#real life ones are just awful in the most mundane of ways

[fereldanwench]

had the most pointless in-office "meeting" this morning (literally went into the office to watch boomers struggle to stream a pre-recorded powerpoint presentation via teams for 30 mins until they just gave up) and i am exhausted from waking up earlier than usual for that fantastic use of my time

[itaipava]

— f1 boys: the ones you catch staring at you and the ones that catch you staring at them.

THE ONES YOU CATCH STARING AT YOU. . .

LANDO NORRIS can’t stop looking at you. everyone can see how in love and enchanted by you he is just by the way he looks at you with so much love, affection and a beautiful glow of admiration in his eyes. and honestly he doesn’t care if you caught him staring at you or if someone make fun of him for it, he’ll simply keep looking at you the same way but this time with a lazy smile on his face. you try to maintain eye contact for a while, but his gaze is so deep (and in love) it makes you feel shy and fuzzy inside, and when you look away first, he laughs softly and walks over to you, kissing your forehead and calling you beautiful.

DANIEL RICCIARDO sometimes can’t help it, he’s so mesmerized and intrigued by every little detail of yours that he gets lost in that moment. his bright eyes follow your every move as he makes a mental note of all your mannerisms and quirks and how beautiful you are. and he just realizes he’s staring too hard when you points it out; he somehow looks more delighted at being caught than embarrassed. his eyes have nothing but warmth and love as you look at him across the table, and he instantly leans forward, his chin resting on his palm, letting out a dreamy sigh along with a simple smile, totally undramatic, ‘i think you’re the most beautiful person in the world’ and you might think he’s joking, but he really says it with his heart.

MAX VERSTAPPEN doesn’t understand why, but everything you do is charming to him. even the simplest and most mundane things became more beautiful and light to him after he saw you do them; it’s as if you’ve given a new meaning to his life. and when you turn to look at him after feeling the weight of his gaze on you, all you can do is smile; the way he looks at you with all the attention in the world, his eyes shining with love and compassion but also curiosity makes your heart flutter in your chest. he just pretends he hasn’t been caught looking at you like you hang the stars and moon in his sky. but if you look very closely, you will notice a slight flush in his cheeks; you tease him about it and he seriously denies it, avoiding eye contact, but one accidental look at you amidst the bickering, he’s a goner of course, with a fond little smile already tugging on his lips.

OSCAR PIASTRI has his heart racing and red cheeks as he quickly looks away when he realizes he’s been caught staring at you for too long, and for a while, he looks anywhere in the room even when you try to get his attention playfully, but unfortunately, the lovestruck boy can’t help but steal a few too many glances in your direction when he thinks you’ve looked away only to get caught again.

THE ONES THAT CATCH YOU STARING AT THEM. . .

CARLOS SAINZ blatantly looks back at you, his gaze on your face light and unwavering; so full of adoration and love it sends a shiver down your spine. and when he knowingly asks why you are looking at him, you tell him that you enjoy doing it because he’s so beautiful, to which he can only smile sweetly and say, taking your hand in his, “i like looking at you too... you’re too pretty to be real”

CHARLES LECLERC is one of those who keep throwing glances in your direction, a hint of a smirk tugging on his lips, and when you’re seemingly unfazed, he takes that as a challenge, looking right at you and holding eye contact until you’re the one who eventually looks away; only then, he cracks a gleeful grin, playfully poking your cheek while coolly yet fondly saying ‘cute.’

LEWIS HAMILTON is one of those who notices you staring for a while now but acts otherwise only to suddenly whip around and face you with the goofiest grin. having caught off-guard, you turn away, flustered, and he coos lightly ‘aw come on don’t get all shy on me now’ and cups your face gently to make you look at him so now you’re two smitten idiots, smiling at each other, utterly and hopelessly in love.

[0cta9on]

Today

Length: 1.3k

Genre: Fluff

IVE Liz x Male Reader

(Author's Note: Motivation is hard to come by these days, I hope you can forgive my lack of frequent updates. For the sake of my mental health, please imagine that Liz's eyes are the slightest bit of gray, I swear they look gray but they could easily by colored contacts :> Enjoy <3)

【☆】★【☆】★【☆】★【☆】★【☆】★【☆】★【☆】★【☆】★【☆】★【☆】★【☆】★

It’s a Tuesday evening. Tuesdays always seemed like an awkward time of the week—way better than Mondays obviously, but still too far away from the weekend for any real excitement to build. The trees outside sway with the oncoming breeze, flecks of autumnal browns and golds dancing against the current before gently landing on the ground. The spontaneity of their movements reminds you of a certain someone that’s running a couple minutes late.

You take another sip of your coffee, warming and pleasant, as your gaze stays glued to the windowpane of the cafe, scanning each passing visage for a semblance of familiarity. You never had this habit before knowing her. In a past life, you kept your head down, too sheepish to look most people in the eye. Yet now, you're actively searching for the eyes of strangers, waiting until you see that glimpse of gray like the sky before a storm.

It’s a little creepy, you admit, but a billion weird glances are worth it for that split second where your eyes meet and you feel light as a feather, like the autumn breeze could carry you away with the leaves.

Across the street, the crowd splits like curtains at the start of the play to reveal the star of the show—Liz, weaving through the crowd and wearing that same apologetic look that’s become an unofficial symbol for the start of your meetings.

“I’m so sorry for being late!” she says, her voice ringing alongside the jingle of the cafe’s door.

“It’s okay,” you chuckle. “I haven’t been waiting long.”

“Still,” she removes her scarf and drapes it against her chair, the same cyan checkered scarf you bought her last year after she lost her old one, “This is, like, the millionth time I’ve been late, I feel awful about it!”

Liz rests her head against the table in defeat and you fight every urge to pat her head and comfort her.

“It’s really okay, I swear. I don’t mind waiting a little longer for you,” you say.

A smile dances across her lips, and suddenly you’re floating. “You’re so sweet, you know that?”

Your heart pounds against the confines of your rib cage like a lovesick prisoner begging to be set free. You’ve always wondered how someone like her can exist on this planet. Someone so charming, so beautiful, so perfect in every way that her only flaw is her lack of time management. Irises like raging storm clouds, paired with the personality of a calm evening in the shade. The angle of her smile, the dimples that adorn her cheeks, the luscious waves of her hair—

“Hello?” Liz waves a hand in front of your face, bringing you back down to Earth. “Are you alright?”

“Y-yeah, yeah, sorry, I just, um… Anyways…” Timidly, you rummage through your backpack for the reason why you invited her here in the first place, taking a little extra time to calm your nerves. “H-here,” you mutter, producing a fairly hefty box from your bag.

“Ooooooh!” Her eyes excitedly glean over its matte finish. “Are these the noise-canceling headphones you were talking about yesterday?”

“Yeah, I was wondering if you could help me test them out,” you explain.

“Of course!” With an eager grin, Liz takes out the headphones and places them on her head. “Ready when you are!” she exclaims, flashing you a thumbs up.

Liz has this super power of somehow making even the most mundane tasks feel like you’re having the time of your life. As you fiddle with the bluetooth settings on your phone, you forget that it’s just another Tuesday, you forget about the countless pairs of eyes you scanned through earlier just to find hers, you forgot about the fact that you don’t actually need these headphones and only bought them as an excuse to spend time with her.

“There we go,” you say as you press play on a song. Almost immediately, Liz starts to shimmy her arms in a goofy looking dance as she mumbles along to the lyrics. You don’t even try to hide the smirk on your face. “Can you hear me?”

“Huh?” she utters a little too loud.

Chuckling, you decide to see if the headphones are as good as advertised. “What’s your favorite color?”

“Uh, my mother is at home right now, probably watching a show or something.”

“When’s your birthday?”

“Earl grey? I don’t know, I’m not much of a tea drinker.”

You keel over with laughter from her nonsensical answers while she continues to dance on like no one is watching.

Then, an inkling of an idea slips into your mind. The smile on your face fades as that idea begins to form into something new—an opportunity. What was once glee is now replaced with an anxious excitement. Your heartbeat overpowers all the background noise and all you can focus on is the gray highlighting her eyes.

The calm before the storm.

“Liz, I…” you start, voice shaky and laced with apprehension. It’s not too late to turn back and forget about this. And yet, Liz’s lack of a reaction to your change in tone calms your nerves the slightest amount. You take a deep breath and continue going.

“…I, uh, need to tell you something important. It’s been on my mind for a long while. Like, a year at this point, and, uh…”

A choppy sigh empties from your lungs. There’s no going back after this. As the last bit of oxygen brushes past your lips, you take in another mouthful of air and clamp your eyes shut.

“I like you, Liz. As more than a friend. I really, really like you.”

As soon as those words leave your mouth, you collapse face first into the table like a rickety bridge finally crumbling underneath its own weight. You did it. Sure, she didn’t hear a thing, but you finally vocalized what you’ve been keeping inside and that’s good enough for you. Maybe one day, you’ll finally build up the courage to say it when she can actually hear you. Maybe.

The sound of plastic hitting the table jolts you back up. “Oh right, how was it?” you ask, unable to meet her eyes.

“They, uh… good,” she mutters, uncharacteristically quiet. “I-I mean, they work good.”

“G-good. That’s good.” You grab the headphones from the table and put them back into their box, making sure to unpair them from your—

Your eyes grow wide as you double and triple check your phone screen. The headphones are already unpaired.

Your mind starts to race with a million questions, but only one echoes in your head—How long were they unpaired?

You shoot your gaze back up to Liz, her once milky white cheeks now stained with a bright pink hue. Your mouth opens to say something, but nothing comes out. It’s too late. You know what that reaction means. And you know what’s gonna come next.

“I-I should go,” you stutter, clumsily throwing your belongings into your backpack. How could you have been so reckless? Why didn’t you double check before attempting something as idiotic as this? You’ll have to move cities now, fake your death, create a new life on an undocumented island in the middle of the Pacific—

“I like you too.”

Her voice sounds so sweet and harmonious, you wonder if all the adrenaline pumping through your system is giving you auditory hallucinations. You’ve imagined similar scenarios to these countless times before, but to hear her actually speak those words and mean them is a whole different experience.

The tidal wave of emotions washing over you renders you completely catatonic. So you sit. You let the feelings stew. You let the smile creep onto your face until your cheeks begin to ache. You let your eyes take nervous yet excited glances towards the girl sitting next to you, watching as she does the same. Those beautiful pearls of gray, gazing at you in a way that you’ve only seen in movies, TV shows, and your dreams.

Not so bad for a Tuesday.

[hyypnotix-writes]

Part 2

~ hiya! I'm really nervous about posting this, but I couldn't not at least try to give you a second part after the response the last one got! ~

~ I really appreciate everyone reading it and enjoying it as much as you did ..I hope this one doesn't ruin it for you! ~

~ I think this one's around 13k words. so again ..it's a long one, if you have nothing else to do! ~

~ there’s quite a lot of story before Alexia makes an appearance, sorry ..but she does eventually show up! ~

~ I promise to put more of her in the next part if any of you end up wanting one ~

~ I’m really worried this will disappoint a lot of you, but at least you still have the first part to go back to, if nothing else! ~

~ I really hope you're able to enjoy it even just a little bit, and thanks again for loving the first part so much! the response was very overwhelming and I've loved you all reaching out to tell me that you liked it ~

~ good luck! good bye xx ~

~ Part 1 ~

________________

One night.  

One perfect night.  

That’s all it took.  

One perfect night to throw your whole damn life into disarray.  

One perfect night, that’s lead to endless subsequent nights, spent tossing and turning on your own, replaying the memory over on a loop in your mind. It’s only been about a month, but it feels like an eternity.  

A never-ending, exhausting cycle of yearning and confusion.  

It was the most welcome distraction from your ex-boyfriend’s evil escapades, you’ve not really thought about him at all since. 

It should have set you free, broken you out of the chains of mundanity. It showed you a whole new world, a world of women. It gave you a new perspective on life. Unlocked a realm of brand-new possibilities all ready and waiting for you to venture, and yet, you don’t want to explore any of them.  

It's not that you haven’t tried.  

You’d have been an idiot to assume that it’s only her that can make you feel like this. That would be giving her an awful lot of credit. Yes, she was your first woman, but that didn’t mean that she needed to be your last. The way your mind and body reacted to her, maybe you could have been slightly gayer than you thought, but it doesn’t really look to be the case.  

A pair of lesbian sisters always seemed incredibly unlikely to you, and your sister’s already called dibs on the label. Maybe it’s the mere existence of your younger sister that eradicates the possibility of any real queerness in yourself. That’s probably how the handing out of sexualities works, right? 

It’s a working theory, and one that you seem to be proving the accuracy of.  

You’ve been to a few more clubs since your entanglement with the Spanish mystery. Only returning back to that specific one, once. It gave you a headache just stepping through the door. She was still everywhere in the room, her spirit living in the walls. You barely managed to stay inside for even a second before it became too much for you, sending your heart and mind racing.  

You took yourself back home, reminiscing every single kiss you’d shared with her on that fanciful journey back to her hotel together. Looking up at the floor she had been staying on, as you hastily walked past it on your own.  

Even the nightclubs that aren’t haunted by her ghost, haven’t yielded much greater success with you. 

You paid a visit to a smaller bar, a fair few nights after your perfect one, and had found a woman interested in you. More than interested. She was pretty, and friendly enough. She was flirty and bought you a few drinks. She didn’t try to play it weird by aiding you in your consumption of alcohol. There was no intriguing salt and lime foreplay. She was far more straightforward, far less irritating.  

Maybe that’s why it didn’t work. Maybe she was too plain. Maybe she was too simple and easy for you to understand. Or maybe it’s the fact that when she pressed herself against you in search of a kiss, an alarm bell rang out inside of your head. You suddenly found yourself all too aware that she was a woman, and you simply no longer wanted to follow through with your curiosities.  

It doesn’t help in your confusion, why the femininity of one woman can leave you feeling more certain of your straightness, while another’s femininity has you still helplessly pining after her.  

It’s not like you were under any illusion with the Spanish woman. You were entirely aware that she was also a woman, and it wasn’t off putting to you at all. You enjoyed her being a woman. She smelt nice, she tasted nice. Her body was beautiful, and her lips were soft, and it doesn’t make any sense that she’s allowed to put a yearning in you that no other woman is able to satisfy.  

That does seem very typical of her, though. She really was very cocky and frustrating.ﾠﾠ

Until she wasn’t, of course.  

Then, she was just sweet and considerate. Cautious and careful. Flirty and undemanding. She took you back to hers and she still had no expectations from you. She was still willing to let you walk away. Maybe you should have.ﾠﾠ

You knew even then that you should have.  

It was daft of you to follow after her. Foolish to lose yourself with her, spending the night together, giggling under the sheets. Sharing kisses as you drowned yourselves in each other. Learning her body, every mark, scar and freckle, and committing them all to your memory. Tracing her curves and her tattoos and discovering what it is that makes her tick.ﾠ

She was patient, and understanding, she wasn’t in a rush with you. She spent the whole night exploring with you. Studying your body, wanting to learn all the things you liked her doing, and the things you really liked her doing. She turned what could have been a terrifying, embarrassing, disaster of an experience, into the most incredible encounter of your life.  

She brought you more pleasure than your pathetic ex-boyfriend had ever managed to give you in your whole 5-year relationship, in less than 5 minutes of her having your clothes off. She had the most unholy of noises spilling from your lips with her fingers and tongue inside of you, and she wasn’t exactly quiet herself, in letting you know when you were doing the right thing with her.  

She was intoxicating, exhilarating. She was life-affirming.  

She’s a far more dangerous addiction to you than alcohol could ever manage to be. You’ve never been tempted by drugs before, but you can’t even imagine the high from them being able to compete against what she’s done to you.  

It was just one night.  

It was one perfect night.  

________________

Living back with your younger sister isn’t exactly where you saw yourself being at 26. Your London flat had started feeling a little too big for you, without a traitorous arsehole of a man invading your space. So, you invited her to move in with you, not wanting to have to give up your dream property just because he had decided to try ruining your life. You needed help with the rent, and she had gratefully accepted.  

You didn’t necessarily expect her to also invite her idiot new girlfriend into your home with her. That wasn’t really part of the deal, though you didn’t explicitly tell her that she couldn’t. You can’t really blame her. If you were able to spend every waking moment of your life with ‘A’ right beside you, you’d jump at the opportunity headfirst.   

It still doesn’t aid in the dispelling of your confusion. There’s no jealousy when you see them together. Her girlfriend does nothing for you, none of her girlfriends ever have. You both have decidedly different tastes in women. Your sister’s taste is entirely questionable, yours is perfection.  

You haven’t mentioned your Spanish predicament to your sister. She’d probably laugh at you for it, call you tragic, and embarrassing. Tell you everything you’ve already been telling yourself on repeat in your head. She wouldn’t be very helpful; she very rarely is. She’s your very annoying, smart-arse of a little sister, who couldn’t possibly give you any decent advice. She’s 2 years younger than you and she's an idiot.  

She’s not the one who’s still hung up on a stranger after over a month, though. It’s rarely taken her longer than 24 hours to get over someone she’s been with. She’s not the one who’s been questioning herself every night. She’s never questioned herself at all. You’re fairly certain her very first thought, straight out of the womb was about another woman.  

She didn’t really have to come out to the family at any point, she kissed her first girl when she was 8. Always been a bit of a Casanova, your sister. A walking stereotype of a lesbian. Short, brightly coloured, undercut hair, quite a few piercings, heavily tattooed. She’s obsessed with women’s football, always watching re-runs of ‘The L Word,’ and overwhelmingly insistent in trying to prove to you that Taylor Swift is also secretly gay.  

Your sister’s certainty in her own sexual identity isn’t something that’s ever irritated you before. Not when you were always so sure of yourself, too. You appreciated her confidence. It was admirable, given the way people can be with her. She’s your self-assured little sister, who isn’t great at confrontation. So, you support her whenever anyone tries to tear her down.  

Now, however, this too-late-in-life existential crisis you’re struggling with, has you wishing she’d try to be a little bit more questioning herself. Her surety and cockiness about her sexuality is suddenly the most prominent attribute of her personality, and it’s really starting to drive you up the wall.  

It’s a rare evening where it’s only the two of you at home together. You don’t really know where her girlfriend is, and you don’t much care. You only feel responsible for one annoying lesbian, the one who shares your surname.  

She’s being rather antisocial with you, playing video games alone in her bedroom, and you’ve just finished tidying up the dining table after sharing the dinner you cooked for you both. You’re not exactly sure how you’ve found yourself solo parenting your stroppy little sibling when you’re really not much older than her yourself, but there you go.  

Maybe you should try speaking to her. See what she can possibly offer you by way of sapphic guidance. If she’s going to continue having her nuisance girlfriend living here rent-free, she should at least try giving you something to make it worth your while.  

You walk straight through to her bedroom and collapse your head onto her stomach on the bed. Making sure to do so with just enough force behind it to ensure you manage to leave her winded and interrupt her gaming. She grunts under you, and you earn an overly aggressive smack to your shoulder for achieving your goal. As, whatever other little child she’s playing her game against, has just managed to score past her.  

“You’re a twat!” She scolds, and you backhand her face to shut her up. She raises her fist above your stomach, and you flinch, bracing for impact.  

“I have a question!” You shout, before she has chance to attack.  

She pauses her lifted fist above you, and reluctantly agrees to a truce, providing your question is of interest to her. “What?” She groans, and you fiddle with your fingers, trying to find the right wording.  

“Why do you like women?” You ask, your face grimacing as you await her response.  

It isn’t your smoothest ever phrasing, not your wittiest form of delivery. It’s honestly, rather annoyingly, not the most subtle line of questioning. Despite it not being entirely to the point, your sister isn’t stupid.  

“What?” 

Oh ..maybe she is! 

That’s not going to be super helpful with your impending interrogation.  

“Why not men?” You suggest, still trying not to be too blatant. “How did you know you liked women?” 

“I looked at one.” She tells you, like it’s the most obvious answer in the world. “Why?” 

“Do you find every woman attractive?” 

“No, but I find enough of them attractive to sense a pattern.” She explains. “Why?” 

“And you’ve never been attracted to a man? Not even tempted?” 

“No. Not once. Why?” 

“Never ever?” 

“Y/N!” 

“I was just wondering.” You tell her quickly, drumming your fingers on top of your stomach.  

“About women?” She queries. 

“About ..why women. What it is about them.” 

“Aside from the obvious?” She snickers, nudging your arm.  

You quickly bounce your head back against her stomach winding her again.  

“Stop doing that!” 

“Stop being annoying!” You warn her. Your frustration at yourself getting the better of you.

She tries to push you off of her, but you mess with the analogue sticks on her controller, and she turns her focus back to salvaging her match. “You really are a twat! Get out!” 

“I need your help.” 

“I don’t care!” 

“..I’m sorry.” You mumble, and she scoffs at you, pushing you off of her bed unceremoniously.  

You can’t say you blame her, you’re a constant threat to her in that position, it’s too big of a risk. You enjoy bouncing your head and ruining her childish little game far too much.  

“Why do you like men?” She counters, and you find yourself stuck for words as you sit on her floor.  

It’s the question that’s been floating around your own head for a little while now. You’d never thought about it before. You just were. You had crushes on them all throughout your childhood, you’d had meaningless boyfriends in your teens, you met your bastard ex at university and figured that was it.  

You didn’t need to question why you were attracted to them, it just always made sense.  

“I don’t know.” You answer honestly, letting out a groan as you grab one of her pillows and bury your head into it.  

“What’s going on?” She asks, as she prods at your shoulder with her foot.  

“Nothing. I was just—” 

“Thinking about women?” 

“No!”  

It isn’t really a lie, you’re not thinking about women, just the one. The one woman who’s been invading all of your thoughts for the past 30 something days. The one who won’t let you sleep properly at night, who won’t let you focus completely at work.  

The one woman who refuses to leave your head for even a second just to let you rest, to let you breathe, to let you remember what life was like, prior to her entering it and recklessly setting fire to everything, before she ran away from you and disappeared into thin air.ﾠﾠ

“I kissed one.” You confess, trying to suffocate yourself with her pillow.  

This really does take her by surprise. You can hear her movements on top of the mattress as she turns her game off and pulls her pillow from you with a rather startling urgency. There’s great confusion on her face as she looks at you. She really must think you’re very boring if that’s enough to render her speechless. Imagine her reaction if you admitted to all the other things you did to the Spanish enigma.  

“You kissed a woman?” She asks, frowning at you.  

You’re not entirely sure why she looks quite so cross about it. You’re not trying to steal her thunder here. You’re not about to start trying to catch up with her numerous exploits of female companions.  

“Mhmm.” You mumble in reply, smoothing your hair back from over your face.  

“Why? For a man?” 

“No! I just wanted to ..I thought it’d be fun.” 

“..and ..was it?” 

“Mhmm.” 

She looks at you with a very distinct air of incredulity. It’s a rather annoying look, weirdly condescending. She doesn’t believe you. Why she thinks you’d bother lying about it, you really do not know. You’re not that desperate for a story to tell her.  

It’s almost offensive that she thinks you’re so incapable. You didn’t just kiss a woman. You went down on one, you had your fingers inside of her. You evoked moans from her, she scratched her nails down your back. You’re not some virginal prude. You’re not inept. It can’t be that shocking and inconceivable that you could share a single kiss with someone of the same sex.  

You were right, telling your sister was pointless. She’s offered you no assistance and no support. She’s a useless little waste of space and her horrible girlfriend is an advantage-taking little freeloader.  

“Thanks, very much! This was really helpful!”  

Your words are laced in sarcasm as you slide yourself up away from her bed with a sigh, throwing your middle finger up back in her direction as you exit the room, and slam her bedroom door shut behind you.   

You slam your own bedroom door shut behind you too, just in case she hadn’t picked up on how pissed off you are.  

You’re not really pissed off with her. She doesn’t know what’s going on inside of your head. You’re pissed off with yourself, for still being all entirely far too consumed with a woman whose name you do not know. Who wouldn’t even bother sharing her profession with you. It isn’t fair.  

You collapse headfirst onto your bed and let out a rather guttural groan into your duvet. You’re very frustrated. Your brain’s a mess, your sexuality’s up in the air, and you allowed yourself to picture, far too clearly, your memories of having sex with the gorgeous Spanish woman and now that ache that she’d put inside of you is back.  

There’s a knock at your door, and you’re not in the mood. You grab your duvet and burrito yourself in it down to the foot of your bed.  

“Y/N?”  

You don’t even grace your sister with a response. She doesn’t deserve it. She’s a swine.  

No, but she really is a swine, as you can hear her turning the doorknob and just walking right into your bedroom anyway. She’s really, unbelievably terrible at reading social cues.  

“Do you want to come to Spain with me next week?” 

See what I mean? What the hell?  

That’s a very serendipitous little offer, though. You didn’t even mention to her that the woman that you kissed was Spanish.  

Did you?  

She can’t have worked that out by herself. That would be insane. She’s already proved herself to not be the sharpest tool in the shed. That wouldn’t make any sense. What an intriguing little invitation.  

It’s very embarrassing that just the mention of the country sends a shiver down the back of your neck. All this instant adrenaline running through you, as if she’ll just be waiting for you there as soon as you land down in a random Spanish airport. Yeah, that seems likely!  

Spain’s not the biggest country in the world, but it certainly isn’t small. You’re not going to accidentally stumble into her again on the beach, or in a marketplace. She’s definitely not going to be staying in the same hotel that you’d be in.  

It shouldn’t have your heart racing like this. The chances of finding her again are so infinitesimally small, so extremely impossible, so overwhelmingly unlikely ..but you do stand a better chance, if you’re in the right country.  

“Next week?” You mumble under the sheets, playing it incredibly cool, as you try to ignore the way your heart’s started thumping at a thousand beats per minute.  

“Yeah.” 

“I thought you were going away with your girlfriend?” 

“..we broke up.” 

Shit. She would make this all about herself.  

You wiggle yourself free of your duvet cocoon and open up your arms for her to crash into you. She might be a useless little swine, but she’s your useless little swine. “Are you okay?”  

“Mhmm.” She grumbles, as she starfishes herself on top of you.  

“I’m sorry.” 

“No, you’re not. You never liked her.” 

“That’s not true.” You protest half-heartedly, kissing the side of her head.  

“I am fine ..I broke up with her.” 

“Well, thank fuck for that!” 

“See!” She laughs, rolling off the side of you. “You hated her!” 

“She was horrible!” 

“You could’ve said.” 

“You wouldn’t have left her if I told you to. You’d be getting bloody married to the girl. Twat.” She giggles defencelessly next to you on the bed, because you’re absolutely right. She has always been a contrarian little thing. “Are you sure you’re okay?” 

“Yeah. I’ll find someone else tomorrow.” 

“Unbelievable.” You chuckle, shaking your head as you push her away. “You can’t just give me her ticket. Did she not pay for it?” 

The embarrassed little look on your sister’s face is all the wordless response you need. Her girlfriend never paid for anything. She really was an advantage-taking little freeloader.  

“Where are you going in Spain?” 

“Barcelona.” 

“Why?” 

“Football.” 

“Oh! Give me a break!” You exclaim and roll down away from her back to the foot of the bed. “Why are you going all the way to Spain just to watch some football? You can bloody watch it here.” 

“It’s the Champions League!” She informs you excitedly, and you can’t even pretend to match her enthusiasm. “Chelsea’s playing Barcelona.” 

“Woo.” You respond flatly, rolling your eyes with a shake of your head. “You watched them play together today, didn’t you? Why are they so bloody obsessed with each other? Even I know there’s more teams than that.” 

“It’s the second leg..” She starts explaining, but none of it means anything to you, and you really just can’t bring yourself to care.  

Going all the way out to Spain to be stuck inside a stadium with thousands of screaming fans? What sort of holiday is that? You don’t care about Chelsea’s success or failure. Your sister’s dirty crush on their star-striker is just another one of her many celebrity infatuations that you can’t make any sense of.  

You don’t want to sit next to her as she gets herself all hot and bothered watching women run around a football pitch. You don’t even enjoy watching men do it, you have no interest in watching women.  

“No. I’m good, thanks.” You tell her, dismissively.  

“Please? We can do more than just watch the football.” She offers, pouting pathetically. “You have to come with me! I’ve just been dumped!”  

“No, you haven’t!” You remind her, laughing at her useless attempt at guilt tripping. “And you haven’t really left me much time to negotiate with work.” 

“You work too hard and you’re due some time off! Your boss isn’t going to refuse you, just bat your eyelashes at him. The filthy pervert.” 

“Hm.” You mumble, drumming your fingers over your stomach as you think.  

She isn’t wrong, about you working hard, at least. You do like to bury yourself in your work. You enjoy your job, and the harder you work, the more you earn. You haven’t had time off in a while, and your boss is unlikely to say no to you, you are his favourite employee. You don’t agree that it’s because he has a crush on you, you get good results for the company, and attract lucrative clientele.  

If batting your eyelashes could get you back in the arms of your Spanish one-night stand more easily, though, you’re not above flirting with him to get you there. You could take a few days of leave, go off to Spain, and possibly run into the woman who’s been living inside of your head.  

It’s such an incredibly remote possibility. An absolute stab in the dark chance of finding her. She probably isn’t even in Barcelona. You’re not cultured enough to be able to pin her accent to a specific city. She’s just Spanish. There’s much more places in Spain than just Barcelona. Barcelona isn’t even the capital. Maybe she’s in Madrid, Valencia, Marbella. She could be a party girl living on the island of Ibiza, you had originally found her in a bar. You don’t get a body like hers drinking yourself senseless every night, though.  

What if you do find her, and she wants nothing to do with you? There was only ever the promise of one night together. You already pushed your luck by spending the rest of the morning with each other, she doesn’t owe you anything more. It’s unlikely that she’s been spiralling quite as pathetically as you have. She’s not going to be fending off a sexuality migraine.  

You undoubtedly won’t have been the absolutely mind-blowing experience to her, that she was to you. She’ll have had sex with countless women. She definitely enjoyed herself with you, that much you’re certainly sure of. You can’t fake every bodily reaction to someone, but the rest of it could have been for show. The display of heartbreak afterwards.  

So, maybe she’s an actress, that would certainly make sense. It would explain why she had money, and why she had a company paying for her hotel. Maybe that was her little ‘business trip’. Perhaps she was in London promoting a Spanish movie. Maybe the entire thing was all a performance, and you fell for it. Hook, line, and sinker.  

Either way, stalking her in Spain would be far too pathetic. Even if she does want you to find her, it’s so desperate and needy of you to go all that way, and if she doesn’t want you to find her, you end up looking insane. Travelling to Spain, to possibly just show up right there on her doorstep? What a terrifying thing for you to do to the woman.  

But what if it’s a sign? 

Your clueless little sister, inviting you all the way to Spain, with absolutely no idea that the woman you’re harbouring all of these confusing emotions for, lives there? Maybe it’s fate. Maybe it’s the universe trying to get you back together. Maybe she didn’t fake it, she does feel the same, you’ll find her in Spain and spend the rest of your lives together.  

Please. Behave and be so goddamn serious with yourself. You sweet and simple, delusional little fool.  

“The woman I kissed was from Spain.” You inform your sister thoughtfully, and she sits herself up on your bed to frown at you.  

“You’re still going with that?” 

“Why don’t you believe me?” 

“You’re straight. Straight straight straight.” She points out, with such an incredibly annoying inflection to her voice, it makes you want to bang your head against the wall. “You’re also 26. You were in love with an ugly bastard for 5 years and you’ve never shown an interest in a woman before.” 

“I hadn’t met her before.” 

“Gayyy!” She giggles, and you give her an almighty clack on her arm with the back of your hand, to wipe the smug little smile from off her face.  

“Go with the woman you’re hooking up with tomorrow.” You instruct her. “I’d be a nightmare to watch football with, you’d have to keep explaining things to me.” 

“I don’t mind doing that.” 

“Do you have no other friends to go with you?” You laugh and she pouts dramatically again, shaking her head. “You’re a lonely little loser!” You tell her with a smile.  

“Is that a ‘yes’?” She asks, rolling her eyes at you.  

You take in a deep breath and let out a very heavy sigh. 

What’s the worst that can happen?  

She’s already completely upturned your life. It couldn’t make things any worse for you. Whether you’re able to bump into her or not. You’ll either find yourself some peace, lounging in the Spanish sun, or you’ll be left in exactly the same position you’re in now, but with a much healthier glow to your skin.  

You could even find yourself a Spanish man while you’re out there.  

Mm.  

It’s really not a good sign for your heterosexuality, that that’s no longer an appealing option to you.  

“If I can sort it with work,” you reason, “yes. I’ll come to Barcelona with you.”  

She lets out an embarrassingly girly squeal and crashes her head against your stomach, with just enough force behind it to manage to leave you winded.  

“Twat! I’m making no promises about going to the game, mind. I’m just coming for the tan.” 

“Maybe your ‘Spanish lesbian’ is also a fan of football.” She encourages  

“Mhmm. I’m pretty sure she is.” You admit contemplatively. “Is that an entry-level of requirement for lesbianism, then?” You ask, rolling your eyes. “Because if that’s the case, I really can stop questioning myself.” 

________________

Booking time off work really is as easy as your sister thought it would be. Maybe your boss does have an inappropriate crush on you like she suspects. 

She’s very excited about having you for company, and she tries to educate you on all of Chelsea’s history, the players’ statistics, and their personal lives, all before you go on your little trip together. It really does just go right in one ear, and straight back out of the other. You’re not fussed on the facts and figures; it’s not why you’re going.  

There’s not enough room in your brain to care about the ins and outs of Sam Kerr and Kristie Mewis’ relationship. You’re not interested in the fact that Chelsea currently have 6 WSL titles, and are going for their fifth-straight one, and you really aren’t bothered that the semifinal’s first leg match against Barcelona ended in a draw.  

That is a fair amount of information for you to have retained already despite not being interested. Your sister really has been going on at you, you’re almost a footballing expert.  

Touching down late in the morning in Barcelona, you can’t pretend there isn’t a tiny part of you that’s letting yourself get a little carried away with dreaming. You’ve played through enough countless scenarios in your head of running into the Spanish wonder again back in London, of course your mind’s racing with the possibilities in Spain.  

You drop your bags off at the hotel your sister’s booked for you both, with the intention of heading back out to explore the city together. It’s a peculiar looking building, bright red, oddly shaped. She really never has been one for subtlety, it’s the perfect sort of accommodation for her.  

She insists on wanting to have a look at the Olympic Stadium before the big match, as well as seeing the state of Camp Nou’s renovations, and you really can’t indulge her any more than you already have. You probably will end up joining her for the game tomorrow, but you’re absolutely not walking around the outside of football grounds for fun.  

You’ve seen the exterior of Stamford Bridge more than your fair share of times, Wembley, the Emirates. There’s not that much difference between the lot of them, and they’ve never really been your favourite form of modern architecture.  

So, you agree to go your separate ways for your first afternoon in the city, you’ll meet back up with each other tonight.  

Playing tourist around the streets of Barcelona on your own, is quite an exciting little experience for you. You’re not very worried about getting lost, despite not speaking too much Spanish beyond the basics. Your hotel’s a distinctive looking building, it’s not going to be super difficult to find your own way back to it.  

You get a taxi further into the main hub of town and you’re able to mosey about with a rather unrestrained confidence, turning down tight alleyways and strolling aimlessly along multiple cobbled streets. You manage to find yourself being comfortably led astray, by allowing nothing more than just the warm gentle breeze to guide you as it blows against your body.  

It turns into a more casual exploration of the more authentic side of Barcelona away from most of the tourist hotspots. You have no real idea where you are, and you’re quite enjoying the small rush of adventure.  

A coffee is what you start craving, and you’re not exactly limited by options. Every other building on the peacefully quiet backstreet you’ve found yourself on, seems to be a tiny café. You could start ip dip doo-ing all the individual offerings, but that’s putting far too much consideration into it. You decide to go for the smallest one, the most unassuming. The best coffees always come from the places that aren’t trying to market themselves to any foreign tourists.  

A little bell rings out as you step through the door and the barista almost jumps out of his skin at the sight of you, he clearly isn’t used to getting anyone other than his regular patrons. You offer up your friendliest of smiles and a quick ‘hola’ to show him that you mean no harm, and you tap your finger gently on the countertop as you inspect the board behind his head.  

Choosing the littlest coffee shop might have been a tiny mistake because absolutely everything on the menu is written in what you can only assume, is a rather confusing variation of Spanish. You can’t back out now, the barista already has an adorably excited look on his face at having someone new in his little shop, you can’t break his heart like that.  

You study the chalk written on the board for entirely far too long, in the hope that the words will slowly start translating themselves for you. It doesn’t work, obviously. So, you take a punt at a random one of them, with the rather daring assumption that you haven’t just ordered yourself a troubling batch of Spanish poison.  

“¡Dos, por favor!” Comes a call from behind you, from a woman you surely do not know. It’s recognisably ballsy of her, almost rude.

Her words echo in your ears, as time stands still around you. You’d recognise that voice anywhere, with that unmistakable, and entirely enchanting, cocky little tone to it.  

You can’t really have found her so easily. Life’s never been that kind.  

You can feel your heart clattering around in your chest instantly. Like it’s trying to escape from your ribs, to go off and say hello to hers, all by itself. Your chest’s rising and falling intensely as your breathing shallows and picks up pace.  

It can’t be her; it can’t be. This city’s just absolutely full of Spanish women.

She holds out her card right over you to pay, gently resting her arm down onto your shoulder, and you’ve definitely seen that tattoo before. The ‘11’ printed on her wrist.  

She’d refused to explain the meaning when you’d asked her about it. She wouldn’t give you the backstory behind any of her tattoos. It was too personal; you weren’t allowed to know.  

She thought you might have really fallen for each other if you both started sharing too much information about yourselves, and you only had the single night to spend together.  

“It would be too painful.” She had reasoned with you.

That was very clever thinking on her part. She absolutely managed to prevent you from having an awful lot of heartache and suffering about the whole thing, by letting you know absolutely nothing about her..ﾠ

You still can’t bring yourself to turn around and look. Even though you know it must be her. It can’t be likely that there’s multiple Spanish women that have branded themselves with that specific number on that specific part of their body. Surely to god.  

“..gracias.” You manage to choke out very shakily, in little more than a whisper, still facing forward.  

You have to turn around at some point. You can’t very well drink your coffee on the tiny little counter right in front of the barista when you can’t even have a conversation with him. Just staring at him, silently, neither of you able to speak each other’s language? That would freak him out! You’ll find yourself back on a plane headed for England before you know it, with a restraining order hanging over your head.  

Grow up and turn around. Just turn around.  

It’s her. It has to be her.  

The barista accepts the woman’s payment method with a familiar little smile back at her, and she carefully retracts her arm from over your shoulder slowly. You can smell her perfume on her wrist as it wafts back past the side your face. You recognise the scent, and you find yourself following it round you like a lost little puppy, your knees almost giving way beneath you.  

You didn’t accidentally stumble upon her at the beach. It’s not a Spanish marketplace. She definitely isn’t staying at the same hotel that you’re in.  

You’ve found her, while getting yourself lost. In the tiniest little café, on an unnamed, tumbleweed backstreet, right in the very heart of Barcelona.  

There’s a wide smile of disbelief on her face. Which is hopefully an indication, that she isn’t terrified of you being here, she hadn’t faked her feelings, and she, much like you are with her, is a little overwhelmed to see you.  

“Hi.” Is all that drops out of your mouth, as your mind goes blank at the sight of her.  

“Hi.” She says back, with the exact same breathlessness as you, her voice cracking ever so slightly.  

“….Hi.” 

“You’ve already said that.” She reminds you, and she’s clearly able to bring herself back to her senses far more quickly than you are, because there’s that charming little smirk tugging at the corner of her lips again.  

You’re not really sure which one of you instigated it, you both just sort of ended up colliding into each other, gripping at the material of each other’s clothes. It’s a very desperate hug. Even more so than the one you shared outside of the hotel elevator. You melt into each other, merging yourselves together like two corresponding puzzle pieces.  

It’s an embrace, holding not just the 12 hours of curious devotion between you, but over 30 days' worth of frenzied yearning. It has you both clinging to each other with everything you have, as it defies everything you came to accept as truly achievable, that heartbreaking belief in you, that this reunion would never really happen.  

It’s an impossible hug, and it’s one that neither of you want to pull away from. 

“What are you doing here?” You mumble against her, clinging to her shirt as she buries her head in the crook of your neck.  

“I think it should be me asking that question.” She tells you, chuckling. “I have far more right to be in Barcelona than you do.” 

“This is where you live?” You ask. “You’re from Barcelona?” 

“Mhmm.” She murmurs. “Mollet del Vallès.” 

There’s really no reason for that to be the most beautiful thing you’ve ever heard. It’s only a place name. It’s a good job she didn’t spend much time speaking Spanish to you back in London, you really would have been like putty in her hands.  

“What are you doing here?” She questions.  

“I thought you might want your sweatshirt back.” You joke casually, and she loosens her grip on you slightly so she can face you.  

“Do you not want it anymore?” She asks, furrowing her brow as she studies your face. 

There’s a clear look of uncertainty in her eyes, a small sense of worry, and you do feel mildly guilty for teasing her. “I was hoping ..maybe I could swap it for another.” You smile. “It doesn’t really smell like you anymore.”

She doesn’t allow you to feel guilty for too long. That small air of arrogance that’s always threatening to escape her, does so, in a predictable little smirk at the implication.  

“You’ve been wearing it that much?” She asks you proudly, and you push your tongue against the inside of your mouth as you roll your eyes at her typical display of cockiness. She carefully closes the small distance between you both again, gently pressing herself flush against you. “Does it smell of you?” She whispers in your ear, sending a ripple of goosebumps down the side of your neck. 

“Mhmm.” 

“Mm. Maybe I could be persuaded to make a trade, then.” 

She’s impossible for you to resist when she’s like this. It’s still an intriguing talent she has, evoking such a physical reaction from you, by doing hardly anything at all. A quiet little whisper in your ear and your body’s immediately burning up next to her? You’re still so incredibly tragic.  

You might no longer be certain of your sexuality, but maybe it really doesn’t matter. Why do you need to understand it? Why does it need an explanation? No one else in the world is important at all when she’s standing here in front of you. No one else would ever really stand a chance. How could you ever be interested in anyone else, when you know that this woman right here exists? How could any other person ever truly compare? 

There’s a desire in you that’s clearly also felt in her, when she moves herself to look at you. It’s written all over her face, the twinkle in her beautiful eyes, and the fact that her lips are so incredibly close to yours.  

You lean in, and so does she, but it’s like something quickly shoots through her body, as though she’s suddenly being brought back into the room. She does a quick scan of the café, and she collects herself before she lets you both get carried away.  

“We can’t kiss in here.” She tells you quietly, and you frown at her as you pull yourself back.  

“Why not?” You ask, doing your own quick search to try and find what she saw to put her off.  

No one seems too interested in you, though there’s admittedly a couple of people discreetly watching her. She is very beautiful, so it’s not surprising, but you do sort of wish they’d stop their gawking. This gorgeous woman is here with you, and you’re not really in the mood for sharing.

“There’s not another bloody homophobe about, is there?” 

“No!” She laughs, shaking her head. “Well, I don’t know, actually. I haven’t asked around, but we just ..can’t kiss in here.” 

It’s curious. She didn’t have any issues kissing you in front of people before. Spanish people are very famously more physically affectionate with each other than British people are. So, it seems unlikely that the two of you would turn too many heads just by kissing.  

“Okay..” you accept reluctantly, pouting a little at the rejection, “so ..should we just quickly nip outside to do it then, or?” You joke cheekily, pointing to the door with your thumb.

She chuckles with you, resting her forehead to your shoulder. “You’re still as straight as ever!” She grins, as she wraps you back up in her arms.  

It’s quite nice just losing yourself in her embrace. Burying your head in her neck and holding her tight against you. Having her arms back around you, her perfume overwhelming your senses. The rest of the coffee shop fades into a blur with her in your arms. She’s comforting, reassuring. She’s real, and she’s here.  

“Ale!” Is called out by the barista not a minute later, and you’d have very happily paid it no attention at all. The immediate flinch from the woman that you’re holding, in response to it, however, tells you that you might have just found out a very valuable piece of information indeed.  

You repeat it under your breath, as she pulls away from you and goes to collect your coffees from the counter.  

She says a quiet ‘moltes gràcies’ to the barista, and she narrows her eyes with a small grimace as she returns to you. There’s still a clear reluctance in her to give too much away, she’s not entirely grateful to her little coffee friend for unknowingly revealing slightly more to you than just her first initial.  

Ale. It must still be short for something, you figure. You start reeling off name possibilities at her in quick succession. Alessia, Alex, Alexis, Alexa. You’re like a dog with a bone, because she makes it clear that you’re getting closer, but she still shakes her head at every guess.  

It’s very frustrating, as she offers you absolutely no assistance with your guessing, but it can’t be as convoluted a mission as trying to discover Rumpelstiltskin’s ridiculous name. Thankfully, it isn’t. It’s on only your 5th attempt that you cause the same small flinch in her, and she smiles softly at you before looking down very quickly. You’ve struck gold.  

Alexia. 

It’s a beautiful name. Your favourite name, you’ve decided. It rolls off your tongue with so much ease, you want to repeat it again and again. 

“Now you know too much.” She sighs whimsically, handing you your coffee as she walks past you to collect her bag from the table she was previously sitting at.  

She gestures for you to follow her and leads you to a quieter area away from the other customers right at the back of the shop. She pulls out your chair for you to sit down, and you can’t not smile at the tiny act of chivalry. She really is very sweet. It’s a shame that she won’t let you kiss her.  

You reveal your own name to her, as she joins you on the other side of the table and she repeats it back to you quietly. Whether it’s the sexy Spanish accent, or just the fact that it’s her saying it to you for the first time, you’re not entirely sure, but your heart skips a few beats after hearing it. 

“Now we both know too much.” She tells you, and she takes a small sip of her coffee.  

There’s the tiniest level of nervousness, that blankets itself over you both as you sit together. It’s a little absurd, you’ve seen this woman naked. She’s seen you naked. It isn’t technically a first date between you, neither of you asked the other to be here, but you both clearly have the little jitters of being on one, coursing through your bodies.  

You find yourself just watching her a few times as you talk over your drinks together. You still can’t really believe you found her so quickly. So, you don’t want to risk taking your eyes off of her for too long, in case she just disappears into thin air while you’re not looking.  

She’s also the most beautiful sight in the café. So, why would you want to waste your time looking at anything else? 

You’re not being very discreet about your staring at all, and neither is she, really. You keep exchanging shy smiles over your cups as you catch each other looking. Both of you blushing and quickly averting your eyes as they meet, and then gradually repeating the whole thing all over again. You’ve definitely caught her gazing a few more times than she’s caught you. So, maybe she’s even more tragic than you are.  

The little coffee you ordered by chance, is Alexia’s usual order, so she tells you. It’s not the most life-changing piece of information for her to share with you, but it’s something else for you to know about her, and you’re absolutely sure to make a note of it. It probably keeps you on an even tally too, she already knows that you enjoy drinking a tequila.  

You’re still not allowed to kiss each other, for whatever obscure reason, but she has reached for you hand under the table. Interlacing your fingers together isn’t a new thing between you both, and neither are those tingles that immediately shoot up through your arm at even the most innocent of touches from her. She really does have an incredible effect on you, it should probably be more terrifying to you than it is.

“Why are you really here?” She asks after a moment, as she strokes her thumb over your knuckles.  

“My sister dragged me here.” You answer. “It’s a very important football match tomorrow, apparently.” 

“The one against Chelsea?” She asks, with an unmistakable look of interest in her eyes, that has you rolling your own lightly back at her.  

“I think she’d say against Barcelona,” you point out with a sigh, “but yeah, that one.” 

You had managed to work out that Alexia was probably a bit of a football fan. She has a little stick figure tattoo of a footballer on her leg, the outline of a baby being given a ball on her back, and you have exceptional detective skills. It doesn’t take a genius to figure it out.  

So, it isn’t a surprise that she’d be excited by your footballing interests, but it is unfortunate that you really don’t share the same passion for it as her.  

“Unless you’re a very daring rebel,” you start, “I assume you’ll be supporting Barcelona tomorrow?” 

“Mhmm,” she murmurs, with a small twinkle in her eye, “and you’ll be supporting Chelsea?” 

“Not emphatically,” you admit with a smile, “but I’ll be in that section of the crowd, yeah.”  

“You don’t really care about football at all, do you?” She asks knowingly, with an edge to her smirk that’s intriguing, as you shake your head at her in apology. “Maybe you should introduce me to your sister instead, then!” She winks, and you very quickly remove your hand back out of her hold.  

“Don’t.” You tell her. “Please. Don’t even joke about it.” 

It’s admittedly a little cute that she finds herself quite so hilarious for her disgusting little joke, but you are very unamused by the idea. If the childish look of mischief on her face wasn’t so entirely endearing to you, you may very well have got up and left her right then and there.  

She rests the back of her hand on your thigh with her palm outstretched, and you roll your eyes at her before placing your own hand back into it. She raises it to her lips to place a lingering kiss to your fingers, leaving you with the faintest of blushes across your cheeks. So, maybe you can find it in yourself to forgive her just this once.  

“I have a sister.” She reveals. “Her name's Alba. She’s a few years younger than me. I’m the older sibling, like you are.”  

“Uh oh!” 

“What?” 

“Well, now I really do know too much.” You tell her with a wink.

“My sister’s Emily.” You inform her rebalancing the tally of facts you keep sharing with each other. “Though she’d kill you for calling her that. I think she’d change her name completely if she didn’t think it would upset our Dad so much. She just goes by Em these days ..so ..she probably would have enjoyed your silly little initial idea, actually,” you admit thoughtfully, frowning a little at the realisation, “maybe I really should introduce you to her instead..” 

“Por favor.” She says quietly, quickly shaking her head at you and raising your hand to her lips once again. “Don’t even joke about it.” 

“Will you be going to the game tomorrow?” You ask, a not-so-subtle attempt at finding out if you might be getting to see each other again so soon. “We’d be like star-crossed lovers in the stands. Very Romeo and Juliet of us!” 

“I don’t know that we want to be comparing ourselves to those two! I don’t remember it ending very well for them.” She reminds you, narrowing her eyes at you as her intriguing little smirk returns to her face. “And no. I’m working tomorrow, I won’t be in the stands.” 

“Boo. You can’t be that big of a fan, then!” You tut in disappointment. “I’ve come all this way to support my team!” 

“Your team!” She chuckles. “Will you be there in a Chelsea shirt?” 

“Absolutely not. I’ll be in very neutral colours.” 

She smiles, nibbling at the inside of her mouth as she lowers her eyes to look at the table. She knocks her hand gently on it a few times before turning her attention back to you. It’s impossible to know what she’s thinking, but she’s definitely debating something silently in her head.  

“I could give you a Barcelona one?” She suggests a little cautiously, and you have to smile at the idea. Your sister would certainly disown you if you took one of those back home with you. It’d be worth it, just to see the look on her face.

“You have a very weird habit of offering me your clothes.” You tell her slyly.  

“Mhmm. I really like seeing you in them.” She admits sultrily, and your breath catches as her eyes darken looking at you. “I think I have one in my bag, if you want it.” 

It’s a surprisingly sexy little offer, and you do quite like having her clothes on your body. It’s hard not to laugh at her peculiarity, though, even your sister isn’t that crazy of a football fan.  

“You just ..carry it around with you at all times?” You ask, furrowing your brow as you chuckle at her. “That’s really weird of you! Do you sell them? You go round offering them to unsuspecting tourists? Is that your job? Is it a fake? Are yo—”

“You need to stop trying to know things about me.” She interrupts softly, shaking her head as she chuckles.  

“And just ..blindly accept that you always have a football shirt on you?” 

“Mhmm.” She giggles, and you narrow your eyes at her.

She really is very curious.  

She pulls it out from her little duffle bag from under the table and hands it to you with a gleam in her eye as you take it from her. You push your empty coffee cup to the side and spread the shirt out over the table to study it.  

They’re not exactly your colours, but you can probably make them work. You hold it up against you to check that it will suit, and she bites her lip as she watches you. There’s a name printed on the back of it, you realise, and you smile a little as you read it in your head.  

“Don’t most adults keep it blank? Or just go for their favourite player?” You ask smirking. You turn the shirt around and rest it over yourself, and she gently bites at the skin around her fingernail as you trace the lettering over your chest. “I thought it was just little kids that got their own name on the back. Do you quite like pretending you’re also on the team?” 

“Mhmm ..maybe.” She mumbles, stifling a giggle as she rests her head in her hand. She smiles at you fondly, as she continues gazing at your little shirt inspection.  

“That’s really very cute of you.” You tell her, placing the shirt back on the table and leaning over it as you trace your fingers over the number. “Why ‘11’?” 

“Hm?” 

“11. You have it tattooed on you. You’ve chosen it for your shirt.” You point out. “Is it your birthday? You were born on the 11th? You were born in November? Born on New Year’s Day? Is it just your lucky number? Is it—” 

“Stop, trying to know things about me.” She interrupts again quietly, reaching for your hand and meeting you across the table to rest her forehead to yours.  

“But I want to know things about you.” You whisper. “I want to know when your birthday is. I’d like to know your surname. I want to know what you do for a living, how you got those scars on your knee, how much you weighed when you were born. The name of your first crush, where you went to school, the meaning behind your tattoos. I want to know each and every incredible milestone you’ve ever achieved, and all the unfathomably boring things that you got up to in between each of them. I want to know every single detail about you, and your life, Alexia. I really, really want to know you.”   

It’s quite the thing for you to confess to the poor woman after only meeting her on two separate occasions, but the way her grip on your hand kept tightening as you spoke, the slight clenching of her jaw, and the fact that her lips are dangerously close to yours once again, probably means you haven’t just completely scared her off with it.  

“We’d have to spend a lifetime together, trying to learn all of that about each other.” She whispers to you, her lips lightly brushing against yours.  

“Is that a proposal?” You chuckle, gently bumping your nose to hers. Your eyes trail to her lips, and it’s really very hard to not act on your impulses. “Am I really not allowed to kiss you in h—“ 

It seems that you are allowed to kiss her in here, when it’s right at the back where no one’s watching. Or she’s allowed to kiss you, at least, because there's no doubt which one of you instigated this. Her lips move against yours, and your pulse reacts to her immediately.

It's a kiss harbouring an awful lot of emotion, for two people who still hardly know each other. It's slow, passionate, careful, and every confusing little worry that's been plaguing your brain since the last time you kissed, instantly melts away into nothing as her tongue slips back into your mouth. You're the only two people in the world when her hand's pulling you in by the back of your neck, and you’re tugging her closer by grabbing at her shirt.

It’s probably a good job she did decide to take you further away from everybody else, because it doesn’t stay an entirely family-friendly kiss for very long. It’s not wildly inappropriate, you’re not animals, and the bastard table’s in the way of you doing too much with each other. Thank goodness it is, because it’s been over a month, after all, and you’re both clearly quite a bit needy. You really can’t be doing that in public.  

“I’ve missed you.” She murmurs against your lips, pulling you impossibly further into her.  

“I really missed you too.” 

Hours feel like minutes, in Alexia’s company, as you spend the afternoon roaming Barcelona together. She still refuses to tell you everything about herself. You don’t learn her surname, and she still won’t tell you what she does for a living, but you do both share other things about yourselves with each other. 

It doesn’t matter how insignificant any of the details probably are. Every single one of them still feels important to you, because it’s another little glimpse into her. Every single fact, story and secret that she shares, is what makes Alexia, who she is, and she was absolutely right, you do find yourself falling more for her, with all of the little things you keep discovering.  

She eventually agrees to tell you her birthday. Which makes the whole ‘11’ obsession even more intriguing to you, because the 4th of February ’94 does absolutely nothing to clear that little mystery up. It does tell you that the man in his twenties that you were looking for the night you first met, didn’t even turn out to be a woman in her twenties at all. She turned 30 nearly 3 months ago. She’s absolutely decrepit! 

She gives you a tiny tour on your stroll together, bringing some clarity to the Catalonian streets you’ve been carelessly walking down. Explaining the extra confusing writing on the menu board, and casually revealing to you that she can speak 3 different languages. So, your drunken boast about your GCSE level German, probably wasn’t very impressive to her at all.  

You’re both approached a fair few times by people asking for directions. You can never understand what it is that they’re saying, and you're not really of much use to them just standing there being awkward. So, you hang off a little to the side taking in your surroundings, waiting for her to help them out, before she excitedly returns back to you. You’re not at all bothered by the interruptions. Your patience with it keeps earning you a quick discreet kiss from her as she wraps her arms around your waist, and you return the same display of affection, for her unrelenting kindness to strangers.

Alexia insists that she isn’t a tour-guide, and she’s also not an actress. So, you are very slowly whittling down the options of what it is she could possibly do for a living. She asks you about your own career, which is incredibly cheeky of her, considering. So, you simply refuse to tell her.

Maybe it’s that competitive streak in you, but if she wants to play it secretive, you can absolutely match her for it. You only agree to give her the corresponding facts to the one’s she’s willing to give to you. That way, if she’s falling for you with each new piece of information the same way that you’re doing for her, at least you’re both crashing down for each other, at exactly the same speed.

There’s slightly less careless abandon with being too physical with each other, walking hand in hand around Barcelona. It’s arguably tame compared to how you both were back in London. Whether it’s the lack of alcohol that’s keeping her more reserved, or maybe just because it isn’t yet nighttime, you’re not entirely sure.  

You’re still stealing kisses as you waltz along the streets, but you’re not pushing each other up against the walls of buildings out in the open. Maybe that would be a little indecent of you both. You’re pulling each other down quiet alleyways, instead, pressing yourselves together in secret coves.  

It doesn’t feel entirely necessary, the streets you’re exploring aren’t particularly packed with people, but you don’t question it too much. You’ve really just missed having her lips on yours, and whatever capacity she feels comfortable doing it in, you’re more than willing to oblige.  

You couldn’t really care less who sees you kissing her. You all but forget that they exist when she's pulling you into her and leaving her mark on you. It is arguably far more exciting, however, trying to be sneaky about it with each other. You're both almost actively searching for places that you're unlikely to get caught in. Finding hidden areas and seeing how much you can get away with together.

Your hands find their way under her shirt on more than one occasion. She really does have the most beautiful body. She jokingly reprimands you for it each time, but she doesn’t really discourage you from doing it. She does continually tease you, for your ever-decreasing signs of straightness, though.

Each newly shared kiss with Alexia, is somehow even better than the last. Whether she’s passionately throwing caution to the wind with you, by kissing down your neck, or trapping your bottom lip between her teeth. Even when she’s just being painfully frustrating, by giving you the quickest of pecks before skipping away. Every single one of them still sets your soul on fire, and they still manage to pull all the air right out from your lungs, every single time.

Alexia waits with you, as it turns to evening, on a bench by the road for your taxi back to your hotel. You try not to let the mild burning in your eyes ruin your final moments with her, but you can feel yourself starting to break.

She pulls out the football shirt from her bag again and holds it out for you to take with a shy smile. “I really hope you enjoy the game tomorrow.” She says, and you try to allow yourself to chuckle a little while nodding your head. 

“Mhmm. Thank you, I’ll try.” You tell her, throwing her shirt over your shoulder and quickly rubbing the corner of your eyes. “I’ll have to get Em’s permission to wear this, first. She’ll be very unimpressed with me.” 

“Just don’t let her burn it!”  

“I won't.” You promise, interlacing your fingers with hers and placing a kiss to the back of her hand. “The other fans might throw tomatoes at it, mind!” 

She chuckles, pressing a kiss to your temple, and there’s that familiar sense of dread in your stomach, as you watch the road, knowing your time together is quickly running out again.

You catch her gazing at you as you turn to her, and maybe there’s a little butterfly or two in your stomach as well, at the way her eyes are watching over you. “Are you okay?” You ask.

“Mhmm. You haven’t even gone yet,” she tells you smiling, tucking your hair back behind your ear, “and I already can’t wait to see you again.” 

“You’re really that certain that you will? You’re still sure you don’t want us to swap numbers?”  

“We’ve already bumped into each other a couple of times now. I have no doubt we’ll manage it again.”

It’s nowhere near as reassuring to you as it seems to be to her, but there’s a certain level of romance in her conviction in fortuity. Maybe you are beginning to believe in the possible existence of fate, though you're not completely enamoured by continuing to leave your encounters with Alexia, entirely up to chance. She cradles your head in her hands and gently wipes the tears that are threatening to spill from your eyes with her thumbs.

"I'll never forgive you," you warn her weakly, "if this ends up being it for us."

"Trust me." Is all she asks of you, and she pulls you back into her, resting her head against yours as she runs her fingers over your back.

It feels like an unspoken promise from her, to keep at least trying to find you, and there's a power in her certainty that has you desperate to believe in it too.

It’s still a little hard for you both to say goodbye to each other, but she’s already told you she has a busy day tomorrow, and you can’t really bring her back to your hotel when your sister’s already sharing the bed with you. You share another long hug, and a few more secret kisses before your taxi pulls up, and you finally hesitantly agree to part ways. She places a kiss to your cheek, by way of goodbye as you clamber yourself into the back of the car, setting off without her once again.  

You try to reassure yourself, on the taxi ride back to your hotel. You've ran into each other twice, in two separate countries, by pure dumb luck. It can't be impossible for it to happen again. Maybe there’s something connecting you both, an invisible string, an intangible little bungee cord, that's making sure that neither of you is ever able to truly stray too far away from the other. Alexia has ‘no doubt’ that you’ll manage another meeting again, and you take some comfort in knowing, that you still have 2 days left in the city, to do exactly that.

________________

Collapsing back down to lay on the bed in your hotel room, you have a sneaking suspicion, that you’ll have a far better night’s sleep than you’ve managed to have in a long time, tonight. Your mind isn’t spiralling with confusion anymore, and there’s no longer a gaping hole inside of your chest.  

There’s an excitement in you, a warmth. An encouraging little hope that you really have found something special. Someone special. That once-in-a-lifetime connection with another person who’s also trapped in this world along with you.  

It definitely isn’t the someone you expected to intertwine your soul with. Any younger version of yourself would be very confused about where she’s ended up. It isn’t a connection you want to keep questioning either. It’s not one you really have any doubts on the existence of at all. She’s just it for you, and maybe it’s okay that that’s all you can say to justify it.   

You don’t need to be attracted to other women; you don’t really care about your weakening attraction to men. It just makes sense when you’re together with her. There’s no confusion, no uncertainty, there’s no warning alarms ringing out in your head. There’s just Alexia, and the existence of anything and anybody else, will always pale in comparison to her. 

Your sister arrives a little after you, plodding back into the hotel room, clearly wiped from whatever individual Spanish adventure she got up to today, and she flops herself into one of the armchairs with a very heavy sigh.  

“Long day?” You ask. 

“Mhmm.” She mumbles, frowning at you suspiciously. “You look very happy?” 

“I am very happy!” You tell her with a smile. You excitedly roll over and reach down the side of the bed to retrieve your souvenir of the day from its hiding spot. You launch it right into your sister’s face and she grunts a little under the impact. “Will you hate me, if I wear that tomorrow?” You ask, trying to contain your newfound enthusiasm. 

She pulls it off from where it’s wrapped itself around her head, and she gives you a very unimpressed look. “You bought a Barcelona shirt?” She asks, clearly disgusted with your choice of fashion.  

“I was given it.” 

“By?” 

“..a woman.” You tell her, gently biting your bottom lip as you smile up at the ceiling.  

“Mm.” She mutters with a sigh, moving to join you over on the bed. She thwacks the shirt down over your stomach and lets out a huff next to you. “Well, at least she has good taste.” She tells you. “Or she’s just a bit basic.” 

That’s a little rude ..and very confusing.  

“What do you mean?” 

“Going for the best player on the team.” 

That’s less rude ..but even more confusing.  

“..What do you mean?” 

“Are you joking?” She asks, with a very clear tone of annoyance to her voice. She grabs the shirt and thwacks you with it again. “A woman gives you a shirt with a name on the back, and you don’t even care enough to ask who the bloody player is?”   

Maybe your head is racing again. That’s incredibly confusing. It really doesn’t make any sense. It’s her name, not a player’s name. Maybe they just share a name. It’s not an incredibly rare name, that’s not impossible. 

Your Alexia has a mild interest in football, she’s not playing it professionally. Who would keep that a secret? She’s reticent with sharing information, that’s for certain, but she’s not a bloody liar, and she told you she wouldn’t even be there tomorrow.  

No.  

She said that she was working tomorrow, and that she wouldn’t be in the stands with you. 

Your mind has started racing, and so has your little heart.  

“What. do. you. mean?” You repeat slowly, trying to keep yourself calm.  

“Alexia Putellas.” She tells you, very nonchalantly, and your brain all but short circuits at the name.  

“Who is Alexia Putellas?” 

She thwacks you again with your shirt in dismay, and you’ve really had just about enough of being treated like a piñata. You sit up, pull it from her hands and thwack it across her face as you ask her to explain herself.  

“She’s a footballer, for fuck’s sake!” She shouts, rubbing the palm of her hand against her eyelid. “She’s Spanish. She plays for Barcelona!” She pulls out her phone, to search for her Instagram and bonks you on the head with it. “That’s Alexia Putellas, you twat.” 

You look at the profile, and the hotel room blurs around you. You can feel your heart thumping in your chest, hear the blood pumping around in your ears.  

Your Alexia, is Alexia Putellas.  

She doesn’t sell shirts for a living, she’s not an actress nor a tour-guide, she really isn’t even a spy. Though she’d probably make a pretty good one, the way she never gave this piece of information away.  

Your unexplainable connection with another human being, and she plays football for a living? Clearly very well too, as 2 of her pinned photos have her holding a massive award for it right next to her face. Every other post on her page is about football. She’s Barcelona, through and through.  

She’s verified, she has over 3 million followers. She’s been out here, existing on the world’s stage, all this time, without you ever knowing. Your own sister’s been privy to more information about her than you have.  

She was in London a month ago for football, according to her Instagram posts. The cryptic little ‘business trip’ she was on, was a quarter-final match against Arsenal. An embarrassingly easy win for Barcelona, she must have been out celebrating it when she found you in that club.  

She was back in London again last week for football. You could have seen her then. You missed a chance at an earlier reunion with her, because you refused to go with your little sister to watch her in the first leg against Chelsea.  

Your breathing’s very shallow as you scroll through the endless stream of photos. Your mind is absolutely spinning. It’s all a bit much to take in. You lock your sister’s phone and place it back on her chest as you try to collect yourself. You really don’t want to risk learning too much about her. You want her to tell you everything, you don’t want to find it all out behind her back.  

You’ve been waiting with bated breath all afternoon, savouring every little piece of information she’s given you, and your smart-arse little sister could probably tell you loads about her if you asked. Lots of the details you’re so desperate to know about Alexia are probably only a quick google search away, but you feel guilty enough just knowing her surname without her having been the one to tell it to you.  

She hadn’t been super willing to even give you her first, and no wonder! It’s the single name that’s plastered on her shirt, it’s the name she’s known mononymously as. She’s women’s football’s answer to Beyoncé, Adele. 

Of course, she didn’t want to kiss you in front of people in the café, out there on the streets. It’ll be why she only kissed your cheek in front of the taxi driver. She probably is a little liar, because she almost certainly wasn’t giving directions to people when they approached you both. She presumably isn’t old friends with the two men who wanted a photo with her. They all just know who she is. The whole damn city of Barcelona knows exactly who she is.  

Maybe she was testing you, waiting for you to crack, to confess to knowing everything about her. How couldn’t you know about her? How unbelievably rude of you.  

She’s a celebrity footballer, and you’ve treated her like she’s one of the most normal people in the world. You’ve flirted with her, teased her, kissed her, slept with her, and she’s welcomed it all with that adorable little smirk.  

So, maybe she’s liked that you didn’t know, that you really had no idea about who she was at all. You can’t have had any preconceived thoughts about the woman when you’ve had no prior knowledge about her. Perhaps it’s been part of the fun for her, just being with someone who really couldn’t care about the noise surrounding her. Maybe that’s the reason she didn’t really want you knowing about it. Her fame could have changed things, pushed you away.  

It wouldn’t have. She’d have to do something intrinsically evil to frighten you off. Especially now, after the afternoon you’ve just spent together, learning more, and falling deeper for her. She’s still just the woman that baffled you with a lime in a nightclub, wound you up by kissing someone else. Rescued you from a night of undeniable regret, and turned it into the start of something magical.

She’s your once-in-a-lifetime connection, your confusing, and frustrating, perfect one-night stand companion. She’s the woman that's turned your whole world on its head, and it just turns out, that she quite likes to kick a ball around, with a bunch of other women for a living, and people from all over the world, have been watching her excel at it for years.

She has to know that you’ll have found out already, you’ve told her your sister’s football obsessed. Even if your sister didn’t know who she is, there’s bound to be other people wearing her name on their backs tomorrow. Probably not many of them were given their shirts by the woman herself. There’ll be even less of them with one of her sweatshirts in their bag.  

Maybe she’s excited for you to connect all the pieces together. Giving you her shirt was far too bold a move for her to still not want you to know. She’d have just talked you out of going to the game, if that was the case.  

She wants you there, being a very daring rebel, with her name boldly resting between your shoulder blades, rooting for her and Barcelona, right in the middle of the Chelsea fans. You’ll probably stand out like a sore thumb with your red stripes in the sea of blue you’ll be standing in, and maybe that’s exactly what she’s hoping for. She had ‘no doubt’ that you'd see each other again, after all. 

“She’s the best player on the team?” You ask your sister dreamily, collapsing back down on the bed and clinging to the shirt in your hand as you hold it against your body.  

“Mhmm. Best in the world.” She tells you, and there’s that exhilarating little thrill shooting right up through your body.  

“Oof. I’ll tell Sam Kerr you said that!”  

She scoffs to the side of you and flicks your forehead playfully. You lift Alexia’s shirt, holding it out in between your fingers to study her name again in disbelief.  

You're falling in love, with the ‘best in the world,’ and she seems to be falling for you, too. A little nobody from London, who’s spent the past month pining after who she thought, was a little nobody from Spain. She’s once again turned your whole damn world on its head.  

She really is absolutely everything.  

“I will hate you if you wear that thing tomorrow.” Your sister warns you, as she hits the shirt with the back of her hand. “I offered you a Chelsea shirt and you gagged at it!” 

“I’ve not gagged at this one.” You point out with a grin. “It’s a shame you won’t be friends with me tomorrow.” You tell her, resting the shirt back out over your torso.  

“You can’t wear it!” 

“I bloody can, and I very much will.” You inform her. “You should rethink wearing a Chelsea shirt. You’ll be very disappointed when we beat you tomorrow.” 

“‘We?’ You really are a twat. You’re Barcelona’s biggest fan all of a sudden?” 

“Too bloody right, I am!” You tell her decidedly, hugging the shirt against you. “I’ve always loved football, me.” 

[paragonrobits]

in adventure time stuff, Marceline is front and center as indisputably the single most popular character, widely loved within and out of the fanbase; she's kind of a distillation of the series' wacky tone because she is unironically a vampirized half-demon child of Satan Stand-In, a heavy metal rock star who's dated a mad scientist princess, her adoptive dad is arguably one of the most powerful entities in the setting and a terrifying ice wizard who survived the apocalypse through cunning BEFORE he was consumed by his curse, and the greatest hero in the land who is otherwise a mundane human won her friendship by punching her so hard she went 'FUCKING SWEET, WE ARE NOW BROS FOR LIFE'

but the thing about Marceline that is arguably the single most essential aspect of her character, and not something that is apparent from the joke or memes around her

is how nice and genuinely sweet she is.

Yes, she's a badass. Yes, she is probably the single most powerful character in a conventional sense among Finn's friend group, to the point that she is less present in serious situations because her picking a side would trivialize just about anything short of the Lich or the apocalyptic arrival of Golb.

But as we see more of her character, we see that she goes out of her way to actually avoid seriously upsetting people. The most recurring motif of her songs is that while they sound threatening or spooky, she says them in a very sweet and loving way that makes them too silly and harmless to take seriously. At her core, that's kind of who she is; she's honestly a genuinely nice person who deliberately distances herself from people because she outlives everyone she cares about, one way or another, and she pushes people away so she doesn't have to see it happen, but she can't help but get close to someone.

In a lot of ways, Finn helps her grow out of this mindset, and the relationships she establishes through him, or rekindles because of him, help her grow out of this. But even then, she has no real mean-ness in her

ironic, given the "MARCELINE WHY ARE YOU SO MEAN" song, but she gives her own answer right there:

"I'm not mean/I'm just a thousand years old and I lost track of my moral code"

Tellingly, when we see her as a young girl (and before meeting Simon, likely almost right before she met him), she has internalized the idea that she's a horrible, awful monster who scares people away. That she loses everyone around her, because SHE'S a scary monster. We see the source of her tendency to push people away, because that way she has some kind of control over it, and otherwise she thinks its inevitable.

But she can't help but get close to people anyway, and in many ways, her relationship with Ash is a very clear example that she is NOWHERE near as violent or ferocious as she looks. Their relationship openly has her abused, meek and quiet, and she is a nigh-unstoppable soul-eating monster that NO ONE could reasonably fight. Even so the closest she gets to actually lashing out against a guy who sold her most cherished possession (and the last remaining reminder of a father figure who can't ever come back) is to just end their relationship instead of lashing out against him.

Much like the reveal of her relationship to Ice King (which interestingly also maps to his slow recovery from being a villain at all, to the point that around the time this becomes a big aspect of his character he is functionally not really a villain, though still a danger to himself and others), its a slow burn. Showing that she's by far one of the least malicious beings in the entire setting, and she could be a hero.

And the answer to that one is: because she used to be. And that part of herself isn't as long-gone as she would like to think.

[velvetcloxds]

ALWAYS THE BRIDESMAID | J.H.

pairing: jasper hale x cullen!reader

word count: 2k

warning: friends in love but the one doesn't know it yet

summary: bella and edward's wedding day has you feeling somewhat envious of their love story

You felt awful, upset with your heart for the way it ached, for the way it shouted shots of anger, of envy, it was not at all what you'd expect of it on such a happy day. Bella and Edward danced below on the makeshift dance floor the vampires had very reluctantly created while you sat crossed-legged on the roof of the Cullen mansion- grateful for the darkness for allowing you to get lost despite the endless eyes that would search for you.

You had a great love for your brother and his new mate, happy that despite years, decades, of such grim, such overpowering sadness he finally allowed himself such mundane emotions of happiness. Maybe that was what had your heart drawing in upon itself. You didn't think yourself possible of such selfishness, being tormented by pity, by jealousy that reformed your decayed cells in a way that made you nauseous. You hated how your insides twisted, begged yourself, and willed yourself to remember the joy that swerved about your lost soul while planning this day.

But you knew where it came from, what it meant. Those were your flowers that cascaded down from the trees, your dress that flowed from Bella's life-kissed figure, your flower petals that spread towards your altar, your day, your dream. Yet you weren't there, it was everything you wanted and yet it belonged to them, you gave it to them, your dream and now you sit alone, rewatching it from the outside.

“Careful,” someone warned from behind you and were it not a warning you’d heard countless times before you’d not have been able to pin its owner down so quickly, the blond vampire swinging down from a branch and sinking down beside you, giving a soft sigh as he adjusted his suit jacket, about as unhappy with the fancy ordeal as you were, for very different reasons. “You might think yourself into a mess you can’t get out of,” he explained and you almost smiled, habitually moving closer to him, letting your shoulders touch as he looked down to search for the reason for your foul mood.

“You know, Jas, I was trying to hide away in peace,” you reprimanded, though he didn’t believe you, your emotions always betraying you, shifting as soon as he was close, it was as if your heart, despite all the wrong it did you, felt safest with Jasper, freely giving away your secrets to him and his senses.

“What do you think I’m doing here?” he argued, he was speaking in that charming, kind tone, you’d be silly thinking he reserved it just for you when really you were just most accustomed to it, prompting it from him much like he prompted calmness from you, a natural reaction despite your unnatural, supernatural existence. “You thought I came here for you?” you didn’t need to answer, he knew you did, and you knew it was true even if he was trying to pretend otherwise. “Very presumptuous.”

“Oh, you know me, always thinking about myself,” your words had a bite to them, thinking the present situation was the perfect time to remind yourself and your heart that no matter how much you wished it was, this wasn’t your day, and you had no right to wish it was.

“Hey now,” he breathed, disapproving of his words being turned into a real reprimand when really he was trying to talk you out of your head, talk you up from that hole you’d dug yourself into, help you crawl back to the surface to enjoy the day, it was a happy day after all, for everyone, or at least it was supposed to be. “What’s messing with your heart today?” you didn’t want to admit it, your selfish feelings, but you also knew that if anyone would be able to help you make sense of it, it would be your best friend, he’d not judge you for your short-sighted and very much unplanned pity party.

“Actually, I think it’s the other way around, think it’s messing with me,” you sighed, stealing a quick glance at him, sure the sight of him all dressed up and perfect would’ve made you blush had the blood still traveled through your veins, instead you managed a little hum, head tilting to take him in before looking back down to the newlyweds. “Can you feel what they’re feeling?” a puzzling question, leaving much to the imagination since you were sure they felt more than just one thing on a day like today, but somehow, as he always does, Jasper knew what you meant.

“That’s not what you want to ask me,” you hated that he could make that statement so casually, so surely, you also didn’t hate it all, you merely hoped he’d answer the real question without making you ask again. “Go on then,” he pushed, you wanted to roll your eyes, lightly shoving your shoulder against his instead, not missing the way his lips begged to tilt into a smile. “Ask me.”

“Can you feel their love?” he scoffed, unsatisfied, you were nearly there, almost at the point, it was dancing on the tip of your tongue, begging for release but you were being stubborn, he decided to be kind.

“I can’t feel it, per sé, it’s not just one single emotion, doesn’t just add up to one thing you can express, as complicated as love is, feeling it is much the same.” His pause was a courtesy, one he offered due to the disappointment that dipped into the air, flooded from you, and surrounded you just as your emotions often do for as entirely as you feel everything, you felt this in your soul, another stab at your heart, another knife in your icy coffin of life. “I can’t make you feel it either, can’t show you what it’s like,” he breathed and you couldn’t deny him the little nod you managed, not even thinking before you leaned your head against his shoulder, one hand snaking around his arm, other hand searching for his fingers and claiming them in yours as if they were your own.  “I would if I could, darling, you know that, don’t you?”

“Of course, I do,” you squeezed his arm lightly, not wanting him to think he’d disappointed you somehow simply by not being able to do the impossible, it’s just that living as you do, being what you are, the concept of impossible seemed so unspecified, so mundane. You had always longed for it, wished for it at night, dreamed of it during every moment of the day, you’d wanted more than anything to feel loved in all possible meanings of the word- yet it seemed more likely that Jasper could create a counterfeit version of it with his gift than someone truly feeling that way for you, about you. “Maybe someday I could feel it, really feel it,” you nearly whispered, you willed the words to sound hopeful, but even if your voice could pretend, your heart certainly couldn’t.

“I’m almost certain that you will,” Jasper promised and you hummed when he kissed the top of your head, your eyes not leaving the sight it had been trained on, the couple in question finally moving away from the dancefloor and by the smell of it, Edward had a howling surprise in store for his new wife.

“Do you think it’ll be worth it?”

“What?”

“Waiting,” you explained and you hadn’t noticed a rather lovely looking, yet slightly terrifyingly quiet Alice creeping up to join the pair of you. “Do you think he’ll be worth waiting for?”

“I certainly think so,” Alice sang, already making herself comfortable next to you, taking hold of your arm and gently forcing you onto her shoulder instead, pleased when the action earned her a little smile from your previously pouting lips. “Think you might not be waiting as long as you think,” she shrugged and you missed her eyes as they locked with Jasper’s, who was already looking at her, hope drowning his features as he fought his brows from furrowing.

“Don’t give me too much hope, Ali,” you said, happy that you had a distraction, her bracelets perfect to fiddle with as she let you move her hand into your lap, you were calming down, feelings simmered but uncertainty lingering, yet you were safe with your comfort people and though the love you shared with your family wasn’t what your heart wished for, it did fill most of the emptiness. “I love you guys,” you mumbled, smiling as Alice proceeded to pull you into a proper hug.

“We love you too,” Alice agreed and Jasper wished the moment would pass because Alice was many things but subtle was not one of them and the way she was looking at him was impossible to miss, even if you weren’t yourself right now. “Some more than others.”

“Oh, I know,” you agreed and when you pulled away to look at them you made sure to give Jasper an extra long smile, he was after all the one to try and make everything better first, even if it didn’t exactly work. “Jasper over here is a real softy for his best friend,” you giggled at that, loving the instant recoil at the words as he pulled you right back to him, being sure to hide the way he melted around you, so perfect, he found it awfully rude of his body to react so willingly to you when the chances of being with you were so slim, so impossible, but then again, just like you, he didn’t think impossible was all that big of an obstacle to overcome.

“That I am, darling,” he purred and with one last squeeze he let you go, already prepared to swoop you right off the roof and onto the dancefloor to take your mind off all that could be clouding it and remind your heart that love was already right there waiting for it, and he would be ready to show you- to tell you more about love and just how familiar he was with the feeling when you and your heart were ready.

“I won’t mind always being the bridesmaid if you’re the one walking down the aisle beside me,” you informed him, allowing him to guide you down from your hiding place, Alice made sure to leave a little space between herself and you two before following you down.

“You won’t always be the bridesmaid,” Jasper noted, not at all surprised when he looked down to where you were climbing the branches to find your shoes had long been abandoned, free hand trying to keep your dress out of the way.

“How do you know?” you demanded once settled on the ground, giving in to his fiddling as he tried to make your dress right, tilting his head slightly as he dusted the purple material of any dirt it might have picked up on your little adventure away from everyone.

“I have a feeling,” he was unnervingly charming as he smirked at you, happy that he could feel your nerves ease, all the horrid feelings that led him to search for you now masked by a sense of content and comfort- happiness, because of him. “Trust me,” you nodded, giving in to the mood of the party as you started dragging him to the very middle of the crowd, pleased that the song had changed pace and the bride and groom were away enjoying themselves in solace.

“I always do.” And you did, you knew him well enough to know he’d always tell the truth, always be honest, always bare his heart to yours, at least when he was ready to do so too.

Twilight taglist: @saintlike78 @scarlet-prey @cupids-crystals @venomsvl @esposamultifandom @itzliyalupin @alexxavicry @iambuckysbae @axen-gers @cauliflowertree

[bunnyywritings]

to be seen...

BAKUGOU KATSUKI X GN!READER

[a/n: i lowkey love the hc that bakugou is partially deaf/hard of hearing cause of his quirk like...it just makes so much sense to me ?? anyways i just wanted to get this one out of my system! it's not the best so...sorry but yeah...enjoy!! - bunny]

© bunnyywritings pls don't use my headers or writing without permission

wc: 1.6k words

warnings: none that i can think of...kinda angsty tbh, there's also more of a focus on bakugou than reader

This couldn’t be real. 

He’s not weak so…why? 

Why did this happen? 

Bakugou’s hands shook as these merciless thoughts ran through his head as Doctor’s poked and prodded at his ears. Their touch was bothersome but he supposed he was grateful he couldn’t really hear what they were discussing, any tangible noise was muddy and replaced by a ceaseless ringing. 

He had gone through all the motions. Denial being the most violent. He had screamed and cried in a clearing a ways away from the dorms where he had thought that no one would hear him but when he returned and immediately clocked your glossy eyes and trembling bottom lip, he realized how mistaken he was. 

Oh, you. Sweet, caring, you. 

He almost felt guilty for how much he had pushed you away. All you wanted to do was make sure he knew he wasn’t alone, make sure he felt loved and cared for but he mistook your empathy for pity and blew up at you. This time around it was much, much louder and much more terrifying because he couldn’t hear how loud and rude he was really being. 

He had scoffed when you clutched your fists to your side as big fat tears rolled down your cheeks. He couldn’t read lips very well but he didn’t need to when the word ‘mean’ had been formed so clearly by your lips before you ran off to your room. 

Now, he was just numb. Having accepted that this was his reality, Doctor’s poking and prodding and the uneasy sight of his mother so broken and…sad. Having to practically be held up by his father. 

This wasn’t right. She wasn’t weak. She was never weak but once again, he had mistaken her love and empathy for pity…for weakness. 

School had been on break for the spring and he was desperate to get back, he was being run through the wringer and as much as he hated to admit it, he wanted the mundane rhythm of his life back. He wanted to attend his classes again. Quirk training. English. Hero Law.

 He actually missed those idiots he calls friends. To sit with them in the cafeteria and hear about the stupid shojo that Denki was reading. Hear how Kiri can’t beat some boss level on the stupid game he was playing. Hear Mina complain about how her cuticles were as healthy as ever. Hear Jiro ramble on about a new band she found and how she thinks he’d actually like them. 

Hear…

Would he still be able to do any of that? 

He couldn’t quite remember what his condition was. The ringing was gone but all that's left is a muffled sea of jumbled up noises. He was getting better at reading lips and he was put through the master class of sign language in a week. His instructor was surprised but he knew that if you had been there, you would’ve given him a bashful smile and said, “I expected nothing less from our future top hero.” 

Ah, that’s right. 

Most of all, he missed you. 

Your smile. Your wit. Your eyes…the very same ones he made shine with tears. Your laugh…the sound he’d miss the most out of anything. 

Despite having left the way he did, you still texted him. He hadn’t responded but you still thought about him. 

“You’re doing an awful lot for a guy who told you to piss off…” Shoji eyed you carefully as you set up the classroom, helping you place workbooks on the desks and open the windows. 

“Yeah but you know as well as I do that Bakugou uses anger like a shield. He’s probably confused and in pain about all of this, it’s only fair that we help out as much as we can.” 

Your caring nature was worrying sometimes. Shoji had seen your heart shattered multiple times by people who brush you off or take advantage of your willingness to do hard work, he was worried that Bakugou didn’t deserve this kindness. 

He remembered holding you as you sobbed into his chest, it took everything in him to not run out to the common room and knock some sense into the blonde but ultimately, he decided that staying and comforting you was more important. 

And despite all that pain he caused you had gone straight to Principle Nezu and pleaded for the school’s help. Going as far as offering to do all the work in finding an instructor and getting all your classmates on board. Now, here you were setting up the classroom for the first day of sign language classes. 

The Friday before school started up again, Mitski got a call from the specialist they had been working with and with the influence of UA, Bakugou’s hearing aids were ready for him. She was ecstatic, enthusiastically waking her son and shouting at him to get ready. 

He was…startled to say the least. If he had been able to hear the yelp he had let out when he was shaken awake, he surely would’ve been a bright red. 

And so, with the promise of heading to a nice restaurant for breakfast before heading back home, Bakugou shoved himself into the backseat of the car and off they went. 

The school had covered two pairs and he almost scoffed at the design of the devices. The first pair’s earpiece was clear, swirled with red and orange and the part that hooks around the ear, an almost gaudy, bright red-orange. The second was just his hero costume earpieces with hearing aids attached. Both pairs were specially made to muffle his explosions while still being able to hear others clearly. They also had a bluetooth feature so he’d be able to listen to music comfortably.

The doctor and his parents looked on expectantly as Bakugou slipped them on for the first time, surprised by how comfortable they were. He switched them on with shaky hands and everyone waited in silence before he looked into his mother’s teary eyes. 

“Katsuki…honey? Can you hear me?” 

His eyes widened. Had her voice always been so tender?

 It brought tears to his eyes, he got up from the uncomfortable exam table, fists clenched at his sides. She looked up at him from her seat and her face crumbled. His eyebrows were pinched, a pitiful frown on his wobbling lips and tears slowly leaking from his eyes. 

“Oh, honey…” He threw himself into her embrace and cried into her neck like he had done many times when he was little. Masaru watched on in tearful wonder, remembering that this was still his son. His baby boy and he was hurting more than he let on. Shouldering an exhaustingly heavy burden on his shoulders all by himself. 

The image of his little boy, only 4 feet tall tearfully struggling to hold a boulder up above his head, arms and legs trembling with exhaustion and desperately calling out for his mommy and daddy shook him to his core. 

He wrapped his arms around both of them, his hand cradling the back of Bakugou’s head. “It’s okay, son. We’ve got you.” At the sound of his father’s steady and calming voice, the boy cried harder. “We’ve got you.” 

Standing in front of the dorms was more daunting than he thought it would be. Hiking up the steps was like attempting to trek Mt. Fuji. The only comfort being that he was expecting the common room to be empty. He expected everyone to be in their room attempting to settle back in after a week long break. 

He hated how wrong he’s been recently. 

When he opened the door, he was met with everyone cheering. It was all so loud and disorienting that, despite his hearing aids, he had no idea what the hell anyone had said. Then, you stepped through the crowd and suddenly everyone faded into the background. 

“Guys! I thought I said no shouting! It’s probably still too much for him!” 

“But you’re shouting right now…” Denki snickered, earning an unamused glare from you. 

His eyes filled with tears, heart constricting in his chest. Twisting and throbbing almost painfully. 

God, he missed you. 

“So scary when you look at me like that!” Denki shuddered playfully. 

You had opened your mouth to refute but were cut off by Bakugou suddenly roaring with laughter, squeaking the slightest bit as he hunched over, arms wrapped around his middle as he laughed. 

Shock ran through everybody’s spines, jaws on the floor. 

He wasn’t quite sure what came over him but it was an involuntary reaction. Maybe to camouflage the fact that he had a river of tears sliding down his chin. 

Once he had finished, he stood upright. Out of breath and wiping his eyes. Meeting your eyes once again made the butterflies in his stomach go berserk. They went downright psycho when your hands were held up in front of you, trembling as you carefully signed, ‘welcome home.’ 

He was silent once again. Absolutely dumbstruck. 

Midoriya watched on fondly, as did everyone, emotions overwhelming and tears filling their eyes. 

Bakugou was in complete disbelief. 

“When…” He breathed, hands coming up to sign the rest. ‘When did you learn that?’ 

It took you a second to register what he said before responding. ‘We learn over break…’ your signing was a little sloppy, he had missed a few things but caught on immediately at the end, ‘...love you. Want you feel normal as possible.’ 

He didn’t let you finish, grabbing you into his embrace and holding you tight. “Thank you.” He mumbled into your hair, you held on equally as tight. 

“You’re welcome.” Your voice so up close and intimate was a blessing. 

[universallychaoticpan]

Can u do the stages of Dazai and Reader's relationship through Kunikida's POV like from enemy/strangers to friendship to lovers♥️

This had been on my had for days and maybe you might like this idea. Imma write this down before I go to sleep bc I'm tired af😭.

You have no idea how much I loved writing this, it was so fun. Ugh I absolutely love it!! Sorry it's taken so long so get it out, but I hope you enjoy it regardless. Come back anytime. <33

I suggest listening to lovers rock by tv girl to set a nice little mood <3

(reader is gn)

Fukuzawa hadn't lied at all; you were a perfect addition to the agency. Even after just meeting you, Kunikida could tell: smart, accomplished, adept at combat, extensive knowledge in both weapons and hand to hand combat, plus a near deadly control over your ability- you were a dream. You were hardworking and on top of it all, shockingly, amazingly, seemingly immune to Osamu Dazai.

Now, you didn't dislike the man. You just weren't one to fawn over him or giggle like a schoolgirl any time he winked at you. You never really understood the girls who would fall all over themselves when he flirted with them, plus, since he flirted with anyone what was the point in giving in? To him, there were a million people like you; you were just another pretty face to him. So you made it your mission to never fall for his charms.

Unfortunately for Kunikida, neither of you quite understood how stubborn you both could be.

After three months, you found you liked him more than you thought. He made you laugh, with his stupid jokes and his antics. You found you liked being his friend. You would go out drinking with him, he would embarrass you in public until you shrieked with laughter, face burning red with your blush. He would make up nonsense songs to make you laugh and you would foil his attempts at flirting with yet another waitress each time you ate together. Quickly, you found yourself calling him your best friend- something that horrified Kunikida in quite a funny manner.

And after six months, Dazai realized something terrible- something awful, sweet, lovely and terrifying all at once. Osamu Dazai realized he was falling for you. He was falling faster than he could save himself, faster than he could stop it; he was falling for his best friend with the stunning smile, the sharp wit that would bite him playfully if he got to close, the pretty laugh and those eyes that melted him from the inside out.

Worst of all, he knew you would never believe him if he told you.

But Kunikida saw it all. He saw how Dazai's eyes would soften ever so slightly when you would walk in, how he would try to be close to you, how he would volunteer to do the most mundane tasks as long as it meant doing them with you. He saw the new way his lip would curl gently at the edges when he smiles at you, a smile different than his usual rakish grin. And god was it painful to watch. He nearly felt bad for the man, and he would if it wasn't so funny to watch. Kunikida wouldn't deny it was just the slightest bit entertaining to observe you.

Nearly a year had gone by since you had first met; nearly a year since you had promised yourself to never fall for him. Nearly a year since he had met you, clueless to the fact that you would change his life without even trying. And everyone could tell it was driving him mad; everyone, or so it seemed, except for you. A fact that Kunikida doubted to the extremes.

"They probably have figured it out by now," he muttered, sipping his drink as a moan sounded from Dazai. "They're quite intelligent, you know. Perceptive, too."

"Shut up," Dazai muttered, lifting his head from off the bar. "Don't tell me that like I don't already know it."

Kunikida shrugged. "Just checking. But in any case, what are you going to do about it?"

"That's just it," Dazai groaned. "Whatever I do, they won't believe it's real; they'll think I just want a fling or a one night stand and it would kill me to loose them over something so stupid."

"Well you'd best figure it out soon," Kunikida observed. "Time waits for no man."

And it hurt knowing he was right. It hurt Dazai, a dull throb forming in his chest because it was true; no one waited forever. No opportunity stayed open for long. So he shook Kunikida's hand, walked out of the bar, and turned for the direction of your apartment.

"Good luck, you lovestruck bastard."

//

You were alone when the knock at the door came; alone, your pajama pants sitting deliciously on your skin, a glass on wine barely held between your fingers. You felt the buzz of the stuff, warm and sweet, spreading through your body as you walked over the door, and opened it.

Revealing your best friend, panting with cheeks brushed pink from the night air. He ran a hand through his messy dark hair and you cocked your head slightly, your lips quirking up into a curious smile.

Oh that smile-

"What's the occasion for this lovely visit?"

He swallows hard, hands fiddling nervously as he tries to decide whether to move closer or not. But you choose for him, resting a hand on his shoulder, stepping so close your have to look up slightly for your concerned eyes to meet his.

"are you alright? Dazai, what's happened, is everything ok?-"

"Do you trust me?"

"What kind of question is that, of course I-"

"No. Do you trust me."

You looked into those eyes, and-

oh.

oh.

"Of course I do," you whispered.

And those were the last words you uttered before his hand lifted your face to his and his lips shaped themselves perfectly against yours. That was all you had to say before he stole the breath from your lungs with that kiss, a sigh leaving you so sweetly it made him fall for you again, more and more- he would devote himself to memorizing every sound that fell from your lips, give you every second if his life if that's what it took, as long as you promised to never take your touch away from him.

You smiled when you pulled away, lips still parted, laughing ever so slightly as you pulled him inside by the hand.

And when you walked into the office together the next morning, chatting and smiling like always, most people wouldn't have batted an eye.

But Doppo Kunikida wasn't most people. And even he had to indulge himself in smirking in the way Dazai followed at your heels like a puppy. Because even though you were not the first to fall for his charms...

you were the first to get him to fall for yours.

[tavshortfortavern]

Noble!Tav

How they react to finding out you were born from high nobility and ran away when they reached adulthood to be an adventurer. Takes place when you're both already in a relationship.

Zevlor

Felt unworthy before learning you were of high status, those feelings doubled after hearning the news. You had to reassure him titles and status meant little to you.

Is there for you when he learns of your family's disapproval for becoming an adventurer and leaving that life behind. But he does appreciate it knowing you had helped so many people and his by choosing this path. He thinks its admirable you chose to help others and venture out instead of living in luxury like other nobles

When he gets the chance to see you in your noble bearings, like you had to attend a fancy gathering or a ball, he'd just look at you in awe. In a regal dress/suit, decorated with expensive jewelry and even some artful makeup, you looked everybit of a princess/prince of fairytailes. He still loved seeing you normally, even covered in dirt and blood, but this was a new side he hadn't seen.

He was used to seeing you in armor, getting into trouble, maybe cracking inappropriate jokes, laughing freely, further estranging you from your noble identity. He'd see you were barely tolerating these 'parties' and would help you leave.

He wouldn't push you to tell him everything. But he was a great listener. He learned your past, your choice to leave, the difficulties with your bloodline and the expectations placed on you.

Would be anxious meeting your family. So sure they wouldn't approve of your relationship. They probably had wanted you with some younger, more suitable match. With your fame now there were probably plenty who would ask for your hand. But then when you do introduce him your chest puffs out in pride and take his arm. Proudly announcing your relationship. He'd be emberassed when you bring him around, showing him off like a catch.

It didn't matter in the end. He saw the real you. Showing true nobility when you faught alongside your companions to defend the weak than the rest of those nobles lazed in their mansions. He'd stick by you for everything.

Would sometimes refer to you as my lady/lord before holding a hand out for you.

Rolan

The discovery hits him hard. He hated being seen as lesser, has worked hard to not be so for most of his life. You were already the hero of Baldur's Gate and savior to the refugees. He knew he had to be seen as your equal. Being the new wizard of Ramazith's tower helped a lot, he would boast whenever you two were out together as a couple but now it was revealed you had noble status.

It felt like you deliberately kept it from him. But he almost didn't believe it either. You were a menace, covered in grime and blood, without any of the elegance and poise nobles possessed. Maybe crass sometimes. Taunting and teasing him.

Some headcanons had him born to a noble woman before being given up for adoption being a tiefling. So this could sting a little more. Especially if you had a good upbringing and were given multiple great opportunities. Perhaps hearing you had gone to this well known university, recieving academic awards before graduating then got bored and took another course! He honestly would feel a little peeved you were well off enough to freely chase interests while he had to claw his way up

While he's ultimately happy you became an adventurer and met him, he could understand your parents dissaproval having paid for your studies, supported those interests (the mundane ones atleast), and got you everything you needed only for you to choose a life of danger, strife and instability. Any parent would be worried and seeing the things you get up to is giving him sympathy stress. Yeah your family should be worried.

Probably wouldn't recognize you at first when you dress up. Used to seeing you a certain way. But startles when he realizes its you, sees you all decked out in finery and has to hide his real feelings. You were already distracting, now it seems his face was permanently warm whenever he stared at you. He'd brush it off thought, play it cool, or tries too. "You- you clean up nice." eyeroll

Is more possessive. Will show up any noble ponce who tries to catch your eye. Would hate hearing your parents had certain matches in mind for you. Feeling the gap betwen you grow larger. Would absolutely try to win your family's approval.

Then sees how empty your eyes were when you were in these noble gatherings or family dinners. It felt like a switch. Whatever brightness and vibrancy you had was sucked out. You barely talked and when you did it was short, polite, fake. Plenty of people wanted to speak to you after you saved the city, but you looked drained and he's seen your stamina.

His more negative feelings shrink when he sees your strained family bonds. Your parents seemed to have a hard time understanding you and you could barely figure out how to speak. If you were someone who was usually silvertoungued and great with words its made more apparent.

He'd be at dinner, trying to make a good first impression, but he'd look over to you and see something off. You simply went with what everyone told you to do, hardly smiling. It was wrong. Not you, stubborn, determined, compassionate you. Plan ditched then, he's paying attention to you, offering to leave with you if you were uncomfortable. He'd feel unimaginably warm when you asked to return home which was his tower.

You would have a long talk about your relationship. You told him you already saw him as an equal and he admits his feelings about your origins. He should have known it wasn't all easy for you and your love wasn't tied to status. Everything returns to normal but he woud reprimand you sometimes for acting un-noble like and require some class.

Dammon

Suspected something early on. Noticed you owned an item, maybe a peice of jewelry, that was really high end. It was subtle in design, could pass as plain, but as a smith he could see it would take a lot of effort and skill to make, not to mention the purity of the material. Either pure silver or gold. It would be worth a fortune. He would notice it after you two were intimate and simply relaxing in bed, having seen it on you and ask about it.

He would remark the craftsmanship, running his fingers on it as he listened to you explain it was a family heirloom. You had it since you were young and never thought to take it off. You didn't reveal much else but he would wonder about your family if they could afford something like this. But doesn't pry.

Then learns you were noble born. Doesn't get upset you hid the fact, just curious why. Atleast on the surface. He's not without doubts. You were already a famous hero, being a noble made him feel he was really out of his league. He's not a fighter or anything like your companions, he was a blacksmith. What would a noble be doing with him?

Never thinks to keep your relationship secret or hold back any affection towards but when you accidentally run into some of your old noble friends in public he saw your alarmed expression. He worried you would be emberassed being seen with him but five minutes in the conversation you're possessively holding his arm and shooing your giggling friends who kept flirting with him.

Once they were gone you grumbled you knew this would happen if they met him. He would admit he thought you were hesitant to introduce him as your partner. That was never the case, you were more concerned your friends and others would see him as the catch he was and try something.

didn't know how to act when you came out dressed to the nines, like a vision out of a painting. Probably won't go to any events with you. It would be so out of his element. Like the tiefling party where he wasn't there. Prefers his forge and being in your company.

Would want to get along with your family but nervous. He's had to deal with discrimination as a tiefling, its stronger in nobles so there's a chance your parents would feel the same.

Seeing you stay with him, spending days in his simple home or keeping him company at his forge would mean a lot to him. It silences most of his doubts knowing your the kind of person that looks past wealth and status.

[acotars]

full listen through complete, here are all my initial thoughts in one place

finally post malone delivering the vocals we always knew he had i love this man’s voice

gorgeous harmonies

i’m sorry charlie puth?????? depressing to hear wish she could unrecord that.

who’s gonna hold you like me? because we’re CRAZYYYY. who’s gonna hold you? — me. KILLLLLLL ME (me-e-e!)

my boy only breaks his favorite toys x my boy billie eilish mashup when

down bad waking up in BLOOD??? in BLOOD?????

staring at the sky chinese satellite moment ?? staring at the sky would’ve could’ve should’ve when i’m screaming at the sky moment??

and i’m pissed off you let me give you all that youth for free :(((( this makes my whole body ache

you sacrificed us to the gods of your bluest days and im just getting color back in my face :(

i’m having his baby!!!!!!!! first laugh of the album. so far it’s nothing but heart aching and then she’s like lol i’m pregnant jk lmao!!!

fresh out the slammer first second sounds like old western like guns drawn dueling in a ghost town

to the one who says i’m the girl of his american dreams UGH!!! i love her songwriting in this one it’s so mundane and winky. it’s so stolen moments of real life it’s so spoken word it’s so everything to me

my friends all smell like weed or little babies LMAO this feels like the sexy baby of ttpd

florence welch the woman that you are………

throwing my life to the wolves or the ocean rocks / drove my car off the road to the lookout could’ve followed my fears all the way down

what if he’s written “mine” on my upper thigh only in my mind. INSANE LYRIC. insane lyric. terrifying horrifying lyric. she is a master

i keep these longings locked in lowercase inside a vault and then LOWERCASE LOML. lowercase love of my life. lowercase loss of my life.

guilty as sin is the most painful breakup song i’ve ever heard it’s so awful it hurts so bad i can’t even think about it without crying

love the screaming in who’s afraid of little old me but i fear in some ways the lyrics feel more juvenile than the rest of the album

i can fix him is and cowboy like me are sisters

LOSS OF MY LIFE??????????? LOSS!!!! of my LIFE!!!!!!!!!!

793 dead 1 bazillion injured

i can do it with a broken heart spotify video just being eras tour footage lol just shoot me. just shoot me in the chest

lights camera bitch smile 1 2 3 let’s go bitch

jehovah’s witness suit is exactly what i’m talking about with her lyricism it’s so real life details it’s so moments out of context turned into poetry

were you writing a book??? :((( :’(((( the desperation of wanting there to be a reason for it all and a reason for it all to be thrown away she’s so used to being used/mused :((((

the alchemy .,, i’ll pass. idc about this one sorry there’s too much matty and travis it makes me :/

YOU LOOK LIKE TAYLOR SWIFT???? AS THE OUTROOOOO she’s crazy for this she’s bonkers

i cried my way through clara bow and then started it over and cried again. and then spotify said oh did you want yoyok now??

[senka-mesecine]

What do the boys think about Halloween? 👀

---

― I don't know, for Chris personally, something like Halloween probably harkens back to a more carefree and simple time; back while he was still in college, his family's home, the carelessness of suburbia and him being just a kid who still cared about the wonder of mundane things --- a time that seems almost entirely bygone now; which means that any and all feelings connected to said season (and really most holidays) will be complicated and introspective because it serves as a metric of comparison just how far he's come since...and how much he's irrevocably changed. There's something almost awkward about the notion. Something nostalgic. This slightly haunting idea he can't go back exactly to the way things were. The stark reminder he's aged out of Halloween, perhaps in a good way, perhaps in a bad one. Especially post-war, Taylor has grown. But, then again, that's not to say he wouldn't commemorate it all; he just probably does it differently to anyone else. Busting out a drink, a blunt and listening to music with you is good enough.

― Not that O'Neill would ever admit to this in a million years but all these asshole kids dressed up as ghouls, zombies and the actual living dead make him nervous and fidgety...well, more than he actually is by default, so really, he might spend all of Halloween ranting to you how these little cocksuckers are running around the block expecting something for nothing (free candy), feeling all entitled, and how, nuh-uh, he's not having it. No, no. He's really not. Truth is, all of his antagonism and passive aggression is a means to cover up that this shit makes him anxious to no end but he'd rather come off like a disgruntled, killjoy, whiny asshole by choice, as a tactical measure, even to you, then ever fess up to the reality that it overall gives him a bad feeling and probably takes him back to some really awful places in time, meaning that the man might just want to spend Halloween curled up in bed with you. Genuinely. His excuse is that he's too pissed off to participate or care. But you know better, so you might let it slide when he acts all tough about it the next day.

― Honestly, Bunny thinks Halloween's great and he loves it. Unabashedly so. He's that guy who's door you absolutely shouldn't knock on while trick or treating because while seems like some smiling, scrawny pretty boy at first glance (harmless, right?) he might just fill someone's basket with candy and a handful of live maggots (could just grab one and eat it in front of the horrified visitors too) or put a defunct grenade into a satchel of sweets and probably have the time of his life being impressed with himself once the kids, rightfully, end up scared it'll blow up, so, really, this holiday's a perfect excuse for him to bully and cruelly prank people, not that he needs any excuses. Might just do it to you too. In fact, it's guaranteed. He does it out of some sickening, juvenile form of love towards you. the way he sees it. He somehow seems like the type of guy who has a live human skull laying around somewhere that he acquired...god knows where...that's on the front lawn and everyone assumes it's decor. But, it ain't. Knowing Bunny then, it's really lucky that Halloween lasts only one day.

― Rhah gives me the impression that like, to him, Halloween's the perfect time to bust out the eerie stories --- and again, much like Bunny, not that he particularly needs too many excuses for this one, but really, this holiday in particular serves his mood just right as he regales anecdotes that might be real, slightly overblown in proportion or completely fabricated. Nonetheless, he tells them with such immersion and oratory zest, he can genuinely have a tingling shiver run down your spine just by talking. In equal measure, one gets the impression he's fully in his element even though he'd never fess up he likes any of well, this. In fact, he might also rant about Halloween to you. Commercial holidays this and commercial holidays that. Theft! A scam! Distracting the common man with nonsense. Vermucci does get all political and social for a brief blip. But, he's simultaneously there, next to a fireplace with you in the dark trying to titillate as well as frighten you as he tells you some of the most harrowing things you've ever heard in the hopes you'll scoot even closer to him. He actually relishes this, to be honest.

― King might think Halloween's inherently some rich people thing and by extension, white people thing --- you know, something aimed at folks who have disposable moolah to throw around on plastic randomness they won't ever need again except for one day a year --- a notion he genuinely finds funny. An opinion someone like, say, Junior might very vocally share as well, much to Bunny's annoyed chagrin. But in spite of that and his social stand on the matter, King's very much pro anything that allows him to unwind, relax, have a good time and party --- the context involved doesn't really even particularly matter, meaning that he'd happily get up to weird activities like blowing weed smoke into a pumpkin, infusing his grass with flavored spice to 'keepin' with the spirit of things', sing, dance and take up the task of handcrafting some decoration himself instead of buying, which, admittedly, comes off like the move of someone who genuinely loves the holiday for its own sake. Somehow, the whole thing might develop into a full on party with you. The pipeline between 'I don't care about that noise, man.' to him being fully into this is a very short pipeline indeed.

― Don't laugh, but Wolfe gives me the impression of someone who nonironically, in trying to, as he might so aptly put it 'keep up the spirits and the morale of the men' genuinely ordered some pumpkins from up the chain of command as needed provisions, singlehandedly carved some and set them up at least somewhere around base to remind the boys of home, only for the gesture to be ignored or considered juvenile and ridiculous by a general consensus. Which...perhaps it was. Or maybe it wasn't. Depends who you ask. The opinions range anywhere from 'Whattheshit!?' to 'A sappy effort'. Regardless, Wolfe might be good intentioned but his fish-out-of-water efforts either 'can't read the overall mood of the room properly' or he tries too hard to impress and be 'one of the gang' only to fall wholly and entirely short. In general though, he enjoys Halloween. And he might just happily celebrate with you with all the traditional markers of it involved the minute he doesn't need to put up a macho front anymore during a more civilian life. He probably ends up being unexpectedly wholesome about it.

― Elias is a non-conformist at heart; celebrate a thing or not. Like it or hate it. Be indifferent or impassioned. It doesn't matter to him --- ultimately, so long as whatever conviction people have is followed by a feelgood feeling and attitude overall --- in translation; Live and let others live. So long as they're not hurting anyone in the process, he thinks people should be entitled to their beliefs, meaning that he himself could very well be disillusioned with most of the pastimes a common civilian could have, but he's not opposed to other people being, well, plainly put, happy even though it's not exactly an enthusiasm he personally shares --- nonetheless, Elias is a good sport about it. Genuinely. The world would've been a better place, he thinks, if more people had an attitude like that. And not unlike Chris? His prefered choice of celebrating with you is just unwinding. Rotating back to the world he'd be one of those guys children are legitimately enthusiastic to trick and treat from because he's the kindest and coolest person who's door you could possibly stumble upon.

― Barnes is an adult and by extension of being an adult and a man, he deems he shouldn't give a rat's ass about it --- an opinion he undoubtedly would've firmly held even when he was an actual child and the main target demographic for Halloween, I imagine. There's just something really grim and no-nonsense about him where his stoicism usually takes precedence over everything, even, say, commonplace holidays. He doesn't mind you celebrating, putting you into a more civilian box by default. He just doesn't care about doing it himself because he finds he's got better things to do. He just doesn't understand people having a separate day in the year where they wanna be frightened in the most staged, artificial sense possible when there's so much actual fear in the world they could experience; he's downright the type of man who'd say something in the vein of 'Hope ya'll get drafted so ya'll can experience some real shit'. He's really the dark inverse of Elias on that front, except, unlike Elias, he doesn't afford people the empathy of thinking they deserve happy stuff just for its own sake.

[jelly-of-many-ships]

Intersting experience in math class:

I was doing some work while listening to the good omens soundtrack because it helps me focus and I love remembering which scene each track is from. Anyway, David Arnold (the composer) also composed most of the music for BBC Sherlock, which I don’t think too many people know (He’s amazing and I love literally everything he makes). And so when I finished the good omens album it started playing other music by the artist, which in this case, happened to be the BBC Sherlock intro.

I have not heard that song in almost a year in a half. BBC Sherlock was like a canon event for me, it was the first real fandom I joined and it introduced me to tumblr, fanfiction, and literally every concept associated with fandoms. Most pieces media Ive consumed, and definitely every fandom i’ve joined since then has been in some way because of tumblr, or other fandom spaces. Even good omens, which I am currently hyperfixating on to a frankly concerning extent, I was only introduced to via the domino effect of BBC Sherlock.

Why is this important? idk...backstory I guess? whatever, anyways, after awhile a fell more and more out of interest with Sherlock, and while I’d definitely still consider myself in the fandom, I’m just not really that into it anymore, especially since the rest of the fandom isn’t very active either. The year when my interest was the strongest was a very interesting time. I was really insecure and not very happy, but I had some amazing people in my life who I really miss. These two things, I think, are possibly the worst combination to have in terms of nostalgia, and I find that experiencing things that remind me of this period feels very strange. For example I physically cannot listen to some of the songs I added to my playlist around this time without getting really emotional, but I refuse to delete them because they really do feel like a part of me. From time to time I do remember the bad things and maybe feel a bit upset, and yet if I could go back, I know I would, just to remember what it was like to experience it all.

I don’t think I could ever fully explain it but BBC Sherlock genuinely felt like opening a very weird portal, and so when in the middle of math class, immediately after listening to the good omens track “the end?” and vividly imagining the end credit scene of season two, the Sherlock intro started playing, I felt such a strange mix of awe and nostalgia that I almost started crying. It sounds pretty stupid typing this up, but it was such a unique experience, and I don’t think I can really explain it. Good Omens is the only thing I’ve been even somewhat interested in to the extend of Sherlock, and after listening to possibly the most depressing song of the entire show, to have such a sharp reminder of who I used to be blast full volume into my head felt like diving headfirst into cold water. It really does sound stupid, but in that exact moment I remembered everything; the evening I heard that song for the first time, staying up for hours scrolling through pinterest and discovering the fandom, the first day I told my friends about it, the day i read my first fanfic, the day I was so convinced they were gay I accidentally discovered shipping (lol), the night I finished season 4, alone, at 2am, the day I joined tumblr, the week I learned how to play “the game is on” on piano, and the lunch period I wrote my first fic after daydreaming about it for weeks.

These things probably seem pretty mundane, but this was like a new world to me. They represent more than just discovering I new interest though. They’re some of the only memories I have of that time. I cut my hair, I realized I was queer, and for the first time in my entire life I had an actual friendgroup, one that I still care about so much. Life was, at the same time horrible, yet the best it had ever been, and I didn’t even know it. When I really think about It, I realize in actuality how little time has really passed, but everything feels so different. I think to myself that there’s no way that person was me, that the kid who had so much energy and enthusiasm for life, poetry and writing and had yet never felt so insecure couldn’t have possibly turned into the burnt out, powerless person I feel I am today.

At least I’m not so insecure anymore? I’m not so sure what to say. All I know, is I think that moment in math class made me realize how much I’ve grown, how much I appreciate those experience I got to have, and how much that song will always mean to me.

[pastryland]

sebchal completed fic recommendations

If any of the authors of the fics mentioned here or are tagged and don't want their fics to be here, please let me know and I'll remove it!

Will update this list periodically

❤️ = favorite

⭐️ = I love fics by this author in general

🔗 = part of a series (will usually only put fav from series on here)

❌ = triggering themes

🔥 = explicit

Changes, Beginnings - 22k

Images of Greek and Roman marble, paintings of ethereal wonder, muses of supernatural awe flashed in Sebastian’s mind as he looked ahead. He was beautiful in a way that struck the word “mundane” from Sebastian’s lexicon, his hair fluffy and cheeks wind chafed, London-pale skin contrasting so wonderfully against his coloring – all underlined with a great... sadness in his downcast eyes.It hit Sebastian like a knife to the heart, looking upon such sorrow at such an unremarkable time on a non-descript day.Or: In which S. Vettel is an awarded literary fiction author, Sebastian is a man with a penchant for people watching and aimless wandering, and Charles is a masters student on the tube. A strangers to friends to lovers story taking place over the course of a year.

With you I'm in real danger - 55k - ❤️🔥

Sebastian is perfectly happy with his life. Living in Monaco is fun, he has a group of friends that he loves, and his days are largely spent dedicated to the antique books he collects, preserves and sells. Then Charles Leclerc, one of the most famous gay pornstars in the world (and Sebastian's personal favorite, if he may say so), comes sprinting into his store one day to hide from paparazzi. Sebastian's life gets turned on its head. He is not complaining, but he's also not coping. It's a thing, just go with it.

this love ain't free - 26k - 🔥

One night in his horrible season, Sebastian treats himself to an unconventional way of cheering up.He didn't expect to come back.

Love Like Mine (Met With Mixed Reviews) - 55k - 🔥

“Have you heard that Seb Vettel is a slut?”

masterpost for all completed fic rec lists

[ladyniniane]

Author Questionnaire Tag Game

I was tagged by @aninkwellofnectar. Thank you for tagging me, it was really fun and interesting!

About me

When did you start writing?

I think I was 12. I have always been a daydreamer, making scenarios in my head. But I started writing for real at that time. I wrote little stories, inspired by my favorite fictional universes, in a notebook. However, I started writing seriously at 19 with my first original short stories. I then went on to write my first novels and short stories before going back to fanfic and then to original writing again.

Are there genres/themes you enjoy reading different to the ones you write?

I read a lot of historical fiction. (And I realize that the more time passes, the less fantasy I read. I'm still reading it, but I'm extremely picky).

My fictional worlds are inspired by historical settings. But historical accuracy isn't my goal (and I'm not writing historical fiction in the first place). My stories are my playground and I'm doing what I want. If I want to change and twist things, put women in roles they didn't have at that time/setting, no one is going to stop me.

If I write fantasy, it's because I enjoy the freedom and range of possibilities it gives me.

Is there an author you want to emulate, or one to whom you're often compared?

Tanith Lee. I wish I could write as beautifully as her, with her lush prose and atmospheric settings. Plots weren't her strong point, just like it is the case for me --'.

Anyway, read Tanith Lee. She has written so many works that you will certainly find something that you like.

Can you tell me a little about your writing space?

I'm either writing on my desk or seated on the couch. That's pretty basic.

I'm writing on my laptop, but I take some notes in a notebook.

What’s your most effective way to muster up some muse?

I read/watch things that inspire me or remind me of my projects. I do some research. I also imagine my characters in different situations and see where it goes. I also brainstorm and just focus on what I want to write to see things more clearly.

Did the place(s) you grew up in influence the people and places you write about?

I think! More in a diluted than obvious way, though. For instance, I've always been in awe of the beauty of summer nights in Corsica, being able to walk outside and see all those stars in the sky. It shows in the way I describe the night and starry skies.

Are there any recurring themes of your writing, and if so, do they surprise you at all?

Coping with grief, loss, mourning, absence and transformation. Life and death. Resilience. Finding a light after a long road in the darkness. Finding the will to live on. The beauty of the mundane. Finding a community and a purpose. Self-acceptance. Self-reliance. Overcoming one's fears and limitations. Breaking free from the chains of the past.

I'm not surprised at all! They reflect my personal experiences and my hopes.

My Characters

Would you please tell me about your current favourite character?

Zoé, the protagonist of my Byzantine-inspired novel project (title: Zoé, dame du palais/Zoé, lady of the palace). She's in her late twenties and a widow (or at least she considers herself so since her fiancé died before their wedding).

Coming from a dangerous border region, she's a skilled warrior. As she moves to the capital, she's presented with an opportunity to work at the palace. There, she becomes an attendant to the empress dowager and will find schemes, rivalry but also love and friendship.

She's headstrong, mature, generous and passionate, but also deeply aware of her own darker sides. It's better not to be her enemy.

I love her for her adaptability and the dual role she's able to play, being both warrior and court lady. She's savvy, world-weary and experienced in all areas of life.

Which of your characters do you think you’d be friends with in real life?

I think I would get along with my OCs Gladys and Maeve! They are both cheerful and sociable so it would be easier for me.

Which of your characters would you dislike most if you met them?

Some of my stories have pretty awful parents, so it would likely be one of them.

Tell me more about the process of coming up with your characters.

I wrote about it here.

Do you notice any recurring themes/traits among your characters?

My stories are almost always centered around a female protagonist. She has the ways to fend for herself in this world (both physically and intellectually). She's the heroine of her story and she isn't defined by a love interest.

The cast of my stories is largely female. There are important male characters, but they aren't the majority. I don't do it on purpose, it's just the way it is.

And as I've said before, most of my characters deal with some form of loss.

There are also strong bonds between mothers and daughters or with a female mentor.

How do you picture your characters?

I have a pretty solid idea of what they look like to the point I can draw them. Sometimes I'm helped by faceclaims, sometimes not.

My Writing

What’s your reason for writing?

I write because I need to. My life feels empty if I don't. I have a vivid imagination and I can't help but make stories in my head. I'm also writing for escapism.

But I'm also writing in the hope of being read one day and also connecting with like-minded people through my writing.

Is there any specific comment or type of comment you find particularly motivating coming from your readers?

First: when I see that I properly managed to convey the feeling/meaning of a scene. I'm also happy when people tell me that a scene had a lasting impact on them.

But what I like the most is when people tell me that my stories touched me/made them happy/feel good. Life is pretty difficult as it is. So I'm proud of being able to bring a little joy/escapism!

How do you want to be thought of by those who read your work?

I want to be thought as someone who writes memorable stories with compelling characters.

What do you feel is your greatest strength as a writer?

I have been told that my writing is immersive. I'm able to convey the atmosphere of a scene, the feelings, emotions and to paint vivid visual descriptions.

How do you feel about your own writing?

I'm proud of what I've achieved so far. I think my writing flows well. I'm proud that I kept going and stopped listening to the hater in my head.

I'm a perfectionist, so I'm never completely satisfied. Sometimes I can't help but wonder why I write. But at least, it challenges me and motivates me so I can improve.

If you were the last person on earth and knew your writing would never be read by another human, would you still write?

Yes. I know, I wrote earlier that I hoped to be read. But that's not the only reason I write.

I also write to find joy and to make things more bearable. So yes, I would still be writing. Because I can't imagine a world where I don't write. It's a part of my daily life.

And besides, some of the things I wrote have been almost completely ignored despite all the energy and love I put in it. So I know that being read is never guaranteed.

When you write, are you influenced by what others might enjoy reading, or do you write purely what you enjoy? if it’s a mix of the two, which holds the most influence?

I purely write what I enjoy (and I mean, I wrote a long OCxCanon fanfic for a fandom where it isn't that popular). I know that my stories don't necessarily fit in a box. For now, I'm happy with just sharing them online.

I don't want to change things because it wouldn't sound like me. It wouldn't be genuine. Trying to please everyone leads nowhere.

I tag (no pressure!) @lilias42, @take-me-to-valhalla, @fuckingferalhawks, @mwezina, @lumeha, @intricatecaprice, @violets-in-her-arms-writes, @sinniel @tockamybeloved

And everyone who wants to do it (feel free to tell me if you want to be included in that sort of tags in the future, I'm looking for new writing friends :D).

[dave2olkat]

Hey, are you up for receiving an entire freaking essay about how you write Dirk and how fucking incredible it is? That was a rhetorical question, YOU'RE GETTING IT ANYWAY.

So. Dirk Strider. The absolute moron who sends himself back every iteration, gets increasingly splintered as a result, and is way too emotionally compromised to do anything about it at this point. I've noticed a lot of the characters draw inspiration from beyond canon, so we can refer to this Dirk as a sort of Ultimate self if I am not mistaken. The guy has memories from all past iterations rattling around his skull after all, and it is MESSING HIM UP BIG TIME!

Like, the man is going by a script at this point. Do this, and this happens as a result. Say this to a person and they'll react that way. Let Roxy leave so you can stay with Dave alone, stab him in the back, and leave him for dead so he gets off the empire's radar, make sure he doesn't actually bite it, and then he'll end up in the position most advantageous to him. He has a ship! A crew! A small support system! He's living his best life this iteration, and he has DIRK to thank for that! Never mind that most of his relationships were completely destroyed in the fallout. Never mind that he has accumulated major trauma from the carapacian war, and was betrayed by someone who he thought he could count on for anything, that's not important. Oh yeah, he hates Dirk's guts now, but he always calculated with that loss. He sacrificed his brother's trust in him and it sucks, it sucks and nobody understands, but it was to give him a happy life, so at the end of the day Dirk's the selfless hero!

And with that, I've accumulated my thoughts on what I think went through his head when he went through with this batshit awful plan. Dirk's literally so wrapped up in himself, that he can only think in terms of other's gain versus personal cost. I don't think he's selfish, no, from a certain perspective, he's far from it, because he's sacrificing the few things he holds dear for the few people he actually gives a shit about in all these loops. His relationships with said people. It's just that he is INCAPABLE of seeing how his decisions and attempts at helping them cause more pain and anguish, and eventually, the doom of the timeline. It's like at one point, he stopped seeing them as real people, with psyches that can be damaged, and feelings that can be things beyond 'I hate you now because you hurt me', and instead thinks of them as merely... puppets.

Because he's the only one who remembers. He's the one who can see the bigger picture, while his friends and family are caught up in the mundanity of each loop, living lesser lives, being lesser people. If only they knew, if only they understood like him, maybe they could be on equal footing, but no, he'd never wish this existence on anyone, and besides, even if they had all that intel they'd never really get it, because they aren't him. So it falls on him to save everyone, him and only him, no Grimmage, just because you have a handy helmet that spouts bullshit about the loops at you does not mean you have all the answers. This is Dirk's mission, Sollux would just fuck it up. Everybody needs to stay out of the goddamn way, you're saving this goddamn timeline. All those previous ones you doomed? They were just test runs, you know what you're doing now.

I just... LOVE how AUTHENTIC he feels in your fic. Like, I look at this guy and say 'Ah yes, that right there is textbook Dirk Strider behavior,' but you wrote him with motivations and a mindset that I can see combined with his Ultimate status. He's an incredible antagonist, and I can't wait for him to show up again, because I need Dave to go up to this guy and somehow slap some sense into him. Unlikely but hey. I want a happy ending for him too, let me hope.

 Okay, first of all, I loved this ask! I've put a lot of time and effort into writing Gold Pilot so if anyone has other essay-length asks or comments about the fic, go ahead and submit them, this monster AU deserves the attention. For anyone who hasn't read the fic, it's a Davesolkat Rebellion/Time Loop Au but it also will go deep into the other characters as well, particularly the Strider-Lalondes, so if you're into that, give it a read!

Okay, now onto Dirk- he's one of my fav characters in Homestuck okay, he's so complex! And I felt like they did him dirty in Beyond Canon and the Epilogues but at the same time they explored some hella interesting aspects of his character that have been in the main comic there all along, same with everyone else. Gold Pilot is MY take on how everyone's true 'Ultimate Self' would work and also them reaching their 'fullest potential' in a way? The situation is much different than in canon, of course, but overall I will try to deconstruct both, the Ultimate Self thing AND the classpect of their God Tier selves. This will happen to everyone, not just Davesolkat, though we WILL focus on those three because I have Davesolkat brainrot and Dave WILL be the only POV character because ‘unreliable narrator who might not have an idea of what’s going on’ is the best trope.

But Dirk- it's funny that you call him an antagonist because he's not that in the story. An antagonist opposes the hero/protagonist in some way, they're there as an obstacle to achieve their ultimate goal, but here's the thing, Dirk WANTS what everyone else wants. He wants an end to the Time Loops, he wants to protect his family and friends and help them reach the best version of themselves, and he also wants to kill the Condesce. Mainly because she's the one who kills Dave, Roxy and Rose, but also, because he recognizes that she's the TRUE threat in this AU (as far as we know). So no, technically, Dirk ISN'T the villain and he's helping everyone else fullfill their own goals, the role they will play in the Rebellion as it is, and he knows full well that they WON'T achieve that unless he's there to provide support.

You're right that he's sacrificing everything else to achieve this. He sacrificed Dave's trust on him, and Dave IS in probably the best position he can be because of it. Does Dave realize this at this point of the story? Probably not. There's hints that Dirk's actually going to be working with them further in on the timeline, but right now? Right now Dave thinks his brother is the person who ruined his life.

You're right in saying that Dirk's so completely wrapped up in himself, but I don't think he's incapable of seeing how his attempts at helping everyone are actually hurting them. I think he's well aware of this, and a part of him is well-aware that none of them will ever forgive him, but he's fine with this because this makes him an even more selfless hero. He does treat them as puppets, but I think he knows that he NEEDS them to be certain versions of themselves so they can properly fight the Condesce. Also, he's aware that even in this, they have a certain level of personal choice. Would he have been forced to stab Dave on the back if he HADN'T become a Treschutioner? We know Dave could have become an entertainer guy instead, and he would have STILL ended up with the Rebels. We've explored this with the Iteration Logs of the Solluxes, but the timelines are less a straight road where everything always happens the same way and more a collection of choices that give out wildly different results while still ending in the same way any way because the Condesce is such a menace, with everyone dead.

And he's another fun thing, Dirk doesn't ACTUALLY know about the helmet. Sollux has specifically kept him in the dark about it because he's convinced Dirk would exploit it if he knew about it, especially because the helmet's not only a device that spouts info about the timeloops. It's a goddamn database containing the research that EVERYONE Sollux has been able to contact has done in the past, what? 286 years or so. So yes, it's quite a powerful tool, but you're right, Mage doesn't have all the answers. And you can say that Mage's actually some kind of cheat code. It allows Sollux to have access to the memories of the loops WITHOUT all the trauma and emotional baggage that come with them, so if anything, I suppose that Dirk would think of it as the coward's way out.

Sollux quite literally decided to divide himself into two different people (or as different as two people can be when one does have all the memories of the other one) and has basically locked the part of himself that DOES remember in a digital prison/dimension, where it cannot harm anyone or control anyone else. What this has done to Mage, well, I think we’ve seen it already, so yes, one could argue that this is an incredibly selfish thing that Sollux did, meanwhile Dirk isn’t afraid to live with the consequences of his own actions, which automatically makes him the better man/hero.

As far as Dirk knows, Sollux DOES remember, he's just, you know, someone who will not do what is necessary to save the timeline. He's soft, he spends so much time trying to get along with everyone that he allows the people he loves to get killed every single time (though Dirk's doing the exact same thing, one could argue). They're more foils to each other that they're enemies, and it will be a lot of fun once we actually see them interact, because while Dirk does think Sollux is as easily manipulated as everyone else, and that he doesn't have what it takes to save everyone which is why it falls on HIM, Dirk does know that Sollux is the only person who knows him in a way. Who can recognize the sacrifice he's making and just what's at stake here, if he doesn't take exactly the same path he's taken every time to ensure everyone will be able to fight for as long as they can.

You're right on the money on the 'Dirk thinking all the other iterations are test runs for the real deal', because Dirk HAS found pretty much the 'best path' for everyone to take. We'll see more of it when we meet Rose, who IS still a very powerful seer in this AU and who also takes after him in a way, but yeah, the fantastic thing about Dirk is that he IS helping everyone and he does care. He's on Dave's side. He just, you know, also Dirk. That's why I've always found fascinating about his character, and what I liked about him in the actual comic. I feel like Beyond Canon let go of that fundamental part of him (the fact that he DOES care) and I'm using Gold Pilot to basically fix that? Basically how I think it should've been handled.

As for the happy ending- I don't think it's much of a spoiler that Gold Pilot WILL have one, because it's in the tags themselves lmao. 'Earn Your Happy Ending', they will get there, but it will take them a long time, and it won't happen in this iteration even. Dave WILL slap some sense into Dirk, but who knows, maybe it'll be Dirk who slaps some sense into him too before he does.

Once again, thank you for this analysis! I wouldn't say I'm the authority on how to write any of the Homestuck Characters, but I'm glad I at least got Dirk's character right :) as I said, he's one of my faves and his relationship with Dave will be explored and milked for all of its angst and comfort in this fanfic.

[bellatrixobsessed1]

Does That Make Her Human

Summary: "Where do I come from, where will I go when I die?" Lust thought that she was ready to have the answers. Right up until they are given to her.

AN: So I haven't made an FMA fic since like 2014? And that one was a silly, poorly written, not serious thing so I thought that I'd write for Lust again. FMA is still cool right? We still love FMA in this house.

She doesn’t have to wonder anymore. 

Her curiosity has been satiated. 

And how sublime it is.

It hurts. Yes it definitely hurts. But she is glad for it. She has been waiting for this. Is she afraid? Yes, she realizes. She is very much afraid. At first she can’t place it, doesn’t even recognize it for what it is. She can’t remember the last time she has felt this thing…this fear. She imagines that it had probably in the time before; in that other life that she remembers in only snippets and fleeting flashes. 

She knows the woman’s face. 

It is not unlike her own. 

But yet it is so different.

It is similar enough for her to know with a fierce certainty that it had once been her face. Her skin had, had some color then and her hair had, had a warmer tone–a deep, burnt wood brown. Her eyes a soft cinnabar shade. She wears her hair the same way and they have the same face shape, the same facial features; the delicate outline of her lips, the length of her nose…

And maybe that’s what will happen when she dies. 

She might return to the woman that she once was, whoever she is. 

That woman had loved a man who she cannot remember; maybe Lust will get to meet him. 

That doesn’t sound so awful. She thinks that she can be satisfied with that. Perhaps she can even welcome it. Not that she has a choice. 

She hears the sound of transmutation, of flesh shaping into metal. A blade that extends with a metallic swish. She closes her eyes. He hasn’t brought it down upon her yet, but she imagines that it won’t be much longer now. She can feel a chill, the cool of steel before it even meets her skin. Lust exhales. It very well could be the last exhale that she gets. 

It is most certainly her last exhale. 

Her chest tickles, her stomach flutters. She has never felt so human. For a moment, her very last moment, she can pretend. Pretend that she is not what she is, but what she desires to be. A human.

A human whose lifespan is so short that she can’t possibly underestimate and forsake its value. A human who knows just how precious life is. 

A human who can feel to the fullest and know exactly what those feelings mean. Someone who can truly live rather than exist, because existence is simply too short to spend it just doing that and that alone. A human who has desires and troubling thoughts that persist…

She thinks that she has always had the last of those things. 

Existential dread. 

She has witnessed many humans struggle with it. 

Lust’s lips part slightly. She can’t say exactly when it had begun, but such matters had been troubling her too. The nature of her dread isn’t exactly like the dread that the humans have. They grapple with what their purpose is and how to fulfill it given the fleeting time that they have. She has to reckon with how to spend a life unending. 

A life that is now ending. 

Did she have any goals? Real goals. 

Had she completed them?

No. No, she doesn’t think that she had any goals. None aside from achieving humanity in genuine.

And so in her final moments she does. She does wish that she could have traveled more and seen more. Because, for all of the time she has been some perverted state of alive, she has not done much living. 

In her final moments she makes a list. A short list of things that she would love to do and achieve. They are typical things, mundane things, vague things that she often hears humans craving; she wants to see more parts of the world, she wants a gorgeous house of her own, she wants the finances to keep it, she wants find a lover–someone to hold her the way that the man in her other life had. She wants to have that man’s children. To have a family. 

Suddenly some 250 years seems like a very short time. Long compared to humans but terribly short compared to someone like Pride. She hasn’t really done much with her existence has she? She has spent much of it wishing to be human so that she could learn what it is to die. Too late she yearns to be human so that she can learn what it is to live. 

Lust is scared. 

Lust is mournful. 

Lust no longer wants to die because there is still so much that she has to do.

Lust understands now.

She wonders if she has achieved her goal after all. 

She doesn’t want to die.

She is suddenly afraid of death.

But she is dead. 

Does that make her human?