#only jukebox that I've found be good

[the-cryptid-finch]

*sweating, visably shaking* yeah yeah I'm just totally normal about musicals

[grogusmum]

Please Mister Please

JOEL MILLER X F!READER (nicknamed)

SUMMARY: You can't seem to escape that one song even after the apocalypse. Joel and Ellies friendship brings you some comfort, and maybe Joel is interested in more.

WORD COUNT: 1700ish

WARNINGS: None to speak of. Unless you need one for soft Joel. As always, if you see something I've missed, let me know in my DMs, and I'll add it.

A/N: Just a little something inspired by the Olivia Newton-John's song of the same name. (She was in her country music era) It's hardly edited, written on my phone, and Imma just yeetin' it out there. Oops. It's just the usual fluffy hurt comfort. But it IS my first go round with Joel. I hope you enjoy it! 💚

The jukebox was found on a supply run at some honky tonk out Fort Collins way called Sundance something or other. You laughed at your first thought, which was it's wasn't one of those new ones with CDs, realizing "those new ones" were now 40 years old... but this one was truly an antique, with vinyl in it and everything.

A Wurlitzer in all its chrome, brightly colored bakelite, and satisfying push button glory.

You shake your head now, thinking you should have known the moment you heard. Everyone was so excited. Because, of course, they were! How fun is an old timey jukebox full of country-western ballads, anthems, and line dance classics?

It brought an energy into Jackson, the likes you hadn't seen before it. You'd gotten in early on, and watched its evolution from place where people were merely surviving to an industrious hive of busy bees, creating abundance but there wasn't much room for joy and then out of the clear blue sky - line dancing. At first they couldnt keep it plugged in all the time, it was turned on for a half an hour at the end of the day, until they had a good handle on the dam and the power plant was working consistently. You're sure it was the inspiration for Maria's attention to holidays and socials after seeing the excitement and morale lift from it. Suddenly, y'all were living, not just staying alive. So it seems silly, with so much real life and death shit to deal with, to get so hung up on one song, but it carried so much weight for you, you just couldn't shake it. If only it wasn't so sweet, if only it wasn't so catchy… Maybe people wouldn't have noticed it among all the other tracks. But it was sweet and it was catchy, and about making it after all the shit they'd been through...

So naturally, at five songs for a quarter, it ends up in the mix at some point. (It's the only reason the town has any coins. Paying it could have been bypassed, but dropping the 25¢ seemed to be part of the fun.) So when you least expected it, it would start to play, and so far, it continued to flip your stomach and make your eyes glass. And think about how he and you didn't actually make it.

Joel and Ellie have been in Jackson several months now. Ellie dove right in, school, taking care of the horses afterward, trying to socialize. She's a little guarded sure but mostly funny and eager. Joel started helping Tommy right away, but it seemed to you more to keep busy than to join the community. He's wary and taciturn. When they weren't in those organized work times, they stuck close. When Ellie ventured into social activities, Joel let her go, but he was ever watchful, with Ellie checking in often even just a look over her shoulder, just to see if he was still there. He always was. They reminded you of a bonded pair of strays.

You liked your place, Catnip's Apothecary. They'd come in twice so far, once when Joel brought Ellie in for a poison ivy rash and once when Ellie brought a very grumpy Joel for inflammation in his knees Ellie found all your jars of tinctures, teas, herbs, and powders fascinating. Asking what everything did, looking at drying plants hanging from rafters in wonder, pspspsing the cats.

“Are you a witch?”

“Ellie!” Joel admonished, but looking at you for a tell. Were you? You could see him wondering.

You only laughed. Sure you were, but what they were seeing here was hardly witchcraft, just herbalism, mostly. Joel and Ellie are both bright and observant - you're pretty sure they both noticed you didn't answer.

Tonight, Ellie is at the rec center, a movie theater for the evening, awaiting the start of none other than Star Wars.

Where did they find all these 70s flicks? Nevertheless, A New Hope's a great find. You can't resist going, even though you know it by heart, and you'll have to force yourself not to recite all the dialogue. Sitting smack dab in the middle, surrounded by all these kids and young adults, seeing it for the first time, you munch your popcorn and smile.

You don't see Joel, but it's not like you are actively looking for him… just curious, given their penchant to stay together and you figured he will know the movie too, maybe he's more of a Trekkie. When you catch Ellie's eye, she waves animatedly and moves to sit beside you.

“Sssoooo, you're like one of the only grown ups here.” there is a gremlin glint in Ellie’s eye.

“Yeah, I thought there'd be more nostalgia watchers-” you say a little sheepishly. “ But it's okay, I'll see it with a soon-to-be New Generation of Star Wars Fans. Bear Witness!”

“And what if it sucks?”

The noise you make is somewhere between an indignant scoff and a gasp of purest offense. But you rally.

“Oh just you wait padawan-”

"What's a pada-"

As quickly as the lights go down the attention commanding drums of the 20th Century Fox fanfare begin.

“Oop here we go! Buckle up, buttercup!!”

You live vicariously through the new audience for the next two hours, and it is a pure joy.

The young people of Jackson laugh at the Laurel and Hardy comedy stylings of Threepio and Artoo, they eat up the “though she be little she is fierce” snarky spirit of Princess Leia, gasp at Alderaan's fate and Obi Wan's sacrifice, cheer at Hans return, hold their collective breath when Luke turns off his targeting device to use the force, and burst into applause when he makes the one in a million shot, womp rats in Beggars Canyon take heed.

“Aw man I really hope we can see Empire some day,” you say as the credits roll.

Ellie is elated, peppering you with questions about the sequel and then Return of the Jedi as you walk out of the rec center, and everyone begins to head home. You do you best answering, not wanting to spoil too much if she actually gets to watch it.

“I'm this way,” she says suddenly, as she peels off from the town center, “see ya!”

You head toward the Tipsy Bison, to join the adults, most of which took advantage of the kids being off at the movie to do a little drinking and dancing.

The spring has brought high spirits, and with it bright chatter and the stomp of line dancing in progress. Grabbing a spot to watch, you order yourself a drink. When the song ends, there's hoots and applause, and the next one is slow and sweet, and it only takes the first note for you to feel the drop in your belly.

Joel saw you come in, he had seen you from the street actually, when the community center emptied after the film, he had his eye out for Ellie and saw her come out with you, talking animatedly and laughing. He smiled. You were his age, or close enough, he guesses, not only from both the smile and worry lines but your points of reference when talking, only missing references that are local to growing up in Texas. It's comforting, you remember Before. You also have a light he can't get enough of. You didn't confirm nor deny it, but he is sure you've enchanted him witch or not. He's just been too, 'shy' isn't the right word... he just hasn't been able to make any sort of move.

Then he does his best to saunter over to your little table, drink in hand. He's pretty sure his sauntering days are over.

Now you sit alone, a moment ago smiling, tapping to the music. He had been taking in some liquid courage, in the form of whiskey, to ask you to dance. But the light in your eyes is replaced with a shine, not in the way he loves. He's seen this a couple times, he realizes. Times when your eyes go far away and a sadness descends on you.

He gets up and checks the jukebox, taking note of the song. He's pretty sure he's right. He can't bypass a song on a jukebox, nor can he tell a DJ to change it. But he's gonna talk to Walt the barkeeper, first chance he gets.

“Hey Catnip, can I sit?”

You look up wiping your wide eyes.

“Oh, sure, Joel, please,” your smile tries to reach your eyes, but it flickers and can't stay.

“So," Joel starts, he's not good at this. He's gotten better but, “You're Still the One, huh? For me, it's Vince Gill- When I Call Your Name ”

You just look at him, and he starts to think maybe he hasn't improved at all.

“I don't know that one, it was kind of a fluke that our song, his song was a country song. It's not my usual genre.”

“Well it wasn't my lady and my song, it was the song that I listened to after she left. Sarah was so little. I felt so lost in those early days. Now I can't even hear the open-”

“Opening chords,” you finish with a chuckle, “yeah, I can't- and now of course it all wrapped up in the Before Times, too. But here it is, in a jukebox of less than 200 songs, the one song that represents my husband walking out on me before the shit hit the fan.”

“I can't even picture anyone leaving you with nothing but a song.”

“Yeah, well, I can picture it quite clearly. I can't imagine someone leaving you with a little baby girl to raise.”

“We are in the same boat, darlin’ until it happened I would have been with you on that. We were very young, 22, she panicked.”

“Aren't we a pair?”

“Why don't this pair go for a walk then?”

Joel holds his breath, looking into your lovely face.

“I'd like that.”

Standing, Joel holds out a hand to guide you up and out of the bar, it settles comfortably on your lower back, the song long over. His hand tingles and theres a flutter in his chest at being allowed to touch you this way.

It smells like petrichor, though the skies are clear. Joel's hand leaves your back to your chagrin, but he gently holds out his elbow, and with a crooked smile you slip your hand in the crux of it.

“Such a gentleman.”

He smiles and brings you to the newly constructed, yet to be painted, gazebo.

You climb the handful of steps and look at the town from this new vantage point.

Behind you, Joel comes close, his hand casually on your hip, like you did this everyday. His mouth close to the shell of your ear and a quiet hum floats in, the controlled breath tickling, you smile knowing the very apt song choice,

“Are you making fun of me Joel Miller?”

He chuckles, then the words over take the hum -

“Please mister, please, don't play B-17

It was our song, it was his song but it's over

Please Mr. please, if you know what I mean

I don't ever wanna hear that song again…”

Joel turns you, arm around your waist, his other hand sliding into yours -

" I'd sound a bit better with my guitar, but when we couldnt dance, so-"

He starts a simple box step, as he sings quiet and low, just for you, while turning you around the gazebo.

You join in singing, whispering in his ear the chorus when it comes again. It feels cathartic. Then you step back - who is this man? Not the guy who came in with a little girl, a gut wound that should have killed him, poorly healed knuckles, and the wary eye of someone who is always waiting for the other shoe to come down on him like it's made of lead. But looking at him now, those brown eyes wide but the little crease between his eyes holding his concern. His jaw soft, making you take more note of his natural pout and the salt and pepper scruff, the little spot that just won't fill in, it looks like a heart… you wonder if it's as soft and smooth as it looks and if he'd let you touch it to find out.

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING 💚

Please consider commenting and reblogging. If you are interested in reading more of my writing, you can find my masterlist here. If you would like to be notified when i post more work, you can find my taglist form here.

[fanaticsnail]

I remember you mentioned having a Mihawk playlist, and the way you manage to find songs that perfectly fit the vibes of your fics and enhance the reading experience is one of the things I love about your writing

So I was wondering if you could share some of the songs on your playlist? Or even some songs that you associate with certain characters/tropes/scenarios?

I always love it when you send me asks, @sexc-snail.

I absolutely DO have a Mihawk playlist. I share the playlist construction with another creator on Tumblr who I love, cherish and adore: @sordidmusings. We add to it as we write, recommend songs as they come to us to help with words in works.

I could get into a long, long rant about music so I will add a page break here ❤. Lots of song recs to follow for the OPLA cast so far.

I am a violinist; have been playing for 25 years this year (I AM GETTING OLD, JEEPERS CREEPERS). Music is a great, passionate love affair for me and I adore learning about songs and pieces new and old. Here are some recommendations for songs and vibes I associate with the characters and the tropes.

I never add lyrics to my fics so the readers can visualize their own favourite melodies where they see fit, but I do have tunes in mind when I write them. The only fic I've really centralised a song about is the "You Should Be Sad" Mihawk fic I wrote a while back and the Koby series I'm writing.

Here are some song recommendations: all songs are Spotify linked. Enjoy a peek into my madness.

For the Characters

Luffy:

Long Way Home: Walk off the Earth, Lindsay Stirling

Following the Sun: SUPER-Hi, NEEKA

La Isla Bonita: Madonna

Zoro

Work Song: Hozier

Promise: Voyager

Cold Shot: Stevie Ray Vaughan

Sanji

Love Story: Indila

Know You Girls: Franz Ferdinand

Family Line: Conan Grey

Nami (She gets four, because she's amazing and I love her)

Runaway: Aurora

My Mother Told Me: NATI, Cullen Vance, Jonny Stewart

Outside: Ellie Golding, Calvin Harris

Queen of the Kings: Alessandra

Usopp

Mechanical Instinct: Aviators

The Higher Ground: Red Hot Chili Peppers

Eastside: Benny Blanco, Halsey, Khalid

Buggy

Be Your Shadow: The Wombats

Gasoline: Halsey

I Wanna Be Your Slave: Maneskin

Shanks:

The One that Got Away: The Civil Wars

Atlantis: Seafret

Barton Hollow: The Civil Wars

Mihawk

Seven Nation Army: Postmodern Jukebox

My Heart With You: The Rescues

The Snake: Lana Lubany

Koby (He also gets four, because he deserves only good things, and because Morgan Davies is Aussie like me)

Grieve No More: Patty Gurdy

Siuil A Run: Ella Roberts

Mad World: Jasmine Thompson

Again: Flyleaf

Helmeppo

Fighter: Christina Aguilera

Torn: Natalie Imbruglia

Elastic Heart: Sia

Garp

Sharp Dressed Man: ZZ Top

Under a Violet Moon: Blackmores Night

Billie Jean: The Civil Wars

For the Tropes

Unrequitted Love (My all time favourite thing)

Wrecking Ball: Beth

Can't Help Falling in Love: Tommee Profitt, Brooke

I Found: Amber Run

Comptine d'un autre ete l'apres-midi: Yann Tierson

Derniere Danse: Indila

Only in my Mind: Kenya Grace

Over and Over: Three Days Grace

Broken Pieces: Apocalyptica Lacey

Too Close: Alex Clare

Stupid Heart: Sorana

Enemies to Lovers

FMLYHM: Sether

Closer: NIN

Hella Good: No Doubt

Play With Fire: Sam Tinnesz, Yacht Money

Why'd You Only Ever Call Me When You're High: Arctic Monkeys

For when they give into their feelings:

Surrender: Natalie Taylor

As the World Caves In: Sarah Cothran

Freeze You Out: Marina Kaye

Say Yes To Heaven: Lana Del Rey

For when they give up but feelings are still there

Lose you to love me: Selena Gomez

Liar: Camilla Cabello

Darkside: Alan Walker

Say My Name: David Guetta, Bebe Rexha, J Balvin

Only Love Can Hurt Like This: Paloma Faith

I See Red: Everybody Loves an Outlaw

If you made it this far, thank you. This was a labour of love. Happy listening ❤

[aladaylessecondblog]

#WeFoundTheHeart (Red Mountain Waffle House ch. 2)

"The fuck is that thing?" Jiub, from behind the grill, gestured at the pot that Sadara was adjusting on the front window-sill. "Looks awful."

The plant in question was definitely under the weather. The leaves were turning yellow towards the base, the red petals were looking dry, the white-ish ones weren't much better, and Sadara was hoping the nice bit of water she'd given it, combined with the nice spot at the window, might be just the thing to perk it back up. She'd considered repotting it--the pot was a bit cracked, and had some daedric-looking figure on it. 'N,' she was pretty sure, but it was faded enough that she couldn't be entirely sure.

"Google calls it a bleeding heart. I found it outside the apartment...it's not doing so well there so I thought the sun might be better for it here."

"You've got a black thumb, that thing's going to be dead inside of a week." Jiub laughed, flicked at his cigarette and went back to work on a scrambled egg, "Put it out of its misery."

"Says the man that once killed a dandelion." Sadara handed over a buoyant armiger's coffee and then looked back.

"Fuck you, it only died because my nix-hound decided that exact spot had to be where it pissed."

"Enough with the chit-chat, can I get my eggs?" a shirtless dunmer called from the table on the other side of the jukebox. Near the bathroom. Usually, Sadara was told, a problem table given the view it gave of the road. "Or are you two going to go at each other right here in front of Dagoth Ur and everybody?"

He looks like he doesn't get enough sleep, Sadara thought, Probably a tweaker. Skooma head, at the minimum.

"I've got about fifteen reasons why that'd be a bad idea," Jiub called out, and dished the eggs out and onto a plate next to the waffle.

Something told her to put on the corprus gloves, so she did, and then brought the plate over. "There you go. It's just been a slow night. People must be getting a good night's rest...unlike you. If you'd like some more coffee--"

"Coffee's the last thing I need right now. Maybe something...less...wake-y."

"We don't have any weed or we'd sell you some," Sadara replied, "And warm milk doesn't do anything except make you want to brush your teeth right that second. I could hit you over the head if you wanted."

"I've tried that. Doesn't work. All it did was give me a headache. I just...I got really bad insomnia." There was a pause, a look past her, and then, "Where'd you get the plant?"

"The plant? Oh, I found it outside my apartment. The sun's better here, so I set it up. Poor thing looks like it could use a little extra light. Better than it'll get on...well, you get the idea."

The conversation petered out and the dunmer paid his check. As she looked up he was snapping a picture of the plant with his phone, but when she was coming back with the receipt she realized he was making a grab for the plant.

"Hey, hey, that's MINE!" she snapped at him, "Fuck off, get your OWN plant!"

"It's not yours!" he snarled back as she was tugging the pot from his hands, "It's my LORD'S!"

One of the weaker blooms shed its bulb from all the motion and the shirtless dunmer moved back suddenly.

"Then tell your lord to come and get it!" she said, "And to ask politely instead of asking randos to do the job for him!"

For a moment the dunmer looked like he was going to give a really acidic reply, but when Sadara raised a hand like she was going to smack him--he stared at it just for a second, and then left.

"The fuck was that about?" Jiub called from the back.

"He says the plant belongs to 'his lord'...whatever the hell THAT means." Sadara put the plant back once she was sure the dunmer wasn't coming back.

(Within the hour #WeFoundTheHeart was trending on Morrotwitter, all accompanied by the same damn picture of the plant in the Waffle House window. Had it not been for what followed she would have been sure that she was hallucinating the whole thing.)

-------------------------

The shirtless guy wasn't the first one to try stealing the bleeding heart plant, and after the next four attempts Sadara felt it was pretty safe for her to assume he wouldn't be the last either. It wasn't just regular dunmer either, it was ash zombies, ash ghouls--It had gotten to the point where she considered telling them it died, but something always seemed to stop her doing that.

"You'd think it was moon-sugar cane, the way they're after it," Jiub said, passing her the bottle of sujamma over his shoulder, "Did you sprinkle it with skooma? Seriously, the fuck'd you do to it?"

"I didn't do anything to it! Well...I gave it some compost I got off Nibani, but...other than that, nothing."

"Heads up," Nibani said suddenly, from where she was cleaning up one of the corner tables, "Ascended sleeper. Stay polite, but don't talk to 'em much and--"

"Don't ask about his god. I know, I know." Sadara took a gulp from the bottle of sujamma and then breathed deep.

The ascended sleeper meandered in and took a seat in the middle of the dining area, right at the counter. There was a look in the direction of the bleeding heart plant. Or Sadara assumed it was a look, anyway, the damned thing didn't seem to have any eyes, what in the hell would it look WITH?

"Coffee, please."

The tone was...strange, not like any voice she'd ever heard. Like someone was putting it through an instrumental filter or something, maybe talking next to a fan.

"Dark? Any sugar, creamer?"

"Black."

"That's the best way," Sadara gave a slight smile, and moved over to the coffee maker to pour him out a cup. "You had a pleasant walk...ah...float here, I hope."

Laughter came, like an orchestra of slightly-off-key flutes. "Pleasant enough. I hear this is where I can see the Heart."

"What, the plant?"

Another couple customers came in. One was a buoyant armiger, off-duty from the look of him. He gave the ascended sleeper a strange look but went on and called for a steak with his waffle.

"Rare, medium, or get the hell out," Jiub said.

"What's wrong with well done?"

"What's wrong is it's a crime against fucking nature. A guar died to give you this meat and you want me to burn the shit out of it?" Jiub asked.

"I was going to ask for it medium anyway." A huff, and then a look back to the menu.

"Is it always like this?" the ascended sleeper asked. "I don't often come here, you see."

"That? That's nothing." Sadara laughed. "Now, what do you want to actually eat? Can you eat?"

"I can, yes. One gets the urge for something more than corprusmeat, now and then..."

"It doesn't sound like it would taste very good, but you must enjoy it or you wouldn't keep doing it."

After a short pause the sleeper said, "Some sausage and a waffle, if you don't mind."

Sadara gave a slight smile. The next fifteen minutes or so were actually rather pleasant--the ascended sleeper would glance at the bleeding heart plant now and then, but mostly he would watch her and make polite conversation. How long she had been in Morrowind, how she (disliked) the weather. All weird, unconnected questions, but she was glad to have one of them talking to her that didn't

She took a from the sujamma bottle when he'd turned his head to look at it.

"I've seen that mark a few times," the ascended sleeper said, "Strange that you should find it on a flowerpot of all things."

"Everyone likes to plant things." Sadara shrugged. "I usually have a black thumb, but..."

"But that plant seems to grow for you?"

"Yeah, it does. Strange, that. It's finally starting to look better."

It was a nice feeling, really. To have plant after plant after plant die--to the point, way back when she'd lived with Jiub the first time, he wouldn't even let her step inside the room he grew the weed in--and then to have something actually grow for her.

The sleeper gave several nods. "It means 'Neht,' if you wanted to know."

"What?"

"The symbol on the flowerpot. It means 'Neht.'"

"Huh. Interesting."

"Well--"

"Oh, come on!"

Sadara looked down the bar at the off-duty buoyant armiger. "Sir?"

"You're going to let that thing stay?"

"He's being more polite than you are," she replied curtly, "And his money spends just as well as yours."

"I spend my day defending the Ghostfence from that sort. Why does this place just--let them--"

"See previous answer. The only one being rude here is YOU, jackass."

That was when Nibani spoke up. "Either shut your mouth or leave, we don't want fighting here if we can help it."

"You two're awfully mouthy for someone who's cozying up to the Sixth House's monsters," the armiger stood and crossed the room. "Makes me think maybe you're involved with them too."

"Makes me think you're about to write a check your ass can't cash," Sadara replied. She took another sip of sujamma, and walked through the little gate at the end of the bar. "So do like the manager says, shut your mouth or leave."

"As if I'm going to let some Sixth House sympathizer--"

The buoyant armiger lunged. Sadara ducked his wild bolt of flame, and clocked him right in the jaw.

"You BITCH!"

Behind her was another shout, Jiub, who'd let out, "I JUST started that egg!"

Then, a rapid fire alarm.

Sadara sidestepped and grabbed the back of the armiger's armor, and with a great effort hauled him towards the door that she pressed open with her foot. "C'mon, I don't care if you paid or not. You're out, and if you try to come back in I'll drag you right back out again. Got it?"

The armiger did not, in fact, get it. He swung at her, got her hard in the shoulder, and found himself hit in the jaw once again, this time with the hand she wore the ring on. It left an immediate imprint, and would probably end up bruising, from what she could guess.

"Now are you going to leave, or am I going to have to kick you in the balls?"

It took the actual kick for him to figure out Sadara was serious.

---------------------------------------

The ascended sleeper had been very pleased with what he saw. Very pleased, indeed. He'd told them, hadn't he--those beneath him--that they could get more information if they just used their words and asked nicely. But then again, niceties weren't their strong point.

That was why HE had been sent.

Once #WeFoundTheHeart started going around, his lord had asked - discern the truth. See if what they were seeing (and hearing) was true. Don't attempt to steal the plant, it was too precious to risk in a tug-of-war situation. It was a delicate variety, after all, it couldn't hope to stand up to much of a stiff breeze this far away from its usual soil and tending.

"Well?"

His lord did not turn around, but that was usual. It was a privilege merely to be in his presence, to behold even part of his magnificence.

"It's true, lord Dagoth. The plant is there. And the one who chased off the dreamer claimed to have a black thumb, yet somehow the bleeding heart grew for her. And she was wearing...the ring."

"The ring?"

"THE ring, my lord, I saw it with my own eyes. Briefly--there was a bit of a scuffle, as a buoyant armiger decided he wanted to make trouble because I was allowed to dine there, and the one in question fought him half-drunk."

There was a pause, and then a sudden sharp intake of breath.

"Nerevar's ring, his plant that I've kept alive for these centuries...and now you tell me there was a drunken brawl."

The next breath was shakier.

"Nerevar really has returned."

[pestilentprayer]

three feet under - chapter one

hello hello! i've been working on a pre-canon different first meeting bobby & buck au for a month or so and now that 'everything has its place' has wrapped up, i wanted to give a little peek! this fic is from bobby's pov and starts a month after the fire.

(trigger warnings are abundant for 'three feet under' but for this snippet they're: child loss, substance abuse, past child abuse, and suicidal ideation)

The closest to his family that Bobby Nash can get is in warped reflections on polished granite headstones.

He’s worn down an edge of the plot: two indents for his knees to fall into as he silently prays and wordlessly begs. Mornings and nights and neither and both of graveside prostration have dug out a damned-dark and crisp-cold hole for him to fall into. When the time comes, he’ll lay himself down to sleep. He pictures the thaw as a revelation. Bones in the dust and fat melting hot-acrid in the earth; maggots and larvae and he finally found rest. His priest calls this season an act of God: as long as all the psalms and a testament unto itself. Bobby calls it evidence of God’s sense of humor.

Smoke billowed out of gaping maws in the apartment complex until steam took its place, white and grey on a white-grey sky when morning stole away the night. Cold tempered hot and hot taunted cold and cosmic cruelty lodged itself between the two; frostbite claimed scant slivers of skin not licked by flame. Bobby watched each and every one of his victims as they were freed from the pyre he lit with percocet and vodka and snarling cowardice. He named them when he could and when he couldn’t, he honored them with a sip taking him closer to his end. Winter has found forever in St. Paul. Bobby hopes he has found eternity.

The closest to God that Bobby Nash can get is at the bottom of a bottle, choking on dregs and memories.

He tells himself it isn’t blasphemy, isn’t divine disrespect; he tells himself a good many things as he finds truth in lies and lies in truth. The pills dull his thoughts until he makes his own peace. The booze is so cheap that he isn’t sure if it even has a name but he knows it makes him forget his own. Daysweeks pass in a haze and collect into a mass of fuzzy warmth that never gets close to the feeling of fire. He claims his punishment in the temptation of fate as he throws drugs back blindly and drinks until he can no longer see.

Tonight, he can still see.

Cheek perched on his palm, he lifts two fingers off of his glass. The bartender, too bright and young of eye, nods slowly. Everything is slow when the liquor swamps his bloodstream. He lives in a miasma of motion, taking in little and making even less sense of it. 

“This is gonna have to be your last one for today, man,” the kid says, quiet as the depths of night draw in, last-call last-chance hovering over the liminal space. 

Bobby grunts and necks the swill down. These days, he thinks he didn’t only start chasing fire to follow in his father’s fateful footsteps: he figures he’s always been chasing pain. His throat is long since numbed to the sting of cheap spirits and cheaper regrets.

Vinny’s is less of a hole in the wall and more of a slash in the ground, the dive bar’s foundation sinking into the Minnesota soil with the burden of its occupants and the demons perched cinder block-strong on their shoulders. It’s far from his usual badge haunt, halfway between his house and his home. Only his home fell to embers. His station hardened to ice and Bobby is weak. He doesn’t care to find out their opinion of him or how far the rumors have spread. All he knows is that they haven’t reached this hellish haven and he can drink himself into a stupor, sleep it off under a veil of insubstantial substances. He hopes to repeat the routine ad nauseam until his nausea consumes him and his liver realizes there’s no point in holding on.

Fifty cent songs croon from the jukebox; corpses that haven’t yet caught up to their fates drown out the noise in bottles of amber and plague-sick green. Bobby’s world is red: red bodies and red flames and the red label on a clear bottle that tastes like mangled memory clouding the nip of red blood in the air. His palms are red, too. 

The night he murdered his family wasn’t the first time he got burned. That was eight years old and a matchbox and the back of a hand across his cheek and a crick in his neck and a blistered scar shaped like Australia on his calf and— The second time was his fault (his fault, his fault, his fault; they were all his fault) when he forgot to disengage the airbags at a scene his fourth day on the job. It was fine because the blast barely scalded his skin and his father wasn’t there to say I told you so. It was fine. It was. The third time was an electrical accident but it made Marcy cry, so he swore not to do it again.

He did it again. He did it again and again and he did it worse each time; the scars he left never touched his flesh except for when they touched his flesh and blood in little flinches of fallout. The doctor said he might not regain full sensation in his hands and that’s alright, that’s okay. He deserves it. He’ll never be able to feel Brook’s hair or Robby’s hand or Marcy’s lips so it doesn’t matter anyway. The glass is slick in his grasp. He only knows that because it always is. Whiskeyvodkarum tumbles down his throat and then it’s gone; he’s empty. He closes out his tab and tugs on his coat. He leaves.

If he wanders a bit to the left then he’ll take a nice long walk off of a short riverbank and meet his maker in a chilling embrace. If he wanders a bit to the right then he’ll be able to understand what his patients felt when a bumper separated their pelvis and their shoes stayed on the ground as they fought the clutches of gravity. He keeps on his path. It’s not a lengthy trip and his destination is nothing like home; it’s everything like home for it smells of sulfur and smoke and there’s a picture of his family waiting for him, a rubber band holding it to the sun visor of his rusted-out truck. He’d lock the car if he had anything of worth inside of it other than the creased paper he stole from their memorial service. He’d lock it if a too-late part of him didn’t accept that other hands than his would hold the photo with more care than he could ever spare for his family.

Charlie brought the picture to the funeral home. He cropped it out of a Christmas card from the year before, the year before that, an in between year when Bobby’s spine was a crooked steeple and he fancied that he placed himself on the cross. Crucifixion came in the form of uppers and downers and he fell into the sepulcher of his worst impulses when a held-back shout hit harder than any fist. The tinsel border is still visible in the photo. Happy holidays, indeed. 

Tragedy—Bobby—struck in the dead of night. The city hasn’t roused from its mourning long enough to take down red lights and green lights, take back their good tidings and well wishes. It’s a locked-in-buckled-up reminder of what once was and will never be again; it’s a broken projector casting flickering shadows of a single frame that defines a people. Angels hung upon the walls of the funeral home in robes of white and gold and Bobby’s angels rotted in boxes of pine, their Sunday best churned into the earth with them.

He held it together at the service until he couldn’t and then he cried until he had no more tears. His words dried up with them and he stood, blank and numb and black-hole-wanting as Charlie took out one year, two years, tentwentythirty of Bobby’s Hell out on him in the cold-scorched courtyard of the cemetery: every stint at rehab, every squandered chance, every time he disappeared and Marcy was left to fend for herself. Bobby was and is and will be worse than Tim ever could have dreamt of; their father had the decency to die. Mom stood by silently, a statue amongst statues amongst graves.

And Bobby broke that night, not the snap of a branch but the crack-creak-whip of a whole trunk toppling over, taking out the next and the next and the next. He broke like his nails as they scrambled through the frozen soil, jealously clawing, dragon-strong and man-weak when he scored the disturbed ground so he could curl up with his family in a horde of the best he could do. He split the grafts off of his palms and watched blood melt a covering of snow far gentler than any embrace he’d ever offered. Charlie hauled him away with arms of overwrought iron, bars around the bars of his ribs.

“This is the last time I clean up your mess,” Charlie muttered and Bobby believed him, still does. Stowed in the passenger seat of his own truck, Bobby watched the bloated sky mist past as Charlie drove and drove and drove until he realized they never really drove at all, two blocks away from the cemetery, exhaust like smoke in the parking lot as the truck idled. A bar, the bar, this bar and it was close enough to the graves that Bobby stayed. Charlie left.

Bobby takes a handful of pills. He sleeps.

[holdoncallfailed]

my amazing pavements the movie review:

it was great actually. i think it spoke to so much of the stuff i've been thinking about in terms of what constitutes Truth when telling the story of a band and how it’s impossible to graft an objective narrative onto a living breathing entity that spans years if not decades with multiple shifting and contradictory takes on a single event…lots of great footage of them when they were young including malkmus wearing his dorky rimless glasses. the editing reminded me a LOT of the VU documentary which makes sense because that one similarly resists a typical biopic narrative and it utilized the same kind of splitscreen/collage-like affect to convey the frenetic and frequently haphazard energy of their performances. which i think works because at their best pavement are capable of being that overwhelming and sublime. i think it did a great job of presenting the irreverence and the earnestness simultaneously without being prescriptive about which is the “correct” interpretation of the band at the end of the day.

i liked the talkback afterwards too, alex ross perry seems like such an interesting intelligent guy and the perfect person (possibly only person?) to have helmed this kind of project. (he is also incredibly malkmusian in affect...like if malk were on the whole slightly friendlier lol.) he said that he wanted the movie to be similar in conceit to wowee zowee, i.e. everything just thrown at the wall at once with little regard as to what “made sense” according to the medium's established norms. which i really liked lol. i also liked that the director seemed more interested in the irreverence/parody angle whereas the editor was deadly serious about it and was clearly coming from a place of sincere devotion to the band, so maybe that's why they were able to achieve that tonal complexity.

and joe keery was a total riot…my only gripe was that they focused too much on the pavement stage musical development and not enough on the fictional biopic. i Get the musical on a conceptual level but i found it fairly painful to watch in reality—perry said something about how "the biopic is the lowest form of highbrow art that we allow as a society" which i'm inclined to agree with but i would argue that the TRUE lowest form is in fact the jukebox musical. it was funny at first hearing pavement songs with a showtune arrangement but it got old SO fast and i would have preferred to hear the songs sung by the guys. i also absolutely cannot stand zoe lister-jones' voice.

HOWEVER, after the screening a woman overheard us chatting about it and explained that the joe keery biopic elements had been largely edited out of the final cut because the band apparently hated it….! particularly for its negative depiction of malk, which is funny considering the whole project. and it's not like malkmus comes across as an angel in the final cut anyway—in fact far from it, though it was almost always presented in a way that fans will find charming and respond to with a sort of good-natured eye rolling “oh that stephen…!” so it's too bad that the band nixed so much of the biopic cos i thought those guys were doing a great job and i would have loved to see more of it especially the cut scenes that the woman described to us. fwiw i especially liked the kid who played bob. and i also give keery a lot of credit for managing to offset malk's genuine obnoxiousness with a (very good) deadpan caricature.

i also liked getting a little bit of insight into the pavement museum project and where all of that stuff came from. again i think there's something very exciting in wondering, how far can you take parody before it reveals something sincere? what does it look like when the irreverence becomes its own subject? what's the difference between a joke and a lie? if you say either one enough times they'll both become true.

IN CONCLUSION yes it was weird and silly and indulgent but i don't think there's any way it could have NOT been any of those things considering the inherent ridiculousness of the movie in the first place. i do not think there's very much to get out of it if you are not already a fan of pavement—but that was the same criticism lobbed at the VU doc, and i think in both cases it would be dumb to try to create something to appeal to non-fans, cos there's already been so much said about their ~importance and influence and it would have been mind-numbingly boring. in a crowd full of fans there were a TON of laugh-out-loud moments both because they were scripted as such and because they were, like, inside jokes that people who were following the 2022 tour would recognize...jocelyn and i absolutely lost our shit at the fred durst moves clip...iykyk...overall i enjoyed it so much and i really look forward to rewatching it and studying it more.

[helix-enterprises117]

Halo Reloaded: Puppy Eyes

In a cozy nook of New Mombasa, tucked away from the usual hustle and the occasional, unnerving peace that came after a particularly nasty Covenant invasion, was a diner. Not just any diner, but the kind with neon lights that had seen better days and a jukebox in the corner that was perpetually stuck on jazz standards from centuries past.

It was here, amidst the scent of overcooked burgers and undercooked fries, that Kelly-087 and Fred-104 decided to plant themselves for what passed as a date night in the Spartan handbook (not that such a handbook existed, but if it did, it would likely advise against anything that could result in fun).

Fred, the ever-dutiful Spartan, was halfway through a cup of coffee that could charitably be described as "motor oil chic." Kelly, on the other hand, was attacking a milkshake with the enthusiasm of a child who'd just discovered sugar was a thing. It was a rare moment of downtime, a slice of normal in lives that were anything but.

"Fred," Kelly said, sliding her milkshake aside with a look that meant trouble. Or fun. With Kelly, it was often both. "How do you feel about dancing?"Fred, whose experience with dancing was mostly limited to dodging plasma fire, nearly inhaled his coffee.

"Dancing?" he sputtered, trying to imagine himself in any scenario where that would be a good idea.

"Yeah, you know," Kelly pressed, her eyes gleaming with a mix of challenge and excitement. "Music, moving, maybe not stepping on each other's feet too much?"

Fred raised an eyebrow, putting down his coffee like it was suddenly made of live grenades. "Kelly, the last time I 'danced,' I accidentally dislocated an ensign's shoulder. You really want to unleash that on the civilian population?"

Kelly leaned back, giving him a look that was part amusement, part exasperation. "Oh, come on. I've seen you in a fight. You're all grace and lethal elegance. Just pretend it's a combat situation. Minus the actual combat."

Fred snorted, shaking his head. "Because nothing says romance like treating a dance floor like a battlefield."

But Kelly wasn't deterred. She employed the big guns: the puppy eyes. It was a low blow, and they both knew it. Those big, earnest eyes that said, "Trust me, what's the worst that could happen?" A lot, actually, but Fred found it increasingly hard to care.

"I can't say no to those eyes," he grumbled, though the fight was already leaving him. "This is going to end in disaster."

Kelly's grin could have powered the UNSC Infinity. "Disaster, adventure—it's all about perspective. Plus, it'll be fun. Promise."

Fred sighed, the weight of impending doom settling in. "You know, most couples would just go see a movie."

"And miss the chance to see you in dancing shoes? Never," Kelly shot back, her tone light, teasing.

They bantered back and forth a bit more, the diner around them fading into a comfortable backdrop. When they finally left, stepping out into the cool evening air, there was a lightness between them. It was the kind of moment that made all the chaos and destruction fade into the background, if only for a little while.

They made their way to whatever dance hall Kelly had in mind. Fred couldn't help but think that maybe, just maybe, dancing wouldn't be the worst thing in the world. After all, how hard could it be?

Famous last words, he'd think later, as he accidentally sent a fellow dancer spinning across the floor. But in that moment, with Kelly laughing beside him, it was all worth it.

@inthatfandom, @ionlymadethissoicouldleaveanask, @makowrites "I can't say no to those eyes."

[ourshadowstallerthanoursoul]

Interview to JPJ

(by Steven Rosen, Guitar Player - July 1977, Chicago)

It was shared on ultimate-guitar.com by Steven Rosen himself (link). I suggest going to read the introduction because there's a bit of angry JPJ which is quite surprising (to me at least). Enjoy!

What was the impetus behind becoming a bass player?

I used to play piano when I was younger, and there was a rock and roll band forming at school when I was fourteen, but they didn't want a piano player, all they wanted was drums or bass. I thought, I can't get the drums on the bus, bass looked easy, four strings, no chords, easy so I took it up. And it was easy; it wasn't too bad at all. I took it up before guitar, which I suppose is sort of interesting. Before I got a real 4-string, my father had a ukulele banjo, a little one, and I had that strung up like a bass, but it didn't quite have the bottom that was required. Actually my father didn't want to have to sign a guarant or to back me in the payments for a bass. He said, ‘Don't bother with it; take up the tenor saxophone. In two years the bass guitar will never be heard of again.’ I said, ‘No Dad, I really want one, there's work for me.’ He said, ‘Ah, there's work?’ And I got a bass right away.

What was your first bass?

Oh, it was a pig; it had a neck like a tree trunk. It was a solid body Dallas bass guitar with a single cutaway. It sounded all right though, and it was good for me because I developed very strong fingers. I had no idea about setting instruments up then, so I just took it home from the shop. I had an amplifier with a 10 speaker... Oh, it was awful. It made all kinds of farting noises. And then I had a converted television; you know one of those big old stand-up televisions with the amp in the bottom and a speaker where the screen should be. I ended up giving myself double hernias. Bass players always had the hardest time because they always had to cope with the biggest piece of equipment. It never occurred to me when I was deciding between that and drums that I'd had to lug a bass amp.

What kind of music were you playing in that first band?

Shadows, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis stuff. I started doubling on piano. We didn't have a drummer at first, because we never could find one. That happened to another bass player, Larry Graham, Sly Stone's bass player. He started off in a band with no drummer, which is how he got that percussive style. You've got a lot to make up for once the lead guitar takes a solo because there's only you left. You've got to make a lot of noise. We got a drummer after a while whom I taught, would you believe. I've never played drums in my life.

That must have definitely had an influence on your playing.

I suppose it must have. I don't like bass players that go boppity boppity bop all over the neck; you should stay around the bottom and provide the end of the group. I work very closely with the drummer; it's very important.

How long did that first band last?

Not very long. I found a band with a drummer. This band also came along with really nice looking guitars, and I thought, ‘Oh, they must be great!’ They had Burns guitars so I got myself one, too. The one with the three pickups and a Tru-Voice amplifier. We all had purple band jackets and white shoes, and I thought, ‘This is it, this is the big time.’ But as soon as I got out of school I played at American Air Force bases, which was good training, plus they always had great records in the jukebox. That was my introduction to the black music scene, when very heavy gentlemen would come up insisting on Night Train eight times an hour.

What was the first really professional band you were in?

It was with Jet Harris and Tony Meehan (bassist and drummer with The Shadows). That was when I was seventeen, I suppose. And those were the days when they used to scream all the way through the show. It was just like now, really, where you have to make a dash for the limos at the end of the night make a sort of terrible gauntlet. In the days before roadies, you'd have to drag around your own gear, so we all invested in a roadie. We thought we owed it to ourselves, and this bloke was marvelous. He did everything, he drove the wagon, he lugged the gear, he did the lights... the whole thing.

What kind of bass were you using with Harris and Meehan?

Oh, I got my first Fender then. I lusted after this Jazz bass in Lewisham, and it cost me about $250, I think. It was the new one. They'd just changed the controls, and I used that bass up until last (1975) tour, and then she had to go. She was getting unreliable and rattling a lot, and I just had to leave her home this time.

What followed your working with that band?

I got into sessions. I thought, ‘I've had enough of the road’, bought myself a dog and didn't work for six months. Then I did start up again. I played in other silly bands. I remember that Jet Harris and Tony Meehan band, John McLaughlin joined on rhythm guitar. It was the first time I'd met him and it was hilarious. Here he was sitting there all night going Dm to G to Am. That was my first introduction to jazz when he came along, because we'd all get to the gig early and have a blow. Oh, that was something, first meeting him. And then I joined a couple of other bands with him for a while, rhythm and blues bands.

Do you remember the first session that you ever did?

No, I don't think so; it was in Decca Number 2 (studio in London). I was late, and I suddenly realized how bad my reading was. There was another bass player there, a stand-up bass, and I was just there to provide the click. It was nearly my last session.

Who were some of the people you were doing sessions with?

All kinds of silly people: used to do calls with Tom Jones, Cathy Kirby, Dusty Springfield.

The Rolling Stones and Donovan, too, didn't you?

I only did one Stones session, really. I just did the strings, they already had the track down. It was ‘She's A Rainbow’. And then the first Donovan session was a shambles, it was awful. It was ‘Sunshine Superman’ and the arranger had got it all wrong, so I thought, being the opportunist that I was, ‘I can do better than that’ and actually went up to the producer. He came around and said, ‘Is there anything we can do to sort of save the session?’ And I piped up, ‘Well, look how about if I play it straight?’ because I had a part which went sort of ooowooooo (imitates a slide up the neck) every now and again, and the other bass player sort of did wooooo (imitates downwards slide) down below, and then there was some funny congas that were in and out of time. And I said, ‘How about if we just sort of play it straight; get the drummer to do this and that?’

How did the session go?

The session came off, and I was immediately hired as the arranger by Mickie Most whom I loved working with; he was a clever man. I used to do Herman's Hermits and all that. I mean they were never there; you could do a whole album in a day. And it was great fun and a lot of laughs. I did all of Lulu's stuff and all his artists. I did one Jeff Beck single, and he's never spoken to me since. It was ‘Hi Ho Silver Lining’. I did the arrangement for it and I played bass. Then we had ‘Mellow Yellow’ for Donovan, which we argued about for hours because they didn't like my arrangement at all, not at all. Mickie stood by me. He said, ‘I like the arrangement, I think it's good’. It wasn't Donovan. He didn't mind either but he had so many people around him saying, ‘Hey, this isn't you.’ But he sold a couple of a million on it, didn't he?

Was the Hurdy Gurdy Man session when you first met Jimmy Page?

No. I'd met Jimmy on sessions before. It was always Big Jim and little Jim. Big Jim Sullivan and little Jim and myself and the drummer. Apart from group sessions where he'd play solos and stuff like that, Page always ended up on rhythm guitar because he couldn't read too well. He could read chord symbols and stuff, but he'd have to do anything they'd ask when he walked into a session. But I used to see a lot of him just sitting there with an acoustic guitar sort of raking out chords. I always thought the bass player's life was much more interesting in those days, because nobody knew how to write for bass, so they used to say, ‘We'll give you the chord sheet and get on with it.’ So even on the worst sessions you could have a little runaround. But that was good; I would have hated to have sat there on acoustic guitar.

How long did you do sessions?

Three or four years, on and off. Then I thought I was going to get into arranging because it seemed that sessions and running about was much too silly. I started running about and arranging about forty or fifty things a month. I ended up just putting a blank piece of score paper in front of me and just sitting there and staring at it. Then I joined Led Zeppelin, I suppose, after my missus said to me, ‘Will you stop moping around the house; why don't you join a band or something?’ And I said, ‘There are no bands I want to join, what are you talking about?’ And she said, ‘Well, look, I think it was in Disc, Jimmy Page is forming a group’, he'd just left the Yardbirds ‘why don't you give him a ring?’ So I rang him up and said, ‘Jim, how you doing? Have you got a group yet?’ He said, ‘I haven't got anybody yet.’ And I said, ‘Well, if you want a bass player, give me a ring.’ And he said, ‘All right, I'm going up to see this singer Terry Reid told me about, and he might know a drummer as well. I'll call you when I've seen what they're like.’ He went up there, saw Robert Plant, and said, ‘This guy is really something.’ We started under the name the New Yardbirds because nobody would book us under anything else. We rehearsed an act, an album, and a tour in about three weeks, and it took off. The first time, we all met in this little room just to see if we could even stand each other. It was wall-to-wall amplifiers and terrible, all old. Robert (Plant) had heard I was a session man, and he was wondering what was going to turn up some old bloke with a pipe? So Jimmy said, ‘We're all here, what are we going to play?’ And I said, ‘I don't know, what do you know?’ And Jimmy said, ‘Do you know a number called, The Train Kept A Rollin'?’ I told him, ‘No.’ And he said, ‘It's easy, just G to A.’ he counted it out, and the room just exploded, and we said, ‘Right. We're on, this is it, this is going to work!’ And we just sort of built it up from there. ‘Dazed And Confused’ came in because Jimmy knew that, but I could never get the sequence right for years; it kept changing all the time with different parts, and I was never used to that. I used to having the music there, could never remember. In fact, I'm still the worst in the band remembering anything. And the group jokes about it, ‘Jonesy always gets the titles wrong and the sequences wrong.’ Even now I have a piece of paper I stuck on top of the Mellotron which says: ‘Kashmir remember the coda!’

What were some of your early amplifiers?

I've used everything from a lousy made-up job, to a great huge top valve (tube) amp. We started off in a deal with Rickenbacker where we had these awful Rickenbacker amps; they were so bad. Our first tour was a shambles. For about a year I never even heard the bass. They said, ‘We've designed this speaker cabinet for you’, and I said, ‘Let me see it, what's it got in it?’ It had one 30 speaker! I said, ‘All right, stand it up there alongside whatever else I've got, and I'll use it.’ I plugged it in, and in a matter of five seconds it blew up. I thought the bloke was having me on; I said, ‘There's no such thing as a 30 speaker!’ And I had to take the back off because I couldn't believe it. Then we met the guy from Univox, and he came up with a bass stack, which unfortunately didn't last the night. But while it was going, it was the most unbelievable sound I've ever heard. It was at the Nassau Coliseum in New York, I remember, and the bass filled the hall. It was so big, it couldn't have lasted. I don't think I'll come across anything that sounded like that. But as I said, three numbers and wheel the Acoustics out again. I used two or three 360 standard Acoustics for quite a long time. They served me well.

You used the Jazz bass until just recently?

Yeah. Oh, I got a hold of a very nice Gibson violin bass (pictured in the little cut out wheel on the cover of Led Zeppelin III). That was nice, too, it's not stage worthy, but it gives a beautiful warm sound. I don't like Gibson basses generally because they feel all rubbery; I like something you can get your teeth into. But the violin bass was the only Gibson that was as heavy as a Fender to play, but still had that fine Gibson sound. I used it on Led Zeppelin III, and I've used it every now and again, usually when I'm tracking a bass after I've done keyboards for the main track. The one I have went through Little Richard's band and then through James Brown's band, and it arrived in England. In fact, I saw it in an old movie clip of Little Richard. It was probably about a '48 or '50 or something like that; it was the original one. Actually, I've also got an old '52 Telecaster bass. I used that on stage for a while, for ‘Black Dog’ and things like that.

Do you ever use a pick when you play?

Yes, when the situation demands it; on the 8-string it's awful messy with your fingers. On ‘The Song Remains The Same’ I use a pick to get that snap out of the instrument. It's fun, you play different. If I was just playing straight bass, I'd use fingers. When I first started I always used my fingers.

How has playing with Jimmy Page for the last nine years styled your playing?

That's hard. I play a lot looser than I used to. For instance somebody like John Entwistle is more of a lead instrument man than I am. I tend to work closer with Bonzo I think. But then again I don't play that much bass on-stage anymore, what with the pianos and the Mellotron. I'll always say I'm a bass player, though.

How do you develop a bass part?

You put in what's correct and what's necessary. I always did like a good tune in the bass. For example, listen to’ What Is And What Should Never Be’ (on Led Zeppelin II). The role of a bassist is hard to define. You can't play chords so you have a harmonic role; picking and timing notes. You'll suggest a melodic or harmonic pattern, but I seem to be changing anyway toward more of a lead style. The Alembic bass is doing it; I play differently on it. But I try to never forget my role as a bass player: to play the bass and not mess around too much up at the top all the time. You've got to have somebody down there, and that's the most important thing. The numbers must sound right, they must work right, they must be balanced.

You just picked a track from the second album, but there was something so gloriously unique about the first Zep record.

I know what people mean when they say the first Zeppelin album was the best. It was the first. I don't know what it was; we could never recreate those conditions it was recorded in. It was done in about thirty hours, recorded and mastered. There was a lot of energy in those days. But I liked (Physical Graffiti). I liked most of them actually. The funny thing was about the first album, when we got to about the third album (Led Zeppelin III) and started using acoustics everyone was saying, ‘Ahhh, Led Zeppelin has gone acoustic. They've changed their style.’ What everybody forgets is there were two acoustic numbers on the first album. Right? ‘Babe I'm Gonna Leave You’ and ‘Black Mountain Side’. The funny thing is people try to pigeon-hole you with all that heavy metal stuff. And if they ever listened to the fucking albums they'd realize it was never riff after riff after riff. It never was like that, you know? Peculiar... oh, well.

Do you practice?

In a word, no. I fool around on piano, but bass I never practice. Although again, with the Alembic, I'm beginning to feel, ‘Wouldn't it be nice to have it in the room?’ It really makes you want to play more, which is fantastic.

The band has always had a strange relationship with the press.

There is an amount of professionalism which must be retained. You can't go around canceling gigs and things like that. After Robert's accident there were rumors of, ‘Oh, they're afraid to come out’ and this and that which was really hard on us because we've always tried to be as professional as possible. And we take a pride in this. We've tried to turn up on time but it gets hard moving this amount of people. And that sort of thing hurts. Robert was in a wheelchair and we had to wait until he was healed. And then we were all ready to go and he got tonsillitis on this '77 tour. And he must have felt so bad. I tell you if this band ever drops from favor with the public, a load of people are going to come down on our asses so fucking hard. They're just waiting for us to drop. I don't know why, I honestly don't know. I always remember the first review of our first album in Rolling Stone and the bloke dismissed it out of hand. I don't even think he would listen to it and said as much. Then they dismissed us as hype.

Who do you listen to?

I don't. I used to listen to a lot of jazz bass players once, but jazz has changed so much now, it's hardly recognizable. I listened to a lot of tenor sax players: Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane and all those people. Bass players? Scott La Faro, who died. He used to be with (jazz pianist) Paul Chambers. Ray Brown and Charlie Mingus, of course. I'm not too keen on the lead bass style of some players. Paul McCartney, I've always respected; he puts the notes in the right place at the right time. He knows what he's about.

Who don't you listen to?

Ian [Anderson] is a pain in the ass. We toured with Jethro Dull [sic] once and I think he probably spoke three words to Jimmy or I at any one time. The band was nice but he was such a funny fucker. His music bores the pants off me, it's awful. Page came up with the greatest line about them. He had a title for a live album when Jethro was playing in Los Angeles: ‘Bore 'Em at The Forum’. (Ritchie) Blackmore is another guy I don't like. He was supposed to have been a big session man but he must have done demos because he was never a regular session man. I'm getting out all my pet hates.

There's nothing you'd like to do outside of Zeppelin in an instrumental context?

I always get the feeling I'd like to write a symphony. I like all music. I like classical music a lot. Ravel, Bach, of course, Mozart I could never stand, though to play it on the piano is great fun. If Bach had ever come across the bass guitar, he would have loved it. Rock and roll is the only music left where you can improvise. I don't really know what's happened to jazz; it has really disappointed me. I guess they started playing rock and roll.

So you're able to continually experiment in Zeppelin and expand your playing?

Yes, absolutely. I wouldn't be without Zeppelin for the world. What's it like being in Led Zeppelin? I don't know. It is a peculiar feeling; it intrigues me.

[kittyball23]

Okay guys, listen up!

Got some insight to the Annecy Film Festival and some of the news it revealed! The info I found was from a posting on the YouTube channel "jstar" (if you're on Tumblr, I'd love to know 😀) from a screenshot presumably found from somewhere on social media ( A friend I speak to on Wattpad brought this channel and its postings to my attention). Here's what exactly was said:

"To be factual: after the furious madness of the second Trolls, whose psychedelic energy had something orgasmic about it, exit hard rock and welcome to the glorious era of boy bands. A retrospective choice (still) logical given the astounding popularity of Kpop today. He's Justin Timberlake's character, Branche, who was actually in a boy band with his brothers when he was little (watch out for the puns in the movie on Nsync, One Direction and the like) before being cowardly abandoned, becoming th grumpy, melancholy troll he is today. The goal of the film will be to reassemble the band to save one of them, captured by idols without talents who sniff him to become good singers. By breaking a crystal that imprisons him with the power of perfect harmony."

So I guess the brothers have to sing the 'Family Harmony' (which sounds like a special song of some sort) to save Floyd who is trapped in a crystal that Velvet and Veneer placed him in after they smell him to obtain his talent?

Um... what? XD

So I guess it kinda makes sense in a way - Bergens ate Trolls to obtain their happiness, so perhaps sniffling them means that they can get their singing abilities?? Perhaps that's why they have to keep him - maybe inhaling his talent is only temporary? Maybe each time they do it continues to turn his hair the white that we saw in the first poster? And what's the deal with the Family Harmony? How will that play out? Are their voices going to combine like a magical force and break the crystal Floyd’s trapped in? If this is all true, I've certainly got a lot of questions lol

Other postings that were made on social media stated that the first 20 MINUTES of the movie were shown.

Here is a posting regarding Broppy:

"Branch definitely has a bigger emotional hurdle to jump through in this movie and Poppy really helps him with that, kind of like in the first movie, but it's a much different issue, even though Poppy feels like it's the same kind of situation to solve."

I had a feeling that this movie would remind me of the first :) This next one is about my boyz:

"We explore the world of boy bands in the world of 90s music! We celebrate them, but with a certain irony, having a little fun with them. They are more expressive and maybe they also have problems on their side. It was fun exploring these different personalities, feeling a likeness and family connection to them. But also for each of the four brothers to find their own personality, their own voice and their own part of the family."

This last quoting is about the music:

"The composer remains Ted Shapiro and we are working with a great musical team at the moment. Justin is still the executive producer of the original music and was involved in its development early on. There are five original songs that he spearheads, as well as more jukebox songs, classic and familiar happy tunes and he calls on other producers he wants to work with to create the best song for this moment in the film."

Still don't have word on the original songs, but we do know from previous info that some of the involved songs are We Are Family, Staying Alive, Everybody (Backstreet's Back), The Hustle, You Got the Right Stuff, Sailing, Sweet Dreams Are Made Of This, and I Want You Back. I also have my own ideas for what songs I think could work for the movie, but I'll save it for another post :)

[50calmadeuce]

Ch. 9: Jake and The Hard Deck

Disclaimer: This is a work of fan fiction using characters from the Top Gun: Maverick world, trademarked by Paramount Pictures Corporation. I do not claim ownership of the characters and the world that I am borrowing.

The story and situation I am creating are a work of my imagination and I do not ascribe them to official story canon. This work is for entertainment only and is not a part of the storyline.

I also do not own the rights or copyrights of 'Mandolin Rain' by Bruce Hornsby and the Range or 'Second Chance' by 38 Special. I just happen to really like these songs.

I am not profiting financially from the creation and publication of this story, but I do hope it gives you happy thoughts.

These stories are my own, so please do not take them and use them for yourself without my permission. If you see them somewhere else, please let me know. :)

Jake sat on the couch in his apartment, gazing out of the window.

"Bro, you've got to get out. You're starting to drive me crazy," his best friend Javy 'Coyote' Machado urged. "I've never seen you come home this upset before."

Jake turned to look at him. "Have I ever mentioned Y/N to you?"

Coyote pondered for a moment. "I think I recall. High school sweetheart, right? The reason you've been steering clear of relationships since."

"Yeah, she's the one," Jake admitted, taking a moment to gather himself. "And that's also why I've been feeling this need to prove myself, to show her I'm the best for her."

Coyote perched on the armrest of the couch. "I had no idea it ran that deep."

Jake met his gaze. "I saw her."

"Wait, seriously? She was home?"

"Her mom passed away. I had no clue until her brother asked me to help bring in cattle one of the days."

"Damn. I'm really sorry to hear that."

"We shared a kiss."

Coyote's eyes widened. "That's something, man!"

"Before I found out she's engaged."

"Ouch!"

Jake's gaze fell downward. "Yeah."

Coyote sprang up, playfully smacking Jake's arm. "Come on, let's get out of here. Shoot some pool, throw some darts. Anything to take your mind off it.:

Jake met his eyes. "True and I need to clear my head."

"Good. Now go and get dressed."

You entered The Hard Deck around 8 p.m. The place was alive with pilots and women, a mix of those in Navy uniforms and others in civilian attire.

You had phoned ahead, speaking with the owner to inquire about the presence of a jukebox and specifically if they had the song 'Mandolin Rain'. The woman on the other end was pleasant and regretfully informed you they didn't have your song, but assured you she could arrange it. You took the opportunity to share a bit about yourself and the plan to surprise Jake. It didn't surprise you that she was acquainted with him, though she was taken aback to learn about his past relationship. You mentioned that you would introduce yourself when you arrived.

As you scanned the room, your gaze settled on Jake at the pool table, dressed in a khaki uniform like the others around him. He was poised to take a shot, and you found yourself unable to look away. In that moment, Leslie's words rang painfully true. You felt like a fool. For years, you had only seen Jake as, well, Jake. The boy next door, a familiar face your family had known for years, who had professed his love for you, but it had never truly registered. You really didn't understand how deep Jake really loved you.

You approached the bar, where a striking brunette locked eyes with you.

"What can I get you?" she politely inquired.

"I called earlier. I'm Y/N," you explained.

Surprised, she gave you a quick once-over before nodding towards the pool table. "Jake's over there."

"I know. I just wanted to assure you that I'm real and I have no intention of hurting him."

She nodded. "I sensed that. You don't sound like the others." She extended her hand. "I'm Penny. Penny Benjamin."

You smiled and shook her hand. "Thank you, and it's nice to meet you, Penny."

"You want something to drink?"

"I'll take a beer."

"Coming right up." She swiftly wiped the bar.

You continued to watch Jake as he played pool, but something just seemed off. He didn't seem like the cheerful Jake you knew. Just then, a blonde in jean shorts and a white tank top walked up to him and whispered something in his ear, but Jake shook his head and the girl walked away sadly.

Penny came back with the beer. "Here you go."

"How much do I owe you?"

"It's on the house. Any friend of Hangman's is a friend of mine. H22 is your song."

You grabbed the beer. "Thanks." You then made your way to the juke box, grabbed some quarters out of your pocket, put them in when 'Second Chance' by 38 Special caught your eye. You pushed that button and then selected H22. You then stepped over to the table a couple of feet away. Close enough to watch him, but also far enough away to hide.

The current song finished playing and 'Second Chance' by 38 Special started to play.

[trashyswitch]

A Strange Package

Henry, Drew, and Scott were working at the Pizzeria, when a package (presumed to be a jukebox) arrives at the door. But Henry is shocked to not only see there was a mix up, but also see that it was a chair...with attachments and a foot rest...

This fanfic was based on a roleplay I did with a few friends. I hope you all enjoy!

Henry was bored, heading to the office with a wrench in his hand. “Hey Drew.” 

Drew turned to his boss, sitting in the office. "Hm? Oh hey!” He waved, still holding the tablet. 

“What’s up? Any updates?” Henry asked. 

"Oh nothing much, the animatronics are doing good, so, not really anything to report." Drew replied. 

Scott had just ordered something new with William's money, and was pacing around the room, hoping his friends would like the new package.

"You okay, Scott?" Drew asked. 

Scott looked at Drew with an awkward smile. "Uhh, yeah! There's just this order I've made. I wanted a jukebox for the pizzeria, but it's taking a while to get here. Hope they didn't lose it in the mail..."

"Surely not-" Drew reassured him. 

There was a heavy knock at the door. Then a ring of a bell. Rushing over, Scott discovered a large box at the door. He went to get the moving device so he could move it inside.

"There it iiis!" Drew declared. 

Scott moved the box inside, beside the main stage and stepped back. "Okay, uhh. When d-do you think we should open it...?" He asked. 

"It's up to you-" Drew told him. 

Scott suddenly felt apprehensive. "Uhh, tell you what? The owners can open it when they're ready..."

Drew nodded. "Alright- Are you sure this is a Juke? It looks a little... Big-"

Scott but his lip. He had a point. "Uhh, yeah. But aren't they always big?" He steps back, taking in the size.

Drew cleared his throat. "Not... That big-" he said. 

Scott chuckles nervously. "Well, tell you what: if they did mix up our order, I'll fix it later. Right now, I'm on break." He looked at his watch and quickly ran to the employee room to get his lunch bag. 

"Uhh... Okay-" Drew replied awkwardly. 

Henry grabbed the box, turned the box slightly, and pulled out some scissors from his pocket. He started to open it up quickly, but carefully in case this wasn’t the jukebox. He still needed to keep the box in case they had to return it. 

Drew raised his eyebrows. “Oh boy…"

Henry opened the box flaps and widened his eyes, dropping the scissors onto the checkered floor. “This…isn’t a jukebox at all…” 

When Scott finished his lunch, he came over curiously. Henry blinked and grabbed a note that was taped to the chair.

"Uhh, is anything the matter...?" Scott asked worriedly. 

Henry gently turned the box to the side to pull the machine out of the box. He pulled the chair thing out of the box. Then, Henry found a note connected to the armrests. He read the note aloud: “...Enjoy some laughter, motherfuckers...~Anonymous." Henry looked at Scott, super confused.

"Huh?! I-I didn't write that!" Scott reacted as he examined the note and the machine, struck speechless at the look of it. 

"I didn't either." Henry said, showing him the note. "And this doesn't look like any handwriting I've ever seen." 

Scott winced. "Not even William's...?"

"No..." Henry showed him the manic handwriting. "William's writing is surprisingly much, much neater than this."

Henry looked at the bottom of the machine. “Huh…It looks like some sort of chair.” Henry pulled the chair legs out from inside the chair and clicked them in. Then, he picked up the chair and placed the surprisingly steady machine onto the floor. 

He felt strange inside. “Is the information right?” Scott asked nervously. 

“Uhhh…” Henry looked at the information. “Yup. The address looks correct.” He replied. 

"O-okay.. so what does the chair do?" Scott asked next. 

Henry shrugged his shoulders. "I have no idea. All I know is that there's some sort of cable box here…and a switch." Henry said as he flicked the little switch up. The machine started to roar, before quieting down. Henry raised an eyebrow, before looking at Scott and Drew. "...You two seeing this?"

Scott nodded. "Uh, yeah..." 

Drew was busy looking at the different buttons and switches. “I’m seeing this whole thing very clearly.” Drew replied. 

Amidst his examination, Scott managed to find a remote in the box. He picked it up and examined it. It looked like a normal TV remote…except, a bit smaller and 3 sets of button groups: One group of buttons with single words on it like [paintbrush], [Q-Tip], [feather], and more. Another group of buttons with numbers: [1], [2], [3] and more. And lastly, there was a group of buttons with words on it: [Armpits], [belly], [feet] and more. 

Meanwhile, Henry was narrowing his eyes as he walked up to the chair. He sat down in the chair, and adjusted himself a little bit. "Hm...Surprisingly comfortable." The boss leaned back and sighed a bit with a small smile. Something in him felt like relaxing after his hard day of signing documents and writing paperwork. It felt good to just sit down and rest his poor feet. But there was just one little problem…he was still wearing shoes. Instinctively, Henry slipped off his slide-on dressy shoes, revealing the black socks underneath, and placed them onto the attached footrest. 

Meanwhile, Scott was looking at the instruction manual. Some of the buttons on the remote were circled in the manual. Assuming this was some sort of massage chair, Scott pressed the ‘on’ button. 

If you could believe it, Henry was reaching his arms up to stretch himself up and out right around the same moment that Scott had pressed the button. With this unusual coincidence, Henry felt something grab and grip his wrists. “What the-” Henry looked up and widened his eyes. “Uhhh-” He tugged on the cuffs. “Guys?” 

Scott gasped in horror. He must’ve done that! Whoops! Panicking over losing his job, Scott started pressing more of the buttons that were circled, hoping and praying that one of them was the ‘off’ button.

Henry yelped as he watched mechanical arms, some with feathers and some without feathers, grew out of the back of the chair like spider legs. “Scott- SCOTTYOU’REMAKINGITWORSE-”

Scott’s eyes widened. "AHHH!! I'm sorry!!!" He searched through the manual, flipping pages rapidly. 

Drew was just watching the chaos unfold before his eyes…and he was grinning. "This is adorable~"

The chair quickly sprang to life. Soft round brushes whirled around and settled into Henry's armpits. Henry gasped as his eyes widened to the size of saucers. He now knew EXACTLY what was going to happen. 

"O-oh goodness-" Drew reacted, slightly blushing. It didn’t take long for Drew to also realize what was going to happen.

A Q-Tip swirled inside of Henry's bellybutton as feathers danced around his stomach and sides. Back scratchers also appeared on the bottom of the chair, and proceeded to scratch at Henry’s exposed feet. 

“eeeeEEEEHEHEHEHEHEHAHAHAHA! WAHAHAIT- NOHOHOHOhohohoho! Hahahahahaha!” Henry bursted out laughing almost manically right away, wiggling around and shaking in the chair.

Drew dropped his jaw in shock. "Hoooooly cow-!"

He pulled and tugged on the cuffs, unable to do much except wiggle around and laugh himself silly. “WHAHAT IHIHIS THIHIHIS?!” He yelled. 

"Who knew an old man could be so vocal and ticklish?~" Drew reacted. "It's a tickle machine, silly!" He added proudly. 

Scott looked panicked and blushed. "O-oh dear!" He scanned the diagram for help. He pushed a button that said [retract]. It ended up retracting the other tools and replacing them all with soft feathers, going at the same speed. Henry’s laughter died down dramatically, leaving him to only start giggling like a little kid.

"I think that... might be better?" Drew said hesitantly. 

Scott looked utterly mortified, hoping he wouldn't be fired for this blunder. Quickly he pushed the manual into Drew's hands. "Uh. I forgot my reading glasses!"

Drew yelped and quickly grabbed the manual and the outside of the remote, as to not touch any of the buttons and make anything worse for his boss. "Oh shit- Uh- Okay-!"

Henry opened his eyes just in time for him to see Scott leaving. “Scohohott wahahahahait! Dohohon’t leeeheheeave!” Henry begged, trying and failing to reach out for him with his hand above his head.

Scott put his arms up in arrest in front of the door. "I'm still here! I just didn't want to make it worse!"

Henry shook his head. “Ihihit’s fihine. Ihihihit’s myhyhy fahahault.” Henry admitted. “Ihihi sahat dohohown in this thihihihing.” 

Scott shook his head, still panicking. "No. It's- it's really not!" He just couldn’t believe him.

"I can see if this can work-" Drew goes over, and starts turning off the machine arms one by one. 

Henry laid his head back as he breathed somewhat deeply so he could recover. “Thahat works great.” He said. 

"There we go. Aaaaand off.” Drew said as he stepped back. 

Henry lowered his arms back down, grabbing his vulnerable belly and sides. “Gohod…Who decided a tickle machine should be sent to Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza?!” He asked, still confused. “I need to know. Cause…” Henry looked like he was ready to throw hands. 

Scott stepped back. "I-I ordered a jukebox, I swear!"

Henry was slightly going red from embarrassment and anger. “Cause that-…That…”

Henry slowly started to calm down and…grew almost surprised. 

“…wasn’t that bad of an idea.” Henry slowly finished. 

Drew dropped his jaw while Scott widened his eyes. "Wait, what?!" Scott and Drew yelled at the same time, looking at each other before looking at their boss.  What did he just say?!

Henry looked at the tickle machine. “It…I don’t know…It felt better than I expected…”

Drew slowly started to smile. "Oh nice!" He reacted. 

Scott was warming up to the idea too. "Wow! Y-yeah, sounds fun!" Scott reacted. 

Henry bit his lip and started to think. “…Is it weird that I might actually wanna keep this?” Henry asked. 

He gasped. "You want to keep it?!" Scott asked, shocked and suddenly super excited. 

Henry nodded. “We may or may not get the jukebox, but…would that be a risk you two would take?” Henry asked. 

Drew nodded, wholeheartedly agreeing. “A lot of us do need to liven up a bit.” Drew added. He immediately started naming off other coworkers that might need the tickle machine. "Clint needs this, possibly. Ooo I could put A in here~" he reacted. 

Scott stepped forward to examine the machine, wondering if it was safe. He felt the armrests and the seat. They felt comfy. 

Drew turned and smirked at Scott. "You want a turn, Scooty Patootie?" Drew teased. 

The phone guy froze and blushed, quickly embarrassed by the nickname. 

Henry guffawed at the strange, but surprisingly fitting nickname. “Ohoho my god- Scooty patootie…that’s cute.” Henry teased next. 

Suddenly the chair sensed him and pulled him into the seat by itself. It strapped down his wrists to the armrests. 

"Oooh so there's sensors... Interesting.” Drew reacted. 

Henry widened his eyes. “And there's cuffs on the armrest too?!” He reacted. “Wait…if there’s cuffs above the head, then…why are there also cuffs on the arm rests?” Henry asked. 

“I-I don’t know.” Drew replied. admitted, watching Scott tug on his arms. “And it looks really secure.” 

Henry nodded awkwardly.

"I know it’s sOoO interesting. But can you PLEASE HELP ME?!" Scott begged, pulling on his restraints. 

"Mmm...Okay~" he turns on the feathers for…

He looked at the remote, and found a button that tickled his fancy right away: 

[Everywhere]

"Sing for me my little tickle phone~" The feathers immediately attack Scott. 

Scott only had a moment to feel shocked before he started laughing and thrashing wildly. "Eeeeeeeheeeheeeheeeheeeee!!! Stahhhaaahaaahaaaa...!!!" Scott laughed. 

"Awww how cute~" Drew teased. 

He squeals as the feathers get into his worst spots. "Naaahaaahaaahaaaaaa!! Haaahaaahaaaahaaa!! Nohohoohooot theheeheeheeeere!!"

Henry tilted his head. “Not where specifically?” He asked.

"Probably the bellybutton~" Drew told him. 

Scott was laughing too hard to answer. "Ehheeheeeheeeheeee! Naaahaaahaaahaaaaaa!!"

“I see…” Henry pulled out a little notepad and pen, quickly jotting down this important information.

Scott shook his head. It was unclear whether he realized what Henry was doing. All Scott really knew at this point was ‘TICKLES! LAUGHTER! AAAAAH!’.

Henry smiled and took note of the other ticklish spots that the tickle machine was specifically targeting. He knew Scott was going to kill him the moment he found out about this list…but was it worth it? Heck! Yes! 

"Just let me know when you wanna stop. Just say red-" Drew decided. 

“Right, yeah.” Henry hid his notebook. “Listen to your body, because we don’t really want you passing out on us.” Henry told Scott. 

"Yeah, and also because I'd probably cry- And we might get sued by Willie-" Drew warned. 

Henry shook his head. “The moment Will tries to sue you, I’ll just throw him into the tickle machine and let the machine, or Scott, decide his fate.” Henry added. 

Scott just kept on laughing, knowing he could easily take more tickles. Not wanting it to end…

Eventually, Scott called out the safe word. “Rehehed-! R-Red!” Scott called out. 

Drew stopped the machine immediately. The mechanical arms all went limp beside the chair. 

Scott breathed heavily as the phantom tickles kept tickling him. "Oh dear... Ohohoho my..." He giggled, wrapping his arms around his belly and pulling his knees up to his chest to shield himself more.

"Hehe sorry-" Drew came out from behind the tickle machine. 

Scott shook his head. "Hey, i-it's ok! Heh. You were being playful!" He continued to smile. 

"Aww! Your smile is cute~" Drew couldn’t stop himself from complimenting him. 

His face flushed more. "It is...? Heh." Scott muttered. 

"Mhm!" Drew stretched his arms above him, popping his knuckles. 

Henry smiled as he watched the two interact. Is it strange that Henry kinda shipped these two together?? Like, as loving boyfriends?

Henry slightly shook his head so he could start focusing again. “So:” Henry walked up to the tickle machine. “Anyone else want a go at it?” He asked.

Scott carefully got up, still holding his stomach and watching Drew with a smile. 

Drew reciprocated that smile back to Scott. "Eh, I suppose I should have a go, hm? It's only fair-" Drew decided. 

Scott chuckled. "Heh, yep!"

Drew walked up to the seat and sat down, suddenly feeling small compared to the chair. Weirdly enough, it seemed like the chair had noticed this height difference too…because the chair soon began to lower the backrest cuffs down a small bit so Drew’s arms could easily reach.

"Oh-! Th-thanks-!" Drew reacted. 

Scott grinned at Drew, holding the remote. "Now... What shall I do...?"

"Ehehe! Anything works!" Drew replied, blushing. 

Scott slowly scanned the remote and saw the [wild card] button. Putting his finger on the button, he looked up and said, "ready?"

Drew nodded. "Mhm!" 

Henry grabbed the manual and read over the machine manual. “…Looks like that button is like a ‘chance’ button. It chooses a random tickle difficulty on random spots with random tools.”

"Oho gohohosh!" Drew reacted, quickly growing nervous.

"Heh. Perfect!" He pushed the button, and out of the chair sprung various tickle tools. A soft hairbrush went in his armpits, a paintbrush targeted under his chin. Many feathers targeted his sides, with another paintbrush getting his belly. Foot massage brushes targeted his feet.

"EEEEEEEEEEHAHAHAHAHA!!"

He chuckled. "Is that good enough for you, or should we add something...?" Scott asked. 

"IHIHIHIT'S GOOOHOHOHOHOOD! EEEHEHEHEHEHAHAHAHA!" Drew replied. 

"It's about time someone made him laugh." A said, standing at the door with a laugh. 

Scott giggled. “Scott laughed to himself. "Hahaha, yeah!" He turned around and then widened his eyes. “Where did YOU come from?!” Scott asked. 

“I’ve been here the whole time.” A replied. 

Henry looked up. “Good evening, A.” He said. 

“Evening.” A replied. 

Scott hummed before turning around and continuing to keep watch over Drew, making sure he wasn't getting too exhausted.

After about a minute, the brushes changed places, some switching for new tools. Now there were feathers going along his neck, and in his armpits, paintbrushes targeting his feet and toes, and makeup brushes getting his belly and sides.

"EEEEEEK!!" Drew reacted, scrunching up his neck. 

"Heh~ His neck always gets him." A added, clearly enjoying the moment. 

Scott laughed more, holding his sides. What could he say? Laughter was contagious. "Oh g-gosh Drew! I-I'm sohohoo soohoohoorry!"

"IHIHIHIT'S OHOHOHOKAHEHEHEHE!" He soon shouts out the established safeword: Red. 

Scott hit the off button immediately. "You ok, Drew?" 

Going off memory alone, Henry sped up his writing so he could get all the tickle spots and percentages written down. He had forgotten that he was supposed to be hiding the book, and was only focused on getting it down. When he sped up his writing though…his writing became quite messy. Though he himself could read it, others may not be able to.

"Hehehehe yeahahaha." Drew said. 

Scott undid Drew’s straps and helped him out of the machine. Then, he looked over at Henry. "Hm..." He snuck up behind Hnery, and took a look over Henry's shoulder. "Whatcha writing there?"

Henry slowly placed the notebook against his chest. “Noooooothing.”

"Oh really?~" A asked suspiciously.

The phone guy reached out for it. "Then let us see…” Scott ordered. 

Henry bit his lip. He very slowly uncovered the notebook and showed them. 

A grabbed it and looked at the notebook. "My oh my~"

[Drew’s tickle spots: 

-Armpits

-chin

-sides

-belly

-feet

-neck]

Scott grabbed it and read through it, his face flushing more as he did. 

[Scott’s tickle spots: 

-belly button

-armpits

-feet

-sides

-basically everywhere]

"Uhh... W-what are you planning t-to do with this...?" Scott asked. 

Henry flushed a bright red. “…For…future reference…”

Scott stuttered more. "T-this is blackmail!" Casting a glance to Drew, he hoped they were on the same page. Drew nods, a smirk forming on his face.

A pointed at the floor. "I'll keep watch~" he said. 

Henry looked at Drew and Scott, sensing their mischief. He was growing nervous. “U-Uh…” 

Scott looked back at Henry, putting the notebook down. "You know, it isn't really fair. You know so much about us, yet we know so little about you...". Scott noted out loud.

“…Uh oh…” Henry muttered. 

The phone guy hoped this would work. He took a step forward, knowing the tickle chair was right behind Henry. Drew stepped forward as well. 

Henry started to walk backwards with his arms up in defense. “L-Let’s think about this!” 

"I'm thinking about it..." Scott hummed, stepping closer, his hands suddenly in the claw position. 

Henry yelped and tripped over his own feet, falling butt first into the chair. The chair strapped him in, using the regular sized cuffs for his wrists and ankles. Henry blushed nervously, realizing how screwed he was. “Uh oh! OH NO-” 

"Payback~" Drew declared, putting down the remote so he could get revenge. 

Scott wiggled his fingers. "Oh yes! This is gonna be good!" He touched down on his ribs, quickly skittering his fingers all over them. 

Henry squealed and giggled, wiggling around but unable to get out of the restraints. Drew soon joined in too, taking advantage of the fact that the tickle machine was stopping Henry from getting them back. At least, for a little while. 

Eventually, the two boys turned on the tickle machine so it would tickle Henry too. Then Scott, Drew and the tickle machine all continued to tickle Henry until he said the established safeword. When he did say it, Scott clicked the off button on the remote, and undid the restraints. Then, the two boys helped Henry out of the machine. After some discussion, Henry decided to put the tickle machine into a back room that no one, other than Henry, knew about. That is, until now. Now Drew, Scott, and A knew about the secret room.

Now, any two people could experience some tickles from the tickle machine during their break. One person would be advised to hold the remote, while the other sat in the tickle machine chair, getting wrecked to their heart’s content. Henry put up a typed note with the classic letter fonts that was on every 80’s computer. The words read:

[Get tickled with the tickle machine on your break! 

Rule 1: Have another person with you. 

Rule 2: The safe word is Red. Remember that so you don’t pass out. 

Rule 3: Have fun!] 

[ilovewhiteroses]

We Are Not So Different After All

Pairing: Clement Mansell x GN! Con Artist Reader Genre: Smut with humour Warnings: Sexual and adult themes, cursing Rating: 18+

After you failed to rob him and had to reveal him what do you do for a living, Clement realised the opportunities and asked you to join him and Sandy in their money making shenanigans...

You were at Sweety's bar and you saw a handsome man by the jukebox, cheerfully singing. The song was familiar to you and you also started singing and approached him.

"You have good taste in music!" he praised you when the song ended and another began. "I'm Clement." he introduced himself to you and you told him your name.

"Well, Clement, now that we know each other, would you like to have a drink with me?" you asked, gently stroking his arm, to which he smiled.

"Okay!"

You went to the bar and Clement asked Sweety for two Strohs. You noticed how good the relationship between the two men was and you asked Clement about it.

"Good ol’ Sweety and I have been friends for years."

“That’s nice.” you said smiling.

The hours passed and Clement started to get more and more drunk while you stayed sober as you just pretended to drink and poured most of your drinks behind your back. At one point, he took off his black leather jacket, put it on his chair and told you that he is going to the restroom. When he was out of sight and no one else saw you, you reached into his jacket to find money or a credit card. To your annoyance, you didn't find anything and when you put the jacket back in its place, you turned around and found yourself facing Clement, who was giving you a very angry look. Suddenly you didn't know what to say and could only gulp.

"What the fuck were you looking for in my jacket? Money?” Clement asked, so angry that he sobered up immediately. He put on the garment. "Bad news for you: it's here." he said and pulled out a small wad of money from the pocket of his dark jeans, which he put in the chest pocket of his jacket. "Look, if you tell me why you did it, maybe I won't make a scene." he said menacingly.

You were so mad at yourself for being so clumsy. You were forced to tell him the truth.

"Are you a cop?" you asked before confessing.

"No."

"Okay. Well, look. I've been doing this for years. I'm nice to people, I become friends with them and when the time is right, I steal their money." you felt embarrassed for having to say all this, but Clement's reaction surprised you. Just when you thought he was going to hurt you, his face softened and he seemed to look at you with understanding.

"Really?"

"Yes."

"Hm. So you're a con artist. Looks like we are not so different after all." he said, now smiling.

"What do you mean?" you asked him confused.

"My girl Sandy and I do basically the same thing. I give the idea, she does the job. She seduces men, and when we have the chance, we steal their money together."

You felt relieved. What luck! Your evening could easily have turned out worse.

Clement's eyes lit up.

"Hey, since we both do the same thing, wouldn't you like to join us? The three of us would get more money and, of course, would divide it into three."

You thought about the offer. You were good on your own and so far everything went well, but sometimes it was quite tiring to work alone.

"Alright, I'll join!" you said enthusiastically.

"Great! Let's meet here tomorrow afternoon, I'll bring Sandy and introduce you to her, and then we'll figure out the rest together." Clement said, rubbing his palms, barely able to hide his excitement.

The next day you went to the bar at the appointed time. Clement introduced you to Sandy, his girlfriend, who was already pleasantly high from weed and offered you too, but you didn't take it.

Clement sat you down at the bar while Sweety poured you all a drink.

"Okay, I'll tell you how we gonna do this. I told Sandy about you and she said she'll get you a job at the casino, which would be good because you'd be twice as efficient together." Clement said enthusiastically.

"Really?" you asked looking at Sandy.

"Yes. There is also a guy I am “dating” now, his name is Skender Lulgjuraj. He is Albanian and a real moneybag.” she said and Clement winked.

"I see." You started thinking about how you could work with the blonde girl.

"What would you say to Sandy and I flirting with potential candidates, getting them drunk and stealing their credit cards? You have to go for the cards, because there is more money on them than what guys usually carry with themselves in cash." you told him and her your idea, which they both thought about.

"I like the way you are thinking." Clement said with narrowed eyes and a sly smile, Sandy liked the idea too. "Okay, we got this. You go to the casino with Sandy and the job can start soon. Come on, let’s drink to that!”

Few days later, you found yourself in the casino in your waiter's clothes and you were taking a few drinks to one of the roulette tables for the guests. You looked at the clothes and accessories of each of them, because they revealed a lot about their wearers. When you saw that one of the guests was wearing a presumably real, expensive watch, you approached him and started flirting with him. When he got bored of the game, you asked him seductively.

"Would you like to party with me and my friend?". The man nodded so fiercely that his head almost fell off. "Okay, but let's have a drink first."

You went to the bar, where Sandy was already waiting for you. The two of you just pretended to drink, but after a few drinks, the guy could hardly speak and his thinking seemed to slow down, so at a certain moment Sandy took out his wallet from his suit, took out his credit card, and then put the wallet back as if nothing had happened. Once you were done with that, you called him a taxi and two security guards took the drunk man away from you.

Then you carried out another such action during the evening, and after work Clement picked you up and you went to the nearest ATM. You took as much money from both cards as was enough for you then went to Clement and Sandy's apartment, where you celebrated the first successful job together.

You continued like this.

You discussed with Sandy that you would rather rob three people during the night, after you made sure that the person had money. In most cases you were good, but were not always lucky. There were times when the person didn't want to drink with you, or it turned out that he had just lost all his money, or he got so drunk that you couldn't help but slap him to come to his senses. It also happened that a guy's wife suddenly appeared, so you were forced to retreat.

After a while, you collected so much money that Clement could hardly count it.

"My darlings, Daddy is very proud of you!" he said, being in his tighty whities and kimono and gave you and Sandy a kiss on the head. You and the blonde girl sat in front of the TV eating potato chips. Her phone rang, it was Skender. While she stepped aside to make a phone call, Clement sat down next to you on the couch and put his feet up on the coffee table.

"What’s up with this Skender guy?" you asked Clement, biting into a chip.

"He supposedly has a secret hiding place or room and I think he keeps a safe full of money there, then when the time comes, Sandy and I will rob him. You can come with us if you want to." he told you.

"And how long have they been together?"

"Maybe a couple of weeks."

"And they sleep together?" at this question, Clement was silent for a moment and just looked in front of him.

"Probably." you could sense some bitterness in his voice. Sure, the money was the motivating force, but you could see in Clement that he wasn't comfortable with his girlfriend sleeping with another man, no matter how hard he tried to hide it from you. "But hopefully it won't be like this for long and then we'll go to an exotic beach where we can relax." he said and rubbed your shoulder as a sign that they would take you with them, because without you they wouldn't have managed to get so much money.

It was good for you that they took you in and that Clement treated you as an equal, not like Sandy, whom he scolded for smoking too much weed and complained to you about her.

You wanted to talk to Clement about this, but Sandy just got back.

After another couple of successful money making actions, you and Clement were alone in the apartment, and Sandy was spending time at Skender's.

You were in bed leaning against the headboard and talking. Clement was again in his tighty whities, you were wearing a T-shirt and shorts.

He told you what he was doing while you and Sandy were busy at the casino. Of course, he spent most of his time at Sweety's bar, other times he negotiated with his lawyer, Carolyn Wilder, or went to rob a few people.

"Just the usual." he said to you and smoked his cigarette. This time you lit one too. "It's good that you don't smoke weed, Sandy often takes it too far."

"I tried it once, but I almost choked on it, so I've been avoiding it if possible, but the smell doesn't bother me." you said and you also smoked your cigarette and then blew smoke rings.

"See? I’m telling you, that shit is dangerous!” Clement said and you both laughed, then he suddenly put on a serious face. "Can I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"Would you sleep with someone just to get their money?" Clement asked, looking at you with almost sad eyes. You knew what he was thinking and you were glad that he asked, because it meant that he also wanted to continue your last conversation.

"No, I would never go that far, my dignity would not allow it. I'd rather get the fuck out of there than give my body for a stranger's money. I hope you understand."

"Yes, of course, and I appreciate your honesty." he said and put out his cigarette into the ashtray on the bedside table. "Look, I love Sandy, but not like I used to. Of course, it's good that we get money together and everything, but at the same time, it bothers me that she's also sleeping with Skender. To tell the truth, sometimes I get a little bored of her and I have the feeling that I want to be with someone else too, if you know what I mean."

"Yes." you nodded and put out your cigarette, then you took his hand. You were understanding and compassionate with him.

"Unfortunately, it's like this, you can't do anything about it. Just because we steal money from others we are human too with feelings. That's why I always worked alone, so that my emotions wouldn't influence me." Clement looked at you with wide eyes.

"Wow! I don't know when was the last time I heard such sensible thoughts. You can't really talk about such things with Sandy, not to mention she doesn't like the White Stripes. How can you not love that band? They are fuckin’ amazing!"

"Really? I love them too!” you told him, and then you started singing 'I Just Don't Know What to Do with Myself' by the band together, which was actually a cover. Clement had a surprisingly good voice, as you had already noticed during your first meeting.

When you finished the song, you both moved at the same time and kissed each other. You kissed like your life depended on it and you only stopped when Clement pulled off your t-shirt and shorts and you pulled off his underwear. It wasn't long before you were lying under him and caressing each other's bodies. During kissing your tongues touched gently, you playfully bit Clement's lower lip, then his neck, and you turned so that you were now on top. You reached down to Clement's cock and started stroking him.

"Hmm, look how greedy you are! You want my cock, honey? You want to feel it in yourself, right?” he asked in his sexy, deep voice and pulled you close by your neck for another tongue kiss.

"Yes!" you gasped, feeling the lust taking over your body and fog started to cover your thoughts. Clement reached into the nightstand drawer and cursed.

"Shit, I don’t have condom. What if we do it with the pull-out method?”

"Okay, just let's do it, I want you so much!"

You sat on him in a reverse riding position and put his hard cock inside you. You pulled your knees up and supported yourself with both arms behind your back. He clasped his hands at the back of his head and with a smug smile he watched you moving on him. In order to reach orgasm sooner, you touched yourself.

"Oh baby, you're so tight, ah!" Clement said, gripping your hip with one hand.

You were so consumed by desire that you didn't even care if Sandy walked in and saw you two fucking.

Your knees started to tire, so you pulled Clement out of you and lay on your stomach, raising your ass up. He took the hint and knelt behind you. He caressed your round butt with his palm, then he grabbed it and put himself back inside you.

"Oh baby, you're so good!" he said between moans and moved his hips in a fast rhythm, so much so that you could feel his balls slapping against your skin.

The bed started to creak from the intense movements and you were sweating like you had run a marathon. Clement waited until you reached your orgasm and then he too was getting closer to it. He pulled himself out of you and came on your back, you could feel the hot fluid dripping off you. He laid on his back next to you, and you spread your legs out and lay on your stomach, gasping.

"Should I wipe your back?" Clement asked with a chuckle, now satisfied and in a better mood.

"No need, I'm going to shower anyway. What…what are we going to tell Sandy?”

"Nothing. She doesn’t need to know about this." he said and leaned in for a kiss. "This should be our little secret." he winked at you and you smiled to yourself.

"We can do this another time." you told him teasingly. Clement raised an eyebrow, apparently liking the idea.

"When Sandy isn't at home, you and I will fuck everywhere in the apartment!"

[food-for-hungry-mtr-fans]

(Actual blog I use is pjunicornart. This is just my main account, the one that'll eventually host my Meet the Robinsons AU ask blog. Eventually.)

I've been wracking my brain trying to come up with an ask... and I finally came up with the most prodigious question!

What indie musical artists do you think the Robinsons would be into? When I mean indie, I mean indie-indie. I think because the Robinsons are so weird and idiosyncratic, they'd be all for listening to artists who aren't as well known as the main faces you hear about. Listen to new sounds, you know.

I'll start! I think Cornelius would be interested in Loveless and Mothica. Maybe a bit of carolesdaughter.

(Sorry for this ask being so poetic... I guess I was channeling my inner Rarity.)

I don’t know as many indie artists as I would like, so most of the stuff I like is popular with indie sound, so I don’t know if these really match.

Franny likes Cranes Wives - it’s probably the only music of that genre she likes. She has written literal analysis sheets on the vocals. Her favorite song is Acturus Beaming.

Laszlo has that one gay person playlist - Will Wood, Lemon Demon, Mother Mother. He unironically really likes Weird Al’s “Angry White Boy Polka”.

Wilbur likes PUP - and his favorite song is ‘Bloody Mary, Kate and Ashley. He tried to show this to Cornelius who kindly rejected it.

Gaston and Art both listen to IDKHBTFM. Gaston’s favorite song is ‘Clusterhug’, Art likes ‘Razzmatazz’. (The song).

Gaston probably also listens to some edgy rage music like 1 800 Pain or something along those lines.

Art likes Time Machine and Isle Upon Thyself from Hawaii P2 but doesn’t know any other song from the album, or the story.

Not really indie at all, but Bud likes Jukebox the Ghost. His favorite song is ‘Where are All the Scientists Now?’ He doesn’t really care about the theme of the song, but he likes the tone of the vocals and the pre-chorus.

Lucille likes ‘Dream, Ivory’ and ‘Jakob’ - who ARE really good indie artists and very different vibe from everyone else here. Her favorite song from either of these two is ‘Perfect Sweet Blue’.

Joe doesn’t share his music taste, it’s like a secret. But when he sits alone at night sometimes and watches clouds, he listens to Current Joys and Foxtide. His favorite song is probably ‘Televisions’.

Billy doesn’t listen to a lot of music, she just generally isn’t interested - but she likes listening to Joes playlist. She picked up an interest in Boy Pablo eventually, but not a strong one.

Tallulah is into Mr. Bungle! I know he’s not REALLY indie but I love him and i need to project that onto somebody. Favorite songs are ‘Ars Moriendi’ and ‘The Air-Conditioned Nightmare’.

Spike and Dimitri don’t understand music.

Lefty likes Dayglow. Nobody knows that Lefty listens to music, but he found the vinyl one day in the garage and listens to it to pass time.

[whatislovevavy]

Back again already with another scenario, I'm alternating between my accounts lmao. How would Jake react if someone started flirting with Mustang? Maybe one of the guys, because they don't know they're together yet?

I just love imagining Jake all territorial and childish, because someone's flirting with his girl, but he can't say it's his girl, because she's not ready to tell people yet.

Ok so I've also thought about incorporating this into the story as well lol but yes this is a very tantalizing thought.

Ok, ok, ok. This is kinda just a scenario that's been playing through my mind the past couple days. Tbh I can see it happening with a stranger or another member of the dagger squad. Hopefully, the muses let it satisfy:

It was a night of celebration. Everyone had come home safe and sound from the mission and Penny had opened the hard deck for Navy personnel only.

You got out your favorite sundress you packed for San Diego: a black soft fabric with lush pink roses gracing the fabric. You had forgone a bra and something special for Jake: your favorite pair of lacy soft pink panties.

From your knowledge, no one else on base knew about your relationship with Jake, with the exception of Rooster, Phoenix, Halo and possibly Coyote.

You both agreed to keep it on the down low until you both found a good time to break the news.

You'd been conversing with Halo as you watched Phoenix and Rooster go against Jake and Coyote in a few rounds of pool, the loser having to pay for the winners drinks.

Jake sent you a wink as he called the pocket and shot the 8-ball in, "and that's game."

Rooster and Phoenix's groans made you chuckle, as Jake sent you a smile as he went to the bar top to retrieve his and Coyote's winnings, as well as a treat for you.

"I'll be right back," you said to Phoenix as you made your way to the jukebox, while Halo went to talk with Harvard and Fritz at the dart boards.

As you looked through the disc collection for a Fleetwood Mac song, you missed hearing Yale approach you, lightly tapping you on the shoulder.

You jumped a bit, "oh hi, Yale, how's it going?"

"not so bad, can I get you a drink ?"

"sure, a beer would be great," you smiled softly going back to finding Rhiannon on the jukebox disc collection and pressing play.

As Yale returned, you only assumed he was being friendly. Those thoughts went down the drain as he complimented your sundress, his gaze focusing from where it cuts off around your knee to your framed breasts to your eyes.

You continued to make light conversation, playing the oblivious card.

"Hey, where's Mustang?" Jake asked when he returned to the pool table with two beers and a pina colada.

Phoenix only chuckled, as Rooster pursed his lips and pointed to where Yale was leaning into your personal space, not caging you in, but definitely too close for his comfort.

Jake's jaw tensed, furrowing his brows as his grip tightened on the glass of pineapple juice and rum as he watched Yale lean against the juke box more. Truth is, he couldn't blame Yale. You were as pretty as a peach and sweet like one too. He didn't know that you were very much taken, you both wanted to keep your relationship a secret for a bit longer. It made it more special and exciting.

But if more people on base kept flirting with you, he wouldn't last another day without having to fight or fuck you in front of someone, which ever came first

Rooster, Phoenix and Coyote only chuckled at his expression. It was that of a petulant teenager. A whipped petulant teenager.

"Bagman, you're gonna have to deal with more of this if you and Mustang don't make yourselves official soon." Phoenix playfully said as she took a sip of her beer.

"Ya know, I could say the same for you two." He snipped back, as Rooster choked on his beer and Phoenix shot him a glare.

Jake took a seat, but his eyes didn't leave your form. This sundress had to be his favorite and it didn't help that when you bent over, your dress left very little to the imagination. He knew you could handle yourself and-

Your laugh had simmered down and you were about to excuse yourself back to the pool tables when you felt Yale push a strand of hair out of your face as he smiled, "you know Mustang, since we're gonna be in Cali for a while would you wanna go out sometime ?"

"Yale, I really appreciate the offer and you're very nice but im-"

You heard a chair screech against the wooden floor as you saw Jake storm towards you and Yale in purposeful strides, jaw tense and eyes piercing.

"Hey community college, you mind if I steal Mustang for a few? Thanks." He said, not even looking at him.

"Jake, what are- put me down!"

Jake slung you over his shoulder, making strides towards who knows where, lightly smacking your ass to quell your protests, making your face burn bright red.

You couldn't believe he was doing this in front of your teammates and colleagues. How were you going to face them when Monday rolled around ? You looked up, seeing Halo and Phoenix's shocked but amused features, Rooster's and Yale's speechless face and the rest of the dagger squad's bewildered expressions. Luckily it was still loud and most people weren't paying attention, but still. You even heard a few whoops and cheers of encouragement.

You heard Jake push through the men's room door placing you down on the sink edge, checking to make sure the stalls were empty before locking the door.

You couldn't take your eyes off of him, his piercing eyes, straight domineering posture, the way his biceps flexed subtly as his hands flexed at his sides.

"Jake, I-"

He brought his lips to yours, growling, stealing the breath from your lungs.

"Princess, I'm gonna fuck you so hard that when I'm done everyone here is gonna know you're mine."

That was how everyone at the Hard Deck that night learned that you were Hangman's girl and the full range of sounds he brought out of you. And how the dagger squad pieced together that you were Hangman's special lady friend and you both were responsible for the uprooted felt on the base pool table. And how you got your favorite pair of panties ripped and "stolen" from you. And, lastly, how poor Yale found out that he wouldn't get that date with you, but you'd be sure to send him Halo's way.

___

So um yeah this is what I got tbh, hopefully it suffices. I feel the muses have served me well lol. Enjoy <3

Feel free to send an ask, my inbox is always open :)

Parts 1-4 of Mustang are up and more are on the way :)

Let me know if you'd like to join the taglist for asks and fics

[joaquinwhorres]

Tailspin - Part 4 (Fanboy Garcia x F!OC)

SUMMARY ››››› Having grown up just across the bridge from North Island, Carolina Alvarez has been told her whole life to stay away from the Top Gun boys. And for the most part, she has. That is, until Fanboy catches her putting quarters in the jukebox at The Hard Deck and initiates a game of cat and mouse that ends with her exactly where she swore she’d never be.

PAIRING ››››› Mickey “Fanboy” Garcia x F!OC

WORD COUNT ››››› 5,592

WARNINGS ››››› None?

MASTERLIST ››››› Here

A/N ››››› The moment you've all been waiting for. Unless you've somehow managed to avoid all of the spoilers I have on my blog about this.

She didn't respond to any of his texts.

His calls went unanswered too, the line ringing only once before routing to voicemail each of the three times he tried.

But it wasn't until the small Read 10:59 AM appeared on Bob's phone that he started to accept that Phoenix might be right. 

His face fell as he stared at the screen for a moment longer before handing the phone back to Bob. "Thanks," he said, the word sounding flat and hollow. 

The other man's mouth made silent attempts to form words as he accepted the phone, only stopping when Fanboy shook his head, relieving Bob of the sense of duty to respond. Bob sighed, pressing his lips together in a commiserative frown as he placed his phone upside down on the bar in front of him. "I'm sorry," he finally managed. 

"Jesus, he doesn't need your condolences," Hangman sighed loudly from where he lay across the leather couch nearby. The accompanying eye roll was practically audible. 

Bob side-eyed Hangman, his lips twisting in contempt.

"Oh, come on," Hangman scoffed as he rose into a seated position, throwing a hand out to gesture towards Fanboy. "You're acting like you just found out your mother died just 'cause some ex from five years ago who blocked you."

The words either didn't reach Fanboy or rolled right off him because his attention remained fixed on the phone in front of Bob. 

"I just don't get it," Fanboy murmured. 

"She's. Not. Interested," Hangman asserted, ignoring the warning looks from the other aviators. "Get over it or give up the dream that you're going on this mission." The blonde shook his head as he stood up. "If I stay at this pity party any longer, I'm going to start growing ovaries," he quipped, heading towards the door.

"Like you could handle them," Phoenix called after his retreating form. Hangman didn't slow down or even acknowledge her statement though as he disappeared out to the hallway. 

Bob shot Phoenix a smile as she shook her head. "Asshole."

"As much as I hate to say it, he has a point," Payback said gently from his seat next to Fanboy. "You've been off your game up there."

"I–"

"Come on man," Payback cut him off with a sympathetic smile. "I've seen what you can do. You were the best Wizzo in our class."

"I know," Fanboy said, hanging his head. "I just can't shake it." 

Payback pressed his lips together, meeting Bob's eyes over Fanboy's hunched form. The other WSO widened his eyes meaningfully, the loss for what to do written clearly on his face. Payback jerked his head in dismissal, and Bob slid from his seat, patting Fanboy's back once before heading over to Harvard and Fritz. 

With a quick glance up to the heavens and prayer for help, Payback scooted closer to Fanboy. "Look, do you still trust her?" he asked, keeping his voice gentle and low. 

Fanboy looked up, meeting Payback's eyes, and he could see that his closest friend here—the only one who knew just how little sense this all made—was approaching the end of his rope. 

"Yeah, of course." 

"Then trust that whatever reason she has for not wanting to talk to you is a good one." 

It was a solid piece of logic, easily traced back to the golden ring that encircled Payback's left finger. Fanboy could practically hear Neema's voice in the advice, reminding him that Caro had never done anything without a reason. While each of her decisions were explained with a breezy sentence or sharp quip, there had always been a thorough and conscientious thought process behind her actions.

But she had always offered up her reasonings willingly. They had never been so much as veiled, let alone something he had to pry from her. 

And it was that thought that led him to shake his head, eyes peering appealingly at Payback, urging him to understand.  "I can't," he whispered, the admission coming out pained and apologetic. 

Payback didn't have the time to do much more than sigh before there was a shuffling at the door that drew their attention. An administrative officer stood in the doorway, clipboard in hand. "Coyote, Payback, Fanboy, you're next." 

The three men nodded, Coyote using Yale's distractedness to spin a shot into the goal before backing up, grinning from the foosball table. Payback slid from his seat, clapping Fanboy on the shoulder as he did so. "Come on. We'll figure this out after we go make an old man do some push ups." 

"198…" Hondo counted, following it up with a loud, "Down!" 

Fanboy wasn't sure what hurt more: his muscles that had been battered from the flying and subsequent push ups, his ego at having Maverick continue to best them despite having no WSO or wingman, or his conscience for being the reason that Payback and Coyote were both sweating next to him. 

Because he couldn't stop thinking about it.

About that look on her face when he told her he'd missed her. 

About the stupid gray letters that appeared on Bob's phone. 

About the last time he'd seen her and how he should have just said it. 

"200!" Hondo announced. "You're good to—" 

The rest of his sentence was lost as Fanboy pushed himself up off the ground and onto his feet, taking off down the tarmac.

"Fanboy!" Payback called after him, but the backseater didn't stop, starting towards the building with more purpose than he'd even shown in the goddamn air. 

Ahead of him, Hangman grinned, the sun glinting off his golden hair. "You know, if you ever get her to talk to you, make sure to thank her for me. For taking out the competition." 

Fanboy's jaw set, his hands clenching into fists, but he continued on and into the showers, to wash away–even temporarily–the feeling of failure. But even the scalding water couldn't burn it away, and he emerged from the showers feeling somehow worse than when he went in.

"Fanboy." 

The sudden sound of his name caused his heart to jump in his chest, jerking around to see Phoenix's form waiting beside the door. She pushed herself away from the wall to fall in line with him. 

"What was that?"

He shook his head, turning back around so he could head towards the debrief room early for some peace and quiet before Hangman, Harvard, and Yale came down. 

"Hey," Phoenix called after him, catching up with long strides. "I'm serious. Calling the wrong break is the kind of error that gets you washed out of flight school."

Fanboy shook his head, looking away from Phoenix. He could still feel her gaze on him, insistent and intense. "I know," he mumbled. 

"Look, I've already got my hands full with Rooster; I can't have you spinning out too," Phoenix sighed, hand pushing at his arm to turn him towards her, finally getting him to stop. "So explain it to me–why is an ex you haven't seen or spoken to in the past five years so in your head?" 

Fanboy sighed, running a hand over his head, the short hairs tickling his palm. His eyes rested on a photo of a pilot grinning in the seat of an old F-14. 

"Because when I left, she loved me, and now she looks terrified of me. Something happened."

He chanced a glance at Phoenix's face finding the pilot staring at him with furrowed brows. "Five years happened." 

He shook his head. "It's bigger than that. I mean, if you're right, she blocked me a while ago, and I don't know what I did." 

"Maybe you didn't do anything," Phoenix shook her head. It was his time to look at her confused. "Maybe it isn't about you. Maybe she needed to block you to move on. Maybe she has."

The sentence hit him like a punch to the gut, knocking the air out of his lungs. It was a moment before he could breathe again. 

"But why wouldn't she just say that?"

"I don't know," Phoenix shrugged. "But you need to figure out a way to let this go and get your head on straight. We need you on this mission." 

Her last sentence was lost to him though because finally someone said something actually actionable.

He needed to get his head on straight. And that's exactly what he would do.

Renew Chiropractic was a six minute drive from base.

Six minutes.

For the past week, he had only been one well-timed traffic light or random turn down a side street away from seeing her on one of his runs. Instead, it took a Google Search and a four hour wait until his scheduled appointment slot. 

His head was still reeling with the revelation as he pushed open the glass front door, entering the serene chiropractic office. Everything about the room was meant to be calming: the soft jade color of the walls, the essential oil blend puffing out of the diffuser, and the soothing nature sounds bubbling from the speaker. Even the row of empty chairs along the wall looked more plush than one might expect from a doctor's office. 

None of it seemed to have any effect on him though, each muscle in his body still tense and on alert as he approached the front desk. 

A tall, thin black man with wire-rimmed glasses looked up as he approached, eyes widening for a second upon seeing Fanboy in front of him. 

"Hi, can I help you?" the receptionist asked. The middle-aged white woman sat next to him cast him a puzzled look before her eyes too wandered to Fanboy. She sat up a bit straighter in her seat, hazel eyes narrowed slightly as she followed his progress towards them. 

"Yeah," Fanboy said, stepping up to the desk. "I have an appointment with Dr. Alvarez." 

He offered them a hesitant smile, one that he hoped softened the edges of his obvious anxiety. Instead, the woman's mouth drew in tighter, dangerously close to a frown. The man next to her however schooled his features into professional sympathy. "I'm sorry, sir. Dr. Alvarez actually had to step out." 

Fanboy's shoulders sank under the weight of his disappointment. He'd known it'd been a risk using his name while making the appointment. A part of him had considered using a fake name, but ultimately decided that would cross the line into unhinged.  "Do you know if she'll be back today or this week?"

The man shook his head. "She didn't say." 

"Dr. Houten is still in and he should be finishing up with his last patient if you would like to see him instead," the woman offered, rising from her chair. "I'll just let him know." 

Fanboy took a deep breath, eyes floating to the open hallway behind them as he weighed his options. He could stay and waste his time getting adjusted by her colleague which meant he'd have to wait until next week in order to try catching her here again or he could just leave and camp out in the parking lot like a total lunatic—he didn't finish the thought. Instead, down the hall a door opened and out of it came Dr. Lane. 

The same woman who had spilled a drink on Caro that first night back at the Hard Deck. 

Who, when he asked during his physical, had scoffed at the very idea of knowing Caro beyond that incident.

Who now made eye-contact with him and clearly and solemnly said, "Shit." 

She spun on her heel, hands coming up as if to push someone behind her, but instead, the person brushed her aside, coming out and peering down the hall to see what had prompted the reaction.

Caro.

She was openly shocked, her eyes wide and locked on him. Dr. Lane cast a quick glance between Caro and Fanboy before fixing her own determined gaze on him, her jaw set as she started down the hallway towards him with long purposeful strides. She stopped next to the older woman who had freed herself from behind the receptionist's desk.

It took less than a second for him to discern what was happening, the piercing realization bringing with it an acute and sharp pain in his chest. They were barricading him from the hallway. They were protecting her from him. 

His face crumpled, brows furrowing and lips bowing into a frown. "I just came to talk," he said, his voice desperate and thin.

Dr. Lane shook her head. "You should head back to base." The words were technically a suggestion, but they sounded far more like an order. "She knows how to reach you if she wants to talk." 

Fanboy opened and closed his mouth again, eyes shooting over her shoulder to try to find Caro. She had come closer, reaching the trio now and laying a hand on the other doctor's shoulder. "Jas," she said calmly, gently pushing her to the side so that she could come out into the waiting room. "It's ok." 

The statement did little to pacify Dr. Lane. Instead, the other woman shot Caro a look that very clearly expressed her distrust of the situation. She didn't say anything though, allowing Caro to pass in between her and the Renew Chiropractic employee. 

"We can talk outside," Caro said, pointing to the door behind Fanboy. 

He nodded, leading the way out, pausing only to hold the door open for her before he headed down the path and out of sight of the glass front door. 

When he turned to face Caro, he found her with her hand stuffed in the pockets of her maroon scrubs, her face carefully and uncharacteristically impassive. 

"I'm sorry–" he started before Caro cut him off.

"You found where I work?" Her words came out even, dull almost, but he could sense the danger underneath them. 

"I tried to text and call, but–"

"But I didn't answer, so you decided to ambush me at my job," she finished for him, folding her arms across her chest.

"It wasn't an ambush!" he protested, his heart rate rocketing at the accusation. "I made an appointment. So you'd know I was coming." 

He watched her process this statement in real time. Her brow scrunching in the middle and corners of her mouth tugging down slightly. Her eyes slid to the right, towards the building, before snapping back to him. It was then that she seemed to see him for the first time—noticing that he was in his service khakis and the tension in his shoulders and maybe even the plea in his face for her to just give him a chance. 

Caro took a deep breath, audibly pushing it out through her nose. "Ok," she said, her voice having lost some of its edge. "I can give you fifteen minutes." 

Fanboy also breathed out a sigh of relief, eyes falling to the ground between them before flickering up to her. "You know, the website said forty-five," he attempted with a smile which faded quickly as her eyes hardened once more. "Sorry, yeah, fifteen minutes." 

Silence entwined itself between the two of them as they stood in front of her office building, both in their respective uniforms and both wishing very much that this wasn't how they were spending their day.

Caro was the one who finally broke the silence. "You wanted to talk?" 

"Yeah," Fanboy breathed out, hand coming up to rub the back of his head. "Yeah, I did." His eyes met hers again, despite the fact that every time he seemed to look at her, she seemed to grow even more guarded, even further away. "The other night at the Hard Deck…and then now…" he took in a deep breath before releasing it and the remainder of his sentence with it. "It just seems like there's something wrong between us." 

"I was just surprised," Caro shrugged.

"Yeah," Fanboy agreed, hating his masochistic need to push the subject. "It just seemed like more than surprise. I know it's been years, but I thought…you just didn't seem…I don't know…"

"Happy to see you?" Caro supplied, raising an eyebrow. 

He flushed at the accurate indictment of his own ego, and she shook her head at him. 

"What were you expecting, Mickey?" she asked, exasperation tingeing every word. "Me to throw myself into your arms like nothing's changed?"

The thought had crossed his mind more than once, but even he knew that outcome was more of a daydream, a fantasy, than a possible outcome of his arrival back in Fightertown. 

"No," Fanboy shook his head. "I just thought we were good." 

"We're fine." 

"Then why did your receptionists just try to keep me from seeing you? And why has Dr. Lane stepped in to keep you from spending more than five minutes with me?" 

He didn't want to know the answer to either question. There couldn't be a good reason–one that would get him back on track and restore his focus on earning a spot in the mission. Whatever she said was going to spin him out worse than he was already. But he had to know. Because if he left it at Caro's lie he would never forgive himself. Just like he already couldn't forgive himself for just accepting that the original plan for their relationship's end was just fine. That nothing had changed from the moment they made that agreement to his last moments of saying goodbye.

"They're overprotective," Caro supplied. 

"But they don't even know me." 

"They know about you. That's enough."

He grew quiet, and the urge he had to walk towards her, to close the space between them, died. Instead, he pulled back some, as if she had poked a finger into his chest the way she used to when she was mad. 

"What do they know?" 

For the first time, Caro was unable to meet his gaze, her eyes going to a large ceramic flower pot that lined the path. "They know I loved you and that you left and blocked me so I haven't seen or heard from you in five years."

"What?" His horrified whisper seemed to suck out all of the air and sounds from their surroundings. 

Caro met his eyes, and he could see the emotion there for the first time, thick and threatening.  "You left," she repeated, "And you blocked me." 

"I didn't block you–" he started, voice still wavering and almost soundless. 

"You did," Caro said with a nod. She took a breath in, and like that, the emotions fell back down into her and away from the surface. "It's fine, though. It doesn't matter anymore."

"It matters," Fanboy insisted, finally taking a step towards her. 

"No it doesn't. I'm over it." 

"It matters to me," he tried again, taking another step, but Caro tightened her arms against her chest. 

"It shouldn't," she said flatly. "Because it wouldn't change anything. You'd still have gone to Virginia, I'd still have been here, and life still would've moved on for both of us."

"Would it have?" He sounded almost as desperate as he felt.

"It did," she said, quietly. Caro ran a hand through her hair, looking over his shoulder and out into the parking lot. "Things are different now."

There was something in her voice. A distance almost as if trying to avoid coming too close to what exactly life had changed. 

A thought popped into his head, and before he could stop himself, the question was escaping. "Are you seeing someone?"

Caro's expression turned stony, and she straightened her spine. "What? You'll only respect the fact that I'm not interested in starting whatever it is you're hoping for if another man is involved?"

"No," he sputtered. 

"Then why does it matter if I'm seeing anyone?"

The pressure in his chest felt worse than any G force he had ever experienced. 

"I just–" he started, struggling to form a response that wouldn't further drive her away. "I'm trying to understand."

Her eyes fluttered closed in obvious annoyance, but he supposed the gesture was better than having her turn away. When she looked at him once more, she was still clearly frustrated, but her gaze had softened some.

"I'm not seeing anyone," she admitted. "I'm just older now. I have more responsibilities, and I can't—" she cut herself off, swallowing and then breathing and then restarting again, slower this time. "I can't do this again," she finished, gesturing with a finger. "I need something stable now."

He was able to nod twice before the weight of his thoughts caused him to just hang his head to stare at his shoes. "Yeah that's...that's fair," he managed. Quiet once more settled itself around them, ballooning in the space between them so he felt even further from her. "Could we at least maybe get a drink while I'm here. As friends?"

"Mickey," she said, gently. Too gently. "You know we can't be just friends."

A car door slammed in the parking lot behind him, pulling Caro's attention from him. The color drained from her face, taking with it the awful look of sympathy. Instead she looked horrified, like she might throw up or pass out. Or both. 

"Caro?" Fanboy asked, closing the space between them in two long strides. "Are you —"

"Mama!" A delighted shriek cut him off as quick and heavy thwaps hurtled towards them. He turned, watching with wide eyes as a little girl with bronzed skin and dark pigtails barreled towards Caro, only stopping when she collided with the chiropractor's legs, narrowly missing him. 

He was going to be sick. 

"Look!" The little girl demanded, shoving her hand up into Caro--her mother--'s face. "Kelsey painted my nails!"

Each little finger nail was a different color. Some a neon green, others a deep glittery navy, a sleek red, and a metallic purple. No two colors or textures were the same. 

"I see," Caro said with a nod, taking the girl's tiny hand in hers and tilting it back and forth to inspect each nail.

For a second it looked as if she might glance up to meet Fanboy's eyes, but instead she looked into the little girl--her daughter--'s face. 

"You know Bryson would probably like to see your nails, " she commented, releasing the small hand. "Why don't you go show him, and I'll meet you in there when I'm done talking? Then we can go home." 

The little girl looked up at her before suddenly shifting her attention to Fanboy, her big brown eyes peering intently at him, assessing. 

Evidently he failed as she frowned and then turned back to Caro, appealingly. "Um, what if you came with me?" Caro gave her a small smile, reaching down to brush hair out of her daughter's face. 

"Give me five minutes ok? You can ask Kelsey to help you keep track," she said, looking up to where the babysitter—Kelsey—hovered. It was then Fanboy noticed that she was staring between him and Caro, brow furrowed. She seemed to snap out of it at the sound of her name though, reaching a hand out for the little girl. 

"Come on, Dalia. Let's go show Bryson." 

The name caused all breath to escape from Mickey's lungs, and this time Caro's eyes did shoot to his, their gazes locking on each other. 

Neither of them took their eyes off of the other as the little girl reached for her babysitter's hand, letting the teenager guide her inside and away from Fanboy and Caro and the tension between them outside. 

"Dalia?" He asked, the repetition of the name more than just a question of whether or not he had heard it correctly. 

He was met with silence, which maybe should have been answer enough. Still, he felt like he needed to hear it, needed some sort of response, and so he attempted to ask again. 

"Is she…?" he trailed off, looking to the door the little girl had passed through just moments before. 

The little girl.

His–

He couldn't finish the thought. 

Because she couldn't be. They had been safe—mostly— and who was to say that she hadn't been with anyone after he left? And it was entirely possible that when he'd shared that name with her five years ago, both of them wrapped up in her sheets with his arms around her and her head resting against his shoulder, she had decided that she'd liked it too and wanted to use it herself for any future children.

But when he met her eyes again, he could see it all over her face. 

"Oh my God," he murmured. 

"Mickey, I—" 

"Why didn't you tell me?" he asked, heart pounding as the world seemed to spin around him, alarms whirring to life to signal that he was crashing. 

"I tried."

The words came out so small and quiet, it broke something in him. 

"What?" his voice cracked on the word. 

"Right after I found out. I tried calling you and texting, but nothing went through. I even tried reaching out on Facebook, and I was blocked." She spread her hands wide, shrugging.

It hit him then: he had blocked her. Right after he had returned to his squadron and gotten word of their upcoming short deployment. It had been too hard seeing pictures of her pop up on his feed. He wasted hours talking himself out of reaching back out and begging her to at least try long distance with him. He'd blocked her to protect her from any potential weak moments on the carrier. 

"Shit," he breathed out, stepping backwards. His hand going up to his forehead. He missed his curls, something to hold onto to ground him in reality.

"I–" he started before taking another breath and trying again. "Do I need to sign papers or something?" 

"Papers?"' Caro repeated. "For what?" she asked.

He lifted the hand from his head, gesturing to where his—Dalia had disappeared.  "For her."

Understanding dawned on her face as she offered a smile that made him want to scream just to dislodge the emotion caught in his throat, threatening to choke him. She shook her head. "You don't need to do anything."

"I should help. I want to help," he pressed, correcting himself. 

"Mickey," Caro said clearly, sternly. The same way he imagined she spoke to Dalia. "You're fine. Nothing changes just because you know now."

He breathed out a disbelieving, humorless laugh. "Everything changes."

"You're still in the Navy."

He sucked in a breath. Fuck. 

Fuck.

She didn't need to continue. Bringing up the Navy was enough, but she went on anyway, whether because she thought he'd need more explanation or because she wanted him to feel the weight of her world. 

"You're still stationed on the other side of the country. You're still gone in a month. You still have deployments and missions and wars and I don't want that for her." Caro stopped, and he could see the emotion back on the surface. It was everywhere from her eyes to her now slightly slumped shoulders to the desperate edge her voice had taken on. "I'm just trying to do what's best for my daughter here. You see that right?" 

Fanboy's shoulders dropped. "I know," he said. "It's just…I have a daughter, Caro. I want to at least meet her. Even if it's not as her dad." 

Caro was quiet, and he could see the thought turning over in her head. The tinkling bell of the front door opening interrupted her, prompting the pair to turn in tandem to see who was coming back out. Fanboy's breath caught hoping for Dalia to come bounding around the corner. Instead, it was Dr. Lane.

"Caro?" she asked. "I've been sent to inform you that it's been six minutes."

Caro nodded, offering a quick reassuring smile. "I'll be right in." 

Dr. Lane nodded, her eyes falling on Fanboy with a hard, assessing look. She remained standing, just off to the side, resolute. 

This prompted a softer, more genuine smile from Caro. "Can you let her know Jas?" she asked. The other doctor seemed more than a little reluctant to head back inside, disappearing with another sound of the bell.

Caro waited a second more, as if not entirely sure Jas was gone. Finally she faced him again, more relaxed than he'd seen her since he returned to San Diego. "I'll think about it," Caro assured. "Just promise me you won't try to come back here again or try to see her on your own. Please." 

Fanboy nodded, taking a deep breath. "Yeah, I promise."

"I'll text you. Either way, I'll text you, and we'll talk. Deal?" 

A sad half smile crossed his face remembering all of the other deals they'd made. This felt like the worst one by far. 

"Deal," he agreed.  

Caro re-entered the office to find Dalia standing on one of the chairs, peering over the reception  desk. 

"Dalia," she sighed, hand going to her head as her daughter's head whipped around. "No standing on the chairs, remember?" 

"Sorry," Dalia and Jas both apologized and Caro's eyes slid over to the auburn haired woman as her daughter jumped down off the seat.

"I thought you'd have headed back." 

Jas shrugged. "Thought I'd stick around just in case." 

"That's kind of you, but I'm fine," Caro said, heading forward to her daughter, wrapping her arms around the four year old's torso in a swaying hug. 

Jas snorted. "That has got to be the least convincing I'm fine ever." 

"I'm sorry, I didn't know," Kelsey apologized from where she had taken her mother's seat next to Bryson.

Caro shook her head. "You have nothing to apologize for. Thank you for dropping her off." She looked down at the four year old. "And giving her a fun day." 

Kelsey smiled as her parents came down the hall together, Dr. Houten giving his wife the same look he gave patients who came in after complicated car accidents. His eyes found Caro's, and her stomach dropped. 

"Are you ok?" 

"I'm fine. Really," Caro dismissed. "It was just awkward." 

"What was awkward, Mama?" Dalia asked, leaning her head back to peer up at her mother. Caro offered a smile.

"I got a surprise visit from someone I haven't seen in a really long time. And sometimes when you haven't seen someone in a long time, things are awkward."

"Oh." Dalia said, hanging herself forwards on Caro's arms. "Can we go home now?"

Caro nodded. "Let me grab my things from my office, ok?" 

She headed towards the back and Dr. Houten followed her. "Robin filled me in a little on what's going on. If you need to take a few days to sort this out, I can take your patients and we can reschedule the rest–"

"It's fine. Really," Caro said, bending over her desk to pick up her purse. "He won't be back."

He raised an eyebrow.

"He doesn't want to see Dalia?"

Caro looked up at him. "He won't be back here. I just–I need this to keep me busy."

He looked unsure, pressing his lips together before nodding. "Ok. But if it becomes obvious that you need time off, I'm not giving you an option."

"Thanks, Mark," Caro said, shouldering her purse. "Really."

He smiled, looking for a second like he might be tempted to give her a side hug before realizing that'd be even more awkward than a regular one. Instead, he laid a light hand on her back as if ushering her out of her own office. 

Dalia was straddling two chairs when Caro exited the office, her hands wrapped in Jas' for stability. The guilty look on Jas' face killed the reprimand on Caro's tongue, replaced instead with a laugh and shake of her head. 

"Ready?" She asked her daughter. 

Dalia jumped out of the chair, tugging her hands free from Jas'. "Can we get ice cream?"

Caro loved her daughter. 

She was so good. So easy all things considered. She wanted her mother and ice cream and fun, and she didn't need any complications to her life. 

"Hmm," she hummed, squinting in mock-thought. She could practically feel the excitement bubbling off of the four year old. "I don't know…."

"Pleeeeeeease," Dalia begged, skipping forward to wrap her arms around Caro, head tilted up to implore her mother with big eyes.

"Ok," Caro agreed, tapping her daughter's nose. Dalia let out a cheer, releasing Caro and bouncing off towards the door. 

It was entirely possible that more sugar was the last thing Dalia needed, but the girl apparently knew a thing or two about timing her questions. 

"You know," Jas said, sidling up next to Caro. "I like ice cream."

Caro raised an eyebrow as she pressed out the door, waving a hand to the staff remaining behind. "Is that supposed to be a subtle hint that you'd like to join us?"

"To be fair, subtlety is not my strong suit," Jas admitted, walking alongside Caro. "If you'd rather keep it just a mother daughter thing, though, I totally get it."

Caro smiled at her new friend before her eyes darted to her daughter about to hop into the parking lot. "Hand please, Dalia," she called out. The little girl turned and scampered back, taking hold of Cato's outstretched hand. "What do you think?" Caro asked her daughter. "Can Jas join us for ice cream?"

"Yep," Dalia chirped as she skipped next to her mom. Caro looked back at Jas with a smile. 

"You're in."

Next Chapter (Coming Soon)

[lolohe12]

In honor of Good Omens Season 2 coming out I'm sharing my Very long and ever increasing Ineffable Husband's playlist

Somebody to Love - By Queen: "Take a look in the mirror and cry. Lord, what you're doing to me? I have spent all my years in believing you but I just can't get no relief, Lord... Can anybody find me somebody to love?"

2. (You're The) Devil in Disguise - By Elvis Presley: "You look like an angel. Walk like an angel. Talk like an angel. But I got wise. You're the devil in disguise"

3. Rewrite The Stars - From The Greatest Showman: "No one can say what we get to be. So why don't we rewrite the stars? Maybe the world could be ours tonight"

4. Old Devil Moon - By Frank Sinatra: "Just when I think, I'm free as a dove Old devil moon, deep in your eyes blinds me with love"

5. Earth Angel - By The Penguins: Earth angel, Earth angel, will you be mine? My darling dear, love you all the time. I'm just a fool, a fool in love with you"

6. From Eden - By Hozier: "Honey, you're familiar like my mirror years ago. Idealism sits in prison, chivalry fell on its sword. Innocence died screaming, honey, ask me I should know. I slithered here from Eden just to sit outside your door"

7. Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy - By Queen: "Dining at the Ritz we'll meet at nine precisely (One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine o'clock) I will pay the bill, you taste the wine. Driving back in style in my saloon will do quite nicely. Just take me back to yours that will be fine"

8. Take This Waltz - By Leonard Cohen: "And I'll yield to the flood of your beauty. My cheap violin and my cross. And you'll carry me down on your dancing to the pools that you lift on your wrist. Oh my love, oh my love take this waltz, take this waltz. It's yours now, it's all that there is"

9. A Thousand Years - By Christina Perri: "I have died everyday waiting for you. Darling, don't be afraid, I have loved you for a thousand years. I'll love you for a thousand more"

10. Black Wedding - By In This Moment Ft. Rob Halford: "I would've loved you for a thousand years. I would've died for you. I would've sacrificed it all my dear. I would've bled for you 'Til death do us part. You were unholy right from the start It's a nice night for a black wedding."

11. Transatlanticism - By Deathcab for Cutie: "The Atlantic was born today, and I'll tell you how. The clouds above opened up and let it out... I need you so much closer"

12. All This and Heaven Too - By Florence and The Machine: "All this heaven never could describe such a feeling as I'm hearing. Words were never so useful so I was screaming out a language that I never knew existed before"

13. Sun and Moon - By Jon Walker: "I could have been a lot of things. I could have seen the world with broken wings. You're the only one who understands. Yeah, you're the only one who understands"

14. When The Day Met The Night - By Panic! At The Disco: "When the sun found the moon she was drinking tea in a garden, under the green umbrella trees in the middle of summer"

15. Still Into You - By Scott Bradlee's Postmodern Jukebox: "Can't count the years on one hand that we've been together. I need the other one to hold you make you feel, make you feel better"

16. Come With Me - By Chxrlotte: "And after six thousand years, if the world disappears I'd fight angels and demons to find you, my dear. I hear heavenly sounds in my head when you're near. I'm alright now you're here"

17. Halo - By Ane Brun: "It's like I've been awakened. Every rule I had you breaking, It's the risk that I'm taking I ain't never gonna shut you out"

18. Like Real People Do - By Hozier: " Iwill not ask you where you came from. I will not ask you, neither should you. Honey just put your sweet lips on my lips. We should just kiss like real people do"

19. Time After Time - By Iron & Wine: "If you're lost you can look and you will find me time after time. If you fall, I will catch you, I'll be waiting time after time"

20. Longer - By Dan Fogelberg: "Longer than there've been fishes in the ocean, higher than any bird ever flew, longer than there've been stars up in the heavens, I've been in love with you"

21. The Book of Love - By Peter Gabriel: "The book of love is long and boring and written very long ago. It's full of flowers and heart-shaped boxes and things we're all too young to know"

22. Heaven in a Place on Earth - By Belinda Carlisle: "In this world, we're just beginnin' to understand the miracle of livin'.Baby, I was afraid before but I'm not afraid anymore"

23. And I Love Him - by Benjamin Gibbard: Bright are the stars that shine dark is the sky. I know this love of mine will never die. And I love him"

24. You're my Best Friend - By Queen: Oh, you're the best friend that I ever had. I've been with you such a long time. You're my sunshine and I want you to know t hat my feelings are true I really love you. Oh, you're my best friend"

25. A Nightingale Sang In Barkley Square - By Tori Amos: "There were angels dancing at the Ritz. And a nightingale sang in Berkeley Square"