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medeaied · 1 year ago

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THE MERCY CHILDREN: A COMPREHENSIVE POST. i do mention the children in lillian's connections and bio - but given their centrality to the plot that meg and i have created, i figure it's only fair to write about the children themselves. this post contains mentions of miscarriages, post-partum depression, emotional neglect, emotional abuse and adultery. please bear that in mind while reading!

ELIZABETH EUGENIA MERCY ( b. january 1824; 22 in 1846 ). elizabeth is the eldest daughter of lillian and archie - and technically their only child when counting the paternity of the younger three ( unknown to archie ). having been born after five consecutive miscarriages, lillian had expected to feel overjoyed to finally be a mother - but unfortunately ended up with extremely heavy post-partum depression; and was unable to bond with elizabeth; something that was only worsened by lillian leaving her in the care of nannies to return to social clubs, gambling dens, parties and music performances when elizabeth was only six months. lillian has never truly attempted to bond with elizabeth, and to this day, is very disconnected from her eldest daughter. elizabeth was characterized as a "difficult" child. both archie and lillian were absent ( lillian by choice; and archie was often at work or dealing with her younger, needier siblings ); and learned to become self reliant and self soothing at a young age. when that proved ineffective, she would often act out in an attempt to garner some attention ( mostly negative ) from her parents; often stealing things from her siblings ( or johanna ), stealing small sweets from shops, verbally acting out, and bullying her younger siblings. while this behaviour mellowed out as elizabeth became a teenager, she has strained relationships with her siblings as a result.

elizabeth's relationship with lillian is as equally complicated. lillian views elizabeth as the source of her ageing ( something she is not ready to accept ); and worries that having children 'robbed' her of her youth and beauty. from a young age, elizabeth was ignored by lillian - and if not ignored, pitted against her sister victoria; or compared to her brothers, who lillian has a... better relationship with. in addition, lillian often picked apart elizabeth's looks and dress the older she got; nitpicking every spot on elizabeth's face as a teenager, remarking on weight gain and loss; et cetera. as such, elizabeth's self esteem and self image is quite low; and she craves her mother's unobtainable approval in addition to resenting johanna for receiving that affection from lillian.

currently, elizabeth is engaged to the young earl of wiltshire, richard butler - the are set to marry in spring of 1846.

VICTORIA LILY MERCY ( b. march 1826; 20 in 1846 ). victoria is lillian's second child and youngest daughter; and is the eldest out of her and edward's children ( unknown to archie; known to edward ). lillian did not anticipate falling pregnant so soon after elizabeth - especially given that she had also just made a triumphant to london's social circles, and found the sudden stop to her social life ( as pregnancy was taboo in victorian england ) stifling. again, lillian suffered from [post]partum depression during and after the pregnancy; and while lillian named victoria after herself, she still felt no connection to her daughter, and did not attempt to foster any connection afterwards, deciding that there must be a 'defect' with both elizabeth and victoria. while lillian did not make an attempt to bond with victoria, archie did; and out of all four of the children, victoria is his favourite. victoria was a bright and inquisitive child; always asking questions and interested in her father's work ( and she was never far behind archie, either ). the peacemaker of the family, victoria was often pitted against elizabeth by their mother - who used victoria as a 'model' daughter despite always finding some flaw in victoria's mannerisms, hobbies, and skills. while victoria's relationship with elizabeth is strained because of this, she is closer with her youngest brother, christopher - and the two are often in cahoots with each other. the easiest of the mercy sisters, victoria was johanna's chosen playmate - and grew up alongside her despite being a couple years older than her - though given turpin's wishes/plans, victoria never became a companion to johanna, and johanna did not become a companion to victoria as they matured.

as for victoria's relationship with lillian, victoria has been constantly ridiculed and very rarely praised by her mother since she was a child - like her elder sister, she has low self worth and is extremely critical of herself, and often doubts her achievements and goals. in addition, much like elizabeth, victoria also faced ridicule for any flaws in her appearance; with lillian comparing victoria to herself often and in a negative light; for in lillian's eyes, victoria ( and by extension, elizabeth ) will never live up to her, their mother. lillian claims that archie has spoiled victoria and made her to meek and self-critical, archie claims she is too harsh on the girl - victoria does not know who to believe; but she does wish that her mother was kinder to her, and will spend years attempting to win lillian's approval as well.

currently, she is being courted by the eldest son of the marquess of exeter, theodore courtenay.

ALEXANDER ELIAS WILLIAM MERCY ( b. november 1827; 19 in 1846 ). alexander is lillian's third child and eldest son; and is the second of her and edward's children ( again, unknown to archie and WELL known to edward ). alexander is lillian's golden child; and easily her favourite. while upset that she was once again pregnant when she did not want to be - there was one marked difference: lillian did not suffer from post-partum depression during her pregnancy and after birth. lillian was able to easily bond with her infant son; solidifying her belief that there was something wrong with her daughters that prevented her from bonding with them in infancy. while still an active socialite, lillian was present for alexander's developmental milestones, took an extremely large interest and role in his upbringing, and oversaw and managed his early education.

given his proximity to lillian, alexander was spoilt as a child; and denied nothing ( much to archie's exasperation ); he was often prone to temper tantrums when staff and his father would refuse him, worsened by lillian who was no better - and would either berate staff until they gave in, or throw a tantrum herself until archie relented. in addition, alexander was prone to tattling and snitching on his elder sisters to lillian whenever he caught them doing anything that might be perceived as 'incorrect'. this fostered competitiveness between alexander and his sisters; as alexander was constantly rewarded with affection and praise - he, in lillian's eyes, could do no wrong; even if he defied her wishes.

now, alexander is still spoilt - and archie firmly believes that the boy is a waste. having never been denied anything and handed what he desired from his mother, alexander does not enjoy being told no ( and his sisters wonder if he even understands the word ); and after finishing school as a child, has begun to study philology ( the study of languages ) at oxford. while alexander is intelligent, he is lazy - and can often be found partying or hungover; though he is the perfect gentleman ( usually ) in his mother's presence. archie, however, has threatened to cut alexander off from the family funds if he does not shape up; and intends to force him into the british navy as a way to ensure he does. this plan, currently, is unknown to alexander - who is in the beginning stages of planning his 'continental' trip to view the cities and wonders of europe with his fellow classmates - though it will become a glorified party trip if he has anything to say about it.

CHRISTOPHER ARCHIBALD MERCY ( b. june 1829; 17 in 1846 ). christopher is the second son and youngest child; and is the last of her and edward's children ( unknown to archie; known to edward ). like the three children lillian had before him, she did not plan to have him nor did she wish to be pregnant again; finding the state of pregnancy very difficult for her to navigate. even so, the pregnancy went well enough; and she found the birth no harder than any other. and much like alexander, was able to bond with christopher as an infant; and took great pride in ensuring his education and upbringing were the best that money could buy.

given lillian's ability to bond with christopher - and that he is her youngest child - christopher is the baby of the family; and receives the most amount of attention and affection from lillian, much to the upset of his elder brother, who was used to having lillian's attention and praise to himself. the brothers did not and continue to not get along; having vastly different personalities and aspirations. christopher, much like his sister victoria, was a quiet child who turned into a quiet adult; studious and eager to please. archie, having failed with alexander, also made sure to stay present with christopher; providing a much more stable foundation for christopher to grow up upon than his brother. christopher enjoyed closeness with both of his parents; and upon turning fifteen, he declared that he wished to follow in archie's footsteps and attend oxford law; going on to become a lawyer and eventually a judge like his father.

christopher was always the meeker out of the two mercy brothers - something that was not lost on lillian; who found it difficult to control alexander. when archie offered to mentor christopher, lillian took the opportunity to go behind her husband's back to christopher's biological father; who had much better connections and a larger network ( due to his own unscrupulous morals ), asking him to mentor christopher, as it was the least he could do for his son ( and it is to be noted that this is the only time she has addressed any of the children as his; first and foremost, all of lillian's children are hers. ) edward agreed - and since he turned fifteen, christopher has been mentored by edward in preparation to enter oxford, and promised a place in court if he passes the barr.

christopher, however, does not enjoy his time spent with edward. archie is a man who follows the letter and spirit of the law - serving with honour and fairness. christopher finds edward lacking in all departments, and has attempted to be distanced from this mentorship to no avail. lillian, noting that her youngest is the easiest son to control, also believes that christopher is entitled to his biological father's estate; and has plans to match-make christopher to edward's ward, johanna barker - plans that remain unknown to all three of them.

#CANONS. like a house in a whirlwind; and all aboard powerless to stop it.#can you guys tell i made lillian when i was still living with my mother as a child. <3 #she's my trauma pookie.

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vritualcreations · 1 year ago

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The Power Of Visualization

Powers Of Visualizations

Have you ever experienced daydreaming, where you just let your mind escape from the task at hand? Most of the time you daydream about what could be. Well, this is similar to visualization –the only difference is that daydreaming just happens; it is you allowing your unconscious mind to do whatever it want. Visualization is more of a conscious action, with structure and intention. The secret to a successful visualization is to fuel your image with all your five senses to make your image come to life, where you are fully entrenched in your feelings. Visualization plays a crucial role in most of the processes that you can use to influence and reprogram the way your unconscious mind thinks because its primary language is images.

Research shows that thoughts produce the same mental instructions as actions; mental images impact many processes in your brain, such as attention, perception, planning and memory. In other words, the brain sees no difference between the thought of an action and a real action. When you perform an action, some specific neural pathways are being stimulated and specific chemicals are being produced. The same physiological changes happen when you visualize yourself performing that action.

Mind and Body Connection

The mind and body connection is the link between thoughts and behaviors that allows you to use visualization to improve every aspect of your life. That’s why visualization is so important in practicing manifestation, where you can create whatever you dream about in your mind.

With practice, you can achieve what your mind can conceive.

If you realized how powerful your thoughts are, you would never think a negative thought again. You may not consciously have taken this on, but your unconscious mind is awake 24/7 and is always eavesdropping on your internal dialogue.

Deepak Chopra talks about the mind and the body in parallel universes. Anything that happens in the mental universe must leave tracks in the physical one. The cells in your body react to everything your mind says; your immune system will be brought down if negative thoughts take over your introspection.

Begin With the End in Mind

Stephen Covey talks about beginning with the end in mind to start with a clear understanding of your destination. It means to know where you are going so that you better understand where you are now and so that the steps you take are always in the right direction.

Successful visualization is to have the end in mind; you should visualize the end goal and not the process. The end goal should be pictured in as many details as possible, including all the senses:

What am I seeing?

What am I hearing?

What am I feeling?

What can I smell?

What can I taste?

The stronger the feelings, or the sensation of your visualization – the stronger your belief.

Repeat, Repeat, Repeat…

Your unconscious mind will accept the thoughts that you repeatedly practice, and over time it will accept them changing your mindset accordingly. This is how you create new habits or transform old habits and actions. Allow yourself to repeat 21 days consecutively, without missing one day!

This creates new neural pathways, new circuits in your brain and brings you into contact with new people, situations and circumstances. Thoughts are enriched with a creative power that designs your life and attracts to you what you think about.

This doesn’t mean that all your thoughts will come to fruition, only the ones that are fueled with emotion, the thoughts that are focused, well defined and repeated. By changing your thoughts and mental images, you change your reality and reshape your world.

Associate with Your Image

When you constantly focus on an image in your mind, every cell in your body is involved in that image. You vibrate and resonate with everything that is in harmony with that frequency, both on a physical and non-physical level. This frequency moves you towards the image; it moves everything that is needed towards you, for the creation of the desired image.

Visualization is simple — take five minutes out of your day to manifest. Close your eyes and imagine exactly what you would be looking at if the dream you have were already realized. Imagine being inside of yourself, looking out through your eyes at the ideal result. Remember to make your image come to life, use all your senses and be vivid with your colors and exactly what you want to be as part of your picture.

If you make this part of your daily routine, you will be amazed at how much improvement you will see in your life. Visualization is also a great way to identify what is going on in your unconscious mind – your outside world is a mirror image of the inside and hidden mental world.

#vritual world #content marketing #ceo

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theunholygrails · 3 years ago

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Foolish Games Part 2

Masterlist

A/N: Introducing new characters and some drama! Percy is still sexy as ever :'(.

Warnings: BJ

I woke up to a door slamming so hard it joined the symphony of my pounding headache. I groaned, hoisting myself over the back of the couch to investigate to intrusion. A brunette head of long sweeping hair rushed through the foyer, barreling towards the kitchen. A familiar mop of black hair hurried after.

Reyna was speaking so fast in Spanish my brain scrambled to keep up. I noted lots of curse words followed by a series of sentences too fast I was surprised she even knew what she was saying. Percy was answering in slow measured words, probably fighting a hangover of equal measure. I ducked behind the back of the couch, reaching for my phone plugged in on the coffee table.

It was noon. 2% battery and a couple messages from friends. Nothing from my ex thank gods. Five from Annabeth being nosey. I opened my uber app, squinting in the sunlight breaking through the cream curtains. I managed to get my driver secured.

A door slammed and I winced, peaking to check that they were in another room. I did not immediately spot my dress in the chaotic. I grimaced remembering the midnight swim. When I sat up I finally noticed the white tshirt I wore and the basketball shorts. And then I went rigid remembering what happened after the swim.

“Motherfucker,” I whispered.

Now I really had to get out of this house. I checked the arrival time of my driver. Three minutes away. Great. I made my way on shaky knees to the large wooden front door. My keys were still in the collection dish. I grabbed them quietly and turned the door handle a fraction of an inch before another door slammed open and Reyna came barreling back into the foyer, brown eyes landing promptly on my guilty ass. Behind her, Percy pursed his lips into a thin line and raised both of his hands to lay on top of his head. His biceps strained nicely against the thin t shirt.

“The fuck is this?” Reyna whispered.

“Nothing. Absolutely nothing,” I babbled.

“It’s just Noa, Rey. Gods,” Percy said.

“I can see that, Percy!” She snapped. I was glad her spear was not strapped across her back this morning. “Why is she sneaking out of my house in your clothes?”

“People were swimming last night. Her clothes got wet.”

“I’m sure the fuck they did.”

“Zeus, Rey! You ended it with me. Why does it even matter?”

“Because I still fucking love you! I’m sorry, okay?” She burst out crying and Percy instantly pulled her against his chest. The memory of being in those arms drove me out the door like a nest of hornets.

~~~~

“I’m just saying. You have nothing to feel sorry for,” Annabeth paused to sip her iced coffee. “Unless they get back together and then you sleep with him. But as of right now, you’re good. Trust me. Been on the Percy train. We’re still friends. You’ll get over it. Just a harmless rebound for both of you.”

I groaned, laying my chin on the cool metal table parked outside our favorite coffee shop positioned between our New York apartments. Just two Manhattan women enjoying their Sunday afternoon. The air was cooling as fall neared. I pulled my baseball cap closer to the top of my sunglasses.

“Should I call him?”

“Maybe tomorrow. Let him deal with his relationship drama. Reyna is a lot to deal with. Still nothing from fuckface?”

“Nope and that’s fine.”

“Good for you. We will hydrate you, get you a good dinner, hit the gym before work in the morning and then get back on our bad bitch mental track. Agreed?”

~~~~

“Good Monday, yogis,” I chirped from my desk at the corner of my studio.

The third class was beginning to trickle in and I was settling into my rhythm. Hot yoga was next and hopefully I would sweat out all the negativity I’d allowed lately. I was in the middle of emailing back a potential client when someone rapped at the wood of my desk. I glanced up to a blonde male who waved gently.

“Heya, sansei Noa,” he said.

“That’s karate. Can I help you?”

“Do you do trial classes?”

I hit send on my email and closed my laptop. The guy was built like a poser with the defined muscles and chiseled jaw but his voice was soft and tempered. He was clean shaven and dressed like a basic gym bro.

“Normally you have to schedule them beforehand because of class size,” I gave my standard answer.

“Right, my bad. Sorry. I was just passing by the front and it looked like the kind of place I needed right now. Can I go ahead and pick a date then?”

I was staring too long into his pale blue eyes, honed in on the polite response. A nice change from the daily demanding consumers. “You know what? Ive got space right now if you like? Have you ever done hot yoga?”

A brilliant white smile showcasing sharp canines. “My favorite.”

“Perfect. I just need a name, number and email to get you a file started.”

He leaned large hands on my desk. “It’s Luke Castellan.”

Before he could give the contact information, I cut him off. “Wait. I know you.” His tanned skin paled significantly.

“I…”

“You’re supposed to be dead!” I blurted out.

His eyes skated around the room and he leaned in closer. “That’s not supposed to be public knowledge. I assume you’re a demigod?”

“Luke, you trained me. We took fucking sculpting together. The Apollo table was right next to the Hermes one for fuck’s sake.”

He winced. I heard a murmuring from the rest of my class I was disturbing with my volume. I collected my shock finally. “Take a seat if you want. We should talk after class. I need to start.”

“Okay. Thank you. I’m sorry Noa.”

I waved him off and walked over to my yoga mat. I sat cross legged and drew in an even breath to smooth out my emotions.

It was a slow 30 minute class. Each pose and movement dragged on. Finally, I dismissed the group and nodded Luke outside. He was waiting on the bench outside of the studio I split renting with a few other instructors. I sat next to him, wiping sweat from my face with the towel slung over my pink sports bra.

“Alright, talk,” I said.

“Not much to say. I was given a second chance at my hearing. Here I am. Starting over.” A shrug of well-defined shoulders. The muscles flexed beneath his gleaming sweat. His red tank top stuck to his chest and stomach. “I wish I remembered you, truly. That time is such a blur in my life.”

“It’s ok. You were a lot older than me and to be honest I had a massive crush on you so I probably hid most of the time.”

A surprised smile slipped across his lips. “I’m assuming the betrayal helped you get over that?”

I laughed outloud, slapping his knee. “No shit! So where are you staying these days?”

“Just around the corner actually. Got a job at the local gym.”

“Yeah I bet the fuck you did.” I squeezed his forearm between both of my hands. I wanted to roll my eyes at me falling back into my school girl giddy at him. Betrayal of the gods aside. He was even more gorgeous than ever. The scar down his face gave him a dark sexy vibe. Like a bad boy even though he claimed he was rehabbing himself now.

“So how, did you feel about the class?”

“I mean, I’d like to sign up for it a couple times a week, that’s for sure. And I’d like to take you out to dinner to make up for not remembering a beauty like you.”

I almost bit my cheek biting out the response of “Yes!”

“You’ve got my number,” he said, chuckling quietly. “I’ve got to get to work.” He shouldered his gym bag and excused himself.

The bike back to my apartment was spent reliving my tween fantasies about bad boy Luke. I opened my apartment door and screeched seeing a man sitting at my kitchen counter. Percy turned to face me.

“You know you live in New York? You should really lock that.”

“It was!” I snapped.

A quick grin. “Yeah. But it was easy to break into.”

I dropped my bag onto the floor and brushed past him to get a protein shake from the fridge. “I have to shower and get prepared for my night classes.” I told him.

“I know. I’m sorry I didn’t call earlier.”

I shrugged. “I didn’t either.”

He paused, studying my face in the shitty lighting of the single bulb hanging between us over the counter. “Are we good, Noa?”

“Of course. What’s a little head between friends?”

“Okay…I can’t read you. Can you not play tough just for a minute?”

I chugged the shake and set the bottle down between us. I leaned my arms on the chilled counter, bun knocking against the light. “Honestly, Percy. I’m fine. We are good.”

“Reyna moved back in.”

“You’re engaged again?”

I drank from the empty bottle to give myself something to do. He watched me with those green eyes. He’d known me for far too long. He was nearly impossible to deceive, but I was determined today. The fact that I had dreamt of fucking him two consecutive nights was irrelevant if he was off the table. Even if his lips did look incredibly juicy tonight. Even if they had done near illicit things to me just nights ago.

“I don’t know. She said she wanted to work on things. And it’s her dad’s house, so I can’t ask her to go and I don’t want to go to my mom’s and admit defeat.”

“You know you could stay here, Perc.”

He worked his jaw silently, then rubbed his hands over his face. “Thanks. I do know. Even if we aren’t officially back together, I think we should work on it…” he trailed off.

“And not tell her about you eating me out?” I leaned closer because I was mean to both him and myself. Because I knew this top combined with this angle gave him a simple opportunity. And he took it.

His tongue slid out between his lips as his eyes flicked down, stayed, then dragged deliberately back up. “Probably not,” he agreed.

For a long moment neither of us said anything. He had more to lose now than me. We were no longer on equal playing fields. So, I left the ball in his court. “I’m going to go shower.”

I was done washing in the first ten minutes. The second ten was giving him a little wiggle room to decide. I had my hand on the faucet to cut off the water that was beginning to go cold when I heard the door creak open. I watched through the fogged glass, catching a hold of my breath. I watched as he tugged his shirt off. My stomach flipped over itself when he reached for his jeans. What had I done?

The opening door let in a rush of cool air, perking my skin to attention. My eyes raked unapologetically over his naked, aroused body. His dark hair quickly slicked against his stubble covered jaw. His eyes were no longer the sea green but murky like the deep water of the ocean.

“Hey,” he said quietly, cautiously.

“Hey,” I giggled, reaching out to touch his rough jaw. He winced, catching my hand with his. “We probably shouldn’t kiss again.”

“Sure, whatever you want, Percy. What can I do to you?”

He groaned, turning his mouth into my palm, scraping teeth against the vulnerable skin. “Touch me,” he said.

My free hand instantly planted against his chest, scraping at the muscle. His eyes fluttered closed, head tilting back to expose his throat. I slid my other hand into his thick hair, tugging it tightly between my fingers and pulling to grant myself more access to the strong column of his neck. I bit it first, backing him into the tiled wall when he shuddered. I kissed over the reddening skin and moved my hands to his flat stomach, feeling the shuddered breaths beneath my touch.

“Like this?” I asked.

His reply was unintelligible. I kissed down his chest, moving my hand lower still as I went. When my fingers brushed over the v-line of his hips, I shifted my route away from the center and to his thighs. An annoyed grunt escaped his lips. “Hush,” I scolded, getting my knees under me. The now cold water was hitting the back of my neck and flowing down my body. I placed my hands on the inside of both his thighs, trailing them upwards and upwards until he nearly contorted when I gripped him. He let out a scandalous string of curses that quickly turned to moaning silence when I took him into my mouth.

He unraveled in minutes and I let him cum all over the breasts I had teased him with earlier. I rose in front of him, my own rosy cheeks mirroring his. “Now we’re even.”

#percy jackson smut #percy jackson fanfiction #percy jackson #logan lerman smut #logan lerman fanfiction

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hintofelation99 · 3 years ago

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Hi! I love your posts and want to ask your opinion on something. Who do you think in the batfam has the most and the least common sense of a normal person? If you can, can you also list how they are arranged? Thank you!

Ooohhh, this is a fun one! In my mind all bats lack common sense. Like obviously they're hella smart, after all they are a family of detectives, they just aren't very bright.

Here's a quick rundown (least to most): Tim and Dick tie for first place, both lack common sense in just in completely different ways. Then Damian (mostly cause of the whole 'being raised by league of assassins' thing), Bruce, Cass (controversial ik), Steph, Jason, Duke, Babs, and last on the list is obvs Alfred. (Kate is probs between Cass and Steph, but I've only really seen her in the DCAMU and need to get to know her better).

And Ima add a 'keep reading' cause this is gonna get long.

Tim:

Tim is one of the smartest in the family. He deduced Batman's identity as a child, majorly fucked up the League of Assassins, and has been honored (I say this v sarcastically just btw) with Ra's creepy obsession. He's smart, plain and simple. However, when it comes to just day to day survival and being loved, goddamn that boy is dumb.

He regularly mixes energy drinks and coffee. Sometimes he even mixes energy drinks, alcohol, and coffee.

In his mind warnings are optional. "Tim, did you just sniff that drano?" "Yeah, why?" "IT LITERALLY SAYS DO NOT SMELL" "Oops"

He regularly tests shit on himself. "Why is Tim on the floor?" "He mixed joker venom and fear gas to see what would happen" "HE WHAT"

Also if you try to compliment him or tell him you love him he will find a way to misunderstand. "Tim, I love you and you are an amazing son." "I don't know who this Tim is but he sounds great" "It- it's you, literally you. Timothy Jackson Drake." "I'm a bit confused, I didn't know you knew two Timothy Jackson Drakes. You should really introduce us."

Dick:

Dick in many ways is a total himbo. He's a complete sweetheart, super supportive, and very ditzy. His ditzy-ness directly correlates to how relaxed he is. Chilling in the manor? Peak himbo. A mission in space? Absolute genius and amazing leader. Just took down a bunch of thugs? Slowly reverting into dopey boi. He always has the ability to be super analytical, smart, and big brain, but he likes being whimsical and even airheaded. And that's not a bad thing, it's just him taking mental breaks, being lighthearted.

"YOU PUT DIESEL IN YOUR CAR?" "...Yeah, in my defense the nozzles look basically the same" "They're different colors?! Also the diesel nozzle doesn't even fit into your gas tank, how did you get it in?" "I'm a good pourer."

He always responds to the word dick and it always confuses him. "God Ra's is such a dick!" "What?" "Ra's is a dick" "I'm not Ra's!" "Wha- no! I mean penis dick!" "Ohhhh, yeah he is a penis dick"

Once Dick is safe he reverts into himbo pretty quickly, even after stressful situations. "Hey Wally?" "Yes babe?" "I forgot how to change my lock screen again" "Dick, you just hacked into an alien spaceship not even an hour ago??" "What's that have to do with anything?"

Damian:

Damian lacks common sense from growing up with the League of Assassins. He's an amazing warrior and super analytical but casual human interaction alludes him. He is getting better though, so eventually he'll be lower on the list than Steph. But for now he's a senseless bby.

The first time someone tried to give him high five he assumed it was an attack and flipped them. Same with a fist bump.

This is complete canon but his original treatment of Alfred, his brothers, and, well, everyone. Like bby boy please read the room.

His ego can easily override common sense. Like he wouldn't jump off a bridge if everyone else was doing it, but if someone said he couldn't he'd immediately swan dive off that bridge.

Bruce:

For the world's greatest detective he can be a major dumb bitch sometimes. Some of it's growing up rich and some is being so wrapped up in his 'crusade for justice' that he just misses basic shit.

One time he walked in on Roy and Jason making out, the next day he saw them cuddling, then they mentioned moving in together. It took him three months to realize that they're dating.

He doesn't understand coupons, like at all. Jason has tried to explain them but Bruce just gets even more confused.

Bruce tried to make coffee once. He literally just poured coffee beans in water and microwaved it. He was surprised when it didn't taste good.

Cass:

Cass is similar to Damian in she lacks common sense from an unconventional upbringing. However she's learning way faster than Damian and depending on where in the timeline you're looking she might have more common sense than Babs.

Basic things like lines, turn taking, and speaking when spoken to aren't innate to her. Like, she knows and understands them, but often forgets about them.

There are many times that she blurs the line between civilian and vigilante because she'll do something that looks v stupid and dangerous for a civilian. The thing is she never notices when she does this.

One time she was in a restaurant and there was a cockroach on the wall across the room (cause Gotham) and instead of getting up and killing it like a normal person she threw her steak knife and impaled it.

Steph:

Steph is probably lacks common sense the most conventional yet slightly concerning way. She lacks common sense in the same way a cartoon character or sitcom character would. Like it's sorta realistic but at the same time damn bby girl why are you such a disaster??

She will do anything on a dare. Anything. There is a rule against daring Steph to do things while in the manor or on patrol.

Every time she hears someone say Red Robin she yells yum. This has gotten both her and RR shot.

Steph is v lucky that 1) she's a badass and 2) the batfam loves her because she annoys absolutely everyone just for shits and giggles and the only reason she hasn't been murdered is that Cass scares everyone.

Jason:

All common sense is lost when dramas at stake. Say what you will but Jason is the (second) biggest drama queen in the family. Also he, like most bats, lacks a sense of self preservation which leads to shit common sense.

He tried to steal Batman's tires.

Sometimes he listens to music during patrol and tries to hit people/shoot on beat. This has lead to stab wounds.

Jason loves to loudly quote classic literature while on stake outs. This is a problem for obvious reasons.

Duke:

Ok this is around the time you get to average common sense levels. But he still runs around Gotham beating people up in tights (or kevlar) so he doesn't get full points. Also he's still not Babs level common sense. One area Duke lacks common sense in is how to deal with the Batfam (which is v understandable tbh)

One time Duke was joking around with Jason and decided to steal a roll off of Damian's plate. This ended in blood.

Other than lacking Batfam common sense, most of his poor judgement moments are less notable but still concerning.

For example the time he challenged Dick to a hot dog eating contest then went on a roller coaster.

Babs:

Other than being a vigilante Babs almost has normal human common sense. However being a vigilante has negative side effects on ones common sense.

While Babs' sleep schedule isn't as bad as Tim's it's not a whole lot better. She's stayed up 72 consecutive hours multiple times.

She has accidentally poured coffee onto her computer instead of into a coffee mug.

One time she drank an entire gallon of milk before realizing it was a month expired.

Alfred:

Most assume that working for Bruce Wayne is a sign of him lacking common sense. But nah, it's him knowing, understanding, and challenging his own limits. Also it's him being a charitable human being. Like he has enough common sense to go around and tbh it's the only thing keeping the family alive.

"Master Bruce, you may not use Elmer's Glue All to close a wound."

"Master Dick I would encourage you not to teach Master Duke acrobatics on the glass coffee table."

"Miss Stephanie I would not advise trying to consume an entire jar of peanut butter in one sitting, and no, I do not care if Master Jason dared you to."

Tada, there's the list! Sorry that was probably a lot longer than anyone wanted, but I enjoy talking about how ditzy the batfam is. Like they're all geniuses but at the same time they're just sooooo dumb.

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dailydnp · 3 years ago

Link

British YouTuber, presenter, and author Daniel Howell offers a practical yet poignant look into mental health – his own struggles held up as a mirror for anyone else going through the same – in his book You Will Get Through This Night.

Written in conjunction with psychologist Dr Heather Bolton, the book is an amalgamation of Howell’s own experiences and Dr Bolton’s expert perspective combined to create a reading that feels like a personal attack in the best of ways, forcing you confront, embrace and then overcome your perception of your own mental health.

Best described as, “a practical guide to taking control of your mental health for today, tomorrow, and the days after,” You Will Get Through This Night takes readers through Howell’s mental health journey, wrapped in his trademark sense of humour and nuggets of wisdom that urge them forwards in their path to a healthier mindset.

Speaking to 1883, Howell describes what pushed him to write the book, learning to question his normal, how upbringing and culture impacts one’s perception of mental health, the role that a sense of humour plays in getting the conversation around mental health started and more.

Was there a particular moment that solidified your decision to write this book?

I think it was just realizing the power that every single person has to tell their story and break down the wall. Because with mental health, it’s the thing that every single person has a universal experience of. And yet, we all like to go, ‘I’m fine,’ when we’re completely having a meltdown on the inside and it was me opening up, not because I thought it was a nice idea just because I thought I had to open up about what I was going through with my depression, my sexuality. I went through 27 years of terrible mental health, without even realizing that you’re not supposed to be that way. It’s the idea that we all think we are broken, born in a certain way and doomed to feel that way forever, and that’s fundamentally wrong. I thought I’d like to write this book because other people may see themselves in it, notice that they relate to something, and therefore maybe there’s something about themselves that they need to work on. I literally I just wrote the book that I wish I could have read, because for me it was a struggle to even find the resources and the advice I needed.

You’ve mentioned in the book, that you never questioned your symptoms and that you were taken aback when the doctor said you were suffering from depression. But where there moments before that you started questioning this perception of what was normal to you?

I think it became my normal to feel bad all the time, which sounds dramatic but it was me. I thought it was all to do with my choices, age, environment and my job. But mental health is deeper than that, it’s something deeper and it’s something that you can actually have a positive effect on, which is what I wish I knew earlier, and it only happened when I got to a point where I was struggling, so much that I couldn’t even function day-to-day. In my mind, there was either nothing or there’s crazy. I thought you just have to get over your problems or you are totally crazy, which is so ignorant but that’s just not the truth. So, I went to a doctor and he said I think you might have depression and that is a real thing. And there’s lots that you can do about it. It’s about just understanding everything to do with how your thoughts and feelings work, the relationship between your biology and how you interact with the world physically. It was such a slow and painful journey to learn all of that that I thought, I’m just going to put it all in here and the idea is that for someone who picks up this book, they can go right in. I’ll put it up on the shelf and then when I need to read it, I’m going to pick it up and open it again. So, I just wanted to be super practical.

I really liked this quote in the book “breakdown can be breakthroughs”. So, when was the last time you can think of that a breakdown led to a breakthrough for you?

Every other week, like you know, all of us. It’s just human instinct to try and stick through it and ignore the problems especially with work. It’s a great excuse to lie, “ I know I feel bad but I’m really busy.” And it goes like that until things get way too intense. For me, there were moments where I felt I simply cannot keep going in my career or day-to-day life or try to pretend like I’m funny, until I deal with the fact that I’m gay. And though there was this terrible feeling like “have I hit rock bottom?” But the thing with any obstacle is that it stops you from going in the wrong direction and when you are forced to turn around usually it means you’re confronting the truth for the first time. Usually if someone has a breakdown, if you hit that wall in your life, that point where you absolutely can’t keep going until you turn around and something scary is going to be waiting, it means you’re going in the right direction. When you have these moments of confrontation, instead of procrastinating or running away, if you face it then it’s hopefully better days ahead.

Speaking of procrastination, you talk about burnout and the five-minute rule in one section. How do you strike a balance between not procrastinating and getting things done, but also not overworking yourself?

The human concept of work is very strange and it’s just one of those great examples of something that we’ve all brainwashed ourselves to see a certain way, to put value on certain things that are ultimately probably not great and inevitably lead to another dramatic moment of self-destruction and procrastination, which are both associated with so much guilt and shame.But in reality it’s not because I’m lazy that I don’t want to start this thing, it’s probably I’m terrified of starting this thing because I know that it’s important, I don’t want to fail at it. So, think of the five minute rule as ripping the plaster off, because it’s always the fear of starting. That was me, writing this book and feel like I’m not in the mood to do that, but then moment I start then I’d just write for consecutive hours. Again, it’s just snapping out of the mindset that you’re probably on, which goes I’m doing this because it’s important, and I have to do it. You probably don’t have to do it, you’re probably just running from something else. So, whether you are procrastinating, you think you’re lazy, or you’re telling yourself that you have to put up all of your issues to deal with whatever you’re busy with, you need to flip it around and look at it, not just from in healthier way but in more honest way. I’m not going to cripple myself with guilt and shame about procrastination but I’m not going to over work myself.

You’ve also written about how one of the worst things you can say to someone going through depression is to get over it. What’s the hardest of trying to get people to understand that it isn’t something you can get over?

I think you cannot underestimate how profoundly ignorant most of the world still is about mental health and that’s not people’s fault. It’s just that science, education and culture has just not been doing the right thing even if science recently has come a long way. We’ve got hundreds of years of stigma that come from. Breaking down the barriers, by being honest, with someone one-to-one is a great way to do that. And it just telling them “I’m not going to pretend that everything’s fine. I just want to tell you that, I feel that way.” And for a lot of people who say they don’t understand depression, anxiety etc, if just say I feel bad and I want to do something about it, people usually empathize with it. I also think lot of people want not take it seriously when other people say that because they feel like where was their help when they needed it? I think that the human nature is usually to feel almost jealous that someone else is asking for help or sympathy and they want to get better but you have to talk back to that voice and say maybe this is an opportunity for me to finally, be honest about how I might have been feeling the whole time. Because at some point you have to break the cycle.

Though you’ve said how you can’t underestimate how ignorant people can be, there’s a section of the book where you talk about how you uploaded your video, “Basically, I’m gay,” and braced for negativity. But that you were surprised by all the positive responses. So, what’s the most recent instance you can think of where you were pleasantly surprised by humanity?

Something that anyone that has to admit something, they’re going through and has in common, whether that’s something that’s come out as gay or someone just admitting that they’re just really stressed or feeling very anxious, is feeling like they have to constantly explain themselves. This is just an example of how you can be afraid of what people will say but when you’re really just honest about something that you’re going through, people usually relate to it on a day-to-day level. Whenever I talk to someone about mental health or sexuality, who may think its weird at first but as I describe my thoughts and feelings, they may relate to it even if they aren’t going through exact same thing as you. For me, a year after coming out and I still have that conversation on a daily basis. As a teenager, I had that deathly fear, that I couldn’t tell anyone because it would be terrible, but now I realize that actually most people are just scared. They aren’t inherently hateful; they’re just putting up that wall because they think that being vulnerable leaves them for attack. But actually, if we’re all vulnerable we’d be a lot happier.

Speaking of vulnerability, you touch upon your upbringing in the book and how it sort of taught you to keep a stiff upper lip. When did you start learn to be vulnerable and what was the biggest challenge with that?

Being a young British man, going to an all-boys school or the comedians that I looked up to on TV – everyone was so cynical. It was about trying to be as like edgy as possible and like act tough, and not show this vulnerability in case it’s seen as weakness. I think that I carried this perception all the way into my mid-20s, it seeped into every part of my personality. A lot of the stuff that I made, when I was younger, had this cynical edge to it and it was only when I started to get more followers from around the world that I began people started questioning that cynicism. At first, I’d go “this is British humour,” but a few years later, I just started to reflect about the way I was about myself and realized it was a bit more than a joke have, I actually started to let this self-hatred and the lack of empathy towards how I feel sort of eat me up. I think because only because of the people who have followed me over the years, giving me a reflection of who I am through how they’ve perceived me that I’ve been able to break free of my default programming.

About your sense of humour and how you kind of make sense of how you’re feeling through jokes, have you ever felt misunderstood -particularly given the cultural differences of your audiences you just mentioned – like you’re trying to make light of something that a lot of people suffer from?

Yeah, there’s a weird line and there’s lots of conversations these days about what you’re allowed to joke about. What the difference between talking about something, being comfortable with it and almost glamorizing it. But I think if the biggest problem with mental health globally is people don’t even want to admit that they’re wrong. And that they don’t even know that they were wrong. A bunch of people joking about how depressed they feel could be a good thing because they have at least taken the first step. So, I think it’s good that people can joke about things in a way that breaks the ice as long as they all know, in the same way that my book might make them feel very personally attacked that just behind that joke that you put up to protect yourself, there is something that you should work on. Even if it’s painful, that it will make you happier.

You mention celebrating small wins in the book. What win are you celebrating today?

I have just moved house and I have a toilet that doesn’t flush yet. But I managed to stick a coat hanger, inside the toilet and to make it flush. I just got my own toilet to flush, and for me, that’s such a miracle. It was a perfect example of how we take so many things for granted in life, whether it’s something huge to do with your health, the state of the world, your privilege. But I now have a flushing toilet and everything else felt easy. I can handle it because I got some perspective.

You also touch on the importance of inner circles in the book. , When was the last time, you personally reached out to bring someone into your inner circle and do you remember how you did it?

I am so awkward and awful at making friends and it’s something that usually, I’ll have one of those breakdowns where I go, “I have no friends.” The next day, I’ll wake up and DM people, out of every three people I DM two-point-nine will just ignore me and I will be very embarrassed. But then one of them will say “ yes, in two and a half weeks, we will go get a pizza.” And you only have to succeed a couple times ever to make friends that you hopefully will see more than once. I know from experience, it can be embarrassing, painful and not fun to try and reach out to new people but you just start adding one person, every two years until you have a friend group.

While working on this book, I know you consulted with a psychologist for it, aside from your lived experiences. What did you learn about mental health while looking at it from an outside, expert perspective?

I think one of the biggest revelations for me while writing this book is realizing how much of it isn’t a logical thought in our head. So much of mental health is controlled by our body, and the physical things that we experience. It’s about just how we breathe, how much light, and fresh air. And the problem is in our modern world, our brains are looking at everything as a threat. As soon as you realize actually, humans are not as complicated and mysterious as we think, we’re just little animals trying not to get murdered. It was freeing to know because that meant we aren’t born with this magically broken consciousness, that’s just doomed. It definitely made me look at mental health for what it is rather than the mysterious fog of pain that I thought it was for the last 10 years that I had absolutely no control over.

You’ve said that you’re obviously not done with your mental health journey, but where are you on that journey at this moment in time?

I’m doing a lot better than I was simply because I can understand what I feel, and why, and that it’s normal now. And I honestly feel like that’s 90% of it. Most people don’t ever question their lives. If they spend too much time, feeling overwhelming you stressed or if they worry too much and they’re just not enjoying life day-to-day. But just knowing that there’s something you can do about, it gives me enough hope. From writing the book, I know everything I can do to get better.

Finally, what’s one question no one has asked you so far that you wish you were asked?

I think it’s just how do I convince the other people in my life to take mental health seriously? I realized from writing this book and now, talking about it that the biggest problem I have is that most people simply do not think the conversation about mental health, or mental health, applies to them because they’re fine. So many people think mental health is only something for people that have crippling depression or serious anxiety disorder, but it’s just how all of us, think and feel all the time. If you have bad self-esteem, if you worry about everything, if you have a way of looking at the world that’s really negative and you expect the worst, then you might not need to immediately have an intervention with a psychotherapist, but you need to understand your mental health. Even if you read this book and say you are totally fine, then you still need to know this stuff so you can understand why you are fine. There will be a point in life where you need to make yourself feel better and mental health isn’t about waiting until you snap, and then picking up the pieces and going on medication. It should be about knowing how to keep yourself healthy and happy so that you don’t have a breakdown. Everyone has mental health, and that’s the thing that I wish I could just shove into everyone’s faces.

#daniel howell #danisnotonfire #dan #phan #mine #interview

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awesomerextyphoon · 4 years ago

Text

A Warrior’s Heart

Prologue

Main Paring: Stucky x Black!OFC (Ifekerenma ‘Ife’)

Warning: Graphic Depictions of Violence, War Crimes, Corruption, Smut, Mentions of Anxiety, Depression, and possible Panic Attacks

Rating: 18+/Explicit

Word Count: 1,461

Summary: Ife didn’t mean to have her employers be the subject of a hostile takeover by Stark Industries. She just held up the city of Novi Grad long enough for the Avengers to defeat Ultron. So naturally, Tony finds and blackmails her into joining the team. No good deed goes unpunished, huh?

A/N: This is my first long form (12+ chapters) story. I’m including characters and/or aspects from Disney’s Atlantis: the Lost Empire, Lilo & Stitch, Big Hero 6, Gargoyles, Inuyasha, and Toriko. Furthermore, I will be including elements of Netflix MCU and Agent Carter as well. Special thanks goes to @jtargaryen18 for the title. Reposting on any site without my permission is strictly forbidden. Reblogs are welcomed! 😊

Series Masterlist

Main Masterlist

Just keep the lie going.

That’s the line many of us have to repeat every day, and by us, I mean Non-Humans. Throughout history, humans have created myths and legends about us; some are true, others complete nonsense, but most are somewhere in between.

Let’s rewind a bit, okay?

Life on Earth lines up with most of what the textbooks say until about 5M BCE. Beings that would later be called gods and goddesses start to form with Mother Earth (the Amazing Gaea) as the focal point with other beings such as dragons, elves, and giants start to show two million years later.

The Celestials (sanctimonious assholes) came to Earth to see what’s happening after hearing about various fantastical anomalies (or that they were just bored). Gaea encouraged some (about 30K) of the human ancestors (Homo Erectus) to ‘the Space Gods’ direction. It took a few months, but they were able to create the species that later be known as Eternals. They also did some other shit but Gaea kicked them out when they wore out their welcome.

Around 200KBCE, the Kree (galactic genocidal nationalistic maniacs) happened upon a group of Eternals living on Uranus and traveled to Earth to ascertain whether other beings had similar potential. They experimented on a good number of early humans (about 150K survived) thus creating the first Inhumans (Inhomo Supremis). Several members of the Kree expedition tried to turn the Inhumans into weapons of the Kree Empire but were kicked off the planet by remaining Eternals and Non-Human factions.

Ten thousand years later (190KBCE), other early humans congregated around ‘magical hotspots’ which led to the births of the Homo Magi, Homo Superius, and Homo Animalis sub-species.

Soon after (okay, 15,000yrs later. Leave me alone.), the Mother Crystal (a semi-sentient comet, or Matag Yob) descended onto the island continent of Atlantis, imbuing the human inhabitants with longevity, knowledge, prosperity, and protection. At its height (around 55KBCE), Atlantis became the technological/cultural center on Earth (besides the Eternals).

It didn’t last long, though.

Five thousand years later (50KBCE), the first (and hopefully only) Pantheon War broke out. What exactly happened is lost to history (none of the people involved will fess up.), but what we do know is that shit went down.

Hard.

All that is known (admitted) is that almost all of the pantheons got into a Pantheon War (probably over some dumbass reason), a failed invasion by the Kree (really?), and the whole continent of Atlantis ‘sank’ into the sea in the span of three years (though some escaped).

Neat.

Fast-forward about 38K years (yeah, we’re making some jumps here) to the beginnings of the three most technologically advanced human nations of Earth: Wakanda, Sypavê, and Fetuilelagi; each with their own extraterrestrial metals/minerals.

Earth was pretty quiet until the ‘Christianity Dilemma’. So around 90CE, several ‘deities’ from the Greco-Roman, Norse, Germanic, and Celtic pantheons called for a Council of the Godheads’ to discuss ‘the ‘threat’ with Archangel Michael. It worked out well enough (no one wanted another Pantheon War).

Most of the world was in a pretty good state with a few ‘hiccups’ until the Bubonic Plague aka ‘The Black Death’ hit in 1346/7. It ravaged Eurasia and North Africa killing at least ½ the population and was seen as the start of non-belief in Europe. Worse, it was the beginning of Non-Human persecution and discrimination. You see, while the Black Death took out humans left and right, the worse a Non-Human got was a two-day flu. Many started to return to their respective realms once the Plague subsided and their once friendly neighbors started to accuse and persecute them.

The feeling of unease did not end but rather subsided. A tip from a Non-Human in Queen Isabella’s court alerted several groups in the Pre-Columbian Americas. Genocidal rapist, sex-trafficker, and all-around monster, Christopher Columbus does make it to the ‘New World’ (people were already there, dumbass) and devastated the indigenous population for centuries to come. By the time Columbus was executed in 1498, it was too late.

As many as 40 – 70% of the indigenous population was wiped out due to ‘virgin soil epidemics’ such as smallpox and influenza. Pantheons from negatively impacted areas called for a Council of the Godheads and demanded the ‘deities’ of the colonizers take action.

It went about as well as you’d think.

Earth was about to be embroiled in another Pantheon War until a few ‘level-headed’ individuals struck a bargain. No one was to interfere with human affairs whether it be good or ill. It was later amended to not have any ‘divine’ intervention (Sure). So by 1593, they had ‘bowed out’ of Earth affairs outside of their respective demi realms.

Outside of the matters of the ‘gods’, the rest of the world was dealing with its own problems. Tensions between humans and non-humans grew since the immediate aftermath of the Black Death. The Age of Enlightenment had started to pop up in intellectual circles across Europe around 1647. It focused on reason and free-thinking (Neat), but it also stoked up fear and anxiety towards Non-Humans (Boo!). Things came to a head in the 1670s. It got so bad that the Inter-Realm Parliament ordered all Non-Humans that weren’t exiled to return. They later founded the Bureau of Non-Human Affairs, BNA, in 1692 to deal with such matters in the future.

Two white-passing Non-Humans, Marcus Ashton and Jakob Schwartz founded Ashton & Schwartz Inc in 1809 along with a private partner. The company made waves in biomedical, chemical, agricultural, and climate science (they had to explain it to the populace) as well as pollution cleanup/prevention. One of their biggest inventions was a truly biodegradable plastic-like substance called biokivó̱tio or biokivo for short. The company made an even bigger impact with Non-Humans by solving issues pertaining to agriculture, large scale portal creation, and maintenance.

When the founders’ private partner decided to shut down the company in 1928, Ashton & Schwartz were a household name (especially since all major fossil fuel investments ended in 1900).

Barely ten years later and the threat of World War II rocked the planet to its core, especially the dropping of the Atomic Bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The war Council went behind current President Henry Wallace’s back and had them done on the same day, August 7, 1945.

Well, that got everyone’s attention.

The Inter-Realm Parliament issued an edict that every one of ‘age’ (biologically 18+) would have to spend at least five consecutive years amongst the humans. It didn’t take long for BNA to lay the groundwork.

Wakanda, Sypavê, and Fetuilelagi (who will now be known as The Unconquered Alliance or UA.) saw this as a ‘we need to end this’ type of situation. Within three weeks of the bomb dropping, they formulated a plan and got to work kicking the colonizers out of Africa, starting with Belgian-colonized Congo (80% of the uranium used in the bombs were mined from there). They also made a deal with British-colonized India.

Once they were successful in their test run, The U.A. moved forward with similar models until they were to liberate the continent in 1955. Meanwhile, Sypavian forces kicked out most of the Nazis that fled to South America and ended US/European influence in Central and South America.

The United States tried to play it neutral until The UA (mainly Fetuilelagi) freed Hawai’i from US occupation in 1951. The war was sold as “We must fight to preserve our freedom!” (Keep telling yourselves that).

Once both South/Central America and Africa were liberated, other colonized nations asked for their aid. UA agents/dignitaries offered to relocate Black people from the Caribbean, Europe, and the United States. As many as five million African-Americans took the offer, including former Howling Commando, Gabe Jones. By then the US was clamping down domestically through the FBI and local/state police.

Irked by the knowledge that the UA had satellites, the US jumpstarted the Space Race (they had more than a few satellites, but good for you).

As with most wars, both sides partook in some ‘questionable actions’ (i.e. Syria, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Cambodia, and Laos).

The war climaxed in 1977 when a UA (Sypavian) agent discovered plans for a super-weapon in the US. A Special Ops team led by N’Jobu realized that the weapon was a mega bomb that would’ve wiped out the African Continent.

After weighing their options, The UA came to an agreement with BNA: BNA would gather their most powerful Homo Magi and cast a spell to erase the memory and evidence of the war from every human outside of the UA in exchange for letting some Non-Humans live openly in UA borders.

They shook on it, unaware of the chaos that would follow.

Next>>

---------

Taglist:@opheliadawnwalker3 @sherrybaby14 @stargazingfangirl18 @hevans-angel @threeminutesoflife @cockslut-padalecki @golden-ariess @sapphirescrolls @holylulusworld

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squidproquoclarice · 4 years ago

Note

What’s Arthur’s recovery treatment like in Sunrise in terms of medically, because it was really interesting to see such a realistic view on how he would recover from the drastic effects of TB. And the way you wrote that the TB although dormant is always gunna be there with him for the rest of his life was a good other aspect to his character, and added to the strength he has, considering the stigma too attached to the disease at that time, and especially once you get to the last chapter and see how far he’s come from the first chapter, I was just like good for him. It was great.

Combining this with another similar Ask: “Can you talk about Arthur’s proceduree with the cactus? Just that him living one with those scars of treatment.. it’s great for the story”. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ So as I’ve remarked on his gunshot wound, I hate “Hollywood” medicine and how it gives us such an inaccurate impression of what treatment and recovery for something is like. It was important to me that I depicted the actual process of dealing with tuberculosis recovery realistically, both medically and for the period. I didn’t want to just skip ahead to three years later and go “And Arthur was well again”. I also absolutely didn’t want to go the route that I’ve seen of claiming “nonspecific magic Indian cure from Rains Fall” because holy shit, that’s exoticism-as-Other and racism. Arthur is badly off at the end of Chapter 6. His TB has run him down to the point where, combined with his fight injuries and hypothermia, it was too much for him in-game. That’s really not something you can sleep off for a few days or get rid of by popping a few DayQuil. Being as antibiotics were several decades in the future, TB was everywhere at the time of RDR2. It was one of the leading causes of death in 1900 America at 194 deaths per 100,000 people. To give you a comparison to another deadly communicable respiratory disease that kills slowly, leaves chronic impact to survivors, and has huge impacts to society, daily life, and public health? As per Johns Hopkins University stats, the current American COVID-19 death rate is 149 deaths per 100K. That’s how bad TB was. Tuberculosis wasn’t a guaranteed death sentence like people assume from the game. But yes, it was very likely. Roughly 1/2 to 2/3 of people who contract active tuberculosis die within five years without antibiotic treatment. Although interestingly, those who make it to 5 years in untreated tuberculosis then show a 60% spontaneous remission rate. So making it to 5 years was unlikely, but your odds got pretty decent at that point. Arthur's a resilient man who's beaten the odds before, so I figured it wasn't impossible for him to do so again. In terms of actually getting into the details of medical treatment, 1900 is an interesting point in TB history. It's sort of a transition point between two regimens of treatment.

The first is the post-Civil War "rest cure" (advised to Arthur by Dr. Barnes in St. Denis) of going to a climate thought to be more helpful to TB sufferers, and from there getting as much rest and fresh air as possible, and just hoping for the best. TB was actually a significant part of the Old West as plenty of people came westward for that supposed better climate. What the ideal climate was varied depending who you asked (hot, hot and dry, mountainous, forest, etc.), and spoiler alert: climate doesn't really affect TB recovery. Getting away from crowded cities was probably the more effective thing. That relied very heavily on patient initiative, though, and the ability of a family to provide any necessary care, as well as to uproot and move to another place. Obviously for those in poverty, not likely to happen. We see this with Thomas Downes, who clearly is poor enough that he wouldn't have had that option. Many didn’t. Many died because they simply couldn’t stop working, let alone move halfway across the country. There were a few sanatoriums/well-known rest places, but they were few and far between. After 1900, and increasingly after WWI, the notion turned more to TB as an issue requiring direct medical intervention rather than letting people quietly hope for the best. That led to patients often undergoing quarantine and a formal treatment regimen (which still relied a lot upon rest and fresh air) in either a private or government-run sanatorium. People went in until they recovered enough to show numerous consecutive negative TB tests and the disease had become latent, or they died. Some took years to leave, and some took years to die. This is the institutional phase of TB treatment, and it lasted until it got increasingly superseded by the antibiotic phase post-WWII. What I did with Las Hermanas was create something in that transition phase. It's a TB ward with a more structured treatment regimen, but there's not the strict bureaucratic oversight and total isolation of patients from family and the world that you see later. I did bring that notion in later in 1907 with Sadie seeing a poster in New Hanover for the new state-run Six Points TB Sanatorium advising that TB patients would be quarantined there. Las Hermanas' treatment is more the hallmark of a forward-thinking doctor. Felipe Garcia's trying different things in treatment with that mentality, and taking the unusual step of keeping families with patients (which wouldn't be the case later). It's something that worked on a micro level, but probably couldn't have happened on a macro level as a nationwide program, so Arthur and Sadie are lucky to have hit upon it. The total bed rest for a while to start to give the lungs a chance to recover is accurate to some TB treatments of the time, and also later. The treatment there at Las Hermanas does include artificial pneumothorax. Again, Felipe's a bit ahead of the curve. It was a known treatment at the time, having been reported, as he says, at an AMA conference in Denver several years before. It had been noted that spontaneous lung collapse (pneumothorax) in a patient actually had i,proved their TB, and the idea of inducing that collapse deliberately (e.g., "artificial" pneumothorax) got kicked around some. But it didn't really become commonplace as a treatment until post-1912 with Italian physician Carlo Forlanini "rediscovering" the technique and getting visibility for it--he'd actually been among its pioneers thirty years earlier. But the fascination with microbiological advancements, including Robert Koch's identification and description of the tuberculosis bacteria in 1882, meant it got sort of shelved for a while. Again, this increasing use post-1912 is also coinciding with the rise of sanatoriums, where controlled treatment regimens under a doctor’s close direction were more possible. Essentially what happens in classic artificial pneumothorax (AP from here on in) therapy is introducing gas--either air or nitrogen--into the cavity surrounding the lungs (*not* the lung itself) via needle and bellows apparatus. For video of classic AP being performed around 1925 in a patient in Chicago, watch the first 3 minutes of this video. It does a good job showing exactly what the procedure looked like, what the equipment looked like, etc. Side note: local anesthetic was definitely used in later years because being jabbed with a decent sized needle deeply enough to puncture your chest wall is not fun. It's very possible Felipe might have used it, as local anesthetic was a concept known and somewhat used at the time. It very likely would have been a localized injection of cocaine as more familiar, still-used local anesthetics like lidocaine and novocaine were years in the future. But, hey, for a cowboy game that's period accurate enough that it gives you cocaine gum, using cocaine as a local anesthetic isn't unreasonable. ;) The AP apparatus, once it was hooked up, put enough gas in there to cause enough pressure and force to induce a partial or full collapse of an infected lung. That would help rest that lung or that part of it from struggling to breathe, and also provide an oxygen-deprived environment that would help kill the TB bacteria swarming in the lesions and cavities they had chewed into the tissue of the lungs. Bonus: breathing on one or one-and-partial lung also probably generally obliged patients to rest more. For one quick set of statistics, 23 of 40 patients with lungs successfully collapsed by AP in 1913 showed dramatic improvement in their TB. So not a magic bullet, but a tool that perhaps upped your odds when done right. There were more severe AP methods also used later, including phrenectomy and thoracoplasty, but those wouldn't have been seen in 1899 in this case. The problem is that the AP gas pumped into the pleura would eventually leak out, or be absorbed by the body tissue. There's a somewhat vivid detail in Thomas Mann's "Magic Mountain", a 1924 novel about a TB sanatorium, of a whistling sound issuing from the AP hole. So the AP process had to be repeated at regular intervals, often called "refills", usually cited as about two weeks from what I read. AP treatment often continued after symptoms stopped, because they wanted to be damn sure that they hadn't treated only enough to just get ahead of the TB or that this wasn’t just a temporary up-cycle, and the disease was well and truly in remission. They confirmed this in later years with actual tests for TB at regular intervals to track that progress. I kept that two week refill schedule for Arthur, and also its effect on keeping him tethered to Las Hermanas for a few more years even after he has a more normal, active life. I think (?) I wrote him as stopping treatments sometime in late 1902, so roughly three years total, and two years post-release as no longer actively symptomatic. All in all, I wrote a treatment that wasn't widespread at the time, but would have been very possible with the knowledge and equipment available. I went the AP route in the end because I wanted to give Arthur more than just bed rest both for higher survival odds, and also because I think now-obsolete medical history in fiction is interesting. The effects are some of the things I noted in Arthur throughout Sunrise. Getting jabbed with a needle every two weeks for years is going to produce some scars on the skin. It would be a tight cluster given you wanted to place your needle very carefully, but they would exist. We see something similar now with "track marks" in those addicted to intravenous drugs, and I think I noted Arthur or Sadie remembering Swanson having something like it in his arm from years of addiction to injected opiates. Working on that one or one-and-partial lung during all AP refills also means that Arthur is incapable of really hard daily physical labor, even after being released from Las Hermanas. The lung capacity, and the stamina, just isn't there. That was one factor that impacted his ability to get a regular job, which has the effects we see in 1904 of them worrying about money. That's also because even after he's got two fully-inflated and working lungs in later years, he's still not 100%. While the lesions on the lungs may heal and send the TB into remission, they don't become healthy lung tissue again. They become scars that still would be visible in later years when X-rays became more common. So there's a lack of both flexibility to contract/expand and surface area for oxygen exchange that were there with healthy tissue. In other words, Arthur's lungs are permanently running on a reduced capacity. His stamina and strength and resilience are going to be affected. He's never going to be exactly what he was before becoming sick due to permanent effects of the damage, as well as just the fact of him going from 36 to 48 and thus just getting into middle age. If Sunrise was an actual playable game using the RDR2 system, I'd depict that as Arthur's Stamina and Health cores being permanently damaged and capped at a lower level than before. Probably down 3 bars for the Wapiti chapter and his first six months at Las Hermanas (due to the near-death status initially and then massive muscle and strength loss from all that bed rest), down 2 for the next six months at Las Hermanas and all of 1901 after his release, and down 1 for 1904/1907/1911 and the rest of his life. The other thing is Arthur can't be "cured" with the medicine of the time. That was pretty much impossible in the pre-antibiotic era given the bacteria could never be entirely killed off in the lungs. The best you could do was get strong and healthy enough for your immune system to effectively keep the ones left contained and inactive. So while TB survivors could live healthy, happy lives, they knew that there was always a chance that TB could always come back. Hence Felipe chewing Arthur out more than once for pushing himself too hard and risking getting run down enough for the TB to have an easier time gaining a foothold again. So his lifestyle's permanently changed in some ways. He learns to recognize the signs of approaching exhaustion, and having to back away from it and slow down or rest. Sadie's necessarily become attuned to this as well. Arthur has to learn his own limits for the sake of self-care, and I think that's not a bad thing given he'd never had any real sense of self-preservation before. He can't just keep pushing like he used to do, telling himself he'll make up for it later. He has to commit to taking care of himself for his sake as well as Sadie's well-being, because he knows she can't lose him, just like he can't lose her. He has to do it later for their children too. Recognizing that taking care of yourself for the sake of your loved ones is actually protecting and showing them love too, rather than selfishness, is a big step forward for him. I'll do the work to take care of myself so I can better be here for you, so I don't cause you the pain of watching me suffer or die, plus the emotional and financial and logistical burdens of my not being there. As first Anon noted, he and Sadie tend to keep hush about it unless they can trust someone, given the stigma associated with TB due to fear of the disease. At some points, Arthur has to wonder if this person knew the truth about him whether he'd be more of a pariah as a notorious outlaw or as a TB survivor. It didn't necessarily matter that the disease was latent. All people had to hear was "tuberculosis". So something like the fact Drew MacFarlane as the father of a TB victim himself not only doesn't stigmatize Arthur, but is willing to work around the TB restrictions, means a lot to both Arthur and Sadie.

#arthur morgan #rdr2 #sunrise ama #may the sunrise #writing #fiction #historical medicine #Anonymous #long post

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theuniversitychallengereview · 3 years ago

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UC 51.02 - UCL vs St Hilda’s, Oxford

So, here in the UK it is Freedom Day, the day on which all of the Covid restrictions that have been in place to varying degrees since March of last year were nominally lifted. I say nominally because some of them are still in effect, and some are still in effect in some situations and not others, but most importantly we can all go to nightclubs and grind up against sweaty strangers again, and even more importantly for the governing Tory party, we are all distracted from the fact that cases are in the tens of thousands again and more than half a million people have been told to self-isolate by the suddenly semi-omnipotent Test and Trace App (which is still forgetting to do a lot of the actual tracing).

And yes, I understand that the vaccine rollout has been very successful, and that hospitalisations are not rising at the same rate as the cases, but they are still rising, and with no barriers in place to stop them from rising they will just, continue to rise...? And then, having promised that today is the magnificently wonderful Freedom Day (on which the Prime Minister himself is self-isolating, ironically, after U-turning on the invention of a loophole which would have made him exempt from the vagaries of the App), will Boris have the stones to turn around and admit that all of his bluster was, once again, just that.

I don’t really know the answer to that question. All I do know is that it was so hot today that no one went outside anyway, making the very first Freedom Day a bit of a damp (though rapidly evaporating) squib. And with that off my chest, lets answer a different sort of question as UCL take on St Hilda’s College, Oxford in the second match of the 2021/22 series of University Challenge.

This is St Hilda’s fifth appearance in the Paxman Era of the Challenge, and their first since 2006, with their best ever result a quarter-final loss to Manchester in 2005. Manchester went on to lose to tonight’s opponents UCL in the semi-finals that year, and UCL would go on to lose to Corpus Christi in the final. They have been beaten finalists once more in the intervening years, falling to Manchester in 2013.

But that’s enough waffle, and I’ll not bother with the rules, so here’s your first starter for ten...

I was watching Love Island yesterday, and based on the one episode I saw I am confident enough to say that UCL’s Traeger has a hair style that wouldn’t be out of place in the Villa. Aside from this, I’m fairly sure there will be no crossover between the two shows (and this isn’t a comment on the relative low-brow or high-brow nature of the two shows, it is purely being done as the set up to the joke which follows, so prepare yourselves for that) unless University Challenge introduces a surprise segment in which the contestants have to dress up as cats and mice and snog each other while scantily clad (though it is Freedom Day, so anything could happen).

St Hilda’s take the first starter of the night through their captain Dionisio, and take a few from the first bonus set, though they do not know that Thomas the Tank Engine was set in Sodor, which Paxman pronounces (to my ear) oddly. UCL hit back with the next two starters and go thirty points clear.

The first picture round is translations of the titles of Shakespeare plays, a topic I always find to be a terrible waste of the picture category. I understand there is still a problem solving element to it, but there are so many other types of question which utilise the format better. And there are enough questions about Shakespeare anyway.

St Hilda’s Bennett guesses an Agatha Christie novel for the next starter and gets ten points for his trouble, but he can only manage one bonus on football clubs who have won all four English leagues. Someone negs and we are even at fifty five points apiece, before Bennett takes his second of the evening to give St Hilda’s the lead again.

Kiso recognises Rachmaninoff’s second piano concerto after about two seconds of the music round, and is very pleased with himself (as well he should be). They only get one bonus but close to within five points. Pal gets Markov for the next starter (I’d initially typed the name out as Markoff and had an extensive riff on the fact that it might have been the first set of consecutive starters to have answers which ended with off, but obviously that’s redundant now so I can’t use any of it...).

Aided perhaps by their unicorn mascot (which I have just at this moment noticed), St Hilda’s go on a run which puts them sixty points clear going in to the second picture round. The picture starter is an actual picture this time, and goes to UCL’s Traeger, though Paxman is needlessly bitchy about his pronunciation of Ratched (as in Nurse Ratched). If the Londoners can go on a run now they might have a chance.

Fleming gives Yorkshire for the next starter, then corrects to West Yorkshire when prompted, and UCL close back to within fifteen points! A neg from Bennett cuts this to ten, and a correct answer from Maka eliminates it entirely. The scores are tied at 120 with a few minutes left. A distinct lack of knowledge on Pakistani geography leaves the score exactly the same after the bonus questions.

Making up for his premature buzz last time out, Bennett correctly identifies the oystercatcher from Paxman’s description, and St Hilda’s are once more in control. Two bonuses put them twenty clear.

An early buzz from Kiso, in which he frantically corrects Chinese to Mandarin Chinese gives UCL a chance. They maintain this urgency into the bonuses, with Kiso again interrupting Paxman to nominate Traeger, who is right, Five points in it. As the gong sounds they give answer, but they are wrong. Who knows whether it would have counted had they been right...

Final Score: UCL 135 - 140 St Hilda’s

Not that high-scoring a match, but more so than last week’s and even closer! This was great fun, and the two teams looked like they were enjoying themselves. There is a chance UCL come back as a high-scoring loser, but it is by no means guaranteed. See you next week for another first round match

#university challenge #bbc2 #st hildas #oxford #ucl #jeremy paxman #quizzy mondays

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academiaandarson · 4 years ago

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I am just so annoyed and frustrated.

The amount of pressure to score well is getting to me. I have been under performing in so many consecutive tests that I feel like i might actually flunk my finals.

And there are talks of my boards getting preponed... So that's fucked.

And then there are more rumours of my boards getting postponed which means I won't be able to prepare that well for clat either.

This feels like The whole universe is telling me that there are zero chances of me ever having things my way. Besides, I have put in weight due to this stress and so I am dealing with constant fat shaming from my nosy teachers.

My parents are equally stressed, so I have to hear them vent and spill out all their negative thoughts of my failing, never amounting to anything, stying home and becoming one of those aunties who blame others for their own shortcomings.

I just want to get out of here. I feel like I'm suffocating and I hate this.

I can't breathe or even smile anymore, I am constantly on the edge of tears and I hate this.

I hate this. I hate this.

Just Thirty five days to go. (I hope)

#Rant #Schools #Finals #Under pressure #Stress #Fat shaming

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treeni · 4 years ago

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For Your Entertainment

Day 4 - There is a trail of color only you can see that marks out where your soulmate has been. (I know its late, I forgot to post here)

Prinxieceit

Wordcount: 5688

TW: Swearing, I may have to accept swearing’s a default of my writing and not swearing is the abnormal. Heights. Abusive past (sad but not graphic) Non cannon blind character, (Avatar-esque level jokes about said blindness (think Toph)) mentions character experiencing homophobia and disable-phobia. Crime?

Summary: If you were lucky, the world would be suddenly bathed in color at sunset or sunrise. Trails of colors left by your soulmate suddenly appear. For the first time, Roman was seeing the colors he had heard so much about in storybooks, that he’d heard even Remus talk about. Finally, finally he was on a quest to follow them.

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Roman took a deep breath. In slowly, hold, and breathe out. He stared down at the crowd of what had to be a couple thousand people, maybe more. The bright lights obscured him from being able to truly take stock even from his position so high up. He rocked on his feet once, the nervous energy still shaking his knees just slightly.

And then he jumped.

Roman arched his back and stretched his legs forward with pointed toes to pick up speed quickly, his white leotard stretched familiarly with his movements like a second skin. The shimmering red accents caught the light and the audience gasped as he let one hand move from the aerial swing to pose for the cameras as Remus mirrored his movements in his own black and green leotard while swinging the opposite direction.

The biggest difference between the twins in their joint performances was that while Roman’s face was always a neutral and calm mask of concentration, Remus face was invariably stretched in a huge, toothy grin as he gave into the freedom and adrenaline rush of their careers. He truly was in his element whenever they practiced or performed. Roman? Less so. It’s not that he didn’t like it, he loved the crowds, the reactions of the audience gasping, and awing at their every trick, it’s just... he wanted something more. Something a little less mindless, something he could get lost in the way his brother lost himself in the rush. Maybe singing? Or acting? Or both? Maybe he could bring it up to their ringmaster sometime?

Remy was open for ideas wasn’t he?

Maybe going to his husband Emile about it first would be safer.

The performance was a constant back and forth between the twins, one brother constantly grabbing hold of the other brother and swinging them into the air, then catching them again on their decent. The had to be in perfect sync and over the years the two learned to read each other’s body language as easily as an open book. Or a hidden diary in Remus’ case. Several minutes in with a head rush of seemingly countless tricks and Roman felt like he was settling into the groove of the performance. He was amping up for the big show stopper soon and shook his metallic gold cuff at his brother, catching the light just so in order to signal for him to get ready. Just in time too it seemed, as a blinking stage light was signaling to them both that they needed to wrap it up soon for the next performance.

Light reflected from Remus’ own silver cuff. One, two, three flashes. He was ready and waiting. Roman nodded, mostly to himself and poised himself to go as Remus swung down first. It took a few trips back and forth while beating his legs to and fro for him to build up the momentum he needed and then he was up, up, up in the air, twirling in three consecutive cartwheels on the way down. As he descended, Roman took off, grabbing hold of Remus’ swing on the way and catching his brother as he turned in the air at the last possible second to avoid certain doom. Or at least, what appeared to be certain doom to the audience. Their job was never absolutely safe, but they did have certain safety precautions in place just in case, particularly a hidden net. If there was one thing that Remy was adamant about, it was that no one was permanently hurt on his watch, not after Emile... well....

Anyway. It was a split second maneuver as Roman twisted and worked off the momentum Remus’ fall added to their now joint swing as Remus in turn tossed Roman high into the air. Roman pulled his arms in with his ankles crossed and twirled as fast as he could, like an ice skater performing an axel spin. One, two, three, four, five, six, he pushed for just one more before letting his limbs free and reaching out to Remus’ already outstretched arm, ready to catch him. Catch him he did as the two swung together to Remus’ starting side. With a flourish, the two bowed together in perfect unison, but Remus broke the synchronicity so he could pretend he was going to fall off the stand. As the audience gasped in horror, he pretended to catch himself at the last possible second, much to the public’s relief. Roman suppressed shaking his head and gave the audience one last wave as they exited to the backstage area and away from audience view. Pretending doom was inevitable was one of Remus’ very favorite tricks.

“Ro that was amazing! I didn’t know you managed to pull off another spin!” Remus cheered, throwing an arm around his shoulders in a side hug.

It wasn’t really amazing. He’d seen Remus practice the very same trick and regularly hit eight spins, nine when he was really pushing himself. However, Roman couldn’t pull off the cartwheel trick in the same way that Remus could. It disoriented him too much. When he tried it during practice, he usually faltered at the end, nearly missing Remus’ grip. It was too dangerous to attempt in front of an audience right now and Remy refused to approve it until he made better progress. Remus never said a negative word about it, but Roman knew he was the weaker link of the two. Twins or no, Roman couldn’t quite move the way Remus could. He was stronger, sure, but less flexible, while Remus moved like a living rubber band.

“Hey, what’s with that face Ro?” Remus asked, hip bumping him playfully.

“Nothing...just...” Roman started with a sigh. “have you ever wanted to do something else?”

“Like what?” Remus asked blinking, as if the thought had never crossed his mind before.

“I dunno... something.”

Roman wanted to write, to sing, to dance, to paint, to act, he wanted to do so, so many things that didn’t involve variations of the same routine again and again, night after night.

“Well you know me, I’m always open for ideas!” Remus exclaimed, throwing his arms in the air to show his excitement at the prospect of change. “I want to hear everything! Let’s work on-”

Annnnnnd he was gone. Remus had stopped mid-sentence going googly eyed as he always did when his soulmate, Patton, walked into their general vicinity. He was decked out in a leotard similar to their own in a soft baby blue, with the added bonus of a floofy cyan skirt that matched his soft pleather shoes.

“You both did great out there!” Patton exclaimed with a big toothy grin, reaching to Remus with grabby hands for a hug that was readily returned.

“You really think so?!” Remus asked, nearly bouncing on his feet at the praise.

“Of course I do Inky!” Patton responded with equal enthusiasm and kissed his nose. They were supposed to use their stage names around the audience, but Patton had a habit of using them as affectionate pet names in equal measure. Remus quickly responded with a raspberry kiss on his neck that left Patton in a fit of giggles.

Roman rolled his eyes. Of course Patton thought so. He literally said it every performance.

“I thought you did great too Charm, dad said you got an extra spin tonight!”

“Yeah he did! He was really great out there Drift! The crowd ate it up!”

Unlike Roman and Remus, Patton wasn’t allowed to pick his stage name. Well, he was, as the story goes, until he tried to pick ‘Kitten.’ Emile had been okay with it, but Remy had put his foot down, saying it would make people think too much of another kind of performance. Plus, Patton wanted to teach classes to kids and he wouldn’t be getting any parental sign-ups with that kind of a stage name. Drift was a compromise that was a nod to the shoes he was filling as he took over Emile’s performance.

The loudspeaker crinkled to life with a tinny, electronic buzz. “Hey, ya’ll, have you been enjoying tonight?”

The crowd sounded out their appreciation.

“Oh, I’m sorry babes, but I can’t hear you. Wanna try that again?”

The crowd screamed louder.

From their spot hidden away, Roman could spot Remy center stage in a relaxed position with a hand on his hip. He always had such a strange demeanor for a ringleader. Sometimes he’d literally just walk on stage, take a seat on a stool and spend a few minutes loudly sipping from the straw of his coffee, doing literally nothing else. Roman really couldn’t fathom why audiences seemed to think it was so funny, but they invariably did. Eventually one of the performers would usually come out and start to pull off some tricks behind his back or Emile would enter the stage decked out in his clown costume and make the audience laugh with various tricks that were mainly at Remy’s expense.

Their ring leader had been shot in the face with a water gun many of times while Emile quoted Toy Story for the kids. Anyone else would have suffered consequences for that kind of behavior, but Emile?

Emile invariably was given a soft, amused look in return and sometimes Remy would even pull out a water gun of his own and shoot his husband back.

“Much better. Let me introduce to you, my favorite, and the very best of our sorry lot! Our graceful tightrope walker Drift!”

The audience cheered again, but got louder still when Remy muttered into the microphone, “Yeah, you better cheer, that’s my son ya’ll.”

It was only mildly threatening.

“That’s my cue I guess,” Patton said, shaking his head at Remy’s antics. He gave Remus a single kiss on the cheek before hurrying to his place on stage.

Even just that was enough to push a dopey looking grin on Remus’ stupid face.

Roman gagged.

The tightrope walker didn’t know it, but Remus rushed off to the rafters with barely a wave in Roman’s direction as he hurried off, just as he did every time Patton performed. Roman pushed away his annoyance at their cut-off conversation. He honestly didn’t expect anything else. As always, Remus sat by one of the stage lights, waiting and watching closely with a taut rope in hand. He was at the ready to swing in like god damn Tarzan just in case anything went wrong.

Not that it would.

Roman was good at his trade. Remus was great at it. However, Patton grew up on the tight rope. It was as familiar to him as walking on solid ground, maybe more so. The boy’s performance was practically a grand pas on a stupidly thin surface with gymnastic moves thrown in for flair. Roman was always most impressed by his ability to fluidly fall into a split, on a rope, without his hands, like it was easy. Patton was truly the star of their little show and Roman was certain he could have gone to the Olympics as a gymnast if he was ever so inclined.

Despite his past, and despite his unquestionable ability, Patton was very much like Roman in one very important way. Neither were satisfied by their performances alone. The two had long conversations about it over the years, especially when Remus was off adding to his seemingly endless skill set as he learned the most obscure of abilities from other performers. Unlike Remus thrived in all of the oddity, Patton wanted to do something that helped people, something social. He had never settled on exactly what, but he always insisted that it didn’t matter anyway, because he couldn’t bring himself to leave his parents behind. Remus’ sheer love of it all only solidified his stance and made him want to stay even more. However, they managed to work in some end-of-matinee kiddy classes to satiate his need for interaction. The twins helped too, well, Roman helped by acting as a second pair of hands that made sure no small children lost their balance too badly on the low bar that Patton taught them how to use. Remus “helped” by coming out in a plushy monster costume toward the end of the lessons and kidnapping “the princess,” which forced the kids into a course that utilized their newly taught skills so they could make a rescue attempt. The whole thing usually ended with Remus being squashed by a gaggle of small children who would beat him with foam swords while he played dead. Meanwhile, Patton would watch him fondly from behind the very crowd of children who saved him.

Roman shook his head of the thought just as Patton gave his closing performance bow. The two truly were the funniest of pairs, but they worked somehow. Patton seemed to thrive off of Remus’ near endless enthusiasm and Remus in turn flourished with Patton’s endless patience.

The rest of the show moved in a blur as Roman waited for it all to end. He was anxious for it to be over, anxious for time to pass already. It was their first day in a new city and he was waiting for his freedom to explore it. Roman was only brought back into focus when Remus and Patton gathered him for the final bow as Remy closed out the show. It was nearing sunset and part of their deal was that the first performance at any one location would end early enough that the performers would have the sunset free to do as they wished.

Most of the ones like Roman were just as anxious as him to explore, to catch sight of a wisp of glowing color that was only revealed in the light of a sunset or sunrise. There were apparently all sorts of scientific reasons why it happened, something about the specific light rays that hit and soul auras. Roman didn’t care enough about the how to really look much into it. All he cared about was the why. The why was being able to see the aura left behind that day by your soulmate. The why was being able to find them.

The why was why he was here.

Roman and Remus grew up in a shitty home, but that was no strange story to hear among the circus folk. Patton was pretty unique in sheer support and love Remy and Emile showed him. Then again, maybe he wasn’t. The power couple acted as group parents in a way and looked out for all of their performers. Remy would bring Roman hot chocolate on days he was particularly disheartened and sometimes Emile would kidnap him to watch Disney movies together. Still, there was a reason two sixteen-year-olds found their way to the circus in the first place. There was a reason they left their old, broken lives behind. It seemed to be fate alone that led to Remus seeing and subsequently following the glowing cyan trail all the way to a tightrope dancer in the middle of a show. It was the only time Remus actually had to catch Patton in the years since they’ve known him. The chubby cheeked, fresh faced, fourteen year old performer had gotten distracted by Remus’ sudden green shine and slipped right off. Without even thinking about it, Remus dove to save him from disaster, well perceived disaster. Still, the crowd ate it up and the reporters in attendance that night labeled him a hero in the next day’s papers.

Emile immediately invited Remus for dinner that night with them as a thank you for “saving” their son. When the couple heard about Remus’ living situation, a dead father and a drunk mother, they offered him a place with them. They showed him how to fill out emancipation forms and gave him all of the instructions he would need. They also told him to think hard about what he wanted before deciding. Remus came home with his arm full of forms and big bright eyes telling Roman the story of his soulmate. How he had found his true love and he wanted the two of them to run away together to the circus so he and Roman would be free.

And... honestly how could Roman ever say no to that?

Roman could still remember the conversation they had that night.

“Do you think mom and dad were soulmates?” Remus had asked him then as they rapidly packed their necessities, and only looking back did he realize how thin his gaunt his brother looked. Roman hadn’t realized they were underfed until they just... weren’t anymore.

“Yeah, Rem, I do,” Roman remembers saying at the time. He still believes it too. He could remember the soul crushing expression on his mother’s face when she got the call about the accident. He could still picture the hollow, dejected look that never left her eyes even as she searched at the bottom of bottle after bottle in hope of finding some peace. She didn’t know how to live without him it seemed. At the time, Roman couldn’t help but feel guilty leaving her behind, but he would have felt worse if Remus gave up his chance at happiness.

Honestly, he wasn’t sure if Remus would have gone through with it if Roman refused. A small part of him was scared his brother would have left him behind. A bigger part of him was scared he wouldn’t have. Roman couldn’t have put him into that situation, choosing between his twin and his soulmate. He refused to. So off to the circus they went and at the circus they’ve been since. It’s been just over a decade now and while it wasn’t the life Roman imagined for himself in the days Roman and Remus would whisper what they’d do when they were finally on their own while their mother drank away her problems in the living room, it wasn’t a bad life.

He just was ready for something more.

The crowd had barely filed out before Remus had grabbed onto his usual rope to swing around the tent and rapidly opening all of the flaps while Patton did the same on foot. The two worked to let in as much light from the setting sun as possible. On evenings like these the couple would sit together in the rafters, hip to hip and hand in hand, watching each other’s soul light bounce around the stage, mimicking their performances in high speed. Meanwhile Roman slipped away and took to the street towards the town.

One perk of his job was that parkour came easily and up the buildings he went to find himself at higher ground like an everyday comic book superhero. Sometimes Roman liked to imagine what it would be like to be in a comic book. What kind of powers would he have? Character flaws? Would he be a hero? Would a comic book Roman still feel so lonely?

He jumped to the next roof.

No glowing mist.

Not that he really knew what it looked like, just what it was supposed to look like according to Remus and Patton. Not that either were the best at explaining.

He knew it looked like a light, but colorful. Like mist, but stringy, streaming. Like water. Like neon. And the description he hated most of all, like nothing he’d ever seen before.

How was he supposed to know what to look for if he didn’t know what it looked like?

Roman jumped to the next roof.

He stared down at the people crowded on the streets below and was suddenly thankful for additional height. He’d never be able to sweep the city for any remnants of glow from down there, the pushy crowd of endless people would both get in his way and block his vision. Plus, as used to he was swinging through the air unobstructed, being pushed into a tight space while completely surrounded by sweaty, gross bodies sounded like a special kind of hell. He wasn’t sure how their audience ever managed it.

He groaned at the height difference of his current building and the next one, before leaping across to grab a window ledge, only to find himself in a upward climb to the roof. He wished he brought a bottle of water, but knew in reality it was a terrible idea. Water would just slosh in his stomach uncomfortably and the bottle could leave condensation on his hands, which in his shoes could be fatal. He got to the top with a grunt, ready to call it for a five minute break when-

When he saw something.

It was barely there anymore, but he scaled down the building as fast as his hands and feet would go, taking leaps and shortcuts he generally wouldn’t risk in order to get down there faster. He lucked out making it down unscathed, knowing that even Remus would have lectured him about a particularly dodgy jump (and when Remus lectured him, you knew he was being stupid) but his quick ascent allowed him to catch the last bits of a rapidly fading yellow trail. It faded from beginning to end, so he must have been closer to earlier parts, he thought as he pumped his legs, trying to keep pace with the lights that moved so much faster than him.

God the sun would be setting soon.

He was determined dammit!

Roman did as he did best and started to swing between the buildings, grabbing hold of a balcony here, a light post there, anything that he could that allowed him forward momentum at a faster pace than he could run it. People dodged out of his way, but he didn’t care as he was finally beginning to keep pace with it. The problem was that eventually the city ended.

He was back on his feet, running as fast as he could manage across open field, trying to defy the odds and keep up with the light that was rapidly denigrating before his eyes, focused on nothing but finding the end of it.

Then it was gone.

His surroundings were bathed in darkness as the very last remnants of the setting sun disappeared before his eyes. He finally looked up to take stock of his surroundings and found himself confused to be back in front of the circus tent he had just vacated earlier. There was no way that his soulmate was one of their crew, he would have known by now.

It must have been someone in the audience.

Oh god, but there were so many of them!

That didn’t help at all! Even if Remy gave him the list of attendees, he’d never be able to cross them all off before they were packing up again! He groaned and wanted to collapse where he stood. He wanted to fall into the grass and let himself sink until into the muddy, crummy underbelly of the earth as it swallowed him up and he rejoined the celestial plane. Screw this physical plane bullshit.

Instead he sighed, his shoulders slumped dejectedly as he headed to his trailer. At least he knew they were somewhere here. He just thought that he’d finally have a story of immediately finding them as soon as he caught sight of that beautiful, golden light that danced through the streets the way smoke weaved away from a warm candle. Like waves ebbing and flowing into each other. Like nothing he’d ever seen before.

At least he understood what that meant now.

For now, he was going to sleep away his depression so he could try to convince Remy to let him out of tomorrow’s show. Tomorrow’s started before the sun set, but decidedly ended much after and he wanted to get another look around town.

Roman paused in his gait, thankful that he had worn cloth slip-ons for balance. It had the added benefit of keeping his foot steps near-silent.

There was an odd clicking noise coming somewhere from his trailer. Roman tip-toed around it, keeping himself minimizing even the sound of his breathing. He was effectively impossible to notice, especially compared to the residual noise of the others shuffling around their general campsite. Roman wasn’t sure what to think when he found a hooded boy sitting at the side door of his trailer, with his ear pressed against a door as his hands... wait was that a lock pick?

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?!” Roman demanded when he stopped in front of the boy- no man, he realized as he rapidly stood up and easily matched Roman’s height.

The guy looked around rapidly, searingly, but his gaze didn’t settle despite Roman standing just in front of him. Now that they were face to face, Roman got a look at his eyes, even with the rapid movement. They were big and beautiful, despite the messy, dark makeup framing them and they sparkled a light lilac color, nearly white. A realization struck Roman and he deliberately he cleared his throat. The face finally settled its search to point in his direction. He was blind.

“You uh... probably wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” the guy said, shoving the hands in his hoodie pockets.

“Try me,” Roman retorted. “I think the least I deserve is an explanation for why someone is trying to break into my trailer.”

“Your trailer?” The guy asked with a head tilt.

“Yes, my trailer,” Roman said, putting emphasis on every word. Why did he look so disbelieving?

“Right,” the man replied and pulled one hand out of his pocket to reach down for a white cane Roman hadn’t noticed before. “Would you believe me if I said I was looking for something for my soulmate?”

“I doubt you could look for much,” Roman said automatically, but horror overtook him as he realized the words that had tumbled out of his mouth.

Shit he’d been hanging around with Remus too much.

“I’m so sorry, that was insensitive of me, I-”

Roman was bewildered to see the man laughing as he leaned his weight on the cane for balance rather than direction.

“You got me there dude,” he said with a snort.

“No, please don’t forgive me so easily for that, that was uncalled for. I’ve had a frustrating day and I should not be taking it out on you,” Roman said with a groan, still in disbelief of what he let himself say.

“Nice to see you’re worried about the feelings of the man who tried to break into your trailer.”

“I do when I misdirect my anger. If I was going to make fun of you, it should have been related to the crime. Instead, my usual foot in mouth syndrome around cute men took over and I said what is probably the worst possible thing.”

“So you think I’m cute?”

Roman just groaned. There was no winning this conversation.

“I’m Virgil,” the hooded man said, finally taking pity on him while reaching out a hand.

“Roman, but you might have heard of me as Charm,” Roman said the stage name with a sigh, as if the name alone was exhausting, but shook the offered hand and tried not to think about how soft those long, pretty fingers were.

“Oh! We went to your performance today. I heard it was amazing.”

“Heard? But if you went to it wouldn’t you have...” Roman trailed off and immediately groaned, realizing his mistake.

Virgil was laughing at him again.

Roman willed the earth to swallow him whole for a second time that night.

“So, Roman, what would it take for a guy to get an escort home around here?” Virgil asked with a cheeky grin.

“Despite what my brother might insist, we’re not those kind of performers,” Roman shot back just as quick, finally able to contribute to the joke.

Virgil paused and Roman knew it was impossible, but it felt like man was checking him out.

“That’s too bad,” Virgil breathed with a smirk. “Sometimes it can be hard to find my way home this late at night.”

Roman snorted at the brazen impossibility of the statement as Virgil reached in his direction. Roman granted him mercy and took his hand, but he hadn’t been anticipating him slotting their fingers together.

“Walk with me?” Virgil asked, playfully bumping his shoulder into Roman’s.

Roman chided himself for automatically nodding, but Virgil seemed to get the idea somehow as he tugged lightly on their joined hands, pulling him forward without even a verbal confirmation. From there the two of them strolled through the city, keeping even a pace that could be best classified as a dawdle. Virgil seemed intent on taking his time as the two slunk along. Honestly, Roman didn’t even mind that much because otherwise he’d probably be in the corner of his trailer, sobbing as that performance’s makeup ran down his face in harsh, ugly lines.

“Tell me a boring fact about yourself,” Virgil said suddenly, not even pausing in his gait.

“Wouldn’t most people wan’t to hear an interesting fact?” Roman asked with an eyebrow raise.

Apparently Virgil could hear the gesture in his tone because he gave a shit-eating grin in return.

“Interesting facts are too much pressure,” Virgil shrugged, “Plus you work in a circus and try to fall to your death for a living, that’s already inherently interesting.”

“It’s not exactly trying to fall,” Roman defended, but conceded at Virgil’s own eyebrow raise. “Alright... uh... I hate sleeping with socks on.”

“Ha, me too,” Virgil agreed with a nod. “Janny always wears them and I don’t understand how it doesn’t drive him nuts.”

“Janny?”

“Oh shit, I mean Janus,” Virgil said, but seemed amused at his own slip-up. “Don’t tell him I called him that when we meet up with him.”

Roman swallowed and couldn’t help the disappointment building up in his gut.

“Is that your soulmate?” He found himself asking, if only to punish himself because he was already pretty sure of the answer.

“Mmmm, yeah,” Virgil agreed with a fond look that consisted of crinkled eyes with a little half smile. It was such a soft and endearing look and Roman wanted to cry.

Why didn’t anyone look at him like that?

“With the whole not being able to see anything, much less these “soul light” things I keep hearing about, it was up to Janny to find me, got me out of a shit situation too.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, apparently being disabled was already pushing the envelope for my family, but gay with a male soulmate too? That was just too much for them. I was instantly kicked out. We barely just met, but he immediately made sure I was taken care of. Even offered to find a way for me to stay somewhere else if I was uncomfortable staying with him.”

“Did you?” Roman asked. This Janus guy deserved a medal or something.

“Yeah actually, chilled with his co-worker Logan for a bit, cool guy, bit of a neat freak though. Didn’t stay too long though. Janus came and checked on me every day and well... its hard not to care for someone who makes it so abundantly clear they care for you.”

“A love story of the ages from there?” Roman teased, giving their intertwined hands a playful squeeze.

“Something like that.”

“I’ve always loved stuff like that,” Roman muttered in admission.

“Like what?” Virgil asked, stopping his trek and pulling Roman to stop too.

“Love stories... soulmate stories, the whole deal,” Roman said wistfully. He loved them more than anything because he wanted them more than anything. “I look at every stop we make to see if I can catch sight of mine. I feel like I’m so close!”

“That’s... actually really good to hear,” Virgil muttered.

“Huh?”

“Nothing,” Virgil said, and reached forward to a door that Roman hadn’t noticed before. “Don’t freak out too much, he’s got perfect aim, I promise.”

What?

Virgil pulled Roman inside without another word. Roman was just about to ask just what that was supposed to mean, when a throwing knife whizzed passed him and landed in the wood of the door mere centimetres from his face!

What the fuck?

“Who the hell is he and where the fuck have you been Virgil?! You’ve been out all night! Do you have even the slightest idea how dangerous it is out there for-”

“For someone like me?” Virgil asked with a huff as an, admittedly attractive man with a snake tattoo covering half of his face stomped straight up him.

The man put a hand on each of Virgil’s shoulders and literally shook him and demanded, “Do. You. Have. Any. God damn. Sense. Of fucking. Self preservation?!”

“None whatsoever,” Virgil deadpanned.

Absolutely savage.

The man sighed and slumped forward, letting his forehead rest against Virgil’s shoulder as he balled his gloved hands into the fabric of his hoodie.

��Aww, giving up already Janny? You haven’t even asked about your present yet.”

Oh! This was the soulmate. Suddenly his distraught reaction made a lot of sense.

Didn’t explain the knife though.

“I’ve been looking for you for hours,” Janus moaned in return. “You’re never leaving this god damn house again, I swear. You’re going to be the death of me.”

Virgil just snorted in return and motioned for Roman to move closer to them and out of the way as he used his cane to push open a curtain.

Then something beautiful happened.

No, something absolutely, astoundingly magical happened.

The room suddenly lit up in purple and gold as the first light of sunrise peeked through the window.

Virgil and Janus were literally glowing.

Roman watched as Virgil carefully tipped up Janus’ chin up, forcing him to face the sudden new lights streaming in and Janus let out a gasp.

“...Red,” he muttered breathily before he whipped around to look Roman’s way. For the first time, Roman could see the beautiful, two toned eyes that stared at him as if he were some kind of dream. “It’s you.”

37 notes · View notes

cosmicsunsett · 4 years ago

Text

I would give I own (just to have you back again)

AO3 LINK https://archiveofourown.org/works/25316791/chapters/61381060

Los Angeles, December of 1979

“Chris! C’mon, boy, Carla is here!” Eddie said as he greeted the smiling woman, both entering the Diaz home.

“I’m coming! Almost there.” Chris’ voice echoed over the tiny house hallway.

Eddie smiled when he heard the familiar tapping of his kid’s slow steps, even when he felt the weight of his worry and exasperation coming down on him as he went back to his desk to finish up some calculations of unpaid old bills and other debts that not even him knew it existed. Eddie had always been careful to make Chris’ school, his physiotherapy and his speech therapist his priority while paying the bills. Yet, he noticed that even if he held back shopping for trivial things, he would still be on the negative.

“The beauty of the adult life, huh?” Carla eyed Eddie as she greeted Chris on the living room, next to Diaz who had been frowning, face heavy. He was barely lifting his head up from all the paper that covered the table. “It’s hard, but you get used to it.”

“I hope I never have to get used to it,” Eddie mumbled and halted when he noticed his son was coming his way, his bag already on his back. “Hey friend, did you get everything? Finished your homework?”

“Yes, dad. But I wanted to show you something,” the boy fished a crumbled paper from his pants pocket, probably had been folded a couple of times by the same artist standing in front of Eddie.

Well, obviously he deduced it was a drawing, since Eddie had a drawer full of them, some even fixed to the fridge.

Eddie met Carla’s gaze over Chris’ head and shrugged, smiling.

“What did you get me this time?” Eddie smiled as he received the paper, but before he could unfold, Chris shouted.

“No! Dad, this is for Buck! You can’t see,”Chris said seriously, as if Eddie was holding something too precious in his hands.

Carla placed a hand over her mouth, trying to smother his laughter after seeing the stunned expression on Eddie’s face.

“Oh, I see.” Eddie mock pouted, looking sad, for Chris’ amusement. Even only seven years old, Chris knew his dad was just playing around. “I’ve been replaced by my own son. So, is Buck better than I?”

“I knew something had pulled me to this house for some reason in the right timing. I could never miss the answer to that.”

Three pair of eyes turned to a familiar voice, the owner standing next to the front door’s frame. Eddie didn’t hold back his smile as he caught the happiness on Chris’ laugh. He hadn’t been the only one, if Buck’s gaze was anything to go by.

“Buck!”

“Hey, superman!” Buck have Carla a quick hug before crouching down to give one of the same to Chris, if a little tighter and careful. “How’s your strength? And where’s my high five?”

When the boy’s tiny hand slapped against his, Buck tossed himself on the ground, face contorted in mock pain, which provoked burst of laughter from Christopher.

“What kind of beans is your father feeding you?” Buck replied, lifting up from the ground and running a hand over the kid’s hair, “I think I need some of that.”

“I don’t know about that, I only know Christopher Diaz needs to go to school.” Eddie interrupted, looking at the wall clock and shrieking. “Time to go, buddy.”

“Please, dad, only five more minutes.” Chris turned to gaze at his father.

“Yes, dad, only five more minutes.” Buck widened his eyes are far as it could go. He could imagine Hen and Chim mocking him for his puppy eyes.

Eddie could feel his heart beating against his ribs, almost forgetting how to be a father and a responsible friend of these two kids, instead of only one of them. And, unfortunately, it seemed he was yet to be immune to those two set of eyes at the same time.

Against his pride, he called for backup.

“Not five, or ten, or twenty. Carla, please, can you take this two children out?” Diaz got up from his chair and gently nudging Chris towards Carla, who laughed, looking as won over as Eddie felt.

“C’mon, kid. The fastest you go, the quicker you’ll be back, an-” Buck was cut mid phrase by Eddie’s not-so-gentle elbow to his waist. “Ow.”

“Dad, don’t forget about the paper!” Chris whispered over Eddie’s ear as they hugged.

“I won’t, promise you.” Eddie chuckled, waving to his kid and Carla before closing the door and turning, only to be face to face with a new problem to deal with.

Blue eyes. Golden locks, which barely covered a well known birthmark. And a smile that always seemed to promise something mischievous.

“Hi.”

“Hello, and goodbye.” Eddie placed his hands over a confused Buck, dragging him to the door. “I’m a little busy right now, and I don’t need a distraction.”

“I need to have a words with your abuela. If she knew that this is how you treat your guests, she’d come to you armed with a wooden spoon.” Buck jammed his feet on the floor, spinning around and coming face to face with his friend’s brown eyes, only to finally pay a closer attention to his friend’s tired face, and to the bags under his eyes that screamed ‘leave me alone’ and ‘help me’.

“Buck, please.”

“What’s going on?”

Eddie sighed, knowing it would be useless to try and kick out Buck now. And if he was being honest with himself, he wanted to spend as much time as possible with the other man. Eddie had the feeling they had spent five months apart, after five consecutive days without seeing each other.

Buck eyed him as he followed his friend back to the table he had been sitting at when Buck arrived the house. Pulling a chair over, he sat and waited Eddie to start speaking, but as he read what was on the papers Eddie held, and watched as his scratched and wrote numbers angrily on the edges of said papers, Buck knew.

“Bills?”

“And debts.” Eddie sighed tiredly. “I was doing the maths, it seems the expenses surpassed what I had expected. I just need to cut somethings, maybe less trips to the supermarket, be more strict with water and power usage. Maybe even do some extra hours.”

Buck shook his head, worried. Over the last few weeks, he had mentioned to Eddie about two open spots at the firefighter station, and he knew Eddie was in shape, besides having already enlisted and possessing a silver star, something his best friend would dodge whenever it came up in a conversation, and Buck never pressured Eddie to talk about it.

And Buck knew how dangerous it was to be alone with his thoughts, which sometimes can quickly morph into frustrations and worries and concerns that then becomes a big ball of anxiety. And, as Buck watched Eddie’s hand coming to his creased forehead for the third time that morning, Buck knew he needed to stop that ball from growing more inside his friend’s chest. Either way, he couldn’t stand watching this man get sad nor upset.

Day after day he had to make peace with himself for wanting to protect Eddie from any evil, even the things he didn’t have control over. At least he would try helping what was on his reach.

“Let’s go out.”

“What?” Eddie barely lifted his eyes from where he was scratching on the paper, his pencil in a tight grip between his fingers. It wasn’t until he felt warm fingers touching his chin and dragging his face from the papers did he look up to those blue eyes, staring intently at him.

“We are going out. Get ready, I’ll wait for you.”

“Buck, I can’t, I have to-”

“Funny, I can swear I’m hearing some kind of muffled noise, but I can’t tell what it is.” Buck replied, pretending to look around for the fake source of the sound, chuckling low at Eddie rolling his eyes. “Can you hear it? Sounds like a buzz, like a very annoying bug.”

“God, even my son is more mature than that.” Eddie got up, knowing it was already a lost cause. And he didn’t want to admit it, but he was ready to burst into flames if he had to do more math or if he found yet another bill to be paid.

“I can assure you that’s not the case, or he wouldn’t be my best best friend.” Calmly, Buck started cleaning his nails, oblivious to the murderous glare Eddie was shooting his way. “Unlike his father. Hurry now, Diaz!”

After a few minutes, as they were ready to leave, Eddie pulled the colorful paper from the table and placed inside his jean pocket. His eyes landed on the piles of paper on the table for a beat, but he soon snapped out of it when Buck’s rough voice sounded from a some meters away.

“Ready?” he asked, opening the door and waiting.

Eddie spent minutes trying to guess, and fail, where Buck was taking him. A few moments ago he watched from the rearview mirror as the city grew smaller and now, tired of looking at the empty road, he turned to the driver as a familiar playful smile grew on his lips as it always did when he was a passenger on the beetle.

His eyes lazily followed Buck’s long legs trying its best to fit on the small space, traveling upwards to the wide hands holding steady the steering wheel. The sleeves of his green sweater were rolled neatly around his wrists, making his muscled forearms pop. Eddie’s eyes continued up, observing how his shoulders were almost curved as Buck tried to make himself as small as possible, or how his blonde locks moved with the chilly breeze coming from the open window and his beard, a highlight around his rosy lips. Lastly, but not the least important, he stared at the deep blue eyes, focused only on the road ahead.

“What?” Buck asked, trying not to move under Eddie’s long stare. His hands started to sweat suddenly.

“Nothing.”

“You’re a bad liar, did you know that?” Buck shook his head, puffing out a gush of air. “Look at the backseat.”

Before turning, Eddie arched his eyebrows in his suspicious Diaz way, something Buck grew used to after dealing with it for almost two years.

“I won’t find a black garbage bag and a shovel, will I?”

“Oh my God, and I’m the kid.” Buck answered, failing to stop himself from laughing together with Eddie. “Now I know why Chris’ so creative.”

Said the man that calls me in the middle my working hours to ask if I knew about whales’ lifespan and that they hunt orcas before going off in a spiral to explain the seaworld for almost an hour with no interruptions.

Eddie scoffed, ready to respond, until he decided against it as he turned back and saw normal paper bags instead. He pulled them to his lap and his mouth fell open, watering up at the smell coming from it. Pastries and cheese balls.

“I think I can start loving you now.”

“How to win over Edmundo Diaz’ heart: cheap but good food, check.” Buck puffed out his chest, looking proud of himself for getting the right food. “Wait, starting now? What the hell?”

“Language, Buckley.” Eddie shoved a cheese ball into his mouth, moaning low and completely ignoring the outraged expression that Buck had turned to him. “Or there won’t be nothing left for you.”

“I hate you.” The blonde pointed out, grumbling, which only made Eddie laugh louder, “A lot! Just so you know, in case you didn’t before.”

“Now I know. You’re so good to me. Thank you.”

“Now you know. You’re welcome.”

Twenty minutes later, Eddie noticed the beetle turning into a narrower road, around a huge forest that enveloped the main road. It descended to a wide beach, and beyond that only a vastness of blue. His feelings caught him unaware, he was obviously unprepared for the destination Buck chose them for that afternoon. As the beach got closer, Eddie placed a hand on his best friend’s thigh, in a silent thank you, and in a split second, Buck’s hand found his. They stayed like that until they left the car, walking to the beach.

“So, what’d you think?” Buck asked his best friend, sitting side by side on the sand close to the ocean. Some moments had gone by, both man had been lost in thought, both gazing the sea, far away from there, until Buck managed to slowly come back to himself first.

Eddie took a deep breath, enjoying the cold breeze that’d been messing with his hair. It seemed like Buck new exactly what he needed in that moment, before he even knew it himself. Maybe one day he could put into words how much that meant to him, how much he felt cared for, for the first time ever.

“This had gone completely differently than I had been expecting, I must confess.” He answered, watching as Buck carefully stared back while eating the last remaining of the pastries, thanks to Eddie, “I thought you’re going to take me to your new apartment to help you finish moving. Speaking of that, how is it going?”

Buck shrugged, chewing as he watched the waves breaking on the sea.

“I’m slowly getting there. After living with Bobby and Athena for a while, I didn’t receive any warm reception from my neighbours. But the building is sound. A little over my budget but it’s only for the time being. I just couldn’t continue reveling on their generosity. To be a burden.”

Something like a warning siren played in the back of Eddie’s mind with Buck’s admission.

“Buck, I only know Bobby and Athena for a small amount of time, but I’m sure that you were never a bother to them.” Eddie closed the distance between them, shoulders touching shoulders to the dirty toes in the sand. It was only because the temperature was dropping and he forgot to bring a jacket, he thought quickly.

Of course.

With Buck’s silence, Eddie added.

“And… you always have a place at our home.”

Eddie felt his heart aching, feeling it squeezing as he noticed the insecurity laced over his best friend’s posture. They would often joke, fight, and over time they had become inseparable, turning into a running gag between their friends, Eddie didn’t care. What he did care was that Buck knew how much he was valued, how important he was, and how loved.

“Hey,” Diaz nudged Buck’s shoulder with his own, waiting those blue eyes to turn, even if they were suddenly afar and glazed with sadness. “I meant it. I know that sometimes I act like you’re nothing more than a nuance, but-”

Come on, Diaz. You know it’s true, just say it.

Buck waited, unusually pacient. Quiet.

“I can’t imagine my life without you today.” Eddie declared, letting his words to be taken by the breeze and waited till they started making sense in Buck’s head. But, deep inside, he knew, after so long knowing each other, both had trouble understanding some things truly. “And neither in my future, Evan. You make me so happy, that sometimes I think I can’t handle it.”

“Handle what?”

“Feel happy. Be happy.” he completed, and smiled seeing Buck lower his face not so discreetly to clear his eyes. Sighing, Eddie picked the now empty paper bag from Buck’s hands, placed it close to their boots, and pulled Buck’s head down to lay on his lap. He didn’t know he needed that until Buck smiled up at him, eyes slightly red gazing at him. “Did you bring me here to watch the sea or me?”

“Both.” Buck’s smile widened for a moment, and he closed his eyes when Eddie started running a hand through his locks, fiddling with it the same way he did with Chris, whenever Eddie wanted a moment of peace. “Hey, Eddie?”

His hand ceased its movement, and he focused only on the man on his lap.

“How are you, really?”

‘I’m fine’ was ready to leave his lips, but Buck’s eyes asked for honesty and trust. And, well, if there was someone who should get an honest answer, this someone was right there. Eddie knew that, even though Buck gave him the space he wanted, and was so very patient, Eddie knew he needed to push his own limits, get out of his comfort zone.

Not only for Buck, or for their relationship, but for himself.

Eddie’s gaze fell on the sea, searching inside himself a place to open up what he’d been holding for months. Years.

“I’m… trying to be ok, Evan.” His fingers continued to wander Buck’s hair, trying to give some comfort to the man, who deserved the world, and some for himself, too, because he knew they were entering one of those intense moments, where both wore big boy’s pants. To talk about feelings… it had never been Eddie’s forte. But for Buck it had always seemed so easy, so Eddie knew he needed to give his best friend something in return, sometimes, even if silently. “Too many changes in too little time. To move with Chris to LA even after seeing how disappointed my parents were, to be a single dad, have sex in secrecy with my wife and separating my child from his own mother… you know, only another day at work.” he paused, “That night, when I saw Shannon-”

Buck, sensing the sudden silence, lifted his hand up to caress the stubbled face of the man that held him.

“Hey, come back to me,” he said, feeling a tiny smile stretch his lips as he watched the tension in Eddie’s jaw dissipating, even if his shoulders were still hard as rock, like so many times when Buck watched his friend drowning in worry. “If you don’t wanna talk, that’s fine.”

“No, I… I want to,” Eddie answered, but grimaced a second later, “Actually, I really don’t, but I need to.”

“Ok,” Buck nodded peacefully. “Take your time.”

“Ever since I was a kid- it’s like I’ve been taught to see the world in a specific way, see the world with the design my parents taught me.” Eddie shrugged, feeling the tension stretching on his skin. “Study, get a job, build a family. Provide, support, do my best so that this pillar never falls.”

After a beat of silence, Eddie almost didn’t catch the question, distracted by the heavy clouds coming their way.

“And who takes care of you, Eddie?”

Buck only received a small smile in return, as Eddie’s eyes were distant, looking at something in his past.

“Me, I guess. It’s never been something that I’ve placed above all else. My dad always taught my sisters and me that we could swallow what life thrown our way, and we could march on. Sit down, lower our heads, suffer… those had never been part of his teachings.” Eddie sighed, feeling a knot growing in his throat. “Men of the Diaz family needed to be steady, strong. The time you waste crying, is time lost, according my dad.

“And indeed, I followed that road, and still do, at least when dealing with myself, old habits are hard to kill. But you know...” The fingers of his free hand started picking at the buttons of Buck’s jacket. “Shannon and I never taught Chris any of this shit. We really give our everything to the kid. And there’s nothing more important than him. Nothing. And that’s why, above all that had gone between me and Shannon, I loved her. But that’s also why I was afraid to let her close to us again.”

After a long pause, Eddie let his gaze fall to find out he’d been observed by Buck, which wasn’t a surprise, but there was something in his expression, something different. His face probably expressed his confusion then, because Buck started searching for words to say, looking serious and thoughtful. But Eddie continued, feeling his words flowing freely, even if the voice inside his head told him to stop, to not lose control. He was being too emotional, too open.

Vulnerable.

“Shannon and I met at seventeen, too young and in love.” Eddie sighed again, looking at this ring finger that was now missing the ring that had sat there for years. “And then she got pregnant, which lead us to our other big step. They were great years, there had been love, but I think there always had been something missing between us. And apparently, our communication slowly became awful, and I took over taking care of the bills after Chris was born, and became absent as a husband, father and-”

Eddie noticed something might have caught Buck’s attention, because at one moment he had his head rested on Eddie’s lap, but in the other Buck was sitting up right in front of him, leaning over his arm on the humid sand, his head only inches apart from Eddie’s. His blue eyes almost competing with the ocean behind him to see who was the bluest.

“Edmundo Diaz, what I’m about to say will not only be said because you’re my best friend and because I know you. And I’m sure it is one of those universally known truths that everyone can see it except one person. You.”

That moment, like so many countless others, in which Eddie shown himself as this incredible man, Buck wished his friend could see himself like Buck saw him. Behind all the sarcasm and his ‘manly attitude’ (which Buck had mocked him of when Eddie would sometimes say something inappropriate and Buck would scold him) he saw his friend’s flaws, but also his good qualities and right actions.

“You are a marvelous dad, Eddie. And was a good husband too. Hey,” Buck held his hand up when Eddie started to open his mouth to interrupt him. “You were. And I don’t know, but I got the impression that despite all Shannon mistakes, she had also been a good wife. She’s still a good mother, who calls and worries about her son. Eddie, you have no idea how good it’s to have all that. Maddie and I didn’t have that. So, from experience, and from any other person with good functioning brain cells it’s obvious. It’s a naked simple truth.”

Eddie stared at him, frozen in place by the intensity and the wild veracity in Buck’s eyes. He felt his stomach churning, shaking his head as he felt his eyes stinging while he looked at the horizon.

“I know that Shannon and you committed mistakes, as a couple and even as parents, but you try so much Eddie, you fight everyday to give him only the best. And to see his admiration and love glazing on his eyes when he looks at you? It’s impressive.” Buck smile when he noticed the tears falling from the face he knew so perfectly, even with his eyes closed. With a soft caress, he cleaned the wet tracks on Eddie’s cheeks. “You are so gentle with everyone, why not with yourself?”

The silence stretched between them. and when Eddie finally felt steady enough to speak again, he replied.

“You really know your way around words, huh? Damn it, I’m never letting you kidnap me again, look at what you did. Fuck”

Buck threw his head back with a burst of laughter.

“Careful, Diaz,” Buck warned, his smile carrying a light playfulness. “Sometimes I bring unfairly hot men to deserted beaches to make them cry.”

“Well, God help me then.” Eddie rolled his eyes, ready respond in the same way when they felt the first drops of rain. They frowned in synch. “The beach is kicking us out after our exciting conversation. Time to go, I’ve got to get Chris from my abuela.”

Eddie, as he lifted from the ground and offered Buck a hand, creased his brown when he pulled Buck up for their walk back to the car, and unfortunately witnessed something shifting in his best friend’s eyes.

“Hey, Eddie-”

Eddie narrowed his eyes when Buck threw his jack on the sand next to the pile of their shoes.

“You remember when the other day you told me you hadn’t been to the sea?”

“Buck.” Eddie retreated a few steps from his friend, calculating and reading to arm himself uselessly with one pair of his boot, “I’m warning you, get away from me, or I swear to God-!”

In a fraction of seconds, everything that Eddie could see was the boot falling on the ground before being carried over the shoulders of the almost two meters tall man. Even as the sun was still shining between the clouds, the rain started to pour, and thunder echoed on the distance, nothing what the LA sky was used to.

“Fuck! Evan, out me down!” Eddie punched on the large back, to which Buck started to laugh freely, running to the agitated sea. “I’m gonna kill you!”

That was the last thing Eddie remembered saing before darkness engulfed him underwater, so cold it felt like tiny daggers were sticking on his every pore. He swam up desperately, before finally finding the open skies above his head again. He panted, blinking and breathing hard. The rain still fell on his face as he tried to stay afloat when he noticed:

A very absent Evan Buckley.

That was so much more worrying than being thrown into a wild tide as a pseudo-storm raged on. He started panting again, not only in search of air, but because panic took hold on him.

“Buck! Buck!”

He dove again, swimming against the strength of the tide that pulled him down, because fuck it, he would go against nature if it meant finding that bastard.

Seconds later, after coming for air again, Eddie almost felt like he would sink from the weight of the arms holding his body and pulling him back to the shore. And as soon as his feet reached the wet sand, he heard the gasping and very excited voice of the only idiot on the world that could almost had drowned to death.

“Eddie, did you hear that thunder?” Buck smiled as he tried to calm his breathing, supporting himself on his knees. “Damn, they are wild today.”

“I hope Maddie won’t go missing her brother, because you’re only getting out of here dead, you mother fucker!”

It took Buck two seconds to start running away from a furious Eddie. This storm couldn’t compete with all this anger, Buck though as he stumbled, freezing to death and laughing hysterically as he made for his shoes.

Eddie had his gaze fixed on the trees passing by them, but he could count on his fingers how many times he felt Buck’s eyes slip between the street ahead, and him. He tried keeping his face straight, even as the cold air that entered through the cracks of the window made him shiver more furiously, and he wished he hadn’t forgotten his jacket back home.

They must have broken a new record, Eddie thought impressed, after ten minutes had gone by and neither had spoken a word.

“Eddie, come on. It was fun, wasn’t it?” Buck asked hopeful, like a child trying to bargain a apologize after some mischief. “It wasn’t that bad.

Buck could the a livid vein popping on the forehead of the man sitting next to him.

Sighing, he hid his worry and frustration from his face, thinking that, yes, in fact he did spoil things with Eddie. Maybe he should really start listening to Bobby when he says Buck can be a little too reckless.

“When will my silent treatment end?” Buck wanted to know, shifting his big, pleading eyes towards a seemingly very troubled Eddie, but something inside him needed to make sure. “Are you distressed?”

That was Eddie’s last straw.

“Well, Buck, I don’t know, maybe the fact that you were reckless enough to the point of throwing both of us into a high tide in the middle of a storm, and then I couldn’t find you, and also maybe, just maybe, we could have been stricken by a fucking lightning. So yes, I might be a little distressed.” Eddie conceded, almost out of breath. “So can I have this? Fuck it, I will.”

Still recoiled from his friend’s outburst, Buck dared look at Eddie and noticed his entire body shivering, his arms around himself and his henley sticking to his torso. Schooling his eyes not to see more than he should, he let a few seconds go unperturbed between them.

Buck took his eyes off the road and stretched his arm to the backseat and, in a peace offering, handed Eddie, who was scowling, his jeans jacket.

“You can have this as well. If you want.”

Well shit, Eddie knew he shouldn’t have looked up at Buck, because all resentment that was still sitting on his face quickly evaporated when he met those blue eyes. His golden locks, now wet and sticking to his blushing face, from all the running they did when Eddie had been chasing him, were shining, and made his face look younger, despite the unkempt stubble.

“Please,” Buck insisted still holding the jacket with his right hand.

Sighing, Eddie put the jacket over him in a hast. It was almost just as wet as the clothes on his body, but he did feel better as he smelt Buck’s scent on the material. He nudged Buck on the shoulder when he saw his best friend smiling by the corner of his eyes.

“Shut up.”

“I haven’t said anything, in fact, I-”

His comment died on his lips when they heard a muffled choking coming from the hood of the beetle.

“Did you hear that?” Eddie looked at Buck as he whined, understanding what was happening.

“The gas is running low.”

If there really was a bigger entity somewhere looking down at them, it would probably be laughing.

“Ok, let’s push it.” Buck said determined.

“You’re joking, right?” Eddie gasped, staring at Buck’s back as he opened the door and left to the be under the light drizzle. They had practically pulled over in the middle of the road. With no one to ask for help. “No, he really isn’t. Fuck.”

“Okay, we push it and as soon as it starts moving again, we run back inside.” Buck readied himself on the car’s rear, eyes locking with Eddie’s on the other side of the car.

“What if you push and I stay back here on the driver’s seat and turn it back on?”

Buck frowned confused, his head tilting to the side, much like the dogs from TV commercials Buck watches fascinated, with Chris and Eddie.

“But then I wouldn’t have time to jump back in and-”

When Buck realized what his friend was trying to imply, Eddie could hold the tension anymore, and burst into laugh, toppling over himself against the beetle as he saw the horror on Buck’s face.

“Rude! I can’t believe you’d let me behind-”

“You should had seen your face! Gosh, I’m saving this moment forever.” Diaz said, with a more calm chuckle on his lips as he walked back to the rear of the car, readying himself next to Buck. Bating his hair from his eyes, Eddie took a deep breath. “Okay, on three.”

Buck puffed out his cheeks, shaking his head desperately.

“One-”

“Two-”

“Now!” Buck shouted, and both pushed, using all the strength they had, which seemed to work. A few seconds on and the beetle started moving on its own, and both ran back inside. “Go, go, go!”

As soon as they were both in, Buck turned the ignition key and the engine sounded back to life, provoking a relieved sigh from them, who were still trying to catch their breaths. Buck turned on the radio distractly, eyes back on the road.

“And now, the number one of the top ten most requested songs from fans. With you, the first place, Elton John with Your Song.”

Even as Buck rolled his eyes, he couldn’t help the tiny smile from growing on his face as he heard Eddie chuckling.

“It’s my pleasure to be your entertainment source, Eddie Diaz.”

“The pleasure is all mine.” Eddie replied with a smile and he stared and admired the man sitting next to him. The man that had given him a day that was far from what he imagined he would ever live. Buck didn’t seem to notice the power that he had over Eddie, always making him feel like a teen, very different from the responsible teen he had been, but a teenager he had dreamt to be years back: foolish, funny and free.

And maybe, truly in love, even.

It's a little bit funny, this feelin' inside

I'm not one of those who can easily hide

I don't have much money, but boy, if I did

I'd buy a big house where we both could live

Stopping the car under a traffic light, Eddie spoke, almost a whisper to Buck’s ears, as they waited for the green light.

“Thank you,” Eddie waited Buck to turn his confused face towards him before continuing, “for today. I wouldn’t change this afternoon for anything.”

If I was a sculptor, but then again, no

Or a man who makes potions in a travelling show

I know it's not much, but it's the best I can do

My gift is my song and this one's for you

“Oh, which moment are you talking about? When you were chasing after me furious on the beach? Or when you were ready to leave me behind?” Buck asked playfully, laughing together with Eddie.

“Every moment. You are full of surprises, Evan. You are-” he gulped dryly, heart threatening to jump out of his throat, all his feelings for Buck suddenly punching him all at once. He needed to let Buck know how much he matters. “You are everything. I’m grateful for today and for every day since the day we met. I’m grateful for you.”

And you can tell everybody this is your song

It may be quite simple, but now that it's done

He couldn’t tell how Buck’s eyes became the exact representation of the saying his abuela loved to say about how the eyes were the windows of the souls, but Eddie would never get used to being the target of what he liked to think were looks of trust, genuine kindness, and love. No one ever looked at him like that: stealing all the air from his lungs, leaving him breathless.

I hope you don't mind

I hope you don't mind that I put down in words

How wonderful life is while you're in the world

Maybe it wasn’t just his gaze, but the space between them was reducing slowly, and he couldn’t tell which one of them closed the distance completely on the sudden tight space. The touch of Buck’s cold hand over his thigh, which made the moment feel more real, his blue eyes, half hidden under those long eyelashes, his breathing mixing up with his own.

“Eddie-”

“I want to give you the world, Evan.” His fingers brushed over Buck’s stubble, and he closed his eyes, noses touching.

And as things goes, fast as so many waves crashing on the sea, the moment broke when a car honked from the other side of the road, making them both jump out of theirs sits. Buck had startled so hard he almost hit his forehead against the car ceiling.

The green light shining bright, almost mockingly so.

Gulping again, Eddie snapped out of it and pulled away from Buck, the hand on his thigh disappearing. Buck cleared his throat, trying to get a hold on himself, even if his posture betrayed him. He was just as struck as Eddie.

His fingers gripped the steering wheel tight, and he pressed down on the pedal, shifting gears mechanically as they found themselves further and further away from the beach.

As she cut the onions to finish preparing the tortillas she knew both her grandson and her great-grandson loved, Isabel ventured a quick glance towards Chris, who was on the living room watching cartoons. Her attention turned back again to the radio. At the end of the day she always turned on some music, enjoying the distraction while she went on with her chores.

She heard a car parking on the street as she sauteed the onions and tomatoes. The familiar sound made her smile while she cleaned her hands on her apron, making her way towards the door with quick paces.

She couldn’t hide the surprise when she opened the door and saw both men walking her way completely wet. She covered her mouth with her hand, surprise morphing into amusement.

“Edmundo what happened to both of you?” Isabel asked, looking at the Evan’s and her grandson’s barefeet. She recognized Eddie’s used boots in his hands, completely soaked and covered with sand, but she couldn’t remember the jean jacket he wore. “A tsunami caught you on the way home?”

“Something like that, abuela.” Eddie replied, holding back rolling his eyes as Buck giggled behind him. Shaking his head with amusement, he gave her the mail he’d found sitting on her mailbox. “Is Chris doing alright? I’m sorry we’re late, we lost track of time.”

“He’s fine, watching his cartoons on the living room.” Isabel answered, and before he could ask, she continued, “Yes, he finished his homework.”

Buck, as he exchanged a quick glance with Isabel, felt the familiar pride settling back into his chest as he watched Eddie getting into his ‘dad mode’.

“Evan, come on in. You both need to get warmer and drier if you don’t want to catch a cold.” She opened the door wider, giving them space to enter. “I’m making tortillas!”

“Yes, you’re more than welcome to stay.” Eddie answered Buck’s silent question, tapping on his own stomach, with a sudden realization of how hungry he is. “Chris will love to see you.”

Isabel checked the mail in hand, and as she expected, most were bills, power, water, phone… except the last letter. Frowning as she recognized the stamp and the address to Rámon and Helena in El Paso. She put all her mail on her apron pocket, predicting it was better to wait till she told her grandson, given the circumstances of the couple’s last visit to LA.

Buck whined when he remembered the state he let his apartment. He left work and went straight to the Diaz house, but he couldn’t put it off being away from home this long, not with the new and not-so-friendly neighbour.

“I’m really sorry, but I have to go. I still haven’t gone back to my apartment today, but I appreciate the invitation.” Buck tried to hug Isabel goodbye, but she took a step back, holding her hands up as she dodged the taller man’s hug.

“Oh no, not covered in sand you won’t!” She said, moving away from his still stretched arm and ignoring the kicked puppy expression he was giving her, and the amused smile on Eddie’s face. “But I’m getting you some tortillas for your to take with you. Just a moment.”

Clearing his throat almost hesitantly, Eddie turned to Buck, who shifted his gaze to his bare feet. His mind suddenly provided him with images of what had almost happened inside the beetle, and he was overtaken with embarrassment. And judging by Buck’s blushing cheeks, he suspected he was thinking about it too.

“I’m sorry if that was too much… back in the car.” Buck apologized to Eddie, looking at him through his lashes, hoping that he hadn’t overstepped the limits too early. He knew he could be impulsive at times, and always take the first step in every situation. But, in that moment, it felt like it was just the two of them, isolated from the rest of the world, away from all obligations, charges and mostly fear.

He knew that Eddie was scared of entering another relationship after his break up with his ex-wife, but there was also a discomfort knowing how close they were, and to come in terms with having feelings for another man, was a new territory, which could be easy in Buck’s eyes, but he wasn’t naive. He knew that for Eddie, things couldn’t easily be thrown away.

And honestly, he was scared for Eddie and himself too.

In less than an hour ago, the fear seemed to become invisible on the moments prior to their ‘almost kiss’.

Eddie must have noticed something on his face, because he creased his brow as if looking for something to say. Checking quick to see if there weren’t anyone in sight, he sighed and closed the distance between them, colliding against Buck’s front into a tight hug. For a brief moment, he remembered the countless minutes they spent like that in the empty disco, and he couldn’t help but close his eyes, his heart squeezing as he reminded himself that they couldn’t do that in public.

He still had his prejudices, personal obstacles to be deconstructed, but the fear that something might happen to this man he held, that made Eddie feel safe whenever he felt his insecurities and fears beating against his chest, was unthinkable. An irrational fear as big as thinking of losing Christopher.

“It wasn’t too much, Evan.” Eddie breathed deeply on Buck’s neck. His hands, which looked small inside the jeans jacket, gripped tight the green sweater Buck was using. “Thank you again.”

“Actually, I think I’m feeling pretty lucky.” Buck whispered on Eddie’s ear, closing his eyes. He held Eddie like he wanted to hold this moment and the entire day they had. “We’ll meet Sunday? I need my two assistants to paint all the walls.

“Of course, we’ll be there.” Then Eddie, against all his better judgement, pulled back from Buck and begun stripping off the jacket, but Buck’s hand landed over his, stopping his movement.

“Stay with it. You can give it back on Sunday.” Evan had been staring at Eddie wearing his jacket ever since he first put it on, and the satisfaction still haven’t left him. “I wanted to say goodbye to Chris, but I really need to go.

Buck waved goodbye, but halted when Eddie seemed to remember something in a jolt. He grimaced while he took a carefully folded, and extremely wet piece of paper from his pocket, and curiosity quickly overtook Buck.

“What’s that?”

“It’s a letter from Chris, he asked me to give it to you, but I only remembered it now.” Eddie gave it to him, and he slowly opened it. “It’s a miracle it’s still intact and not lost somewhere in the sea.”

He felt affection squeezing his heart, which was already full of emotions the Diaz next to him peppered him with, now there was another Diaz that shared that same space. He tried telling himself that he was only emotional because he was receiving his first letter from Chris, but he knew that in reality, it was much more than that.

“Ah, no.” Eddie stopped Buck before he could unfold the paper completely. “He had been strict and clear when he prohibited me from reading. Orders are orders.”

Isabel came back with a bowl full of tortillas in hand, silently observing the moment her grandchild and Evan smiled at each other, completely at a lost about their surroundings. Not even the smell of tortillas would snap these foolish men out of it, she thought as she shook her head.

These two were too obvious, God help her old heart.

“Edmundo, enter and go change your clothes, now!”

The man almost jumped out of his skin, a step away from toppling over Buck, who widened his eyes as if remembering where they were.

“Abuela!” Eddie felt his cheeks growing warm, suddenly feeling way more younger under Isabel’s piercing gaze. “I’m not a child anymore.”

“Oh,” Isabel laughed, walking past him and giving Buck the bowl, “not in my eyes, mi chico. And you, eat them all! Don’t forget to bring my bowl back.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Buck bent over to receive a kiss from Isabel on the cheek. “I’m going now, thank you and see you soon, Diaz’s.”

He waved to Isabel and Eddie, his eyes resting a tad longer on his best friend’s hazelnut ones before getting inside the beetle. They both hurried back inside after watching the car moving away from them. Eddie didn’t waste time before finding Chris, who finally noticed his presence and greeted him with a long hug and a customary smile.

“Dad! You’re all wet!” Chris pulled a face as he touched his dad’s shirt under Buck’s jacket.

“Edmundo Diaz! Are you sitting on my couch without having changed your clothes?” Isabel’s voice sounded from somewhere in the hall, and Eddie whined while Chris giggled in amusement.

“You are in so much trouble, dad.”

Eddie stared down at him, overly serious, before surging forward and tickling him, laughing with his son.

“I love you, kid.” Eddie kissed his hair, lifting up from the couch.

“I love you too.”

Dodging the storm that was Isabel Diaz, Eddie sneaked on the tip of his toes to the kitchen for a glass of water. After drinking the last of it, he took off the jacket, readying himself to go change in the bathroom when he noticed the familiar song playing on the radio. He hugged the jacket absentmindedly as he recalled the afternoon he had with Buck. A smile formed on his lips almost involuntarily as he leaned against the counter, going over the conversation they had on the beach, Buck’s words and all the mess that leaded them to that moment under the streetlight.

That Buck’s eyes were one of the most beautiful things for Eddie. Aside from the rest of the package that was Evan Buckley, which was noted by most people, getting to know him behind all that, let Eddie feeling like a fool in love, standing in his grandmother’s humble kitchen.

So excuse me forgetting, but these things I do

You see, I've forgotten if they're green or they're blue

Anyway the thing is what I really mean

Yours are the sweetest eyes I've ever seen

Daring his luck for a brief moment alone, Eddie lifted the jacket to his face, and, as he closed his eyes, he felt his own scent penetrating the material, but he also recognized the faint perfume that screamed Buck. On that moment, all he could feel and think of was Buck. His mischievous laugh, his expressions, from the most silly and surprised to more the most serious and worried, his touch, his hug, the stubble brushing his cheeks, his smell.

Damn it, Diaz. What happened to you?

Buck had a tiny smile on his lips as he sighed and walked down the corridor after climbing the stairs to the fourth floor. He entered his apartment, throwing his soaked boots next to the door and locking it. He approached the second-hand record player he found on a friend’s thrift store near his work and placed the tonearm gently over the record, observing as if spinned around under the fleeting touch of the headshell. His room was just around the corner, but as he walked to it he almost stumbled as he recognized Elton John’s voice echoing sweetly over the small room.

And you can tell everybody this is your song

It may be quite simple, but now that it's done

I hope you don't mind

I hope you don't mind that I put down in words

How wonderful life is while you're in the world

Buck chuckled low as he shook his head, letting his sand covered feet guide him all the way to the other end of the corridor.

He could say that his body was present in this new house, although, his heart had stayed back in the Diaz household.

#911 #911 fox #911 fic #buddie #buddie fanfic #my writing #my 70's boys #disco #evan buckley #eddie diaz #evan buckley x edmundo diaz #eddie x buck

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