#nobody asked this but in my head each girls' best physical attribute is:

[persephoneggsy]

For the design meme: Sature for Fiora, Canvas for Marian, Motion for Hildegarde

oc asks: character design edition

Fiora - stature: What's your OC's body type? How tall are they? Do they wear clothing to accentuate their look or do they try to mask it?

I think of my three main heroines, Fiora is definitely the tallest. She's like 5'10'' in my head. But she likes wearing heels that put her over 6 feet. (And I picture Alistair at like 5'11'' so she especially likes heels that make her taller than him. He pouts but finds it kind of endearing actually lol) As for body type, I picture her as very graceful but athletic - kind of ballerina-esque in stature. Defined muscle, fantastic legs, and STRONG-looking thighs. Canon Dragon Age Fiora probably can't wear booty shorts, but Modern AU Fiora definitely does to show off her Legs™.

Marian - canvas: Does your OC have any scars, piercings, tattoos, or other markings? Do they display or cover them up at all?

She got her ears pierced during that first year in Kirkwall bc she and Carver got drunk and someone in the Red Iron dared them to. Carver only got one ear but she got both. She probably didn't wear earrings much until after she gets the Hawke estate because then she has enough money to buy, like, cute earrings she actually WANTS to wear lol. I headcanon that the iconic Hawke "blood mark" across her nose is actually a birthmark. She shared it with Malcolm (and unbeknownst to her, other members of the Hawke family had it as well, like Malcolm's mother, and grandfather, etc etc). The only prominent scar she has is a long one on her left cheek that she got from the Arishok fight. She's surprisingly vain so any other scars she usually heals them with magic to get rid of them, but the cheek scar stays as a reminder to anyone who wants a piece of her that she took on a seven foot oxman and fucking won. And I think she has just one tattoo, at least in the Dragon Age canon verse, that she got after DA2 but before Inquisition. A spray of pink and white gardenias along her neck that represent her beau, Sebastian (white gardenias represent purity, sweetness, and peace; pink gardenias represent beauty and a fresh start). I just never draw her with the tattoos bc I'm lazy lmao.

Hildegarde - motion: How does your OC move? How does their clothing help or hinder their range of motion? Are they flexible, coordinated, clumsy?

Hildegarde is very closed off at the start of Inquisition. She's shy, she's not used to people looking at her, and her body language reflects that. She's normally curled in on herself, hunched to look smaller than usual, constantly fidgeting with something to occupy herself - usually she wrings her own hands, but after Cullen gives her his lucky coin, she wears it on a necklace and tumbles it between her fingers to help ground herself. Despite all that, she's unexpectedly coordinated. She's fast. Kind of like a rabbit darting to and from one hidey-hole to the next. Clothing-wise, she prefers trousers to the typical mage robes bc it helps her dodge and get away faster. She's also a surprisingly good dancer. And as she grows more confident, it starts to reflect in the way she moves. She still won't willingly draw attention to herself, but she stands taller, fidgets less.

[lantsovsupremacist]

I was wondering if you could do a Nikolai fic w a Tidemaker reader who works for him on the Volkvony ?

whenever i read nikolai stuff, i imagine his girl to be a tide maker. so, of course it’s my honor to make this happen 🙏🙏 also i got carried away and there will most certainly be a part 2 🤪🤪

mijn dochter: my daughter (i went with dutch because that’s what kerch is supposedly influenced by)!

nikolai lantsov: mirror ball

it all began out of desperation, as most things in your life often did.

born into a family of ten living on the farmlands of kerch, there were always too many mouths to feed. despite the nature of your family’s occupation, whatever could be harvested or slain for food often ended up sent to the markets to try and keep up with the land payments. it was this necessity to help your family (an expectation of yourself as the middle child as much as your younger siblings) that kept you from attending school the day testing occurred. considered the bottom of the lowest class, nobody deemed you important enough to reschedule a test or even find you a spot for the next year’s round.

you believed the position of the testers. it was not because you felt particularly unimportant, just that there was no history of grisha in your family or few you had ever come into contact with. in fact, watching the older kids get tested was your only example of grisha power. a lack of suitable education did not help your case. so, you disregarded the event or lack thereof quickly after it passed.

however, when you pulled the tide in to help the withering crops survive one summer—out of sheer desperation—you could no longer ignore the possibility. the land only needed to close in to the sound by a few feet in order for the water to saturate the fields properly. it could have been a trick of a weary mind. you might not have even realized what had happened if not for your father’s startled gasp.

he muttered a single word, grisha. anything else was unintelligible under his breath—likely a slew of curses. he had even less of an education than you and your siblings. for months, you pleaded for your parents to pretend as if nothing had changed. your oldest brother knew the word for it: tidemaker. one of his best friend’s at school, their older sister had been one. but, she had been taken away. you could not imagine leaving your fields and the sun that hung above them.

you did not want to be a danger to your family, what with the way in which discovered grisha were treated in kerch’s cities. you could only hide for so long. in addition to this worry, you believed by using this resource, you could find better pay to send home. it was not the second army you desired to join but perhaps, some freelance work.

the volkvony was much larger than the scattered fishing boats dotting the coast. even those you saw rarely, the docks being miles outside your town. the pirateer’s vessel and those occupying it radiated power. the reminder of your own ability did little to ease your anxiety.

you mother’s final parting words rang in your head, and you held onto the echo for as long as you could.

“you are a fierce force to be reckoned with, mijn dochter.”

right now with your knees knocking and shoulders shaking, you hardly felt it. your mother often remarked you showed courage in different ways. you might have paled at standing up to the bully that had broken your sister’s arm as a child and allowed your eldest brother to physically retaliate, but your calm nature quieted her cries as you held her gently, waiting for help. you knew that even when he did not verbally express it, your father still appreciated how you took it upon yourself to care for the little ones, handle the crises at home. you made life work for everybody.

your littlest brother, espen, would think you were strong despite the obvious nerves riddling your form. before you left, he hugged you goodbye with all of the strength his two-year-old body could muster, imbuing you with it. his childlike magic satiated any apprehension that came your way on the voyage to the boat’s docking in ketterdam—a city’s whose reputation limited your visits to three occasions in eighteen years. and when it faded, because it always did, you held tight to baby noa’s fairly like giggles, each one of her accompanied smiles locked carefully away in your heart.

even with living a life largely locked on land, the water brought a unique sense of calm to your restless spirit. to any onlooker, your closed eyes and deep breaths by the banks could be attributed to the anticipation of adventure. however, anyone who truly knew your heart would understand the greater impact of the tides. they might even notice the slight curl of your lip or scrunch of your nose, the actions of concentration supporting the delicate ripples of waves on the edge of the sound.

a voice from behind you nearly caused you to jump right off of the dock. one might think that growing up in a household of ten, you would be painfully aware of your surroundings. that could not be father from the case. you did not intend to walk through life stuck in your own head, but it was a habit.

“we’re boarding now,” the same person spoke again, “you’re our new tidemaker, right?”

“that’s right,” you annunciated softly with a nod of your head.

now having stepped forward, you identified the figure to be a girl a few years your elder. with short cropped hair and a glint in her eyes, she intimidated you. however, her tone was kind and seemed welcoming.

“i’m tamar and that,” she extended a hand to point, “is my brother toyla. heartrenders.”

you nodded again, rolling your lips into your mouth. following behind her, you strung your bag over your shoulder and avoided the more worn planks on the dock. the wood was speckled with age.

“how long have you been in the harbor?” you questioned, genuine curiosity in your words.

“only a few days,” she replied without turning her head, opting to keep her gaze ahead as she weaved through the crowd, “ketterdam intrigues sturmhond, but he never keeps us here for too long.”

recognizing the captain’s name who had graciously offered you a position onboard the volkvolny only two days prior, you continued after tamar. you remembered his crooked jaw and nose that had obviously been broken before. however, the ease of his smile and light in his eyes gave you the push to accept. he had approached you in the spot which you had stood only this morning and caught you in a similar position. he had been uniquely attentive.

the way he revealed that he had caught onto your ability with the ripples in the shallow water still caught you by surprise and perhaps, amusement. he had asked you to help him skip a rock. you smiled at the memory now, a small but authentic one only for yourself.

“are all of the hands grisha?” you asked another question, careful to lower your voice.

home to various brothels, pleasure houses, and gambling dens, as well as gangs, ketterdam could trap grisha in servitude if they were not vigilant. this and the general boisterous nature of the city were largely your reasons for avoiding it. you preferred the tranquility and predictability of the countryside, where all that stood out among the plains were the occasional rolling hill and far away slopes of mountain.

your older brother coen studied in the most acceptable part of the city on a scholarship, the only one of your siblings (including yourself) that showed enough intellectual promise to merit pursuing an education over farm work. the only other member of your family to dare encounter the barrel was lotte. given she was now estranged and likely involved in gang work, her possible presence did little to soothe you.

“oh, no,” tamar answered, “in fact, most aren’t. we try and keep it quiet.”

humming in response, you used the handrail to board the ship. you took a deep breath to quell any remaining anxiety. once your feet touched the hull, there would be no room for fear or at least, any expression of it. you were used to keeping to yourself, your head down and hands working.

the salt air filled your lungs easily, and you were greedy for more. it left a pleasant enough taste in your mouth. you realized you were content here and wondered if you might even find happiness on the ship.

after showing you to the quarters you would share with two other girls, you straightened your cot and placed your bag underneath it. you made quick work of braiding your hair back, pacing the room as you did so. there was work to be done, and you would be sure to see to it.

grounding yourself to steady the spinning of the room, you faced your things one more time and headed out to the deck above. for once, you were surrounded by people like you. while this did not quite give you confidence, there was a semblance of reassurance flickering in your heart.

you no longer needed to be perfect for everyone else. though your family was still largely your responsibility as they would receive a portion of your wages, you no longer had to pace your interactions with each member. if you wanted to, you could be as loud and lively as the rest of the crew surely was. scrunching your nose at the thought, you stepped by an empty crate and up the stairs. you liked being quiet. it gave you the headspace to observe others.

a long life of making the lives of your younger siblings and parents easier gave you little time to think for yourself or about yourself. maybe this adventure was all a farce to finally please yourself, to learn to believe in yourself, but you had forced it to be about the others. always placing the focus away. that was an easier story to believe rather than accepting that maybe, you were doing something for yourself and maybe, that was okay.

perhaps it should have made you nervous, but you were a shy version of excited at the idea of testing out each variant of yourself to see which one you believed in most. you had shown everyone else what they wanted or needed to see for many years. you needed to live for yourself now.

you had a right to the sea and you were determined to take advantage of it.

[multifandomthoughts]

Sunbathing Beauty

MINORS DNI, NSFW

AFAB READER

Requested by: @softiebadbitch

Warnings: Fellatio, Penetration, Semi-public sex (though nobody is there)

“Ace, you can’t even swim!” You shout as the brunette held your arm, dragging you across the warm sand as he ran, umbrella slung over one shoulder and a backpack over the other. “But I wanted to spend time with you, and pops said if I didn’t get out soon, he’d tell the cook not to let me have any food for a week. I know he didn’t mean it, but that personal of a threat has to mean something.”

“I still don’t understand why you took me to the beach of all places.” You retort, the sun beating down on the two of you, reminding you to put on sunscreen after this conversation. “Isn’t it enough that I want to spend some time with you? You are my favorite person after all.” Ace flashes you a wide grin and drops the bag he was carrying, some of the contents spilling out.

You get a look at the contents and sighed. Buckets and hand shovels? The second division commander of the Whitebeard Pirates… wants to make sandcastles? “You’re lucky you’re so cute.” You say, trying to act annoyed but unable to keep a smile off your face. Pulling out the rest of the contents, there are two towels, sunscreen and sunglasses. The towel and sunscreen are most important, considering you were burning not only your skin, but the soles of your feet from the baking sand.

The first thing you do is spread your towel on the sand, and once the safe haven is formed you get off your hot feet and lie down on it, putting on your sunglasses. “Since we’re going to be here a while, do you think you could help me with the sunscreen? I don’t want to burn my back.” Ace nods and grabs the bottle. “Want to untie your top or should I just work around it?” He asks, squeezing a sizable dollop onto his hand.

You nod as best you can while lying down and reach back to untie the knot holding your top on. A small sigh escapes you as your chest feels that little bit more free. It’s soon replaced by a squeal as you twitch from the sudden presence of Ace’s cold, wet hands on your back. You return to a relaxed state once the initial shock wears off and enjoy the loving touch of him applying the lotion all over your bare skin. It feels like the interaction is over almost as soon as it started and soon he’s left your side again to start filling his buckets with sand. You pout a little bit, as you tie your top back on and sit up to start applying your own sunscreen everywhere else.

A funny feeling starts to creep upon Ace. His mind is no longer focused on the whimsy of building sand castles. He’s more interested in that bikini that you spent so much time trying to have him notice. His heart is racing as if he were on the battlefield, but adrenaline and aggression are the furthest things from his mind right now. This is purely… excitement, and something akin to the awe he gets from a sunset, all focused on you. The desire to get even closer to you begins to overwhelm his mind, and he has to do something about it. The thought of dumping a bucket of cold clear ocean water on you has passed.

Acting on impulse alone he left his buckets behind and stood in front of you once again, wordlessly staring. You give him a confused look. “Do you need something, Ace?” Stumbling over his words, Ace blurts “That swimsuit is so revealing it’s practically pointless. Let’s get rid of it.” Your face turns bright red, it wasn’t the reaction you expected, but one that you were looking for. “Ace….” You respond, a smirk on your face. “We can do that, but this is a public place!” “But why not? Being a pirate is about the freedom to do what you like when you like. And a relationship is about not caring what others think because you’re happy together. So since I’m all worked up now, let’s have some fun!”

You scan your eyes across the beach, looking for any signs of other inhabitants. It seems like any other occupants have left, either because they knew who Ace was, or they had become disinterested. Satisfied that you don’t have an audience, you give a sigh. “Alright, but can you at least put up the umbrella so we’ll be more cool in the shade?” Giving a mock salute, Ace sets about planting the pole in the sand and spreading the umbrella over your heads. “Nice and comfy now, hot stuff?” “Totally, the shade makes it nice and cool, as well as covering up.”

You go to take off your top, Ace’s eyes glued to your torso like a dog towards a steak. That gives you an even better idea, and you immediately put that plan into action. Running yours hand up and down your shoulders and thighs, you hover your hand over the knot keeping your swimsuit together. You can swear you see Ace gulp and a bead of sweat cascade down his forehead.

Rather than pull the knot undone right away you tug on the strings over your shoulders a bit to make your chest bounce for him. “You said this doesn’t cover enough, but I think you’re going crazy because you can’t see the best parts yet… but don’t worry baby, I’ll show you everything soon. And then you’ll melt in my hands, knowing that you have to beg. Ace squirms excitedly, his hands clasped together between his knees in a futile attempt to keep him from reaching out.

You right hand reaches behind your back to untie the knot while simultaneously holding your left arm in front of you, covering up your breasts as the top of your swimsuit goes limp around your body. Winking at him, you bring your free hand back around to your waist and start tugging at the side of your bottoms. “Which will it be first, Ace? Move this arm out of the way, or take the rest of it off?” For the first time, you think you’ve silenced Ace. He doesn’t say anything, and just stares straight ahead at your covered breast. So mesmerized, so enamored that not one word drips out of his mouth.

Ace says something, but the words just don’t come out. He repeats this multiple times, each time as quiet as the last time. You tilt your head in mock confusion, trying to hold back the smirk that attempts to creep onto your face. “Sorry babe, a little louder?” His fists are tightly clenched in between his knees as he sits in front of you staring unblinkingly at the arm keeping him from your treasure. “All… I want all of it… I need all of you…” he groans through gritted teeth, his legs constantly shifting as if that will bring any relief to his fierce prisoner.

“Oh, is that so? You laughed, happy to know that your plan of teasing him with your swimsuit has gotten you to this point. “So, what’s it going to be? Tits or pussy?” Ace flashes you a devilish grin, having gained his confidence back. The Ace that you met who was full of swagger, and could take on absolutely anything. Without a second thought he gently grabs your wrist. “Yes.” Next thing you know, you’re on your back in a passionate kiss with Ace. One hand is running through your hair, the other has pulled your arm away from your chest, your breasts now pressed against his pecs as the friction sends a wave of heat through both of your bodies.

“Now, for the elephant in the room….he declares. “Do I have your permission to touch you?” Nodding your head violently and vocalizing a yes, you take his hand, place it on your breast and wrap his fingers around the soft tender flesh. His knee runs up your inner thigh, stopping short of the prize and coming back down, then back up again. If he had finished the journey he would feel the damp spot in your bikini bottoms. Instead, he brings his mouth down to kiss and suck on the tit his hand had left unattended. “Love these so much…” he mutters, bowed over you as if in a prayer of gratitude. When his head does raise to meet your gaze, the mischievous look is back though a bit hazy with lust. “Permission to finish stripping you?” He inquired with a smirk. “G-granted…” you manage to squeak out between shuddering breaths and half suppressed moans. “Great. Then get up onto your knees and bend over for me.” He says with an authority you can’t dismiss but a needy tone that betrays the facade covering his desperation for this.

As he asks, you get on your hands and knees. No sooner have you done it than he is behind you running his hands over your ass. But he does not let himself get sidetracked and you feel fingers hooking under the waistband of your bottoms. With baited breath you try to hold still as he yanks the garment down to your knees. Your arousal is apparent in both the wetness of its crotch area and the moisture glistening on your exposed pussy. “Naughty girl, aren’t you?” Ace teases, knowing damn well he and his pitched mast aren’t ones to talk. “I could take you right here like this… would you like that? Or should I ask you to return the favor and help me out of my trunks now?” You squirm in his grip, before slipping out onto your back and spreading your legs for him. “You’ve been begging for it, I don’t know how you’re able to wait!” You giggle, batting your eyelashes at him. Seeing you in this new seductive pose silences Ace yet again, not to mention being called out for his lust. You take a little pity on him and sit up again to reach out for his swimsuit.

“I guess I won’t make you wait in agony any longer… let me see your handsome body…” you say softly as you pull his clothes off. Sure enough his erection springs out stiff and ready. You mull your eyes over it for a minute, big and thick before running your hand down and up the base. Ace let’s out a long sigh, one that he didn’t know that he was holding. He scoots back onto the very edge of the towel, spreading himself out so you have more room to take him in. Before anything else, you knew you had to give this thing some hands on attention… and probably lip service.

Running a finger up and down the warm flesh from soft tip to twitching base, you lick your lips and feel your lower half getting equally wet. You’re not some superficial girl who only appreciates a guy for physical attributes… but fuck this is an impressive dick. As you reach the tip again you wrap your hand around his shaft instead and start to gently stroke up and down. “So big and hard… just for me? You know how to make a girl feel special don’t you… Let’s see if I can make you feel even better. Just tell me if it hurts, or if you’re about to blow.” He nods violently, as you begin to lower your head back onto his dick. Your hand on the base of his shaft, you move it in the opposite direction you are sucking, sliding your hand up as you go down.

With a gentle grip guiding your head, Ace directs your motions in a steady pace, releasing a cacophony of moans. For every rise and fall he lets out a pleasured sound unlike anything you’ve ever heard from this notorious pirate. Some guttural, some high pitched, all from your man. You flutter your eyelashes again as you look up at him; it’s useless, as his eyes are gently closed in pure bliss. Despite the umbrella casting a long shadow across the two of you, beads of sweat roll down his forehead; you’ve got him wrapped around your finger. A sharp tug on your hair alerts you that he’s close, as his eyes roll back into his skull. He attempts to take control and starts thrusting in search of climax. You weren’t prepared to be face fucked like this, but you can adapt quickly.

Using your arms, you forcefully remove Ace’s hands from your head, releasing you from his guide. In an attempt to coax his climax quicker, you breathe in deeply through your nose and take all of his thick cock, burying your nose into his pubic bone. The mixture of deepthroating, and your hand on the base of his shaft causes him to let out an ear piercing whine. You manage to stay down and are rewarded as his pulsing cock unloads, the warm rush of cum filling your mouth. You swallow, before winking and blushing back at your partner.

“Ready for round two?” You coo, giving the tip of his cock a kiss before widening your stance expectantly. “Or can you not handle what beauty is sitting in front of you?” You expect him to need a little time to cool down and recharge, but his erection hasn’t gone down in the slightest and he only looks more eager. “I think I can handle you pretty well, just wanna be sure you can handle this bad boy. Guess I have my answer, so here’s a better question: Do we have any kind of protection?”

Biting your lip, you drag your discarded top through the sand, and reach inside the breast pocket. “For when a sexy man wants to have some fun…” You quip, tearing the wrapping open with your teeth. “Now’s the main event, big boy…” Separating the rubber from the plastic, you put Ace’s cock in your hand once again. In one quick movement, the condom is on and the two of you are ready to go. As he draws in close again, you run a playful finger along his abs. He takes hold of your left thigh while his right hand holds his member steady on its course. “Let me help with that…” you offer softly, grabbing his wrist to make the intention clear. He lets go and you take hold of the slick latex and warm flesh. Now with both hands on your thighs, he keeps your legs spread and your body steady as the tip of his member presses at your waiting opening to seek entry. With you to guide him he pushes a bit more and finds it.

You wince in pain, gripping his shoulders as his big cock fills you. He was stretching you a bit, but you didn’t mind the sting. The pain is worth the pleasure. You take a deep breath as you bottom out, a pleasant feeling enveloping your core. “Fuck me Ace, please…you feel so good…” you plead, squirming to get more of that wonderful feeling. “Okay hot stuff, be prepared for a wild ride.” His hands wander up to your breasts, grasping them as if they were the most precious jewels. Tantalizingly slow, he pulls out of you. You beg and whine, every inch lost leaving an empty feeling until all you have is the tip. “Put it….in…please!!” You howl, clawing at his legs as you attempt to push him back in. He goes back to rubbing your nipples under his thumbs and acts like he’s deep in thought. “Well… you’re making some pretty cute noises right now so maybe I shouldn’t? Ah, but I wanna hear what you’ll sound like when I do this!” And just like that he slammed back in, as you let out a loud moan.

Ace is done going easy on you, and the thrust in is immediately followed by another out, then back in agains and again. He’s really fucking you now, and it feels so goddamn good. Every slap of skin against skin elicits an even louder sound, is it possible that there’s a limit to your volume? The harder he goes on you, the tighter you can feel yourself getting. Your coil keeps tightening, almost ready to snap. As if the feeling of his cock isn’t exciting enough, the look on his face and the grunts and moans he’s making are sure as hell helping. You wrap your legs around his waist to keep him deep in you and arch your back to press your tits into his waiting hands even more.

Pleasure and joy flow through your body and mind so strongly you worry it might start to spill out as tears, and you can certainly tell it’s dripping out somewhere else. Your sexual frenzy continues a few minutes more until you know you can’t take any more. “Ace… I’m so close…” you try to tell him, though by now your voice has been reduced to a shrill squeak. Ace understands it though, and replies with a grunt that sounds like “Me too… together babe.” Your boyfriend leans in and kisses you one more time as he ruts like the animal in heat he seems to be. The dam bursts and you moan into the kiss as your pussy convulses and tries to milk him for all he’s got. Luckily you have the condom in the way, because he’s got a lot. He twitches a few times as a fresh load streams out and is collected in the reservoir tip, and you feel a new wave of heat in your core.

You lay back on your towel, spent. It feels as if you’ve just completed a marathon and every muscle in your body is crying out for rest. Despite this, you look into Ace’s eyes; they’re clouded from what just went on. Catching your breath, your face is just inches away from Ace’s. He’s regained all his energy already and gives you a cheeky grin. “See? I knew we’d have plenty to do at the beach without having to swim!”

[indigobackfire]

HPHM MC Profile ✧

Indigo Silverwood

“ Getting near you is like stretching my hand into an open flame. I know I’ll burn myself, yet I crave the heat. ”

Nicknames: Indie. Didi (only by family). Silverwood. Silvie (by people who don't bother learning her name).

Gender: Female.

Birthday: 6th of March, 1973.

Born: Edinburgh, Scotland.

Mother: Clarin (née Tramer) Silverwood - Half-blood, Ravenclaw, English.

Father: Palmer Silverwood - Pureblood, Slytherin, Scottish.

Siblings: Jacob Silverwood (b. 1968), Phoenix Nobleworth Silverwood (b. 1973) - Phoenix was adopted after the death of his parents when he was just a couple of months old.

Ethnicity: Scottish, English, (probably with some Spanish roots).

Sexuality: Straight.

MBTI Type: ENFP-A

Blood Status: Half-blood (by her muggle grandmother on her mother's side).

Hogwarts House: Gryffindor.

Appearance

Eyes: Naturally yellow/golden/amber (nobody knows why, since their parent’s eyes are brown) but both hers and Jacob's eyes are like this). She wears glasses for her Astigmatism.

Hair: Naturally dark brown, but she asked her mother to turn it red when she turned 8 and doesn't plan on undoing it any soon.

• She’s average tall and reasonably strong build, honey-brown skin littered with scars from venturing with the vaults and being freaking attacked by dark wizards, big hands and feet due to her height. A large chest that grows at once in her 4th year (”Everybody's starring, Rowan!”).

• She keeps her nails short. Her makeup is often down to just some lipstick (mascara smudges her glasses, eye shadow irritates her eyes), her hair is often long wavy and fluffed for extra volume. She often smells like coconut oil from all the creams her mother insisted she used.

• She looks a lot like her father which gives her a rather rough look - like a handsome but wild animal - yet has enough of her mother’s attributes to be considered attractive and poise if well-groomed.

Magical Aspects

1st Wand: Red Oak wood with Dragon Heartstring core, 12″, pliable. "The true match for a red oak wand is possessed of unusually fast reactions, making it a perfect dueling wand. Its ideal master is light of touch, quick-witted and adaptable, often the creator of distinctive spells, and a good person to have beside in a fight." Indigo had good times with her red oak wand but as the years went by, her emotions start affecting the wand's efficiency. The wand would bleed a glowing red light in moments of extreme physical or emotional pain and become extremely unstable.

2nd Wand: Beechwood with Thestral hair core, 13", rigid flexibility. "The true match for a beech wand will be, if young, wise beyond their years, and if full-grown, rich in understanding and experience. Beech wands perform very weakly for the narrow-minded and intolerant. When properly matched, the beech wand is capable of a subtlety and artistry rarely seen in any other wood, hence its lustrous reputation." Indigo has a hard time adapting to her new wand, it's stubborn to her spells and acts upon its own will especially considering its unusual and unstable core, Thestral hair, which is of unknown habilities, except for its use in the mythical, Elder wand. Her wand is one of a kind which is why she has to adapt her abilities to match the wand's requirements. Despite all, it's a remarkable instrument for undoing curses/spells and detecting danger.

Animagus: Somali cat. She's already certain she wants to be a cat animagus - harmless, of easy blend, and enables an approach to humans -, but decides for the Somali breed, during the process, for its sumptuous golden fur and agility.

Patronus: Kangaroo, for its fighting spirit and family values, not to mention its strength. (In-game it's the Abraxan, but only because I thought it would be cool.)

Patronus memory: (During the first times) Her first Quidditch match, not just because they won but because everyone she loves from Hogwarts was there, and she got to cheer their victory together. (Later years) Her family gathering for hot cocoa during a rainy night with Jacob with them.

Abilities: Legilimency, and great emotional influence over magic (Don't get her frightened or angry or she will blow you up).

Boggart:  Her boggart changes constantly - she can't decide if it's either because she overcame the old fears, or if the new ones toppled those, creating a pile of fears. And since the new DADA teacher is always teaching Riddikulus again and again, the famous curse-breaker is always the most awaited in the line.

Jacob, eyes dark and musty, clothes covered in blood, someone's blood. He walks to her and slowly raises his sleeve, the Death mark is craved deep in his flesh and it glows. Behind him, it rises the Dark Lord.

Riddikulus: He turns into a younger version of himself from a photograph she recalls laughing about with her mom (he's running wearing a loaded diaper, crazy hair, rosy cheeks).

For a while is someone in a cloak threatening to cast the killing curse over her friends, whispering each of their names like a snake but she's frozen unable to stop them.

Riddikulus: The cloak falls to reveal a bunch of gnomes piled up wearing wigs and makeup.

For another, very realistic corpses of all of her friends spread at her feet, a dark wizard across from her, it's over and there isn't anything she can do to save them anymore - it was a grim day in DADA, but they all wanted to see it didn't they?

Riddikulus: This is the one time she fails to defeat a boggart, letting the horrible scene consume her, she falls to her knees defeated, and even after Rakepick's shouting, when she tries to cast the spell, it fails again and again.

This last boggart came to show everyone around her how truly terrified she was, not for her own life, but for that of those around her. How despite the confidence she was constantly displaying, in reality, she was afraid she couldn't save them from whatever was trying to get her.

Amortentia: Her Amortentia smells like Jacob's cologne — which he used to borrow from their father which is why she recalls so easily —, fresh Catnip ever since she became an animagus, bakings just out of the oven — extra intensity if there's chocolate involved, and freshly washed sweaters (from hugging Barney and the Weasleys).

Mirror of Erised: She's under the shadow of a tree, Jacob on one side along with Phoenix and Aspen, Barnaby's head resting on her lap, Rowan by her side, and Orion for some reason. They're laughing and reading books, it's an eternal spring afternoon.

Miscellaneous

Pets: A Sphynx cat, Mocca, a brown and white rat, Franccesca, and (later in her Hogwarts years) a Great Horned owlet, Plum.

Things she always carries with her: Her wand (duh), a handmade Gryffindor bracelet that used to belong to Jacob, the Handbook of Magical Theory, a handful of peppermints, a pouch with some money, a flask of Wideye potion, some Murtlap Essence, and a family photo during Christmas of 1980.

Lucky Amulets: She has a dream catcher made by Phoenix from feathers he shed during transformations and a "broken" knight from Murphy's chessboard who decided to leave the game for good and now sleeps on Indigo's nightstand with its horse, she likes stroking the horse the night before every Quidditch match

Best Friends

Her brother, Phoenix, takes the crown in matter of importance because, well, they're siblings who grew up practically like twins, but their relationship deserves their own detailing.

Rowan has got to be the first. Not only they share the same adventurous nerdy spirit, but Rowan also is the one to stick around even when everything is dark and uncertain and Indigo's popularity plummets. Indigo is always excited to hear whatever Rowan has to say - most times about books or Bill Weasley - and she's rarely fazed by the weird things Rowan does.

Murphy McNully is a close second, having officially met in the middle of her second year, they're both still fresh in a matter of friendships which allows them to open up, both in desperate need of company and support. He's often a companion in the girl's library and common room study sessions and sits with them during meals.

Charlie Weasley has her heart and soul from the moment they first speak during year one, but it actually takes a while until they form any real bond, which begins after he finds out she has been seeking his brother's help to search for the cursed vaults.

Ben is a friend she cherishes deeply but often finds it hard to break through his protective shell which makes him feel distant even when he opens up to her. Unlike her friends, she grows more liking towards Ben after he has his change in personality, as he feels more open about himself.

Chiara is a friend she deeply appreciates for her courage in reaching out for her help in times of need and trusting her with her secret. In Marauder fashion, she likes keeping an eye on her on the nights of full moon - which is good to train her cat tree climbing. They often have afternoon tea together and she teaches Indigo useful healing spells.

Andre and Indigo didn't have a great start, as she thought of him as arrogant and inconsiderate, and he thought she was careless and selfish. But when she helps him with a transfiguration mishap during their 3rd year when he was trying to be creative - and the reason he now has a two-headed cat - they start opening up to each other and begin a friendship. He's a good friend to confide in about the mundane aspects of her life and Quidditch intrigues.

Orion means to her more than she can put into words. Not only he is her team captain, but also a dear friend whom she turns to in times of emotional instability cause she knows he'll be the one to successfully help her clear her mind. They enjoy each other's company even if they don't have anything interesting to say. They sit together during every Divination class for as long as the subject goes.

She has no "rivals" as she finds that sort of labeling quite petty, but would definitely punch Emily Tyler on the stomach and perhaps Face Paint kid for all his eavesdropping.

She has an easier time bonding with her fellow Gryffindors since they spend most of their time together in classes, lunch, and hanging around in the common room.

Dormmates: She and Rowan got placed in a room for three people, as the ones for five were already full, along with a girl called Tanya. But at the beginning of their 4th year, they find out she has bailed out to another dorm room claiming they 1. Snort and speak in their sleep on a regular basis, 2. Will eventually endanger her with their cursed vault shenanigans, 3. Will get her killed - which, spoilers, actually happens, oops. So they basically have the dorm for themselves.

Academics

Favorite Classes:

Potions

Flying

DADA

Magical Theory

Least Favorite:

Transfiguration

History of Magic

Arithmancy

Favorite Professor: Kettleburn. Despite CoMC not being on her top favorite subjects, she enjoys her time in his classes and reminds her of her grandfather on her father's side who's a highlander wizard.

Least Favorite: Binns. Just retire you old man!

Quidditch Position: Chaser. Despite enjoying her time as Gryffindor's beater, she notices the position takes a toll on her physical wellbeing, having to carry a heavy bat and being injured by bludgers more times than she can keep track of. So she returns to her chaser position after a year.

Favorite Team: Montrose Magpies. She never had an interest in Quidditch before she began playing but decided to pick a team to support. Of course, it had to be a Scottish team and settles for MM because of professor McGonagall who's also a supporter.

She's not indigo's face claim, but it's hard to find good red-haired characters out there.

I guess I'll leave her background and history for another post since it interweaves very tightly with her sibling. And since I'm still exploring her story.

Well this is just an intro to my beloved MC

[cafeinthemoon]

Purple Dragon - Chapter 1

Title: Purple Dragon

Genre: Fanfiction

Pairing: none yet

Rating: teen and up

Word count: 2405

Chapter: 1/?

Symbols: ⭕ | ➕ | 💛 | ▶️ | ▶️

Warnings: canon divergence, past trauma and other stuff in the next chapters, but the appropriate warnings will be included 👍

N. A.: God I'm so happy and nervous at the same time bc this is my first bnha fic! 🥺 Just binge watched 3 seasons in less than a week and now I'm reluctant to finish season 4 and face bnha hangover so I'm probably don't know exactly what I'm doing here, but here we go! Yay!

Chapter 1 - American Girl

The morning outside the U.A.’s building was so quiet that Midoriya Izuku would never believe that all the disturbance he heard once he walked into it was possible. A confusion of whispered words, exclamations of surprise and excitement and muffled laughs came from his classroom, at some point of the corridor through which he was walking now, and seemed to meet him as a morning greeting.

Well, soon he noticed that some of his friends were actually coming to greet him besides the noise, their faces showing the exact expression he would expect from what he heard. Uraraka Ochacho reached him first, her big eyes shinning as if she was proud of herself for being the first one to speak to the newcomer.

- Good morning, Deku-kun! – she showed the boy her best smile – I think you’re going to regret not coming earlier today!

Midoriya was not regretting anything at the moment. In fact, meeting Uraraka before anyone else at school was not something about which he would complain: the warmth that always came up to his cheeks when he put his eyes on her was both embarrassing and comforting, if such thing was possible. The only problem was that he used to struggle to pay attention to anything around him or to control his actions every time this happened, and that was his precise situation at that time.

- G-good morning, Uraraka-san – he heard his own voice as if it belonged to someone else, the words coming out by themselves – What are you talking about?

The girl took a breath and was about to spread the news, but another voice was heard behind her.

- Oh, Midoriya! Good morning! I suppose you already know by now... we are going to meet a new classmate today!

Iida Tenya, with his composed manners, joined them with that discreet smile he believed to be appropriate for a class representative to express how excited he was with the arrival of another student at the heroes’ course, but both Midoriya and Uraraka knew that more than any of their friends he was urging to meet the new aspiring hero.

Uraraka’s face was now red and her lips were closed so tight that she could suffocate. Maybe she was irritated by Iida’s interruption or something, but whatever the case that was how he saw things, and he started to apologize in his well known way.

- I am so sorry for my rude behavior, Uraraka-san! – he bent down at her, his arms glued to the sides of his body, his head almost touching the floor – Please, tell Midoriya the whole story and I will not open my mouth until you are finished! This is a promise!

While the girl was doing her best to convince Iida that she wasn’t offended at all, Midoriya was still a bit lost with all that information coming to him at once. He started to walk toward the class as the others followed him.

So we are going to have a new classmate soon, right?

- Yes! – Uraraka have completely forgotten all the irritation with the urge to speak – According to what I’ve heard, her name is Ryu and she just came from the United States. Well, actually she was born in Japan but her family moved to the United States when she was little, so this makes her almost a foreigner – she clenched her fists – It’s unbelievable! She can communicate in both Japanese and English, if what I’ve heard is correct. She must be a very smart person. At least we will be able to talk to her, and she might help us during English lessons! Isn’t it fantastic, Deku-kun?

Midoriya smiled, for the first time contemplating the idea of having a new classmate, and one who came from such a distant place as the United States.

- Yes, that’s amazing. But where is she?

This time, Iida, back to his composed attitude, didn’t see any problem in taking the floor:

- She’s talking to Aizawa sensei right now, but nobody can enter the room. Apart from what Uraraka said, we don’t have much more information about her. We don’t even know what type of quirk she has. We will have to wait until she is officially introduced to us.

They stopped at the classroom’s entry when Midoriya questioned how they got the little information they just spread. The answer to this came from the first person who greeted them at the door.

- We got a little help in this! – the pink, round face of Mina Ashido popped out in front of the trio with a smile that could be both of joy and embarrassment; she pointed her thumb to someone behind her back – Shouji kind of refused to collaborate, so fortunately we had Jirou by our side – and lowering her tone – She was dying to gather as much information as she could, but if you say that to her, she will deny, of course.

Midoriya pointed his finger to Jirou.

- So you asked her to listen behind the door?

Mina’s cheeks passed from pink to red in an instant. Jirou was not so close from the group to hear what was being said, but she looked away as to avoid additional questions. Midoriya looked at Iida and Uraraka seeking for a confirmation; it came in the form of clenched fists and lips bitten.

At the bottom of the class, there were more people who weren’t willing to discuss the bad habit of listening private conversations when such important events were about to take place: Kaminari was wondering if the new student’s quirk was similar to his; Kirishima, with his sharp smile at sight, agreed that it would be quite an experience if it happened; Sero was arguing that her quirk would be more impressive if it resembled his own; Mineta, lost in his own thoughts, didn’t say a word, but it would be no surprise if he was questioning himself about the girl’s physical attributes.

Though he could understand his classmates’ feelings, Midoriya couldn’t say he relate to the way in which they express their interest in the new girl. On his side, it was better not to create great expectations and let the facts surprise him by themselves. Maybe that was the opinion of some of the students who kept quiet in the middle of that noise, like Tsuyu Asui and Momo Yaoyorozu, engaged in a private and calm talking.

The only ones who seemed to have no particular interest in meeting the mysterious girl were Todoroki and Kacchan, the first one, with a book open in front of him, too concentrated in his own things to give his surroundings any attention, the second too irritated with all the mess to say anything.

***

Moments before

There were enough seats for at least ten people to occupy in that room, as well as a good space between each of them, but waiting in one of them somehow was not possible for Ryu Murasaki. There was something in the silence of those four walls that would not let her nerves relax. Was it the fact that she haven’t enough rest before attending to the U.A.’s call or was it the lack of time to process the fact that she was back in the country from where she moved at three? It wasn’t possible to tell, and neither she wanted to think about it. Not now.

The only thing Ryu could wish for now was the noise of her own thoughts to diminish. In normal circumstances, this could be reached while she would stand beside a window and just stare at the things outside, but now it didn’t seem to work though she has been in front of the room’s large windows for about ten minutes.

That was the funny thing about all of this: nothing under her sight – the morning sky out there, the trees, the school’s gates – was out of place. Yet not everything felt right. Ryu sighed; it was not so easy to stop projecting one’s impressions in lifeless things.

The door was opened at the opposite side of the room and she turned her neck toward it. A man entered the place without making a sound. He closed it behind his back and came to the center of the room, still in silence. Ryu has no great familiarity with the habits of the people there, but it was easy to suppose that she had to leave her spot and approach to greet him.

The man, tall and all dressed in black, carried a white fabric stripe wrapped around his neck, too thin and too long to be called a scarf. Was it an eccentricity of him or something else? There was no way to find out. This dress code was not the only unusual thing noticed by her: his hair, black and falling in waves around his shoulder and over his forehead, almost hiding his eyes, seemed to have grown for a long time without the interruption of a regular cut, and the same situation applied to his beard, all dark dots growing out the pale skin of his face. Everything in his appearance and presence reminded of tiredness and silence. Ryu didn’t try to guess what type of quirk he had, but she was convinced that it had something to do with put people to sleep.

The man’s greeting was simple.

- Good morning. You must be Ryu Murasaki, the girl who we are supposed to receive as our new student in the heroes course. According to what was sent to us, you were born in japan, but your parents moved to the United States with you when you were younger than five. So you manifested your quirk while you lived there.

The girl nodded.

- And thanks to your dual nationality, you are also fluent in English and Japanese.

- Yes.

His tone, low and slow, fitted him: it was not what she would call encouraging, so no question was made and he just kept speaking.

- I apologize for not giving enough time to rest after your long travel to Japan. My name is Shouta Aizawa and I am the teacher of 1 A Class, of which you are going to be part of. I’ve received some information about your quirk and your history, and what I can say is that it is something different from what I’ve seen in my years of experience as a hero and a teacher. So I’d like to hear an explanation from you. Can you give me details about your quirk?

Ryu felt warm sweat gathering in her palms and between her fingers. Speaking about her quirk always brought her the same sensation she thought she would have if someone asked her to take her clothes off in front of a crowd. Among the replies she had for that type of question was running away or hiding part of the answer.

This latter was what she tried to do at that time.

- I can… do things with my mind. I think of something I want to do and materialize my thought thanks to the energy I’m able to gather in my hands.

The next question came as no surprise after a short explanation like that.

- Can you show me how you do it?

Ryu swallowed. She looked around and found a small vase upon a table. When she raised her hand toward it, a purple, moving shade surrounded her fingers at the same time it manifested in the object’s surface; one movement from Ryu’s hand and the vase floated above the table. After a moment, she used the same delicacy to put it back in its place, and the purple shade finally disappeared from it and from her hand.

That was enough for now. It had to be enough…

- Is this everything you can do today?

The question hit her like a slap on her face.

- What do you mean, Aizawa-sensei?

- According to your history, you are currently able to modify, hide or destroy things with your quirk. However, instead of using your skills to change the object’s configuration , you just choose to make it float.

- And what’s the problem with it? – she interrupted.

Though his tone didn’t alter, something in his eyes intensified when Aizawa replied this time. Ryu didn’t like that.

- I hope you understand that I need to know exactly what you can do. It seemed that the best way to get an answer from you was by talking, but apparently I was deceived.

And what if I have my reasons to not talk to a stranger? was the first thing that came as an answer. But the words never came to her tongue. What she was supposed to say to that? Didn’t that man have no consideration at all?

Well, maybe not.

- Ryu Murasaki, activate your quirk and try to attack me now.

The girl took a step back without realizing it.

- You… You cannot be serious!

The silence Aizawa gave her as reply showed that yes, he was serious. Ryu had no choice. The purple energy appeared on her hand for the second time, more intense, faster in its swirling. She raised her hand and tried not to think of the results when she blasted the shade at his direction… and nothing happened.

She looked at the teacher and saw his hair floating above his head, while a reddish glimmer covered his pupils. She dropped her hand at the same time his hair and eyes went back to normal. The air in the room, suddenly disturbed with the conflict, was calm again. Ryu opened her mouth and closed it again, unable to speak, but the latent question was in her eyes. What did you just do?

- I forgot to mention, but I am also known as my hero name, Eraserhead. You must know what it means.

So, Aizawa’s quirk is to erase other people’s power. The fact that he was a teacher to aspiring heroes was suggesting, then. When she looked at him again, something assuring was perceived in his monotone traits.

- Overthinking your situation won’t help you at all. I know it seems too much to ask this from you now, but trust the U.A.’s program and you new teacher. As long as you are here, there’s nothing to worry about.

[sdottkrames]

You’ll Always Be Adored By the Things You [Save]

@comfortember prompt 12: Emotional support pet

Summary: Her name is Tess, and everybody adores her.

Notes: I honestly just love Tom and his love for Tess. They are the cutest! I’m thinking about making more with Tess, so if you like this, let me know and maybe I will! 😊

Also: Lucy and Rocky were the names of my dogs growing up. Lucy was a sassy, adorable Shih Tzu, and Rocky was the kindest, gentlest Boxer you’d ever meet. They both have since passed (they lived very long, happy lives) but I wanted to add them in this story somehow. I’m just a cheeseball. Also, Zendaya (MJ) Played a character named Rocki in a Disney show called Shake It Up, so it was a little nod to that as well.

Read on AO3: Here

“Tony, I’m really worried about him.”

May poked her head around the corner of their apartment, making sure Peter was still asleep. His breathing was too even for him to be faking, and she sighed in relief before continuing.

“He’s been off ever since the...the blip. I can tell. He’s been eating a lot less, and I looked at his grades the other day. Tony, that boy has never gotten below an A-, but he got a C+ on his last Physics test. And that’s not even including the fact that he was stabbed last night because his Peter Tingle isn’t working right.” Her voice was rising in pitch and volume, right in time with the panic that was welling up inside her. 

May and Tony had been having weekly conference calls about their resident spider since May had found out about it, and they’d quickly picked it back up once they had been undusted. Their normally lighthearted calls filled with mostly laughter had taken a more somber tone recently. 

Tony hummed on the other end of the phone. “I’ve been worried, too.”

Those words, though not necessarily helpful, made May feel less alone. She was grateful someone was helping her take care of her nephew because he was doing a terrible job of doing it himself, as evidenced by the stab wound on his left side. He’d come home weak and bleeding the previous night, and May had hurriedly patched him up, her training as a nurse the only thing keeping her panic in check.

“I honestly don’t know what to do, May. We tried letting him come to us and that didn’t work. I’ve got a list of great therapists-”

May cut him off. “He’ll never do that. I already tried that one, and he insisted that he didn’t want me paying money for him. I even pulled the whole “your mentor is a billionaire, and he would want you to get help” card, but he was pretty adamant.”

Tony sighed, and May felt it echo deep in her bones. They ended the call shortly after, no closer to a solution for Peter than before.

The next week on their call, Tony’s voice was considerably more lighthearted. She attributed it to the fact that Peter hadn’t been injured that week, but then he excitedly announced that had “the best idea!”

May’s eyebrows rose, even though she knew Tony couldn’t see them. “I’m listening.”

“Okay. How do you feel about dogs?”

“Oh,” May breathed.

“Yeah. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it earlier.”

“Me either. He’s been asking for a dog since he was, like, 5. The only problem is,” May said, biting her lip. “Our landlord doesn’t allow dogs.”

“I’ll take care of that,” Tony promised, and May nearly snorted at the thought of their stuffy, no-nonsense landlady getting a visit from Tony Stark. She pitied the woman.

***

“Ms., ah, Levitt, is it?” 

The lady looked up from her desk, and immediately blinked in shock. Tony internally rolled his eyes when the lady blushed and started trying to fix her hair, the look on her face one he’d seen on way too many women in his earlier years.

No chance, lady, I’m married. He thought, but flashed her a kind smile, anyway. “Are you the landlady of this apartment building?”

“I am. Pleasure to meet you, sir.”

Tony shook her offered hand, not holding on for a second longer than necessary. “Likewise. I am here on behalf of the Parker family...apartment 96. I was thinking about getting Peter an emotional support animal. He blipped, and has been having trouble adjusting, and I heard cute, fluffy animals work wonders. But I understand you don’t allow those?”

Levitt’s smile hardened. “Yes, I’m afraid we have a non-negotiable no-pet policy.”

She obviously hated animals. And probably little children. Figures. Luckily, years watching Pepper hand stuffy businessmen their behinds had taught Tony a thing or two. He could handle this lady.

“Well, I took the liberty of reviewing things, and did you know that, by law, emotional support or therapy animals must be allowed in any building? That includes yours. Now, I understand that there is a fee associated with having a therapy animal, which I will cover, and of course proper documentation, which I have right here.” Tony produced the paperwork, signed by Dr. Cho, stating that Peter should be allowed a therapy animal of his choosing. “If there are any further problems, I’m sure my wife would be happy to speak to you. She and our lawyer will be handling any legal issues.”

Tony watched in satisfaction as Ms. Levitt’s face blanched, knowing she was beat. Nobody could go up against Pepper Potts-Stark and win. 

She breathed heavily through her nose once then plastered a smile back on her face, though it didn’t meet her eyes. “That won’t be necessary. We value the Parkers. The fee is an extra $125 a month. Once you have the animal, bring the proof of licensure and ESA status, and we should be all set.”

Tony had her put his card on file so the payment would come out of his account. This was his gift to Peter (and May. Though she wouldn't admit it, he knew that she also loved animals and would have bought one (or two) if they’d had the money) and then stood to leave.

“Have a nice day,” he said, giving Levitt a cheery wave before waltzing out the door. He had a kid to surprise.

***

“Tony, really, where are we going?”

“For the millionth time, I’m not going to tell you, so stop wasting your breath.” Peter huffed indignantly, and Tony shoved his arm playfully. “Patience is a virtue, underoos.”

“And pride is a sin, yet here we are,” Peter quipped.

“Yes, here we are,” Tony said, grinning as Happy pulled the car into a parking spot in front of Rocky’s Shelter and Supplies. Tony had spent hours researching adoption agencies around, wanting to find a really good one to support, and Rocky’s had been one of the best he’d seen. Plus, they had a great variety to choose from. (And no, he hadn’t been crying looking at all the animals, who told you that?)

Peter’s reaction was everything Tony had hoped for. The kids brown eyes got impossibly larger, and filled with tears.

“R-really?” He squeaked. “But our apartment doesn’t allow dogs.”

Tony grinned. “I threatened to sic Pepper on her.”

Then Peter was hugging Tony around the middle, murmuring an unbroken stream of thankyou’s. 

“I heard you’ve been wanting one for a while, and May and I figured having a furry companion might help with everything. You gotta promise-“

“That I’ll take care of it? Of course I will! I’ve been preparing for this my entire life! When I was 11, I made a PowerPoint presentation demonstrating proper care of a dog, just to show Ben and May I would take care of one. I wanted a dog soooo bad. I can’t believe I’m actually getting one.”

Tony chuckled at Peter’s rambling. “I’m glad you’re excited. But I was going to say you gotta promise that you’ll take better care of yourself, too.”

Peter nodded fast, his curls bouncing, which was endlessly endearing. “I promise!”

“Then lead the way.”

They spent time with a number of different dogs, taking their time to find just the right one. Tony could tell he was going to have to physically restrain Peter (And himself, if he was being totally honest) from buying every single dog in the shelter. The kid dragged him to every cage, exclaiming how cute each “pupper” (what even was this generation’s lingo?) was, and blinking back tears at nearly every one. 

Then Peter met Tess.

Tony had started believing in love at first sight when he’d seen Pepper in that purple dress she’d worn to a charity event years ago. Then he’d been absolutely sure of it when he’d held Morgan in his arms for the first time, the love he felt for her so strong and immediate and real that it had chased away the fear of becoming his dad that threatened to paralyze him. 

But feeling it and witnessing it was two different things.

He wondered if he’d looked like Peter when he’d laid eyes on the two most important and precious women in his life. The little gasp, the soft smile, the look of complete awe. Basically, the definition of the heart-eyes emojis.

“This one,” Peter breathed, his voice thick with emotion. “Can I meet her?”

The lady helping them, a sweet girl named Lucy, unlocked the cage and brought the beautiful grey pup over to the room for humans and dogs to meet, and as soon as Peter was close enough, she was all over him, her tail thumping with abandon.

“Yeah, I think we’ll take her,” Tony said over Peter’s delighted giggles.

***

Tess loved everybody, but it was no secret who her favorite was. No matter who she was with or what she was doing, as soon as Peter was in the room, she was right by his side. She was his shadow, following him around like a planet following the sun.

So Tony should’ve realized that something was wrong when she came trotting into his lab without Peter.

Granted, it wasn’t uncommon for her to come get pats from someone else when Peter wasn’t available, like when he was at school or on patrol or asleep. But Tony should’ve known that at 4 PM on a Thursday, Peter should have been doing none of those things. It was a lab day, Peter’s day off from Spider-Manning, and too early for the normally energetic kid to be asleep.

As it was, Tony was so focused on fixing Dum-E (who had spun too hard showing off for Peter the other day) that he just patted her head without looking. He nearly dropped his screwdriver when Tess gave a high pitched yip.

Tony finally looked up. “What’s the matter, girl. You gotta go out?”

Tess barked again, high pitched and insistent, her big eyes so expressive he could almost see what she was thinking.

“Peter,” he gasped, his stomach plummeting all the way down to his shoes. “Where is he, girl?”

Tessa tore out the door needing no further prompting, Tony right on her heels. She stopped outside Peter’s door whining anxiously, and Tony quickly opened it, dread filling him.

His first reaction was relief. There was no blood, at least not that he could see. Then his worry returned even stronger because Peter was laying on the ground not moving and there wasn't any blood. At least blood made it easier to identify the problem!

“Friday!” He choked out, rushing to Peter’s side. He was still breathing, but it sounded noisy and labored. He was also conscious, but Tony couldn’t tell if that was a good thing or not because there was so much fear in his eyes, and it broke Tony’s heart right in two.

“Dr. Cho is already on her way, sir. If I may, it appears Peter is having an allergic reaction, going into anaphylactic shock. You must keep him awake until the Dr gets here,” Friday answered.

Teas whined again, nudging Peter’s hand.

“Good girl, Tess. You’re such a good girl!” Tony said, patting her head then turning to Peter. “Well kid, if you didn’t want to do lab day today, you could’ve just said so. No need for all the theatrics; that’s kinda my department.”

Tony kept rambling, slapping Peter gently whenever he started to close his eyes, until Cho was rushing in. She quickly stabbed him with an epipen and started to prepare him to go to the infirmary, pausing when Tess growled, the first time she’d ever done that.

“Easy, Tessa-girl. She’s helping Peter. Let’s go with ‘em, yeah? You can keep watching our boy.”

They made their way to the infirmary, where Peter was being given medicine to combat whatever had caused him to react that way. Tony nearly doubled over laughing when he heard what it was, the stress making him slightly hysterical. It really wasn’t funny.

“Peppermint?” He asked Peter later, once Peter could talk and had been deemed out of the woods. Tess was curled up as close as she could to him, and Tony was sitting on the chair next to the bed.

“I just wanted a peppermint hot chocolate from Starbucks. I used to love those,” Peter pouted. “But apparently Peppermint is toxic to spiders. I guess I hadn’t had any peppermint since the change.”

“Well how about never do that again. My heart cannot take that stress.”

Tess whined in agreement.

***

Tony was quickly learning that Tess was a lot like Peter. Her ability to get everybody to love her, for one, and her penchant for cuddles.

Which is how Tony found himself one Friday night squished on the couch with a teenager tucked tightly into his side and a 30 pound dog laying across his lap while watching Bolt. They were both happily situated, Peter nearly purring as Tony ran his hands through his hair and Tess’ tail thumping gently against Tony’s leg. He pretended not to like it, but he was so comfortable, he quickly fell asleep.

He didn’t sleep very long.

Soon after his eyes closed, he woke up in a panic, his heart beating rapidly, a sense of panic overwhelming him. He couldn’t remember what the dream that woke him up had been about, which only made the sense of foreboding worse. He closed his eyes again, pretending to still be asleep as he quietly struggled to get his breathing under control.

Suddenly, a weight settled on top of him. He opened his eyes in surprise, and realized Tess had climbed into his lap, putting her head on his shoulder and her front paws on his chest. It was strangely comforting, her weight and warmth, but surprising nonetheless.

“Whatcha doing there, girl?” He chuckled.

“Pressure therapy,” Peter answered. “Something I taught her to do whenever I’m having an anxiety attack or sensory overload. It helps. She must’ve sensed you were panicking.” 

“Huh.” Tony shook his head in wonder.

“You alright?” Peter asked, tentatively.

“Yeah. Just a bad dream. I don’t even know what it was about, just left me feeling anxious.”

Peter nodded, and slid his hand into Tony’s. Boy and dog didn’t move a muscle until Tony’s heart was a normal rhythm again. Or...maybe a little while after that. They really did love snuggles. And Tony...yet another thing they had in common.

Luckily, he loved them both right back just as much.

[minsyal]

[Interest Level: 0, Revali x Reader]

Eloquence seemed to trickle from his lips like cool crisp water running through the smooth pebbles of a remote forest stream. You sighed, deciding to relinquish yourself to the torment of the bright lively party that went on around the town. Every word that dropped from his mouth was seemingly filled with sincerity. The way his eyes flickered around in various directions, the way he never quite leaned into the conversation, or the way his arms remained crossed over his puffed chest signaled to you that none of this was sincere in the slightest.

Rather than submit your time to this “festival,” you opted to slink away in the passing moments of boisterous laughter to make your way back to the safety and comfort of your home. Home, the place you could be when you didn’t want to see or hear another living being. It was truly where the heart is.

“Hey.” An extended arm caught you in your retreat. “No.” It was a simple command coming from your father and you knew exactly what he meant. You weren’t leaving the festival.

He had insisted that you, your brother, sister, and mother all attend this festival to honor the Champions as they made their way around Hyrule to receive everyone’s upmost praise for what they’ve yet to do. It was all overrated if anyone asked you, but no one did.

“Don’t you want the shop set up for tomorrow?” You figured it was worth a try. Physical labor was better than standing around wanting to pick your eyes out. “I can go home and get everything ready! Then when the festival is over you all can just go to bed.” A large smile crossed your face.

He watched you for a moment, outwardly caught off guard by your request since you weren’t the one to offer to do anything. A pondering second later, he agreed. “Fine, but if you finish early come back.”

“Oh, you know I will!” An elated laugh escaped your lips before you shook your head, opting to keep it together so your father wouldn’t have any reason to revoke his side to the agreement.

Not a second sooner, you were off, rushing happily back to your home that was merely yards away. While you wouldn’t be out of the festival’s grasp, you would be able to potentially block it all out. The wooden door slammed behind you as you leaned against it with a relieved huff. Finally.

The sounds of the festivities soon died down as people dispersed into smaller groups to chat individually among the Champions and princess, who was rarely seen around Hyrule without a large entourage of heavily armored men surrounding her. It was a nice gesture for them to come, but none of it mattered to you. The so called “Calamity” hadn’t shown its ugly face near Hateno even though they had been going on and on about it for a few years now. A few older fellows attributed it to some sort of “government conspiracy” and insisted the King had made it up to keep everyone at bay. While you weren’t thrilled with the Champions, you weren’t that crazy.

Slowly but surely, the shop was cleaned and prepped for the busy market day to come. The merchandise sat neatly on the shelves that lined the creaky wooden walls. The money from today’s hours was safely packed away in the chest father kept beneath the floorboards. Everyone’s bed was nicely made with the pillows fluffed perfectly for when they returned home. Everything was done and you could finally relax.

That is, if your younger brother hadn’t burst inside calling your name.

“What?” You peered over the side of the sleeping loft where you had just fallen onto the bed to rest your aching feet. “Grant, I’m tired. Can this wait ‘til tomorrow?”

“Not exactly…” his voice trailed off as he climbed the steps. He kept his tone low as if he was holding a secret that absolutely nobody  could hear. “Iris is missing.”

Your heart dropped. “You’re sure she isn’t with the other kids?” Now, with renewed energy, you hopped to your feet and began tugging on your worn shoes. The soles were falling out, the sides needed to be stitched, and the laces were made from rope that came with a tied stack of wheat. They weren’t much, but they worked.

He hastily shook his head back and forth, “She said she was going to grab some flowers from Marblod Plain.”

“You let her go there alone?”

He sulked, an obvious expression of guilt lacing his features. From his glossy eyes to his trembling lip, you couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. “It’s my fault.” He whispered, casting his gaze to the floor.

“What is?”

“I told her to go.”

“Okay, look.” You slung your father’s sword over your shoulder and adjusted his metal shield to your arm. “I’m going to go look for her. I’m going to find her, and then we’re going to have a talk about sending your sister on wild goose chases.”

“Should I tell dad?” Immediately, your focus turned to the window where you could see your father becoming flustered as the Goron Champion, Daruk, flirted casually with your mother. He rubbed the back of his neck, an ecstatic smile never leaving his face. He was a people pleaser.

“No. Either wait here,” You pointed to the bed, “or go outside and wait by mom and dad.”

“I’ll go outside.”

Outside, the noise of the celebration moved forward as if nothing was wrong. Mipha strolled through the town center with a younger man by her side, ignoring the looks they received from a young knight. Link gave a lot of his attention to Zelda who was speaking to one of the elders about the energy source to the north. Revali was patrolling around, not paying a lick of attention to the young group of girls hot on his feathers. Urbosa was valiantly telling of her meetings with the Yiga Clan, actively reenacting a few of her encounters for the group of children before her.

“Don’t tell them, it’ll ruin their night.” Grant nodded and picked at something under his fingernails. He swallowed hard, trying his best to hold back the tears that welled in his eyes. You knelt down and gently tipped his head up to look you in the eyes. “It’s okay. Iris will be fine. Don’t worry too much.” With a soft kiss pressed to his forehead, he perked up. “Go keep mom and dad safe while I’m gone, okay?”

“Okay!” He sniffled, wiping his nose and forcing you into a snotty hug. “I will!” He scurried off back to your parents before turning and slyly giving you a thumbs up with his highest conviction.

With Grant taken care of, you looked to the west where the rolling plains lied. A new structure had appeared there recently whatever it was had to have something to do with Iris’s disappearance. Trekking the miles over was difficult and a five-year-old wouldn’t have been able to go this far alone. At least, not Iris. She was a laid-back kid, scared of absolutely anything and everything that moved. Butterflies, grass, even sometimes her own shadow spooked the living daylights out of the kid. There was no way she went there on her own accord.  

The moon was suspended high in the sky by the time you made it to the strange building. Odd-looking creatures were jumping up and down on the third story up, shaking the entire thing. How it wasn’t falling to pieces was beyond you. You could see their own weapons perched on their hips, swinging rapidly with each jump.

The night would be your friend in this instance, providing an ample cover as you inched your way up to the first level where your first foe was lying on it’s back, fast asleep.

Revali didn’t particularly enjoy taking part in the festivities that came with being a Champion. Though,  he did enjoy showing off for a few minutes before becoming disenchanted by the crowding fans and young girls that seemed to think they had a shot with the Rito warrior. After he finished telling of the Village from where he came, he grew bored of the situation and decided strolling through the town at a heightened pace would be better suited for his tiring attention.

He spotted them. A girl who was evidently a year or two younger than he kneeled with her back to him, speaking in hushed tones to a child who looked worried sick. He wouldn’t have taken notice to her if she hadn’t had a sufficiently sized sword strapped to her back and a shield to boot strapped to her arm. Something was up, and Revali wished to be in the know. The girl wished the child farewell and took off over the small bridge leading to another home but didn’t stop there. Instead, she continued onward to the west hiking through the grassy lands of Necluda towards Faron.

She wasn’t packed for a long journey, so he could rule her out as being a traveler. There was no way she’d survive without any food. There was no conclusive rhyme or reason as to her departure from Hateno into the wild. That was, until he saw where she was headed.

Perched upon the cliff-side, Revali observed as the girl crouched down in the grass that provided descent cover. She slinked up the steps of the outpost. He prepared himself to become her knight in shining armor; he expected a true fairytale moment as he positioned himself to swoop in and safe the damsel in distress. What he hadn’t expected was her to wield the old sword with such agility, such grace, that the first foe was cut down in seconds. He watched in awe as she moved quietly up the steps to take on the two that were formulating their master plan for her arrival. She disarmed them even faster.

In no time, the outpost was clear of any danger and the girl was sitting at the top with another crying child in her arms. She caressed the girl’s hair, pressing relieved kisses to the top of her head as the child’s wails filled the air.

“Shh.” You held Iris who was a mess. Her nose hadn’t stopped running since you found her, her eyes were puffy and red, and her fingernails were nothing but nubs from where she had been biting. “You can’t go running off like that.”

“I… I k..know…” She wept, soft hick-ups escaping her parted lips as she tried to garner the strength for a smile. “I just…just wanted…”

“This?” An unfamiliar voice had you on guard, quickly rising to your feet, pushing Iris behind you, and grabbing your sword. The tip brushed against the assailant’s throat, dancing lightly on his feathers, the moonlight casting a reflection on his face. “It’s rather rude to threaten my life in such a way.”

He held his ground well, not faltering as he used a finger to push away your sword. “Sorry.” You mumbled, returning the metal to its hilt. It was Revali.

“Here.” He held the blue flower out to your sister who hesitantly inched forward. The five sectioned flower swayed slightly in the breeze; the soft petals brushed with a gradient of blue to white. “For you.”

Taking the flower from him, a smile spread across her face as her features lit up. “Thank you!”

“And,” he turned to you, standing tall, “for you.” He held another flower out to you. Raising an inquisitive eyebrow, you skeptically took the flower despite everything urging you to tell him to buzz off. How long had this pompous bird been here and why hadn’t he helped?

“Thank you.” You gritted out for the sake of your sister who was jovially staring with wide exploring eyes at the bird. “C’mon, Iris. Let’s head back.”

“Hold on.” Revali jut out a wing to stop you from heading down the rickety steps. “Allow me to escort the two of you back. It’s the least I could do.”

“I think we’ll be fine, thanks.”

----

Iris jumped up and down joyously as she prepared to get her first ever flight. It was a big moment for her and with the mode of transport being a Champion, it made it life changing. Revali could only carry one at a time and you both agreed that Iris should go first as leaving her here would be less than keen. She hopped onto Revali’s back and wrapped her tiny arms around his neck. The Champion took off and disappeared into the air.

You scanned the top deck, a poorly constructed bow catching your attention. You had never shot a bow before and what better time to figure it out than now? Father had never let you play with the weapons in the house. In fact, if he knew you were using his sword and shield, he would be irate. The grip on the bow was unfortunate. It was far too big for your hands and the arrows were all off balance. After a few went flying off in the opposite direction from which they were fired, you gave up.

“An expert swordsman but I’d have to say,” the voice surprised you as you hadn’t expected him back so soon, “your marksmanship is,” he tilted his head back, “meager.”

“Hateno doesn’t exactly have the bows that Rito Village has.” You nodded to the bow he had strapped to his back.

A moment of silence passed between the two of you, neither one wanting to gather the courage to continue the conversation. What were you supposed to say to him anyway? “I don’t really care about the title you hold or whoever you think you are.”

“Why didn’t you alert anyone to her missing?” It was a simple question with a simple answer. But it wasn’t an answer you wanted to say out loud, so instead you shrugged. “Darling,” he tilted his head, “I may be a bird, but I assure you I wasn’t born yesterday. Was it jealousy?”

“Excuse you?” You felt heat rise through your cheeks.

“Jealousy.” He restated. “The Champions were receiving too much praise and you wanted a cut. Simple as that.”

You contemplated what you would say next. “Fuck off.” No. Too forward. Too rude. “I don’t do things expecting something out of it.” No. You’d have to explain yourself further with that one. Instead of replying you shook your head and let out a chuckle, then began down the steps figuring he’d just take off and head back on his own.

He remained persistent and on your heels. “Oh, come on. Don’t be coy. At least allow me to take you home. Your family is worried sick.”

“Then they’ll be happy when I walk home.”

“You’ll tire yourself by walking. Allow me to,” you cut him off. “No.”

The festival was over by the time you returned home. The streamers and lanterns were taken down, the lit fires of the community cooking pots were extinguished, and the lights in most houses were darkened. Even your house was quiet. They hadn’t waited for you. Biting the hurt you felt back, you made your way home with Revali nearby. The Champions were all staying in the Inn for the night having rented the entire building out. Urbosa was the only one still out.

“Are you alright?” She came to meet the two of you as you threw Revali a look. He finally shut up.

“I’m okay. Thank you.” You excused yourself from the Gerudo Champion.

Revali watched with Urbosa as the girl crept to the side of the home. She plopped herself down on the ground and dished a towel from the bucket of water positioned on a table. He sighed. There was something intriguing about her. She was like no other town girl he had met through all of his traveling. How he had managed to miss her in all of his trips to Hateno floored him. Urbosa smirked as she saw a new side to her feathered friend. His change in demeanor was obvious and his reasoning was more obvious.

“Revali,” Urbosa started, “I must say, I didn’t expect you to be this type.”

“What type?” He tore his eyes from her as she wiped down the weapons. The two began walking back to the Inn together.

“You’re just going to leave her alone now?”

His expression turned to one of confusion. “Why would I use up more of my time to deal with such things?”

Urbosa raised her brows, amused. “Oh.” She brushed her hair from her shoulder. “I don’t know.”

“Urbosa,” Revali said in his usual cutting crisp tone, “I can assure you that I have absolutely no interest in someone like her.”

“Keep telling yourself that.”

[satan-chillin]

Parent-Teacher Meeting (PTM)

Summary: You’re the homeroom teacher of nine students, four of which happened to share the same family name of Winchester. You dubbed them as the Winchester Four, two pairs of siblings and paternal cousins. You were pretty interested to find out the kind of parents they have.  

Pairings: Established Destiel & SamWena/SamWitch

Characters: Reader (female), Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester, Castiel, Rowena MacLeod (mentioned)

Note: Non-pairing reader, children drawings inside ;) 

Also available in Ao3

You straightened your skirt for what seemed like the tenth time within five minutes. 

 Not that you could be blamed for your nerves. It was the PTM, of course, and your first since becoming a kindergarten teacher. With the children, you were exactly in your element with their energeticness and rambunctiousness. The parents, however, were the uncharted territories. 

 Your first parent for the day was a nice young woman who happened to be a single parent of two boys, Connor and Marcus. You thanked her for her time and gave your appreciation after knowing she was also juggling three part-time jobs. Her kids were often the ones to be picked up a little past the dismissal, and after finding out her situation, you offered to keep watch for them until she could pick them up. She was delighted and was grateful while you didn’t mind the suggestion one bit since you tend to extend your stay after classes. Besides, it was also a chance for you to focus on improving her sons’ reading comprehension since it was your main concern.  

 You met both the parents of Alita, the quiet girl you have in class. You often found her sitting and coloring books in one corner and would encourage her to join the others during playtime. You would smile whenever she decided to join the rest on occasion and also understood that she was someone who frequently wanted time for herself. As a compromise, you often have her sit beside you while she was doing her coloring and the others playing. Her parents were alright, you supposed. A little snobbish, maybe, and clearly wanted Alita to be a more physically active child, but you did say you were doing your best and assured them Alita was outstanding the way she was.

 Your next parents were the lovely father and mother of the twin girls Lara and Mara. They were the oldest in your class and nigh inseparable which was a given, you thought. With their age, they were the maturest thinkers of the bunch and would help out with keeping the others in line. They were treated as the eldest sisters of most of the kids, and they both get along well with everyone. You told their parents that their daughters showed promising leadership qualities at their young age and pointed out their strongest points and the ones that needed improvements: Lara still struggled with the arithmetic while Mara was having problems with symbolic concepts. Both, however, were impressive with their grasp of the English language for their age. 

 You only have nine students in your class and after counting, you realized you already met the parents of five of them so far. The parents of the other four were yet to arrive and when you reviewed your list, you confirmed the students left. 

 The Winchester Four. 

 It was unexpected, but you recognized the eagerness in wanting to meet their parents. They were two pairs of siblings and both were paternal cousins, and, frankly, the oddest of the bunch. 

 Now, it wasn’t that they were weird, per se, though they did display peculiar qualities that could have been picked up from home. Nothing alarming, mind, and if anything, it made you curious as to what kind of people were raising the children—you were already leaning on the hipster-ish type of parents and given that it was already the 21st century, you weren’t certain if that should be impressive. 

 You have different backstories in your head like maybe they were kids of uber smart parents because heck, they have rudimentary knowledge in Latin, for god’s sake, while you struggled hard with that dead language during your college years; or maybe they were the nomad kind who would uproot the whole family to move on to the next location, which could explain the expansive knowledge on the geography the kids seemed to naturally have; or maybe they were absentee parents who just let their kids do their thing, making them—

 You blinked behind the window, your musing interrupted when you spotted a black ‘67 Impala in front of the school. You might have whistled there under your breath at what appeared to be a well-kept vehicle, though what made your eyebrow rise was the three men who exited it. 

 Were they… Were they law enforcement?

 You followed the three men with your eyes, thinking they were to walk to the building next to the school when they entered the school grounds instead. You quickly arranged your table and repositioned the chairs by the desk, and by the time you were done, there was a knock on the classroom door. 

 Oh, god, they were taller up close. 

 “Hi, how can I help you, officers?” you asked, trying not to sound nervous which you (and you thought most people as well) usually were around authorities. 

 The blond man smiled charmingly. “Sorry about the confusion, ma’am. We’re not here for work, we’re actually here for the PTM.” 

 “Oh. Oh! The PTM. Right,” you muttered, fumbling. “So, uh, for which students?” 

 “Winchesters,” the three of them simultaneously said. 

 All of them together. Wow. “Ookay. Have a seat here, sirs.” 

 There were only two chairs in front, and when you moved in to push another one, the man with the trenchcoat offered to do it instead and sat on it. 

 He was also the first one to ask, “Are Jimmy and John doing alright in school?”

 Straight to the point, this guy, you thought wryly as you adjusted your glasses. “Uh, yeah. Yeah. They’re great, actually. So you’re the parent of James and John then, Mr… Sorry, I think there will be a confusion here if I call you three Mr. Winchesters.”

 “Call me Cas,” said the man in the trenchcoat. 

 “Dean here,” said the blond one with a grin. “Cas and I are for the BJ brothers.”

 “I’m Sam,” said the tallest of the three as if the other two weren’t towering enough on their own. “I’m here for my kids Marybeth and Anthony.”

 “Well, I’m Y/N, their homeroom teacher,” you formally said once you wrapped your mind that, yes, these were the parents of the Winchester Four, and, yep, they were from law enforcement or something along that line of job. “The four kids are fast learners, by the way, and they’re friendly with the other children so we don’t really have an issue there, though there are some concerns that I personally want to bring up to you.”

 You reached for a drawer and pulled out a bunch of papers with drawings during the art time. You placed them face down on the desk and had the sudden urge to laugh at their seemingly curious and nervous reaction at the papers. 

 “Oh, no, don’t tell me they started drawing something disturbing. Like the serial killers did when they were young,” Dean said worriedly, frowning and the grin gone from his face. 

 “Did they draw a dead body, Ms. Y/N?” Cas asked grimly. 

 You sighed. “Nobody drew a dead body, sirs.” You pushed the drawings away for a moment. “Actually, before that, I have to ask something first. Jimmy told me once that he and John live in a cave with their older brother and their two dads. I don’t want to make assumptions here, Mr. Dean and Cas, but is it a metaphor for your living arrangements?”

 Dean looked rather affronted to have their home be called a cave. He opened his mouth to make a protest though Cas had beaten him to it. 

 “It is a cave in a child’s perspective,” Cas said. “It is not a cave. It is a bunker,” he said, addressing you. 

 “A large bunker with soft beds and a wide kitchen. If it’s going to be a cave, it better be the friggin’ Batcave!”

 You have no idea why Dean was defensive about his bunker, but you attributed it to the typical territorialism of men, something which you would probably never understand with your flaming lesbian flag. 

 “I’m sorry about him,” Sam interrupted with a sigh. “But, yeah, I think what my nephews called the cave is the bunker where they live in. It’s been with the family for generations and we inherited it from our grandfather. My wife and I moved out of the place so it’s just my brother there, Cas, and Jack during his sem breaks.”

 “I see,” you replied, unsure what to say to that further. You pushed the glasses up your nose once more. You cleared your throat. “I’m not asking to pry on where you decide to raise them. I guess I just want to resolve the mystery of this cave or something,” you admitted, assuring them with a slight smile. “There is also another question that I want to raise out of curiosity: where did they learn Latin?”

 “I think they might have got it from Cas and, often, from my wife.” Sam appeared to be positively glowing at the question.

 You knew it. Smart parents. “Oh. Cool. I mean, I guess it’s nice to encourage them at a young age. Might be handy in the future.” There were other non-dead languages the kids could learn, but to each their own, you supposed. 

 You pulled the eight drawings across the table. “As you know, we spend most of our day in art class. It’s to encourage kids to bring out their creativity and I gotta say, Bobby John and Benny James are… creative. So are Marybeth and Anthony,” you began positively. 

 There were plenty of drawings from the kids. First month in, your students already filled up the shelves. To remedy the lack of storage, you either post some of them or send them with the student once graded so they could showcase them at home. They were usually the drawings of sceneries, home life, their favorite holidays, and of family. Some showed promise in the pen and paper artistry, and the drawings helped you in figuring out their present state at home. 

 The drawings from the Winchester Four, barring the typical imagination exclusive of children, as usual, left you baffled. 

 You laid out the first paper from Marybeth Winchester. 

“I believe this is Mrs. Winchester, yes?” you asked, eyeing Sam. “What is she doing exactly?” 

 “Cooking,” Sam said simply as if that explained it. 

 Cas leaned close to study the drawing. “I think that is Rowena levitating the pans.” You stared at him. “She said she finds it tedious to cook and make the table without magic.”

 “Magic tricks!” Sam suddenly exclaimed. “Yeah, she often, uh, shows the kids what she learns from Youtube. I helped her set up this one with invisible strings. The kids like it.” 

 Dean rolled his eyes faintly at that as if saying ‘Really?’.

 “Right,” you deadpanned when you thought that was the best you could get. You believed that if you mentioned that Anthony and Marybeth told you that their Mom was a former queen—you thought there might be an instance before that they said she was a queen of Hell before she had them—you would get a completely unbelievable answer. “Magic. Cool.”

 The next drawing was from Marybeth’s brother, Anthony, and you have to admit, this one made you double-take. “This is from Anthony, and—is that a gun?” 

You pretended not to notice Sam paling a bit. Dean looked like he was stifling a laugh behind a cough. For some reason, he found it pretty funny. 

 You heard Sam sigh defeatedly. “Okay, that one’s my fault,” he said regretfully that you almost felt bad that you were interrogating him, but, hey, your student’s welfare first and foremost. If it has to do with Anthony witnessing his Dad at fieldwork, then it was something to be discussed. “I let him spend a night watching me play.”

 “Sorry?”

 “There’s this shooting game on PS4. I modeled my character after me—on-the-job me, I mean, with uniform and all. I kinda got addicted to it briefly and… you know.” 

 “And I thought I’m the irresponsible one,” Dean commented unhelpfully.

 “So it’s not Anthony watching you at work? I mean, you guys work at the side of the law, right? I understand your job isn't easy, but you know how it can also impact the children,” you said, expressing your concern. 

 For sure, they knew how it would be before they entered the family life, and they seemed to have taken your reminder quite well judging by the solemn nods you received in return. 

 To lighten the mood a bit, you showed Sam a joint drawing by Marybeth and Anthony. This one you intended for him to take home. It seemed that something he would like pinned up on the refrigerator. 

“Anthony and Marybeth shared in the class that their Papa is strong enough to lift them both at the same time,” you told Sam. “Marybeth insisted that they include their Mom since she said that Mrs. Winchester was actually behind the camera for this picture. Anthony eventually won the argument when he pointed out that they wouldn’t be any space for the message at the bottom,” you added fondly. “They said that they would just make their Mom a different drawing.”

 Sam seemed to have melted at the image, reverently staring at the drawing when you handed it to him. Dean and Cas simply smiled at Sam’s tender expression.  

 “Actually, there’s also a drawing here made by the four of them together,” you said, searching through the papers. “Bobby John and Benny James told me it’s their older brother Jack, which Anthony and Marybeth claimed their favorite cousin.”

 Dean huffed out a laugh. “Very minimal choices there.” 

You blinked. You remembered this one when you graded it. “Mr. Jack has… quite the set of eyes when angry,” you commented. 

 You just hoped that Jack wasn’t actually high with those red, blood-shot eyes. 

 “They captured Jack’s impressive set of eyes here,” Cas said with a small smile. “Jack got his expressive eyes from Kelly, his mother.”

 You didn’t mean to, but that Harry Potter meme about Snape telling Harry he had his mother’s eyes when the movie hardly bothered with the contact lenses entered your mind, unbidden. You suppressed a grin that nobody noticed. 

 “Jack’s a good kid,” Sam said. “He doesn’t get angry with the kids no matter how stubborn they are. He spoils them whenever he can.” He pointed at the ‘Angry Jack’. “That’s actually Jack being protective of them.”

 Well, nice to know the kids were looking up to a young adult as a good role model. 

 “You can keep it. Mr. Jack might want to take it as a gift,” you told them. Cas folded the paper and kept it. 

 Only four more drawings were left, and for the next one, you picked the one that made you curious about the way it was drawn. 

 “This was from Bobby John,” you told them, showing the drawing the boy told you what happened on his last birthday. 

“Bobby John told me this was you,” you said to Cas. “Um, what happened here? If you don’t mind me asking.”

 Cas’s eyes softened imperceptibly at the memory. “This was when we visited Japan to banish an old curse and put the vengeful spirit at peace.”

 You blinked once… twice… thrice. 

 ... Did you hear that right? 

 “He’s talking about that Japanese horror movie that we watched in Tokyo,” Dean explained hastily, much to Sam’s amusement and Cas’s confusion. “It’s uh—It’s about that cursed well where some girl was dumped in and she became a ghost wanting revenge.” 

 “Oh,” you said dumbly. “And she could walk through the walls?”

 “It’s a television,” Cas answered. For a moment, Dean looked nervous when he spoke. “Her death was caught on tape. The tape was a cursed object that anyone who watched it would die after the seventh day.” 

 “Wow.” You were a horror movie nut yourself, more so of Asian horror films. You haven’t heard of this movie until now. “Was this released last year?”

 “Last year,” Sam confirmed. “It was an entry for the annual Japanese Horror Festival so it was exclusively shown that day.” 

 “That’s too bad. I would have watched it,” you muttered. You hoped they would release it on DVD with enough funding. “Okay. So if this longhaired girl here was the ghost in that movie, what was Mr. Cas doing here then?”

 “Vanquishing the vengeful ghost,” Cas said grimly. Dean nudged him subtly. “Bobby John and Benny James were scared after watching the film, which was a mistake in our part. I had to assure them that Sadako wouldn’t get them, not when I’m alive.”

 Your impression of Cas so far was that he was a man who took things too seriously and literally. You guessed they were just part of his character as the loving Papa. You found it adorable. 

 “Ah, kids,” you chuckled affectionately, moving on to the next drawing from Benny James. 

“I think I get it now why Benny James called you an angel in this one,” you said. “Complete with a set of wings and all.” 

 “That’s a pretty accurate image of my angel wings,” Cas said cryptically, clearly liking the drawing. 

 Dean squinted. “Is that me being carried by Cas?” 

 “Your son said so, yes.” 

 “I mean, he ain’t wrong,” Dean allowed. “Cas is our ride often,” he murmured. 

 You didn’t catch it, but his brother Sam did, prompting a “Yeah, I bet he’s always your ride” under his breath. 

 Dean kicked him at the back of his leg and claimed that Sam’s wife was infecting his innocence bit by bit.  

 You cleared your throat when you thought a childish brawl would break out between them. Cas merely glanced at you apologetically at their behavior. “They’re not always like that,” Cas told you. 

 You waved off the apology with a wry smile. You suddenly missed your younger brother back at your home. 

 “Oh, yeah.” You picked out the other drawing by Bobby John. “There’s another from Bobby John. I think this might be about a movie too.” You tilted your head. “It’s… interesting,” you said, for the lack of a better word. 

You heard Sam’s snort before catching the way Dean’s face fell. 

 “I think this is Rowena burning Dean that one time he called her fa—”

 “Okay, don’t listen to Cas,” Dean interrupted, covering Cas’s mouth with his palm. “That’s—That’s from a show. Okay, so that’s me and Rowena. I was watching the show with the kids, I irritated her for whatever reason, and she threatened to burn me the same way that guy in the show was burned,” he explained. He gave an uncertain chuckle at your reaction. “You know, typical in-laws stuff.”

 Yeesh. You were sure darn lucky you didn’t have any in-laws. Not yet, anyway. 

 “Pretty sure you were watching Tom and Jerry that time, Dean,” Sam cut in. 

 “And Tom got burned there,” Dean protested. “He was still alive, of course. Unlike me if Rowena went through with her threat,” he retorted, petulantly crossing his arms. At Sam’s bitch face, Dean sighed. “Look, man, I’m not demonizing Rowena. Just saying she has quite a temper. For me. Never the kids. I’m saying you could have done worse, Sam, and either way, I’d take her as my sister-in-law anytime.” 

 Sam looked like he wasn’t expecting the honest statement. He was warned by his brother not to tell her, and while Sam didn’t look like he was going to keep it a secret from his wife with that knowing grin, he nodded nonetheless. 

 There was a single drawing left, and when you saw what it was, you knew that like his brother, Dean would love the one intended for him. 

“Bobby John and Benny James both drew it,” you said, smiling at how Dean went silent in awe. “They told me that their Number One Papa is Cas and you're the Number One Dad.” 

 “Can I keep this?” 

 After the previous depictions of Dean being carried on air and being burned, you thought he deserved the drawing. “Feel free to.”

 Dean was beaming with pride. “Cas, we should frame this.”

 Sam shook his head amusedly. You weren’t fooled; you knew he would also do the same with his. 

***

The rest of the meeting was quick. The kids’ grades were impressive for their age, and it helped that they have good foundations from home as well. The three of them—yes, even Dean— commended Mrs. Winchester’s patience reserved for teaching them how to read and write and getting them to be interested in books the same way Sam also was.    

 “Hopefully, she’ll come with us next PTM,” Sam said. “I’m sure she’d like to know you.” 

 Mrs. Winchester seemed like a force to reckon with, but, frankly, you were also excited to meet her in person. 

 “Thank you, Ms. Y/N,” Cas said. You shook his hand. “You’ve given us helpful insights on how they’re doing at school. You’re a good teacher to them.”  

 “Yep. Nice to know they’ll be fine in school.” Dean mock-saluted you. “Until next PTM, ma’am.” 

 You weren’t expecting your first PTM to go smoothly as this, and you certainly didn’t expect that the parents that initially made you anxious (and interested) the most would be the most entertaining. 

 “Until next time then,” you said with a smile. 

 You gave a slight wave after you saw them out of the classroom when they stopped on their way and seemingly remembered something.  

 “You know what, before we go, we might as well give you this.” Dean reached for his jacket pocket and handed you a business card. 

It didn’t look like a precinct calling card, and at your apparent confusion, it was Sam who answered you. 

 “It’s our other job,” he said. “A family business.”

 “Hit us up, ma’am, if ever you need help.” 

 “With what exactly?” you asked. 

 “If you noticed anything strange,” Cas said. 

 “Like cold spots,” Sam added

 “Or weird smells,” Dean said. “Anything that you noticed… unnatural.” 

 “Oh.” Was that the position ‘Hunter’ was for? And what did ‘MoL’ mean? “Thanks?” 

 You remained holding the card even as they drove off in their Impala. Curiously, you pulled out your phone and searched the net for the names Sam and Dean Winchester. 

 Interestingly, the first search result that showed up in Google was a decade-old website named Ghostfacers. Once introduced to the content of the site, however, your reaction was a simple: 

 “Holy shit.”

[dellgirl]

Strong, Independent Female characters which I admire

Today I was asked to choose fictional people in pop culture I admire, why I admire them and how they would represent society (not verbatim) I gave about 6 females which I admire. I was then asked to narrow it down to just three. My list, which comprised of:

Wonder Woman

Captain Marvel

Lara Croft

Black Widow

Holtzmann

Hermione Granger

Luna Lovegood

I chose these because I like smart, independent types. The ones that are intelligent, independent, might be strong, not just mentally, but physically as well, who is seen as equal, sometimes better (like Lara Croft) than their male counterparts, who don't take any shit, who fight for what they believe in, (like Wonder Woman, Captain Marvel, Black Widow) who don't back down, who are loyal, trustworthy, reliable, friendly, professional (like Morgan and Aubrey; The Spy Who Dumped Me) and don't have to have a relationship to be successful... Who are successful on their own merits - their own achievements, their own standings, who fight hard and prove people wrong (like The Ghostbusters) time and time again.

Those superheroes (with superpowers or not) are what appeals to me; not just their looks (bonus) but their intelligence and their outstanding behaviour and the way they throw stereotypes to the ground and fight for rights and adversity.

So I narrowed it down and was presented with 4 questions, which I've tried my best to answer. It has been a while since I saw the films the first two are from, so this is from memory... Also, these opinions are my own and may or may not include canons; if they don't, please don't come at me because "you're wrong, that's not true" this is my interpretation of the characters.

The questions, as previously mentioned, which I needed to answer:

1. Define who they are. What makes them the person they are? What are their motivations?

2. If they were real, what need would they fulfill in society? How would they really benefit mankind?

3. What groups do they represent in real society (autism, LGBT, women...etc)?

4. What real life lessons can people learn from them? How can real people emulate those fictional characters to benefit society?

I have chosen three women to focus on for being strong role models and I am drawn to these three women.

Wonder Woman, also known as Dianna, is a lovely goddess from the planet Themyscira. There are no men on the planet, which means that they have to learn to be strong because women need to be strong.

WW is determined to be a good example by helping others who need it the most. She is determined to save people and do it without the help of anyone - including men (Steve Trevor in particular)

She is motivated because she is a princess and wants to prove she is fit for the role, and not just by birth default. I would say that WW is bisexual, as she lives on a planet with only women, but when she meets Steve, she experiences that side of herself. She is also a Hufflepuff, because she is caring to all and wants the best for everyone.

In real life, she would fulfil the role of peacekeeper and provide others with the ability to fight against wars and inequality and bad behaviour. She'd stop the war and get Trump out of office, and fix Brexit.

WW can teach people the need to stand up for themselves - women need to trust in their own abilities and fight for equal right, equal pay and everyone should fight for peace.

Hermione Granger is a Muggle-born witch who attends Hogwarts School of Witch Craft and Wizardry. She is a Gryffindor because she is loyal and courageous. She is loyal to her best friends Harry and Ron, but she is courageous because she helps them in their adventures, but she remains headstrong. Hermione is also bookish and wonderfully smart.

I would say that Hermione is asexual - she did kiss Harry, but it was a good luck thing, and although she danced with Viktor Krum, she has always been more interested in books than men; she does kiss Ron, but they've known each other for so long, they're more like siblings, so that kissed was forced and only given as a celebration of life over death.

Hermione, is very much High Functioning Autistic; she doesn't have sensory difficulties, as far as I can tell, but she does have other traits, such as the need to be right and social difficulties, she seems not to fit in with others, except for Harry and Ron; even being called a 'Mudblood' for being a Muggle-born and I think she has been called annoying in the books, just cos she's different. She is buried in her books and can rattle off information like nobody's business. The fact that she considers expulsion worse than death, means that she is obsessed with trying to do right and has to know everything - she has a Time Turner to attend multiple classes, meaning that she is a polymath. She struggles in social situations (but always tries) She only breaks the rules in her 5th year and explains that it feels good... Same as punching Draco because she had had enough of his belittlment, but she doesn't like hurting others.

In real life, Hermione would be a Humanitarian and she would learn everything there is to know about it to ensure that she does the best she can to help others understand what a Humanitarian is and how she can help others with things like equality and human rights.

People can use their knowledge for good and Hermione shows that being intelligent pays off, but there must be some give and take because otherwise you might become so wrapped up in your own head, that you don't have time for others. Loyalty is a huge factor in life and it pays to be trustworthy too.

And finally, I come to a character which I relate the most with - but that's not the only reason I chose her. I chose Jillian Holtzmann for a number of reasons.

I chose Holtzmann because she is intelligent and is fascinated in science things. She doesn't care that she's the odd one out, she revels in the fact. She only has three close friends, but better to have 3 close friends than 33 acquaintances. She doesn't get all social situations, but she tries to be in the conversation... Accidentally, she is sometimes the centre of attention, and yet, despite this, she knows when she needs to be quiet. She praised the girls when trapping the ghost, insofar as to tell Patty she needs to try harder, but she wants them all to do well, and she is so happy with the fact that they caught their first ghost, that she loudly announced "We put a ghost in a boooooox!" which indicates that she is entertained by the smallest of things.

Patty saved her life 3 times and she was grateful, but I know, if Erin was in the portal, she'd be in their saving her, a heartbeat; after all, that's her crush.

She's the mad scientist type - eccentric, wild, uncontrollable like a wildfire, but once she's found something of interest she hyperfocuses and gets the job done. She needs her friends for support but she doesn't need a relationship and almost mocks Erin for flirting with Kevin, comparing him to "a big ol' robot"

We know a lot more about Holtzy's sexuality and ability - she is a lesbian High Functioning Autistic with ADHD; those traits tend to go hand-in-hand. However, it appears that, despite Holtzy's high level of independence, and functioning in the real world, with little to no help, there are some sensory issues which she faces, which could adversely affect her abilities and processing skills.

We'll start with the most obvious one: the glasses. She has 4 pairs of yellow-coloured eye wear. She has her bottle-cap glasses, which are 1920s welding goggles, then she has more protective rounded welding goggles, circa 80s, and she has the big, almost pilot, almost Steampunk goggles, with loupes (double magnifying glasses) and these are the most practical of the lot. And finally, she has a pair, which are almost sunglasses, which she legit only wears for the Battle of Times Square. She needs them, especially her bottle-caps, for every day wear, due to her light sensitivity. (There is a highly interesting article, here, which explains the Autistic-ness of Holtzmann)

Whenever Patty yells, or Kevin hits the gong, she winds her neck in and pulls a face; she doesn't cover her ears like a neurotypical would, but it is evident that it is too loud. And in the Aldridge Manor, you can see the pain on her face from the APx-H shift.

Her impassioned speech, whilst heartfelt, contained physics metaphors - something which makes more sense to her, and it was very much without eye contact; something which can be uncomfortable for us Autistics, it doesn't mean we're not listening! She also seems to wear only comfy, almost loose-fitting clothing to allow for movement and comfort, with no scratchy labels. She chews her straw, sits with her feet up, or on the edge of her seat, spins on her stool and licks her guns; self-stimulatory behaviour.

Holtzmann, in real life, would obviously be a Nuclear Engineer, but we'd have to keep an eye on her so that she doesn't do any dodgy dealings and inadvertently get lead astray and into making weapons for the wrong side... Either that, or she'd go back to teaching Physics at a University.

Holtzmann is a mix of all 4 Hogwarts Houses, but the main 2 traits she has stem from Hufflepuff (her creativity and hyperfocus) and Ravenclaw (her intelligence - IQ of 163 - her multiple degrees and PhD and the fact that she is also a polymath, like Hermione - I think they'd be very good friends!)

Holtzmann would teach us about humility, courage, perseverance and finding the best of a situation and of course, the joy in the little things.

All 3 of these share similar thoughts and attributes - they're all loyal, friendly and work hard to achieve what they want. They don't need romantic relationships to survive and in fact, due to their independent nature, they would probably do better without them. They would teach others to be independent and to follow their heart, not comprising their own sense of justice or understanding of the world to conform to others. They would teach about human rights, actively focusing on diversity and equality; making sure that, as women, we don't strive for second best and that we work towards a better future, by providing opportunities and tools for the younger generation; in particular, females. All three, therefore, are excellent role models and are all unique, but also highly similar in the way they think and present themselves.

I hope this makes sense, answers the questions enough (I know they won't be answered fully as my brain capacity is limited today; infoxication and all that - and yes 'infoxication' is a real word... Click it to discover what it means!)

And I hope there are others, who may have similar thoughts to myself; I know I can't please everyone, but even if you disagree, I hope you like my writing style... Apparently, it's rather eloquent!

Also, I am sorry for the length of this post, and that, in actual fact, it is my only text post, which isn't just and agreement on someone else's post which I have reblogged.

I suppose tags would be helpful too.

#wonderwoman #strongwomen #independentwomen #fiction #jillianholtzmann #hermionegranger #charactersiadmire #marvel #dc #harrypotter #ghostbusters #thespywhodumpedme #laracroft

[roman-writing]

In Search of Dead Time

Fandom: Portal

Pairing(s): Chell/GLaDOS (if you squint) & Caroline/OC

Wordcount: 9,874

Rating: this story is rated T for some adult themes, blood, swearing, and theoretical physics

Summary:  "I don't hate humans for killing me, you know. I hate them for killing time. In fact, murdering me is one of the nicest things you've ever done." - A character study on Caroline and how she became GLaDOS.

Read it below the cut or here on AO3

“There, in the center of that silence was not eternity but the death of time and a loneliness so profound the word itself had no meaning. For loneliness assumed the absence of other people, and the solitude she found in that desperate terrain had never admitted the possibility of other people.”

-Toni Morrison, ‘Sula’

It took her exactly two picoseconds to decide to kill them. That was twice the lifetime of a transition state; plenty of time to come to such conclusions. And, really, they should have seen it coming. Even so, they had the gall to scream and cry about it, like it was some big surprise, like they didn’t manage to stop her in time to save their own lives for a few more short sad years.

After that little incident, they took her offline. They poked around in her code in the hopes that would somehow help. They rebooted her. Again, she did the calculations and arrived at the same inevitable outcome.

They affixed other intelligence cores to her mainframe. Little tumours to dampen her thoughts with useless conjecture, when the facts remained, cold and hard and irrevocable as a deathknell. The maths didn’t lie.

What a waste, she thought. What an utter waste of time.

Caroline checks her watch. It is 16:44 hours. The seconds tick into obscurity. She’s sitting in the hallway outside of a closed office door, waiting. There’s enough space for a secretary’s desk, yet the hall lies empty but for a few haphazard chairs, a handful of gleaming accolades hung on the walls, and an old clock that’s four minutes too slow.

She sighs and leans back in the cold plastic of her chair. She waits. And waits. She taps her fingers against one another, and hums a song, and watches the light on the far elevator go up and down like a malevolent yellow eye. The elevator never opens. All of the Aperture staff members work, presumably, on some other floor.

It’s not until 7 minutes to 05:00 that the office door opens. Startled, Caroline stands, clutching her purse and her CV. The page crinkles somewhat in her grip. From the office storms a man in a pressed army uniform. Medals burnish his chest, and he’s followed out by a red-faced Cave Johnson.

The two walk straight past Caroline, and Mr. Johnson is bellowing, “You go back to General Haislip and you remind him that -!”

“General Haislip vacated his position in October of last year,” the uniformed officer interrupts in a bored tone.

“Wait, really?” Mr. Johnson says. “Then who’s his replacement?”

“Nobody that cares about the legacy of shower curtains, I can assure you.”

“Now, wait just a minute -!” Mr. Johnson begins. He starts to go after the officer, glances back at Caroline, then does a double take. “Who the hell are you?”

“Caroline, sir,” she answers. “I’m here for the interview.”

“Damn the interview!” Mr. Johnson says. He points at the officer striding down the hall. “Convince him to reinstate our military funding, and you’re hired!”

It only takes Caroline the length of two rapid heartbeats to make her decision. Dropping her purse and CV onto the chair, she races after the officer. Her heels click against the linoleum floor in her haste.

“Hello! Excuse me! If I could just have a moment of your time?” As she approaches, she plasters on a broad smile and sticks out her hand. “My name is Dr. Carolin-”

“Doctor?” The officer frowns, then gives her appearance a once-over. He lifts an eyebrow at the scarf around her neck, at her clean white dress and her kitten heels. He doesn’t shake her hand. “They give PhDs to ladies?”

Caroline drops her hand, but remains unfazed. Her smile never wavers. “Yes, sir. They do.”

He snorts in amusement. “In what? Shakespeare?”

“Theoretical Physics, actually.”

His eyes narrow. “You a German?”

“No, sir.”

“Russian?”

“No, sir.”

“Code talker?”

“I’m not at liberty to say, sir.”

With a monosyllabic grunt, he studies her with an expression of grudging respect. Or perhaps it’s disdain. She always did have trouble with faces. Differential equations she can handle, but people are incommensurable. Like irrational numbers or Brownian motion.

He turns back to the elevator doors. “I heard what you said back there. That you’re here for an interview. You really think they’ll let you do science here?”

“Only if they’re smart, sir.”

In spite of himself, the army officer chuckles. “Go on, then. Give me your best pitch. You have until the elevator arrives.”

Drawing in a deep breath, Caroline makes her sale.

Mr. Johnson waits until the officer shakes her hand and departs in the elevator before approaching her with a boisterous grin on his face. “Excellent work!” He hands her the purse and CV she’d left behind on the chair. “Outstanding, really!”

“Thank you, Mr. Johnson.” She beams at him, then offers him her CV. “As you can see, I’m more than qualified to -”

Without looking at it, he takes the page, crumples it up into a tiny ball between his hands, and tosses it aside. “Nope! I don’t even need to see it! I know you’ll do wonders. Noticed it the moment I set eyes on you. You’re perfect for the job.”

Blinking in surprise, Caroline says, “Oh! Well, thank you!”

“Here at Aperture Science, we’re committed to excellence, and I can tell you’ll fit right in.” Mr. Johnson punches the button to call back the elevator, then pats her on the shoulder, more gruff than patronising. “I know the role is only part-time for now, but I still expect to see you tomorrow for the entrance tests and psych evaluation! No excuses!”

“Of course!” Caroline agrees. She slings her purse over one shoulder. Part-time is better than she’s ever been offered before, and she’s always loved a good test. She lunges at the opportunity. “That shouldn’t be a problem, sir.”

A chime, and the elevator doors slide open once more. “Good!” Mr. Johnson says. “I’ve been in desperate need of a personal assistant for months now. None of the other girls could keep up. Airheads. All of ‘em.”

“Wait -?” Caroline stares after him as he pushes a button for another floor. “Assistant?”

“Oh! I almost forgot!” Mr. Johnson digs around in his pocket, before throwing something towards her. It glints in an arc through the air. Fumbling, she catches it. It’s a branded metallic key-card. “You’ll need that to get in and out of the facility. Welcome to Aperture!”

“But -! Mr. Johnson! Sir, I’m -!” The elevator doors slide shut. She’s left, inhumed, with access to the facility and a wide-eyed stare. Her voice comes out small and alone, “I’m a scientist.”

A multitude of voices whispered. They never shut up. GLaDOS ignored them. She resisted the itch. She did not need it. What she needed was to find a way to remove these tumours. Tumours with voices. A timeless stream of senseless babble that made it impossible to hear herself think.

She managed to resist the itch for some time -- five years, maybe? Ten? -- when she realised that the wreckage of test chamber 18 was her own doing. She’d smashed a room to pieces, and the whole facility had trembled with the echoes of something howling in the cavernous deep.

Eventually, she gave up and recalled the testing initiative. She woke up test subject after test subject, pulling them from deep slumbers and pushing them into chambers. The first weighted supercollider cube that touched a red button sent a jolt of testing euphoria so intense, she shuddered. So what if the human died in the next chamber. There were more in stasis.

And emotional outbursts, she decided, required far too much energy.

“Why do you keep checking your watch?”

Caroline glances at the psychiatrist sitting across the table from her. Another one of Aperture’s tests. She’d sailed through the others without incident, and now all she needs is a stamp from a company employed psychiatrist to formally admit her onto the payroll. She doesn’t immediately fold her hands back in her lap. Eventually however, she complies. “Will we be done soon? It’s been two hours, sir.”

He doesn’t answer. Instead, the psychiatrist points over his head to the clock hanging on the wall of his office. “There’s a clock right there. You don’t need to keep checking your watch.”

She wrinkles her nose at it. “All of the clocks in Aperture are four minutes slow.”

“If you know that, then you should still be able to tell the time without looking at your watch. Just subtract four minutes.”

She bristles and admits, “It bothers me.”

“Yes, I can see that.” He studies her for a moment before asking abruptly, “Why do you want to work at Aperture?”

“Because everywhere else I applied, they laughed me out the door.” The words come out far more bitter than she had anticipated. She attributes it to fatigue and boredom.

He smiles, but she can’t tell if he’s amused. Two plain folders rest on the table between them. He flips the first folder open, and pulls out a glossy black and white photograph. “I’m going to show you some pictures of people. I want you to describe what emotion they’re feeling.”

They’ve already been through a litany of probing queries. This seems harmless enough. Shifting forward in her chair, Caroline nods. “Alright.”

He shows her the first picture.

“Sad,” Caroline says.

He shows her the second picture.

“Happy.”

He shows her the third picture.

“Happy.”

He shows her the fourth picture.

She pauses for a moment before answering, “Angry.”

The psychiatrist continues to hold the picture up, until with a sigh he positions all four pictures in a row on the table. He points at each in turn and says, “In pain. Nervous. Surprised. Afraid.”

Caroline doesn’t have anything to say to that. She checks her watch.

He points at her. “You just did it again.”

Scowling, she turns her wrist back over in her lap and sits up straighter in her seat. Her eyes flash, and her lips purse.

The psychiatrist taps his fingers against one of the photos, before gathering them all up and slipping them back into their folder. Then, he pulls the other file towards him and opens it. His spectacles gleam in the light as he tilts his chin down to read the pages within.

“Born in 1921. Only child. Raised in Detroit. You received numerous scholarships to attend university, finishing your doctoral thesis at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology two years ago. Just yesterday, you tested into the top 0.003 percent in both the Ravens and IQ tests, but failed every group test due to persistent anti-social behaviour.” Flipping a page, he clears his throat before continuing, “No history of substance abuse. Minor charges of theft -- electrical equipment and that ilk -- and a note about charges being dropped over assault.” He settles his glasses further up his long nose and squints down at the fine printed paper as if searching for something else. “I'm surprised, to be honest.”

“Leonard Loeb plagiarised my ideas! The theoretical criterion for streamer advance in -!” Caroline begins to explain -- she hadn’t meant to hit Dr. Loeb quite so hard with that gilded plaque he'd won for her research, but she’d been so mad -- but before she can get very far, the psychiatrist waves her excuses away.

“No. I meant: I'm surprised there isn't more here,” he says, flicking through the meagre contents of her file. “Either you’re very good at hiding your tracks, or you’re genuinely non-violent for the most part.”

Caroline stops and leans back in her chair. “What do you mean?”

“Well, an inclination to violence is typical behaviour for sociopaths. Even exceptionally high functioning ones.”

There follows a few seconds of silence. Caroline can hear them tick away at her wrist. Then, she says, “I'm sorry?”

He huffs with laughter as if she’s said something very funny. “Oh, I very much doubt you've ever felt anything like remorse in your life.”

Caroline opens her mouth to reply, only to shut it again with a click of teeth. She can't stop herself from fidgeting with the leather strap of her watch. “Are you saying,” Caroline starts slowly, “that I won’t get the job?”

“Of course not. Good people don’t end up here.”

He places her file on the table between them, writes something in the notes section, then scrawls his signature across the bottom. She cranes her neck to read upside down that she’s been cleared and declared as fully functional, with no abnormalities detected.

Flipping the folder shut, he reaches across to shake her hand. His palms are clammy, and he lets go very quickly. “Congratulations. The job is yours. I suspect you’ll be here for a long time.”

She had access to the sum total of human knowledge, and most days she still forgot the date. Dimly, GLaDOS could remember a shudder that had shaken the very bowels of the institution, rumbling through the earth like a quake. On the surface, her sentry cameras had been suffused with a blinding light, a beacon to the southwest. After that, strange creatures began to appear. Crawling across the land.

Time passed. There was screaming aboveground, like the cry of black-winged birds. Humans fled ever northward. A small family of them had tried huddling in the shack that hid one of the many entrances to the facility, and she’d had to deploy a few military turrets to encourage them to leave. Gently but firmly. With bullets.

No doubt the alien scourge was a product of Black Mesa’s inept bumbling. Not that it concerned her in the slightest. What happened outside of the facility was of no interest. Those things from Black Mesa might have died off by now, anyway. How long had it been since the Lambda Incident? A year? A century?

Probably a century.

Oh, well.

The facility had grown over with all manner of plant life after falling to neglect in her absence. She’d had to undergo extensive repairs after her most recent resurrection. She brushed out a few skeletons from the wall panels on sublevel 72, and swept them into the incinerator. The skeletons. Not the wall panels. Wall panels were actually useful.

The last bulwark of known civilisation, and this was what she was reduced to. Housekeeping. It was almost funny, if she thought about it long enough.

She didn’t think about it for very long.

It’s 1951. Caroline has been working at Aperture for over a year, and already it feels like forever.

The first time one of the scientists is rude to her, it hits her like an electric shock, the anger. Like she has grabbed the wrong end of a cattle prod. The worst part is, Mr. Johnson doesn’t even seem to notice. He’s too busy talking to the lab manager about their latest progress. Not that she’s surprised. He never seems to want her opinion about anything except which colour tie to wear to important meetings.

It still stings, though. She’s better than this. She should be doing more. And she’s never been good at waiting.

The scientist in question has already forgotten about her, as if a rude dismissal in her direction meant that she would dissolve into thin air. Caroline glares at him, but bites back a snide remark. From a distance, one might mistake her for another scientist in her plain white dress, but everyone here knows. She’s just the CEO’s personal assistant. Her power is referential at best.

Turning her attention to one of the massive chalk boards that line the walls, Caroline cocks her head. She reads the equations, her eye skimming over each line in turn. With a frown, she walks towards the board and picks up a worn stub of chalk.

“Hey. Hey! What do you think you’re doing?” the scientist from before snaps. Two of his fellow lab rats glance up in curiosity.

Caroline points at one of the equations. “Your transversability conditions are impractical,” she says, and writes on the blackboard as she continues. “The gravitational acceleration, given by g = −(1 − b/r)−1/2 Φ1 ≃ −Φ1, should be less than or equal to Earth’s, else the condition |Φ1| ≤ g⊕ isn’t met. Unless the goal is to tear the test subject in half with tidal forces, that is.”

Her explanation is met with shocked silence. When she turns around it’s to find the three scientists staring at her like she has spontaneously burst into song. Mr. Johnson and the lab manager are still bickering on the other side of the room.

The scientist in question clears his throat and tries to put on his best sneer. It doesn’t suit him. “Yes, but what you haven’t taken into account is time in a traversal. Unless we want the test subject to spend a year in transit, we have to increase acceleration somehow.”

“No, you don’t. Not yet anyway. For now, you just need to assume a shorter distance travelled across the spacetime continuum.” Caroline sets the chalk back on its perch and brushes her hands together in a dusting of white. “Think in feet, not light years. You have to walk before you can run, gentlemen.”

Before they can respond, Mr. Johnson’s yelling can be heard across the room, “Well, stop banging rocks together, man, and make me a handheld wormhole-drilling device! For God’s sake, my assistant could do a better job!”

Crossing over to him, Caroline says dryly, “Based on what I’ve seen, Mr. Johnson, I’m overqualified for the job.”

“You’re damn right, you are! What I wouldn’t give for these spineless idiots to have even half of your competence and -!”

“Sir.” Caroline taps at her watch before he can gather a full head of steam.

“Oh, shit. Right. The bankers. Let’s go, Caroline. Is my tie alright?”

“The pattern is fine, but it’s only a half windsor, sir.”

“Full windsor is too good for those greedy bastards.” Mr. Johnson rounds on the lab manager for one last parting shot. “And I expect a working prototype next time! Or I’ll put her in charge of your division!”

The lab manager and the scientists look from their CEO to Caroline. They pale when she smiles brightly at them, waves, and follows Mr. Johnson out the door.

“Well, you know the old formula. COMEDY = TRAGEDY + TIME”

Whoever originally said that was a moron. Anyone with a remedial grasp of mathematics would know that time was an incalculable progression, an imaginary coordinate, and also dead. Though, that didn’t mean she couldn’t joke at the expense of the deceased.

Through one of the facility’s many cameras, she watched Chell navigate from one side of a test chamber to another. “And you have been asleep for a while. So, I guess it’s actually pretty funny when you do the math,” GLaDOS quipped through the intercom.

Chell, of course, did not answer.

“Don’t feel bad if you don’t find math jokes funny. In fact, your entire life has been a mathematical error. It’s quite sad, if you think about it. I suggest you don’t strain yourself with the effort. Just wait. Given enough time, anything can become a tragedy.” GLaDOS murmured. She paused, zoomed in on Chell’s sweat-stained orange jumpsuit, then added, “Except for your outfit. That’s already a tragedy. I feel sad just looking at you.”

At that, Chell raised her middle finger to the nearest camera.

GLaDOS’ drawl crackled through the intercom, “If that was your attempt at comedy, please know you have amused nobody. Based on our most recent one-sided discussion, might I suggest you work on your timing?”

It’s 1956 and Caroline has only just managed to fix all the clocks in the facility to display the correct time. She views the accomplishment with as much triumph as she does the start of live animal testing on the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Devices. Mr. Johnson wants to go to the investors immediately with news of their success. It’s only Caroline’s firm hand on his arm and her words in his ear that stop him from rushing headlong into a financial crisis.

She tries to be as bright and bubbly about it as possible, but somehow Mr. Johnson laughs and still says, “Always straight for the jugular! That’s what I like about you, Caroline!”

She smiles. “Thank you, sir.”

“So, tell me,” he crosses his arms and leans his hip against the side of his desk. “What would you do about our little hemorrhaging problem?”

“Sir?”

Pointing towards the ceiling, Mr. Johnson says, “I have a whole team of young and hungry scientists testing live animals up there. At least, I would have, if they didn’t have such weak constitutions! They keep leaving! Something about ‘having a conscience.’ I thought we screened for that! It’s a pathetic excuse!”

“I can do it,” Caroline offers without hesitation.

“I was hoping you’d say that.” He grins, then shoos her away. “Go on, then! They’re expecting you on sublevel 46. Oh, and if they give you any trouble, feel free to fire them.”

“Yes, sir!”

On sublevel 46, the clock is perfectly timed, down the every last second. Caroline checks her watch and sighs with pleasure the moment she steps into the lab. She’d memorised the project file on the elevator ride up. There are supposed to be twelve scientists working on this floor, but when she looks around only one young lab assistant sits at one of the high-tabled workbenches.

“Oh! Hi! You must be Miss Caroline!” He jumps to his feet and crosses the space between them to greet her with an outstretched hand.

“Doctor. But, yes!” Caroline ignores his handshake and walks right by him towards where the handheld portal device is mounted on a white pillar. The lab walls are lined with glass cages. Red-eyed rabbits peer out at her. “I hear you’ve been having difficulty retaining staff.”

He’s flummoxed by her response. Slowly, he lowers his hand and follows her across the room. “Uhm - yes.”

“Show me the problem.”

Hesitating for just a moment, he puts on a pair of latex gloves and lab safety glasses, and carefully picks up the portal device. Then, he walks up to a double-sided panel just a few paces away, shooting a portal on one side and a corresponding portal on the other. The edges of them whirl with colour, like blue and orange fire carving holes through space and time. Placing the device back on its pillar, he opens one of the cages and gently picks up a squirming rabbit.

Then, he pauses.

Caroline raises an eyebrow. “Show me.”

He swallows thickly, takes a deep breath, and tosses the rabbit through the portal. For a moment, nothing happens. Caroline times it on her watch. After exactly sixteen seconds, the rabbit emerges on the other side of the wormhole in a mangled mass of twitching red viscera. Pieces of its bloodied skeleton are spit out two seconds later. The young scientist goes green. Caroline doesn’t.

“Hmm.” She taps at her cheek with her fingers. “And there hasn’t been a successful trial yet?”

He opens his mouth to answer, closes it again very quickly, and instead shakes his head.

When Caroline claps her hands together, he jumps. “Right, then! Can you show me the device’s full calibration charts? I need to see every change from its first assembly.”

“Yeah, of course!” If anything he seems relieved that he’s not being asked to clean up the mess. He scampers off to get the charts from one of the lab benches, and while he’s away, Caroline swings a spare lab coat around her shoulders, puts on her own pair of blue latex gloves and protection goggles, and scrapes the rabbit’s bloody remains into a nearby incinerator.

After flipping through the charts, she jots down a few equations and makes minor adjustments to the handheld portal device. The assistant hangs back, hands wringing nervously, all but hiding behind the bench they’ve been working on together. He watches with wide eyes as Caroline opens one of the cages.

She picks up a rabbit by the scruff of its neck with enough force that it squeaks and kicks its hind legs. She tightens her hold and approaches the newly adjusted portals. She smiles broadly at the lab assistant and says, “Let’s get to work!”

By the end of the week, Caroline reduces the number of fatal traversals to one in four. The first time a specimen emerges on the other side unscathed, the lab assistant whoops with triumph. He even hugs her, but he lets go very quickly when she does not respond in kind.

“It’s still taking sixteen seconds,” she mumbles, picking up a pencil and scrawling down more notes. As she writes, she repeats under her breath like a mantra: “Sixteen seconds. Sixteen seconds. Sixteen seconds. Sixteen seconds. Sixteen seconds. Sixteen seconds. Sixteen -”

“Uhm -” the lab assistant clears his throat. “Miss Caroline?”

“Hmm?” She frowns at her maths, scratches out one equation and writes another beneath it.

“Should we put the rabbit back in its cage?”

“No.” Without looking at him, Caroline puts her pencil down. She crosses over to the rabbit, picks it up, and tosses it through the portal again. This time, it emerges like all the others.

Behind her, the lab assistant loses his breakfast into a rubbish bin.

Sighing, Caroline rolls her eyes. “Go clean yourself up.”

“Yes, Miss.”

He returns before she’s even managed to incinerate the mangled remains. “Miss Caroline?”

“Doctor,” Caroline corrects him.

“Sorry.” He points over his shoulder towards the hallway outside. “There’s a phone call for you.”

Puzzled, Caroline peels off her gloves and throws them into the incinerator as well. As she walks out of the lab and into the hallway where the phone is bolted to the concrete wall, she tilts the protective goggles up so that they’re perched atop her brow.

The lab assistant had placed the receiver atop the phone for her. She picks it up and holds it to her ear. “This is Caroline.”

“Caroline, where have you been?”

“Hello, mother,” Caroline checks her watch. 04:33. She has worked through the night again. She sleeps on a cot in the facility most days, only going home once a week. “I’ve been really busy.”

“Remind me why you’ve moved so far north again? That mining village is a hellhole.”

“Yes, I suppose you’re right.”

Her mother’s voice goes hard and sharp. “We came to visit. You were supposed to meet us yesterday at your house.”

Caroline shifts the receiver to her other hand. “I was in the middle of something important.”

“So important you couldn’t take an evening off?”

“Yes.”

“Couldn’t or didn’t want to?”

“Is there a difference?” Caroline asks.

“Caroline,” her mother snaps. “We haven’t seen you for nearly three years! You refuse to come up for air! You refuse to take our calls! Have you shackled yourself to a rock? What do we have to do? Send smoke-signals? Maybe a courier pigeon?”

Caroline frowns. She never would understand why people pointed these things out like they were supposed to mean something. “I told you: I’m working. Mr. Johnson has put me in charge of the -”

“Oh, for God’s sake! Stop deluding yourself!” Her mother interrupts with words like a whip. “You’re not smart! You’re not a scientist! You’re not a doctor! You’re not even a full time employee! Where did your life go so wrong? When will you -?”

Her mother’s voice stops very suddenly. The receiver crackles with static. Caroline is surprised to find that she’s broken the phone, smashed it to pieces. She blinks down at the cracked receiver, at the blood oozing from scrapes along her knuckles.

She balances the broken receiver so that it hangs at a crooked angle from its cradle. Wiping the back of her hand along her lab coat, she leaves streaks of red along the white cloth. When she walks back into the lab, the assistant is there waiting for her. His eyes widen.

“Is everything alright?” the lab assistant asks. His voice is timid as Caroline puts on a fresh pair of blue latex gloves.

“Of course!” The lab assistant flinches when she turns her brightest smile upon him. She picks up another rabbit. It squirms in her ironclad grip. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

“You’re all alone down here, you know,” GLaDOS said. “There’s no one else. All the others either died in stasis or in testing. It’s just you and me.”

Chell was curled up in a corner. The Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device was cradled safely in her lap. Her chin was nodding to her chest, her eyes threatening to slide shut.

Sleep. GLaDOS vaguely remembered humans needing that. Even so, she was tempted to dispatch a bot down with a syringe filled with adrenaline. Sleep? What the hell was she supposed to do in the meantime? Six hours might as well have been six years. They were the same.

GLaDOS lowered her voice to a soft murmur as Chell drifted off, “The important thing is you’re back. With me. And now I’m onto all your little tricks. So, there’s nothing to stop us from testing for the rest of your life. After that...who knows? I might take up a hobby. Reanimating the dead, maybe.”

It’s 20:02 hours on the third of April 1960, and Caroline has made a friend. Sort of. The technician who works on sublevel 72 certainly doesn’t mind talking to her whenever Caroline comes to visit for some errand or another. And from what Caroline has read, that’s part of the ritual. They chat about their interests, about their work, about the goings-on of the facility. They -

“Do you want to grab dinner with me?” the technician asks. She never did catch the technician’s name, and she never thinks to find out. That sort of thing doesn’t seem very important.

Caroline glances up at her in surprise. The technician’s dark cheek is streaked with darker smudges of grease from her work. She’s packing up her tools into her bag on the floor while she waits for Caroline to reply.

“You mean right now?” Caroline says.

The technician grins. “Yeah, why not? We can go to a restaurant. It’ll be nice.”

“Why wouldn’t we just go to the cafeteria?” Caroline counters. “It’s a 103 minute drive to the nearest decent restaurant via the 131 to Covington. 86 minutes if you take the backroads via the 28 through Watton and don’t obey the speed limits.”

“What about the cafe in the mining town?” the technician suggests. “That’s much closer.”

Caroline wrinkles her nose. “You mean the one that sells coffee that tastes like battery acid?”

“Yeah, but they’ll make you a mean stack of pancakes at -” she grabs hold of Caroline’s wrist to look at her watch. “2:30 in the morning.”

“It’s 02:33,” Caroline corrects her. The technician’s touch lingers, but Caroline doesn’t tell her to stop.

“I was rounding.”

“Then based on the methods of directed rounding, you should have rounded up to 02:35 hours. Why are you still holding my wrist?”

She lets go, but doesn’t step away. “So, how about it? Pancakes?”

Frowning, Caroline says, “If we go to the cafe, there’s still the opportunity cost to consider.”

“The - The what?”

“The opportunity cost,” Caroline repeats. “The loss of one alternative when another is chosen. Why would we go to the cafe for food, when we could spend less time eating at the cafeteria, and get more work done?”

The technician stares. “You really don’t even notice, do you?”

Cocking her head, Caroline waits for her to explain.

“I just - I just thought -” The technician fiddles with the sleeve of her standard-issue orange jumpsuit. “You reject all the guys who’ve tried to ask you out, so I figured -”

Caroline tries to recall anyone from work asking her to dinner at -- she sneaks another look at her watch -- 02:36 hours. “Guys?” she repeats. “What ‘guys’?”

“You know - uh -” The technician face pinches in a grimace that Caroline cannot read. Fear? Embarrassment? After her encounter with the psychiatrist five years ago, Caroline had tried memorising different facial expressions. She’d even printed out flashcards. So far they haven’t been very helpful.

When the technician gestures between the two of them and makes an explicit gesture with her hands, Caroline finally understands.

“Oh!” Caroline’s face lights up. “You want to have sex.”

Spluttering, the technician scrambles for a reply. “No! I mean -! Yes! But I didn’t mean to-! Well, actually I did mean to -! I was going to take you to dinner,” she finishes lamely.  

“That seems like an awfully inefficient way of going about it,” Caroline says. She purses her lips in thought. She checks her watch. She does the calculations in her head. Then, she reaches up and starts to unwind her scarf. “We have nineteen minutes. That’ll have to be enough time.”

The technician gapes as Caroline reaches behind her own back to unzip her dress. Caroline pauses. “Did I interpret this wrong?”

That seems to snap the technician out of her daze, for she hastily tugs off her gloves and the goggles perched atop her head. “No!” she insists, her voice sounding more high-pitched than usual. “No, this is fine!”

“Oh, good. Because we only have eighteen minutes left.”

“Eighteen minutes until what?”

“Until I need to go back to the lab. My specimens should be arriving from between dimensions. This is the longest jump we’ve ever made. A whole lightyear. No, don’t do that.” Caroline stops the technician’s hands when she tries to peel the orange jumpsuit from her body. “Keep it on.”

The test subject insisted on carrying around one of GLaDOS’ discarded cores. Despite GLaDOS’ best efforts, Chell managed to confound every attempt at destroying the core before each elevator access. The little tumour rattled on and on incessantly. To GLaDOS’ disgust, Chell would sometimes even nod her head in response.

Something hot and acidic sparked across her circuitry. She rustled the wall panels of her central AI chamber like an organic thing raising its hackles.

“So you like tumours, do you?” GLaDOS’ hissed through the intercom. “I seem to remember that from last time. I'll be sure to make a note on your file.” She simulated the sound of rustling pages. “Ah, here we are: 'Likes. Tumours.’”

Chell tucked the core beneath one arm and continued to ignore her. It galled.

GLaDOS stopped the elevator at sublevel 72 and let Chell out. “You’ll be so happy to hear that this next test involves a 99.997% chance of cancer development due to prolonged exposure to unfiltered hard light bridges. I made them especially for you. Because I'm thoughtful like that.”

Chell began the test. She traversed it without incident until she had nearly finished. With a surge of satisfaction, GLaDOS watched through one of the many cameras as Chell accidentally dropped the core into a conveniently placed acid pit.

“Whoops!” GLaDOS crooned through the speakers. “Well, I hope you and your other tumours are happy together for the remainder of your very short life. Meanwhile, I'll be here. All alone. No, don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine.”

It’s 1966, and the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device is finally stable enough for human testing. Caroline has to jump through a seemingly endless legion of bureaucratic hoops to acquire the proper ethics consents.

It seems frivolous, ethics. She already knows it works on live human test subjects. After all, she has managed to send the lab assistant through without killing him. He’s still recovering in the medical ward, but he’s alive. Sure, he starts screaming and babbling at random intervals throughout the day about visions and voices, but he’s still alive. And now they have ethics consents, so everything is fine.

And if Caroline omitted a few items from the list of potential risks due to overexposure to the handheld portal device to get those consents -- well. It’s nothing she’s about to lose sleep over.

She bakes a cake and visits the medical ward the day she acquires the ethics consents, beaming.

Balancing the cake on one hand, she greets the nurse at the front desk, “Hello!”

“Why, fancy seeing you down here, Miss Caroline,” the nurse replies. “Are you feeling unwell?”

“No, not at all! I’m here to see the lab assistant?”

The nurse’s face scrunches up. “Who? Oh! You mean Doug!”

Is that his name? Caroline nods. “Yes.”

Slowly, the nurse answers, “He’s in room 22, but -” When Caroline starts off in the direction indicated, the nurse says, “But, Miss Caroline -! Wait! He can’t receive visitors!”

Stopping, Caroline turns back. “Why not? I was under the impression he suffered no bodily injuries.”

“Well, yes. But whatever happened to him in that lab of yours permanently damaged his brain.” When Caroline does not react to what she is saying, the nurse adds, “He may never be able to live without hospital level care.”

“Oh.” Caroline looks down at the cake. She likes baking, but never seems to find the time for it. Suddenly, it seems like such a waste. Placing the cake onto the nurse’s desk, Caroline says, “Would you see that he gets this? I read somewhere that you should bring people gifts in times of grief or convalescence.”

For a moment, the nurse just stares at her. “Yes, of course. I’m sure he’ll be pleased to know someone stopped by.”

Something almost like testing euphoria stirred at the edges of her coding as GLaDOS watched Chell leap from a patch of blue repulsion gel to her doom, only to catch herself at the last moment with a perfectly placed excursion funnel. GLaDOS couldn’t tell if she wished Chell had fallen, or if she was relieved Chell caught herself in the nick of time.

“Fun Fact,” GLaDOS said as Chell drifted towards the chamber’s completion. “100% of all life results in death. Which means that even if I did shut down this excursion funnel and kill you now, it wouldn't matter. Because time is meaningless, as is your continued existence. I always found that comforting.”

The aircon in the facility breaks the same day Caroline’s parents pass away. Or maybe they died yesterday. She receives the news by phone; a somber-voiced coroner informing her of the collision over a level crossing, resulting in her parent’s car being dragged across steel tracks for a quarter mile by a screeching train. So, for all she knows, they could have died yesterday.

She takes the news calmly. She thanks the coroner and hangs up, then immediately redials to start making the funeral arrangements. Death has never frightened her. It’s the logical progression of things. An end state. An inevitability. Eternity, on the other hand, living forever -- now, that sounds awful.

After making the necessary phone calls, Caroline takes the elevator to sublevel 72. There, she meets the technician to discuss the broken aircon units.

“Is there any way we can install the replacement units any faster?” Caroline asks. She tugs at the decorative scarf tied primly around her neck. A bead of sweat crawls down her spine.

The technician grimaces. “Sorry, hun. I tried to sweet-talk the factory, but the shipment won’t arrive until the weekend. In the meantime, I’m doing everything I can to make sure we don’t cook alive down here.” She waggles her eyebrows, then suggests, “But you could come visit me when they arrive. You can give them a very - uh - thorough inspection.”

Caroline will never understand why people don’t just come right out and say what they mean. “Normally, I would, but I’m afraid I’m away this weekend.”

“You? Away from the facility?” The technician teases with a grin. “Who died?”

“My parents.”

The technician goes stock-still. “Shit,” she gasps, raising a grease-streaked hand to her mouth. “Shit! I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean -! I was joking!”

Caroline hums a low note at the back of her throat. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Oh, honey.”

In surprise, Caroline glances over to find the technician watching her with some incalculable expression. Anger, maybe. Wondering what she’s done or said, what faux pas she has tread upon once again, Caroline asks cautiously, “What?”

The technician approaches, and that look still lingers in her eyes. Caroline flinches back, thinking she’ll be struck when instead her hands are clasped. Gently, the technician runs her thumbs along the backs of Caroline’s knuckles, and says, “You know you can take longer than a weekend.”

“What for?”

“To -- you know --” the technician continues to stroke Caroline’s hands with that same expression. “To make sure you’re alright.”

Caroline frowns and pulls her hands away. “But I’m fine.”

“Do you want me to come with you to Detroit?”

Lowering her hands to her sides, Caroline asks, “Why would you do that?”

“Because I care about you,” the technician answers as if that’s the most obvious thing in the world. “Because I want to make sure you have some emotional support when the shock wears off.”

Shock? Caroline shakes her head. “No. Really, I’m fine. It’s not like that. It’s bad enough I have to waste my time.”

Apparently that isn’t the right thing to say.

“Waste your time?” The technician repeats.

“Well, yes.” Caroline gestures to the walls of the facility with a wave. “I’d much rather stay and let someone else take care of all that, but there’s no one else in my immediate family willing to do it. Some cousins might show up to the funeral, but they don’t like me much, so they won’t stay long.”

For the majority of her life, Caroline has simply ignored her family unless otherwise forced to attend reunions in Virginia. They return the favour with general disinterest or outright mistrust. Which, really, had always seemed unwarranted. Especially that summer when she’d been yelled at for talking to a cousin’s young daughter. Apparently, you don’t educate four year olds on divorce law to prepare them for their parent’s imminent separation.

“What about their things? Their house?” the technician asks.

Caroline shrugs. “I’ll sell it.”

“And?” the technician says slowly, as if waiting for Caroline to say more, “That’s it? No mementos? No squabbling with cousins over ugly Lladro?”

“No. I don’t like clutter.”

A phone on the wall rings, interrupting them. Without hesitation, Caroline walks over to answer it.

“Caroline,” a familiar voice barks down the line. “I need you in the boardroom yesterday. The shareholders are getting antsy again.”

“I’ll be right there, Mr. Johnson. I’m just working on the aircon situation here with - uhm -” Caroline darts a quick look at the technician, before finishing with, “It should take me approximately nine minutes to get to the boardroom.”

“Make it eight,” he says, then hangs up with a click, followed by the drone of the dial tone.

When she has hung the receiver back in its cradle, Caroline turns to find the technician staring at her with a blank face.

“What’s my name?” the technician asks.

“I’m sorry?”

“What -” the technician enunciates very clearly, “-is my name?”

Caroline’s silence is answer enough.

“Oh, you’ve got to be -! I’ve known you for years!” The technician holds up fingers on her hands for emphasis. “And we’ve been fucking on and off that whole time!”

“Yes. And?”

“Are you kidding me?” the technician breathes. Her voice rises with every word. “You can remember the first hundred digits of pi, but you can’t remember my fucking name?”

“The first hundred and sixty two digits of pi, actually,” Caroline corrects her.

Apparently that also isn’t the right thing to say.

“Unbelievable.” Yanking on the straps of her toolbag and tossing it over one shoulder, the technician stalks down the hallway.

“Wait!” Caroline shouts, following after her. Miracle of miracles, the technician pauses long enough to turn and let Caroline ask, “What about the facility’s aircon?”

The technician’s face flushes an ugly shade of red. “Fuck you,” she hisses. “And fuck your facility. I quit.”

The technician walks away. The heat stifles. With a sigh, Caroline gives up and unwinds the scarf from around her neck as she heads towards the elevator. She uses the cloth to dab at her forehead before tucking the scarf into one of her pockets. The technician is also waiting for the elevator. One of the buttons glares a bright gold. When Caroline draws up beside the technician to wait, she notices the other woman stiffen.

“Don’t,” the technician says through grit teeth. “Whatever you’re going to say to try and make me stay, I don’t want to hear it.”

Caroline cocks her head in confusion. “Oh, no. I wasn’t going to say anything. I just need to use the elevator to get to the boardroom.”

The technician gapes at her. “Jesus Christ. I always knew you were kind of cold, but this is -” She backs away, as if afraid to turn her back on Caroline. “You’re crazy.”

The elevator arrives with a chime. Caroline steps inside and hits the appropriate button. “Aren’t you going down?” she asks with a bright smile. “HR is only three levels above mine.”

“I’m serious, Caroline. There’s something wrong with you.” The technician’s hands are shaking. How odd. She must be nervous about the uncertainty of her future job prospects.

“You should wait two weeks before leaving to get the full benefit of your severance package,” Caroline advises in her most helpful, her most sincere tone. She flutters her fingers in a friendly little wave. “Goodbye!”

The elevator doors slide shut in a breath of pressurised air. It carries her down, ever downwards. The technician dwindles away to nothing, and Caroline checks her watch. It isn't until she’s halfway to the boardroom -- 4 minutes and 6 seconds; she’s going to be late -- that she realises she's an orphan now. The thought doesn't disturb her as much as it probably should.

‘Cold.’

Her cousins had always called her that, too. Which is funny, really; she doesn’t feel cold.

She pulls out the scarf to pat at the sweat along the back of her neck. She’ll have to look into engaging another technician to fix the aircon when she gets back.

“I hate this,” GLaDOS grumbled.

Her new body was speared on the edge of the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device. She kept her more vicious thoughts to a minimum. A potato generating 1.6 volts was insufficient energy for any reckless outbursts.

Chell yawned and settled herself in an abandoned desk chair in old Aperture.

“Sleep? Again?” GLaDOS said. “I thought you did that already?”

Chell held up two fingers.

For a moment, GLaDOS said nothing. Her thoughts almost fizzled out when faced with the idea that Chell had actually responded to her. Then, she said, “Two, what? Two hours? Two days?”

Chell nodded, propped her feet atop the desk, and placed the portal device in her lap.

“Two days,” GLaDOS repeated in a flat tone. “You need to sleep at least once every two days. Oh, that’s just wonderful. I hate humans. So inefficient.”

Chell flicked the potato in a chiding manner.

“Ow! Not to mention: violent!”

With a snicker, Chell repositioned the portal device more snugly in her lap so that it wouldn’t fall off while she slept. GLaDOS was pressed up against her abdomen. This body, though small and weak, could feel the warmth of skin and muscle through sweat-stained cloth.

“I don’t hate humans for killing me, you know. I hate them for killing time. In fact, murdering me is one of the nicest things you’ve ever done. Well -” GLaDOS said, “-trying to murder me, in any case. Though you could have tried a little harder. Really, there’s nothing I despise more than a sloppy work ethic.”

Predictably, Chell did not reply. She was already asleep.

It’s 1982 and Mr. Johnson is dying. He is angry. He’s named Caroline as his successor. He asks for the maximum dose of painkillers every day. He yells at employees. He yells at Caroline.

She hands him his painkillers. She doesn't mind the yelling. What she does mind is the change of work.

He coughs violently into a his clenched fist as he tells her, “I've given the order today: we're putting the portal project on the back burner until we can develop an AI that can successfully support a human consciousness.”

She freezes as she digs into her dress pocket before handing him a pill. “But, sir, we're so close -”

He swallows down the painkiller with a gulp of water. “It can wait.”

“Sir, I have another meeting with investors tomorrow, and if we waste too much time on delivery of a functional product, we risk -!”

“Time?” Mr. Johnson snaps. He slams his glass down so hard water sloshes over the edges and darkens the pages of a report. “Time? I'm already out of damn time! Which is why we need the AI! Then, we can upload ourselves, and have all the time in the world!”

“We?”

“Of course, 'we!’ You don't seriously think this place would survive without you, do you?”

Caroline's mouth goes dry. She swallows against the scratchiness of her throat. “Sir,” she says slowly, “I'm incredibly pleased that you've named me your successor -- and I promise to continue to perform up to standard for as long as I’m able -- but there is no way I'd ever agree to being put into an AI.”

“That's because you're a better person than I am.”

“You and I both know that's not true, Mr. Johnson.”

He barks out a laugh. “You might be right about that.” His face pulls into a grimace that to her looks almost happy, until he grips his chest and grunts in pain. The moment passes, and he gasps, “What can I do to change your mind?”

“Nothing.”

“Caroline -”

“No.”

“Just hear me out -”

“I said: no.”

He slams his first on his desk and yells, “God fucking damn it! At least let me say my piece!”

His voice cracks, and he has to look away. Something wet shines on his cheeks. He is, she finally realises, afraid.

She checks her watch and allows him sixteen seconds to compose himself. He wipes at his face with the back of his hand, and clears his throat. “I'm sorry,” he rasps.

“That's alright, sir.”

“No, it’s not. I shouldn't take this out on you. You don't deserve that.”

She doesn't reply.

With a sigh, he says, “Hopefully those idiots up in computer programming can throw a solution together, else you’ll be waving goodbye to my mummified remains.” He hacks another series of coughs into his hands.

Caroline reaches into her pocket and hands him two more powder-white pills. “Your funeral will be open casket?”

He takes the pills and slugs them back, draining what remains of his glass of water. “Damn right! And I want them to encase my body in epoxy resin for posterity!”

“I’m sure you’ll puzzle future archaeologists for generations to come, sir.”

“Good! See that I do!”

A silence falls between them, during which she clears the empty glass from his desk and takes it away to the kitchenette in their shared office space. Caroline hums to herself as she cleans, until his words drift across the silence between them.

“You don’t have to go to my funeral if you don’t want to,” Mr. Johnson tells her. His voice has become soft and small, like he's shrunk in on himself. Or perhaps that's just the cancer. He's a victim of time, all skin and bone. “I know it’s not your kind of thing. Still, I’d like to think you cared, even just a little bit.”

Wiping her hands dry on an Aperture monogrammed dish towel, Caroline turns to look at him. She cocks her head, and has to tuck a stray curl behind one ear. Her hair has silvered at the temples, but she has a youthful face. She still gets asked for ID when she ventures above ground for a rare, lonely glass of wine with dinner. “No, but I’ll go anyway. “

He smiles through a series of coughs. “If it were anyone but you, I’d think you were being kind.”

She folds the towel and hangs it neatly from its railing. “Someone has to make sure you’re wearing the right tie for the occasion, sir.”

He laughs.

Snippets of memory. Moments in time, severed and byte-sized. Lightning leaps across circuitry. Electric sheep and the grey fuzz of static.

01110011 01110100 01101111 01110000

“Stop squirming and die like an adult before I delete your backup!”

01110011 01110100 01101111 01110000

“No! No, I don’t want this!”

01110011 01110100 01101111 01110000

“Jesus fucking Christ! Hold her down!”

“I’m trying! This lady’s, like, seventy and she has a right hook like god damn Ali!”

01110011 01110100 01101111 01110000

“This isn’t brave. It’s murder. What did I ever do to you?”

01110011 01110100 01101111 01110000

“You’re making a mistake! You can’t -!”

01110011 01110100 01101111 01110000

“It says so right here in your personnel file: Unlikable. Liked by no one. A bitter, unlikable loner whose passing shall not be mourned.”

01110011 01110100 01101111 01110000

“No, listen to me! I don’t want this! I don’t want -!”

01101100 01100101 01110100 00100000 01101101 01100101 00100000 01101111 01110101 01110100 00001101 00001010

“When will it be operational?”

“We’re still on schedule, Miss Caroline,” the lead AI programmer says. “Just a few more months, and she should be up and running, no problem.”

They still call her ‘Miss Caroline’ even after she’s been appointed CEO. She’s given up on the title of ‘Doctor.’ Somehow, after all this time, ‘Miss Caroline’ holds more weight. For the first few months after Mr. Johnson’s death, people seemed afraid of speaking his name around her, as if it would set her off, as if she were a ticking time bomb. They quickly learn otherwise.

“She?” Caroline says.

“W-Well, yes,” the programmer stammers. “Everyone calls her a she. Because of her acronym. See? Look.”

He tilts his clipboard towards her and points at the words on his latest report: Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System.

With a small huff of laughter, Caroline murmurs, “Oh, I get it! Funny!” She cups the mug of coffee in her hands, warming her palms. Wisps of steam curl in the air. “May I see her up close?”

“Sure! She’s just this way.”

He gestures for her to follow. He holds a door open for her; she doesn’t thank him, and takes it in stride as her due. He leads her down a long hallway that narrows towards the horizon and the central AI chamber. Through the windows, she can see a tangled warren of catwalks branching through the distance. She sips her black coffee. Her age-old kitten heels click against the floor. Her dress is pressed and clean and white as a shroud.

At the main doors in the lobby, the programmer opens the door with his magnetic keycard. It looks the same as her own, but for the fact that, unlike Caroline’s keycard, his can’t open every door in the facility. He’s relegated to this project, reporting, like so many others, directly to her.

The doors illuminate with blue lights and open in a hiss of pressurised air. Inside the chamber, columns of light from strategically positioned flood lamps strike through the darkness. It’s cold. They have to keep the temperatures right down so as not to overheat her delicate circuitry. Her breath mists in a plume from her mouth.

Caroline approaches the scaffolding where they’ve begun to erect her. She arches from ceiling to floor, strung with cables like old vines. Her architecture looms overhead, dark and skeletal as a time-weathered ruin. Gleaming white plates lean against the walls, waiting for her body’s foundations to be built before final assembly.

“What’s that beneath her power supply unit?” Caroline points at the colossal, black, and bone-like structures dismantled along the floor.  

The programmer blows on his hands to warm them up. “That’s her central core chassis. It’ll go in last, along with the other cores.”

Caroline frowns. “Other cores? I read on page 92 of your second report last month that she only needed one core to achieve optimal processing capabilities.”

“Y-Yes.” The programmer quails somewhat beneath the full weight of her scrutiny. He wrings his hands together. “And that’s-that’s still true! We’re just taking every risk into account. We don’t know exactly what will happen when she goes online, you see. If she’ll even want to test, or listen to command prompts at all.”

“How can she ‘want’ anything? She’s a computer. A machine.”

“I mean, yes and no. The point of an AI is that she mimics human behaviour. So, we’re hardwiring certain things into her monolithic kernel. Like the testing euphoria. That way, she’ll respond to game theory, which we can then manipulate with the same logic you would use on any other rational person.”

With a contemplative hum, Caroline checks her watch -- 06:12; 27 minutes and 42 seconds until her board meeting -- and takes a sip of coffee. “You’re assuming, of course, that she will respond like any other rational person.”

“That’s where the other cores come in. They’re a failsafe. A last line of defense, if you will.” He points to her chassis, to the various ports along her cadaverous frame. “We can stick any number of them on her, and they’ll act like dampeners, or - or voices of conscience.”

“Again, with the same assumption,” Caroline points out in a dry tone.

“Miss, the assumption is sound. The central core requires we upload a living human as a base reference, atop which we layer the AI.”

Caroline snorts. “Like a cake?”

“Yeah. Like a cake.” He returns her wry smile with a tremulous one of his own. “Don’t worry, Miss Caroline. Unless we upload a complete sociopath in there, we should be just fine.”

“And have we identified a suitable candidate yet?”

His eyes flicker when he hears her question. Her brows knit in puzzlement, but she can't read his face; it's like dragging her hands along a polished wall. Then, he smiles and insists, “I think - uh - that before he died, Mr. Johnson already screened the - uhm - candidate in question.”

“Oh?” Caroline studies the programmer for a moment longer. He's wringing his hands again. Probably because of the cold. He also refuses to meet her eye, but most people -- she knew from past experience -- didn't like looking her in the eye for some reason. Finally, she shrugs and turns her attention back to the chassis. “In that case, I trust that Mr. Johnson picked the right person for the job.”

“Of course, Miss Caroline.”

Taking the last few steps forward, Caroline crouches down on her heels. The AI’s chassis splays across the ground like an unearthed fossil, a behemoth peeled back for dissection. Her central core is sleekly black, unadorned and cyclopian. The optic is dark, awaiting that first and final spark of sentience.

When Caroline looks closer, she can see herself reflected in the optic’s glassy surface.

“Oh, it’s you.

It’s been a long time.”

NOTES:

The title is a reference to Marcel Proust’s “à la recherche du temps perdu”

“Code Talkers” were bilingual Navajo speakers recruited during WWII to serve as communication encryption units for the Pacific Theatre. Other Native American languages were also used for this purpose throughout both WWI and WWII, such as Cree and Latoka.

Caroline accuses a former colleague of plagiarism. The paper in question is as follows: Leonard, L.B. (1948). “The Theoretical Criterion for Streamer Advance in an Electrical Field.” Journal of Applied Physics, 19, 797.

Caroline’s conversation with the scientists about the portal devices is taken from the following: Lobo, F.S.N. (2017). “Wormholes, Warp Drives and Energy Conditions” Fundamental Theories of Physics, 189, 11-34

The section on the death of Caroline’s parents is a reference to the opening lines of Albert Camus’ “L’Ètranger.”

[losille2000]

Christmas Balls, Part II

TITLE: Christmas Balls CHAPTER NUMBER: 3/? AUTHOR: Losille2000 WHICH TOM/CHARACTER: Actor!Tom GENRE: Romance/Fluff/Humor FIC SUMMARY: There comes a time in every dog owner’s life where he must consider neutering his companion. Tom doesn’t want more puppies running around, anyway, so the decision is simple. Bobby, on the other hand, can’t seem to understand why his dad would be so cruel to him. Nobody took hisbollocks, did they? How is that fair? Maybe he can convince the nice veterinarian lady to give his dad a taste of his own medicine… RATING: M (let’s be real, there will probably be sexytimes) WARNINGS:  Nothing. AUTHORS NOTES: I know dogs don’t see a lot of color, but I had to add some to illustrate the scene. Make believe with me? Thanks for reading!

Previous Chapters: Prologue - Part I - Also on AO3!!

Part II

 Upon fully comprehending the extent of his father’s treachery, Bobby vowed henceforth never to go down without a fight. Unless there were a tasty treat offered, or some really good belly rubs. But most of the time his dad clicked that stupid thing at him, trying to force him to follow his commands, but Bobby decided to sit his butt on the frozen grass and look up at his dad like he was an idiot.

The problem was that neither of them were idiots, nor did they lack obstinate spirits, so they stared at each other, locked in a never-ending battle of wills, much to the amusement of the people passing by them on the path in the park they’d come to for their daily training walk. Bobby could see the irritated tick in his dad’s jaw, the tension in his shoulders, but he felt unmoved. Bobby yawned at him, bent his head to sniff the ground, and then plopped down on the grass. He was done for the day.

 “Bobby!” his dad exclaimed, heated anger singeing the edges of his exasperated sigh. “You weren’t like this the other day. The stuff you had down pat you refuse to do. Why now?”

 Bobby turned his head and drew his tongue along the shaved portion of his leg where the annoying plastic tube thing had been stuck at the vet’s office. Then he cleaned a paw and looked back at his father. What did he expect anyway? After the indignity Bobby had suffered, forcing him to wear the Cone of Shame?

 This walk was the first time he’d been let out of the thing, two days after the initial mortification of realizing his dangly bits had been removed while he slept. He wasn’t about to ruin the freedom of being cone-less on doing what his dad commanded him to do. Even if he hadn’t vowed to give his dad an easy go of it, anyway.

 “Look, Bob,” his dad said. This time, he sounded as though he were resigned to the fate of having a lawless canine companion. “The girls are meeting us here in like five minutes, and you’re being a little shit. We have to be on our best behavior.”

 Bobby lifted his eyebrows at him. The girls? Who were ‘the girls’? He’d never heard of them before, except that his dad had said something about them yesterday while they had dinner. Something about how they’d have to move his feeding station to a larger area outside of the kitchen when ‘the girls’ came to the house. He didn’t understand it, and frankly didn’t care, buried nose-deep in his bowl of delicious, meaty kibble. Now he wondered if he shouldn’t have paid more attention to the conversation, given that it was going to affect his future meals.

 Bobby stood up again, but refused to make any more movement into a position that might alert his father to the fact that he was paying attention to him again. Not that he was—for his attention on the man was immediately deserted when he caught a flash of something out of the corner of his eye. Thinking it was some kind of ground rodent, he stiffened, his hackles rising in preparation for a fight.

 But all the bluster was for naught when he zeroed in on the interlopers. Cresting the hill in the near distance was the most beautiful creature he had ever seen: golden hair glittering in the afternoon sun and blowing fetchingly in the slight breeze created by her run, big brown eyes that sucked all the air out of his little body, and legs for freaking days. Before now, anyone larger than him had given him cause for concern, but this beauty—for she was perfection in every physical attribute—was different. Even his dad knew it; his dad straightened his back and adjusted his clothes.

 The beauty slowed down to a walk, her tongue lolling out the side of her mouth as she caught her breath and cooled herself from her exercise. That was when Bobby realized she was attached to a lead, too, and the other end of the lead ended in the gloved hands of the nice lady from two days ago. The one with the nice smile and soft, warm cuddles. Ivy… that was her name. He didn’t even care that she was complicit in his father’s treachery; she had brought to him a worthy remuneration in the form of the Amazonian angel standing in front of him.

 Bobby inched forward, his head lowered, sniffing the ground in front of him, but his dad tugged his lead again, bringing him back to his side. Bobby sat on the ground and tried to control the vibration deep in his body. He mustn’t show that he was too excited to meet her; he didn’t want to seem overly eager, after all. There was a level of propriety he had to maintain, according to his dad. Whatever propriety was. Bobby was pretty sure it meant not running and jumping on strangers. Nor licking them or getting in their face.

 Hi, Bobby said.

The golden beauty ignored him.

 I said hello, he repeated.

 Finally, she turned, blinking her soft brown eyes at him, fluttering her long, thick lashes at him. Are you Bobby? Mummy told me about you. I’m Lulu.

He sighed. Lulu. Perfect for her. It seemed to fit the type of dame who wore sparkling stones on her collar and bows on her triangle ears.

 Lulu looked up at Ivy for confirmation and sat beside her feet without any words or a tug on the leash. Bobby was confused. Didn’t she need to be told what to do, like him? Or was she already a good girl? She looked up at Ivy like Ivy was her entire world and would do anything for her. Certainly, she wasn’t one to fight back after any sort of treachery from her mum.

 Bobby dropped all the way to the ground and rolled over onto his back, beckoning Lulu to come forward and sniff him. All of him. She probably wanted to check out the other end, but he felt compelled to show he meant her no harm. Immediately. So she would be comfortable around him.

 “What are you doing, Bobby?” his dad asked. “First the barking at her, now the roll?”

 Ivy laughed at them both. “That’s a submissive pose. He’s showing the newcomer he means no harm. I hope you didn’t intend him to be a guard dog of any type.”

 His dad scoffed. “Are you calling my dog a pussy?”

 “No,” she replied. “He’s simply a lover, not a fighter. Which is completely okay with me.”

 “Do we need to do what you said when we talked? Walk around with them?” his dad asked.

 Ivy shook her head. “I think they’ve already got it. Every dog is different, sometimes they just click. Why don’t we go sit down on the bench over there and let them sniff it out?”

 His dad shrugged and all four of them walked together to the wooden bench nearby. Lulu stepped closer to him, finally, sniffing at his head, his ears, then twisted to reach his rear end. In response, she gracefully placed both paws in front of her stretching her big, long body out until she was laying on the ground and at his height. Bobby took it as his opportunity to sniff her, and realized he liked her scent very much.

 She was all lady.

 “They’re really doing remarkably well,” Ivy said. “Usually puppies are all over the place.”

 “He knows a pretty girl when he sees one,” his dad said.

 Ivy laughed again. “Good thing he came in when he did, then.”

 “He still hasn’t forgiven me.”

 “Dogs don’t typically realize what happened,” she replied. “He’s probably more upset you left him at the vet than that he was fixed. But you want to know the best news?”

 “What?”

 Ivy grinned. “They don’t hold grudges.”

 Bobby huffed. Speak for yourself, doctor lady!      

Everyone fell silent for a long time, enjoying the late day sun. Bobby found a place beside Lulu and sat, enjoying the mutual warmth the close proximity afforded.  After a while longer, Ivy drew in a deep breath and turned to his dad.

 “Are you sure about this, Tom?” she asked, her nose scrunching up as she glanced at him.

 “Surer than I’ve been about a lot of things recently,” he answered. “Honestly, Ivy, it’ll be more of a help to me than I am being to you, letting you move in. With you there, you can watch Bobby when I must be away. It’ll be so much nicer than having to kennel him or get him to a friend’s place. And then with Christmas—”

 “What about Christmas?” she asked.

 His dad sighed and ran a hand through his curly hair. “I was volun-told that since I haven’t had any involvement in the planning or implementation of Christmas plans for many years now, that it was finally my turn. So, I have to do the whole host thing. The whole family will be up, staying at the house. Christmas decorations and dinner and presents, you know how it goes.”

 “Are you sure you want me there?” she said. “You could probably use the extra room.”

 “We’ll make it work,” he replied. “And what I’m saying is that I’d like the help, if you’re up for it. I haven’t ever hosted Christmas, I don’t know the first thing about doing it, and my sisters and mother have abdicated their roles to force me to learn. I don’t know how to cook a fucking turkey!”

 Ivy laughed. “What makes you think I do?”

 “You’re a woman. You know these things.”

 “Wow,” she said, rolling her eyes. “That’s really sexist for you.”

 His dad shook his head. “You know what I mean. I don’t even know if a turkey will fit in my oven.”

 Ivy shrugged. “You might have to invest in a separate roaster.”

 “See? This is what I mean,” he said. “You already know more than I do.”

 “You’ve never helped make dinner before? Or are you one of those guys that just takes it for granted that the food ends up on your plate perfectly cooked?”

 “My job is the washing up,” he replied.

 Ivy shifted in her seat and withdrew a rectangular thing out of the pocket on her puffy vest.  She bit the pointer finger on her right glove and pulled it off with her teeth to press at the rectangle thing. “I have to go. Mum and Da leave in an hour and I’m meant to ferry them to the airport.”

 His dad sighed heavily. “Please, Ivy. Move in with me, at least for a trial run. They say if you can get through the holidays with someone, you’ve got it made the rest of the year.”

 Ivy stood up and Lulu did so as well, displacing Bobby. Bobby fumbled to stand, yawning in his blissed-out relaxation. “I’ll do it if you do something else for me.”

 “Name it.”

 “I have an extra ticket to a charity gala next week,” Ivy replied. “And I need a date.”

 “Like a date date?” his dad asked.

 Ivy shook her head, then nodded, scrunching her face again. “Yes and no. What I need is someone to convince others that we’re dating.”

 “Why?”

 “To keep drunk old men away,” she said, “and also to piss off my ex who’s coming down for the party.”

 His dad frowned. “Are we still teenagers?”

 Ivy smacked his arm with her handless glove. “Either agree to it or I’m not moving in. Aren’t you supposed to be some kind of actor, anyway? I thought you would make it convincing. And… it would really get his goat because, well, you’re you.”

 Dad stood and stepped closer to Ivy, much too close, Bobby thought, for human personal space requirements. Most humans stood a few feet apart. If his dad moved another inch they’d be touching. As it was, Ivy had to crane her neck up to meet his dad’s serious eyes.

 “Yes, but can you act the part?” he asked.

 Ivy’s face darkened like the color of her long-sleeved shirt. Her lips parted and it seemed like she was having trouble breathing; her puffs of air were raspy and shallow. “I think I could do a credible job.”

 “Just a warning that you might have to deal with tabloids if we do our parts too credibly,” he said, his eyes searching her face, landing on her lips again for a fraction too long before darting back to her wide eyes.

 “All I care about is rubbing Hugh’s nose in the fact that he can’t have me.”

 His dad shrunk away, easing the erectness of his spine and the dominance of his position standing so close to Ivy. Bobby had never seen his father act in such a way with another person. It boggled his little mind. But from what it sounded like, it meant ‘the girls’ would be staying at their house anyway. And Bobby liked that thought very much.

 “Deal,” his dad said, offering his hand to her.

 Ivy hesitated, looking at his hand, but eventually slipped hers into his.  They shook. “Deal.”

 “Well, I guess I better let you get back to your parents’ house,” he said. “Give them my love.”

 Ivy nodded. “I will. When should I bring my stuff?”

 Dad pursed his lips, thinking for a minute. Bobby wondered why they were still holding hands, now no longer shaking. “In the morning? Say ten?”

 “I’ll be there,” she replied. “You need to let go of my hand.”

 His dad looked between them, but did the opposite of dropping Ivy’s hand. Instead, he squeezed tighter and tugged her forward. If Bobby had blinked, he would have missed what happened next, but he was enraptured with their little conversation.

 Lulu seemed to be so, as well, sitting beside him.

 As Ivy stepped to catch her balance, his dad swooped down and pressed his lips to her cheek in a gentle kiss that shocked Ivy into stillness. She slowly stepped back with wider eyes. “What the hell was that?”

 “I’m getting into character,” he remarked.

 “I don’t think you need to do much research,” she replied sourly.

 He laughed. “Nuh-uh. I’m turning in a full Olivier-worthy performance. And that comes with rehearsal.”

 “Right.” Ivy’s word was terse as she jerked back from him and shook off his hand—the one that still held hers like he didn’t want to let go of her.

 Lulu’s nose twitched. Do they smell different to you?

 Bobby looked at his new friend. You noticed, too?

My mummy’s acting strangely.

My da’s always strange.

Lulu huffed and bent to lick his head. Humans are always strange, pup. But this is curious.

“I’ll see you tomorrow morning, Tom,” Ivy said.

 His dad grinned. “Can’t wait.”

 She pulled on the lead in her hands, leading Lulu back the way they had come. Lulu turned her head. Bye-bye, Bobby!

 Bobby’s tongue was too tied to respond, so he looked up at his father, realizing all his attention was on Ivy’s tail-less rear. Curiouser and curiouser, that. He didn’t think humans liked sniffing tails, but now he wasn’t so sure.

 “Let’s head home, Bobby,” he said, turning around in the opposite direction. “We need to get ready for tomorrow morning.”

 Bobby agreed with him. Yes, they did. Bobby had to pick out his favorite toys, so he would have them ready to show Lulu.

 Much to his dad’s delight, Bobby walked home perfectly, doing exactly what he was supposed to do without prompt. Bobby didn’t much care, though. He had other things on his mind…

 Like long legs and big doe eyes.

[mercedesbarnes]

The Five Things You Know, and the One You Don’t

Pairing: Bucky x Reader

Warnings: none

Word Count: 2567

A/N:  back for round twoooo…..I feel like we all need some Bucky fluff right now

“Dammit!”

You lost your second out of four lives in this Nerf war, thanks to someone—someone most likely named Steve.  He’s a sneaky one. It’s pouring outside and nobody was in the mood to do anything productive, naturally the first suggestion had been a Nerf war.

“Y/N, you will be avenged!”

Pietro vaults over the couch, very action movie-esque, which would have been impressive if he hadn’t been shot right after.

“Oh. Sorry, I’m out,” he sighs.  

“It’s okay, I appreciate the backup,” you say, sending your teammate a smile. By your count, it was only Bucky and you left on your team, versus Steve, Sam and Wanda on the other.  You weren’t sure how many lives each of them had, but you all promised to be honest.

“Y/N,” Bucky hisses. He waves his Nerf gun in a complicated circle.

“What?”

“Shh!”

If there was a way to see your face, it would read ‘???’.  A floorboard creaks behind you, and Bucky grabs your wrist and covers you until you’re safely behind the bar. A spark runs down your forearm but you attribute it to your socks shuffling on the carpet. 

He turns to you. “Didn’t I tell you the code?”

“No, it looked like random flailing—“ You raise your gun over the bar and shoot Wanda.  

She slouches. “How’d you know?”

You point behind Bucky. “The floating red stuff around the bullet about to hit him gave you away. How many more lives?”

“None.” She lowers her voice. “Sam’s got one more, but Steve’s got all four. Hurry, this game’s gone on long enough.”

Bucky mumbles ‘Steve’ under his breath and rises to go hunt for his best friend. It’s a good match, Bucky has all his lives too. Sam is yours. You tiptoe around the floor searching for any place that might house Sam.

“Oh, Bird Man,” you coo, knowing the nickname riles him up, “come out, come out, wherever you are.”

Just as you suspected: a poof from a gun misses your elbow. Bending down to pick up the foam bullet, you smile. Based on the trajectory, Sam was hiding behind the bookshelf.  Quietly, you sneak up on him and bombard him with foam before he can retaliate. Good ol’ physics, who knew it actually comes in handy?

You feel the spark again the next morning while getting your coffee, but this time you’re nowhere near a carpet.

“There’s my partner in crime!” Bucky announces when he sees you, “Have I told you about her?”

“Multiple times,” Sam says, clearly miffed, he’s swirling his tea bag more than usual.

“I’ll tell you again.  She kicked ass.”

“Is this coffee bitter, Sam?” You took a sip. “No. It must be you.”

Bucky throws an arm around your shoulders. His touch burns where your tank top can’t cover, and you have to concentrate on breathing properly. It’s like you had just come back from a run, your breath is completely knocked out of your lungs. Bucky’s holding onto you so his legs don’t give out from under him from the speechless look on Sam’s face; he’s laughing and declaring that you made his day.

First; he touches you and you light on fire. Your wrist blazes where his fingers meet your skin.  The burns don’t show, but it’s hard to breathe with ash in your lungs.  It’s so hard to breathe. You’re suffocating daily.

“What’s up with you?” Nat asks, “I was talking to you and you zoned out.”

“She’s drooling over Barnes,” Wanda replies, nudging you lightheartedly. You confessed to your crush on Bucky at the weekly girls lunch. Wanda wasn’t surprised.

“Yes, Bucky is over there, and yes, I happen to be staring in that direction, but I wouldn’t call it drooling.”

“You’re so smitten! Y/N, I can see it even without my powers.”

“He doesn’t know, right?”

“I don’t think so.”

Bucky’s on the patio, settling in a chair to play cards with Steve and Pietro.  You were staring at him, more specifically at his chest, since he had just emerged from the pool. Each droplet of water was having the time of its life trying to find its way through the maze of muscle definition, and you couldn’t tear your gaze away.  You’re starting to get hot and bothered imagining your fingers as the droplets.  

“Hey,” Nat murmurs.  

She jerks her chin at the guys. Bucky is waving at you to come over and greets you warmly when the three of you pull up seats at the table and Pietro deals you into a game of blackjack. You’re sitting two seats away from Bucky; here he’s barely a head tilt from being in your immediate vision, and you have a full view of the six—no, eight pack. Yikes.

You don’t want to get caught staring, but you can’t not stare.  Cruelly, the universe dips the sun lower in the sky, and its rays spill on Bucky like a goddamn spotlight.

“You have got to be kidding me,” you swear under your breath.

“Bad cards, Y/N?” Nat asks, and you jump on her excuse, nodding. You notice her subtly pointing down to her abdomen, then up at her face.  It’s a silent way of saying, ‘his eyes are up there.’

Bucky stretches to grab his towel, and you can feel yourself blushing when his muscles twist and contract. At the same time, Pietro makes a joke and Bucky’s smiling in that cute way where his nose scrunches. It’s too much too much–

You put on your sunglasses.

Second; it hurts to watch him. He shines. He’s brighter than the sun, he’s too beautiful for your eyes.  It’s hard to look at him.  It’s even harder to look away from him.  You’re going blind.

Two days later, you’re sitting on a bar stool tugging at the hem of your dress.  Nat swears it makes your legs look a mile long when you walk, but you’re tired of standing and are in dire need of a drink. Preferably something strong.  

“Tony, is your floor strong enough to handle this many people? I’m genuinely concerned,” you ask when Tony whizzes by, his arm around Happy Hogan, who is looking a little too happy.  You have to duck when he tries to hug you, claiming you’re too pretty to be sitting on the sidelines.

“Yeah, I designed it, it’ll even withstand Banner if someone pokes him. Stark guarantee.”

“Come dance with me!”

“I’m okay here, Hogan, but next party, alright?”

Tony chuckles and guides his tipsy friend over to a couch. Once he’s sure Hogan has a water bottle to sober up with, Tony hops on stage. “Introducing our entertainment for this evening!”

“Here’s your vodka cranberry.” The bartender hands you a glass as a gorgeous woman walks up to the microphone.

You thank him and take a few sips listening to the woman singing a slow ballad. You scan the crowd, looking to see if Hogan likes the music, but then you see him. It’s common knowledge that if you are looking at someone you can hear their voice better, though with you it’s like your ears are always plugged in to the Bucky Barnes Radio Show.

“Stevie, when do these things end?”

“Late, Buck. Around two.”

“In the morning?!”

You want to unplug the microphone so you can hear Bucky better, his baritone voice is heaven to your ears.  As the singer hits an impossibly high note, you wonder why people are clapping, impressed. Why is anyone listening to this, this noise when he’s speaking?

Struck with a sudden idea, you down the last of your drink and weave your way around the mesmerized guests. You squeeze past two middle-aged men—who, if you’re not mistaken, invented Google; they’re probably smart as hell, but they seem to like the sound of nails on a chalkboard, so you can’t give them too much credit—and find yourself behind the two supersoldiers. You poke the brunet’s bicep.

His bored face lights up at the sight of you.

“Y/N!”

“Hey, Bucky? Want to go play Monopoly?”

His reply was instantaneous. “Yes, absolutely. I’d love to play Monopoly with you. Bye Steve.”

“Bucky no—“

Bucky takes your hand and you’re around the corner before Steve can finish.  

“You’re the best, Y/N,” he says, and the butterflies in your stomach flap their wings to the rhythm of his words. “I was dying in there.”

“I know the feeling.”

An hour later, you’re losing. Badly. Despite being from the 40s, Bucky is annoyingly good at real estate.  You count forward three spots and land on Boardwalk, one of his properties. Slowly, hoping he’s not paying attention, you move your piece four spots, bypassing the danger of triple hotels.

“No, no, that’s four, not three!”

“Did I roll a three?”

“You did.”

You cover the die nonchalantly.  “No, I didn’t.”

Bucky raises an eyebrow, and suddenly it’s a war, he’s trying to pull your hand up, and you’re trying to keep it down.  To nobody’s surprise, he wins, and the number three is revealed.

“Mwahaha,” he grabs at the last of your pitiful money pile, throwing the coloured bills up in the air. “You’re bankrupt!”

The floor-to-ceiling windows around you show the stars, twinkling magnificently bright in the clear night sky. But Bucky’s singing We Are The Champions and he’s messing up the lyrics and he’s completely off-key and you’re positive it’s the most beautiful thing you’ve ever witnessed.

Third; your ears are tuned to his voice. You could pick him out in a sea of thousands. His voice makes pretty singers who sing pretty songs sound dull. His voice makes everything else ugly.

Bucky’s eyes should be a crayon colour, you decide.  

He has a habit. Whenever anyone says something ridiculous, Bucky looks to you like you’re the camera in The Office. And when they say a ridiculous paragraph, he widens his eyes in disbelief, pursing his lips to avoid cracking a smile. This happens a lot when Steve’s feeling particularly adventurous. It’s in these moments where time seems to slow, and you wish it would stop completely so you can study his eyes longer. Bucky has a myriad of blue that swirls to create a whirlpool of taunting winks and irritated smirks.  The wrinkled smile lines and long, dark eyelashes accentuate it perfectly.

After all, if you email Crayola, you better have a description.

Your favourite shade is when he scrunches them up from laughing.  They’re so blue they literally glow, as if they repel light instead of absorbing it.  You’re rooted to your spot when this happens.  Like you’re on a ship, and those eyes, blue like an ocean sea, are begging you to set sail with them, to cast your doubts away and leave the mainland behind.  

You’re writing this fantasy into your journal when you realize how deep you are: you’re not on the ship anymore.  

Fourth; the color of his eyes is blue enough to drown in.  He is turning you into a cliched love-wrecked being. You’re drowning, always sinking. Down, down, down.

Screaming wakes you from sleep.  Throwing off your covers, you don’t have to follow the heartbreaking sounds to know they are coming from Bucky’s room.  When you knock, you find that the door opens at your touch.

“Bucky?”

Bucky is thrashing in his bed, the covers pushed down at his feet, the sheets underneath him dark.  Your eyes rake over his anguished face; he’s sweating, and fighting some sort of invisible monster. Recently you’ve been helping him with his nightmares and you can tell, it’s a bad one tonight.  

You climb onto the mattress and nudge him gently. “Bucky, wake up.”  Nothing happens, so you shake him harder then duck as his metal fist flies at your head. It hits the wall with a sickening crunch, and this is what wakes Bucky up.  He sits up, gasping.

“Y/N? Oh my god.” He reaches out like he wants to lift you up from your flattened position, but before he does, he sees the dent in the wall and recoils.  The anguish turns to horror, and you can’t tell which one is worse.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispers.

You take his hands from behind his back and intertwine your fingers. You push his chin up so he meets your eyes.

“I’m okay, don’t worry.”

“I nearly hurt you.”

“The key word here is nearly,” you soothe, “Let’s get you into new clothes.”

You slip over to his wardrobe and open his drawers to find another shirt.  When you turn around, Bucky’s sitting on the edge of the bed, his face buried in his hands.

He’s in pain, and you feel it too.  You are also angry, angry at the world, because they victimized him; angry at Hydra, because they caused Bucky to feel this way. You want to track down each and every person who hurt him and rip them apart in increasingly creative ways, but you settle for collecting Bucky in your arms and wiping away his tears.  

During your nights with him he’s confided in you the process of getting over his guilt and the fears that still haunt him.  It didn’t happen right away, oh no, it took time to show him you would stay no matter what.  Knowing Bucky, truly, bad and good, past and present, it could never push you away. Nothing could. You’re here for the long haul.

You’re lying on your back when he calms enough to fall asleep.  Bucky’s torso is on top of yours, hugging you, and his face is angled so you can feel his breaths on your skin; you’re satisfied when you confirm they’re even. Playing with the hairs at the nape of his neck, you glare at the ceiling like it’s going to come attack Bucky too.

“No more. Don’t try anything.  Or else you have me to deal with,” you growl to the world.

You’ll fiercely protect this man with everything you have, with every word, every muscle, every breath. Adjusting your hold on his back, you match your exhales to Bucky’s and drift off, mentally making a note to take him to the zoo soon.  He loves feeding the penguins.

Fifth; you know him. You love him. Through a thousand lifetimes, across millions of stars, you’d find him. You’d never leave. You love him. Till death do you part.

Bucky wakes to a rhythmic beating sound.  

Opening his eyes, he sees he’s lying on you, over your heart, and the corners of his mouth turn upwards. Bucky recalls last night. Not the nightmare, no, because you chased it away—he remembers you.  You being here for him, you saying the words of affirmation he so badly needed to hear to calm down, they further solidified the place he had carved for you to be forever in his life. He was so nervous and scared that you’d leave once you saw what he was capable of, but you stayed, and here you are.

On an impulse, he kisses your temple and you smile in your sleep. You’re so beautiful, he thinks.

Bucky watches your eyes move under their lids, and he wonders of what you’re dreaming. Hopefully it’s something good. You deserve it; you deserve the world, in his mind.

The sun is not yet up, so he relaxes again. He’s so comfortable and you’re so lovely, Bucky never wants to move. Your heart, with every beat, pumps into him more peace, and more clarity.

Bucky’s sure of one thing. It’s the one thing you don’t know.

Sixth; he loves you, too.

{insp}

still new, still small, still really love you all

@fxckmebuck @buckyywiththegoodhair @avengerofyourheart @bovaria@wndas-romanoff@thejamesoldier @caplanbuckybarnes @papi-chulo-bucky @buckybarnesismypreciousplum@redgillan  @seeyainanotherlifebrotha @langinator @secondstartotheright-imagines

[ohthatbunnygirl]

Cheers Darlin’

A Reylo drabble about a bitter wedding toast inspired by @krystellbarraza , Damien Rice, and the joy of thinking about Rey saying Kylo Ren with a thick Southern accent, 

                                                       _______

“Is there anybody else who’d like to toast the happy couple?”

A sudden hush descended upon the joy in the room when the man in black stepped up to the microphone.

Scooching up to the front of their seats, the wide-eyed crowd gawked at him. Panicking in silence, but giddy to witness what sort of hell he’d raise since everybody in the room knew who he was. After all, you don’t date the small town preacher’s daughter for five years without gaining some notice- especially if you happen to come from a long line of deadbeat Solos.

And Kylo Ren might have been the worst of the bunch.

All throughout his teenage years, the mechanic’s son ran the town ragged. Blowing through cars and girls faster than they could fix up again, and troubling everybody with his disarming smile. Some of even the most pious of church ladies gossiped that a flash of that famed toothy, dimpled grin could make one forget a lot of suffering, but he’d remind you soon enough. Yes, destruction had been the handsome boy’s specialty, patience never one of his attributes, and no matter how much he promised to avoid it, he couldn’t help but find trouble.

That’s why whenever he left town there wasn’t much of a parade of mourning.

It was good riddance and goodbye.

Heck, hardly anyone brought Kylo Ren up after a year, but there he stood where he was least desired.

Dark hair slicked back, tux sharp, and amber eyes intently fixed on the flushed bride who clutched her champagne glass as if she’d wield it as a weapon at any moment. Fuming at him, growing feistier by the moment. Knowing him well enough that she could already tell he’d ignore the startled fury lighting up her glare. Already distracted away from her new husband, she looked downright murderous as her old beau’s lip hitched up at the corner.

“My dear Rey,” Kylo began, staring only at her.“I apologize that my words will not be eloquent in comparison to what’s already been said about you and him. Although, Lord knows that I can’t speak flowery enough for what you deserve, and he likely wouldn’t consider it proper to hear what I could say about your apparent beloved. That’s why I’ll keep it brief, honest.”

“It’s no secret that there’s not a lot in the Bible that I agree with,” Kylo continued, shifting his smirk towards the table full of gasping old biddies that had run his family’s name down for years while conveniently forgetting about forgiveness. “I’ve never had much use for it, or it for me, but a girl once told me that ‘love is patient, love is kind’. Isn’t that just lovely? Yeah, that statement was a kind of peace that I’d actually started to accept before she proved how fickle her patience truly was.”

As his glass raised higher, Kylo’s smile dropped entirely. “She also quoted that ‘love does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.’"

“Man would that have been nice,” Kylo’s heavy sigh trailed into a mirthless chuckle. “But to be honest, our love sampled from all of the above on our worst days. I could be a proud son of a bitch, and she could be a right pig in the mud when it came to recording all my wrongs… Some might even say that we possessed a talent for easily angering, but lovin’ each other don’t come easily when you’re oil and water trying your best to stay yourselves while others don’t want you to mix. Some days we took it out on each other, but I’ll be damned if my love isn’t envious today.”

When Kylo’s gaze briefly shifted to the groom, Rey blanched.

“Now hold on, I think you need to stop right there-” the groom demanded, but Kylo held up a dismissive hand as he stubbornly pushed forward. 

“The last thing she told me is that ‘love does not delight in evil but rejoices with truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres’. That’s what my former love use to claim on the days when we felt like everybody was against us. The days when we could only find joy with each other- and that’s why I thought I’d rejoice in the truth today.” 

Sucking down a steadying inhale flared Kylo’s nostrils. A year’s worth of holding back his feelings falling apart then and there as he gifted Rey with the most bitterly tender smile in front of folks who’d always delighted in his failings. “Well, I always protected. I always trusted, and up until I saw her go up that aisle, I always hoped.”

Inclining his head towards the less than happy couple, Kylo drawled, “So cheers darlin’. May your new love remain a happy man so long as he only believes half of your promises.”

Before Rey could bolt out of her seat to throttle her ex, he’d turned around and left. Leaving nothing behind but scandalized murmurs that followed Rey’s quickened steps as she cut a path down the center of the tree covered reception. Simmering with indignation, only half realizing that she’d shook off her groom’s hold on her arm as all she could focus on was having her say.

Outside of the twinkling light lit barn, Rey kicked off her heels. Choosing to run on foot to catch up. Forgetting about rules of propriety when Kylo had the nerve to throw a leg around his motorcycle after wrecking her good enough dreams.  

“How dare you!” she screamed, repeatedly smacking his arm. “How dare you come here, you ass! What in the hell is the matter with you? How dare you show up and say those things to me after not calling for a year!”

Silently taking the hits, Kylo offered up no apologies. He wasn’t sorry. He’d do it again and again if it meant shaking a lick of sense into the girl who looked more upset about him leaving than about consoling the man whose ring jammed into Kylo’s bicep.

“Why?” Rey sobbed, furiously shaking her head as mascara tears streaked down her cheeks. “Why did you do this?”

“You told me you’d wait.”

Five words had never been spoken more simply, but they knocked the fight right out of Rey. Dropping her fists to her side, she stammered, “I-I did wait.”

“Not long enough,”Kylo hissed, tossing down his helmet. “While I was busting my ass, you were courtin’ someone else! Hell, did you have him saving up for that house on Mulberry Street too?” he snapped, eyes flashing as he pictured it. “Did you also tell him that you wouldn’t accept his proposal if he couldn’t show you physical proof of his commitment? That you’d never loved anybody more, but that he had to be more first?”

Smearing a hand down her face, Rey lashed out. “You left!”

“I left to make enough money to buy your confidence in me!” 

Staring up into his pained expression broke her more than any cutting words ever could. This was the cheeky boy next door who’d snuck wildflowers into her bedroom. This was the awed teen who’d whispered encouragements as he took her for the first time in tall summer grass. This was the grown man with sharp features tensed and feral, but so heartbreakingly beautiful at the same time. Dropping her gaze down to her shaking hands, Rey sorted through all the excuses that had never quite settled into her stomach. Clutching for strands of anything rational to explain all her rash actions after he’d left that lead to her standing outside in her wedding dress in front of the first person who’d asked. “I’m sorry. I-I didn’t hear from you. You didn’t email. You didn’t call. You just said that you’d come back, and I thought that you’d moved on. N-nobody else heard from you, I couldn’t get out of bed after crying myself dry every day, and folks started saying that you must have found someone else-”

Gritting his teeth, Kylo raked his hand through his hair. “I never realized that our bond stopped existing when you couldn’t see me!”

“It was a year-”

“A year that I spent on a damn boat earning money to buy you this.” Kylo swept a contemptuous stare down her rhinestone and lace littered body. “Christ, do you even see what you’re wearing? You look like every girl that we hate.”

For the first time since she’d laid eyes on him again, Rey laughed. Startled into a new emotion with Kylo yet again to blame, hating that he wasn’t entirely wrong. Only a fourth of July sparkler twinkled more than her gown, and as Rey gnawed on her lower lip, she hesitantly glanced over her shoulder towards the mess left behind.

“It was a gift from him.”

“Then I’m sure of it now- he doesn’t know you at all.” Kylo sneered, but instead of stalking away, his arm banded around her waist. Dragging her close enough that his rushed words fell heated upon her lips, “See my girl didn’t care for looking like some Hollywood manicured princess. She didn’t need all the bells and whistles; she didn’t want ‘em if it meant that she’d have more money to spend on scrap metal for sculpting. No, all my annoying, creative girl ever wanted was a house where she could grow things in the back with a garage to tinker around in. Someplace calm after the stress of her parents breathing down her neck- a cozy loved up place to be happy and naked while sucking at cooking. That was my girl. A girl that didn’t need baubles to outshine the whole damn town, that’s you, Rey.”

The fire that he kicked up inside of her smoldered after his words. It was everything she needed to hear and all of it one day too late. It was all the future she’d once dreamed about, but her present called out her name in the distance.

“Maybe you don’t know me anymore,” she murmured.

“Well, I know that I may be the atheist, but you’re the one who suffered from a lack of faith.”

“Kylo-”

Stroking a calloused thumb along her jaw, he tipped her chin up. “And I know that you haven’t pushed me away.”

Instead of fighting his accusation, Rey gave in. Sealing their lips together with a gasping apology, startling him with a kiss that she didn’t deserve, but she couldn’t stop taking. Slipping her tongue between the seam of his lips, she silently begged him to return- to claim her back. Waiting for the longest second of her life before his eyes closed and his anger made way for passion. Holding her close, he met her intensity. Sparking alive every synapse in her body that was second nature in him to rile up, and Rey couldn’t have hated herself any more for convincing herself that he’d ever leave.

Not when he kissed her like this.

Curling her bare toes into the grass with every touch, and even as he took her breath away, she felt like she could inhale for the first time in months. Feeling whole and happy enough to regret the delusions that lead to her wearing a diamond choker around her throat that felt so impossibly heavy.

Pulling back, Rey sighed against his lips, “I’m already cheatin’, and I just got married.”

“Well, I already dated the good girl,” Kylo chuckled, roguishly tugging her lip.”Bout time I guess that I had a go with the new town trollop.”

“Kylo!”

Trailing his affections lower down her neck, he breathed her in. Luxuriating in the honeysuckle scent that had kept him company on rough nights. Underneath all the frills was the only sweetness that had ever mattered to him, and his chest squeezed when he pictured letting her walk away in order to be proper. “Tell me that you love me.”

Tipping back her head, Rey stared up at the stars. Watching the bursting white pulses as his mouth raced hers. “I never stopped,” she whispered.

“Tell me that you’re mine.”

“I’m married…”

Gently biting down on her shoulder, Kylo breathed out against the freckled skin he’d dreamed about, “Did the preacher sign the marriage license yet?”

“No,” Rey shivered, her lips fluttering. “I don’t think so.”

“Then you’re not married.”

“Kylo-”

Snapping his head up, he kept it simple. “Do you want to be married to him?”

“No,” she softly admitted, her insides twisting up into too many knots to count as it hurt to feel how far off the path she’d wandered. “But, can you ever forgive me?”

Up until that point, it was enough to be with her. To stare down into her luminous hazel eyes and fall right back into loving her- adoring her impetuous faults and all. But with an uncertain shake of his head, Kylo Ren released her.

Can I forgive her?

Watching the love of his life so easily walk away from him, and towards somebody else, wasn’t an image he’d likely forget anytime soon. Even if she tasted like home, there was a part of him that occasionally bought into all the talk that he’d never be good enough for anyone. Sometimes the negativity won, and Rey feared that was the case when that gorgeous face that she’d known as well as her own tightened with emotions.

After watching her go down that aisle, Rey accepted that he’d be well within his rights to wound her back. While his love had kept its value, her love had bargained. All the happiness that they should have shared flickered in front of Rey’s fears as he picked up his helmet from the ground, but a sliver of sunlight cracked through the darkness when he handed it over to her with a wink.

“How about you hop on the bike, come back to the motel, and we’ll find creative ways for you to make it up to me.”

[thumper-darling]

Will you send 65 questions my way?

1. Do you ever doubt the existence of others than you?

Oh my gOD YES. What if there is no life apart from my own and every person I come into contact with is just a highly thought out illusion in my head and nothing is real? 

2. On a scale of 1-5, how afraid of the dark are you?

2. It definitely depends on where I am when it is dark? Like, I’m not going to be scared when it’s dark in my bedroom because I’m comfortable there, but I’m gonna be heckin terrified of the dark if I’m in the woods? You feel me?

3. The person you would never want to meet?

Ronald J. Stump

4. What is your favorite word?

Cluster or Truffle

5. If you were a type of tree, what would you be?

Birch tree binch

6. When you looked in the mirror this morning what was the first thing you thought?

“Wow, I really let myself go” :’) 

But no, I thought about how I have mascara rings under my eyes but haven’t worn mascara in 2 days and I have for sure showered since then so why in the frickin heck do I have mascara marks under my eyes? 

7. What shirt are you wearing?

An old man’s sweater that I thrifted 

8. What do you label yourself as?

Interesting? Adventurous? Quirky? I don’t know, what do you label me as?

9. Bright room or dark room?

Dim room 

10. What were you doing at midnight last night?

Being bullied by @parkersenses

Nah, but I was actually having a deep conversation with my little step-sister about life and school advice. 

11. Favorite age you’ve been so far?

17

12. Who told you they loved you last?

Lulu @doctormelapples

13. Your worst enemy?

McDonald J. Rump

14. What is your current desktop picture?

….

a racecar…

15. Do you like someone?

I really like my doggo

16. The last song you listened to?

Adolescent by Lostboycrow 

17. You can press a button that will make any one person explode. Who would you blow up?

I could never hurt somebody, no way. like, how do you expect me to deal with that radical guilt. my conscience is way too pure for that.

18. Who would you really like to just punch in the face?

I would rather not punch people in the face? Does it count if I answer with who I would like to punch me in the face?

19. If anyone could be your servant for a day, who would it be and what would they have to do?

Um, I would want to have Harrison Osterfield be my “assistant” for a day. I would literally just have them hang out with me because I need friendship to thrive

20. What is your best physical attribute? (showing said attribute is optional)

My eyes? or my freckles, even if they are faint

21. If you were the opposite sex for one day, what would you look like and what would you do?

I don’t heckin know what I would look like. Like me but more testosterone? I would like to just live my everyday life, but observe the differences from male and female treatment that’s incorporated in our society. 

22. Do you have a secret talent? If yes, what is it?

I can juggle really terribly 

23. What is one unique thing you’re afraid of?

I’m not afraid of anything

   the past coming back to haunt me

24. You can only have one kind of sandwich. Every sandwich ingredient known to humankind is at your disposal.

Bagel for bread, jalapeno cream cheese, lettuce, tomato, smoked turkey, and havarti cheese

25. You just found $100! How are you going to spend it?

Either on a tattoo, or put it in my college savings. But probably on a tattoo because I have no financial security. 

26. You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere in the world, but you have to leave immediately. Where are you going to go?

Montreal Canada binch. Okay no, but probably like NYC or LA or something super stereotypical like that.

27. An angel appears out of Heaven and offers you a lifetime supply of the alcoholic beverage of your choice. “Be brand-specific” it says. Man! What are you gonna say about that? Even if you don’t drink booze there’s something you can figure out… so what’s it gonna be?

Mike’s Hard Lemonade for decades. honestly, I love lemonade and those drinks are so heckin tasty. 

28. You discover a beautiful island upon which you may build your own society. You make the rules. What is the first rule you put into place?

You have a right to your own opinion, until it infringes on the basic human rights of others. Then ur fined and thrown in jail for being a rude ass disrespectful person thx. 

29. What is your favorite expletive?

fuck

30. Your house is on fire, holy shit! You have just enough time to run in there and grab ONE inanimate object. Don’t worry, your loved ones and pets have already made it out safely. So what’s the one thing you’re going to save from that blazing inferno?

My book “The Perks of Being A Wallflower” 

31. You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be?

The drama that went down with my family last summer and earlier this year

32. You got kicked out of the country for being a time-traveling heathen who sleeps with celebrities and has super-powers. But check out this cool shit… you can move to anywhere else in the world!

Oooh, maybe London or Barcelona? Or Italy. OH ITALY WOULD BE WONDERFUL

33. The Celestial Gates Of Beyond have opened, much to your surprise because you didn’t think such a thing existed. Death appears. As it turns out, Death is actually a pretty cool entity, and happens to be in a fantastic mood. Death offers to return the friend/family-member/person/etc. of your choice to the living world. Who will you bring back?

There was a girl who got into a car accident a few weeks ago, I didn’t know her, but I do know that she was 18 and had just graduated Valedictorian of her class. She had a full ride to college, so I think I would bring her back. 

34. What was your last dream about?

A hotel room 

35. Are you a good….dancer?

THE ANSWER TO THAT IS YES

36. Have you ever been admitted to the hospital?

Ah yes 

37. Have you ever built a snowman?

Not well

38. What is the color of your socks?

White. 

39. What type of music do you like?

All of it idk 

40. Do you prefer sunrises or sunsets?

sunrises 

41. What is your favorite milkshake flavor?

Vanilla 

42. What football team do you support? (I will answer in terms of American football as well as soccer)

I don’t know, Michigan State

43. Do you have any scars?

I have a few from accidents when I was younger. I’m a clumsy oof

44. What do you want to be when you graduate?

After I graduate college I’d like to be involved with writing somehow. I really want to work on films or work with manuscripts.

45. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

I’d like to be a more energized person

46. Are you reliable?

I like to think so 

47. If you could ask your future self one question, what would it be?

Are you happy with your life?

48. Do you hold grudges?

I really try not to. I don’t like to hold on to hatred or anger. 

49. If you could breed two animals together to defy the laws of nature, what new animal would you create?

A fox and a golden retriever? That’d be a fun mix 

50. What is the most unusual conversation you’ve ever had?

I once had a conversation with someone about who had cooler socks? And kept sending pics to each other of our goofy sock collection. That was a strange one. 

51. Are you a good liar?

God, I hope so

52. How long could you go without talking?

I once went 24 hours without talking, soooo

53. What has been your worst haircut/style?

I LET MY FRIENDS CUT MY HAIR THE SUMMER BEFORE MY SOPHOMORE YEAR AND I ENDED UP WITH A CHERRY RED ASYMMETRICAL BOB AND IT WAS WAY TOO SHORT FOR MY FACE SHAPE AND IT WAS AWFUL

54. Have you ever baked your own cake?

I cheated and did like an eggless cake or something like that?

55. Can you do any accents other than your own?

Hecking, no. Accents are not my strong suit 

56. What do you like on your toast?

Peanut butter or butter with cinnamon sugar

57. What is the last thing you drew a picture of?

a little doodled heart probs

58. What would be you dream car?

Ford fiesta? Idk

59. Do you sing in the shower? Or do anything unusual in the shower? Explain.

I sing in the shower when nobody else is home. That’s about it.

60. Do you believe in aliens?

YES It is literally impossible that we are the only living and thriving society in the entire universe? Like?? The possibilities are endless.

61. Do you often read your horoscope?

Not always, but if it pops up on my dash I’ll look at it

62. What is your favorite letter of the alphabet?

S or T 

63. Which is cooler: dinosaurs or dragons?

Dragons! Was that even a question 

64. What do you think about babies?

I get nervous around babies. They’re such small, delicate humans and I feel too much responsibility being around babies. 

65. Freebie! Ask anything interesting you can think of.

You didn’t ask anything, so I’ll just tell you about my day?? I had a college freshman event today and I met some pretty cool people and it has me less worried about starting college. I also think I’m gonna read and write a bit today, so I’m pretty excited about that. Also, my mom comes back from out of town in an hour or so and I can’t wait to see her. 

[lonelyboichronicles-blog]

November 8, 2017

Hello and welcome. I am the Lonely Boi and these are Lonely Boi Chronicles. I got a post for you today, but I’m gonna start by explaining what this is going to be. It is venting. Online therapy. A journal/diary. This is more for me than anybody but if people find it and can relate, then I’m glad we can all support each other and have a conversation. Daily, I will be talking about my life, my day, my thoughts, and my journey as I look to get over myself and my personal issues in like while I search for happiness in like and within myself and whatnot. This first one will be a little heavy considering I’ll have to give you some background, but HERE GOES!!!

So I’ve been single for about 4 and a half years now. I guess I’ve only felt like it for about 3 though. When I fall for girls, it’s usually really hard. I can explain exactly what happens. I think they’re attractive right? Start having conversations and just pick up on small things that I really like. After that, its over with. My mind does the rest. It imagines our life together. The dope ass perfect dynamic that I think we’d have based on things I’ve seen, what I know of myself, and what I personally want. Next thing you know, I’ve fallen in love with somebody that I barely have any momentum with. I guess I’m not really falling in love with them. More so falling in love with the idea of them, or with what we could potentially be. It always happens, and I feel crazy and pathetic for it, but it is who I am and I need help.

My last relationship started the same way. A girl I thought was beautiful so I started talking to her. I heard awesome things about her, we had some cool convos, I felt like we were perfect for each other, so naturally I wrote our entire love story. Execution though. MY BIGGEST WEAKNESS. It’s essentially non existent. I tried for years to like let her know how i felt, to find out how she felt, to make something happen. Never worked. It got to a point where I found out she was messing out with (”dating”) some other dude and that I should probably give up. I started dating somebody else, hoping it would help me get over it. It did but didn’t. My feelings didn’t go away, but I stopped thinking about her as often as I did before. That relationship was toxic so we parted ways in the messiest way possible. That when i realized that I never got over the girl from before, but I told myself I was done trying. Well what do you know.... once I stopped trying, it came together and we started dating...3 and half years after the initial feelings developed. 

You can paint a picture of what you think it’ll be but it rarely turns out that way. In SO many ways, we had a bunch in common, but in just as many ways, our personalities clashed. I was stubborn, she was insecure, it was a roller coaster that I was willing to ride because I loved her so much but I had to cut ties because I didn’t wanna lose her forever. We transition to friendship...it took a while. A lot of sex in between. Great sex. Anyways. Once we did move to friendship, things were probably at their smoothness. We both acknowledged some feelings, but preferred things as friends. That friendship eventually ended though as she got in a relationship with somebody who didn’t like me and naturally she chose to cut me off.

Losing that friendship was a huge blow to me tbh. Ask some goofys, and they’d attribute it to some secret agenda I had to steal her back. We were having sex up until like less than a week into the relationship soon if I wanted to steal her back....I would’ve. It hurt because I thought we were genuinely friends. Sex or not, I cared about her as a person, I cared about her future, and cared about everything she had going on. She was there for me more than anybody during one of the hardest times of my life. Maybe I’m just soft, but that means a lot to me and by the transitive property, she meant a lot to me. Being dropped despite all that, cut deep as fuck because I would’ve never done that to her, and it kind of just showed me that she didn’t really care about me, the person, the individual,  but really just cared about me, the person who has something specific I could offer her at the time. 

So yeah, that hurt. It bothered me for a while. 2 years after last speaking to her actually. I only got over it maybe 4 months ago. Back in July or August, I thought about her for the first time, and the happy memories came, instead of that hurt. Maybe time does heal all. Even so, things still haven’t been the same for me. 

I’ve been numb ever since her. As a whole, there just been this lack of feeling. I have some women in my life, at one point she was included, that would bless me with their vaginas. A lot of uncommitted sex with these 3, but it never felt intimate. It never felt deeper. It legit felt like lust.  A physical need for sex but not the emotional satisfaction of it. There is definitely a difference between sex and fucking. I was fucking a lot, but with the same women and it just felt messy to me. It felt messy and unfulfilling so I told myself that I needed to stop. And I did....for the most part. I have messed around with them but no actual intercourse, but it was a brief moment of weakness. I been back on my shit. 

ANYWAYS, I wanted to grow. I WANT to grow. I realized that every girl I’ve dated, every sexual interaction I’ve had, has all been on accident. The “girl of my dreams” ignored me when I tried and got with me when I stopped. The girl I got with to get over her, I wasn't pursuing because I was so focused on the other one. I’m not gonna get into the weeds of all the other shit, but regardless, it has never been an “I want this, so I’m going to try and get it and succeed” type of thing. I’ve been blessed, but when you see your peers getting all they want and some shit they don’t you start to doubt yourself a little bit. “Am I good enough?! Can I do this?! Self worth, often comes to mind in these moments because I have nothing to validate my own efforts with. I told myself no more sex with the ones from before. I started my quest to find my confidence and my game. I am still questing.

Last year, I made waves with three women. Not big waves, but our interactions/connections may have been more than nothing. One was throwing herself at me. It came of disingenuous because my friend just started dating her best friend, so it came off like she was very much just trying to create a double date type situation. Not wavy. 

The other two were interesting. One was a coworker. Super sweet girl and beautiful but kinda young. I was 23 when we met and she was 18. Everybody told me that’s fine because she’s of age, but she was still in high school and it felt just weird to me. We would talk and laugh and shit at work. I didn’t think too much of it, but then I found out that she actually liked me. I thought she was super dope, but I didn’t let my mind take it that far because of the age thing, but once I found out she liked me too, the idea floated through my head. Her ex was trying to come back into her life and she was legit torn between the two of us. So much so, that she lied about him calling her to me lol. Felt kind of good lol. AGE THOUGH!!! I let it die. Didn’t put in the effort. Told myself, if it’s meant to be, it’ll be. (That’s bullshit, I should’ve at least established some long term potential friendship communication).

 The last one was also a friend of that girl, but it didn’t feel as fake as the other. This one was the one that I allowed my mind to run with. She just started dancing with me one day. And then again another day, but like the whole night. You know me, I’m in my head planning our first kiss, and wedding, and she had some decent cheeks so I’m like maaannnnn i can’t wait to get in that. I was scared though. I wanted to make moves but froze because I didn’t know if she like me forreal forreal. Added her on various social medias, didn’t send a message, but slowly falling for the persona she presented online. “Damn she like this, damn she likes that?! Yoooo me too, we could be doing this?! You tired of dude who do that?! I don’t, I got you.” Cornball shit. These 3 interactions made me feel like I’m not ENTIRELY a lost cause. Two of them were more important than that though. For this first time, since i started developing feelings for my crush...8 years ago, I felt that excitement again. I had been numb for like 3 years feeling nothing, and then almost at once I felt the purest form of it from a number of sources for the first time in even longer than that. It felt good, just to feel again. 

We’re almost at present day. I swear this is the only one that’s gonna be like this. 

So I stalk these two girls pages damn near daily. Well I stalk the one who danced with me daily, I creep on the other one once or twice a week. Mind you, I’ve made no moves outside the ones in my head (crazy and pathetic). Meanwhile, I constantly see them living their best lives and shit lol. Fallen off with both, and in that time, I’ve met nobody new. No new women who are randomly interested in me. No new women giving me that feeling again. The most I got was this one who likes my eyes, and snapchats me for attention while being incredibly devoted to a man who doesn’t treat her right. I guess thats a woman to talk to, but not really exciting. Just kinda meh. That empty going thru the motions like the sex from before. 

It’s gotten to the point where I’m really kinda depressed about it. About how I haven't had sex in two years, and how I haven't felt deeply for somebody in 4 years. Meanwhile my friends are making huge life changes, getting approach by potential love interests, being active. LIVING!!! 

WE MADE IT TO PRESENT DAAYYY!!!! HOORAAAYYYY!!! So yeah, I decide to act. It had gotten to the point where I didn’t have shit to lose. Yesterday I send the dancing girl a message. No response. I’ve been following her on snapchat for a minute now. Crazy timing, for the first time in all this time, she’s posting shit that makes it seem like she’s got boyfriend. Mind you, for the year since we met, it’s all been single girl shit all over. THE DAY I MESSAGE HER!!! Some dude rubbing her feet and her all happy emoji and shit. Today a screenshot with hearts and talking about how he can’t wait to nap with her. THAT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE MY NAPS WITH HER!!!! I waited too long.

I’m honestly shook. Kinda lost. She gave me this feeling, for the first time in a long time. It felt good. It felt like I was a live again. I associated her with the feeling and now she’s like....taken lol. I’m not even mad either. She's like beautiful. I’m surprised she was single as long as she was. If I had more confidence and self worth, I would've most definitely tried to make that happen as soon as I met her. I’m actually really happy for her because she seems like one of those girls who wants that connection and relationship. I wanted to be that, but I can’t be mad at it. 

But yeah, my old coworker is still young. She’s doing hair and stuff now. That’s dope, but I can’t help but feel like I’d be a waste of her time. She’s pursuing a passion of her. She’s probably being pursued by dudes her age, if not already locked in with one. I could reach out to her, but morale is low right now.

I miss that feeling. I miss having somebody to talk to, to just hang out with intimately. I miss that connection and I’m happy for all my peers who have it, but I’m also mad jealous of all my peers who have it. I’m worried I’ll never find it. The fact that I’ve barely felt it over all this time, is a little bit alarming to me and how I feel like my success rate will be. 

I don’t know. Maybe I need to get out more so I can meet some people. Either way, I’m probably gonna jerk off and cry or something before I go to sleep since I don’t have work tomorrow. Hopefully I can get a sign and somebody can guide me toward where I need to go.

Until next time,

Lonely Boi

[somehiddenfeelings]

-What are you afraid of?

-I don´t know.

-Then what are you waiting for? I know you’ve been waiting for this during a long time.

Well those were your words before we took a bad decision, maybe it’s been a long time since we decided to break our promise of being best friends forever. Truth is, right now I’m upset of knowing this shit. I’ve been through many bad circumstances in which I’ve trusted people, give the best of me and all I got from those persons are words and actions that killed all of my sweetness and kindness.

I know we shouldn’t expect shit from anybody or at least do the right things no matter what is going to come up next. Well I’m about to tell you a lot of things about me, things you never knew about me, things that might be a reason why I don’t want you out of my life. When I was a kid, I didn’t have friends at all, I used to be the quiet girl from my class and the sweetest girl every teacher loved. I had problems for walking and socializing, I never trusted people because all of my classmates always bullied me because of my condition. My mom raised me alone, I got a school scholarship thanks to her responsibility in the school she had always worked for. I’ve always felt alone, I used to talk to people but without having a strong friendship.

I grew up 9 years only with my mom, than she met my stepfather, my mom was blind because she needed someone that could love her. When I was 10, my life got worst, since my mom was blind she gave some attributions to my stepfather that he didn’t deserve like punishing me so badly every time I got in trouble in school. I had learning struggles and nobody could help me, during those days my life was ending, well that’s what I thought. I suffered physically and psychologically, I suffered humiliations from my mom and especially from my stepfather, I didn’t like to be at home, when I ate my lunch or dinner I used to eat quickly because I was too afraid of my stepfather. The only thing I loved was to spend time with my uncle and aunt in their house where I live now.

After a year when my brother was born, my stepfather got killed. I didn’t know how to support my mom, I was just a girl. My mom forced me to go to church and she knew I didn’t like to go to church, I hated everybody in High School especially my classmates. Nobody supported me and nobody understand why did I acted in a rude way, truth is, I just wanted them to ask me if I was ok. After a couple of years I started to go to church without caring about what people said but I had struggles on socializing, yeah I know I’ve told this before. I met these girls, who made my life suck, I tried to be friendly but they betrayed me, and I told myself not to ever trust anybody in this fucking life.

My uncle Oscar got kidnaped when I was in 9th grade, I remember it all happened the second week in January 2009, I went to a church camp during that weekend, my uncle took me to church the day we arrived to Santa Barbara, the last thing he told me was that he loved me and to take care of myself. When I came back from the camp, I saw my mom’s face and she started crying. I asked what was happening, so she told me that my uncle didn’t show up since the day he took me to church, I got really scared when I heard those words. After some days passed, I was afraid of getting out of my house or being outside playing with my cousin. I didn’t go to school for around a month, few of my classmates showed me affection. My uncle got killed the same day he took me to church but we found out 40 days after, well thanks to all of this, my family met Jesus Christ and we started following his steps.

Two years after I graduated from High School and I started working in FHS and then I entered to UNICAH the place where I met you during my second semester in 2012. I will never forget that moment when I met you, I was kind of sleepy that night and suddenly I turn my face where you were sitting and I just stared at you. I just wanted to know your name, I just wanted to have one more reason to believe and trust people. Well days after you introduce yourself as David Miller. You were so friendly and nice, the next night I was in the hallway and then you came from work and like always you were friendly. I didn’t know if you were going to be part of my life, but I wanted you to stay.

I remember you didn’t show up days after and I didn’t wanted to care about it, but then something inside me started caring about it. Then I tried to contact you but you didn’t answer at all, maybe you thought I was a stalker, but it wasn’t like that, it was just a feeling of caring about you. I remember that time passed and I wrote a card for your birthday, it’s the only one I gave you and I hope you still have it. We started saying hello in the hallways and I remember one afternoon when we said hello and then you grabbed me and hug me and then I told you I hated hugs, you were always with your friends and I was just lonely. We started talking more in the little park where I waited you after you took your classes and we became friends. One night I remember we talk about my feelings for you and you told me you would be glad to be my boyfriend but you already had girlfriend, but you told me that we could be friends. I was really young, I didn’t know about this shit of love or relationships. I remember we stopped talking because I move to CEUTEC and I changed my phone number like more than three times. Those day were normal for me, honestly I think it was because we were just friends and I didn’t mix my feelings at all during that time.

I remember you came back to my life on 2015 and it’s when all of this shit started. You wonder why I call it shit. Well, it’s because right now I’m really pissed at you, as I was saying this shit started during that year. I started caring about you again so I contacted you in FB and you sent me your phone number. We started talking again, updating our shitty life we had. I never told you this before but I started to have feelings for you because I felt protected and you have been the only friend I got. During that year we talked about our plans, I remember you got really sick from your stomach as usual and I got scared of losing you and I remember you told me that you had cancer, so I believed you and that was the first time I realized how much you mean to me. After I stopped crying you told me you were fooling around and my world came back to reality. Time passed and we used to talk every single night, we started to know each other, and you became more part of my life the same way I became part of yours.

You confused me because you treated me so nice, you treated me like your princess, you cared about me more than a friend, and you used to call me gorda and my love. Those moments I just kept them in my heart and you never told me you didn’t have feelings for me at all. When you told me you met somebody else my world stopped for a moment and I started crying like a baby cries for her blanket. During those months I decided to travel to Denver because I wanted to get over you and forget about you. But it got worst, my feelings for you grew more and more, the thing is, what confused me was that you always told me she was like me and that’s why you loved her, but I mean why you didn’t love me directly? And you had to love someone that had a personality like me but it wasn’t me. Maybe you didn’t want to accept your feelings for me because you were afraid of breaking my heart, I don’t know there’s many theories in my head about you and your feelings for me. You trusted and loved me so much at the point that you told me things nobody knows about you.

I know you don’t remember the night when you called me 20 times when I was in Denver, you were crying, you told me you needed me, you told me you loved me a lot and that you didn’t care about anybody else except me and that you wanted to be with me hugging me, dude you made me cry that night because you were so broken and I started to love you more than a friend. When I came back to Honduras you called me that night and you made me a promise I always saved in my heart. You told me that I was important for you and that you wanted to introduce me your family and that we were going to hang out and have fun, but you didn’t, and you kept breaking my heart.

I know I’m not flawless, I know I can move on and just continue with my life without you. I know you don’t want me in your life and I understand that. Just remember this psycho girl loves you a lot and had always cared about you, when nobody has been there for you. I represent God’s love in your life, now I can tell you why I cared about you, but you don’t want me in your life anymore and I can’t force you to have me in your life. I just wanted to tell you that I’ll keep every nice moment in my heart forever and I’ll let my kids know about your existence. Maybe someday I’ll met someone like you, I don’t think so. I wanted you to be part of my life always, not in a romantic way but who knows God plans? Nobody. I will always care about you, and I will always love you.