#my strawberries are FINALLY starting to ripen

[fulltransmetalgenderist]

gardening is such a mindfuck for the adhd brain. you mean i have to WAIT !?!?! i have to do a little bit of consistent work each day and only after significant time will I reap the rewards???? what started out as a hyper fixation has now became a daily practice in patience and acceptance!?!?!? 😡

[luminiamore]

SOUL, PT.2

basketball player ony x black spiritual reader

first part here.

warnings: bomb dick, vibrating panties (idea came to me last minute)

masterlist

The day finally arrived. The man you had been crushing on for months— the man who sucked the soul out of pussy just two days ago— was taking you out on a date. Your nerves were racking up, your breathing heavy as you stared at yourself in your mirror. The scent of lavender and the burning blunt you just rolled are lingering in your nostrils. It was 5 p.m., 30 minutes before Ony told you he was coming with your outfit.  

You were stuck in the mirror, fixing the baby hairs on your ginger wig as you took another hit. Your head was being hit pretty hard by the effects of the marijuana. Your gold and stone bracelets jiggled around with every movement you made. Why were you so nervous? This is the same man that slobbered over your clit on your clit appallingly not too long ago. So, why were you so nervous? You jumped when you heard a ding coming from your phone. 

“omw mama.”

Another hit. You read the text without even clicking on the message, and if Ony was the type of nigga to go 50 on a 20 road, you had about 10 minutes before he came knocking on your door. You quickly wrap a pink silk robe from one of your hangers on your body, not putting on panties because you have a gut feeling. You already showered, already lathered your body in your strawberry body milk. Your light makeup sat perfectly against your skin, your lips brown and glossed.

The only thing left for you to do was to spray a bit of your Kayali Sugar Candy perfume, and after the final spritz, you heard a light knocking sound coming from outside your room. Your heart is beating ten times faster— he didn’t even tell you he was outside. Another hit, and you ash it out outside your window. 

Your feet could barely be heard on the ground as you rushed to open the door and shit. Seeing Ony outside of his usual attire was doing more to you than you cared to admit. He was in a white dress shirt and black suit pants— all dressed up for the date he was taking you on. His hair was freshly cut, the first two buttons on his shirt were loose, and he had a freshly ripened hibiscus bouquet in his right hand and a medium-sized bag on his left. How did he know those were my favorite flowers?

“Heard you tell that girl you always with that you really liked these.” He smirks a bit when your eyes widen in realization that you said your thoughts out loud. You grab the flowers from his grasp, fingers burning when you accidentally graze his hand, and mutter a small, “Thank you, they’re beautiful. Come in, Ony.”

His aura alone was so potent, so calm and safe, and inside, you knew your spirit guides were probably cheering you on. Your cat’s immediate approach to him, rubbing its head on his legs, was a sign that you made the right choice. Waiting for him to pet her, she plopped down on the floor, and unsurprisingly, Ony crouched down to honor her wishes.

You wanted him to take you now, but you knew Ony was a man of his word. He wouldn’t fuck you until after tonight. You just had to wait until after tonight. You glance up to where a regular clock is hanging above your door. 

5:25.

..Waiting until after tonight suddenly seemed like forever. 

“Not as beautiful as you. You smoking in here?” The smell of it was immediately detected when you opened the door. He smiled internally because he was waiting outside your apartment in his Hellcat while he texted you and lit his own joint. You really were meant for each other. 

Ony thought you looked good enough to eat. Again. Nothing but a thin robe on you, accentuating your curves and showing a slight peak of your voluptuous brown tits. Flashes of you moaning his name and bucking your hips wildly onto his tongue started slipping into his mind— would it really be wrong to taste you again?

Your pretty voice breaks him out his thoughts, “Yea, you want a hit? Or two?” You release a chuckle, the sound making the tall man shiver a bit. He takes a deep breath— patience. He has to have patience. You’ll be moaning his name soon enough.

“Nah, was smoking before I got here. Here, mama.” He hands you the bag he was holding after you got done putting the flowers on your kitchen counter. You were a bit.. skeptical when Ony asked if he could dress you for tonight, worried that he might choose an outfit that you wouldn’t like. 

What you didn’t know is that Ony observed you. Studied your peculiarities and the way you dressed when you walked up into Econ, he wouldn’t have asked such a question otherwise. He had precise knowledge of what to give you, and it was evident when you took the bag from him and found an exquisite crochet skirt set. 

The skirt ended with shades of light to a deep royal purple, and the top had no straps. Flower patterns were all over it. There was also a pair of shoes, white mini heels with thin straps. And when you reached the bottom of the bag, you saw panties, purple, and flower patterns all over it, too. 

“Ony, this is- It’s gorgeous. I-”

He kisses your cheek and gently pushes the items to your chest, “Go put ’em on. Reservation’s at 6:30.”

You giggle and nod, rushing to your room on your tiptoes. In your living room, Ony is waiting for you, lying down on your comfortable couch and petting your cat after she jumps onto his lap. He has reason to believe that you two wouldn’t make it outside if he came inside your room with you. 

You take your time, slowly putting each piece on to not stretch the crochet material. Your last step was the panties, and you couldn’t help but feel that they were slightly heavier than any of the panties you owned. You’re about to examine it a little more, but you stop short when you hear Ony’s voice: “You ready, mama?”

Any confusion about the panties was long gone after you put them on, following the heels. After spritzing your perfume one more time, you grab your keys and head out the door, Ony following closely behind you. 

It was a peaceful ride to wherever Ony was taking you, with only soft Brent Faiyaz music playing in the background and the light-burning sound of the half-finished joint he offered you. At every red light stop, you would let him take the hit until both of you finished it. 

He parked his car in front of a garden-like spot just before you ashed it out, just in time. You are about to reach your hand to open your door but fall short when you hear a click!

“You should know better.” Was all he said before he got out of the driver’s seat and got to your side. As he opens the door for you, he grabs your hand to guide you out and leads you to a person who is ready to seat you both. Hand in yours the entire time. “Reservation for Onyankopon, please.”

The man gives a smile and gestures for you both to follow him. It would be an understatement to describe how beautiful the area was when you surveyed it. It was like a restaurant in a garden of flowers. You are led by the person to a table surrounded by grass and daises, with occasional butterflies flying around you. 

“How did you even find this place?” You ask in complete awe. Ony spent a while trying to find a place he knew you would like. You didn’t seem like the type of person to like classy restaurants, and he definitely didn’t want to take you to some low-end place. He wanted to find something that resembled you. A place where you would feel completely comfortable. 

And well, when you sat down, and a white butterfly made its way onto your awaiting finger... Ony couldn’t help but think he made the right choice. You look like a goddess. An ethereal being that was all his. “I drove by it one time, and it reminded me of you. You like it?”

He hoped you did. The expression on your face wasn’t telling him enough. He wanted to hear the words come out of your mouth, or else he would drown in his anxiety. All he wanted to do was please you. 

“I love it, Ony.” A bright smile graced your face. You never looked more pretty— aside from when you made those gorgeous faces when he was pleasuring you. 

A server came to take your order, Ony ordering for himself before the woman turned to you, 

“And for you, miss?”

“Could I please have the-” The sensation of intense pressure vibrating on your clit causes you to stop your sentence with a faint gasp. Both of your hands are gripping the table to provide support.

“Miss? Are you okay?”

“You good, mama?” You look up when Ony questions and catch the faux concern in his eyes, his lips twitching up a bit as he almost fails to contain his smile. This was his doing. You knew those panties were different. And you seriously should’ve questioned why he bought you a pair anyway. Fuck it felt so good.

You steady your voice so you don’t stutter when you speak up, “… I’m okay. Could... I have the-the Shrimp Fried Rice, p-please.”

You curse yourself internally when you stumble upon your words. You observe as she reluctantly nods and accepts your order. You would’ve flushed your head down in embarrassment, but in your defense, you had a vibrator going at full speed on your clit. Fuck whatever she was thinking about you right now. 

The minute she walks away from the table, you give Ony the meanest glare you could muster— which, to him, wasn’t doing much. In retaliation, he just turned the vibration up, causing you to yelp silently. 

“Ony! W-why?” You whimper out as quietly as you can so as not to raise attention from the people around you. He just shakes his head, amused at how weak he could get you. 

“You look so pretty like this, mama. Enjoy yourself, hm? You deserve it.” 

He couldn’t get his mind off the events that occurred when you came to his dorm. Could you even blame him? For wanting to see more of those pretty faces you make. For wanting to eat you whole again.

He realized he couldn’t outright finger you in a public setting, not here anyway. He didn’t want to wait to fuck you so he could witness you fall apart like you did last time. He longs for you with a strong desire. Even 72 hours later, the flavor of your juices is still lingering on his tongue. “But-”

“Shh. Just try not to get too loud, yeah? Don’t want anyone else seeing those gorgeous faces you make.”

Squeezing your thighs together, your head falls back against your chair. This goes on for a good while, Ony just staring at you, biting your lips to stop the moans bottling in your throat from getting too loud. He watches as your pretty lashes flutter open and close while your eyes roll in the back of your head.

You rub your lower hips against the chair subtly in quick, fast motions to stave off your impending orgasm. Light gasps released from your throat when you feel a burning sensation in your abdomen. Just when you start feeling like the dam is about to burst and ruin the only thing that holds you up right now, everything comes to an end. 

The vibration, your rubbing— nothing but your ears buzzing can be heard until you finally register what just happened. You don’t have time to dwell on it much because your waiter comes back with what you both ordered. 

“Would you like some water, miss?” And this time, Ony grants you the mercy of answering for you, ears still buzzing and clit still twitching because of your ruined orgasm. 

“She would, please.” When the waiter walks away from your table, Ony almost cracks under the pleading look you give him. He can’t believe it took him this long to ask you out. What if someone got to you before him? He wouldn��t be able to live with himself. 

Your soft and crackling voice reaches his ears, “Please, Ony. Let me-”

“Eat your food, mama. I said enjoy yourself, never said you could cum.”

Giving him a pout is all you can do, and his tone indicates that this is not a subject for discussion. The rest of the night went surprisingly well. The conversation was full of rich details about both of you. Only told you many stories about him, how he got to be a basketball player, and how it was a dream of his since he was a toddler. In return, you told him how you even started your spiritual journey, spoke about your childhood even because you were just so comfortable around him. 

He didn’t turn back on the vibrator for the remainder of the evening, only listening to the sweet melody of your voice whenever you said something or laughed at something he said. It seemed like you hadn’t been here for that long when the bill came. You were truly in the present moment with Ony, so you lost all sense of time. But you caught a glance at your phone— 9:30.

Damn. It’s already been three hours? Ony takes out his wallet and pulls out some cash. He gently grabs your hand to pull you out of your chair so that you and he can leave together. Before you know it, you both are on your way back to your apartment. What catches you off guard is the intense vibration from the restaurant coming back, causing you to let out a loud moan in his passenger seat. Your passenger seat after tonight, if he was being honest. 

Your body thrashes against the seat belt, hips bucking wildly because you are still so horny after being left on the edge like that. “F-Fuck!”

He pretends to be unfazed, his eyes still focused on the road as you release the honey moans contained in his car.

“Can you hold it f’me? You’re almost home, mama. I’ll make you cum as much as you want when we get there.”

He must like torturing you. That’s the only explanation. At his words, you don’t think you ever worked harder to stave off an orgasm in your life. The pressure feels so good, your body bubbling with heat and the pleasure being felt in every corner. You wail when the vibrator hits a particular spot on your clit due to your hips rapidly shaking and moving.

Your breathing starts to become erratic as you release light hiccups. Your efforts to not cum are so intense that tears are falling from your brown eyes. Why was it taking so long to get home?

“I n-need to.. cum. Please!”

How do you do that? Look so divine while your pussy is being overstimulated? He almost wants to let you have cum because you look so pretty while trying to beg for him. But then he thinks about how he doesn’t want you finishing on anything other than the massive tent in his pants, and he figures— you can wait a bit. He’s pulling up in your garage anyway, and he wasn’t going to fuck you in his car for your first time together. 

Your heavy breathing and the sudden slam of Ony’s door are all that remains in the car when he puts it in park. He opens your door and swiftly holds you in a bridal style to your apartment number. He presses light kisses to your cheek, his tatted hand rubbing gently on your wide hips.   

He doesn’t wait a second to devour your lips once you open your door, your moans being muffled by the sheer force of the kiss. His lips were soft and sweet against yours, fitting perfectly as your lip gloss was smeared onto him. Still in his hold, you weakly point to the direction of your room, which he follows wordlessly. Heels are long gone, and been thrown in the hall amid your make-out session. 

He plops you down on your mattress, and you don’t hesitate to yank him down towards you into another brutal make-out session, your smooth legs encircling his waist. You gasp when he firmly squeezes the fat of your tits, allowing him to dip his tongue into yours, deepening the kiss.

Fuck, you wanted him so bad. Your skirt rises, and soon, there’s nothing but his pants and your panties separating the two of you. Ony was unusually big.. you knew this when you first saw his print at his dorm. And right now, as he was fumbling to take his belt off, your mind was scrambling, trying to figure out how you were going to fit all of him inside of you. 

All thoughts went out the window when he ripped your damp panties off in one go and immediately started playing with the obscene amount of slick that’s been gathering ever since he came to pick you up. Your cute sounds are heaven to him.

His deep voice whispers in your ear, “You’re so wet, baby. Don’t need me to prep you, right?” 

His fingers are moving rapidly against your clit, as he is awestruck by how his hands keep slipping off out of rhythm due to your wetness. Or maybe he was already drunk on you, desperate to split your pussy apart on his cock. His pants aren’t even entirely off before he’s fisting his fat cock out of his boxers and slapping his brown tip right on your pussy lips, creating wet squelching sounds.

“Could just slip right in with how you’re leaking all over your sheets. You gonna take it, mama?”

And he was right. Your wetness was creating a dark stain on your bed, likely gonna start seeping into the mattress. You sneak a glance down at Ony’s ministrations, and you immediately try to move your hips away. This man was dead-ass walking around with a third leg. It was so big, it actually scared you. How the fuck was that supposed to fit inside of you? Even your last fling wasn’t this hung. 

He immediately pulled your hips back towards him, refusing to let you run away from the deep fucking he’s been craving to give you. “Don’t do that. Take it f’me, baby. Please?”

You whimper, his pleading tone getting you even more wetter. “O-Ony.. you’re too b-big! I can’t- Ooo fuck.”

You didn’t have time to finish your sentence before he sank his length past your tight walls, making you feel every inch of him. Fuck, he was so deep, and he almost wanted to cum right there. He looks down at you and shit. 

You never looked more beautiful, as he said. Your mouth is constructed into a lovely “o” shape, and your eyes roll back so deep into your skull he can see your white eye sockets. You were drooling, the feeling of his dick inside of you simply too much for your tiny brain to handle. He wasn’t gonna last long.

Your wet cunt was so stretched out, and Ony didn’t even give you a second to relax before he started feeding you deep, harsh strokes. You could do nothing but let tears fall from your eyes and wail his name so loud you’re sure you’ll probably get a noise complaint from your neighbors. 

“Gorgeous. Such a good girl taking my dick like this, you love it baby? Talk to me, mama.” He pleads as his face is buried in the crook of your sweat-filled neck, the feeling of your pussy being better than he ever imagined. Than he ever dreamed of. The sounds you both were making were so lewd, so nasty. But it was bringing you much closer to splashing all over his disheveled dress shirt.

“So-so good, Ony! L-Love it s’much.” Your pretty cries make him groan loudly against you; you can feel it vibrating against your chest. Your mind is blanking, and the fire in your stomach that you felt twice today is coming back, only much stronger. Your already overstimulated clit is causing it to come much faster.

With every thrust he gives you, you give Ony a beautiful yelp. And he could only watch your face contort as you struggle to find something to hold on to, to ground you. You’re a bit dense if you think he would let you do anything other than feel every spec of what he gave you. He grasps both of your hands with only one of his hands and presses them above your head.

“Pussy’s so damn good, shit. M’gonna cum. Where you want it, mama?” 

And you respond to him so eagerly, choking on your spit when he presses down on your stomach, his bulge being prominently displayed every time he thrusts in and out of you. 

“Ahhh! M-me too! Inside, Ony. P-Please Ony, cum in m-me.” 

He can’t say no to you, not when you beg him to fill you up with tears like that. The final straw for you was when he forced his tongue into your panting mouth again, swallowing every gasp and moan that managed to fall past your lips. You make a sudden and unwarranted shriek against his mouth, and your pussy splashes all over him. 

He groans as you babble his name repeatedly, allowing salty tears to flow freely down your cheeks. Your body twitches as your pussy creams and squeezes tightly around him, and that’s enough for Ony to shiver as his cum spurts past your womb. He should have slowed down or stopped because now you both feel overstimulated. 

But he couldn’t. He couldn’t stop thrusting his hips rapidly against you, the feeling of you squirting on his dick quickly becoming something he wanted more of. He needs you to do that again. He needs you to spray your sweet juices so hard it reaches his face. Your chest is heaving as you try to wriggle your hands out of Ony’s grasp to slow him down. Your attempt doesn’t do much but make him tighten his grip on you,

“Give me another one, mama. Come on, just one more, baby.” And by the look on his face, even you can tell it wasn’t just going to be one more. You were in for a long night.

[lou-struck]

Strawberry Candies

Hajime Iwaizumi x reader

Prompt🍬+ garden

WC: 1.2k

Warnings: Cursing, violence directed towards a slug.

~This is one of the requested prompts for My Emoticon Expression’s Event; check out the Masterlist on my welcome page.

Ever since you and your boyfriend Hajime Iwaizumi moved into your new home together, you have been waiting for the chance to take advantage of the cute garden outback.

Finally, after months of cold weather and busy schedules, the temperature is more than warm enough to sustain whatever crops the two of you wish to grow together.

He started the process of clearing out the beds weeks ago. Now all you really have to do is lay seeds and plant a few starters you bought at a local greenhouse, so hopefully, you will have an abundance of fresh fruits and vegetables ready for you to eat all summer long.

Hajime busies himself planting some leafy greens for his morning smoothies, and you are weeding around the strawberry bushes that were in the yard before you moved in. The bushes are healthy and full of promising-looking blossoms. 

Something bright catches your eye. Just through the leaves, you see the beginnings of a large green strawberry; it is just beginning to start turning pink. Curiously you reach out and touch it, it seems much too early in the season to have a berry like this, but here it is in the fruity flesh.

"Babe, come look," you call over to your boyfriend. Pointing to the unripe berry. "The first strawberry is almost ready."

He gets up, a bit of dirt on his knees from being crouched in the dirt but neither of you mind. "Oh, That's gonna be a big one." he smiles softly, smearing a bit of dirt on your cheek.

"We should share it when it's ready." you grin, trying to step away from him and his dirty hands. 

He looks at the berry closely, looking between it and your eager expression. "Not a chance; that's all you."

"Why not?" you huff. "You said it yourself that the berry is gonna be big."

"Not big enough to share between two people, you dummy," he laughs, resting his hand on your shoulder, "You saw it, so when the time comes, you eat it."

~

Two weeks later, you are back, tending carefully to your garden; every day, you have checked that first strawberry like clockwork. Just waiting for the day; it is fully ripened.

You can only imagine how sweet it will taste once it's done. Things always seem to taste better when they come from the garden. There's a sense of pride that comes with the taste. 

Finally, after weeks of waiting, you have determined that the berry is ready for picking.

The front side of the strawberry is a brilliant shade of red; it calls to you as if begging you to take it. Carefully, can you pick it up and pull it off its vine with a little twist. Only to feel something slimy stuck to the back of it. And shock, you drop the fruit. It hits the ground with a Little splat, and you see what the thing was you actually touched.

A gardener's worst nightmare, a slug…

This little spotted fellow had Glade claim on your strawberry, chewing a large hole right through the middle of it. Its slimy shiny trail completely covers what is left of the berry. Leaving only a hollow husk.

"Nooo," you cry, watching as the little guy begins to move across its surface. 

From the corner of your eye, you see your boyfriend swing open the sliding glass door. "What are you yelling about now?" He asks, referring to your last minor inconvenience from this morning in which you had run out of your favorite cereal.

"A slug ate the berry," you say sullenly, glaring down at the little bugger. You hope he enjoyed it. Hajime's face takes on a murderous expression as he grits his teeth, "Where is it?"

"The berry?" you ask,

"No, the slug," he says, approaching the berry husk ominously. "We gotta get it out of here before it eats my spinach."

"Do you only care about your spinach?" Utes, crossing your arms. 

"Your berry may be gone forever, but we can still save the spinach." He replies, reaching down and picking up the berry by the stem. He glares coldly at the slug attached to it before he winds up and throws the whole thing up into the air, making sure to put his whole strength behind it.

You aren't sure where it ended up, but you know that slug will never make it back to your garden.

Hajime heads back inside to grab his gardening gloves, wanting to check to make sure there aren't any more slugs. With a sigh, you clean your hands with a bit of hose water. You were really looking forward to eating that strawberry.

"Hey, I know it's not the same, but I thought you might want this," he says from behind you. In his hand rests one of those strawberry-flavored hard candies, You know, the kind that old people typically have on hand.

"Where did you get this?" You ask with intrigue, taking the sweet from him. Eagerly, you unwrap the strawberry skin printed paper, feeling nostalgic as you listen to the crinkling.

"I helped an old lady across the street the other day, and she actually gave me one." he laughs, rubbing the back of his neck bashfully. As you pop the candy into your mouth.

The sweet flavor melts onto your tongue, giving you that sweetness you have been craving.

"Feeling better?" he asks. 

"A little bit," you say. "You're so sweet to me, Hajime, and to old ladies as well."

"Shut up; I just didn't want to hear you whining about it anymore," he barks, not meaning the words that come out of his mouth; he may say that kind of stuff to Oikawa, but he's too sweet on you, and he knows it.

"Whatever you say, ya big softie." Easy laughter falls from your lips as you imagine some little old lady pushing a handful of candies into his much larger hands. You wish you could've seen it.

Fueled by the sugar, you decide to pull a few weeds by your strawberry plant. Pushing past the leaves, you notice something you hadn't seen before.

It's another berry, even bigger and brighter than the one before. 

It's the best time to pick it. Gently you pull on the fruit; it snaps right off the stem and into your hand. You look at it with a tender smile, still tasting the candy from earlier on your tongue. Do you know what's the right thing to do?

Hiding it carefully in your palm, you make your way over to your boyfriend, who is at work weeding his spinach patch. "Hey Haji, open up." you humm, plopping the berry into his mouth, much to his shock.

"You found another one?" he mumbles, his speech a bit jumbled from the large berry in his mouth. 

You nod. "I did, and I wanted you to have it."

He takes his time savoring every morsel of the fruit, not letting even a drop of its juice go to waste, and swallowing with an almost nostalgic look on his face. "That was delicious, but why did you give me this one?"

"Because you're you." you smile, giving him a quick peck on his lips. Their taste far sweeter than any kind of strawberry you could've eaten.

[ticklystuff]

hello friends, i can finally start picking the tomatoes im growing and look how big they are (nuili for scale)

there’s also the giant cucumber behind him but that’s how they always turn out

but it’s my first time growing tomatoes and it’s interesting because my friend and i both started our tomatoes from seeds and we both planted them at the same time and used the same top soil but my tomatoes are five times bigger than hers but hers ripened faster

im a little sad bc the cucumbers and tomatoes are huge but the strawberries are itty bitty

i also have japanese yams and i think they’re growing well? they have lots of leaves but im not sure when’s the best time to actually pick them lol

[imdoingitareyou]

what could’ve been — joel miller x reader

summary: in jackson, you and joel talk about how things might’ve been, had you met outside of all the mess

warnings: its just fluff. its straight fluffy drabble.

After a day that wasn't particularly long at all, that hadn't left you tired or sad, that resembled something regular—as close to it as you could come in a post-apocalyptic world, anyway—nothing mattered because, still, all that you had wanted was Joel. You wanted him next to you, filling the air with his musk of wood and leather. You wanted his hand to hold and his lips to kiss. That was all.

Hence the instant relief when you heard the creak of your front door after a quick jangle of his spare key, and the immediate apologies that he cast down the hallway, explaining that Tommy had needed a hand with cleaning up some mess at the bar.

You were glad to see him when you did, having rushed out immediately from the lounge and finding him with one boot in his palm and the other still on his foot.

At just the sight of him you were grinning like a kid with ice cream.

He was tackled into a hug before he could even return the gesture with one of his more tame smiles.

Through a light chuckle, he said, “I missed you too.”

Head sunken into the crook of his neck, you mumbled some weak response, breathing him in. He did the same, his lips pressed against the top of your skull as he could finally do more than just imagine the scent of your strawberry shampoo.

It wasn't after long that the two of you were tangled up on the couch, just talking, when a thought crossed your mind.

“Do you think we would've had a chance, were it not for all of... this?”

“If I'd known you then... I would never have let you go.” You smiled again up at him. Joel did the same, briefly pressing a kiss to your cheek before holding your face in his palms. “Just like now.”

Through your nose, you exhaled slowly, contently.

“I wish it didn't have to be like this,” you uttered, “I wish I could take you places.”

He tilted his head. “Yeah?”

“Mm-hmm. I would've been the first person to get you outta Texas; would've been momentous,” you giggled lightly.

“Oh really?” he leaned back slightly. “Well, you'd have had to abduct me.”

You shrugged, “Maybe. But you'd like it, that place we'd go. Sicily—my mom's family had a lemon orchard there. Of course, I'd abduct Sarah, too,”

“Of course.”

“Yeah. We'd head down there in the fall, when they start to ripen, and would look out at the sea and fall asleep in the fields, looking at the stars. It's so beautiful there.”

As you spoke, you watched as his eyes closed slowly and he pictured it, breaths slow and heart rate steady.

“You'd meet my family and they'd get you drunk to show they loved you. We would do anything we wanted. And when we got back we'd already be planning the next visit—my parents usually go around Christmas. We'd think about bringing Tommy along, too. Back in our lives, we'd fill the time with trips to the museum for Sarah, and card games that I'd win, and she'd meet a quirky girl at school with a weird sense of humour—shitty puns and sarcastic comments. And I'd kiss you every night before we fell asleep and then every morning before breakfast.”

When he opened his dark brown eyes yet again and found you smiling he couldn't help from doing the same. “Sounds perfect.”

[queerdiazs]

some of my personal fav eddie hcs 🫶🏼

he's the oldest cousin and only boy so he doesn't know what it's like to have any older siblings, but when he met hen and chimney, he felt for the first time what it was like to be taken care of as a younger brother and he's never ever going to take it for granted

it took him a while to grieve his wife, but eventually he brings shannon's things out of storage and puts them out all over the house. sometimes it hurts, but it's all worth it when he gets to answer his son's questions about where the eccentric iron armadillo came from

when shannon found out she was pregnant, she told eddie and they decided to run away. it was fun while it lasted, but eventually they ran out of money and had to return home. he'll forever treasure those few weeks they had together; it was their happiest time.

shannon loved music, so when he's missing her he'll put on the songs she liked and dance all over the house with christopher

he LOVES watching movies at the theater and often goes alone in the mornings after he drops chris off at school. he stops at the dollar store first and get snacks and puts them in his boots to sneak them in

he's queer (it's easier than explaining the complexities of being bi and on the ace spectrum) and he's known since he was 20 years old. it wasn't a sudden realization; it hit him slowly, like snow falling one by one. he's comfortable in his queerness and he has support from his family.

he wore his wedding ring even after shannon died. he lost it, though, and he went to a pawn shop to buy another one, and then buried it next to her grave when he finally felt ready to let her go

what sold him on the 118 after graduating the academy was how hard bobby fought for him without even knowing him. he didn't have to prove himself. it was nice.

he doesn't want anymore children. he didn't even want christopher, honestly, but it takes two to tango and shannon was excited and he was, too, even though it took him a while to wrap his head around the idea of being a dad.

bobby and buck are his emergency contacts.

he used to wear his abuelo's boots because the man was a real-life cowboy and eddie wanted to grow up to be just like him

he used to love thunderstorms but after buck's accident he doesn't like them much anymore + listens to music when it's late and the thunder's too loud

he has his childhood dog's name tattooed on his leg

his favorite flower is magnolias. he likes dark chocolate covered strawberries and buys two dozen for himself every valentine's day. he brews his own sweet tea. he leaves his tomatoes on the windowsill to sun and ripen further.

bobby's like a dad to him, the kind he deserved

he had a little crush on linda when he was at dispatch (and buck LOVED it)

he loves buck, like that, but his heart's big enough for more than buck buckley and he's enjoyed every relationship he's had that led him and buck to one another

when buck proposes and they start planning their wedding, he turns into bridezilla. groomzilla?

he is a sassy dude. his mouth gets him in trouble sometimes, but he says stuff so dryly and blandly people look over it. it drives chim up the wall.

he dances with maddie at her and chim's wedding, and jee-yun, too, who stands on his shoes

he tries really hard to be normal when christopher starts dating, but it's hard when it's the kid of abbie jean gentry, pta president and eddie's sworn enemy

he visits shannon's grave often and talks with her. she's dead but he isn't gone, not when he can see her in their son's smile and hear her in their son's laughter, and he likes to tell her what chris is up to even though he's pretty sure she's watching

he loves cartoons. LOVES them, i'm so serious. i can't stress enough how INTO cartoons he is, okay.

buck said kissed him first and decided they were going on a date. eddie went batshit, didn't go to the date because he was making a list of all the reasons why he and buck shouldn't be together, and buck finds him in his kitchen and he's pissy, and eddie shows him in the list, and on it there's 'buck keeps his loft on 68. cold.' and 'buck uses too much onion powder' and 'buck doesn't wear socks to bed and he sticks his cold feet on me' and buck just laughs and laughs and laughs because they're terrible for each other, kinda, but that's what makes them perfect for each other, too. losers.

his favorite color is green and when apple came out with a green iphone he was so excited he squealed

he's a fan of country music. not that new age, jason aldean, toby keith did to country music what pantyhose did to fingerfucking type shit, but the real country music, full of outlaws and rebels and rednecks. it's one of his roman empires.

his favorite movies are twister, titanic, without a paddle, dirty dancing, and dazed and confused

patrick swayze in roadhouse was his Awakening

he enjoys sex, even with the people he had one night stands with, and doesn't care whether he tops or bottoms because it feels good regardless. he does tend to lean toward the (soft) dominant side of things, which his partners respond to beautifully

he was born 31 october 1991

he was held back a grade in middle school to give him another year of eligibility of playing baseball in high school

he was a member of ffa, held office as sentinel all throughout high school, and supports the organization still. chris is in 4h, but the high school he wants to go to has an active ffa program and eddie's really excited about it

he's soft and so full of love he doesn't know what to do with it sometimes. it just spills out of him, splashing at his feet and flooding everybody around him. he doesn't hold it in anymore because he likes the way people respond to him when they realize he's sharing his love, all smiles and acceptance and unconditional love in response

[ramonasturniolo]

~Constellational Love~

~(A short one-shot!)~

-Matt Sturniolo x Fem reader

-(This is my first fanfic, please be considerate!)❣️

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Summary: Under a starry sky in a flower-filled field, Y/N and Matt Sturniolo share a charming date. Amid laughter, strawberries, and tales of constellations, their connection deepens. A heartfelt exchange of wishes leads to vulnerable confessions, culminating in a sweet kiss that marks the start of a blossoming romance under the celestial canopy.

Does not contain any triggers listed on my about me post!

Disclaimer!; This is entirely fiction! None of this is true and is not real!!

Please enjoy❣️❣️

(Consider listening to this song while reading!❣️)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Under the velvet sky, strewn with a myriad of stars, Y/N and Matt found themselves in a picturesque flowery field, a scene straight from a dream. A cozy blanket spread beneath them, adorned with a modest picnic, set the stage for a date filled with enchantment.

The evening air carried the scent of blooming flowers as Y/N and Matt settled onto the blanket. Their fingers danced in a silent ballet, finding each other effortlessly. Laughter filled the air as they indulged in the simple pleasure of strawberries and shared tales from their past.

"Remember that time in high school when we snuck into the school garden at night?" Matt chuckled, his eyes sparkling with nostalgia.

Y/N grinned, "How could I forget? We thought we were so rebellious, stargazing and getting caught up in constellations instead of studying for exams."

Matt's gaze turned skyward as he pointed to a cluster of stars. "Speaking of constellations, see that one? That's Cassiopeia, the queen. Dad used to tell me stories about her too."

Y/N's eyes followed his finger, captivated by the celestial stories unfolding above. "She must have been a remarkable queen to have her own constellation."

Matt nodded, a warmth in his voice. "Just like you, remarkable in your own way."

Blushing, Y/N nudged him playfully. "Smooth, Sturniolo. But I'll take it."

As the night wore on, they continued to explore the cosmos, sharing tales of their favorite constellations and creating new stories beneath the celestial tapestry. Their laughter and banter wove seamlessly into the quiet symphony of the night.

Matt, with a twinkle in his eye, pointed to a particularly bright star. "You know, they say that star grants wishes. What would you wish for?"

Y/N pondered for a moment, her gaze fixed on the luminous star. "I'd wish for more moments like this, surrounded by beauty and sharing laughter with you."

Matt's expression softened, a tender sincerity in his eyes. "I think that's a wish we can make together."

Their hands found each other once more, fingers intertwining in a silent promise. In the quiet of the night, their conversation shifted to dreams, hopes, and the quiet confessions that often go unspoken. The vulnerability of the night sky seemed to invite honesty, and Y/N felt a sense of serenity in Matt's presence.

As they lay side by side, their gazes met in a shared understanding that transcended words. In that quiet exchange, Matt's hand found Y/N's cheek, and with a soft smile, he closed the distance between them, “I love you Y/N. You mean the whole world to me, and I never want to lose you. I cherish every moment with you.” Matt seals the moment with a gentle kiss upon Y/N’s lips.

“I love you too Matt. I always will.” Y/N states lovingly.

The world melted away as their lips met, the sweet taste of strawberries lingering in the air. It was a kiss filled with the unspoken promise of shared wishes and the blooming of a connection that had ripened over time. When they finally pulled away, the night seemed to hold its breath, as if nature itself was celebrating the magic of a newfound love.

Under the star-studded sky, Y/N and Matt nestled into each other's warmth, the blanket beneath them now a cocoon of shared dreams and whispered promises. As they continued to stargaze, the night embraced them, a witness to the beginning of a love story written in the language of constellations and sealed with a kiss beneath the cosmic canopy.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Thank you so much for reading! I really hope you enjoyed❣️

-Consider leaving a follow if you enjoyed!

-Ramona❣️

[dru-reblogs-stuff]

Updates from the Balcony

The last update I did was way back at the end of June. I've been to Scotland since then and also gained a minor injury, meaning the garden suffered a bit (also I was too busy eating toms and bluebs). I'm nearly healed now, and was able to do some bits, so I thought it might be time for another plant-update.

Do we all remember the cute little tomato plant I got? Do we remember how it barely reached the top of the balcony?

"Look, ma - I'm a houseplant!" This thing has turned into a monster! It's taken over my balcony and is still growing! And it's still fruiting! I'm starting to get a little sick of tomatoes 😅️ Admittedly the heat has turned up again, so much so that I spent Friday watching one of the tomatoes ripen before my eyes. But still. It was supposed to have finished by now so I could put some other stuff out.

A few weeks ago we took a trip out to a garden center (very dangerous, wanted to buy everything - there was an orange tree!). I'd given up on the dianthus (right). It was dry as anything and I assumed I'd finally killed it, not a micron of green anywhere. So I found this cyclamen to replace it. It went into the basket and the dianthus went on the floor until I could deal with it. But it was below the strawberry plant which I gave a bit more feed to because it was looking sad, and I guess it needed some feed? Because it's now looking happy again!

Talking of the strawberry plant, one of the things I bought ages ago was another grey basket because the red thing the strawb was in was annoying and I hated it. (Ignore the tom plant) So I've potted out the strawb, with a bit more drainage and some more soil. There's also room for a few more plants at either end, I think, if the middle two still don't amount to much. I had 3 whole strawberries off it, and they weren't very nice, so it might be getting some better fruiting friends...

Something else I picked up from the garden center was another grey basket and some spring bulbs - snowdrops (one of my faves) and mixed crocuses. Those have been planted now, and to make sure they're not too crowded, I've only used half the bulbs. The rest'll go to my Mum for her garden. Not very exciting at the moment, but I'm really looking forward to seeing those pop up between Feb and March.

I was successful in not buying any more succulents! However, we were talking about the bromeliads they had, and my Aunt goes "Oh, I've got one at home. It's giving off pups so when I sort it out, I'll pot one up for you." So I might be getting a bromeliad too (gods' only know were I'll put it 😅️). (We went back to their for dinner and she showed it to me, and she and my uncle then proceed to give me a bunch of beetroot and 'cooking' tomatoes. Love is sharing produce ig 😊️)

[saveahorse-ride-a-cowboy]

When the boys finally reach camp, Jimmy’s shocked to find that they’re greeted with a shotgun.

“Woah, easy,” Jimmy raises his hands in surrender. “Hey now Mister- don’t shoot okay? We come on behalf of Miss Lili Harris.”

John lowers the shotgun and stares at him. “Lili Harris. She got my friend’s letter?”

“Yes sir,” Jimmy nods quickly. “And- and she sent us up here with supplies. For Mr. Kilgore and for all of ya. Coats, food, some wines, uh… a special gift chest for Mr. Kilgore. May- May we enter camp and deliver everything please, sir?”

“Cmon then,” John helps them navigate into camp and he, Dutch, and several others help to unload the items.

Murmurs quickly spread through the camp as all the items are discovered. Gun oil, fruits, expensive alcohol and juices… everything.

Arthur sits up at all the commotion. “John?” He calls. “Dutch? What’s goin’ on?”

John and Javier round the corner carrying the trunk of goodies for Arthur. “You never told us that your rich girlfriend was a Harris.” John snaps.

“What is all this?” Arthur asks.

“Gifts for you,” Javier explains. “From the girl herself. She sent all of us stuff. Warm stuff- and food- cheese! There’s a letter for you and everything but the men said this one is yours. All this is for you.”

“Thanks, boys.” Arthur nods and winces a little as he sits up more, carefully hanging his leg over the bed so he can sit forward and search through the chest.

His breath hitches at everything inside. Watercolors?! Traveling art kit?! A thick, warm coat?! How did you have enough-

Of course you did. You’re rich.

And you still thought of him. “My rich girl,” he breathes a laugh, carefully pulling out the letter resting in the chest.

My dear Mr. Morgan,

I am overly pleased to hear your name is not Tacitus Kilgore. Whole Publius Tacitus was a wonderful Roman historian, it is… quite a name. Thoight I cannot say mine is much better, as it is also Latin.

I am so sorry to hear about your injuries, once I contracted a disease so serious I was bedridden for months, I can confirm how stir crazy one goes. I hope you find some comfort and enjoyment in the art supplies I have sent, you have a true talent and I hope to help foster it. One day, I wish to see a piece of yours hanging in a museum. Maybe… gunslinger themed? Rich folks like myself would pay handsomely for a taste of freedom like that, I assure you. That’s just an idea, though.

I was happy to hear about your adventures! John sounds lovely. I’m curious, do you outlaws have wives and children running with you? From what you’ve described it sounds like you’ve got quite the family with you. I’d love to hear about them if you feel so inclined. I’ve included stationary and stamps as I imagine they are not an easy thing to come by up in the mountains as you are.

The drawings you have sent are so beautiful, it’s almost like I am there. I love my home but it’s always a treat to see new things. I’ve sent you strawberries and fruits from my fields, I hope they’ve arrived alright. Jimmy and Paul are two of my best riders so I have full faith in them. Please do not let them get shot!

As for you… I think your writing was quite eloquent and I hope your leg has healed some. I’ve included medicine and clean bandages to hopefully aid that process. Should you not heal properly… don’t worry too much about trying to survive. You are more than welcome here, Arthur. Any time.

As for me, I’m afraid my tales aren’t nearly as thrilling as yours. I’ve started a new charity, helping single widows take care of their children, and I’ve planted some blueberries in my south most field as I love a good blueberry tart. The apples have ripened as well and I’ve eaten so much apple pie I believe my cook shall quit if I even dare ask for another. (I’ve included a few jars of the filling as a treat for you and your men. It is not a pie but it is as good to eat with a spoon!)

Should you and your men find yourself back my way, feel free to come inside for some warm beds and good food. I always love company and stories, and I am sure your men have the best stories to tell.

If you need anything else in your travels, do not hesitate to write. Giving gifts is my favorite past time.

Do take care of yourself, Arthur, as I wouldn’t want anything further to happen to you. I have not, as you put it, found my someone special yet. The position is yet to be filled.

With kind regards,

Lilium Kay

P.S. the golden pocket watch is for Mr. van der Linde, Heather informed me he is a man of taste. The Irish setter puppy is for John, as I imagine a hunting dog is better company than the Mr. Javier.

[wuahae]

currently eating an orange and just woke up from a toe-curling nap ready to review the Best Fic Ever... im strapped in and ready to go!!!!

When a strawberry is ripe, the seeds push out from the heart of the fruit, as if it's bursting from the inside out.

first off what a fucking Start to this fic... if there's one thing you know its how to have a banger opening like its SOOOO... it sets the mood so well but also i just think its so </3 that you chose a Fruit Heavy metaphor fic when you know what fruit metaphors mean to me... (and Also maybe you did this unintentionally or maybe this was the whole Point of you doing it in the first place but . i remember one of our earliest convos in our lilycat lore was talking about fruit metaphors!!! oranges and pomegranates and the like.... either way .) man. the way the ripeness of the fruit softens it to the touch . that's why its so beautiful, maybe that's why it's so scary . huuuuu.

but in general all the descriptions of strawberries in this fic go crazy btw like. "bright red murder between his fingers" / "scarlet belly of a newly picked strawberry" / "his woven basket bleedds over with little berries" like i am SEEING your motif . your themes . its so visceral and violent but that is what love is to YOOUUUU that is what it feels like to ripen yourself and splay your belly open to someone . letting them dig into your most vulnerable self . Ok.

You start to wonder if he bought the watermelon just to show you a party trick—not that you mind, though. The strain of his biceps peeks through his rolled up white tee, and you remember why he was able to stop you with just one look back when you first met.

MEOWWWWW

"Maybe. Haven't decided yet," he says. "I think I want to be here, though. Maybe do something with food, but I want to be home." "That's funny, because I think I’ve always wanted to live a different life. Or at least one somewhere else."

SMALL TOWN BOY WHO'S GONE OUTSIDE BUT JUST WANTS TO BE HOME . GIRL WITH BIG DREAMS BUT NOWHERE TO PUT THEM . the comparison makes me sick actually. the way he goes "you know what you want. i admire that." implying that despite seeing more than you in his life he still hasn't really pushed his fleeting desires to anything more . how you take your yearning not as a blessing but a curse .

But you can't blame any of them—wanting has always been a hereditary failing [...] But you don't know how to tell her that the only thing you can do sometimes is want, because otherwise you wouldn't really have much at all.

WET PAPER DOLL SIMULATOR.

It's then, under the veil of summer, where you meet Mingyu's gaze and, finally, things seem close to simple. All you know are his eyes, heavy with sun, and then the slow, slow move of his lips against yours. He tastes like August, long and sweet, and for once you know what it's like to not only want, but to have, and to have again. The ocean sings on the horizon, and the watermelon bellies weep.

i ripped off my shirt and started howling at the moon.... FRUIT VIOLENCE IS SO IMPORTANT TO ME.

Mingyu eats taiyaki headfirst because he says it hurts less.

HE IS JUST LIKE MEEEEE.....

"Taiyaki isn't alive. And why would you want to pretend it is? Eating gummy bears would become an extinction event." / "Why does the Haribo bear have a face? Why do the gummy bears live in a gummy forest?"

he is sooooo lame i just need to eat him up Right now.... they're so silly to me.... a crime of gummy passion.

He's sweet, too sweet, and his kisses stick to the back of your throat.

But you can't be fooled. There's an unsaid violence to the way Mingyu loves. (The meticulous spiral of the peel he carves when you ask for him to cut you an apple. The grind, decisive and cruel, of a knife against a cutting board. A pair of canines against your neck, your jaw.)

i gasped and started dryheaving btw... eyes glazed over at the mention of his canines but what's Important is how you describe his love... like Yes its set in this silly silly scene talking about gummy bear families and taiyaki livelihoods BUT thats the whole point... the way you interpret mingyu's love as something carved out (like the bloody strawberries like the cracked and split watermelons) and cloyingly sweet but to HIM he is just an endless pool ready to give..... wah. also i like how in the Last scene you enter into this relationship because of how it comes to you at that time (it's august, and its long and sweet, and he gives you a taste of what it's like to not just want, but also have...) but the more you have it the stickier it gets . the more unsure it becomes . what good is the now if it doesn't last until the future . gah. also the fact that the future is this shaky scary uncertainty to you but to mingyu he doesn't really care... lets everything slide off him like a fine mist. im shaking my fists.

"Kinda?" The word gathers speed in the pachinko machine of your mind. You never liked being a kinda person. For Mingyu, it seems like a luxury of a word, but for you, it's really just another thing to hide behind. Kinda talented, kinda ambitious, kinda just there. You're always one foot in, one foot out of something better.

idk if you were meaning to make this connection maybe im just yapping but this also kinda connects to like. his obsession with splitsies. liiiikeee in the same way that you see it as this sort of childhood relic that no one Actually uses anymore because it never means anything the same can be applied to his idea of Kinda...like. Kinda there, kinda not, half committment, half wishful thinking ... it never means much of anything to you either . But i am just yapping...

You would be lying if you said you didn't—it's what you always wanted. Seogwipo has been a sun-rot, too-small crutch for you, but you would also be lying if you said you weren't terrified that you'd eventually come back, limping like some doomed Icarus, unable to truly make it in the real world.

UWWWAAGGGHHH.......... i have nothing to say that doesnt pertain to my own personal failings....... kinda there kinda not .

Mingyu's complete and unfounded belief in you makes you feel something close to betrayal. / Either that, or he already cares for you too much, too painfully.

open mouth smiling emoji ..... what if i killed myself.............. he hurts me so bad. ACTUALLY this whole section has me in shambles bc what the actual fuck,,,, each paragraph shot me in the chest... THE FEAR OF DISAPPOINTMENT?! EXPECTATION HAS ALWAYS STOOD TALLER THAN SHAME......oh my god....... the way she hides and tucks everything away from mingyu bc Again. she doesnt want to disappoint him... gah. THERE'S A SCARED LITTLE GIRL INSIDE YOU,,, A SPADE IS A SPADE YOU CAN ONLY PRETEND SO LONG?!?!

iv. winter pears (rotten, outside your parents' house)

designated christmas scene. kills myself. its just soooo tender and you can feel the love from mingyu's household... how it shaped him to be the person he is today . uwa. the way december holds so much warmth that differs from august that you try to forget about the stickiness and your worries and all the violence... its supposed to be Easy... like the poached pears like butter . wah. LOVE POURED FROM A FULL CUP NEVER SEEMS TO RUN OUT!!!! but also now its toooooo real.....

"Please let me carry some of those," Mingyu wheedles. "Oh my god. I'm like the worst boyfriend in the world."

I WONT YOU

So here you are, standing in your nicest dress and balancing a stack of gifts you hope will amount to something, never enough but something, to repay the people who you feel have loved you more than you deserve. [...] They're just those kinds of people—they would be just as happy if you didn't bring anything at all, and somehow that makes you feel even more guilty.

floats away into dust..... the way you still don't think you deserve it . the way its toooooo easy.... you can't let it be easy. it makes you guilty. it makes you feel like you need some sort of payment to be this happy and this in love and to recieve this much love. WAH. if its too easy to receive then it'll be too easy to leave.... also career talk over dinner makes me nauseous /gen ... please the pears don't deserve this . I'm going to be sick . ooouwwaahhgghjfds and the assurance and trust his parents (and him, of course) have in you that you'll succeed but YOU are still stuck in sun-rot and the feeling of icarus's melted wax burning on your back. OK. the trust that rots to disappointment that molds to shame. OK........

There are words at the seam of your lips. You want to tell him you're sorry for worrying so much. For making the whole dinner about you and then very possibly having nothing to show for it when it matters. For the heaviness in your chest. Your cowardice. But none of it comes out.

and once again you can't get it out........ she's just like me . sorry its me IM the problem!!!!!

But that's the problem, you want to say. You all do, and I have no idea why. Some of the pears are beginning to rot now. You watch one drop off the vine, and it caves to the pavement like it was made of nothing at all.

HUUUUUUUUUUUU......... PAPER DOLL SIMULATOR

That isn't to say that it's Mingyu's fault. In fact, it's never really Mingyu's fault, and that's the worst thing about your relationship. Sometimes you wish he was worse just so there was someone else to blame.

he cares tooooooooo much........please stop caring. he just wants to help but he CANT...... im the problem........

Mingyu smiles at you, hazy through the glass. Your cheeks hurt and your mouth is paper mache, but you smile back anyway.

PLEAAASEEEE JUST TALLKKKKKKK (<- pot meet kettle)

No, but— It was always like that with you. No, but it's not as bad as you think. No, but give me a chance. No, but I’m trying. I've been trying.

this makes me sick actually MSDFJLSKDF LIKE ACTUALLY NAUSEOUS......... i had to lean against the wall and dry heave....... you're trying so hard . you're trying to be strong you're trying not to be a disappointment but somewhere in that process you've started to hurt the people you love anyway . wah. also MINGYU who wants to play fix-it felix always bc he believes that if he loves hard enough then it'll all be okay. like love is all you need to heal and be happy. MINGYU YOU FOOL........ but also its like. like you said in the fight scene he wants to believe that his worth is in his love. if his love can't fix you if you won't Tell him anything that what good is he.... mingyu please.

the way they keep missing each other and miscommunicating hurts sooooo bad bc yn wants to keep the worst parts of herself hidden cause she already doesn't know Why mingyu and co love her so damn bad when all she can see is almosts and kindas and things that Never amount to much in the end . what good is want if it never evolves into deserve,,, what good is trying if a We regret to inform you still lies at the end of that road. and mingyu doesn't see it like that because of Course he doesn't and as harsh as yn says it its like. Yeah it isn't about him... this isn't something him and his strawberry jam and honey tea can fix .....

"Mingyu, I think we should...." You looked at the zigzags of jam on your toast, angry and uneven. "I think we should stop seeing each other. For now," you had added, as if that made anything better at all.

FOOD IMAGERY AS SYMBOLISM!!!!! and also interesting that she says For Now,,, an uncertainty . a Kinda, and therefore, something that doesn't mean much of anything in the end ........... i have to lie down .

You think you knew, someplace, inevitably, this would happen. You, who only knew hunger, had reached deep inside Mingyu and rooted out a love you didn't think you were worthy of having. And yet you still ate from the vine, bite after guilty bite, until you couldn't take any more. The only time he asked you for anything at all, you couldn't give it to him—such was the irony of your relationship. Maybe you were doomed the moment the first strawberry hit your tongue, just like you had said, all that time ago.

i don't have much to add this just fucks immensely . hug emoji

You held the package to your chest and cried, loud and with abandon, as if taking a deep breath after almost drowning. Ironically, the first person you wanted to tell was Mingyu. But the good news you needed to save your relationship came too little, too late. Perhaps that meant it had no legs to stand on in the first place, but that didn't stop you from missing it.

HOWLING TO THE FULL MOON. also

(Fickle, fickle heart. You always needed things to be taken away to really be able to appreciate them. Somehow, all that wanting had boiled down to something more satisfying, more filling.)

yeah.... Yeah. bc her entire problem in the beginning was that she wanted too much with no place to put her dreams . but now that she Got what she wanted (law school) without the home that fostered all of it..... huuuuu.....

"Don’t apologize," he says, easily, as he always does. Everything seems to flow off him like water, and you think that's the part of him you loved the most because it was the one thing you couldn't touch. "We loved each other. I think that much was true."

the way they're finally COMMUNICATINGGGGGG.........UUWAAAGGHHHHH............ also its like. he is everything good he is everything you love.... despite what you think about how your selfishness hurts the ones you love they never think the same. man.

The sea, the clay dirt, Mingyu. Even yourself, clumsy and care-worn. You think, somewhere along the line, you forgot how to love. But you're learning—one step at a time.

Starts to bawl.......

Maybe one day, you'll think of closing it once more, but you like where you stand now. You can admire him better from a distance, without your fingerprints all over him. He stuffs his hands in his pockets, something he does before he gets ready to leave. But before he does—"I'll see you soon, okay? You better come back. Promise me."

THIS IS SOOOOOO....................... like i said before about how he's everything good he is everything you love. you've learned Better now,,, you don't want to hurt him again,,, he is a ripe fruit always ready to be taken but you see that as digging your nails into him again,,,, seeds bursting from the inside out.... BUT to him its like. he doesn't care...... he still loves you.............. he still wants you to come back................ and for the first time you throw away your self-loathing and your traitorous thoughts and you BELIEVE HIM! you finally Accept his love without being afraid of any strings attached. ohhh my god.

You watch the wind dance through the peach blossoms, their branches never searching, never wanting, and you finally feel as if you've arrived home.

STARTS TO BAWL.............. ugh where do i even start its like. CHARACTER GROWTH! CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT! for both yn And mingyu but its like. yn finally being content with where she is and where she's headed . the sun-rot is just warmth, the fruit that bears in seogwipo sweet and not sickly . you're not afraid anymore..... starts to cry .

this was just such Good Fic i can never thank you enough for writing this for me ,,, like it was SO worth the wait i think i will think about this fic for as long as i love /srs,,,, your prose is insane as always but what matters More to me is the thought and care put into it :( i know you talked endlessly about not wanting to give me a sad ending because it was a Birthday Fic gifted for me and as much as i am a Fiend for angst and sad endings i loved the path you chose for this ending so much . like it felt so fitting and really encapsulated the coming-of-age Growth theme that i . quite honestly really needed SFDDLSFK i just yap in these reviews to be honest but i Hope you can tell how much i truly loved it and how much it means to me that you did this </3 thank YOU for being so kind, funny, and thoughtful and overall just such an amazing writer but an even more Outstanding Friend . this fic has 1000 reblogs to ME!!!

TO GROW LOVE (AND EAT IT TO THE CORE)

pairing: mingyu x gn!reader wc: 8.1k summary: your whole life, you've only wanted one thing. then you meet mingyu. suddenly you want too much, and you wish the summer never ended. notes: farmer!au, established relationship, angst/hurt/a little comfort

this is a birthday fic for my one and only cat @wuahae ! yes this is about half a year late but what can i say. all good things come with time. thank you for being so kind, funny, and thoughtful (and patient)! not a day goes by where i’m not thankful for our friendship :)

and a million thanks to hana @wqnwoos and jackie @97-liners for helping me with edits. literally you guys are insane writers and i will never stop looking up to you.

i. strawberries (the summer we were young)

When a strawberry is ripe, the seeds push out from the heart of the fruit, as if it's bursting from the inside out.

This is one of the few and only things you've learned by living in Seogwipo, where strawberry season comes like a supernova. The May sun, full and heavy, peels into summer, and the roadside farms open their doors, trying to catch stray vacationers from Jeju City on the other side of the island.

That being said, there are approximately two things to do here. One of them is farm. The other is pretend like you have a life, which is your childhood friend Yizhuo's favorite thing to do when she's back from university on summer break.

Today, this involved convincing her ritzy, too-good Seoul friends that they're missing out on this side of Jeju. (Missing out on what? You're not sure. Perhaps the chipped paint of the mural walls, or the endless flat-topped stretches of seagrass. Yizhuo isn't fooling anyone, but you've always liked stretching your legs out in the bed of her pick-up, even on the long drive to nowhere.)

Unsurprisingly, her friends quickly came to the same conclusion. Just one look at your local strawberry patch, with none of the glamour of the bloated tourist traps in the city, and they decided they'd rather spend the afternoon at the beach.

It was then, between the fragaria blooms, when you met Mingyu. He asked for your name, and the rest was history. Yizhuo and co. scattered like the grasping hands of an overripe dandelion and you learned that he was, one, the newly-graduated son of a pair of local farmers, and two, very, very attractive. Almost too much so, especially for a place like this.

Now he holds up a berry, a bright red murder between his fingers, and tells you to try it.

"You must be delusional if you think i'm taking food from a stranger," you laugh, perched on the fence bordering the field. It sprawls before you, melon stripes on the sunbaked ground.

"No, my name is Mingyu," he replies. "No idea who delusional is." His smile, all bright lip and snaggletooth, tears into the scarlet belly of a newly picked strawberry.

"We all know what happened to Persephone."

"Well, if the underworld was a strawberry patch, I wouldn't mind being stuck there for all of eternity."

"What're you picking all these for, anyway?" you ask, watching Mingyu struggle with his too-big straw hat between the vines. His woven basket bleeds over with little berries.

"Jam. I make it on the very first day of every summer."

"Why?"

"You ask a lot of questions for someone who trespassed on my farm. You're cute, but I won't let you off easy."

He laughs at how you balk, clearly red-handed. You're not sure how to tell him you don't think you were supposed to be here either. You don't do things like sit in the back of trucks, trespass, or talk to pretty farmer boys who take a fancy to you, but it's the summer before you graduate and you're not even sure how long you'll have to continue making bad decisions.

"Are you gonna take my first-born now?" you joke instead. The daylight runs down the rim of Mingyu's hat, trickles down his brow, and you wish you could pour the image of him into a jar and keep it forever.

"No, but I will invite you in for some fresh jam on toast. I baked a loaf this morning." and when you say nothing, he continues. "The strawberries are only good once a year. It's the best you'll ever have. Promise."

It's a whine and a half, and somehow you convince yourself this will be the last bad decision you'll make. You've been here long enough to know that good things don't come twice in Seogwipo, and he is unlikely to be an exception.

Yizhuo blows up your phone, you tie the gingham apron around Mingyu's tiny waist, and the basket turns to blood in the saucepan.

Mingyu is right. Love comes to you in that kitchen, high and red like the sun, and the jam never tastes as good as it does that summer.

ii. watermelon (hollowed out, like a magic trick)

"A good watermelon sounds like a heartbeat."

You watch Mingyu heave the fruit, small and striped, out of his grocery bag. It joins the array of egg sandwiches and banana milks you picked up from the store together earlier. (There should have been chocolate Pepero too, but you split the box on the walk).

You're on a picnic, sprawled out on the outcropping overlooking the water. The path up is basically right behind your house, but you had never cared to visit. It had always been the local makeout spot, a schlocky teen crawl for those with nothing better to do, and yet, with Mingyu stretched out beside you, it seems newer. More exciting.

You're still just friends, or at least that's what you told Yizhuo. But ever since you sat on Mingyu's kitchen counter and ate from his jam-covered spatula, you don't think you've gone a week without seeing him. It's been almost two months, which seems so long and yet not long enough—he makes it easy to be greedy.

"See?" He thumps the watermelon with the heel of his palm. "Try it."

You already went through this entire charade at the grocery store, right in front of all the local aunties, but you indulge him. There's little point to triple checking if it's still ripe, but you think he just likes hitting it.

"It sounds good," you say. "But how are we even gonna eat it? We don't have a knife."

"Watch this." Mingyu procures a coin from his pocket. "You didn't learn this in elementary school? I feel like everyone was doing it."

"Here?" you ask, incredulous.

"Yeah, here. I grew up here too, you know."

He holds the edge of the coin to the skin and slams his palm into it once more, so that it lodges itself into the rind, and begins dragging it around the fruit. You start to wonder if he bought the watermelon just to show you a party trick—not that you mind, though. The strain of his biceps peeks through his rolled up white tee, and you remember why he was able to stop you with just one look back when you first met.

"No way." The watermelon is so ripe, it bleeds around the incision. "I feel like I know everyone here. And I definitely would have remembered you."

"I was probably, like, two grades above you," he replies. "And my parents shipped me off to live with my cousins after elementary school. They said I should get out of Seogwipo and experience the real world."

"Good call. There's nothing here." You watch Mingyu spin the melon over to cut through the other side. The coin catches the sunlight, and it looks like gold. "I wish I left for university. The one here is so small."

"Really?" He pauses to show you his handiwork. The two melon halves roll over on their backs, their cut edge cruel and jagged. "Cool, huh?"

"Impressive," you say. "Honestly. I really didn't think that would work."

"I didn't either when I first saw someone do it. But I’ll try anything once," he replies, ripping open the packaging of the plastic spoon from the bag. "I can't believe you don't like it here."

"You do?"

"Yeah. A lot." He shoves the spoon in his mouth, and you watch the watermelon juice pool around his lips. "I missed home. The trees and the tall grass and the ocean. All the fruits. Everything. I learned to ride a bike, right down there by the water."

"Hm." He passes you the spoon. You don't want to hog it, so you carve out a piece bigger than you need. "Are you gonna work at the farm?"

"Maybe. Haven't decided yet," he says. "I think I want to be here, though. Maybe do something with food, but I want to be home."

"That's funny, because I think I’ve always wanted to live a different life. Or at least one somewhere else."

"You want to go to law school, right?"

"Yeah." Mingyu is right. The watermelon is all sugar, and you would almost feel guilty for eating it if it wasn't technically good for you. "I’ve always wanted to be a lawyer. It's something about the people watching, I think."

"That’s really cool," Mingyu says, mouth full but no less sincere. It's then that you notice your shoulders are almost touching, and your heart crawls back up to your mouth. "You know what you want. I admire that."

He makes it sound like a compliment, but you're sure it's a curse.

You think of your parents. There's a permanent wrinkle ironed into their foreheads, the paper crease of expectations and high standards. It's not that they didn't care, but their kind of care was a humbled sort, made heavy by a hard life. It didn't help that your big sister Seohyun went straight from Yonsei to work a big tech job in San Francisco and never once looked back.

But you can't blame any of them—wanting has always been a hereditary failing. Sometimes Yizhuo will catch you frowning at nothing, and then you remember that life isn't a performance and every day ends at the same time no matter how hard you work. But you don't know how to tell her that the only thing you can do sometimes is want, because otherwise you wouldn't really have much at all.

It seems like the exact opposite of how Mingyu lives—everything about him seems to pass like the seasons. Maybe that's why you can't seem to get enough of each other.

"Thank you. Really." You dig the spoon into your half of the melon. There isn't much left. "You're way too nice to me."

"It’s not hard to be," he laughs. "Maybe you're just too hard on yourself."

You're losing track of the distance between the two of you. You can almost feel the heat playing off his skin.

"Maybe."

It's then, under the veil of summer, where you meet Mingyu's gaze and, finally, things seem close to simple.

All you know are his eyes, heavy with sun, and then the slow, slow move of his lips against yours. He tastes like August, long and sweet, and for once you know what it's like to not only want, but to have, and to have again.

The ocean sings on the horizon, and the watermelon bellies weep.

iii. adzuki beans (or, the blood of a headless taiyaki)

Mingyu eats taiyaki headfirst because he says it hurts less.

"That makes no sense," you tell him, your pinkies linked. You never really liked holding hands, but yours fits so perfectly in Mingyu's and there's some girlish, childlike shine to it when you watch his finger search for yours after just a moment separated.

"What do you mean."

He breaks your gaze to eye a red bean taiyaki, like an unwilling predator sizing up their prey. It's the lamest, most embarrassing iteration of National Geographic you've ever seen, and yet you cannot find any fiber within yourself not deeply in love with the lion.

Fall is a forgiving place for your relationship to settle. You're now a senior at university and he's started his gap year. Gap implies he's in the middle of something, but in true Mingyu fashion, he leaves it up to fate, or chance, or something not nearly as kind (whim).

"Taiyaki isn't alive. And why would you want to pretend it is? Eating gummy bears would become an extinction event."

"It kind of is." He holds out the tail end of the taiyaki, the pastry almost explicitly flayed open, in front of you to eat. "Why does the Haribo bear have a face? Why do the gummy bears live in a gummy forest?"

"Great, so now I can’t even enjoy gummy bears without feeling like a serial killer?"

You dig your pointer into his shoulders, broad from all the time he spends on the farm. To think that his hands, big and weathered, were made to pick berries (and now wrap around your pinky finger) is bruising, if not ridiculously funny.

"It's a crime of passion. Gummy passion. Prosecute that."

He kisses your cheek and your heart almost squeezes into two.

The terrible thing about being with Mingyu is how seemingly endless his affection is. Now he's feeding you in public and buying the two of you matching socks (cat and dog, to be exact), although you'll admit it's a little charming, even if the neighbors do gossip.

He's sweet, too sweet, and his kisses stick to the back of your throat.

But you can't be fooled. There's an unsaid violence to the way Mingyu loves. (The meticulous spiral of the peel he carves when you ask for him to cut you an apple. The grind, decisive and cruel, of a knife against a cutting board. A pair of canines against your neck, your jaw.)

Even now, he bites the head off another unwitting taiyaki before stuffing it back in the bag.

"We're still splitsing, right?" he says, with perhaps 1% of his mouth available for speaking and the other 99% murder machine.

Splits, he always says before you share food. You never had the heart to tell him that it's in the same family as mines or sharesies or takebacks—silly childhood relics, ones that no one uses anymore because they don't mean anything.

This time, you don't hear him because you're thinking about the law school fair you went to before Mingyu picked you up. The future is so close, it scares you. A year from now, what ground would you be standing on? Would it smell like this—the peat, the thread-spool fields, the balm of the ocean? Would you still have Mingyu's finger wrapped round yours?

"Have you decided if you're staying at the farm?" you ask.

"Not really." He uses the back of his hand to wipe off his chin. "If my sister decides to take over, I’m actually kinda thinking of going to pastry school instead of getting a masters."

Mingyu had been toying with the idea for some time after you had talked about it on the outlook. It started off as a joke (September; a galette), then a what if (October; green tea mochi), and now it sits at a kinda.

"Kinda?"

The word gathers speed in the pachinko machine of your mind. You never liked being a kinda person. For Mingyu, it seems like a luxury of a word, but for you, it's really just another thing to hide behind. Kinda talented, kinda ambitious, kinda just there. You're always one foot in, one foot out of something better.

"Yeah, kinda. Why?"

"I dunno. What if we both end up leaving?"

"Maybe. You still want to, right?"

You would be lying if you said you didn't—it's what you always wanted. Seogwipo has been a sun-rot, too-small crutch for you, but you would also be lying if you said you weren't terrified that you'd eventually come back, limping like some doomed Icarus, unable to truly make it in the real world.

Then you think of the pockmarked farmland beside your home, lacy with the fall harvest. Even now, you can trace the endless blue of the coastline all the way there, cut through all the maybes and just let the sound of the ocean fold you into sleep like you were a child again. You wonder if Seohyun, all the way on the other side of the world, ever misses it.

"I’m not sure," you say, because, as much as you don't like it, it's the only answer you have.

"It's ok. You'll figure it out. You always do." He squeezes your cheeks together between his thumb and index, laughing at how they pillow out underneath his fingers. "Screw pastry school. I could come with you. Who else would keep you fed?"

Mingyu's complete and unfounded belief in you makes you feel something close to betrayal. How could he say any of that? With what proof? Only someone like Mingyu would be able to hold the wrinkled fruit of your unremarkable life between his palms and see something better than that. Maybe it's because he grew up on a farm. Either that, or he already cares for you too much, too painfully.

Secrets are easy to keep when they look like yours. At least here, in the pit of your stomach, you can keep count, take attendance of them, all your tittering, small anxieties. Some days it feels like your ribs are pressing out, but it's better than cutting everything loose to spill out over what little you do have control over.

You can handle a little pressure. You have to.

What concerns you is the hand Mingyu's got across your chest. With one look, he just might gut you. A twist of the heart-knife, and all those carefully wound insides carved out in an instant—maybe he'd pity you, but worse than that, he'd likely be disappointed.

For you, expectation has always stood taller than shame, and the idea that he sees something past you makes you want to run away.

"I could be a house husband," he says as easily as ever. "You'll be off saving the world, arguing with whoever, and I'll be there to run you a bath afterwards."

"Let's not get too ahead of ourselves," you reply, binding up the strange, hollow feeling in your stomach with a laugh.

There's a scared little girl hiding inside you, and whether Mingyu sees her or not hurts the same. A spade is a spade. You can only pretend so long.

You look at the taiyaki floating in their wax paper bag, blinded and wrought open by the same grin that now peels you down, and you're not hungry anymore.

iv. winter pears (rotten, outside your parents' house)

Mingyu's family loves Christmas.

You think it's because of the pear trees they have in the front yard. They stand bravely before the house, all emerald ash and wisdom in the December freeze. Run your palms over the knobs and it's like you can see into a sleepy visage of simpler days past. (Below its heart, carved: 1982, the year the farm was bought. Along the tangle of the roots: gyu waz here, in an unsure, childish scrawl.)  

Winter comes to the countryside crawling on its hands and knees. On days it doesn't snow, there's a mist, boggy and clingy. You've come to realize the cold is more of a threat than a promise, and so the pear trees still bear fruit; the silvery branches hang heavy, faithful.

The first day of December, Mingyu's parents had tasked the two of you with decorating the farmhouse, a duty you took very seriously. You wrapped Mingyu up in string lights and watched him blink in and out like your own personal firefly.

It wasn't until you watched the rafters, the barn doors, the joyous vault of the ceiling all glow, like a spectacular firework, that you finally started to understand why Mingyu was so into the holidays.

It was in the yellow blush of the string lights that you had your first pear from the tree, which Mingyu insisted was a holiday tradition. We make poached pears, he said, mid-bite. You simmer the pear in syrup until it gets so soft, you can cut into it with a fork. Just like butter.

That same night, he kissed you, mouth hot and trembling and tasting of honey, and pressed you against the bark so hard, you could feel the grit of its veins against your skin.

You think December became your favorite month, and pears your favorite fruit.

So much so, that for the entire month, you try to put away your worries about law school applications to celebrate with Mingyu and his family.

You learn his mom makes the best hot chocolate (a cinnamon stick and a dogged devotion to the whisk), and that Mingyu has no clue on God's green earth how to ice skate. (He careens right into your chest the first time. You spend the next hour with him attached to you like a backpack—he manages to find the most impractical ways to do anything, which you somehow admire the most). On Sundays, Yizhuo ditches her Seoul friends and instead accompanies you to the mall two towns over, where she watches you compare different ties and watches and collagen creams as you decide on gifts for his family. (Lilac is so last year, she'd say, stirring the straw of a watered-down milk tea.)

It's not until the weekend before Christmas when you realize just how serious things have gotten. Your feet understand the meander of the dirt path to the farmhouse, your bones the scent of the yellow-skinned apple, the faded wildflowers. Your palms crave the plush of the rug they have in front of the fireplace. Hell, you can't even eat soondubu without thinking of the kind Mingyu's dad makes, with extra anchovies and green onion.

You don't think about what this means. There are ten days left in December and love poured from a full cup never seems to run out.

"Please let me carry some of those," Mingyu wheedles. "Oh my god. I'm like the worst boyfriend in the world."

"No, you are not." you make your way up to his doorstep, taking care to one-two step over the stray roots of one of the pear trees. It's second nature to you by now. "The moment I hand you a box, you are gonna start trying to figure out what it is."

He harumphs and plucks the big one off the top anyway, the one he knows you can't reach. "I didn't even know you were getting us gifts. You didn't have to."

"It's the least I could do. Who shows up to a holiday dinner emptyhanded?" You stop at the front door. "And stop shaking it," you laugh, using the tip of your boot to nudge his shin.

"Okay. Okay," he says, saccharine, adoring, before grabbing the doorknob. "Ready? Are you nervous? You shouldn't be nervous, right? It's not fancy or anything, if you were worried about that."

And that's the thing that wedges itself between your ribs. Mingyu and his whole family are like this. They love and worry and love again; it presses deep into you, fills you, and overflows.

So here you are, standing in your nicest dress and balancing a stack of gifts you hope will amount to something, never enough but something, to repay the people who you feel have loved you more than you deserve. It's all you really have. You do your best, and yet you know when that door opens, it'll all be washed away in a high-tide flurry of hugs and laughter and the familiar press of Bobpul's wet nose against your leg. They're just those kinds of people—they would be just as happy if you didn't bring anything at all, and somehow that makes you feel even more guilty.

"No, no," you wave him off. "I’m fine. Excited."

When Mingyu opens the door, everything goes just as you expected. His sister takes your coat, your gifts are whisked away to the tree (Aji has already figured out which one is his), and his parents descend upon you in a choking swell of warmth and charity.

We baked some fresh bread for your parents (—Thank you so much, but you really shouldn't have.). You look so beautiful in that color (—No, no, you flatter me too much.). Mingyu better be taking good care of you (—He is. He really, really is.).

The kitchen is gauzy with cinnamon, anise. They must be making their famous poached pears, which Mingyu remarks on, just like clockwork.

Dinner passes the same way. It bubbles over with affection, and you feel swallowed by an impossible yearning. This—a full table and a hand to hold underneath it—did you deserve this? And could you keep it?

For an instant, you picture yourself, years later, at this same seat. Mingyu would be fussing over the rice cakes, his apron still gingham because it reminds him of the day you two met. His parents, grayer but no less happy, bickering over the shade of tinsel on the tree. And the dogs, coiled at your feet like they are now. The vision laps at your bones like you're a raft in a storm.

You're pulled back into the moment when Mingyu squeezes your hand, grounding and insistent. "Mom asked how school was going. I told her I think you're basically the smartest person I know, and I’m pretty sure you're getting into whatever law school you want."

Mingyu's parents laugh, and they cut through their pears.

"Oh, sorry," you say. "Um."

Clink. Knife meets flesh, meets porcelain. Your cheeks are hot. You wanted to talk about anything other than yourself tonight. Clink.

"The top programs are a reach, but it'd be nice." clink. "I just want to get in somewhere."

"They’re all so far away," Mingyu's mom remarks. "So grown up. Any school will be lucky to have you. You'll get into all of them."

Clink.

"Or maybe you can stay here." You watch the prongs of Mingyu's father's fork disappear into the pear. "Keep us old folk company."

"No, no, I think Mingyu should take notes and get off his lazy ass," his sister says, teasing. "Going back to the city will be good for him."

"So you can, what, burn down the kitchen again?" Mingyu grumbles, and the whole table seems to boil over with laughter.

"We’re kidding," his mom tells you. "No matter where you go, I’m sure you'll do great. We can even throw you a party at the end of the year. For graduating."

Clink. Clink.

There's a horrible uneasiness writhing around in your stomach. It's pear and syrup and clove and a blackness, an anxious, selfish one that sucks up all the generosity of the evening and turns it into shame.

Mingyu's mom is talking about throwing you a graduation party, something you didn't even think to do for yourself, and here you are, thinking about the shaking moment you open your rejection letters and the lonely path you'll draw on your way back home.

It's ok. They missed out, Mingyu would say, pouring you a consolation drink, and then it would be over. You'd go home and sit on your bed and the trifold piece of paper would go round and round your head like it was in a washing machine.

Your heart, an inventory of tasks and goals and tally marks. Things you've taken and things you've owed. It's a soft, boneless excuse. Be grateful. Give them that, at least.

Clink.

Dessert ends before you can tell his family not to get their hopes up. Mingyu's mom sends you off with your loaf of bread and a kiss on the cheek, and the moment is gone.

"Gyu," you call out on the steps in front of the house.

There are words at the seam of your lips. You want to tell him you're sorry for worrying so much. For making the whole dinner about you and then very possibly having nothing to show for it when it matters. For the heaviness in your chest. Your cowardice. But none of it comes out.

Instead you watch Mingyu pull at the leaves of a pear tree, watching the frost-filigree they get at the end of the season. He looks over his shoulder and smiles at you, as if he's on the hazy cover of a magazine. His eyes bend so wonderfully at the corners when he looks at you, and it breaks your heart.

"You had fun, right?" he asks. "My parents like you a lot, you know. I think they really do."

But that's the problem, you want to say. You all do, and I have no idea why.

Some of the pears are beginning to rot now. You watch one drop off the vine, and it caves to the pavement like it was made of nothing at all.

v. wild barley (grows like weeds)

In March, you play house.

Your parents leave on a two week trip to see relatives, and Mingyu takes it upon himself to make sure you survive.

It's a kind, blinding charade.

(7 am, breakfast. You usually don't even eat breakfast, but you wake up to doenjang and a smile, one that presses itself to yours until you're wearing it on the long walk to school.)

(4 pm, the stretch between lunch and dinner. You're muddling through another useless club meeting when Mingyu sends you a picture of him in your mom's apron, making kimchi. Kiss the chef, he texts you. You promise to, over and over and over.)

It's good until it isn't.

That isn't to say that it's Mingyu's fault. In fact, it's never really Mingyu's fault, and that's the worst thing about your relationship. Sometimes you wish he was worse just so there was someone else to blame.

(1 am, a fridge-cold glass of water and a hand on the column of your spine. Can't sleep? He asks. Just had a weird dream, you say.

It's a lie. You're a liar.

You miss your parents and the first wave of acceptance letters comes out in two days. You're not like him. Sleep has never been a cure for the exhaustion you're feeling, and you have no way of telling him that however warm the bed is won't fix that.)

It's on a Thursday afternoon when you open your mailbox and see the tiny, thin envelope that you've been expecting for the past week. You don't need to open it to know what it says, and yet you do it anyway.

The sun is white, a ghost in the spring sky. The ocean bleeds into the overcast, the curly barley stands tall around your feet, and you let the worst letter you've gotten in your life fall upon your shoulders, word by terrible word.

Then you close it, pinching the seam shut, and draw up your brave face. Nothing left to do but be brave. You're convinced you've used up all the sadness in your relationship—spend in pennies and the well still runs dry. Mingyu will cup your cheek and call you darling, pouring into your emptying basin, holey and broken.

You see him now through the kitchen window, Venus in his clamshell of a kitchen. Galbijjim day, he had said this morning. Now, he waves at you, glittery with recognition.

Your throat feels like crumpled paper.

Mingyu smiles at you, hazy through the glass. Your cheeks hurt and your mouth is paper mache, but you smile back anyway.

///

The letters come one after another.

You know what the envelopes hold and yet you keep opening them. The little folder you keep stashed in your bottom drawer gets fatter every passing day because you can't help but revisit your misery, almost as if you need to remind yourself it exists.

Mingyu is none the wiser. Today he decides he'll put off pastry school for one more year. "It doesn't feel like the right time," he says, rolling a log of burdock kimbap up. "You know what I mean?"

No, you don't. You never really do.

You do know, however, that it would feel really fucking bad that, come the end of the year, to have nothing. All your friends would be going somewhere—even Yizhuo opened her acceptance to an MFA program in Shanghai yesterday—and you would be here, still, feet firmly planted in the muddy Jeju dirt like they always had been.

"Hey, don't look so disappointed." he jokes. "Don't tell me you're already trying to get rid of me."

You're not, you really aren't. But part of you wonders if it's just a race to the bottom. If you got rid of him before he decided he wanted to get rid of you, maybe it would hurt a lot less. One less letter for the folder.

"Never. But imagine if you picked up a French accent at pastry school. Then I’d consider it. Maybe."

You watch his knife rock back and forth on the cutting board as he cuts the kimbap.

"Some for you. And more for me," he says, in what you can only describe as someone attempting to speak French when they've never heard it before. "Unless you want more, mon cherie."

He brings the plates to the table, his grin nothing short of dizzying.

"I’m irresistible, huh? Still wanna leave me now?"

"You're gonna have to try a little harder than that, I think."

The words roll off your tongue, easily, traitorously.

You watch the kimbap disappear off of Mingyu's plate.

Going, going, gone.

///

Seogwipo is always dark at night, only kept alive by the glow of the moonlit sea.

You can't sleep. Again. And so you sit out on the steps in front of your house, letting the twilight wrap around you like a blanket.

You got your last letter back earlier today. You held your breath and tore it open like you would a birthday card with money in it.

Waitlisted.

It was surely better than a rejection, but some naive, child-eyed part of you thought that if you had just closed your eyes and hoped hard enough, things would work out the way you had planned. Tragically, it wasn't enough this time. You wanted and wanted and you thought maybe that would mean you'd come close to deserving it.

Your parents called today. After managing to sideline the issue of basically the rest of your entire life, they had finally cut through your sad little charade. No good news yet, huh?

No, but—

It was always like that with you. No, but it's not as bad as you think. No, but give me a chance. No, but I’m trying. I've been trying.

You wish things didn't come out of you so complicated. That you could be like Seohyun, who could go through school with her eyes closed and still graduate at the top of her class. Instead, you parade around your little failures, trying to convince people it all could mean something only if they squinted. See? It isn't so bad.

You think you're past the point of crying about it. Your stomach hurts, you're cold, and most of all, you just want to go back to bed. Plus, although Mingyu sleeps like a log, you think he's developed a sixth sense for whenever you get up too early.

Time to be brave, you've been telling yourself, although you don't know who you're pretending for anymore.

So you nudge the front door open—it's so old, it wails if you come at it with any more force—and, to your surprise, see the light above the kitchen sink turned on.

It's not very bright, but it's enough to make out Mingyu's broad silhouette, back turned to you as he makes a cup of tea. He's humming one of his made-up songs.

"Mingyu?"

"There you are," he says, turning around. "Just came out to check on you. And make you some tea."

The kettle whizzes. Your gut twists.

You still haven't said anything to Mingyu. To manage your own disappointment was one thing—you don't think you could handle another person's. And yet when he stands there, Pororo mug between his huge hands, you feel as if you are holding a knife, big and guilty and bloody.

"I-I'm fine, Gyu. Honest." you watch his expression flicker, unreadable in the persimmon lamplight. "Sorry you had to come out. It's chilly out here."

"You know, you can tell me what's going on. I won't judge."

No, no, no. This is the last conversation you wanted to have, with the last person you wanted to have it with.

You feel feverish. You think your hands are shaking.

"Mingyu, I swear—"

"Whatever it is, we can fix it. I know we can."

That almost makes you want to laugh if you didn't want to cry so bad. Of fucking course he would say that. Mingyu, who treats life like it's the watermelon trick he showed you on the outlook, wants to put a bandaid on this whole thing, as if that could come close to fixing it.

He'd tell you to curl up on the couch with a bad movie while he orders takeout. Kiss you on the top of the head. It's ok, baby. Just another bad day for the person who has the worst luck in the world. Another lump of problems for him to try and make better. If he isn't sick of you now, he sure would be soon enough.

"It’s okay," you say, steeling your voice. "It really isn't a big deal. Let's just go back to sleep."

You try to walk away, but the hardness in Mingyu's eyes roots you down to the tile.

"Stop doing that."

"Doing what?"

"Pushing me away," he swallows. "Like you always do. I know something's going on."

"I’m not, i just—"

"You just what? You can't help it?"

"No, I—"

"Because you like to know that you can? That you can say whatever and then watch me come back?" A fragmented, heavy silence thrums between you. He's looking at you like he's daring you to say something, anything. His gaze is black. "What am I good for if you can't tell me anything?"

There's that familiar, stinging pressure behind your eyes. You think you're crying, but you're not sure. Maybe you've been crying this whole time.

"Fine," you bite. Your blood feels like hot metal. "You really wanna know? I didn't get into law school. There. Happy now?"

Mingyu looks stung.

"W-why didn't you tell me?"

Because I thought you would stop loving me. I thought you would have finally had enough.

"Because it's not all about you, Mingyu."

The words, selfish and damning, burn your tongue. Mingyu is right. This is what you always do. You fuck up and then make everyone else hurt for it.

"I'm sorry," Mingyu says. His voice doesn't sound like his. Instead, the words seem to hang in the air, trembling and holding their breath, waiting for an apology you can't give yet. "I shouldn't have—"

"It's ok." You swallow hard, and it hurts. "Let's just go back to bed."

It's getting colder and colder. You think there's a little hole in your sock, right above the cat's whiskers.

Mingyu doesn't reach for you as he passes to get to the hallway. Maybe he doesn't know how to anymore.

The Pororo cup is left abandoned on the counter. You walk over and read the label on the tea bag—barley, because you have class tomorrow morning.

You pick it up, let the ceramic buzz between your hands with whatever warmth it has left, and hold it to your lips.

It's cold now, but all you can think to do is drink it. Erase all the evidence that tonight ever happened, and maybe it'll be nothing more than a bad dream in the morning.

There's honey at the bottom of the cup. It sears the back of your throat, but you drink until there's nothing left.

vi. the peach blossoms (without fail, bloom every August. I miss you.)

You broke up the next day.

Even now, you remember what happened. You had woken up early that morning to make your own breakfast because you couldn't allow Mingyu to give you any more of himself. Your hands could only hold, shatter, so much.

"Mingyu, I think we should...." You looked at the zigzags of jam on your toast, angry and uneven. "I think we should stop seeing each other. For now," you had added, as if that made anything better at all.

Somehow that seemed more merciful at the time. Really, you think it just showed your cowardice. If you were going to break his heart, you might as well have gone all the way the first time.

Maybe it was a good thing that Mingyu saw right through you. He always did.

"So that's it, huh? You're just gonna give up on us?"

"No, I just...need some time."

"How long?" he asked. "Be honest with me. Because you know I’ll wait."

"I don't know." You couldn't meet his gaze. His eyes reached and reached over that kitchen table and you denied him even that.

"Don't you always know?" he asked, pitifully, desperately. "Don't you want this to work?"

And you did. In fact, you don't think you had ever wanted anything more, and it was that that scared you. You had already lost law school—you couldn't let the only other thing in your life let you go. So you pulled the trigger first.

"We should just end things. I'm sorry. I can't give you what you need."

He packed his bag within the hour, and you think everything, from then on, froze inside you. You didn't move from your seat until your parents came home from the airport later that day and asked why there were two plates of toast still on the table.

You think you knew, someplace, inevitably, this would happen. You, who only knew hunger, had reached deep inside Mingyu and rooted out a love you didn't think you were worthy of having. And yet you still ate from the vine, bite after guilty bite, until you couldn't take any more. The only time he asked you for anything at all, you couldn't give it to him—such was the irony of your relationship.

Maybe you were doomed the moment the first strawberry hit your tongue, just like you had said, all that time ago.

About a month later, you got another letter in the mail. Chungnam National University Law School, it read. This one was fat, in one of those brown envelopes lined with bubble wrap. Somehow, miraculously, that position on the waitlist had turned into an acceptance. You held the package to your chest and cried, loud and with abandon, as if taking a deep breath after almost drowning.

Ironically, the first person you wanted to tell was Mingyu. But the good news you needed to save your relationship came too little, too late. Perhaps that meant it had no legs to stand on in the first place, but that didn't stop you from missing it. Instead, you told Yizhuo, and she drove you to Jeju City and treated you to dinner. "You should just call him," she had said. "Hey, don't look at me like that. He'd probably pick up on the first ring."

The city is swathed in August's crimson summer—peach season. The narrow streets are lined with peach trees, the fruits glowing like fat drops of sunlight. All you do these days is plan for your eventual move to Daejeon and the start of a life that seems newer and shinier than your own. But surrounded by the cicada song, the velvet treeline, the rain-soaked asphalt, somehow you think you're going to miss Seogwipo more than you think.

(Fickle, fickle heart. You always needed things to be taken away to really be able to appreciate them. Somehow, all that wanting had boiled down to something more satisfying, more filling.)

You wonder how Mingyu is. Now that you think about it, he seems just as much a part of Seogwipo as the farm he lives on. It was only last summer when you had first met him in the field, set on fire by the strawberry harvest. You think about him now, peddling around that ridiculous wicker basket to make jam. Maybe talking to another pretty girl, someone as naive, cruel as you had been.

Not long ago, you considered calling him to apologize, but that'd just be another thing to be selfish about. A little time and some warm weather, and I’m calling to finally wash my hands of you. That's what it would sound like, no matter what you said. Still, it didn't stop you from thinking of him, every flower, every season.

"You know, I always wanted to grow peach trees. But I think we've always been a pear kind of family."

Mingyu. If a voice could cut through air, it'd be his.

You whip around, half-believing you're hearing things. Certainly that would be easier, but you're learning that there are some things you can't run from.

And like a picture, Mingyu stands tall, golden, framed by the peach blossoms. Not a thing about him has changed. Not even the way he looks at you.

"Mingyu," you breathe. Unfortunately, none of the times you replayed your last conversation with him help you come up with something to say, because in none of them did you anticipate him coming back. "W-what are you doing here?"

"I live here, silly."

"No way," you reply, scrambling. "Crazy, because I live here too."

You both laugh nervously, a silly, bubbly thing, but you feel like you're going to throw up. It's only now that you realize you're kind of on the walk to his place. Seogwipo has never had places to hide.

"I...um." You try and disentangle the guilt from the nostalgia from the scent of the peaches and the warmth on his face. They all look the same. You missed him. "I got into law school. In Daejeon."

"I heard," he says. "Not surprised at all. I always knew you would."

"Thank you. I mean it." The cicadas buzz around you, as if they know they have an important silence to fill. "You're staying in town, right?"

"Actually, I decided to apply to culinary school. It finally felt right, you know? I'm leaving at the end of the summer, but it's just in Jeju City. I couldn't leave the island."

"Thank goodness. I don't know if you could tell, but I kind of always hoped you would. I don't think I’ve ever eaten better food." Your voice wobbles, but it gets there. "You'll do amazing."

Then time stretches and forces you to recognize, reckon with, the moment you're in. You wonder if he feels the same way you do—bruised, overripe. If there's still a space in his heart for you.

Deep breath. Life only gives you so many chances.

"Mingyu, I’m sorry. I'm sorry I couldn't make us work. You deserved better." Saying it feels like peeling the skin of your heart back. There's still a palpable distance between the two of you—you think that had always been there—but it feels more comfortable in a way it never did before.

"Don’t apologize," he says, easily, as he always does. Everything seems to flow off him like water, and you think that's the part of him you loved the most because it was the one thing you couldn't touch. "We loved each other. I think that much was true."

A jasmine breeze curls through the trees, sending the blossoms fluttering around you like ink in water. The very first time you met Mingyu, you thought the image of him, haloed with the sunset, was the one you wanted to keep forever. And yet, somehow, you don't think you'll ever forget the way he looks right now.

"Will you ever come back to Seogwipo?" you ask.

"I was gonna ask you the same thing—you were always the one who wanted to get out of here." He grins, ear to ear. "Of course I'm coming back. There's nowhere I'd rather be."

"Yeah. I think I know what you mean."

The sea, the clay dirt, Mingyu. Even yourself, clumsy and care-worn. You think, somewhere along the line, you forgot how to love. But you're learning—one step at a time.

"Friends," you say. "Let's be friends. If you'll let me."

"Thought you would never ask. Gladly. Always." The space between you seizes, like it's holding in a breath. Maybe one day, you'll think of closing it once more, but you like where you stand now. You can admire him better from a distance, without your fingerprints all over him. He stuffs his hands in his pockets, something he does before he gets ready to leave. But before he does—"I'll see you soon, okay? You better come back. Promise me."

For the first time, you see the honesty in his eyes and you really, truly believe him.

"Promise."

The Seogwipo sun is high and red in the sky when you wave Mingyu goodbye. It feels like you're coming to an end of a long summer, but you're not afraid. You watch the wind dance through the peach blossoms, their branches never searching, never wanting, and you finally feel as if you've arrived home.

[xmarchwarden-of-lothlorienx]

Sneaking Spring

Thranduil x gn!elf!reader

Summary: Based off this imagine by @mrsmidnight15

“Imagine making out with Thranduil when he was younger and still a prince and getting caught by his father.”

Authors Note: I really loved this idea, so thanks again @mrsmidnight15 for letting me write a little fic for it ^_^

*this has been in my drafts for a VERY long time lmao. I hope it’s still fine to use that imagine as inspiration it’s been a YEAR.

__________________________________________

Spring was by far your favorite season. Freshly bloomed flowers bowing in the wind, picking perfectly ripened strawberries, and all the elation of the world renewing itself for another year.

It was on one of these days you had ventured out, accompanied by the Prince, Thranduil. The two of you had been friends for quite some time, yet there was an unacknowledged connection of something more. Being in his presence was calming. It felt more like home than anywhere else. Your heart ached to tell Thranduil of your feelings, but you knew how horribly it would break if he didn’t feel the same.

In the forest, you two were foraging for mushrooms.

“(Y/N)?” You heard Thranduil call. “Do you know what mushroom this is? I have not seen it before.”

You peeked at the fungi from over your friends shoulder. “Hmmm, I can’t say I have,” you said, eyebrows drawn together.

Thranduil tilted his head towards you, “I believe my father has a collection on mycology in his study. Perhaps we should go find it?” He raised his brow ever so slightly. You noticed the heat beginning to rise and spread across your face, finally noticing the proximity between you and your friend. You drank in his appearance-his eyes that glimmered like gemstones, the soft pink of his lips, his smooth even complexion-

“(Y/N)?” Thranduils voice snapped you to reality.

“Yes!” You shook your head, attempting to shake away your thoughts. “I mean yes, I think we should go look for the book.” You bashfully smiled and diverted your gaze towards the ground.

———

King Oropher’s study was magnificent. The room featured tall bookcases of richly carven wood, beginning on each side of the room and meeting in the middle behind a delicately hewn desk. The fireplace was not lit at this time of year, but you imagined how delightful it would be to settle in front of it during the freezing winter and read the day away.

“Will you help me find it? I’ll start at this end and you can start at the other,” Thranduil gestured to the far side of the room. You began scanning the shelves, looking for whatever mushroom guide would hold the answer. “Has something been on your mind lately?”

Thranduils question returned your mind to earlier, and you felt your face begin to heat once more. “No,” your voice broke and you mentally face palmed. “Not at all. What gave you that idea?”

Thranduil continued scanning the shelves. “You’ve seemed…distracted lately, staring off into nothing,” he paused. “I hope I haven’t been boring you.”

“Oh, no not at all. It’s just-I don’t know. I’m not sure how to tell you,” You stopped abruptly, nearly bumping into Thranduil. The two of you were now face to face where the bookcases met behind his fathers desk. His eyes were boring into yours, as thought he could see right through you. You swallowed, attempting to calm your nerves.

“Is someone bothering you? You know you can tell me anything, (Y/N).” He placed an affirming hand on your shoulder.

Willing yourself to not lean into his touch, you said, ”I’m sorry, Thranduil. I do not think I can bring myself to say it.”

“Then perhaps you can show me.”

You softly smiled. You were friends, yes, but the care and concern that he took for you. The days you spent together-the crunch of autumn leaves while walking the forest, winter days spent in the snow and returning to drink mulled wine before the fire, spring days like today spent foraging and laughing beneath the sun. “Yes,” you answered. “I think I can show you.”

You leaned in and gently kissed him. The same lips that you had been admiring just an hour ago. He moved the hand on your shoulder lower to rest on your waist. Breathlessly, you pulled away, resting your forehead against his.

“I think understand now,” He breathed.

“Oh, do you?” You lightly teased.

“Yes,” He connected his lips with yours once more. Placing both hands at your waist, he lifted you and placed you on top of the desk. Thranduil pressed his body flush with yours and deepened the kiss. You trailed your hand to the back of his head and gently grasped his hair, receiving a hum of pleasure in return. He began to kiss your jawline, when-

“Ahem!”

The two of you jumped. You slowly turned to meet the eyes of the king who was now standing in the doorway of his study. You made a quick glance towards Thranduil who’s face was rapidly turning red. When you looked back towards King Oropher, he said:

“If you two are done, would you please leave me to my study. Alone.” The king was rubbing his brow and seemed to be feeling a mixture between embarrassment and disappointment.

“Yes, of course, father.” Thranduil blurted. “Let us go,” he said briskly, taking your hand in his. Passing the king at the door you covered your mouth and began to giggle. The whole situation was completely absurd. Out in the hallway with the door to the study finally closed, Thranduil pulled you close. “Now, let’s continue this elsewhere.”

Tag List: @entishramblings @themerriweathermage

[ofcloudsandstars]

Summer Solstice {Litha} Fantasy Feast

It’s here!! Nearly in the final hour!! Have been wicked busy but still dedicated to fulfilling my self imposed duty this year to upgrade all of my 2016 fantasy feasts. It brings me joy each year seeing people reblog my old feasts especially as those posts did help me to visualize and manifest incredible magical celebrations with friends. However as time goes on my standards unfortunately get higher and my tastes more elaborate so I felt it was time to redo my Summer Solstice vision. I hope this post with included recipes below get you in a hot summery mood! 

Here are the previous feasts this year: Winter Crossquarter, Spring Equinox, Spring Crossquarter (And here was Litha 2016)

In the read more there are the recipe links and additional explanations on personal symbolism and of course the image credits! I also always plan my feasts to be vegan inclusive for those with dietary restrictions but also aim for all the food to be somewhat local which matters in these seasonal feasts since it’s celebrating local nature. Anyway there is something for everyone here.

1: Starters The ideal Summer Solstice feast to me is a mad fiery pagan bonfire bbq. If we are talking about a celebration honoring the fiery sun, summertime and food, my mind goes to a grill. However most BBQs can end up getting heavy quickly. Therefore the starters are a bit light. There will be charred vegetable skewers, steamed seafood, shrimp cocktail and jalapeno poppers. Honorable mention would be blistered padron peppers.

Garlic Herb roasted Shrimp with homemade Cocktail sauce recipe Balsamic Grilled Veggie Skewers Recipe Seafood image Source  (I would ideally want to serve just steamed seafood. The image is from a Paella recipe which is very summery but Paella is definitely a main dish and not a starter). 

Jalapeno Poppers Recipe Blistered Padron Peppers Recipe

2: Sides The bread choice for this feast will be focaccia with sundried tomatoes and garden herbs. Other dishes will be charred bell peppers, and a refreshing cucumber tomato salad.

Chili herb tomato focaccia bread recipe (vegan with olives image source) Homemade Roasted Bell Peppers Recipe Cucumber Tomato Salad Recipe

3: Mains The grill would provide a selection of food, but the main feature would be marinated barbeque ribs. The plant based option would be stuffed grilled bell peppers with smoked paprika.

Stuffed Bell Peppers image source (there’s no vegan recipes online that I find satisfying so I would prepare this with sautéed pinto beans with red onions in tomato sauce, smoked paprika, coriander and topped with a dash of chili flakes and oat crème fraiche). Marinated Ribs Source (Beer-b-q ribs recipe)

4: Desserts Summer is the fruity season!! We start to see more fruits in season towards the Summer crossquarter harvest, yet Summer Solstice sees strawberries and in some regions melons start to ripen. Other fruits I associate with this sabbat are light citrus flavors from Lemon, Grapefruit and Lime. Also since I was raised in NJ a regional summery treat we have are orange creamsicles. It’s a dreamy creamy citrus delight and has a special place in my heart so I feel like since it evokes summer so well for me it deserves a spot here. For each sabbat dessert I have a tart of choice, a cake of choice and a special dish. The tart for Summer Solstice is torn between a fresh strawberry tart and a lemon meringue, but I would ultimately choose  a lemon meringue tart with flamed mallow topping. The cake would be strawberry shortcake, and the special dessert would be an icecream cake (could change flavors per year but would mostly be orange creamsicle). Alternatives provided would be ice cream cookies as they are easy to make with vegan options/dietary restrictions and in different variety of flavors to suit peoples pallets. Also if you are in a region where it’s available, definitely a watermelon fruit salad. Watermelon was such a big part of summer in NJ but in England its like out of region so it’s mostly strawberries over here.

Curly Dock and Strawberry Balsamic Tart Wondersmith recipe Simple Strawberry Shortcake Recipe

Lemon Meringue Tart Icecream Sandwiches source (simple ice cream sandwich recipe) Icecream Sandwich Bars vegan Orange Creamsicle Icecream Cake Recipe Strawberry Shortcake Icecream Cake (I was obsessed with these icecream bars as a kid)

5: Drinks Fruits really make their way into everything during summertime and the drink selection would reflect this. Only thing not pictured here would be an elderflower fresh mint iced tea which will be cooling and refreshing to counter act all the hot and spicy foods. Other than that of course the main non-alcoholic drink will be lemonade! For the alcoholic selection I would love Strawberry wine, boozy melon bowls and grapefruit shandies (shoffenhofer tastes like summer on tap it will change your life). The spirit of choice will be tequila. Something about tequila is so fiery, summery and solar. I would make spicy mezcal sunset margaritas and flamed tequila shots.

Dragon Lemonade Holder Strawberry Wine Recipe Grapefruit Shandy Recipe (Shoffenhofer) Boozy melon Bowl (the Recipe is for Subak Hwachae which is a Korean boozy bowl with Soju)  Spicy Sunset Margarita Recipe

6: Treats Final part!! You can tell I am a very sensory person and one thing that made celebrations and holidays memorable as a kid were always the treats you walked away with. The little candies, snacks and tokens. If I were to have a celebration with a whole community including kids I would include some of these. Summery sweets for me were salt water taffy, fruity gummies (especially shark gummies), sticky sun drops on paper and fruity candies with melon, strawberry and citrus flavors. For savory options I would love spicy and smoky treats from fiery chili chips to smoked paprika crisps.

Salt Water Taffy (Recipe) Shark Sour Gummies Fruit Candy Selection Flaming Hot Party Mix

________________________________

If you made it this far thank you so much for reading it all!! Hope I put you on a visual sensory experience for the summer. I would love to hear what dishes and foods you associate with the summer solstice or summer time in general.

You can check my litha tag for more ideas or my correspondence list for why I associate certain things with this time of year.

________________________________

Image Credits: Litha Art by Julia Nikitina Bonfire Party Lemon Beeswax Candles Summer tablescape Bonfire gif Grill Gold and Red tent Flames Fire Dancers Fire Breather Gif - From me actually! It was my first summer solstice party and there were fire breathers. I took this video. Bilbo Baggins Birthday (Lets be real, the ultimate summer solstice party would be that shire party) Fruit Bowls Fireflies gif Flaming Shots Grapefruit Cocktail Beach Sunset

[thessalian]

Thess vs Crises

My mother has this really weird blend of “They’re making a huge deal over nothing” and “But I guess it’s not nothing really” when it comes to ... well, almost everything. And at the moment, it’s about the heat wave.

I hadn’t been sleeping well lately and was finally paying off some sleep debt when Mum phoned asking if there was anything she could do to help me during Monday and Tuesday, the two really bad heat days we’re expecting. Apparently some of the news outlets are calling it a “heat crisis” and my mother says that if she hears people use the word ‘crisis’ one more time she’s going to throw up. I mean, I don’t like it either, but mostly that’s because I am honestly sick to the back teeth of living in a state of crisis every fucking day. But that’s what I mean about how she complains that people are making a huge deal over nothing while still being supportive.

Thing is, some of the suggestions are fairly unworkable. Going over to theirs if it gets too bad ... I’m not even going to want to move if it gets too bad, and I won’t have anything to do to take my mind off it there. Bringing some ice over? Good thought, but I don’t have room in my freezer for any, and if I need to put ice on wrists and neck to take down my core temperature a little, I can just use frozen vegetables.

The really nostalgic suggestion was sleeping on the balcony, which I used to do when I was a kid in Montreal and the heat got bad (that mostly stopped being a problem when I started going to sleepaway camp, but there were still occasionally a few bad days in August). Unfortunately there are a couple of problems with that. Like the plants taking up one corner, and the fact that the balcony’s too narrow even for my current single mattress, never mind the small double that’s apparently still languishing in the other flat (it’s been nearly fifteen months, by the way), plus the problems that used to plague my sleeping on the balcony when I was a kid: biting insects and spiders. The mosquito population of my flat’s interior has miraculously gone down since I started having basil growing in my windowsill - which is part of why I moved my other basil plant into the bedroom, by the way; apparently basil keeps them away - but outside, not so much. Also spiders. Look, I don’t mind spiders in general but one year while sleeping on the balcony in Montreal I woke up to find my wrist itching like crazy and swelling up until it looked like a golf ball was embedded in it. Spider bite, apparently. That was bad enough when I was a kid; don’t want to do it again.

I’ve made what preparations I can. I’ve done some advance preparation of meals so I won’t have to use the oven overmuch. I can more or less approximate sleeping on the balcony by opening the door out onto the balcony and sleeping on the sofa. And I do at least have the fan - at least this kind of heat wave probably qualifies as a good use of the electricity and there was an article about “how much does it cost in electricity to run a fan?” (which is how you know the electricity bill situation has just gone stupid) and it’s not that bad. So we’ll see, but I’m hoping to be able to manage. Besides, I want to be here for my plants. I have a watering strategy - little, but often. I did not put in all this work and watch it pay off in the form of flowering cayenne peppers, tomatoes, and cucumbers - not to mention slowly ripening alpine strawberries - to lose my plant babies to extreme heat.

One thing did bewilder my mother, though - when I told her I’d taken Tuesday off, she went, “But wouldn’t the office be air conditioned, and thus better for you?” My stepfather, who was hearing her side of the conversation, flagged up to her that it’s the getting there and back that’d be the problem, and I agreed with that ... but I also flagged up that my office does not have air conditioning. A lot of admin offices in hospitals don’t have air conditioning, because a lot of the admin offices are repurposed labs, scanning rooms and the like and some don’t even have windows, let alone air conditioning. Hell, most of the hospital doesn’t have air conditioning. This country is significantly ill-equipped for this kind of heat and yeah, people - and we’re not just talking the vulnerable here - are going to die. THIS IS WHY IT’S A CRISIS, MOTHER.

Well, that and things like transport infrastructure is built according to estimated needs and no one estimated 30+ heat, never mind approaching 40, so train tracks could buckle under the heat and roads ... well, not just ‘could catch fire’ but have caught fire. I can sympathise with my mother not wanting to hear the term ‘crisis’ anymore, given the amount it’s been used, but... I guess it’s the difference between her, who is insulated from the worst of the fallout from all this, and me, who only has a minor buffer through her, and has disability issues besides. She doesn’t have to think of it as a crisis because the people most hurt by it are just people on the news to her. So the difference is partially proximity but mostly empathy, I guess? On one level, I can see it being healthier to a point to be more selective in one’s empathy to avoid empathy fatigue ... but on the other ... caring about people other than yourself is good? And I think more people ought to do it? Especially the ones who are currently making crises - or making them worse - through power-hungry, greedy, assholish behaviour that puts the burden of their bad decisions onto those who least deserve it?

[nciwch]

                                     TEDDY'S FRUIT SALAD

Teddy quietly put away his fruits in the refrigerator on Monday when he brought them in. We said it may be better to keep the bananas out on the counter. “Why?” he asked and we said so that they would ripen and be ready for the fruit salad. We observed him walking over to the banans several times a day to see if they were ready and finally on Thursday, we told him that they would be “perfect” to be cut up on Friday. “I know,” he said matter-of-factly. 

On Thursday, Teddy started work on his fruit salad at the start of the work  cycle as it was a rainy day and we were starting the day indoors. He washed the “purple grapes” which he clarified “are my  favorite”. He destemmed them and cut a few in half with a very sharp knife. He received some help with that as the stress of cutting an entire bag of grapes was proving too much. 

The he culled the strawberries very professionally. He worked in almost complete silence and we could barely see his eyes over his mask. One of the older students actuallty asked him, “Wait, can you see anything, Teddy?” And he replied, “Yes, my eyes are open.”

He sliced the strawberries in a fairly arbitrary manner - so that they would be a safe size and nobody would choke. He received some help with comletin the task as he had 2 large tubs to get through.

On Friday, the banans were peeled and sliced quickly and then the salad was mixed. It looked lovely and when Teddy told his friends the ingredients at Gathering Time, he saw that most of them had the same favorites as him!

[weirdfetishes123]

Blueberry Bottom Blaine Ripens Again (part 2) - deviantart

by juicybb

"Blaine, wake up!"

Tommy shook Blaine's shoulder as he awoke with a start. He rubbed his eyes. "Sorry T, was I shouting again?"

Tommy nodded. "You were dreaming about what happened the chocolate factory again?"

Blaine sighed. "Yeah, I just can't get it out of my head." As if to prove his point, Blaine tried rolling onto his back, but he was prevented by his swollen butt — a byproduct of what happened that didn't deflate during the juicing process.

Twiddle had been wrong though- after being juiced, Blaine hadn't blown back up into a blueberry. His hair had stayed a rich, deep blue, and after the juicing his stomach stayed the size of a beach ball. His arms and legs were still slightly swollen, and to Blaine's delight at first, his butt cheeks were the size of basketballs.

Blaine rolled in the bed, his blue spandex bikini briefs stretched around the plump cheeks. "Anything different about this dream?" Tommy asked.

Blaine yawned. "No- just reliving the events again. I keep filling up with juice and blowing up into a blueberry again."

Tommy looked down and saw that Blaine, laying on his side, sported a erection as he said it. "Just inflating like a big balloon, huh?" He smirked as he saw Blaine's bulge throbbing at the words.

In the three weeks after the factory incident, Blaine had tried to resume his life as he realized he wasn't going to stay a blueberry forever. He found pants with elastic waistbands to get over his giant rear, and spandex that wouldn't rip.

At first, the proud power bottom was addicted to the attention he was receiving. When he and Tommy and Rich would go out, all the boys would be whispering and pointing at his butt. One group even tried resting their drinks on the plump cheeks.

Eventually, Blaine came to realize that his butt was also a hindrance. The times that he'd gone home with a guy, even the biggest tops that he knew were unable to squeeze far enough past his enormous cheeks. Some were able to get their members in, but not far enough to hit Blaine's pleasure spot. The result was an awful tease for the poor big booty Blaine.

He also realized that his reputation was being changed forever. He'd always had a big butt, but the immediate swelling of his belly and butt, and his bright blue hair, were all that anyone could talk about. Blaine wasn't shy and he and Tommy and Rich didn't have any problem talking about what happened.

"Did you have plastic surgery or something??" one boy had asked.

"Nah," Blaine asked. "I had an accident at the Twiddle Chocolate Factory. We went in for a private tour, and I ended up having an accident and inflating into a giant blueberry."

"A... blueberry?" the boy stammered.

"Yeah," Blaine nonchalantly replied, beginning to subconsciously rub his swollen rear. "They got most of the juice out of me but there were some permanent side effects. I guess I'm part blueberry now!"

The nickname stuck, and Bottom Blaine also started becoming known as Blueberry Blaine. First it was only snarky behind his back, but quickly Blaine came to embrace it- having his friends call him that, and wearing blue clothes and chewing gum and blowing big bubbles that elicited comparisons to his spherical gut and butt.

Still, Blaine's hunger got worse and worse. He hadn't been properly screwed in over a month now, and he kept dreaming about what it would be like to be back in the factory, in front of his friends, blowing back up. As his sexual frustration mounted, he began to fantasize about it more and more.

That day Blaine had climbed out of bed, squeezed his taut balloon belly into a t-shirt.

Rich and Tommy were having breakfast, getting ready to go to the gym. "What's going on today, Blaine?" Rich asked, clad in a white shirt and shiny black workout tights.

Blaine pulled his breakfast out of the fridge- blueberry yogurt- and added more fresh blueberries to the cup. Rich and Tommy glanced at each other. "I think I need to see a doctor," Blaine said.

"You've seen plenty," said Tommy, who was dressed almost the same as Rich. "They've all told you, there's nothing you can do about your... bigger body."

Blaine sighed. "I know, it's just... I tried again last night, and the guy couldn't hit the spot."

"Again?" Rich asked.

"I know!" Blaine exclaimed. "And he's pretty big too- my cheeks were just too big and plump for him to get his hips up against mine."

Tommy looked at Rich, then back to Blaine. "What if we saw Mr. Twiddle again?"

Blaine's eyes lit up. "Do you think that would help?"

"Sure," Rich said. "He knows better than those doctors what happened to you. And besides, what could hurt?"

Blaine grinned. "Let's do it!" He bounded away back to his room, both Tommy and Rich staring as his big butt cheeks bounced in his blue bikinis.

Blaine returned a few minutes later, clad in the same shiny blue spandex suit from the factory the month before. It still fit him like a glove, and Rich and Tommy were surprised to see that he had held onto it. As the boys stared, he looped the bright red elastic belt around his swollen waistline, highlighting his enormous belly. "Still fits," Blaine said with a smile. "Let's go!"

The boys had phoned ahead, so Twiddle had been waiting for them at the entrance. As Blaine squeezed out of the car, Twiddle clapped. "Look at that blueberry boy!" he cried. "You make not have blown back up but you're still a sight!"

The spandex-clad boys all walked into the entrance with Twiddle, Rich and Tommy both flanking the plump blue boy in the middle. Twiddle ushered them along. "Unfortunately we're scaling up production tomorrow, so like I said on the phone, we're going to have to talk as I'm touring the factory."

"That's no problem," said Tommy.

"In fact we might actually get to see more of it after our last tour was cut short!" Rich said, shooting a look at Blaine who sheepishly grinned.

The group followed Twiddle into a large room with conveyor belts, lifts and chutes, where chocolate bars in various forms were moving around the room, being chopped, wrapped, and packaged.

"So my problem, Mr. Twiddle, is that I can't get my butt to go down," Blaine began to explain, hollering over the noise.

"I thought a boy like you was excited to have a big posterior!" Twiddle shouted in a surprised tone.

"I do!" Blaine said as he began his subconscious rubbing. "But my cheeks are too plump and it's made certain... recreational activities more difficult."

Twiddle and the boys walked into the next room, where boilers filled with concoctions rose 20, 30, 40 feet into the air! Each was spurting out candies and chocolates into sheets, and the loud sound of bubbling and steam whistles filled the air.

"I see, I see," replied Mr. Twiddle to Blaine. "But really you only have yourself to blame. I did warn you." Seeing the boy rubbing his taut plump rear end, he prodded it with his cane. "I see you're getting quite attached to the size, in fact!"

Blaine made a face and Rich and Tommy could swear they saw him blush a little — Blaine was never one to be embarrassed! — but that might have been the light and his bright blue hair.

"I need you to help, it's driving me crazy," Blaine exclaimed.

"Just consider yourself lucky that only a few of the side effects became permanent!" Twiddle said. "You can thank your friends here, for juicing you so quickly!" Tommy and Rich quickly looked away- they remembered how excited they'd been and how eager they were to release the juice from their friend's bloated erection.

They walked into the next room. This one was much quieter, with green vines hanging down from the 25-foot ceilings. The vines moved and shifted on their own like snakes, as a group of Twiddle's diminutive orange minions were carrying a giant strawberry out of the room. Once they left, the floor was empty.

The boys stopped. "What is this room?" Rich asked.

"Remember all the giant fruit that proved to be too much for poor Blaine here on your last visit?" Twiddle said. "This is where I make them. These vines are specially made to pump juice into the giant fruits. We make them on a daily basis- well, except for blueberries lately."

"Why not blueberries?" Blaine asked quizzically.

"Why, because you drained every last drop of juice out of my last blueberry!" said Twiddle. "These fruits are designed to be plumped up and then juiced, but not drained entirely. Since you sucked the juice out of my prize fruit, the blueberry vine here won't touch it." Twiddle gestured to one of the vines that was engorged and dripping blue, slippery liquid.

"I'm sorry! I didn't know!" Blaine protested.

Twiddle shook his head. "You think you're frustrated, this vine hasn't filled anything up since your visit to the factory."

As they spoke, the vine curled around, almost inspecting Blaine's rear end. The young man stopped rubbing his butt and twisted around. "What's it doing?"

Twiddle furrowed his brow. "Your rear end is plump and shiny and blue! I expect it's mistaken it for its old blueberry."

Blaine stared, transfixed at the phallic vine with the small opening at its rounded end. Blue juice dripped out. Blaine's sexual frustration boiled over, seeing the throbbing vine, and his spandex started tenting out under his taut belly. Rich and Tommy stared as Blaine's erection became more and more prominent.

"It looks... weird," said Rich.

"It looks funny," said Tommy.

"It looks delicious," said Blaine, his voice hungry and lustful. He stared as the vine began prodding each cheek, checking the plumpness of the blue globes.

"Let's move along," Twiddle said, "I've got a lot to do today and I'm behind production without my prized blueberry."

Blaine ignored him. All he could think about was something that could finally hit his spot. As the vine explored his rear, Blaine began to rock his giant butt back more. The vine leaked more and more juice, as it found the tiny rip in Blaine's suit.

"Watch out, Blaine..." Tommy warned.

But it was too late. With a loud juicy PLOP, the vine had entered Blaine. He shivered as the slick vine began to go deeper as Blaine's throbbing erection full tented out the front of his spandex suit.

"Oh man, guys, stop, its inside me!" Blaine yelled.

Tommy and Rich stared on. Twiddle blew into a whistle, and warned "That vine is plenty ripe, we'd better get it out of Blaine."

But the vine twisted and turned on it own. Blaine could feel the blue juice begin to pulse out of it, and he began to moan. "Guys, I'm finally getting to bottom!" His hands moved from his butt to his beach ball belly, bisected by the wide red belt. Blaine's eyes widened as he felt the juice pulsing in his gut as well.

"Blaine, you know what happened last time," said Tommy.

"Get it out before something happens," Rich said. Blaine heard them both but couldn't get past the feeling as the vine pulsed in and out of his massive butt.

Rich grabbed Blaine's shoulders, giving a quick break in his pleasure. "Dude, if you don't get this out of you quick, you're going to start inflating again!!"

With that realization Blaine let out a deep moan and his tent throbbed harder. "Dude... I want... this... inside me..." Blaine trailed off. Almost on cue, he felt the pulse of the juice quicken, and more began to pour into him.

The boys and Twiddle stared as Blaine's face flushed blue, matching his spandex and hair. His mouth framed in a moan, Blaine's blue eyes begged- for escape, Tommy wondered? Or for more?

Blaine's butt began to swell first, bigger and bigger until each cheek matched the size of his giant belly. He turned around watching it, feeling the juice pump it bigger and bigger. Sensing the shift inside, he began lifting his plump arms and looked down at his stomach.

The juice then began to swell his midsection, as the boy's belly inflated slowly. The red belt continued to stretch to impossible proportions as his belly went from beach ball to yoga ball sized, finally snapping with a loud POP! The boy's entire outfit and body was a bright blue now, his rear end sticking out prominently, and his taut juicy belly protruding over what was still a very visible tent made by his erection.

"Dude, you're blowing up again!" Tommy said.

Rich poked his belly. "Blueberry Blaine can't help himself!"

Twiddle smirked, "It doesn't seem like he wants to! Is that what this was about? You boys were looking for an excuse to help Blaine's inflation addiction?"

Rich and Tommy couldn't answer. Even though they had seen what happened last month, they were still transfixed by the sight of Blaine inflating into a giant blueberry. The young man was still swelling, his waist almost four feet in diameter. His arms flapped down as he felt his bloating body continue to get bigger and bigger. "Guys... I feel fuuuuunny," he said, once again understating his predicament.

Blaine's belly swelled in every direction — up, back, down, and out — the swelling midsection eventually reaching both his plumping butt and his tenting member. He began to lose mobility as his bloated legs and arms met his blueberry middle. "I'm ripening!" he gasped as he looked at his spandex-clad friends.

Tommy and Rich looked at Blaine as he once again plumped up into a full blueberry- his arms and legs slowly disappearing into his round body. The vine in Blaine's rear continued to pump more and more juicy as the young man groaned softly in ecstasy.

As Blaine once again fully ripened, the swelling slowed, his hands and feet pressed against the sides of his fully inflated, spherical body. His sighed as the vine twisted out of him, retreating to the ceiling high above the bloated blue boy and his two friends.

Rich and Tommy stared with wide eyes. Blaine turned with a few quick waddles to face them directly.

"How are you feeling, bro?" Rich asked cautiously.

Blaine looked at them with a mixture of contentment and lust. "I needed that- finally got to bottom for real this time," he said with a half smile. "I'm so juicy," he said, pressing his taut, plump, spandex covered blue body. "So ripe! I'm a blueberry again!"

Twiddle raised an eyebrow at the boy. "Tommy and Rich, you'd better get moving. You might be able to reverse some of the side effects permanently again if you juice him quick."

"Wait..." said Blaine, his deep blue face a mask of pleasure. "Take... your time guys, this feels... incredible..."

Tommy looked over at Rich. His eyes were stuck on bloated Blaine. Rich's shiny black tights gleamed, and Tommy couldn't miss Rich's tent in the spandex. Tommy realized that he had an erection to match in his own spandex pants.

Blaine eyed them both lustily. "Maybe... you guys... were a little... too quick... last time..."

Twiddle clucked his tongue at the young man. "I'm warning you Blaine, you got out lucky last time. The longer you wait before juicing, the more permanent the side effects will be! You could find yourself with an even bigger butt and bigger belly, or a blue face forever. Or you could simply blow back up into a blueberry after every juicing, constantly inflating and ripening and swelling up like a big blue blimp."

Blaine listened to Twiddle's warning and felt his erection throb harder. "Time to roll me to the juicing room... boys..."

Tommy patted Rich's butt in the black spandex, and the two then put their hands on their friend's plump, round, blue body. "Let's get going," Rich said, smiling at the newly ripened Blaine...

[westerhos]

Our Story: Chapter 7

Hi friends! Sorry for the delay here. I’ve been on vacation, so my priorities have been boozin’ and cruisin’. Thanks for your continued support of this story—I love hearing your feedback. This one’s a whopper of a chapter!

______

We often lose track of time in this great, big world of ours, in much the same way we lose a pair of keys, a couple of pens. “I swear I saw them two seconds ago!” we groan, groping to purse-bottoms, finding only lint and chump-change. So many things—these small facets of our lives—sucked into the void of bygones, taken before we can ever think to tie them down.

“I swear I was twenty-two just yesterday.”

This is how it is for Jamie and Claire, their years like old playbills confiscated by the wind and an invisible clock. Certain acts reappear from time to time, when the arm of a broom sweeps them into the light, when the frosting of dust disturbs, then floats. And for a brief moment, as the particles of time and forget resettle themselves, Jamie and Claire can hear their lives’ most glorious crescendos. The lowest notes tip-toe from the long-kept silence, rising and sinking slowly, steadily. All plucked strings, still vibrating, until the echoes die, cradling the past.

You can write an entire story with these bits and pieces of their lives, cut the acts together to form one winding opera. It plays and stops until, eventually, the grand finale. The overlap: a perfect harmony which carries them from their separate wings, to center stage and to each other.

And it is there, finally, that they meet again, lips and lives melding. They stand together in the orb of the spotlight. A single sun, glowing.

THE SPIRIT IN THE HORSE, 2000

Starring James Fraser, Jenny Fraser, Brian Fraser, The Doctor, Ellen Fraser, Fitzy (and a More-Than-Flash of Someone Else)

Though a bestselling author, JAMES FRASER did not grow up with dreams of books, but of horses.

He was born on an unusually hot day, spring 1968. Everything melting at its very seams, the birthing room’s thermometer feverish with mercury blood. His father and sister had fashioned fans from intake forms, moving heat-murk and birth-stink with the accordioned papers. They looked on with damp foreheads, lips white and tight, so that Ellen could have the breaths they saved.

At half-past noon, the doctor had caught Jamie’s auburn crown, dripping more heavily than his own laboring mother. All of this—the heat, the sweat, the waving forms—was taken as the stamp of Jamie’s fate. Surely, they had all agreed, he would set the world on fire, would be a brand forever puckering its skin.

The hibernators had emerged early that year, scurrying from their earthen wombs just as Jamie had slipped from his mother’s. Heat-drunk and dizzied, they had eaten everything in sight. Corn stalks, cabbage leaves, whole fields of barley—gone. Even Ellen’s strawberries, barely ripened—devoured by mid-April. The red fruits had shrunk to halves, then thirds, as the creatures munched and munched. Fleshy hearts eaten to bleeding, the pulp left to the sleepy stragglers.

And so on the day Jamie entered the world, the Frasers had returned to a dark and stifling house. Rot wafted from the windows, and the electrical wires were chewed cleanly through. One rabbit, the chosen martyr, had laid cooked in the grass, fur spiked.

Brian had thrust Jamie into his daughter’s arms, ran inside to rescue what unspoiled food he could (three eggs, a loaf of bread). Waiting in the yard, Jenny had imagined the wilting lettuce inside the fridge and Ellen, equally wilted under the blue hospital sheet. She had watched a squirrel leap across the berry guts, a rope of black wire between his paws.

How—if at all, she had wondered—would they survive without her mother?

Too exhausted for a trip to the store, Brian had fried the eggs on the driveway. The yolk was thick in his mouth and the sorrow thicker in his chest, before he realized Jamie’s cries had quieted. He started when he heard the horse’s whinny, the snorty exhale through its nostrils. Beside him, Jenny had scuttled away, feet scraping at the egg crusts.

Incensed by the heat and the crowd, Fitzy the horse had stormed her stable doors to freedom. She had brayed, desolate to find her owner gone, until she spotted the flame in Brian’s arms. Copper, auburn, cinnabar—all Ellen’s colors—poking from a swaddle of blue. And so Fitzy had bowed her head, brought Jamie into her awed silence. One shining moment, the first since Ellen’s passing—calm and peaceful.

Even now, 32 years later, Jamie loves to tell this story. How Brian had pressed his baby fist to the mane, his mother still a stickiness on his baby thumb. And how, as a young boy, Jamie had thought Ellen lived somewhere inside auld Fitzy. Something in the black bead of the mare’s eye: a flash, a peculiar spark. It was an acknowledgement that, until one night in 1989, Jamie had never felt before.

After his book tour in ’99, Jamie Fraser decided to take the leap—carpe diem—and purchase his own horse and his own land (fields way out in the Highlands; a farmhouse converted to splendor by his millions). The horse, like Fitzy, wears a chestnut coat. She is stubborn but loving, recognizes Jamie’s voice when he calls and his face when it floats above her stable door. He sees a flash of Fitzy—and of his mother, he thinks—when she surrenders her anger to Jamie’s flags of truce: a fresh Granny Smith, a carrot stick plucked from the ground. He sees a More-Than-Flash of Someone Else when she nudges his shoulder, apologetic. The only source of happiness, this beautiful beast, outside of his writing.

“Ye see?” Jamie had said after their first standoff, “Ye canna stay mad at me forever.” And when the horse had chomped the apple from his hand, he’d sworn that she was smiling.

“Mo nighean donn,” he’d whispered, and decided, then and there, to name her Sorcha.

______

CARROLL’S THEORY OF TRUTH, 2003

Starring Claire Randall, Frank Randall, Joe Abernathy, duncandonuts, wetwillie, mark_me_1745, parsleymarsley, l.mackenzie (and The Author)

When CLAIRE RANDALL is not working at the hospital, her nose is pressed to a blue-white screen.

For years, she had resisted those monstrous, blocky machines—Macintosh, Dell, Gateway—all brand names accompanied by her husband’s greedy and jabbing elbows.

But there was value in tradition, Claire had argued. A kind of sanctity in the ping of an Underwood or the swish of pen; privacy and authentic connection. Frank had merely rolled his eyes, always lusting after the new and shiny—whether it was a computer or a student’s gloss-plumped lips—knowing it was not “tradition” itself that his wife was holding onto.

“So like you, Claire,” he’d said bitterly one day, “wanting to stay stuck in the past.” And, of course, he’d been right. Just to spite him, she’d finally surrendered and gave him one for Christmas.

Gradually, Claire came to love the whirring engine, the wail of the dial-up, the period of isolation where she was unreachable by phone. Like time travel, almost, the way it took her places past and present, opening every door like some futuristic gentleman.

But mostly, Claire loved the computer for the freedom it gave her. Boot up the system, click the mouse, log on, be someone else. Online, Claire could play a different role than the surgeon or the amateur gardener, pretend she was not the wife who turned her cheek as often as she made her husband’s dinner. On the Internet, her identity was a thirty-word bio, her face a grey silhouette displayed comfortably—anonymously—inside a neat, square frame. A million different bodies growing inside her, once her fingers flew across keyboard:

Claire Randall, the British spy.

Claire Randall, the avid hiker, climbing the Blue Ridge Mountains.

Claire Randall, the mother, who loved the melt of ice cream down her daughter’s chin. Her tiny mouth, sweet and sugared, when it met hers for a kiss.

One website, her favorite, was this: a forum, populated by other faceless humans who, like Claire, could recite page 451 (or any others) of A Blade of Grass. In this corner of the online universe, they had spoken of The Author on a first-name basis, trading facts like prized baseball cards. But it was only Claire who could share the most private knowledge, attribute it all to her keen nose and thus earn the respect of 16 anonymous users.

Even so, Claire had been surprised by what they knew solely through their reading. The Author’s childhood, his relationships, his favorite color. She was able to ask her own prodding questions and receive correct answers, such as:

whiteraven: A long shot, but does anyone know how to contact him by telephone?

And five of the grey-faced few had responded.

duncandonuts: easier to send him send him a letter (might get lost among the rest of his fan mail though).

wetwillie: have you tried his agent, john grey, in london?

mark_me_1745: if u meet him, tell him 2 come 2 brasil!!!!!!! we <3 him!!!!!!!

parsleymarsali: Publishers Weekly mentioned he’s now with Geordie Gibbons at the Claude F. Agency, not Grey, @wetwillie. Think it had something to do with creative differences and missed deadlines.

l.mackenzie: pass that info onto _me_ if you find it, girl! <g>

By a stroke of luck, someone had known someone who’d known someone who’d known someone. And just like that, she was given a phone number the following Wednesday. A day like any other, if it weren’t for a single string of digits sitting in her inbox, a silent but ticking grenade.

She spent three months with the numbers inside her head, stored in a folder marked with The Author’s name. She did manage to call though—once—when her hand finally lowered from its hover. She’d waited out the sonorous ring-ring-ring, the robotic chime, “You have reached the voice mailbox of..." She had listened to the beep that followed and then the silence, stretching, until she remembered her mouth. It opened, exhaled, then shut abruptly with the click of her teeth. There was the clatter of keys and the thwop of a briefcase—Frank home from work.

She had almost whispered, but did not.

It was too much to have both men in the same room: one gently pecking her lips, the other pressing an electric current into her cheek, crackling. Too much, too much. Claire had slammed the phone down and cursed, “Bloody teleprompter. Always calling before dinner,” which had made her husband laugh. She’d made him spaghetti that night, the spices forming twelve digits in the saucepan no matter how many times she swirled the spoon.

It’s been four months since that first and only call, though Claire still remembers The Author’s number. She thinks of if—when—she will have the courage to call again, to finally speak and fill the space of eleven empty years. While Frank snores beside her, she plays the scene from start to finish, like a draft of the real, inevitable thing.

Again: the sonorous ring, the tinny greeting, the beep, and the silence that waits for her. But this time: her mouth opens—one, two three times—and five words repeated, again and again.

In some versions, she says them aloud. In others, merely pushes them, soundless, into the air. Still, they are there, held aloft by satellite arms high up in the sky. Somewhere between her and The Author, existing: I was born for you, I was born for you, I was born for you.

And what is said three times—even unfinished, even without words—is always, always true.

______

THREE TIMES THE WORLD ENDED , 2004

Starring Jamie Fraser, Jenny Fraser, and Laoghaire Mackenzie (and The Girl)

JAMES FRASER, age 34, can pinpoint three moments where his world fell apart.

He was eighteen during the first, a brazen thing, but still as green as the pot freshly stinking his Levi’s. After reading the call notice pasted to his door, he’d floated to the common room on a cloud of White Widow weed. He dialed, laughing, until Jenny’s voice had sobbed down the line, breaking the peace of his druggy fug.

Their father, she’d cried, had died the previous evening.

With the news, the had drugs turned. Floors slanted, limbs jellied. Jamie watched as a hole ripped open the wall behind him, its enormous black void revealing the space Brian Fraser had left behind. It had swallowed Jamie up, refused to spit him back again until The Girl reached inside and found his heart two years later. Returned it to him, like a love note, passed on the inside of her smile.

Jamie describes the second collapse in his two famous novels, A Blade of Grass and Two Centuries in Purgatory. This time, the world had split completely, Jamie and The Girl like two tectonic plates shifting in the night. It was his writing that had bound Jamie’s world together again, though the spine remained cracked, a few of the pages missing.

The third time occurred just last week though Jamie was not entirely surprised. It’s what happens, he supposes, when you build something on uneven ground. Physical presence—someone’s here-ness—does not equate to love.

Nine years after the second earthquake, a new person had come into Jamie’s life. She would stand in the doorway at 6:30PM, jump to her tip-toes to welcome him home. There would be steam from the stove, and utensils would gleam in perfect, shining order. Napkins would wait with their patient folds, each prepared to catch the food that she, his ever-present Laoghaire, had prepared during the day. And for those three years, Laoghaire’s toothbrush had sat next to Jamie’s, her silks hanging beside his cottons. Evidence, he had thought, that he maybe-almost loved her.

But then Laoghaire had grown curious—“Why’ve no made progress on yer novel? What are ye writing all day if it isna yer third book?”—and stuck her piglet nose into places it did not belong. She, in a rare moment of ingenuity, had unlocked the safe and found his letters.

And so this time, Jamie’s world had not ripped or split—but exploded with a thousand sticks of paper dynamite. Laoghaire had burned through the house, burned through the letters. She’d called the magazines and the bloggers, vowing to tarnish his reputation with lies: cheater, drunk, lunatic, fraud. Finally, she’d left, taking the napkins, the cutlery, and the toothbrush—but leaving the embers in her wake, smoldering. A few scraps had avoided the fire, and Jamie read them as the night rose.

My da once told me I’d know straight away, that I’d have no doubt. And I didn’t.

For so many years, for so long, I have been so many different men.

The love of you was my soul.

and

Yours, Jamie

Forever, Jamie

Come home, my heart. I am not as brave as I was before, Jamie

On and on and on they went. Singed pieces of his letters. Every one meant for The Girl who’d confronted his darkness, had rescued his heart at a Christmas Eve party.

4,380. One letter for every day he had missed her.

______

THE KILLING GIRL, 2006

Starring Claire Randall*, Henry Beauchamp, Julia Beauchamp, Quentin Lambert Beauchamp, Frank Randall (and The One Person)

CLAIRE RANDALL* , resident at Boston GH, was five years old when she thought she was murderer. For years, she could hardly sleep, fearing not the monster beneath her bed, but the one beneath her covers.

Instead of counting sheep, she’d recounted facts as they’d been reported in the paper: Henry and Julia Beauchamp, parents of one Claire Beauchamp. Their mangled car, and a rocky deathbed set one hundred feet below. Both husband and wife, father and mother—dead upon impact.

Rarely, did this guide Claire towards sleep, and so she began to picture the accident as she’d recorded it in her diary. The same story, but more accurate—one that played behind her eyelids as if she had watched it all, a spectator on the road’s shoulder.

There was her parents’ blue Ford ribboning the cliffside. The low hum of conversation and the static of the radio. There was Claire’s goodbye before they left—“You always go without me! IhateyouIhateyou!”— which followed her parents and pushed them off the edge. She was sure it was her words that had broken her mother’s neck, had snapped it like a flower’s stem. One Claire Beauchamp, the little killing girl.

Five years passed before Lamb had found her in the courtyard, weeping her guilt into a mat of grey feathers. She had confessed to her five-year old anger then; how she’d pried open the rocky mouth and dropped her parents in.

“Death doesn’t move according to reason, my dear,” Lamb had said, “but only chance. And by no fault of yours.” He had patted her on the head like a priest grants forgiveness, and they buried the bird in the Nyungwe Forest. Wings and Claire’s blame laid to rest beneath the trees.

Still, Claire likes how accountability sets her world—so wracked by coincidence—back on its axis. Responsibility, however false, is easier to accept than the fickleness of husbands, of dead parents, of love and life. She assumes the role of the guilty to feel a sense of control, like she herself is in charge of the scale’s tip. And so:

It was Claire’s fault that the frost returned in May, all her marigold suns snuffed out.

It was Claire’s fault that the infection took the wound, gnawed the patient’s flesh so that a saw had to chop the bone.

It was Claire’s fault that midnight voices chirped down the receiver. The girls’ lovesick pleas—I need you. I love you. Leave her.—placed in Frank’s pockets by Claire’s own hands.

And of course, it was Claire’s fault that things had ended as they did. The final fight, every bit of hate, hers to claim:

“I am not an idiot, Frank! And I’m tired of being made into one.”

“Darling, you aren’t an idiot. I never said you were an idiot.”

“Don’t bloody ‘darling’ me, you bloody cad.”

“I’m sorry.”

“How novel.”

“Truly, I am.”

“So that’s it, then? Just ‘I’m sorry.’ No excuses? No begging-on-bended-knee?” (Claire had scoffed. Her laughter, like the paring knife that guts the beast.) “No, of course not. Begging would be too embarrassing for you. Too much effort. All your energy is spent chasing skirts and quick fucks. You selfish, disgusting man.”

“So I’m the only selfish one here, is that it? Just me?”

“You’re saying that I’m selfish?”

“I am.”

“Me.”

“Yes, you, Claire! You, who is always working and never here. You, who sleeps with his books under our mattress, still wears the man’s goddamn ring on a chain. Like a fucking noose around our marriage, from the start.” (Claire had winced; Frank’s knuckles had cracked the wall.) “No, I’m not selfish, Claire. I’ve shared you with another man for thirteen years.”

“So I see you’ve lost all sense, but still have some fucking nerve."

“Cursing doesn’t improve your argument.”

“Wanker.”

“Now Claire…”

“Just go.”

“Claire, please—”

“Go.”

And thus, it was Claire’s fault that Frank had whispered, “You’ve never looked at me. Not once, not really.” And it was her fault that he had grabbed his keys, slipped into the blizzard and into his car.

And it was Claire—Claire, Claire, Claire—who became the ice that hissed against tires. Who launched Frank’s body through the glass, turned his skin purple-blue and the snow dark red. Her fault that the last thing she’d said was “go”, and Frank had taken her at her very word.

All of this, she has put upon her shoulders, for its burden is lesser than the truth: that she has no control, never did and never would. Claire is forever held at the mercy of a capricious gravity—she and everyone else, a little bit helpless. Always.

But there was One Person, she often remembers, who had given her a kind of foothold. On their wedding night, she had whispered about her mother’s flower neck, about the grey bird whose wings she’d given to the Nyungwe. And he had understood, promised forgiveness for whatever wrongs she had and would commit. “Real or imagined, Sassenach” he’d said into hair, “Already forgiven.” They had spiraled through life, the pair of them, both a little bit helpless—but everything shared.

But of all of her false faults, this is one Claire fears is true: that she is the reason The One Person is not here, but some 3,000 miles away. She was, after all, the one who had packed the suitcase and caused the gavel to fall, Divorce.

All her fault: Claire Randall. The guilty one, the killing girl, the widow. Spinning and spinning into empty space, grasping at stars, alone.

*[Note from director: Ms. Claire Randall has requested we change her name to Claire Beauchamp. Please reprint with this correction ASAP. Thank you.]

______

POINT OF CONVERGENCE, 2007

Starring Jamie Fraser (The Author, The One Person), Claire Beauchamp (A More-Than-Flash Of Someone-Else, The Girl), Geordie Gibbons

JAMES FRASER does not like to disappoint. It is his greatest fear, seeing someone’s face pull, twist, and finally droop into an expression of discontent. Even worse: when the expression is given a name, “I’m so disappointed in you, Jamie.” And worst of all: when the name is given by his agent, Geordie Gibbons.

One of the most important days of Jamie’s life began in anticipation of such disappointment. He had twiddled his thumbs beneath a table, dreading the moment Geordie’s fedora ducked beneath the restaurant’s eaves. The wait staff had milled around him: A waiter dashed towards snapping fingers, the hostess offered towels for rain-soaked heads. He’d felt jealous, watching them, of their readiness—how they could be so effortlessly on time. Jamie couldn’t even manage to meet his deadlines, the desk calendar at home flipped far beyond the designated X.

Jamie and Geordie were to have “lunch” and “catch up”. This would, inadvertently, devolve into an interrogation about Jamie’s third novel, which was nothing more than a series of working titles. It was a pattern, this lateness and lunching, never changing despite the demands and promises made by both parties. Geordie would remove his hat, exposing the frown previously shadowed beneath its brim. Their food would be served—Jamie, something yeasty; Geordie, a taxidermist’s culinary experiment—and Jamie would choke down a side of his agent’s disappointment. Eventually, they would part ways, and Jamie would return home, knock out a few pages. Turn in a shitty draft the next morning for the sake of postponing a second “lunch.”

But on this day, the universe had shifted; the pattern broke. Jamie had continued to sit there, all sweat and nerves, but Geordie’s fedora, the interrogation, and the food never came.

Because while Jamie had waited in the restaurant, CLAIRE BEAUCHAMP was arguing in her bedroom mirror: Claire vs. Claire, Head vs. Heart. She was thousands of miles away in a Boston apartment, but still—the tremor traveled, pushing a storm across the Atlantic, down the Royal Mile, to Jamie. The trajectory of his day and his life had changed as Claire gesticulated wildly at her own reflection.

So at 12:14, Jamie had been alone, Geordie unusually late for a man so fond of punctuality. He read the menu three times, settled on a whisky. Thought better of it; ordered two.

At 12:30, Claire’s battle had still raged, no victor in sight. The thunder had shaken the house, shaken the mirror on the wall.

At 12:46, Jamie had condemned Geordie, then deadlines. Art, he’d fumed, was beyond time, existed outside of it. He had ordered a third whisky when a wine spill was wiped up, gone before it had the chance to leave its mark.

At 12:48, Claire had moved to the kitchen. Both armies were advancing quickly, charging into the living room, to the yard, back to the living room, over and over. She and herself, it seemed, had reached a stalemate. Head and Heart had squatted, dripping rain, and awaited the other's surrender.

At 12:50, Claire had paused and looked through the window. She caught a glimpse of her garden, reborn and thriving despite the storm, and the sight of the marigold blooms did not reveal an emptiness inside her. She felt, for once, happy. Her Heart had stormed her Head’s walls, then, the gates of decision giving way.

At 12:51, Claire had opened her scrapbook, a secret once kept from Frank. It was filled with bits and bobs: a piece of bubble wrap, a bell from her holiday sweater. Both of them glued beside old polaroids. Again, she did not feel her Heart stutter, but expand; lift straight out of her chest. A full siege after that. Her Head’s weakest men fell beneath the lash of artery whips.

At 12:52, the end was near, and Claire’s Heart marched to her computer, hunted through years of mail. Its trophy had laid buried in a folder—one message with twelve digits—and the battle, at last, was won.

At 12:53, both Jamie and his phone had buzzed. The door opened, letting in the air. It had smelled of wet soil, earthy and ripe. Familiar, like a ghost’s kiss on the back of his neck. He put the phone to his ear, and…

At 12:53:05, he said, “Jesus, man! Where are ye? I’ve been waiting nigh on 50 minutes!” There was no response.

At 12:53:08: “Did ye get caught in the storm? Are ye calling from a pay phone?” More silence.

At 12:53:13: “Hello? Anyone there?”

At 12:53:20: “Geordie, man, is that you?”

At 12:53:25: A deep, shaking breath. An audible gulp. Claire’s Heart whispering its victory song.

12:53:26: “It’s isn’t Geordie.”

12:53:27: “It’s me.”

And at 12:53:28, everywhere, suddenly—the brightest sun.

Phew! This chapter is one of the longest, but it’s also one of my favorites. The structure is lifted straight from Fates and Furies—there’s a chapter that is just a series of the protagonist’s plays—and I was looking to try something new (it also weirdly fits in with the tone of the chapter introductions). In my opinion, the best thing about writing fanfiction is that you have so much room to experiment.

This structure also allowed me to do what I’d been wanting to do from the beginning: move away from the One Day conceit and explore Jamie and Claire’s pasts. It was very easy to just run with any image or idea that came to mind—we know so little about their childhoods; there are so many possibilities!

And speaking of why fanfiction is so awesome—and I mentioned this in another post—but it’s a blast figuring out how to incorporate canon into an AU setting. Using canon dialogue can boost the emotional punch of a line in a way that is just *chef’s kiss*. “I was born for you.” “I am not as brave as I was before.” Ugh, kill me.

I have to whistle past some of the melodrama and Frank’s computer craze (wouldn’t he also be a typewriter sort of person???). And modern!Bonnie Prince Charlie’s Brazil comment still tickles me. This is not meant as an offense to Brazilians—y’all are just always on *clap* it *clap*, and I love your enthusiasm.

Anyways, hope you enjoyed :)