mad at me for about 45 seconds before realizing she needed to laugh and that I was awesome. 

“You are. It’s a skill I wish I had now that you don’t live nearby anymore. She’s been extra on edge lately. If you come home for a while this summer it will do all of us a world of good.”

“I’m coming home. Just don’t tell her or Jeremy yet.”

“Good. I’m glad. I miss having you around.” I hugged Ryan one more time before Jeremy slid up beside me and slid an arm protectively around my waist. 

“You okay?”

“Yeah, why?” I asked.

“I saw you and Ryan doing shots. I just wanted to check and see if that was the signal.”

“If the signal was shots we would both be fucked.” I rested my head on his shoulder as he kissed the top of it. “Thank you for being here. You have no idea how much I appreciate it. I’m going to owe you big time.”

“I’m sure we can come up with an appropriate method to pay me back.” I laughed at the tone of his voice. I knew what he meant and didn’t even have to look at him to confirm the smirk on his face. As our girls came running out the back door I lifted my head off of his shoulder and he dropped his arm. While it was painfully aware to everyone here that he wasn’t just my daughter’s best friend’s Dad we hadn’t really discussed telling the kids and we’d really only gone on one date. Trying to explain to the girls what that was seemed too complicated. Especially for this weekend. 

Everyone mingled for a while. There was lots of catching up, cocktails, and awkwardness between me and Alex. Sam’s parents clearly wanted to talk to both of us but neither of us was all that interested in talking to each other. I was really doing my best not to have a complete breakdown on the chic white couch that had been delivered to my backyard earlier today while we sat in conversation with Jane about how Robert’s most recent doctor’s appointment had gone. Robert was of course off with Jeremy, Ryan, and my Dad talking about cars, a conversation I’d much rather be in.

“How was the end of the school year?” Jane asked. She had made eye contact with me while she asked it but of course, Alex started to speak.

“The boys absolutely loved their teachers this year, they were of course in separate classes so as to not confuse the teachers. They both excelled tremendously and had straight As.” Internally I rolled my eyes. They weren’t at a point where grades should matter, honestly, grades should never matter because life is way more important than if you get a B+ or an A- but Alex would never see it that way. “Savannah will be taking more classes in fall but she’s only taking one online course this summer. She’s really loving school which makes me so happy. She’s decided to study early childhood education. I don’t know if that’s a permanent thing but following in my footsteps as a teacher would make me so proud.”

“Kindergarten went as well as could be expected,” I finally answered seeing the smile on Jane’s face change because Ellery was the kid she really wanted to hear about. “Ellie struggled with friends, for the most part, she’s very much her mother’s daughter, she doesn’t need a ton of friends, just a few great ones. She found Ava and latched on for dear life. They are inseparable which makes me really happy. This week was a bit rough, Ava was in Los Angeles with her mother so Ellery was a bit lonely. They’ve been able to still see each other nearly every day of break.”

“Ava and her Dad both seem wonderful,” Jane said. “I love seeing Ellie so happy with a friend.” I glanced at where Ellie, Ava, Harlow, and Aria were dancing together. 

“I do too. Ava is a great kid. It’s nice that they have built a friendship that even at such a young age is so close. It will also be nice that when we do need to be back in LA for something that it’s possible that Ava will be there too. Having kids with multiple homes is a struggle for friends, Ava was like the perfect fit.”

“Her Dad seems like a great fit too.” Jane nodded in Jeremy’s direction, his laugh had risen above the volume of the conversation and made me smile.

“He really is. He’s been an absolute blessing to have around. Tony’s surprise relocation was made significantly easier with his help. He was here to make sure that the guest house was ready for Tony to move into. He has helped with the kids when I needed to help Tony with stuff. He’s been a great addition to our lives. It’s also nice to have an adult friend who lives in Tahoe. The Moms at school and I never really meshed. My journey of motherhood has been so different than theirs. There isn’t a whole lot to relate to them about.”

“Understandable,” Jane said. “It’s nice that you’ve found that with Jeremy.”

“It is.” I smiled again. I could tell it was the giant smile that if Sam were here would make her immediately start doing her ‘you’re in love’ happy dance. I wasn’t in love but I was very much in like.

“How long does Jeremy plan on staying in Tahoe?” Alex asked. “He is an actor after all. I assume he has a movie set to get to.”

“He will at some point. It’s not really my business what his work schedule is like. I know that he’ll need to be in Atlanta at some point later in the year and that he has some work in LA later this summer. He slowed down his workload a lot with Ava starting school. Being a Dad comes first, the rest is secondary.”

“Will you be back in LA at all this summer?” Alex asked. I could tell she was pissed that she didn’t know the answer to this question.

“Yes, for how long though I don’t know. I think the plan is to do Ellery’s birthday party at my Dad’s place in Santa Barbara. Jane, I know with you being in Los Angeles for the trial that you’d be there and would need to travel back to celebrate our little girl turning 6 so we’ve started talking about planning the party there so you can stay at my condo and not have to travel back. Plus Ava will be in Los Angeles as are my nieces, nephew, and the twins. So we thought it just made sense for the group of us to go to LA instead of everyone coming back here for a birthday party. Outside of that, I’m really unsure how long I’ll stay. I need to start getting things prepared for fall. I need to get Ellery into a dance class and start finding some opportunities for Axel to make friends. The little guy needs more social interaction than Ellie, Ava, Savy, Tony, Jeremy and I.”

“He’s just getting so big so fast.” I was happy to see that his grandmother’s face showed love when talking about him. “He looks so much like Michael.”

“He does. He’s got a lot of his personality too. It makes me happy to have a miniature version of each of them around the house. Ellie and I sing musicals every morning while we get ready. Axel is already showing interest in drums. Tony has been playing them and Axel just sits there staring wide-eyed at him as he plays.”

“You and Sam with your musical mornings were the absolute worst,” Alex said laughing. “How does Ellery already know the words to them?”

“We listen to musicals instead of Kidz Bop.” It was sort of a ‘duh’ response but honestly, what did Alex expect the answer to be? Sam and Ellery had listened to musicals every day. She’d been able to sing the lyrics to Disney songs before she was actually able to form complete sentences on her own. “Her favorites are Hamilton, Dear Evan Hansen, and Rock of Ages. I mean we still listen to Disney soundtracks too. Let me tell you about how I know all of the words to every Descendants song. She picks up the lyrics to everything so quickly. We sing all day every day. It was something she loved doing with Sam so we still sing.”

“I’m so happy you’re keeping music in her life the way that Samantha and Michael always had. It’s a unique way for her to channel her emotions. It had always been such an important part of who Sam was.” Jane smiled at the memory and it tugged a little bit at my heart. “I remember her writing her first song when she wasn’t that much older than Ellery. It was absolutely terrible but as a mother, it was also the best song I’d ever heard. I can’t wait for Ellie to start writing her own music.”

“She’s getting close. I hear her singing to nonsense to the cats most days. She has completely choreographed dances to the entire Greatest Showman soundtrack. She’s possibly going to grow up to be an actress with her stage presence.”

“We can only hope that doesn’t happen,” Alex said. I rolled my eyes and this time it wasn’t all that hidden. 

“Whatever she does when she grows up I’m going to be proud of her. Singer, sales manager, actress or activist whatever that little girl puts her mind to she’s going to do perfectly.” I stood up. “I need to go check with the caterer to see how soon it is for dinner. Excuse me.” I walked to where Frankie was talking to the catering chef. 

“I am fucking miserable,” I mumbled. “Why did I agree to this?”

“You love Sam and Michael and you wanted to do this to honor them. It’s gonna be okay. Dinner will be served in about 20 minutes, they suggested we all get seated,” my sister answered.

“Oh thank fucking god. I also need another drink.”

“I have selected a wine for dinner that I can have served as soon as everyone is seated,” the chef said.

“Perfect.” I grabbed a fork from the table that was right beside them and taped it against the glass. “Hello everyone. First I want to say thank you to everyone for joining the kids and I tonight to celebrate as a family the life of Sam and Michael. Tomorrow will, of course, be filled with friends but tonight it was important to me that it just be the family.” Ellie came up to me and I reached down to pick her up and hold her. I felt my dress hike up weirdly and knew that somewhere Alex was huffing about how terrible my behavior was. “The chef has let me know that we are about 20 minutes away from dinner being ready and asked that we start getting seated. Ellie Belle, did you want to say anything first?” We’d practiced this yesterday and again today.

“My Mommy and Daddy were so lucky to have all of you in their lives and…” She paused clearly forgetting what was next. I whispered into her ear. “My baby brother and I are lucky to have all of you too. Thank you for coming tonight. Enjoy!” Everyone clapped as I kissed Ellery’s cheek.

“You did perfect baby girl.”

“Do I get to sit with Ava?”

“You do. There’s a little table set up for you, your cousins, the twins and Ava. Are you okay with that?” I asked. “You can sit with me if you’d rather.”

“No, I want to sit with my friends.” I hated the idea of the kids all having to sit together and away from the adults but it made the most sense. The table was set up right beside our main table and within reach of me, Savannah, and Frankie. I put her down and she ran to take her seat with her friends.

“She did so great,” Jeremy whispered in my cheek before kissing it softly. “Your practice run yesterday and today was totally worth it.”

“Tomorrow’s will be easier. She and Tony have practiced a song that they are going to do so she doesn’t really have to talk.”

“That will be fun. You ready to sit down?” I nodded. Jeremy put his hand on the small of my back as we walked towards the middle of the table where we were seated. I had Frankie on my other side and was directly across the table from Alex. Jeremy pulled out my chair and helped me sit down before taking his seat. The waiters came around pouring wine for everyone and leaving the bottles in ice buckets. “Alex, Savannah tells me that you just finished publishing your 6th book. Congratulations.” He was so cute for trying so hard.

“Thank you. It was a labor of love. I’m working on the next edition of a textbook I’ve written and should have it finished up in the next few weeks so it hits bookstores in time for fall classes.” Like every good professor, Alex wrote the textbooks she required her students to use so she made money off of them beyond being their teacher. 

“That’s great. I stole one of your books off of Charlie’s bookshelf and started reading it last night.”

“Which one?” Alex and I both asked. 

“I don’t remember the title. It was about how marriage, divorce and gender norms are portrayed in modern literature. It seemed pretty interesting. Having been divorced and the amount of reading I do for my job it was insightful. Something of the things I wish I’d realized before I got married.” I laughed, Jeremy made light about his divorce a lot. It was like me and my self-deprecating sense of humor. I think it’s part of why we got along so quickly, our humor is similar.

“Interesting that you’d pick that off of her shelf. Charlie has quite the collection of books.”

“I thought it might be nice to read one of your books before you got here. Charlie and Savy have both talked about your writing before so I was intrigued.”

“So Jeremy, I’m sure that Tony and Ryan have both asked but can you tell me anything about the next Avengers movie?” Max asked. I laughed as he betrayed his wife and fell victim to the same thing every other man ranging in age from 5 to 95 did when meeting a superhero. He’d attended a midnight showing or two with a group of us over the years.

“I can’t. Honestly, I don’t even know what the hell happens in it. They didn’t give anyone a full script for any of the movies after the first one. Mark tends to blow the secrets so they don’t let us see a full script. We get copies of our lines for the day and have about an hour to memorize them. I wasn’t even 100% sure I wasn’t in Infinity War until it came out.” I laughed.

“Sorry, I’m sure that gets annoying.”

“Nah, it’s okay. I get it. I grew up loving Spider-Man so I understand.” It was a canned response but I appreciated that he wasn’t trying to make Max feel like an idiot. 

“He also has put up with both of my brothers,” I said. “Can you imagine Tony and Ryan around this guy? Every single theory and question possible has been asked. There’s nothing that they haven’t already tried.”

“She’s right,” Tony added as he sat down next to Jeremy. “He’s tolerated us well.” Jeremy squeezed my brother’s shoulder.

“I don’t put up with you, kid. It’s more that I put up with your sister. She’s a handful.” My mouth dropped open and I punched him in the arm. “Ow.”

“She is a handful. I forgot what living with her was like.”

“You’re an ass sometimes,” I said quietly hoping the table filled with kids behind us didn’t hear me.

“You like my ass.” I rolled my eyes. 

“See what I have to put up with. These two tag team me. The last couple of days have been worse. Jeremy and Ryan have bonded.”

“Yes, yes we have,” Ryan added from his seat beside my sister. He and Jeremy high-fived over our heads. “He’s pretty cool and is pretty good at putting up with Charlie.”

“I hate you too, Ryan.” 

“You’re getting tag teamed by all of them,” Alex said. She smiled and it looked like her real smile. Was she going to crack and be okay? I wasn’t going to hold my breath but I was hopeful. Eventually, everyone was seated and the chef signaled that he was ready to bring out the food. I moved my chair back and stood up. 

“I want to first thank all of you for coming. This weekend is something I struggled with. I didn’t know how to approach it. It’s a hard weekend but today is also a celebratory day. Eight years ago tonight all of us gathered together to celebrate Samantha and Michael’s wedding. It was honestly one of the best nights of my life. Seeing my best friend so immensely happy and marrying the man of her dreams was as much a dream come true for me as it was for her. She deserved all the happiness the world had to offer. I saw her that happy a year ago too.” I felt the tears sting my eyes and my throat close up. Jeremy grabbed my hand, squeezing it. I glanced down at him to see him say ‘you’re okay’ and I took a deep breath. “Sam and Mikey dropped the kids off to me as they went out to celebrate 7 years of wedded bliss. They looked so happy. Having that image in my mind is what has gotten me through the last year, along with the support of all of you. The kids and I have come out of this year stronger than any of us could’ve imagined. It’s because of all of you. Tomorrow is an anniversary that I will dread for the rest of my life but today is the anniversary of one of the best days of my life. So tonight we celebrate the incredible, beautiful, and loving relationship that Sam and Michael had. We celebrate the two amazing children that relationship produced and we celebrate the family that has been created because of the love Sam and Michael shared. To Sam and Michael,” I said as I raised the glass of wine I had.

“To Sam and Michael,” the voices at the table responded. I took a drink of my wine before sitting back down.

“You did great, sis.” Frankie leaned over and rested her head on my shoulder.

“Thanks.”

“You really did,” Jeremy said. 

“Thank you.” I glanced back at the table of children all happily coloring the coloring sheets that Ellie had insisted I get for all of them. They were copies of the coloring sheets that Sam had made for the wedding. It made me happy to see all of the kids coloring all over them. Dinner went nicely. The conversation flowed well and was polite. There were a few fun stories shared about the wedding, Sam and Michael, the kids, and our fondest memories. It was, in general, a really happy and cheerful occasion which is what I’d hoped it would be. We said our goodbyes to Sam’s family as they were headed back to Reno. 

Once they were gone the night started to quiet down. All of the kids were put in bed despite their continual protests. Seeing all four of the girls crowded into Ellie’s room made my heart feel so full I thought it might burst. All of the adults ended up in the kitchen and living room with the remaining wine from dinner. 

“So are you going to apologize to each other?” Frankie asked Alex and I.

“I mean I’m sorry I yelled. But I’m not totally sorry about what I said. I’ve always felt like you judged me and thought like I was less than you. You’re the only person who has ever questioned my career choice and whether it was conducive to raising a family. Honestly, sometimes the things you say to me are so horrible and it’s like you don’t care that you hurt people with your words,” I said.

“I’m sorry you feel that way. I also know that sometimes you can be extra bitchy when you’re stressed and clearly you’re stressed.” Of course, Alex’s apology was the world’s most common apology. ‘I’m sorry you feel that way’ nowhere does she take ownership for how she makes others feel. 

“Ya think? I have a house full of people and generally speaking, I hate people.” Both Alex and Frankie laughed.  “I knew there would be a million questions about what is going on in my life right now.”

“Why didn’t you tell me about Jeremy?”

“Your exact response to him when you met him. You judge everyone in his profession because of one person. That’s not fair.” She rolled her eyes. She didn’t like being called on this, ever. “I hadn’t honestly told anyone in my family about it. Okay, that’s a lie. Stevie knows about him. She can tell by the tone of my voice if I’ve met someone. It’s her 6th sense, discovering romance.”

“He seems nice, but I just worry.”

“You worry for no reason. First of all, we’ve been on one date. One date that ended in my kitchen with my entire family. He didn’t run for the hills at that, which most sane men would. And for some reason, he didn’t bolt from the house witnessing me turn into a complete psycho bitch on you earlier. So he either kinda likes me or is completely crazy.”

“I’m a little of both,” Jeremy said as he approached the three of us, he wrapped his arms around my waist kissing just below my ear. With the kids in bed and the amount of wine we’d both had tonight, we were a little more touchy than we had been at dinner. “Alex, I have no intention of hurting her. She’s an incredible woman who frankly I’m surprised I got to agree to go on a date with me.”

“You almost didn’t.” I laughed as I spoke causing everyone else to laugh.

“She blew him off for like two weeks Mom. He’s been persistent in convincing her that not only is she allowed to have a life but he’d like to be part of it.”

“I promise, I’m not neglecting the kids. I’m not making your child raise my kids.” Her face contorted at ‘my kids’ and I knew she didn’t like the way I phrased it. They weren’t my kids, but they were mine.

“You should’ve been honest with me, even if you thought I’d be mad.”

“Yeah, because walking into one of your lectures is my favorite pastime. I know better. There wasn’t anything to tell you then. There is now. So I’ve told you. Jeremy isn’t likely going anywhere. Ava and Ellie love each other and it makes me happier than I could imagine to see her that happy. Added bonus her Dad happens to be mildly attractive and single.”

“Mildly attractive?” Jeremy asked as he leaned back from me, a look of shock on his face.

“I don’t need to enlarge your ego. I have to share a bed with it tonight.” This made the other people in the kitchen laugh. He laughed at me before giving me a kiss. It felt comfortable to be with him even if it was in front of my family and friends. He fit into this group of people perfectly and watching him expertly navigate all of them today had made me fall a little bit more for him. 

“Mmmmm bed.” At the mention of the word I yawned. “We should go to bed. You tossed and turned last night.”

“He stayed here last night?” Alex asked her voice again dripping with judgment.

“He did. I’ve been having nightmares where I am in their house, blood, and bullets everywhere and then I’m in the morgue staring at Sam’s cold, dead body. I typically wake up screaming. He thought that staying here might be nice so that I wasn’t alone.” Alex’s body sank. 

“I didn’t realize you were still having nightmares,” she replied.

“Yup.”

“I’m sorry.” 

“Thanks,” I replied. “Let’s go to bed.” I was done with this day. I didn’t want to deal with Alex anymore. I wanted my quiet bedroom. My warm, comfy bed. Jeremy’s body lying next to mine. I didn’t want to talk to anyone anymore. I just wanted to sleep.

“Get some rest, sis,” Frankie said. We hugged before Jeremy and I said the rest of our goodnights and headed up to bed. We were quiet while we changed into pajamas and I went through my nightly routine. I walked into my bedroom and climbed into bed next to Jeremy. He’d gotten in bed and turned the tv on. I said nothing I just curled into his body and laid my head on his chest, which had no shirt covering it tonight.

“I am sorry today was such a shit show.”

“You don’t owe me an apology. I get it. I’m honestly proud of you. You could’ve maybe handled it differently but being honest is something you needed to do.”

“I didn’t need to be a bitch but I don’t know that I’d have been capable of not being a bitch.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’m sure things will be okay in the morning.” He ran his fingers through my hair. I started to relax and get tired.

“Thank you for being here today and staying here tonight. It means a lot. Like more than I can really explain.” I moved so I could look him in the eyes, my chin resting on his chest. He bent down to kiss me.

“Nowhere else in the world I’d rather be, Charlie.” 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

PHEW! That was a lot. I know it was heavy and emotional and just...a lot. Charlie had CLEARLY been holding in some feelings about Alex for a really, really long time and just sort of word vomited them. Could she have handled it better? Of course. But I probably would’ve done the same thing. When you break a person it’s hard to get them to stop. There’s hope that things will be okay, but it will obviously take work from both of them that they may not be ready for. There’s a lot of baggage there to work through. I don’t know if you’ve ever had a friend like Alex, but I have and let me tell you, they are hard friendships to maintain. Most of the people like that in my life are gone. It was healthier for me to let the friendship go. 

Charlie’s family is basically my favorite thing. They are loud and crazy and fun and giving her shots before a dinner party. She’s lucky to have them and she knows it. Having all of them with her as she’s going through this weekend is good for her. Whether it’s her sister taking care of the party, her step-mom helping with the kids or Ryan there for comic relief everyone knows their job and fulfills it perfectly. 

And Jeremy. Oh, Jeremy. He is like the sprinkles on a donut, the cherry on a sundae, or the star on the top of a Christmas tree. He’s the perfect addition to the circle of people she’s built around her. He can read her. He wants to be there for her. No judgment, no prerequisites, nothing. He just wants to be there because he cares deeply about her. And she cares about him. Their relationship is developing beautifully into something that will have a significant impact on them. For Charlie to be willing to let someone in is a huge thing. For Jeremy to be willing to take on the challenge that Charlie’s life and circumstances bring is a huge thing. They each come with their own baggage and they are allowing each other to unpack it in a way that isn’t forced or uncomfortable. Writing their relationship as it develops makes me really happy and I truly enjoy doing it. So you reading this and enjoying it is the icing on the cake for me. 

Now the hard part. The email. I didn’t know how to fully convey what happened the year prior. I felt that Charlie’s emails to Sam were the best way to do that. She feels like she’s still able to be her most authentic self in those emails, the way she was with Sam when she was alive. Telling her truth and the way that the weekend haunts her was a huge part of healing and grieving. Telling it to Sam was the biggest part for Charlie. She’d never in those emails been honest about what happened. She sent happy snippets of life and the kids. Sure she has told her she’s sad and she misses her but to explain every detail of that weekend and what she went through was a moment she needed to get to. She needed to feel okay writing the words down, it might help her get through the nightmares a little easier.

I hope you’ve loved this chapter. It was a labor of love to write. I cried writing the email. I read it aloud to my Mom (who is probably my biggest fan - I am so lucky) and I sobbed. I openly wept. Not because I think I’m some phenomenal writer. But because Charlie lives inside me. She’s in my mind, in my heart. I become friends with my characters as I develop them and Charlie is someone I want to protect and keep safe. I want to take her pain away and telling that story was hard for her and for me. I would love to hear what you thought of this chapter. It would mean the world to me. My hope is that I can get started on the next chapter soon but playing catch up from being sick for 3.5 weeks with work has been challenging. Tonight I gave myself some time off to finish this because it was important to me.

Thank you for everything.

xx. Annie

[crazy-little-cool-cat]

Gold Digger - Chapter 3 | Gwilym Lee x OFC

A/N: So back to our regular Saturday schedule only it’s Wednesday, we are! Sorry for the long wait, I had some family things to take care of and whatnot.

Warnings: The usual?

Word Count: ~3.4K

Warnings: Cross-over (I miss those HiG idiots so much), swearing, alcohol use, Joe shenanigans.

The Playlist (updates regularly)

Prologue, Chapter 1, Chapter 2

Lizzie and Shelly were in some foul moods. They've been arguing for nearly half an hour now. Although Lizzie promised Shelly a Gwil-a-thon, she changed her mind because she was feeling quite ill. Sniffles, coughs, and sneezes where the majority of the sounds emanating out of her. Balls of tissues surrounded her on the living room sofa, empty mugs of tea decorated the coffee table. Her ducky slippers poked from under the blanket she covered herself with. Her Grumpy Cat pajamas indicating that she hadn't left the house that day. Shelly, however, did not care in the slightest. She was promised a binge session and she was going to do whatever it took to make it happen.

"I don't care if you're under the weather, and I don't understand what it has to do with watching some telly." Shelly planted her hands on her hips and tapped her foot impatiently. "I want to see your Prince Charming act, alright?!"

"Do you dot udderstadd the word doe?" Lizzie croaked inbetween sniffles. "Christ!"

Shelly scoffed and rolled her eyes, crossing her arms. Then, a lightbulb seemed to go off in her head, because she had a devilish glint in her eyes.

"Doe, a deer?" Shelly smirked. "A female deer?"

"Oh, God." Lizzie grumbled and slapped her palm to her face. "Dot this."

"Raaaaaaay," Shelly bellowed, "a drop of golden suuuuuun!"

"Shelly, please stop."

"Me," Shelly puffed out her chest and pointed upwards, "A name I call myself!"

"Shells, please!"

"Faaaaa," Shelly ignored her, "a long, long way to run!"

"Shelly!" Lizzie barked.

"Yes?"

"Why?!"

"Because I know how that movie terrifies you." Shelly shrugged. "Seeeeew, a needle pulling thread!"

"Shelly!!!"

"Laaaaaa!" Shelly's voice rose in octaves, "a note to follow Sew!"

"For cry-eed out loud, woo-bad!"

"Teaaaaaa," Shelly carried on, "a drink with jam and bread!"

"Fide!" Lizzie raised her hands in surrender, "fide. We'll watch Jabestowd. Just please stop!"

"Oh, alright."

"Thakes, Shells." Lizzie groaned.

"You know, you really do talk gibberish when you're sick." Shelly noted and sat down on the armchair, keeping a safe distance from her sick roommate and best friend. "It's alright though. I speak fluent "Ill-zie."

"You're such a dork."

"Get it? Ill-zie?"

"Yes, Shelly." Lizzie said as she put on the first episode.

"It's like Lizzie but with jumbled up letters!"

"Shut up already! It's starting!"

###

A week after the "Gwil-a-thon", Lizzie kept radio-silent when it came to him. Watching him on screen made her swoon. Knowing how talented he was made her head spin. The fact that she's now friends with someone like him made her heart stop. None of it made any sense to her. Why would someone like that be interested in someone like her? She couldn't wrap her mind around the fact that an actual celebrity wanted her company. 'A bloody schoolteacher', as she fondly referred to herself as she got drunk on wine with Shelly on a Saturday night, fully healed from her flu. Then, her phone notified there's an incoming message, and Lizzie's heart dropped right to her knickers.

'My mate's coming by for a visit next week and we're going to this party. Would you like to be our plus one?'

Lizzie sighed and tapped her finger against her cheek as she contemplated her response. She didn't know much about who Gwilym's friends were, or the kind of parties they enjoy going to. She also hasn't really spoken to him at all for a whole week after binge-watching everything he was ever in with Shelly. Her green eyes bore holes into the screen as she pondered over it. She blew a soft curl away from her face, pensive.

"Penny for your thoughts?" Shelly quipped as she poured them both glasses of white wine.

"Gwil invited me to a party with one of his mates next week." Lizzie looked up and reach her hand out, opening and closing her fingers.

"Go!" Shelly barked and gave Lizzie her glass. "Go!!!"

"I don't even know the lad -"

"You'll get to know him at the party!"

"- and I haven't spoken to Gwil at all, all week. Don't you think it'll look a bit sketchy if I suddenly jump on the opportunity?" Lizzie pouted.

"He doesn't seem to think anything of your silence, Liz." Shelly noted. "He probably just assumed you were busy being a bloody schoolteacher, you know."

"Hm."

Shelly and Lizzie stared at her phone for a minute before Shelly snatched it away and unlocked the screen.

"Hey!" Lizzie cried.

"Shut up, I'm doing you a big favour here!" Shelly pushed Lizzie back with one hand and texted 'sure' with the other. "Done."

"What did you do?"

"Nothing." Shelly shrugged innocently and gave Lizzie her phone back. She sipped her wine calmly.

Bloop.

'Great! We'll pick you up. We'll figure out the rest of the details next week.'

###

"What if it's the blond one?" Shelly slightly slurred her words as she drained the third bottle of wine into her glass. "The drummer guy?"

"Ben Hardy?" Lizzie snorted. "You think it's going to be Ben Hardy?"

"Why not?!"

"They were castmates, Shells!" Lizzie sipped her wine. "Just because they acted in a film together doesn't mean they're bffs."

"You're clearly not following them on Instagram, then." Shelly smirked.

"Oh, and you are?" Lizzie scoffed.

"I sure am!"

"Jesus."

"No, my name is Shelly." She joked. "Whoever this bloke is, you know he's a looker if Prince Charming is hanging out with him."

"What?"

"Attractive people only hang out with other attractive people!" Shelly informed her best friend. "It's the rule of law."

"What law?" Lizzie's brows knotted in confusion.

"The law of science!"

"He's married, you know." Lizzie noted.

"Gwilym?!" Shelly gasped.

"No, you plum!" Lizzie rolled her eyes. "Ben Hardy!"

"Oh, right. To your girl-crush." Shelly sing-sang.

"She's not my girl-crush."

"She totally is." Shelly giggled. "Look at you blushing!"

###

The night of the party, Lizzie was beside herself with nerves. She wanted to impress Gwilym and make him want her as more than just a friend. Whether it was the fact that he was Annabelle Lee's cousin or the fact that he was just the perfect man, she just wanted him. His company. His touch. His attention. Fluffing up her hair at the roots, she looked down at her vanity and deliberated the perfect lipstick to match her outfit and finalize her look. Tonight was the night Gwilym will see her and fall in love. The thing she didn't know was that he already had - when he knocked her on her ass and she laid there on the grass, looking like a porcelain doll some child had dropped. With her look complete, she left her room for Shelly's input.

"How do I look?" Lizzie twirled in front of Shelly.

"Too clothed."

"It's January. I don't want to get pneumonia, alright?" Lizzie scoffed. "T'was bad enough with the flu. My class got split and -" Lizzie adjusted the cuffs of her skin-tight red sweater-dress.

"Shut up with work talk on weekends already!" Shelly put a hand up to stop Lizzie's rambles as she stepped up to her. "Ugh!" she groaned and pulled Lizzie's neckline down. "It's like you're not even trying -"

"Shells!" Lizzie gasped and jumped back. "That's so rude!"

"You have to flaunt some of the goods, missy."

"The goods were flaunted, thank you very much!"

"No, they were not. Now, however?" Shelly hiked up the skirt of Lizzie's dress. "Much better. Wear the knee-high black boots."

"I'll look like a prostitute." Lizzie scoffed.

"A high-end escort, really." Shelly countered. "If you do shag prince charming," Shelly tousled Lizzie's soft curls to give her a bedridden, disheveled look, "bring him home and be as loud and as nasty as you possibly can, please."

"Good God, woman!"

"Or just do it right on the sofa, if you want. Make a sex-tape out of it." Shelly winked and wiggled her eyebrows suggestively.

"You're hopeless."

"I know."

###

Gwilym leaned against the car, one leg crossed in front of the other, as he waited for Lizzie. His breath clouded as he exhaled, the January winter chill seeping into his bones. A flash of red caught his eye, making him do a double-take. He gulped when he saw Lizzie and rubbed his hands together, suddenly slightly nervous. She walked up to him with a lopsided smile, batting her eyelashes flirtatiously. She had a swagger to her steps, she almost looked like she was cat-walking towards him.

"You look amazing!" Gwilym's eyes scanned over her body. "Aren't you frozen solid?"

"I am, in fact, freezing," Lizzie giggled and hoped he couldn't hear her teeth chattering. "Where's your mate?"

"He decided to stay in the car." Gwilym rolled his eyes playfully. "Americans, you know?"

Lizzie nodded and made a mental note to herself that it was not Ben Hardy in that car.

"Did you enjoy free-heeeeeeee -" Gwilym's friend seemed to have forgotten how to use words as he turned around in his seat to look at Lizzie. "Hello."

"Joe, meet Lizzie." Gwilym said as he collapsed into the driver's seat and she sat down very carefully at the back. "Lizzie, this is Joe."

"Hey, Joe."

"Hello." Joe had a dopey smile on his face. A whiff of whiskey reached Lizzie's nostrils. "Hi."

"Pre-gaming?" Lizzie snorted and made eye contact with Gwilym through the rear-view mirror. "Really?"

"He insisted." Gwilym shrugged and flicked the blinkers on. "So this party we're going to is nothing too fancy, really."

"What's the occasion?" Lizzie blushed under Joe's gaze.

"Birthday!" Joe announced. "Someone we worked with on a project not too long ago."

"Look at you, trying to be cool." Gwilym chuckled and earned a glare from Joe. "Our best mate is having a birthday. Joe is very excited."

"Benny deserves every bit of my excitement."

"B... beh..." Lizzie stuttered and gulped as she composed herself, "Benny?"

"Yeah." Joe had a dreamy look in his eyes. "His name's Ben."

"Huh." The prospect of meeting Ben Hardy and his wife so casually made Lizzie obliviously bite her bottom lip. Both men shift uncomfortably. "That sounds like fun."

###

"Silly Gwilly!!!"

Gwilym, Joe and Lizzie turned around to the source of the screeching as they walked inside the club. The music thumped and the light flickered.

"Oh my God!" Lizzie gasped and froze in her tracks. "Is that...?"

"Annabelle!" Joe finished her sentence and ran towards Annabelle with open arms.

"Move it, Joseph!" Annabelle side stepped around him and made a bee-line towards Gwilym. "I feel like I haven't seen you in years! What the fuck?!"

"Got a bit preoccupied, Banana." Gwilym picked her up and swayed with her from side to side in a tight hug. "I missed you too."

"Just because you and Clara aren't together anymore doesn't mean you have to cut all ties with me, you know." Annabelle detangled her legs from around his waist and slid down his body to the floor as if he were a fireman's pole. "She's on holiday anyways. Who's this?"

"This," Gwilym took Lizzie's hand and pulled her closer to him and his cousin, "is my new... Er... friend, Lizzie."

"Friend, huh?" Joe and Annabelle said simultaneously.

"Yep. Ran into her in the park one day, literally." Gwilym explained.

Lizzie opened and closed her mouth like a fish as she tried to conjure up a coherent sentence. Annabelle Lee-Jones was, by far, her favourite person on the entire planet. Mentally kicking herself, Lizzie extended a hand out for Annabelle to shake with an awkward giggle.

"Hi, I, um..." Lizzie struggled for words and only felt worse when Annabelle raised an amused eyebrow at her. "I don't get starstruck very often but you're just about my favourite person ever..."

"That's so sweet!" Annabelle laughed and pulled Lizzie in for a hug. "After BoRhap exploded no one even cares about me anymore. You just made my day, you know."

"Where's Ben?" Joe interrupted.

"At the table." Annabelle rolled her eyes. "Go find your husband, Joe. Lizzie, you're coming with me!"

Annabelle pulled Lizzie along by the hand and walked her over to the bar. Lizzie stumbled as she looked back at Gwilym. He waved at her with an amused smirk on his face. If she survived a night out with this crew, it will be nothing short of a miracle.

###

"Who's the redhead?" Ben asked as he stared at his wife chatting up a stranger. "Why is Annie latching onto her?"

"Gwil's friend. Lizzie." Joe said and wiggled his eyebrows.

"She really is just a friend." Gwil shrugged. "I'm not sure she's even remotely interested in me."

"Is she blind or just stupid, then?" Ben wondered.

"Neither, you rude fuck." Gwilym snorted.

"Are you into her?" Joe asked.

"I mean, she's gorgeous..." Gwilym rubbed at his chin.

"That, she is." Ben said under his breath.

"I'm telling Annie." Joe warned.

"Go ahead, I think Annie might have a crush on her. She won't mind. She'll probably let Ben watch." Gwilym chuckled and made Ben blush a crimson red.

"So, if she's just a friend..." Joe started.

Gwilym groaned and bit the inside of his cheek, knowing where Joe's train of thought was going.

"I mean, I wouldn't want to cock block my best -"

"Yes, Joe. You can hit on her." Gwilym rolled his eyes and cut him off. Lizzie wasn't his to have and it seemed like the situation won't change in the foreseeable future. "Knock yourself out."

###

Lizzie was sloshed. Blitzed. Completely and utterly hammered. Gwilym seemed to keep her at a safe distance all evening, calling her his 'friend' every other sentence. Each time made her feel slightly more devastated - something that did not go unnoticed by Annie. Coming to the rescue, Annie made sure Lizzie will forget all about her troubles and have a happy, drunk, good time at Ben's party.

Indeed, Lizzie felt like a happy haze veiled everything around her. She swayed from side to side, Joe behind her with a hand on her hip, telling her silly jokes as they danced. His breath fanned over her ear and gave her goosebumps. She hasn't hooked up with anyone in a while, and Gwilym was obviously uninterested in her and more interested in the flock of girls surrounding him and batting their eyelashes at him. A small pang of jealousy made her hurt, but then Joe gave her all of his attention and she was drunk and happy, and things rolled downhill like a snowball effect. His lips softly grazed the shell of her ear and he pulled her closer to him. Her lips parted at the sensation. Joe's warm hands roamed over her as they danced, leaving seary trails in their wake. He looked up to see Gwil waving his hand at him, trying to get his attention. When he finally did, Gwil lifted his other hand up, dangling his car keys to signal Joe that it was time to leave.

"Gwil's calling for us." Joe slurred, inclining his head down and nuzzling her cheek slightly. "Think it's time to go."

"I don't wanna..." Lizzie pouted.

"Me neither."

Lizzie turned her head and brushed her lips against Joe's, feeling a small rush of adrenaline flow through her. Throwing caution to the wind, both drunks locked lips on the dance floor in a sloppy, almost obscene kiss.

Gwilym, Ben and Annabelle watched from a distance and snorted, all at the same time. They've been watching the two carefully since Joe asked for Gwil's "permission" to hook up with Lizzie as if it were a National Geographic film.

"So you're really going to let Joe have his way with her?" Ben looked at Gwilym questioningly.

"She's not mine." Gwilym shrugged. "And from the looks of it, she doesn't want to be."

"You oblivious wanker." Annie muttered under her breath, unheard by the other two.

###

"Oh, no, no, no!" Gwilym said and grabbed Joe by the elbow as if he were a disobedient child, "you're going in the front!"

"Hey!" Joe protested and stumbled after Gwilym. "That's rude!"

"No, rude is snogging with my Lizzie in the back of my bloody car."

"Your Lizzie?" Joe raised an eyebrow.

"You know what I meant."

"Look, man, if you have any issues with this..."

"I don't have any bloody issues." Gwilym scolded. "Now, get in the car."

Both boys collapsed into their seats and looked at Lizzie through the rearview mirror, obliviously scrolling through her phone. Her face softly illuminated by the white glow of the screen. She blinked slowly, as if falling asleep.

"Where to, Miss Daisy?" Gwilym asked and smiled softly when she looked up at him through her lashes.

"Home, please." She smiled sweetly. "Is it alright if I stole Joe?"

Gwilym knew this was coming but he still felt a small pang of jealousy in his gut. He glanced over at Joe's drunk, pleading face and nodded with a sigh, starting the engine.

"Well then," Lizzie smiled mischievously, "onwards, noble steed! Take me home!"

###

"You're so fucking hot." Joe whispered in between feverish kisses. He had Lizzie pressed up against the front door to her flat, his knee parting her legs. "Goddamn."

"Let's go inside, then?" She bit her bottom lip and looked up at him expectantly.

Joe replied with a low growl. Lizzie giggled and turned around, quickly unlocking the door and stumbling in. Joe pressed himself up behind her, his hands travelling everywhere they could reach on her body. He kicked the door shut behind him and released his hold on Lizzie's body, allowing her to turn and face him. He caught her lips, nibbling and biting on them. His hands worked their way down her torso and gave her bum a hearty squeeze.

"Eager, are we?" Lizzie laughed.

"It's been awhile." Joe admitted sheepishly. "And you're so fucking hot, I..."

Lizzie crashed her lips onto his.

###

Joe woke up at the crack of dawn, feeling like a rat died in his mouth and a horse kicked him in the head. He took in his surroundings, letting the night's memories flood back in. Ben's birthday party. Picking Gwil's friend up. Lizzie. Dancing. Making out. Gwilym's mood on the ride to Lizzie's place. Making out again. Hooking up.

He turned his head to the side and took in the sight of Lizzie's naked body next to him. She wasn't curled up next to him - she was spread out in all her naked glory, her soft red curls veiling her breasts like a nymph. With a sigh, he rolled over and pawed at the floor, looking for his boxers. When he finally found them, he groggily stepped into them and pulled them up, walking towards the door. Nature called.

He rubbed his eye sleepily as he left her bedroom and closed the door behind him, and collided with another person.

The realization made him shudder. There is a strange woman looking at his almost totally naked body, and she was hot and smirking.

"And to whom do I owe the pleasure?" she drawled, her voice like honey.

"I, uh -" Joe tried to shake the embarrassment off and stood up straighter. "I'm Joe."

"Hello, Joe. I'm Shelly."

"Shelly." Joe echoed, a dopey smile on his face.

"What are you doing in my home and where are your clothes, Joe?" Shelly looked him up and down. She seemed pleased with the sight. "Not that I'm complaining."

"Well," Joe gulped, "I'm... See, last night -"

"Elizabeth McGee!" Shelly roared. "Lizzie!"

"Shhh!" Joe leaped forward and placed his palm on her lips, muffling her bellows. "What the fuck?!"

Shelly looked at him challengingly, one eyebrow raised. They stared each other down before she poked her tongue out and licked Joe's palm.

"Ew!" Joe flinched and pulled his hand back. "But also, good thinking!"

"Thank you!" Shelly bit her bottom lip. "The bathroom's that way."

"Uh, thanks." He said, confused at her abruptness. She looked down at Joe's crotch and noticed a prominent bulge. He felt heat flood his chest, all the way up to his ears. A gorgeous woman stared at his bulge and all he could do was stand there. "This isn't awkward at all."

"On the contrary, mate." Shelly winked at him. "I'm enjoying myself."

"Yeah?" A cocky smirk tugged at Joe's lips.

"Yeah." Shelly stepped closer to him and put a hand on his cheek. "Too bad Lizzie's the one who saw you first."

Her hand slipped down the column of his neck and to his chest before she dragged it across as she left and disappeared into her bedroom, closing the door behind her softly.

##########

TAGLIST: @ramibaby @filmslutt @lose-you-to-find-me @sonic-volcano  @nosferatyou @rogertaylorin1976

[1800hotlinebizzle]

Chapter One

“Peter! Stop that right now!” I giggle and he continues to nuzzle his nose against my neck. I try to push him away, but his intense UVA lacrosse practices had bulked him up a bit more. His biceps, though they were impressive in high school, had doubled in size and seeing him shirtless was always my greatest secret thrill.

“What? You love it. Plus you smell so good” I scrunch up my nose and this time he lets me push him away. Though a perfect puppy dog pout rests on his face.

“I wish I could say the same for you stinky. Look at you, messing up my sheets!” He frowns and wipes at a grass and dirt stain that would probably never come out of the pristine white ruffles of my bedspread.

“Oops. Sorry… Bae” I cringe. We were trying out pet names to spice up our long distance relationship.

“Take that one off the list” he kisses my neck before smiling almost devilishly.

“Sure thing, babycakes”

“Ew!” He laughs, standing up from my bed. It’s then that we both notice that we had more than a few grass stains to worry about. A green imprint of his ass stared back at the both of us.

“Oh fuck Lara Jean I’m sorry I-” I wave him off and stand up too. I strip off the bedspread and crumple it into a pile on the floor.

“It’s fine. Really, it is. Stormy once told me how to get grass stains out of white clothing. It’s likely the same” Peter laughs recalling the helion of an old lady that I used to keep company.

“What? Don’t tell me Stormy played football!” I blush and shake my head before bending over and picking the bedspread up to throw into the hamper labeled ‘LJ’.

“Oh, no. She slept with a lot of the players though… On the field.” Peter’s eyes go wide the way they do when anyone anywhere even hints at sex.

“Legend” he praises before attempting to sit down on my bed before I yell a quick,

“No!” He holds his hands up in surrender before peeling off his jersey and tossing it across my room. I’m terrified when it lands neatly on top of my roommate Leighton Blair’s pristine monogrammed pillow.

“Shit!” I squeak, racing over to grab it and toss back at Peter. Leighton wasn’t in the room of course, though she never was. Her boyfriend Chad Wellworth was in town visiting from Harvard and she’d, unbeknownst to her parents, rented them a gorgeous bed and breakfast in the vintage area of North Carolina.

“Has she uh, calmed down?” He was referring to Leighton’s EXTREME OCD. I shrug. I was a little distracted by the way his muscled flexed and moved as he walked towards me sans shirt. Was it hot in here?

“Shruggy Covey” he teases and that get a (drool filled) smile from me. He folds his jersey and stuffs it into the extremely nice team athletics bag that all players received before kissing my cheek and abruptly dropping his pants.

“Peter!” I screech, naively covering my eyes as if he’d whipped out his junk then and there.

“What Covey? I’m in my undies see!” I peek through my fingers and sure enough there he stood in tight compression short underwear that left a speck to my imagination. My eyes followed the cutouts of his abdomen before focusing on the trail of hair that disappeared into the shorts.

“I feel like a piece of meat” he jokes before I shake my head and push past him to grab a towel from my dresser so he can shower. I hand a huge blue fluffy one that I had bought just for him because his body was so wide and long I couldn’t imagine him ever getting dry with the small child size ones I used.

“Join me?” He’s only half kidding when he says this, but the 50% is enough to make me blush. We reached a huge milestone a month or so ago. That milestone? Boobs. We were making out in his dorm room and in a rare showcase of boldness I took off my top then I reached behind to unstrap my bra and once it fell he’d looked like a kid on christmas. Not bad for a B cup.

“I already showered.” I say biting my lip and he pulls me in for a kiss.

“Don’t bite your lip like that Covey. Drives me wild.” His voice is husky and deep and I feel the blush spreading all the way to my toes.

“Yeah?” I whisper and he makes a sound in the very back of his throat.

“This will be the fastest shower ever I swear.” He promises racing to my bathroom and shutting the door with a loud bang.

“Hey! Keep it down!” Someone yells from the room nextdoor and I shrug, smile, and sit down on my bed.

“Fresh as hell” Peter boasts once he’s out of the shower and dressed in only a pair of loose fitting flannel pants. I grab a smaller towel and motion for him to come towards me so that I can towel dry his hair. He spreads out on my bed and rests his head in my lap. I bend down to sniff at him and let out a sigh of relief when the smell of sweat and grass is missing.

“Much better,” I say as I dry his hair to the point that it’s a little damp and a lot wavy.

“Should I join a sorority?” I blurt out. He had been thinking about joining a fraternity on his campus and a few days back Leighton and I had been all but ambushed by girls in matching t-shirts.

“You’d be such a hot sorority chick oh my god.” I press the towel across his face until he gasps out ‘mercy!’

“It would look really good on my resume and I mean… I could always use more friends.” Peter scoffs.

“Lara Jean you’re the most popular freshman here” I blush. College had already proved to be different from high school. I’d started my baking club during my first month here, joined the Asian American Association, and even taken up ballroom courses. John Ambrose Mclaren was my partner, but that was something I neglected to tell Peter.

“Official recruitment starts next Wednesday. I was invited. How prestigious is that?” He wrinkles his nose and looks up at me.

“Invited? For the frat events you just… show up. Doesn’t even matter if you're wearing clothes or not”

“Fraternities are kind of gay” I admit teasingly and for a minute Peter gets serious.

“Everyone’s a little gay” he says and I look down at him with questioning eyes. He only shrugs before rolling over like a labrador retriever.

“Hey. Let’s watch a movie. Your pick.”

“I choose… Clueless!” Leighton and I had already watched/ bonded over it a few times.

“Is that the one with the hot white and black chicks?” He asks bluntly and I swat his arm and press my index finger to my nose so that it mimicked a pig snout.

“What! They’re smokin’. Hey be one of them for Halloween we’ll get you a short plaid sk-” I get up from the bed to turn on the tv and DVD player.

“Got snacks?” Peter wonders before shaking his head and scolding himself.

“Nevermind. Meat only diet.” I don’t question him. I never do when it comes to lacrosse. He must be doing something right to have had won ‘Most Valuable Rookie” his starting week. He grabs a blanket from a chair and drapes it over both of us before starting to pepper kisses all over me. I giggle and he laughs and before he relaxes he lets out a sigh.

“What?”

“If you join a sorority and I join a fraternity we will have even less time together” here it was. The vulnerable side of Peter Kavinsky.

“Not true. We’ll have formals to go to and parties to hit up…” He smiles lightly before leaning in for a kiss. It’s urgent, the kind I like the most from him, and with a strike of boldness I swipe my tongue against his lips and initiate a french kiss. We’d done that before, but recently Peter had brought up how ‘sexy’ it was for girls to make the first move. I didn’t forget anything easily, or ever. We pull away for air just as Cher begins to make her opening monologue.

“Fuck my diet. Just for today. Let’s get a pizza”

“Peter…” But he is already dialing.

“I’ll get a meat lovers. Same thing as a big ole steak” I shake my head.

“I want mozzarella sticks” I say in defeat and he smiles and nods.

“That’s my fucking girl.”

FOLLOW ME ON WATTPAD THATS WHERE I WILL UPDATE THIS STORY IT DOESNT HAVE A NAME YET

1-800-hotlinebizzle

Stargurl✨ (@1-800-hotlinebizzle)

https://www.wattpad.com/627948300-rush-let%27s-party-love-lara-jean

[noona-clock]

Big Man on Campus - Part 8, Final Chapter

Genre: College!AU/Fluff

Pairing: Park Seo Joon x You

By Admin B

Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8

“So, you’ve never been to a baseball game before?” your roommate asked as you stood in line at the concession stand.

“...No,” you admitted with a shake of your head.

“But you’re going to one just because Seo Joon asked you to?”

“Well, he’s playing! I don’t know! I guess.”

Your roommate smirked wildly at you, and you could tell she wanted to laugh or hug you or something. “You got it so bad for this guy.”

Your cheeks warmed considerably as you inched forward in the queue. “Well!” you retorted defensively. “Wouldn’t you? I mean, you’ve seen him, right?”

“Of course, I have. I just never would’ve thought he was your type.”

“Me either, to be honest,” you chuckled. “He... definitely surprised me.”

Once you two had procured your hot dogs and cokes, you found an empty spot in the bleachers, making sure you could easily see every part of the field (and every part of the field could easily see you - Seo Joon had said it would be nice to see you at the game, so you wanted to make sure he could!).

Thankfully, your roommate knew a bit more about baseball than you did, so she explained it to you as the game progressed. It wasn’t very difficult to understand like some sports were, and the guys looked pretty good in their uniforms, so... what was there not to like?

When Seo Joon first came up to bat, you quickly set your food down so you could clap loudly, even letting out a little ‘woo’ as he walked by. He didn’t turn to look, but you figured he was probably in the ~zone or something.

The first ball pitched to him went horribly off-course, and your roommate told you it was a good thing he didn’t swing at it. You were about to ask why, but the pitcher threw a second ball, and Seo Joon hit it almost perfectly. He began to run toward first base, and as the ball sailed over the outfield fence, you and everyone around you got to your feet to cheer.

Even you knew that was a home run.

As Seo Joon came back around to home plate, he found you in the crowd, a huge grin coming to his lips as he jogged.

You smiled back, waving excitedly at him and giving him a thumbs up.

You felt like a total dork, but he looked way too happy for you to actually be embarrassed.

You were pretty enthusiastic for about... the first five innings. And then your interest began to wane. You loved watching Seo Joon, of course, but he wasn’t always out there, and you couldn’t text him or anything.

By the seventh inning stretch, you figured the game was just about over, so you began gathering your things.

“There are still two more innings left,” your roommate informed you, her brow slightly furrowed.

“There are?!” you cried. When she nodded, you let out a sigh and plopped back down on the bleacher. 

When the game actually did end, though, you only knew because your roommate told you.

“Wait, don’t we still have to go?” you asked, looking curiously up at the scoreboard.

“So, since we were winning, it would’ve been pointless for us to go again because all we could’ve done is win by more.”

“Ah, I see,” you nodded. “Well, that’s nice. I like that. We already won, so let’s not brag about it.”

“Basically. And you do realize your boyfriend is a big reason why we won, right?”

“...Of course, I realize that,” you replied, hoping you were convincing enough. “And he’s not my boyfriend.”

I mean... you assumed he wasn’t because neither of you had said anything about that yet.

“Mhm,” your roommate hummed skeptically before snorting out a laugh. “Come on, let’s go find him.”

Oh, god. You were suddenly nervous about seeing him. You weren’t sure why, but... I don’t know. What if he didn’t want to see you around his teammates?! Or what if he was going out with them for dinner or something and didn’t have time to talk to you?!

But before you could chicken out and run to your car, you heard him call out your name.

Your eyes found him weaving through the small crowd of people, still in his uniform with a huge, goofy grin on his lips.

When he reached you, he slid his arms around your waist and lifted you off the ground in a tight hug. You let out a little squeal and quickly wrapped your arms around his neck to hold on.

“You did so well!” you exclaimed just before he set you back down on the ground. “You got... what, three home runs?”

“Well, four, actually, but who’s counting?” he replied with a little shrug.

“I mean, I don’t know much about baseball, but that’s a lot, right?” you asked, your brow furrowed.

“...Kind of, yeah.” You could tell Seo Joon was trying not to brag, so you decided to just keep going.

“What’s the most you’ve ever gotten in one game before?”

“Five,” he answered immediately.

“Oh, wow!” you smiled. “You almost tied your record!”

Seo Joon’s cheeks were considerably pinker than normal, and you had to resist the urge to reach up and pinch them. How could a man be so adorable and so handsome at the same time?

“Maybe next time I’ll try to break the record,” he murmured a bit bashfully.

“I bet you could, you’re really good,” you assured him, leaning over to slightly nudge his side.

“Yeah, I had fun,” your roommate interrupted. “I need to head home, though... Are you coming with me?”

Your eyes widened a bit as you shifted your gaze to her, and you were about to stammer out some sort of awkward reply because you had no idea if you were coming with her or not.

“We’re all going out to dinner if you want to join,” Seo Joon said, putting a gentle hand on the small of your back.

“Oh -- I --” The thought of being around all those people you didn’t know with a guy you’d just started dating and wasn’t quite your boyfriend was extremely nerve-wracking. “No, I don’t want to intrude. You go have fun.”

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“Yeah, totally. Go eat, you deserve a nice meal,” you smiled.

“Can I... call you later?”

“Of course,” you answered softly.

And with that, he quickly pecked your cheek and thanked both of you for coming before jogging over to where the other players had accumulated.

About two hours after you arrived home, you received your phone call from your not-quite-boyfriend. Though the way your heart pounded as you answered was a clear sign you wanted him to be.

“Hey,” you greeted with a soft smile. “How was dinner?”

“Delicious,” he replied. “I totally left the game too quickly, though.”

“Why’s that?”

“I wanted to get a picture with you.”

“Oh! Well... next time, then. When’s your next home game?”

“Next Wednesday.”

“So soon?”

“Yeah, baseball’s not like football or soccer. We have a lot of games.”

“Okay, so next Wednesday. We’ll definitely get a picture together.”

“Good, good.” He took a deep breath, and your brow furrowed slightly at the sound. “And, uh... I was wondering... I didn’t really want to do this over the phone, but... When I post that picture, can I... say that you’re my girlfriend?”

You bit your lip, though you knew there was no earthly way you could hold back a smile at this moment. “You... you can call me your girlfriend now if you really wanted to.”

“Yeah?” he asked. You could hear his own smile as he spoke, and you honestly wanted to squeal.

“Yeah.”

“Well, I want to.”

You were so happy right now, you felt your flirtatious teasing side rising to the surface. “I don’t want to call you my boyfriend, though,” you sighed as you rolled over onto your back on your bed.

“No?”

“No, not right now. Maybe tomorrow. We’ll see.”

“Do I have to do something special to be your boyfriend?”

“I’m not sure... You might have to hit five home runs, to be honest.”

Seo Joon chuckled, and you immediately beamed at the sound.

“Then I’ll hit five home runs on Wednesday.”

“Oh, just like that?”

“Just like that. If it means I can’t be your boyfriend until I do it.”

“What if... I said you didn’t have to do anything special at all? That you only have to be yourself?” you asked bashfully.

“Then I would have to rub it in your face that you thought you wouldn’t like me at first and refused to get to know me.”

“Ouch,” you laughed. “I deserve that, I know.”

“Hey, it takes a very strong, smart woman to admit she’s wrong.”

“I haven’t exactly admitted it,” you pointed out. “Not verbally, anyway.”

“Oh, yeah, I guess you haven’t.”

“But... I was.”

“You were... what?”

If he were here, you would definitely have to smack the back of his head because you could tell he had the smuggest expression on his face right now.

“I was wrong. I was wrong about you, and I was wrong for being so close-minded and intolerant.”

“I’m really not that bad once you get to know me!”

“No,” you agreed. “And... I’m sorry for being such a brat about it. And for avoiding you instead of talking to you. That’s just how I am, I don’t like confrontation.”

“Really? I never would’ve figured that out...”

You chuckled shamefully, shaking your head at yourself because... what else could you do?

“That’s why I stepped in and forced you to talk to me. And... because I really wanted you to like me, and you couldn’t like me if you didn’t talk to me.”

You still didn’t truly understand why he ever liked you in the first place, but it was pointless to bring that up now. You were merely thankful he had (and still did).

You talked for a little while longer which was surprising considering you usually didn’t enjoy talking on the phone. But Seo Joon made it easy. 

Before hanging up, you made plans to go see a movie one night before the baseball game. You almost invited him over for a pajama/movie night party like you’d talked about the other day, but you remembered what he’d said then: there would be plenty of time for that later. There was no need to rush anything, and you were just fine with that.

“Do you think we’ll get our grade today?” Seo Joon asked as you headed up the stairs to your usual seats in class.

“I mean, it’s been two weeks since we presented,” you pointed out with a shrug. “We might.”

“I think we aced it. No, we definitely aced it.”

“I’m feeling fairly confident, yes.”

Once you were both seated, Seo Joon took out his phone to scroll through social media before your professor arrived.

“Hey, look,” he murmured, tilting his phone to show you. “Our picture has almost two hundred likes.”

You had, of course, taken more pictures besides the one at the baseball game, but Seo Joon had only posted the one. The fact he had a different one as his phone wallpaper, though, had not gone unnoticed. It made you embarrassingly happy in the cheesiest way.

“It’s because your face is in it,” you replied, tapping his screen. “I know whenever I see a picture with your face in it, I immediately like it.”

Seo Joon scrolled to one his selfies and pointed out the fact it only had 150 likes. 

“That has to be a mistake,” you proclaimed with a furrowed brow. “There’s something wrong with the coding, they got the numbers mixed up. Our app would never be like that.”

“No, you’re right. For once.”

Before you could properly scold him for being cheeky, your professor entered the classroom and announced she’d just posted your grades for the partner project. She allowed everyone a few minutes to check, so Seo Joon leaned over to look at your laptop screen (because, no matter how hard you tried, he still insisted on using pen and paper).

You quickly navigated to the school’s learning platform, logging in and clicking on this class on your homepage. You scrolled down to your grades, not minding that Seo Joon would see what you’d scored on everything else so far (you had nothing to be ashamed of, of course!).

A smile sprang to your lips when you saw you’d received a 97, and you felt Seo Joon’s shoulder nudging yours.

“See, I told you we aced it,”  he murmured. “We make a good team.”

“Yeah,” you agreed, turning to face him. He was incredibly close to you, and it took everything in you not to kiss him. “We really do.”

As you turned back to your laptop, you completely missed how Seo Joon continued to gaze at you. You completely missed the look in his eye, the soft and adoring smile on his lips. And, while there was no way for you to really know this, you completely missed how the thought popped into his head that he wouldn’t mind making a great team with you for... a long time.

But you were thinking the exact same thing.

A very, very long time.

Tagging @daelicious-jongbulge , @cramelot , @kpoptrashbcwhynot , @lovebuginlove , @garlandcrowns , @ifyoudareto-believe , @kart1404 , @k-poptogan , @shinrin-yokeu , @marshmallowxmuke , @bbfool to let them know the next part is up! Thank you so much for all the support for this series! I had such a blast writing it, and I hope you enjoyed reading it just as much!

-Admin B

Master list // RULES // Submit a Request! // Read About the Admins

[deanssweetheart23]

Five Years Of Christmas

Title: Five Years Of Chirstmas (Mechanic!Dean AU)

Summary: 25th December 2013. Dean isn’t looking for love. In fact, he’s doing his best to steer as clear from it as possible. And then he meets her. The girl that shows up at his brother’s party only to turn his entire world upside down and makes him believe in the magic of Christmas again. So, he falls for her, falls so quickly that no one in the room even hears the sound. And that is the beginning of their story.

Author: deanssweetheart23

Characters: Dean Winchester x reader, Sam Winchester, Eileen Leahy (mentioned), Autumn Brae Winchester (OFC), Benny Laffite, Lisa Braeden (mentioned)

Word count: 8129 (it’s a monster fic, I know, but it’s worth it)

Warnings: Fluff. Angst. Some language. Implied smut. Death of parents, references to loss, grief and infedility (not Dean associated). Domestic Dean Bean (yes, totally a warning)

Author’s Notes: This is my submission for @d-s-winchester‘s 12 Days of Christmas Challenge. Ashley, thank you so, so much for letting me participate and being so kind and understanding when I asked for an extension. I hope this was worth the wait.

Also, special thank you to my amazing friend slash sunflower @trexrambling because she beta’d this entire thing and helped me figure out how to make this story better and more beautiful. This would have never been posted without her.

My prompt for this was Baby, It’s Cold Outside by Michael Bublé and Idina Menzel (I love it btw) and it’s been used both as an inspiration and a key for the plot of this fic.

Thank you all so much for sticking with me and Merry Christmas! <3

Wednesday, 25 December, 2013

Arkansas Street, Lawrence

Dean knows she’s trouble the first time he sees her.

He’s leaning against one of the bookshelves in his brother’s living room, tiny snowflakes still sprinkled across his hair, and even though there are so many things he could have noticed, the fresh evergreen branches and the printed patterned ribbons and a Christmas tree with plaid garments, she’s the first thing that catches his attention.

He finds her dancing on top of a sofa, one of her hands reaching up towards the ceiling while the other holds a mustache stick close to her upper lip, and God, she’s singing, she’s actually singing Michael Bublé’s part in Baby, It’s Cold Outside while his little niece is sitting on the floor, just a couple of feet away, giggling and clapping her hands giddily.

And though there are reindeer antlers on her head and her tiny feet are engulfed in a ridiculous pair of red and green fuzzy socks and she probably looks like a mess in that oversized Christmas sweater of hers, Dean’s sure he’s never seen anything more radiant in his life.

It’s there, in the way she moves and laughs and sings so completely out of tune, in the way her eyes shine, alive with a warmth Dean has never seen in a stranger’s eyes before, in the way she just lives in the moment, and everything else around her ceases to exist.

He’s smitten.

“Beautiful, isn’t she?” Sam’s voice crawls deep into his thoughts, and he’s so lost in his own little world, so lost in her, that he doesn’t understand what is happening until he hears himself humming in response.

His brother chuckles.

He turns to look at him, chin jutted in offense.

“Dude, don’t gimme that look. You were obviously staring.”

“Shut up.” A pause. Eyes glancing towards her again. “Who is she, anyway?”

“Eileen’s roommate from college. Just moved back from Italy.”

“Huh.”

“Yeah.” Sam smirks, patting his brother on the back. “Totally single, by the way.”

A groan.

Eyes rolled skywards.

“What?”

“Man, you got to stop trying to hook me up with friends of your wife.”

“I’m not, I swear,” Sam huffs out, hands thrown up in surrender. “All I’m saying is, she’s kind and smart and I like her. And,” -he jabs a finger at her direction- “Autumn Brae loves her.”

Dean shakes his head a bit then and lets his eyes drift back to the fascinating girl with the lively eyes, the girl that dances with his niece and blows Eskimo kisses on her nose and tickles her sides.

Her eyes dart up and meet his and she smiles.

She doesn’t know him, she’s never even spoken to him before, but she smiles like she does, like he’s a dear friend, a smile that’s all softness and sweetness and sunshine.

He nods at her, “Nice mustache.” He smirks before he can stop himself.

Her cheeks flush pink.

She bits her bottom lip and he’s sure she’s going to look away but-

“Nice smile,” she retorts.

And he’d give anything to come up with something smart to say, he’d give anything to impress her and smirk and flirt in that way he knows makes women swoon but, somehow, he feels like that’s not nearly enough with her.

He makes sure to sit next to her at the dinner table that night.

Friday, 27 December, 2013

Merriam Ln, Kansas City

Dean had stopped looking for love a long time ago.

He used to, once, back when he was younger and the world was much simpler, a place swirled around his parents’ fiery glances and their inside jokes and a love so profound he thought nothing and no one would be able to conquer it.

He’s seen enough since then though, has seen too much, and knows that true love does fall apart, and the world is a pretty crappy place and there’s no justice, no magic in it, just like there’s no point in falling in love just to get your heart broken in the process.

Because he had had his heart broken. And ripped out of his chest. And stood up at the altar.

So, yes.

Dean’s not looking for love anymore.

But as he sees the way Y/N’s eyes shine in the dim light of his car, its soft glow dancing across textures and shades and edges he so desperately wants to trace with his fingers, he thinks that maybe, just maybe, he’s found it anyway.

“Are you sure this is edible?” Y/N asks after a few seconds, voice laced with a bit of uncertainty as she squints suspiciously at the paper box of Poutine in front of her.

They’re at a drive-in movie theater, slumped in the front seats of the Impala, and she’s got one of those blankets he keeps at the trunk of his car wrapped around her because she is always too cold for her own sake.

She looks like a burrito.

The thought makes him smile.

“Kid, I’m telling you this is one of the best street foods in America right now.”

“Yes, but is it safe? Because it looks like-”

“A mess. Yes, that’s the whole point. Just,” he spreads his hands and locks eyes with her, wide and pleading, “try it.”

She pouts, brows furrowed into a curious scowl. “Okay. But if something happens to me-”

“You’ll serenade me to death with Baby, It’s Cold Outside. Yeah, okay.”

She groans and rolls her eyes, but he can see the brightness there, can see the amusement and the playfulness as she takes a reluctant bite.

Silence and then-

“Oh my God,” she moans, looking up at him, “dude, this tastes like heaven.”

He chuckles, a rich, loose chuckle that dances in the empty space of his car and nestles between them.

“You like it then?” he asks, hopeful and pleased and just a tad cheeky.

“Do I like it? S’ so –how did you even know about this?”

He shrugs, something nonchalant, and hands her a cold beer.

“Got a buddy that spent a couple of years in Canada before moving here. He’s the one that told me to try it out.”

She nods and takes a swig from her beer. “Did he also suggest taking me ice-skating on the first date?”

A groan.

Eyes rolled skywards.

“You’re never going to let me hear the end of that, are you?”

“Nope.”

“Well, for the record, I’m actually terrific at ice skating.”

“Obviously.” She shakes her head, raises her brow a bit. “I mean, that fall on the ice was definitely terrific.”

“Hey,” he groans, pursing his lips, “I was just trying to keep you entertained.”

“And you almost lost a leg in the process.” She snorts. But then. “Seriously though. I had a really good time today.”

And though she’s fidgeting as the words come out, he can tell it’s a genuine statement, and he smiles, just a tug of his lips upwards, but so thankful, so heartfelt.

“Hmmm. Sounds like someone’s impressed.”

She laughs.

Her lips curl up in a smirk.

“Or. This could be the booze talking.”

“Oh, yeah, blame it on the beer, you lightweight.”

More laughter and eyes that shine brighter than any star he’s ever seen.

Fingers that tuck a strand of hair behind her ear.

God, he really wants to kiss her.

He clears his throat, quietly.

“What?” she asks, nervous half-smile playing at the corner of her lips.

“Nothing, I’m just,” he scratches the back of his neck, “m’ glad Eileen invited you to that Christmas dinner.”

She beams and Jesus Christ, it’s brilliant.

“Me too.” Her fingers brush up against his. “She’s…. She’s just amazing, you know? She’s the only college friend that actually stayed in touch after I moved to Italy. And she’s been so helpful since I moved back.”

Dean nods, mind drifting to Eileen and how selfless and loving and accepting she is, how hard she tried to win him over when she started dating his brother, how she loves him like he’s family and makes Sam happier than he’s ever seen him.

“Yeah, she’s pretty awesome.”

“Runs in the family, doesn’t it?”

He chuckles, but it’s bitter and darker than before.

“I dunno about that, kid.” He thumbs the label on his beer bottle. “I come with a lot of baggage. Eileen, uh…” He rubs at his forehead. “She said Sam’s told you about Lisa.”

The muscles in her face tighten.

She knits her brows in a frown.

“I didn’t ask him, if that’s what you think. I mean, I might have asked about you, but not like –Sam only wanted-”

“Hey,” he soothes, placing his hand on her arm gently, “’s okay. I’d rather you didn’t know that my fiancée dumped me at the altar for someone else, obviously, but it’s not like it’s your fault my brother can’t keep his mouth shut.”

“It wasn’t like that. Autumn Brae...” She sighs, eyes going a bit narrow. “She was going through some photos of their wedding and there was a picture of you and Lisa there and-”

“It doesn’t matter,” he tells her firmly, but his jaw still clenches a bit. “That was years ago, but she just… What happened with her really messed me up, kid. And m’ still probably not as great as Sam and Eileen paint me to be.”

“Yeah, well. I’m not Little Miss Sunshine either.” She snorts and pushes some hair off her face. “I got plenty of issues I need to work on. Family stuff, personal crap I need to deal with, all that jazz. But. That’s conversation for like, the sixth date, so…”

“Sixth date, huh?”

“M’ willing to bribe you with homemade Italian cuisine. Hell, I’ll even add my famous tiramisu to the mix if you’re willing to put up with me that long.” She grins. “What do ya think?”

He smirks then, and leans closer, close enough that he can feel the heat that’s radiating off her. He tries hard not to think how much he wants to lose himself in it, and reaches for her hand, small and soft in his large one.

She looks up.

“Wild horses couldn’t drag me away, sweetheart,” he whispers, and she flushes, lips trembling into a shy, radiant smile.

He never once pays attention to the movie when it starts.

Monday, 30 December, 2013

Tennessee Street, Lawrence

Dean’s in way over his head.

He has known it from the very beginning, has known it from the moment he locked eyes with her and felt like a part of him had returned home, but it’s only getting clearer, only getting more evident now that they’re walking around the crowded Christmas market trying to find a present for his niece, and every time he catches her staring he just wants to lean over and kiss her until he can’t breathe anymore.

The Polaroid flashes for what feels like the hundredth time that day, pulling him out of his thoughts.

He groans.

“What?” she asks, a nervous chuckle escaping her.

“You do realize I know you just took a picture of me, right?”

She smiles then and, even though it’s nervous, there’s a glow to it that does funny things to his heart.

“Always so observant, Sherlock.” She waits for the photo to print, then hands it to him. “Here. S’ a good one.”

It really is a good one.

“So, I take it you like photography?” 

“Kinda, yeah.” She gnaws on her bottom lip. “I, um… I actually wanted to become a photographer when I was a kid.”

And he’s not sure whether he’s supposed to ask but-

“Why didn’t you?”

She sighs, lets her eyes drift to the floor for a second.

“Y/N, look, you don’t have to-”

“My parents… I’m not sure whether Sam’s told you anything about them but they’re very difficult people. Very frigid, very driven. They, uh,” she laughs, but it’s harsh and there’s a darkness in it that hadn’t been there before, “run one of the most prestigious business companies in Kansas so, having a photographer daughter just didn’t fit into the kind of high profile they wanted to keep.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah, I know.” She rocks back and forth on her heels a little, seemingly thinking about something. “There was this program… I got accepted into it after I graduated high school. My parents and I got into a terrible fight about it so, I ended up getting into Princeton instead.” She gulps, head tilted to the right. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, Princeton was great, and I love the job I have now but…”

“Your relationship with your parents was never quite the same,” he whispers, careful to keep his voice void of all emotion.

She nods, bottom lip wobbling.

“We were never close, but,” she runs a hand over her face, “they’ve been crappier and way more judgmental about my life choices since then. Which is why I spent the past five years working in Italy. Hiding is easier than dealing with them, sometimes.”

His jaw clenches.

He tries hard not to think about the scars those people have left on her, tries hard not to think that they might match his, despite the fact he’d grieved for the loss of his parents after they died in a car accident, while she’d grieved for the loss of hers whilst they were still alive.

Maybe that was worse.

“Well,” Dean mumbles and lets his fingers lace with hers, then grips, “for the record, I think they have no idea what they’re missing out on.”

She cracks a small, shadowy smile. “Thanks, D,” She whispers. Her eyes drift to the Polaroid he’s still holding. “You should keep that one.”

“Kid, I-”

She takes a step closer to him, purses her lips in a pout.

“Please?”

He chuckles.

God, how can he say no to her?

“Okay, but,” he tucks a strand of hair behind her ear and lets his knuckles brush against her skin for just a second, “I want to see the rest, too, if that’s alright.”

“The rest?”

He grins and it’s all mischief and brightness. “Everything you got,” he says.

“Dean, you don’t have to do that.”

“I want to. Over dinner at my house. I’ll even let you buy me ice cream.”

“How considerate of you.”

“Just be glad I’m a cheap date, sweetheart.” He smirks and she laughs.

He knows then, knows with a certainty that’s beyond him and seeps into his bones, into his very marrow, that he’ll never fall deeper in love with a laugh.

He kisses her outside the ice cream parlor that same evening.

Thursday 25 December 2014

Massachusetts Street, Lawrence

Dean can’t take his eyes off her.

They’re strolling down the snow-covered streets together, surrounded by Christmas lights and large, fluffy flakes of whiteness, and still, all he sees, all he can see is the soft girl in his arms, the one that marched into his life a year ago and turned it upside down just by being in it.

“Are you sure Sam and Eileen were okay with us leaving so early?” Y/N asks, biting the inside of her cheek nervously.

He snorts out a laugh. “Oh, please. Benny and the Harvelles were still there. They won’t even notice we’re gone.”

Y/N arches an eyebrow at his response but he just chuckles and presses a kiss on the top of her head, lips brushing against the fabric of the burgundy beanie she’s wearing.

“We should have stayed a bit longer. Eileen worked so hard to make this dinner perfect.”

“And it was. But as much as I enjoyed getting my nails painted by Autumn Brae, I’d like to spend the rest of my time doing very adult things with you,” he gloats. “’Sides. We’re having breakfast with your parents first thing in the morning, remember?”

“Yeah, I’m actually trying to forget that,” she deadpans, brows furrowed in a scowl. “Do we really have to go? S’ not like they’ll care.”

And he knows she doesn’t want to sound bitter, knows she tries very hard not to let the venom that’s been poisoning her seep into her voice, but she does because she’s so tired of trying to win a battle that’s already been lost, tired of trying to make the two people that are supposed to love her unconditionally actually care about her.

So, he shakes his head and wears the fakest smile he’s ever worn in front of her.

“You know they will,” he says, squeezing her hand tight into his.

“D. -”

“Look,” he starts, “they’re not my favorite people in the world, alright? I know they got tons of flaws and they made lots of mistakes and they never valued you enough.” The muscle in his jaw twitches, but he just licks his lips and carries on, “But they’re trying, kid.”

“Are they? Because they’ve been treating you-”

“—c’mon, don’t go there.”

“No, Dean. They’ve been treating you like crap for months,” she retorts, and though Dean knows she’s trying to keep her emotions at bay, they’re tumbling out of her very soul, illustrated in the way she clenches her jaw and juts her chin.

“They have been nasty about your job and your family and the fact you didn’t go to college so that your brother could, and I’m just –you don’t deserve that because you’ve been,” she lets out a nervous chuckle and spreads her hands in a spread-armed shrug, “you’ve been everything I could ever ask for and-”

“Hey,” Dean whispers, titling her chin, “breathe.”

He gives her a second, lets her frustration burn out until all the angry things she wants to say are swallowed up by the crispy night air.

And then.

“I don’t give a rat’s ass what your parents think of me,” he tells her, but there’s no hatred there, no bitterness or pain or tartness. Just the truth, spoken into the darkness only for her to hear.

“Not when I got you. I wish we could get along, obviously, because they’re your parents and you’re –you’re too important to me. But this.” He laces their fingers together and brings their joined hands to his lips. “God, this is the best thing that has ever happened to me.” He kisses her knuckles sweetly. “And I’m not letting them ruin it.”

She smiles, and it’s a smile he’s seen there before on afternoons spent by the fireplace with Vonnegut books and wine flavored kisses, in between tangled sheets and mornings when they wash each other in the shower, fingers running leisurely through shampooed hair, and in those nights they spend making lazy love like it’s the first and the last time.

It’s the smile that lets him know he’s not the only one feeling this way.

It’s the smile he loves.

“So,” he drags his fingers through her hair, “you and I are going to go out with them tomorrow, and we’re going to have fun and whisper inappropriate things to each other until they give us that murderous look you hate so much.” He smirks, all spark and playfulness. “And then, we’re going to come back home, and I’ll give you that gift I’ve been bugging you about.”

A lazy grin spreads across her face.

“So, you’ll just wear that pair of godawful Santa boxers you bought from the mall and dance for me?”

He lets out a loose chuckle, green eyes sparkling in mischief as his mind drifts to the new professional camera that’s wrapped in a plaid patterned roll, just waiting for her under his Christmas tree.

“Well, that wasn’t the plan, but if you’re into that kind of thing, I’m sure we can-”

“Shut up.” She whines and smacks his chest, trying to push him away.

He wraps his arms around her middle, firmly.

“C’mere, kid.” He cups her face with his large hands. “You’re cute when you blush, you know that?”

“Am not. M’ vicious and scary.”

“Hmmm,” he nuzzles her nose, leaning in, “so vicious, tiger.”

He kisses her then, lets his mouth brush up against hers, all purpose and fire, and smiles when he realizes he can taste the apple pie they’ve shared earlier, can feel the Tennessee Whiskey she’s been drinking on her lips.

“So,” he beams when it’s all over, hands precariously low on her back, “everything you could ever ask for, huh?”

“Well, yes,” she grins, “I love you, D.” She traces his jawline with her thumb. “Christmas Grinch and all.”

“Pffft. M’ so not a Christmas Grinch.”

A chuckle.

Lips curved into a smirk.

“Sure you’re not, old man.”

“Old man?” he growls out as he lets go of her, eyes drifting to a pile of snow beside him. “Careful, sweetheart. You don’t wanna poke the bear now, do you?”

She breathes out air through her nose, hand on her hip.

“M’ not poking the bear. I’m poking the Grinch,” she says with a brilliant, unwavering grin.

“Oh, you’re in for it now, you brat,” he hisses, reaching out for a handful of snow, smashing it in his hands.

“Dean, don’t you dare.”

“What, you’re scared now?�� he asks, heat dancing in his eyes. “You were such a smart mouth just a few seconds ago, baby.”

“Dean, I’m warning you. If you throw that snow –you jerk!” she shouts as the ball crushes right against her chest, flecks of snow dotting her coat and the Y/H/C of her hair, but he just laughs because he isn’t even sure he’s played in the snow before.

She reciprocates after that, allows the snow to fly back and forth until their clothes are soaked, and they’re exhausted and limbless and frosted to their very bones.

She never stops though, wild laughter spilling from her lips as she runs away from him to collect more ammo, and he sees a chance and takes it, lunges for her and pins her to the ground with him.

And he’s sure the fall must have been painful, but she blinks, a pleased, half-smile spreading across her lips, lighting him up like a firework.

Leaning closer, he holds her hands above her head and takes everything in, the flushed cheeks and the snow-painted eyelashes and those brilliant eyes that look at him like no other eyes ever had.

He feels alive.

“What?”

He feels them then, feels those three little words he’s never told anyone since Lisa ready to slip out of his mouth and nestle into her softness and, this time, he’s not afraid, not willing to hold them back.

“I love you,” he whispers, and she beams, like he’s just whispered the words to her old favorite song.

It’s the happiest moment of his life.

Friday, 25 December, 2015

Karl Johans Gate, Oslo

Dean’s never been abroad before.

He’s never been particularly fond of the idea, never really cared to see what was beyond the little world he’d built for himself because he was content, he was safe there.

And then she came along.

Y/N waltzed into his life with her ugly Christmas sweater and her ridiculous fuzzy socks and brought with her colors and feelings and love, the love he’d given up on, the love he thought he’d never deserve again, and let them wrap around him like a vine until they seeped into his veins, into his very being and became a part of him.

He’s felt it before, felt that change creeping in through stolen kisses and drunken nights at Irish pubs, and he feels it again now that he’s leaned against the wall of one of the oldest hotel rooms in Oslo and watches in amusement as Y/N stands in the balcony and leans over slightly so she can take the perfect picture of the frozen landscape.

Joining her outside, he wraps his arms around her waist quietly and presses a soft kiss on that spot where her neck meets her shoulder.

“Taking pictures already, aren’t we?”

With a hum, Y/N lets the camera hang from the strap around her neck. “Well, we have to fill that scrapbook somehow.”

“You mean the one that’s already been filled?”

She snorts, placing her hands over his and squeezing. “No, I mean the one I just bought, smartass.”

“Hmmm,” he mumbles, brushing his nose against her neck, “go on then.”

“Yeah, I can’t if you keep that up.”

The words come out in a whine, but he feels her shiver against him, hears the way the breath hitches in her throat and her heart beats just a little faster and loves the fact that, after two years, he still has that effect on her.

“Seriously, s’ distracting.”

He smirks, eyes crinkling at the corners.

“What, that?” He trails kisses up the column of her neck leisurely. “Or maybe, it’s this,” he gloats, hands wandering lower, to that junction of her thigh and hip.

A groan.

Shaky breaths.

“D., cut it out.”

More kisses.

“D., I’m serious,” she warns, finally managing to turn around and face him. “We don’t have time for this.”

“Says who?”

“You,” she says, clasping her hands around his waist with a coy smile. “You promised you’d take me to the Christmas market today. And I want to see Ibsen’s house. And go to the National Gallery. And try the potato pancakes.”

“Well, yes, but,” he takes the camera off her carefully and places it on the table next to him, then walks until he’s got her pinned against the wall, “we could totally do that later in case you, ya know, want to show me how grateful you are for this trip.”

She laughs then, and he swears it’s the sunniest sound he’s ever heard.

“Real smooth, Mr. Winchester.”

He grins and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, eyes light and bright as they flicker across her face.

“Well, not everyone can be as smooth as you, Fuzzy Socks.”

She rolls her eyes, but he still sees through her, sees the smile she’s trying to hide.

“You’re an ass, you know that?”

“Yes,” he brushes his mouth against hers, sweet and drifting, “but you love me.”

The corner of her mouth pulls up.

Her eyes lock onto his, something sincere.

“Yeah,” she whispers, hands trailing up around the back of his neck, “I do. I really do.”

And he wishes there were enough words to explain how much that little sentence means to him, what she means to him, but they never are, so he just leans in and presses his lips against hers, pours everything he feels into a kiss that’s gentler than rose petals and warmer than the first day of summer.

They pull away, breathless but sated.

“Listen, I have...” he lets his head drop on her shoulder, then swallows, hard. “I have an idea. But it’s insane.”

“Your ideas are always insane.”

“Oh, yeah?”

She kisses his jaw, fingertips grazing the back of his neck. “Yeah.”

Rough, calloused hands caress her cheeks.

“Wanna hear it then?”

“Hmmm.”

He lets out a soft laugh and leans in, until his mouth is inches away from her ear.

And then.

“Let’s get married,” he says.

Her jaw almost drops to the ground.

For a second, there’s nothing but silence, eerie and white silence dancing in the air between them, save from the sounds of strangers passing by the street in front the hotel, laughing and shouting and chatting.

He blinks, second-guesses himself.

“Dean, is this –do you mean this?”

“’Course I do, kid. C’mon,” a small kiss, “follow me.”

Taking her hand in his, he leads her inside the room and reaches for his duffel bag, fingers wrapping around a little velvet box.

“Here,” he waits until she snaps the box open to reveal a simple diamond ring with a platinum twisted band, “it, uh… This was my mum’s.”

“Dean-”

“No, just –I’ve been carrying this with me everywhere for months because I hoped.” He scratches the back of his neck. “I love you,” he says. “I love you so much that is scares me sometimes, and I don’t,” he sighs, and squeezes her fingers, “God, kid, I don’t want to wait anymore.”

She smiles, sparkling and rosy and real.

“Then don’t.”

A skipped heartbeat.

Brows furrowed in puzzlement.

“Does that mean that-”

“I’ll marry you? I dunno, D. Why don’t you ask me again?”

He doesn’t hesitate this time.

He just looks at her, at the girl he wants to spend the rest of his life with, and lets go.

“Marry me.”

“Yes,” she kisses him, “yes,” -kiss-“yes,” -kiss- “yes,” -kiss- “yes, I’ll marry you, you ass.”

It’s all heat and need and secret smiles after that, ragged breaths and lingering touches the only thing he can focus on until he lays her on the bed and makes love to her like he’s never made love to her before, whispering praises and sweet nothings and tender nonsense into her ear.

She follows him over the edge a million kisses later, then holds onto him, hides her face in the crook of his shoulder as he crashes on her and laughs, and it’s all because of him.

“Man,” he brushes sweaty locks of hair off her face, “merry Christmas to us.”

She chuckles, the sound vibrating into his lungs.

“I thought you didn’t like Christmas.”

He shifts a little then, presses his lips on her forehead.

“I do now,” he beams.

He’s the luckiest man on Earth.

Sunday, 25 December, 2016

Kentucky Street, Lawrence

Dean doesn’t deserve her.

He knows she’s too good for him, he’s always known it, but somehow has managed to bury the thought deep within the fragments of his soul.

It still hits him sometimes, though, hits him in the least expected moments, when he steals glances of her getting ready for work or when she’s asleep next to him in the mornings, hair a bird’s nest, smile soft and serene, and he swears that he’s never seen anything more perfect in his life.

It’s there then and it’s here now that her parents’ disapproval is getting to him again and her mum’s words are echoing soundlessly in his mind, a horrifying mantra.

You’re going to be her downfall.

How can she say that? How can she even think that when she knows that Dean would give everything, his job and his life, his very soul, to make her daughter happy? How can she say that when he’s spent the past year working double shifts just to give Y/N the wedding he knows she’s always dreamt of, even though she’d told him time and time again that all she wants is to marry him, pomp and circumstance be damned?

Y/N enters the kitchen, dressed in his light grey sweater, the one he bought to impress her parents the first time he met them, and even though he’d normally be unable to take his eyes off her bare legs or that soft spot on her neck that’s still bruised from his ministrations, now his eyes are locked on hers, on how puffy and swollen they look.

His heart clenches in his chest when he realizes it’s because of the fight they had the night before when he discovered that she was offered a position for a photography program in Paris and had declined it –for him, because of him- and never told him.

He’d been mad then, mad she didn’t tell him anything, mad that she’d given up on something so big for his sake without even asking him.

“Hey,” he rasps out.

He wishes he had something better to say, but he doesn’t.

Jesus, he hates fighting with her.

“Hi.” An awkward pause. Eyes that look anywhere but him. “Uh, can we talk?”

He blinks.

“Yeah,” he runs a hand over his face, “yeah, let’s do that.”

She nods, a thankful, relieved nod, and licks her lips.

“I’m sorry,” she mutters, and it’s weak and shaky and genuine. “I should have told you about Paris. I just… God, I’m an idiot.” She wraps her arms around her middle, a self-deprecating laugh escaping her.

“Y/N-”

“I never applied for that program,” she says, like she doesn’t hear him, like she doesn’t notice how her name leaves his lips in a prayer. “One of the instructors just happened to be at that exhibition I did in Kansas last summer. He liked my work, so-”

“So, he offered you a position in it.”

“Yeah. And my mum was here the day he called, or I wouldn’t have told her, trust me.”

His forehead puckers.

“I know. But why,” he lets out a brittle chuckle and shakes his head, “why didn’t you tell me?”

And it’s just a simple question, but it’s laced with wounded pride and concern and a heart that’s been painfully scarred far too many times and he knows, the moment the words leave his lips, he knows she sees it, too.

“Because I said I wouldn’t go. And I didn’t want you to worry over something that wouldn’t happen.” She ducks her head, juts her chin a bit. “And I was wrong, and I could come up with a million excuses, but you don’t deserve that.” She doesn’t look up at him, “You deserve an apology.”

“I don’t want an apology,” he says, flinging his hands up. “I want you to trust me. I want you to not let me make the same mistakes your parents did.”

“But I don’t want to go. Not this time.” She presses her mouth into a thin line, fights with herself for a few fleeting seconds. “Dean, I love photography, but it’s not what I want to do for a living anymore. Because I love my life here. Because I love you.” She crushes the heel of her hands over her eyes. “God, D., I love you more than anything in the world and I know sometimes you –I don’t want you to think you’re not enough for me. That having you isn’t enough to make me happy. Because it is.”

“Jesus Christ, that’s just,” he runs a hand over his face, “c’mere, kid.”

She walks closer to him and reaches out to touch him, letting him lace their fingers together.

“Do you know I used to hate that ridiculous Michael Bublé song until I met you?”

“You did?”

He chuckles, just a little under his breath, and curls an arm around her waist, pulling her close.

“Yeah, but then…” He takes in a deep breath and smiles, all love and longing for the memories waltzing in his mind. “Then I saw you dancing to it that night and… Now every time I listen to it, all I can think about is how it made me fall in love with the craziest woman I know.”

“Hey,” she whines, smacking his arm, and he laughs and tightens his grip around her, “m’ not crazy.”

“Yes, you are, kid.” He tilts her chin up. “And I love that about you.” A kiss that’s fleeting, soft and fragrant. “And that’s why I’m going to ask you to think about that offer again.”

“Dean-”

“Nope.” He clasps a hand at the side of her face. “Just listen to me for a sec. I know photography’s just a hobby. But you’re too good at it. And this is a pretty great opportunity.”

“But-”

“I want you to go.”

“D., we’re getting married in four months. The program starts in August.”

“Yeah, well. We can reschedule. It’s a six months program, right?”

“Yes, but-”

“Then we’re having a Christmas wedding. Next year.” He leans in, nuzzles her neck. “What do you think?”

She leans against him, fingers curled around the fabric of his shirt.

“How did I ever get so lucky with you?”

“I got no idea, but,” he braces his forehead against hers, lets his arms wander under the sweater she’s wearing, “you’re about to get luckier in about, uh, five maybe six minutes?”

She barks out a laugh, nose nuzzled against his.

“God, I love you.” she whispers.

“So, that’s a yes?”

“It’s not that simple.”

“It is.” He kisses her and this time it’s all depth and desperation and need. “It is if you promise you’ll come back to me.”

It’s the only moment he allows his walls to crack, the only moment he lets his armor down and lets her see him, see through him, through his fears and worries and tears, and she smiles.

“I’ll always come back, D.”

That’s more than he could have ever asked for.

Wednesday, 11 October, 2017

Rue des Francs Bourgeois, Paris

Dean can see why she likes Paris so much.

He can see it from the moment he sets foot on the City of Lights, can see it when he feels that last ray of daylight dance across his skin and knows that it’s somehow different, somehow brighter than the ones that cast light to his own world, back at Lawrence.

And he feels it, too.

There’s a fascinating kind of frenzy strapped to every street, every boulevard and cathedral and café he passes, and he can easily picture her flowing out of the bookstalls, with a newspaper and a croissant in hand, hurrying to get to the Louvre or to Seine.

A smile plays across his lips at the thought.

He misses her. It’s only been two months since the last time he kissed her lips, only two months since he held her in his arms, solid and concrete and warm, and yet, he feels like there’s a vibrant part of him missing.

Tonight, though…

Tonight, he’s going to surprise her.

He hadn’t thought about it until she called, almost a week ago, and sounded so tired and troubled that Dean lost a night’s sleep over it. She said she’d only had a bad day, of course, but he’d been worried and so, with the first opportunity he got, he booked a last-minute flight, bought her a stuffed teddy bear and flew to Paris.

He’s just purchased a bottle of her favorite wine from a little liquor store right across the street from her apartment when he sees them.

Y/N kissing someone else.

The man’s hands digging into her hips.

And for a moment, he’s so absolutely stunned and startled, so shocked that he refuses to believe what he’s seeing is real, refuses to believe that that girl is Y/N, his Y/N, but it’s written in the smoothness of her skin, in the radiance of her presence.

His stomach churns.

He lets the stuffed animal drop to the ground, mud painting its limbs.

“Monsier,” a young man asks him softly, taking a step towards him. “Ça va bien?”

Dean blinks away the tears, eyes glancing back to where Y/N and that, that man were.

They’re gone.

And Dean wants to do so many things, wants to punch a wall and smash every single bottle in that cellar, wants to go upstairs and beat the crap out of that punk that’s kissing his fiancée, wants to take her in his arms and yell at her and kiss her and ask her why, to run and scream and cry, he wants to know why she’d do that to him, and wants to ask someone, anyone, why he’s not enough, why he’s never enough, but there’s no life, no fight in him left.

“Monsier,” the man asks again, brown eyes gazing upon him with concern.

Dean lets out a ragged breath and shakes his head.

“I’m fine,” he says, running a hand over his face. And then again, if only so he can fool himself. “I’m fine.”

She tries to skype with him a few hours later.

He doesn’t answer.

Wednesday, 18 October, 2017

Sunnyside Avenue, Lawrence

Dean hasn’t talked to her in a week.

She’s called and texted and tried to skype more times than he can count, but he just keeps ignoring her, keeps pretending that it doesn’t break his heart every time he sees her smile on his screen and has to let it ring, let it go to voicemail like her effort means nothing to him.

Like she means nothing to him.

But that’s not the case. Because Y/N is still everything to him, no matter what she did, no matter how much he wants to hate her.

He can’t.

He can’t because for every second that kiss lasted there’s a good memory of her, a smile she smiled just for him, a laugh shared over spilled coffee, a soft whisper pulled out of her lips in the moments he spent plugged deep into her, an inside joke, a loving glance.

And then he doubts himself and he doubts her and everything he saw because he’s felt her love so deeply, felt her love interweaving itself so thoroughly into his existence, into the strings of his life that he can’t understand how she could do that to him.

“Benny,” Dean chokes out, waggling his fingers, “I want another round.”

“Yeah, that ain’t gonna happen, brother. M’ tired of dragging your drunk ass home every night,” Benny says, tossing the rag on the counter. He lets one, two, three seconds pass and then. “Have you talked to her?”

“C’mon, man, don’t-”

“Have you talked to her?”

Dean clenches his jaw.

His fingers wrap tighter around the pint glass.

“No.”

“Go talk to your fiancée, Chief.”

“She’s not,” his voice breaks, “don’t call her that.”

“How much of an idiot can you be?” Sam’s gruff voice startles him, and he turns around to find his brother walking towards him with long strides, fury dancing in his features.

“Sam, what the-”

“Y/N called me,” he states, the muscle in his jaw twitching. “She was crying. Said you haven’t called her in a week.”

Dean swallows, hard.

His eyes drift to the floor.

“We, uh… We’re dealing with some stuff.”

“Some stuff?” Sam repeats, incredulous. “Some stuff? Jesus Christ, Dean, she thinks you’ve been in an accident.”

And he knows it doesn’t make any sense, but his heart breaks all over again when he realizes she’s hurting.

“Sam.”

“She’s been calling every hospital in Lawrence, you ass.”

“Sam.”

“Why would you-”

“She’s seeing someone else!” He shouts, a shout that’s all bitterness and anger and heartache.

A few heads turn his way.

He can’t bring himself to care.

“She’s seeing someone else,” he says again, and this time the words are laced with unshed tears and wordless whys.

He expects Sam to apologize then, to stumble over his words, but instead.

“She’s not.”

Dean huffs out air through his nose, not quite a laugh.

“Sam, I saw them. They were kissing and-”

“If you had bothered to pick up your phone when she called, you’d know that the guy kissed her. He was drunk. She punched him and called his friend to take him home.”

“She --that guy-”

“The guy had been flirting with her for weeks. She told him she was engaged. He obviously couldn’t take no for an answer.”

Each word his brother speaks is like a slap in the face, leaving nothing but bruises and cuts and wounds as it pierces through his skin.

“I don’t understand…”

“She gave me the guy’s number. She gave me his friend’s number. Apparently, Eileen knew about this, but didn’t say anything because Y/N didn’t want you to worry.” He pauses, lets his words sink in. “She’s telling the truth, Dean.”

Dean’s bottom lip trembles.

The lump in his throat tastes like hope and guilt and shame.

He calls her thirty minutes later, and when she doesn’t answer he does it again and again and again.

She never picks up.

Monday, 25 December, 2017

Kentucky Street, Lawrence

Dean keeps a picture of her in his wallet.

It’s one of those photographs that never made it into their scrapbooks because she absolutely hates the way she looks in it, nose red and hair wild and unruly from the wind. He’d taken it in Norway, a day after he proposed, while she’d been staring at some kids that were playing next to them in the snow, and every time he looks at it he’s reminded of brilliant smiles and frozen kisses and whispered promises in the darkness of their room.

It’s been two months since the last time he saw her, two months since they broke up, and he still can’t believe he’s lost her.

Part of him thinks he’s going to open the door one day and find her there, asleep on the couch, or that he’ll walk into the kitchen and she’ll wrap his arms around his middle and step on her toes to kiss him and ruffle his hair like he’s a little kid. 

He still turns around every time he hears a camera flash, still thinks it’s her trying to steal pictures of him like she used to do, and on the nights he’s had too much to drink he believes she’ll crawl into bed with him and he’ll get to touch her again, get to feel her sleep next to him.

But that never happens, so, he drinks a bit more and smiles a bit less and tries to get by.

And he loathes himself. He loathes his own stupidity and his fear and his pride because he did the one thing he swore he’d never do, because he let his scars define him, let Lisa and what she did to him ruin the one good thing in his life.

And then there’s a knock on the door one day.

With a sigh, he heads for the entrance of his house and swings the door open, ready to tell Sam that yes, he is sure he doesn’t want to have dinner with him and no, he doesn’t need a baby sitter because he’s a grown ass man, but-

“Hi,” an all too familiar voice says. 

He freezes, then blinks.

She’s still there.

“Y/N,” he says, “hey.”

She smiles, something nervous and awkward, and every atom, every cell in his body screams at him to kiss her.

He doesn’t.

“You, uh… You look beautiful,” he whispers. “I mean, you always do but Paris… Paris looks good on you.”

Her cheeks flush a light shade of pink. “Thank you.”

One, two, three long minutes pass.

They just stare at each other.

And then.

“So, Sam,” he scratches the back of his neck, lets his eyes drift to the door, “he said you’d spend the holidays in Paris.”

“I was going to, but…” She shakes her head a little, gnaws on her bottom lip. “We were supposed to get married today.”

“I know,” he says, hoping she can’t taste his heartache on her tongue.

She laughs and God, it’s so broken.

“We really screwed this up, didn’t we?”

“Y/N-”

“No, I was… I was at that little café in Paris yesterday and Baby, It’s Cold Outside started playing and I remembered,” she sucks in a breath, but the words that leave her mouth are still wrecked and choked and fragile like porcelain, “I remembered how it made an amazing man fall in love with me. And I know it’s too late, that I’m too late, but… I miss you.”

Dean’s breath hitches in his throat.

She misses him.

It’s that simple.

It’s that complicated.

It’s everything he needed to hear.

“And I know I should have called. And I still can’t believe you think I’d cheat on you but-”

“You miss me,” he breathes out, and he can’t even remember the last time three little words had meant so much to him.

“I do.” The wind blows cold on her face then and prompts her scarf to sway, revealing the diamond ring that’s hanging from a chain around her neck. “I always do.” 

And there are a million things he wants to say then, a million things he needs to say, but he doesn’t, because for the first time in two months, he knows he still has time, knows it’s still not over.

So, he settles for the first words that come into mind.

“It’s cold out here, isn’t it?”

She shoots him a bemused look.

Her brow furrows in a frown.

“It’s...cold?”

“Yeah,” he says, running a hand over his face, “you should come inside. I just finished lighting up the fireplace and everything.”

And this time, she understands.

This time, she smiles, and it’s a smile that takes him back to the start, back to the first time they locked eyes and he realized she was it for him.

“Are you sure?” she asks.

He doesn’t answer.

Instead, he reaches out for her, lets his calloused hand slide against her own and grips.

And when she beams, he knows.

They’ll always find their way back to each other.

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[fereality-indy]

The Night Is Young

This is the sequel to The Geeks Get The Girls. Dipper and Wendy Have been dating for a month when she tells him that her roommate is co-hosting a Halloween party. Dipper uses this info to plan a surprise for Wendy.

Wednesday October 14th, 2020

Tanoak Terrace Apartments

Apartment 42

Beaverton, OR

“Dude, don’t go through that door!” Wendy called out at the television screen. She then stuffed a handful of popcorn into her mouth.

“Come on, it’s b-movie horror 101. When your friends start dying you don’t separate and you definitely don’t go through doors with blood on them.”, Dipper said as he walked back into the living room with a couple cans of Pitt Cola.

He sat down beside her on the sofa and placed and arm around her. As he did she snuggled into the embrace.

“So Halloween’s coming up,” Wendy started as she opened her can of Pitt and took a drink.

“Yeah?”  Dipper prompted her to continue, the movie half forgotten with her in his arms.

“And I remember that it used to be you and your sister’s favorite holiday,” She continued.

“Uh-huh,” He murmured as he took a sip of his cola.

“Well Lacey, my roommate, is co-hosting a Halloween party and she invited us. She wants to meet the guy who broke the ‘Corduroy Curse’ as she called it.” she said with a smirk.

“Corduroy Curse?” Dipper asked confused.

“Yeah, she kept setting me up with guys during our freshman year and none of them lasted more than the first date. Guess I just kept looking till I found what I wanted.” Wendy replied as she leaned her head back and kissed Dipper on his chin.

“Well I’m glad you found me when you did,” Dipper said as he leaned over and kissed her nose.

“Well actually, I have her to thank for that even.” Wendy said as she settled back into her snuggled position.

“Oh?”

“Yeah, she had been at a conference for her sorority and ran into Pacifica. When Paz mentioned that she was originally from Gravity Falls, Lacey remembered me mentioning it before. Lacey said she thought that her roommate was from there and told Paz my name. Paz asked her to call me so we could talk. And the rest is history.” she said before she grabbed some more popcorn and popped it into her mouth.       

“That explains it, that has been bugging me a lil bit. But I definitely didn’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth.” Dipper replied as he prepared to take a drink.

“So?” she queried.

“So what?’ he asked back.

She looked up at him and asked, “Do you want to go?”

With a smile and a twinkle in his eye he said, “If you do, then of course.”

“Are you sure? It’s a costume event.” Wendy said, remembering his reluctance at dressing up back when they were younger.  

He perked up a bit at this, “Even better, if you’ll let me I’m sure I can come up with a great couple’s costumes set if you want.”

“You mean Mabel will come up with a great couple’s set of costumes.” Wendy said as she jokingly elbowed him in the ribs.   

“Hey now, I’ll have you know I came up with at least half of our costume ideas in Mabel’s scrapbook.” Dipper said defensively as he jokingly rubbed where she had elbowed. He then added, “Of course she would always make them.”

“Well we could just get something from a store.” she teased.

He physically flinched at the suggestion, “No thank you. Have you seen those outfits. Lord, no. Ninety percent of those ‘costumes’ are nothing more than an excuse to show off skin.”

“I get you. Not that I wouldn’t mind seeing you in one of those thong outfits.” he started sputtering as she finished and she burst out laughing.

“That’s not what I meant and you know it.” he managed to get out despite his flustered sputtering.

“Yep, deep down you’re still the same sweet, shy, dork I fell for all those years ago.”  and with that she pulled him into a kiss.

Thursday October 15th, 2020     

The Spiced Panda Buffet

Beaverton, OR

“And so that’s the situation sis,” Dipper said before he took a bite of his sweet n sour drenched rice.

“So you asked me to make the hour drive, to leave Pacifica in the dark, and make it sound like an end of the world type crisis all because your girlfriend wants to go to a halloween party as a couple.” Mabel said after she had finished her third crab rangoon since he had begun. “Ok, sounds like fun. Any ideas?”

“Well I want it to be a romantic costume set. Possibly Romeo and Juliet.” Dipper said as he gathered up another spoon full of sweet n sour rice, ignoring his chicken. His chopsticks lain to the side of his plate as he ate the soupy concoction.

“Too cliche, how about Bonnie and Clyde. Talk about a ride or die couple.” Mabel tried. She was looking at her plate and trying to decide if she wanted to eat her schezwan barbecue or orange chicken first.

“Uhm, I dunno. I’m not sure how I’d feel with us carrying around guns, especially on a campus. How about Arthur and Guinevere?” He said before finally eating a piece of the chicken from his sweet n sour plate.

“Well, wait a minute. You said it was her roommate that’s throwing the party right?” She asked. Once he nodded in affirmation she continued, “Then nope. No can do, broseph. Paz and I are going to that party as Lancelot and Guinevere. We got invited by Lacey after Paz helped her get seats to a Seattle playoff game for her dad’s birthday. I can’t risk Wendy’s Guinevere out shining Paz’s. Also the party is supposed to be a big bonfire get together, no wait a minute that’s not right. Think, think. Ok. I got it. it’s gonna be at the other co-host’s family farm and they were going to have a bonfire with it so you wouldn’t have to worry about the gun issue, but I totally understand. Maybe you could do one of the Mizmey Princesses couples, like Echo & Narcissus or Othello & Desdemona.”

“Nah, she’s still too much of a tomboy for that. Mizmey always makes their princesses be way too girly. I almost think it needs to be something where she can be seen as my equal or even superior.” he pauses there and absentmindedly shuffled the chicken and rice on his plate. After a moment he he saw that somehow he had separated the dishes so they had some familiar paths in between them. Routes he hadn’t traveled in years, the paths in the woods of Gravity Falls. Including the one to Wendy’s house. The woods where they sure used to have fun. “Wait a minute, I got it. Robin Hood and Marian.”

“But isn’t Marian a Mizney Princess?” Mabel said around a mouth full of orange chicken.

“Well yes, but not the one I was thinking about. I’m talking about the one from the Sherwood television series. Marian was just as much part of Robin’s band as Little John. And she dresses similar to the rest also, so breeches and such. See.” He pulled out his phone and looked up pictures from the series to show her what he meant.

“Ok, I think I can pull this off fairly easily. I’ll need to meet with Wendy to get her measurements of course.” Mabel said as she pulled a notepad out from her purse. As she wrote she continued, “And I have a friend in the costuming department that should be able to help get the two of you jerkins that fit properly.”  

“Can’t you just make them?” He asked as he looked over the table at what she was writing. Once he got a better look he realized that she had not only written down the show name and the website he had just showed her, she had already started sketching out the pieces needed for the costume.      

“Not all of them bro-bro, I may be a mistress of fabric but leather is out of my wheelhouse.” she explained as she continued sketching. Pausing she took a bite of her barbeque before she asked. "Do you want to keep the traditional Errol Flynn hat?”

“Yeah, it’s iconic.”

“Hmm, how about I use the idea from the show as a basis but blend in stuff from other versions of the characters. I mean there’s the old black and white serials, the Flynn movies, the one with Azeem, the parody one, etc.” Mabel rambled on as she kept making notes.

“Oh, the parody movie. I loved that one.” Dipper replied with a smile, “The opening rap, the one guy stopping to pump up his shoes, the panty hose gags, the songs…”

After hearing her brother stop rambling caused Mabel to look up from her work. “What’s up Dip-Dop?”

“Well there is something else that I’ve been thinking about,” Dipper said looking down at his plate, somewhat avoiding his sisters eyes.

“Ok, what?” Mabel said putting down her pen and studied his face intently. She knew it must be something good as he was starting to blush and he hadn’t even said anything yet.

“Uhmm, as you know Wendy and I have been together for almost a month now. And you also know we haven’t exactly been chaste in that time.” Dipper went even redder as he said that.

Mabel smiled as she remembered the morning after her brother and his other first got back together. “Oh yeah, I remember seeing her in flagrante delicto half buried in your covers that that first morning. You certainly got lucky there broseph!”   

“Yeah, well. Like I was saying, we’ve been together for over a month and,” he turned his head at this point blushing even more, “neither of us have said the L-word yet.”

“Don’t be a fool Dip, you told her that years ago.” Mabel said with a serious look on her face.

“That doesn’t really count sis,” Dipper said as he turned back towards Mabel, still red in the face. “I was still just a kid. Look let’s not get off track. I’ve been wanting to tell her but I don’t want to do it during a make out session or something heavier. So this party will be the perfect chance and I think I have a plan.”  

“Uhmm, Dipingham.” She said with a wane smile, “You don’t usually have a good track record when it comes to plans and Wendy.”

“Well this party is where it’s gonna change.” he had a gleam in his eye that he hadn’t had for awhile (since around the time he had given up on his dream of filmwork) and Mabel had missed it “Cause really there’s only a couple items needed for this plan; an instrumental recording of the song, speakers, and a couple of back up singers.”

“Now where could we find you back up singers,” Mabel started till she saw Dipper give her a ‘You’re not fooling anyone’ look, “Oh you know I’m just kidding you, of course I’ll talk Paz into it.”

“Great, now here’s the plan.” Dipper said as he leaned in closer.

Saturday October 31st, 2020

Gladden Farms

Beaverton, OR

Our young couple have just arrived at the party after parking his truck. They had noticed that there were only about a dozen or so cars parked in the drive. Wendy had said that Lacey told her they weren’t inviting that many people.

He was dressed in a pair of cedar colored breeches, a dark hunter green leather jerkin worn over a dusty tan tunic, and the Robin Hood hat in the same hunter green. On his back were a quiver and real wooden longbow that Wendy had insisted on getting from her dad once her told her of the costume idea. And finally he had a stage scabbard on his hip. Wendy was in a pair of forest green breeches, a ladies cut version of the jerkin Dipper was wearing, and a white tunic. Like dipper she sported a quiver, longbow, and scabbard. Her hair was pulled back in a gentle braid.   

The door to the farmhouse was opened by a by a somewhat mousy looking brunette, dressed as a stereotypical nerd. “Wendy, glad you came.”

The brunette pulled Wendy into a hug. As she was released, Wendy said “Hey Clarissa, thanks for inviting us.”

“No problem, so is this the curse breaker?” Clarissa asked as she eyed Dipper up and down.

“Yeah. This is my boyfriend Dipper.” Wendy said as she went about introducing the two, “Dipper this is Clarissa. She’s one of our hosts this evening and one of Lacey’s Theta Sigma sisters.”

“Good to meet you,” Dipper said as he shook Clarissa’s hand, “I like your Tri-Lamb outfit.”

“Finally, someone who gets it. So far most of the guests have called me Leonard, Sheldon, or Leslie.” Clarissa said shaking her head.

“Well I guess it takes a nerd to know a nerd.” Dipper said with a smile.

“Ok, I like this guy.” Clarissa said to Wendy, “Lacey was in by the refreshment table the last I saw her.”

“Thanks.” Wendy said as she and Dipper headed into the party    

As they walked through the farmhouse Dipper took stock in their fellow party goers. There really were only about a two dozen people at the party with a sixty/forty slant in the female to male ratio. Surprisingly there were really only two ‘sexy’ costumes and the Gladiator and the Cowboy seemed to be together. At least he doesn’t have to worry about Pacifica and his sister being out of place here.   

Truth be told he never was a party type but he planned having as much fun as possible with Wendy. The plan was to start the song sometime after the party moves outside for the bonfire.

As they walk up to the snack table a pair of mocha colored hands cover Wendy’s eyes. “Guess who?”

“Well considering only three people are foolish enough to do this and I’m holding one of their hands and another is gonna be in armor, I’m gonna say Lacey.” Wendy said before the hands dropped.

When they turned Dipper saw a mocha skinned beauty dressed as a calico cat. She gave him a once over (including an appraising walk around) before she  turned to Wendy and remarked, “So this is him? Sheesh girl, if you had told me you into the bookish type I’d’ve had you hooked up ages ago.”

“Nah, this one is special. Ain’t another like him in the world.” Wendy said before she kissed Dipper on the cheek.

Lacey chuckled at his blush, “Man, this is too adorable. So what’s your name Loxley?”

Still blushing Dipper said “Everybody calls me Dipper.”

“Oh, I’m sure you do.” Lacey joked as she shot Dipper a wink.  

“Lacey!” Wendy exclaimed as she chucked her roommates shoulder.  

“Well, she hasn’t complained yet.” Dipper said with a little smirk as Wendy went as red as he had been and Lacey snickered at her reaction.

“Dipper!” Wendy marveled at what she just heard her normally quiet boyfriend say. He just leaned over and gave her a quick kiss.

“Ok. I like this guy,” Lacey said around her laughs, “Girl he’s a keeper.”

“Oy, I see you found my brother.” Mabel called out from behind them.

As they turned around they saw Mabel standing there in full chainmail armor, with her hair done up in a crown braid that led to braided tail, a blue tabard with a gold fleur de lis in the center, and a glorious blonde van dyke. Pacifica was beside her in a flowing regal purple gown with gold and silver inlay, her hair was plated and topped with a silver tiara. and a golden scepter.

“Mabel,” Dipper said as he walked over and gave her a hug. As he leaned near her ear he whispered, “Is it ready?”

“Yep, take the path to the left of the bonfire as you leave the farmhouse.” She whispered back before she released the hug.

“You guys look great,” Wendy commented, “Beautiful dress Pacifica, and Mabel I love the armor.”

“This old thing,” Mabel said as she attempted to twirl around as if she were showing off a dress. “It was just something I had laying around in my closet.”

“And she means that, it’s been on the floor of her closet since she helped the design costumes for the theater department’s production of MacBeth last year.” Pacifica remarked with a smirk.     

“Well it was too great to be thrown away at the end of the production’s run.” Mabel smiled as she patted down her tabard.

Later That Night

Dipper and Wendy walked around the bonfire while the party went on around them. Dipper led them down the path Mabel described. When he got to the small clearing that was partially hidden he said, “You know Wendy, we’ve been together for almost two months now and I have something to tell you.”

Dipper called out to apparently no one, “The Night Is Young, B-flat.”

“Dip, what’s going on?” Wendy asked as suddenly music began to play.

“The night is young and you're so beautiful,” Dipper sung out as he looked into Wendy’s eyes.

Pacifica and Mabel walked into a nearby clearing and began to harmonize to the music.

“Here among the shadows, beautiful lady, open your heart.” Dipper swept his arm out to show they were currently in a shadowy part of the farmland.

“Oooooo” Mabel and Pacifica sung along to the harmony

“The scene is set, the breezes sing of it,” Dipper sang as he pulled Wendy into a hug.

“Oooooo”

“Can't you get into the swing of it, lady, when do we start?” the two of them spun around in a slow waltz like dance.

“Oooooo”

“When the lady is kissable,” he bent down and kissed the back of her hand, “and the evening is cool.”

“Oooooo”

“Any dream is permissible,” he place their hands over his heart, “in the heart of a fool.”

“Oooooo”

“The moon is high” he sung looking up to the sky before coming back down to her. He took his right hand and traced her jawline as he continued, “and you're so glamorous,”

“Oooooo”

“And if I seem over amorous, lady,” he leaned over and placed a kiss on her lips, “what can I do?”

“Oooooo”

“The night is young” Dipper paused here before he quietly said, “and I mean this from the bottom of my heart”

“I'm in love with you.” Dip finished up the song looking directly into her eyes.

“Dip,” Wendy said with her eyes beginning to mist up, “You didn’t have to go through such a production just to tell me that.”

“Oh I know, I just wanted the first time I told you that to be memorable.” Dipper said a little more shyly than he wanted.

“And it was, but this isn’t the first time you told me. Remember.” She said with a smile on her lips.

“Yeah but…” was all he got out before her lips met his. And while the party, the bonfire, heck even the world seemed to disappear he did hear ‘I Told You!’ from somewhere in the distance.  

Sometime later when they finally came up for air Wendy whispered to him, “I love you too, dork.”   

[imaginedilestrade]

Surreal but nice- Part one

A/N: Okay so it's my birthday this week and to celebrate I've decided to do a 90's marathon! I was born in the 90's and I've incorporated some iconic 90's movies and tv shows into fics! 😁

Kicking off this week is 'Notting Hill' 😊it's a two parter! I hope you enjoy! ❤️

Warnings: Swearing, lil bit of angst.

It was a typical Wednesday for Greg, spending the day in the unsuccessful little travel bookshop that he ran in Notting Hill. His favourite part of the world.

Nothing extraordinary happened to him.

He wasn't successful, he was divorced- his wife left him for a Harrison Ford lookalike, he was living with his mad Irish roommate Jim and he was stuck in a rut.

"Can I get you a cappuccino?" Sherlock sent him a smile as they went over the books. Another month, another loss.

"Sure but make it a half," Greg tried to make light of the situation "Its all I can afford!" His laugh fizzled out. Sherlock nodded and left. Greg pondered over a thought again, a reoccurring one.

Nothing extraordinary happened to him.

That was until the bell above the door rang and he saw someone sneak into his bookshop. "Can I help you at all?" He called out to the person he couldn't see because they were behind a bookcase.

"No thanks..." Greg felt his breath hitch at the softness of the voice that lingered for a moment in his stuffy bookshop. Although, it made the shop a little more refreshing "I'll just have a look around."

Greg noticed that you were wearing a large pair of sunglasses and a dark jacket with the same colour of trousers and a crisp white shirt with shoes to match when you peered your head from around the bookcase.

Greg couldn't shift his gaze from you or form a sentence that was more than one word.

You walked around and grabbed a book, opening it and skimming over the page "That book isn't that great, but if it's Turkey you want to read about," he called out and you looked over your shoulder, noticing he was grabbing a yellowish book "I recommend this one." He cleared his throat and glanced between you and the book "I think the man has actually been to Turkey, which always helps. There is also an amusing incident with a kebab," you felt the corners of your mouth twitch upwards "One of many amusing incidents!"

"I'll think about it..." you hummed and turned around. Greg looked around to the monitor and let out a sigh, you watched as he went to the back of the shop and confront a man trying to steal a book by stuffing it into his trousers. When Greg returned you walked up to the desk with your book "I was going to steal a book but now I've changed my mind," you joked and Greg let it a small, nervous laugh "Signed by the author I see."

Greg glanced at the book "If you can find an unsigned one it would be worth a bloody fortune!" His remark made you chuckle. A moment later the same man who attempted to get away with a book down his trousers walked up to you.

"Can I have an autograph?"

You glanced up to Greg briefly before looking down at the desk and then to the man "Sure..." you sighed out. Greg could visibly see you stiffen and noticed the nerves in your eyes when you looked at him again to take the pen he was handing you. "What's your name?"

"Phillip, Phillip Anderson." You quickly scribbled on the piece of paper and handed it over to him with a thin smile. He read over it "What does it say?"

"Well that's my signature and above it, it says: 'Dear Phillip, you belong in jail."

"Good one," he uttered "Do you-do you want my phone number?"

You had to physically restrain yourself from laughing "Tempting, but no." He left after that and you handed the book over to Greg "I'll take this one." He rang it up for you and tossed in another for free. You took the bag off him with a smile and a thanks before leaving. Greg watched you exit the shop and disappear, he couldn't comprehend what had just happened. It was simply...extraordinary.

---

After downing the cappuccino Sherlock had got him, Greg popped out to the coffee shop to pick up a bite to eat as well as an orange juice for Sherlock. He left the cafe with a smile on his face as the sun shone down on him. It was a lovely day, made even better by seeing-

"Shit!"

He had collided into someone whilst daydreaming and spilled the orange juice all over someone's top. Your top. Although some did end up over him. He tried to wipe it off you but you jumped back "Get your hands off me! God!" You whined and looked down at the bright orange patch on your shirt. Greg offered for you to clean up at his house that was just across the road. With a defeated sigh, you accepted his offer.

He lead you over to the flat and pointed upstairs, explaining where everything was. As you want to change, he attempted to clean the flat a little bit. When Greg looked up a few minutes later you had changed into a completely different set of clothes and no one could have guessed that you were soaked in orange juice not even five minutes prior. Greg, being nervous yet hospitable, offered you a multitude of drinks and snacks, including the odd combination of apricots and honey. You said no to it all. "Do you say no to everything?" He asked.

You were about to answer almost instantly before your voiced hitched, a small smile played on your face as you replied "No." You watched him lean against the fridge "Thank you for your help."

"Not a problem and if I may," you raised a brow slightly "Can I just say that I think you are...heavenly. I probably won't get the chance to tell you ever again because you'll never return to my bookshop because those ones you got today are awful!" You couldn't help but lightly laugh as you made your way towards his front door. "It was nice to meet you...surreal but nice!" You sent him a small smile before he opened the door again and you left, disappearing out a door once again. "What was I thinking?" Greg muttered to himself as he walked away from the door. Seconds later, it rang. He opened it back up and you were standing there, you had forgot your books. Greg let you back in again and fetched your books.

"Thank you," you took them from him and then faced him, staring into those big brown eyes of his. You were drawn to them and gravitated towards them and his lips. Greg was taken by surprise feeling your soft, warm lips on his. He never expected anything like this to happen to him of all people. You both slowly pulled back and were left looking at each other again, burning your eyes into one another's. But your eyes diverted to the door when it suddenly opened and Greg's roommate walked in, completely passing the two of you and acting like there wasn't a thing out of place.

"I uh..." you watched as Greg's roommate vanished around the corner "I'd appreciate if you didn't tell anyone about this."

"Oh no of course not!" Greg assured "I'll tell myself sometimes but I won't believe it!" You couldn't help but smile at his disbelief and the way his cheeks had flushed a light pink colour. You left once again, leaving Greg in a hazy cloud of different emotions.

---

Over the next few days Greg ground himself thinking about you constantly. There wasn't a single second where he didn't think about you or that kiss.

Jim, being unbelievingly scatterbrained, told Greg that you had phoned-three days ago-under a fake name. Greg made his way to the Ritz with a bunch on sunflowers but when he arrived at your hotel room, someone was behind him. "Are you sure this is the right room?" He asked the man who nodded. Seconds later the door opened and a blonde woman invited them both in. With confusion riddled over his face he followed her into the room and found a multitude of other people waiting.

"What magazine are you from?" The woman asked.

"Uh..." Greg glanced about and said the first one he spotted on a table "'Horse and Hound'."

"Right..." she wrote it down on her notepad "Well she's waiting for you, I'll take you through Mr..."

"Lestrade, Greg Lestrade."

Greg entered another room and felt the air drain from his lungs seeing you by the window with a smile on your face. "You have five minutes," your agent made Greg jump, suddenly appearing behind the bookseller. You awkwardly smiled and extended an arm to the seat beside you, your agent kept walking in and out of the room.

"These are for you but," Greg glanced around the room, it was already engulfed in flowers "But I suspect you already have enough!"

"No!" You took them from Greg "They're lovely thank you." You placed them down and let out a small sigh "I'm sorry it has to be like this. I thought the press tour would be over. I'm also sorry I had to give you a fake name, I do it all the time when I'm in hotels. People know how to hunt you down!" You forced a laugh.

Greg opened his mouth to speak when your agent came in and raised a brow at him "Uhh so do you have many horses in this film?"

"Well..." you glanced over to your agent and noticed him lightly shaking his head "Not any at all, no."

"Why is that?"

"Because the movie is set in space..." the corner of your lip twitched upwards.

Your agent left again and Greg let out a sigh of relief "I'm absolutely balls at this!" As your agent appeared and reappeared, he kept asking you horse related questions, eventually Greg's time was up.

"It was nice to meet you," you shook Greg's hand, keeping up appearances "Surreal but nice."

Greg felt his lips curve into a smile. Your agent left again and Greg squeezed in one final question before he came back "Are you free tonight?"

You sadly smiled "No...sorry." You pulled your hand back and cleared your throat, your agent came back and led Greg away where he was unexpectedly taken away to interview other cast members. He didn't have a clue was he was doing at was making a fool out of himself in the process. The blonde haired woman Greg had met before called out his name again and he uttered out a protest under his breath, he really didn't want to interview another movie star. But he didn't. Instead he was lead to your room again "I'm not busy tonight."

"Y-you're not? But I thought you had plans?" Greg's brow crinkled with confusion.

"I cancelled them."

Greg widely smiled "Oh shit! It's my sisters birthday! I totally forgot!"

"That's okay," you reassured "I don't mind going."

"You want to go?" He pointed at his chest "With me?" He then pointed in a westward direction "To my sisters birthday?"

"Yes." You nodded with a growing smile "I'll be your date."

---

"Uh Y/N," Greg nervously introduced you to his friends and family "This is John and Mary. Dear friends of mine."

"Hello!" Mary smiled "It's funny you are the spitting image of-"

Greg cut her off "Y/N, this is Y/N..." Greg sent Mary a knowing glare. She shook your hand with a gaping smile. Greg lead you over to John who was in the kitchen "John this is Y/N."

"Well it's nice to meet you Y/N," he went to shake your hand before freezing, instantly recognising who you were "Y/L/N!"

"Nice to meet you too," you moved your hand forward and shook his hand before he pulled away to get the door. Greg's sister entered and as soon as she did, she gasped.

"Oh holy fuck!"

"Y/N, this is my little sister, Honey. Honey, this is Y/N." Greg formally intoduved the two of you. Honey was in a starstruck haze.

"I am such a huge fan! Massive fan! You are utterly amazing and I think you are the most beautiful woman in the world!" You bashfully smiled at her comment "I genuinely believe, and I have for some time now, that we are destined to be best friends. What do you think?"

You were a little taken aback but sent her a smile "Lucky me!"

The doorbell rang again amd John answered it "Mycroft's here!" Greg introduced you to Mycroft, he was oblivious to who you were. You spoke with him while Greg chatted with John and Mary.

"So what do you do?" He asked.

"I'm an actor, films mainly..." you replied with a small smile gracing your face.

"Must be tough, I know people who barely get seven thousand a year! How much did you make on your last movie?" Mycroft sipped on his wine.

"Fifteen million."

He choked on his Chardonnay "Well that's," he coughed "Fairly good..."

John announced that dinner was ready but before you sat, you wondered where the bathroom was. Honey happily lead you through. "I can't believe the girl you mentioned was Y/N Y/L/N!" Mary squeaked.

"Y/N Y/L/N?!" Mycroft repeated back and placed a hand on his head "Ohh god. Oh god I feel so stupid."

"I can't believe it," Honey returned "I just followed Y/N into the bathroom. She had to tell me to leave! I was still chatting to her as she was pulling down her zipper!" She giggled. You returned a few moments later and enjoyed the company of Greg and his friends and family over dinner.

---

You and Greg walked side by side down the streets of London "Do you want to uh..." Greg spoke up, you could hear the nerves in his voice "My place is just..." he trailed off and nodded towards the end of the street.

"Too complicated..." you sadly smiled and continued walking. You stopped when you noticed a gate "What's this?" Greg explained that it was a garden that the residents in the surrounding houses shared. It was locked and Greg didn't have a key. "Lets go in!" You couldn't help but bit down on your lip to control your smile as you climbed over the bars. Greg struggled whereas you jumped over with ease.

"Now what in the world in this garden could make that ordeal worth while!" Greg jogged up to you, catching his breath.

He was caught off guard when you crashed your lips against his, sharing a passionate kiss under the moonlight.

He shook his head and his lips curved into a smile "Nice garden."

You silently walked through the park, every so often Greg would say something that made you laugh or smile. He was enamouring to you, he truely was like no one you had ever met. And you liked that.

A few days later you had dinner with him, it was ruined by a group of men sitting behind the small partition wall who were making remarks about you. At first you tried to smile and laugh their comments away but they got worse and soon Greg couldn't take any more of it and stormed up to the table. You felt your heart swell as he attempted to fight for you, to stand up for you. The men were too ignorant and rowdy so you pulled Greg back and headed to the exit "Thank you for sticking up for me, I love that you tried. Someone had to put them in their place...in fact..." you stopped and turned around, making a beeline for the table. All the men gasped and quickly uttered out apologies "My friend is a little sensitive," you shot them all a fake smile. "I'm sure it was all banter and I'm sure you guys all have dicks the size of peanuts, anyway, have a good night!"

You turned and walked away, Greg hot on your heels. "That was amazing!"

"Ohh I shouldn't have said that! I should not have said that..." you mumbled. Greg walked you to your hotel and you both stood outside for a moment "What am I doing with you...?" Your head cocked to the side a little.

"I'm afraid I don't know..." Greg shrugged a shoulder with a half smile.

"Do you want to come up?" You rashly asked. Greg didn't know what to say at first but after a few minutes of internal deliberation, he agreed. "Give me five minutes!" You walked into the hotel and made your way to your room with a smile. It fell very quickly when you saw who was waiting for you.

Greg made his way to your room five minutes later and knocked on the door, you opened it and felt your stomach sink. "Hello again," he kiss your cheek.

"You have to leave..." you whispered with tears prickling your eyes. Before Greg could open his mouth to ask what was wrong, your boyfriend appeared.

"Finally, some room service!" He bellowed and your gaze fell to the ground "I wanted to be the best boyfriend ever and order some fruit or somethin' for Y/N. Only fruit though!" He laughed and jabbed your side. He always degraded and you hated it, you hated it even more that Greg was standing in front of you. You didn't want to drag him into this mess. "And take that trash when you leave!"

You squeezed your eyes shut and let out a watery sigh "Greg, I'm sorry. I don't know what to say..."

Greg slumped his shoulders, disappointment clouding his face "I believe it's usually 'goodbye'." He couldn't even crack a sad smile.

He was heartbroken.

---------------------

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PART TWO

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<<EXCERPT>>

Wednesday 29th, November 2017

If there was something El Ives put her mind to, she was sure to accomplish it. Always.

Well, most of the times.

As a matter of fact, today was one of the few rare exceptions to that rule. This, since Will Byers, El’s best friend, had managed to convince the otherwise socially awkward El to finally come with him that weekend to some party at a friend’s house.

They were both currently seating on the beige colored carpet of her dorm room, supposedly trying to be productive by getting their History 102 assignment done before the due date.

“Pleeease El! I’m about to beg you, it’s almost Christmas break and, for once, I’d like for you to come meet my friends and not stay locked up here again like a loser”, Will had been pouting at his friend for over two hours.

“Hey, I happen to like being a loser”, said El feigning indignation and scowling at her skinny best friend.

Will managed to hold back his smile at his oldest friend’s antics and maintained a serious expression for the sake of getting his point across. They’d been friends since the age of twelve and both knew just how determined the other could be. Holding each other’s stares defiantly in a silent challenge, neither of them wanted to give in.

As she stubbornly stared into Will’s lively brown eyes, El suddenly felt a wave of nostalgia wash over her. She had been having a few of those for a while now, especially whenever she thought back on their high school days on Hawkins High School. Actually, the biggest irony was thinking about how much she had looked forward to graduating and moving as far away as humanly possible from that hell hole she called hometown. Whereas, now, she couldn’t help feeling strangely homesick. As a matter of fact, lately, El was often ambushed by random flashbacks from her teenage years and usually found herself wishing she could somehow go back and do it all better.

She regretted everything, actually, except for her friendship with Will.

Their friendship was yet another reason El kept thinking back in nostalgia to her high school days: even though Will and her had managed to get accepted into their dream college together and even lived in neighboring dorm buildings, she felt him more distant than ever before. Worse than that, El was painfully aware that she was the reason of the increasing (figurative) distance in their friendship and she loathed herself for it. Now, more than ever, she hated herself for her apathetic and awkward personality. Why couldn’t she be a normal eighteen year old? Why couldn’t she just stop feeling so nervous around other people? Because of this she was finally managing to drive her best friend away, her partner in crime, after being the closest of friends for over half a decade.

For most of their first semester at college she had declined Will’s enthusiastic invitations to parties and any social events, preferring to skip them in favor of spending her afternoons in the solitude of her room either reading ahead or watching some movie or TV show. It was just easier that way, it seemed. El had never really been a social butterfly and she knew how much Will loved meeting and bonding with new people. So, she just figured that she could give him some space by making herself scarce.

However (and she’d never admit it out loud), as Will started spending less and less time with her and his invitations became rare occurrences, El began feeling terribly lonely (which was weird). She usually cherished her alone time, often glad she wasn’t out there fake smiling and making small talk, getting emotionally drained after overthinking and worrying over every tiny detail of her social interactions. Nonetheless, now, it just felt like a very different kind of loneliness.

El felt lonely in a bad way, a way she hadn’t felt for quite a long time: the kind of lonely she used to feel before meeting Joyce Byers and befriending her son, Will.

Finally, after glaring at Will some more, El lowered her gaze in defeat. Mostly because she missed spending more time with him, and also because she was a bit curious about going to a college party.

“Ok. Fine, I’ll go. BUT I’ll only stay until a reasonable hour and you better not be dragging me up there so I can be your designated driver”, answered El with an annoyed huff, hurling one of her fluffy pillows on Will’s general direction and feeling quite annoyed (mostly at her pathetic, abnormal self).

Her friend easily managed to catch the pillow midair and offered El a sympathetic smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. She knew he was worried about her spending so much time by herself – the fact that she had no roommate made it easier for her to just hide away for hours on end without any excuse.

“I’m only doing this for your own good El, you know I look out for you and it’s about time you start having a normal college experience and, you know, getting to know people. After all, the semester is almost over”.

--….--…--…---

Friday 1st, December 2017

El bit her lip as she stared at her reflection on the mirror critically. Was her top too revealing? Was her midsection looking gross and bloated? Should she put any make up on? Was her hair ok? Were jeans and sneakers too casual for the party?

Man, I badly needed a School of Life 101 crash course, El thought with a groan.

It was always on times like this that El really wished she had a roommate or a best friend who could actually give advice on these kinds of things. It was also on times like these that El regretted not learning about this stuff back on high school. Finally, after examining her reflection some more, she decided to change her sneakers in favor of her black leather boots and apply some lipstick to her dry lips.

Feeling quite nervous, she turned her phone screen on and was surprised to see several messages from Will.

8:02 pm U excited yet for your first college party?

8:03 pm Totally getting drunk as skunks 2nite.

8:46 pm Waiting for the guys, we’re coming to pick u up

9:29 pm On our way, expect a call in 15

9:44 pm Almost there

9:59 pm Ok, let’s go

*3 missed calls from MY FAVORITE PERSON IN THE WORLD*

10:03 pm Pick up the phone

10:11 pm We’re waiting downstairs

10:27 pm What the hell u doing? We’ve been here for ages

El was surprised to find out how long she had taken to get ready, her nervousness was really not helping. As quickly as possible, she grabbed her tiny purse and keys and made her way out. At that very moment, her phone screen lit up and the contact name Will had programmed for himself popped up.

*incoming call from MY FAVORITE PERSON IN THE WORLD*

Smiling, El answered.

“I’m sorry, I completely lost track of time, that’s all. I’m almost there”, she said breathlessly while making her way down the flight of stairs.

“No problem El, just making sure you were still up for it”, answered Will sympathetically.

“Wait. So did I actually have an option?” replied El only half joking.

She really was terribly nervous, like she always was whenever she had to face a new social situation.

Will laughed at her lame attempt at making a joke and was silent for a bit, maybe trying to empathize with his best friend’s nervousness.

El could hear Will’s friends talking loudly on the background:

“We need to hurry if we want to get wasted before the night ends, that’s kind of the point of tonight”, a loud male voice whined pathetically.

“Hey, I’m actually enjoying watching this show”, another male voice answered in fake annoyance.

“Booooooring”, someone else interjected.

“You’re too lame Wheeler”, the first voice teased.

The conversation on the background grew faint as El realized Will must have walked away from his friends to talk to her privately.

“Everything will be fine and you’ll have fun, you’ll see. If you feel uncomfortable or something you have us”, finally whispered Will before hanging up.

El had really tried to avoid meeting Will’s friends for a while now, feeling resentment and jealousy towards them because her best friend spent most of his time with them now and talked all the time about how fun and loyal they were.

It actually made sense that they spent time together since they were all taking science related careers and had most of their classes together – Will was an engineer major, like Lucas, while Dustin and Mike were physics majors.

It was silly, she knew.

Calm down El, it’s going to be ok, Will’s friends are probably as nice as him.

Finally, El got to her building’s common area. She saw four guys sprawled comfortably all over the beige couches, two of them were fighting over the remote and the other two were trying to watch whatever show was on TV.

They didn’t notice her presence until she started timidly approaching Will, who was gazing at the screen with mild interest. He was the first one of the group to notice her and his face was instantly filled with a broad smile.

“You’re finally here!” he exclaimed, startling everyone.

“Guys, this is El”, Will said loudly. Then, pointing at each of the guys next to him, he introduced them, “These are Lucas, Dustin and Mike”.

“Thanks for waiting”, El managed to smile at them without making eye contact. She hoped they didn’t notice her nervousness.

“No problem”, said the smallest one of them, Dustin, “honestly, we were all dying to finally meet you”.

“Yeah, we had a bet going on about Will’s friend being imaginary”, laughed Lucas.

Upon hearing that last comment, El snorted while trying to contain a laugh and turned to look at Will with amusement. Her friend merely shrugged.

“See how you make me look bad El?”

“Oh, it was only for the sake of making the bet more interesting”, answered El with a laugh, “it would have been no fun without the mystery, now would it?”

The guys smiled, amused, and the air significantly relaxed. She felt a tiny bit more comfortable, and the voice in her head repeating her own doubts and fears in a loop grew quiet for the first time that night.

“So, who won the bet?” asked Will, looking at his friends.

“Me”, said the tallest boy, Mike, smiling.

He was the only one who hadn’t spoken up yet, but she recognized his voice from her phone call with Will – he was the one who claimed to be enjoying the TV show while they waited for her to arrive.

Overcome by curiosity, El risked a glance up at him and was surprised to find him already looking at her, matching her interest. They made eye contact.

“So thank you for being real, I guess”, he said smiling kindly at her.

She quickly averted her gaze, not knowing what to do or how to respond, and tried to keep her upcoming blush from actually showing on her face. It wasn’t even a compliment, why was she reacting like this?

Social awkwardness truly sucked.

There was a short moment of silence, which was (thankfully) quickly broken by Lucas.

“Ok, let’s get going”, said Lucas enthusiastically as he strode to the nearest exit.

--….--…--…---