#no one gives a shit about solving any of the real issues. I’m done!

[queen-esther]

To be brutally honest, a lot of the issues with public school are because of parents. Negligent parents don’t give a shit when they get a phone call about their kid cussing out a classmate or throwing a chair, but they sure as hell care when they hear their precious baby got recess time taken away for acting up in class. Problem kids don’t care about getting sent to the office or being put in ISS, because to them, it’s a free vacation out of the classroom, and their parents don’t hold them accountable for their behavior, so they’re not scared about consequences at home, either. So then, teachers are facing pressure from “customer service mindset” admin to “handle it on their own,” which means teachers are having to constantly stop what we’re doing every five seconds to address behaviors instead of actually getting to teach the rest of the kids who do want to learn and get their work done, which ultimately puts everyone behind.

[jigensass]

Part 1 - Video Games

Part 1 – Video Games.

The more I wrote this list, the more that I realized I played a lot of games this year. More than average.

First off, the one shot sittings.

Unpacking – made me cry 10/10.

The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog. Best April fool’s Joke ever 10/10.

Papa’s Freezeria Deluxe. 7/10 because nostalgia.

Now, let’s start off with the real shit.

Persona 4 Golden – Yes I am aware this is a 10 year old game. I don’t care.

I have known about this game this its inception, most likely due to the now defunct playthrough from Super Best Friends. But not gonna lie, the pony version of this version was way much better.

I’ve ranted on Persona 5 so damn much but I actually enjoyed this game and the critical issues of the teenage psyche that it delved into alongside the purpose of the main villain, who I am not going to spoil. Even the mascot character was bear-able to hear because you could literally bench the guy since he didn’t become a member of your party until halfway through the game. And Teddy was never in my face on what to do and didn’t creepily live in my house. The game just gave me suggestions when important events would happen to nudge me to say ‘hey, you should probably do this thing.’ Unlike Morgana who kept saying ‘Hey, Hey. We must sleep. Do as I say and obey.’

Overall I just found it more engaging and new mechanics weren’t always being shoved down my face during every new chapter and if there were new mechanics to use, I hardly ever used them because I mostly stuck with the same four core of Yu, Yukiko, Yosuke, & Kanji. I really wish I could have had more time to play with Naoto but by the time she enters your party, the game is nearly entering the final battle and any missed content you forgot to pick up along the way.

And I obviously picked well to romance the goth girl Marie, because I got a secret ending.

Overall, solid 8/10.

Sherlock Holmes the Awakened.

So the Gigachads at Frogwares have done it again and managed to make a sequel to their prequel ambiguously gay Sherlock game and as a remake of one of their first point and click adventures where Sherlock takes on Cthulhu.

Meanwhile in the background of all this madness (and how maddeningly they played the ending to a remake be a sequel to the original), kept throwing this about.

I’m just saying, if they announce the remake for Nemesis, I will live stream it.

And for those who don’t know what Nemesis is, it’s Lupin Part 6, the way it was supposed to be.

There is a demo on steam, the game is very short due to its age and if the old puzzles frustrate you, the game has an entire guide to how to solve Lupin’s shenanigans built in. If you love old point-and-click Nancy Drew like games, you’ll like this.

Giving it a cocktease/10.

Final Fantasy XVI & Final Fantasy Crisis Core (I’m lumping these two together).

Crisis Core is…Crisis Core. It was my first time playing it and because I set it down I believe last year or when it first came out, picked it up again, and finished it in maybe two or three more sessions and a few guide reads later, it felt…eh.  It’s been a while since I’ve played it so since it really didn’t latch on to me like some further entries into the list, I would have been able to remembered some more.

However, I played FFXVI and there are only two things you need to take away from it.

The gays are winning.

Sex on the beach.

TORGO IS BEST BOI.

Cildilfus

No really that’s it. The combat for XVI is certainly something new. And at some points, it did make me cry. But overall because the game was so small and finite, it felt…unfulfilling. I wanted to spend more time in this world to get to know these characters. Yes, I am still a bit petty that when I played the demo before I bought the game they teased that you could also play as Joshua, maybe other characters, but that never came into fruition in the final version. Which makes me believe that this game had a lot more going for it than intended.

Just like the next game on the list…

Assassin’s Creed Mirage.

This game was probably the fastest I had explored a map within one sitting. My playthroughs for FFXVI and AC Mirage were about the same length. The return to form with the old stealth mechanics was refreshing, although I only played a small bit of Valhalla and that main character drove me nuts. However, I could have cared less about the story. It was all about that sweet, sweet map exploration. The very instant I was given free reign after the tutorial, I flipped off the first objective and went off to go explore the entire map. The glaring issues of how little work went into this game showed when I just waltzed up to the final area of the game with ease or how it felt boring that to have to backtrack through the plot to get half the armor and weapon upgrades that I went out of my own way to get on my own. At that point, I just didn’t care and the ending…yeah the ending made no sense to me at all.

5/10. Very mid.

But let’s go from mid to god tier and talk about the latest Yakuza- sorry Like a Dragon game, shall we?

Like a Dragon: Gaiden – The Man who Erased his Name

AFTER 7 YEARS, HE HAS RETURNED- No wait this is Joryu Jozuma, but everyone is calling him Kiryu Kazama? WHO IS HE?

Jesus Christ I hope the people at SEGA got paid well for making this DLC into a masterpiece in six months. https://automaton-media.com/en/interviews/20231030-22625/ (link it here)

Not going to lie, this is definitely one of the better titles in the RGG franchise to date up with Yakuza 0 and the original Ishin (more on this in a bit). It’s essentially ‘Yakuza Lite’ for anyone who wants to get into the series. It’s not the best place to start if you want to get invested, but it’s a good swallow pool to get your toes wet.

The story, depending on how much you know about the series, will make you cry during the end. RGG (the studio, not the game), brought their A-game with the animations and it has been a long time coming.

Most of the fan favorite minigames are here so there’s a little bit of everything for everyone. And although most of the game does feel like busy work, which it’s a Yakuza game. The whole vibe it is supposed to give is to get you invested in something so unrelated to the main story that 40 hours later you go, ‘wait, what the fuck was I supposed to be doing again?’

And I’m not going to lie, I’m glad the finishing of the completionist list and maxing out the Akane network to level 30 being completely optional is a breath of fresh air. Because the trophy list was so easy to attain, minus a few snags here and there, I am proud to say that RGG Gaiden is my first platinum trophy on PS5.

9/10.

Meanwhile on the other hand…the meme is dead.

At the beginning of this year around February, Yakuza Ishin Kiwami dropped to the mainstream western audience, officially making it localized. I’ve already played Ishin in its prime form, so to see the state the game was in was…very depressing.

This was the first RGG game to run on the Unreal Engine and it shows that the team was not well-versed with it and the time constraints on getting the game out did not help at all. I believe this game went through six or seven patches before they said ‘enough was enough’ and just let it be.

I even broke a portion of the game on a substory with the final mail delivery race. What happened is that I took a different path than the AI so he went off screen and sooner or later I realized I was kicking his ass. Upon further investigation, I noticed that he had gotten stuck in a loop on a bridge, which was not supposed to happen.

OH AND THE AUDIO BALANCING WITH THE NEW VOICE LINES IS REALLY GOOD WE SWEAR!

Just go find a copy of OG Ishin on Ebay or somewhere. I can hardly read Japanese and still had a good time. I did not have a good time with the clunky combat, the necessity of using the tropper cards (I never used them in my original playthrough in Ishin, why should I have to use them NOW? Shinada card OP.)

6/10. – Because Majima’s lines are obviously re-used, unlike Kiryu’s who got to have most, if not all of them, re-dubbed.  

Ace Attorney Spirit of Justice.

It took me so long, but I did it. Coincidentally, right around the second trilogy announcement for consoles came about. I sat down and played the current final game in the Ace Attorney series.

And what did I think of it?

Well, it’s a mess that is for sure. That fourth cock tease of a trial with Athena may or may not be getting her own game soon…eventually… is possibly the worst case in the entire series. And no, it’s not just because of this is the case that gave the internet the sheer thought of…………….clussy. It was boring, bland, uninteresting, and there were no stakes or ingenuity to use your brain to solve the case.

Apollo? Trans? High probability. I didn’t feel any kind of deep connection to what was going on and the plot twist at the end was…too be honest kind of dumb. Like in the…’oh you had no idea but look at this cool thing we did so it feels kind of empty’ rather than how I felt when it hit me like a truck about the obvious plot twist with Bridge to the Turnabout did. Listen I’m just linking HBomberGuy’s video on Sherlock because the analogy of the 12 hour trial and Bridge to the Turnabout are identical to Moffat’s Sherlock and the OG Sherlock serials. It was his idea first.

Really the only thing I can remember is the one post I made that popped off about Athena calling out Apollo for being flustered about Klavier.

Speaking of posts that popped off…

8. Obey Me! Nightbringer (aka dear god why do I make terrible decisions with my life).

So, the gacha otome game that ruined my life last year is getting a sequel prequel!

I’m not going to play it! The gameplay will probably be just more of the same-

It’s a rhythm game.

It’s. a. rhythm. game.

*audible screaming*

ANYWAY SO NINE MONTHS AND ABOUT TEN THOUSANDS ANALYSIS POSTS ABOUT HOW EVERYONE IN THIS GAME IS AWFUL- (no I’m not joking. I’ve analyzed Lucifer like I analyzed Jigen and dare I say this man is more akin to my inner struggles than Jigen will ever be.)

Don’t worry, the money spending has been a lot more sparse and comes in giant dumps during events of a card that I want rather than a consistent cash flow since the game is more of a way to have fun rather than a way to escape humanity. Due to how much my workload has becoming, I’ve just gone down from playing daily to just playing weekly to play the new story chapters. I’m probably just going to do the bare minimum to get anything out of the Christmas event (the plot is so silly it made me laugh, ngl).

Because the story is ongoing and my opinion on some characters has changed drastically over the course of the last week. I’m just going to make a tier list of how I feel the story have been IN ACCORDANCE TO THEIR ACTIONS. (mild theory spoilers) as well as how I actually see the characters.

PLOT OPINION

CHARACTER OPINION

Overall the game is enjoyable when it takes itself seriously.

But now we must address the elephant in the room aka the big star of this year’s game list?

WHY THE ACTUAL FUCK DO I HAVE 250 HOURS IN AMERICAN TRUCK SIMULATOR?

NO REALLY.

(btw add me on Steam, it means you actually read this disaster piece)

I don’t know what it is with this game just driving around in a big rig blaring country music is so…cathartic. It just makes me hate people in cars even more. If anything, this sparked my love for crappy 90’s country music to a spike. I admit it, it’s a guilty pleasure of mine. This is my guilty pleasure game. And judge me for it all you want. My inbox is obey.

But let’s get serious. I was going to just…ignore this game despite… THIS being the release showcase. This is how I initially found about this long game that had been in development and beta testing for many years beforehand. And don’t lie, this is probably how most people found out about it too.

But someone told me that the VA from Sherlock Chapter One was doing some of the moaning during the sex scenes and I just hopped onto the train

Of Baldur’s Gate 3.

I had absolutely no idea what I was getting myself into (I started playing around launch in late August, right around Hotfix #3 with the mirror came out). I knew next to nothing of the main lore of the Forgotten Realms universe, but my knowledge with D&D from college was basic, at best. And I was going to quit playing the game because I really did not like the constant top-down view camera. Until a co-worker, who was also playing said, ‘you know you can move that camera, right?’ So I came back, plugged in my PS4 controller into my computer and I was off to the races.

That was until when I went to go free up some space on my computer, this fucking piece of shit game nearly bricked my damned PC and I saved it with patience and by the grace of fucking Mystra herself because I deleted MY ENTIRE USER FOLDER LIKE AN IDIOT

Disclaimer: I have yet to finish the game because this is an OC simulator, I still want to play the Origin characters, as well as the Durge playthrough. Which, depending on how you play, is THOUSANDS OF HOURS of CONTENT. And there is just so many options and how you can go about things as well as that random chance of RNG.

I currently have four OC campaigns. I have not even touched the sheer tip of the iceberg. Azazel, the buff High Elf Bard who is fucking Halsin. Donna, the sorcerer Luna, the Wood-Elf Druid Burrito, the human warlock. (This is by far the craziest playthrough so far)

I am also writing this after the game awards so congrats to Larian for getting the sweep they deserved. All the other games that were nominated this year were just a blip on the radar compared to what BG3 was doing. The gameplay is not innovative outside of the world of D&D, but they hit a homerun with all of the story that is crammed into this game and did it so well that they continued to update the game MONTHS after the open release with change of life styles and multiple bug fixes that many players enjoyed.

Also all of the voice actors are beautiful. They all did a fantastic job with their work. But you know who this is about now.

(I go looking for one specific video and I find this fucking piece of gold while the game was still in beta access.)

Yes we are going to be talking about Astarion (or for me at first it was A-‘stair’-ion).

What do I think of him? Since I have seen many posts going around that apparently a portion of the fan community cannot separate between actor and the art. I made this meme.

Yes, Neil is a very precious man and deserves more work in the industry after his spring board with Astarion. I do not associate him with Astarion outside of their voices because I hate to love Astarion. The man is a fucking slut of a PROSECUTOR. He would make Miles Edgeworth jealous because he took his husband of an attorney and would make Klavier Gavin foam at the mouth at his sense of style is 10000x better than his. He would be slaying in the courtroom ALL THE TIME.

Astarion is the devil on every player’s shoulder that goes ‘yeah we could be goody-two shoes but is that fun? No, no it isn’t. Spill some blood, just for me kitten.’ And you wouldn’t hesitate to do it.

My bard, Azazel, who was mostly aligned with good, had a neutral relationship with Astarion going into Act 3. Astarion at this point was EVERYONE’S Devil and I blame him for Gale getting into deeper shit with Mystra than he already had been. Azazel would always listen to what Astarion would had to say, but never would be drag along with his shenanigans, despite keeping him around to use as a distraction to try multiply times to steal 10 scrolls of dimension door from the wizard shop in Baldur’s Gate. Did I do? Fuck yes I did. Was it worth it? Hell yes it was.

MEANWHILE, I’m currently going through the game as well, me, as a human warlock. And let me tell you, this game will show you what kind of person you actually are. And truth be told, I’m a decent person, but will go the shady route to get things done. I almost ALMOST sided with Minathra based on looks alone until I found out she sounded like a crazed member of the Alt-Right and was going to also kill the refugees. I pissed some kids off, lied, stole, but somehow in the name of Mystra, just because I fed Gale some magic items and heard him out did he instantly rise to ‘excpetional’ status without me even realizing it. He instantly became an incel because you guessed it, some white-haired vampire seduced me into sleeping with him and THEN the githyanki because I helped HER out of her problems wanted to sleep with me. THEN THE VAMPIRE found out I was sleeping with the githyanki, and told me ‘it’s either me or the gith’.

It was a hard decision: Being stepped on, or good sex.

Obviously I chose the latter. Because I’m a sucker. Though I really do wish I could let this go on.   

[stxleslyds]

MY TOUGHTS ON THE END OF RED HOOD BY CHIP ZDARSKY.

Dishonour! Dishonour on you, dishonour on your cow! 

Well Jason Nation, it happened again, fanon wins over canon. The amount of bullshit that DC made Zdarsky write in this issue is insane, I have never seen this many fanfiction tropes shoved in a single issue in my life.

This book has been a constant insult to Jason’s character and his Red Hood “persona” since the very first issue but I never thought it would end this badly. It’s incredibly sad.

I will go ahead and say it, this tumblr and this post is not “Batfamily” friendly and it definitely isn’t fanon friendly when it comes to Jason Todd.

Fanon is destroying canon for Jason Todd. I am sorry but that’s how I see it, fanon doesn’t belong in canon, I would never get tired of saying that. But here is the thing, DC latches on to Jason’s fanon version because it fits their narrative of “the Batman is all that is right and all must follow his rules or they shall disappear”.

DC has been dying to make Jason bland and flavourless just like Batman. And now here it finally is.

Let’s be honest the story in this book, the new drug, Cheer, Tyler and his mom, none of that shaped this story, none of those things were the support beams for it. It was all about this never ending “daddy issues” thing that DC pretends is going on between Jason and Bruce.

It was all about those two fighting because they “think differently” so in the end they can push Jason towards the “no killing rule” being also the Red Hood’s modus operandi.

Its utter bullshit.

From the moment that Jason had to put a bat suit on I knew that this was going to be a mess. Luckily like I predicted they didn’t make a big deal out of him wearing it but the “Jason admires Batman” feeling was very present in the issue.

I will not talk about how easy it was for that one thug to land a punch on Jason while he was distracted and I will also not talk about Jason being a dumbass for not securing his dumb mask better when he knew the fight will involve gases. I will not talk about it.

Anyway, let’s talk about the Cheer Gas induced illusion, shall we?

In Jason’s illusion he finds Bruce at the manor looking at the picture of Joker’s death (?) and even though that is strange what Bruce says next is even weirder, he says this: “I did it. He was the last one, but I did it…Joker is dead. I am done.”

Now what the hell was that? This is Jason’s illusion, and by the looks of it in his illusion Bruce has killed every baddie in Gotham and left the Joker for last? Am I reading that right? Is this this a joke?

I understand that this is an illusion so the gas is making “real” things that Jason probably doesn’t know he wants, like wanting Bruce to go on a killing spree, which Jason never wanted because he said it himself, do you guys remember the iconic “I’m not talking about killing Cobblepot and Scarecrow or Clayface. Not Riddler or Dent…I’m talking about HIM. Just him.” Because I remember and it’s so important to Jason’s character, Jason never wanted Bruce to go on a killing spree, he wanted Bruce to kill the clown who had killed him when he was only fifteen. Is that so hard to remember DC?

And then it gets worse! Since WHEN has Jason wanted a perfect family life with the people that he has tried to kill, harm or looked down to? Why is “being with a bunch of people who NEVER get together for anything other than ��help” the Bat in a fight against a fucking clown” the idea of happiness to Jason? Has this man ever interacted with any of these people in a positive way without the intrusion of a Batman/Robin event in the way? I will give you the answer, it’s no, the answer is no.

Jason Todd doesn’t care for your “Batfamily” bullshit DC, why would it matter to him? Because he was Robin? He was killed by the Joker when he was Robin, and he was killed because the man in charge of him didn’t pay enough attention! Jason Todd who was written as Dick Grayson’s number one hater for so long (and fandom loves that) is now having an illusion where he enjoys happy times with him along the others? Cass and Stephanie? What? Am I missing something, is this actually AO3, is this fanfiction?

I think Zdarsky got confused, this illusion is what would happen if Jason were dosed with fear gas. That must be it, I solved it everyone! Zdarsky just got confused by his own writing!

I wish.

Let’s go back to the sad reality, Jason has a moment in which he actually puts all his training in motion and shakes of the gas’s grasp on him. He does that but he is grabbed by so many people (who are this people?) and he is unarmed and I believe that’s the only reason why Cheer is still alive after saying that he has someone in Tyler’s mom’s hospital room ready to kill her if he doesn’t join him.

(If this were the real Jason, Cheer would have dropped dead instantly.)

But this is not the real Jason and this is not a *real* comic, it’s fanfiction! So just like that time in Batman #100 when Dick was fighting alone as Nightwing (for the first time since his “family” left him alone after losing his memories) the rest of the “family” shows up to fight Cheer and four random thugs.

Yep, its like the MCU had considered having Cap say “Avengers Assemble” when they were fighting a couple of robots instead of Thanos.

What a mess.

Also having Jason say, in real life (not illusion world), “You know what happiness is? It’s knowing that others have your back.” about this group of people is the perfect recipe for a big OOC moment for absolutely everyone. I cannot believe they have dragged Jason back to this awful concept and that they have sank him so low. It’s quite honestly, disgusting.

But the horrors don’t end there, we have a wonderful moment after Jason gives Batman the antidote, Jason stops Batman from punching the living shit out of Cheer. Because I am not stupid. There is no way in the world that you can convince me that Jason just stopped Batman from killing Cheer.

How incredibly delusional do you have to be to write Batman finally killing someone and that someone being Cheer, a guy that was introduced to comics two months ago?

Yes, later its said that between the gas and the antidote Bruce was a little too crazy and couldn’t help himself BUT I call bullshit once more, because Bruce has gone completely bat-shit-crazy on people before! I remember two recent instances in which that happened. Batman #57 in which Bruce beats the living shit out of KGBeast after he shot Dick. And the other one is Batman beating up Jason more brutally than he ever beat up Joker in RHatO #25.

DC cannot fuck with me. I might has bought this digital comic for 8 dollars but I am not buying that bullshit.

ALSO, there was no need for Zdarsky to do Jason as dirty as he did him when he made him say: “If you are going to come down from mount judgement to MY level for once… he’s not the guy to do it for.”

Zdarsky, why did you write a Red Hood story when you hate Red Hood? Couldn’t you have just told DC that you wanted to write a love letter to Batman? Once again, I am reading a Red Hood story for RED HOOD content not Batman content. Is it really that hard? I bet that if Zdarsky had asked DC to let him write a Batman story they would have said yes, there are like 20 Batman stories, they wouldn’t say no to one more!

Can you tell I am mad? And salty?

This post is so long and so full of anger, I am truly sorry for that but I have to write these feelings down or I would explode. And I am not even done, our suffering, Jason Nation, continues.

But first a little break from the pain, Tyler. Thank you after all the pain this book has given me Tyler is back and just like I predicted his mom is fine and he will stay with her, they both have been given a place and money to rebuild their life (not given by Jason nor Dick but I was close enough). The only happy ending that Tyler could have, he had and I am thankful for that, we even got a little adorable moment between the Red Hood and the Blue Hood.

I am weak for these little glimpses of a good Jason take in the middle of an incredibly awful/OOC story. And just to live in my own fantasy world I will headcanon that Jason promised himself to keep an eye out for Tyler and his mom. He would have wanted to know about their life and that they are still out of trouble.

Jason is a good man, don’t you forget that DC, I don’t care how much you twist it. Jason killing Tyler’s dad wasn’t a horrible act, it was fair game. That man was a horrible person, he drugged his child and made his wife (?) almost overdose. You never gave context as to why that man was working as a drug dealer but you told us those things so Jason should never feel like he did something wrong. As far as we know, Tyler and his mom are better off without him.

Having said that, lets go back to the pain of what is reading a Red Hood story.

“I’m giving up the guns.”

You know what, fine, as long as DC doesn’t pull another “I will stop being Red Hood for you Barbara” I will be fine. He can kill people with other things, he used to have the all-blades, he had normal swords and he had crowbars.

I will sacrifice Jason looking hot as hell when he pulls out his guns just to keep him as the Red Hood, all DC has to do is not give him that stupid… bat… symbol… oh no…. oh my god I can feel it… that thing, that horrible thing is making a comeback! NO!

Jason and Bruce’s talk is basic and it doesn’t do anything for anyone, in the end saying that Jason isn’t changing his ways for Bruce but that he is doing it for himself is more of the same. We know he is doing it for Bruce and we know DC is doing it because they cannot handle good, complex and interesting characters. We know that and sadly we have to live with it.

About Bruce’s illusion, well, Bruce has said that he wanted to kill the clown for a very long time and in the King run it was basically said that if Bruce were to be happy then the idea of Batman would die.

Listen, between me and you, sometimes I think that the Joker isn’t that big of a problem for Gotham as a whole, that clown has beef with the Bat and no one else. If Bruce has killed the Joker Jason would have been happy with Bruce all those years ago but killing the Joker wouldn’t make Gotham a safe place and any of his kids happier.

Bruce needs to care for his children, but he won’t do that, he has Dick for that. Taking care and raising Damian? No, thank you, I will not do that. Giving a shit about my son who lost all his memories and is alone? No thank you, I won’t do that and then I will lie about having watched him over. Tim? Oh, never heard of him, sorry.

The last page of this story is the one of Jason arriving home and finding a new suit that Bruce gave him with the bat symbol on it. That symbol that he had ripped off of Jason’s beat up body back in RHatO #25 (nope, I am not letting that one go).

Oh, and Bruce leaving that suit in Jason’s home gives me the same exact vibes as the time that Bruce was like “Long overdue. This is where you belong. As one of us. One of the family” in Nightwing #74 a second after Dick had regained his memories.

I don’t know why but they make him sound incredibly cold and like these people are just his pawns that he needs to rope back in every time they get away from him. It’s very disturbing.

Anyway, that’s all from me, I obviously LOVED this book, best Jason Todd/Red Hood characterisation ever! 11/10 would recommend to everyone including my enemies!

🙃

[kikyan]

Izaya Ending

His ending is here along with the smut! MDI after the cut! ALSO I RLLY HAD TO HAVE A FRIEND HELP ME WITH THE SMUT CUZ I WAS SO EMBARRASED TO WRITE IT ALL OMFG-

TW: Dub-con! Degration! Name calling! Oral Sex (both giving and receiving)! Collar! Choking! Vaginal Sex/Penetration! Think that’s it if not lmk!

ALSO I RLLY USED THE MOST WATTPAD BASIC ASS LANGUAGE FOR THIS SMUT THIS IS HOW YOU KNOW THIS SHIT WAS WRITTEN YEARS AGO

PART ONE

“Oh? It seems he even has the Dollars searching for you!” 

“ Izaya, please I apologize for anything that I did that caused you to do this, but I need to get back to Shizuo!” 

“ And do what? Apologize for my actions and say everything is fine? You truly are different than other humans (Y/N)! Besides, does Shizu-chan know?” 

“ K-know what?” 

“You can drop the act. I know who you are (Y/N) or should I sa-?!” 

“ Izaya, I won’t ask you again. Please, I apologize for what I said or did but I must return to my fiance.” 

“ I can’t do that (Y/N). You thought you had me fool, no you thought you had the whole world fooled, but unlike Shizu-chan, I know the real you. You are far too unique, too precious to be in the hands of that brute, that damned monster!” 

“ IZAYAAAAAA! GET YOUR ASS OUT HERE AND GIVE ME MY DAMN FIANCE!” 

“ Speak of the Devil, he really did arrive, didn’t he? (Y/N) it’s better if you stay, wait no- I want you to see God punish his worthless creation, than have his Goddess forgive him and the cycle continues!” 

Grabbing her arm, (Y/N) was dragged to the door where Shizuo lay in waiting/ Shizuo’s eyes lit up with hope as (Y/N) arrived, quickly scanning her to ensure that she was not harmed by Izaya. 

“ This is low, even for you Izaya. What the hell do you want anyway?” 

“ I want (Y/N) of course! How rude of you to keep her from society, from me! She is too perfect, in fact, she is perfection! I can’t stand you of all people, a damn monster near her!” 

“ If I am a monster, what the hell does that make you?” 

“ That hurt Shizu-chan, but I’m sure my goddess, (Y/N) would forgive you nonetheless!” 

Grabbing a stop sign Shizuo prepared to swing at Izaya before seeing (Y/N) duck down. 

‘This is too dangerous for (Y/N)! I have to lead him away. . .’ 

“ You see (Y/N)! This monster swung at you! I told you, he would only hurt you! Stay with me, my Goddess!” 

Taking his knife out, he swung it at Shizuo cutting him horizontally across his chest. As Shizuo remained unfazed he swung the sign hitting Izaya as well sending him flying back inside the apartment complex. As Izaya got up and grabbed the knife and (Y/N), before placing the knife under (Y/N)’s throat causing her to panic slightly. 

“ (Y/N)! Izaya you damned bastard! Let her go, that’s low. . .” 

“ It’s fine! Besides, my Goddess is so forgiving, I'm sure she will let this slide! In fact, I feel as if instead of the way I initially thought, it was you Shizuo who used (Y/N)!” 

Catching him off guard Shizuo looked down from (Y/N) with a hurtful expression as he pondered if he did truly use her as Izaya said. 

“ Kid. . . ding. . .!” 

With that Izaya took this time to spin (Y/N) from his hold and bolted to Shizuo, knife ready and a gun to end this beast’s life. As Shizuo looked up he failed to notice the blade approaching fast, approaching close to his eye until it did, leading to Izaya stabbing Shizuo in the eye causing him to crouch down in pain and hold his eye that was bleeding profusely. Izaya held the gun on his forehead before looking down with insanity filled eyes and a smile to top off the look. 

“ Shizuo, let’s ask (Y/N) if she forgives you for using her?” 

Turning to the side he was met with (Y/N) sobbing as she looked at him straight in the eyes before blurting out, “ Izaya, please! Leave Shizuo alone! He did nothing wrong! I’ll do whatever you want me to do just please leave him b-!?” 

“ Oh but (Y/N), you already are. He did nothing wrong? That sounds like forgiveness! Now Shizuo, any last words?” 

Turning slightly noticing he lost the battle and that Izaya won, he mumbled a small “ I love you (Y/N), forgive me” before having his life taken away as well as his fiance. 

“ SHIZUO!” 

(Y/N) ran to catch his body as she sobbed louder before clutching his arm, the one that held his engagement ring. Looking at his corpse (Y/N) continued saying “I FORGIVE YOU I’M SORRY PLEASE, PLEASE COME BACK!” 

“ Heh. . . hehe, ha, haha, HAHAHAAHAHAHA! THIS IS SPLENDID! THIS IS GREAT! THAT DAMNED MONSTER IS GONE! MY GODDESS IS MINE AND MINE ONLY NOW! HEY (Y/N), YOU FORGIVE ME, RIGHT? I MEAN, ON THE BRIGHT SIDE NOW THERE ISN’T A SHIZUO TO EDGE ON, RIGHT?” 

“ . . . I-I-I-I-I. . . I f-forgive y-you. . . I forgive you Izaya. . .” 

“ SEE I KNEW IT! ISN’T MY GODDESS WONDERFUL? NO MATTER THE CRIME SHE WILL ALWAYS FORGIVE! OH (Y/N) YOU TRULY ARE SPECIAL AND ONE OF A KIND!” 

Crouching down to hug (Y/N) from behind, Izaya smiled before speaking. 

“ Indeed (Y/N), you truly are special! Who would have guessed in a million years that I would meet the one who changed me! The one who became my goddess, the one who made me see humanity in a new light!” 

“ I-I-Izaya. . . why me. . .? 

“ Why you ask? Simple, it’s because . . . yOu’Re My FaVoRiTe HuMaN~” 

Standing on the rooftop Izaya was speaking with a female in pigtails as he began to tell her that she wasn’t really planning on killing herself and that she had one or two secrets that she didn’t tell anyone, so if her parents had one. . . what was the big deal? 

“ All humans lie, hide things, no one really makes it through this life being completely honest. Everyone's the same, no exceptions! Well, that is what I thought until I met (Y/N) (l/n) but I’ll let her do the rest from here on out. What you choose to do is on you in the end so choose carefully~!” 

Walking out to the edge with the girl (Y/N) looks and stares at the blood splatter as she turns to her and says, “ we humans will commit the worst of crimes, murder, robbery, rape, you name it. Though, the biggest crime any human can commit and go about not knowing is lying to yourself and making a mistake thinking it will solve the issue. Do not fear, I am not judging you I just want you to know, no matter what you choose to do tonight, I forgive you and I assure you, a second chance is waiting for you all! So please, on the bright side, you now know what is happening and now you know what you can do to change it!” 

The girl began to sob as she clutched onto (Y/N) sobbing and pouring her heart out with her smiling as she looked at the girl. After some time she finally left and (Y/N) looked up to the moon before hearing Izaya speak once again before hugging her and smiling. 

“ Who would have known, so tell me is this you speaking (Y/N)? Or is it Saika?” 

“ You can rest assure it’s me Izaya, but please don’t mention Saika.” 

“ I never imagined someone as happy and cheerful as you to wield Saika, more importantly, go through something as traumatic as you have. Oh well, that’s life I guess! I’ll be waiting by the door whenever you wish to leave my Goddess. . .” 

“ Alright. . .” 

As (Y/N) stared at the moon and then the red blood splatter she began to recall that memory, that small memory that started it all. 

~ 

In a small room all alone lived a young girl in her ‘timeout punishment’ as they called it. It was actually isolation, for three days the young girl hasn’t eaten and was barely drinking enough water to stay alive, but who was she to complain? Looking out she saw several children walking around and playing and it began to sadden the young girl as she could not join them for a small game of tag. Her mother was most likely with some other man and so was her father. As they argued and took out their stress out on other people, such as their daughter (Y/N), they failed to realize the young girl apologize for everything. 

Blood stained the nice mats and floors as two bodies lay on top of each other with wounds in their stomachs causing their entrails to leap out. 

“ I’m sorry mother and father! I apologize, if I wasn’t so weak then this never would have happened. On the bright side, I have freedom now! I also heard that I can play with the neighborhood kids too! Ah, don’t look at me like that mom! I know that I caused you so much pain, but you did too! I know for a fact that I should have done so much more but it’s fine mother! Father was upset when I defied the orders but then again father always got mad!  I ended up reading a book on how to make friends and it said that I should try to make them happy and if I make them sad to apologize! I love people mom and dad! I’m scared they won’t like me or worse hate me! Which is why I need to make them happy, which is why I need to be happy!  I don’t know when they are sad so I will just apologize if I do something you would disapprove of mom, dad!” 

~ 

Looking down from the moon (Y/N) smiled before turning to face Izaya and walking side by side. He too was hurt and didn’t know how else to cope so it was fine! Besides, you’ve made so many friends so any sacrifice that was paid was rightfully paid! After all, you were his goddess and he treated you like one! You’ve made so many friends so it’s been working right! Well whatever, just remember that (Y/N) is afraid of people hating her and never wanting her, so treat a friend right before you start to see not only you fall but they themselves. 

“ What are you thinking about (Y/N)?” 

“ Nothing much Izaya, c’mon let’s go home if that’s all. I still have dinner to make!” 

“Indeed, so what are we making?” 

“ well, what’s your favorite meal?” 

“Well, what was Shizu-chan’s favorite meal?” 

“ Well. . . if you want we can make that. . .” 

“ Then it’s settled! Hey (Y/N). . . you don’t hold it against me for killing Shizu-chan do you?” 

(Y/N) turned to look at Izaya who held the same crazed expression as he did when he pulled the trigger. Shaking her head (Y/N) looked up to smile at Izaya before mouthing, ‘I forgive you Iza-chan!” 

Smiling at the nickname he approached the girl standing before him as he grabbed her by the waist before kissing her softly. Soon after the kiss turned heated as his tongue found its way next to the girls as their tongues entwined together. Feeling the need to breathe, they separated as their only connection was the string of saliva that hung from both of their lips.  

" You are just so forgiving and unpredictable. . . It's exciting to see what our dear (Y/N)-chan will do when faced with a predicament but I think it's more exciting to see how much you of all people can hold on, can withstand before you break! Don't worry my Goddess, because you have me to help you!" 

"Thank you Iza-chan! I appreciate that you will make me happy as much as I make you happy!" 

Grabbing the (h/c) haired female, Izaya began to walk downstairs with his goddess in hand as his mind raced and began to wonder, how far would your relationship with Shizuo last, that is if he was still alive? Well, whatever the case was, Izaya wasn't going to lose to Shizuo so with a sadistic, yet smug grin, he turned to the female he held in his hand and said, 

"(Y/N) - Chan. . . How does a baby sound to you?" 

Pushing Y/N onto the bed, Izaya began to remove his jacket. Pressing kisses onto her neck, mumbling to himself about how this child would be absolutely perfect.

"I-Iza. . .?" 

"Shh. . . (Y/N) - Chan~ don't worry~ The pain you will experience will only make you stronger, our baby will be the summit of all of humanity. Our child will be born to be the perfect mix of our best qualities.”

"Iza. . . I-I. . . If you want a baby then I'll give you one, I'll give birth to our baby. . ." 

" Perfect~ Just to make sure that monster hasn't tainted you, he didn't touch you did he?" 

"No. . . We decided to wait till marriage. . . But it's fine Iza! I mean the one I love is well. . . you isn't it?" 

Not liking the response the young girl gave him Izaya smirked before turning to a straight face filled with anger and lust. 

"That's perfect!~ That means I'll be your first right (Y/N)-chan?"

“O-Of course! You’ll be my very first Iza!”

"That's perfect! (Y/N), you should do more than love me, you should worship you me like your God, your savior, and your salvation. So until then, until I know I have your life, love, admiration, and belief, you are just a lowly human that doesn't deserve my attention."

"Iza! I'm sorry for what I said, but I hope you still know I love y-!?" 

"Apologizing isn't enough (Y/N) - Chan!~ You need to show me you mean it! Show me your love, your faith, show me who you belong to, lowly human. . . " 

" W-w-what should I do?" 

"Well. . . That's up to you to decide! I'm sure Shizuo asked you to do something naughty before right~" 

"W-w-well t-t-that's-!?"

" So you aren't denying it! Well, I guess I'll have you so the same but show more devotion to me! Show me your love!" 

Understanding what he meant (Y/N) turned to the side before nodding and proceeded to get off the bed getting on the floor before nearing Izaya again. 

Izaya began to smirk seeing how submissive (Y/N) was acting and decided to edge her on more.

"Let's make a bet (Y/N) chan~" 

"A bet?" 

(Y/N) tilted her head slightly adding to her "cute" factor causing Izaya to smirk seeing how he was about to taint his Goddess before that monster did. 

"Yes! Let's see. . . Oh! I know! If you can show me your faith by simply being a little naughty then I'll reward you! If not, you'll get punished!" 

"P-p-punished?!" 

(Y/N) scared expression causing Izaya to harden upon her expression. 

"After all, a lowly human like you has to be punished already for doubting in your God! Now (Y/N) - Chan, let's start!" 

(Y/N) began to near Izaya's jeans and nervously began to unbuckle them before turning away with red dusting her facial features. 

"Aww is a sinner embarrassed to face her punishment? Her God?" 

Nodding slowly, (Y/N) began to turn around to face Izaya who was smirking as he saw the young girl timidly stare at his erect member. 

(Y/N) began to fumble with his boxers as she blushed before thinking about the previous time she did something like this. It was late afternoon, Shizuo and (Y/N) had a mini drinking competition which lead to some intense moments. As soon as her mind came back to her she realized that Izaya's member was exposed and she was staring at it. 

A small chuckle brought her out of her daze before she remembered that she needed to do this, to avoid punishment, she didn't mind doing what she was going to do, but if she didn't do well, she was going to be punished and she feared that a lot more. 

(Y/N) began to near his member and placed a small kiss upon the tip causing Izaya to shift a little as he stared at the female below him as she nervously wrapped her lips about his member, begin to slowly suck on it. 

Izaya tilted his head back as he tried to silence his moans. His Goddess was tempting him, in fact, he had to restrain himself from taking her then and there. 

"A-a-ah. . . (Y/N)-c-chan. . . ~"  

Letting small moans escape his mouth he looked down to see the young female, she was red from embarrassment and small tears slipping from her eyes as she continued to tease the young male. 

As the female began to suck a little harder, Izaya bit his lip but it was futile as he huffed a little before letting out soft moans. 

"(Y/N) - chan!~ I-I-I a-a-ahh~" 

Letting his lust get the best of him he grabbed (Y/N)'s hair and pushed her mouth further in causing her to choke a little and to deep throat him. Getting used to his length was difficult for the young girl as she was trying to match the speed of his forcefulness and her own. 

Izaya was shaking a little as he began to chuckle as he stared deep into the girl’s eyes before whispering and grunting a little in response. 

"S-so (Y/N)-chan. . No more like a lowly human. . . Do you believe that was enough? Are you going to finish and follow through with your punishment?" 

(Y/N) continued to suck on his member before hearing more smaller grunts indicating he was close and he was. Izaya was blushing as he continued biting his lip, although this degrading was a big turn on for him and hopefully his "lowly human" he couldn't conceal his excitement as he let one more moan out before releasing inside the girl’s mouth. 

"Swallow." 

(Y/N), already a step ahead, began to swallow the male’s cum making sure to get any leftovers around her mouth. 

"Good job, but I still didn't feel your devotion, your faith in your actions. Nonetheless, I did feel pleasure, so I'll reward you my lowly human~" 

Izaya began to reach for a collar of some sort before showing it off to (Y/N). As she soon understood the message she allowed him to place it on her, she made sure her hair wasn't a bother as she allowed Izaya to gently place it around her neck. Soon after it was placed Izaya noticed how the collar had a circular ring piece in the center and as he smirked he allowed his fingers to wrap around the ring before yanking it causing (Y/N) to jerk forward and meeting his hungry gaze. 

"You were so good, but not good enough. . . Out of my utter kindness as your God. . . I'll pleasure you as well lowly human." 

"I-Iza. . . I-I-I l-love y-yo-?!" 

"THROUGH ACTION! NOT WORDS, ACTION!" 

Izaya grabbed the collar and dragged you to the bed, not before turning and witnessing your red face, you were being slightly choked due to the tightness of the collar, small tears from the previous event and the biggest turn on, you were drooling a bit and it was so cute, like a little ahegao face. 

" You look so fucking hot, are you tempting me? Do you wish to seduce me and make me forget your crimes? Well, that won't work human, but that doesn't mean I can't play with you~" 

"I-Izaya w-what are you doin- a-a-ahh~" 

Small moans escaped from the girl’s mouth as Izaya began to kiss her, his tongue entering her mouth and slowly melting together with hers causing ultimate bliss. Halfway during the kiss, Izaya's hands wandered downwards to the girl’s jeans before he unbuckled them and proceeded to pull them down causing the girl to gasp. 

"Izaya! W-wait!?" 

" I believe you mean God~" 

(Y/N)'s jeans were removed as Izaya's fingers began to near her clothed womanhood. As he massaged your clit through your (f/c) underwear he smirked as he saw his goddess bright red and soft moans and mewling sounds as he made her feel pleasure. Soon after his fingers made it inside and he massaged her womanhood with much ease and it drove poor (Y/N) crazy. 

"I-Izaya. . ." 

" I think you mean God my lowly human!~" 

"G-God. . . I-I f-feel strange. . ." 

" Not yet! Don't tell me that's all! Well, I guess I better start!" 

Izaya neared (Y/N) womanhood as his tongue went to meet her clit and massaged it ever so gently. Making sure she could experience everything he made sure to hold onto her thighs before sucking and nibbling lightly against the bundle of nerves. Causing her back to arch, (Y/N) moaned in pleasure before Izaya began to change not only where he was attacking but the speed. He slid his tongue up and down one last time before he used his tongue to plunge into (Y/N) womanhood. His tongue went in and out of you as you moaned loudly, it was driving you over the edge. Soon after he stopped before getting up and returning back to his position, straddling you but he replaced his tongue with his finger gaining more access. To start off "soft" he allowed two fingers to access the girl plunging them in and out at a small pace before adding another and going faster causing the girl to moan and turn to face her God. 

" I-I-I f-feel f-funny. . ." 

" It's only a matter of time, my dear human." 

(Y/N) began to feel a knot in her abdomen, it was getting more intense and tight with each time his fingers went inside of her. As she was reaching the point of no return he began to speed up as (Y/N) let out one more moan before her body trembled as her eyes slightly rolled back as her juices sprayed everywhere especially on Izaya's fingers. Izaya smirked before seductively removing his finger from inside of (Y/N) and licked them before smiling softly. He leaned down to whisper, 

"That was amazing! You taste so sweet I can't get enough of it!~ but. . . I think it's time we moved onto the main event don't you think, my lowly human, my little slut. . ." 

It was only at this point that (Y/N) noticed the mirror facing the bed. It was a large, floor mirror that gave the observer a good view of the bed. It hadn’t been there before meaning one thing: Izaya had bought it just for this event.

“Ah, I see you’ve noticed it, finally! The perfect instrument for this night of trial! It’s there to test you, you see. . .”

Izaya’s hands snaked around (Y/N) to the back of her shirt. From there, he pulled one of the straps holding her shirt up, letting the tie unravel. 

“You didn’t really think that our fun, little night would end here, did you? I said we were gonna have a main event; an event with a special little treat for you, my lowly slut. Take it all off, we shouldn’t waste any time!”

(Y/N) sat up in shock. Izaya was being too candid, too forward. The darkness of the room led to Izaya’s face having dark shadows. The look made him too lustful and brought a familiar knot to (Y/N)’s abdomen.

Leaning in, Izaya whispered, “Hurry up.”

With shaking hands, (Y/N) brought her hands to her top and took it off in one swoop. The air suddenly surrounded her and she felt ever colder. The easy part was over, but now came the bra. She had been dying to take it off ever since they arrived home, but she couldn’t have expected that it would be in this situation. 

She could feel her face flushing red as she undid the hooks behind her back. She couldn’t bear to face Izaya, but she could still feel his lustful gaze directed towards her. She could feel him surveying every part of her body in arousal.

When she finally slipped the garment off, her body may have been cold but she could still feel the heat pouring between her legs. The air enveloped her body and made her nipples harden up. They perked up even more when Izaya brought his face closer to her.

“No matter what, I want you to look at me. It’s the very least a whore like you can do during this. If you can prove yourself through this, then you’ll get through this next trial~”

Without breaking his gaze, Izaya began to descend upon her chest. Taking one bud into his mouth, he began to swirl his tongue around it. His other hand pinched the remaining nipple and worked together to create a rhythm. Popping it out of his mouth, he bit into the skin around (Y/N)’s chest before moving on to the opposite bud. The sensation made her mind cloud and her mouth threatened to let moans escape. Every part of her body was on fire.

“Mmm. . . Is this pleasurable for you? Are you enjoying it? Don’t forget, my little bitch, that you have to prove your love for me. How devoted are you really?”

“Izaya, I-”

“How many times do I have to say this, (Y/N), only through your actions. Hm. . . Maybe a little punishment will help set you straight?”

Izaya kneeled up from the bed, pulling (Y/N)’s collar with it. The collar constricted around her neck, bringing a wave of euphoria as she was choked for those few seconds as he filled the two of them, leading to Y/N being on top of Izaya. 

“Don’t think this is how we end it. Just for now, you’re nothing more than a slave with a hole. If you ever want to be anything more, prove it.”

Staring at him for a few seconds, (Y/N) was in disbelief of what she was hearing. Did Izaya really believe that, that she was just a warm hole for him? And she already sucked him off, what more did she have to prove?”

“Well go on, prove your devotion to your god, to your complete master.”

(Y/N) knew what she had to do. Her whole body was shaking as she lifted herself on top of Izaya. She could feel her cunt getting wetter by the second, almost soaking Izaya’s midsection. She couldn’t believe that she was doing this with Izaya, much less how obedient she was. It was her first time, she should be hesitant! Maybe she had been secretly wanting this for so long?

Once she was in position, she began to lower herself onto Izaya’s member before being stopped by Izaya.

“Ah, ah, ah, did you think that this is your only punishment? No, no, no! Turn around, (Y/N), face the mirror. If you dare to look away for even a split second, your god will make sure you get disciplined.”

(Y/N) found it good to not upset Izaya. That would be an adventure for another time. Hesitantly, (Y/N) turned around to look at herself in the mirror. When she saw herself, she couldn’t believe the state of her appearance. (Y/N) looked like an arousing mess. Her hair was messy, but it looked artistic in a way. Her hairs were jumbled up and her lips were swollen. Her chest was flushed, riddled with hickeys and as hard as ever. 

“Remember what I said~”

Filled with determination, (Y/N) rose onto her Izaya and steadied herself. She lowered herself onto Izaya’s member, sliding it in with ease. It hurt a lot at the start, but the pain went away and was quickly replaced with arousal. (Y/N) felt like a crab, looking at herself in the mirror. It was uncomfortable to watch, but she didn’t dare disobey Izaya. 

She started moving up and down, watching as her breasts bounced along with her body. Izaya laid below her, helping her along by holding her waist. His fingers dug into her sides, making her squirm around. If only she could see him, what face would he be making?

The room was echoing the moans of both (Y/N) and Izaya. He stayed silent, except for his grunts and the occasional moan. That, along with the sight of such a lewd image right before her eyes, made the knot in her stomach grow and grow. 

The wet claps grew within the room, along with Izaya’s heightened pace. Now, his nails dug into her sides but she didn’t dare comment on it. (Y/N) was too distracted by the intensity of her senses. Her hair started to stick onto her face and she found herself moving into Izaya’s thrusts. Her arms were burning from the position, she kept trying to adjust herself into a better position. 

Izaya’s hands briefly left her waist to play with her breasts some more, before returning to add some much-needed support. The clapping now was wetter, almost sounding empty and echoey. (Y/N)’s abdomen could feel herself tightening around Izaya, but the position just wasn’t enough. Lifting herself up more, she raised her heels and put all her balance on the balls of her feet. The position was just enough and to add more friction, pounding Izaya in further. 

She lowered her hand to play with her clit before her own hand was replaced by Izaya. He said nothing as he played with her folds, rubbing and tugging at it with ways that sent (Y/N) into a frenzy. Her legs twitched and shook, threatening to compromise her position. 

Soon, the passion was more than (Y/N) could withstand. She came all over Izaya, feeling the liquid flow out of her. Her vision blurred and she could feel chills wash over her body. Between her legs, it felt as if everything was pulsating and her heart was ringing in her ears. Izaya followed shortly afterwards, removing himself from her insides and letting her fall onto her side.

His arm snaked around (Y/N) once more, pulling her closer.

“Guess what, my sweet (Y/N). You passed!  You managed to catch my attention through that amazing performance! What do you think?”

(Y/N) had no thought within her mind. The pulsating still hadn’t gone away and the fluid between her legs still felt sticky. If there was one thing she knew, it was that this baby would certainly end up interesting.

[thickenmyblood]

hey maca :)) I have sth that I’d love to hear your input on! (wall of text incoming so beware- I’m absolutely not mad if you don’t want to answer lmao). Basically it’s about how you portray women in your works and to what extent you see that portrayal mirrored in the canon books. I have noticed that a lot of writers tend to go a traditional route with for example daughters not being heirs like you also mentioned in an answer for a wtsioa ask on here. Considering the cultures Vere and Akielos are based on that’s obviously very logical and a lot of authors (including you) make it work fantastically! Yet personally I never got the vibe of Vere and Akielos being as patriarchal in canon, mostly because the Information we get is kind of confusing. On one hand damen is a walking manosphere (and. all of Akielos in general as well) without any prominent female figures in his life but on the other hand damen only ever speaks appreciatively of for example the female vaskian warriors. Both countries seem to ban women from the army yet Damen also refers to a warrior queen. The regent is a total misogynist but with the wording Laurent uses it almost seems like that is more the exception and not the general rule of veretian court life. Both countries also have ties to Vask, an exclusive matriarchy and Akielos is said to be similar to Patras which Pacat has stated is also partly a strong matriarchy due to vaskian occupations in the past. I could go on for a lot longer but I guess that damens overall positive attitude towards women and especially stereotypically spoken masculine women is what sticks out the most to me. It just seems kind of misplaced in a world that supposedly is as sexist as the original cultures from our world. Which is why I’d say both countries do have gender roles but are overall a lot more egalitarian than their respective real world og cultures. But that’s only my take and I’d love to hear more on what others think about the portrayal of women in canon and how they chose to portray it in fanfiction. Love you and your new work, hope you’re doing well❤️

HELLO!!! Thank you for asking me interesting stuff :, ) you always have the best questions and my sad little inbox is open to you any time, friend. I divided this into parts, so:

My portrayal of women: I need to work on this a lot lmao. I’m not proud of any female character I have ever written for this fandom, and I’m also not proud to say I struggle horribly when it comes to writing female OCs, especially if the story is not about a female character that is a literal projection of me. Or Bella Swan (yes, Twilight literally shaped my sad little brain and the way I write and consume fiction).

Authors writing female characters in a “traditional” way (for fantasy settings): I can’t speak for other authors but I definitely think, in my case, that using the “it’s a patriarchal society, women have no rights, women can’t be heirs, etc.” blueprint is a matter of being lazy. It’s quick, and easy, and it’s been done before so we all know how it works and a) it’s unlikely that you’ll mess it up (in the plot hole kind of way) and b) it’s obvious that most readers know how the usual system works and so you don’t have to spend paragraphs or even chapters explaining it to them. I am very lazy when it comes to world-building for fics. Why? Because when I’m writing fanfiction I don’t give two shits about the world, I just care about the characters doing Things and having Feelings. The moment you start to question these issues (a society where women can join the army, where they can be heirs, where maybe they can have multiple husbands, etc.) a billion issues arise because it’s not the “usual way” and so you’ll have to deal with “unusual problems”. See: plot holes, info-dumping, etc.

Vere and Akielos in canon: I think the books get very, very confusing at times when it comes to gender roles in that specific world. They also get very confusing about how royalty works, in my opinion. So:

Damen never mentions female influences in his life, not even nannies or wetnurses or anything. He mentions past queens and his mother, but even then… It’s always struck me as “what the actual fuck” that we get no information on Egeria. In TSP, he doesn’t even read as curious to me, especially when I think of that line that goes something like “oh, well, he’d never asked how tall she was”.

Then you have Jokaste, who is highborn and also… perhaps trained in politics? It’s unclear to me if she’s ever been directly involved in meetings or been an active member of the Council or even been allowed to study these issues. Clearly, she’s smart and capable and cunning, but like… how? Did she have private tutors? Is she a self-made woman? Like, what’s up with that? Are women allowed to engage in public politics? Are they allowed to be kyroi?

IMO, Damen complimenting the female warriors in Vask has to do with how appreciative he is of war-related stuff. Like, he thinks people with his own qualities are neat. We see this time and time again in the books—having honor, being brave, respecting one’s family, protecting those who need protecting… He compliments these things when he sees them in others, especially in Laurent. Obviously one of the big changes in Damen as a character is that he goes from being daddy’s boy to being like “well, actually… maybe war isn’t always the answer, and maybe war isn’t always honorable”. The Vaskian warriors prove themselves worthy of praise in a “manly” way, if that makes sense. (In the same way, Laurent proves himself in the Okton, not so much to Damen but to other Akielons). So, in essence, War > Any issues he may have about women doing Stuff.

Don’t judge me for this but I can’t remember the Regent talking about women. Do you have any quotes about that? I feel like Book 1 is super rich when it comes to world-building stuff and yet it’s the book I remember the least. I know he obviously has a preference for boys and not girls, but I don’t recall him having interactions with Vannes or ladies at court? I’M SORRY I’M SO STUPID but I don’t own the book so I can’t exactly word search my way out of this one, and so instead of saying stupid stuff, I’m asking anyone reading this (lol, you and my mom probably) to please tell me what canon says on this issue.

Ties to Vask: Er, yeah, I mean… They’re clearly not at war with Vask and have some sort of economic deal (there are Vaskian pets in Arles? Which makes me wonder if they, like, buy them from Vask? Or if the pets are Vaskian and turn into pets in Vere? Slaves are not like pets so I don’t know?), BUT just because they have deals with this kingdom/are on good terms with the ruler does not mean they necessarily approve? Like, maybe they’re like “yeah, it’s weird they give women so much power, but also I need that silk/leather/WHATEVER, so I’ll shut up about that”.

“Akielos is said to be similar to Patras which Pacat has stated is also partly a strong matriarchy due to Vaskian occupations in the past.” Is this in the books or is this something she said in an interview/post-releasing the trilogy? I know in the books there’s a quote that Akielos and Patras are similar because they both have slaves, but other than that I can’t quite remember anything about Patras? Like, I don’t recall Pacat giving us extensive and thorough world-building on either nation, at all. Once again, I am asking you for more explanations on this because I literally don’t remember.

4. My opinion and a Stupidity Disclaimer: As I’ve said above, there’s a lot of stuff I don’t remember and so I’m not trying to preach to anyone reading this or even saying that I hold the truth about… anything. I’m answering questions as I see fit and asking more questions when I run out of answers.

I believe world-building is not one of Captive Prince’s strong points. I will not elaborate on this because this is already long enough but there is simply, in my opinion, not enough material to reach any solid conclusions when it comes to world-building questions such as the role of women in Vere and Akielos, how compulsory homosexuality affects the development of highborn men and women in Vere, exactly what makes Akielos’ view on women different from Vere’s (if there’s any difference at all), the history of gender roles in this world and how it’s evolved up until canon, how Lamen can solve the heir issue without recurring to, once again, “the usual stuff” (concubines, bastards, marriage to women, etc.). It’s clear from what I’ve read that Pacat has come a long way as a writer and that her new trilogy has a lot more in-depth explanations to world-building questions, but this is not the case with CP, and so I’m afraid my answer to most of this is “I don’t know, and I don’t think anyone can know for sure”.

Lastly, I think I struggle a lot with understanding the role of women in this universe because I simply did not see enough women doing stuff, so I don’t know what’s permitted, what’s unacceptable, what’s illegal, what is straight-up execution worthy, etc. This is not me complaining about the lack of female characters in CP, at all, which I know is contradictory to stuff I’ve said in the past (I answered a couple asks a year ago about how I’d wished we’d gotten Vannes’ POV or Jokaste’s POV in the short stories). I’ve changed my mind, and so I think Pacat is entitled to write whatever she wants, just like I’m entitled to talk shit about KR with any living soul who will listen lmao.

To end this on a spicy note, I think sometimes we consume the wrong media and then complain because it doesn’t have what we wanted. If you’re looking for a trilogy with strong, fleshed-out female characters, Captive Prince is not for you. If you’re looking for a trilogy on female struggles and, I don’t know, defying… the male gaze… Captive Prince is not for you. There are plenty of books out there that focus exclusively on female characters, featuring sapphic relationships, and dealing with gender issues. WHICH IS NOT TO SAY WE SHOULDN’T BE HAVING THESE DISCUSSIONS. This is not about this particular question, but more about a lot of posts I’ve seen floating around… complaining about Pacat’s writing and the themes she didn’t explore.

If anyone has made it this far, thank you for reading, and know this is NOT me telling you what to think. This post is an open question that anyone can engage with, although I hope people will engage with this directly and on this platform, instead of… taking it somewhere else where I sadly can’t engage back! Unlike what happened with our awesome fat Laurent discussion, I will be replying to any questions I get on this (Note: I did not reply to most of those questions because a long time had passed and they were sort of repetitive).

[shit-scfandom-did]

so i have a few questions

1)i cannot understand how you ship k*ramel. their relationship was FILLED with toxicity. from mon-el failing over and over again to listen to what kara had to say to him basically telling her to give up being kara danvers. convincing her that "being supergirl and having you is enough” was absolutely horrible. karamel had their moments but overall it was toxic. then in s3 mon el was married and the whole point of season 3 was allowing them to move on. accepting the toxicity from s2 and pushing past that romanticized time. mon el was a better person by 3b but he was still married. even if mon el and imra did break up in the finale there’s no future for karamel. even during 5x13 kara went to ask on advice about lena. and when winn came to visit from the future not a word about him. she’s moved on and it just wouldn’t make sense for kara to end up with him.

2) how can you hate lena so so so much?? it’s been said over and over again that all she’s ever wanted to do is good. though she’s designed to be this morally grey character. she has FLAWS but that’s what makes her so good. she’s a victim of abuse and you can see her struggle with that especially in seasons 4 and 5. in 5 she definitely goes down a questionable path but how can you expect her not too? after being emotionally abused by her brother, betrayed by her family, andrea (this did happen before kara), and then eve. finding out that kara and EVERYONE she loves has betrayed her as well. I mean how could you not go mad?? and even when she “went mad” she was trying to rid humanity of PAIN. something she later realized was a necessary part of life. her hurt blinded her from reality and lex’s manipulation pushed her down further. she’s been hurt and broken so many times and while that’s not an excuse for what she’s done you have no sympathy for her and that I find appalling. lena has realized what she’s done is wrong, that she’s made mistakes, what she did to kara, and she will have to live with that isn’t that punishment enough? she’s apologized and is trying to make up for everything she’s done by saving the world (again). your unnecessary hate towards her infuriates me. cant you take a step back and see the whole picture?

3) why DONT you ship supercorp or accept the queerbaiting? (watch this: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=C2w2GBXd_Pg) They are the core relationship of the show while the danvers sisters are the heart. they’ve gone through so so much together and practically dated in early season 2. they love each other it’s just oh so apparent. i like to believe one of the reasons lena reacted so strongly in s5 is because she was in love with kara and she couldn’t handle the person she was in love with lying to her. and kara flew around the world to get lena’s favorite food!! if that’s not romantic idk what is. I feel like you’ve developed such a clouded view of supercorp that you need to take a step back and understand what lena is the love of kara’s life.

wow what a long message. im not here to hate. im here to inform & undertand. i get it. karamel had their moments and even MY perception of them might be a little cloudy. im not going to hate you for liking them. hell I even shipped them for a little! my brother thinks 3b mon el and kara would’ve been perfect but he understands that supercorp is just where the show is leading and he wants them to be endgame. but what I will hate is your hate. what’s the point of all this? this thread, this account is going to do NOTHING. so why bother? I debated sending this and I hope I’m not too harsh at times but I really wanna see what you say. I hope you can open your eyes to lena and supercorp. maybe even become a supercorp shipper yourself!

- thanks and supercorp endgame 💙❤️

First of all, if you want to discuss ships in the future send this type of anons to facepalming-since-chernobyl, this blog is not for this, but for gathering receipts.

1.I just ship it, I don’t get why you have to understand it. It’s shipping. But if you insist:

No, it was not filled with toxicity. Count me when he failed to listen to her when they were in a relationship. Secondly, he is not a dog, he has his brain, he is his own person. People don’t always do what others asked them to do. It’s not slavery.

He has NEVER said to her to give up being Kara Danvers. How did he exactly convince her? How can you read the scene that he convinced her that being supergirl and having him is erasing Kara Danvers? In this scene he supports anything SHE WANTS to do. Also, Kara Danvers doesn’t equal Kara being a reporter in CatCo. On that moment she had her blog. She change people’s live with it like a real reporter. She took the risk and met consequences of her actions aka being fired by Snapper. Also, remind me who told her to create a blog? With your logic Lena was erasing Kara Danvers too.

Friendly reminder that he was forced to the marriage to keep peace. Also, friendly reminder Imra and the Legion out him in this situation without telling him about her plans. She and Brainiac put him there, knowing exactly how much he loved Kara and how much she meant to him. Imra knew that, that’s why she asked him to stay and solve his feelings. She said if he had come back, she would have known he had no doubts. But he wanted to stay, that’s why they broke up. He came back because once again he sacrificed himself for the greater good, like a real hero. Maybe watch the Argo eps because they clearly show that no, it was no about moving on.

It was not accepting about so called toxicity. First of all, she already forgave him that he lied. Secondly, all of she was screaming in that scene, when she was infected with M’rynn’s powers, happened before they got together and it was already approached in the musical ep. Aka, this scene had no point.

There is no future for karamel because you say so?

Kara went to asked him, because she truly believed and trusted him and his judgment. And yes, she asked about Lena and what did he said? That Kara deserved the same compassion she gives others, something Lena never gave her. And sorry, I know all scs scream the 100 ep was about sc, but it was about Kara fully realizing she is not responsible for Lena’s horrible choices. That’s it. And friendly reminder she called her a villain in the last scene. Also, the ep showed than no matter what, Lena always ends screwing something, because she has too big ego, always knows better, doesn’t stand criticism and doesn’t trust anyone.

It doesn’t make sense for you. Suit yourself.

2.Her fans made me hate her :) Thanks to them and how they excuse her every horrible action, how they treat her as a victim, while she abuse everyone etc. I started to watch her more carefully. And well, she is a horrible, white, privileged capitalist, who plays god, judge, jury, has mommy issues and acts like typical Luthor while crying she is not one, while still using Luthors money and resources.

Yeah, many people want to make good and end doing evil things. Common people pay for their sins, she has never. Since allowing hostile Daxamite army to invade the Earth (also, her portal affected the other aliens who destroyed the NC), producing a device that could recofnize aliens without their consent (and it was used by Children of Liberty,)producing and lying about Kryptonite, trying to make people superpowered without any supervision, killing Adam during illegal experiment, supporting openly alienphobic president and in a way Agent Liberty, killing Lex and then blaming Kara and finally manipulating Kara for months, lying, gaslighting, yelling, making her steal Lex journal, trying to lobotomize her and tortured with kryptonite, hurting every way possible, physically and mentally. Working with mass murderer, enslaving 3 people (kidnapping Eve, without her consent putting AI into her mind, basically RAPING her brain and making her a puppet in her own body; enslaving end experimenting on Malefic and Russel – threatening to kill him to steal Andrea’s necklace) – none of it are flaws. It was horrible abuse and violating every human right and the fact some people excuse it is disgusting.

First of all, being victim of abuse doesn’t give you the rights to HURT other people. The fact I have to explain pains me. Secondly, what abuse exactly? Lillian didn’t love her? Lex kidnapped her? Said he was going to kill her? You know what? Winn HAD HORRIBLE past and he didn’t turn into a murderer. Mon-El was abused by his mother and never tortured Kara with Kryptonite. J’onn killed a lot of white martians but last time I checked he doesn’t feel good about it. Also, never said the things he has done were GOOD. See a difference?

Yeah, and all of it, still doesn’t give her the rights to torture people. Also, friendly reminder she lied to Supergirl about Kryptonite in s3, much before the whole drama. Remember how she destroyed the life of a girl that stole boyfriend in middle school? It clearly shows she always had THAT in her. Plus, sorry not sorry, if she wanted different life, outside her family she could have easily done that. She was in Star City, with Jack, doing her researches, making her career. And she threw it all away, because she WANTED to be a Luthor.

Plus, sorry not sorry, if you feel betrayed and hurt because your friend didn’t tell you something she didn’t OWE you, you go to therapy, not trying to lobotomize entire planet.

Mate, she wanted to lobotomizer entire humanity, without ANYONE’S consent, because SHE, one single Lena, felt hurt. This is playing a GOD. Nothing explains it.

Planning a cold ass revenge for months is not being blinded by feelings.

Once again, even if could argue about how many times she was broken, most of that was a white privileged life she chose herself but whatever, it still doesn’t excuse her. All of she has done should meet consequences. Paying for shit you have done, accepting it, fully realizing what you have done is a part of redemption. Still in s5 she didn’t even apologize to Kara. Because she still didn’t understand what she has done and doesn’t feel sorry about it.

Feel appalled as much as you want, because I’m not going to feel sorry for a white, privileged woman who has never paid for her actions and is basically a living avatar of the worst Karen you can imagine.

She realized Lex was using her horrible experiments (remember? She experimented on puppies too) to his own agenda, that’s why she went to Kara. That’s not grasping a thing. Mhm, if you call that an apology then suit yourself. She is not saving the world, she is helping once again other people fixing the shit she created.

Feel infuriated as much as you want, because I don’t care? Especially when it comes from a person who tells others to take a step back while being totally narrow minded about Mon-El and karamel.

3.Because actors, prodcuers, writers call SC a female friendship. Mel did that in her last interview. See whatever you want but maybe stop forcing people to ship a horribly abusive ship.

Well… no. Kara is the heart and soul of the Supergirl. Alex is her most important relationship. Lena is an important friend, who doesn’t deserve it yet, but we all know Kara is the Paragon of Hope so of course she is going to forgive her.

I know you people think sc dated because they breathed in one room, but in s2 Kara dated, had sex, kissed, cuddled and enjoyed her time with Mon-El.

Yeah, they love each other as friends. It was said more than once.

That’s your delusion, you are free to do it.

Kara done that to Alex too, so you are saying she is romantically in love with her sister or something? If bringing people food is romantic and damn, most of the people I know loves me, god.

No, lena is not Kara’s love of her life.

Cool, you are not going to hate me because I ship karamel, I’m touched.

Sorry that you are going to be super disappointed in the end of the show I guess.

You will hate my hate – what’s the point of it?

Once again, because I don’t think you understand the point of this blog or read the description – it’s gathering receipts of assholes who cross tag and hate on the actors. Maybe go and search #gross hate or #cast hate on this blog so you can see how amazing your fandom is. Have fun.

I would rather eat my own shit than starting shipping the victim of abuse with her abuser.

Thanks and no :)

[masterthespianduchovny]

The Poor Development of the Marauder's Era

I've recently been listening to Binge Mode and, even now, I honestly believe the Marauder's era is some of Rowling’s worst writing of the series. When I say Marauder's Era, I'm simply referring to characters and events pre Harry.

The Marauder's era isn't poorly developed because I didn't like what happened. It's poorly developed because of how Rowling handled the characters, the events she put them in, and the reaction to said events.

As a kid, I respected Lily and thought she could do no wrong. As an adult, I find her decisions questionable. For transparency purposes, I read these books in real time and was a similar age as the characters. So, I don't want to hear anything about me being "unfair." Of all of the Mauraders era kids back then, I was the most generous to Lily. It's only when I reflected more about her role in the series that I realized how lackluster she is as a character and as a friend.

Rowling relies on Lily being seen as the moral compass to signify who and what is right or wrong during this era. The problem with this is that Rowling undermines Lily in the process. Minus being flat out called Mudblood by Snape, she has no proof that Snape has done anything her friends accused him of doing, but she unequivocally views it as the truth. Despite Lily listening to Snape, it's not really in good faith because she already has her mind made up about Snape's guilt.

Now, this is important to note because since Lily hasn't seen any of Snape's alleged bad behavior for herself, why would she definitively accuse him of these things? Lily claims she was in denial about this when she ended their friendship, but it's quite obvious she does believe Snape is guilty.

What makes Lily's beliefs and choosing to side with others over Snape is that none of the Marauders have ever mentioned ONE instant of Snape doing or saying some fucked up shit. As a reminder: THEY HATED HIM. They never mentioned anything about him bullying others, calling muggles mud blood, or any other troubling behavior. It was merely because he existed. They couldn't even tie him to being a Death Eater.

Also, let's consider the fact that kids like Snape have rumors made up about them all of the time. ALL OF THE TIME. Not even Snape's own bullies could attest to Snape doing the things Lily's friends claimed Snape did, yet Lily believed their words?

And, maybe I'm being nitpicky, but the fact that Lily says "my friends" in reference to defending Snape has always rubbed me the wrong way. Snape IS her friend too. Her best friend, in fact. Why wouldn't she have said, "my OTHER friends." My Gryffindor mates or whatever? IMO, that implies that Snape is just some weirdo she talks to and not the person she's known the longest.

HOW ROWLING COULD'VE FIXED THIS:

Have Lily overhear Snape calling one of his peers Mudblood. Have the Marauders be incensed that Snape called someone a mud blood. Have them call out Lily when she tries to intervene on them confronting (confronting NOT bullying) Snape. Hell, even have Snape fucking bully someone.

Because as far as canon goes, Snape was a bystander as death eater wannabes bullied people and presumably did nothing about it. We don't see any of his alleged wrongdoings and the people who hate him can't even recall that this happened.

There shouldn't be an ambiguity or readers relying on the word and opinion of Lily to guide their opinion.

Some may say, "she's only a kid." To this I say, "You're right." Lily was a teen and teens don't always know how to handle complex situations, I will give her the benefit of the doubt. However, this means we shouldn't hold her as the moral standard.

Lily essentially says that the difference between the Marauder's bullying people and the death eater wannabes doing it is dark magic. I'm sorry, but that's weak sauce. Dark magic is such a vague and broad thing depending on what you're talking about, so nah...Also, is there something not dark about James choking Snape with soap? I mean, that could've traumatized Snape to the extent of him being triggered by soap. Isn't that dark?

HOW ROWLING COULD'VE FIXED THAT.

Jut have Lily acknowledge that behaviors by the Marauders and death eater wannabes are both bad, but for different reasons. Problem solved. She can even emphasize that she takes so much issue with Dark Magic due to why it's being used and what it ties into.

We hear how great Lily is and that everyone loves her, yet Harry meets literally NOT ONE FRIEND of Lily's. He meets James' friends and a former teacher of hers. We don't see Lily hanging out with anyone else. We hear examples of Lily feeling sad for people, but no references to her actually helping people or supporting others somehow.

HOW ROWLING COULD'VE FIXED THAT.

Maybe instead of Lily talking about the bad thing Avery and Mulciber did, she could've intervened, even if it was too late, and "saved" Mary. Hell, we could've had Lily hex James rather than just threatening it. I'm sorry, after literally reading the many ways the Golden Trio are there for each other even before big shit started to happen, Lily threatening to hex someone who is actively bullying her friend doesn't cut it.

And give her her own friends for Harry to meet.

Lily is said to be smart and empathic, but how she deals with Snape and his issues don't exactly support this.

HOW ROWLING COULD'VE FIXED IT.

Have Lily genuinely listen to Snape's grievances about the night he was saved. Don't have her be so dismissive about the Lupin thing. Maybe have Snape set up by the Marauders and the big reveal is a flop.

I know Rowling wanted to tackle people having shady pasts and how they can change, but 1. Either she needed to commit to it being a rivalry or 2. She needed to appropriately deal with the bullshit the Marauder's did. Snape is justifiably angry and distrusting of the Marauders due to one almost killing him as a joke and the other publicly humiliating him. This doesn't even account for YEARS of bullying, which remus admitted happened.

We cannot say that bullying is wrong, and then excuse the bullies because they were on the right side of a war.

HOW ROWLING COULD'VE FIXED THIS.

She should've had Remus flat out acknowledge they were wrong for what they did and that there was no excusing it. Then, have Sirius and Remus privately talk about this where Sirius admits it too. OR, despite loving them and his dad, Harry realizes how flawed they were and that their reasoning is simply to protect their dad not necessarily because James grew up. OR Rowling could've not written James and Sirius behaving as psychopaths AS WELL AS show instances of Snape starting shit with them.

SHOW US Snape deliberately starting shit with the Marauders and James trying to apologize. Show us James' growth outside of that. Don't tell us that James is secretly hexing Snape behind Lily's back because it has her looking like a dumb ass.

Also, all of this James stuff is important because Lily ending up with James is such a bad fucking look. IMO, it makes her disgust at his behavior seem performative. It says that she didn't really care about him bullying others, but rather, the perception of her being with someone who bullied others. And, no, having Lily smile as Snape was actively being bullied, and then poverty shaming him isn't a good look.

"BUT, BUT SNAPE CALLED HER A RACIST SLUR!!!"

It doesn't matter how much you want to give your friend the benefit of the doubt, if you believe he's calling others racist slurs, you need to confront it. And, if you believe it to be true, you need to end it. You don't wait until he calls you the slur to say, "hey, maybe he really is this racist person people claim he is."

HOW ROWLING COULD'VE FIXED THIS.

After James saved Snape's life, this is where he could've matured and his big head lessened. He still hexes others, but leaves Snape alone because he realized that they went to far with him even before Sirius' "prank." Instead of James being the antagonizer, it should've been Sirius. Once again, James breaks this up and he and Sirius gets into a small argument. Snape is let down as Lily runs up and Snape says his mud blood remark.

Snape then tries to hex Sirius and James steps in once Snape refuses to stop. It gets out of hand and Snape accidentally harms Lily.

I won't lie, I'm a HUGE Snape fan. However, because of how Rowling handled this era, there are many ambiguous things, situations that don't make any sense, not enough development of characters, etc which undermines the story she tried to tell.

Yes, I do love the series, except I don't like any of the Marauders or Lily. I don't hate Lily, but she grates. Remus really was a coward and irresponsible as hell. Sirius was childish as fuck and, no, him being in prison doesn't excuse or justify all of his behavior. James saved his peer's life, and then publicly humiliated and sexually assaulted him. He didn't stop bullying, he just stopped how he did it.

This doesn't mean I believe that Snape was faultless, but I believe this era was so poorly told that by default, I believe and sympathize with Snape.

Although I believe Rowling wanted readers to do this, I don't think she planned for some readers such as myself to hold the positions we do. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy Snape as is, but I do believe Rowling didn't intend for me to hold the views I do about Lily and the Marauders.

I don't understand her laziness during this era, especially since it's so key in Snape, Lily, and James' stories.

Lastly, she could've developed James and Lily better.

I know she only has so much time, space, pages blah blah blah. However, the best writers find a way to make it work with what they have.

[secondhand-trash]

Kinktober 2020 — under the table

A/N: omg it has been half a year since I last wrote any ghost!shinsou this is why I should never do series- but anyways here is out first fic for kinktober, kicking it off with the return of ghost boyfriend!^^

Warning: oral (receiving), fingering

Word count: 2641

Q:

What kind of street do ghosts prefer to live on?

Shinsou sat on the kitchen counter crossed leg as you paced around the room, mumbling to yourself as you checked off everything that was laid out.

“Remind me, why are you suddenly in need of learning how to cook again?" 

You turned around with a sigh, shoving your hands into the pockets of your apron. (The purple apron with cats printed all over it was Shinsou’s, he had spent hours looking for it when you suddenly came to him saying that you needed to learn how to cook a decent proper meal within a week.)

It all started when you got a message from your mom one Sunday afternoon. You were sitting cross legged on the living room floor, all the old records left in the house by one of its previous owners sprawled out all around you. You had decided that it was not ok to just stack all of them up in the corner and pulled your ghost boyfriend to sort everything out so you could store them properly. He had protested but got shut down when you made the very valid argument that he literally didn’t have anything else better to do, to which he claimed that you were abusing his status as a ghost to get him to provide labour. 

You were still trying to explain to him why arranging everything by alphabetical order was a better way of sorting than doing it by genre when your passionate rambling was disrupted by a ping from your phone. Shinsou watched as you picked it up with a smile, then freezing in place when you read the message, and your eyes going from dead to contemplating to panicking in a matter of seconds.

He shifted to sit closer to you when you put your phone onto the ground, your eyes as wide as saucers while staring blankly ahead.

“Is everything ok?” he asked, giving you a light tap on your forearm.

“Toshi,”

“Yes?”

You blinked, before opening your mouth slowly, “Can you teach me how to cook?”

Fast forward a few days ahead and there he was, pondering how long it had been since he last tried to cook anything. Shinsou was not a master chef by all means, but in the short period of time when he was alive and actually needed food to survive, he had trained himself to be somewhat of a decent cook in order to save money from buying takeout. He never really thought much about it but now that he watched you struggle to chop up an onion with oddly placed hands and slicing down cutting only the thinnest slice at a time, he realised that he had never seen you cook something more elaborate than sunny-side up on instant noodles since you moved into the house he haunted.

“You can always order take out and then transfer them onto your own plates or something,” he leaned to the side, his brows locked together at how clumsy you were, “I’m sure your parents won’t notice.”

You turned around with an exasperated sigh and he immediately reached out to warn you from waving the knife around, “Yes but this is the first time they’ll come over and I want to show that I, you know, have my shit together!”

“If you keep swinging that thing around then you won’t even have all five fingers together,” he clicked his tongue, hopping off the kitchen counter when you flashed him a sheepish smile as you slowly put the knife down. He walked over, blinking a few times at the poor onion that looked like it just suffered from a failed beheading. He sighed pitifully, and you happily handed him the blade when he extended his hand to you. 

“Here, I’ll show you how it’s done,” his fingers were arched up against the vegetable as he skillfully sliced them up, “did you microwave the potatoes as I told you to?”

“Yeah, I put them in there directly.”

He paused, “Didn’t you put the dices into a metal bowl?”

You tiled your head, not understanding why he would bring that up. “Yeah?”

"...metals will explode in the microwave.”

“Oh fuck-”

-

You solved the issue of your hopelessness in the kitchen by not going in at all. 

Shinsou took up the task of cooking on the night your parents would be visiting after witnessing you almost burning yourself on the stove from boiling water. Humans could be such fragile creatures sometimes, he thought to himself as he picked the pot up from the fire with his bare hands, feeling not even a tickle on his deadly cold skin. 

He still thought that you were being way too dramatic with the way you checked the table every time you passed by and adjusting the utensils on top even though the difference would not be noticed by anyone that wasn’t you. 

But still, when he saw you getting yourself into near death situations from the smallest of tasks, he decided that if he couldn’t get you to give up your plan of serving up a homemade supper then he would take the matter into his own hands. 

Your mortality was far more important over his cynicism and the last thing he wanted was to chain you down in this house with him for a cause as dumb as you accidentally blowing the kitchen up.

“Kitten,” he sighed as he put down the salad bowl in the center of the table, holding onto your fidgeting hands, “you are starting to make me nervous and they can’t even see me.” 

You paused, and he felt the dread building up in his chest when he realised that he had said the wrong thing as your eyes widened. “Oh god, what if they can see you too? How should I explain to them that I’m living with someone? I-”

Your rambling was interrupted a ring of the bell that echoed through the house. You sucked in a deep breath, squeezing his hand tight as if you could calm yourself down with the coldness of his skin.

“Should I hide?” he asked when you got to the door.

You ran your hand down your face, your knuckles popping out as you gripped onto the metal doorknob. “They can’t see you, right?”

Shinsou felt a strange stir in his chest when he saw the dramatic change in expression on your face the moment the door was opened. Shivers crept up on him when your parents looked around the house, their gaze going directly past him even though he was standing right next to you. He sighed. He had gotten so used to you that he had instinctively expected to be noticed when most people would not even pick up on his existence at all. 

“Who were you talking to just then?”

“What?” you let out a forced chuckle, hoping that the panic that flashed through your eyes would not be recognisable, “No, no one. It’s just me.”

He was left at the side as you showed your guests to the dining room, walking straight past him. He stood there as the familiar feeling of being invisible caught up to him like a wave. 

Would you have introduced him to your parents had he been alive?

It wasn’t often that he thought of the possibilities had he stayed alive. In fact, he truly did think he had reached the point where he was content with the situation he was stuck in. There were lonely times, times when he was very much so here but didn’t feel like it as the world past him by, leaving him as nothing but a fragment in the past that was sealed within these walls. But then you showed up, and then suddenly he had company. Someone to hold at night, someone to laugh with, someone who would correct him when he did the wrong steps while clumsily following dance tracks. Everything seemed to be great, even though he still had limits to be bound to.

“This is amazing,” an unexplained irritation welled up in his chest at the surprised gasp of your mother reached his ear. “did you really make this yourself?”

“Of course, I’ve been learning how to cook since I moved out!”

It was always odd to watch a family interact from the point of view of a complete stranger. He could see everything more clearly but also knew nothing about the dynamic or the nuance behind each word. He thought of his own family for the first time in years as he watched you smiled cordially at the table.

He wondered what they would think about you too.

Perhaps he had underestimated how much years of loneliness had affected him, or he just wasn’t keen on being reminded that no matter how real this all was, you two were still very much so on the different side of life and death, and the sudden emptiness was suffocating him. 

It was like you had forgotten that he was still there too, and he wasn’t happy about it.

You sat at the table, pushing the food on your plate around as you eyed your parent’s reaction nervously. They seemed to be enjoying it, giving “your cooking" compliment after compliment. You would have to really reward Shinsou for his help later on, you thought to yourself as the knots in your stomach slowly loosened up.

Where was he now? Did he really hide up? You tried to glance around as subtly as you could manage, seeing if you could catch a glimpse of violet hair poking out from the corners.

You dropped your knife when you felt something cold touching your calf. 

“Is something wrong?” 

“No, everything is fine,” you forced out a smile but inside you were panicking. What the fuck? What was he doing under there?

You nearly couldn’t hold in the gasp you were about to let out when his head slid up from your calf to your knees, pushing them apart. Your hand instinctively gripped onto the edge of the tabletop, not able to move away in fear that your parents who were sitting right opposite to you would pick up on the way your jaw was clenched.

You had no way of ignoring his touch as he gripped onto your thighs. His ice cold fingers sent shivers down your spine as he danced them across your warm skin, each tap and each stroke of his fingertip along the root of your leg had you sitting straighter and straighter against the back of your chair.

“So, what have you been up to lately?”

“Oh, nothing much-” you coughed when his finger brushed past your clothed slit. You tried to close your legs shut but you were stuck with him being right in between. Your breath hitched when your panties were peeled off, your now bare cunt clenched around nothing reflectively when the layer of fabric was suddenly gone.

You felt terribly vulnerable with your legs being pushed back and for a split second, you were hyper aware of even the tiniest twitch of your muscles. Your parents didn’t seem to notice that you were sitting awfully stiff in your seat, your legs feeling like they were about to cramp up with how hard you were trying to close them up.

“Mm-” you bit down on your lips when he licked a long strip up from the very bottom of your folds all the way up to your hooded clit, his tongue pulling away with a flick against the small bud.

“Did you just say something?”

“Oh no, you must have misheard,” the muscles around your face was twitching as you tried to remain a neutral expression as he continued to alternate between swirling and pressing down on your clit with the tip of his tongue.

Fuck him for knowing your body so well.

Your legs were shaking under the jolts of electricity that shot up from your core all the way up to the back of your neck. He seemed to only get more vigorous with his licks and sucks, lapping up on the wetness that was starting to seep out of you. Your toes curled and uncurled, gripping onto the floor to your desperation as his cold breath fanned across your sopping pussy. Each drag of his tongue had you spasming, the lack of temperature on his lips numbing your senses as he dipped his tongue in with each flick. 

“Anybody you are seeing?”

All movements paused. His teeth graced past your clit tentatively, as if questioning what you were gonna do. You gulped, feeling the tip of your ears burned up.

“No-”

You jolted forward when he placed a hard suck on your clit. Your parents eyed you with a confused stare and you gripped onto the glass on the table, bringing it to your trembling lips to take a sip. 

He slipped his tongue in, dragging it along your walls at a rough pace. The corner of your lips was twitching, dreading the fact that your parents seemed to take your choked answer as a sign that you were hiding something. You gritted through your teeth, trying hard to not let any of the moans that were threatening to slip out leaked.

You could hear the slurping, like he had done a sloppy job concealing each pop and lap on purpose. It was like the two of you were in your own world, and the other people were intruders sitting there with a veil separating the two of you. He paid close attention to the way you reacted to each touch, the muscle of your legs flexing under his hand as the heaving of your chest got heavier and heavier.

You could almost feel blood on your lips from how hard you were biting down when he slipped his fingers in, matching the rhythm of his tongue with the pumping of his digits. You brought your napkin to your lips, covering your parted mouth.

You nearly screamed into your napkin when he crooked his finger, the prodding of his joints inside of your spongey walls had your muscles clenching down. 

His mouth left your folds with a lingered lick before pulling his fingers out with a languish drag, his lips ghosted along your inner thigh until he was gone completely. No more touches on your skin, not even a puff of air anywhere near you. He was just gone, vanished into thin air with nothing but your fluttering folds and the mess between your legs to remind you that he had very much so been kneeling there and making you crumble down just moments earlier.

You gave a slight shake of your head when your parents once again questioned the way your face scrunched up, your hand shaking as you dropped the napkin down onto your lap.

Stupid fucking ghost and their disappearing acts.

-

“We had been worry about you when you said you want to move out but it seems like you are doing fine, perhaps we really worried too much...”

“I told you so,” you said as you opened the door.  Your smile was rigid on your face as you walked your parents to the door, trying very hard to ignore the dullness between your legs, “come back at any time!”

Your smile dropped the moment the door shut in front of your eyes. Turning around on your heels, Shinsou was right there, a lazy smile tugging on his face with no remorse.

He had his arms crossed, leaning all his weight on one leg in a posture that was not fitted for someone who nearly had you moaning out loud in front of your parents.

You grinned, and he felt goosebumps rising on his skin at how innocent and sweet the smile was.

“You’re sleeping in the guest room tonight.”

Back to the masterlist

A:

A dead end

[snowstark]

hi! can i get 5 and 6 for sambucky? thank you!

5. “You’re more than just a one night stand.” 6. “Would you just shut up and kiss me already?”

Unsaid Whispers of Our Hearts.

Link to AO3

The first time it happened, they'd said, "It's okay, we were just blowing off steam, just getting through some stuff together, helping each other, because that's what good friends do. It won’t happen again. We're not partners, we're just good friends, and that's why we spent the entire night in bed together making love."

And then they'd sworn that it wouldn't happen again.

But it did.

Again.

And again.

And it continued until Sam invited Bucky to his family cookout. Bucky got the idea that that was a pretty big deal, and his suspicion was confirmed when Sam had told him, hesitantly, "We all bring a date, you know, to the cookout, just to keep things fun."

So, he'd politely denied it at first, saying, "Oh, no, I don't know if I can—" but then Sam had given him that look, the one he could never resist, and said gently, "Buck, please."

Bucky had held his gaze for a few moments, then given a nod, because, well, why not? They weren't—they weren't dating, that was for sure, but they were good friends, and if Sam needed him to do it, he would. Besides, it wasn't a big deal. It was just a barbecue. With all of the important people in Sam's lives. No pressure at all. “Yeah, okay," he'd said. "Yeah, 'cause—'cause we're friends, I'll do it."

Sam had given him a beaming smile, one that warmed his entire heart, and clapped him on the shoulder, because hugging reminded them of those moments in their lives, too intimate, and said, "I knew I could count on you."

So now, Bucky was standing in front of Sam, staring at him, while Sam stared back, because they were both lost as fuck, and Bucky had a feeling that Sam didn't know any better than him as to why exactly they were doing this.

Bucky was pretty sure Sam wouldn't have had an issue finding a nice girl or guy off of a dating app. But then again, maybe that wasn't his thing. It certainly wasn't his thing. Too many men holding fish, he recalled. It had grossed him out. Seriously.

Besides, Sam had to have known that Bucky would’ve done this for him anytime. The realization made him blink, because shit, that was right, he would do this for Sam, no matter when or why or how. And that… that was something he didn’t want to dwell on, but they were good friends, maybe even partners by now, so it worked, it made sense. It wasn’t that deep.

Bucky had brought a cake to the cookout. He’d tried to bake one himself, but it hadn’t really worked out. He’d had to rip the oven out of the wall to solve the issue. Then he’d gone and bought himself a nice vanilla cake, because that was a classic. Everyone loved vanilla.

He laughed when Sam’s nephews greeted him immediately, shouting, “Mr. Bucky! Take this!” and pretending to sock him in the jaw while Sarah watched on fondly.

He played along, then greeted Sarah with a wave before bumping right into his—his date for the night.

Sam.

“You made it.” Sam beamed.

Bucky took off his sunglasses and gave him a look. “‘course I did. I’m your date, dumbass. I wasn’t gonna stand you up.” And he shoved the cake into Sam’s arms. “Cake,” he said brusquely, as if it wasn’t the most obvious thing in the world.

Sam’s lips twitched into a smile. “A real sweetheart for bringing me a cake, Barnes.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Bucky rolled his eyes. “Now gimme a kiss; isn’t that how you’re supposed to treat your date?”

Sam laughed, turning his head to the side like he was looking for people watching, rubbing the back of his neck almost sheepishly, and Bucky was secretly delighted at the sight of Sam all awkward, because that was usually him. It was nice to see the roles reverted for once. He mockingly puckered his lips, and Sam leaned in and gave him a quick peck on the lips.

He pouted, because he was not done tormenting Sam yet. It wasn’t every day he could do this—kiss Sam. No, tease him. That—that was what he’d meant. “C’mon, really? That’s all you’re gonna give me? I’m feelin’ a little neglected, Samuel.”

Sam pulled a face. “Don’t call me that.”

Bucky grinned. “Then go ahead and shut me up.”

He was instantly reminded of the first time they’d—they’d pressed each other into the mattress, gentle and sweet, and he knew by the look in Sam’s eyes he remembered too. “Don’t make me shut you up, Barnes,” Sam had threatened. “Try me,” Bucky had responded.

Well, Sam had definitely tried. And succeeded.

On multiple counts.

And this would be yet another moment added onto the rest.

Sam leaned in, gave him another kiss, and this one was longer, deeper, softer, and it made heat furl in Bucky’s gut. He sank into it, shoulders sagging, and let it happen. Eventually, he had to pull away, his cheeks glowing with heat, and he and Sam stared at each other for a few long moments—“It won’t happen again”—until Bucky broke it by saying, “Uh, food’s ready, isn’t it?”

Sam nodded. “Yeah, yeah, it is. C’mon.”

Dinner went by easy enough. Bucky Barnes was a real charmer, thank you very much. The kids loved him, used him as a playground, basically, and he made everyone laugh, especially Sam, and that was something that made him smile to himself, not just proud, but happy.

It wasn’t until they’d finished the cake Bucky had brought that Sam excused himself, heading off, and Bucky watched him leave. A few minutes later, he followed.

Sam was standing by the shore, away from the cookout, and watching the waves crash against each other, sending droplets of water fluttering through the air before disappearing, landing where they were meant to, glinting in the setting sunlight.

“Thinking?”

Bucky’s voice made Sam turn around, looking surprised, and Bucky tucked his hands into his pockets before stepping closer until he was right next to Sam. Sam could easily loop his arm through Bucky’s.

“Yeah, just thinking.”

Bucky glanced at him. “‘bout anything in particular?”

“About you.” Sam grinned, clearly teasing. “Couldn’t keep my eyes off of my date tonight, you know.”

Bucky snorted. “Oh, yeah, real charming. Let me know if you want some tips on how to woo someone; I gotcha.”

“Well, I don’t need tips if I’ve already wooed someone myself.”

Bucky made a mockingly offended noise. “Wooed someone? When you have a date right next to you, waiting for you to take him to bed?”

Sam laughed, sounding surprised, then said, “You’re the one I’ve wooed, actually, but yeah, okay, I’m a jerk, I get it.”

“You’re a dumbass,” Bucky corrected absentmindedly, turning his gaze back to the sun.

“And you have a staring problem.”

“Don’t discriminate against us starers. It’s not our fault we want to remember someone like a fuckin’ photograph in our minds.”

“Someone?” Sam turned to face him.

Bucky kept his eyes on the horizon. He didn’t respond.

“Someone?” Sam pressed.

“Jerk,” Bucky sighed.

“No, seriously, Buck—”

Bucky turned, suddenly feeling tense, his heart rate picking up speed, thumping in his chest like it was about to jump out of his chest and run off before he could stop it. The words spilled from his mouth before he could stop it. “You want that ego fed, Wilson? You want me to say I’m tryin’ to remember you that way?”

Sam stared, an odd expression flitting across his face, and then said slowly, “No, Buck. I think you already have.”

Bucky’s breath hitched in his throat, and his shoulders rose up an inch more. This wasn’t—

Sam’s eyes flitted down to his lips, and Bucky’s heart jumped again, remembering the first time Sam had looked at him that way, the second time, the third time, and he knew by now that he looked at him like that when he was going to… when he wanted to—

Sam leaned in close, eyelashes fluttering, and Bucky met him halfway, because this was—yes. This was good.

Even though it wasn’t their first kiss that day, it still felt just as strong, just as good, just as perfect. Sam kissed him, then cupped the back of Bucky’s head in a soft, intimate move, and Bucky made a soft noise in his throat. He was still for a split second, his mind going blank with white noise in his panic, before it felt like someone had slapped him back into reality, and he pushed into it, letting his lips part open so that Sam could taste him, could do whatever he wanted.

Despite how tender the kiss and the moment was, Bucky felt like he was burning, overwhelmed by the feeling, by everything, but in a good way, something he’d needed for a while now—

“Buck—Buck, wait—” Sam pulled back, panting, and Bucky’s heart lurched for a split second, wondering if Sam was regretting all of this, but then— “You… you’re more than just a one night stand. I swear. It was supposed to be something simple, something to—to blow off steam, like we said, but then I couldn’t stop thinking about it, and—”

“Oh my god.” Bucky stared at him. He was kissing an idiot. He was literally standing here, a few metres away from the cookout, kissing an idiot. Sam Wilson was an idiot. And the best part of all this was, he was an idiot, too. So really, it was just two idiots making out. The thought made a giggle bubble up in his throat and he swallowed it back in favour of saying hoarsely, “Would you just shut up and kiss me already? Jesus, Sam, I’ve been—this ain’t—”

Sam huffed a laugh, then pulled him close, kissing him again, and Bucky made a soft noise in his throat, shoulders going lax as he leaned into the kiss, trying to taste every inch of Sam he could, letting his entire world narrow down to Sam and only Sam. He was gasping for breath when Sam finally pulled back, and he missed the feeling of him already. “Yeah,” Sam breathed, eyes flicking down to Bucky’s lips like he was tempted to just stand there and keep kissing him, making the entire goddamn world stop for them because the world wasn’t going to stop if they didn’t force it to. “Yeah, I’ll do that.”

Bucky swallowed, mouth going dry, and his eyes flitted down to the tent in Sam’s pants, and he couldn’t help but press the palm of his hand to his own cock, growing harder and harder with each passing moment. “I can—I could—” He broke off when Sam wrapped a hand around his wrist and pulled it back, making him whine in protest, then panted, “Please.”

It was the first time he’d begged since…

He braced himself for the ice-cold feeling of shock that washed over him when he remembered, when the memories flashed by in his mind, unrelenting and loud like gunfire, but it… it didn’t come. He only focused on the hand around his wrist, Sam’s warm touch, the feeling of skin against skin, and he felt something swell up deep inside of him. He wasn’t sure what it was, but it was there, and overwhelmingly strong, nearly bringing tears to his eyes.

And he looked up at Sam, meeting his eyes, his golden gaze, as warm as the sun, and knew in that moment that from then on, he’d feel Sam’s touch everywhere, always there, surrounding him with warmth, and he felt a lump grow in his throat.

He gestured to Sam’s—Sam’s problem, one that he could offer the solution to—and croaked, “Lemme help you with that. ‘cause—you know, we’re good friends, we’re—we’re friends—”

Sam blinked, then cracked a grin as Bucky trailed off. “You think I’m just gonna let you go home when we’re both like this? Of course not; that’d make me a shitty friend. C’mon, cyborg-brain.” And he pulled Bucky along by the wrist, then paused, and Bucky paused, too, because they had nowhere to go.

In the heat of everything, they’d forgotten that even though they were each other’s worlds, constantly revolving around each other, the universe didn’t care enough to pause for them, to show some mercy and let them have this moment.

“We don’t—Buck, we don’t have anywhere to—” Sam broke off uncertainly, and his grip on Bucky’s wrist tightened the slightest bit, like he was scared that he’d suddenly lose Bucky just because they didn’t have a place to fuck.

Bucky was quiet for a few moments, thinking, and then he hesitantly offered, “The boat…”

Sam burst into laughter, and Bucky thought that he’d quite possibly said the stupidest thing ever, until Sam nodded, eyes still wide with laughter, and spluttered, “Yeah, yeah, that works, let’s go, c’mon.”

And Bucky let himself be dragged along by Sam.

They entered the boat, rocking it precariously when they struggled to rip each other’s clothes off, damn near wrestling with each other in an effort to quick, hurry up, clothes off, and Bucky let Sam press him against the wall, dragging his tongue over Bucky’s neck, then up his jaw and to his lips, kissing wetly and sloppily.

“Oh, god,” Bucky gasped. “Sam, oh, god—”

“I got you,” Sam breathed. “I got you.”

“Yeah,” Bucky agreed, dizzy from the words and the meaning they carried, and gave himself to Sam, every inch of him, because he wanted to. “Yeah, you do.”

send me a smut prompt!

[excalibent]

About SquigglyDigg

I still don’t get it.

It’s difficult to really vocalize my feelings on the issue because they’re all kinda crossed. Like, people are touting certain posts of hers like they’re proof that she’s a terrible person or whatever, screenshots and shit of her political takes, but, like...hey. Guys. Have some of y’all ever once interacted with someone who doesn’t agree with you politically?

In the real world. Face-to-face. If you met Squiggly (fuckin’, fine, someone like Squiggly) in the street, would you look them in the face and start ranting about all the shit they’ve done and said to make you feel upset?

I’ve been trying to parse out what the fuck happened there for years, at this point, and it still doesn’t really make sense to me. Like, a lot of the shit she caught (and apparently, is still catching) flak for is just...Republican. You know? Like, conservative beliefs that a lot of Republicans share. I don’t like the party myself, but I know a good number of people who would consider themselves Republicans and I’m starting to think that just, at some point, saying ‘alright, I guess the argument ends here’ never registered for some people.

Part of it is definitely just how Tumblr operates. You essentially curate your own content, and if you don’t like someone’s opinions, you just stop following them - which means that there’s a lot of people who exclusively get info and opinions totally counter to conservative ideologies, and believe that this information is not only right, but it’s also the only right anyone should be allowed to believe in.

Let’s get specific.

I, personally, unfollowed SquigglyDigg because of what seems to be anti-vaccination sentiment that’s showing up on her blog just recently. I believe in the vaccine, I believe it is necessary, and I certainly believe that claiming that it’s harmful in any sense is harmful to society at large.

So there’s something about the vaccine, or how it’s being handled, or something about the vaccination card they give you that just rubs her the wrong way. I have no specifics, don’t presume that she’ll give them to you, either, and for fuck’s sake, don’t harass her about it, because it just occurred to me that some of you spineless fucks actually think that sending death threats to people on the internet is a good way to handle shit.

But, back to the point - she doesn’t like something about the vaccine and the particular post I saw seems to equate the vaccine card to the star that Jewish people were forced to wear during the Holocaust.

The internet allows for accumulate opinion like this. It just happens - but I believe that’s because the internet is predisposed to radicalization. What about someone I meet in the real world?

All of my coworkers are antivaxxers. They refuse to get it for various reasons, none of which I think are good or even valid.

Okay. What now?

Everyone around me is pretty conservative in general. I can’t opt for a more agreeable experience by ‘unfollowing’ anyone, because they’re still going to be there every day I come in for work. Hell, I can’t even get them to agree with me.

I’ve always hated the phrase ‘agree to disagree’ because it leaves a lot of loose ends in terms of the argument it pertains to, but what else can I do? I’m sure as hell not going to go to my boss and go ‘hey x coworker is republican please do something about it’. For one, they can’t do anything about it, and for two, even if they could, I don’t think I could ethically prescribe to whatever method of political pruning they might be employing to ‘solve’ the disagreement.

So that’s the whole ‘But she’s conservative!’ side of it. So what. I know a shitton of conservatives who are actually very nice people and it’s just not a problem.

Then, of course, there’s the other...stuff. Can’t even really dig into all of it, but...I don’t know, man, it just looks like regular fandom drama bullshit to me, and the only reason Squiggly caught so much shit for it was because she was a big target who was only tangentially involved in some of those situations.

And just in case some of you didn’t notice that little bit in the middle - for god’s sake, do not harass her. If you got fucking pilloried for your political beliefs because of an opinion you had on a goddamn kid’s movie, I can guarantee you that you’d dig your heels in through the crust of the Earth and start taking active measures to build up a wall around yourself to get people to quit fucking doing it.

“But I wouldn’t-” You would. You absolutely would, if not from the beginning, then from the moment that people started dragging up everything they could find that would help them feel more comfortable or sure in disliking you, every little mistake or irrational slip of the tongue that they could possibly dig up.

Don’t. Fucking. Do it.

So to summarize:

- I’m pretty sure SquigglyDigg is just conservative, guys

- That’s not a bad thing, just in case I have to reiterate

- Petty fandom RP bullshit? Get in line, it’s literally fucking everywhere

- Why did it take me so long to figure this out? It didn’t because I’m still parsing through it all (because believe it or not I can agree to disagree but I’ll still have reservations about it because it’s fucking politics, people, it’s a goddamn minefield) but what I know for sure is that the shitstorm that erupted around her was not remotely warranted and you people need to fucking cool it

[fbfh]

nico di angelo relationship and intimacy headcanons

As with all steamy/nsfw works, the characters are aged up to 18+/college era

so

let’s get started ‘,:)

(1.1k words ooooh boy get ready)

Clingy cat boyf

If he’s dating you he already feels really close and comfortable around you

Do not be surprised if he gets really physically affectionate really fast

I’m talking jump your bones after a week of being official

Pun intended

He loves when you kiss his neck

Blushes so easily

Tends to mutter things in italian when he gets overwhelmed 

Which is often

but that doesn’t stop him

Believe me

Okay he’s an old fashioned fella

He still has a lot of internalized dating and courting etiquette rules from the 30’s 

and you’d think it makes him wanna take it slow

But nah son

During the 30’s no one had any goddamn time for taking it slow

Don’t worry about that 

It was also common for soldiers to get gifts like gum, candy, flowers, chocolate, and nylon stockings for girls they liked

Nico subconsciously falls back on this a lot

You end up with a small collection of fuzzy socks

You don’t automatically get the connection, but when you realize how important nylon stockings were in the 30’s because of the shortage, and that he was getting the present day equivalent of that for you

You appreciate your little collection of socks even more

All that being said we can come to two conclusions

His love language (amplified by the whole son of the God of wealth and death thing) is gifts, physical contact, and quality time

Especially with how much mortal danger he and the gang have been in the past few years, he does not want to waste any time, especially if he really likes you

Which he probably does 

Really really likes it when you take off his clothes 

Especially his shirt

That’s up there among his favorite parts

Absolutely an any time any place kinda guy 

Thinks of it exclusively as making love

Finds any new slang or euphemisms hilarious 

You call it banging once and he laughed for like 20 minutes

“So, are we banging or what?”

“Nico?”

“Nico why are you laughing?”

He has a lot of trauma obviously

His problems aren’t magically instantly fixed by you but he’s noticed how drastically your presence helps him feel better 

Can barely sleep if you’re not there

Like he has some of your cologne/perfume on him in case you get separated and can’t sleep next to him

If he does have nightmares 

Which thank gods are getting fewer and further between

A little light making out and netflix can usually solve the problem

Or like

Riding him

That usually works too

The faces he makes are,,,,,,

Very nice,,,,

he’s also very vocal

You one time deleted a happy birthday voice mail from a childhood friend to make room on your phone for an audio recording he sent you

And like be real

If your friend had heard it they would have deleted their message themselves

It takes him a while to get the hang of technology 

As soon as he does

He sends you a voice text

You’re like aww 

So you listen to it 

“Hello, cuore mio…”

Oh shit

Your face got very red

You were really lucky you were alone

Every time you see audio messages from him you know not to listen to them without headphones 

You also try not to listen to them until you’re on your way to somewhere you can be alone with him

There have been a lot of “meet me in the janitor’s closet” texts between the two of you

aLsO play with his hair

You did it once cause some hair fell in his face 

He moaned

“… will you do that again?”

The answer is yes

Yes you will

Write him love letters and his heart will explode

Everything from “thoughts of you get me through the day” to “truly astonished by how much I want you to rail me”

All are super effective 

He absolutely 100% has a locket with a picture of you

He just gazes at it sometimes when he needs a little extra hit of serotonin 

Okay okay we all know a certain Mr. Jackson who is king of surprising you in the shower

Nico is a close second

Honestly you and him probably break the intimacy ice first of any couples in the demisquad

Stamina for dayyyys

Never gets tired???????

Even you find yourself laughing “are you actually hard again?” Way more than you’d expect to

Also expect a lot of…. Private photos and Polaroids

You never would have expected to have a shoebox buried in your closet full of pictures and love letters that are very much not suited for general audiences

Much less three or four

K i n g  of quickies

“Any time, any place” -Nico Di Angelo probably

Likes buying you underwear and lingerie 

A whole lot

He’ll sometimes surprise you with a bunch of shopping bags 

You look through them equally excited every time

You do a little fashion show of all the stuff he got you

You usually don’t make it past three things before they’re on the floor

His kisses are so gentle and tender

They have all the soft fierce passion of Shakespeare plays and jazz vinyls

At one point pretty early on you started to feel bad that he was spending so much money on you 

“Don’t worry, vita Mia, it’s a non issue." 

After you’re done shopping he pulls out a black credit card with gold accents from a bank you don’t recognize

It says "bank of afthonos”, and in a fancy, minimalistic script below, “palladium select”

He sees you looking at the card and a smile plays at the corner of his lips

“Birthday gift from dad,” he answers without you having to ask

Ah

You can tell the cashier wants to roll her eyes, but he always makes a point to tip very generously

He hands her a few big bills and the irritation falls her face 

he holds you close as you leave the store, still a little surprised by everything that had happened in the past five minutes

“Anything else you want?”

You think back to when you two first got together

“I’ve had everything I want for a while now,” you tell him, giving his hand a squeeze

He smiles and presses a kiss to your cheek 

He pulls you into a small family bathroom and locks the door, pulling you close and kissing your neck

“I think we can be a little late to our lunch reservation…”

[hockeyboysiguess]

how to cross a hurricane | m. rantanen

a/n: well... she’s finally here. i’ve had this idea in my head since early july. i’ve rewritten parts of this a ton since then, but it’s finally here. i’m really proud of this fic and i hope you all really love it! shout to @nolypats (who has been with me through EVERY version of this story, god bless you) @slapshot-to-the-heart, @jasondickinsons​, and @danglesnipecelly​ for all of your supportive words. this would not have been finished without any of you. all that’s left is to say enjoy!

word count: 40,379 (eeeep!)

warnings: some swearing, a little vague smut at the end. 

wine pairing recommendation: something with a low alcohol content because you’re going to be here for a while honestly. whatever you have in your fridge with the lowest alcohol content.

After eight months on the road, twelve countries, seventy-two cities, without more than a few days stop at the house she owned in Los Angeles, the apartment furnished by some local interior designer who thought they knew her tastes but never actually asked her what she liked, felt as good a home as any other. Really, after eight years of consistent travel, near constant comings and goings, the next stretch of time, the almost year in her calendar that was completely blank, was going to be the single longest Josephine Evans had spent in any one place since she was fourteen and still lived with her parents.

Taking time off, an entire year, wasn’t Josephine’s idea. She was a workaholic to the levels practically unheard of, but it was hard not to think about work all the time when her work was the only thing she had ever really wanted to do, a childhood dream made reality that people constantly tried to take away from her. She had almost broken when her manager, Krista, acting more like a general sending a soldier home from war than a manager, told her to pack a bag, pack a lot of bags, and get the hell out of town for a while. It hadn’t been a suggestion. There hadn’t been any room for debate. She made it clear to Jo, who she had known from the time she was eight years old, that this wasn’t a discussion. Jo had tried to argue for a month off, that was all she said she needed, but that had earned her a one-way ticket out of Los Angeles, and a firm ban on stepping foot in New York City either. Krista had told Jo that the fact that she was a twenty-three year old woman who worked her ass off every single day, but couldn’t even take a month off at a beach somewhere was something that needed to be rectified, immediately. Jo couldn’t do anything halfway, all or nothing, everything or bust, so she was chased out of a town she sort of ran with a wave of Krista’s hand, telling her that the world would continue to turn without her. Krista added insult to injury when she told Jo the world she ran would probably spin better if she actually took the time to rest her voice, get her head on straight, and deal with the recurring issues in her life before coming back.

Jo walked over to her fridge, finding nothing but the takeout she had picked up on her way to the apartment, her apartment, from the airport, and instead going for the wine fridge under the opposite counter. No one had stocked the fridge for her, but Krista had made sure the wine fridge was stocked and honestly, what more could she want? It took Jo a few attempts to find the wine glasses, mentally making a note to move them to a shelf she could reach without climbing onto the counter, taking her glass and a bottle of something white and sweet looking to the only part of the apartment that was exactly her taste, the massive, pillow-filled couch. 

The wine was thankfully almost as sweet as it looked when Jo finally poured herself a glass. She let out a long, deep sigh, willing some of the stress of the day to melt away. No one in her life seemed to get that the very act of trying to take a break was stressful for Jo because all she was thinking about was everything she wasn’t doing, everything that was going undone, and what the results of the lapse in activity might be. Could she really put her entire career aside for a year? Jo had kicked and scratched and clawed her way to success in spite of a veritable army of men who thought they knew better than her. They tried to tell her she wasn’t talented enough, that she wasn’t a good enough song writer, that she wasn’t a good enough singer, that she didn’t have the “it” factor to make it. She had looked those men in the face, spit on their blatant sexism, and won every award they said she couldn’t, made number one album after number one album, sold out headline arena shows, all before she turned twenty-four. She was, unfortunately for them and the bets they made against her, a ubiquitous in the most unavoidable way possible. 

The only problem was it was also unfortunate for Jo, something she hadn’t even been aware of when she was six dreaming of being the one on stage on the television, something she didn’t fully understand all the repercussions of when she signed that record deal when she was fifteen. Twenty-three-year-old Jo was now reaping the rewards of that contract, and the even more lucrative extension she had gotten two years ago, but paying a steep price for them. She got to live in penthouse apartments like the one she was in and pay for a sweatshirt that didn’t need to cost anywhere near as much as it did while not giving a damn if she spilled wine on it tonight. She got to go to parties people would die for just a glimpse of and hang out with people others dreamed out. But now, Jo didn’t feel like a little girl whose greatest wish came true. She felt absolutely and utterly alone, staring out at the beautiful Denver skyline, high rises and mountains sharing the landscape, without even her work to distract her.

Jo picked Denver much to the surprise of almost everyone in her life. She had grown up here. Well, Jo had done some of her growing up here. Her parents picked up and moved to Los Angeles for the sake of Jo’s dream that wasn’t even close to a career when they did. Jo left before she was even double digits and had tried her hardest for years not to spend too much time here. Nostalgia was a dangerous thing when experienced unchecked. Being in Denver was a veritable fire of unchecked nostalgia for Jo. She looked out and remembered her childhood with those same mountains in the background, remembered when things were simpler, when dreams were just dreams and not her everyday reality. Dreams were meant to be inside one’s head, not out in the world. They were always tainted during the move from one’s head to the real world. Being here in this city, Jo remembered when the life she lived was the purest dream she had ever had and she longed for simpler days. 

Jo debated texting one of the few friends she knew was around the city; people were always coming in and out of Denver, which was just a hop away from her unfortunately beloved Los Angeles. Actually, Jo deeply hated LA and she didn’t really feel all that bad for saying it. She hadn’t grown up there, an LA transplant like almost everyone she knew, so there was no loyalty. The best things in Jo’s life had happened in LA, but so had the worst, some of the things Krista has been referring to when she had told Jo to get her head on straight out here in Denver. Jo wasn’t going to deal with any of that tonight. Instead, she was going to try and think of all the things she could possibly do in Denver that she couldn’t do in LA, both for the constant paparazzi and for the fact that LA had summer and not as much summer as its only seasons. Plans calmed her, even when she wasn’t supposed to have them. 

She could go skiing, or, she could learn to ski anyway, maybe in the winter. It was only September, not exactly peak skiing weather. Winter reminded Jo of Denver always, a place she rarely made it back to anymore since her parents had since moved to Florida, like it seems most people’s parents do eventually. Jo’s success had just allowed them to go sooner than they would have otherwise. Winter made her feel like a kid again, the one that lived here in Denver with big dreams and missing teeth and frizzy hair that was supposed to be curly but no one had known how to take care of it. Jo couldn’t wait for the first snowfall, even though the leaves hadn’t even started to change color yet. Maybe she could go ice skating, if she wore a scarf around her face. Maybe she could build a snowman, even if she had to do it all by herself, and even if she didn’t have any gloves yet.

Maybe a return to Denver would be good for her. The mile-high air could lighten the heavy weight on her shoulders of people’s expectations and the pressure she put on herself because of them, letting her take a deep breath of non-suffocating air, nothing like what she was forced to breathe in LA. Maybe Jo might just learn how to take a break and give herself a break for the first time in a really long time, maybe in her entire life. Tonight though, tonight wasn’t going to solve anything. Tonight, Jo found the bottom of a bottle of cheap wine, the only kind she really liked, and then fell asleep in foreign sheets, but she didn’t really know what her own sheets were supposed to feel like anymore, so it didn’t make a difference. Jo slept like shit anyway. 

Jo woke up not enough hours later, but when she was up, she was up. It had always been one of her biggest problems with remaining rested and level headed on the road; she couldn’t sleep just anywhere, anytime, no matter how tired she was. She stumbled into the kitchen with a sliver of hope Krista had supplied her with coffee along with wine, but her hopes were dashed further and further with each cabinet she opened, until her hopes were nonexistent. She knew her only option at this point was going out, not her strong suit, but a baseball cap from a local sports team, some old Levis, a plain white t-shirt, and pair of Raybans might have hid all of her best features, but that’s exactly what she was looking for at seven shitty in the morning on her first full morning in Denver. 

Jo managed to get through a Starbucks drive through unseen and ended up just driving around under the guise of wanting to get a better feel for her new neighborhood, but really just needing to drive for a bit. A bit turned into hours and hours turned into needing to get gas. She finally checked her phone that day. Her phone was usually the first thing she did in the morning, the last thing before she went to bed, and a whole lot of what she did in between. She scrolled through, a few from her mom, asking about the apartment, some lingering group chats about some party going down in LA tonight, and one from her friend Helena that was actually relevant. 

Hey Jo! Welcome to Denver!!!!! The hometown gaining the BEST old/new resident :) anyway, having a thing at my place tonight, chill people only, I promise. Think you might wanna show that Vogue covergirl face???

Chill people only was LA code for people who wouldn’t take her photo and post it all over the internet with a glazed over look in her eyes that the media would only infer terrible, inaccurate things from. Jo didn’t even get to think about her response before a second text came through. 

Also some REALLY cute REALLY single guys if you’re looking for a little Denver somebody ;) 

Jo was absolutely not looking for a little Denver somebody. Jo was looking for a little Denver nothing. After a series of relationships that all ended the same way with guys who were all essentially variations on the same concept of a man, Jo was not looking for anything at all. Jo thought a lot about love; it’s the reason she wrote music, in a bid to understand her emotions, love being the one she understood the least about. Jo knew that she was difficult to love, at least, that was the core behind every breakup she had ever gone through. The circumstances surrounding her, the ever present hurricane of the media and fans and the prying eyes of naysayers, made her almost impossible to reach, even though she tried desperately to make herself available for people to love. Josephine tried so hard, but the answer was always the same. She would always be too hard to love, require more effort than another nice, pretty girl with good intentions. Nothing about her was worth fighting through the category five hurricane made by the crowds in the stadiums she performed in, and the people outside the walls of them with pitchforks and daggers. No one ever got out from her attempt to love unscathed. She always caused the people she loved immense, insurmountable pain, and there wasn’t a fucking thing she could do about it. She just sat in the eye of the storm because she knew what it felt like to walk through it. She had tried over and over again, each time coming back to the calm of the eye, battered and bruised and worse for wear than the times before. It was uncrossable and as long as it was uncrossable, Jo would be unlovable. So, no, she wasn’t looking for anything in Denver, absolutely nothing at all.

Jo did need more than a couple of friends in Denver and drinking a bottle of wine alone in her apartment for the second night in a row wasn’t exactly the image she tried to portray. She shot Helena back a quick text asking for the details for tonight. Helena was a good person with even better intentions, but if Jo let it slip to even one good person with good intentions that she wasn’t looking for anything, she should prepare for a rumor to get out that she was seeing someone, which would start the witch hunt through her Instagram and Twitter follows, through every public record to find someone it could be. No one Jo trusted, Helena least of all, ever meant to; their intentions were pure. Someone would just tell a slightly wrong person that Jo wasn’t available who would tell another even more slightly wrong person and so on until the game of telephone reached the ears of someone whose mouth would move for a price from the gossip columns. Jo ignored her racing thoughts, rejected the option for a receipt at the gas pump, then drove to the apartment that didn’t quite feel like hers. 

A delivery of groceries, a hot shower, and the removal of some odd pieces of art and decoration someone else had placed did go a long way in making Jo feel like this was more of a home. Jo had fussed around enough for ten people already before noon, so instead she dusted off her old list of shows she swore to various people she would get around to watching when tour was over, letting Netflix play episode after episode until it was actually time to get ready. Jo didn’t take a lot of time to get ready for things, much to the surprise of most people. She preferred sleep, something that she often lacked, so her getting ready routine was condensed to exactly the things she wanted, no more, no less. She wasn’t too picky about outfits either. Almost everything she owned for casual purposes went together. She wore extravagant, out of the box things all the time. Sometimes, it was nice just to be able to put on black jeans, ankle boots, and a black cropped long sleeve shirt and head out the door without any fussing. People fussed about her enough; Jo wasn’t about to join them. 

The address was close enough for Jo to walk, something else she rarely got to do, just go for a walk outside. The early September air was chillier than she thought it would be and she briefly wished she had brought a jacket, but she would be drinking her jacket for the walk back and drunk Jo was liable to forget everything that wasn’t in her pockets. She punched in the code to the building Helena had given her, and made her way up to the penthouse suite, thrilled to find the party already in full swing when she arrived. Arriving too early usually gained her a lot of stares and whispers that made her regret ever getting off her couch. 

Jo walked through the party with her head hung low, in search of Helena and her bright red hair. She was the easiest person to spot at a party because you could hear her from a mile away and if the music was somehow louder than her, she had fire engine red hair you could spot from across town. She was in the living room, tucked among a crowd of people Jo didn’t recognize anyone in, so she veered toward the kitchen instead where the drinks were most likely to be found, grabbing the first thing she could get in a hand on, none too picky after too much time being picky when she was younger and everyone wanted to impress her, to be her friend based solely on their own self-interests. Now, Jo drank anything she could get herself without making too much of a fuss. 

“Hey, are you Josephine Evans? There’s no way, but my buddy swears you look just like her. ”

Jo let her eyes droop shut as she mentally searched for the right personality to put on for this occasion. The problem was Jo wore so many faces, so many different personalities put on in an attempt to protect the real her, that she felt buried under all the faces and the expectations they represented. People always wanted her to look a certain way, talk a certain way, act a certain way, be a certain, pleasing way. What was pleasing to some was abhorrent to others and Jo had fractured herself a very long time ago, putting pieces of her in all of the faces she wore, just enough so they were all believable as the true Josephine Evans. She used to think the faces were entirely false, things she created to protect herself. But if Jo’s time alone so far had told her anything was that there really wasn’t much of her left when you stripped it all away. And she already knew she was a bad actress. 

Jo settled on the version of her that was cool, calm, and collected, could both crack and take a joke without feeling too much about it. The ideal party version of her that contained most of the self deprecating humor she possessed. Jo spun on her heels to face the guy who had spoken. Your standard man, tall but not too tall, medium colored hair, eyelashes that were too nice, a trait too many boys had, and a smile his parents paid good money for. Nothing to write home about, nothing to shrug your shoulders at, a median household income of a human being. 

“I hope you didn’t make a bet on that,” Jo let herself, more like forced herself, laugh it out, “because, yeah, that’s me. Just call me Jo.” 

Just call me Jo was probably one of her most used phrases, the ultimate ice breaker. For some reason, people were convinced that using her extremely public and logical shortening of her name opened a door to friendship, and guys tended to think the door was to her bedroom. It was just her name, like anyone else. The guy was talking and Jo wasn’t listening, hoping her neutral expression with active eyebrows was doing the work for her. His name started with a J, Jacob, Jason, Josh, something like that; all Jo knew is he was hitting on her, swinging way out of his league for the potential experience of Josephine Evan and well, Josephine Evans didn’t really give people who thought like that the time of day. She excused herself from the conversation shortly after it started in search of Helena or really, anyone else at the party who wasn’t like that guy had been. 

Helena was virtually free, as free as a hostess could get, when Jo saw her next and took her opportunity to slide in next to the tiny redhead. 

“Oh my god, it’s so good to see you!”

Helena wrapped Jo up in a crushing hug, impressive given how small Helena really was compared to almost every other person at her own party. She left an arm around Jo’s shoulders, somehow, after releasing her from her grasp. 

“It’s good to see you too, H,” Jo sighed, taking a sip of her beer. “Thanks for the invite.” 

“For you, Jo? Always,” Helena assured her. “So, how’s the time off going?” 

“It hasn’t even been forty-eight hours,” Jo reminded her softly, beer hanging near her lips as she spoke to take another sip when she finished. 

“You and I both know that’s practically a lifetime for you,” Helena laughs. “Wouldn’t surprise me if you’d driven yourself mad or taken over a small country with half that time.” 

Jo nodded softly. Helena might not have been too far off with driving herself mad in all reality. She has too much time to think. Jo with too much time to think led to far too many introspective thoughts that almost always became negative. She couldn’t help it though; she had always and probably would always be her own worst critic, including the people who were paid quite a lot of money to critique her. Jo did it for free, well, at the cost of her relationship with herself, and they lined their pockets with the profits off their critiques of her poorly wrapped as critiques of her art. 

“Well, you know me,” Jo laughed it off. 

“That I do, that I do,” Helena mused softly. “Which is why I single handedly have brought together Denver’s most eligible bachelors for you.”

“H,” Jo started, but Helena waved her off. 

She grabbed a flower from the vase on the window sill, a daisy, but the sentiment was still the same, and tucked it behind Jo’s right ear, much to her chagrin. The look she was giving Helena could melt glaciers, but Helena just smiled wider at her friend, resisting the urge to crumble under Jo’s icy stare. 

“Come on. You’re going to be here for a while. You can’t honestly tell me you want to be alone,” Helena’s small hands gripped Jo’s shoulders and pointed her toward the general population of the living room, “your whole time you’re here. Plus, there’s some real untapped snacks here and you need to broaden your horizons.” 

“My horizons are exactly as broad as I want them to be,” Jo quipped back easily, the response sliding off her tongue effortlessly. 

Helena scoffed and Jo could hear her friend’s eyes rolling, before she verbally blew past Jo, “Anyways, some Broncos players, some classic rich elite who live here because they just really like it, a couple of Denver Nuggets, and I hope you like hockey players, because I think the Avalanche boys are your most solid options in terms of looks and being decent human beings.” 

“H, I’m not interested,” Jo said firmly, fingers crushing the daisy under her fingers as she yanked it out from behind her ear. “I don’t care what sports team they all play for. I’m not looking.” 

“Oh, come on,” Helena groaned softly, popping up and down on her heels a little, making Jo scoff this time. “I get to live vicariously through you.” 

“You assembled all the hot guys in Denver you wish you could fuck so I could do it and then tell you about it?” 

If this was anyone other than Helena, Jo would’ve already been out the front door for this stunt. Helena deserved Jo’s presence more than almost anyone. There was no one who had stuck with her through more tsunamis of bullshit in Jo’s career than Helena. Helena actively supported Jo through thick and thin, ups and downs, diagonals and double-backs and every single ebb and flow. Also, Helena truly did mean well; she just couldn’t read between the lines to save her life. 

“Hey, I did this for you,” Helena pushed back. “You haven’t been seen with anyone since whatever his name was, I can’t remember, they’re all the same. It’s time for you to, you know, dust off the vaginal cobwebs and have some fun.” 

“I could engage with that,” Jo tipped her beer back and took a healthy swig, “but I’m not going to. I appreciate what you tried to do, but it’s just not where my head’s at right now. Maybe in a couple of months or something, but you know me. Too invested for casual, not enough time for serious, forever just drifting in the weird in between, destined to die alone.”

Helena breezed past that, knowing Jo long enough to know she was trying to change the topic by forcing Helena into a corner where the only way out was to accept the change of topic and correct Jo’s self deprecation. Helena knew well enough to know she wasn’t actually in a corner at all, just being made to seem like she was in one. 

“Whatever.” With a shake of her head, Helena surrendered for the night. “Just talk to some of them though. They’re decent guys and you could use more than one friend in Denver.” 

Helena failed to mention that apparently all of these men had geared themselves up for a night on the Bachelorette. Four conversations in that all seemed to start nicely, asking her about her tour, her asking about their seasons or whatever else they did, restaurant suggestions. But restaurant suggestions became asking her on dates. Asking her how she was liking Denver turned into neighborhood recommendations where they just so happened to live. 

By the fifth conversation, some rich guy whose dad paid for him to have an apartment nice enough and a car nice enough that he knew people he didn’t have the talent or personality to know, Jo had officially had it. She needed a break, eyes scanning the party for Helena, but there wasn’t any red hair to be found. She could’ve ducked into the cluster of women in the far corner, but she couldn’t differentiate a single one of them from any of the other girls who looked and dressed exactly like they did at parties crazier than this one in LA. They could’ve been the same women, but even if they weren’t, they were trying to be the same as them and Jo wasn’t in the mood to be asked to follow them all on Instagram and if they could tag her in their stories. Jo spotted the next best thing, a back stairwell tucked out of the way, vacant of any other partygoers, and slipped away from the guy with more hair product than her to make a break for it. 

Any empty rooftop greeted her at the top of the winding staircase and for that, Jo couldn’t have been more grateful. The rooftop air was cool, cooler than when Jo had walked over. She let out a long, drawn out breath, hands gripping the railing’s edge to ground her. She felt weightless in the worst way possible, without substance, like she could float away with the nighttime breeze. Despite the fact that millions of people would probably miss her, Jo felt like no one would if she floated away right now by a breeze from another realm taking pity on her, carrying her to some place that wasn’t this life. People would miss Josephine Evans, their favorite singer, their idol, the girl they could sleep with and instantly catapult themselves to a new level of fame, the girl whose coattails they could ride to the highest of heights. But no one really knew Jo, not even Jo herself, so who would actually miss her? 

Jo felt the tears fall down her cheeks before she even registered that her eyes were cloudy. They came too fast for her to notice. Maybe it was dumb, letting something like too much attention from guys, something a lot of women would kill for, make her cry, but it was all too much for Jo. It just made her feel hollow, like only the faces she presented mattered, not her. Jo was really crying because she knew under the faces people liked and wanted to be seen with, between the girl who went to galas and toasted with ungodly expensive champagne, between the one who Jo consciously chose to be at this party tonight and the brave face she put on for in depths interviews, there wasn’t a whole person left, just a few unused fragments, the least likable pieces of her. That's what was making her cry and had been making her cry for a long time.

Jo apparently wasn’t even allowed to cry in peace because the door swung open in the middle of her moment. 

“So, now is a bad time then, huh?” 

The voice was deep, deeper than she expected, a thick accent, either Finnish or Swedish if she was venturing a guess. Jo wiped her eyes, but didn’t turn to look toward the voice, so she was genuinely surprised when she heard the dull thud and felt the vibrations of a body making contact with the railing next to her. 

“Definitely a bad time to tell you I think you’re pretty, huh?”  

Jo couldn’t help but laugh, but it was clogged, the laugh catching on the lump in her throat from crying. She wiped her nose on the back of her hand and shook her head softly. A weak, pitiful smile pulled at her lips. She sighed before turning her head to look at the owner of the voice. 

“Definitely a bad time,” he said, his voice softly than before. “Need to talk about it?” 

He was everything Jo had expected, but somehow more. She was right to think Swedish or Finnish, but his hair was blonder than she had expected, gentle waves at the ends. Jo wanted to know if they were as soft as they looked. Even in the dark, she could tell his eyes were a stunning shade of blue, the kind that looked like the oceans that he grew up near, the kind people wrote albums’ worth of songs trying to find the right words to describe. His jaw was sharp, cheekbones even sharper, but softened by dimples between them, endearing in a way that made Jo wish she was a better person for a moment. Even with him leaning against the railing, Jo could tell as soon as he stood he would make her feel as physically small as she felt inside right now. 

“No offense, but I’m not interested,” Jo managed to get out in a way that vaguely sounded curt. 

“I’m not anymore either, so glad we’re on the same page,” he told her with a smile that had to have cured cancer somewhere once. “You seem like you need a friend more than you need some other guy telling you that you’re pretty tonight.” 

“And you, random rooftop guy, want to be my friend?” 

Jo couldn’t help but snort a little and roll her eyes at her own question. 

“I’m Mikko,” he told her, “and yeah, I do. I think you could use a friend and I’ve been told I’m a bad texter, but a pretty good friend.” 

“You come up with the intent to what, hit on me, and switch gears into friendship like that?” Jo asked with a snap of her fingers, her voice heavy with disbelief.

Mikko nodded softly, “Yeah, just like that. I came up because Helena said we’d get along and you’re pretty. That second thing is still true, you are, but you need friends more than you need some guy asking you out. So, guess I’ll take the upgrade to friendship.”

“I think you mean downgrade,” Jo corrected him gently. 

“No, definitely upgrade,” Mikko laughed. “I don’t have to buy you dinner or try and impress you, but I still get to hang out with a cool new person who needs a cool person in her life. That’s an upgrade, baby.” 

Jo was careful about the people she considered friends, the people who got to see her cry. Before her life became something unrecognizable to the little girl with a dream, Jo had still been careful about her friends. Jo used to understand that she wasn’t for everyone when she was younger, that she was who she was and people could either take her exactly as she was or they could leave. That girl didn’t exist anymore and her reasons for being careful about her friends came from a place of looking to protect her reputation and her career over herself, because what, in truth, was she really even protecting? But Mikko was different. Jo had moments like this, of someone attempting to become her friend at a party, but this wasn’t that. He already felt like her friend. He felt like someone the little girl with a big dream and no idea what would come out of it would have been friends with too. Jo hadn’t met someone like that in a long time. 

So, Jo took a deep breath and did what seven-year-old Jo would’ve done; she made a friend. 

------

Jo pulled herself out of bed the next morning, displeased but unsurprised at the pounding in her head. She drank and she cried, two things bound to make her head pound the morning after. It was Advil or bust for the first thing she would do today, even before checking her phone, something she religiously did first. Jo let herself fall back into her covers after swallowing three Advil, eyelids drooping closed for another half an hour as the medication kicked in well enough so she could actually do her normal routine the next time her eyes opened. 

She dragged her phone off the nightstand, groaning at the volume of texts that were waiting for her. Thankfully, it seemed to be largely group chats and could just be cleared and ignored. One text stuck out, just two words from an unsaved number, less than an hour old. 

Hey friend :) 

Memories of last night, technically this morning if you were into technicalities or booked a lot of airline tickets, flooded to the front of Jo’s sore head. Mikko. Her thumbs hovered over the keyboard, debating on if she, now sober, was really going to entertain this or not, which hinged entirely on if she really believed he had set aside any intentions he had walking up onto that rooftop and was capable of keeping them set aside. Jo’s thumbs twitched over the screen, debating on what she should do, but one thought kept coming up again and again. She wanted to understand why she had thought about him like she thought about friends when she was a kid, full of nothing but wonder, still believing in forever and magic and the idea of everlasting happiness. He had reminded her of all of that and Josephine needed to know why. 

Hey friend

Keeping it easy breezy, beautiful, Covergirl. Jo rolled out of bed after saving his phone number then ditching it in the covers before going to wash her face and start a pot of coffee for the day. After the coffee had started to drip into the pot, the best sound hungover Jo had ever heard, she went back to collect her phone, seeing she already had a reply from Mikko. 

Still down to do lunch today? Or are you too hungover from all those tequila shots? ;)

Jo furrowed her brows down, but she couldn’t help but smile a little at the message. 

I don’t do tequila shots, must have me confused with some other girl who you bullied into being your friend on a rooftop last night ;) but lunch is still good

Mikko hadn’t taken no for an answer yesterday on having lunch with him today. He had insisted that friends who caught other friends crying on rooftops during parties didn’t let the aforementioned friend have lunch alone the next day. Jo told him it wasn’t a rule. Mikko said it should be. The bit went on for far too long considering Jo was just fighting about lunch and the fact that Mikko seemed nothing but persistent, a fact he had proven true by texting her before ten in the morning after a night out to confirm her presence at said lunch. Luckily, lunch was at her place so she didn’t exactly have to commute anywhere. Lunch out was risky for her and Mikko’s eyes had lit up at the prospect of being able to wear sweatpants to lunch because if he was going out with her, he could be photographed and might have had to wear jeans, something he’d been horrified of last night. Jo looked over the menu Mikko sent her, pleased that he picked a taco place because tacos were very publicly Jo’s favorite food of all time, and sent him her order. He said he’d grab it on the way to her when practice finished later.

By the time Jo managed to pull herself together enough to shower, she needed to get ready. Well, as ready as someone had to get for lunch at their own apartment with a new friend who had already committed to showing up in sweatpants. Jo figured matching his style commitment was her best play, comfortable joggers and one of her dad’s old Colorado Rockies t-shirts she had confiscated years ago. It reminded her of home, of the city she was in now. Jo was home, technically, even though it didn’t feel like it just yet. 

Mikko more than fulfilled his end of the bargain when he showed up, in sweatpants and a sweatshirt, both carrying the logos of the team he played for, and two bags of take out definitely too full for what they’d ordered, even taking into account that Mikko could definitely out eat her based on body mass alone. Jo didn’t account for the fresh from practice look though, hair still damp, waves more pronounced now than they had been last night. There was a small cut on his cheekbone that looked fresh, making them appear even sharper somehow. In the bright light of her kitchen, a smile like a lazy afternoon on his face, Jo, who was very used to being around very pretty people, was getting a little bit distracted by Mikko Rantanen in her kitchen. Until he spoke, anway. 

“I should get you an Avs shirt,” was how Mikko said hello after already pushing his way into her apartment. “You’ve got to rep the best team in Colorado.” 

“I thought you,” Jo opened a cabinet opposite Mikko who was already ripping into the bags and spreading the food out, “were supposed to be supportive of all of the local teams.”

Mikko smiled at her and Jo felt like that smile could fix a heartbreak and cause it at the same moment, “I am! I just think you need to be more supportive of your friends.” 

“When would you have liked me to have gotten this?” Jo asked Mikko after grabbing two water glasses from the cabinet. “We just became friends twelve hours ago. Is water okay, by the way?” 

“I thought it would be a top priority for you. And yeah, water’s good.” 

Mikko laughed as he talked, something Jo was realizing was common place for him. He was fidgeting, feet tapping on the hardwood floor, unable to settle, but it wasn’t from anxiousness like Jo’s almost always did. Mikko seemed to just have more energy than he knew what to do with, energy fed by pure childlike joy he had possessed every second Jo had seen him so far. His hands fussed with the takeout containers, his right foot hadn’t stopped bouncing, but he was doing it all with a smile on his face, dimple showing itself almost constantly. His energy was overwhelming Jo who was used to people completely unlike him. She was used to people who were so bogged down by the lives they lived that continuing to live them was exhausting in a way that bred negativity and squandered joy. Mikko seemed genuinely happy to be here in Denver in Jo’s apartment with her right now and more than that, he seemed genuinely happy to be Mikko Rantanen, something Jo just couldn’t understand. 

“You seem eager, so get me one and I’ll wear it,” Jo threw back at him, an easy smile coming across her face as she started to fill their water glasses from the fridge. 

“Oh yeah?” Mikko raised his eyebrows at her. “You can afford to get your own. Plates are where?” 

“Wow, rude,” Jo scoffed, but it was fake and Mikko knew it before she’s even finished her rebuttal. “But if you can get me one for free, why would I buy one? And upper cabinet to the right of the stove. Silverware is the drawer below that.” 

“Because you want to support the Colorado Avalanche organization because your friend is a part of it,” Mikko retorted, snagging two plates and way more silverware than Jo thought they needed from the drawer. “I got a few extra things I thought you should try, by the way, since you’re looking at me like I got too much food. I did. I did it on purpose. ” 

With everything spread out and open on the table, Jo placed the waters, her only contribution to the spread, by their plates and sat down in a previously unsat in chair. Everything around here was too new. Things like this would make it feel more like her place eventually. Mikko had pretty much gotten one of everything on the menu as far as Jo could tell from her brief memory of reading it over earlier, but she could see why he had with the pretty incredible smells and sights laid out on her table. 

“Half and half of everything, yeah?” Mikko asked Jo, fork and butter knife already in motion to the taco closest to him. 

“You know,” Jo reached out and placed her hand on Mikko’s hand holding his fork, ignoring how warm and soft and large his hand was under hers, “I’m going to dip into traditional gender roles for a sec and briefly force them on you. How about I get a real knife and do the cutting?” 

“That’s definitely a better idea,” Mikko agreed, the ever present laugh in his voice ringing more prominent.

Jo grabbed a knife out of the block on the counter and got to work cutting everything in half. Mikko took his half as she went, until his plate was full. Jo may have hit him with her elbows a couple of times and whined he was getting in her way. Mikko was apparently experienced enough with being elbowed over food due to having two sisters and the team that he just continued on, acquiring half of each taco, burrito, and side dish he could fit.

“I’m coming for my other halves,” he threatened Jo emptily with his fork when she finally finished the cutting. “Don’t get greedy.” 

“Mikko, I consider myself a woman who can really eat,” Jo informed him, nabbing two half tacos to start, “but I think eating even my half of everything is beyond me.”

“Quitter,” Mikko smirked before shoving a large bite of a taco into his mouth.

“Not a quitter,” Jo countered before taking a bite of one of the half tacos on her plate. She almost moaned at the taste, but kept it inside. “I’m just a girl who knows her limits.”

As they both devoured their meals rapidly, Jo filled up much faster than Mikko who somehow cleared his first full plate and was creating a second, casual conversation flowing easily between the new friends. When Mikko finally reached a point where his inhalation slowed, his plate mostly cleared again, he looked over at Jo, who watched the smile fall from his face for the first time since she sat down across from him. She noticed instantly. It was easy to notice a lack of something that had always been there than to notice new things sometimes. All Jo saw was the lack of a smile on his face, not the genuine concern that had replaced it.

“Want to talk about why you were crying last night?” he asked Jo softly, watching as she pushed unfinished rice and beans across her plate to avoid making eye contact with him. “You don’t have to, obviously, but there’s no way there isn’t something worth talking about.” 

“It’s nothing,” Jo tried to assure him, but Mikko wasn’t buying it for a second. 

“Look,” he sighed, tossing his napkin onto his plate, “I said I was going to be your friend and sometimes friends tell you shit you don’t want to hear. You don’t have to talk about anything you don’t want to, but it just seemed like that wasn’t the first time you cried at a party like that and I don’t think you should be crying at parties is all.” 

Mikko was right. Even Jo, as stubborn as she could be sometimes, could admit Mikko was right. But Mikko could be right and Jo could still not want to deal with it. Those might be conflicting views, but Jo could deal with conflict better than anyone else she knew. She could put it in a box and ignore it, pretending it didn’t exist, pretending that it wasn’t eating her up inside how much she truly felt like there wasn’t anything good enough left in her to be worth anyone’s time, that the dream she first had here in Denver, the dream she had worked her entire life for, meant she lost herself. At least, that she had lost a version of herself anyone could love. 

But that was too much for lunch on a Saturday with someone she had known for under twenty-four hours, even if she felt like she had known him for longer, even if he brought a blanket of comfort around Jo with his words, even if seven-year-old Jo would’ve liked him, even if he was asking.

“I don’t really want to talk about it. It was stupid,” Jo brushed him off. 

Mikko sighed again and nodded softly, “Okay, you don’t have to talk about it, but it wasn’t stupid. How you feel isn’t stupid.” 

How Jo felt was stupid though because she had more than almost anyone could ever ask for. She had apartments like this one. She had the ability to take a year off on a whim. She could go anywhere she wanted, buy whatever she liked. She had friends that other people would kill to even meet, even if a lot of them weren’t what people imagined them to be. She had a life millions of people would kill for, and yet Jo felt like no one really knew her. Jo knew that no one really knew her because Jo couldn’t even find herself, the real her, among everything she created to become that person that lived the life she lived. She didn’t think the real her existed. She was just the personalities and faces she created. It was almost hollow space underneath it all, with just a few useless fragments, the worst parts of her, left floating in the space. 

“Thanks, Mikko,” is all Jo could come up with. 

“You don’t believe me,” he told her, catching on to the sigh in the way she said his name. “It’s okay for today. I’ll try again tomorrow.” 

Jo almost laughed at his words. No one kept trying and that’s how Jo wanted it. She didn’t want to admit everything underneath, the emptiness of it all, because then, if a person who cared enough to keep trying discovered there was nothing worthwhile under the facade of it all, they’d leave too and there was no way Jo could stomach that. Jo didn’t laugh though. She simply nodded and changed the topic to ask Mikko about the preseason game they had tomorrow. He noticed the look in her eyes when she changed the topic, but didn’t say anything. He just memorized it, how her eyes shifted, the heaviness in her face, the glossiness of her eyes, and put it in his growing folder of things he knew about Josephine Evans, even if he didn’t understand the expression at all. One day, he would. He would keep trying until he did.

------

Jo hadn’t gone more than four days without Mikko Rantanen showing up at her apartment post-practice, or requesting her presence at his when he was feeling particularly lazy, with wet hair, a dimpled smile, and some incredible smelling takeout since she moved to Denver a month ago. Even after training camp transitioned into the first games of the season, Mikko showed up, bag of food and charming personality in hand, ready to fight Jo’s demons. Really, just ready to crush her at Fortnite. He was horrified she had never played and brought over his old Xbox so he could teach her and they could play at her place too. Jo was terrible, absolutely tragic at it really, but Mikko made her laugh while trying to play, even though Jo was normally such a perfectionist she didn’t really want to do things she was bad at. Doing things she was bad at with Mikko was the exception. 

A knock on Jo’s door let her know what time it was. Mikko didn’t even text beforehand anymore. He just showed up, several entrees in tow in case Jo didn’t like something he picked out after the olives incident. Mikko had brought Jo over some Greek takeout, a personal favorite of Jo’s because of the prevalence of olives in Greek food. Except Mikko ordered everything on the menu that didn’t contain olives. 

“Why didn’t you get the little olives?” Jo had asked Mikko when he laid out the food on the coffee table. “The yummy marinated ones?” 

Mikko looked at Jo with absolute disgust. His mouth dropped open, lips curling back, before he stuck his tongue out and made a gagging noise. 

“You like olives? Gross, Jo. I don’t think we can be friends anymore,” Mikko told her, fake gagging when he said the word olives. 

Jo shrugged off Mikko’s gagging, “Actually, it means we’re supposed to be friends, if you’re familiar with How I Met Your Mother anyway.”

“Nate talks about that show a lot and Tyson too, but I’ve never seen it,” Mikko told her, sitting down on the couch with a falafel in one hand and a messy plate of food covered in tzatziki in the other. 

“It basically, well, they applied it to couples and stuff, but it totally works for friends too.” Jo caught herself before she could start, trying to walk back how the show had intended the meaning before she came off like she had feelings she was certain she didn’t have for Mikko. 

“Anyway, it’s called The Olive Theory and it suggests that in every relationship, whatever kind of relationship, that there should be one person who likes olives, me,” Jo pointed at herself, “and one person who doesn’t like olives, you,” she pointed at Mikko now. “That way, I can eat all the olives I want and you don’t have to eat any. Plus, I can be your hero and rescue you from olives on your pizza so they don’t go to waste. It’s the whole like, two halves of a whole, opposites attract, people balance each other out, thing.” 

Mikko nodded softly, thinking about Jo’s words carefully for a moment, before saying, “As long as I don’t have to eat any olives, this is good with me.” 

Jo laughed before taking a bite of her falafel wrap, moaning openly at the taste. Mikko might be a shit teacher at Fortnite, and a kind of stupid boy sometimes, but he had figured out exactly the kind of food Jo liked and had never failed her. Mikko laughed a little at the sound, but he enjoyed that she liked something so simple as the food he brought over. Mikko liked Jo, genuinely and honestly and fully. Jo liked Mikko, cautiously at first, but even she, the self-coronated queen of denial, couldn’t deny that she did really like him. She liked being around him. She liked who she was around him and she couldn’t deny it. She noticed herself changing when he was around, that she felt lighter and more at peace, finding it easier to feel happiness and to laugh when he was around. Jo had spent a lot of time over the last month trying to figure out why she was feeling like that. 

People could think about themselves as much as they wanted to, journeys of self discovery, self exploration, what have you, but part of it was looking through the eyes of other people at herself and the life she chose to live. Jo looked at herself through the rose-colored glasses of other people’s eyes all the time for affirmation, for support in her times of self doubt, but she also used it to validate her own negative views of who she was, finding the angriest, reddest view of herself when she felt like she deserved the worst pictures of herself that were out there. Jo had millions of eyes to view herself through, millions of slightly different versions of herself to see, to choose from at any point, but she couldn’t figure out which was the most accurate, many swaying too positive or too negative. It all was so jumbled, people’s misconceptions getting the way of seeing her with clear eyes and an honest mind. It overwhelmed her often. But the most overwhelming thing that had happened to Jo in a long time was realizing she was looking at herself through the eyes of one person a lot now, one person who seemed to actually see Jo, the real Jo she thought was lost in the hurricane forever ago. Jo was starting to think the way Mikko Rantanen saw her was her favorite way to view herself and it scared the hell out of her.

-------

Jo made it all the way to two days before Halloween before Mikko sent her an incredibly aggressive but incredibly Mikko kind of text. 

Since you haven’t been to an avs game yet, I’m assuming you are only my friend because I bring you food. I will no longer be bringing you food until you come to a game. You’re in luck though because I reserved a box seat for you for the game tomorrow and have already pre-ordered one of everything our kitchen makes to the box for you because I do care that you eat, but I feel like our friendship is very one-sided right now and would like to see more effort out of you. Bring a friend if you want! See you tomorrow, Jojo!!!

The text was immediately followed by another with the information on where Jo could pick up her tickets and wristbands tomorrow before the game. As much as Jo had been trying to avoid public places, deeply enjoying the hunt the media was having, “Where In The World Could Josephine Evans Be?” Jo was excited about the prospect of getting to do something. She texted Helena, knowing she would reply immediately, which she did, and want to come with, which she did. Helena ordered a car for tomorrow to pick her up, then Jo, because Helena didn’t want to DD, a fair thing, and neither did Jo, also a fair thing, so calling a car was the only remaining option. Jo sent Mikko a quick text back, confirming her and Helena’s presence at the game tomorrow, and she had gotten a smiley face in return. The little smiley face text had Jo falling asleep with a smile, and waking up with it still on her face the next morning. 

Despite earlier bullying less than a day into their friendship, Jo still lacked Avalanche gear, something that greatly upset Mikko when she had snapped a picture of her watching the first game of the season, an away game, team-spirit-less. His displeasure had been well known, a pouting photo of sweaty, post-game Mikko with his thumb turned down coming over in return that day. Jo still hadn’t acquired any Avalanche gear since that day though. As she was getting dressed later, she realized the closest she could get was a long sleeve burgundy t-shirt and that Mikko would just have to deal with it. She knew she’d get an earful after the game, especially considering since sport-averse until you were talking the athletes Helena was wearing an Avalanche t-shirt when the car picked Jo up later. She didn’t judge Jo for not though, just decided to leave it up to Mikko later. 

Picking up the tickets was easier than Jo had thought it would be and a baseball cap low on her head in addition to the heavy crowds was letting her keep a low profile. Her and Helena managed to make it up to the box level without incident. Jo double checked the box number on her phone, confirming 256, before following the signs towards the box. As Jo got closer, she started to hear more and more people fussing about, boxes inhabited by people nearby. She stopped in her tracks when she reached 256, finding the door wide open, many voices floating out from inside. She glanced over at Helena, who shrugged, fearless in the face of the unexpected, and breezed past Jo to walk right in. Except Jo didn’t realize Helena had wrapped a hand around one of her wrists and pulled her into the box right along with her. 

The first person who made eye contact with Jo, a girl wearing a Compher jersey, went wide-eyed when she saw Jo. Jo immediately wanted to spin on her heels and get herself anywhere but here when the girl turned and aggressively tapped the shoulder of a blonde wearing a Landeskog jersey. Helena on the other hand was already filling a plate full of snacks, blissfully unaware of Jo’s desperate need to throw herself out of this box headfirst to avoid whatever was next in a box of people who recognized her who she didn’t know. Jo was, fortunately, wrong about what she thought would happen next. 

The blonde girl turned around and she smiled brightly when she saw Jo, making a beeline over to her. She wrapped her arms around Jo before she even said anything and Jo couldn’t hide her confused expression when the woman released her from a tight, crushing embrace. 

“He didn’t tell you, did he?” she sighed, then shook her head softly. “I’ll have to yell at him later. I’m sorry. I’m Mel, Gabe’s wife. I’m sure Mikko’s told you about Gabe, right?” 

Mikko had told her about Gabe. And Mel. He often came over to her place after being at the Landeskog’s, in search of a friend without a young child who would kill a bottle of wine with him without any judgement. Still, Mikko loved and idolized Gabe. That much was obvious from how he talked about his captain, and he talked about Mel almost like a mom sometimes. Jo took a deep breath, and then nodded softly, deciding to give Mel a fair shake herself, see what she thought. 

“Okay, good,” Mel laughed a little. “Sorry Mikko didn’t tell you anything. I told him to give you a heads up what you were walking into here.” 

“Yeah, he didn’t tell me anyone would be here,” Jo said, crossing her arms tightly over her chest, a naturally defensive posture. 

“Of course he didn’t,” Mel groaned, head falling back in obvious displeasure with Mikko. She sighed before lifting her head to look at Jo again, “Well, this is where all the wives and girlfriends and I guess some friends watch the games usually. You’re welcome to food and over there’s wine and beer. Everyone’s really excited to meet you, by the way. Mikko talks about you a lot, you know.”

“He does?” 

Jo didn’t mean for her words to come out as floored as they had, shock dripping from each letter. Why would Mikko talk about her to his teammates and their partners? Why was Jo watching the game from this room, of all places? Why would-

“All. The. Time.” Mel punctuated each word, cutting through the fog of questions in Jo’s mind. “We were wondering when he’d bring you around. I think he was trying to make sure everyone would be cool or whatever before he did. Oh, reminds me, he left something for me to give to you.” 

Mel walked over to where she’d been sitting, then came back with a black bag and handed it to Jo, a wide, knowing smile on her face.

“There’s two seats open next to me after you put it on for you and your friend,” Mel told her before sliding back down to her seat. 

Jo felt a little silly opening a sort of present right now, but Mel kept glancing over her shoulder at her encouragingly, waiting for her to open it. Jo looked into the bag and knew what it was. It wasn’t wrapped, so it wasn’t difficult to guess. She grabbed the small Post-It note sitting on top of it first, recognizing Mikko’s sloppy handwriting instantly. 

Figured you wouldn’t pick up any Avs gear before the game because you hate me. Hope it’s not too big :) - Mikko

Jo pulled out the brand new Avalanche jersey from the bag, fingers tracing over the logo on the front, sliding over to the number stitched onto the shoulder. 96, Mikko and Jo’s birth year. She sighed as she flipped over the burgundy and blue jersey, Rantanen in bold letters across the shoulders. She knew as soon as she looked into the bag this was what it would be, but holding it in her hands, standing in a room full of the women who were actually with the guys warming up on the ice below wearing them too, Jo didn’t really feel like she should put it on.

“God, you two are so cute,” Helena whined at the sight of the jersey in Jo’s hands with a plate of food in one of her hands and a chicken wing in the other.

“H,” Jo sighed. 

“I know, I know, I know,” Helena rolled her eyes in reply. “I know you’re not like, boning or whatever, but something is going on. You’re holding the proof and you better put it on. Don’t make me put down this chicken wing to fight you over it.”

Separating Helena from her food was one of the highest crimes Jo could commit. Plus, Helena’s threat to fight her wasn’t completely empty. Jo sighed, defeat sinking in heavy on her shoulders, before she tugged the jersey over her head without a second thought. She slid her arms into the sleeves, letting it settle over her, tugging at the shoulders and the neckline to try and make it feel more comfortable. It wasn’t the fit that was the problem. The name on the back made Jo feel like she was on fire and that fire was seeping into her skin, becoming burning questions Jo was trying so hard to think about. She didn’t want to know the answers to them. She didn’t even want to think about them. She took a deep breath and let it out forcefully, trying to blow out the flames, turn the questions into ash, and forget about it. She was partially successful and that was probably as close as Jo was going to get today. She picked up the Post-It note from where it had fallen on the floor and folded it up carefully, sliding it into her wallet for safe keeping. His handwriting was terrible and his gift was causing her mind to race in directions she didn’t want it to go, but they were both reminders that Jo knew at least one really, really good person. Some days, one good person was more than enough. 

Jo watched the game from her seat between Mel and Helena, mind everywhere but on the rink in front of her the entire time. She was so zoned out, she missed when Mikko even scored, but she didn’t miss his name and face across the Jumbotron for what felt like ages after the puck hit the back of the net. Jo couldn’t catch a break to think about what the gift of a jersey with his name on it along with a ticket to sit among the wives and girlfriends of his teammates meant. There were no other friends present; Mel lied. Jo couldn’t take a break from his face on the screen, his name emblazoned on what felt like every inch of the building, on the screen, on the backs of the fans in front of her. She couldn’t find enough air to try and think about what it all could mean and took it as a sign from the universe that maybe the question needed to go back into the box, into a mental vault, for the time being. A sign that now wasn’t right. She wasn’t supposed to complicate this, just let a jersey be a jersey and a ticket be a ticket and a Post-It note be a Post-It note. Jo took a deep breath, and locked the question of intent in a deep vault and threw away the key for now. 

She joined the wives and girlfriends down by the locker rooms after the game, getting Mikko straight from the shower, hair fully wet as her reward. He smiled bigger than Jo had ever seen when he saw the jersey actually on her, shuffling over to her with his head rocking side to side with each step. He wrapped his arms around her waist and lifted her up off the concrete, making her yelp in surprise, before setting her down quickly. He was laughing as he did, an open mouthed smile on his face, eyes crinkling shut. 

“Did you have fun?” he asked her.

“I did,” Jo nodded softly, leaving out the internal turmoil she had been working through throughout the game and left purposely unfinished. “Congrats on the goal.” 

“And assist,” he added with a playful smirk. “Were you even watching?” 

“I show up and you critique how I watch? That’s rude of you, Rantanen,” Jo verbally tossed back at him, a smile pulling up the corner of her mouth as she looked up at him. 

“Eh, guess a guy can’t win them all,” Mikko shrugged. “Want to come back to my place? We can watch a bad movie, well, part of a bad movie until I fall asleep. It’s closer.” 

“Was sort of counting on it,” Jo admitted. “Kind of already told Helena she could leave if she wanted to.” 

Mikko put a hand over his heart, face twisting into shock as he faked like he’d taken a shot to the heart. His knees even buckled slightly, trying his best to sell it. 

“Using me for my couch, huh?” he asked Jo with a shake of his head. “My couch and food.”

“Those are your only redeeming qualities,” Jo joked, scrunching her nose up at him as she smiled again. “Come on. Let’s get out of here and to that bad movie, yeah?” 

Mikko threw a heavy, tired arm over Jo’s shoulders, and pulled her into his side for a moment as they headed out toward the parking lot. Jo let him drag her into his side as they walked, enjoying the warmth he gave off in the cool, fall Denver air. 

“Everyone was good, yeah?” Mikko asked her softly when they neared his car. “I told Mel to make sure everyone was cool and not to like, take pictures of you and post them or anything. I really didn’t want to be the person that ruined Denver for you.” 

Jo felt his words hit her chest and soften everything for a moment. The walls she built to protect herself shook from being hit with the full force of how much he cared about her, gaps forming in the walls that his words slid between and found her behind it all. Jo had never said she didn’t want to go to a game because of the risk of people finding out she was hiding out in Denver. Mikko had never even asked why. He didn’t ask because he already knew the answer. He was desperate to make it work for her, to try and make space for her in his life so she could be in it as much as she wanted without feeling like everyone in the world was watching. It had taken him a month to work out the best way to get her at a game, but let her have her privacy, let her be just Jo. 

“Everyone was great, Mik,” Jo replied. “Thank you, for everything, honestly. Everything since I came here really.” 

Mikko’s heart swelled in his chest. Not just for today, but for everything. It was small, nondescript, but the feeling behind the words rang true because it was. Without Mikko, Jo wouldn’t have started to feel at home in Denver. Without Mikko, Jo would know one person in this city. Without Mikko, Jo would’ve never found her favorite taco place and her third favorite Greek restaurant of all time. With Mikko, Jo wouldn’t smile so much. 

Without Jo, Mikko wouldn’t know what it’s like to see someone and immediately realize that that person is supposed to be in your life. There was no rhyme or reason to that feeling, but Mikko had gotten it that night on the rooftop and every single interaction with Jo since had done was prove that feeling to be correct. Josephine Evans was supposed to be in his life and he was supposed to be in hers, the least complicated part of it all. 

------

Jo didn’t think when the year started that this was how she would be spending her Thanksgiving. For most of November, which passed like October had seemed to, Jo didn’t think she would be spending her Thanksgiving like she would get to. Her parents usually travelled since Jo often wasn’t able to make it home for Thanksgiving and Christmas in the same year. One or the other was tied up in some performance or a series of flights that couldn’t time out to get her home when she needed to be for family dinner, so her parents often spent the holidays on a beach somewhere. However, with Jo semi-permanently parked in Denver for the time being, and her younger brother a short flight away in Los Angeles, Thanksgiving was coming to her for the first time ever. Her mom had promised to do a large chunk of the cooking, not because Jo couldn’t, but because her mom’s cooking was her favorite and Jo didn’t get to have it much anymore. 

Jo was like a kid at Christmas, which her apartment was already decorated for, when she found out she was actually going to get her mom’s cooking for Thanksgiving and that her little brother, who was a little annoying but also one of the people Jo loved most in this world, was coming too. Mikko had been over when everything was officially confirmed and Jo started to worry if she had enough serving dishes or not. 

“I’ve only done Thanksgiving a couple of times,” Mikko shrugged when Jo asked him if the stack of serving dishes she managed to collect would be enough, even though she had verbally gone through and assigned each one a dish on her family’s traditional menu. “I really couldn’t say, Jo.” 

“What are you doing for Thanksgiving?” she asked him when she realized she didn’t actually know. 

“Gabe and Mel usually host something? I’m not really sure actually. No one has really made any specific plans,” Mikko replied, horrifying Jo a bit. 

Someone not having plans for the holidays? Josephine Evans’ true nightmare. She didn’t even think before she spoke. 

“You could always join us,” Jo told him. “You know you’re always welcome with me.”

Mikko smiled so brightly in response to Jo’s words, brighter than all the lights on her Christmas tree combined. He accepted her invitation easily, and promised to bring a dish before he seemed to remember he couldn’t actually cook. He promised to bring whiskey Jo’s dad would like instead of trying to cook, deciding to spare her family from the potential horror show that could be. 

It didn’t surprise Jo when Mikko showed up thirty minutes earlier than she had told him to, her hands a complete mess of flour and pie dough when he knocked on her front door Thanksgiving afternoon. Jo groaned when he did because she wasn’t exactly in the position to get the door. Her mom was an equal amount of a mess next to her, elbow deep in the turkey, and her dad and brother were immersed in football. They hadn’t even heard the door. Jo rinsed off her hands as fast as she could, not fast enough not to earn a second knock from Mikko before she could get to the door. 

“You’re covered in flour, Jojo,” Mikko chuckled when he saw her. 

“And you brought a box?” she challenged, eying the cardboard box in his hands. 

“Brought a couple of kinds of whiskeys Gabe told me to get,” he smiled at her, dimples prominent on his cheeks. “I’m not even going to pretend I picked them out. Anything I can do to help?”

“Yeah, stay out of my kitchen,” Jo laughed as she opened the door wider and motioned him inside. “You made a mean box of leftover Chinese takeout, but that’s about it, Mik.” 

“We all have our strengths, okay?” he countered, scrunching his nose up at Jo. He shifted the box to his left hip to free his right hand up to tug on the end of Jo’s French braid, “This is cute.”

“It’s just a French braid,” Jo mumbled, brushing a few loose pieces out of her face in a vain attempt to hide the slight color that had risen in her cheeks from his compliment. 

“It’s cute,” Mikko repeated as he kicked off his shoes, knowing full and well how Jo felt about shoes in her house. “Should I take these to the bar then?” 

“Come meet my mom first, then I’ll introduce you to the father and the brother,” Jo told him. 

He followed her, halving the typical length of his stride to do so, literally making space for Jo, something he did in the figurative sense all of the time. Mikko dropped the box off on the edge of the counter, as far away from Jo’s baking as he could get, when he reached the island. He didn’t want to even sort of maybe possibly get in her way and mess something up for her today. She had been talking constantly about it, smile growing impossibly wider each day as Thanksgiving got closer. Mikko had spent all of his Thanksgivings so far hosted by European transplants who knew next to nothing about the holiday itself. This one, with the Evans men screaming at the television in the living room, the Evans women in the kitchen where they loved being together, there was something in the air that separated this Thanksgiving out from the others Mikko had seen. Family. Mikko could feel it hanging heavy but comfortably in the air. There was a lightness to Jo though, something Mikko had only seen glimpses of before when he’d managed to temporarily lift the clouds. The lightness seemed constant today, something Mikko wished for Jo all of the time. 

“You must be Mikko! We’ve heard so much about you!”

Jo’s mom reminded Mikko of Jo, but it was distant. Jo might have been thirty years younger, but Mikko swore Jo’s soul felt older. Their smiles were the same though, even if Jo’s was rarer, Mikko got it to show more than anyone else and knew it well enough to recognize it on her mom’s face. She was wearing earrings shaped like turkeys with multi-colored feathers and an apron with a corny pun Jo would never be caught dead in, no matter how old she got. 

“Mom,” Jo groaned, giving her mom a firm look for her comment. 

“Aw, Jo does like me,” Mikko joked before giving her a little shove that was a little too hard causing Jo to stumble sideways. 

Mikko caught her wrist, keeping her from stumbling too far. She glared at him as he pulled her back solidly on her fuzzy sock covered feet. Mikko laughed at her glare, knowing Jo who was almost a foot shorter than him really couldn’t do a thing about her anger with him if she wanted to, regardless of her motivation. 

“I like him,” her mom nodded in approval. 

“I’m not even sure you liked me that fast and you gave birth to me,” Jo mumbled, not quite loud enough for her mom to hear, but plenty loud for Mikko to, who snorted in response. 

Jo’s mom surveyed the two before deciding to let whatever she had just missed go in favor of returning to her bird, the turkey that was going to be her number one pride and joy that day, kids included. Jo tugged Mikko’s forearm to get him to follow her into the living room. Mikko grabbed his box on the way, bottles inside clinking together as he walked. Their entrance into the living room went entirely unnoticed by the men engrossed in the football game on the television. Jo cleared her throat as the whistle on the television blew, seeing an opening to introduce Mikko. 

“Dad, Luke, this is my friend Mikko. He brought whiskey.”

Jo gestured over to Mikko, who put on his best smile, the one Jo still thought must have cured cancer somewhere once, and shook the box a little to make the bottles inside rattle. Her dad looked him up and down, the assumption among Jo’s family being that they were either dating or almost dating and for one reason or another not admitting it to anyone, so her dad was giving Mikko the look he’d given Jo’s past boyfriends. 

“Dad,” Jo sighed, “cut him some slack. We’re friends and he brought whiskey.” 

Mikko flushed a little when he realized he was getting the stare down because her dad thought there was something beyond what they could see going on between him and Jo. Mikko fidgeted with the edge of the box where there was a small hole, trying to avoid her dad’s harsh gaze. It was unearned, but it just reminded Mikko more of what he didn’t have, what he couldn’t have, which was all of Jo. Mikko was trying so hard, so incredibly hard, not to fall in love with Josephine Evans, but it wasn’t really working for him. He knew she wasn’t ready. He knew there was too much noise, the storm in her head was too strong, and that he would lose her if he tried right now because he wasn’t through it. Mikko wasn’t even sure he had gotten into the storm yet. He felt like he was just on the edge of it, staring into the darkness of it all, watching the winds pick up and toss aside everything. He couldn’t even see Jo through it all most of the time, but he caught a glimpse of her before, the real her behind it all and she was the most beautiful person he had ever seen, infinitely better than how he had ever imagined someone could be. He was going to get across it. He just had to wait, take his time, otherwise the storm would pick him up and deposit him miles away from her, battered and bruised, unable to even get back to the edge of it again. 

“Whiskey?” her dad perked up, eyeing the box with a raised eyebrow.

Mikko nodded, dropping the box onto the wet bar in Jo’s living room. Her dad was up off the couch and next to Mikko before he could even get the box open all the way. Jo had understated how much her father loved nice whiskey, because his hands were already grabbing a bottle before Mikko could and Mikko was closer to them. Mikko pulled the other out while her dad read over the first one and Mikko thanked his lucky stars that Landy had not just recommended four bottles to get, but also took the time to run Mikko over each whiskey, the important flavor notes, how they were aged, and some basic information about each distillery. Still, he was grateful that the first one her dad had a question about was one Mikko had actually been to the distillery that made it before. 

“Is this local? I haven’t seen it before,” her dad told him, eyes not leaving the bottle. 

“Yeah, it is,” Mikko confirmed. “This local place, treats them sort of like a rye whiskey even if they aren’t. It’s a cool place too, actually. Jo and I have been. They have a bunch of small batch stuff, all really good.” 

“Oh, that place we went with Nate and Landy?” Jo called out from the kitchen, hands already back in her pie dough, figuring Mikko’s personality plus whiskey could manage her father from here.

“That’s the one!” Mikko called back, grabbing a glass with each hand from the back edge of the wet bar. 

“Ah, that was fun! We should do that again,” Jo replied, followed by a loud huff as she worked to combine the crumbly pie dough by hand. 

“Luke, you want one?” Mikko asked Jo’s brother who hadn’t left his spot on the couch. 

“Yeah, pour me whatever you guys are having,” he told him, obvious in his tone that his eyes were still trained on the football game.

Mikko dropped down on the couch, two glasses in hand, and passed one to Luke, Jo’s dad dropping down on the opposite side of Luke with his own glass in hand. Mikko watched her dad sip the whiskey carefully, and let out a breath of relief when he nodded softly in approval and went for another sip. Mikko didn’t know if he was ever going to have to impress Jo’s dad in the way he wished he would have to, but impressing him now would go a long way to making that future conversation easier for him. Her brother was much easier. 

“So, catch me up on the game,” was all it took for Luke to start talking to him.

In the kitchen, Jo’s mom finally got the turkey in the oven as Jo started to roll out the dough for the apple pie. The game picked up in the other room, the boys all shouting at the television over something that happened. Jo’s mom used the increase in volume as cover to try to pull some information out of her daughter that she knew she would never willingly give. 

“You failed to mention he looked like that,” her mom told her with a bump of her hip against Jo’s. “He’s a gorgeous young man. Seems sweet too.” 

“Mom,” Jo groaned, her attention still on the pie dough on the floured counter.

“Josephine,” her mother countered, stealing Jo’s tone, “he’s a catch. Catch him already.” 

“Mom, stop,” Jo sat the rolling pin down, pivoting with her hip now on the counter’s edge to face her mother. “He’s a friend, a good friend, but I don’t want to be with anyone right now. You know that. Being single is good for me right now.” 

“Sweetheart, do you even notice how he looks at you?” her mom replied, exasperation heavy in her voice, but her volume staying low. “He looks at you like you say you’ve always wanted someone to look at you. You’ve literally written songs about how you wanted someone to look at you like he looks at you. He really likes you and it’s so obvious. So what if it’s not the best time?”

Jo wiped her hands off on a dishtowel as her mom spoke. Her mom was genuinely trying, something she often did, but she wasn’t really listening to Jo, something she often did as well. Her mom cared, deeply, but she cared about what she thought other people’s priorities should be, her vision for someone else’s life, more than what the other person actually wanted. Right now, and honestly moving forward into forever as far as she was concerned, Jo didn’t want to put anyone in the war path of her love. Her love wasn’t gentle. It was calamitous, life-altering in the worst way possible. People she loved lost their privacy, their independence, their ability to decide if they even loved her back without the pressure of millions of peoples’ expectations. They also had to endure all of Jo and the chaos in her mind. Jo wasn’t easy to love, so difficult she didn’t even see how loving her could ever be worth it to anyone. Even if someone was stupid enough to decide she was worth it, Jo couldn’t put anyone she loved through the experience of loving her. Least of all someone like Mikko. 

“Mom, if I wanted your opinion, I would’ve asked,” Jo said curtly, knowing her mother would keep pushing if she didn’t stomp out any hope, blow out the candle she had lit for the idea of her daughter with the tall Finnish boy on her couch. “There's no chance that’s ever happening, okay? That’s not how I feel about him. It’s not how I want to feel about him. I want to be friends with him and I am. It’s not settling. It’s what I want. Please, stop pushing.” 

Her mom threw her hands up and shook her head at Jo, displeasure evident on her face, but she let it go. She didn’t even call Jo out for the most bold faced lie she had told her since she was a little kid here in Denver and pushed her brother off the swing and broke his arm. Jo felt a hell of a lot of things for Mikko Ratanen friends didn’t feel, but her mom didn’t call her out on it because she knew her daughter was still lying to herself too. 

By the time dinner was on the table and the Evans family plus Mikko sat around to eat it. Luke and Mikko were in a heated debate, well, heated for Luke, over if football was a better sport than hockey. Mikko wasn’t one to actually get heated. He was just enjoying getting to talk about one of his favorite things in the world, hockey, as much as he wanted with the brother of a person fast moving their way up the list of Mikko’s favorites. Mikko’s fork was in hand, moving toward his plate, ready to consume the amazing spread in front of him, but Jo’s mom cleared her throat and unnecessarily tapped her wine glass. It was unnecessary in a group of five people, but also unnecessary because the glass shattered when she tapped it just the wrong way with her knife. Thankfully, she hadn’t poured herself wine yet and it seemed to break in just a few pieces, but unfortunate because Mikko’s fork had to return to his napkin.

Jo was, as she often was, a step ahead of Mikko, collecting the shards in a spare cloth napkin. Mikko stood up to try and help, but really couldn’t figure out any way to help as Jo was already on her way to the trash can, glass shards in tow. Not even a step later, she was opening the cabinet to grab another wine glass, her mother still flustered and rambling apologies from the table. Mikko saw his opportunity to help as Jo looked up at the cabinet. He watched her shoulders drop when she realized a replacement glass was out of reach for her. Luckily, it was very much within Mikko’s reach. He headed over into the kitchen, sliding up easily behind Jo. 

“Need a hand?” he asked her softly, a smile pulling at the corners of his mouth. 

She huffed in reply, knowing her need for his help was obvious and that he was just milking everything he could get out of her actually needing him openly for once. Jo needed Mikko Rantanen more than just for his height, but she definitely wasn’t ready to admit that yet. Jo’s eyes went wide, before she blinked to cover it up, when one of Mikko’s large hands rested on her waist from behind as he reached up with his free hand to grab another glass. The feeling of his warm palm over her shirt over her skin shouldn’t have been enough to send her mind racing, questioning, but it was. It was one simple touch and Jo was ready to do anything to make it stop so she wouldn’t feel her heart picking up in her chest anymore. 

Mikko sat the glass down on the counter in front of Jo, a smug smile on his face as he looked down at Jo who had no choice but to tilt her chin up to look at him. Jo watched Mikko’s smile fall, soft pink lips parting a little as his eyes widened, pupils growing. She saw his eyes jump down from hers to her red wine stained lips, then back to her eyes, then back again. His head moved down just a little, almost imperceptibly, and Jo’s breath caught in her throat. Mikko knew he shouldn’t be doing this, but she was so beautiful and she was right in front of him, right there, with his hand on her waist, and her lips dark with wine, and he just wanted to know what it felt like to kiss her. But he shouldn’t. He couldn’t. Doing this now would mean his days doing it were limited, a trial period he couldn’t extend. He couldn’t do this. He forced a smile on his face, leaned down quickly, and tapped his forehead against hers briefly. He grabbed the wine glass and spun out from her, mind and heart racing with what could have been. He gave up that moment, for the chance at a lifetime of others with her. He’d give up any single moment for a chance at infinite ones. He made that choice again and again, like it wasn’t one of the hardest things he had to do. 

------

November bled into December, Thanksgiving gave way to Christmas, and the last vestiges of fall disappeared under the first blankets of winter snow. Jo watched it all happen, from her apartment, from Mikko’s apartment, from the wives and girlfriends and Jo box at the Pepsi center. She felt the season change, stretching across the two months, but that wasn’t the only thing that was shifting. Jo was shifting towards something she didn’t want to say sometimes for fear saying it would ruin it. She was shifting toward happiness and it was all Jo could think about as the car rolled to a stop in front of Gabe’s driveway. 

Jo she tugged at her sweater, pulling at the sleeves, at the slightly too tight bottom band, at the neckline, really any part that was touching her skin. It was itchy beyond belief, but she was pretty sure that she was about to take home the non-existent prize of ugliest Christmas sweater at the party tonight. Jo had been out with Helena for dinner, so she threw the sweater on in the car on the way over to Gabe’s and was regretting never having tried it on before this moment. But, the look on Mikko’s face when he saw just how ugly the sweater was would be worth her temporary discomfort. 

She punched in the gate code at Gabe’s and made her way up the driveway, smiling the whole way, something Jo had been doing a lot more of lately than she usually did. She told herself it was the hometown air, mile high and clearer than any other city. She told herself it was the fresh snow falling regularly now, deep into December. She told herself it was Christmas and a lot of people were happier around Christmas. Jo’s happiness wasn’t temporary though. It was a shift, slow and steady, a constant pressure forcing her out of the mindset she settled in years ago, the one where she always needed to be pleasing other people to be happy, the one where she needed everyone’s approval to find her own joy. She knew the clearer air, the snow, and the holidays weren’t the pressure. The pressure was a tall, somehow clumsy Finn who wanted nothing more than to see Jo smile every single day.

He didn’t try to make her happy with jokes and gimmicks and other things that were essentially bandaids to Jo’s heaviness. He didn’t try to pull a funny face while jumping just high enough for Jo to see from the other side of the walls she has built to protect herself, the ones she thought were too high for anyone to climb. Mikko wasn’t climbing them, knowing full and well that him getting over them wouldn’t truly help Jo. It would make her just okay for a little while longer, make the way she lived a little more bearable, until it destroyed them both. Mikko was taking the walls apart, brick by brick, his patience and his steadiness guiding the way. He never got frustrated when some of the bricks went back up in the middle of the night while he slept. He got up the next morning all the same and went back to work, taking the walls apart piece by piece, at whatever pace Jo would accept. Mikko hadn’t given up in four months, and he wasn’t planning on it, not until all the walls were gone and the bricks were destroyed, crumbled back into dust, and Jo could see herself the way he saw her the few times he managed to make a hole in the wall and actually see her behind all her defenses.

Jo opened the door into Andre Burakovsky. It was an accident and he shouldn’t have been standing directly in front of the front door and he wasn’t hurt in the slightest, but Jo felt bad about it all the same. 

“I’m dumb, it’s my fault,” he assured her. His mouth dropped open when he saw her sweater as Jo hung up her jacket in the front closet. “That’s the best thing I’ve ever seen and I wish we had a contest because you’d so win.” 

“I would so win,” Jo agreed, fussing with her curls to get them reasonably back into place

“There should be a contest. Maybe you can bully Gabe into getting some sort of prize anyway because you deserve it, ” Andre told her, his signature wide smile on his face. “He’s in the family room last I saw him by the way, since I know you’re looking for him.” 

Jo blushed at Andre’s words. He had caught her eyes tracking over the party that was in full swing, looking for the guy who had technically invited her, but she probably could’ve shown up anyway without his invite. She ducked out on Andre, blush still deepening with him laughing in the background, and made her way through the living room and kitchen into Gabe’s family room. She was old news by now, a days old newspaper no one wanted to read anymore, and it was Jo’s favorite thing about the Colorado Avalanche. She was Mikko’s friend Jo. Full stop. No additions necessary. 

“Jojo!” 

Jo heard Mikko before she saw him. She technically felt him before she saw him either as two heavy, muscled, ugly sweater covered arms wrapped around her stomach and lifted her off the ground, making her squeal.. He was laughing as soon as her feet left the ground. Jo’s hands gripped one of Mikko’s forearms around her waist to steady herself as Mikko rocked slowly side to side, weight shifting from foot to foot, with Jo in the air in his arms. 

“Mikko!” Jo shouted through her laughter. “Put me down!”

“You’re so easy to pick up though, and now you can actually see the party,” Mikko pointed out unhelpfully. 

He set her down anyway, knowing that when Josephine Evans made up her mind, such as wanting to be put down, she was a woman who would figure out how to get her way, Mikko’s shins be damned if that’s what it took. Mikko had a game to play the day after today and wasn’t excited about doing it with shins bruised by Jo’s boots. 

“This sweater,” Mikko breathed out as Jo turned to face him. He was in disbelief as he looked at it, “Jo, this is the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life.” 

“Are you proud?” 

Jo spun slowly on her heels, letting Mikko take in the absolute monstrosity she had bought to wear just for this. Mikko was in disbelief, written plainly all over his face, as he observed the sweater in all its terrible glory. Jo had more than delivered when he texted her and said it was an ugly Christmas party. Mikko loved the sweater, a true ugly beauty, but he thought the best part was that Jo put her hair in those little half space buns, the rest of her hair in curls falling down her back. He thought she was the cutest person he’d ever seen and he only knew one way to deal with it in a healthy way Jo would actually appreciate.

Appreciate might have been the wrong word. 

Mikko reached out with two large hands and gave her little half buns a squeeze while saying, “Your antlers are cute.” 

“Mikko, I swear to god, one day you’re going to die and it’s because I kill you,” Jo informed him with a tone so casual you would think she had just ordered a breakfast sandwich. 

“And what a way to go,” Mikko just laughed in response. “Mel made spiked eggnog. You interested?” 

Mikko knew Jo was interested before he had even asked, which is why it didn’t surprise him in the slightest that she took off for the kitchen, dragging him by his hand to get to the eggnog. Mikko had released when he stepped into Jo’s apartment on November 3rd, almost two months ago now, just how much Jo loved Christmas, because it had already been decorated that day he walked in. She had offered no explanation for the decorations being up so early other than that it was her apartment, she could do what she damn well pleased, and if Mikko didn’t like it, he could damn well leave. He stayed. Mikko always stayed when Jo was involved. 

“Those are some pours there, Jo,” Mikko told her as he eyed the cups Jo was already filling for them from the pot. “Trying to get me drunk?” 

“You’re a growing boy,” Jo countered, shoving a full cup into Mikko’s waiting hand. “Drink your milk and maybe you’ll grow big and strong.” 

Mikko couldn’t help but laugh. He might make Jo laugh a lot and Mikko laughed a lot in general, but no one made him laugh more than Jo. Even on his worst days, even on Jo’s worst days for that matter, she could always pry a full bellied laugh out of him. It wasn’t even prying. Mikko would willingly give it over to her even when all she offered him was a shitty joke in exchange. It wasn’t lost on Mikko why that was. It wasn’t lost on anyone in the room, or really anyone who had ever spent four minutes in the same room as Mikko and Jo. Mikko looked at Jo differently from other people. Debate what you want about loving someone or being in love with someone, Mikko knew Jo didn’t want him to be in love with her and he respected her wishes more than how he wished she felt, but Mikko Rantanen loved Josephine Evans and it had taken only a few months for it to happen. Mikko realized it the other day on the plane coming back from a road trip. All he wanted was for the plane to get to altitude so he could turn on his phone and text Jo about something funny that had happened since his phone had been in airplane mode. All he wanted to do was get home and see her. All he wanted was her. And that’s not how you feel about people you don’t love. 

“Does the alcohol mean that the good stuff in milk cancels out?” Mikko asked Jo with one half raised eyebrow and one fully raised eyebrow. 

He couldn’t lift one without the other, but he tried anyway. Mikko always tried. 

“I don’t know,” Jo shrugged as she put the lid back on the pot, her full cup in her hand now. “Drink it and we’ll see if you grow some more. You’re still a little too small. A couple more inches and a few more pounds and you’ll be perfect to dress as Fezzik from the Princess Bride next year for Halloween.”

Mikko smiled and laughed through his reply, “I’d rather be the Wesley to your Buttercup though.” 

“That’s actually a pretty solid idea. You’re even already blond, no wigs necessary,” Jo smiled up at him, lips at the edge of her cup.

“Hey, Mik, I need a pong partner.” 

Josty was standing in the kitchen doorway, ping pong ball in hand, already with a slightly glazed over look in his eyes, a few drinks clearly already in him. Mikko definitely wasn’t the best pong player at the party, but his long arms meant he could be kind of shit and still get away with it. 

“You good?” Mikko asked Jo, attention focused solely on her as he waited for confirmation. 

Jo nodded and shooed him off with a wave of her hand to go play a round or two or seven knowing Josty. She could see the pong table set up in the corner of the family room from here and watched Mikko’s face light up when he sank the first cup. It might have been the bitch cup, but he lit up nonetheless. Jo lasted all of about thirty seconds at her observation point in the kitchen alone before Mel slid in, leaning up against the kitchen island next to her.

“Nice sweater,” Mel told her, giving the younger girl a little shove on the arm to get her full attention. 

“It’s itchy as hell, but you know the sacrifices we make for beauty,” Jo joked with her, an eye still on the tall blond boy in the corner of the other room. 

“You two are cute, by the way,” Mel told her with a smile edging at her lips. “I know there’s nothing going on, before you even say it. I’m just saying you two are cute together, that’s all.” 

“Mel,” Jo groaned, but the older girl cut her off with a wave of her hand. 

“I said what I said,” was all she offered Jo in response. 

Jo was pretty sure every single member of the team had cornered Mikko and every single significant other had cornered Jo at least twice now since September about their friendship. Several people insisted they were hiding it, a “real” relationship. Jo always turned her nose up at the idea that friendships didn’t count as real relationships because her friendships had always been the most consistent, best kind of relationships Jo had ever had in her life. Her romantic relationships were unnecessarily complicated with what felt like the entire world feeling like they had a right to an opinion. She felt exposed, like she wasn’t allowed to love people without the world’s approval and even if she had it, she had to love at the pace they wanted, which was so fast that Jo felt all the air rush out of her lungs every single time. Romantic relationships thrived on patience and time, letting them flow as they were supposed to rather than forced up a river before the boat was big enough to handle the rapids. Jo had never gotten to do that and so, they all failed. Her friendships weren’t like that; they were genuine and pure and good, like Mikko. She would ruin him if she tried to turn this romantic, him and them at the same time. She cared about him too much to do that, so she never dwelled on the thought, never let it foster. She refused to witness what the world would do to someone as good as him. 

“Don’t overthink it though,” Mel tossed into the mix of everything that was already swimming in Jo’s mind. “Don’t force it, obviously, but don’t resist it.”

Was Jo really resisting it if she tried, even though she wasn’t one hundred percent successful, to never even let a thought form about it? If she never even let herself for a single second daydream about what it might feel like to be loved by someone as good as him, did that even count as resisting it? Besides, Jo wasn’t even sure it was really on the table. For romance to be on the table, they both had to want it and Jo didn’t know if Mikko wanted that. 

“You’re overthinking,” Mel sang softly. “Don’t sell yourself short, Jo, okay? For someone who loves to kick ass and take names, you won’t take the smallest risk here.” 

Mel didn’t get it. Jo wasn’t risking herself. She was already so damaged, bent until she broke, utterly unlovable that it didn’t even matter. She would be risking Mikko. Mikko with his beautiful smile and his positivity and his determination to make Jo realize she was just as good as him when she knew she never would be. Mikko with his kind eyes and his warm hugs and his patience unmatched by anyone else Jo had ever met. She would be risking one of the best people she had ever met and Jo couldn’t do it. She wouldn’t let her life darken him with a permanent ink stain, coating everything bright and good with an inky black residue that would always weigh him down. There was a version of Jo, a version of her that she hated to admit ever existed, a version of her that believed people could be in love with someone and that their love would fix them, that wouldn’t have thought twice about it. She would’ve reached out and taken him anyway, hoping some of his goodness would transfer over to her without a care in the world for if she took everything he had from him. That version of Jo was thankfully dead, but the one that stood in her place only saw the harm she could cause him, would cause him if she exposed him to what loving her looked like. Jo wouldn’t do it. She wouldn’t watch it happen, not to him, not if it was the hardest thing she ever had to do. 

So, Jo drank her eggnog. She took photos and laughed and smiled and told Mikko he was her best friend, because he pretty much was at this point. No one else even got half of what he got from her. She wore that itchy sweater all night because Mikko thought it was the best thing ever. She wore it until she got to Mikko’s apartment after the party. His was closer to Gabe's and Jo didn’t feel like the effort of going to her place was worth it when Mikko had the best couch in the entire world. Jo kicked her shoes off and threw herself onto the couch the moment she set foot in Mikko’s familiar apartment. He laughed as Jo tucked herself into the cushions, letting herself be swallowed up in them. 

Mikko vanished down the hallway for a moment, returning with one of his t-shirts and sweatpants for Jo to put on instead of her itchy, but iconic, sweater and jeans. Jo groaned as she took the t-shirt from him, knowing it meant she would need to get up to go to the bathroom to put them on, arm flopping down on the couch in disgust. 

“Could be a little more grateful I’m providing a place to sleep and pajamas,” Mikko told her, not able to fake a scolding tone without laughing for more than a few words. 

Jo glared at Mikko as she lifted her head from her spot on the cushions and slid unceremoniously from the couch to head to the bathroom to change. She changed fast, sleep calling her name from the couch she was forced to vacate, brushing her teeth faster than her dentist would approve of with her purple toothbrush Mikko had gotten for her specifically and left it next to his green one. The toothbrush had just shown up one morning after Jo crashed on the couch and Mikko left early for practice. It had been in the bathroom when she had woken up, a little sticky note with Mikko’s horrible handwriting on it.

Jojo’s toothbrush :) 

They had never spoken about it, the sticky note being the only communication they exchanged. Jo had used it, her mind trying not to think about everything a toothbrush at his place was implying, and had put it in the holder next to Mikko’s, trying further not to think about how her toothbrush was next to his. Jo shook the thoughts from her mind again as she rolled the bottom of Mikko’s sweatpants up so she wouldn’t step on them on her way to the couch. Mikko had pulled her favorite blanket out of the closet for her and was waiting on the couch when she came down the hall. 

“You’re so tiny,” Mikko practically giggled as he saw how big the sweatpants and t-shirt were on Jo. He’d seen it before, but he thought it was hilarious every time. “Little Jojo.” 

Jo hated the nickname Jojo from everyone. Her mom didn’t even use it anymore because of the way Jo’s face scrunched up after she said it, disgust plain as day on her face. She let Mikko use it and it even made her smile sometimes, like just now, and like the toothbrush, Jo didn’t let herself think about what it all meant as she climbed onto the couch and snuggled up into Mikko’s broad, warm chest. Mikko was always the perfect amount of warm, enough that his warmth sunk into Jo’s bones, into the places that never seemed to warm up enough. 

“You should sleep in your bed,” Jo mumbled as her eyes started to close. 

“I’ll leave when you fall asleep,” Mikko assured her softly, letting his thumb rub her upper arm softly, crossing the edge of his too long t-shirt sleeve she was wearing on her skin and back gently. 

“M’kay,” Jo sighed contentedly. 

Jo’s eyes didn’t open again that evening. Her breathing slowed, naturally timing with Mikko’s deep breaths, his chest rising and falling against her back lulling her softly to sleep. She was almost asleep, just on the edge of it, when she heard Mikko’s voice whisper softly. 

“I wish you could see how great you are, Jojo.” 

It wasn’t meant for her to hear, so Jo didn’t reply. She drifted off to sleep, trying not to think about what that sentence meant. She also tried not to think about what the purple toothbrush next to his meant and why she slept better next to him than she ever did by herself. But that was a lot of things Jo couldn’t think about and instead, she fell asleep reminding herself exactly why she couldn’t dwell on all of those things. 

-------

Christmas passed with Jo leaving Denver for the first time since she had arrived to spend it with her parents and brother in Florida. Mikko stayed in Denver, but his family came to him at least. She stayed through New Year’s, taking a week-long trip before her brother had to return to school in the Bahamas with her family. Being on a beach somewhere remote, the sun on her face, sand in her toes, made Jo miss Denver more somehow. A week on a beach in the Caribbean plus a week in Florida on a different beach and she was itching to get back to the snow, back to Avalanche games, back to the mile high air. A part of her brain whispered one more thing she wanted to get back to, back to Mikko. Jo already knew that was part of it, and she knew why that was. She loved him. There was no way around that anymore, no vault she could put it in that would even close due to the amount of ever growing love she had for him. Two weeks apart came with almost daily Facetimes and texts, the Christmas morning one standing out brightest of all. Mikko had sent Jo to Florida with his gift for her, covering in wrapping that would’ve made an eight-year-old proud, but horrified a precocious nine-year-old.

“Mikko, this is half tape,” Jo whined into her phone as she tried to break into the box. 

“Not all of us can wrap like we’re a Pinterest mom, Jo,” Mikko scolded her softly, holding up the box she had wrapped for him as evidence. 

“I’ll teach you.” 

Jo laughed as she said it, and Mikko joined her, because they both knew Mikko couldn’t be taught how to wrap a present. He didn’t care enough about crisp lines and details like that. If it was wrapped, it was good for him. Jo had wrapped all of his gifts for everyone this year, except her own. Hers had been Mikko’s only present to wrap this year and he had done an absolutely horrible job. Jo finally managed to get through all of the tape and into the box. She tossed the tissue paper aside to reveal a candle. A candle, of all things. 

“So, okay, remember how I said you have to come to Finland in the summer?” Mikko told her, offering up his explanation for the seemingly random gift in her hand. “Well, that candle smells like Finland. I did a bunch of research and got like, ten or whatever from Etsy, you know Etsy? Anyway, I smelled them all and that one does smell like Finland. I want you to know what it’s like before you get there and you really like candles and stuff.” 

It was objectively a mediocre gift without the context. In context, it almost made Jo cry. The amount of thought behind it. The effort he went into to find the one that reminded him most of where he grew up. The fact that it was a physical representation of his wish to bring her back to the place he grew up. Jo almost cried looking at it. She popped the top off and smelled the candle deeply, ocean and forest mixing with some smells she couldn’t identify but hoped she would be able to soon. She smiled as she put the lid back on and set it aside. 

“I love it, Mik,” Jo smiled at him now. “It’s one of the most thoughtful gifts I’ve ever gotten. Thank you.” 

MIkko smiled widely, dimple popping out as it often did, “There’s a card in the bottom, but you can read it later. I want to open my gift.” 

Jo laughed as Mikko took one last glance at her pristine wrapping job before ripping it to shreds, busting open the box in an effort to find out what was inside as fast as possible. The fact that he had the present under his tree for three days and hadn’t opened it yet was a miracle within itself. And besides, some beautiful things were supposed to be temporary. Jo felt some days like maybe she was one of those temporarily beautiful things and like her beautiful moments had already passed, then she would see the way Mikko Rantanen looked at her for a second and think that maybe some beautiful things were supposed to be beautiful forever and maybe she was one of those things. 

“Okay, I really hope you like it-”

“Jo, I love it,” Mikko cut her off.

Mikko pulled the sweatshirt out of the box and immediately yankedit over his head, smoothing out the image on the front. It was a cartoon caricature of his dog back in Finland, who he missed constantly during the season and talked about often. Jo ordered Mikko’s actual size instead of his preferred too large one. It fit tightly, but comfortably around his shoulders and arms, sleeves managing to be just long enough to cover his arms and reach his wrist. It fit perfectly and Mikko was staring fondly at the image on the front. Jo had picked the cutest picture she could find, one of his dog wearing one of Mikko’s helmets on his head. 

“Fits perfect,” Mikko told her, bright blue eyes lifting from the sweatshirt to his phone to look at her again, his dimple showing itself again. “I love it, Jojo. Thank you.”

“Always, Mik,” Jo smiled softly at him

Maybe it was the holidays getting to her brain, the warmth and comfort of it all, but Jo was inches away from spilling words she could never take back, ones that might alter the beautiful boy on the other end of the phone in a way Jo didn’t want for him.

“What are you thinking about?”

Mikko knew something was up, something was pressing itself forward in her mind, demanding to be said. He could always tell, even from that first night on the rooftop he could always tell. He was always checking, looking for the smallest signs since Jo had never given anything larger than a single grain of sand compared to a beach of outputs. Mikko knew he must have missed thousands of signs by now, so it was important for him to acknowledge all the ones he saw. The worried glance to the right, following by a tap of her short nails on the table, and a quick sigh. She was overthinking.

“I just,” Jo let out a long breath and Mikko waited. He just waited, giving her time and space to choose her words. Jo wanted to tell him she loved him, but she couldn’t use those words, so, instead, Jo let him in for a moment. “Um, remember how you asked me that, um, first day you came over for lunch why I was crying?” 

“I remember, Jo,” Mikko assured her softly, support coming over through his words that somehow seemed to take a physical form, something Jo could reach out and grab onto now to help stay on her metaphorical feet and continue talking. 

“I was upset because I just felt,” Jo took another deep breath and looked at the face on the screen. Mikko’s eyes were steady and true, grounding her, calming her nerves. “I just felt empty. I felt like, I don’t know, it’s stupid, but I just feel sometimes like I’ve worked so hard that I don’t really know who I am anymore, like there really isn’t anything left of me after everything, after everyone took something, I guess.”

Mikko smiled softly, but it wasn’t pity in his eyes. It was love, raw and real and true. But Jo couldn’t see it. She wouldn’t let herself see it.

“Jo, how could there be nothing left when you’re my favorite person I’ve ever met?”

Jo felt the tears well up in her eyes because she knew they were true. Mikko genuinely believed them. Mikko was a lot of things, but he was a terrible liar. He really believed Jo was his favorite person he had ever met. But what was he seeing that could possibly make him feel like that?

Mikko saw all of the fractured parts of Jo hiding in the pieces of her personality, the faces she put on, all living behind the walls she built. Mikko saw all the parts of Jo and he could put the parts together in his mind and see just how beautiful she was. Broken things could still be beautiful. Things that used to be broken and were put back together one piece at a time could also still be beautiful. Things didn’t have to be exactly as they were originally made. 

The word Mikko didn’t know to explain it was kintsugi, an old Japanese tradition of repairing broken pottery with gold. It wasn’t about trying to make the pieces look like it had never been broken. If you tried to do that, the lines where it had broken before would always look like faults, like unsightly scars. But if you joined it back together with gold, you weren’t hiding the past. You were making it beautiful, letting past fractures create an even more beautiful, unique piece when it was all finally assembled again. That’s what Mikko thought about Jo, that all of her pieces were beautiful and that the person she had been before she fractured herself was beautiful too. But Mikko thought that Jo, stitched back together with trust and love like gold, would be even more beautiful, the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. He could see her now and who she would be when she put herself back together, and he loved her all the same.

The conversation ended and Mikko didn’t bring it up again while Jo was in Florida and in the Bahamas with her family. He let his words sit with Jo and acted as a constant reminder of the care and love he showed her, confirming them every single day without ever talking about them again. Jo still didn’t know what Mikko saw in her, but he kept the daily FaceTime calls, never missing one while she was away.

When she got back to Denver, he picked her up from the airport, even though Jo had tried to tell him he didn’t have to. There was takeout in the car for her when she climbed in, the best gift a girl could ask for. Mikko had just laughed at her excitement and driven her home, taking his place on her couch, to go container and a fork in hand, and listened to Jo talk about her trip. Mikko was on that couch or she was on his practically every single day in January with the Avs on a stretch of home games for a good chunk of it and All Star break Mikko didn’t feel like traveling for. He wanted to spend it with Jo, so he did. It wasn’t a decision that required much thought for him, nor was it one he felt the need to defend to his teammates who kept pushing for him to go to a beach somewhere with them. He knew where he wanted to be for All Star break, the same place he wanted to be all of the time, with Jo. 

Since the Christmas morning conversation, Mikko was getting more and more pieces of how Jo’s mind worked and what she thought of herself. They didn’t come in big reveals of insecurity like that one. The comments were small, something about missing being a kid without any worries, something about how Los Angeles felt suffocating, something about how she felt like Denver was too good to be true sometimes. After too many glasses of wine one night as January bled into February, Jo let one bigger thing slip out on Mikko’s couch, something that he couldn’t understand how she could possibly think when he was right there next to her, loving her louder than he meant to. 

“I just don’t think I’m really all that lovable,” Jo admitted one night. “I think loving me is too hard for someone.”

It had almost broken Mikko’s heart, not because he loved her and she didn’t see him. It wasn’t about him. It hurt because someone he loved so deeply, who his love for kept growing every second he spent with her, someone he wanted to give all of his love to, didn’t even think they could be loved.

Mikko would keep showing up at her front door. He would keep loving her until one day she couldn’t deny that just because she might be difficult to love, that didn’t mean she wasn’t worth it. 

-------

Let the record show, Josephine Evans vowed to do absolutely nothing other than eat the chocolates she bought herself and watch cringe-worthy Netflix romantic comedies for Valentine’s Day. It was a date she set up with herself and it only involved moving to her couch to attend the date, so she was pretty sure she wouldn’t have a problem making it and therefore wouldn’t let herself down. Until there was a knock on her door in a pattern that had become incredibly familiar to her since her third day in Denver. Jo groaned as she lifted herself from her couch, moving the chocolates to her coffee table and her blanket around her shoulders. He knew about her date with herself today. Why was he here? 

“Mikko,” Jo groaned as she opened the door.

But she couldn’t be mad at the smiling face on the other side of the door. His dark beanie was pulled down over his ears, his coat buttoned up high on his neck to protect him from the chilly Denver air. His cheeks were flushed from his walk from the parking lot he had long received Jo’s second pass to; he was over so much, she finally surrendered and gave it to him. He didn’t have a key yet, but he was well on his way there. He sniffed a little from the cold as he offered her out a red envelope with her name scratched on it in his handwriting. She had never been mad at Mikko, not even for a minute, since they met. She wasn’t going to start now, even when he crashed her self-love date, with his sweet smile and a fucking valentine. 

“If no one is going to be smart enough to ask you to be their valentine, then I will. Jojo Evans, will you be my valentine?” 

Jo looked at the red envelope in his hands, then up to his smiling face, dimple prominent, eyes still a shade of blue Jo hadn’t figured out how to describe. Not an ocean, not the sky. Nothing was quite right. They were all too cold for how warm his eyes always were. Jo was brought back into the moment by Mikko scrunching his nose up at her and wiggling the envelope, waiting for her answer, even though he knew she couldn’t say no to him. Jo sighed and gave him her best displeased look, before snatching the envelope from his hand. Mikko smiled impossibly wider and pushed into Jo’s apartment, taking up residence on the chair by the couch after leaving his snowy boots by the door. 

Jo ripped open the red envelope carelessly; she had never been good at opening envelopes. The card inside was cliche, sweet to the point of being cavity inducing. There was glitter and hearts and everything you would have put on a card in third grade when you made cards for your classmates, except Mikko didn’t hand make this one, which was probably for the better. He had definitely picked out the most obnoxious one he could find at the store though. It was his short note inside that had Jo clutching the card to her chest as Mikko scrolled through his phone in the living room. 

Happy Valentine’s Day, Jojo-bean :) Hope you don’t mind me crashing. Wouldn’t want to spend today with anyone else

With shaky hands, Jo clipped the card to the front of her fridge, like her mom did with Valentine’s Day cards when Jo was little and still lived in Denver and the world was simple. Jo had been thinking a lot about her childhood, well, her early childhood anyway, when she lived in the suburbs of the city. She hadn’t even driven through her old neighborhood since she had been back. She was sort of afraid of it, not because her time there was bad, the opposite. Her time there was so good. It was pure, not yet ruined like Los Angeles where her family had moved after or New York City, where Jo had unfortunately learned what it was like to be an adult judged by millions of people for every micro-movement she made. That neighborhood in Denver was a safe place, housing memories of her childhood untouched by the harsh reality of twenty-four-year-old Jo’s life. She didn’t want to go and ruin it for herself. But she wanted to go. And maybe, maybe if she took the brightest human she knew with her, his light would cancel out her darkness and those memories would stay a safe haven. 

“Hey, did you have anything planned?” Jo shouted out to Mikko as she made her way into her closet, reaching for a pair of jeans to throw on. 

“Honestly, not really,” Mikko admitted. Jo could hear him talking around the chocolate he’d definitely stolen and was currently trying to hide from her in his mouth, but she let it go with a smile and a shake of her head. “Anything you want to do?” 

“You ask a girl to be your valentine and you don’t even have a plan, Rantanen?” Jo chirped, well, as good as she could chirp, as she yanked on a comfy Avalanche sweatshirt Mikko had gotten for her. 

Mikko laughed and played it off well, “I figured if I was crashing your plans, maybe I’d see what you wanted to do together instead?” 

Jo grabbed her snow boots and a gray hat with a bobble on top she knew Mikko would bat at before they even made it out the door before heading back into the living room where he was waiting. There was chocolate on the corner of his mouth and there was definitely more than one extra empty space in the box, but Jo let it slide. 

“Would you be down to take a little drive out to the suburbs near where I grew up?” Jo asked him as she sat down on the couch to start lacing up her boots. “I haven’t been since I got this place and I kind of want to go?” 

She said it like a question, a bad habit she had picked up in an effort to sound more flexible to other people’s needs, diminishing her own at the same time. Mikko knew what she was doing as he lifted himself out of the chair to grab his boots, staying by the door so he didn’t track snow through Jo’s pristine apartment he’d never seen even a pillow out of place in until he messed it up himself. Mikko knew Jo was trying to hide the fact that she really wanted to go to her old neighborhood, so to her old neighborhood was where they were going to go. 

Mikko drove since Jo really didn’t drive much anymore, at least, that’s why she told herself he drove. It wasn’t because she liked being able to look at him while he drove, large hands on the steering wheel, sunlight across his face, making his eyes look like a different color Jo still couldn’t describe for the life of her. That definitely wasn’t why Mikko usually drove. Mikko let Jo control the music. He’d play exclusively Finnish rap music if she didn’t and besides, music was her job. She had introduced him to so many incredible things he could probably never thank her enough, but really, he always let her control the music because she’d talk about it if he did. She’d walk him through the song, commenting on its construction, the originality, the way it fit together, her passion deep in each analysis. If you were ever lucky enough to hear a person you love talk about their deepest passion in life, you should let them talk as long as they want to. At least, that’s what Mikko thought and that’s why Jo always controlled the music in the car. 

Jo directed them into the suburbs, streets becoming more and more familiar as they exited the city. A sense of home Jo hadn’t felt in a long time flooded her as Mikko took the turn into her old neighborhood, her memory flashing back to all the times her mom and dad had taken that turn with her in the backseat, all the times the school bus she rode as a little kid, all the times she turned that corner on her bicycle. She learned to ride it on this street. The feeling of home was distant, almost foreign in how far away it felt from her. 

“Turn right at the next street, Mik.” 

Mikko nodded, shifting to bopping his head to the music as he turned. Jo added the song to the playlist on his Spotify simply titled “Jo’s Music.” Any time she played a song in the car for him and he seemed to like it, she added it to a playlist for him, in case he wanted to go back and listen to it later. Jo didn’t know that Mikko listened to it every single day without fail. It was his everything playlist. When he didn’t have a specific type of music he was looking for, he put it on. It played when he first got up in the morning as he made himself breakfast and in the car on the way to the arena. It kept him company on flights back to Denver, flights back to Jo, after losing roadies. Every time he played it, he remembered these moments, moments with Jo and him alone, something he knew that when she left Denver eventually he wouldn’t get many of anymore. When each song played, wherever he was, he could hear her voice singing over it, hear the little comments she made, see her bad but still better than his dance moves in his passenger seat. He saw her when it played like she was right there next to him, living his life with him.

“Turn left at the next street, then it’s the third house on the right. It used to be yellow, not sure if it still is.” 

Mikko flicked on his turn signal then turned as Jo instructed. It was easy to spot the house Jo grew up in as soon as they turned the corner. The house was still yellow. And somehow, the fact that the house was still yellow, a color Jo demanded her parents paint it when she was three with no concept that it would make the house look like a bumblebee when they put the black shutters on it, made tears come to her eyes. She wiped them on the back of her hands as Mikko rolled to a stop in front of the house, hoping he didn’t see. He did see, but he let her have a private moment in the passenger seat of his car, ready to step in if her tears shifted from ones sponsored by her childhood to something else, something negative she drove herself to instead. 

“I remember making a snowman every year right there,” Jo told Mikko softly, a hand pointing to the spot on the grass near where the driveway met the walkway. “I wanted to pick the most visible spot to the street, I guess.” 

Mikko nodded softly, then turned the engine off, surprising Jo. He grabbed his keys and slid them into his pocket before stepping out of the car without a word to Jo. He had an idea and he was going to see it through and he knew if he told Jo what it was, she would try to hold him down in the driver’s seat to stop him. Mikko was already knocking on the front door by the time Jo had opened the passenger door of his car and had started to shout to ask him what he was doing. 

The front door opened before Jo could reach Mikko, despite her best efforts to run through the snow, in her large snow boots, to peel him off some poor person’s front porch before he created what Jo thought would be a disaster. Mikko put on his best smile as an elderly woman appeared in the doorway, a confused expression on her face as she surveyed the two twenty-somethings on her doorstep that were too well dressed to be trying to sell her something. 

“Hi there,” Mikko was really trying to pour as much European charm into his voice as he could. “We’re sorry to bother you. I’m Mikko and that’s Jo behind me. This might be a kind of weird request, but Jo actually grew up in this house when she was little and I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind if we built a snowman on your front lawn? We won’t come inside or cause any trouble, I promise. We just want to build a snowman, or really, I want to build one with Jojo like she did when she was a kid.” 

The woman looked at Mikko and Jo watched her absolutely melt under his dimpled smile and kind eyes. Her hands came up over her heart, one on top of the other and she gasped softly. She looked at Mikko like he was heaven sent, which Jo thought someday might not be too far off from the truth. She turned to Jo, the look of adoration on her face staying strong. 

“Your boyfriend is the sweetest little, well, big, piece of peach pie I’ve ever seen,” she told Jo, the adoration on her face dripping from each word. “Of course, build away!”

The door closed before Jo could correct her, that Mikko wasn’t her boyfriend, just her boy friend, her best friend really. No one else was even coming close to vying for that job title anymore. Mikko turned and smiled at her and Jo sort of forgot why that distinction even mattered for a second, lost in the moment of one of the sweetest things anyone had done for her in awhile, or, at least since Mikko had show up at her door this morning with a valentine for her. 

“Get our gloves from the car and we’ll get started, yeah?” Mikko asked her. 

Jo turned on her heels to head to the car, but Mikko’s hand grabbing her wrist stopped her and pulled her back to him. He was chewing his bottom lip as his eyes shifted to look at the concrete beneath his feet. Jo used his hand on her wrist as an anchor and leaned into him, her other hand falling on his chest making him lift his eyes back to hers.

“I didn’t overstep, right?” he asked her, his voice much softer than for his first question. “Did I make you uncomfortable?” 

“No, Mikko,” Jo said firmly, her voice solid and sure, strong and supportive. “You surprised me, but this whole day so far is one of the sweetest things anyone has done for me in a long time. You’re the best, Mik.” 

Mikko pulled his lips tight over his teeth, nodded softly, then let his trademark smile come back over his face as he looked down at Jo. Mikko slowly let a part of him he kept tucked far away from the surface come up, letting it guide his hand to transition to holding hers instead of her wrist, fingers lacing together. Mikko tugged Jo closer by their conjoined hands, her boots shuffling against the floor to comply easily with his request. 

Mikko Rantanen wasn’t harboring a secret love for Josephine Evans. It was clear as day to everyone, even Jo herself. It was in his shaky handwriting on the card from earlier. It was in the purple toothbrush at his place. It was in the car rides. It was in the hugs after games. It was in the texts that always started with, “Saw this and thought you’d like it.” It was in the knock on the front door of her childhood home. It was in the way he was looking at her right now. His love was right there, breaking on the surface, begging Jo to jump into the deep waters of his ever growing love for her. Mikko loved her more than she could understand, probably more than he could fully understand either, but he could feel it. She could feel it as his head slowly leaned down towards hers, her eyes fluttering closed as she felt his warm breath fanning out across her face.

But Jo couldn’t jump in. The water might have been deep and warm and crystal clear, the kind she wanted to swim in forever. But Jo was still a hurricane. She would cause a storm over that water, over the lands that made up Mikko touching it, and wreak havoc on it all. Her winds would cause his love for her to destroy him, the water crashing to shore, washing away everything that made him her favorite person, water damage rotting the parts that didn’t wash away.

Jo couldn’t jump in, but she never wanted anything more as she could feel him, his lips inches from hers now. Jo was saved from the moment by the front door to the house she grew up in opening again. Mikko recoiled back before Jo could even open her eyes. 

“Oh, sorry!” the elderly woman said. “Sorry, I interrupted you two sweethearts. Would you like some hot chocolate? I can get a batch going on the stove. Don’t want you two getting too cold out here.”

Mikko looked at Jo all the same, like that moment hadn’t just happened, but it was almost like it hadn’t. Because Jo never had time to pull away. She never stopped it, something outside of both of them did, so Mikko’s love remained untouched, calming waves still washing over her through his soft eyes and kind smile, through the very day he created for her and her alone. She loved him too. Standing on the porch of her childhood home, she loved him too. She loved him as deep as he loved her. That was so clear to her in the place where her heart felt lightest. He knew she loved him too. He knew today wasn’t the day she could share with him, the walls still too high. Mikko believed one day she could. Jo didn’t. And that made all the difference. 

“Hot chocolate would be great,” Mikko told the woman softly, his eyes staying on Jo. 

“Coming right up!” The woman spun to head toward her kitchen, the door almost completely shut before it opened again so she could ask, “Marshmallows?” 

“Of course,” Jo smiled at her.

“Me too,�� Mikko added, his voice as embedded with happiness as ever. 

“You got it!”

With that, Jo and Mikko were back to being alone on the front porch. There wasn’t an awkwardness in the air though because Mikko didn’t feel turned down. He didn’t feel pushed aside. He simply felt like it wasn’t the right time and that the right time was just a little further down the road. Some days it seemed a little further down the road than others. Today it seemed close. It didn’t matter how far it was to Mikko though. He’d keep going anyway, even if the right time never came. If their lives changed and Jo found someone else, then he would too, but he’d never stop loving her. The love would just shift and Mikko would continue to keep on walking and being in Jo’s life. You can’t say you love someone, then stop if they can’t love you the same way you love them because then you don’t love them. You love the idea of them. Mikko loved Josephine, not his idea of her. So, he kept going. Today, keeping going meant walking to the car to grab their gloves to build a snowman on the front lawn of her childhood home. 

Mikko tossed Jo’s gloves at her, hitting her square in the chest, as he rejoined her by the snowman spot. Jo glared at him, but it fell into a smile quickly when Mikko laughed at her glare. Jo rolled her eyes at his laugh as she slowly gathered up some snow in her hand, packing it down tightly as Mikko squatted down to start creating an initial ball for the base of the snowman. Jo took her newly formed snowball and shifted it solely into her right hand then, without thinking about any possible repercussions, she threw it as hard as she could at Mikko’s left shoulder. The look on Mikko’s face when he looked over his shoulder at Jo made her instantly laugh, but she covered her mouth to try and be a little sympathetic. Mikko’s jaw was slack, blue eyes wide with artificial horror. His head was shaking softly from left to right as he stared at Jo. 

“Jojo,” Mikko drawled out slowly, taking his time to harp on each syllable like a frustrated mother with a petulant toddler, except Mikko was very, very bad at it. 

“Mikko,” Jo drew out the last vowel in his name as long as she could, until a smile forced itself onto his face. 

“Expect payback when you least expect it,” Mikko vowed. “Now, are you going to help me build us the best snowman ever or are you going to cause problems?” 

“Who said I can’t do both?” Jo smiled slyly as she joined Mikko on the ground. 

“Touché,” Mikko laughed, nodding softly as he did. “Touché, Jojo.” 

The day Mikko had first used that nickname she had hated since she lived in this house was far in the past now. Jo realized as she started to roll a giant snowball around the front yard of her childhood home with her best friend who was too large for this activity in all reality that she didn’t hate it anymore because she couldn’t think about that nickname without hearing it in his voice. Mikko had attached himself to that nickname and Jo was pretty sure there wasn’t anything Mikko was capable of that could make her hate him. The bottom snowball got too big for Jo to roll around quickly, but Mikko easily took over and let Jo get started on the second one instead. Even though it was just snowballs, it felt like a representation of them. Jo’s life felt too big, too tough for her to ever push aside, or to ever brute force into being something beautiful in spite of how messy it really was. But she could do parts of it, the early stages where everything could easily fall apart, Jo was working on her life, part by part, a section at a time. If the snowball fell apart, she tried again. She didn’t fall into her couch and surrender with a bottle of wine anymore. She let out a deep breath and tried again because she knew she wasn’t alone. There was a tall blond boy, rolling a snowball around the yard, would would help her push her life into the shape she wanted it to be if she asked for his help. Jo didn’t even really have to ask. He could see clearly when she was struggling, when she couldn’t get to the end of something, when she couldn’t finally delete that toxic person’s phone number, when she couldn’t cut the final thread holding someone in her life who didn’t deserve to be there, when she was so close to getting out of a thought spiral. Mikko stood behind her, his warm presence and her least favorite nickname, encouraging her with a patience unmatched by anyone she had ever encountered. Any sane person would’ve given up by now. But people in love weren’t really all that sane. 

“Hot chocolate! I even found some to go cups so you kids don’t have to worry about anything.” 

Of course this angelic grandmother would have to-go coffee cups for hot chocolate. Of course she would. And of course she would go to all the trouble of finding a carrot for the snowman’s nose and bringing some coals from her grill out back out front for them to use as buttons and eyes. Of course some people on the planet were this good and pure and wonderful and absolutely deserving of love. 

“You didn’t have to do all this,” Jo sighed gratefully as she took the hot chocolate from her. 

“Oh, don’t be silly,” she hushed Jo with a careless wave of her hand. “I’m happy to help you two kids out. It’s like my grandkids are here, well, like when they were here when they were eight.” 

She disappeared back into the house with another wave of her hand, telling the two of them to have fun. Jo took a sip of her hot chocolate at the same time Mikko did, both of them sighing contentedly at the the warm, sweet beverage. A shiver ran down Jo’s spine as the hot chocolate heated her up from the inside out. Jo scrunched her nose and smiled at Mikko over the top of her cup and of course he smiled back. It was never a question of if he would. 

“I think you might need to be done with that boulder of a snowball you’re making,” Jo noted as she observed Mikko’s handiwork. “You’re going to make it so big that the second one is going to have to be so big we can’t lift it.” 

“You might not be able to lift it, but you’re tiny so,” Mikko trailed off as a smirk lifted the corners of his mouth. 

“Not all of us can be giants,” Jo rolled her eyes at him. “The worlds needs shorter people who don’t mind climbing cabinets and counters and shelves and other people to get what they want in life.” 

“Pretty sure no one could ever stop you from getting what you want, Jo,” Mikko laughed. “At least, I wouldn’t want to be between you and whatever you wanted. Seems like a dangerous place to be.” 

Except there was really only one thing Jo wanted and she couldn’t stop thinking about how badly she wanted it as Mikko set his hot chocolate aside to roll the base snowball into place and transitioned to taking over the second one so Jo could start on the snowman’s head. It was the only thing she could think about as Mikko helped her stack the two smaller snowballs on top of the first, as he accidentally shoved the carrot almost through the snowman’s head in excitement, as Jo had to stop him from directly handling the coals to prevent him from making a mess of his hands. He grabbed some nearby twigs for arms and Jo found the perfect one to bend to make a smile. The elderly woman came out and took their photo with their snowman who was obviously a little lumpy, but Jo thought it was the best snowman she had ever made. 

Still, there was only one thing Jo could think as Mikko slid his hat back on and they climbed back in his car, declaring the day well spent. 

The only thing Jo wanted was Mikko Rantanen and the only thing standing in the way was Jo herself. Jo was only standing in the way because she loved him. She would stand in the way for as long as it took, just to protect him from it all. Jo would stand in the middle of a hurricane for Mikko Rantanen, rooting herself into the ground to keep herself there, category five winds and all. She would stand there for the rest of her life if that’s what it took to make sure he was still this optimistic, still this kind, still her favorite person because she wouldn’t let anyone else ruin him. She wouldn’t. 

------

With the Avalanche in a playoff push from late February to late March when they finally clinched a spot, Jo had seen Mikko on her couch less, but she hadn’t talked to him any less. He insisted she was his good luck charm and talked to her every single night, even if the team had gotten blown out the game before, he still claimed they would definitely lose if he didn’t talk to her. But Josephine Evans wasn’t all that lucky anymore. All the luck she had, her life’s allotment, had been used to get her to where she was now, in this apartment, with her childhood dream made a reality. Teenage Jo was lucky. Adult Jo? The opposite of lucky. 

She had just gone to the grocery store. She was missing one ingredient to bake oatmeal cookies, Mikko’s favorite, and he had asked her early that morning if she could make them to celebrate clinching the playoffs. He didn’t really need a reason to get her to bake them. Jo baked for him whenever he wanted, the smallest token she could give him to show her appreciation for him, her love for him that she couldn’t admit. It had just been brown sugar, stupid brown sugar, and suddenly six months of a secret had been destroyed, photos of her in an Avalanche sweatshirt in a Denver supermarket were everywhere. The only lucky part was that unlike almost everything Jo owned with the Avalanche logo on it, it was a plain sweatshirt, absent of the number ninety-six or Rantanen on it. Mikko was still unknown. He was still good, still untouched by her real life, the one she was starting to wish she wouldn’t have to go back to. 

Jo couldn’t even bake because her hands were shaking so badly. Today was supposed to be a good day, a great day, because her best friend had achieved something great and it was sunny out. Sunny days were supposed to be good days. Instead, there was a barrage of articles slamming Jo about how she had left her career to do absolutely nothing in Colorado, how she was a “has-been” now since no one has seen her in six months. Then the crazy theories started picking up. Rehab was a popular one Jo saw; there were lots of good facilities in the Denver area apparently, unknown to Jo. Her sweatshirt was baggy, so naturally Jo had to be pregnant, a constant rumor that showed itself every six months or so at the press’s whim. The stories were crazier from there, some nonsensical as always. People were saying they wished she would never come back, picking apart every single part of Jo they didn’t like, turning them into reasons she should just stay out of the public eye forever. Everything, from her hair to her smile to the way her voice sounded to the way she talked in interviews, that list quickly becoming too personal, people saying they were the reasons all her relationships had failed, all the reasons no one loved her. Normally, Jo could handle it, but six months without it had made her softly, more vulnerable, more normal, and everything hurt. Her head was spinning and her heart was pounding. Jo needed to stop reading. She threw her phone across the room and took a show to try and catch her breath for a moment. She turned the water up too hot, willing it to burn the negative feelings that were eating her alive to no avail. They were all internal. 

When she got out of the shower, her phone had blown up with the Avalanche girlfriends, wives, and Jo, as it was now named, group chat. Everyone was talking about the bar for later for the celebration. In the chaos of the day and the heavy feeling in her mind and her chest, Jo had forgotten she had promised Mikko she would meet him at the bar with the rest of the team when they landed, the real celebration. The cookies Jo had failed to make were supposed to be used as sponges for the alcohol they would be consuming so Mikko could actually make it to practice in the morning. 

Jo tried. Jo really, really tried. She got all dressed up, black bodysuit, black jeans, black heels, red lipstick, hoping that looking good would make her feel good enough to get out of her apartment. She got as far as her hand on the door knob, purse over her shoulder, before her eyes clouded up again and she realized she couldn’t do this. She tried so hard to put on a brave face, thinking she could get through today and deal with the overwhelming feeling that maybe they were all right and Jo had just given up, taken the heat and let it burn herself away for the sake of success, but the fire was too untamed, too strong, and it burned away everything instead, meaning losing herself was for nothing. The winds were too high, the storm was too strong, and Jo wasn’t making it to the bar. 

Hey Mik. I know you might not have landed yet, but I’m not feeling too good, so I’m not going to be able to make it to the bar. Have a good time without me!

Jo sent the text without reading it over again and tossed her phone aside, knowing if she held onto it, she would just go looking for more things that would feed the hurricane already verging on a category five in her mind that Jo felt like was sucking all of the air out of the room. With still shaking hands, Jo fumbled with her heels, her skinny jeans, the bodysuit she had picked out because it made her feel confident, and returned to her baggy sweatpants and big t-shirt she had been wearing earlier. She went to light the candle on the nightstand, but realized it wasn’t the one she wanted. She pushed around half used candles in the drawer below, until her hands wrapped around one that had made the journey from Denver to Florida in a terribly wrapped box, and back, tucked safely in her suitcase, the one the boy she was in love with gave to her because it smelled like his home. Jo lit the candle after almost dropping the lighter twice then climbed into bed. Jo took deep breaths, trying to calm herself with what Nousiainen, Finland was supposed to smell like and how that made her think of the person who made her happiest, the boy who was from there who wanted to take her there and show her around the place that made him, him. 

Jo wished she was there right now. She wished she was in a place she had never been before and it didn’t fail to dawn on her just how fucking pathetic that was. She hated fame, the thing she dreamed about every night, the thing she wished for when she blew out her birthday candles when she was seven, the thing that gave her everything around her right now, that she wished she was in a place she had never been before. Jo had hundreds of stamps in her passport, but she wished she was somewhere she had only seen in the pictures she painted in her mind from the stories Mikko told about it. She wished she was there because of the way Mikko smiled whenever he talked about it, a calm, warm smile, steady and sure. Home. It was his home, something Jo wasn’t even sure she really had anymore. She was from Denver. She lived in Denver now, technically still temporarily, but she didn’t have a home. She wanted to be home right now, but there was nowhere in her life to get that feeling, so she wanted to see if maybe the home of the person she loved was close enough. 

Maybe that was part of the reason Jo felt empty all of the time because she never truly settled anywhere. There was no place on earth her soul was at rest that she was allowed to stay. She didn’t have a safe haven, just more empty apartments and hotel rooms in cities that tried to swallow her up. Maybe she left pieces of herself in all the places she had been, trying to make a home for herself. But that’s not how homes worked, so Jo had just failed and lost herself in her failure. 

Today, Jo was standing in the middle of a spinning hurricane, getting battered by the winds and the things they threw even though she was trying to stand in the eye, trying to stay out of its way, it was hurting her anyway. And she felt so deeply alone all she could do was cry. 

Except there was a knock on her front door and Jo felt the hurricane stop for a moment. The winds ceased, everything they picked up frozen in time and space as Jo walked to her front door. She opened it without even checking, even though the only person who normally knocked was at a bar, having a great night like he deserved. 

“Okay, I didn’t know what kind of not feeling good you were, so I picked up wonton soup from your favorite Chinese place in case you were feeling sick, ice cream in case you were upset about someone getting engaged or having a baby again, and Sour Patch Kids in case- Josephine, what’s wrong?” 

Josephine. In six, almost seven, months of knowing Mikko Rantanen, he had never called her Josephine. Not once. 

Jo couldn’t answer. She just cried, a sob wracking her body. Mikko shifted forward, dropping the bags on the front table, and reached for her. He pulled her into his chest, one arm around her back, the other letting his hand cup the back of her head protectively. 

“Josephine, what’s wrong? What happened?”

Jo’s hand fisted into his dark t-shirt, the material soft and forgiving under her hands. She was crying harder, sobs shaking her body over and over again. She felt Mikko press a gentle, lingering kiss to her hair. 

“Jo, I’m right here. I’m right here,” he told her softly. “It’s me, Mikko. I’m right here, baby.” 

Mikko was right there, but it was more than that. He was standing next to her in the hurricane. He wasn’t on the outside looking in. This was it. This was what the eye of the hurricane looked like. The storm blocked out all light, anything good, it was pure negativity, daring him to become part of it.Mikko didn’t know what to do. It was the most overwhelming feeling he had ever felt, feeling the storm licking at his back, trying to rip him away from her, but he had her. She was right here, in his arms, and nothing was taking her away. Mikko didn’t understand it all, but he didn’t have to. He just had to be there. He just had to stay. 

Mikko scooped Jo into his chest, arms securing around her waist, just so he could get her to bed. He kicked his shoes off by the door, knowing Jo would still be mad at him if he tracked mud through her apartment even on her worst days. This was the worst day Mikko had ever seen, but she was still Jo, even on her worst days. He still loved her more today than yesterday and he’d love her more tomorrow than today. 

He stripped off his jeans and tossed his jacket into the chair in her room, sliding into bed with her without even thinking about it. Jo wrapped her arms around his torso and pressed her face into his chest and continued to cry. Mikko slowly worked his fingers through her hair, doing his best to keep it out of her face as she cried. He knew it would upset her if it stuck to her face, so he tried to fix that. He couldn’t fix Jo tonight, but he could fix her hair sticking to her face. 

“I’m sorry,” Jo mumbled. “I’m ruining your day. Today is supposed to be a good day for you and I’m ruining it.” 

“I want to celebrate with you, Jo,” Mikko told her softly. “It doesn’t have to be today. It’s okay if it’s not today. I care about you. If this is what you need today, this is what we’ll do. We’ll celebrate tomorrow, okay?” 

Mikko kissed her forehead sweetly, lips lingering on her again. Jo shuffled in the bed next to him, adjusting so her arm was around his hips as she settled against her own pillow, tears finally slowing. Mikko reached a hand out gently, cupping her face and letting his thumb rub cross her skin to wipe away the tear stains. 

“They found me here,” Jo admitted. “Someone posted a photo.” 

“I’m sorry, Jojo. I know that’s not what you wanted,” Mikko spoke softly, careful not to upset her further.

“I knew it would happen at some point,” Jo shrugged, eyes clouding up again. “I guess I had just been able to hide here for so long I started to think maybe I would never be found? Maybe I could just stay here and I wouldn’t have to deal with it all, you know? I just, I feel like myself here, more than anywhere else, but now I feel like it’s ruined and I’m ruined with it.”

“Jo, you’re not ruined,” Mikko assured her, thumb gently passing over her lips he desperately wanted to kiss. “Things can be damaged, but still be beautiful. You’ve dealt with a lot of shit, Jo, and you’re still here and I’m so impressed by you always.”

Mikko cleared his throat softly, before daring to add, “For what it’s worth, you’re the most beautiful person I know. This version of you. This crying, messy version of you, this real version of you, is the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen. I feel lucky to know you, Josephine Evans, so lucky.”

“Not sure you should, Mik,” Jo told him. “I can be a pretty rough friend.” 

“I play hockey for a living,” Mikko cracked his first smile since walking through her front door. “I like it rough sometimes.” 

Jo smacked his chest, hard, and he just laughed, chest shaking under her hand. Jo tried so hard not to laugh, but Mikko’s laugh was infectious, replicating in her, making her laugh too. His laugh was like sunshine breaking through the clouds hanging over Jo’s head. The storm was breaking, the winds slowing, and Jo felt like there was finally air in the room again. Jo took time away because she couldn’t stop working and she couldn’t stop working because she was trying to please a mass of people she would never meet who only wanted to say terrible things about her. Today, they won, but Jo was starting to see that she wasn’t perfect. She made mistakes, like the angry mob with pitchforks said she did, but a broken clock was still right twice a day, but was wrong for the other one-thousand four-hundred and thirty-eight minutes in a day. 

“Hey, Mikko?” 

“Yeah, Jo?” he replied softly. 

“Is there ice cream melting on my front table right now?” she asked him, a smile playing at the corners of her mouth, noticeable in her voice. 

“No,” Mikko replied smoothly. “It was very frozen when I got here because your favorite flavor was almost sold out and I had to get a frosty one from the back of the freezer, so I was just warming it up to the perfect temperature for us right now. I’ll go get two spoons because it’s definitely perfect right now.” 

“If you say so, Rantanen. If you say so.”

------

From the moment Jo woke up with her legs tangled in Mikko’s, his shirt shed to the floor in the middle of the night, an arm secure around her waist, and his golden hair a mess on top of his head, Jo knew she didn’t want to wake up next to anyone else, maybe ever again. She also knew that if she wanted to, if she asked him to stay forever, he would. There was never a doubt in Jo’s mind that Mikko loved her, not since she unwrapped that candle, sitting on her nightstand now. That was never in question. There was no question really. Jo knew he loved her, but she also knew she loved him. Even if everyone on the outside was wrong, they would still rip him apart. Insults don’t have to be based in any truth to sink deep, to leave cuts and scars. Even if Jo somehow got a handle on herself and could block some of it out, she couldn’t protect him. He would get the same treatment, the beautiful boy with the beautiful soul who loved her, no questions asked. She couldn’t watch it happen to him. Even if she put herself all the way back together, watching him take beating after beating wasn’t an option. She loved him too much to let it happen. 

Jo untangled herself from him as best as she could, sliding a pillow into his grasp as a replacement for her, smiling when he sleepily tugged it into his chest. Jo set out to do something she could do really well, make Mikko pancakes and oatmeal cookies. An absolutely unbalanced breakfast, but the first of things Jo could think to do to thank him for skipping out on his team’s celebration, his celebration, in favor of wiping her tears and braving it all just to hold her as she slept. The least she could do was make him breakfast today, and throw his clothes in the laundry so he could take home clean clothes, while also returning a shirt and sweatpants she stole from him, and send him home with a container of cookies. 

Three dozen oatmeal cookies in the oven, laundry in the dryer, and pancakes on the stove later, Mikko made an appearance in her kitchen. 

“You stole my clothes,” he mumbled, voice gravely with sleep. 

“They’re in the wash. I left you a t-shirt and sweats I stole before,” Jo said, not even bothering to turn around. 

Mikko slid up behind Jo suddenly, and arm wrapping tightly around her waist. From the feeling of him pressed against her, he’d found the sweatpants, but forgoed the shirt she left him. Jo couldn’t help but lean back into him. Mikko’s free hand found Jo’s braced against the counter’s edge next to the stove and tugged her wrist until she lifted her hand to lace their fingers together. His head leaned down, back arching away from hers so he could put his chin on her shoulder. 

“You’re making me pancakes,” he muttered. “God, Jo. I- fuck, you’re killing me.” 

“Did you want blueberry pancakes? I wasn’t sure, but I can add some,” Jo started rambling. “Or should I have made something healthier? Fuck, I’m just feeding you bad food, aren’t I? I’m sorry. I can make you eggs. Over easy right? I think I have some turkey bacon?”

“Josephine,” Mikko said softly, sleep slowly edging out of his voice. There was her full name again. “You know that’s not what I’m talking about. You know what I was going to say.” 

Mikko’s hand squeezed hers softly as she felt his head leave her shoulder. She gasped when he shifted suddenly, hand leaving hers to let his arm around her spin her to face him, spatula ditched in the pan. He was right there, forehead finding hers. He was right there, steady and sure and so ready for her. Except she wasn’t ready for him. He could see it. He could see it in her eyes, the anxiousness, the uncertainty. She wasn’t ready, but she wished she was. Mikko couldn’t kiss the girl he loved, the one who slept in his arms last night, the one standing right in front of him. But he could see the walls falling. He was seeing more of her now, the parts of her that were real, the parts that he knew loved him too. But it wasn’t about Mikko seeing it. Jo needed to say it. She needed to be ready to love him too, and she wasn’t today. And that was okay. 

“It’s okay,” Mikko told her. “I’m not going anywhere, okay?” 

Mikko lifted his forehead from hers, letting his lips drop to where his head had been, kissing Jo’s forehead gingerly. He gave her hips a little squeeze, a smile coming across his face. Just like that, like it never happened, like it wasn’t an open conversation just then about how Mikko Rantanen was in love with her and was ready to love her if she was ready too. Just like that, he was her best friend again, loving her still, just from the other side of the kitchen island, throwing the blueberries she grabbed out of the fridge at her because Mikko did in fact want blueberry pancakes. Jo added blueberries to the pancakes, and letting Mikko pelt her with a few, giggling the whole time, 

The pancakes and the laundry and the oatmeal cookies were just the start. Jo spent the entire playoff run doing her best to do anything she could for Mikko, to try and say thank you. Thank you for that night. Thank you for the previous eight months by the time the playoffs came to end for the Avalanche. Thank you for still being just as patient with her as he’d been the first night on the rooftop. Thank you for seeing something real and worthwhile in Jo, even when she couldn’t. 

Jo watched the Avalanche’s season end on her television since it didn’t end in Denver. All Mikko did after the loss was text Jo and tell her they were coming back that same night and the time they would land. It was an ungodly time, but Jo didn’t hesitant. She slid on leggings, a big sweatshirt, and some sneakers when the time came. The streets of Denver were quiet as Jo drove to the airport. She waited in her car, knowing Mikko wouldn’t want her to make a big fuss. She watched him come across the tarmac, spotting her car. He tossed his suitcase in the back, then climbed in the front seat without a word. 

Jo put on some soft music, something new she’d found during the first series when Mikko was away. He was quiet as Jo drove back to her apartment, just letting his eyes close even though Jo knew he wasn't asleep, just listening to the music. It wasn’t until they were close to Jo’s apartment Mikko finally spoke. 

“Can I stay with you tonight?” 

Mikko’s voice was soft in the worst way, hesitancy, insecurity, and vulnerability showing. He needed her tonight, desperately. He wasn’t asking to stay on her couch. He was asking to stay with her, to fall asleep holding her, in her bed, with her. He’d only done it once before, that night when clinched the playoffs, when Jo needed him. Mikko didn’t ask much of Jo usually, just that she showed up. He was asking for a lot tonight and he felt so guilty for it. 

“Of course, Mik. Anything you need.”

“I need you to come to Finland.” 

The words slipped out before Mikko could stop them. He didn’t mean to say them. He felt that way, like he wanted to pack Jo up in his suitcase and take her with him, but he wasn’t supposed to say it. 

“For a visit in the summer,” Mikko added too late for it not to clearly be an afterthought.

Jo was a better person than everyone often gave her credit for. She took a deep breath and let Mikko’s last minute addition be the full statement to her, even though she knew what he meant. He didn’t want her to visit. He wanted her to come and spend the summer with him. He wanted her to come back to Denver with him the following September and stay. He wanted her forever. That’s what Mikko wanted. That’s what he meant. But Jo, for his sake and hers because that couldn’t be talked about on a night Mikko was torn up about the loss, pressed her foot on the gas, put her eyes back on the road, and pretended like it wasn’t. 

“Well, my little brother’s graduation is in two weeks,” Jo told him, choosing her words carefully. “Then we’re all going to Hawaii to celebrate that. Surprisingly, I do have other friends, a couple bachelorette parties. And you’ve got that trip with your friends mid-June, right?” 

Mikko nodded softly, blue eyes fixed on the road ahead as Jo drove. 

“How about I come for Midsummer?” Jo asked him. “You’ve talked about how great it is. That’s the end of June, yeah? Seems like the perfect time. I don’t really have any firm plans after that honestly, so maybe I’ll just come and we can figure out when I’ll leave later? Leave it open ended?” 

“I’d really like that,” Mikko breathed out. 

It would be seven weeks before he got to see her again after he left. He’d seen her for the next few days as he packed up his life, cleaned out his apartment here, but after that, he wouldn’t see her for seven more weeks. But the thought of having her in Finland, of getting to show her his home like she had shown him hers on Valentine’s Day, of getting to show her off to people Mikko knew wouldn’t give a shit that she was Josephine Evans, and to do it all without an expiration date. Just him and her, for months if he wanted and god, did Mikko want that. But first, he would get to hold her as he fell asleep tonight. 

Jo didn’t even say anything that night when he cried a little into her hair. She just pressed a kiss to his shoulder and snuggled in tighter, which was exactly what Mikko needed. He talked a lot sometimes, arguably too much when he was excited, but when he was hurting, he just wanted silence and assurance that everything would be okay. Nothing assured him more that everything would eventually work out than Jo because he knew things with her would eventually work out like they were supposed to. The chips would fall, a picture would form, the world would keep spinning, and Mikko would keep on loving Jo as best as he could, waiting for her to realize there wasn’t anything that would make him stop. 

------

Jo looked around her physically unchanged apartment, but it still felt different. Mikko hadn’t even been gone twenty-four hours yet and her apartment already felt different. He had been absent from it for longer than that since she had known him, several times over on road trips, but it was different knowing he wouldn’t be back in it until September, if Jo even decided to keep this place. Jo was kidding herself if she thought she would get rid of it though and didn’t even pretend she would for a second. Even when Jo would have to go back to Los Angeles, go back to a version of her life she didn’t like herself in as much, she still wanted to have Denver be an option for her whenever she wanted. When she wanted might happen to frequently line up with home games played by a certain blond Finnish boy, and he would be grateful if that was the choice she made, which meant she was going to make it as often as possible. 

Krista, who had stayed almost completely silent since Jo arrived in Denver in September, reached out under the guise of just checking in on Jo, but really making sure that she was still planning on coming back and getting started on her next album by the end of the summer. If she was, they would need to start looking at possible arena dates for two summers from now because that’s how far that sort of thing gets booked. Jo just answered curtly, saying that was still her plan, and tossing her phone aside. The thought of going back to it all was overwhelming and the one person who made it all go away with a smile and a laugh was nine hours ahead of her where it was three in the morning and she wasn’t going to wake him up for this. 

Jo opened the top drawer of her nightstand all the way, finding the plastic bag tucked safely in the back. She had to put them in plastic because the Valentine’s Day card kept getting glitter in everything else in the drawer. Jo had saved the cards Mikko had gotten her and every Post-It note he left. There was the Post-It note that had been on the now well worn jersey hung up in her closest. There was simple, yet confusing at the time but incredibly unconfusing now, one identifying a purple toothbrush that lived next to his green one as hers. There was the glitter bomb of a Valentine’s Day card where he asked her to be his valentine in the most sickeningly sweet way possible. If Jo ever doubted if she had Mikko Rantanen’s heart, one look at the collection of items covered in his terrible handwriting in front of her would confirm she’d had it for longer than she realized. 

There was a card from when he bought her flowers for his birthday to say thank you for baking him a cake. Of course Mikko would buy her flowers on his birthday. Of course he would. 

Just wanted to say thanks for the cake. Might have been the best birthday cake I’ve ever had, but don’t tell my mom yours is better :) - Mikko

Jo smiled at the memory of the beautiful flowers that Mel had definitely picked out because there was now way Mikko knew any flowers other than roses and the bouquet hadn’t been roses. She found what she was looking for, the card from Christmas. The card itself was simple, very few words or images printed on it by the company who made it, mostly just a little snowman on the front corner and Merry Christmas inside. It was Mikko’s writing on the card that Jo was looking for. 

Hi Jojo, 

Merry Christmas! I hope you like the candle and that you don’t think it’s a silly gift or something. I don’t think you will, but if you do, don’t tell me, okay? I spent way too much time on it :) 

I hope your Christmas is good and that you have a really good New Year’s too. If I can make a suggestion, I think I know what your New Year’s resolution should be this year. (I googled that word to spell it right for you, hope you’re proud.) Anyway, I think your resolution should be to try and realize how amazing you are. I know I haven’t known you that long, but you’re kind of the best Jo, not even kind of. You are the best, Jo. I know that’s a hard resolution probably, but lucky for you, my New Year’s resolution is to help you see it too. :) Because you’re one of my favorite people and I really hope one day, this upcoming year, you can understand why.

Merry Christmas, Jojo-bean. Happy to be your friend always. - Mikko

The words on the card were a little blurred because Jo was crying now. She had waited her entire life, dreamed internally in her mind and openly in the songs she put out, to find someone like him, someone who loved her without any reservations. Mikko Rantanen loved her selflessly, not looking for anything for himself in his love for her. His love was pure and real. Jo could feel it when he was around, in the way he hugged her, in the way he spoke to her, in the constant effort he put in to spend as much time with her as he could, in the message on the card in her hands. His love was focused on her.

Jo took a deep breath and slid the cards and notes back into the bag, a calm coming over her that only came from Mikko. Jo wanted to accept every ounce of love he offered her, let it fill her forever, but in opening herself up to allow that, her toxicity would flow into him. The toxicity Jo picked up from her life would flow back into him and ruin him and Jo didn’t want that to happen, but Jo was starting to wonder how long she could really keep him at bay. How long could she really keep him out? In trying to help her, he was breaking down walls she’d build to protect herself, but also protect people like him from her. She would keep trying to make sure he stayed at arm’s length, make sure he stayed separate from her, because that was the best way she could love him, by preventing him opening himself up to a world of negative feelings and experience he didn’t fully understand. Jo had seven weeks to try and figure out how to keep him at a distance when he was next to her without any other commitments or distractions, when she was so far from her life that she could barely feel it anymore, when it would feel like none of the reasons she kept him out were real. 

Seven weeks did nothing for Jo. Not a damn thing. She got on a plane, knowing she was torturing herself by doing it, giving herself a taste of what she could never have, but she got on the damn plane anyway. She got on the plane anyway because she loved Mikko Rantanen anyway, even though she shouldn’t. She got on the plane anyway because she didn’t know how to do anything else. 

------

“Did you sleep on the plane?” was the first thing out of Mikko’s mouth, spoken too loudly in Jo’s ear as his arms were already around her at the airport. 

Mikko had picked Jo up, her legs wrapping around his muscular waist, before the two had even spoken. His arms were around her, face tucking in her neck. She smelled like the fancy conditioner she used, lavender, honey, and something Mikko couldn’t figure out, and like Jo. He never wanted to kiss her more than he did when her face appeared from the airport tunnel. Seven and a half weeks without her was longer than Mikko ever wanted to go. She wasn’t his, but with her arms about his neck, legs around his waist, the smell of her overwhelming him, in one of his Avalanche sweatshirts with his name on the back, she felt like his to him. Jo felt like she was his too, so much like it was all real for a moment, like with her arms around him like this, he was hers. But he wasn’t hers. The closest Jo could get was a quick kiss to his cheek that travelled a little too far down, hitting more at the corner of his mouth than his cheek. Mikko sucked in a hard breath when she did, wishing more than anything he could tell her she missed and kiss her until she couldn’t breathe. Instead, he smiled and helped set her back down on the ground with steady hands like his heart wasn’t screaming in his chest, like he wasn’t undeniably in love with her. 

“Uh, yeah, I slept pretty good actually,” Jo told him after clearing her throat, both of them trying to ignore their flushed cheeks, their own and the other person’s.

“Want to drop off your stuff then get brunch?” he asked her. “There’s a place with good mimosas near where I live.” 

“Now you’re speaking my language, Rantanen,” Jo laughed, putting one of her bags in his outstretched hand, knowing better than trying to take care of everything herself. 

“Actually, I think you’re going to have to learn a little of my language, Evans,” he chirped back, a smirk crossing his face. “Come on, car’s this way.” 

They talked on the drive to Mikko’s apartment, Jo handling the background music as always. In six, verging on seven weeks apart, Jo had filled some of her spare time not spent with Mikko listening to even more music than she normally did, an arguably absurd amount. Jo had also started writing music again, for the first time since her move to Denver, something she hadn’t admitted to anyone yet. Anyone included the tall, tanned, Finnish boy in the driver’s seat who knew enough about her to fill a series of novels. She couldn’t tell him because everything was about him. All the songs were about him now and Jo still didn’t know what shade of blue his eyes were. 

They dropped Jo’s stuff off, her bags going in his spare room when Mikko really wanted them in his even though he knew that thought shouldn’t cross his mind. He fussed with his phone while Jo got changed from the plane, a message from Burky in the team group chat catching his eye. 

Mik, is your not girlfriend here yet? Bring her to Sweden. It’s nicer here. 

Mikko barely stifled an audible groan at Andre’s text. His teammates knew. Really, everyone knew he was absolutely head over heels, write home to your mom, risk it all, in love with Jo. He couldn’t hide it if he tried. He wasn’t even hiding it from Jo anymore. He was actively acting upon his love for her, asking her to come home to meet his family, see where he grew up, meet his home friends. There was a cabin booked for Midsummer in a few days with friends, a room planned for him and Jo to share, which she said she didn’t mind and Mikko was hoping to whatever higher power that existed she’d fall asleep in his arms one night they were there. That was his favorite thing in the world, the few times Jo had fallen asleep against his chest on his couch. She was right there, safe in his arms. No one could touch her. No one could hurt her. He could just love her as hard as he wanted when she was right next to him, with no one around to say a damn thing about it. Still, Mikko took a deep breath and pulled himself back to center. 

Jo was closer now, closer than she’d ever been before. She felt like she was right there and all Mikko would have to do is reach out and take her hand to pull her in. But Mikko knew better. He knew if he let himself want everything that had just come through his mind, if he openly wanted that, he’d pull her in and if he pulled her, he’d lose her. There was no world in which Mikko Rantanen could do a damn thing other than wait about loving Josephine Evans. If he did anything at this point, with her so close he could practically feel the warmth of her hand near his, he would lose her. He could wait. If she was this close for years, he would wait. He would rather bunch his hands into fist so hard his nails drew blood holding himself back and then lose her.

Still, Mikko let himself act on his love, showing it to her as plainly as he could, showing her he was right here, his love was right here, ready for her whenever she decided to take it.

“Ready to go?” 

Shorts, a t-shirt, a baseball cap, and sandals after an over ten hour flight and she was the prettiest girl he’d ever seen. Mikko led her out of his apartment, opening every door on the way, and pointed across the street when they got onto the sidewalk. Jo looked both ways and went to step into the street, but Mikko caught her hand with his. 

“You’re in a foreign country. You shouldn’t cross the street without holding someone’s hand. Something bad could happen,” Mikko told her, his sweetest, most innocent smile on his face.

“By that logic, I should be holding your hand whenever you cross the street in Denver,” Jo retorted, making Mikko smile even bigger. 

“Sounds good to me.” 

Jo rolled her eyes, but a smile pulled across her face anyway and she laced her fingers through his. His hand dwarfs hers, warm and strong, practically pulling her across the street to keep up with his long strides. They talked like nothing had changed, like this was something they had done a thousand times already. Jo wasn’t worried about who saw. There were no cameras, no people with cell phones waiting to see. She could just hold the hand of the boy she was in love with and walk to a restaurant for brunch. That’s when Jo realized Finland was her favorite and least favorite place she had ever been. It was her favorite because she could love Mikko here, openly. There was no one to hurt him here, no one to hurt him through her. She could just love him as loudly as she wanted. They could be together here, love each other until they were old and gray and they didn’t understand how technology worked anymore and could barely hear anything, loving each other the entire time. It was her least favorite place because Jo couldn’t stay, but the thought of that, of a life with him, was the most heartbreaking thought she had ever had, because it was nothing more than a dream that couldn’t become reality, a thought that could never manifest into an action. It would move from her head, to chest, and fester there, rotting her from the inside out, eating her alive. 

Mikko slid down into the seat opposite Jo when they reached the restaurant, the drink menu already confiscated by Jo before he could even get settled in his seat. Mikko crossed his arms over his chest, a smirk rising on his face as he watched Jo realize she had made a critical mistake. The menu wasn’t in English and she couldn’t read a word of Finnish. 

“Got a problem there, Jo?” Mikko laughed as he asked her, making her blush. “If you ask nicely, I might be able to help you out.” 

“Mikko,” Jo said through gritted teeth, “can you please translate the menu for me?”

“Sure,” Mikko laughed louder, sporting his best shit-eating grin. “Come on over.” 

Jo groaned before tossing the menu carelessly over to him, making him laugh harder. She grabbed the seat of her chair and shuffled herself a quarter of the way around the table, sitting near enough to read the menu together now. Mikko had other plans. He reached one hand out and gripped the seat of her chair and tugged, hard, until the seat of her chair bumped against his. His arm shifted to rest across the back of her chair, like he hadn’t just pulled her closer to him shamelessly, and he propped the menu up between them against his water glass.

“Well then,” Jo mumbled. 

Mikko couldn’t help himself. A grumpy Jo was one of the cutest versions of Jo for him because she was the least threatening person he had ever met. She called Mikko once thirty minutes before midnight because there was a big spider in the corner of her room and she couldn’t sleep if it was still there, but she couldn’t go anywhere near it. Mikko drove twenty minutes across town at midnight to kill a spider for her. He would’ve driven an hour, probably more than that if he was really being honest with himself. Mikko dropped a kiss to Jo’s temple, the fondness of that memory and the cuteness of her grumpiness overtaking his better judgment for a moment. Jo didn’t freeze like he thought she would. Jo just leaned closer into him, accepting the contact, and Mikko swore his heart was about to beat out of his chest when she put a hand on his thigh to lean closer toward the menu. 

“Um, okay,” Mikko stuttered, trying to center himself. “The top one is just a regular mimosa.” 

“Thank you, oh great Finnish speaker,” Jo teased him, giving his leg a squeeze that had Mikko’s mind spinning hard enough he was pretty sure he couldn’t speak Finnish or English anymore. “I got that from the picture next to it. Got any other helpful insights?”

Mikko let a laugh calm himself before walking Jo through the different flavors of mimosas she could try. She settled on the pineapple one before exchanging the drink menu for the food menu so he could walk her through that. It was the littlest thing, but for just one moment, Jo actually needed Mikko in a way she could admit. If something as small as translating a menu could make Mikko feel so warm inside, then what would her being in love with him make him feel like? Mikko didn’t have any way to wrap his mind around how that would make him feel. All he knew was when Jo slid back to the other side of the table, he missed her, even though there was only four feet of distance between them and she hadn’t actually left.

Mikko’s eyes shifted when he heard laughter down the street. Jo’s eyes followed his. It was a little girl, already wearing a flower crown definitely meant for Midsummer at the end of the week. 

“Midsummer thing?” Jo asked him. “Sorry, I’m a novice.” 

“Well, I’ll make you an expert by the end of the week,” Mikko promised. “Maybe, it’ll even be your favorite holiday, if you can let yourself be open to thinking there are holidays better than Christmas out there.” 

“That’s a tall order there, Mik,” Jo laughed before taking a sip of her water. “Maybe aim a little lower?” 

“Don’t tell me to dream smaller,” Mikko countered, a lazy but sure smile on his face. “I’m dreaming big while you’re here. I dream big when you’re involved.” 

------

Mikko had told Jo that Midsummer would become her favorite holiday if she let it be. Less than an hour into the sunny night, something Jo definitely wasn’t used to, she was pretty sure Mikko was right. It seemed like everyone in Nousiainen was here. Guaranteed, it wasn’t exactly a large place, nothing in Finland was, but Jo hadn’t ever been to anything like this before. In her lacy, loose white dress, a cup of white wine in her hand because drinking red while wearing white was just asked for trouble, with Mikko’s arm around her waist, she had never felt more content before. Jo watched the youngest kids from the village run around, carefree and happy. She watched as Mikko’s parents interacted with everyone else from the village, beaming as they constantly gestured to where Mikko and Jo were standing among his friends. Like everyone else, they thought the two were just private. The lines of friendship and romance had blurred on this trip under supportive gazes from Mikko’s family and friends and under stolen touches Mikko would’ve normally kept to himself. But he was home. He was in the place where all his purest memories rested, during a holiday his favorite memories from his childhood came from, with the girl he was in so incredibly in love with. He couldn’t help but secure an arm around her waist and pull her into him. Even if it would hurt when he couldn’t do it back in Denver later. She was comfortable and Mikko would always take up whatever space Jo allowed him to in her happy moments, trying to show her in them what it could be like if this could happen all the time. 

“Are you having a good time?” Mikko whispered softly in her ear, bending down low to do so.

“I’m having the best time, Mik,” she told him, honesty obvious in her voice. “Thank you again for inviting me for this. It makes me feel really special that you wanted me here.” 

Mikko wanted to make Jo feel how special she was to him all of the time, not just here in Finland. He wanted her to feel special all of the time. She deserved everything good the world had to offer. Jo was the purest soul Mikko knew. She had just been handled careless by too many people for so long. They created cracks in her, tried to steal pieces of her goodness for themselves, and covered her in dark stains she tried so hard to get out, but couldn’t, so she just excepted them as who she was now. They weren’t her. They were still stains and Mikko was washing them away day by day, moment by moment, with the crashing waves of his love for her. Jo had built up walls to protect herself, put on thick, clunky armor to try and block the good parts of her that were left. Jo didn’t seem to understand that all of the good parts of her were still left. They just needed to be cleaned and gently put back together so they could shine again and that when they were back together, the world would be a better place if she took down her walls and retired her armor so the world could see her shine. 

Jo was shining right now, in Finland, in the prettiest white dress Mikko had ever seen, during his favorite holiday of the year. There was no pressure here. No one cared who she was beyond that she made Mikko, their local boy, happy. That was the only metric they measured her on and she made him happier than anyone else. Mikko never wanted her to leave if she was going to shine this bright here, if she was going to be this free and happy here. This is how Jo deserved to feel all of that time. 

“Jo!” one of Mikko’s sisters called out from the right of them. 

She walked past without stopping, slowing just long enough to push a flower crown into Jo’s free hand and shout, “Midsummer!” then continue on. 

Mikko laughed as Jo looked softly at the delicately weaved flowers and ribbons in her hands. Mikko sat his drink down on a nearby table so he could take the flower crown from Jo’s small hands. 

“Let me do it,” he told her softly. 

She nodded as Mikko gently smoothed her hair out with one hand first, before gently setting the delicate weaving of flowers and ribbon on the crown on Jo’s head, situating the ribbons to fall with the soft, dark curls of her hair down her back. Jo put a hand on the flower gingerly as she turned to face him. Mikko’s hands fell to her hips naturally as he looked at her, the prettiest girl he’d ever seen in his entire life, the flush in her cheeks from the wine, the flowers in her hair, a real smile on her lips, her eyes bright in the evening sun, and he had never been more in love with her. He didn’t know how to say it. He didn’t know any words in English or in Finnish or in the little bits of Russian he’d picked up from Zadorvo or Swedish he learned from Gabe that could express it. The only thing he knew how to do to make sure she felt his love was kiss her, but he wasn’t doing it for the first time under the eyes of everyone he grew up with. Instead, Mikko let his eyes close slowly as he dropped a lingering kiss on her forehead, just below where the flowers started and wished they weren’t surrounded by everyone he knew, wished it was just her and him somewhere else so he could make sure she knew how much he loved her. 

Jo’s small arms wrapped around his waist after he pulled his lips back from her skin. She pressed her face into his chest and hugged him tight. Mikko’s strong arms wrapped around her back, securing her to him. Mikko couldn’t pour the same amount of love into a hug. Hugs were too casual, but he was trying. He was trying so hard that he was gripping Jo a little too hard, like she would float away if he let go. But this was the first time Mikko was sure she wouldn’t. If he let go right now, he was sure she’d stay. 

The bright evening passed by quickly, filled with laughter and games and food and the bonfire customary to Midsummer’s Eve, Jo’s hand in Mikko, Jo on his lap, his arm around her waist, always touching her, always checking in, always there. Jo wanted him and it was radiating out of her and into Mikko through every touch, every gaze, every moment he spent with her today. It occurred to him at some point during the evening, a terrible thing to think really, that Jo might look something like she did now on her wedding day and Mikko desperately wanted to be the guy at the end of the isle waiting for her. He’d wait for her for his whole life. He’d wait for her even if she never walked down the aisle to him and he would consider it a life well spent because he spent it loving the single most incredible woman he had ever met.

Normally, most other years, Mikko would have rented a cabin with friends for the evening, woken up too early in the morning considering how late he was up celebrating with all of Nousiainen, but he hadn’t done that this year. When Jo said she’d come, Mikko had still gotten a cottage on the lake, but tonight he had wanted it to just be him and Jo. His friends would show up tomorrow late in the day to join them then. He wanted a night just with Jo with no one around to ask questions and he was so grateful for that decision as he pulled up to the cottage. He’d stopped drinking hours ago so he could drive and so Jo could keep drinking if she wanted to do so. 

“It’s so pretty, Mik,” Jo commented as she climbed out of the car, eyes trained on the water that was still lowly lit by the setting sun, something Jo still couldn’t believe with how late it was in the day. 

“I thought you’d like it,” he told her as he grabbed his bag and hers from the backseat. “Want me to throw these inside and I can meet you out on the dock?”

Mikko didn’t have to ask Jo twice. She was already heading out onto the water before he had even finished his question. Her excitement was child-like, pure and good, something Mikko rarely got to see from her. He felt like he was truly seeing Jo, the one he had only gotten glimpses of before now, the girl he loved more than anything. He carelessly tossed the bags down inside the front door and came as close to running to meet Jo on the dock as he could. She was sitting on the edge when he joined her, her shoes left on the grass at the end of the dock, Mikko’s now next to hers, kicked off haplessly on his way to join her. Mikko dropped down on the edge of the dock next to her, feet dangling into the cool evening water unlike Jo’s which couldn’t reach. 

“Thoughts on Midsummer so far?”

Mikko watched Jo carefully, flower crown still on her head, as a warm smile came naturally across her face. She didn’t have to say anything for Mikko to know she loved it. 

“It’s no Christmas,” she joked, making him laugh, “but it’s pretty spectacular. Thanks again for inviting me to do all this with you.” 

“Anything for you, Jo.” 

Mikko meant it and Jo knew he meant it. It wasn’t something he said as a joke. It was real and raw, sincerity infused into the words.

“Hey, Mikko?” 

Jo’s voice was timid, unsure of both of the words even though they were two she said with incredible frequency. It wasn’t those words she was unsure of. It was the ones that would follow that had her voice shaking, a symptom of her heart quaking in her chest.

“Yeah, Jojo?” Mikko replied, keeping his voice quiet as not to overwhelm hers. 

“I’m sorry,” was all she could get out.

“What are you sorry about, Jo?” 

Mikko lifted his feet from the water and spun to face her, folding his legs in so he could slide closer to her. She froze when he reached a hand out and placed it on her forearm. Her eyes were trained on his hand on her skin, warm and steady and strong. Mikko didn’t move it, just pressed her again verbally, gently, afraid she would break under the slightest pressure at this moment.

“What are you sorry about, Jojo?” 

Jo took a deep breath, trying to steady herself, before she tried to explain, “I’m sorry that I can’t love you, Mik. I mean, I do. I really do, but I’m sorry I can’t be in love with you because if I let that happen, it’s going to ruin you, I’m going to ruin you. Everything in my life is going to come into yours and corrupt everything good about you. I can’t let that happen, not to you. You’re too good. You’re the best person I know, Mikko, and I can’t open a gateway the entire world will try to use to rip you apart. I can’t watch it happen and that’s how I know I love you. I never thought about it before. I never thought about what my life would do to someone else. I just jumped in and let the chips fall where they wanted. Really, I let grenades go off in other people’s lives and walked out right before they could hurt me. I’ve hurt everyone I’ve ever loved just by trying to love them, Mikko. I can’t do that to you. Hurting you, knowing I hurt you, would kill me.” 

Mikko really only heard three words out of the entire thing. He heard Josephine Evans, the girl he loved more than anything, say she loved him. Mikko wasn’t staring at walls anymore. The only thing between him and her was Jo herself and if there was anything Mikko had learned in the almost year he’d known Jo, it was how to reach her through the noise in her own head. He could reach out and take her, but he wouldn’t do it. He was just going to stand there with open arms and wait, because if he pulled her in, she'd just pull away later. He was going to sit here on this dock and show her his open arms with as many words as it took for her to see him standing right in front of her, already having braved the hurricane she was scared of to get this close to her. The hurricane wasn’t her life. It was Jo’s fear of what her life would do to the people she loved. Mikko had already decided Jo was worth whatever storm could come and no one could change his mind, not even Jo. 

“Jo, I don’t think I’ve ever met someone so smart who chooses to be so blind to everything before,” Mikko told her, his voice breaking as he let out a tight breath. His hand rubbed her forearm softly, trying to ground himself in the moment and not the one he hoped would follow. “Jo, stop being so scared of what everyone else has been like and look at me. See me, Jo. Stop seeing your exs and shitty people who never really loved you in the first place. I love you, Josephine. I fell in love with you way too fast and it sort of scared the fuck out of me, but I decided to stay anyway, decided to see what loving you could really be like and I have never been happier with a decision I have made in my entire life. I see you, Jo. I’m right here. I’m right in front of you. Just open your eyes and really look at me. You’ll see I’m not going anywhere. I’m exactly where I want to be forever and that’s with you.”

Mikko shifted slowly, letting his hands ease up toward her face to take it gently between them. He applied just enough force to encourage her to turn to face him. Her eyes were still looking down, unable to meet his. Mikko gently ran his thumb over her lower lip softly.

“Josephine, look at me. See how much I love you.” 

Jo closed her eyes and took a shaky breath in and out. She didn’t want to look. She was so scared she would look and see nothing and that everything would fall apart in front of her when she couldn’t see it. But Jo couldn’t close her eyes forever. She had to face this moment before she could move to the next one, before she had to deal with the consequences of this one. Jo took in another shaky breath before opening her eyes softly, greeted by Mikko’s.

She knew what color they were. After almost a year of trying to figure it out, she knew what shade of blue his eyes were. Real love wasn’t loud; it didn’t draw crowds. Real love didn’t need to scream itself from rooftops and in song lyrics and in front of the entire world. Real love was quiet, honest and true. It was peaceful and pure and good. And it was in Mikko’s eyes. It was Mikko’s eyes, at least, to Jo anyway. Someone else might look at them and think they were another color, but color was individual. No one ever experienced it the same as anyone else. Mikko’s eyes showed his love for Jo in the most true way she had never imagined possible, in their very color to her. He loved her deeply, deeper than the oceans, deeper than the darkness of Jo’s saddest moments. He loved her fully and honestly. He loved her not in the way Jo had ever written about because she didn’t know this could exist. He loved her in a way that Jo knew, just by looking at him now, that he always would, that he would weather any storm to continue to do so, as long as she loved him too. 

Mikko saw Jo see him. He watched the moment she truly understood, just for a moment, how much he loved her. All he needed was the one moment. He could show her the rest. He didn’t hesitate this time. He leaned forward, slowly and steadily, and brushed his lips softly over hers. Jo didn’t hesitate either. Her hands reached out and fisted into his t-shirt, pressing her lips against his more firmly this time. One of Mikko’s hands slid down her neck, down her arm, dipping over to her waist so he could pull her into his lap as he kissed her. Mikko wanted to live like this, Jo as close to him as he could get. He never wanted to not be kissing her now that he'd done it. This was easily his favorite thing to do now, have her under his hands and her lips on his. 

“I love you,” Mikko whispered against her mouth when he pulled back before transitioning to kissing down her jaw.

“I love you,” Jo replied easily, the words she had been so scared to admit that now were the easiest words to say in the world. 

Mikko groaned as his hand cupping her face journeyed slowly down her body, fingers tapping slowly down her neck, outlining the neckline of the white dress he was never going to be able to get out of his mind until it was replaced with her in a different white dress with a certain piece of music playing in the background with all of their friends and family watching. His mouth moved back to hers, pressing his lips firmer against hers. His hand trailed down to join his other on her hips, keeping her grounded against him as he poured everything he had into the kiss. His words could only do so much. Mikko was trying to show her how he felt, pour his love for her into her as he kissed her.

“I love you,” Mikko repeated against her lips, not realizing in his haze of unbridled happiness it had slipped out in Finnish.

“I love you too,” Jo replied in English. 

She didn’t speak Finnish in the slightest. She barely knew a couple of swear words, but those words had felt the same as the others. Based on the way the words made her heart pick up faster in her chest, she knew what they meant. 

“You’re the most beautiful person I’ve ever met,” Mikko mumbled softly, his lips beginning to work gently up and down her neck.

“Ever met yourself?” Jo joked, making Mikko chuckle against her neck.

“I’ll keep that in mind, rakas,” Mikko hummed softly against her skin before kissing her neck gingerly. 

Mikko pulled back to look at Jo again, flower crown slightly askew on her head, cheeks flushed due to breathlessness rather than wine now, her lips a deeper shade of pink, slightly swollen. Mikko knew his looked the same. The strap of her dress was pushed down her shoulder, something Mikko must have done accidentally when he was enjoying the feeling of her skin under his palms. She was absolutely angelic like this and she was all his to get to love, to get to cherish, to get to make sure she knew how absolutely, earth-shattering, life-altering loving her was, to get to make sure she knew he considered it the greatest privilege of his life so far.

Jo tried to hide it with a hand over her mouth, but she yawned and Mikko laughed at her poor attempt to hide it. She pouted for him, bottom lip sticking out in a way that made Mikko want to take it between his teeth, but that wasn’t what tonight was. Tonight, he was going to get to fall asleep with Jo in his arms, something she was clearly ready for as he watch her eyes droop closed, and never have to leave her on the couch alone, because she wouldn’t be on the couch anymore. She’d be in his bed with him the entire time and Mikko almost cried at the very thought of opening his eyes and seeing Jo as the first thing he saw on a new day every day. He didn’t have to imagine how her hair would look spread out across his pillow when she slept peacefully. The only time he’d seen it before either Jo had been a wreck or he had and that wasn’t the same. He didn’t have to imagine the way their legs would tangle together as they slept next to each other every night. He would see it and he would feel it in a few short hours. Mikko didn’t have to wait for anything anymore, except maybe seeing Jo in an even prettier white dress. 

“I think we need to get you to bed,” Mikko laughed softly when Jo yawned for a second time. His thumb rubbed her cheek softly now, moving in smooth circles, lulling her softly closer to sleep. “Want me to carry you?” 

“I can walk,” Jo smiled softly at him, “but thanks, Mik.” 

“Anything for you.”

He echoed his words from before, but they meant more to Jo this time because she truly understood what was behind them. It wasn’t cliche in the way that people often meant it, too sickeningly sweet, sticking to everything uncomfortably with artificial love like artificial sugar, only to leave a bad taste in your mouth later. Mikko said it and it was real. He meant anything, from dancing with her in her brightest moments, to holding her hand in her darkest hours; from telling her when she needed to pick herself up, dust off her knees, and get herself back in gear, to using all of his strength to get her back up after she was knocked down. Mikko could say he would do anything for Jo because in saying it, he would do whatever needed to be done to ensure Jo was the happiest, truest version of herself, that she was the woman she wanted to be. 

As Mikko pulled Jo into his chest to fall asleep, he didn’t have to be careful. He didn’t need to worry he was holding her too close, if he was crossing a line he wasn’t supposed to even realize existed. He could just hold her now. Jo fell asleep easily, the exhaustion of the day wearing heavier on her, pulling her to sleep moments after they climbed into bed. Mikko looked down at the beautiful girl against his chest and he smiled because she was smiling. She fell asleep like that. Mikko willed himself to sleep with the promise of that smile being the first thing he would get to see tomorrow morning, what he had been dreaming of for almost a year now, what he wanted to see every morning for the rest of his life. 

------

Jo opened her eyes slowly and she immediately knew it was way too early to be awake. Finland getting less than six hours of darkness in the summer would have been fine if there were blackout curtains like at Mikko’s apartment, but here in the cottage, that wasn’t the case. Jo wanted to fall back asleep, but that wasn’t in Jo’s skillset, so she was up now whether she liked it or not, and she most certainly did not. Mikko had Jo locked against his chest, his strong, heavy, still sleeping arms wrapped around her keeping her there. She fished around under her pillow, sighing with relief when her fingers wrapped around her phone. The time was atrocious, not even seven in the morning yet, but Jo was still happier than she had been in a long time as she let herself look at the boy whose arms were keeping her warm. 

Mikko’s hair was sort of all over the place, blond strands going in multiple directions. His face was soft, dimple hidden since this was one of the rare moments Mikko didn’t have his customary wide smile on his face. His lips were slightly parted, practically begging to be kissed, and Jo couldn’t resist. She knew it might wake him up, but she wanted to kiss him. Jo leaned her head up, wiggling in his tight grasp enough so she could press a quick, barely noticeable kiss to his lips. Except Mikko noticed. Mikko had been thinking about how her lips would feel against his since that September night on the rooftop and he was not going to miss an opportunity to actually feel it, sleep be damned. 

He hummed softly as he reached up to cup her face, keeping her in place as he pressed into Jo’s supposedly quick, unnoticeable kiss. The kiss was broken by both of them smiling into it, the best reason to break a kiss. Mikko titled his head up to press a kiss to her forehead as Jo smiled.

“Morning, rakas,” Mikko told her softly. “A little early for you, no?” 

“Morning, Mik,” she sighed contentedly, burrowing her head under his chin, into his neck, and pulling herself flush against him. “Sorry I woke you up.” 

“No worries,” he mumbled, pressing a kiss to her tangled hair now. “We can sleep more whenever.” 

“Aren’t your friends coming up later?” Jo reminded him hesitantly. 

Mikko groaned before Jo could even finish her question and Jo laughed before Mikko had even half finished his groan. He pressed his face into her hair and pulled her tighter into his chest. Jo managed to get her head up a bit to place a kiss on his jaw, drawing a long sigh from him. 

“If I pretend they aren’t coming, will they still come?” Mikko asked the universe more than he asked Jo. “I just want to spend the whole day with my Jojo.” 

“Your Jojo, huh?” Jo teased him, following her teasing with a kiss to his jaw, the only thing she could reach with his tight grasp on her. 

Jojo squeaked when Mikko suddenly shifted, taking her with him. She was on her back now, Mikko’s large hands on the bed beside her head, strong arms holding him firmly above her. Like this, his body blocking out everything except how the sheets felt under her hands, Jo was reminded just how much bigger he was than her. More than anything though, Jo couldn’t take her eyes off him, with the sunlight pouring in from the window, making his eyes seem even brighter and lighter, shining through his golden waves. He was the most beautiful person Jo had ever seen and he was all hers. 

The funny thing about being in love with someone, about being two people who come together to create something that is somehow more than the two of them were separately, is that sometimes they think the same thoughts. As Mikko looked down at Jo, hair fanned out across the pillow, sunlight showing the golden flecks in her eyes, her lips slightly parted, a deep shade of pink leftover from yesterday, Mikko thought Jo was the most beautiful person he had ever seen and she was all his. 

As Mikko dropped down, his elbows coming to rest where his palms had been, so he could press his lips to hers, all he could think about what how much he loved Jo and how good it felt to be loved by her in return. It was all he could think about as one of his hands trailing down her side, feeling the curves of her body under his palm. All Jo could think about was how lucky she felt to being loved by him and get to love him back, even though she had held herself back from him for so long, thinking she was undeserving of this happiness. With his lips on her neck now, a hand under her shirt on her waist, and one of her hands tangled into his hair, he felt so right to Jo. Everything about him was right, the softness of his hair when she ran her fingers through it, the way his hand felt sliding over her skin, the strength she felt in his shoulders under her hand. Everything about Mikko was right. 

“Mikko,” Jo breathed out when he tugged down the neckline of her t-shirt to keep kissing more of her, “you can just take it off.” 

Mikko held back a sound deep in his throat at her words. This was what he never let himself think about. If he thought about this, he couldn’t have been her friend over the past year. The thought of this would have corrupted that, weaving its way into how he treated her. He never let his mind go here, imagining what it would be like to have her in his bed like this. She needed him to be her friend, so he forced the thoughts from his mind, knowing they would poison everything he was trying to be for her. But now, now this is what she needed. This was what she wanted. He didn’t have to dream about it. He could just live it, right now. 

Mikko took his time. He was pretty sure he would get to do this countless times over the course of the rest of his life, but this would always be the first time he got to make her absolutely breathless, speechless, and he wanted to take his sweet, sweet time. Jo, who normally wanted her life to run at the pace her mind usually did, wanted Mikko to take his time as he pushed her shirt up and off her body, as he kissed every inch of skin as he revealed it.

He took his time learning every curve, every spot that made her gasp, every one that made her giggle. He took his time exposing her in front of him, except Jo didn’t feel exposed. She felt damn near worshiped when Mikko settled between her thighs, kissing her, tasting her, making her fist her hands into his hair desperately. Slow and steady, like the calming waves of the ocean, Mikko pulled Jo over the edge again and again until she couldn’t be patient anymore, until she needed him more than anything else. 

He kissed her as he slid inside of her for the first time, a sensation that made Jo cry out and Mikko almost lose it with how good this moment was, the softness breaking a little as he cursed into her neck, desperately grabbing for anything inside to anchor him before this moment broke way sooner than he would’ve liked. He anchored in the most stable thing he’d ever felt. 

“I love you, Jo.”

“I love you too, Mikko.” 

The entire world seemed to slow down, letting them live in this moment for longer than they thought possible. As long as the world was going to spin a little slower, Mikko was going to spend his extra time like this, with soft moans falling from Jo’s mouth, whispers of his name between them, as he slowly rolled his hips into hers and slowly lost his mind a little at the feeling of her, at the sight of her. Mikko collapsed down onto her when he finally finished, head collapsing into the crook of her neck as her hand ran through his hair gently.

“I love you,” Mikko repeated again. “I’m never going to get tired of saying it, so I hope you never get tired of hearing it.” 

“It’s my favorite sound in the entire world, Mik,” Jo said breathlessly. “I’m never going to get tired of it.” 

Mikko kissed her neck again before he slowly rolled over onto the bed next to her, pulling her partially on top of his chest in one smooth motion. He ran his fingers through the ends of her hair, working out the tangles gingerly as his breathing slowed to normal, as the world starting to spin at the right speed again. 

“Hate to ask and ruin the moment,” Jo spoke as she idly traced circles and swirls onto Mikko’s bare chest, “but what time are your friends coming?” 

“Oh, that’s not happening anymore,” he groaned, reaching for his phone to cancel the festivities that were supposed to be coming their way. 

“As much as I want to spend the day with you, here, you can’t cancel day of,” Jo pressed softly. 

“Watch me,” Mikko laughed, kissing her forehead. “Sanna’s dad has a cottage we were originally going to go to before I found this place. They can figure it out. I’ve got something way better to do right here already.” 

“Mikko!” 

He laughed as Jo smacked his chest, her cheeks turning pink at the literal and intended meaning of his words. He kissed her temple, eyes fixed on his phone screen as he typed out a terrible excuse to his friend group. It was a boldfaced lie. Mikko said that he and Jo both had gotten sick after last night and that it wasn’t a pretty sight and he didn’t want any of them to catch what they had, so they should just go to Sanna’s instead. The lie worked for the length of time it took someone to respond in the group chat, which was about twenty seconds, telling Mikko that if he wanted a private sex trip with his girlfriend, he should’ve just told them that from the beginning. They were teasing, all in good jest, and Mikko knew it, but they also weren’t far from the truth as to why he was telling them they needed to change their plans. 

“They’re good with it,” Mikko told Jo after tossing his phone back onto the nightstand, gratefully she couldn’t speak Finnish so she couldn’t read what specifically had been said. 

“I find that hard to believe that’s how they said it, seeing as you laughed,” Jo called him out easily, “but I’ll let it slide because this is what I want too.” 

“Mmm,” Mikko hummed softly, hand rubbing Jo’s arm softly. “Want to celebrate getting this place all to ourselves today in the shower?” 

“I could be convinced.”

------

Jo ran a towel through her hair again, trying to get a little more of the water out so she didn’t trail it around the cottage. She decided how it was now was as good as it was going to get, slid on one of Mikko’s large t-shirts he left for her and some comfy shorts, then headed into the kitchen where he was. He was shirtless, hair wet from the shower they shared, his hands busy pouring two cups of tea. Jo sighed as she reached him, letting her arms wrap around his waist from behind. Mikko put the kettle down in order to give one of her arms a quick squeeze. 

“Hi there,” Mikko said softly. “Tea’s good right?” 

“Tea’s perfect, baby,” Jo replied before kissing his shoulder softly.

Mikko hummed softly at the feeling of her pressed up against him, her lips on his skin. Mornings with her like this had been the thing Mikko craved most because what they had before had been so close to this, having breakfast together, spending the quiet moments of the morning together. But it was so much sweeter now, now that they were damp from the same shower, now that Jo was pressed up against him, now that she was truly his to love. 

“Want to drink these outside? There’s this big couch,” was all Mikko had to say to get a happy noise from Jo and get her turning for the back door. 

Mikko carried the tea, just enough steps behind Jo to be lucky enough to see her launch herself into the large round couch. She tunneled herself into the pillows as Mikko laughed. He didn’t really understand his girlfriend’s love affair with comfortable couches, but he could get behind it and make sure she had as many as she wanted. Mikko sat the cups on the side table and climbed onto the couch with her. He settled himself among the pillows before he patted his thighs, stretching out his legs for Jo to come sit between them. She slid in between his legs happily, her back pressing against his chest. Mikko wrapped an arm around her waist, large hand spread out across her stomach. He grabbed Jo’s mug and handed it off to her with his free hand before grabbing his own.

Jo was fiddling with the tag on her tea bag and Mikko knew something was on her mind. He didn’t have to push this time. He just gave her a small, supportive squeeze with his arm around her and she let him know what was going on inside her head.

“Do you want to like, tell people? By people I mean like, everyone,” Jo asked him softly. 

“Jo, I want you and have you,” Mikko replied, like what he was saying was the most natural and obvious thing in the world. “The rest of it doesn’t concern me. I don’t care what people say. I care what you have to say. You’re my only stake in all of this, the only part I care about. Whatever you want is good with me. You want to put it on Instagram? Go for it. You want to write songs about me? I’d be honored. You want this to just be us and never talk about me in public? I’ll be just as happy as long as we have our friends and family and I have you. I don’t care about the details, Jo. Whatever you want is good with me. But don’t think you need to protect me, okay? I’m a big boy and I love you more than enough to handle anything to keep loving you, okay? I’m not changing my mind. I’m not going to get overwhelmed. I have you and the rest of it doesn’t matter to me.”

Jo almost cried at his words. She didn’t have a way to express the way her heart rose in her chest and then settled back down, cushioned by just how deeply she loved him, at his words. She didn’t have words for that feeling, so she had to settle for a sort of joke. 

“Sort of already started on the song thing, so good to know that’s okay,” Jo laughed a little as she talked, hands fidgeting with her mug. 

“I can’t wait to hear them, Jojo,” he replied, kissing her temple with a smile on his face. “You don’t have to play them for me, obviously. But if you want to, I want to hear.”

“Of course I’ll play them for you, Mikko,” Jo said as Mikko took a few long sips of his tea. “They’re for you. The rest of the world will just get to hear them at some point.” 

Mikko smiled against the edge of his mug and pressed his nose softly into her hair, letting his eyes close, just breathing in the moment as best as he could. He settled back into the couch, bringing his tea and Jo with him, tea secure in his hand and Jo secure against his chest and Mikko realized there was no place he would rather be. A comfortable silence fell over them as they drank their tea and Mikko’s hand rubbed in smooth circles over her stomach. Jo’s free hand rubbed up and down his forearm as she looked out at the water, thinking there was no place she would rather be either. 

“Thank you,” Jo said softly, breaking the silence after a few minutes. 

Mikko just kissed the side of her head and took a sip of his tea in reply.

“Thank you for being patient with me,” Jo spoke softly this time, voice hesitant, “for waiting.”

“Josephine Evans,” Mikko smiled as he spoke, “I’d wait for you my whole life if that’s what it took.”

Jo sighed, letting herself put all her weight against his chest, and let her love for him settle throughout her, through every inch of her, where it had always belonged. Mikko kissed her head again, face pressing softly into her hair. Mikko would have waited for her his entire life, but he was so happy he didn’t have to.

“Hey, Mikko?” 

Jo’s tone was lighter than when she had spoken the same words yesterday. The question was hesitant, but there was unbridled joy behind it.

“Yeah, Jo?” he replied, just so she knew without a doubt he was listening. 

“I think we should get married here someday.” 

Mikko sat his now almost empty mug down to wrap both arms around her tightly, dropping his face into her neck. He kissed her neck softly and sweetly as his heart swelled on his chest. He had her now, the person he wanted more than anything else in his life, but hearing her say that, those eight words, Mikko knew there was something he wanted more for certain. He wanted her in a pretty white dress, by the water, promising in front of the people who mattered most to them that what they felt was forever. Mikko could see it now, the flowers down the dock, the chairs by the water, he could see it all. He could see Jo barefoot in the kitchen ten years from now, a ring on her finger and a child on her hip. He could see her when she was eighty-five, hair long since gone gray, still making him smile. He could see her in every part of his future, loving her all the same in each thought that felt like memories that had yet to actually happen. 

Mikko had spent almost a year trying to get across the hurricane in her mind to find the girl he loved behind it all. It has been the hardest thing he’d ever done, but holding her now, staring out at the water, with the world quiet except for the small waves crashing on the shore and the feeling of how much they loved each other, thinking about marrying her someday sooner rather than later, Mikko didn’t have a single regret. 

“Whenever you're ready, Jo, I’m ready.”

[beyondthetemples-ooc]

My thoughts are all over the place lately. Apologies. I know what’s happening today; I got sent home from work early because I work in a government building and they were Anticipating Protests. I held my sibling while they cried today. So believe me. I Know.

But I also have to write this down.

I didn’t realize how Hungry I was for praise until just this week. Because usually my Internal Motivation is all I need. I’ve been practicing meditation for 17 years as of this summer (read: Disciplining my Mind and Emotions), and I’ve always done my best to keep a good attitude and work ethic up, no matter how depression and bad life stuff tries to get me down. (Because I know Very Well how to fight that battle within my mind.)

Praise from other people? Never happened except from my mother who I saw twice a month growing up, IF that, and thus I was never motivated by craving praise. (And occasionally from stepmom+dad and teachers about How Smart I Am, but THAT was always wrapped in some backhanded comment about how “You’re too smart to be doing this.”) I always figured my Internal Determination was all I needed.

But then a co-worker came to me to critique a paper in one of the cases I prepped. I told her the page had been copied like that already, and that there were going to be a lot like that because for some reason the CEs liked copying the checks over the forms instead of copying them separately. (It’s a quality control issue, and the people above HER look at those Forms Being Blocked By Checks and will come down on them like it’s THEIR fault. It’s messy. But she was able to tell the higher-ups that we couldn’t do anything about it, because apparently I was the only one who had noticed that and been Certain Enough that I wasn’t doing it myself to tell them about that Problem^tm?)

Anyways, to my immense relief and surprise (because nobody had given me ANY feedback on how I was doing that job before), she told me she thought it was weird that I’d do something like that, because “Your cases are always perfect.”

My cases are always PERFECT???

I was stunned, and then I was smiling one of those Rare Big Real Smiles, and though all I said aloud was “Good to know”, internally I’ve been repeating “Your cases are always perfect” in my head like a themesong. And I’m like 10x more motivated to Do It Right, because I want my work to Be Worthy of That Praise!

I think it was Dale Carnegie in How to Win Friends and Influence People that recommended giving people praise and a good reputation to live up to? As of that conversation, I can confirm, that shit WORKS!

And then today, I solved 3 problems because of 3 separate situations that had arisen, helped my boss plan how to get our jobs of the day done with less personnel, and then when The Higher-Ups Told Us to Go Home, I was going around helping people modify their timesheet because nobody foresaw this happening. (The new timesheet system confuses a lot of people. I only figured it out because I’ve needed to take a LOT of time off for doctor appointments already, and I’m good with computers and Learning New Software Systems.)

And then, my boss thanked me profusely and said “You’re a great asset to the office.”

And I lit up like a Christmas tree.

Like, yeah that’s a Very Business way to phrase it, but: 1.) She Singled Me Out Specifically! 2.) We WERE in a professional environment, after all. 3.) I’m really good at reading people and though the phrasing may not be Mushy Gushing Appreciation, I could tell that she MEANT it!

And, I mean, it’s not like the praise totally Changed anything in me.

But gosh, it sure is good to feel Appreciated. To know what I’m doing is Good Enough and Helpful.

(And also hopefully a sign that I’ll keep getting signed onto the next projects instead of having to find a New Job. ;P )

[spookysmujer]

Mi Hombre, O. Diaz

Summary: You overhear Monse trash talking about Oscar and you’ve had enough of him being painted as the villain. 

warnings: monse being a hater!, cute s h e t, freak s h e t  👅

word counter: 1.5K

requested by: @un-poetryy​

A/N: I always give the “bad” guys the benefit of the doubt because my attraction to toxic men began with Damon Salvatore LOL. Thank you for requesting, I love trying new things when writing for Spooky, this was fun! SEND ME ASKS/REQUESTS! I finally turned on the Anon option, heh. And don’t forget, please: follow, heart it and leave some comments, reblog and also turn on the notifs for when I post! Lots of love!!

taglist: @clemmingstylins0n​ @fairygardenss​ @firebenderwolf​ @spookysnena​ @princesstiffxoxo​ @mbaku-babygirl​ @chellybear98​ @multiyfandomgirl40​ @i-just-wanna-live-gc​ (please let me know if you wanna be added or removed!)

(Gif doesn’t belong to me, owner unknown!)

The sun is warm against your skin and the slight breeze is adding to a perfect summer day. Now that school is out, the public pool has extended it’s days of operations and hours, so here you are out with you boyfriend’s little brother and friends, tanning and having a relaxing day.

Oscar called you saying to meet him at the pool since he’s really trying to avoid spending any alone time at home with his estranged father. As you await his arrival, you’re laying back and letting the sun fill in the paler parts of your skin due to your bikini straps. And it’s been lovely but you’re starting to lose you’re patience as Monse, Cesar’s toxic ass girlfriend, keeps talking ill about Oscar.

You sigh once more as you try to zero out on the things she is saying about him but it’s getting real hard to bite your tongue the more she goes on. It’s Oscar “Spooky” Diaz and of course everyone has an opinions about everyone. And rightfully so but Monse only says bad things about her boyfriend’s older brother. Every single time it’s something negative. And granted you don’t spend much time with her, it’s sad that she can’t say one good thing.

It’s also when Oscar is never around and the devil is prying to get out of you to say something. Oh, please say something. But you keep your eyes closed and pray that your boyfriend arrives soon. The last thing you want is to cause a scene in a family area.

“I mean he’s been hanging around a lot and it’s just annoying he gotta bring his gang tendencies when it’s been clear as day you don’t want nothing to do with it. Doesn’t he have drugs to sell? or other people to jump into the gang?” Monse says and you huff audibly.

Though you got your eyes closed, you could feel her gaze move to you briefly.

Cesar only sighs as Monse kept on going and that was the tip of the iceberg for you. How can Cesar not defend is older brother? You know the shit the Diaz brothers have been through but to not defend someone who has defended you on countless occasions?

“Seriously? You really going keep talking shit, Monse? I’m convinced you’re obsessed with Oscar since all you ever do is talk about him,” You’ve had enough, you get up and say to her as you stand above them,

Both she and Cesar look up at you, surprised. “I-I, uh, was just saying th-”

“No, you weren’t just fucking saying nothing. You’re trash talking his brother and my boyfriend and it’s shit on me to have waited this long to say something but you’re such a pussy for only knowing how to talk smack when he’s not around.”

She tilts her head to the side and stands to cross her arms over her chest, “I have no problem saying this to his face as well. He must have you whipped if you are too blind to see that all he is is trouble, Y/N. You’re a smart girl, you deserve someone better than Oscar.”

If you could see the world in a single color right now, it’d be red and for Monse it’s about to be black considering you want to pop her one right in the mouth. You’re at a disbelief that she can’t give Oscar the benefit of the doubt considering he has done a lot for his brother and group of friends. Everytime there had been an issue that they couldn’t solve, which was 99.9% of the time, Oscar came in with the save.

You see your boyfriend walk through the gated entrance of the public pool. He makes his way over to the food stand and you smile to yourself, the sight of him always making you melt, “ I am a smart girl, thank you. I’m smart enough to know that no one in this world is perfect. We all have flaws, Oscar knows it too. But you’re quick to forget that if it weren’t for him, you all would probably be 6 feet under next to Lil Ricky, who isn’t even 6 feet under might I add!”

She laughs a little to herself before continuing, “And we wouldn’t have gotten in those situations had Oscar not jumped his little brother into that stupid gang of wannabes anyways! Who does that? Forces his own family into something he didn’t want to be apart of? That’s messed up! And you the complicit one that stands by not saying anything!” Monse says loudly, now catching the attention of those around you. Even Oscar is now looking your way, you and Monse in each other’s faces. 

You weren’t planning to make a big scene about this, you just wanted to call her out on her bullshit peacefully, if that is even possible. But if the shoe fits? You lace that bitch up and wear it.

You scoff and step closer to her face, “Cesar grew up in this life, wake the fuck up, Monse! It looks like a duck, it quacks like a duck, it’s a fucking duck! Think this lil duckling was gonna join the rabbit family and live a peaceful life? That is how the world revolves, that is how people like us survive. Whether you like it or not. Yes, it is messed up. And I can promise you, Oscar never wanted this life to begin with, not for him and definitely not for his brother, whom he raised. Was it a perfect life? No. But it was and still is enough.

“So I swear to God, if you can’t say anything nice please shut the fuck up. Don’t say shit. Because if you wanna point out flaws, let’s all do it, hm? Gather around family and friends, “ You look around and say, “We’re gonna play the What’s wrong with Monse game I’ll start, she’s toxic as fuck! She loves to play the victim, she’s dating a freshly jumped in Santo, which she claims are wannabe gangsters!”

Everyone’s attention is on you now, Oscar is trying his best not to laugh at the situation but when you get argumentative, it’s a damn good time. You have valid points and Monse knows it. The people with the most problems never like to admit them. She has a look of embarrassment plastered on her face.

“Y/N...” Cesar speaks up, also with a look of embarrassment on his face. He scratches the back of his head as he looks around and spots his brother in the distant. Oscar raises his water bottle in the air as a notion of, Salud. 

You cross your arms and wait for him to say something but he only looks down at his feet and rocks on his heels. Monse’s mouth agape at his lack of input, “What’s wrong? You upset he’s not defending you? That’s how complicit ones are, sweetheart. They see the problem and let it go on so long as it’s not personally affecting them. Which means you probably just a piece of culo. And also means he’s a little puto for not defending his brother. A little bitch! Both of you!”

“Hey, hey mamas. Calmate, com’n. Let’s go get some food, hm?” Oscar appears and starts to pull you away as you spew out the last of your words. He can feel your skin is warm to the touch and it is not from the tanning either.

He is smiling like a fool once you two make your way to the stand, “Wow, my lady defends my name even when I’m not around.”

You shake your head and cross you arms, exhaling a much needed breath through your nose. Monse is collecting her things, angrily and storming out to the parking lot. A frantic Cesar following, you look back to Oscar and both laugh.

“Was I too harsh?” You ask him, he shakes his head in disagreement.

“Nah, bout time someone tells her off and you did just that. It’s hot, y’know? Calling them out for talking shit.” You look to him and whack your arm on his stomach, he wraps his arms around you and kisses the top of you head. “What else would my lil traviesa do for me?”

As you tip your head back to answer, Jasmine walks towards the two of you blasting music from her phone.

I don’t wanna spit, I wanna gulp

I wanna gag, I wanna choke

I want you to touch that lil dangly dang that swang in the back of my throat

You look to Oscar and wink at him, feeling the hardness in his swim trunks as you lick your lips. He clears his throat looking at Jasmine that means to leave. She snobs you two and walks off.

“Aye, you gotta walk in front me. He won’t let up.” You look between the two of you and see his boner. Laughing away, you let him trail very close behind you.

[youranxiousnerd]

Spring Break Thoughts

bc i want to get stuck in an airport and break into first class

spoilers below

EJ DOING THE INTRO

the most...profound intro?

“maybe it’s really about other people” looks at gina

i have jumped on the portwell train

when i first saw they were doing zoom backgrounds i was not on board, but they’ve grown on me carlos’ sucks

miss jenn and the zoom backgrounds

NI NI HEL LO

nini didn’t you get cut?

you know miss jenn they could get together out side of school (at least the kids who are here)

olivia is so pretty

aww carlos called miss jenn his madrina

HA I KNEW IT OF COURSE CARLOS INVITED SEB

seblos tension, ill get to that later

they’re so passive aggressive guys i love it

ASH AND EJ

CASWELL COUSINS YESSS

“You guys are watching like, old, old movies”

“This is why we’re soulmates” the redyln goal has been reached bye

this...this is the only line they get?

miss jenn has obviously not gotten the memo

three weeks and you havent blocked act two

“not it”

of course sebby is the last one to leave

“bye” awww miss jenn

GINA THAT LITTLE GIG YESSSS

just one complement after another ej

AHHHH EJ WITH PAINTED NAILS YESSSSS

he looks so good ej should do it more often

ej fell hard guys

jack in the background doing tik toks i cant

gina and signs

RICKY IN A BLANKET

ugh its lynne

i dont care enough to spell her name right

“just being a burrito here”

bitter ricky, i feel ya

“I’m sorry to hear that’s it over” *smiles*

nini you should have just posted a video

ope empty notebook

awww ej’s insta

gina and jack

thats it

“she changed her name” nina is literally her real name 

the leg pull away

ricky and bedding is my new favorite ship besides therapy

“Your boy Jack”

when i first saw the promo for this nini scene i was worried it was gonna be another solo (shes had like 16)

I SPY WITH MY LITTLE EYE A RAINBOW HEART

my gay heart is bursting

nina really said “rainbows are awesome” this episode

and the necklace is off

guys i love improv scenes

it was so goood

soooo howie and kourt just get no closure after that killer song last week? no nothing? 

BAHAHAHA KOURTNEY BREAKING UP

i love kourtney

sofia is so pretty

okay i dont ship jack and gina but they’re fun together, little chaos demons

THE DUKE SWEATSHIRT AHHHH

“my friends, like, my castmates, they think it sucks what you did on opening night”

good talk, long overdo. nothing is solved by any means but little steps

the therapy line omfg 

“HI, CUPCAKE”

“I’ll meet you in the pool” there is an ocean right behind you

 “Don’t ask me”

“Ashlyn, Big Red, Miss. Jenn, Carlos”

the way seb’s face just DROPS when he mentions carlos

“Are you guys fighting” big red looked so happy omfg

“That would imply that we’re speaking”

“Who has time to talk when you’re busy posting selfies with random guys in a cabana”

guys i had to pause for five minutes because i was dying

jealous seb... where did you come from?

ALRIGHT IT IS TIME TO TALK ABOUT SEBLOS!!!!

first off, it seems the writers love to make major seblos things happen off screen. examples include there pinning and officially getting together

where... where did all this tension come from? it has been light the past two episodes then bam, everything they say to each other is bitter. since when is seb jealous? the writers have so many other conflicts to talk about and they choose jealous seb? off all thing?!?! im honestly kind of disappointed because there are so many other things to talk about from previous episodes and instead they choose this?!?!?! hopefully this isn’t the only thing that is addressed next week, it cant be. they better talk about the constant “no seb” because its an issue. 

moral of the story is i hope the fight next episode isn’t about seb being jealous bc there is so much more to talk about

i am loving passive aggressive seb like i hope that doesn’t go away when their conflict is resolved bc it’s awesome

HERE are my thoughts on the zoom call

okay seb’s line about doing public makes sense with the full episode

everyone on the call is just like “wtf happened to my otp”

EJJJJ

EJJJJ I LOVE YOU

THE BEST EJ SCENE 

“Hi Nini!” ejjjj

you have to watch the scene twice, one to watch nini and ashlyn and another for ej

EJ AND THE PUPPET THATS IT IM DONE

sassy gina i love her

guys i just love everybody

ASHLYN AND NINI I MISSED THIS DUO GAHHHHHH THEY’RE ADORABLE

ej is a child i love it

ricky i feel you with the songwriting

look at big red being best friend of the year now give him a plot line

i am under the impression jack recorded gina 

SHIT THE CANDLE TO LAMP TRANSITION YESSSSS

i love transitions and that was it

matt is ripped

julia lester showed up this season. queen shit 

she is perfect

YES BIG RED AND KOURTNEY DANCING I WANT MOREEEE

i am so confused with seb’s gloves

that has been bugging me for two days 

carlos has more style then a hawaiian shirt and khakis

im in heaven the harmonies are soooo good

they are amazing they sound so good

you can hear all there voices

julia popped off

aint seen nothin is really good, i wasn’t sure about it at first but its grown. they sound so damn good the talent they hold. not the best song but its fun

the video actually looks better than i thought it would

“Wow” me too richard

jack is fun, i’d be okay if he comes back. he is a little chaos demon.

i like how the writers didn’t make them romantic (for once), hopefully gina got his number bc i would

i want to be stuck at an airport with jack

“let you go” is genius. so far the best original song this season. josh has been killing it lately. this is the ballad ricky deserves. lyrical genius. he sounds sooo good.

the one time i agree with lynne

EJ YOU CAMEEEEEE

OMFG THEY’RE ADORABLE

PORTWELLLLLLL BABY WHOOOP

HE IS GONNA TREAT YOU SO GOOD GINA 

HE BROUGHT YOU FOOD AND TOOK YOUR BAG 

GAHHHHHH 

nOoOoOoOo thats it?!?! i cannot wait a week i refuse

i normally don’t talk about promos but episode 10 (im a sucker for sleepover episodes) is my most anticipated episode so we gonna do it. 

for starters ricky has a guitar, so he might sing?

AWW THE SETS THEY ARE SO PRETTY

ooo lily is back?

blueprint?

ashlyn and ricky where have you been?!?!

seb and the girls yesss

since in a heartbeat is next episode seb probably leaves? i hope it is a private moment

oh please talk about your other issues pleaseee

“why did i never hear about this?” nina no, it was an accident alright?

gina and nini haven’t interacted this season and the first thing they do is fight.

lets hope there “beef” doesn’t take the a slot 

maybe another seblos kiss?

did you know i love seblos

i have stocked up my tears for next week

[itsclydebitches]

Here's a quandary I've suddenly found myself in: where do you stand on writers deleting their own works, fanfiction or otherwise? I've had this happen to me on more than one occasion - I go to look for an old favorite and find it's since been deleted from whatever site I read it on.

On the one hand, I'm inclined to think that, "Sure. The author wrote it, it's their call. I don't own the work - I certainly didn't pay for it. It's their decision, even if it's disappointing."

But at the same time I can't help but consider the alternative - if I believe in death of the author (and I do), that an author's work fundamentally isn't solely theirs once it's been published, posted, etc., then it also seems wrong to have a work deleted. Stories aren't the sole property of their creator, after all.

But then I circle back. D'you think there are different obligations between authors and readers and the works being made in fandom space? I know if I had bought a book and the author decided they wanted it back, I would feel pretty comfortable telling them no, given I'd paid for it and whatnot. But that's a different world from fanfic and fandom space generally.

So. You're insightful Clyde, I'm curious as to what you'll have to say here (and to all y'all thinking about it, don't flame me. I haven't decided where I stand here yet - haven't heard a good nail-in-the-coffin argument for or against yet).

Val are you a mind reader now? I’ve been thinking about this exact conundrum the last few days!

(And yeah, as a general disclaimer: no flaming. Not allowed. Any asks of the sort will be deleted on sight and with great satisfaction.)

Honestly, I’m not sure there is a “nail-in-the-coffin argument” for this, just because—as you lay out—there are really good points for keeping works around and really good points for allowing authors to have control over their work, especially when fanworks have no payment/legal obligations attached. In mainstream entertainment, your stories reflect a collaborative effort (publisher, editor, cover artists, etc.) so even if it were possible to delete the physical books out of everyone’s home and library (and we're ignoring the censorship angle for the moment), that’s no longer solely the author’s call, even if they have done the lion’s share of the creative work. Though fanworks can also, obviously, be collaborative, they’re usually not collaborative in the same way (more “This fic idea came about from discord conversations, a couple tumblr posts, and that one headcanon on reddit”) and they certainly don’t have the same monetary, legal, and professional strings attached. I wrote this fic as a hobby in my free time. Don’t I have the right to delete it like I also have the right to tear apart the blankets I knit?

Well yes… but also no? I personally view fanworks as akin to gifts—the academic term for our communities is literally “gift economy”—so if we view it like that, suddenly that discomfort with getting rid of works is more pronounced. If I not only knit a blanket, but then gift it to a friend, it would indeed feel outside of my rights to randomly knock on their door one day and go, “I actually decided I hate that? Please give it back so I can tear it to shreds, thanks :)” That’s so rude! And any real friend would try to talk me out of it, explaining both why they love the blanket and, even if it’s not technically the best in terms of craftsmanship, it holds significant emotional value to them. Save it for that reason alone, at least. Fanworks carry that same meaning—“I don’t care if it’s full of typos, super cliché, and using some outdated, uncomfortable tropes. This story meant so much to me as a teenager and I’ll always love it”—but the difference in medium and relationships means it’s easier to ignore all that. I’m not going up to someone’s house and asking face-to-face to destroy something I gave them (which is awkward as hell. That alone deters us), I’m just pressing a button on my computer. I’m not asking this of a personal friend that is involved in my IRL experiences, I’m (mostly) doing this to online peers I know little, if anything, about. It’s easy to distance ourselves from both the impact of our creative work and the act of getting rid of it while online. On the flip-side though, it’s also easier to demean that work and forget that the author is a real person who put a lot of effort into this creation. If someone didn’t like my knitted blanket I gave them as a gift, they’re unlikely to tell me that. They recognize that it’s impolite and that the act of creating something for them is more important than the construction’s craftsmanship. For fanworks though, with everyone spread around the world and using made up identities, people have fewer filters, happily tearing authors to shreds in the comments, sending anon hate, and the like. The fact that we’re both prefacing this conversation with, “Please don’t flame” emphasizes that. So if I wrote a fic with some iffy tropes, “cringy” dialogue, numerous typos, whatever and enough people decided to drag me for it… I don’t know whether I’d resist the urge to just delete the fic, hopefully ending those interactions. There’s a reason why we’re constantly reminding others to express when they enjoy someone else’s work: the ratio of praise to criticism in fandom (or simply praise to seeming indifference because there was no public reaction at all), is horribly skewed.

So I personally can’t blame anyone for deleting. I’d like to hope that more people realize the importance of keeping fanworks around, that everything you put out there is loved by someone… but I’m well aware that the reality is far more complicated. It’s hard to keep that in mind. It’s hard to keep something around that you personally no longer like. Harder still to keep up a work you might be harassed over, that someone IRL discovered, that you’re disgusted with because you didn’t know better back then… there are lots of reasons why people delete and I ultimately can’t fault them for that. I think the reasons why people delete stem more from problems in fandom culture at large—trolling, legal issues, lack of positive feedback, cancel culture, etc.—than anything the author has or has not personally done, and since such work is meant to be a part of an enjoyable hobby… I can’t rightly tell anyone to shoulder those problems, problems they can’t solve themselves, just for the sake of mine or others’ enjoyment. The reason I’ve been thinking about this lately is because I was discussing Attack on Titan and how much I dislike the source material now, resulting in a very uncomfortable relationship with the fics I wrote a few years back. I’ve personally decided to keep them up and that’s largely because some have received fantastic feedback and I’m aware of how it will hurt those still in the fandom if I take them down. So if a positive experience is the cornerstone of me keeping fics up, I can only assume that negative experiences would likewise been the cornerstone of taking them down. And if getting rid of that fic helps your mental health, or solves a bullying problem, or just makes you happier… that, to me, is always more important than the fic itself.

But, of course, it’s still devastating for everyone who loses the work, which is why my compromise-y answer is to embrace options like AO3’s phenomenal orphaning policy. That’s a fantastic middle ground between saving fanworks and allowing authors to distances themselves from them. I’ve also gotten a lot more proactive about saving the works I want to have around in the future. Regardless of whether we agree with deleting works or not, the reality is we do live in a world where it happens, so best to take action on our own to save what we want to keep around. Though I respect an author’s right to delete, I also respect the reader’s right to maintain access to the work, once published, in whatever way they can. That's probably my real answer here: authors have their rights, but readers have their rights too, so if you decide to publish in the first place, be aware that these rights might, at some point, clash. I download all my favorite fics to Calibre and, when I’m earning more money (lol) I hope to print and bind many for my personal library. I’m also willing to re-share fic if others are looking for them, in order to celebrate the author’s work even if they no longer want anything to do with it. Not fanfiction in this case, but one of my fondest memories was being really into Phantom of the Opera as a kid and wanting, oh so desperately, to read Susan Kay’s Phantom. Problem was, it was out of print at the time, not available at my library, and this was before the age of popping online and finding a used copy. For all intents and purposes, based on my personal situation, this was a case of a book just disappearing from the world. So when an old fandom mom on the message boards I frequented offered to type her copy up chapter by chapter and share it with me, you can only imagine how overjoyed I was. Idk what her own situation was that something like scanning wouldn’t work, but the point is she spent months helping a fandom kid she barely knew simply because a story had resonated with her and she wanted to share it. That shit is powerful!

So if someone wants to delete—if that’s something they need right now—I believe that is, ultimately, their decision… but please try your hardest to remember that the art you put out into the world is having an impact and people will absolutely miss it when it’s gone. Often to the point of doing everything they can to put it back out into the world even if you decide to take it out. Hold onto that feeling. The love you have for your favorite fic, fanart, meta, whatever it is? Someone else has that for your work too. I guarantee it.

So take things down as needed, but for the love of everything keep copies for yourself. You may very well want to give it back to the world someday.