#rakes progress magazine

[grantgoddard]

Teach your children well? : 1960s-1970s : vegetable-free adolescence, Camberley

 “How often do you wash your face?” asked the doctor.

“Like how?” I responded, uncertain about what he was enquiring.

“You know, with soap and water,” he clarified.

“Er, never,” I replied truthfully.

“Why not?” he demanded.

“Because nobody ever told me I needed to,” I said, somewhat embarrassed.

The doctor regarded me pitifully, imagining I must belong to a tribe of itinerant gypsies or have been raised by wolves. To the casual observer, my suburban home life appeared quite normal. Scratch the surface and you would have discovered that my parents had given me few of the ‘life skills’ that are supposed to be demonstrated to children. On this occasion, my mother had sent her teenage son to the family doctor in Frimley Road because his face had become progressively covered in spots. But neither she nor my father had ever instructed me how or when to wash. Once a week, I stood under the water in our modern home’s shower cubicle. If my face became wet while shampooing my hair, I merely dabbed it dry with a towel.

The doctor wrote a prescription for a liquid called ‘Phisohex’ which came in a large green bottle. After a few weeks washing my face twice daily with this cleanser, my spots magically disappeared, following more than a decade of cheeks shamefully having been untouched by soap. Did my mother acknowledge this shortfall in her parental duties? Of course not. This was but one aspect of her ‘hands-off’ approach to childrearing. She had enjoyed a good post-war education at Camberley’s girls’ grammar school in Frimley Road where she was likely taught conventional housekeeping and domestic skills in preparation for marriage. She was goodlooking and always dressed immaculately in the latest trends. Her parents had raised her and her two sisters impressively. So where had her own parenting regime gone awry?

Most of the basic skills I developed – writing, reading, arithmetic – I learned from books and television rather than parental instruction. However, one ability that proved impossible to appropriate in that way was tying shoelaces. As a result, at junior school, after ‘PE’ (Physical Education) lessons that required us to change into slip-on plimsolls, I always had to seek out my cousin Deborah in the year below mine to ask her to retie the laces on my shoes. Once I progressed to grammar school, my skill deficit became more difficult to hide. The mandated school uniform required black lace-up shoes. My mother acknowledged my ‘shoelace’ issue but, instead of simply demonstrating how to do it, she bought me slip-on 'Hush Puppies' shoes for school which resulted in regular disciplinary action. Finally, I had to draft an embarrassing letter from my mother to the school, asking for her son to be excused from the dress code due to difficulty finding suitable lace-up shoes for his high in-step feet.

Like many 1960’s housewives, my mother regularly cut out recipes from magazines and stuffed them in a kitchen drawer. She was particularly proud of a plastic box with transparent lid holding two rows of Marguerite Patten recipe cards that she had sent for to ‘Family Circle’ magazine and which I was tasked with keeping in correct order. She loved making cakes and had a sweet tooth that probably promoted the development of diabetes in her later life. However, her skills with main meals were limited and she preferred to rely upon ‘instant’ foods like fish fingers that were heavily marketed to ‘busy’ housewives at the time. This was probably why I remained as thin as a rake during my childhood, despite teenage years spent scoffing two bowls of cereal both morning and night.

I had been a regular visitor to the family dentist on Middle Gordon Road due to the dreadful state of my teeth. Even at a tender age, I was being gassed for extractions. On one occasion, the stern dentist accused me of not brushing my teeth sufficiently firmly to prevent decay. I resolved to use the state-of-the-art electric toothbrush in our family bathroom with greater pressure during twice-daily cleanings. I returned to the dentist six months later, only for him to inform me that I had rubbed away most of the enamel from my remaining teeth. The outcome of his ‘advice’ was merely more extractions. Not once did this dentist question my mother about her children’s diet. Even if he had, she would have been unlikely to respond honestly.

My mother had an inexplicable lifelong aversion to vegetables. Only the humble potato would accompany our meals, usually in the form of Cadbury’s ‘Smash’. Carrots? Never. Peas? Nope. Broccoli? Unseen. There were other foodstuffs we never experienced – spaghetti, yoghurts, condiments, rice – because my mother had a preference for jellies, custard and blancmange, but it was the lack of vegetables that must have impacted our health growing up the most. I never understood how, despite the piles of women’s magazines around our home, she somehow studiously avoided taking their practical advice regarding suitable family diets. Such behaviour could have been excused earlier in the twentieth century when literacy and knowledge were less prevalent, but surely not by the 1960’s.

Much of my childhood during weekends and school holidays was spent at my maternal grandparents’ adjoining house where I helped prepare ingredients for their meals. Instructed by my wonderful grandmother, I would sit on the backdoor step with a bowl between my knees, shucking peas from their pods. I would use a peeler to remove the skins from various vegetables whose names I did not know. I would carefully place dozens of apples in rows within cardboard boxes, separating each layer with old newspapers before carrying them into the recesses of the house’s darkened larder under the stairs. My grandmother loved to make jams with these fruits, for which I carefully wrote out white adhesive labels carrying the manufacture date and type. Bizarrely, none of these vegetables or jams were ever served in our own house next door.

From the day she left school at twelve until the day she retired, my grandmother worked in fruit and vegetable shop ‘H.A. Cousins & Son’ at 11 High Street on the corner of St George’s Road in Camberley. During all those decades, her ‘sales assistant’ job never changed, standing all day on the shop’s bare floorboards, putting requested items in brown paper bags, weighing them on old-style scales against combinations of various brass weights, calculating the cost in her head and then the correct change to return to the customer.

Shop owner Mr Cousins would daily travel thirty miles to the fruit, vegetable and flower markets in London at the crack of dawn, returning with a van of produce to sell. Once a day’s stocks were sold, that was it. Any produce left over would be given to the shop staff. My grandmother regularly brought home quantities of all sorts of fruit and vegetables which she shared with us, though my mother always refused the vegetables. Thankfully, she did accept the fruit which became the sole source of my necessary five portions per day.

Cousins advertised its shop locally as “by appointment to Staff College” (Sandhurst Royal Military Academy), providing “Dessert Fruit and Flowers for Dinner Parties, etc.” Its upper-class customers and Sandhurst’s foreign residents necessitated it stock a variety of exotic fruits, the excess of which ended up in my family’s fruit bowl. Visitors to our house in the 1960’s were shocked to see pineapples, mangoes and lychees on our dining table, delicacies that I enjoyed as ‘normal’ long before their availability in supermarkets.

My mother insisted that fruit always be eaten covered in sugar, her favourite ingredient. Cups of tea required two spoons of white sugar, coffee two lumps of Demerara sugar, stewed apples or pears served frequently as our dessert had to be sprinkled with granulated ‘Tate & Lyle’. Even when I visited my mother in her final years, she would buy in a banana to offer me (she refused to eat them), accompanied by a plate of sugar in which to dip it. Thanks, mum. Banana yes, sugar no.

When my grandmother reached the statutory retirement age of the time, we all went round to her house for a little celebration of her departure from a lifetime of work on Cousins’ shop floor. She was pleased to be able to retire before Britain switched to decimalisation in 1971 as she feared metric calculations that no longer involved farthings, florins, half-crowns and guineas. Months later, the shop asked if she would return and work part-time because it was short-staffed. Of course she agreed. In total, she clocked up more than half a century working for that one employer in that one location, a 400-metre walk from her sole marital home.

In 1976, on arrival at university, the bulk of my Surrey County Council grant had to be paid in advance for one term of accommodation and three meals per day within college. Having never taken school dinners and rarely eaten out in restaurants, I was unfamiliar with the canteen system where you line up and tell the kitchen servers which food you want. I hardly recognised any of the foodstuffs on offer and would often merely opt for two identical desserts, skipping main courses entirely. Most intimidating were twice-weekly ‘formal dinners’ lasting an hour, during which more than a hundred students remained seated at long benches in the huge dining room to be served by staff a succession of courses completely foreign to me. The table places were laid with radiating lines of various cutlery, none of which I knew their specific purpose. My fellow students seemed to find all this ‘etiquette’, including ritual table-banging and foot-stomping, perfectly normal because 90%+ of them had grown up around such ‘practises’ at elitist private schools. I often avoided these ghastly events and sat in my room eating a packet of biscuits.

My parents having never taught me how to use cutlery, I had developed my own system whereby I always used my right hand to hold the fork. Only when I had to cut up some food would I transfer the fork to my left hand and then simultaneously use the knife in my right hand. The rest of the time, I placed the knife down on the table. Nobody had ever corrected me. Not until sitting in that university dining room, surrounded by loud toffs with posh accents and double-barrel surnames, did I have to learn to eat holding the fork in my left hand. To this day, my default way of eating is to grab the fork with my right hand. Old habits die hard.

In 1986, my little sister was offered a Saturday job on the till of a small self-serve fruit and vegetable shop in Camberley town centre. She was worried that she would not recognise the produce she would be expected to ring up, since our mother had never fed us veg other than potatoes. By then, I had spent a decade living away from our vegetable-free home and was able to accompany my sister on a ‘Secret Squirrel’ mission to the shop, during which we walked slowly around its one central aisle and tried to identify the varieties of common vegetable on sale. ‘Common’ to everyone else, particularly to our beloved late grandmother, but weirdly not at all to us!

In retrospect, my childhood must have been quite unusual because, although I lacked some basic life skills, I was steeped in other abilities beyond my age. By junior school, I had taught myself to type, to read music and play the piano (despite having non-musical parents). Having recruited me into his business once I could walk, my father taught me how to survey a property, create architectural plans on a drawing board, use Letraset, calculate floor areas and room volumes, prepare client invoices and statements on an electric typewriter, photocopy and make dyeline prints. Meanwhile, my mother enrolled me into reconciling her employer's accounts and calculating its staff's pay packets, pinning and cutting dress patterns to materials, basic knitting stitches, using her sewing machine and threading multiple yarns on her knitting machine. I was eight when typing the forms for my parents' passport renewals, testing my mother's knowledge for her driving test and testing my father for his pilot licence. By the time I started secondary school, I was holding the fort at my father's town centre office, learning shorthand from my mother's discarded 1950's text books and calculating potential profits of deals for my father's new property business. What a strangely un-childlike childhood it was!

[comicconradio]

A new LEGO Harry Potter game is reportedly in the works. Harry Potter is one of the biggest brands in all of entertainment. The books took the world by storm and a series of films followed, raking in billions at the box office. The impact they had is immeasurable, but it has lost some of its luster in recent years. The Fantastic Beasts movies started out with decent reception, but got progressively worse until it became evident that Warner Bros. had no interest in making the remaining sequels that it had initially hoped to put out. However, Hogwarts Legacy showed there is still love for the Harry Potter universe on a major level. The game sold an absurd amount of copies in just days of its release and the momentum may be sustained by a different developer. In a new report from NintendoLife, it was reported that TT Games has canceled a bunch of LEGO games and other projects in addition to a new Batman game and Mandalorian DLC for The Skywalker Saga having stalled out. The studio is putting a lot of energy into another major project, however: a new LEGO Harry Potter game. However, this isn't going to be an adaptation of Fantastic Beasts or even Harry Potter and the Cursed Child (a play from JK Rowling that continues Potter's story), it's something else. It's believed this project will be more like LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga and serve as one big, refined collection of the LEGO Harry Potter games. Although TT Games has made LEGO Harry Potter games, they're likely going to start from scratch just as they did with Star Wars.⚡️🍿🍿🍿🚀 #comiccon #spoilermagazine #news #losangeles #podcast #magazine #art #instagram #galaxy #film #tv #hollywood #feature #movies #fandom #graphicdesign #nyc #spoiler #comicconradio #comicbooks #starwars #lego #harrypotter #gaming (at Los Angeles, California) https://www.instagram.com/p/CpxC5nSreLu/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[thegardeninggoodlife]

I was rather taken with the pressed flowers @rakesprogress #rakesgoeslive pop-up exhibition, especially the wild carrot, daucus carota. I've just purchased some seeds and hope to grow it next year on my #balconygarden #balconygardening #wildcarrot #Daucuscarota

[harry-leroy]

So people were doing Endeavour cosplay today and I was a little late to the rush because I’m a lit student and the essays never stop. Enjoy my Endeavour Morse inspired look! (and that bottom left pic of me just being ridiculous). 

[tedesquire]

Hey I saw your requests were open! I was wondering if you could do a gender neutral reader insert for Bill? Like the reader is more punk/goth and paints their nails and Bill is curious about it so they paint their nails together? Thanks for taking the time to write and take requests! :)

Bring Back Manly Men (Headcanon)

Gender Neutral! Reader/Bill

Typical to 80′s fashion, nail polish ads targeted towards women usually ranged from a spectrum of nudes, peaches, bronze, bronze, light pinks, hot pinks, violets, reds, maroons, purples.

These were the colors Missy often seemed to go for on the Preston family’s rare outings, so Bill hadn’t really given deep thought to the possibilities of other colors. 

Nevermind the fact that Bill doesn’t really think deeply about anything other than Wyld Stallyns and his friendship with Ted. 

However, he suddenly started paying attention when Best’s Magazine came out with a new issue that featured Steven Tyler with painted nails on the cover.

If an absolute rock legend such as Steven Tyler could wear nail polish, why couldn’t he?

Of course, he wasn’t sure where to go to buy black nail polish and if Ted couldn’t tell him (which he couldn’t) then Bill was out of luck.

That is, until he saw you.

Bill noticed the dark tint of your nails and it took him a moment to come up with enough courage to ask you where you got the polish.

You wanted to be skeptical... Why was Bill Preston of all people talking to you, let alone asking about your nail polish?

“Mervyn’s.” You replied. “...Why?”

“To have the best band in the world.” Bill answered, as if it was obvious. You weren’t able to make the connection and let the conversation end there. 

The next day at school, you noticed Bill stumbling late for your shared class together, acting nervous with his hands held firmly in his pockets. 

“Mr. Preston, would you like to participate in class today?” Your history teacher snidely remarked, much to Bill’s chagrin. The boy hesitantly took his hands out of his pocket, revealing a pair of thin, winter gloves.

“Mr. Preston, would you like to take off the gloves?” Bill huffed, his cheeks pinking as all eyes met his figure. One the offending items were removed your teacher sighed heavily, eyes raking over the bandages wrapped all around his hands.

“Get into an accident, Mr. Preston?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And how exactly did you manage to injure both your hands?”

“He cut them!” Ted offered, making Bill’s eyes twitch. “On the washing machine?”

“Trying to fix the washing machine.” Bill tried to correct.

“And no blood on your bandages? Well Mr. Preston, I think your injury has distracted the class long enough. I expect these worksheets to be done by the end of class.”

“Yes, sir.” You saw Ted pick up Bill’s paper, trying his best to follow along and help his friend out.

“Hey,” you whispered, having finally found a moment in the lecture to try and talk to Bill. “What really happened to your hands?”

Bill looked around, making sure no one was looking to peel some of the bandages back to reveal black paint stained on his fingernails down to his middle knuckles. 

“I tried to paint them but my hands were too shaky but then it wouldn’t come off.” He fidgeted, looking shameful. “I don’t know what I’m gonna do.”

Your heart went out to the dim blonde, and you sighed, wondering if you were going to regret what you were about to say.

“Swing by my house after school, I can fix them for you.”

“Really?” You nodded, eyeing your teacher’s back to make sure you weren’t going to get caught. You scribbled your address on a piece of paper for him. 

You weren’t sure why he wanted to paint his nails so badly, but nonetheless, you felt the urge to help him. 

-

As much as Ted wished to tag along, he knew his dad would kill him if he so much saw a drop of paint on his son’s nails, and he didn’t mind some alone time with Missy as she dropped him off, so he opted out of the experience. 

“Oh god.” You mumbled as you peeled off the last layer of bandages. It really was a mess. The two of you sat on your bed, soft music playing through your radio.

“So,” You opened your bottle of acetate, a chemical scent sweeping through your nostrils. “Why do you want to paint your nails anyway?” You worked on cleaning the goop off his nails.

Trying not to move his hand, he gently leaned over to the side of your bed and unzipping his backpack, revealing the rolled up copy of Best.

“Oh! Is that what you were trying to go for?”

“Trying, at least. Ted tried to help as well but...” His free hand went to scratch the back of his neck. 

“It takes a bit of practice.” You patted his hand, trying to encourage him. “It’s nice, every once and a while, to try and treat yourself by painting your nails.” He hummed in agreement.

“You know, It’s not just Steven Tyler,” you mention, ignoring his wincing as you pushed his cuticles back. “David Bowie paints his nails, Ozzy Osbourne, and so does Freddie Mercury! Although, he only paints his left hand since he’s right-handed.”

“Most excellent.” Bill was caught off guard. He supposed he wasn’t as caught up with the rock world as he thought. 

“I’m surprised you wanted to do this.” You mumbled, clipping his nails. “Most guys wouldn’t be caught dead. And.. aren’t you afraid that people will call you.. names? Most of our classmates may not be as progressive as you are.” You unscrewed the nail polish cap 

“Well... Ted is the only person I hang out with, and you’re my friend now, right? For doing this?” You met his gaze and nodded, enjoying his candor. “So if I only care about you two, then what does it matter? The only negative consequence I can think of is how it will affect our band, but if anything, we’ll be even more bodacious than we already are!” He concluded.

“I think you’re on to something there, Preston. Most of those guys became famous because they didn’t let bias or other people’s judgement define them. They were just themselves. You finally finished, picking up his palm and admiring the work.

“What do you think?” You asked.

“Wow. I- This is most resplendent.” He gushed, lifting his hands to get a better look.

“Be careful not to touch anything, the paint still isn’t dry.” He nodded, slowly getting off your bed to head to the mirror in your room.

He almost forgot you were there, getting so engrossed in posing his hands and recreating the magazine’s picture, until you awkwardly cleared your throat.

“You.... want a picture? Like Steven’s?” You asked, opening one of your drawers to reveal a polaroid.

“Really?” 

“Yeah, for your band, right?”

“O..okay.” Bill couldn’t suppress the smile, backing up towards your wall and lying his hands on his face.

“3...2...1...” click. “There you go.” Bill looked quite nice, and you couldn’t help but feel proud that you helped him be able to feel this way.

“Here, you keep it.” Bill handed the picture back to you. “You can be the first.”

“First?” You questioned. “First what? First fan?”

“No! The first stylist! We’ll be sure to mention you when we go on talk shows and perform concerts.” He answered, his confidence making you smile.

The moment was broken by the honking of a car outside.

“Oh! That’s probably Missy. Thank you for helping me! I’ll see you tomorrow?” Bill gently but quickly gathered his stuff, standing by your doorway.

“Yeah, I’ll see you tomorrow Bill.” He smiled, leaving your eyeline as he traversed downstairs. 

You looked down at the polaroid, still in your hands and smiled softly. You had a feeling you weren’t going to regret being Bill’s friend.

[x-ladyathena-x]

Red

Dean Winchester x Reader

Part 1 of 4 [Little Red Riding Hood-Dean Winchester] in my Wishful Thinking series- This is a completely ridiculous self-indulgent, smut filled catastrophe. All stories in this fairytale AU are interlocking and part of the same continuous plot, but can be read as stand alones. Basically, reader is the main character of all these fairytale-esque situations that she finds herself in and gets to bang all the dangerous, hot men.

Part 2 of 4 [Cinderella-Kylo Ren] Commander

Part 3 of 4 [Sleeping Beauty-The Witcher/Geralt of Rivia] Morning

Part 4 of 4 [Beauty and the Beast-The Winter Soldier/Bucky Barnes] Castle

Warnings: Shameless Smut & Dirty talk/cursing

Word count: 1.6K

Summary: Little Red Riding Hood AU. When your little red corvette breaks down on the side of the road, the big bad wolf will be the least of your problems.

The previously purring engine of your red Corvette convertible sputtered to a halt.

“Damn,” you muttered to yourself, as you tried to restart the engine.

You turned the key and listened to the engine struggling to turn over. You’d put a lot of time and energy into this car’s restoration. You’d brought it back from the dead. Well, almost.

The engine gave one last pitiful flutter before dying completely.

“Fuck,” you seethed, letting your head fall to the steering wheel in defeat.

You glanced sideways to the basket of blueberry muffins in the passenger seat that you were taking to your grandma’s house. She didn’t live very far, just through the woods. Yet, the little red corvette couldn’t even make it that far, apparently.

A very prominent car magazine from the area had even featured you and your restoration, praising your hard work. How embarrassing that the car wouldn’t even start now.

This particular stretch of woods was in the middle of nowhere, which meant no phone service… Great.

Before you could finish worrying about your poor car, you heard the rumble of another engine pull up. You looked in the rearview mirror and saw a black Chevy Impala.

The car made you sit up; it was very well taken care of and beautiful. But not nearly as beautiful as the man that stepped out of it. He was tall, with light brown hair. Stubble dotted a jaw so sharp it could cut you. And his green eyes were sharp as a predator.

He wore blue jeans, motorcycle boots, and a faded leather jacket. Your stomach fluttered. This was the type of man your mother would’ve warned you to stay away from. The kind that would ruin your life, but you’d thank them for the pleasure of it anyway.

Another, more logical, side of you realized that you were all alone on the side of the road with this stranger. What if he was a crazy person? No one would hear your cries for help.

You decided to get out of the car. All the easier to run, if need be.

“Well, if it isn’t the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” the stranger said as he approached you.

You blushed a little, his deep voice did nothing to help the twisting in your stomach. He was even more handsome up close.

“What is this? A ’91?” He asked, patting the roof.

You found your voice, “An ’89, actually. Bought it at auction and thought I’d worked out all the kinks, but obviously not,” You laughed nervously.

The stranger smirked, “don’t worry, sweetheart, my ’67 back there is a constant work in progress. Rods like these, they need constant love and a tender touch, but if she wants it the hard way, I’ll give her that too.” He winked at you.

You felt a throbbing in your core at the way his eyes raked over you and a pooling on your thigh. It was a hot day and you’d opted to wear a lightweight sundress. No underwear of course, because that wasn’t really your jam. You became very aware of how wet you were becoming as the wind ruffled your dress. You didn’t really know what to say, because your mind was elsewhere.

“I’m Dean,” The stranger said, extending his hand.

“Y/n,” You replied, reaching out to shake his hand. It was rough and calloused, but warm.

It was strong too. He gripped your hand tight and held it up to his lips, “Mmm, y/n, you smell good enough to eat.”

You pressed your thighs together, trying to get a grip on yourself but it only made the ache worse.

Dean’s eyes lingered on you for a moment before he asked in his husky voice, “Can I look underneath?”

You swallowed hard, “What?”

“Your hood. Mind if I take a look under the hood?” Dean said, pointing to the front of the Corvette.

“Oh! Oh, yeah, sure thing,” You replied and walked around to lift it for him.

There was a bit of a trick to opening it, sometimes it got stuck. And of course, now was one of those times. You cursed under your breath.

“Here, let me help,” Dean said as he came up behind you to help lift.

As the two of you pulled upwards on the hood, you could feel his erection through his blue jeans, pressing hard against your ass. A shiver ran though you, causing your body to wiggle against him. You could’ve sworn you heard him inhale sharply as he stepped away like nothing happened.

You composed yourself as the two of you inspected the engine. As you pointed out all the modifications you’d made and he nodded enthusiastically, you felt the two of you drifting closer together until your shoulders touched.

“You trying to get cozy with me, sweetheart?” Dean grinned playfully.

“Maybe I am,” you answered sarcastically, throwing all caution to the wind.

Dean looked up at you through his lashes and bit down on his bottom lip, “It’s your spark plug, easy fix, but I’m sure you already knew that.”

Your eyes roamed over the obvious answer to your engine troubles. Had you been less distracted by this gorgeous man, you’d have probably noticed it sooner.

“Right, yeah, I’ve been having issues with that. I’ve got extras in the trunk.”

You ran around to the back of the car, retrieved the extra spark plug, and the two of you had your car fixed in no time.

At the exact moment you reach up to close the hood of the car, a large gust of wind blew through the trees, blowing your skirt up, and revealing your ass.

You hear Dean swear under his breath and feel a finger slide between your soaking wet folds.

“Already so wet for me,” Dean says as he spins you around and sits you down on the front bumper.

He squats down in front of you and draped both your legs over each of his shoulders, “Do you want me to devour this pussy like I’ve been dying to do and take you right here on the side of the road?” he asked, his voice thick with lust.

“Yes,” you whimpered. You wanted him to touch you more than anything.

You felt his wide, warm tongue lick a strip straight up your center and couldn’t help the moan that escaped from your lips as you threaded your fingers through his hair and pulled him closer. He licked and suckled on your clit until you came not once, but twice. You were a screaming crying mess.

When he pulled away, he stood up and pulled you with him. Dean turned you around and bent you over the hood of your little red Corvette. You were so wet he slipped in with ease.

“Fuck, you’re so tight,” He whispered in your ear as he wrapped his hands in your hair and pulled your head back so he could bite into your shoulder. It hurt deliciously.

You could feel each thrust as he stretched you. He felt so good, it’d been way too long since you’d been with someone and you made a wish right then and there that you could have run-in’s like this with hot men more often.

He pounded into you as you came again, and all you could do was moan and scream his name.

Dean flipped you around to face him and you wrapped your legs around his hips. He reached up and pulled the front of your dress down, exposing your breasts, allowing them to bounce freely with every thrust. You dug your nails into his shoulder as he closed his mouth around one of your nipples.

You felt his thrusts begin to slow and could tell he was close, “I’m about to cum deep inside this tight little pussy,” he growled in your ear.

You weren’t sure if it was his long deliberate thrusts or his filthy mouth that did it, but your final orgasm made you clamp down tight around him as he came with you. As he came, he buried his face in your neck and whined your name.

When he came down from his high, he looked up at you and kissed you full on the mouth in the most tender way.

He stood you on your feet slowly as he pulled out of you. You could feel his cum dripping down your leg as you stood there catching your breath and reveling in what had just happened.

Before you could catch your breath, he’d already zipped his pants back up. He kissed you on the mouth again and you could taste yourself on him.

Dean began walking to his car and called over his shoulder to you, “Be careful on these roads sweetheart, I hear there’s a big bad wolf out here looking for pretty girls.”

He winked, got back in his car and drove off, leaving you there on the side of the road a very satisfied and well fucked mess. Mmm, what a day, so far.

[terrimanduca]

Sally Kvalheim - Makeup & Hair - Rakes Progress Magazine - August 2019

[heavyarethecrowns]

Forget Wills and Kate - it's Harry who's found love - May 2007

Gazing into the flames of a campfire on the banks of Botswana's Okavango River, a scruffily dressed young man took a sip of his beer and let out a prolonged sigh.

Minutes later, he was pouring his heart out to the three strangers sitting beside him.

"Apparently, he had fallen in love with some girl in Cape Town who was the daughter of a rich businessman in Zimbabwe.

"He seemed really serious about her, saying he couldn't understand how he had fallen head-over-heels only four days after meeting her," one of those fellow travellers later recalled.

The love-sick youth was, of course, Prince Harry, then on holiday in Africa during his gap year. And the girl who made such an impact was Chelsy Davy.

Three years on, almost to the day, Harry is preparing to wave goodbye to his girlfriend and march off to war.

Much has happened to the young prince in the intervening period: officer training at Sandhurst; periodic brawls with the paparazzi; and his father's marriage to the woman Harry once blamed for causing his late mother so much anguish.

But, to the surprise of many observers, one of the few constants in Harry's life has turned out to be the coltish, snub-nosed girl he met in Cape Town.

Indeed, some of his friends believe that an engagement is almost certainly on the cards, though probably not for a few years yet.

Of course, feelings can change. A tour of duty in Iraq, fighting for his country, may accelerate the progression from pampered prince to more mature man of the world: he may want to close the book on his youth, open a new chapter, find a different kind of soulmate.

But maybe not. Even 12 months ago, few could have predicted that Harry's long- distance relationship with the coquettish daughter of a Zimbabwean wheeler-dealer and former Coca-Cola model would outlast William's romance with the eminently proper Kate Middleton.

The truth of the matter, however, is that Harry has always seen himself and Chelsy as better suited and more capable of going the distance.

"And now," said a well-placed source this week, "he's been proved right."

The 22-year- old prince has become increasingly irritated by what he saw as the "hype" surrounding William and Kate's relationship.

A friend of Harry's says: "Harry doesn't want to be subjected to the level of interest people have been taking in William and Kate.

"It's his idea of hell. But he also feels very frustrated at the way people are so dismissive of him and Chelsy.

"They are always portrayed as a pair of poor little rich kids who will burn themselves out sooner rather than later.

"In Harry's mind, there is nothing ridiculous whatsoever in the idea that one day, in the not-too-distant future, Princess Chelsy could be standing on the balcony at Buckingham Palace - even though she would probably be hiding a cigarette and a bottle of Malibu behind her back."

Despite the stream of paparazzi photographs that reveal a fondness for partying and a distinctly beach-chick style, the 21-year-old Zimbabwean has been an "A" student at school and university.

Harry would not want to change anything about her.

While others - including his own father, according to Harry - find themselves transfixed by Chelsy's more obvious charms - the prince has always believed that his girlfriend has some sterling qualities that Kate probably lacked.

"Harry has always been quietly very proud of the fact that Chelsy - or Chedda, as he affectionately calls her - loves him for who he is.

"In fact, she sees the fact that he's royal as more of a hindrance than a help," says a confidante.

"As the hugely popular daughter of a multi-millionaire businessman with homes in at least three different countries, she doesn't really need to take advantage of Harry's birthright."

One source close to the prince suggests that he actually sided with members of William's circle who felt that Kate Middleton had started to take advantage of the relationship.

"Harry had sympathy with those of William's friends who felt Kate had begun to rather enjoy her fame by association a little too much - unlike his own girlfriend, who he thinks is a 'real class act'," the source explains.

'When she first met William, Kate had few friends of her own - but over the years, she carefully assimilated herself into his circle.

"There was a feeling among some of William's friends that Kate had become a little too self-aware - she even had the cheek to bag herself a cut-price Audi, thanks to her royal links - while publicly insisting that she wanted to be treated as an ordinary girl."

Although Chelsy and Kate were photographed together on several occasions, most notably at the Beaufort Polo Club last summer, Harry's girlfriend apparently didn't particularly take to Kate.

"It wasn't that she disliked her - it's just that they had nothing in common. One only has to look at them to see it," says the source.

"Chelsy is a lot sweeter than she looks, but she is still a very outgoing girl who likes a beer and a fag.

Thanks to her rather indulged upbringing, she is incredibly sociable and self-confident - qualities that don't come naturally to Kate."

Others more sympathetic to Miss Middleton's cause, suggest the reality is that Chelsy has been just as keen to turn a royal relationship to her advantage.

She may protest about the attention, but she has not raised objections about her new status as international cover girl.

Last year, the society magazine, Tatler, even bracketed her with the Duchess of Cornwall as one of the most powerful blondes in Britain.

Her brother Shaun, meanwhile, has taken to styling himself as one of Harry's official bodyguards, and has been known to chase after photographers when they try to take the prince's picture.

Yet, in Harry's besotted eyes, Chelsy and her family can do no wrong.

Courtiers who have expressed concern about the Davys' controversial business links to Zimbabwean despot Robert Mugabe, have been told that she is a "non-negotiable" part of his life.

And he is undoubtedly entranced by the relative normality of his girlfriend's close-knit family.

Which is perhaps hardly surprising. By the age of 13, Harry had weathered not only his parents' separation but had also been forced to cope with the tragic - and endlessly raked-over -death of his mother.

Since then, his upbringing has been marked by a lack of parental discipline, thanks to his loving but laissez-faire father.

Even those with reservations about Chelsy concede that she has had a positive effect on the headstrong, devil-may-care young prince.

"It's far from a coincidence that when Harry does slip up - the times when he falls out of nightclubs drunk and brawls with photographers in the streets - Chelsy isn't around," says one who knows them both well.

"Believe it or not, he has matured in recent years - in large part thanks to Chelsy, whom he is incredibly protective of - and really does try to keep his head down.

"They are so besotted with each other - like a couple of lovebirds, really - that when they are together, nothing else really matters.

"Their body language is so different from that of Kate and William, who always used to look more like brother and sister.

"The trouble is that when Chelsy isn't around, Harry is easily led astray."

On their recent jaunt to the Caribbean, the couple barely left their luxury condo in the exclusive Glitter Bay resort in Barbados, preferring to lie, holding hands, by the pool.

And at last Friday's raucous Blues and Royals party to celebrate Harry's deployment to Iraq, it was William who stayed out clubbing until 4am with a bevy of beautiful girls.

Harry and Chelsy quietly sipped cocktails in a private booth before slipping off discreetly at 1am.

Lately, friends have noticed that the relationship seems to be deepening - although that is not to say there haven't been some pretty intense spats.

Unlike William, who was accused of leaving Kate to flounder under the weight of expectation while he forged on with his own life, Harry has been actively encouraging Chelsy to make solid plans for their future.

Bristol University has flatly denied rumours she plans to do a postgraduate degree there in the autumn, but friends say she is definitely planning to spend more time in England, where she has many friends from her days as a boarder at Stowe, a co-educational public school in Buckinghamshire.

She has even cancelled her plans to return to Africa over the summer and will instead wait for Harry to return from Iraq on leave.

"Chelsy hates the weather here, but is desperate to be nearer to her darling Haz. She is willing to make sacrifices if it takes their relationship a step forward," says a friend.

And Harry has already asked Chelsy to attend the memorial concert in July that he and William are organising to mark the tenth anniversary of their mother's death, though they are still discussing whether she should attend the formal church service later that month.

A Clarence House source says: "The problem is that every senior member of the Royal Family will be there, and Harry knows that taking her is tantamount to making a public statement on the future of their relationship.

"He doesn't think that it's fair on her to open the floodgates just yet."

In the immediate future, he knows that he needs to concentrate on leading his men in Iraq.

The highly charged public debate over his deployment to the Gulf has radically increased the pressure on him to make a success of his career - and he wants to show that the Army's confidence in him has not been misplaced.

"After what happened to my mother, I'm not afraid to die - but I am frightened for those around me," he recently confided to one close friend.

Although he did once petulantly threaten to quit if he were not sent to Iraq with his troops, his attitude has changed in the last few months.

"He knows that the situation is bigger than him now, and he'll take whatever he is told to do on the chin," says a royal aide.

Indeed, those who know him well say he is haunted by the fear that one of his men could be captured or even killed because of him.

"That's something he just couldn't bear, and he knows he would be held to account for the rest of his life.

"The men in his troop have tried to reassure him - joking that they will all wear ginger wigs to confuse the enemy, which is typical of Army gallows humour - but he is wracked with guilt," says another friend.

Iraq, however, is also Harry's big opportunity to strike out from under his elder brother's shadow.

For the first time in his life, the spare to William's heir will be taking centre stage.

"Harry loves his brother very much, but he is acutely aware of the way in which he is overshadowed by William.

"He is determined to go to war and make his family proud," says a friend.

But unlike William, he will have a long-term sweetheart to sweep into his arms when he returns.

[novemberhush]

Something to Talk About

They’re roughly twenty hours into a twenty-four hour shift, a gruelling series of back to back calls having left them all longing for the comfort of a warm bed and the luxury of uninterrupted peace in which to enjoy it. Eddie knows they’re all tired, but Buck? Well, he’s the weariest of them all, having had to physically exert himself more than the others at several of the rescues today (nobody’s fault, it was just the way things had worked out that day) on top of having already been exhausted from not sleeping well the night before. The dark circles under his normally bright eyes hadn’t escaped Eddie’s notice as they’d walked into the firehouse together from the parking lot to start their shift, but when he’d asked if everything was okay Buck had shrugged off his enquiry with a hasty Yeah, just didn’t sleep well is all before quickly changing the subject.

Now, though, they’re back at the 118 and none of them are much in the mood for chatter. Scattered out across the upstairs floor, Bobby sets to cooking them something to eat while Hen flips through a magazine, Chim and Eddie halfheartedly play a few hands of cards and Buck stretches out on one of the couches while they wait. None of them notice he’s slipped into a doze until Bobby declares the food ready and Eddie, seeing Buck make no move to follow the rest of them to the table, goes to check on him.

He hesitates for a moment when he realizes he’s asleep, debating which Buck probably needs more right now, food or rest. Taking in the dark circles under his eyes once again, however, decides the matter for him. Pulling the throw from the back of the couch, Eddie drapes it over Buck, eyes raking over his friend’s supine form.

He knows his face is doing something all kinds of fond and gooey at the sight of Buck lying here before him like this, flopped out on the couch, so open and vulnerable, asleep where he dropped. He looks so young, like the child he’s so often accused of being (even if he is maturing with every passing day, always seeking to do better, be better), and all Eddie wants to do is to protect him with all his might. To take him in his arms and never let go.

He knows how many times he’s come close to losing Buck, knows how lucky he is he’s still here. Knows that tomorrow is promised to no one, not even those in less hazardous jobs than theirs. The thought of losing him is one he can’t bear.

So he pushes it down, back, away.

Locks it up tight in that dark place Frank is trying to get him to shine a light on. That part of himself where he hides all his worst memories and biggest fears, all his doubts and insecurities.

It doesn’t go quietly, though, and Eddie knows that the day is coming when he’s going to have to face all of these things head on if he’s ever to free himself from the power they have over him. He can only trust that Buck will be there to have his back and help him through it when that day finally comes. (He has to be there, Eddie sends up a private prayer, he has to be.)

The only other person Eddie feels this strongly about, has ever felt this strongly about, is his son. He loved Shannon, but it doesn’t come close to what he knows he feels for Buck. Part of him thinks he should feel guilty for that, but a bigger part of him, the part that’s been slowly and steadily making progress in therapy, that’s been opening up little by little to Frank, and Bobby, and, yes, to Buck, realizes he has nothing to feel guilty for, at least not about this. He wasn’t always there for Shannon, he knows that, but in the end she was the one to let go first. She was the one who didn’t love him enough to try. So no, this isn’t something he needs to feel guilty over, he tells himself. He mostly believes it and for him that’s progress.

He thinks he probably should feel guilty, though, for ogling his best friend in his sleep like this, so he tucks the throw a little more snugly around Buck’s (strong, broad, delectable) shoulders and with one glance back over his own (okay, fine, maybe two glances) he hastens over to join the others at the table, resolutely ignoring the all too knowing looks Hen, Bobby and Chimney throw his way. Shovelling the chow into his mouth, he resists the urge to check with Bobby if he saved some for Buck. He already knows the answer and he doesn’t need to give the team any more ammunition to tease him with.

When they’ve finished eating, the dishes all done and cleared away, Bobby looks around at their tired faces and takes pity on them, allowing them to forgo chores in favour of enjoying some rest and relaxation while they can. It’s already been a long, hard shift and it’s not over yet. There may be more calls in the next few hours and Eddie is grateful the captain seems to have figured they’ve earned a little downtime today.

With Bobby excusing himself to his office to go do some paperwork, and Hen and Chim settling in to play some video game or other, Eddie finds himself at a loose end.

Usually when they got time to sit around like this he would find himself next to Buck, nodding along and laughing as he listened to his stories from before Eddie joined the team, or his always sweet, creative ideas on things they could do or places they could take Christopher on their next day off together (the fact he always put so much thought into these little outings and get-togethers never failed to touch Eddie), or his sometimes amusing, but also sometimes surprisingly deep, musings on the universe, the human condition and all things philosophical.

But today Eddie finds himself adrift without Buck’s solid presence at his side to anchor him. Finally, after sifting through and rejecting all the various magazines heaped on the coffee table and not in the mood to play games on his phone, he remembers the book in his locker. The memoir of Jim Abbott, a former baseball player.

Buck had read it while he was in the hospital (he hadn’t specified which time, but Eddie thinks it’s safe to assume it was most likely during the lengthy stay his leg being crushed by the fire truck had required). A fact he’d revealed one night, shortly after Christopher’s accident with the skateboard, as they drank beers in his kitchen and he listened patiently to Eddie fret about his son and the extra challenges he would face in life because of his cerebral palsy and the limitations it would put on him. Buck had used the story of Abbott, a player who’d achieved success at the major league level despite being born without a right hand, to try to assuage Eddie’s worries. A few days later he had shyly presented a copy of the book to Eddie before launching into an enthusiastic rundown of ideas he’d found online to help kids like Chris work around some of their limitations. It was just one more example of the thoughtfulness that was so innately Buck. Eddie knew he shouldn’t be surprised by it. But, swept along by the tide of his friend’s exuberance and doing his best to keep up, he hadn’t been able to stop himself once again marvelling at the extraordinary kindness and consideration of the man he was lucky enough to call his best friend.

Back to the present day, though, and a quick jog to and from the locker room to grab the book is all it takes before Eddie is back and making a show of deciding where to sit before oh so casually opting (to the surprise of absolutely no one) for the armchair directly opposite the couch Buck is lying on. He doesn’t miss the smirks Hen and Chim exchange at his theatrics, but once again he chooses to ignore them, settling down instead with his book and opening it to where he’d left off last, the page marked by a brightly-coloured homemade bookmark Christopher (with a little help from his Buck) had made him for Father’s Day. The small token never fails to make him smile. Today is no exception.

It is, however, the first time he thinks about how he wouldn’t mind if maybe next Father’s Day Chris had two dads to make presents for. The thought doesn’t surprise or scare him. He doesn’t feel threatened or unnerved by it. Instead he traces his fingers lovingly over the bookmark, ducking his head to hide the smile he can’t suppress as he indulges himself in imagining the shocked but happy look on Buck’s face at Chris handing him a present on that special day reserved for fathers.

It doesn’t take long for Eddie to get lost in fantasies of domestic bliss, fantasies not all that far removed from what he already has with Buck, but taken that one step further. He gets so lost that he doesn’t immediately notice how restless Buck has become. He filters back to awareness when his ears finally pick up on the series of harsh breaths coming from the clearly anguished figure on the couch opposite.

Buck is panting, the occasional soft refrain of “No, no, no” escaping his lips, head thrashing left and right as if desperately searching for something. His feet fight against the blanket Eddie had laid over him, as if treading water; his hands curl around the top edge of the throw, knuckles white as he clutches it to him. Eddie is already out of his seat moving towards him when Buck bolts upright, eyes springing open, wide, terrified but seemingly unseeing, at least of the room around him, as one word is ripped from his throat.

“CHRISTOPHER!!”

Eddie feels something crack in his chest. It feels suspiciously like his heart. But he’ll deal with that later. Right now Buck is the one who needs put back together.

Eddie doesn’t even stop to think about what he’s doing before he untangles Buck from the blanket and manoeuvres him into a position that lets Eddie join him on the couch and wrap him in his arms. Buck goes willingly, still dazed and sobbing, still not entirely aware of his surroundings. Eddie arranges them so Buck’s head is on Eddie’s shoulder, his face turned into Eddie’s neck. He gently cradles the back of Buck’s head with one hand as the other glides up and down Buck’s arm. His body is wracked with tremors and Eddie pulls him impossibly closer, willing him to stop shaking, to come back to himself, come back to Eddie.

He murmurs words he hopes are soothing, calming, himself now every bit as unaware of the room around them as Buck is. Buck is his sole focus, his sole concern. Slowly he feels the tremors start to subside before they eventually stop altogether. He knows the instant Buck comes back to himself, feels him tense in his arms. Still he continues to utter words of reassurance, comfort, love.

“It’s all right, Buck, everything’s all right. You’re safe now. Christopher’s safe. You saved him, babe. You saved him. Everything’s all right.”

The ‘babe’ had just slipped out, but Eddie can’t bring himself to wish it back.

“Eddie?” Buck whispers.

Eddie has never heard him sound so small. That crack in his chest widens.

“Yeah, Buck, it’s me. I got you. Everything’s all right now. I got you.”

“Ed… Eddie, I lost him! I lost Chris and I couldn’t get him back!”

“But we did get him back. You saved him, Buck. You saved him.”

Buck’s hand curls into Eddie’s shirt, just over his heart, and Eddie instinctively moves his own hand that’s been stroking Buck’s arm to cover it, his thumb immediately starting to rub back and forth over the back of it. His other hand still cups the back of Buck’s head. Of their own accord his lips find their way to Buck’s temple and press a kiss there. He’s close enough to both feel and hear the stutter in Buck’s breathing as he registers the action.

He catches movement then out of the corner of his eye that reminds him they’re not alone. Sparing a quick glance up he sees Hen and Chim hovering close by. Bobby has also appeared from his office, alerted by Buck’s scream of Christopher’s name maybe, or possibly called by Hen or Chim or someone else close by. All three of them look stricken at seeing Buck like this and Eddie is once again reminded how much Buck means to so many people, how he endears himself so easily to everyone he meets.

He knows how this must look to them. The way he holds Buck, the term of endearment that had fallen so easily from his lips, the kiss to the temple. And he knows the Eddie of old, the Eddie before the 118, the Eddie before Buck, would be embarrassed by such a public display of private feelings. But he’s not that Eddie anymore and these people are his family, and even if they weren’t he’s way beyond caring anymore who knows how he feels about Buck. Buck needs him and Eddie’s going to be there for him in any way he can, even if that means stepping outside his comfort zone.

Bobby must see something in his face because he gives Eddie a small, reassuring smile and a decisive nod before turning to the others and ushering them downstairs with a whispered “Come on, Eddie’s got him.” They follow their captain’s lead, as always, all still obviously concerned about Buck, but trusting that Eddie does indeed have him.

“Buck? You okay?” Eddie asks softly, turning his attention back to Buck. A jerky nod assures him Buck is and Eddie can’t resist planting another kiss on his temple. “You wanna talk about it?”

This time Buck shakes his head, curling in even closer to Eddie. “Not right now,” he mumbles. “Later.”

“Okay,” Eddie acquiesces, not wanting to push too hard when Buck is clearly still so raw. “But I’m holding you to that ‘later’, all right?” Buck just nods again.

There’s silence for a beat, the only movement between them the steady rise and fall of their chests as they breath in sync and the constant back and forth of Eddie’s thumb over the back of Buck’s hand where it still clutches Eddie’s shirt. Buck breaks the silence first.

“I’m sorry,” he croaks, voice still weak and hoarse. “I’m so sorry.”

“Hey, what do you gotta be sorry for, huh? Nothing, that’s what,” Eddie replies. “Come on, what do you say, let’s see that million dollar smile and those baby blues, hmm?”

Buck sniffles a little before hesitantly turning his face to look up at Eddie. His hair is every which way and his face is a tear-stained mess. Eyes red and puffy. Cheeks flushed and damp. Nose running like a tap. And yet, Christopher aside, he’s still the best thing Eddie has ever seen.

With what Eddie knows is a Herculean effort Buck manages to give him a small smile. It’s a million miles away from his usual easy, open, megawatt one or his charming, contagious, irresistible grin. It breaks Eddie’s heart all over again, but it’s a start and he’ll take it. Still, he’d be lying if he said he wouldn’t prefer one that didn’t require quite so much effort on Buck’s part, wouldn’t prefer one that came naturally to that face Eddie has come to love so much, rather than the forced one Buck is currently sporting and which Eddie knows has only been summoned up in an attempt to reassure him. His mind casts around desperately for a way to put a real smile on Buck’s face and can come up with only one solution. A quick glance at his watch tells him his plan should be doable.

“Hey, what do you say we FaceTime Carla and get her to put Christopher on? They should be up and getting Chris ready for school by now, but I don’t think they’ll have left yet. I think we can still catch them at home. Come on, I think both of us could use a dose of our own little Superman right now, don’t you?”

Buck hesitates for a second, but Eddie can tell he wants to say yes, unable to turn down any chance to interact with Christopher. That thought alone, that someone else other than him is always so eager to see his son, warms his heart.

“O...okay,” Buck says quietly, nodding his head, before taking a deep breath and slowly pulling away from Eddie to sit upright. “But give me a minute. I don’t want him seeing me like this,” he adds, swiping at the residue of tears on his face.

Eddie reaches for the box of tissues they keep on the coffee table. Grabbing a few, he gently eases Buck’s hands, which are still rubbing, almost angrily, at his face down into his lap. With a hand they’re both going to pretend not to notice is shaking more in this moment than it ever has in any war zone or rescue situation, he tenderly wipes away all traces of tears from Buck’s face before handing him a clean tissue so he can give his nose a good blow. That done, the used tissues are crumpled up and tossed in a nearby waste paper bin and Eddie’s hands are in Buck’s hair, finger brushing it back into some semblance of order. Eddie wonders briefly if this is crossing the line, but then he figures he and Buck crossed the line so far back they can’t even see it anymore.

Buck snorts suddenly, the noise breaking the silence that has fallen around them once again and making Eddie startle a little.

He gives Buck a confused look, eyebrows raising in wordless enquiry as to what is so funny. Buck just shrugs and says, “I was just thinking I hope you don’t do that mom thing of licking your hand and then using your saliva to slick down my hair.”

Eddie makes a face, nose scrunching up. “That’s disgusting, Buck!”

“I know! That’s why I said I was hoping you weren’t gonna do that!” Buck responds indignantly.

They both smile then and Eddie shakes his head with a huff of laughter.

“Idiot,” he mutters, but they both hear how fond it comes out. It’s a relief to him to see a genuine smile on Buck’s face again, but he knows the one he’ll see when Buck sees Chris will leave this one in the dust.

“There, that’s better,” he says, giving Buck’s hair one more (spit-free) comb through. Reluctantly pulling his hand away from the soft locks he looks Buck in the eye and asks, “You ready?”

Buck takes a deep, fortifying breath and nods. His eyes are still a little red, but Eddie hopes it won’t be noticeable over the phone screen.

Snagging his phone off the coffee table, Eddie unlocks it and hits the contact number for Carla with one hand while the other closes tightly around Buck’s, intertwining their fingers. They slot together so easily, as if they’ve done this a thousand times before. It’s a grounding touch for both of them, Eddie knows. A reminder that Eddie always has Buck’s back and knows Buck has his in return.

On impulse he leans over and presses one more kiss to Buck’s temple right before the call connects. The smile the action brings to Buck’s face takes Eddie’s breath away. He’d have gladly sat there and stared at it all day if Carla’s voice hadn’t snapped him out of his daze.

“Eddie? Is everything okay, sugar?”

“Carla! Hey! Yeah, everything’s fine. Sorry, didn’t mean to worry you. Look, I don’t wanna hold you guys up, but could you put Christopher on for a minute? There’s someone here who’d really like to speak to him.”

“Sure thing,” Carla replies and Eddie hears her calling Chris to the phone. He can’t be too far away because it’s only a few short seconds later that his bright, smiling face appears on the screen.

“Dad!”

Eddie lets out a breath he feels like he’s been holding in ever since he last saw Christopher when he kissed him goodbye and headed off to work yesterday. It’s not that he doesn’t trust Carla to look after Chris, but there’s something in him that only settles when he sees his son’s face, when he can see for himself that he's okay, that everything is right with his world, even if it is only over a call like this. If the way Buck exhales and very obviously relaxes next to him, some of the lingering tension in his body visibly seeping out of him, is anything to go by Eddie thinks it’s the same for him, and isn’t that something to think about.

“Hey, buddy! How’s it goin’? You got all your homework done for school today?”

“Yessssssss, Dad,” Chris sighs exaggeratedly, drawing out the ‘yes’ with a pout of his lips and a roll of his eyes that draws a chuckle from Buck and gives Eddie nightmare visions of what his teenage years might be like.

Deciding to skip the lecture on not rolling his eyes at his father that he knows his own father would have dispensed, Eddie settles for elbowing a still chuckling Buck in the ribs and throws him a ‘don’t encourage him’ glare. Buck just smirks back at him. Eddie can’t keep the fierce look on his face when Buck is looking at him like that, so fond and teasing. Eddie has always hated being teased, being made fun of, but when Buck does it it’s different. But then everything’s different with Buck.

Before Eddie can start overthinking about why that is he is broken out of his thoughts by the sound of Chris calling him.

“Dad? Dad! DAD!! … Carla, I don’t think he can hear me anymore.”

Eddie focuses back on the screen and sees Christopher looking away, somewhere to his left, presumably at Carla who is beside him, holding the phone for Chris.

“No, hey, Chris! I’m still here. I can still hear you,” he rushes to assure his son.

“Dad, Carla says we have to leave soon or we’ll be late!”

“Okay, okay, I hear ya, buddy. It’s just I have someone here who really wanted to see you so I thought I’d call you so we could both say hello.”

Chris immediately sits up straighter, his whole face lighting up, the excitement rolling off him, plain for all to see.

“Buck! Is it Buck? Please say it’s Buck, Dad!”

Eddie laughs. “Wow, I’m so relieved it wasn’t Chim, Hen or Bobby sitting here with me waiting to say hi. I’m not sure how they’d feel at being so obviously overlooked in favour of Buck,” he jokes.

Chris pauses for a moment, considering, before he shrugs. “They know I love them, but everyone knows I love Buck the most. Just like you.”

Eddie freezes, all the breath seemingly having left his body. By the way Buck noticeably stills next to him he figures Christopher’s words have knocked him for six too. When he finally manages to turn his head to look at his best friend the expression on Buck’s face is one Eddie can only describe as ‘awestruck’. But Buck is still the first to find the wherewithal to speak again.

He leans in close to Eddie so their faces are practically touching (and that’s not at all distracting, thank you very much) and waves at the screen with his free hand.

“Hey, buddy!” he says, beaming widely. “How you doin’ this fine morning?”

“Buck!” Chris is bouncing up and down with glee at the sight of his favourite partner in crime. “I’m okay! Carla’s taking me to school today! It’s art class later and I’m gonna get to work on the col… the col… the collage I was telling you about on Saturday!”

“Oh, yeah? That’s great, buddy! I can’t wait to see it!”

Christopher nods enthusiastically. “You’re gonna… gonna put it on your fridge, right? Along with the painting of the dinosaurs I made you last week?”

“Of course! It’s gonna have pride of place, I promise.”

Christopher smiles again, albeit a little shyly this time, and ducks his head, clearly thrilled that Buck would be proud enough of his work to display it so prominently in his home, but bashful at the same time. Eddie knows he’s biased, but he can’t help being endeared by the sight. One look at Buck’s eyes, love shining from them clear as day, tells Eddie he feels the same way. The need to have both his boys together in one place, a need that’s been steadily growing day by day, and which Eddie has been getting more and more powerless to resist, makes itself known again and Eddie, on a whim (and since when did he start acting on those?), puts forward a suggestion he hopes Buck won’t mind not having been consulted about beforehand.

“Hey, Chris, what would you say to Buck having a sleepover at our place tonight? We’ll be getting off shift soon. We could go home, grab some sleep and then when Carla picks you up from school later we could all have dinner together and then maybe watch a movie if you don’t have too much homework. What do you say? Do you think we could persuade Buck to join us?”

“Yes! Please will you come over, Buck? Please, please, please!” Christopher pleads, once again bouncing up and down on the couch in Eddie’s living room.

Eddie can’t help the grin that spreads across his face at his son’s antics. One look at Buck and he knows what his answer will be. The man is putty in Christopher’s hands.

“Of course I’ll come over, Chris. I’d love to have a sleepover with you guys.”

“Yes!” Chris fist pumps the air, causing both Eddie and Buck to laugh.

“But if you have any math homework you’re gonna have to ask your dad to help you with it because math is really not my strong suit, okay?” Buck adds, still grinning from ear to ear, the effects of his nightmare from earlier seemingly forgotten. Eddie knows enough about trauma to know it’s unlikely to stay that way forever, at least not without talking about it, but now he knows there’s a problem he can be there to help Buck work through it, just as Buck has been there for him.

Because having each other’s back doesn’t just mean when they’re running into a burning building together or dealing with a pile-up on the freeway or talking someone with a gun down from a ledge. It doesn’t just mean being there through life-threatening injuries, like being crushed by a fire truck, or the loss of a loved one, like an estranged wife and the mother of your child. It means being there for the aftermath of all those things too. Being there for the hours, the days, the weeks, the months, hell, the years, it takes to heal from all those things and more. Eddie intends being around for all those times.

But he wants to be around for the good times, too.

Times like barbecues at Cap and Athena’s. Poker nights with Maddie and Chim. Playdates with Hen, Karen, Denny and Nia. Pool and karaoke with the whole team at their favourite bar.

Times like taking Christopher to the park or the zoo or the aquarium together. Sunday lunches at his grandmother’s house where Buck is sure to charm her and she’s sure to say they’re all too skinny and send them home with full bellies and enough leftovers to feed a small army. Trips back to Texas so Buck can get to know the rest of the family. Birthdays, Christmases, weddings and graduations. All the big, important milestone events.

And times like tonight, when it’s just the three of them, Buck, Christopher and Eddie, hanging out together at home. Helping Chris with his homework. Having dinner and doing the dishes. Talking about their day. Watching a movie or playing video games. Wrangling a wriggling, giggling Chris into the tub come bath time. Reading bedtime stories together and doing the voices. Kissing Christopher goodnight. All the normal, everyday stuff families do.

Eddie wants that. He wants it so bad.

Lost in thought again (that’s been happening to him quite a lot today, he realizes), he only vaguely registers that Buck and Christopher have continued chatting merrily away to each other, but a rather loud rumbling sound from Buck’s direction brings him back to the present moment. Buck looks down at his grumbling stomach, a scandalized look on his face, like he’s shocked at this betrayal from his own body. Eddie can’t help snorting.

“Hey, Chris, I think we’re gonna have to go now, bud. I think Buck needs to go eat something.” Eddie leans in a little closer to the screen, like he wants to tell Chris a secret. “Buck’s stomach just growled like there was an angry bear in there trying to get out,” he stage whispers.

Christopher starts rocking back and forth on the couch, hands coming up to cover his mouth, but doing little to muffle the giggles escaping him.

“Hey! What’s so funny, you two?? I'm wasting away to nothing here!” Buck splutters, pretending to be offended by the wisecracking and the giggling, but the smile plastered all over his face gives him away. Chris just giggles all the more. It’s a sound Eddie will never get enough of.

“Come on, say your goodbyes and we’ll go feed the bear and let Chris get to school,” says Eddie. “Cap cooked for us while you were asleep and he left you a plate, Buck.”

“Yes!” Buck pumps the air in repetition of Chris’ earlier gesture. “That man is a saint!”

“He must be, to put up with you,” Eddie teases, earning himself his very own scandalized look of betrayal.

“You wound me, Edmundo!” he declares, clutching his chest dramatically. “You wound me!”

Chris giggles again, Buck endlessly delighting to him, but then they hear Carla’s voice urging them to wind things up. A quick glance at the time tells Eddie she’s right. They need to let them go or Chris really will be late for school. They’re cutting it fine as it is.

Goodbyes are exchanged, kisses are blown, promises for Buck to come over tonight are reiterated and then the call is ended. Silence falls between them again, only a few muted noises drifting up from downstairs disturbing the peace, but it’s not awkward or oppressive. It does feel a little charged, though. Like maybe they both want to say something, but are waiting to see who’ll go first. Eddie finally bites the bullet and starts talking, only to be interrupted mid-sentence.

“Sorry for just springing the sleepove-“

“So, you kissed me and called me ‘babe’ earlier. That actually happened, right?”

Eddie sighs internally. He should have known Buck wouldn’t let it slip by unremarked upon. Well, he’d told himself he was done hiding how he felt about Buck from everyone. He guesses ‘everyone’ includes Buck himself.

Taking a deep breath, he sits up straight, squaring his shoulders, steeling himself for a possible rejection, but determined to be honest, to stop hiding from the best friend he’s ever had, the best man he’s ever known, the only man he’s ever loved like this.

“Yeah,” he says, turning to face Buck, to look him right in the eye. “Yeah, it did. Is that okay?”

Buck just looks at him for a moment, a moment that feels like an eternity to Eddie, before shaking his head and laughing softly. “And everyone thinks I’m the dense one,” he teases, rolling his eyes and grinning. Eddie’s heart is in his throat.

And then Buck is looking at him with those eyes of his (those blue, blue eyes with the ridiculously long, pretty, fluttering eyelashes that have kept Eddie awake more nights than he cares to admit) and the softest smile Eddie has ever seen and Eddie feels like he can breathe again.

“Yes, it’s okay, Eddie,” he says, barely above a whisper, squeezing Eddie’s hand as he speaks. “Of course it’s okay.”

Eddie can’t help but grin back before opening his mouth to say he doesn’t even know what, but a noise to his right distracts him. Buck must hear it too, his head turning in sync with Eddie’s to locate the source of it. They both laugh as they turn just in time to see Chimney’s head duck back down the stairs like he wasn’t just peeking at them to see if it was okay to come back into the lounge area.

Eddie turns back to Buck. “Maybe, ah… maybe we should talk about this later. In private.”

Eddie’s not backtracking on the whole not caring who knows how he feels about Buck thing, but he’s still reserved enough that he’d like to actually tell Buck how he feels first, and hear how Buck feels in return, and discuss what that might mean for the future direction of their relationship, without an audience present. Even if that audience does consist of some of their closest friends, people they’ve chosen to call family.

Buck nods, just once

“Good,” Eddie says, slapping his own knee decisively and preparing to stand up. “Now that’s sorted we should go and heat up that plate Bobby left for you. Can’t have you fading away on us. Christopher would never forgive me. Plus, I’m pretty sure Chim has set up camp on the stairs and he’s likely to cause an accident if we don’t let him back up here soon. Come on,” he nods towards the kitchen and dining area, “let’s go get you fed.” He starts to stand, making to pull Buck up after him, but Buck tugs him back down on the couch by the hand he still holds.

Eddie frowns when he catches the hesitant look on Buck’s face. “Buck? What is it? What’s wrong?”

Buck shakes his head, looking away, glancing down at his feet before looking up at Eddie again. “It’s nothing, it’s just… there actually is something to talk about later, right? I mean, really something.”

Understanding washes over Eddie. Of course Buck, who seems so brash and full of confidence on the surface but who underneath it all is heartbreakingly unaware of his own worth, is questioning everything. Doubting that anyone could truly want him for anything more meaningful than a one-off hook-up, or a casual fling, or as a crutch to help them through the rough times until they find their feet again and discard him.

Eddie lets everything he’s feeling but usually hides behind a stoic countenance write itself large across his face. All defences lowered, his face open, earnest and he’s pretty sure downright adoring, he lays it all out there for Buck to see. He needs Buck to see how much he means to him.

“Yeah, babe, there’s really something to talk about,” he says, smiling softly, his face doing that fond, gooey thing again he’s sure, but he can’t regret it when he sees the moment it clicks with Buck that he’s serious, that he means it.

“Okay, that’s, uh… that’s good,” Buck stammers, returning Eddie’s smile with that soft one of his own that’s quickly becoming Eddie’s favourite. Rising to his feet then himself and pulling Eddie up after him, Buck, his hand still in Eddie’s, leads them over to the kitchen area.

Before Eddie can let go of Buck’s hand to go warm up his food and inform the others it’s okay for them to venture upstairs again, though, Buck gives Eddie’s hand another gentle squeeze to get his attention. Eddie looks up at him, sees a flicker of mischief in those blue eyes and a playful smile tugging at those far too kissable lips. “Yeah, that’s… that’s really good… babe.”

And, oh, the way he says that one word. Breathes it, really. Soft and sweet, with just a hint of spice. A tease and a promise all in one. If Eddie hadn’t already known he was completely gone for this man, he would’ve realized it right in this moment.

Yes, they definitely have something to talk about later.

[algernoninwonderland]

It’s been three seasons and I’m still not sure what Miraculous wants to be about

TL:DR: Every single one of Miraculous’s themes, and there are so many of them the show wants to tackle, is dealt with in the most superficial fashion, making none of them stand out. By trying to be a show about lots and lots of different things all at once without a strong focus on its meagre overarching plot, it ends up being a directionless mess. 

Is it a cartoon about love? Sure, if it’s romantic, one-sided, bordering-obsession love, I guess. That’s only one flavour of love but sure, let’s roll with that… Except the directors and writers are so afraid that the audience will lose interest in it that they have characters say “look how in love they are” about our main duo all the time. Showing Marinette blushing and stuttering and Chat Noir doing his, err, thing, had gotten stale. The writers and directors have understood that problem but haven’t come up with anything new, it would seem.

It’s a show about the hardships of growing up, right? But before the New York Special, none of the characters outside of Adrien were allowed to feel down for more than a minute without being akumatised or inspirational music and uplifting music popping up instead of letting the scenes carry any emotional weight. Plus, the characters can only achieve so much growth before the episode hits its magical reset button, and it often feels like the characters change to fit the plot instead of following any kind of progression (or regression, for that matter).

A show about school life, then? This isn’t a slice of life anime, most of the secondary cast is too one-dimensional for it to work anyway, most episodes take place when our heroes aren’t in school, Marinette and Adrien’s friends have been demoted to glorified Adrienette shippers as the show went on and that’s a shame because Alya was really cool when she was something other than that and the mouthpiece for most superhero titbits. The classroom drama is too caricatural to be compelling, even for its target audience of schoolchildren.

Could it be a show about family? Parents are mostly out of the picture in most cartoons, otherwise they’d get in the way of all the adventuring. Miraculous has the occasional “that one family member comes for one episode and is never talked about ever again” episode but that family member is turned into the Monster of the Week. Confrontation, all the time. It could be dealt with in a way that could resound with the viewers emotionally, but no, have dumb sound effects, forced accents and Kung-Food, that’ll do the trick. Oh, and we get crumbs of “Adrien loves his dad who is mostly Bad but still cares about him... Or does he?”. Man, the Adrien side of the show is the one they created with the more effort, didn’t they?

Is it a show about life in Paris? I made a whole post about how Paris doesn’t work as a space in Miraculous, and yeah, sure, it’s a nice commercial for tourism, shows us a bunch of iconic buildings and monuments, but that’s just neat and doesn’t feel very intimate.

Surely it’s a show about heroism? There are snippets of that, but heroism as envisioned in Miraculous is mostly “fighting the bad guys when they manifest themselves, our heroes tried to track them down that one time but we were afraid we’d run out of plot so that ended up leading nowhere”. That’s simplistic, even for a cartoon aimed at children. Even the Instagram pages showed more of the daily lives of its heroes, the smaller, less spectacular and yet meaningful acts of heroism they did. Superman saves the cat from time to time, and it feels just as emotional as him punching the baddies if not more so.

In an interview with the Times Magazine in 2000, Matt Groening of The Simpsons fame had this to say about television, and I think this quote resonates pretty well with Miraculous:

"Television touches on an issue then dances away from it and never comes back to it. So it has the illusion of having a strong point of view, but the real point of view of television is that nothing matters, because it's going to be replaced in the next millisecond by something different, and then replaced again and again.

The thing is, Miraculous has a plot. Well, if you want to get into details, it has a shoestring for a plot in 90% of its episodes instead of a narrative thread, or rather, there is a narrative thread but it’s buried so deep within most episodes you need a degree in archaeology to be able to dig it up. Still, it could make these themes it dances around an inherent part of the narrative. 

The showrunners and producers just seem to have forgotten that running a show doesn’t mean “making an episode and then another and then another still” but “ensuring that there’s a sense of direction to it all that makes the show as a whole more gratifying to watch.”

It’s an entirely directionless franchise as a whole, not just the show, but that’s on ZAG. There were these comics that may or not be canon, and now a manga for some obscure reason (money, the reason is that ZAG is after profit first and foremost and does everything it can to rake in as much money as possible before it goes bankrupt).

[eccentricpony]

Hello dear! I kind of did a spin on this request, and the story starts around the time of their first meeting and shows the progression into a romantic relationship. Mildly inspired by Tenma’s home screen quote to practice a kissing scene.

I think it’s a good blend of angsty, spicy, funny, and fluffy, but you be the judge! I am quite fond of this piece, and I hope you are, too!  <3

Bad First Impressions

Despite your best efforts to suppress it, a dramatic sigh rumbles past your lips. And to think that you had actually looked forward to working with Tenma Sumeragi. You had watched his performances in a few teen dramas and found his ability to be quite impressive, and he was highly lauded among other actors in your professional circle for being the consummate professional and perfectionist. More like pretentious and pompous.

“…and you there-“ the haughty redhead pointed towards a mousy looking boy sitting at a diner table on set.

“Uhh, B- Bill?” the mousy boy responded meekly.

“Yeah, sure – no one just stares at the person across from them without saying anything at all. It’s creepy and weird. That goes for you, too, guy with the glasses.” He moved an accusatory finger towards Bill’s dining companion. “Haven’t you guys ever heard of “peas and carrots”? I mean, this is amateur hour stuff that you don’t even need any skill to execute…”

“Can you just close your mouth and do some work, Sumeragi?”

You could hear a pin drop in the spacious sound studio. The cantankerous teen star whipped his head towards you with a pointed glare. You were an up-and-coming actress in the teen drama scene, and although you were a year older than he was, his acting resume was at least three times the length of yours. Sure, you were pretty, and you seemed passably talented, but you had a long way to go before you could even reach the echelon of his level of expertise. And you had the audacity to criticize his judgment??

“Excuse me?!” His eyes raked up and down your form, sizing you up in an attempt to appear intimidating. The manner in which you nonchalantly rested your hand upon your hip, head-cocked and eyes rolled; it was utterly disrespectful to him, a major authority in the industry, not to mention disrespectful to your fellow actors, to the very sacred space of-

“And to think that I had heard you were a competent leader…” you continued in a jaded tone. There was a visible flare in Tenma’s cheeks, the fury sizzling behind his eyes red hot.

To his credit, he certainly had a high level of talent, but that gave him no authority to degrade his teammates, whether they be fellow actors or the key grip. You weren’t normally this abrasive, but charming teen cutie Tenma was a self-important bully who was surrounded by “yes” men. This suave schoolboy star needed a wakeup call. The scandalized celebrity opened his mouth to commence a tirade when the director stepped in.

“Now, now, please folks. Let’s be civil…” Pinching the bridge of his nose, he glanced between you both with a pleading look.

With a final sour stare in your direction, Tenma transformed back into TV’s favorite high school hottie with a heart of gold.

“Yes, of course,” he replied, and you also nodded in consent. Everyone placated Tenma, endured his toxic attitude because he brought them money. But one thing was for sure, you had no intention to relinquish control to tyrannical Tenma.

Japan’s Newest Sweetheart

Tenma rushed down the street, tipping the brim of his hat further down his forehead, his alarming speed drawing attention from passersby. But he couldn’t slow down now; it was only a matter of time before Igawa caught up to him and asked where he was going, and why he was going by himself, and what was he looking for after all, and a number of other questions whose answers he would very much prefer not to explain.

With the convenience store in sight, he quickened his pace until he reached the threshold, throwing open the door with a tenacity that startled the cashier. Returning upright from where he hunched over his newspaper, the shopkeep threw a cautious eye to the young man at the doorway, wearing a suspicious amount of accessories and panting like he was running from the law.

The ginger on a mission performed a quick visual sweep of the displays until he located the object he desired. Bounding forward, he approached the magazine rack and flipped open the arts & entertainment periodical to the index. …page 31…

Rifling through the flimsy pages of the gossip rag, he at last reached the article which he had sought. There looking up at him was a page-wide spread of you, armed with an impossibly charming smile and a sparkle of mischief in your eyes. The page opposite of your come-hither headshot bore the headline “Japan’s Newest Sweetheart.”

It was infuriating. You were a nobody – barely any experience at all, and certainly not in anything particularly noteworthy – yet you were the one pushed to the forefront of advertising. His eyes flicked back to your picture once, twice… I mean, it was a good photo.

Ignoring the manner in which his throat seized when met with your 2-dimensional gaze, he directed his attention to the article. His eyes tripped along the words, “captivating new series… “ “character growth and development…” – aha! He spotted his name among the text and focused on the containing paragraph.

“blah, blah… he’s a true veteran in the industry…” Tenma puffed up like a rooster at this remark. Damn right, I am. He continued to read your commentary, mouth silently forming the shape of the words, scouring each sentence for more well-deserved praise. You went on to describe the characters, their struggles and how the cast related to their roles… One line in particular raised his brow. Tenacious young man?? Young man, what? She’s like, one year older than I am! He rose his head, appalled that you would speak of him like a child. He turned back to the print, reviewing the sentence a second time. She’s not even a whole year older, we’re practically the same age. He bent his brow in concentration. He counted back from your birthday. Yeah, totally not even a year old. Tch. He chose to ignore the fact that he recalled your birthday so quickly and glowered down at you while you beamed right back up at him.

It was undeniable that he was pissed off due of all the attention you were receiving when he was the lead. Possibly because… well, maybe you did deserve it. He had come to respect your acting ability over the past few months, in particular your impressive ability to become truly immersed in a role.

But maybe also because…. well, you looked good in this spread. Like, really good. Your smile was intoxicating; why didn’t you smile at him like that?  On second thought, maybe it was for the best that you hadn’t. His hardened exterior would likely dissolve, and he’d be a stuttering, fumbling mess. Scanning your features, he noticed that they airbrushed away a tiny birthmark on your face. Or maybe it was a freckle?  And they did something to your eyebrows, they just looked off. Why would they even do that? They were perfectly fine eyebrows…

“Hey, buddy, are you going to buy that or not? This ain’t a library.”

Tenma’s head shot upright, dazed for a few moments before he comprehended the words spoken to him. His tense fists gripped the wrinkled magazine tightly, fragile pages strained and starting to tear. Loosening his hold, he spared a final glimpse at your face before neatly closing the pages and smoothing out the bent cover.

“Uhh, yeah. I am.”  

Sliding his shades further up his nose with his pointer, he coolly ambled to the checkout area and lay the gentleman’s digest upon its surface. The material refused to remain flat after its recent abuse, leaving your shirt and neck visible beneath the dog-eared pages. The employee recognized the article right away.

“That new actress is really something, huh? They say she’s going to be the next big thing.”

Tenma scoffed but offered no discourse, handing over the required yen.

“Pretty cute, too,” the young worker added as he slipped the purchased item into a plastic bag.

“Yeah, whatever,” Tenma huffed heatedly, snatching the illustrated booklet containing your first big media premiere and returning to the sidewalk to await Igawa.

Salty to Sweet

“Don’t they teach you how to stay on task in Middle School? Or are you in High School?  Your lack of common sense is misleading…”

“Funny,” Tenma retorted caustically, though more annoyed at himself than you. He had been finding it challenging to focus as of late since he bought that magazine and he kept screwing up on the same damn lines. His short fuse was growing ever shorter with every butchered word.

You could see that Tenma was downward spiraling; the spark he always carried behind those big, vibrant eyes was fading fast.

“Look, why don’t you try something else…” you started, preparing for opposition.

“What?” the taller boy began, with no small amount of skepticism. Ignoring his sour attitude, you stood opposite him and continued in a calm tone.

“Try talking to me about something you really like while staying in character.”

“Talk about something I like?” Tenma replied incredulously. “What am I, six?”

“Sometimes I wonder, with the way you hide your vegetables under your mashed potatoes during lunch, so no one notices you throwing them away.”  You smirk knowingly, pleased with the look of surprise on your fellow actor’s face.

“You saw me do that?”  Tenma stared at you with a look of both wonder and bewilderment. He was certain no one could see him do that, and you sat at another table entirely! How on earth could you have been paying close enough attention to him to spot that, unless…

“Everyone knows that,” you deflected quickly, the rosy tint on your cheeks belying your innocence in the matter. “So what are you going to talk about?” Your bitter scene partner rolled his eyes. As a veteran in the industry, he felt pretty foolish having you talk him through basic acting exercises. Yet….  There was no question that he was struggling with the script, and no better ideas came to mind. With a sigh of defeat, Tenma offered the one outlet that came to mind.

“Bonsai…” he mumbled in a barely audible tone.

“What was that?” you ask, leaning it. Your close proximity fuels a steadily growing warmth along the back of his neck. He takes a sudden step backward and repeats himself louder.

“Bonsai! Are you deaf?”

“Bonsai, huh?” You smile with amusement. “Well, that’s something you don’t read in all your magazine interviews.”

“Reading my interviews, are you?” he responds dryly, but his stomach does a flip. He thinks back on the magazine he has featuring you, kept privately stashed away in a box under his bed. The thought that maybe you had a magazine featuring him tucked away somewhere in your bedroom causes chills that ran down his broad arms and shoulders.

“Nevermind that,” you grumble, brushing a stray hair out of your face. “Well, bonsai it is, then. Whenever you’re ready.”

You spend the next few minutes listening to Tenma ramble on about bonsai pruning, the proper tools to use, and even the proper light, pH and moisture levels to ensure optimal bonsai health.  Despite the fact that you now know more about bonsai trees than you would have ever cared to know, it seems that engaging, dynamic Tenma has returned. He comes to a full stop after finishing a discourse on bonsai diseases; his head now feeling clear, he’s convinced that he can recite his lines without hesitation.

“That was really good,” you commend him honestly, mirroring the pleased look on his face.

“Naturally,” he boasts in a cocky tone, feeling confident following his flawlessly delivered bonsai monologue. “It’s amazing how pleasant you can be when you’re not yelling at me,” he jibes, looking rather pleased with himself. You raise a brow at his renewed brashness, but you’ve always been quick on the trigger.

“It’s amazing how handsome you can be when you’re not scowling,” you reply with a smug expression, reveling in the crimson darkening his cheeks.

“Flattery will get you nowhere,” he mumbles with an air of mild embarrassment irritation, rubbing the back of his neck which is now damp with sweat.

“Who says I want to go anywhere with you?” you shoot back with a patronizing smirk before turning your attention back to the script. “SO, where were we?” you inquire loudly before he can get a word in edgewise. Thumbing through the marked-up pages, you see in your periphery that he is doing the same.

“Scenes 12 and 14 we did, 17 we did… no need to go over scene 28…”

“Why are we not practicing scene 28?” Tenma inquired in a cheeky tone. He knew exactly which scene 28 was: the kissing scene. You hadn’t gone over it yet, in read-throughs or on set. After you had just bested him in a mini battle of wits, this would be a great opportunity to even the playing field.

He had performed at least a dozen kiss scenes; it was old hat for him by now, and he knew for sure (not that he had googled your TV and film credits or anything) that you had never performed one. He was certain you’d flounder in search of a clever comeback, then, admitting defeat, blush profusely and outright refuse to do it.

“Fine, let’s do it.” You were no fool, and Tenma Sumeragi couldn’t bluff to save his life.

If Tenma wasn’t youthful and in great health, he might fear he were having a heart attack. Words seized up in his throat, and he could only manage a curt nod. He walked in a small circle, shaking his limbs as he often did while getting into character. He could do this, this was nothing. He had kissed, like, at least 12 girls before. 12! That was more girls than most men kissed in their entire lifetime! Wasn’t it? He couldn’t really think straight. With a long breath in, and out, he reformed his strategy.

He would perform a star-worthy kiss, absolutely knock-your-socks-off amazing, and then swagger out of the room while you were still swooning and dazed. His ego swelled a bit at the thought of leaving you desperate for another kiss, but his blood ran fast and furious at the thought of… well, actually having the kiss.

“I’ve seen the way you look at me,” you started in the tone of your character’s persona, the sudden smoldering look in your eye plucking at his every last nerve.

“At lunch, in the hall… even waiting for the bus.” Slowly, you crossed the floor towards Tenma’s frozen form. “You’ve given me flirty smiles, you’ve given me teasing winks, but there’s one thing you have yet to give me...” His pulse pounded in his ears as you leaned in closer, far closer than you had ever been before. His eyes flicker anxiously to your mouth, his breath held tightly in his throat.

“A kiss” you purr, biting your lip with the thrill of anticipation. Your lip bite just about crushes any dignity that remains in Tenma; tracing the lines on your lips with a wanton stare, it takes him a few seconds of feeble gaping before he remembers he has a line.

“Come and get it,” he whimpered, his line in a tone more befitting the token band geek than a smooth high school hunk. And get it, you did.

His script is lost to the floor as you press your lips onto his, his body rendered both limp and tight all at once. He did not expect this kind of kiss from you. Or maybe it was because he was used to a stage kiss, with twenty people watching and instructions from several individuals on how to hold his mouth at just the right angle for the camera. This… this was a kiss kiss. Your soft mouth was moving fluidly against his with such hypnotic, sweet caresses that he was convinced that he had never truly kissed someone before now. It was humbling but delicious; he had no control, and he couldn’t care less.

He couldn’t contain the small whimper of disappointment you drew from his throat when at last you pulled away, slyly wiping your reddened lips with the back of your hand. Tenma watched you with a mixed look of shock and awe, as though you had just miraculously materialized from thin air. Practice was over.

“Don’t lose that script,” you called over your shoulder cheerfully as you exited the practice space. “I think you could use another review of that scene.”

The Premiere

The Interview

You: …and it’s been bittersweet, but we’re both ready to move onto new projects. Isn’t that right, Tenten?

Interviewer: Tenten? That’s adorable, is that your nickname for Tenma?

You: Yeah, I call him Tenten because to me, he’s a ten out of ten. [You place an overly-dramatic kiss on his cheek]

Tenma: [Feigns a gagging sound while seated beside you, but reciprocates the kiss] That is a heinous lie, by the way, on both counts. [Tenma’s ability to poke fun at himself is refreshing, his overall manner humble and gracious, demonstrating his tremendous growth from child star to the consummate professional actor.]

Tenma: Actually, one of my fellow trou- uh, one of my friends at the Mankai Company, Kazunari, gave me that nickname.

Interviewer: The Mankai Company, that’s right! You’re putting on a production soon, aren’t you?

Tenten: We are! I’d love to give you the details of our production if you could publish them alongside this article.

Interviewer:  Absolutely. [Turning to you] And do you usually attend Tenma’s performances? I know both of your schedules are rather hectic these days, with all the job offers you’ve both received following the highly successful final season of your most recent television drama.

You: Yes, absolutely; I attend every one.

Tenma: In the front row, every performance. [He links his arm in yours, speaking with a tangible sense of pride]

Interviewer: I’ve noticed you have at least a half dozen bonsai trees in your apartment. Is that a mutual hobby?

You: Well, it’s our thing. I mean, it’s his thing really, but it’s kind of both our thing now. [You smile at Tenma with affection]

Interviewer: And, I’ve been meaning to ask - that framed script on the wall there, is that a keepsake? Or a valuable script from one of your favorite films perhaps? [The interviewer gestures to the worn script hanging above the mantle, protected and held in place by a thick pane of glass, bearing a large penned “SCENE 28”]

Tenma: Yeah, it has a…  special meaning. [Your boyfriend contributes, glancing into your eyes with a knowing smile that only you two could understand]

[purplesurveys]

1111

Something a little bit random and silly for my 1111th, just because.

survey by joybucket

List three things you love that start with each letter.

A: Art and most forms of it; anchovies, in most cases; and Angela.

B: Burgers, Beyoncé, and buffets.

E: Escargot, the name Eloise, and elephants.

F: FISH, Friends, and some folk indie.

S: Sleeping, signing off work at the end of my shift, and all kinds of seafood.

T: I’m obsessed with tteokbokki; trying out new food; and table tennis.

Q: I like the quiet time I occasionally give myself; quail eggs, especially in the form of kwek-kwek; and quattro formaggi pizza.

R: Rainbows, the rain, and riding planes.

O: Old movies, the ocean, and Okinawa milk tea.

List a phrase including an adjective, noun, and verb for each letter. Examples: "angry artist anticipating", "rude rascals running", "dirty dogs dancing", or "empty elephants eloping." Have fun!

A: Adorable animals appearing.

F: Fabulous fingers frolicking.

C; Chummy classmates cooking.

S: Suspicious self salivating.

R: Rambunctious raccoon running.

T: Tired turnip tumbling.

Q; Questioning quail quipping.

J: Joyful joggers jamming.

I: Inquisitive igloos imagining.

L: Luxurious lemonade luminescing.

Z: Zesty zebras zoning out.

E: Ethereal eagles embracing.

List three different occupations starting with each letter.

O: Orthodontist, oceanographer, opthalmologist.

E: Engineer, equestrienne, elementary school teacher.

F: Firefighter, flight attendant, farmer.

S: Scientist, singer, seamstress.

T: Talent agent, tricycle driver, tennis player.

I: Illustrator, inspector, IT technician.

E: Economist, editor, electrician.

L: Lawyer, librarian, lifeguard.

A: Accountant, actor, architect.

Y: Yoga instructor, youth pastor, yogurt maker?? if that counts, lol. Otherwise I got nothing else.

List three adjectives that begin with each letter.

A: Affable, abrupt, adequate.

B: Broken, blunt, bleary.

C: Crazy, clear, clingy.

D: Daunting, delirious, dark.

E: Existential, enraged, exemplary.

F: Fantastic, far-flung, flavorful.

G: Ghastly, gentle, gigantic.

H: Harrowing, healthy, hopeful.

I: Intelligent, identical, impervious.

J: Jovial, jaded, joyous.

List three nouns that being with each letter.

K: Kangaroo, keychain, kiwi.

L: Lemonade the album, lemon the fruit, and Liz Lemon.

M: Mall, maple syrup, and mop.

N: Nightingale, nest, napkin.

O: Ogre, olive, orange.

P: Piano, panini, and pizza.

Q: Queen, quill, quilt.

List three verbs that begin with each letter.

R: Running, raking, reliving.

S: Singing, sailing, surfing.

T: Tricking, tossing, teeming.

U: Understanding, urging, unwrapping.

V: Villifying, venerating, vaccinating - get vaccinated, folks.

W: Wandering, washing, wriggling.

X: I don’t know if there are any and I can’t bother to look it up.

Y: Yawning, yelling, yearning.

Z: Zipping, ziplining, zapping.

List three...

girl's names you love: Olivia, Mia, Emma.

boy’s names you love: Mason, Jacob, Lucas.

girl’s names you dislike: Karen, and our local versions of Karen, Marites and Marivic.

boy’s names you dislike: Chad, times three.

things you hate about summer things you hate about winter things you hate about spring things you hate about fall things you love about spring things you love about winter things you love about fall things you love about summer Crossing these out because my Southeast Asian ass can’t relate, but if you do decide to take this survey feel free to un-strikethrough them!

things you miss from your past: Having more freedom to make mistakes; not having to worry about the future; and friends I’ve since lost.

people who have really hurt you in the past: Gabie, my mom, Marielle.

names of people you have had crushes on: Gabie, Andi from 5th grade...and that’s it, really.

names of people you have gone on a date with: Only Gabie. And I guess maybe Mike? Since he asked me to go with him to his ball as his date.

places you've been and would love to go again: Sagada, Jeju, Bali.

places you want to visit before you die: Morocco, Spain, Thailand.

items on your bucket list: See Times Square, live in a condo, plan a solo trip.

health conditions you have: Scoliosis, lactose intolerance, and very possible depression.

health conditions you've had in the past but don't anymore: Dehydration, UTI, and some kind of weird low-platelet-count thing that was just that, and never diagnosed as anything.

things you are allergic to: Possibly some types of grass, and maybe face masks. Idk how to confirm it really; I just know my skin gets irritated around them sometimes.

youtube channels you love to watch: Good Mythical Morning; the KBS YouTube channel mainly for clips of Return of Superman and 2 Days 1 Night; and Binging With Babish.

favorite drinks: Water, coffee, Long Island Iced Tea.

favorite foods: Sushi, chicken wings, pizza.

favorite desserts: Cheesecake, MACARONS, cupcakes.

favorite holidays: The only one I care for and get super excited about is my birthday, if that counts. Christmas is fine, but I only get the excitement for it on the actual day itself.

favorite colors: Pastel pink, white, maroon.

people you would like to meet: Ysa and Bea, my teammates at work. I’ve met them only once before, and I wish we can be allowed to report to the workplace physically soon so that I get to see them more often and strengthen my relationship (both working and personal) with them. I’d also love to be able to chat and chill with Hayley Williams even for just 30 seconds.

people you want to meet in Heaven: I don’t believe in that, but I’d love to have met my great-grandfather on my maternal grandfather’s side. Also, Audrey Hepburn and Princess Diana.

good names for a dog or cat: Depends on their personality.

reasons why you get up each morning and keep on living: Because I’ve been able to see myself get better, and why stop all the progress?; because I’d want to be able see if the future will get better; and because I’m afraid of what will happen to/who will look out for my dogs if I’m suddenly gone.

For each name, think of three people you know with that name, and list their occupations.

Amanda: I only know one Amanda, and she’s a friend of my ex’s younger sister. She’s only in senior year of high school. I know an Amandine which is close enough I suppose?? and she’s a dentistry student.

Sarah: She’s a media contact and I’m constantly in touch with; she’s the editor-in-chief of a local magazine. I think she’s the only Sarah I know.

Ashley: Also a media contact. I’m not sure about her title, though.

Beth: @bionic-beth is a teacher! :) But I don’t know any Beths in real life, I think.

Katie: Well I know Kate, and I’ll sometimes playfully call her Katie. She works in a government agency and she’s one of their PR people. The HR person who recruited me to come work at my current employer is a Kate, but I have never and have no plans to call her Katie.

Matt: That’s too foreign-sounding a name where I live.

Emily: Don’t know any Emilys, either.

Chris: Media contacts. They run blogs or news sites of their own.

Mike/Michael: The one Mike I know is currently a med student. Not sure if he’s working on the side - I think he is, since I saw him post about a job update on his Facebook a few months ago; but I can no longer remember what he does, or if he’s still doing it.

Jessica: I went to high school with a girl named Jessica but I don’t follow her on social media, so I have no clue what she’s up to now.

Becca/Bekah: Rita’s sister is a Becca. I think she is currently a grad student.

For each name, think of three people you know, and list one adjective to describe each person. (Skip if you don't know anyone with that name.)

Laura

Michelle: Hilarious.

Victoria: Strong.

Tessa: Friendly.

John

Claire: Influential; motherly.

Briana/Brianna: Bitch.

Vanessa

Brittany/Britney, etc.

Allison/Allie/Ally, etc: Kind. 

Olivia

Jordan

Jo/Joe: Ambitious; pretty.

Corey/Kori

Sophie: Sweet; quiet.

Mitch/Mitchell: Tall.

Madison/Maddie/Maddi

Out of all the people you know or have met, list three...

redheads: Yeah, you’re not going to find them in most of Asia. West Asia and some parts of East Asia, probably, but definitely not for the rest.

tall people: Jo, Chesca, and Shaun.

people with really curly hair: I know Kleo has naturally curly hair from her Aeta roots, but it’s been straightened for a very long time now. I think Chesca also has curly hair, albeit slightly. There is also Liana.

sets of twins: My sister had two sets of twins in her high school batch, but I can no longer remember their names. I also had an English class with a pair of twins named Ardy and Thirdy.

of the cutest babies you've seen on social media: My workmate’s baby. My friend Jar has a super squishy niece/nephew pair of twins as well.

people you miss: Angela, Kate, my grandpa.

people with beautiful eyes: I can only think of my ex.

people with nice hair: God I have not been around people for so long, I can barely think of anyone for this.

people who are the same height as you: Aya, Hannah, Tina.

own one of the same clothing items as you: Angela since we went to the same high school and have several of the same school shirts; Laurice since we share a college org and we have our own trademark polo shirt; and my brother and I have our own pairs of Nike Cortez shoes.

make you laugh: Andi, Hans, and this girl I had a couple of history classes with, Rose.

List three celebrities who...

are the same height as you: Lady Gaga and AJ Lee are the only ones who are coming to mind. I wouldn’t call AJ a celebrity though.

have the same hair color as you: Mila Kunis, Kelly Rowland, Dita Von Teese.

look like you: Only based on comments I’ve gotten in the past and not because I necessarily claim these for myself, Lucy Hale, Anna Akana, and Kakie.

List three....

adjectives to describe you: Timid, stubborn, sensitive.

academic courses you enjoyed: Philippine social history, international relations, anthropology.

words you always forget how to spell: Rhythm, committee, accommodate.

things you wish you were better at: Singing, dancing, drawing.

things you are really good at: Writing, reading people, and knowing the best things to order at most restaurants hahahah.

jobs you'd like to have: Ideally, a lawyer or doctor. But realistically, I’d love to have a leadership position in the PR sphere.

jobs you've considered having: ^ Again, lawyer and doctor. Also a journalist or news anchor, back when I still thought I was passionate about journalism.

jobs you'd hate: Journalist, an LTO clerk, an assistant to an asshole celebrity.

things you miss: Being a student, many parts of the past, and deceased family members.

names your mom considered when naming you: Ariel, Kathleen, Katrina.

things people call you: Robyn, Byn, Bynbyn.

*Bonus*: what is your name? (first and middle)? I always feel like just sharing Robyn.

[samrolandheughanappreciationpage]

TBT March 2018 The Rake in Progress photo shoot  curtesy The Rake Magazine.... so lucky to have been able to get a copy of that issue 4 months and 4 tries  ,  after ordering but  got it. Eventually...  it's in my treasure vault now TIMELESS CLASSIC ❣❣❣❣❣❣❣❣❣

[thegardeninggoodlife]

A gallery space which incorporates nature gets a thumbs up in my book 👍🏻💚🌿🌱 Loved the pop-up space for @rakesprogress #rakesgoeslive

And the #eyesasbigasplates exhibition by artists #rittaikonen and #karolinehjorth is bonkers but I love it!

This is what the artists say about their work: ‘Eyes as Big as Plates has evolved into a continual search for modern human’s belonging to nature. Each image in the series presents a solitary figure in a landscape, dressed in elements from surroundings that indicate neither time nor place. Here nature acts as both content and context: characters literally inhabit the landscape wearing sculptures they create in collaboration with the artists. As active participants in our contemporary society, these seniors encourage the rediscovery of a demographic group too often labelled as marginalized or even as a stereotypical cliché. It is in this light that the project aims to generate new perspectives on who we are and where we belong.’

I’d love to have my #nature portrait taken by them but will need to leave it for a few years to be regarded as a senior 😂#rakesprogress #rakesprogressmagazine

And the perfect street to have a nature/flower pop-up #floralstreet #coventgarden #lovelondon

[harry-leroy]

I was tagged by both the lovely @je-suis-em-jee and the forever talented @princess-of-france to make a personal moodboard - I’ve done one before with pinterest pics, but I thought it would be more fun (and more personal) to make one with some photos of mine! (Just a note this is 9000% not required, I’m just extra all the time). 

- The top left, middle center, and bottom right pics were all taken this week. (Center pic is me trying to channel the inner angsty tenor that lives inside of my soul). 

- I play the flute, so naturally gotta include Windermere. 

- My lovely puppy boy, Hudson, makes an appearance in the top right. He’s a three year old Golden! 

- Middle left pic is from a 1953 magazine all about The Rake’s Progress (my favorite opera!) (and peep the Così fan tutte Cambridge guide up top - my second favorite opera, naturally). 

- Bottom center is what my desk look like on a typical day, while top center is one of my favorite plays - Love’s Labour’s Lost! 

- And bottom left pic is another fun picture I have of myself - it’s also my avatar :) 

Tagging (and no pressure because life is CRAZY and this might also not be your vibe :) ): @dustyp-rose, @maplelantern, @lovesjustachemical, @shredsandpatches, @forcebros, @babinicz, @henriadical, @skeleton-richard, @themalhambird, @twostarsinonesphere, @devilsss-dyke, @bonebreakfast, @ardenrosegarden, @upstartpoodle, and whoever else wants to do it! (Sorry my brain is blanking on people to tag for some reason ahhhh). 

[tomeandflickcorner]

Episode Review: The Real Ghostbusters- Ghost Busted

Okay, I realize that this is supposed to be a kid’s show, so there’s bound to be moments that don’t make a lot of realistic sense.  But oh boy, this one really went a bit too far, particularly towards the end.

It seems that the Ghostbusters have not received any cases in a few weeks, and they’re all visibly bored.  Janine is flipping through a magazine, Egon is fiddling around with his P.K.E. Meter (and the Egon/Janine shipper in me grins a bit over the fact that he’s sitting with his back to Janine’s desk), Ray is reading a comic book, Winston and Peter are playing cards and Slimer is just lounging about.  And full props to Winston here for attempting to look at the silver lining by saying they could use a break.  However, boredom is not the only issue they have to deal with.  Egon crunches some numbers and determines that if they don’t get any calls soon, then they will be essentially bankrupt.  This is driven home when Janine reveals they’d received a notice from Con Ed, stating that they’re planning on cutting off their power because they haven’t paid off their bills.  At that moment, the phone rings, and everyone goes nuts, with everybody practically fighting to answer it.  Of course, Janine manages to be the one to pick up the phone, only to find out it’s a false alarm- the caller was some random solicitor trying to sell them some swampland in Florida.  (Though points for callbacks, as Peter remarks it might have been his con artist father calling.)  In any event, it’s announced that the Ghostbusters desperately need to rake up some cash, so it might be necessary for them to all get secondary jobs.  (Something Peter is particularly distressed over.)

Regardless, the Ghostbusters and Janine all refer to the classified ads and apply for various jobs.  For the next few minutes, we see their attempts at finding secondary jobs. Peter ends up getting a job at some chemistry lab, but is quickly fired when he causes a small explosion.  Egon tries his hand at being a used car salesman, but that doesn’t work out, as he apparently can’t get a car door open and somehow ends up ripping the door clean off the car.  (Come to think of it, why didn’t Peter apply for the used car saleman job and Egon go to work at the chemistry lab?  Wouldn’t that have made more sense, given their individual personalities?) Janine gets a secretary job at what looks like a fancy office, and it’s clear that this new job is keeping her super busy.  Ray gets a job at a local zoo, but he apparently quits rather quickly after feeding a lion or something.  (Which seems a bit stupid, really.  I would love to have a job that involves feeding the animals at the zoo.  But Ray seems to turn tail and run simply because the lion was able to remove the giant slab of meat from the pole Ray was holding. I don’t get why Ray had a problem with that.)  As for Winston, he gets a job as a taxi driver.  But that doesn’t go so well for him, as he ends up honking at some large truck in front of him, and the three burly truck drivers respond by exiting the truck and actually flipping Winston’s taxi cab clean over.  Okay, granted Winston probably was a bit out of line by honking at the truck, since they were clearly in a traffic jam and it wasn’t as if the truck could go anywhere.  But wouldn’t those burly truck drivers face repercussions from flipping over the taxi cab like that? I admit, I can’t find any real information on any legal issues they would face from doing this, but I imagine it would count as vandalism.  So were those truck drivers hit with a fine after this?  Did they lose their jobs over this incident?  

However, it turns out that, in their efforts to find second jobs, nobody remembered to keep an eye on Slimer, as he’s taken to just roaming around unsupervised.  He ends up stealing a pretzel from a street cart and takes refuge behind a locked gate that guards the door of a closed electronics store so he can eat in peace. And, as bad luck would have it, some jewel thief that just happened to be nearby witnessed Slimer effortlessly passing through the locked gate and he decides to take advantage of this, tricking Slimer into helping him gain access to a jewelry store in exchange for food. Slimer, obviously too naïve to recognize the situation for what it was, readily agrees and unwittingly assists the thief in breaking into the jewelry store.  But as the thief is stuffing necklaces and such into his bag, Slimer notices the Ghostbusters and Janine hanging around outside the jewelry store.  Yeah, they just happened to choose that particular spot to regroup and check up on everyone’s progress in landing jobs.  Excitedly, Slimer begins waving at them, inadvertently alerting them to the current theft going on.  The Ghostbusters and Janine, instead of calling the cops, decide to take it on themselves to catch the thief and give chase.  In the end, Peter ends up catching the thief by firing his Proton Pack at a fire escape overhead, which results in the thief getting trapped in the makeshift cage.

The Ghostbusters subsequently get a check for $10,000 as a reward for catching the thief.  Thinking they might be onto something, they decide to become vigilantes by catching criminals instead of ghosts.  To achieve this, Egon and Ray modify their equipment so the Proton Packs would be attuned to the bioelectric fields of living individuals and the Ghost Trap would produce a solidified energy cage.  (Not certain how sound the science behind such a thing would be, but oh well.)  And so, things progress from there, with the Ghostbusters rebranding themselves as the Crimebusters.   We’re then treated to a mini montage that shows the newly dubbed Crimebusters continuing to make the front page news as they proceed to apprehend various criminals, with Mayor Lenny even hailing them as his new special task force.  Before long, crime throughout the city dropped by 30%, and the Crimebusters are soon out of debt, with an additional $30,000 surplus.

However, Ray decides to jinx things by stating the infamous phrase of ‘what could go wrong?’  It turns out that the top crime boss in New York (whose name is simply Crimelord, indicating a severe lack of creativity within the criminal sect) is not at all happy that the Crimebusters’s efforts are effectively putting a monkey wrench into his operations.  In an attempt to scare them off, Crimelord ends up arranging for Janine to be abducted from the Firehouse, leaving behind a ransom note that states the Crimebusters must stop their crime fighting activities if they ever want to see their secretary again.  Of course, the Crimebusters are not easily deterred and decide to take matters into their own hands.  Egon modifies the P.K.E. Meter to track Janine’s bio-rhythm (has Egon memorized the bio-rhythm of everyone on the team, or just Janine?  If it’s the latter, that’s actually kinda adorable) and they manage to follow the signal to this building that’s actually an entrance to some underground subway storage facility. Of course, Ray ends up loudly tripping over a subway rail, which ruins their efforts at sneaking up on Crimelord’s goons.  And a full-on shootout erupts.

And this, dear readers, is one of the major issues I had with this episode.  The fact that the Crimebusters charged in blindly into a place that was undoubtedly filled with hardened thugs who would sooner shoot you than look at you instead of alerting the authorities, who are supposed to be trained to handle hostage situations.  After all, this IS supposed to be a kid’s show, right?  Isn’t that one of the moralities many kid’s shows try to incorporate? Encouraging kids to view the police as people who are there to help serve and protect?  Having the Ghostbusters/Crimebusters take matters into their own hands seems a bit counterproductive.

Either way, Egon ends up saving the day by managing to magnetize the subway tracks, which results in the guns the thugs were using to fly out of their hands and attach themselves to the tracks.  (No explanation as to why the Proton Packs weren’t also affected.) With the threat of getting shot to death nullified and the thugs effectively captured, the Crimebusters are able to enter the abandoned subway car where Janine was being kept hostage, leading to a really nice moment where Egon personally unties Janine, with the two sharing a rather sweet hug.

Sometime later, the Crimebusters storm into Crimelord’s office building.  They inform him that Slimer had personally spooked his thugs enough to force them to provide signed confessions that implicates Crimelord as the one who ordered Janine’s abduction.  (Why would they actually confront the dangerous crime boss about this instead of actually turning in the evidence to the police?!)  Of course, Crimelord isn’t willing to come quietly, and he manages to escape by activating a force field he just happened to have, as well as an elevating chair that enables him to escape through the ceiling.  (How does he have those things?!  Is Dr. Claw his brother or cousin?)  Upon reaching the roof, Crimelord attempts to make good his escape on his personal helicopter. But the Crimebusters are soon in hot pursuit in the Ecto-2, which has finally made a reappearance in the show.  For the next few minutes, we get a whole dogfight between Crimelord and the Crimebusters.  In the end, Winston is able to bring down Crimelord’s helicopter by disabling the propellers with a well-aimed shot from his Proton Pack.  Of course, Crimelord doesn’t die when his helicopter crashes, as it is effectively skewered by the Chrysler Building.  Of course, I didn’t expect the episode to actually have this guy die in a helicopter crash.  Again, it’s a kid’s show.  Still, I think it would have been cooler if they showed Winston’s arm getting nicked by one of the bullets being fired at him from Crimelord’s helicopter.  Not that I wanted to see Winston harmed, of course. But there were bullets flying everywhere.  The fact that his arm didn’t get grazed in a miracle.  Was there some sort of network mandate that prohibited the appearance of blood?

As the episode comes to a close, the Crimebusters bask in their success at getting Crimelord behind bars.  However, they also realize that, in doing so, they might have just put themselves out of business.  With Crimelord out of the picture, it might mean that the city is free of criminals. So they’re now at the same exact spot they were at the start of the episode.  But, as luck would have it, the phone starts to ring.  Wouldn’t you know it, someone has a ghost problem!  And seconds later, a second ghost related call comes it.  So it looks as if the dry period of no paranormal activity has come to an end. And the Crimebusters become the Ghostbusters once again.  In the final moments, the Ghostbusters drive off in the Ecto-1 as Slimer and Janine return the Ghostbusters sign to the front of the Firehouse.  And, out of nowhere, the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man appears on the screen, watching the Ecto-1 drive off before turning to the camera and winking.

Um…questions.  Why is the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man roaming free?  Isn’t he supposed to be in the Containment Unit?  And why is he winking at us?  Are we supposed to suspect that he is somehow responsible for ghosts appearing in the city again?  If so, was he doing it to help the Ghostbusters get back in business?  Because if memory serves, he does become an occasional alley to the Ghostbusters in future episodes.  Rather like how Godzilla eventually stopped being an antagonist in Kaiju films and became a protector of Earth.  Also, I do wrinkle my nose at the show showing the Ghostbusters become vigilantes.  Isn’t that basically sending a dangerous message to kids that they can do the work of the police and take down criminals and crime bosses?  Then again, I suppose it’s not that different from people like Batman, Daredevil and Spider-Man taking the law into their own hands.  I don’t think many kids try to imitate their comic book heroes.

(Click here for more Ghostbusters reviews)