#no Becky it’s just a funny story it was the ONLY question I got right the entire game

[hexalene]

The person I’m reblogging this from is an excellent blogger u should follow if you’re into BNHA, and I kinda wanted to jump off some of what they’re meta-ing with a literary reference/comparison I’ve been marinating on for a while.

To address the immediate relevancy to makeste’s post tho - I think they're dead on that OFA and AFO are more intimately tied than what’s initially been pitched by the characters in the story.

I personally think they ARE the same quirk, just forced to exist in two bodies. Like half of AFO went with OFA when it was accidentally forced into Yoichi with the stockpiling quirk. Yoichi was genuinely quirkless, no hidden quirk inside him all along (which would explain how he was able to survive having multiple quirks as well).

So to destroy AFO, they’re going to have to find some way to scatter the power of OFA across the whole cast as a last minute power up (look jake, it’s a shonen) or Deku is going to die to destroy it, becoming the ultimate number one hero to save them all.

Okay fine that’s too depressing for this story, what I REALLY think will happen is that Deku will destroy OFA and become quirkless again, but be recognized as the number one ultimate hero for his sacrifice. Better yet, the LAST number one hero because they better abolish the popularity contest BS before the series ends.

Then he’ll go on to keep being a hero because those muscles were 100% natural home grown grass-fed beef that didn’t need no OFA and he’s ALREADY started been using Hatsume’s gadgets so WHAT’S STOPPING HIM

Ahem

But what I REALLY want to ramble about is the fact that the quirk is named “One For All” and “All For One”

BNHA has shown some surprising depth of knowledge and research into what’s considered traditionally “Western” history. I wouldn’t be surprised if Horikoshi was aware of the origins of the phrase “one for all and all for all.”

Not to get all literary tinfoil hat on you but I feel like the themes of the story, at least as far as the origin of OFA/AFO as well as the society of BNHA generally, fits pretty well within the circumstances The Rape of Lucretia. The poem notable for being is the origin of the phrase “one for all and all for one” before Dumas popularized it in The Three Musketeers.

Honestly based on my memory the whole poem, The Rape of Lucretia is very All For One-core. It’s his aesthetic. He’s a bit of a Tarquin. At risk of extreme tinfoil hatting, I am going to try to elaborate:

Most abbreviated summary ever, I will not lie, it has been MORE than a decade since I read this thing:

Tarquin is a powerful roman military dude with all the honor and underage boys that comes with the job. He’s got a buddy, named Lucretia’s Husband, who does nothing but sing his wife’ praises night and day.

Unbeknownst to Lucretia’s Husband, Tarquin’s other job is hating women and he refuses to believe that she wouldn’t cheat and be a scheming, conniving feeeeeemale, so he makes his way over to her place and sets about with the alpha male dude bro SEDUCTION TECHNIQUES

It fails, she’s faithful AND a courteous host (the WHORE) so instead of facing his inner demons, Tarquin goes to her room and tries to seduce her one more time. She refuses him.

Tarquin threatens her, saying if she doesn’t consent to sex, he will kill a slave and make it look like they were having sex and tell Lucretia’s Husband about it so that he thinks she cheated.

She refuses. He threatens to kill her. She refuses. Failing to get any “““““plausible deniability””””” he goes through with the act he planned to commit all along and leaves.

Lucretia waits until Lucretia’s Husband returns, makes him gather all his soldiers, then tells them the awful truth of what happened to her.

They’re enraged, and then horrified, for Lucretia then takes her own life as she can no longer live as Lucretia’s Husband’s wife now that she is impure, ensuring these muscleheads Get The Picture and don’t talk their way out of getting vengeance for her in a useless “he-said-she-said” debate.

With the message thoroughly received, the men take her body and parade her through Rome or wherever they are and rile up a massive crowd to strip Tarquin of all his glory and kill him or something. Idk it’s been a while, but it’s all very Greek Tragedy and Sad n’ Shit.

NOW TO THE POINT:

Tarquin’s….act….is shown to not be driven by lust, instead completely driven by Lucretia’s Husband’s love for his wife and the praises he sings on her openly and proudly. Tarquin professionally hates women, so he cannot believe a woman could be loyal and pure.

(ties to: AFO’s belief that society is inherently corrupt and that noble acts of heroism are actually selfish grabs for personal honor and wealth. AFO acts as a villain and creates a world that reflects his worldview. He cannot believe that hero society can exist without fundamentally being as corrupt as he is.)

Like this man cannot stand the idea that Lucretia is a woman of genuine good character and pure while her husband is away. It has nothing to do with her as a person, but her husband’s belief, faith, and optimism in the inherent goodness of society his wife.

(At this point, AFO is Tarquin, society and the heroic forces acting against him are Lucretia’s Husband…and Yoichi is Lucretia. Hm…well this comparison just got a lot grosser, sorry for the unfortunate implications)

So Tarquin sets out to prove his worldview by corrupting Lucretia. He starts by trying to seduce her and fails. Then he tries to bargain and threaten her into consenting. This also fails. In the end, he forces himself upon her, which STILL doesn’t work, and then leaves her locked up in her home oh yeah he does that too, great guy Tarquin

(Unfortunate implications aside, I hope the line between AFO trying to convince Yoichi to join his side, to imprisoning and threatening him, to finally forcing a quirk onto his body only for that to fail in corrupting him as well is clear enough.)

So, Lucretia waits until her husband returns, makes him gather his allies, THEN passes the knowledge of Tarquin’s crime to her husband. She then kills herself.

Lucretia’s body is then picked up and carried through the streets, a symbol of rage and uprising against Tarquin, and what ultimately is used to bring his downfall.

(COME ON. Yoichi is saved from his prison, brought out by the second, only to die and pass on the -tragic backstory- quirk that is carried through the eras and becomes stronger the more people carry it on and becomes the catalyst that will defeat AFO??)

Obviously you could just point to the old tinfoil hat and be like “this kinda common tragedy stuff, asshole” but then there’s the name of the quirk, One For All and All For One.

The stanza the phrase “one for all and all for one” comes from is this one in The Rape of Lucretia:

The aim of all is but to nurse the life With honour, wealth, and ease, in waning age. And in this aim there is such thwarting strife, That one for all, or all for one we gage; As life for honour in fell battle’s rage; Honour for wealth; and oft that wealth doth cost The death of all, and all together lost.

The website I pulled this from says this is intended as a description of soldiers bound nobly together for war or some shit or something but hm ME PERSONALLY I feel like I remember this describing Tarquin and men like him?

Or it’s describing the circumstances that shape men to act like he did but it’s been more than ten years and that website has cast doubts into my heart, but for the purposes of this I’m sticking to my memory and I would love it if people with a fresher memory or more education than me had thoughts on it as well.

Anyways, my recall says this stanza is referring to all the work people do to have a good life. That war destroys that life and that in conflict instead of the collective being important, with wealth and honor generated from a good life, a man like Tarquin can come in and take the honor achieved by all and make it his alone through killing and taking credit for the efforts of those in his command, granting him power he lacked before.

In other words, the honor achieved by the “all” becomes the honor of the “one” and that honor is taken ignobly to create material wealth and power for the “one”.

And when that honor is taken by the “one” and wasted dishonorably, then all of the death was for nothing as well.

AND COME ON does that not sound like AFO??

Man takes the powers of others, uses it to amass wealth and power but what for?? Crime??? Nihilism??? Villainy??? SOUNDS LIKE DISHONORABLE WASTE TO ME.

And think of the society BNHA is built on — the glory of thousands of people (heroes, yes, but also scientists, researchers, other first responders) consolidated on the shoulders of an unworthy few more interested in furthering their own gains than improving the world they’re in. It’s a society built on AFO’s ideals, a world he helped shape and is complicit in the corruption of.

….if I follow through this comparison, that puts the successors of OFA after Yoichi in the role of Lucretia’s Husband, championing her injustice and building a mob to take town Tarquin.

You could also follow through and talk about why Stain’s “murder everyone who isn’t All Might levels of purity” is worthless as the teenagers that agree with him grow up and get part time jobs instead of worrying about the logistics of serial murder, because tragedy and collective injustice are a better adhesion than impotent rage against the machine.

Hm.

That’s enough of that, here, take this tinfoil hat from me.

Do you actually believe the DFO theory? What do you think supports it? (Genuine question)

I do think Deku and AFO have a yet-to-be-revealed connection, and back in my early BnHA fandom days I did think Dad For One was a possibility. nowadays though, I'm convinced there's a different explanation for the link between them -- namely, that OFA and AFO are actually the same quirk, and Deku is effectively a horcrux of AFO. I have a post here which explains this theory more in-depth, but basically the gist of it is that OFA was never a separate quirk at all. Yoichi really was quirkless, and when AFO attempted to force a quirk on his brother, he accidentally gave him a piece of his own quirk in the process. just broke off a lil section of it, like a Kit-Kat bar.

I will say that regardless of which theory turns out to be true, there's definitely something going on between AFO and Deku. chapter 217 in particular is practically overflowing with hints that the two are linked. Katsuki sees it right from the start, and even theorizes that AFO might have something to do with the SIXQUIRKS activating. and rather than disagree, All Might simply says "I didn't want to raise that point," meaning he made the connection as well. and then they just freaking drop the entire subject never to mention it again. and Horikoshi lays this panel on us as a parting gift.

which to me is confirmation that we'll be revisiting this at some point. simply because you do not lay the symbolism on that thick without some kind of game plan for the future. this isn't merely setting up OFA and AFO as foils; this is deliberately (and ominously) drawing attention to the numerous "coincidental" similarities between their two quirks. such as the fact that OFA is the only other quirk capable of holding multiple quirks within itself. and the only other quirk capable of being passed down to another user.

not to mention there's also the as-yet-unexplained link between Deku and AFO. the fact that Yoichi can "hear" his brother, and vice-versa. back in Jakku, the pre-Danger Sense Deku somehow knew that Tomura was awake before anything had actually happened. and when Deku first activated SIXQUIRKS, AFO was somehow aware, even miles away locked up in Tartarus. and we're just supposed to pretend this is all perfectly normal and makes total sense, lol.

so yeah there is definitely some sort of reveal coming up before this all ends. but I think DFO is more likely to be a red herring at this point. Horikoshi definitely knows about the theories, and that's probably why he still hasn't revealed anything about Dekupapa. he's the Hagakure in this scenario. distract me us with speculation about her, when in reality Aoyama was the culprit all along. it's the same tactic here. convince all the fans that AFO is Deku's father, when in reality the truth is even more insidious. he's not Deku's dad -- he's Deku's quirk. and the final final boss, secretly lurking not within Tomura, but within Deku himself.

tell me that's not the perfect final showdown setup. you know it's true. you know it's coming. or at least I hope it is lol.

incidentally, during the process of typing this all up, it occurred to me that if AFO is capable of creating horcrux!quirks (which we know for a fact he is regardless of how this theory pans out, since that's essentially how TomurAFO was created)... then why not Deku as well? which immediately led me down a whole new different theory rabbit hole. that's going to have to be its own separate post, though. my mind is now going a mile a minute, holy shit. this is going to be a busy weekend.

[tmblrcolouredpaper]

Solitaire - Chapter 1

overanalyzing/-interpreting and probably pointing out the obvious... just random notes and thoughts (ca. 2100 words in the form of bulletpoints)

counting got fucked up, imma fix it later, sorry if it's confusing to read -> should be fixed now

Solitaire, a fictional story with Tori (Victoria Spring) as homodiegetic narrator

Pride and Prejudice Quotes introduce us to the tone of Tori’s story

→ we know that Tori rather identifies with mr Darcy, so lets see what we find about Mr Darcy that might tell us something about Tori before we even get to know her:

Quote 1:

‘And your defect is a propensity to hate everybody.’

‘And yours’, he replied with a smile, ‘is willfully to misunderstand them.’

→ we learn about Mr Darcy that he allegedly tends to hate everybody and that he assumes willful misunderstanding one sides of the other party

(PART 1) Quote 2:

Elizabeth Bennet: Do you dance, Mr Darcy?

Mr Darcy: Not if I can help it.

→ without having a specific pace as instance in mind, it definitely sounds like something Tori would word for word answer to a question as the one given

• Getting to know Tori, before she ‘officially’ introduces herself to the reader (p.3f)

she perceives the majority of people in school as almost dead, including herself (p.3)

→ creating the picture of a crowd that allegedly shares a tragic similarity

2. she observes her steady numbness opposed to the socially anticipated numbness as reaction to the contrast of a phase of event (here: Christmas) and the eventless phase after (p.3)

→ differentiating herself from the crowd

3. Becky says that Tori looks like she wants to kill herself (p.3) to what Tori responds with ‘It’s funny because it’s true’ (p.4); Tori describes Becky’s reaction as her looking some more without really looking (p.4)

→ Tori feels perceived by Becky, but not seen

4. Tori says she and Becky are laughing about something that isn't funny (p.4)

→ Tori’s inauthenticity

5. Becky realizes Tori’s apathy and moves away while Tori leans into her own arms and falls half asleep (p.4)

→ Becky not taking action but physically bringing some distance between Tori and her, while Tori stabilizes herself by her own strength, escaping into a state of being half asleep but also halfway remaining in reality

6. Tori’s focus on appearance and her insecurity about her own

→ changes in peoples’ appearance like in hair and makeup that make herself feel ‘inadequate’ to which she ‘deflates’ into a chair a.k.a. makes herself smaller and hides away (p.4)

Tori’s ‘official’ introduction to the reader (p.4f)

‘My name is Victoria Spring’

→ she starts off with her full name

2.she makes up a lot of stuff in her head

→ focus on reality in form of her interior world

3. likes to see, and blog, and is going to die someday

→ listing the obvious fact of dying right beside other mundane activities emphasizes the priority of that topic in her daily life

4. Rebecca Ellen as only real friend and therefore probably best friend (p.4); Tori categorizes her as a ‘popular girls’ due to being recognized and therefore popular because she has long purple hair (p.4); Tori differentiates between being known by name and known personally (p.4)

→ Tori categorizing people even her friends

→ Tori challenges the significance of being popular and its lack of guaranteeing depth and significance

→ Question: Since when are people popular in school when they have recognizable purple hair? In my experience teenagers with colored hair are the one’s being likely to be bullied by the popular ones 🙄

5. Evelyn Foley categorizes as ‘alternative’ due to her appearance (p.5)

6. Tori questions if Becky actually likes Evelyn and she believes people only pretend to like each other (p. 5)

→ does Tori think that, because she only pretends/ feels like she pretends?;

→ is Tori worried that people only pretend to like her (believes that she is so unlikable, people must pretend)?

7. Tori does not participate in Becky and Evelyn’s conversation and only reacts to them when she ‘deduces’ she’s supposed to (p.5); she feels ‘pressured’ to contribute something to the conversation (p.5); she expresses her disinterest in the current discussed topic (p.5) and believes she ruined the conversations, so she leaves

→ Tori doesn't connect naturally with people, even when she considers one of them her friends and rather feels pressured to react in certain way than feeling invited to share herself authentically

→ without Becky and Evelyn even saying anything nor showing any reaction regarding Tori impacting the conversation immensely negatively, Tori’s insecurity of not meeting expectations causes her to escape the situation right away

8. Tori says she sometimes hates people what must be bad for her mental health (p.5)

→ does she include herself in that statement like she did in the beginning (p.3)?

→ self-awareness

→ awareness of mental health (I’m just adding that, because when I was her age ‘mental health’ was not a term that was used too often yet nor truly cared about/ talked about, so in my reality it is somewhat remarkable that Tori observes herself and immediately evaluates whether her thoughts could be detrimental to her health, that she immediately makes that connection; I also wonder if that’s caused by being confronted with mental health due to Charlie being such a big part of her life)

9. Tori focuses on ‘social hierarchy’ in school (p.5)

→ categorizing her social environment

10. ‘shoot me in the face’ (p.5)

→ another self-detrimental joke/ phrase

→ radical way of thinking and agains with the worst outcome for herself in mind

11. Tori not feeling pretty in school uniform (p.6)

→ insecurity about her appearance

the plot commences or Tori in action

Tori sees and follows post-it (p.6)

→ she observes and takes action

2.other people don’t see post it; ‘…or they don’t care. I can relate to that.’ (p.6)

→ people oblivious; Tori differentiated from people

→ Tori can relate to the general sense of not caring, however in this case she does care contrary to her words; at least she cares enough to register the post-it and actively follow it

3. doing stuff that other people don't seem to care about makes Tori feel like she is doing something important (p.7); ‘mainly because no one else is doing it’ (p.7)

→ differentiating herself from others

→ paying attention to things that seemingly don't get attention (Is that an interior wish of hers as she feels like not truly being payed attention to?)

→ shows her trait of not leaving things (or people) alone by themself (Charlie)

→ she cares, she seeks out moments of significance

4. she’s rather paying attention to the game Solitaire than to the IT class (p.8)

→ solitaire = alone, isolated

→ again, paying attention to what others don't

→ literally involving with what’s alone, while being alone doing so; isolating herself from her surrounding by seeking out what’s isolate; bonding over isolation

→ she also evaluates that playing Solitaire does more for her intelligence than paying attention to the IT lesson (p.8) → being alone appears to be more beneficial to her

5. Michael enters the room and verbally registers the room first (p.8)

6. Tori thinks that he registers her only after he scanned the inanimate parts of the room (p.9)

7. Tori judges Michael’s appearance (p.9)

8. Michael ‘absorbs’ Tori’s face (p.9)

→ not just ‘looking’ or ‘seeing’, he literally takes her in from her perspective

9. ‘his eyes flare up’ + ‘I swear to Got they double in size’

→ most animated way Tori has described something yet

→ (I love the eye flaming up phrase so much!)

10. ‘leaps towards me like a pouncing lion’ (p.9)

→ comparison

→ wildness, strength

→ movement towards her (contrary to the last described encounter in which Becky, her allegedly best friend physically moves away from her)

11. ’ fiercely enough that I stumble backward in fear that he might crush me completely’ (p.9)

→ it is possible that Michael actually moves in such exaggerated manner, but it might also be such a drastic contrast to Tori that she uses such strong wordings to describe him due to not being used that people react so strongly to her

→ the unfamiliarity of Michaels demeanor overwhelms Tori

12. ‘he leans forward’; ‘face only centimeters away from mine’ (p.9)

→ Michael leans into Tori’s presence

13. Tori sees herself in Michael’s glasses

→ she sees herself first when she’s forced to look at him closely

14. ‘He grins violently’ (p.9)

→ I just love that sentence, okay. Michael just has such a strong presence, especially in a place like school that Tori keeps describing as ‘dull’ (p.6). So many contrasts that crystallize characteristics.

15. ‘’Victoria Spring’, he cries’ + big arms thrown in the air movement (p.9)

→ he celebrates that he found her

16. Tori stay quiet and ‘has a headache’ (p.9)

→ contrast to Michael’s reaction; her lack of reaction

→ overwhelm?, confusion?; hating people?

17. Tori finds her picture awful (p.10)

→ insecure about her appearance

18. ‘It’s like I don’t even have a face’ (p.10 )

→ lack of identity, significance?; hidden away

19. ‘Michael steps back a little’ but only to give her back her personal space (p.10)

→ he moves away, but remains as close as possible without irrupting Tori’s comfort unnecessarily

20. Michael’s ‘insane smile’ (p.10)

→ Tori describing/ judging his appearance (she’s so obsessed with his smile, haha)

21. ���Everything lit up like it’s on fire’; ‘He notices me looking too’; ‘’It’s like it’s pulling you out, isn't it?’’ (p.11)

→ the foreshadowing, hehe

→ he notices her actions/ immersion/ interest and reacts to it by directly talking to her

22. ‘You are definitely Tori Spring, aren’t you’. ‘This should be a question, but he says it like he’s already known for a long time’ (p.12)

→ he does know her from when he showed her around at school last year; Tori doesn't know that they already met yet

→ without knowing, she intuitively interprets his words correctly; he knows she’s Victoria Spring, he recognizes her and has known about her for a long time

23. contrast of interest level regarding the solitaire case/ mystery (p.12)

Tori calling the day ‘pointless’ (p.13)

→ Tori lost interest I the post-it and blog the second Michael joined the moment; she already stated that she finds significant in moments no one but her is involved in and with Micheal now being another person paying attention to the post-it, Tori’s attention isn't the solely presence anymore ergo she looses interest and a feeling of significance

24. Tori feels deeply for Michael’s sudden sadness (p.13)

→ she can’t but care

25. Tori doesn't know what to do (p.13)

→ the post-it task lost significance due to Michael ruining her solidarity, but now Michael she is alone with him and the only one who is paying attention to him, therefore his sudden reaction forces her to go through a sudden shift as well, him bringing a sense of significance

→ Tori’s apathy and confusion collide with the rollercoaster of the situation

26. ‘You don’t say anything you mean’ (p.15)

→ Michael doesn't know Tori yet sees through her

27. Tori describes her laugh as a ‘pathetic sort of expulsion of air’ (p.15)

→ emphasis of her insecurity by choice of words connoting a neutral thing such as a chuckle or laugh

28. ‘Who are you, Victoria Spring?’ (p.15) - ‘I am nothing’ (p.15)

→ we just got an introduction by Tori beyond only her name and now she states she does not know how to answer that question beyond listing her name

→ insecurity, low self-worth

→ also, the fact that she thinks so deeply about how she could possibly answer that question by a stranger, just to realize how she does not feel like being anything/ anyone more worthy than ‘nothing’, instead of not caring and walking away, well, proves that she does care; she listens and thinks and doesn't find an answer that she evaluates as satisfying

29. she doesn't know at on point Michael hands her the post-it before he vanishes;

‘This is probably how it starts’

→ with a moment of significance (her own definition of significance in moments of seemingly being the only one paying attention and taking action)

→ with being seen and looked at and talked with (encounter with Michael)

→ by taking action as one’s own decision (following post-it)

→ by being recognizes (by Micheal)

→ by an unfamiliar encounter in an otherwise familiar and dull place

→ by being confronted with oneself (seeing herself in his glasses; being asked who she is)

Analepsis

Tori became form leader by getting volunteered ‘mostly because no one else wanted to do so’ (p.9f)

→ taking action when others don’t

2. Tori’s hair cut story (p.14f)

→ her inner tumult and its exterior display

[pridepages]

Storytelling: Imogen, Obviously

I just finished Imogen, Obviously by Becky Albertalli. I have thoughts...

Here there be spoilers!

Our lives are made up of the stories we tell. Narrative is how we make sense of the random events that occur and the feelings they inspire. We take the chaos and we impose order. Give it structure.

Slap a label on it.

I’ll be the first to tell you how important and empowering queer storytelling is. Control of the narrative is a form of power, and for centuries cisheterosexual society has tried to control our narratives by silencing them.

Little by little, we’re taking back the mic, the pen, the keyboard. We’re getting our stories out there, sending them out to let other queer people know: we see your experience. You are not alone.

So stories are powerful tools to help us define ourselves and find our people. But if stories help us define queerness...can they also confine it?

Enter Becky Albertalli with her newest YA novel Imogen, Obviously. Meet Imogen Scott: she’s the Best Ally Ever. Her sister is a queer woman. Both of her best friends are queer women. Imogen loves everything about them and about the gay culture around them. Imogen also feels a little funny, a little stung, whenever someone brings up the fact that she’s Straight. It’s almost like the label is being forced on her when it doesn’t fit...

“I’ve never quite been able to pin it down. The way queerness announces itself,” Imogen reflects. “How it seems so intuitive for people. How people just seem to know...There have to be some sort of visible markers of queerness. Otherwise, how could so many people know at a glance that I’m straight?”

That phrasing rings so many alarm bells...it’s not ‘I know I’m straight.’ It’s other people. Other queer people who draw the lines and set the rules of engagement.

It’s funny because it’s true. There are queer people who can say with the same breath: ‘it’s okay to question your identity!’ and ‘straight people need to stay out of queer safe spaces!’ It’s Schrodinger’s Gay--until you come out of the closet, you’re somehow both and neither.

Take Gretchen, one of Imogen’s best friends who talks like she’s terminally online and basically embodies the Schrodinger’s Gay approach. I give full credit to Albertalli for giving us a complex antagonist. Gretchen’s assumptions that straight is the default and absolute refusal to give any unlabeled person the benefit of the doubt is caused by the fact that she regularly experiences homophobia. Readers feel simultaneously furious watching her shove Imogen into the closet and sympathetic because we understand it comes from a place of envy for anyone with that mythical ‘straight passing privilege.’ For people like Gretchen, there’s one way to be gay. If you don’t fit the standard model, then you can’t be real.

For girls like Imogen...girls like me...this line of thinking is very, very dangerous.

Because it turns out that feelings and desires aren’t completely intuitive. We have to learn how to read them, how to put names on them...in effect, how to label them. And we need to be taught how. As it turns out, queer girls can be handed a lot of cracked lenses through which to see their own sexuality distorted...

Here are some of the ones I heard growing up.

“Everyone likes to look at women. They’re objectively more attractive than men.”

“You’re just too mature to be boycrazy.”

“You’ll feel it when the right man comes along.”

“Of course you feel intense about your friends...friends are more important than boys because they last forever!”

“Straight girls like when other girls touch/kiss them because it makes them feel a little wild.”

“If you’re gay, you just know. Because gay people are born that way.”

So that guilty, eager feeling I got looking at the Victoria’s Secret window just meant I was perverse.

And I was smart for not getting why my friends lost their heads over guys.

It didn’t matter that I only liked boys as friends. That funny feeling I got around my third grade teacher couldn’t be a crush.

It was normal that I hated all my best friend’s boyfriends.

It was cliche that tequila made me loose enough to like it when other girls grabbed my chest at college parties.

I wasn’t gay...

Because if I was, then I would already know. 

I’d have grown up a little tomboy who hated girly things. I’d have identified some sort of unattainable crush and suffered from homophobia and consciously silencing myself. I’d gravitate toward flannel and the Indigo Girls and have pictures of famous women pinned up on my walls. Because that’s what Real Gay Girls did...

Right?

“It's like there's this idea that you have to earn your label through suffering. And then you have to prove it with who you date, how you dress, how other people perceive you,” Imogen explains. And she’s absolutely right. This idea that there is some kind of ‘right’ way to be gay poisons our brains and makes us feel like imposters in our own bodies.

For years, I thought the reason I kept failing every time I forced myself to try dating men was because I was a Broken Heterosexual.

Those words actually appeared in my brain.

Like that is a real thing a person can be.

People like me are in desperate need of stories like Imogen’s. Because it is long past time to break the mold. This cultural pressure to perform identity the ‘right’ way leads to internalized homophobia. We police ourselves, struggle with imposter syndrome and insist we must be making up our feelings.

Screw that. Here’s Imogen’s lesson for anyone who needs to hear it: No one knows you better than you know yourself.

Only you know what you feel right now. Only you know when your feelings are evolving. You are the only person who gets to label you because YOU are the authority.

And to anyone who dares to say otherwise, I’m holding up this bit of wisdom from Imogen: “promise to hold space for variation.” Because we aren’t one narrative. We’re a library.

So keep sharing your stories.

I can’t wait to read them all.

[brick-a-doodle-do]

Hmmmmmmmmm

Irza definitely has a temper but he also has the "I really don't care" behavior. If he caught Vara he probably wouldn't hurt the cat, he'd be more confused bc fairies exist in that world but fairies are actually treated horribly and used in potions.....he'd wonder why a wingless fairy (which isn't too strange since some will just have wings taken and then be tossed aside...) has cat features and is even in his house. But that's it the borrower was actually living in his house.—There's also the chance he finds the borrower outside, which would mainly end with him staring and walking away unless an accident got Vara into a pocket or bag...

And if he was caught? Irza wouldn't touch it, he'd use his shadows and just trap their legs in place. Then you'd have to get through his questioning bc there's no way he wouldn't be suspicious of a tiny person in his house

Some thoughts I had for aus would mainly be Irza as the giant bc yes...and I'd make several different ones, I love first meetings and I can't decide which one is better so I'll use em all. Vara would be the gentlest giant but he'd get his hands really chewed on by Irza, that guy won't change at all! The ideas go from doing crossovers to my fairy story, borrower, and even just someone shrinking them. There's so many powers in their world, who's to say someone can't change the sizes of things?

And I didn't even realize the nom compatible thing with Irza until recently

Vara finding tiny little villain Voidshire instead of a fight and having to argue with himself over whether to turn him in or help him...btw tho bc of Vara's mixed races he has huge cat instincts so that would be possible for like mouthplay but probably not anything more, you just gotta be careful bc he reacts to everyone like that...but he's so nice he catches bugs and mice and releases every one outside. Irzayn hates mice bc of them eating his homework the one time (which was just a really funny canon thing), but this also means if he doesn't see that the borrower is humanoid he could very well kill them by impulse

Song that fits Vara: Luke Bryan—Most people are good

We all love the sweet Varazae cat

And if that's what you think~~ Ezephr would say thank for mwahahaha (there is such a deep reason that mixes all of the above into that answer bc he'd be smiling while being killed and thanking his killer)

okay okay you got me to read it and of course now i have to answer

whaa fairies exist?? elaborate?? what purpose do they serve??? also in and case i love that they do bc i can imagine vara being pretty lost if irza ever addresses his confusion- (as a borrower, would vara know about fairies?)

OOO tinies falling into bags is the BESTTTTT (btw becky if you see this, you somehow always manage to stroll right down my alley every single time with your fics!!! how do you do that?? it's so cool >:DDD or. new theory. you writing the fics makes the trope automatically top tier because you wrote it :00)

AHHHH i loveeeeee the shadow thing oh my GOD that would be so confusing for vara and AJJFSAJSDJ ksdkasdasdasdsads multiple hands in g/t is rarely touched but i think it's pretty cool- i mean i know it's not directly irza's hands but STILL that concept is just /pos to me :D

ah yes the good ol' interrogating a terrified borrower :D <3

yesss g!irza >:3c

AHHH these ideas are all so lovely and LMAO for irza eating vara's fingers AJVDS i bet he'd try and get vara's claws to use for personal use like a new and improved hook JDSJ (the only thing on my mind when i type that is the line from 30 rock "gimmie your fingernails!" "no!" LMAOAOO)

i like the lane of someone having sizeshifting powers. maybe some person is tired of their hero/villain bickering and just shrink one of them to force them to stop and focus on something else FDLDSJAJA

aw everyone just finds all the right g/t buttons for me- fucking tinies helping their human? FUCK YEAH!!!

LMAO they ate his homework??? 😭😭 that is genuinely the best thing i have heard about this au ever- it's the useless bit of canon that makes my brain go brrrrrr like that thing with curiositybur will never fail to make me happy. the fact that serenityinnit just walks around staring at the world like he's never seen it before (which he hasn't) is FUNNY and USELESS but the BEST

ooooooo vara's gotta run off of reflexes then, let's hope he survives!

OO that's a cool song! usually country isn't my jam (is that considered country?) but that is an exception fs!

yesyesyeys beloved catboy

and hmhmhhmhmmhmhmmhhmmhm love him smiling, i strive to be ezephr when i'm being killed :D

[fa-by]

Hi Faby I have a question L said that she knew she was queer when she fell in love with her best friend when she was 15 and that her and L started to have a physical connection when she was 15 and I know everyone says that she was talking about C because L met C for the first time when she was still 15 but to me that doesn't make sense because L and C only started to get closer after L turned 16 and her and C basically just met so how could she be talking about C?

Hi to you, dear Anon 👋🏼😄 I know it doesn’t seem to make sense because the narrative’s goal is to confuse you and get you on their side by making you abandon the ship. You have to pay attention to the details and what they say because there are always flaws in the stories that our Camren are forced to tell. But don’t worry, I’m here. I’ve already talked about it many times, but I’ll explain it again to make you understand better and answer your ask at the same time.

So. During Becky G’s ‘En La Sala’ podcast (October 28, 2020), Lauren said she realized she was queer because she fell in love with her best friend when she was 15 and they started having a physical relationship. She forced herself to think that kissing and sleeping with her friend every once in a while was just a funny thing and nothing important; something that she has ‘normalized’ in her head by justifying it as something that ‘straight girls do’, and therefore fueling her internalized homophobia. Personally speaking, I believe in this. Not in the ‘she fell in love’ part because Laur’s still forced to say that the only girl she has ever loved is Lucy, but I believe Lauren and Lucy really did everything L said. Lucy was the first real unlock thanks to which Laur experienced the attraction and the feelings towards the girls she’d always felt and hidden deep inside herself. I firmly believe that Lucy was the first girl among her crushes on girls Laur acted on, and with whom she experimented in secret given the environment in which they both grew up and which still surrounded them at the time.

Now, the time frame in which this experimentation happened. Paul Martinez, the one she believed was her first love and whom she believed she would marry, broke up with her in late July 2011, and she only managed to move on when she wrote a song about how she felt on September 17th of that same year. Lucy moved back to Puerto Rico in February 2012, returning to visit Miami occasionally (that’s why the fetus pictures with Lucy and Camren at Laur’s house). Therefore, the time frame in which that experimentation happened, is from the end of September 2011 to February 2012. It could’ve happened in all those four months, or only in two, or only in one. Who knows. But that’s the time frame. Time frame during which Laur was 15 years old.

Having explained this, let’s move on. Camren first met during the first phase of the audition, the ‘cattle call’, on May 1, 2012, in Greensboro, North Carolina. You know? Where that short and really cute conversation started by Mila happened: “Hi, I like your shirt”, “Thanks. I like your jacket”. But it ended up there because they didn’t become friends from that day. They didn’t exchange phone numbers and they therefore didn’t even spend time together at home in Miami. They were still just two strangers who had auditioned for a TV show to pursue their dreams like so many other people. Oh and, on May 1, 2012, Laur was still 15, and Mila had turned since almost two months; therefore they were both 15 years old. The moment they became friends by no longer detaching one from the hip of the other, was two months later, on July 25 in Miami, when they met for the first time for the first day of boot camp (L went to C: “You’re the Cuban girl!”). On July 25, 2012, Lauren had by then turned 16 for nearly a month, and Camila was still 15.

Now let’s move on to the biggest miscalculated mistake that, either they made her say, or Laur herself said; perhaps even deliberately and not by mistake. On June 26, 2020, and therefore before the podcast with Becky, the PAPER Magazine article was released. In that article, Lauren explained, along with other things, that she’d been in love with her best friend for seven years. But the calculations don’t add up, for two things to be exact.

First thing: The Laucy narrative includes that A) Laur fell in love with her sure, Jan at 15 when they kissed and hooked up during parties.

P.S. Is it just me, or does this smell like what actually started happening to Camren the following year? I mean, the Like Friends Do situation whereby Laur got out of her internalized homophobia and realized she loved her and then got her head out of her ass by finally going to get her girl? No? Just me?

B) The wanting but not being able to be with her and giving her what she wanted made them grew apart not by her choice and not because Lucy returned to live in Puerto Rico and they simply grew apart for the distance and Lauren’s busy schedule with 5H, no, no.

P.S. I don’t know about you, but this still smells like Camren’s story to me.

C) Lucy returned to her life after she had a car accident on May 17, 2015:

“She came back into my life when I was 18. I was on tour and I was in my room in a hotel somewhere and she called me”. From that moment on, Lauren decided they would’ve been together “all in” and “now we’re gonna be in this relationship”. Yeah, sure. No contract that was supposed to help both of them involved here. No, no.

D) They broke up because Laur confirmed that theirs was a very toxic relationship, and the specific reason she gave was because they both weren’t fully healed from the past yet, but that they still loved each other very much. Mmmh-hmm, okay 🥱😴 Yeah, no, yeah, sorry. I fell asleep as a result of hearing bullshit.

Second thing: Ty.

Shall we reveal the miscalculation (again)? In love with her at 15, got together with her at 18 and broke up at 20 (1 year and 8 months, from mid-May 2015 to mid-January 2017), and after less than a month, start of another PR dating Ty. Now, 20 minus 15 (Laur’s two ages from the beginning to the end of the ‘story’), how much is it? 5. Shall we calculate from the moment of Laucy experiment to when they ‘broke up’? From late September 2011 to mid January 2017, how many years are? 5! 5 years and four months to be exact. According to the logic of the narrative, if she was oh so in love with Ty as they made her proclaim every two seconds, it means that she’d stopped loving Lucy that same year, and it’s not 7 years anyway! It’s still 5! Do we want to try with two last calculations? Okay. Also because you may have wondered: “Faby, what if we instead calculated from when ‘they got together’ to the release of that PAPER Magazine article?”. I’d answer that it’s still 5 years. From mid-May 2015 to June 25, 2020, it’s 5 years and 1 month to be exact. “Faby, what if we tried to calculate from the beginning to the publication of the article?” From the end of September 2011 (beginning of the time frame of the Laucy experimentation) to the publication of the article on 25 June 2020, it’s 8 years and 9 months to be precise. Not even in this case it’s 7! So, as you can see… And at this point I wonder: is there an alternate world where math calculations lead to 7 and not 5 here? What was that? Why say 7? Well.. I actually know why.

Shall we play another little math game? Can I reveal the truth in the lie? Let’s try to make sense of this 7 together now.

Lauren explained that she’d been in love with her best friend for 7 years in that interview, right? The interview with PAPER Magazine came out on June 26, 2020, but was done before the date it was released. We all know Laur was born on the 27th, and therefore in both cases, Laur was 23. And tell me, dear, how much is 23 minus 7? Sorry, I can’t hear your answer. A little louder please? Got it, got it. Can I also write it for everyone else who’s reading? Okay, thanks: 16. Wait, 16??? So who was Lauren actually talking about? Ohhh. How foolish of me. That’s why it ‘smelled like what actually started happening to Camren the following year’ to me. Because Laur was talking about Camila all along 🤦🏻‍♀️

🤣😏😎

Sarcasm and jokes aside, do you see how easy it is to manipulate and confuse people's ideas? It's still 7 years if we calculate from mid-January 2013 (after the first real New Year's kiss and the signing of the contracts with Syco/Epic) to the release of that PAPER Magazine article on June 25, 2020. And it's still 7 years even if we calculate from July 25, 2012 (first day of boot camp) to June 25, 2020. Camila is the answer to the 7 years because even if they try to make Laur modify the narrative by making her change the names with the PRs' ones, she's always talking about Mila anyway in reality.

Does it make more sense now, dear? I hope I’ve taken away all your doubts 🥰 Stay safe and have a good day 🤗 You guys too ❤

[billiewena]

for the 100k fic celebration, here a portion of the “what if 10x05 had a sastiel agenda?” AKA lil shit sam/jealous dean destiel fic I first shared a while back! been having a lot of fun basically rewriting and expanding on the entire musical episode with new songs (and lots of cute kristen & siobhan moments because OF COURSE they’re still a couple.) it was really encouraging to see the positive response to it back then and it's been taking forever because of work/other writing but I’m so excited to have this one be the first full-length fics I ever post.

It starts with costumed teenagers locked in a tight embrace with absolutely no room for Jesus.

“What are they doing?”

Marie glances over her shoulder for only a brief second.

“Kids these days call it hugging,” she says slowly. Geez, it would’ve been less insulting for her to just outright say Wow, you’re old.

Except it’s not just any of the show’s stars hugging over there. One of them is the “Dean” who’d been mid-rehearsal when they arrived and looked more like Bieber than him with the blonde wig. And the other? Well, he would recognize that Columbo coat anywhere.

“Is that in the show?” he asks, pointing their way.

Marie quickly shakes her head at the accusation. “Oh, no. Siobhan and Kristen are a couple in a real life.”

He nods and lower his hand. Got it. That’s all it was. Everything’s fine. Nothing to worry about—

“No, my play explores the nature of Sastiel.”

“The — wait, what?” he says, confused at once.

“Sastiel?” Marie pauses, giving him a second to figure it out. He doesn’t. “You know, the relationship between Sam and Castiel?”

Dean blinks.

“Sam and…C-Cas?”

“I know, I know. Edlund’s series never finished. I’m lucky I got these drafts. Ugh, it’s Midnight Sun all over again. But the love story is all in the subtext,” she says with confidence. “Can you believe there are people who still think Destiel is endgame? After everything that happened after the angels fell? After Gadreel? Please.”

He silently sounds out the word. Des-tiel? Wait…

“Ever since Cas came back from the dead and took on Sam’s pain, I knew. I just knew. Every one of their arcs had been parallel to each other’s from their fall from grace to the trials. And now with Dean gone, all they have…is each other.”

Marie sighs. “Besides, you can’t spell subtext without S-E-X.”

He coughs and nearly chokes on an asteroid-sized lump in his throat.

“I…uh. Yeah, th-that’s not…you know, I think I’ve seen enough,” Dean says with a forced smile. “Thank you for your, ah, time. I’ll, uh, we’ll follow up if we have questions about the missing persons case. I—alright.”

And with that he purses his lips, turns on his heel and walks away — nearly tripping over one of the stage chords as he does. Why are there are so many of them anyways? This is just some all-girls school production, not the goddamn West End.

He finds Sam in his natural nerd habitat (the tech booth) sifting through all the bins of A/V supplies.

“Yeah, not to interrupt the blast from the past here but it’s time for us to go,” he says, patting the door.

His brother shoots him an annoyed look but packs up and follows him out all the same. Not that Dean bothers to wait for him; no, he makes a beeline for the car as soon as he leaves the booth.

“Hey, what’s with the rush?” Sam calls after him as he runs to catch up with him at the school entrance.

“No rush,” he says shortly. “Just wanted to see what you found out before you got too lost in the nerd sauce over there.”

He doesn’t need to look back to know he’s on the receiving end of a Classic Sam Bitchface right now and continues to stomp his way through the parking lot.

“Well, no EMF, no hex bags. None of their props are remotely hinky. Talked to Maeve and all those extras in the auditorium.” Sam finally catches up and walks side-by-side with him now. “You have any more luck?”

“Nah. Ms. Chandler's office is just a pile of empty bottles and regret. She's probably just face down in a bar somewhere. Or a ditch. I did get to hear all about the director’s, ah, creative vision though,” Dean says, teeth gritted. “Apparently we go into space, I become a woman, and there’s even ninjas and robots!”

“Robots. Huh. Well, that’d definitely be a new one.”

“There’s no robots in Supernatural—”

“I-I know that,” Sam says in exasperation. “I just mean it’s, y’know, innovative. And Dean we’ve fought weirder. Remember the teddy bear? The fairies? The ballet shoes?”

“Well, you just wait until you hear about what she in store for you, Lover Boy,” he says.

And that makes Sam do an instant double-take.

“Uh, Lover Boy?”

“Yeah, your number one fan back there —” he says, gesturing back towards the school, “— was telling me all about the play’s, uh, love story between you and Cas. You got something you’ve been meaning to tell me or what?”

“The love story? Wait, what do you mean me and Cas?”

Dean scoffs, already in utter disbelief of the words he was about to say. “Like you and Cas, together. Together together? Romance of the ages the way she made it sound. Apparently it’s all in her play!”

To his surprise though, Sam just… laughs. “Well, I mean hey, that’s an improvement from the ones who wrote about me and you.”

“You got that right,” he agrees with a shudder. Meeting one Becky the Stalker was bad enough. Knowing she wasn’t alone and that she had an audience made it even worse. “She even had a portmanteau for you, dude. Like you’re some celebrities in a grocery store tabloid. Sass-tiel.”

“Sass-tiel?” He seems to seriously consider it but shrugs. “I don’t know. What about… Samstiel? CasSam? Cam? Mmm, maybe not that…”

Dean groans. “Really? That’s your issue with this?”

“Of course it’s not my issue,” Sam says. He stays pensive for a few more seconds until chuckling again to himself this time, as if he’s the only one in on a private joke. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, Cas is great but…”

“Not your type?”

“Yeah, sure,” Sam says. No, it’s definitely more than that and he’s doing a piss-poor job of hiding his amused expression.

Dean turns and stares him down. “What?”

“I dunno,” he says, his smirk fully visible now. “I just think it’s funny they’re pairing me up with Cas when the one with the ‘profound bond’ with him is right there.”

“Oh, haha. You’re hilarious,” Dean retorts at once.

“Hey man, I’m not the one who stayed in Purgatory for a year to find him.”

His glare takes on a murderous edge.

“Okay. You know what? You’re going to do that thing where you just shut the hell up! Forever!”

Sam holds up his hands in either what’s either a show of innocence or surrender.

“Alright, alright. Well, other than the Charlie Kaufman of it all I got nothing.”

“So…what?” Dean says. “This-this all... This whole musical thing, everything, it's... it's all a coincidence? There is no case?”

“Unless you're seeing something I'm not, no, Dean. There's no case here,” he says sincerely this time.

“Come on. This has classic Trickster vibes all over it.” He almost wants to turn around and start yelling, Come on out Gabriel you bastard!

“Trickster’s dead, man. And he wasn’t just a trickster, he was an archangel. And they’re all gone too.”

“Could be a lower-rank angel?” Dean tries. “I mean, Zachariah pulled off an entire apocalypse world. And that place where we were both corporate drones. Before you know it, this’ll get all Buffy and it’ll be me and you singin’ and dancin’—“

“Dean…I think it’s just fans. Look, as long as they’re not putting another love spell on one of us I couldn’t really care less what they’re doing,” Sam says with some bitterness, clearly not looking back at that particular memory with any fondness. “Just writing some songs? I mean, it’s innocent enough.”

“Oh yeah, so innocent,” he scoffs. “They’re singing about our dead parents, your demon blood bender, the apocalypse, all of it! This is just…it’s make-believe for them! But it’s our lives!”

Sam runs a tired hand through his hair. “Look, I don’t get it either man. I wasn’t exactly thinking about the books’ entertainment value while Chuck was describing my sex life in vivid detail—“

“Don’t remind me,” he says, holding up a hand in disgust.  

“—but I dunno. There’s obviously something about it they connected to, right? Something they related to, something that moved them, inspired them? And I guess…I mean, what’s wrong with that?”

There is so, so much wrong with that.

“I don’t know what story they’re reading and what Sam and Dean they’re ‘connecting’ to here. But it sure as hell ain’t us. I mean…they even made me blonde, dude.”

“It’s a high school play, what can you expect?” Sam laughs. “It was probably the closest wig they could find at Party City.”

Dean ignores him, muttering aloud as he makes his way to the driver’s seat.

“The hair…the singing…the robots… the love story…”

“You really were bothered by that, weren’t you?” Sam gives his brother a curious look.

“SUPERNATURAL ISN’T A ROMANCE!” Dean snaps. “Look, these girls obviously don’t know what they’re talking about—“

“I dunno, Dean,” Sam said in a clearly taunting voice now. “Maybe you’re just jealous of what me and Cas have.”

He flushes. “W-what? I-I’m not—“

“We could give you two a name too, y’know? So you don’t feel left out? What about…Dee-stiel? CasDean?”

And he refuses to entertain this conversation any longer.

“Shut your face! Get in the car!”

Thankfully Sam notices the shift in tone and obliges at once.

Dean, meanwhile, takes a moment outside the car to glance around — almost as if checking to see if anyone overheard that comment. Not that it mattered. Who could overhear? No one even knew they were THE Sam and THE Dean. Who cared? He certainly didn’t care. He didn’t care at all...

(to be continued)

[thefanficmonster]

Never Satisfied [Chapter 4]

Corpse Husband x Original Female Character

Warnings: Language

A collaboration between Vy & Ashens 🖤

“there’ll be a next time...right?“

Corpse and Cora have found a nice secluded picnic table outside the restaurant, out in the sun rays’ path enough for the warmth of the day to be caressing their skin while simultaneously being a safe distance away from the other people enjoying their lunch. Their meal has just arrived, bringing a large grin to Cora’s face.

“So?” She asks as she chews the bite she took without waiting even thirty seconds. Her feet are on the bench, legs crossed, elbows rested on her knees as she chomps down, happily perched in front of him.

Corpse is enraptured by her. He’s staring a little, desperately trying to keep it subtle, hands still holding the small bag of food as he peers at her, a hood over his dark curls. Even in this quiet little part of town, he still doesn’t feel safe showing his whole face - no mask, no eyepatch, no privacy and sense of security. But as his eyes take in his lunch partner, her calm aura and leisure attitude, he can’t help but admit that his heart quickens a little. The girl moves with the grace of someone not afraid to kick ass and he is simply awestruck by her beauty and outward powerful aura. He’s never before been so captivated by a person - someone so different and so similar to him simultaneously.

Swallowing nervously, he reminds himself that she has taken on the role of his checkpoint, something like a friend, a hand to hold if he starts feeling anxious. Even if it’s just for today, he appreciates it wholeheartedly. It’s more than he’s ever been offered by others. That type of comfort is something he hasn’t felt in a long time. Surprising himself when his hand reaches out to touch her free one, he’s surprised yet again when he finds the touch so familiar and welcoming, so natural.  Despite it being just a brief movement, his knuckles softly brushing against her wrist before withdrawing and returning his focus to his meal, it is so meaningful and soothing, he’s afraid he might get used to it. Addicted to it. 

Half expecting a comment or a look, he is taken aback when she doesn’t give any sort of reaction. No movement, no expression change, just curiously watching him while she eats, waiting for his response to her previous dubious question.

 “So?” He rumbles softly, fishing out his lunch from the confines of the little paper bag. He isn’t sure what type of answer he should be expecting but he’s sure he won’t be disappointed regardless.

“Tell me about yourself! You’re not all rumbles, fear and BONES, right? You’ve gotta have a personality under that black hoodie.” She says enthusiastically, her eyes glimmering as though she’ll dig the answers out of him with her gaze alone. He’s not sure whether he’d prefer that or not. He doesn’t like talking about himself but he has an even stronger distaste for the idea of her seeing some information he’d rather keep hidden. Good thing she doesn’t seem to be capable of telepathy, but even that wouldn’t be too odd for her.

His cheeks flush faintly and he looks down for a moment to take the first bite of his food, buying himself some time to think and formulate a proper sentence. He racks his brain, looking for what would be the most vague yet satisfactory answer. 

What am I? I mean, all she stated is true, I definitely am all that...but I have a hard time coming up with what else I am? What else makes me me?  Youtube? Anxiety? Suicidal ideations hidden underneath liquor?

“I um...dropped out of school at, like, thirteen.” He finally speaks, mumbling around the small bite he worked on swallowing. 

Cora’s eyes widen and her brows shoot up. Now he is nervous, his anxiety slowly starting to creep in as he’s worrying if he has said something wrong. Or something that she could be disgusted by. 

Who would want to talk to some grown ass man who couldn’t even make it to highschool? How fucking sad is that? She has all right to judge me for it. 

However, unlike everybody else in his life who’s given him a frown of pity while internally thinking of how absolutely fucked up he had to be to drop out so young, Cora spared him from the pitiful glance he has grown to hate so much. Instead, he sees something alike amazement on her face as she sips her drink before saying:

“Damn dude, that’s intense. I mean, it sucks cause I can’t imagine you had a normal childhood if you’re bailing from school that young but, nowadays, who among us actually had a real childhood? Very few, I’d say.” She grins, putting down the soda can, her eyes leaving his for only the briefest of moments instead of the familiar awkward eye-contact avoidance he’d face when this topic would be nudged during a conversation. Still, the relief and skepticism in Corpse can never end their war so easily - there’s still that shred of doubt that she’s just good at hiding her pity or judgement. Nevertheless, she continues, “You’re doing well for yourself, you’re in an ok place right now, right? Isn’t that what matters?.” She concludes, touching his fingers as a form of yet another subtle reassurance. 

He looks down and finds himself ever so carefully curling one of his fingers around hers, just briefly before he draws back fearfully. “Yeah...guess having an apartment in a shitty part of town, and a car that seems to attract criminals could be considered ‘doing okay’.” He smiles faintly under his hood and she laughs, that bubbly little noise that he is slowly realizing he wants to hear more of. 

“You got a car, that’s more than I have.” Cora pokes her tongue out with a little growl before leaning down to take another bite of her lunch. “So, you like music and aren’t a narc. What else you got up your sleeve?”

Corpse smiles a bit and takes a sip of his drink before clearing his throat. “Yeah, I like video games too.” 

That seems innocent enough, right? Everyone likes video games...or people tend to be okay with them, at least. Video games are fun.

Another bright, sun-like smile. “Yeah? Well in that case I’ll have to kick your ass in Mario Kart some time.” She threatens playfully. 

So she might want to hang out, he thinks to himself, the thought causing his heart to do a little flip and he smiles an almost shy and timid smirk. “Challenge accepted.”

“What do you do for work?”

That question catches him off-guard, causing his eyes to widen a bit. He doesn’t know if it would be better to lie or just tell the truth. He narrates stories on the internet and makes and puts out music people have constantly been telling him wouldn’t be enjoyed. He doesn’t see how that would leave a bad taste in her mouth exactly but because of his inability to stop himself from overthinking he doesn’t want to run the risk of repulsing her. Then again, he doesn’t want to lie either, he’s been so honest with her thus far, why would he derail now and because of such a simple question. That’s why he chooses to answer truthfully but keep his answer relatively vague: “I do online work and make music I haven’t released yet. I honestly dunno if I ever will.” That last part felt like a harsh hit of reality coming on too suddenly, forcing him to look away from her to gather his composure and put it back together.

“I bet it’s good. You’ll have to let me hear it when you get something done. I’ve got a clearly refined taste in music, but I bet you already figured that out.” She exaggerates a wink, reaching over to wiggle the straw in her drink. 

Feeling a bit less tense now, he clears his throat and picks up the conversation once again. “What about you? You keep asking me all these questions, but all I know about you is that you’re a klepto with no car.” 

That signature bright and bubbly laughter leaves Cora’s chest, sending Corpse a millisecond away from swooning over her completely. “I’m actually a starving artist. I’m a pet photographer and I'm going back to school for advertising graphic design. When I’m not off goofing around with people getting their dogs birthday documented, I’m working at ye good ol’ Starbucks, serving all the...” Her voice lifts to a higher pitch and is now coming more from the back of her throat as she takes on the most preppy tone she could muster, “Beckys their venti mocha caramel frappuccino with TWO extra pumps of caramel, but with SOY because they’re all on a diet. Funny how that works, no? All those women with the exact same order and exact same attributes - I almost laugh whenever one of them walks in. You can smell them from a block away.” 

Corpse chokes out a laugh as he covers his mouth, hiding his half chewed bite from view. He definitely wasn’t expecting that. Then again,  he can’t help but acknowledge the warmth that has spread across his cheeks at how she giggles along with him. “And to be fair,” Cora quickly interrupts herself, “I am not a klepto, I just really liked the belt I found and thought forty five dollars was a rip off.” She smirks, finding herself absentmindedly looping her pinky with his. Corpse doesn’t look down, doesn’t comment, doesn’t want her to know he noticed, because maybe she’d put an end to their so small yet so meaningful contact. Instead, he smiles a little and swallows the last bite of his lunch, his heart beating rapidly in his chest and he briefly entertains the idea that he maybe wasn’t the only one awestruck. 

Anyhow, that thought gets pushed down real quick when he considers how absolutely out of his league she is, and how...well, how he’s in absolutely no league whatsoever. The world has done plenty to prove that to him real fast. Corpse sees himself as a nobody; he believes he doesn’t matter and everybody likes to remind him of it. But, as Cora’s pinky curls a little and one of her thumbs brushes against the arch of his wrist, all that bitter venom in his cold soul starts to slowly ease up, loosening its typically firm hold of his mind. Maybe, just maybe, one day, he would matter to someone. Someday.

@fockingwhore  @vixenl  @annshit  @wineandionysus  @wiseflamingoqueen

[florencewritez]

Euphoric

AN: have a good day <3

WC: 6431  words

WARNINGS: consumption of alcohol, cursing "Mia, babe I genuinely don't know what I'd do without you," I told her as she carefully applied another white dot above my eyebrow to the row she'd already done. Mia only smiled, squeezing my cheeks a little more and telling me to keep my eyes closed or she'd poke them out. Begrudgingly, I did as she asked, tearing my eyes away from the stunning red look she'd given herself earlier. When the Glastonbury Festival started approaching quicker and quicker and me and Mia still had nothing planned, it had been Will who suggested who went as a pair. Angel and devil. Of course, we had to jump on the idea, we'd never pass that photo opportunity. That had been around four weeks ago. Now, it was only around an hour before our group would leave for Glastonbury and I finally felt the festival excitement bubbling in my stomach. Clearly, it bubbled out too, making me squirm a little, as Mia scolded me for moving and again repeated her empty threat of poking my eye. I only giggled. Mia was the least likely person to poke someone's eyes out, let alone mine. She knew it too because when I peeked my eye open, I saw her soft smile, eyes crinkling and making a single star she'd stuck on fall off. By the time we arrived, I was sure they'd all be gone."All done! You can look now."

"Finally." She playfully smacked my arm and handed me a hand mirror. The girl looking back at me felt like a different person. Roségold shimmery eyelids with a small line of white streaking through the glitter. Pretty highlight covering my cheeks and nose, like I'd captured the very essence of a rainbow on my face, complete with two white strokes at the top of my nose. And to top it all off, the white dots above my eyebrow, complete with little jewels in between each dot. Somehow, I actually did feel angelic, more than I had when I'd actually put the wings on that were supposed to be the trademark angel piece. Mia truly had worked wonders. "I can't believe this is really me, you're makeup skills are underrated," she snorted and sat down beside me, tilting the mirror to check her hair, hand tucking a spare curl behind her ear, lips turning up into a smile. "It's payback for styling my hair, don't undersell yourself either y/n." Will's voice echoed down the hall, telling us we were leaving to catch the bus soon and I smiled at the dark-haired girl beside me. I could already feel the music pounding through my veins, the adrenaline pumping through me after the fairground. I'd been attending festivals with Will and our friends since we'd moved to London together, having grown up together as neighbours and decided to pursue YouTube together. Some of my best memories in recent years were spent in a random field usually used for dairy farming, screaming lyrics to a song I didn't know I knew, clinging to someone's wrists as we jumped up and down to the beat. The inevitable headaches were always worth the feel of the moment, not to mention the pictures dotting my wall of the before and after that always made me smile when I woke up. George, Will, Becky, James, Aria, even a few random strangers always greeted me, either pissed out of their mind or suffering a severe hangover. However, whilst Mia's face did make an appearance in several non-festival pictures on my wall, this would be the first time we attended a festival together. She'd only started dating Will a little over a year ago and at the time, she hadn't quite been welcomed to the group enough to join us for festival season. Now though, after nights spent together with our group at clubs or nights out and a lot of sleepovers with just me, her and Aria, it'd be a sin to not bring her. I turned to face her, excitement flashing in my eyes and took her hand in mine. Mia smiled back at me, squeezing my hand. "I can't believe this is the first festival we'll spend together Mia, it feels long overdue." "The first of many right?" I saw a flicker of anxiety pass through her eyes and knew she sometimes felt she didn't fit in our group, even now. I understood where she was coming from, it was always hard to find your footing in such a tight-knit group of people who'd known each other for ages, but truly, everyone loved her just as much as the others. Especially me. "Of course. You're one of us now." She wrapped her arms around my shoulders in a short tight squeeze, our perfumes mixing together for just a second. It was a sweet moment, my best friend hugging me close, but I couldn't help but tease her. After all, it was Will she was dating. "Though if I have to watch you and Will make out I will puke, that's too much for me. May I remind you I knew him when he was a square little lad in a diaper." Mia rolled her eyes, pulling me to my feet. I was reminded of the silver heels I was wearing on then when I stumbled forwards, grateful for her being there to make sure she caught me. "Oh please, it's not me and Will anyone is worried about. Can we talk about you and Alex?" She winked. I flushed pink, (which probably looked rotten combined with the highlight) and Mia grinned, her tongue peeking through the gap in her teeth. Alex. At first, when Will started blowing up, dragging me along from almost being featured in his videos, he started making a lot of new friends that I had never met before for the first time in our lives. Before that, we'd always had the same friend group, even through the awkward high school years where friend groups were extremely messy. One day, he'd managed to drag me to a bar with his new friends, despite my complaining, and that's where I'd met Alex. Or rather, where we met each other. Stupid swooped hair with eyes that rewrote my definition of blue eyes the very first time my eyes met his. It had been Alex who managed to integrate me into Wills new group and Alex who remained the closest person in our group to me even to this day. Alex who, along with George, my favourite mask-wearing bloke, I moved in with once Wills place got a bit cramped. And of course, Alex who all my friends liked to tease me about dating. Of course, they did the same to him, probably worse considering the boys were usually a bit dirtier mouthed with each than with the girls, but I was the only one who turned red all the time. Probably because they were right mostly. When Mia prodded about the way I looked at him, my efforts to say there was nothing to prod at were all lies. When James would wink at me when Alex would pull me in closer on nights out, always downing whatever drink was in front of him before I could glare. When Will sat me down one day, patting my knee, and asked if I liked him, he saw past my eye rolls and dramatic head shakes. Most of all it was George who brought it up, always finding a way to shove at least five comments a day about our relationship and giving me the look when I'd mumble a comment back. Because yes, of course, I liked him. I had a stupid school girl crush at the same age I got blackout drunk and could legally do drugs in some countries. Alex was the nicest person I'd ever met, always treating me with such kindness and respect. Some nights I'd pass out by my desk when editing, exhausted from the hectic schedule I forced myself to follow. When I'd wake up, my video editing would be finished and there'd be a sticky note by my head, something that would make my heart beat a little faster, with his signature and a small heart. Not to mention the blanket thrown over my shoulders that smelled faintly of him. That was just one of the many things Alex did for me regularly without ever asking for anything. Yet, something deep inside me screamed to not do anything about it, screamed it was purely platonic on his side. Alex would constantly chatter about what a great friend I was, how much he loved me as a friend. For some reason, him friend-zoning me accidentally hurt a lot more than if he hated me. At least then there was a chance he'd see me as something more than a best friend, even if it was a mortal enemy. Mia cleared her throat and I snapped back to reality, laughing awkwardly. "There's nothing to talk about Mia. We're just friends." If Will hadn't called again, I would have been in for a lot of questions and yet another speech begging me to just tell him. Instead, she just sighed and rugged on my arm. "We'd best be going before his head explodes." "That'd be a sight to see. He doesn't deal well with stress you know," I told her, walking out of my room with our arms interlocked. "Did you know during our GCSEs, I found him out my back in the wet dirt, mumbling algebraic formulas?" "Ay, y/n are you telling that bloody GSCE story again?" Will called, peeking his head out from around the corner. His festival sunglasses were perched in his hair and I couldn't help but giggle.  "I'm sorry Will, it's just so fucking hilarious." "To be fair Will," Mia said, holding back a laugh, "it's pretty funny." Neither of us could hold back our laughter and finally cracked when his glasses slid down his face. Will groaned and told the boys waiting on the couch behind him we were bullying him again. I heard James say he probably deserved it, followed by Georges laughter and Alex's giggle. "Are they ready yet?" Aria called, having arrived with James already ready way before me or Mia had even started. Mia let go of my arm and walked ahead to the living room, posing at the doorway. Aria gasped and said she'd looked gorgeous and Will said the same, snaking a hand around her waist. Gross. Still, no matter how gross I called Mia and Will sometimes or how much I insisted nothing was going on between me and Alex, it didn't stop me from smiling like an idiot when he stopped giggling, calling me pretty. Schoolgirl crush. That was all that was. We'd finally piled onto the coach awhile after before pictures already filling my camera roll and only two videos on my Instagram story. One of me recording when Mia was doing my makeup and the other just our group leaving me, George and Alex's apartment to get the coach simply titled 'it begins'. Once on the coach I came to the startling revelation everyone expected me to sit with Alex, the couples all pairing up and Becky insisting she absolutely had to sit with George. My eyes stared out the window, surprising heavy despite not doing anything yet. "You alright?" Alex asked, poking me in the ribs as the coach finally started, several cheers erupting around us. I couldn't help but smile back, nodding my head. His eyes didn't stop looking worried so I opened my mouth. "I'm fine, don't worry Al. I'm just tired for some reason." "To be fair, you and Mia were up half the night talking about today. I warned you to sleep you know, don't blame me." I giggled remembering how he'd come into my room several times to warn me and Mia to get some sleep. Back then we'd only waved him off, saying we were having girl talk. Now, I wished I'd listened as a yawn escaped my throat. "See?" "Fine, you win. I should have slept earlier last night. I'll be fine when we get there, the pure adrenaline will be enough to keep me up for the entire festival." He didn't look convinced. "It takes around an hour and a half to get there you know." "I'm aware." "Go to sleep, I'll wake you when we arrive. Promise." At first, I was going to deny and say I'd be fine, ask his opinion on the latest Star Wars movie so I could listen to him ramble again. However, as another yawn escaped me, I smiled and nodded, telling him he'd better wake me up when we arrived. "Of course I will, I need someone to go on rides with me. We both know the others are pussies." I smiled, eyes closing without me telling them to. "Of course they are. We're the only brave ones on this bus. We'll ride all night." Alex raised his eyebrow but I was too tired to care, leaning my head on the bus window. The loud rattling actually helped ease me into sleep and the last thing I remembered before waking up was hearing a snippet of James and Arias conversation behind me, laughing about some joke I didn't understand. Gross couples. "N/n, mate, everyone else is waiting outside. Can you please wake up." It was dark for a bit, my dream ending before it really begun because of Alex's voice cutting through the cloudy landscape I'd arrived in. Whatever I was lying on was warm and I nuzzled in more, sleepily asking for five more minutes. Alex chuckled and poked my cheek. "We've arrived you know. The first festival of the year? The one you're usually most excited for?" I had no idea what he was talking about till the wings I had on ached against my back. Shit. The fucking festival. I jumped up quickly, too excited to be embarrassed about the fact I'd somehow ended up sleeping on Alex's instead of the window and smiled. "Everyone else is outside yeah? Do I look okay?" It was then I noticed the pink on Alex's shoulder, sticking out a lot against the light blue denim. Crap, my lipgloss. I opened my fanny pack, white to match my outfit of course, and searched for that stupid tube of lipgloss I'd brought to retouch it later. Of course, I hadn't planned to wipe it off completely on my friends' fucking jacket before I even got off the bloody coach but hey, at least I was prepared. Finally, I found the blasted thing, under my purse, phone, portable and a small bottle of vodka, of course at the very bottom and pulled it out, holding it like a sacred Egyptian jewel.Then there was another problem. "Crap, I didn't bring a mirror. How am I supposed to apply it now? Wheres my blasted phone?" Again, I started to scramble through my bag. Alex gently grabbed my wrist, stopping me from shoving my hand around. "I can do it for you, it can't be that hard. I've watched you do it to yourself like a million times."I paused. For some reason, that sounded like the worst best idea ever. I sucked my teeth for a moment before nodding. "Go on then, it's a challenge." I tossed the tube onto his lap and turned my face towards him, urging him to do something before I did. He unscrewed the tube, a focus in his eyes I'd only ever seen when he was working a video before and then gently placed his hand on my cheek, leaning in. I parted my lips as he carefully did his best to apply an even layer of sheer pink, so close I could feel his breath on my face. I gulped, moving closer to him subconsciously, hand gripping his thigh. "I think I'm done," he whispered, pulling the lipgloss down but still not moving back. In fact, I felt his hand tighten into my hair, tugging it slightly. My eyes darted from his eyes to his lips. "Thanks," my voice was barely a whisper, more of a gasp honestly, and still neither of us leaned back. I wondered if his eyelashes were always this dark or he'd changed overnight. "Oi lads, I'm going to have to start driving to pick up the 2 o clocks now. Are you okay back there?" The bus driver suddenly called, peeking his head out of his seating area. I snapped back into my seat, zipping my bag closed as Alex cleared his throat, standing up. He told the bus driver we were fine, that I'd lost a contact and then we scrambled off the bus, pulling oh hands back at even the slightest contact. The moment my feet touched the grass, I was swooped away by Mia and Aria, both smirking at me, eyes wide. "What?" I asked, my voice a lot more bashful than I meant it to. "What was that?" Aria asked, Mia nodding behind her. Arias's hand was resting on my shoulder, Mia grasping at Arias in a small human centipede. "What was what?" Completely inconspicuous, they'll never know. "Dude, James told us he'd seen you and Alex nearly kiss Alex on the bus," my eyes widened and I was quick to ask how he'd possibly seen that, bus windows weren't the easiest to see through. "He went back on to tell you and Alex to hurry up and instead found you knee-deep in a shift session," Mia exclaimed, a giggle in her tone. "Nothing happened. I just asked him to put my lipgloss on because I didn't bring my mirror." Both of them raised their eyebrows and slowly nodded. "Nothing happened," I repeated slower, making sure to make eye contact with both of them. They seemed to let it go, at least for now, and Becky's voice cut through the air and her arms were thrown over Aria and Mia's shoulders. I laughed at their surprised faces smiling at Becky who already seemed to have cracked up the drink she'd brought in her fanny pack. "Come on girls, let's go in before the boys yeah? The real show doesn't start till tomorrow when performers come so I say first stop the pier yeah? I want some candy floss." Becky looked at me, hoping I'd take her side so she'd get her damn candy floss and I complied, laughing and throwing my head back as I threw my arm over Mia's other side. "I'm down for some 1pm candy floss. Feel like we're going to have a lot of that this weekend ay?" Becky whooped again as Mia and Aria agreed and we all started to walk towards the entrance, Mia yelling for the boys to hurry up and follow before they got lost. Still, even as I laughed at another joke Becky told, posing for a video Mia was taking as we entered, I couldn't help but let my mind linger to that bus seat, to my wet lips of floss, to crystal blue eyes, to what could have happened. I tossed my head over my shoulder, hoping to see Will or George or James or even the fucking busman to distract myself but of course, instead, I met the same stupid blue eyes. He stopped talking and looked at me, I took a deep breath and then James nudged his side and Mia squeezed my ribs and the moment was over. God, this stupid tension had to arrive now, didn't it? Couldn't have waited till after festival season? Still, nothing a bit of alcohol couldn't help drown out, right? Right? "Are we going to go on the rides today lads or are we waiting for that madness till tomorrow?" George yelled over music playing, the night being relatively old at that point. Aria and James said they were heading to their tent now so they'd pass for now, as did Mia and Will after Mia persisted a little. Becky tucked her arm into mine and asked if I wanted to go to our tent yet since we were sharing and I thought it over, biting my cheek. The air still smelled like candy floss, as did Becky's breath and probably mine, though there was a slight sting that I put down to the few shots I'd downed so far, not enough to be pissed just yet. That was for Saturday night. I thought it over for another second before shaking my head, pulling back for Becky's grasp. "Actually Beck, you go ahead. I'm going to stay back with Alex," I turned and gave him a small smile, finally meeting his eyes for the first time since the incident and he smiled back. "He owes me a few hundred rides to live up to his earlier words, right Al?" "That's right. You can go back too if you want George, you keep yawning on me." "Yeah, I think I'll pass on watching whatever the fuck that's going to be you're right, I'll make sure Becky gets back to her tent fine. I'll wait with her till you decide what you're doing yeah?" I didn't ponder on what George meant and only let out a whoop, promising Becky I'd get back fine. She smiled, her nose scrunching and she pressed a kiss to my cheek before nodding at George to go. I watched her go with him, a few close encounters with people already puking on the ground from a really bad-or good-night depending on your perspective. I jumped when I felt someone take my hand until I realized it was Alex, his voice close to my ear, making me shrink away. "So Will and that are already boning huh? Think they could have waited till tomorrow to settle in at least." I snorted and pushed him away, gagging at that thought. "Jesus Alex please refrain from giving me that image. Will is still twelve years old to me. Not to mention little Aria with my man James." "Your man James? I'm offended I thought I was your man." There he goes again, that stupid your man joke. Still, it did make me smile genuinely, even if I rolled my eyes to hide how my face was so bright. I took his hand and let it rest over my shoulder, pressing a soft kiss to it as we walked towards the flashiest ride. "Of course you're my man. My favourite man. But you currently aren't riding anything so I think you're a man backing out of his promise," I carefully evaded a man pissing, his poor girlfriend looking disgusted beside him, still keeping my eyes on Alex beside me. "Then let me prove it to you, three rides on this bastard. Unless you're too scared?" I chuckled, stopping to take his other hand and lean up, glaring me eyes threateningly. "Alex Elmslie, you're fucking on. The first to chicken out this weekend has to do what the other says." He thought about it for a moment before nodding, returning the glared eyes. "Okay, then y/n l/n. First challenge is this. Oh, and by the way, I'm not going to lose." Oh, it was definitely on. The last day arrived quicker than anyone wanted to and before I knew it, my suitcase was packed again, ready for the coach that would pick us up tomorrow. Still, there was one more night to enjoy and especially one last performance. Becky put her phone down, sighing as she tucked her hair behind her ear again. "Babe, we have to go soon. Billies performance will definitely be packed and I don't know about you, but I want to be as close as possible." I smile back, finally satisfied with my last day look. A simple soft pink makeup look complete with a light pink dress and flats. Flats made it a lot easier to hop around. "I'm ready Beck, just waiting for the others to show up at this point. You definitely told James and Aria to meet us here right?" Becky nodded, checking her phone again but her eyes rolling at the lack of new messages. I considered just going to save a spot for our group with just Becky until there was a yell outside asking if they could come in. A few moments later, James Marriotts face peeked through the now unzipped hole of our tent, a smile on his face. After another second, Arias's face appeared on top, face covered in pretty blue glitter. "You ready to be going then? Mia will kill me if we don't get a good spot." James tilted his head, a serious tone to his not really a joke-joke. "Oh I know," I edged towards the tent door, smiling. "She's been raving about this performance for weeks now. If she doesn't get to see more than a bean from a distance, she'll have all of our heads." Aria laughed and they both stood back, letting me step into the warm air. Ah, England's summers, surprisingly warm most of the time for such a known shit weather country. "Alex wouldn't shut up about it last night either to be fair though I suspect at least half of that was due to the drink." Becky followed me out and shared a glance with the couple. Aria licked her lips and looked away. Becky seemed to stifle a laugh, disguising it as a slight cough. I narrowed my eyes at James, hoping he'd crack and eventually he did, sighing. "Y/n, we were wondering if that stupid competition thing was still going on." I raised my eyebrows, falling into step with the trio as we headed for the stage she was performing at in an hour. "Yeah, we decided to keep it going till the festival was over. Why, would you like to join?" I teased, receiving unimpressed grunts from the whole group. Aria piped up next, seeming to take a long time in what she said next. For some reason, I felt like I wasn't going to like what she had to say. "It just feels like it's delaying the inevitable or something, that's all." "What's the inevitable?" "You and Alex getting married and having six children, three dogs and a cat." Becky chirped up, giggling. Aria and James laughed along with her. I could tell that I'd turned red and unfortunately, no makeup could cover that mess, which made everyone laugh a little harder. "I don't like Alex, we're just friends." "N/n, we were all there that night last year. Plus, there's behind such a weird vibe with you two lately, not to mention the way you look at each other all the time. Like bloody puppies or something." Aria tells me and this time, my face pales. That night a few months ago. It had been just another late night out at the club, some music playing in the distance as we all had a chat and chugging back as much as we could consume without dying. I decided to be brave and asked Alex to dance, tugging him to the floor before he could refuse. At first, we'd just been messing, twirling and more so stumbling around the place, clinging to each other for support as the world seemed to spin. It'd been just as I fell forwards the DJ announced they were starting romance hour, the music switching from stupid random beats to the soft vocals of Billie Eilish, singing about ocean eyes and falling from a height. Neither of us moved, my arms remaining wrapped around his neck as they had to stop me from falling, Alex's softly placed on my waist. "I like this song," I told him, leaning up to his ear on my tippy toes so he could hear me. "Me too, Billie's proper class." I snorted, falling back onto my heels. "It reminds me of you actually, this song," Alex tilted his head, pulling me in a little closer. "Because your eyes are blue are so pretty. You know, the first time we met the first thing I noticed was how pretty they were, even before I thought anything about how soft your hair looked. Will had to nudge me back to reality. Felt like everything just suddenly made sense." My words were slurred, heavily influenced by tequila and the heaviness starting to fall over my eyes. Still, I felt his lips press against mine, felt how it was better than any drink or drug. Perfectly moulded together, as though it was meant to be. I pulled him closer, fingers curling into his hair and he gripped desperately at my dress, his fingers able to be felt through the stupid fabric.When we'd pulled back, the song changed and I suggested we headed back to our friends, didn't look him in the eye. He agreed and we never spoke of it again. I had assumed our friends hadn't seen, that we'd been swallowed into the crowd as just another couple making out to a song. The look on my friends face at that moment told me otherwise."I just thought none of yous had seen that," I stammered, eyes looking to the ground so I didn't have to meet their eyes. "Of course we did, you were only a few feet away. Honestly, after that, we'd all just assumed you were dating in secret until this challenge thing." James explained, pointing to the girls to back him up. Both of them nodded, Aria looking slightly guilty and Becky just grinning.Great, everyone thought I was shagging my stupid crush. "Well we aren't, that was just a drunk mistake. Me and Alex are just friends, I promise." None of them looked convinced and I decided to pretend nothing had happened, saying we should hurry before all the good spots were taken. They didn't mention how I'd just moved on and agreed, breaking into a conversation about how excited they were instead. Even though I joined in, laughing when James told a joke or agreeing with Becky when she'd waffle, nothing could erase the strange feeling in my stomach. I couldn't quite decipher what it was, nervousness, guilt for lying about not liking Alex maybe, perhaps just pure excitement from seeing Billie. Whatever it was, it settled deep in my stomach and didn't go away, even as the others joined us at the spot we'd found. In fact, it only worsened when Alex landed beside me, whispering that the next challenge was to sing louder than the other, his hand resting ever so slightly on my shoulder. This would be a long night. My throat ached, begging for the relief I refused to give it as my voice croaked out the lyrics to bellyache like I'd be shot if I didn't. Alex gripped tightly at my wrists, both of us jumping up and down like idiots. I could hear Mia behind me, most likely on Will's shoulder and somewhere in front of me, George was laughing at Becky and James' awful slightly drunk dance moves, Aria most definitely recording to laugh at when they had sobered up. The rest of the world didn't matter at that moment and I pulled my wrists away from Alex's wrist to hold his face, laughing at his expression when I squeezed it. The song came to an end, turning into only loud cheering and instrumental as I croaked out that he looked extremely stupid. He pouted more and I laughed more, a slight snort coming out. The vibe of the audience changed when Billie sat down, announcing she'd be singing an oldie. Everyone got even more excited and couples linked together like magnets, arms around necks and eyes on eyes. I rolled my eyes at the gross displays of affection, letting my hands drop to rest on his shoulders. The first chord of the song played and I felt both of our bodies freeze, my throat becoming suddenly sore. Oh. It was that song. Of course, it was. Everyone else was too occupied to notice how we both stopped singing, how I opened and closed my mouth a few times before deciding to keep it shut. Except, of course, Alex and his stupidly perfect blue eyes, squarely focused on my own. "Al, we need to talk." No, we didn't, why did I say that. Shut up. "Okay." Great, no going back now. That'd make it worse. I cleared my throat. "You don't remember this but I can't pretend it didn't happen anymore. There was one night awhile ago, we were both very drunk. We had a moment and kissed. Everyone actually thought we were dating for ages." "Wait you remember that?" I nodded, swallowing harshly. If anyone had asked why my throat was suddenly dry and closing in, I'd have blamed hayfever. That would have been a lie. "N/n, I've been waiting for you to talk about it for ages. I thought you'd forgotten." My heart stopped, mind still doing cartwheels to try process the pure idiocy that was currently radiating off of both of us. Billie hit the chorus at the same time Alex leaned down ever so slightly, lips just grazing against mine for a moment as if testing the waters. I didn't hesitate to press my lips back against his, more full of emotion and present, saying everything my lack of worlds could never. I could hear the crowd cheering and clapping, the song ending, our friends whooping, but all I focused on was my heartbeat pounding out of my chest, his heartbeat against mine. When I finally pulled back, my eyes remaining closed for an extra beat to process what just happened, I saw him smile. Some people liked to say blue eyes were overrated and I used to find myself agreeing with them. Why so many love songs about boring old blue eyes, the most common eye colour, and not the mysterious browns and mesmerizing green? But at that moment, I understood. It felt like I'd seen him again for the first time but also met eyes with someone I'd known forever at the same time. A mixture of nostalgic warmth and crazed excitement wrapped into a crystalline package. Ocean eyes. And I understood. Mia threw her arm around my neck and yelled that this was our song, swinging me around. I chuckled, pulling her in closer by the waist and allowing her to tug me away. Alex didn't mind, turning around to talk, or rather shout, at Will, cheeks slightly tinted and a certain buzz in the way he laughed that wasn't there ever before. Pretty. "So," he said, arm around my shoulder and Ferris wheel slowly reaching the top. "What do you think about telling our friends we actually are dating this time?" I shrugged, nuzzling closer to the soft fabric of the hoodie he'd thrown on, probably leaving flecks of glitter that would never go away. He wouldn't care. He never cared about stuff like that. In fact, I think he had the right face for makeup. Maybe he'd let me do his makeup if I asked for a video, a festival look and q+a wrapped into one. The smell of cotton candy wafted up from above and somewhere below, I could just about hear Becky screaming on some ride. "They can figure it out themselves. Probably already have knowing our friends. Same with the fans honestly. Alex didn't answer, rubbing circles on my arm with his thumb instead. My body let out a shaky happy sigh. "Look, we're at the top now. Stopped for just a moment too." I peeked one eye open and smiled at the pretty sight before us, the lights of the rides mixing with phone flashlights and distant concert stages, smells of food stands, drink, weed, the sound of faint music, screams, laughter, happy yelling. Of course, the prettiest sight to me was the shimmering stars high above us, our interlocked hands resting on his chest. As I heard Becky let out another shriek, I was reminded of something from earlier that weekend and smile cheekily, sitting up to properly look at my boyfriend. God that felt to think without it being imaginary. "You know, technically you stopped singing before me which means you lost our game." "That sounds fair to me. So, whats my challenge then?" I pretended to think, finger tapping my chin as if I didn't already know exactly what I was going to say. "You have to be the one to tell Becky shes staying with George tonight because you're staying with me." He raised his eyebrow and turned a bright shade of red. I only smiled wider. "You lost the game, Al, those were the rules." "I haven't lost anything actually, I'd say I won a lot today," he held our interlocked hands up. And, if I wasn't so very in love with him, I would have puked. Because I was, I just rolled my eyes and made him promise to not back out. He insisted he wouldn't and walked straight over to Becky the second we were off the ride. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't just a bit more embarrassed than him suddenly when Becky gasped and grabbed my arm, giving it a slight shake and congratulating me on moving from big fat crush to a big fat relationship. The next Sunday, new pictures dotted my bedroom wall and my Instagram feed. There was a few that overlapped, a group shot by the pier, picture of me and the girls all on a ride, Becky laughing so hard alcohol shot out of her nose, me and Will recreating the same photo we did every year, but most were only on my wall. Me and George taking a shot at the same time, arms interlocked, James watching on with pride. Aria and a random stranger who happened to be wearing the same shoe hugging. Me and Mia in our outfits, laughing so hard we cried or spilling drinks on ourselves. A lot of Will and me simply existing together, whether it be dancing or screaming on a ride. Strangers I found interesting. But most were of Alex. A shot someone snapped when we were on the Ferris wheel. Selfies from just about every location at the festival. And of course, my personal favourite, the one James took on the bus on our way home, when this time when he applied my lipstick, I immediately ruined it with a kiss that told our friends everything they needed to know. When I sat down by the edge of my bed to admire my handiwork, years of photos mixing and telling a story, Alex grunted slightly and woke up from his sleep. He sleepily asked if I'd like to make brownies in a bit before pressing a kiss to my cheek, resting his head on my shoulder. His shampoo filled my nose and the soft material of his jumper pressed against my skin. God, I was ever so glad I understood why there were so many songs about blue eyes.

[expectingtofly]

dean/cas fic

1.3k

inspired by this adorable artwork

also posted on ao3

The Ranger and The Tourist

Dean loved his job. One of the obvious perks was getting to be outside all day. He’d loved the outdoors since he was young and being a park ranger meant he got his fill of it. Aside from that factor, though, was the benefit of working at a large national park where tourists came from all over and sought him out with questions. 

Like these two women from… somewhere. He didn’t remember where, actually. The point was, they were both very attractive and very receptive to his (slightly exaggerated) park ranger stories, which he’d been regaling them with for the past ten minutes.

He was in the middle of one such story when he heard someone clear his voice and say, “excuse me,” behind him. Rolling his eyes good-naturedly at the women, Dean turned to see who’d interrupted him from shamelessly flirting on the job.

Bright, blue eyes looked back at him. They belonged to a young man wearing a backpack, a camera slung across his neck, a crinkled map in his hands. His boots were caked with dirt and his dark hair was disheveled, but he was easily more attractive than both the women combined. Suddenly, Dean became much more invested in helping this poor tourist.

“Sorry, ladies, duty calls,” he said to the women, prompting frowns. As they walked away, Dean turned back to the attractive tourist. “What can I help you with?”

“I, um, I think I’m lost.” The man squinted at the map he was holding, then up at Dean. Those really were some gorgeous blue eyes and a ridiculously deep voice that was doing things to Dean’s stomach.

Keep it professional, Dean thought, though he toed that line often enough. “Where're you trying to go?” he asked.

“My brother and I were trying to follow this trail.” Blue Eyes pointed to a spot on the map and Dean moved to his side to see.

"Looks like you've been here before," he commented. The map was deeply creased, some trails highlighted and marked with a pen.

"Oh, no," Blue Eyes answered quickly, looking flustered, "I was just trying to plan our hike, I don't actually know what I'm doing."

“Well, for starters, it’ll probably help if you hold the map this way.” Dean took the map and turned it around, trying to hide his amusement at how comically confused the man was. He pointed at a spot on the map. “You’re here. And you’ll wanna go this direction.” He traced a line upwards on the map and glanced at the man to see if he was paying attention. 

His eyes serious, Blue Eyes nodded. Though Dean was used to tourists who couldn’t tell up from down, he’d never met one who made it so damn attractive as this one. In such close proximity, Dean could see the five o’clock shadow across his jaw, as well as dirt streaked across his arm. “Did you fall off the trail or something?” he asked.

Blue Eyes frowned, then looked down at the dirt stains on his pants and reddened. “My brother thought it would be funny to trip me.”

Dean laughed and Blue Eyes smiled a little. God, what a smile. Realizing he was staring, Dean pulled his eyes from Blue Eyes and pointed across the clearing where they were standing. “If you go through there, you’ll see another marker for the trail. Can’t miss it.”

He handed back the map, about to ask if he could help with anything else (please, please, please) when Blue Eyes asked, “Is this a trail you would recommend, Ranger Winchester?”

Dean startled a little before remembering he wore a nametag on his uniform. “Oh, um, yeah, sure.” Blue Eyes stared at him steadily, waiting, and Dean composed himself. “Yeah, it’s a good trail, pretty flat. If you want something more challenging, you can take this one.” He pointed to the map again, found the yellow line and traced it up. “There’s an overlook where you can get some great photos.” He gestured to Blue Eye’s camera and the man nodded. Dean hoped he wasn’t sending him out to get lost again. Though, he wouldn’t mind getting asked to help again. “You can call me Dean,” he added as an afterthought.

“I’m Castiel,” Blue Eyes said, smiling at him. “Cas for short.”

“Cas,” Dean repeated, that smile making it difficult for his brain to form words.

Cas studied his map. “So, the Flint Ridge trail, the one that crosses through the alders?”

“Right. Wait.” Dean frowned. “How do you know that?” That wasn’t a detail on the map. Most tourists had no idea what trees surrounded them on the trails.

Cas’ eyes widened, the flustered look returning his face. “Oh, uh…” Dean looked him over again. He’d thought the muddy boots and crinkled map marked this guy as a clueless tourist who’d gotten in over his head. On second thought, though, maybe the boots were just worn in and Cas was a more seasoned hiker than he was letting on. 

“You’re not lost, are you?” Dean asked, putting it together. 

“I, um,” Cas stammered. “Well, no." He looked back down at the map. "I may have lied, a bit. This isn’t exactly my first time here.” 

Dean bit back a smile at how embarrassed Cas looked. “Why are you asking for my help then?” He crossed his arms. “I do have actual work, you know. You’re distracting me from my very important job.”

“I’m so sorry—” Cas looked actually panicked now and Dean laughed. 

“I’m just fucking with you.” He patted Cas on the shoulder. “I don’t have anything better to be doing.” He wasn't sure his boss would agree, but it was true on his end anyway.

Cas let out a sigh of relief. “Oh, alright.”

“But seriously, why’re you asking me for help if you already know this park?”

Cas seemed to weigh his response, “It was a dare? My brother Gabe bet me $10 I couldn’t get your number.”

Now it was Dean’s turn to be flustered. Looking to the right, he saw another hiker standing a few feet away watching Dean and Cas with a wide grin. He waved and Dean looked back at Cas in time to catch him rolling his eyes.

“So,” Cas said, turning his blue eyes back to Dean. Dean realized he still hadn’t said a word. “Is there a number you can give me? I mean, to call in case I get lost again?”

Dean swallowed. “Well, um, I could give you the number for the park service, but they get so busy... maybe it’s better if I give you my personal number—you know, in case of emergencies.” Handing out his number was extremely unprofessional, but seeing Cas smile again was worth it. 

“I would appreciate that,” Cas said, and Dean pulled out a pen and wrote his number on the edge of the map. “Thank you for your help, Dean Winchester.” 

“No problem. Feel free to call anytime.” Anytime, immediately, please.

“But only for emergencies, right?” Cas asked, folding up his map, his mouth twitching with a smile.

Dean nodded. “Right, official park stuff only. Like if you want to know where to get the best burgers in town. That sorta stuff.”

Cas’ smile widened. “You should probably come with me and show me in person. I wouldn’t want to go off alone.”

Dean grinned. “I can do that.”

“Well, thanks again.” Cas gestured to the map. “For everything.”

Dean nodded and with a wave, Cas walked off to join his brother. Dean watched him before turning back to see other tourists milling around the clearing. He’d almost forgotten they were there, that he was supposed to be working. He glanced back at Cas and Gabe heading towards the Flint Ridge trail. Cas looked back at him over his shoulder and Dean felt his phone vibrate. He pulled it out to see a new text:

Will tonight at 6 work?

Dean smiled. God, he really loved his job.

Tag List:

@becky-srs @good-things-do-happen-dean @misha-moose-dean-burger-lover @xojo @marvelnaturalock @cas-you-assbutt-dean-needs-you @aelysianmuse @gmotheemo @prayedtoyou @spnwaywardone @letsjustdieeveryone 

Let me know (message, ask, comment) if you’d like to be tagged in my other random destiel fics :)

[alirhi]

jfc FINALLY

Ugh. I have been fighting with my muse to get this done for two months. And I was actually going to stretch it to line up more or less with the movie's timeline, but honestly... I'm just so burnt 😂 So this is what you get.

Title: Monday Chapter: Oneshot Fandom: Monday Rating: R/NC17 (I mean, have you seenthe movie?) Pairing: Mickey/OC Summary: What if, instead of Chloe, Mickey met a woman that night who was actually good for him and whom he was compatible with? WARNINGS: swearing, sex (not explicit; I rarely if ever write smut, but still) Notes: I hate Chloe. Omfg I hate her so much. So I fixed it XD Yes, I literally rewrote the entire movie with a different love interest. Well... most of it lol. I get bored, okay? Lol. Oh, and the girl is actually a character I yanked from one of my original stories lol. I didn't make her up on the spot for this (I'm too lazy for that XD). Tweaking her to fit the setting was kind of a bitch, as she's from a fantasy series, so if she seems kind of Mary Sue-ish...sorry.

“You have a nose for American cheese!”

Mickey rolled his eyes. “Come on, that girl looks insane!”

“What?” Looking surprised, Argyris turned and looked where his friend was pointing, and then laughed. “Not her, you idiot! The ginger-snap over there!”

The girl in question, a lithe, pretty thing with a wild mass of red hair that she constantly shoved impatiently out of her face was dancing alone a few feet away from the angry-looking blonde Mickey had thought he'd been talking about. She was gorgeous, he had to admit.

“Go and talk to her, man!”

He pointed to the turntables in front of him, impatiently reminding Argyris, “No, I'm working!”

“Come on,” the other man taunted, “I know your playlist inside-out! It's the same R&B shit, and then a little bit of disco!”

“It's not R&B, and it's not disco!”

“This song is twenty fuckin' minutes long! Come on!”

“Hey!” Mickey grimaced, hastily yanking his headphones off and setting them down as he was dragged off toward the redhead. “Fuck!”

All puffed up with pride – and way too much to drink – Argyris pushed Mickey when they drew close to the girl, so that he slammed right into her. Laughing, he patted her shoulder, but his mirth was short-lived. She grabbed his hand and twisted his arm up behind his back.

“Put your hands on a girl you don't know again. I dare you.”

Mickey covered his mouth with one hand to hide his laughter as his friend writhed in the deceptively delicate-looking girl's grip.

“Alright, alright! I'm sorry!” Laughing as he was released, Argyris went to put a hand on each of their shoulders, took one look at the girl, and just hung off of Mickey's shoulder, instead. “You're an American... You're an American! You're a man, you're a woman! There you go!”

“Yeah, crazy kismet,” she snapped, rolling her eyes. “Two Americans out of their natural deep-fried, flag-waving habitat at the same time! Imagine!”

Undaunted, the drunk Greek simply shrugged and flounced off with a flippant, “Whatever. Have fun!”

“Sorry about him,” Mickey said immediately, smiling when she turned and smiled at him. At least she didn't seem to be judging him by the company he kept.

“Friend of yours?”

“Argyris? Yeah.” He grinned. “He's kind of an idiot, but he's a good guy.”

She laughed. “I'll take your word for it. Aren't you the DJ? Should you be over here?”

“No,” he admitted with a laugh, “but I'm fine for a few minutes. You wanna dance?”

“I'd love to.”

She was tall, he realized as he spun her around; in the little barely-there heels she was wearing, they stood eye to eye. Clearly drunk, though, she lost her balance every few seconds and crashed into him with a laugh, occasionally giving up on righting herself and just resting her head on his shoulder.

Mickey grimaced as he heard the song beginning to wind down, but the girl hanging off of him only smiled and patted his chest. “Go on! Get back to work. I'll be here when you're done.”

“Any chance I could convince you to come around the other side?” He gave her his most charming grin, and felt a little warm inside when she laughed.

“Why, so you can stare down my top the whole time?”

With a shrug, he admitted, “I've been doing that anyway, so why not?”

“Honesty!” She grinned and kissed his cheek. “I like it. Alright, you gorgeous lech! Get back up there. We'll see what I can do about your view.”

He only made it another hour or so, with the girl coming up to him every few minutes with another drink, and occasionally flashing him from the spot she'd found in front of him. Queuing up enough songs to play through the end of the party, he hopped down off the podium and ran over to her, tugging her close for the kiss he'd been dying for since Argyris had first pulled him over to her. “You wanna get out of here?”

“You sure? What about-”

Mickey shook his head, smiling. “It'll run til they all pass out. No one'll touch my stuff, not here. Come on!”

“Okay, yeah.” She shrugged and laughed, allowing him to pull her through the throng of dancing people and away from the party. “Fuck it. Let's go!”

The next morning, naked, hungover, and covered in sand, they were nudged awake by a police officer while an angry lady yelled about their indecency. The officer waited for them to scramble back into their clothes and then cuffed them both, ushering them into the back of a cruiser.

Despite the situation, Mickey couldn't keep the silly smile off of his face. At least the cops had been kind enough to cuff their hands in front of them, allowing him to hold his out to the girl beside him. “Hi. I'm Mickey.”

She laughed, the realization that they'd never introduced themselves clearly dawning in her bright green eyes. “Beck.”

“Nice to meet you.” He shook her hand, but couldn't hide his slight confusion. “That a first name or a last name?”

“It's short for my first name.” She was still smiling, but there was a dangerous glint in her eyes as she added, “Call me 'Becky' once and I'll be facing real prison time at the end of this ride, and you'll be missing body parts.”

With a slightly nervous laugh, he nodded. “Alright, noted. Beck it is!”

“And, nice to meet you, too.”

There was the briefest of conversations at the police station, the sandy couple signed themselves out, and then Mickey persuaded one of the officers to give them a lift back to the beach.

“You want a ride?”

Beck grinned, one ruddy eyebrow arching up. “I still need to clean up from the 'ride' last night.”

Laughing, Mickey shook his head. “I'll never say 'no' to more of that, but that's not what I meant.”

“I know.” She shrugged, snarky grin turning into an almost bashful smile. “And yeah, I'd love a ride. Thanks.”

He loaned her his helmet and, after getting directions from her, drove her to her hotel. It seemed like that would be the end of it... and he hated that thought. “So, what're you doing tonight?”

“Packing and sleeping,” she told him with a laugh, leaning against the building. “I gotta be on a plane Monday morning, and I hate leaving things to the last minute.”

“You're leaving?”

With a grin and a snarky air kiss, she teased, “Missing me already, lover boy?”

Mickey shrugged, grinning. “Maybe I am. I like you, is that so bad?” He beckoned, and was somewhat surprised when she walked right over to him. Still smiling like a fool, he grabbed her by the waistband of her shorts and pulled her close for a kiss. “Come with me tonight, for a proper sendoff.”

“Come with you where?”

“I'm DJing on an island.” Thumb sliding under her clothes to slide over her hip, he wheedled, “Come on. Come with me.”

“I need to shower. I'm all sandy and sticky from last night.” Beck gave him just long enough to deflate, and then she smirked and nipped his jaw. “Care to join me?”

“Fuck yes!” He was off his moped in a flash, following the laughing redhead as she took his hand and tugged him into the hotel. Giggling like hyenas, the pair made their way up to Beck's room, stopping every few steps for one to yank the other close for another kiss. Mickey was on cloud nine. This girl was fun, she was sassy and wild, and he couldn't get enough.

It seemed she couldn't get enough, either. They'd barely stepped into the shower before Beck was on her knees in front of him, her hand on his ass and his hand tangled in her hair as she sucked him off. He leaned back against the wall, tugging lightly on her hair and shuddering as he felt her moan around him.

“Fuck... oh, fuck, you're good at that! Holy shit... Stop. Stopstopstop!” With a little half-smile at her look of confusion, he tugged her back to her feet and kissed her. “You're fucking amazing. God damn, you are good with that mouth! But that's not what I want.”

Beck grinned, a playful glint in her bright green eyes that made him weak in the knees. “That's not a good idea.”

“Oh, no?” He backed her up against the wall, nuzzling her neck as his hand drifted down between her legs. “Funny... You don't seem to really believe that.”

“I definitely want you to fuck me til I can't move,” she assured him, shaking as she tried desperately not to laugh. “But it's not a good idea-” Her words turned into a startled whimper as Mickey hoisted her up by her thighs and slid into her to the hilt.

“I think it's a great idea,” he purred, biting her shoulder. Then he almost dropped her, and they both cracked up.

“The wall's slippery! This isn't smart.”

“No, it's definitely not smart,” he agreed, turning so that he was holding her up in mid-air instead of bracing her against the wall. “But that doesn't make it not a good idea.”

Beck laughed, clinging to him for dear life. “You're just gonna hold me up?”

“Yep.”

“The whole time?”

“You don't think I can do it?” Mickey grinned, bouncing her a few times just to prove her wrong. “You weight nothing, baby girl. I got this.” She was surprisingly light... but she was also a grown woman almost the same height as him. His pride would never let him admit it aloud, but there was no way he was going to be able to fuck her like this for long.

Just as he was wracking his somewhat foggy brain for a solution, he saw light dawning in Beck's eyes and waited. “Counter!” She nodded toward the sink, and only then did he realize they hadn't even closed the shower curtain, and the bathroom floor was getting soaked. “Put me on the counter.”

“I thought we were supposed to be getting cleaned up.” Even as he teased her, he was carefully stepping out of the tub, blessing her foresight when she grabbed a towel and threw it down just before he set his foot down, and carrying her across the bathroom.

Beck snickered and kissed him. “No point getting clean until we're done getting dirty. Shut up and fuck me.”

“Yes, ma'am!”

A little while later, they stumbled across another logistical issue Mickey hadn't considered.

“You are not putting dirty clothes on a clean body!” Beck insisted, prying his – pretty nasty at this point, he had to admit – clothes from his hands. “That's disgusting!”

“Well, what the fuck else am I supposed to wear? Clearly, I can't just run around naked. We got arrested for that this morning!”

“Pity,” she teased, eyeing him in a way that made him wonder if they were ever actually going to leave her hotel room. “You're the best view in Athens.”

“Maybe they arrested us out of jealousy, then.” Mickey shook his head, though he couldn't help chuckling a little, despite his frustration. “Either way, I'm kinda stuck. It's either be gross, or don't go anywhere.”

“As much as the thought of keeping you trapped here as my sex slave appeals to me...” With another mocking grin, Beck turned and started going through her dresser drawers. “I think I can help you out.”

“I'm not wearing your clothes.”

“They're less flamboyant than what you do wear.”

“They won't fit!”

She tossed him a tee shirt and a pair of cargo shorts that proved him very wrong. They were huge. At his questioning stare, she shrugged.

“I always pack a couple of cute outfits when I travel, and the rest is super baggy; at least three sizes too big. I like to be comfortable.”

“Convenient.” He stared at the shorts in his hands, and then at the belt she handed him a few seconds later. “Am I supposed to wear your underwear, too?”

Beck snorted and walked away, patting his shoulder as she passed him. “I don't wear underwear.”

“Then I guess I kind of am wearing yours.” Even as the joke was tumbling out of his mouth, he knew it was lame, but they still both laughed. Then he glanced at his watch and winced. “Shit, we gotta go.”

“What?”

He waited for the dress she was pulling on to settle into place and then wrapped his arms around her, tugging her back against his chest. “We gotta go. If we don't catch the next ferry, we're gonna be late.”

She flinched. “Okay, two seconds.” The girl moved like lightning. Mystified, Mickey watched as she yanked on a pair of canvas sneakers, grabbed her wallet and cell phone – which she then stuffed in the pockets of the shorts he was wearing – grabbed a hair tie, and ran for the door. In no time, she'd strangled her wild red curls into submission in a low ponytail. They hadn't even reached the elevator yet.

“How did you do that?”

“Do what?”

Handing her his helmet, Mickey shook his head. “I think you got dressed faster than I did! I thought girls always take forever to get ready.”

Laughing, Beck rolled her eyes. As she settled on the back of the moped and tucked her skirt around her legs for decency, she told him, “I spent two years in the jungle with nothing but what I could fit in a backpack. Low maintenance is kinda my thing. The fewer steps to getting ready, the less time it takes.”

“That explains so much.” He stared at her for a moment, and then shook his head and grumbled as he slid into place in front of her and started the moped, “And raises so many more questions!”

“Full disclosure: I will probably answer none of them, as I'm very likely never going to see you again after tonight.”

Well, that was a depressing dose of reality he wasn't ready for. Not one to dwell on things, though, Mickey simply decided to have as much fun as he could with this girl while she was around, and treasure the steamy memories.

They made it to the ferry just in time. Making sure there was no one else around, Mickey smirked and tugged Beck into his lap, one hand sliding up her thigh. He moved slowly, giving her plenty of time to push him away if she wanted; she simply arched an eyebrow at his questioning look and grabbed his wrist, tugging his hand closer.

“Why do you think I'm wearing a dress?”

Fuck, he loved this girl!

They were pretty much attached at the hip the whole day – literally, when they could steal a few minutes alone. While he was DJing, she was dancing like a lunatic, front and center. Those piercing green eyes never strayed from him; he knew, because he couldn't look away from her, either. Once he was free, they danced together for a little while, but it didn't take long for Beck to grow bored and yank him down the beach, away from the party. They found a dark, hidden nook to be alone, spent the night hopelessly wrapped up in each other, and then cuddled as they watched the sun come up.

“Gods, this place is so beautiful!”

Mickey chuckled at the plural, but didn't ask about it. He had a more important question for her: “You really gonna leave all this behind?”

“I have to.” She didn't sound any happier about leaving than he was about letting her leave. “I gotta get home.”

“Where's home?”

“Boston. You?”

He grinned and nudged her. “Athens, baby. Been here seven years!”

“Okay, but where before here?” she prodded with a laugh. “You're obviously not Greek; you don't even speak it!”

“Do you?”

Beck sat up a little straighter, grinning like the Cheshire Cat. “Nai.”

“Showoff.”

“One word is being a showoff?” Beck laughed, shaking her head. “You've been here seven years, and you don't know a single word of the language?”

Mickey scowled, feeling defensive. “Everybody speaks English!”

“Wow.” She wasn't smiling anymore. She actually looked and sounded pretty pissed off. “That is astoundingly arrogant. And completely American, so clearly your obnoxious friend with no boundaries was right; it's not just a funny accent, you actually are American.”

“You're an American, too!”

“By birth,” she snapped, “not by choice. And I fucking hope not by attitude. I don't go stomping around foreign countries with absolutely no respect for their language or customs, expecting everyone around me to cater to my laziness.”

He rolled his eyes, scooting away from her. “Give me a break! Learning another language is hard!”

“Impossible, if you don't even try.”

“Yeah? How many languages do you speak?”

“Fluently?” She held up her hands, ticking each one off on her fingers as she listed them. “English, obviously. Korean, Irish Gaelic, Italian, and German. Passably? Japanese – I can speak it fluently, but I have trouble reading it; the kanji is a nightmare – Greek, Spanish, Portuguese, and Swedish. I can read Latin and Old Norse, and I'm learning Mandarin, but I admit I'm struggling with that one. Mostly for the same reason I can't read Japanese; the writing system.”

Gaping at her, Mickey couldn't formulate a response for a long moment. When his brain finally started working again, all he could think to say was, “Jesus, what the fuck are you, a robot?!”

“I'm an archaeologist,” she told him flatly, still looking irritated. “And I've been traveling since I was seventeen. Been studying at least one language other than English since I was ten. I definitely had an advantage, starting when I still had a little kid's spongy brain, but it's not impossible to learn at any age, if you actually care enough to try.”

“You sound like my ex.” Hoping to distract her from that comment he hadn't meant to make, he hastily asked, “If you love to travel so much, why're you in such a rush to get home?”

Beck sighed, turning to stare out over the water. “I promised my daughter I'd be home in time for her birthday.”

Huh. They had more in common that he'd thought. “You have a kid?”

She nodded. “Two. Two girls.”

“How old?”

“Alice is five,” she murmured, pulling her knees up to her chest and crossing her arms over them. Head pillowed on her arms, she added, “And Madeline's about to turn fourteen.”

“How the hell old are you?!” He hadn't meant to ask so bluntly, but he was so stunned by her daughters' ages that the question just kind of blurted itself out.

Mercifully, Beck laughed a little. “I'm thirty-three. I'll spare you some math – I was nineteen when I had Maddie.”

Mickey shook his head, not sure how to react. In all honesty, she didn't look much older than that now. There was a shadow behind her eyes that he was dying to ask about, but even as thoughtless as he could be, he knew when to just not go there. Instead, he told her softly, “My son is six.”

“What's his name?”

He smiled. As much as the situation with his ex sucked, he loved his son, and thinking about him always brought a little smile to Mickey's face. “Hector.”

The look on Beck's pretty face as she watched him like a hawk made him blush, though he wasn't sure why. There was just something about that direct green gaze that made him feel like she could read his mind. “He's the real reason you don't want to leave Greece, isn't he?” A spot-on guess like that certainly did nothing to dispel the notion.

He nodded. “Yeah. Yep. His mom hates my guts, but I don't care. There's nothing I wouldn't do to stay in his life. I actually, um... I have a room for him, at my place. If she'll ever let me take him, you know, just for a weekend or whatever... His room is ready and waiting for him.”

“All you can do is keep trying. Put in the work, be the best dad you can be, and hope for the best.”

Unsure what to say to that, Mickey changed the subject with an awkward smile. “So... Alice? She blonde, like Alice in Wonderland?”

Beck snorted, shaking her head. “No, she has black hair, like her dad.” She paused and then shook her head again with a bemused smirk on her face. “Actually, both of my girls look like their dads – dark hair, big blue eyes.” Smirk turning into a grin, she nudged him. “Guess I've got a type.”

“'Dads,' huh?” He grinned, too, and nudged her right back. “Plural?”

“You gonna get all judgy on me, now?” Her tone was light and teasing, but her eyes promised a whole lot of pain if he answered wrong.

Mickey just laughed. “Nope, no judgment. I think you've seen enough of what I'm like this weekend to know I wouldn't have the right.”

“Good answer.”

“I don't want you to leave.” He watched her go rigid and sighed, shaking his head. “I'm not gonna try to stop you. If you were leaving for literally any other reason, I might, but I'd never dream of trying to keep a mom away from her kid. I just... I really like you, and I wish you didn't have to go.”

She shrugged a little, staring out over the water again. “To be honest, I don't wanna go, either. I mean, I'm dying to see my girls again, being away from them is always painful, but... This place is so beautiful. I would love to stay a little longer.”

Not a single word about whether or not she liked him. That stung, but he did his best to ignore it. “Why don't you bring them with you when you travel?”

“I used to,” she admitted. “When it was just Maddie, I brought her everywhere with me and tutored her myself. I tried to keep it going after Alice was born, but it was rough. They got tired of always being on the road and not having kids their age to play with, so now I leave them with my sister when I'm away.”

“Wait, you taught her yourself?” He laughed, shaking his head in dismay. “Are you sure you're not a robot?”

Beck laughed, too, rolling her eyes. “I'm sure. There's more down time than you think in archaeology; plenty of time to keep an already smart girl from falling behind in her schooling.”

“They must take after their mom. I mean, you speak a zillion languages, so you gotta be pretty damn smart.” She was so reckless and carefree, it was hard to picture this woman digging in the dirt for broken clay pots, or wrangling two children to teach them math. From what he'd seen, it felt like Beck was describing a completely different person. He didn't want to offend her, so he refrained from pointing out that she came across less brilliant, multilingual career woman in her thirties and more Girls Gone Wild: Athens.

“Cheapann tú gur leathcheann mé.” He had no idea what the hell she'd just said, but he could tell from the look on her face that he hadn't been as good at keeping his thoughts to himself as he'd hoped. She looked both offended and darkly amused. “Pensi che una ragazza non possa essere intelligente e libera? Eísai vlákas, Mickey.”

He didn't bother asking for a translation; her tone told him he didn't want to know. “How many languages was that?”

Beck grinned. “Three. Gaelic, Italian, and Greek. I sometimes mix a few in the same sentence – I constantly mix Japanese and Korean at home; it makes my girls laugh – but I figured I'd be nice.”

Mickey opened his mouth to say he wouldn't have noticed the difference, and then stopped. He had noticed the difference; the lilt of her voice changed dramatically with each language. That was how he'd realized that she'd been speaking more than one in the first place. “I kinda wanna hear that mix, now. Are the languages that similar?”

“No.” She laughed. “Not at all. They share some slang thanks to pop culture, and both borrowed a lot from China, but they're structured differently, and the way they're spoken is different.”

“Then how do you mix them?”

“I speak them both,” she said with a shrug and another laugh. “If you speak more than one language well enough, they don't have to be similar to still flow. Like...” She smirked, leaning against him and batting her eyes. “Kimi wa baboya, demo... mada jowayo.”

“Showoff.”

“Yes.” Cracking up, she pulled him back to lie on the warm sand with her and cuddled close. “That time, absolutely.”

“Do you think you'll ever come back?” He'd been trying so hard to avoid the subject, but he just couldn't get his mind to budge from the fact that he didn't want her to leave.

With a fond smile, she kissed him before teasing lightly, “You gonna miss me, honey?”

Mickey grinned, hoping she couldn't see that he was feeling more melancholy than amused. “I think mostly I'll miss the sex. It's hard to find a woman who can keep up with me.”

“Oh, is that so?” She laughed and tickled him, making him squirm. Then she stopped, a warm, almost wistful smile on her face. “I'm gonna miss you, too, you know.”

Forced playful grin turning into a soft, genuine smile, he pulled her closer and kissed her. “I was beginning to worry you didn't like me.”

Beck grinned and nuzzled his neck. “The past twenty-four hours wouldn't have happened if I didn't like you.”

Feigning shock, Mickey gasped. “You mean you don't fuck strange men all over Greece indiscriminately?”

“No, that I do all the time,” she joked, hand sliding up one leg of his borrowed shorts. “But I only let the really special ones wear my clothes.”

He laughed, glancing down at himself; he'd forgotten for a second that they were hers. “Right. We should stop at my place so I can change and give these back before I take you back to your hotel.”

Beck sighed, snatching her hand back as if he'd burned her. “Right. Yeah, we should get going.”

Though he still hated that she had to leave, he kept his word and didn't try to stop her. Argyris tried to convince him to make some grand gesture at the airport, but Mickey shut him down with a grumpy, “It's her kid's birthday. I'm not that much of a selfish asshole.”

“I can't believe you're in love with this girl!” Hooting with laughter, Argyris slapped his back. “I'm a fuckin' matchmaker! Who knew?”

“Fuck off, Cupid!” Mickey grinned and shoved him away, hoping the other man couldn't see how shitty he really felt. He moped for a couple of days, barely paying attention to the world around him, just missing the crazy girl with the temper as fiery as her hair.

Then he answered an unexpected knock at his door and was baffled by the sight of a cute, petite brunette with huge blue eyes staring up at him. “Um... Can I help you?”

“Huh.” One dark eyebrow arching up, she called back over her shoulder, “You really do have a type.”

A familiar laugh made Mickey freeze in shock as Beck stepped into view behind the girl, another one in her arms. “I made the mistake of telling Maddie that I met this awesome DJ in Greece-”

“And since I have no friends anyway,” the girl, who he finally realized was Beck's older daughter, Madeline, cut in, “I figured there'd be no problem moving my 'party' somewhere more fun than my aunt's house. For the third year in a row.”

“Jesus, you might look like your dad, but you sound just like your mom!” The words slipped out before he could stop himself. While Madeline rolled her eyes, the little girl in her mother's arms – Alice, he figured – giggled.

“Yeah,” Beck agreed with a grin, moving closer and leaning past her daughters to kiss him. “She's got my snarky attitude. Gods help me. Thankfully, this one's still innocent.” She squeezed Alice tighter against her side, making her giggle again.

“Mommy! You're squishing me!”

“Her? Innocent? Did auntie tell you what she did to my stereo?!”

“It was an accident!”

“My butt it was!”

Wincing, Beck glanced at Mickey and mouthed, 'I'm sorry.' “Girls, enough. What have I told you about bickering in front of strangers?”

“I mean, you also tell us not to spread our legs for strangers, and yet...”

“Madeline Fiona O'Brien!”

“What?!” Eyes wide and looking frustrated, Madeline gestured to Mickey. “I'm kinda right!”

He couldn't hold it in anymore. Leaning on the door frame to stay upright, Mickey burst out laughing. God help this woman, he thought as he struggled to get his breath back. Her daughter's exactly like her!

Face even redder than her hair, Beck grumbled, “I did not tell her we slept together.”

“You couldn't shut up about him and your clothes smelled like dude. Doesn't take a genius.”

“Maddie, couldja stop? I kinda wanna see more of Greece than two buildings. If mom drags us home early cuz you're being a jerk, I will kick your seat the whole way back to Boston!”

“I'll let her.”

Mickey had just about gotten his laughter under control. Still chuckling, he yanked Beck into his arms and gave her a long, slow kiss. “You are dreaming if you think I'm letting you leave again.”

“That doesn't sound kidnappy at all!”

Laughing again, he released the blushing redhead only to trap Madeline in his arms and tickle her until she squeaked. “And you, little miss Queen of Sarcasm!” With a grin, he kissed the top of her head and released her, pleased to see that she was smiling. “Happy birthday.”

“Thanks.”

As he stepped aside to let them in, it finally dawned on him that he'd never actually worked a child's party before. He was used to crowds of rowdy drunk Greeks, not two innocent little girls. He didn't even know any kids, besides his own! He glanced helplessly at Beck, who snickered and kissed his jaw.

“Just do whatever; I can keep an eye on them. Maddie was more interested in the change of scenery than an actual party.”

“Does she really have no friends?”

She shrugged, turning to watch her daughters awkwardly settle on the couch and begin nudging and poking each other repeatedly. “She's never been the most social kid in the world. Around their own age groups, Liss is the bubbly extrovert and Maddie can't be bothered; she wanted to hang with kids her own age until she realized they annoy the hell out of her.”

“Argyris might know some people with kids...” He rolled his eyes. “He'll think I'm nuts, trying to hunt down teenagers, though.”

Beck laughed and shook her head. “No, really, don't worry about it. We don't even have to actually throw a party-”

Cutting her off with a kiss, Mickey insisted, “Oh, she's getting a party. When is her birthday, anyway?”

“Today, actually.”

He flinched, glancing at the clock, and then relaxed. It was still pretty early. “She's getting a party,” he repeated firmly. “She's fourteen! That... has no special significance in any culture I've heard of, but the kid still deserves some fun on her damn birthday. Especially if the last few have been disappointing.”

“The day after is pretty significant in our culture,” she murmured, so softly he almost didn't catch it.

“Is it?” Wasn't she American? He seemed to recall a whole conversation that almost turned into an argument about it. “Since when?”

Beck blushed again, looking uncomfortable. “Never mind.”

“...Girls, make yourselves at home. I need to talk to your mom for a minute.”

“You're talking now.”

He almost wrote that off as another snarky response, until he realized it had come from Alice. Looking innocently confused, she stared at him with almost comically large blue eyes, and he smiled. “In private,” he clarified as gently as he could as he grabbed Beck's wrist and tugged her down the hall toward his bedroom.

“Door open at all times!”

With a huff, Beck dug her heels in and spun around to glare at Madeline. “Who's the mom, here?”

“Sometimes I wonder.”

“Madeline.” Wrenching free of Mickey's grasp, she crossed her arms over her chest and stared her defiant offspring down. “Who's the mom?”

Glowering right back, Madeline mirrored her pose and grudgingly admitted, “You are.”

“Good. Now that we've got that cleared up, how about you show our host a little respect?”

Madeline's face was red as a tomato, but she still looked more angry and resentful than contrite, until she took a deep breath and turned to Mickey. With a surprising note of sincerity, she grumbled, “Sorry, Mickey.”

“Jet lag gets the best of all of us. Maybe you two should take a nap while your mom and I talk.” He didn't know what the hell else to say. He couldn't say 'it's okay' and undermine her mother, and 'you're forgiven' sounded kind of dickish. With an awkward smile, he waved and resumed dragging Beck down the hall.

As soon as the bedroom door was closed behind them, Beck sighed and leaned against it, looking worn out. “I'm so sorry about her. She's been so bitchy lately; my sister said she was even copping an attitude with her, which she almost never does.”

“She's probably just tired and been missing her mom.” In truth, he thought Madeline's sass was funny as hell, but he wasn't about to step into the middle of a mother-daughter war. Instead, he focused on his own curiosity. “What 'culture' celebrates the day after a birthday?”

She winced. “It's nothing, Mickey. Forget it.”

Weird. “What's the big deal? I'm just curious.”

“Alright, fine.” Looking and sounding resigned, she muttered, “If you're gonna judge or laugh, might as well get it out of the way – I'm a witch.”

Mickey stared at her. Whatever he'd been expecting her to say, it wasn't that. “...A witch?”

“I don't ride a broomstick and I can't turn you into a toad.” Oof. Defensive. Judging by her tone, she'd had this conversation before, and it hadn't gone well. “My sister's a witch, too, and so are my girls. There's an old tradition in the craft; at thirteen we find our deity, if we're meant to serve one, and a year and a day later, we pledge to their service.”

Light dawned. “Oh, that's why you always say 'Gods' instead of 'God'! That makes sense.” Who was he to judge? He wasn't particularly religious, but was any one religion really any weirder than the next? Curiosity abated, he brushed it off and tugged her into his arms. “My very own Sabrina.”

Beck snorted and dropped her head onto his shoulder. “Sometimes I feel more like Sarah Sanderson.”

“You really want me to throw a rager for your fourteen-year-old?” He didn't know what to say about her Hocus Pocus reference – 'horny and ditzy? Sounds about right' was...probably not the right thing – so he decided to just jump back to the original topic.

She shrugged. “I honestly don't know what to do for her. Coming back here was her idea, but I kinda doubt it had much to do with her birthday. She wasn't kidding about wondering which one of us is the parent; that kid's been trying to take care of me since she was little.”

“Why?”

Sighing, she stepped back out of his arms. She looked so sad and broken suddenly that he wished he'd never asked. “I would love to say that it's just who she is – and it is, to a point. Some people are just natural caregivers, and Maddie's definitely one of them. But I was a mess before Liss was born. Maddie's had to deal with a lot of bullshit, and it made her grow up too fast.”

That settled it in Mickey's mind. As he pulled his cell phone out of his pocket with one hand and opened the bedroom door with the other, he told her again, “She's getting a fucking party.”

Three hours and a lot of yelling at Agryris to get him to stop laughing later, he was setting up speakers in front of his apartment building, surrounded by what looked like every kid in Athens between twelve and sixteen, along with their parents. It definitely wasn't his usual crowd, to say the least, but they were friendly enough. Most importantly, Madeline was already smiling and laughing.

Remembering the posters he'd seen around town, he pulled his phone out again and called a number he hadn't used in quite a while. “Well, well. So you're in Athens. What do you know? I have a favor to ask you...”

“OHMYGOD! BASTIAN!”

Mickey grinned. Clearly, he'd made the right call, and it was earning him hugs galore. For the first time all day, Madeline was acting like a teenage girl, bouncing up and down and screeching with joy as Bastian made her way through the party. With a bright smile, she hugged the birthday girl and smoothed her dark curls back off of her face before approaching Mickey and hugging him. The second she moved back, Madeline launched herself at him, squeezing so tightly he thought she might crack a few ribs. And then her laughing mother replaced her, and he'd never felt so popular.

“Hell of a dad move,” Beck teased, grinning at him as she stepped aside and Maddie barreled into him again.

“Thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou!”

Laughing, Mickey lifted her up and kissed the top of her head. “Happy birthday.” She was too light; idly, he made a mental note to ask what the hell Beck and her sister were feeding these kids, or failing to feed them. Then he realized he sort of was acting like Maddie's dad and he blushed, setting her down.

As she ran off to dance with her little sister, he pulled Bastian up onto the platform and picked up the mic. “First of all – let's hear it for the birthday girl!” He pointed, and grinned when the revelers around him cheered, making the brunette blush. “Maddie O'Brien! You said you have no friends back in the States-” Boos echoed around them, and her color deepened. “-So I thought, what could make a better birthday present than a couple hundred Greek friends?”

The crowd cheered again, and a few “YEAH, MADDIE” shouts made the girl in question laugh, covering her face with the hand not holding tight to Alice's little wrist. Mickey noticed that she did that a lot; whenever the younger girl wasn't in her mother's arms, she was in her sister's tight, protective grip.

“What do you guys think?” He shouted into the mic. “This girl's really cool, right? You wanna be Maddie's friends, and show her how much better everything is here in Greece?”

The cheers were deafening. Mickey was grinning like a fool, and was pleased to see that so was Madeline. Big blue eyes shining, she stared up at him like he was her hero, and for a minute, life was pretty damn good. He'd die before admitting it aloud, at least so soon, but he could easily see a bright, happy future where he was stepdad to these two beautiful little girls, and they doted over their step-brother Hector, the way Maddie doted over Alice. He glanced at their mother, and couldn't help getting just a little choked up when he saw an identical look of joy and appreciation on her beautiful face. Man, it was nice to be the hero.

Before he could get too emotional and ruin the party, he pointed to Bastian. “You guys know who this is, right?” Another enthusiastic roar; he was a little jealous this time, but shoved it down and smiled. “Well, she's gonna take over for a little while, so make sure you give her some love, alright?”

Yanking her into one more tight hug, he handed the reins over to Bastian and hopped down. Beck immediately threw her arms around him and kissed him. “You are amazing, you know that? I descend on you unannounced with a grouchy teenager in tow, and you give her the best fucking night of her life!”

“All in a day's work,” he joked, squeezing her. “She seems like a great kid; they both do. I couldn't just do nothing and let her be miserable.”

“Hector is lucky.” She was grinning so wide, her face hurt; Mickey only knew because he was doing the same. “He's got a really great dad. If you'd do something like this for a kid you've never even met before, I can only imagine the lengths you'd go to for your own.”

“Think you can pass that praise on to my ex? Maybe she'll actually let me see him.”

Smile fading, she gripped his head with both hands and pulled him down to press their foreheads together. “If you want me to, I'll help you fight for him. You deserve to see your son, and he deserves to know his dad.”

“How long are you staying this time?” He didn't want to talk about Hector suddenly; not at a party surrounded by strangers and their children.

Seeming to sense his mood, Beck smiled and glanced at her giggling daughters. They were hopping around like lunatics to the music, surrounded by kids Maddie's age. She looked like she was having the time of her life. “From the looks of things now? Forever.” Mickey thought she was joking, but the look on her face stopped him from laughing it off. “I've never seen her so happy. Athens might just become home.”

“I hope so.” He shrugged, forcing a chipper smile to hide the desperately hopeful one he couldn't quite keep in. “It did for me!”

“We'll see.”

Unlike most of the parties he'd worked, this one started winding down fairly early as kids hugged Maddie, wished her a happy birthday, and were ushered home by their tired parents. Alice was asleep in Mickey's arms, her tiny body limp as a rag doll and her silky black curls tickling his nose. As the last of her party guests wished her well and left, Madeline hurried over to him and cuddled up to the side not currently occupied by the dead weight of her sister.

“Thank you, Mickey.”

“Did you have fun?” She nodded, and he smiled softly, stroking her dark hair. “Good. Let's get inside and get the little one into bed, shall we?”

She glanced around, frowning a little. “Where's mom?”

“Already upstairs.” Grinning, he watched her for a reaction and added casually, “With Bastian.”

Bright blue eyes widening, she gaped at him. “She's staying?”

Mickey laughed. “For tonight, at least, yeah. Come on.”

As they trudged through the door of his apartment a few minutes later, Mickey found himself wishing he'd stayed outside.

“No way!” Beck whipped around to gape at him while Bastian laughed. “You didn't tell me you were in a band!”

“Oh lord,” Madeline grumbled under her breath. “Get something pierced and she'll propose to you by midnight, I swear.”

Choking on a startled laugh, he lowered Alice into her sister's waiting arms. “Put her in Hector's bed. You and your mom can take mine tonight.” As she obediently wandered down the hall to tuck the younger girl in, Mickey flopped down on the couch beside Beck and tugged her into his arms. “That was a long time ago. Then she got her big break and got all famous, and she didn't need losers like me anymore.”

“Oh, that is such bullshit!” Laughing, Bastian stretched out to kick him. “We got a break. We got a deal. You were every bit a part of all that!”

“Oh, please!” Mickey rolled his eyes. “You never needed me. It was the Bastian Show, and we were just-”

“No! No, what happened was...”

They bickered for a while, going back and forth over who was to blame for Saint Claude's ultimate demise. After a few minutes, Beck excused herself and left the room, leaving the two old friends to catch up. When the argument showed no signs of ending, Mickey huffed and stood up, muttering something about getting a drink as he walked away. He loved Bastian, but damn she could be stubborn!

“What the fuck are you doing?” A glass in each hand, he stared at her as she laid out lines of cocaine on her phone's screen.

“What the fuck does it look like I'm doing?”

“Oh, god.” He grimaced, glancing toward the bedrooms. All quiet, but he didn't know if Beck and Maddie were asleep, or just hiding from the debate. “Come on, let's go in the bathroom.”

“The Brat Pack's asleep. Don't worry about it!”

“You don't know that,” he hissed. “Come on.”

Bastian rolled her eyes, but she allowed him to usher her into the bathroom. “You're paranoid. You barely even know these people! What do you care what they think?”

“I care,” he snapped, though he didn't refuse when she offered him a line. He'd just finished, was still hunched over the phone, when the door opened and he was faced with, basically, his worst nightmare: Madeline was standing in the doorway, hand on the knob.

They both froze, staring at her like deer in headlights. Face completely expressionless, Maddie looked at each of them, then at the line of cocaine still on the phone, and then straight at Mickey. "I just wanted to thank you again for today." Without another word, she calmly turned and left the room, closing the door behind her.

"Shit." Ignoring Bastian's drug-fueled giggle fit, Mickey was on his feet and chasing after the teen in a flash. "Maddie!"

Though her face was still a stony mask, there were tears in her eyes when she whirled around to face him. "I need to talk to you. Now."

"Okay." He gestured to the couch, but she shook her head.

"Outside. I don't wanna wake up mom or Alice."

Nodding, he followed her without another word. At first he'd thought she meant out in the hall, but she didn't stop until they were outside the building. "Maddie, listen-"

"Let her go." Mickey's heart broke when she turned to face him again. Tears running down her cheeks and lower lip trembling, she stared up at him with those huge blue eyes and he almost started crying with her. "You have to let her go. Mom's loyal even when she shouldn't be. She'll never break it off."

"Maddie, I don't want-"

"I only exist because my dad drugged and raped her!" Wiping furiously at her face while he shrank back in horror, she continued more calmly, "She doesn't know I know that, or that he tried to kidnap me a bunch of times when I was little. Auntie told me. She still stayed with him for almost a year. Will hit her, Owen was a toxic psycho, Alex was a racist jerk... Alice's dad was always really nice to us all when he came around, but he almost never did. And I don't know what he did, but he's in jail for life now." With a bitter grimace, she spat, "And you're a druggie."

Maddie's had to deal with a lot of bullshit, and it made her grow up too fast.

Beck's soft voice, so full of pain and regret, echoed in his head as Mickey sank down to sit on the steps and tugged Madeline into his arms. "I'm not a druggie," he assured her as she clung to him and broke down sobbing. "One time thing, kiddo, I promise."

"Like you'd say anything else!"

The little whimper that escaped her as she scooted up his leg to get closer and dropped her head onto his shoulder very nearly made him start crying with her. For all that she insisted he get the hell out of her life, he could tell that she was desperate for someone decent to stay. This poor kid was fourteen going on forty after watching her mom date a string of losers; no wonder she had no faith in men, or in her mother's ability to make sound decisions. He squeezed her a little tighter, not sure what to do or say.

"Mickey, I'm tired," she croaked, making his heart ache for her even more. He knew she didn't mean sleepy; she was tired of being the mature one, and he couldn't say he blamed her. "I'm so tired..."

"Shhh, it's okay, baby," he whispered, rubbing her back. "You can rest now. I'm here. I'm not going anywhere. You're my little girl now, okay? And I won't let anything happen to you, or your sister, or your mom. You don't have to take care of her anymore, honey. I will. You just take a breath and be a kid while you can."

"How can I trust you?"

Well, that hurt, but he got where she was coming from. Pressing a soft kiss to the top of her head, he murmured, "I gotta earn that." He pried her loose and pushed her back a little, just enough to be able to look her in the eye. "Do you think you can give me a chance to?"

After a pause that felt like an eternity, Maddie sniffled and nodded. "Okay. But if you hurt her, I'll kick your nuts back up inside."

Laughing, Mickey nodded and smoothed her hair back. "Noted.” A thought occurred to him and he frowned. “Why did you aunt tell you all that? Putting that weight on a kid... That's cruel.”

“I asked,” she admitted with a shrug. “I asked why mom was such a mess, and why I didn't have a dad. So she told me.”

I'd have made some shit up, damn. Even high, he was smart enough not to say that. He chose not to say anything at all, and just held her for a while as the cool night air soothed their frayed nerves and her breathing slowly returned to normal.

“Mickey?”

“Hm?”

Voice a small, timid whisper, she asked, “Do you really wanna be my dad?”

Smiling softly, he kissed her head again and hugged her just a bit tighter. “I am your dad.” When she tensed and let out a frustrated huff, he explained, “I'm in love with your mom, kiddo. And I already love you and your sister. We're family now, and I'm not going anywhere. I promise.”

“You're weird.” He could hear her teasing smile in her voice, and he smiled, too, relieved. “You don't even know us.”

“I know enough. Come on.” Though all he wanted was to sit there and cuddle with her all night, he gently pushed her off his lap and stood. “It's getting late. You should get to bed.”

Sending her off down the hall to his bedroom when they got back upstairs, he collapsed on the couch and sighed. He'd known when he met her that Beck would make his life more interesting... he just had no idea how interesting.

A laugh beside him reminded him of his other guest and he reluctantly opened his eyes. Judging from the way she was twitching and snickering, Bastian had finished the rest of the coke. “That was intense!”

Mickey closed his eyes again. “If it's not already gone, get that shit out of my house.”

“Oh, come on!” She shoved him, grinning impishly. “Don't try to act all virtuous now! You were right there with me, until that kid walked in.”

“'That kid'?” Annoyed now, he sat up and glared at her. “My kid.”

“Not really, though.” Confused, she twisted to glance down the hall, and then back to stare at him. “...Right? I mean, shit, she does kinda look like you...”

He shook his head. “No. Biologically, no, but I don't care. I'm not gonna add my name to the list of guys who've hurt her.”

Bastian snorted, rolling her eyes. “Mickey, you can't just decide to play daddy to this random kid on a whim just because your ex won't let you see your own. She's not yours, and changing your whole life and personality isn't going to change that.”

“I haven't touched that shit in years. I'm not changing on a whim; you just don't know me anymore.”

“Enough,” she challenged, settling back in her seat and staring down her nose at him. “I know you well enough to know this is never gonna work.”

“What isn't?”

“This!” Bastian gestured vaguely around them. “This whole self-domestication shit. You're not some house husband and stepdad – you're a musician. You belong on the road, Mickey! Not shut up in some old lady's apartment playing House with some crazy chick and her walking, talking reminders of past mistakes.”

“Beck,” he snapped, glaring at her. “'That chick's' name is Beck, and her gorgeous daughters are Maddie and Alice. They're not mistakes. Alice is adorable and so smart, and Maddie is fucking awesome and she's been through Hell. I haven't seen you in years and you think you're gonna sit here in my house and tell me who I am and what I want? I don't fucking think so, Bastian.”

“Alright, alright!” She held up her hands in surrender, eyes wide. “Chill. I just miss you, okay? I want you to come on tour with me, like the old days, not sit here and rot away in some mediocre domestic life. You could have so much more!”

Mickey sighed, staring off into space for a moment. Some part of him was drawn to her offer, but that wasn't him anymore. He didn't actually want to tour with her, he just hated feeling settled; at some point in his wild youth, stability had begun to feel like stagnation, and now he found himself often desperate to avoid it, even if it came with everything he truly wanted.

He thought about Beck, and her bright smile and her two beautiful, lonely daughters, and he thought about Hector. Beck had been spot-on; as much as he did love Greece, Mickey had really only stayed this long because of his son. He wanted to be in Hector's life. Now he wanted to be in Maddie and Alice's lives, too. He wanted a family.

And for the first time, he was willing to fight for that family.

“You're right,” he admitted slowly. “You're right, I've been hiding here, just floating around aimlessly.” Before she could get all triumphant, he stood and growled, “But that's not what I'm doing now. Now, I'm finally seeing a life that I want, and I'll be damned if I'll let anyone take it away from me.”

That said, he walked away without giving Bastian a chance to argue. He peeked into his son's room to check on Alice, smiled when he saw the way she was sprawled, half hanging off the bed, and he quietly closed the door and headed to his own room. Hopefully Maddie wouldn't mind; he'd originally intended to crash on the couch, but he couldn't stand to be in the same room as Bastian, and couldn't quite bring himself to kick her out, either. Moving slowly, so as to avoid waking either of the bed's other two occupants, he slid in next to Beck.

She immediately rolled over and cuddled close to him. At first he thought she was just fidgeting in her sleep, but then she whispered, “Don't let anyone change you or tell you who you are. Not even me.”

“I won't.” He tried to smile, couldn't quite manage it, and kissed her, instead. “Goodnight.”

“Night.”

It wasn't quite a seamless transition. Mickey's place was too small for a family of four, and he didn't exactly love the idea of moving a bunch of heavy audio equipment down those winding stairs. Though he wanted to jump right into living together, he didn't put up much of a fight when Beck started looking for her own place.

It helped that she didn't spend a lot of time at home. Once the girls were enrolled in school, their mother started dropping them off and then going straight to Mickey's place. She helped Argyris translate for Mickey and his clients, which both men had thought was a terrible idea... until they saw her in action. The short fuse he'd become so familiar with in their first couple of days together was nowhere to be found. Around even his most difficult clients, Beck was the embodiment of charm and professional courtesy. Mickey quickly found that while Argyris was better for direct translation, he was no match for Beck when it came to diplomacy and deescalating a heated argument.

“You haven't seen 'difficult',” she teased, “until you've been a woman in a male-dominated field arguing for funding. This is nothing.”

Mickey laughed, yanking her into his arms. “Where have you been all my life?”

She flinched, closing her eyes and pressing her fingertips to her mouth for a second. It was the briefest of moments, and then she was smiling again and joking, “On my knees in the dirt, mostly,” but he refused to ignore it.

“You okay?”

With a little shrug and a nod, she admitted, “Been a little queasy and lightheaded lately, but I'm fine. It never lasts long.”

“You are so American.” She glared at him and he grinned, pleased that he knew how to get her attention. “You're not in Dystopia anymore – go to a doctor.”

“Did you not hear me? I'm fi-”

“I heard 'lately,'” he countered, poking her side and immediately regretting it when she cringed. Right; queasy. Maybe don't mess with her stomach, Mickey. “'Lately' means this is not normal. It means you're sick, so go to a doctor.”

She shook her head, winced, and dropped it onto his shoulder. “I don't need a doctor.”

“You can't even move without turning green.”

“I'm fine. I don't need a doctor.”

“Why are you being so stubborn? You're supposed to help me with stubborn people, not be the Queen of them!”

“Am I your girlfriend or your lawyer?”

“That's not what I meant and you know it. Don't change the subject.” Rubbing her back, he insisted as gently as he could, “Please just go get checked out.”

“I don't need to. I'm fine.”

“Look, even if it's minor, do you wanna suffer or find out what's wrong and get better?”

“I don't need a doctor to tell me what I already know!”

What she already knew? He frowned, more confused than ever. “Is it some kind of chronic-”

“Mickey, I'm not sick – I'm pregnant!”

He froze, gaping at her in shock. She started to pull away, but he tightened his grip on her waist before she could stand up. “You're what?”

Looking nervous and uncomfortable, she mumbled, “I was trying to find the right time to tell you; we've just been so busy with that 'make it more Greek' asshat...”

“You're really pregnant?” When she slowly and carefully nodded, Mickey grinned and hugged her as tight as he dared. “That's fantastic!” He finally let her up, only to stand with her and frame her face with both hands. Between frantic kisses all over her face, he gushed, “That's incredible! Have you told the girls yet? Oh, Alice is gonna be so excited to be a big sister! And Hector! I can't wait for Hector to meet his little brother or sister!”

“Mickey...”

He glanced around, smile dimming just a bit. “Damn, we gotta get a bigger place.”

“Mickey.”

“I wonder if Agryris' grandmother had-”

“Mickey!” Shoving his hands away, Beck got a tight grip on his hair and forced him to turn back to face her. “Do you really think we can do this?”

He blinked, taken aback by that. “Don't you?”

“Three kids, and fighting for joint custody of a fourth?” She shook her head, looking at him like he was an idiot. “The thought that we might be in over our heads crossed my mind, yeah. I was struggling with just two!”

“Well, now you have me.” His cheeky grin didn't seem to comfort her as much as he'd hoped it would. “You were struggling 'cause you were alone; now you're not.”

“A single mom with two kids really isn't all that different from two parents with four,” she pointed out, releasing his hair and crossing her arms over her chest. Seeing the hurt he tried to mask, she sighed. “Look, I'm glad you're excited, I am. And whether we're ready or not, the kid's on the way, I just... I just wish I shared your optimism. I'm not excited, Mickey; I'm scared to death.”

“Well, get excited,” he jokingly commanded, pulling her close for another hug. “We'll be fine. Besides, it's not like Aspa's ever gonna give me full custody, so it's not really two to four. Maddie's old enough that she doesn't need constant hyper-vigilance from us, so it's really just two to two-and-a-half.”

Finally, finally, Beck laughed. It was quiet and weak, but a laugh nonetheless. “Jesus, you're like sunshine in human form. Does anything ever get you down?”

He shrugged. “Sure, but I try not to let it for long. And I see a new baby as something to celebrate, not freak the hell out over.”

“See, you get to see it that way because you don't have to push it out,” she teased. “It's not so perfectly sunny from where I'm standing.”

“No one said life is perfect.” Still smiling like a fool, he kissed her. “Whatever you need, I'm here. You're not doing everything alone anymore. We got this.”

“I love you.”

It didn't seem possible, but somehow his smile got even wider. “I love you, too.”

“Speaking of Aspa, though...”

“Oh, god, what?”

With a laugh and an apologetic smile, Beck ventured, “I don't think you should come today.”

“What?”

Her smile immediately faded; apparently, he was really bad at hiding it when he was confused and offended. “Baby, you're chaos incarnate. It's one of the things I love about you, but it's not exactly conducive to a civilized conversation with a woman who probably kind of hates you.”

“Yeah, thanks.”

“I just think I might have better luck getting through to her, single mom to single mom.” She looked like she was waiting for him to hit her, which only made him feel worse. “I know how hard it is, and how, whether we mean to or not, we tend to villainize our exes-”

He snorted, rolling his eyes. “Yeah, well, with the stellar guys you've dated, it makes sense. It's not really villainizing if he's already a villain.”

“Exactly how much did Madeline tell you?”

Uh-oh. She was mad. Knowing he was in trouble no matter what and refusing to drag his stepdaughter down with him, Mickey hastily changed the subject. “Do you really think I'll fuck things up that badly if I go?” Why was he even asking? Offended or not, he knew she was right; Aspa hated his guts.

Thankfully, Beck let the dig about her exes drop and her steely expression melted back into one of gentle sympathy. “I just want you to have the best chance possible of getting to be an active part of Hector's life. I want him to know you, to sleep in that bed you bought him before he outgrows it, to meet his new sisters. And I think your feelings towards Aspa, and hers toward you, are probably too raw and volatile right now for a face-to-face meeting to be a good idea.”

“Alright.” Forcing a faint smile, he nodded. “Alright, go. You've got a point.”

“I'll tell you all about it when I get back, okay?” She promised with an equally strained smile, kissing his cheek.

“Can't wait.”

When she came back a little while later, she was laughing. Mickey's hopes that it meant things had gone better than expected were dashed, though, when she managed to gasp out, “She really hates you!”

“Yeah, thanks.” He shook his head. “I knew that much.”

“I'm sorry.” Still giggling, Beck wound her arms around his waist. “She was just such a bitch. I kinda respect the hell out of her.”

“What did she say?”

“That you're a baby,” she dutifully recited, “and you're irresponsible, unreliable...”

“Why is this funny?!”

“Because, Mickey... Mickey, honey...” Framing his face like he had to her earlier, she told him, “It's nothing I didn't already know. You're flighty and you're a big kid; this isn't news. She was floored that I love you anyway, and my god, the look on her face when I went off about how that childishness is what makes you such a good dad, and you're great with the girls... I haven't been able to stop laughing since! Pretty sure she hates me now, too.”

“Great!” Failing to see the humor, Mickey jerked free of her light grasp and moved away, beginning to pace the room. “So instead of helping, you just alienated her from us both!”

“We're going to see him on Saturday.”

“What?” He spun to stare at her; she wasn't laughing anymore. “Are you serious?”

Looking rather proud of herself, she nodded. “Supervised by Aspa, of course, but yep. You get to spend time with your son, and I finally get to meet him. It doesn't matter what she thinks of either of us, as long as she can see that you give a shit; that we're safe to be around Hector, and can be trusted to think of him first. Show her how much you love him, that even childish and flaky you can be reliable, that you want to be reliable, and a supervised visit might turn into father-son weekends, without your ex underfoot.”

“I... wha... how...?”

She shrugged, smiling faintly. “Mother to mother. We came to an understanding.”

Overwhelmed by emotions he couldn't even identify, Mickey closed the distance between them and lifted her up. “I fucking love you, you know that?”

Beaming as he set her down, Beck leaned in for a kiss. “I love you, too, baby.”

“That's not cute anymore.” Despite his protests, he was grinning as he backed her toward the bedroom. “Now I just feel like you're calling me a baby. That sucks. Don't do that.”

“I'll call you what I want,” she teased, pulling him down for another kiss. “And you can't stop me!”

With a hand on her belly, he joked, “How about you call me 'daddy'?”

“No.” She laughed and shook her head. “I physically cannot do that. I'll puke.”

“Well, morning sickness is pretty common.”

“No, this is pure disgust.”

They were both laughing now as they reached the bed; he almost playfully shoved her back, but then remembered the baby and thought better of it. Instead, he flopped across it himself and beckoned for her to join him. “We're gonna be okay, you know.”

Beck winced as she settled gingerly on the edge of the bed. “It's just such bad timing. I don't...”

“Hey.” He tugged at her arm until she stretched out beside him, and wound his arms around her. “It's all gonna be okay. No matter what life throws at us, we'll deal with it together, okay? I want this baby. I know you want this baby. The rest is just details.”

“Pretty big fucking details. I was supposed to go to Mongolia next month.”

“Then go.” God, he didn't want her to, but he was determined to show her that they could be together, be a family, without completely derailing her life. When she looked at him like he'd lost it, he gave her a bland 'are you kidding' look right back. “You're not really gonna try to convince me that you weren't still going on digs when you were pregnant with Alice, are you?”

She blushed. “My team didn't know...”

“So don't tell them this time, either.”

“Mickey...” Pushing his arms away, she sat up. “You really have no idea how physically demanding my work is, do you? I almost lost Alice.”

For a second, he floundered, wondering what the hell to do or say. Then he brightened and sat up, as well. “You speak a million languages; just work as a translator until you're safe to go back out into the field.”

“...I do love it,” she conceded, making him perk up. “And maybe I can finally teach you some Greek so you can talk to your son more easily.”

Mickey chuckled. “I'm not getting out of that, am I?”

“Nope.” She grinned and settled back against his chest as he leaned against the headboard. “Not until we're both fluent.”

“Alright, I'm in.” He smiled, kissing her jaw and lacing their fingers together. “New home for us, new job for you, learning a new language...”

“New baby on the way.”

“New baby on the way,” he parroted, pressing their linked hands to her belly. “New chapter.”

“Here's to a new life.”

Mickey nodded and leaned down for a proper kiss, murmuring against her lips, “Together.”

[captainjimothycarter]

How about Steve and Peggy meeting alternate versions of themselves?

Listen, I don’t know where I am going with this.

Modern-day Steggy, where Peggy is a Shield Agent and Steve, is Cap meet Cap Peggy and skinny Steve.

--

“Steve. Steve. Steve!” 

The last Peggy wanted to do was wake her boyfriend up, but she was afraid she had no choice. The guy didn’t get enough sleep as it was between these countless Shield missions alone, not to mention the Avenges, but right now she wasn’t taking a risk. She watched as his eyes instantly popped open, knowing he was holding his breath. Listening. Waiting.

Looking to her for the next move.

“Somethings wrong.” He still stared at her in the darkness of their room, only lit up by the annoying corner the curtain didn’t reach so the streetlamp filtered through. “There was...I can’t explain it, a surge of energy or something.”

If Steve thought it was funny, he didn’t say so. Instead, he slowly sat up in the bed and scrubbed at his face. He still looked down at her, eyes searching her features. No, Peggy wouldn’t joke about this and she looked understandably worried. Her brow was ruffled, lips pursed. Her hand was just inches from her gun.  

She wouldn’t have woken him up if she thought she could handle it. Meaning, she didn’t’ think she could or she was that worried.

“Okay,” he whispered right back, giving a nod of his head. “Okay, we’ll go look. Let me get dressed and get the shield.”

It was three in the morning but time and night meant nothing for Brooklyn. There were fewer people on the street and some neighborhoods were quieter than others. They drove with the lights off down neighborhoods, Steve following Peggy’s direction. Every so often he’d stop to look over at her or ask if she still felt that surge here. 

Twice they got turned around thanks to construction and he could see Peggy getting frustrating. Time at war had taught him to be careful with his words.

“Maybe…” he said carefully, earning a hard look from Peggy. Steve sighed, looking at the clock. It was nearing five-thirty, dawn would be here soon. “Maybe we should head to HQ? See if something was there?”

“Fine, but I’m heading straight to my office to look at the CCTV cameras from the night.” She sounded grumpy, but Steve understood. She didn’t like to be wrong. “Can you stop by security? Ask if they’ve seen anything. Davis trusts you more than me.”

“Because I haven’t threatened to put him through a window, for good reason.” Steve shrugged as he turned their jeep around and headed straight towards HQ. His hand laid in Peggy’s on the drive over. “I believe you.”

“Of course you do. You’re my partner, you have to believe in me.”

Steve laughed at that one, causing Peggy to roll her eyes. “You know what I mean, Pegs. If something is wrong, we’ll find it. Give it another hour, we’ll see what the cameras say, if we can’t find anything, then we’ll ask Tony.”

--

Steve, I need you to come to my office. Now. PC

That was never a good text. Steve tried to ignore the anxiety in him as he grabbed at the shield from his back and bolted down the hall, ignoring Davis’ questionable looks. He took the stairs rather than the elevator, blowing past a small blonde figure as he entered the office.

He nearly ran into Peggy.

Or Peggys. There were two of them.

His Peggy. And...A Peggy in...a Captain America uniform? There were clearly differenced between their uniforms, hers had a tie and his, well didn’t. Not that he was wearing it.

She had a hard look on her face as she addressed him. His eyes falling to his Peggy.

“Uh, anyone wants to explain? Pegs, why am I staring at another one of you? Did Nat poison me again?” 

“I almost wish,” Peggy sighed, pinching her nose. “I don’t know. I came into my office and found her here… How the hell she got here…”

“I’m not HYDRA,” Cap Peggy said with a roll of her eyes.

“Oh good, because neither of us was thinking that,” Steve snorted, still not dropping his shield. “Because a sure identical look of Agent Carter in a uniform mimicking mine defiantly couldn’t be HYDRA.”

“She’s not,” a voice from the doorway said, one sending a chill down his spine.

Steve almost didn’t want to look, yet he did. He could hear his Peggy’s gasp.

There he stood, well a younger version of him...well...one...smaller… Much smaller. Is that how he really looked? Did he really have that cowlick on his head? Were his eyes really that soft color of a blue? And the way his shoulders sagged because he knew the pain of his back hurting…

It was him, from before, before the serum but...older…Not by much, a few years but still. He, sure enough, wore the uniform of an aviator from the 40s’.

“I don’t…” Steve, his Steve, him, opened and closed his mouth and looked to his partner behind the desk, where she still stood still. “Understand this. That’s...me…”

“I know,” Peggy said carefully, catching Stevie - the smaller Steve - cross the room with a heavy limp and watched Cap Peggy turn her full attention to him.

Even though they all knew it wasn’t full, if she was Peggy, she had eyes on the back of her head.

“I read the files, Steve. I-I saw Erksine’s reviews. I know what you looked like.” She was being gentle, soft, trying to create a balm for both of them that they didn’t know what the hell to do with. “I think...we need to talk. All of us.”

“Fine,” the 40s pair easily said.

Everyone sat, the desk between them, Steve choosing to stand behind his partner and grip her shoulder tightly. Peggy rubbed at her brow again and sighed. “Okay, I think we just need to come to an understanding here on what the hell is going on. We’re Steve Rogers and Peggy Carter, but so are you?”

The other pair exchanged a look. “Yes. Except I didn’t get the serum and Peggy did,” Stevie mused with a shrug of his shoulders. “I was almost killed by a rouge HYDRA agent that killed Erksine. Peggy got the serum to keep it safe from others. Howard had me chosen for...special aviator projects instead.”

“If you’re Captain America,” Cap Peggy mused, nodding to Steve. “How’d you end up here? In this...future?”

“Plane crash,” Steve replied simply, squeezing Peggy’s shoulder. 

“With the tesseract?”

Steve blinked before shaking his head. “It fell into the ocean. It was later recovered by Howard Stark but I… Hang on, does that mean…”

Cap Peggy nodded, a hand laid over the familiar bulge in her pouch. “First, you..” She turned to her mirrored self. “How do I know you two aren’t HYDRA?”

It was a good question - back and forth game here. One Peggy was tired of and wanted to get down to business. She wasn’t too sure of time travel but she knew that two versions of yourself couldn’t be good.

“Michael Carter confessed to me he was gay and never told a soul. A few years later, he was killed after an argument between us meant we hadn’t spoken in weeks,” Agent Carter said tightly, reaching up to touch Steve’s hand. “I joined SHIELD as a level one agent and worked my way up to here - co-director with my own office. I was there when Steve Rogers - this Steve was found in the ice and tended to him.”

“I crashed my plane after a fight with Schmidt,” Steve continued, looking at himself and then Cap Peggy. “The tesseract dropped. I was frozen in ice for over 70 years, kept alive by the serum. Bucky-”

“Becky.”

“Bucky died as a result of falling off of the train. I found the Howling Commandos. Do I need to go on?”

“It’s Becky,” she huffed. “Or...the version I know is. It - no it sounds familiar. Even...Becky.” She shared a look with Stevie and reached over to take his hand. “Except I have the tesseract, except...there’s a problem.”

They could trust them, she decided. They had to.

Taking the familiar object from her pouch and laying it delicately on the table between them, everyone was caught in awe by the blue glow that started to sputter into turning a shade of grey.

“Like it’s dead,” Steve breathed, shaking his head. “I don’t pretend to understand that thing beyond the misery it causes. None of us do.”

“Talk us through your last few moments,” Agent Carter mused, pulling her eyes away from the cube. 

“We were following as Rogers’ story went - plane crash. Steve...Steve was with me, foolishly, and...our plane was going down. We had no choice, we…” Her throat tightened and Steve nodded, he knew the pain of talking about it. “Next thing I know, that-that thing...exploded in a flash of blue light and we found ourselves crashing into Brooklyn River.”

“Why can things never be simple?” Agent Carter sighed, turning to her screen and starting to type on the keyboard.

Steve swallowed, giving a firm nod. From one soldier to another, he knew the pain of talking about this death...it hurt. To a degree, not many would understand. Sure enough on Peggy’s screen was the familiar Valkryie crashing into Brooklyn River, yet with no soul around to see it, no waves disturbed, even as the pair climbed onto the embankment.

“So what now?” Stevie asked, breaking the silence in the room.

“Now?” Steve looked down at Peggy who looked as confused as he was. “We get you two set up in a private quarter around here so you can eat and rest. Then we’ll decide from there. In the meantime, I know a guy who might be able to help with the cube.”

Cap Peggy worried her bottom lip, looking from the cube, to those around her, before back at Stevie who nodded. “We have no choice,” he said. “We have to trust ‘em.” 

“Alright,” she sighed, pushing the thing forward. “I’m overdue for a nap anyway.”

[robinrunsfiction]

can you do a smutty vampire mikey fic please

Bite Me, Baby

Pairing: Vampire Mikey Way x Female Reader  Rating: Mature (Smut) Requested By: Anon Word Count: ~2300 Author’s Note: I really don’t know how this story ended up so long, but there’s some fluff for good measure.

It was a typical Thursday happy hour after work with your friend Christine and her coworker Becky. You were doing your best to have a good time, but something about Becky irritated you to no end and you were trying to think of any excuse to leave sooner rather than later. After another story from Becky that went on way too long, you felt your phone vibrating in your purse. 

“Tonight?” the text read. You couldn’t help the smile that crept across your face as you replied.

“Who are you texting?” Becky asked incredulously.

“Is it your vampire boyfriend?” Christine asked.

“Vampire?” The word dripped from Becky’s mouth. “You’re dating some guy who thinks he’s a vampire?”

“His name is Mikey, and yes, he is a vampire,” you smirked.

“So he takes you out on dates and then drinks your blood?” Becky rolled her eyes. “Yea right.”

You dropped some money on the table to cover the cost of your drink, and stood up. “You’re half right,” you replied as you pulled down the collar of your high neck top to show two healing puncture wounds on your neck.

“Holy shit,” she replied in awe.

“Have a fun night,” Christine laughed knowingly.

“Bye,” you waved over your shoulder as you headed out. 

You had met Mikey at a Halloween party where his vampire costume, with some of the most authentic looking fangs you’d ever seen, caught your attention. After making a cheesy joke about donating blood, as you were dressed as a sexy nurse, you found yourself alone with him, making out hot and heavy on the hosts’ bed when you felt the sharp teeth glance across your neck.

“Are you gonna bite me with those things?” You asked breathlessly as he continued to pepper your neck with kisses.

“Can I?” He asked, pulling back and you could see the hunger in his eyes.

“Wait, you’re not really… no, they’re not real,” you stammered and sat up.

“I really am a vampire,” he replied.

You didn’t know how to respond. “Then why haven’t you already bit me?” You finally stammered out.

“Because that’s rude. And I’d hate to make a bad first impression and have this be our last encounter," he said, his fingertips grazing your cheek, down to your jaw, then dancing across the side of your neck.

All logical thought had left your brain as you considered what he was asking. “What if I taste bad?”

“There’s no way that’s possible,” he replied with a smirk.

You nodded. “You know what? Sure, it’s Halloween, let’s do this right. Bite me, baby.”

From that night on, Mikey had been dropping by your place regularly to hook up, or drink your blood, sometimes both. It had been an arrangement that worked out well because you really liked Mikey, he was funny and interesting, not to mention hot as hell and really good in bed. But as you walked back to your apartment something Becky had said was nagging at your mind. 

You never went on dates. You weren’t actually boyfriend and girlfriend like Christine had teased. You just had this symbiotic relationship that was on every level purely physical. But you had grown fond of him, and you couldn’t help but wonder if he maybe liked you for more than just a lay and a meal.

~

On a typical night, Mikey would have leapt to the fire escape outside your window, but it had been a while since he had been able to come around and he was weak from hunger.

He climbed the metal framework on the side of your building until he was outside your bedroom window. You had left the blinds open and as he looked inside, he could see your sleeping form in bed.

He tapped on the glass and your eyes fluttered open, smiling once you realized what had woken you.

"Hey, come in," you greeted him as he clambered in, less than gracefully. "What do you need tonight?"

"Blood," he replied sitting on the edge of your bed. His voice sounded weak to you, so you knew he meant it.

"Ok," you replied softly as you sat down, pulling your hair back from your neck. 

He leaned in, lips pressing against the spot he always bit. Then the fangs sank in. You gasped at the pain, but as always, it subsided quickly once he started to drink. Then the gasps that escaped your lips turned to those of pleasure at the sensation of his lips on your neck.

When he finally pulled back and placed one last tender kiss on the wound, you found yourself feeling lightheaded.

"Are you ok?" He asked when he noticed you blinking hard.

"I'm ok, I'm just gonna lay back down," you replied. Mikey kicked off his shoes and climbed in next to you, holding you close as you rested your head against his chest. 

"What's on your mind?" He asked after a few minutes of silence.

There was no use denying when something was off. It wasn't that he had the ability to read your mind, but sometimes it felt like he did with how easily he could certainly sense when things were off with you. “When I was out tonight, this  girl asked if we went on dates, but we don’t really and I kinda started wondering... what we are.”

The look of surprise on Mikey’s face quickly changed to a thoughtful one. “(YN), would you like to go out tomorrow night?”

“Mikey no, don’t feel like you have to take me out on a pity date,” you said burying your face against his chest.

“No, it’s not that,” he said, pressing a kiss against the top of your head and squeezing you tighter as you looked up. “I don’t think I’ve properly conveyed what you mean to me. Can I try to make it up to you?”

You sighed. "Not a pity date?"

"Absolutely not."

"Ok, then yes, we can go out tomorrow night."

~

The next evening after work you hurried home and changed into a nice outfit. Mikey had left a note before he slipped out the night before that you didn't need to worry about dressing up for the date and he'd be around after dusk to pick you up.

You were still in the bathroom getting your hair just right when the intercom for your door buzzed. You hurried to let Mikey into the building. When your doorbell rang, you couldn’t believe that you actually felt nervous. You had spent so many nights with him, but this was your first real date.

“Hi, oh!” You were surprised that Mikey had brought a bouquet of deep red roses. “Thank you.”

“You look beautiful,” he complimented, his smile almost shy and you couldn’t help but grin in response.

“Thanks. What did you have planned tonight?”

“Follow me,” he replied as he took your hand and lead you out to his car.

Mikey drove out of town, one hand on the steering wheel, the other on your knee. The road climbed upward as the trees grew more dense until eventually he pulled into a clearing at the top of the hill. 

“What is all this?” You asked in awe as Mikey parked. There was a tree with twinkling fairy lights strung up carefully and below it a blanket was spread. Mikey grabbed a bag from the backseat and smiled at you as you headed to sit down in the glow of the lights.

“I brought dessert,” he said as he unloaded the bag with pastries, cupcakes and other sweets, “and coffee,” he said, pulling out a large thermos.

“Yes,” you grinned as he poured you a cup. There was a chill in the air, and clouds blocked out the stars above, but the twinkling lights more than made up for it. You took a cupcake and leaned against Mikey’s side contentedly. “This is quite impressive. How did you manage to get these lights up before coming to pick me up?”

“I had help from my friend Ray,” he replied, taking a sip of his coffee.

“A human friend?”

“Yea. But I don’t bite him, if you’re wondering.”

“So I’m your only,” you paused searching for the right word, “food source?”

Mikey laughed. “Yea, you can say that.” You laughed too, but the question from the night still lingered in your mind. What were you and Mikey, other than a source of food for him? But once again, he seemed to sense what you were thinking. “But that’s not all you are to me.”

You glanced up and saw the look of concern on his face. “What do you mean?”

He nodded. “You mean everything to me. I’ve never met anyone who was so willing to put themselves on the line for me like you have. Plus you’re beautiful and funny and kind.”

You couldn’t help the smile that cracked across your face. “Mikey, you don’t have to say all that.”

“I do, because I’m in love with you (YN).”

You were stunned. You had no idea that his feelings ran that deep. Suddenly butterflies filled your stomach and your smile grew even bigger. “I love you too Mikey.”

He grinned back, relief evident in his eyes. He leaned in and kissed you deeply. You shifted so you were straddling his legs, not breaking the kiss, as his hand ran over your back and you played with his hair.

It started slowly, with big heavy raindrops falling down around you, but neither of you noticed until the rain really started to fall.

“Oh my god!” you exclaimed, as you started to feel your shirt getting wet.

“Let's get in the car,” Mikey suggested as you got up.

“Wait, the food!” You cried, grabbing the treats, and tossing them in the bag as he grabbed the thermos and blanket and hurried to the vehicle. When you were both inside, you couldn’t help but crack up laughing. Mikey’s neatly combed back hair, was now hanging in dripping strands, and you were certain you didn’t look much better.

“What?” Mikey asked, unable to keep from laughing as well.

“We look like a couple of drowned rats,” you laughed, although it was hardly audible over the rain that was pouring down on the car, and the rumble of thunder in the distance.

Mikey laughed, and shook his head before running his hand through his hair. “We should probably wait for the storm to pass before we go.”

“We should probably get out of these wet clothes, wouldn’t want to catch a cold,” you suggested with a wink.

“Getting sick isn’t something I have to worry about, but I’d hate for you to get sick, love,” he said shrugging off his black coat and pulling off his striped scarf.

You peeled off your top and climbed into the backseat of the car. You shimmied out of your pants and tossed them into the front seat as well. Mikey was pulling off his clothes as well before joining you.

In the dim light of the fairy lights in the tree outside, you were able to make out the expression on his face. He was looking at you with awe, even though he’d seen you in all states of undress, but things were different now. “I should have told you every day how beautiful you are.”

You blushed and put your hands over your face, but he pulled them away before leaning in to kiss you again. Your hands found the hem of his shirt and broke the kiss to pull it over his head. You slid down, until you were laying back, his hips pinned against yours. Mikey’s hands ran down your sides and then back up to your chest as his lips trailed from yours to your jaw, then your neck. He tenderly kissed the freshly opened wound on your neck from the night before.

“My everything,” he murmured against the spot.

“Yours,” you sighed.

Things moved swiftly from there, with the rest of your clothes coming off, discarded to the front seats as the windows started to steam up. His lips were all over you, kissing down your body until he was leaving marks across your thighs, then he was dipping a finger inside you as his tongue found your clit. The sensation made you shiver as his fingers, like the rest of him were cold to the touch. Moans spilled from your lips, sounding like music to Mikey’s ears.

“Baby, I’m close,” you breathed.

He hummed in acknowledgement before slipping his digit out, kissing back up your body. “You ready for me?”

“Yea,” you nodded excitedly as he shifted up, his lips meeting yours as he pressed into you. The pace he set was slow and steady as you rolled your hips to meet him. Your gasps and his moans drown out by the rain pounding on the roof of the car and more rumbles of thunder. 

His lips were again on your neck, kissing and leaving marks that for once weren’t bite marks. “I love you (YN), you’re my everything,” he murmured again and again like a mantra as his pace picked up.

“Love you too, Mikey” you moaned. “I’m close again, can you bite me again?” 

When he heard your request, he looked up and locked eyes with you, the passion written across his face was undeniable. His pace quickened as he began kissing your neck. “Tell me when.”

“Now,” you moaned and as you came around him he bit down. Then the feeling of him coming undone as well completely overwhelmed you completely.

Minutes later as you caught your breath, he kissed away the last of the blood from your neck.

“I mean it, you’re everything to me,” he said again as he caressed your cheek. “I hope you never have to worry about that ever again.”

“I don’t think I will,” you smiled back.

[multimetaverse]

Jamie Johnson 5x09 Review

We see Jamie at his sullen worst and poor Boggy’s mental deterioration  continues apace in what was a good but downer ep. Let’s dig in!

We finally return to the season’s most important story line, e-gaming. Jamie’s doing pretty good for himself in the virtual world of gaming so much so that he’s clearly willing to throw away his chance at making a full recovery in the real world. Jamie was well out of order this ep, just constantly burning bridges and being a sullen jerk. We’ve seen this play out before where Jamie can be a little shit but they really dialed it up to 11 this ep. In general from what I’ve seen of British TV they’re not afraid to have their characters be more unlikable then most American shows but we really do need to see Jamie act like a good guy at least a few times this season

A good start would be for Jamie to actually be a good friend to Boggy who’s not doing great. His anxiety is getting quite bad and we can see that he’s desperate for Jamie to talk to him again even though the pressure of being Jamie’s stat man is making his mental state deteriorate further. The only other example of anxiety being tackled on kids tv is Jonah Beck from Andi Mack and while the writers did a very good job in S2 with Jonah’s panic attacks, that story line was abruptly dropped half way through S3 without Jonah ever seeking treatment, telling his parents, or even telling Andi herself onscreen. I don’t expect the JJ writers to make those mistakes and I would imagine Boggy actually gets real help and Jamie does find out

The Jamie and Boggy friendship has become seriously one sided this season. During Andi Mack S3 the friendship between Andi and Cyrus wasn’t really apparent on screen but it just seemed like Andi didn’t particularly care about Cyrus, she was never actively malicious towards Cyrus like Jamie is being with Boggy. We certainly need to see Jamie being there for Boggy but we also need an apology and I hope Boggy gets one #justiceforboggy

As an aside, the writers obviously couldn’t have known in advance but this e-gaming plot would have been ideal for the post covid19 S6 they’ll eventually get to filming

There was a darkly funny moment where Jamie confronts Dillon about being jetpac11 only for Dillon to reveal he’s only texted his mom to let her know he wouldn’t be coming home and Jamie just drops it without asking follow up questions. I hope we get a Dillon coming out to Jamie scene as having Jamie Johnson himself react positively to Dillon coming out would be important in setting a good example for the mostly young audience

There’s been a lot of theories as to the true identity of Jetpac11 bandied about, the one I favour is that it’s Howard Royle’s son. We’ve seen him e-gaming, he has a grudge against Jamie which might explain the use of 11 which is Jamie’s jersey number, and he’d know all about Hawkstone’s strict social media policy which would explain why he got Jamie to post a sexist comment that would surely get him in trouble. Though one strike against that theory is that he might not know enough about Phoenix to correctly guess that it was Zoe who made Jamie take down his sexist comment

I’ve heard Jethro Stevenson as a possibility which would be interesting. He’d bear a grudge against Jamie, they specifically brought up the stolen bike escapade earlier this season, and might have learned enough playing with the Phoenix kids to guess that Zoe would make Jamie take down the post. I’ve also seen it suggested that Boggy created Jetpac11 as a way to get Jamie to need him which would be quite the twist but I don’t know if Boggy is capable of pulling that off at the moment. It seems that Aisha was ruled out as a suspect as she was seen doing other things when Jetpac11 would have been playing

I liked the detail of Dillon still wearing the same clothes he left home in

Nice to see Zoe and Kat being friends and good to see Zoe not just giving up on playing professional football. Her making Jamie write an apology post and then telling him she’d be watching him was hilarious

There were a lot of sad moments this ep but I think Liam bringing his kite to the beach in hopes of ‘’accidentally’’ running into the gang was the most desperate and pathetic moment of the night. He’s burned a lot of bridges and though he has made things right with Phoenix he’s still not in the inner circle. Clearly he regrets outing Dillon and he did have the good sense to wait until him and Dillon were alone to ask when he’d be coming home but he still needs to actually apologize for his actions. I’m excited to see how his redemption arc will play out

Poor Mike, you could see how disappointed he was when he caught Jamie lying  to him. We already knew about Mike’s career being ended by injury but it hammers home that Jamie still has the chance to go pro. It also adds a nice little parallel to Graham Simmonds, Graham wasn’t injured but he had been a talented football player in his youth who never went pro and that drives him to pressure Dillon and Liam to succeed where he couldn’t. Of course, unlike Graham, Mike has never pushed Jamie like that and has always been his biggest supporter 

I don’t know why we needed an Eric/Aisha/Freddie love triangle but I assume it ends with them learning to choose lads over lasses. It already seems that they’re taking this love triangle to a more textual level than they took the Jamie/Jack/Michele love triangle from S2

Looking Ahead:

Jack’s back, wonder if she’ll interact with Jamie at all

I assume the eventual reveal that Zoe has the pendant will put a damper on her friendship with Kat

Graham Simmonds goes to see Dillon in person. That should be an interesting scene to watch

Ruby and Alba’s adoption story line comes to the fore again, I wonder if we’l lget more light shed on their past before coming to live with Becky and Dawn

There’s not much left from the S5 trailer that hasn’t already happened. Dillon playing in blue against an adult team in red is the biggest thing. I could buy part of it being a dream sequence but I also think it’s likely that there is a real game he plays in. I wonder if he ends up signing for Northport since he knows that our problematic fave Duncan Jones is stridently anti-homophobia 

Until next week Jamie Johnsoners

[danwhobrowses]

WWE - Best and Worst Booking from Wrestlemania 36 to 37

Wrestlemania 37 is in the books and so a new saga of WWE booking begins anew.

But the year has had its ups and downs, in the outside world and the booking, so - for doing something new - I'm gonna run down some of the best and worst booking decisions made by WWE from the Raw after Wrestlemania 36 to Wrestlemania 37 Night 2.

I will note, these are my opinions - some of which acts upon hindsight rather than 'in the moment' - and if you're gonna call me an anti-WWE mark rest assured I plan to do this for AEW too after Double or Nothing in May

Also, there is the off chance of spoilers...somehow? But it's worth covering that base

April 2020 Best WORST - Samoa Joe on Commentary On April 27th, Samoa Joe was called upon to replace Jerry Lawler (we'll get to that) on Commentary. Joe provided a great presence to commentary and it kept him on TV, we do still await his return but seeing more of Joe is a huge plus. EDIT: This was best until just now I learn that Samoa Joe has been released, the fuck WWE?

Worst - 'Ramen Noodle Moonsault' Part of what caused Lawler's replacement was the scrutiny caused by an April 13th call by Lawler during a match between Austin Theory and Akira Tozawa. He called a Step Senton a 'Ramen Noodle Moonsault', Lawler is rarely funny nowadays with his dated comedy but this was the straw that broke the camel's back.

Best - Giving Sonya and Mandy the Floor It could've been a huge down not to see Sonya vs Mandy at Wrestlemania after she was outed in manipulating Mandy away from Otis, but their feud managed to carry on strong all the way to Summerslam thanks to Sonya stepping up her game to come off as a fantastically asshole heel - which in turn made Mandy a sympathetic character. Their post-mania build allowed for an anticipated match, it was only unfortunate that an attempted irl kidnapping in August would sour the momentum and cause Sonya to take some justified time off.

Worst - Charlotte Flair on all 3 Shows Charlotte's NXT Title win did not go down as well as WWE had hoped, somehow giving the woman that had won next to everything another title reign at the expense of Rhea Ripley's Wrestlemania debut backfired on them. And unfortunately, exposing Charlotte on all 3 shows did not help matters at all, furthering the criticisms WWE have often faced when they overbook Charlotte on the upper card.

Worst - COVID-19 and Black Wednesday While not necessarily a booking thing, it was very bad of WWE to do what they did at the time. Another outbreak raised some backstage concerns over the conduct WWE, who had tried to not acknowledge the pandemic in the same vein then-president and somehow HOFer Donald Trump had done, were acting towards the pandemic. The worst of it all though was Black Wednesday, a mass exodus of talent in the height of the pandemic was never gonna be great PR, but a lot of the talent let go were very popular - Drake Maverick's video also cast a negative light on WWE even when they rehired him and used it as a storyline. While some found greener pastures to flourish, not everyone landed well on their feet, equally baffling was that WWE would then boast a quarterly profit before rehiring some of the staff they let go.

May 2020 Best - Giving the title to Asuka While we were all surprised to see Becky Lynch survive Shayna Baszler at Wrestlemania, nobody could dispute the post MITB segment on Raw when Asuka was rightfully awarded the title for winning the MITB. Being a shining light in the Empty Arena Era, Asuka was certainly a fan favourite choice to succeed Becky as she embarked on her journey towards Motherhood. A truly wonderful segment which showed that segments can pay off just as much as wrestling.

Worst - Not Pushing Otis While Asuka's MITB victory was done right, the same could not be said for the Men's Winner. Otis had the fan's backing and while his victory was surprising especially given the competition it had potential. Which WWE then squandered and buried as hard as they could. Otis never got to develop beyond a joke act, his love interest and partner taken from him, before he would months later lose it to the Miz.

Best - MVP joins up with Lashley Lashley was in a rough spot here. His main story was cucking Rusev by having an affair with Lana, and then marrying her. The pair was not built to last and mercifully we upgraded to the MVP/Lashley partnership. Together both men began their career resurgence as they now stand at the top of the pile, this was the beginning of the Hurt Business.

Worst - The Brand-To-Brand Invitational Much like how the Wild Card Rule was stupid, the Brand-To-Brand Invitational was also stupid. Often used as a tool for Survivor Series or to bring Charlotte or Corbin over with their bad heat, overall it served nothing for the fans or the booking, regardless of whatever they named it.

Best - The Fight Pit Timothy Thatcher can still do a lot more in NXT, but he still leaves a great legacy in introducing the Fight Pit. When there's not enough people for War Games but a Steel Cage won't do, the Fight Pit sold stiff aggression with its debut affair between Thatcher and Riddle, a brutal match only since done once more. It may have been done twice, but if someone calls for a Fight Pit you know shit's gonna go down.

Worst - Stripping Sami Zayn of the IC title, for staying safe Sami Zayn had finally won a championship on the Main Roster in March, then COVID happened. While WWE did make an outward statement that anyone who didn't wish to risk their health could exclude themselves, when Sami did it he lost the championship. This was rather hypocritical given that Jordan Devlin was still the Cruiserweight Champion and an Interim Champion was being crowned, rather than an official one like Smackdown did. While Sami would return to reclaim his title, his time away is still not acknowledged.

June 2020 Best - NXT start using old show names Partially due to AEW using Bash at the Beach, WWE decided to hold onto some of theirs and WCW's old PPV names. While this was slightly petty, the way they used them proved fortuitous in exuding nostalgia in a big way. To start, we had In Your House but this would also lead to the resurfacing of Halloween Havoc and Vengeance.

Worst - Not Firing Jaxson Ryker During this time the BLM protests were in full swing, so Jaxson Ryker decided this'd be the right time to praise Donald Trump on twitter. The backlash was high and his stablemates suffered for it as well, depushing and taking all the Forgotton Sons off TV. Jaxson Ryker still somehow has a job and tv time in WWE, and that continues to baffle.

Best - Maverick vs Fantasma in the Finals While exposing Maverick's firing was in poor taste, the story of the former GM chasing the title was one we can get behind. Paired with El Hijo del Fantasma finally getting the platform to debut after being hired in August 2019. The finals match would also beget to a strong title reign by Fantasma where he showed his charisma as a heel and birthing his faction Legando del Fantasma, as for Drake it led to a mismatch team with Killian Dain, it could be better but it could be worse.

Worst - Jeff Hardy vs Sheamus' narrative You'd think putting Jeff and Sheamus together would be fine, and the wrestling was indeed good. The storyline however was wrong, very wrong. Rehashing the Jericho/Punk angle, WWE decided a urine test angle would make for good TV - which was a particular low for both men.

Best - Io Shirai at the Top (which she could jump off of) When Charlotte won the NXT Championship from Rhea I vocally worried that this'd mean curtains for Io Shirai, the Stardom Ace had found her footing as the 'Mad Queen' heel character and won a ladder match to contend for the title, but she was going up against Charlotte Flair - WWE's 'Queen' who had already cut the legs from Asuka, Rhea and Bianca Belair - so the worry was high. Fortunately In Your House decided to give Io the much-deserved title win, granted she should've beaten Charlotte and Rhea was there to take the pin but this would begin Io's long reign as the female Ace of NXT, as well as jumping off of anything and everything on each TakeOver.

Worst - Street Profits vs Viking Raiders doesn't happen for Backlash During their time as Raw Tag Champs, the Street Profits engaged in an 'Anything you can do, I can do better' series with the Viking Raiders. The segments itself were mostly silly but some parts were admittedly humorous like the leg of meat popping up everywhere. But the payoff match on Backlash never came to be, instead we continued a cinematic brawl which would've been fine...but it had no conclusion. It ended in a bin, much like the feud was trashed, with the malice of the Viking Raiders mostly thrown away.

Worst - Nia vs Asuka ends in a Double Count Out Backlash 2020 already had the questionable booking of Profits vs Vikings, Braun vs Miz and Morrison and promoting Edge vs Orton as the 'Greatest Wrestling Match Ever'. But another that could not be let go was the women's title match. This was Asuka's first major defense, the storyline should have been her proving that she deserves the title and the best we got was Nia Jax. Like Profits/Vikings it could've been salvagable had there been a legitimate finish, but the match ended in a double count out, only to follow up with a Raw rematch - sadly this would not be the end of Asuka being poorly booked as champion.

Worst - Kairi's Injury Speaking of Nia, in a May taping that released in June Nia faced Kairi Sane in the build to her feud with Asuka. But Kairi came out of the match with a nasty head cut after being thrown into the steps. Unfortunately, this was not the first time Kairi had been injured by Nia so it was not a good look on Nia to repeat herself.

Worst - *Unmasks* 'Old Man Santos Escobar!?' When El Hijo del Fantasma revealed himself as the leader of the masked men, it began the stable Legando del Fantasma. But of course, 'El Hijo del Fantasma' isn't really a heel name that rolls off the tongue, the name change was justified but the choice was not. Using the surname of a drug lord exposed WWE's continued hypocrisy of things - who were adamant in removing Apollo Crews' surname when a killer was also named 'Crews', among their usual obsession with cutting names - but it was worsened by the choice of Santos, which means Saint. It also made it odd that his faction carried his old name but not him, what was wrong with Santos del Fantasma?

July 2020 Best - A New US Championship Design Aside from the 24/7 title, the US Championship design was one of WWE's weakest, fans had been calling for a change for quite some time. During Apollo's feud with the Hurt Business though we got a new US title unveiled by MVP; a slightly better design, it was definitely a good move in terms of booking and merchandising.

Worst - Asuka loses to Shenanigans, and then to Count Out Alas, Asuka's reign hit a bump in the road when the Bayley/Sasha connection set their sights on claiming all the gold. While this would do well for Bayley and Sasha's story, it was once again a story that came in Asuka's expense. She lost stupidly in Extreme Rules and when that was revoked she lost by count-out in a match where nothing was meant to influence the wrestlers on the outside. This was an added blow because Asuka was counted out to save Kairi from being attacked backstage - which effectively wrote her out of WWE, which meant that the attempted save was worthless.

Best - Big E goes his own way, but doesn't split from the New Day Before the WWE Draft split Xavier and Kofi from Big E brand-wise, injuries to Xavier and Kofi left Big E unable to compete for tag titles. However, fans had been hoping for another singles run from Big E and this was the platform for it. What made it good though was that Big E didn't leave the New Day to pursue a singles career, keeping the beloved faction still alive.

Worst - Bye, Kairi Kairi Sane carried a similar star aura that Io and Asuka before her did as the Mae Young Classic winner, former NXT Women's champion and basically being an all-round adorable human. When it was learned that she would be taking an ambassador role in Japan - where she would get married and spend time with her husband also - fans were upset to see her go. But WWE never gave her a proper sendoff, the last we see of Kairi is just her KO'd backstage with Asuka having given up her title to fail in saving her, and that left a bad taste.

Best - Keith Lee: Double Champion Keith Lee had captured NXT hearts with his physicality, athleticism and theme song, he was NA Champion and WWE had decided that double champions are all the rage now, so they pit Lee and Adam Cole against one another. It was a brief run, but the moment Lee held two belts became a big moment signifying a new chapter for NXT.

Worst - 'The Horror Show' Extreme Rules was kind of a low point for WWE. Rather than just continue with the no DQ gimmick they threw all their chips into the Braun vs Bray swamp fight, which tanked horribly. Also Rey vs Seth suffered from it with the daft Eye for an Eye stipulation - which AEW had previously done effectively - it was a great wrestling match marred by its goofy stipulation and thus its ending, all of which was made simply because Rey hadn't extended his contract at this time. Needless to say, overbooking and stupidity left 'The Horror Show' Extreme Rules a dud.

August 2020 Best - Introducing the Thunderdome There was some hesitations about the introduction of the Thunderdome, the fact that it's just screens some of it reused to pair with piped cheers and boos doesn't sound too good on paper. And granted, it has its flaws still, but at the same time the Thunderdome has been more positive on WWE's atmosphere than a purely empty arena has. The NXT cages are probably better paired with AEW's using their backstage staff as the crowd but you get what you give sometimes.

Worst - Retribution Retribution is a lost cause, even to this day. It tried the Nexus-esque debut with big names but shitty masks, as well as their purpose contradicting their actions. It all began here, and shouldn't have happened in the first place, Mercedes learned that one quickly. At least T-Bar has Twitter game.

Worst - Changing Keith Lee's attire, theme, and making him a side character to Drew vs Orton Within a month of winning both belts, Lee would be moved up to Raw where immediately he was pitted against Randy Orton - who was feuding against Drew McIntyre. With a new outfit and new music, Lee was a stepping stone to simply further Orton's feud with Drew rather than influence it, in a single moment WWE had made fans lose confidence that they could book Lee as well as he was in NXT, a worry that continues to this day even with another theme change.

Best - Damian Priest gets a shot A star who needed a chance to shine, Lee's vacating of the NA title left a slot open for someone to get a solid push and the winner was Damian Priest. Having proven himself there and in a prior feud with Finn Balor, Priest was a worthy candidate to hold the title and he still is able to hold that momentum in his main roster pursuits.

Worst - Raw Underground Doing something different is nothing to be afraid of, but sometimes you have to read the room. And Shane McMahon introducing a boiler room fight club was not it. Granted, Raw Underground didn't get the fairest crack of the whip, but it had also not distinguished itself on the card nor did it have as many decent stars to carry it. The repackaging of Babatunde to 'Dabba Kato' didn't sell any seriousness to it either.

Best - Pat McAfee Shines The Adam Cole/Pat McAfee feud did somewhat stumble at the start with WWE's insistence that this was a shoot, but the end result paid dividends. Pat McAfee raised a very low bar on celebrity contributions in wrestling matches, showing what celebrities who are actual fans could do to pull off an athletic and entertaining affair.

Worst - Mauro and Renee leave Mauro Ranallo may've been divisive for some fans in his enthusiastic commentary, but I loved the guy. He actually sold the energy of the matches and he knew the moves. Renee Young was also someone who proved to be a fantastic sports journalist, her commentary times on Raw marred by micromanaging she was a great host for Talking Smack and her podcast showed how relatable and fun Mrs. Moxley truly is. The departure of both had left a void WWE have struggled to fill again.

Best - Dominik Mysterio steps up In Summerslam 2005, the PPV was main evented by Shawn Michaels overselling Hulk Hogan for 20 minutes. The event saw not just titles go on the line but Kurt Angle's Olympic Medal...and the custody of a child. That child was mini-Slim Shady Dominik Mysterio, who in storyline had recently discovered that Eddie Guerrero is his biological father, adopted by Rey Mysterio and his wife. Fifteen years later, Dominik would step back into a Summerslam ring, this time to make his wrestling debut. While he would lose, Dominik gained a lot of positives especially given how he was up against Seth Rollins, Dominik's progression continues to impress as his father ensures that he gets the best training he can provide, the prince of the Mysterio household has a bright future ahead of him.

Worst - Murphy takes the fall in the Mysterio/Rollins Feud Alas, the Mysterio Family vs Monday Night Messiah would only have sporadic good moments and part of that is because Seth would escape mostly squeaky clean. The few times the Mysterio family would win was when it was a tag match with Murphy to take the fall. This wasn't just unfair on the Mysterios since they were being robbed again of 'winning' a feud which involved Seth ripping Rey's eye out but it also was a disservice to Murphy's talents as a former Ace of 205.

Best - Reigns FINALLY turns Heel, and is a Heyman Guy Roman Reigns was consistently booed for about 5 years, earning a reprieve when kayfabe was thrown away to support him in his bout with Leukemia. Given his dialysis, COVID left him as a risk for most of the year, but he made a huge return in the Universal title match between Braun and the Fiend. Debuting a heel persona which would align with Paul Heyman, WWE had finally done what the fans wanted - turn Roman heel. And Roman has been on top ever since, the Tribal Chief Reigns.

Worst - Splitting the IIconics In a bout of trying to raise stakes, WWE decided that the best way to service their women's tag division was for 2 popular teams to fight for contendership - but the losers would have to split up. Between the Riott Squad and the IIconics, the former would win the match - but continue to be underbooked to the point where their reunion after feuding with each other has become fruitless - which meant that one of the few established tag teams in the women's division were splitting...not too long since the Kabuki Warriors had split too. Despite half a year later Peyton delivering a killer promo and Billie showing some comedic flair, neither bounced back from the split - their only solace now is to reunite now that they too just now have been released...

Worst - Velveteen Dream comes back June proved to be a shocking time for wrestling in general when brave people publicly called out their experiences with sexual, emotional and physical harassment and abuse. This rattled all companies and blacklisted a ton of once renowned wrestlers such as David Starr, Jimmy Havoc, Jack Gallagher, Marty Scurll, Travis Banks, El Ligero, Joey Ryan and shut down all of Chikara pro wrestling. Velveteen Dream was among the names listed, accused of having inappropriate communications and grooming minors, this was of course a huge blow to the once-popular rising star. Like they did with Matt Riddle, Joe Coffey, Wolfgang, Jordan Devlin and Sid Scala, WWE decided to investigate rather than immediately release Dream. During this time, WWE should have kept Dream off TV for an extended period of time, instead he appeared a month later on NXT to qualify for the NA Title ladder match Priest would win under heavy scrutiny of the fans. As much as WWE point out that they had found nothing, many still remain unconvinced and while Dream is currently off tv now, having him return so soon did not inspire confidence.

September 2020 Best - Sami gets the IC Title Back After being unfairly stripped of the title back in May, Sami returned to claim himself the true IC champion. Pitted against AJ Styles and Jeff Hardy, the trio would embark on a smart and highly acclaimed ladder match for the title, which Sami would win. Course correction coming into play for Sami to resume his reign, but I still wonder why he was the heel in all of that...

Worst - Changing Aleister Black's Attire and Entrance Aleister Black had the IT Factor, he was a superb striker with a great gimmick of a dark and brooding warrior, rising like a vampire in his entrance with a demonic jacket, he oozed the aura of a main event player. Until Vince changed the music and decided that Black should wear an eyepatch...this of course was done after a span of barely booking Aleister anyway - despite him delivering in his matches - before not booking him at all.

Best - The Prince is Promised Finn Balor's return to NXT had been on a slow burn at this point, but with Karrion Kross having to vacate due to a separated shoulder a new NXT champion had to be crowned. After a 4-way iron man tie, Balor came on top on Super Tuesday Part 2. Finn being champion again was indeed the right choice, while it delays his collision with WALTER indefinitely he has had a superb reign filling in for Karrion Kross, who would reclaim in a good match at Stand & Deliver.

Worst - Telenovela Bullshit The Mysterios/Messiah storyline tangented in a bad way in its ending stages before fizzling out. Aalyah Mysterio had been booked into a romance with Murphy, the acting was like a soap opera and not in the good way. 'But mother, I love him' literally being the weekly storyline of coaxing Murphy away from Seth, all of which became dropped to mean nothing for anyone.

Best - Kyle O'Reilly and Jey Uso enter the Main Event Primarily tag wrestlers for their WWE careers, Kyle O'Reilly and Jey Uso were given unexpected chances at the world champions Balor and Reigns on NXT and Smackdown, and boy did they take those chances. Both men impressed hugely in their matches, enough to get multiple rematches and a bigger role in the main event from it, Jey would join Roman as a heel and support to the Tribal Chief while O'Reilly would come to blows with Adam Cole in an unsanctioned match. Both men can be seen as world champions now.

October 2020 Best - NXT UK Acquisitions NXT UK hasn't really gained the desired momentum, which is a shame because there are a lot of great talent still there, and they sport one of the best looking active belts in Wrestling today. The problem is the limited audience and minimal roster depth, which is why it was refreshing when WWE signed more to the brand, the big name of Meiko Satomura being the headliner but also Rampage Brown and the steal of Ben Carter - now Nathan Frazer - from under AEW's nose. Later they would push A-Kid and sign the former Lucky Kid and Millie McKenzie to further bolster its brand.

Worst - Not Repackaging Retribution On October 5th, WWE decided to turn Mustafa Ali heel and put him as the leader of Retribution, but they would also pit them against the Hurt Business - a heel faction - and reveal himself the 'Smackdown Hacker' - who had unveiled some heels doing heelish deeds. Confusing at the best of times, Retribution never got past losing either, forcing Mia Yim to do tantrums in the ring on a mini-push that came to nothing and elevating nobody. Retribution had chances to save itself, but WWE didn't take those chances.

Best - Sasha wins big! At last, Sasha wins a big title match clean in a storyline payoff against Bayley. Both women at the top of their game, they earned the Hell in a Cell spot and began a title reign that would go longer than any of Sasha's other main title reigns. The Boss was finally standing on top as the main roster finally did Sasha vs Bayley right.

Worst - Orton wins big... Randy Orton had been feuding with Drew since beating Edge at Backlash, losing on consecutive title matches until Hell in a Cell, where he won despite the slow burn hints at a Fiend feud. While Randy was at the top of is heel game and Drew didn't have to hold the title all year, the multiple past attempts deflated this story as well as scrutinizing WWE constantly saying 'no rematch clauses' and 'you can't just walk in and demand a title match' but then doing the absolute same thing. Orton's title run wouldn't last either, which makes it all the more meh.

Worst - The Draft The Draft is meant to lead to surprising new dynamics and storyline changes, but 2020's Draft was a misfire. For one, there was no competition for it, Raw got 3 just because it ran longer and a percentage of the draft picks were wrestlers staying on the brand they were already on, making the shock factor limited. The Mysterios followed Rollins to Smackdown to continue their drab storyline, the tag champions swapped belts to remain colour coded and for some reason some tag teams were treated as individual and some not.

November 2020 Best - Undertaker's Retirement Ceremony After 2 previous 'retirements', the Undertaker finally hung up his boots for real this time, ending it where it began: Survivor Series. It was a very tasteful affair with nods to the card he debuted on such as the Gobbeldy Gooker and Brother Love, it was a good time and a good sendoff for one of WWE's greatest characters.

Worst - Survivor Series books it wrong While there was many good matches in Survivor Series, it did suffer from the usual booking mentality of 'Raw Superiority'. Lana became a sole survivor by default of count outs and DQs in a team including Shayna and Asuka, the Smackdown men were completely squashed despite having a strong team and Baron Corbin and finally, no NXT. There was the potential for adding Balor, Io, Priest and Imperium to these matches and that just could've elevated it, the last was more understandable though given COVID.

Worst - Not booking 3 Future Stars Andrade, Aleister and Murphy. All three had shone before reaching the main roster be it for NXT on the former two and 205 Live on the latter. But on the Main Roster their luck was a mixed bag; Murphy had recently beat Rollins clean, but after the Mysterios were about to come down with COVID themselves WWE didn't push anything with him, Andrade was a former US Champion in a faction that all fell apart within the year and Black was a shitkicker who WWE were methodically gutting. All three would soon see themselves not on tv at all, and for two they had an alarming connection.

Worst - Zelina gets fired Zelina Vega was the one who elevated Andrade to a face midcarder to a heel main eventer on NXT, she was also coming along well as a wrestler with some decent bouts with Asuka. But when WWE enacted a policy that their wrestlers couldn't profit from third party stuff like twitch, when Zelina resisted and found loopholes she found herself getting released soon after, Andrade and her irl husband Aleister Black now ominously missing from WWE, it was for the most part pettiness on WWE's behalf to forbid their talent from making money elsewhere by being themselves.

December 2020 Best - Big E wins the Big IC Without his New Day buddies, Big E could continue his singles run despite daft claims from Corey that as a decorated tag champion Big E couldn't do singles wrestling like he did when he was NXT Champion and IC Champion. But on the Christmas Smackdown taping, Big E would win the IC championship to a big babyface moment, which he would carry into Wrestlemania.

Worst - Gargano wins the NA Title (again) I have nothing against Johnny Gargano, but it is odd that he was the one to usurp Damian Priest and then Leon Ruff. To this day he still holds that title despite Dexter Lumis, Bronson Reed, LA Knight, KUSHIDA (who recently just won the Cruiserweight title) and Cameron Grimes all looking like worthy competitors to get a push. It's a strange place where Gargano builds a faction with gold but it doesn't elevate anyone around his waist.

Worst - Charlotte returns just to add another title to her list WWE's obsession with mismatched teams is matched only by their obsession with pitting a champion and no.1 contender against tag champions, both of which are overdone. So when TLC came along with Asuka having a mystery partner to face Shayna and Nia, it didn't quite land that her partner was Charlotte and they went on to win the titles...only to drop it in about a month as they teased a title match between the two. It showed the low pecking order the tag titles had, the lowered stock of Shayna and how the title change was merely to say that Charlotte had won every title in WWE (at that time).

Worst - Miz fails his Cash-In, but gets the Briefcase back The Men's MITB was horribly booked all year and time was running out, WWE had to decide whether they would have to book a failed cash in - and put the Miz in the same list as Sandow and Corbin in those who lost their cash-in (Cena and Braun if we include those who didn't capture gold), making Miz champion or hot potatoing again. At the end of TLC it looked like they picked the latter, which would've tied things up in a bow. But the following Raw, the Miz got his briefcase back because Morrison had cashed it in for him, meaning the saga was forced to continue.

January 2021 Best - Xia Li finally gets a repackage Xia Li has been on the NXT Roster for a long time, like Vanessa Borne and Aaliyah long time, but the best NXT could give her for a long time was 'Chinese Undercarder'. 2021 however made a shift, by turning Li heel with a storyline of her and Boa answering to a mystic overlord, Li turned into a brutish kickass killer, squashes building to her dispatching her former friends. While she still sits low on the card, it's promising stuff that can easily be pushed towards the main title scene, and frankly Xia Li has done her time to earn such a push.

Worst - Goldberg challenges Drew 'for disrespecting legends' The whole Goldberg fiasco was once again a rush job that served nobody except old Bill. Still soured by the fact that he cleanly defeated the Fiend and also had a horror match with Taker, nobody was quite amped to see Drew vs Goldberg at Royal Rumble. His reasoning for feuding with Drew was also confusing since he was claiming that Drew had disrespected the legends on Legends Night when he had been fully supportive and respectful towards them. Mercifully, the feud did not go Goldberg's way.

Best - The Women's Dusty Classic is Announced The Dusty Rhodes classic has in NXT become a platform for tag teams and mismatch alliances to flourish and open into newer storylines, and also to sometimes set up War Games, and with the vast depth of the NXT Women's Locker Room it was the right call for WWE to make a women's variation. The tournament allowed Candice, Dakota, Raquel, Ember and Shotzi to get tv time outside of a world title shot and so their talents weren't entirely wasted.

Worst - Sonya Returns, but as a GM Assistant When Sonya Deville took some time off post-Summerslam, she had proven herself to be skilled on the mic and in the ring. But on Jan 1st's Smackdown Sonya would be spotted and later it was officially announced that Sonya was back on Smackdown, but as Adam Pearce's assistant. Aside from some backstage talks and Street Profits trying to bribe her for a title match, Sonya hasn't seen much TV time - which is a poor utilization of her skills. The position is fine to an extent, but Sonya should be using her position to further her in-ring prospects too, take a leaf from AJ Lee's book.

Best - Edge returns at the Rumble While I was never unhappy with Edge winning the rumble I wouldn't say it was the best booking choice out of the roster. If anything though, Edge returning from Injury at Number 1 was a definite crowd-pleaser, and pitting him against Orton to resume their hostilities set the tone for the Men's Royal Rumble.

Worst - Corbin beats the Mysterios Clean on Consecutive Weeks I don't know what the purpose of this was. After returning from COVID, the Mysterios were put against King Corbin in weekly matches, Rey lost to Corbin clean, Dom lost to Corbin clean, there weren't any interferences or weapons, and there wasn't really a plot to this. Only when Dom beat Corbin thanks to Rey's help did the feud 'end', but it didn't really do anything for them, in the end, Dom cheats to win and not in an Eddie Guerrero way. It was just weird.

Best - The Women's Royal Rumble The Women's Royal Rumble in 2021 was a masterpiece, nearly every woman in that match got some shine and a bit of story. There was depth, context and clarity in the bout and the exciting prospect of the final two being Bianca and Rhea - two NXT prospects who would both later grasp gold. The ending segment solidified a perfectly-booked bout that would set a standard the men couldn't outshine that night.

Worst - The Universal Title Last Man Standing botch Handcuffed on the scaffolding, Roman Reigns looked certain to lose his Last Man Standing match against Kevin Owens as Heyman frantically tried to uncuff him. Of course, this was a botch at the worst of times but instead of attempting to ad-lib something, the Ref just restarted his count after reaching 6. It was a daft choice that killed the sails of the match, they should've either attacked the ref or let Owens - who had lost to Reigns several times already - hold the title for a month or so before dropping back to Roman.

February 2021 Best - MSK win the Classic On Impact the Rascalz were a beloved faction, and when two thirds of them jumped ship to NXT as MSK, fans were eager to see if WWE would go all the way with them, or if they would let the UK uberheel team of Grizzled Young Veterans take the spot. Fortunately they went for the former, which was a big boost for the future tag champions - only slightly delayed by injuries to both MSK and the then-champions Burch and Lorcan.

Worst - Top Tier Bad Booking on all 3 Shows Despite Smackdown and NXT regularly dwarfing Raw in quality, each show had begun a less than stellar narrative to build some feuds among their favoured wrestlers. On NXT, Gargano's faction The Way were having a Dexter Lumis problem - and although Lumis had won a non-title match against the NA Champion he did not get a title shot - one which had its bright parts but was often found goofy especially with the Indi Hartwell romance stuff. Smackdown merely had to keep it simple with Bianca and Sasha, but instead, they decided to go through the 'can they work together' route with Shayna and Nia, again shoddy booking threatened to dampen a Women's Wrestlemania Main Event. But Raw of course had the worst of it, Charlotte would be a babyface feuding with Lacey Evans, who was fucking her father...fans were already aware that Lacey has a husband and child which WWE had acknowledged before, and the feud only ended because Lacey was legitimately pregnant - which they storyline'd to be Ric's too - sparing Asuka of the same fate. It just wasn't a good time.

Best - Cameron Grimes STONKS The Gamestop Reddit Stocks moment came out of nowhere and made people a lot of money, WWE decided that Cameron Grimes would be one of those people. Already exuding charismatic energy and a decent catchphrase, making Grimes rich somehow elevated his character further as a hilariously snobby whackjob. Here's hoping he gets a solid crack at it as he cites DiBiase, maybe like he did Grimes can pay his way to the top.

Worst - Sheamus sucks at history Sheamus turning on Drew was an inevitability, and their matches were strong and entertaining affairs. But WWE really didn't try too hard to think of a reason for Sheamus to turn on Drew, citing his reasoning to be that Sheamus had lived in Drew's shadow. I mean really? We're talking about the same Sheamus who has won every men's accolade in WWE bar the IC title while Drew was doing air guitar with Heath, Jinder and Hornswoggle in the undercard? You have to make things make sense for people to buy into it.

Worst - Miz gets to be King for a Week Following on from Miz's failed cash-in was Miz's successful cash-in after Elimination Chamber - an action he succeeded in thanks to Lashley assaulting Drew post-match. While Miz being world champion again was anticipated for a long time, the timing was not right at all and fans were more or less relieved to see that Lashley would be taking the title from him within the next week. It was mostly a bit of clean up after realising that they don't want to use the MITB in the build to Wrestlemania, afterwards Miz went from WWE Champion to feuding with a rapper - also spare a thought for Morrison who doesn't really get to do anything outside of being the Miz's buddy.

March 2021 Best - Lashley wins the WWE Championship Speaking of Miz's short-lived reign, the one saving grace from it was that Lashley would claim it soon after, looking like a monster in the process. An overdue run for the man who was slowly looking like he was about to fade out of the company the same way that several others had and later would got his position to be WWE Champion, long may he reign.

Worst - La Sombra de El Idolo Andrade remains one of the most talented wrestlers of his generation, he had several paths in WWE that could have moved him to the top of the card, several feuds that people were amped for. And none of it came to be, because Andrade was granted release on his second attempt. Where Andrade El Idolo will appear next remains up for discussion, the likely route being AEW or reconvening with his old Ingobernables, but wherever he lands it'll be on his feet.

Worst - Shane returns just in time for Wrestlemania Season Shane McMahon is the boss' son, with a masochistic urge to be thrown off of things. But he doesn't seem to realise that every time he's on the card someone more deserving is not, not even with a posse as he tries to renew his 3 Minute Warning days. This time around Shane beleaguered WWE's card with a feud against Braun Strowman circulating around Shane calling him stupid and pouring green goo on him...who asked for this?

Worst - Apollo changes his accent Speaking of 'who asked for this?', Apollo's heel turn in embracing his Nigerian heritage was fine, a new edge for the otherwise smiley naive face character. But then Apollo decided to put on an accent, even though he's spent years without it. It was just unnecessary, a stamp that was to say 'I am foreign, boo my foreignness' that certainly has no room in today's wrestling. What's the odds that within a year Apollo's Nigerian Royalty gimmick will be warped into a Nigerian Prince scammer gimmick?

Worst - Women's Tag Fuckery Upon winning the women's Dusty Classic, Raquel and Dakota got a Women's Tag Opportunity against boringly longstanding champions Shayna & Nia, however rather than just pull the trigger and give the titles to them, WWE opted for a cheat finish which had Adam Pearce turn heel for the day just to screw over NXT. This was all a convoluted plan to create NXT Women's Tag Championships, which were awarded to Raquel and Dakota...before immediately losing it to Ember and Shotzi. Just what you want when establishing a new title huh? Quickfire title changes! It was all just very roundabout, should've simply announced the titles for the Women's Dusty Classic prize or given the Women's Tag to a team that could actually use it.

April 2021 Best - Edge and Roman add a bit of YES Alone Edge vs Reigns was still a highly anticipated Universal title bout. But the addition of Daniel Bryan brought in several new layers and conflicts for all characters. Each of them (like Balor vs Kross would) were presented as warriors who were forced medically to vacate the top prize only to come back stronger, each of them main evented Wrestlemania, and each of them were some of the best wrestlers in the world. The triple threat also meant that No DQ stipulations could be opened up, allowing Edge to show more of his heelish and psychotic side, as well as Bryan and Roman's viciousness. All three sold that they wanted that title and it made it stand out.

Worst - That Hurts our Business The Hurt Business was looking to become another success story in modern WWE factions. Masterminded by a resurgent MVP and helmed by now WWE Champion Bobby Lashley, Business was indeed booming. Until the final few weeks of Wrestlemania decided to cast aside Shelton and Cedric - the latter they strived to convince in joining them within the past year - and effectively dissolve the group. The loss of the Hurt Business led to high criticism, especially since Cedric and Shelton fell hard into the undercard only to see King Corbin cross brands to do Lashley's dirty work, it just wasn't a good thing and the possibility of replacing those spots with Mace and T-Bar does not quite fill the void.

Best - Cesaro gets his Push Cesaro had often been haunted by the dangling of the 'brass ring' over his head. Despite a frequent tag champion and also a US champion, WWE shied away from his strong and dedicated fanbase that desired more for the Swiss Superman/Cyborg. In the build to Elimination Chamber, fans were intrigued by Cesaro's clean wins over such names as Daniel Bryan, but were not surprised when he didn't come out on top in the chamber itself. In the aftermath though, Cesaro began a feud with Seth Rollins, someone who could boast an impressive Wrestlemania W/L record, compared to Cesaro - whose only Wrestlemania singles match was last year's Pre-Show. The match was put on Night 1 and was a lovely affair with a clear story, most importantly though Cesaro came out on top with a huge rub and like that, the Cesaro section gets to believe again.

Worst - Fiend Falls to One RKO After spending the last year re-mystifying the Fiend by having him survive all manner of things including drowning and being set on fire, the return of the Fiend to open Night 2 of Wrestlemania left a sour taste in fans' mouths. After 8 minutes of no-selling Orton's offense, Alexa Bliss reappeared with black goo over her face to distract the Fiend, he was hit with an RKO and pinned for 3. The bafflement was high as fans wondered what exactly the intention was for having the Fiend lose on his return, and why it took only one RKO to finish it when so much worse things have struggled to keep him down.

Best - NXT Stands and Delivers before Mania In what was a long and entertaining week of wrestling, NXT said goodbye to Wednesday Nights in style with their Wrestlemania-esque 2-Day Takeover. The shows were good sporting some fun matches, including an entertaining CW unification ladder match and Io passing the torch to Raquel, though NXT weren't invited to Survivor Series or Mania this time, they still put on a great show before moving to Tuesdays.

Worst - Riotts, SD Tag Champions slighted The Riott Squad currently stand as one of WWE's last surviving genuine tag teams, everyone else being singles wrestlers thrown together to avoid Main Event or Superstars. However, they also stand as a team who after multiple attempts are still not tag champions. After carrying the bulk of their Night 1 Tag Team Turmoil, the Riott Squad were unfortunately left to be felled by Natalya and Tamina - who would lose on Night 2 rendering this pointless anyway - and I have to ask, is it ever going to happen? The Riott Squad are not the only tag team hard done by at Wrestlemania, as the Smackdown Tag Championship did not even make it on the card! A fatal 4-Way between the Dirty Dawgs, Street Profits, Alpha Academy and Mysterios could've brought some infectious energy into Night 2 given the amount of talent in those four teams, but instead it got put on a 'Wrestlemania special Smackdown' while Shane vs Braun ended up on the main card. Priorities were not straight there and WWE robbed Dominik Mysterio of a Wrestlemania debut, their only contribution being a video recap and a Dirty Dawgs interview on Night 1 to prelude the Raw Tag Championship match.

Best - Wrestlemania dished out the goods, and the fans In spite of some questionable booking in the early stages, we end the list on a high. Wrestlemania didn't have the best build or go-home show, but it certainly delivered on a blend of storytelling and wrestling, big title changes for Bianca and Rhea and solid matches for the majority of the card meant that WWE ended on a high. Most importantly too, it was in front of a crowd, the ambiance very much missed on the Grandest Stage of them All.

I would rant about April 15th 2021 but I said it's from Mania 36 to 37 so yeah, footnote fuck April 15th. In the end though WWE had its ups and downs, but hopefully they will learn from some of their mistakes and come back stronger

[wizisbored]

@hatchetober day 2 - universe

basically this promt remids me of a fic idea i had a few months ago - the gang are camped out in hidgens’ bunker after the events of black friday, and some wiggly portal shennanigans led to a connection to the tgwdlm universe and now theres 2 pauls - paul and musical paul - and 2 emmas - LXIX and CDXX

so anyway, i typed up one of the scenes i wrote in my notebook while i should have been paying attention in class

"She… wants to speak to you, Emma."

Emma freezes momentarily. She did kind of expect this - and she's been curious to properly meet her too, honestly - but you can't blame her for being fucking freaked out by the woman. An exact copy of her from an alternate reality? That's some weird shit.

Taking a deep breath, she nods to Becky. "Alright. I'll talk to her, that's fine." Looking around, it's clear that nobody believed that.

"Are you sure?" Paul asks.

"Yeah."

"Do you want me to come with you?"

"I don't think that would be a good idea, Paul," Becky tells him. "She's still a little… on edge."

"Oh. Yeah," he says, gently knocking his fists together.

"Don't worry, I'll be fine," Emma tries to reassure him, "if she's an exact copy of me, then she's going to be just as great as I am, isn't she?"

"I guess so," he agrees, smiling. "You are pretty great."

Emma gives him a quick kiss on the cheek - she has to go on tiptoes to reach - and turns to follow Becky to the 'sick bay'. Gently opening the door a crack, the nurse peers into the room to address her patient.

"Emma? Your… the other Emma is here."

"Okay. Thanks, Becky."

Hearing her speak sends shivers down Emma's spine. The two of them even have the same voice. She starts to follow Becky into the room but stops short just inside the door, stunned. Sure, she's seen her before, and she knew she was going to see her again now, but there's a difference between remembering she looks exactly like her and seeing she looks exactly like her. It's almost like looking in a mirror - the double looks about as freaked out as Emma feels. There's a long pause.

"Uh… hi?"

They speak at the same time, and see each other's eyes widen as their own do. That must've been a coincidence, right? Slightly more freaked out now, Emma glances to Becky and back to her double, seeing out of the corner of her eye that she does the same thing. "What the fuck?" It's whispered, but once again simultaneous. "What the fuck?" They both look to Becky for help, though they don't really know what they expect her to do.

"Well this is… Unexpected…"

"No shit!"

"Alright, I think you both need to take a few deep breaths,” Becky suggests, a little sterner than she sounded before. Closing their eyes, both Emmas do as she says.

“I understand that this is a strange situation, but panicking won’t help. Now, how about we try this again and I’ll help you make sure you don’t speak at the same time.” She places a hand on the nearest double’s shoulder. “Alright, Emma?” She looks the woman in the eye as she says it, trying to make it clear who she’s addressing. It works - only one of them replies.

“Yeah, okay. Thanks, Becky.”

The nurse flashes her a smile, then turns to address them both again. “Do either of you particularly want to speak first? Do you have anything to ask the other?”

Neither of them speak. It’s not that they don’t have questions - they have millions of questions - but neither knows where to start. The nurse resorts to turning to the nearest one once again. “Well… Maybe you could go first?”

“Um… Okay…” She turns to look at the woman sitting on the camp bed. “Hey… Emma. How… how are you doing?”

She shrugs. “Not great, honestly. Leg’s fucked... But hey, at least I’m going to live. Oh, and this whole alternate universe thing is… confusing, and… I’m kinda scared.”

“I’m confused and kinda scared too. I mean, this is the weirdest fucking conversation I’ve ever had.”

The Emma on the bed chuckles. The other is a little unsettled - she has her laugh too. But there’s something off about it. It’s not a ‘that’s funny’ kind of laugh. It’s a ‘this is fucked up and I’m uncomfortable’ kind of nervous laugh. The standing Emma looks closer at the other’s face and, since she sees it every time she looks in a mirror (well, minus the scars) it’s easy for her to notice everything off about it. This isn’t an exact copy of her, she realises. This is a version of her that’s trying to pretend she’s not terrified.

“I’d thought you’d feel the same way,” the one on the bed says, “since… you know…”

“We’re the same person,” they finish together. For a while the two of them just stare at each other, not knowing how to move past the first real acknowledgement between them of their situation. And then it clicks - for both of them.

“That’s why we’re speaking at the same time,” they say together, “we’re reacting to things in the same way.”

Becky looks from one to the other in disbelief. “You must be having identical thought processes, at least when you say the same things.”

“Woah.”

It’s completely surreal, but it’s starting to make sense.

“We must have had the same experiences, up to a point,” they say together, “so our brains developed in the same way. But then…”

The Emma on the bed drops off, and the one by the door continues alone. “Something must have changed.”

She looks again at her double’s face, at the fear she’s trying to hide. All she’s told the inhabitants of the bunker so far is that the creepy version of Paul that came into this reality with her is ‘infected’, and that her leg was injured in a crash. That, and the fact that she thought she was dead for sure before the portal opened.

“Emma?” the standing one asks. “What happened to you?”

“What, you want my whole life story, or…?”

She’s trying to laugh it off, avoid the question. Shaking her head, the other continues: “something fucked up your reality, didn’t it? I’m guessing it’s got something to do with whatever’s wrong with your version of Paul. And I think you’re still scared of it. More than just ‘kinda scared’.”

There’s a long pause.

“Your reality’s fucked too,” she eventually mutters, “we wouldn’t be in this bunker if it wasn’t.”

“Yeah, but I managed to avoid most of the fuckery. Hell, I spent most of it watching shitty kids’ films with Paul and Tim. My version of Paul didn’t start spitting up blue shit and try to kill me.”

The Emma on the bed shrugs. “Fair point.”

“So what happened?”

She sighs, looking down at the bandage wrapped around her thigh. “Becky, could you leave me and Emma alone for a bit?”

The nurse nods slowly, though she looks uncertain. Turning to the one by the door, she tells her to find her if they need anything, then leaves.

The Emma by the door steps a little closer to the bed. “Why did you ask her to go?”

“I don’t-” She pauses and sighs. “It’s not that I don’t trust her. She saved my life. But I don’t really know her, you know? I know you - I know that’s weird to say, ‘cause I just met you a few minutes ago, but after all that synchronization shit I figured you’ll react the same way I did, so I can figure out how to explain it so you’ll understand.”

“I guess that makes sense.”

The sitting one nods, then takes a deep breath.

“This isn’t going to sound scary but it was fucking terrifying. You have to think about the implications. Seriously, think about them. I didn't at first and that didn’t go well.”

“Okay. I promise I’ll think about it.”

“The world… turned into a musical.”

She says it with a gravity that stops her double from laughing, but she’s still confused. This doesn’t go unnoticed. “Please. Think about the fucking implications.”

She tries to figure it out. Sure, people randomly bursting into song would be unnerving, but terrifying? Not really. Maybe it was what they were singing. Did people spill their darkest secrets? Or maybe people had to sing and dance, like they were possessed. And then, all of a sudden, she remembers.

“That creepy version of Paul… You said he was infected. The musical was a disease?”

“Yeah, well that’s what we called it. But it wasn’t really. That thing that came through the portal with me wasn’t just Paul with a virus. That was - is - his corpse being puppeted by an alien hivemind. It was trying to kill me so I could join it.”

Her double stands in silence, shocked. The injured woman draws her right knee up and hugs it to her chest, resting her chin on it, tears welling up in her eyes.

“He died trying to kill it,” she spits bitterly. “But it got him too.”

As carefully as she can, her double perches herself on the edge of the bed. She’s almost surprised to find they’re the exact same size - the other looked so small crying there alone, wrapped in one of Tom’s flannels. Putting an arm around her feels strange, but right.

“You probably know this reality’s Paul better than I ever knew mine,” she sniffles, “but I cared about him.”

“I know you did. If it’s even a tiny fraction of how much I care about him, I know how much you cared. You have my s-”

“I don’t need your sympathy Emma,” she chokes out.

“I know you don’t, we’re-” the other begins,

“-the same fucking person-” they continue together.

“I know.” The injured woman finishes alone.

“I was going to say you have my support, Em,” the other explains gently. “I know sympathy does jack shit on its own, I... “ Her voice drops to almost a whisper. “I lost Jane too. So I know what it’s like for me- uh, you? ...us? I know what it’s like for us to grieve. I can help you.”

“Thanks. Some help would be good right now.”

Her double offers what she hopes is a reassuring smile. “Hey, look on the bright side. I know you came close, but you managed to escape dying in Hatchetfield.”

The injured one chuckles. “God, you don’t know the half of it. I almost died in Clivesdale.”

They take a simultaneous breath. “Fuck Clivesdale.”

[purplesurveys]

1003

survey by --rainboweyes--

When you think of this country, what first comes to your mind?

Argentina: We have a local brand of canned corned beef called Argentina, so instead of the country I immediately thought of that food. But if I really have to connect this to the country, I also remembered a wrestler called Giant Gonzales; he hailed from Argentina.

Brazil:  Those “Come to Brazil” hashtags that used to trend all the time on Twitter. Brazil had some reallllly loud fanbases; I’m just not sure if they’re still as vocal now.

Canada: Bret Hart. Also @inchoate-surveys, heh.

Denmark: I don’t really know anything about Denmark. OH WAIT NO there’s Legos, so we’ll go with that.

England: I honestly thought of their dishes first since I find them rather unique and super different from the Asian dishes I’m used to. We don’t really use beans or make a lot of puddings and pies, but I think they’re all interesting. 

France: Escargot and baguette lol. I’m constantly thinking of food, guys; what a shocker. Also the movie Funny Face since most of it was set in France.

Germany: Sauerkraut and long words.

Hungary: I always confuse Hungary with Germany, but the difference is I don’t know a single thing about Hungary. So I don’t actually know how to answer this haha oops, sorry.

Ireland: Niall Horan HEHE. Also the wrestlers Becky Lynch and Sheamus. Ireland’s got a lot of talented folks.

Italy: @justsurveys (:D), Lizzie McGuire, the movie Roman Holiday.

Jamaica: I also first thought of a wrestler. His name is Kofi Kingston and I remembered him because at one point in his career he was packaged to have a Jamaican gimmick even though he’s actually Ghanian, just because of his race and the fact that he had dreadlocks. Like seriously? Classic example of WWE being racist and stereotypical...ugh. It’s truly hard to vouch for them sometimes.

Japan: The brutally honest first thing I thought of wasssss how they took over my country for a few years and subjected thousands of women and children to various forms of torture before killing them.

Korea: Korean food :( Man I miss having jjajangmyeon.

Libya: Their old flag, which was just entirely green. No designs, no stripes, no other colors. Just a good ol’ green flag.

Morocco: I think of Marrakesh and how colorful the place is. I’d love to go someday.

Norway: Northern lights.

Poland: The current Pope. < OMG editing this answer. The Pope I was thinking of was John Paul II, the actual Pole. Pope Francis is from Argentina lmaooooo so sorry

Romania: I honestly can’t tell you a single thing. Slowly starting to realize that I’m not as good in geography as I thought I was, ha.

Russia: Onion domes, I think that’s what they’re called.

Spain: When I think of Spain I always immediately think of the unfinished church, Sagrada Familia is what I think it’s called, if I remember correctly. It’s in my bucket list of places to see, for sure. Then there’s also the 333 years of colonization, but I’m not feeling bitter enough tonight to rant about that.

Tunisia: Not a clue. I’m bringing my ass to read more about other countries after this.

Turkey: Gabie, because she has Turkish blood.

Uganda: That Joseph Kony documentary that blew up nearly a decade ago. I’m pretty sure that was based in Uganda.

United States of America: Trump, Target, cheeseburgers, elderly people on scooters, those machines at the store that count your coins for you, more cheeseburgers.

United Kingdom: The royal family, Black Mirror, accents that sound fancy.

Australia: Barbecue, kangaroos, deserts, Vegemite.

New Zealand: I thought of my relatives who live there. Also Lord of the Rings.

List 3 movies you like in each genre.

Action: Eugh, I hate this genre. Wonder Woman is probably the only action movie I ever really enjoyed.

Comedy: Can romcoms count? I like The Proposal, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, andddddd This Is Spinal Tap. 

Drama: Room, Revolutionary Road, Requiem for a Dream.

Fantasy: Huge pass.

Horror: Midsommar, The Shining, (the original) Carrie.

Kids/Animated: Toy Story, Finding Nemo, Tangled.

Romance: Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Carol, Two for the Road.

Sci-Fi: 2001: A Space Odyssey(!!!), The Martian, Interstellar.

Thriller: Misery, Black Swan, Gone Girl.

Western: Not my cup of tea. The only thing I could think of is Breaking Bad, and that’s not even a movie.

Answer just in numbers.

Number of brothers you have: 1.

Number of sisters you have: Also 1.

Number of the house you live at: Eh.

Number of close friends you have: Off the top of my head, 3.

Number of pets you have: 2.

Number of times you shower a week: 6 or 7.

Number of concerts you've been to in your life: Too many to count if I include local gigs at schools. But if we’re only referring to bigger acts held in arenas or stadiums, 4.

Number of cars your household has: 3.

Number of serious relationships you've been in: 1, but we dated twice.

Number of movies you've seen at the cinema this year: Hahahaha

Number of people who live in your house: 5, including myself.

Number of plug sockets in the room you're in now: 4.

Some more randomer questions.

What food do you have cravings for the most? My cravings are always changing, though. Right now, it would be sushi and takoyaki. We actually just had both last night for dinner, but we devoured them SO fast and now I’m seeking them out again.

What TV shows do you hate to miss on TV? I’m not that attached to any show. I used to religiously follow WWE Raw and The Walking Dead and always wanted to watch both live as often as possible, but those days are long gone.

What do you tend to lose the most? My appetite. As for actual items...probably pens.

The last time someone shouted at you - why were they shouting? It’s been a while since that happened, so I don’t remember.

Would you rather have a cactus or a bonsai? Cactus. I heard taking care of bonsai trees is quite complicated, and I just know I’d kill it within a day or two, if not a lot shorter.

What scary story freaks you out the most? Not really in the mood to think of an answer to this considering it’s 1:07 AM and dark as fuck in my room D:

Are you better with gadgets or cooking? Probably gadgets, but just barely.

How would you rate your own looks? Personality? I hate deciding on things about me. I don’t want to hype myself up too much but I don’t want to drag myself down either lol

What accent is the most attractive? Some English accents are very pleasant to the ear.

Do you get annoyed when people spell your name wrong? Not for the most part since I have the more uncommon spelling anyway. But if someone is talking to me on like Messenger or Viber where my name is blatantly stated and spelled out and they still misspell it, then I get peeved.